The Choice Humorous Works, Ludicrous Adventures, Bons Mots, Puns, and Hoaxes of Theodore Hook

by Theodore Edward Hook

This specimen of his highness's "decorum" is sufficient. With reference to his highness's horsemanship, we leave the following exploit of the succeeding morning to the consideration of the reader:—

"About a mile and a half farther on, the path suddenly ends in a ha-ha, over which my horse utterly refused to leap. As the wall was on my side, and the turf below very soft, I hit upon a new expedient; I tied my handkerchief over the eyes of the refractory beast, and pushed him down backwards over the wall. He was very little frightened, and not at all hurt by the fall, as I had expected, and grazed peaceably blindfold till I rejoined him. This manœuvre saved me at least five miles." (No doubt German miles.)

We presume this experiment was performed upon a friend's horse. In the execution, however, of his "new expedient," he had, it appears, dropped his purse: and we give the account of its restoration to its owner in his highness's own words, in order to show the opinion his highness entertains of the numerous fools who were civil enough to make "feasts for him" while he was in this country.

"Scarcely had I rested myself at table (at Avoca), when I was told that some one wished to speak to me. A young man, whom I had never seen, was shown in, and presented to me a pocket-book, which, to my no small astonishment, I recognized as my own; containing, besides other important papers which I always carry about me, all the money I had taken for my journey. I had, Lord knows how, dropped it out of my breast-pocket; and had, therefore, no small reason to congratulate myself on so honourable and obliging a finder. In England I should hardly have had the good fortune to see my pocket-book again, even if a 'gentleman' had found it; he would probably have let it lie in peace,—or kept it."

Whatever we might have been likely to do by his pocket-book, we may, on this particular occasion, allow his highness's tour-book to "lie in peace."—He proceeds to exhibit his intimate knowledge of the "insular life:"—

"A really poor man, who is not in a situation to contract debts, can on no terms be a 'gentleman.' On the contrary, a rich scamp, who has had what is called a good education, so long as he preserves his 'character' (reputation) dexterously, passes for a 'perfect gentleman.' In the exclusive society of London there are yet finer 'nuances.' A man, for instance, who were to manifest any timidity or courtesy towards women, instead of treating them in a familiar and 'nonchalant' manner, would awaken the suspicion that he was 'no gentleman;' but should the luckless man ask twice for soup at dinner, or appear in evening dress at a breakfast which begins at three in the afternoon and ends at midnight, he may be a prince and a 'millionaire,' but he is 'no gentleman.'"

Had his highness named none of his English (and Welsh) associates, one might have found a charitable apology for the above: as it is, we are bound to express our cordial agreement with one of his observations—viz., that a man "may be a prince" without being a gentleman. His highness now threads the Dargle; a coarse attack, full of blasphemous allusions, upon Lord Powerscourt, follows; and we then are carried to Donnybrook fair. A description of the bestialities of that festival is given, which concludes with an account of a flirtation, to call it by the gentlest name, between a pair of lovers "excessively drunk,"—the whole of which is introduced merely to usher in this remark:—"My reverence for truth compels me to add, that not the slightest trace of English brutality was to be perceived." We hope the Lady Janes and Lady Marys, who waltzed and gallopaded with this "thoroughly illustrious" prince—their fathers, whose wines he drank—and their brothers, whose horses he rode,—will not forget this passage, in case his "noble and prepossessing aspect" should again chance to enlighten our "insular gloom."

Once more safe in his quarters at Dublin, our Prince lays down as an axiom that "nobody eats soup in England." "This," says his highness, "is the reason, by-the-bye, for which my old Saxon left me; he declared that he could not exist any longer in a state of barbarism—without soup." Now, that his highness's "Saxon" should have quitted "his ground" on this score seems odd,—inasmuch as his highness himself has just before told us, that "the luckless man who asked for soup twice at dinner" could be "no gentleman;" in other words, that such is an usual mark of what our superfine novelists call "vulgarity!" For the rest, his highness appears to have lived much more in coffee-houses than anywhere else; and, as everybody knows, whole seas of soup—black, grey, red, and green—are daily and hourly bubbling and smoking in all such quarters. Of one of these same coffee-houses, after denying the existence of soup, and explaining that the Irish boil their potatoes "in water," his highness thus continues his description:—

"But now follows the second stage:—the table-cloth is removed; clean plate, and knife and fork laid, wine and wine-glass, and a few miserable apples or pears, with stony ship biscuits are brought: and now the dinner seems to begin to enjoy tranquillity and comfort. His countenance assumes an expression of satisfaction; apparently sunk in profound meditation, leaning back in his chair, and looking fixedly straight before him, he suffers a sip of wine to glide down his throat from time to time, only breaking the death-like silence by now and then laboriously craunching his rocky biscuits.

"When the wine is finished, follows stage the third—that of digestion. All motion now ceases; his appetite being satiated, he falls into a sort of magnetic sleep, only distinguishable from the natural by the open eyes. After this has lasted for half an hour or an hour, all at once it ceases; he cries out, as if under the influence of some sudden possession, 'Waiter, my slippers;' and seizing a candle, walks off gravely to his chamber to meet his slippers and repose."