A swell
A buck
In October 1830, we find Thackeray writing from Weimar to a bookseller in Charterhouse Square, for a liberal supply of the Bath post paper on which he wrote his verses and drew his countless sketches. On certain sheets of this paper, after his memorable interview with Goethe, we find the young artist trying to trace from recollection the features of the remarkable face which had deeply impressed his fancy (see [p. 100]). There are portraits in pen and ink, and others washed with colour to imitate more closely the complexion of the study he was endeavouring to work out. The letter to which we here refer contains an order of an extensive character, for the current literature, which throws some light on his tastes at this period:—'Fraser's Town and Country Magazine for August, September, October, and November. The four last numbers of the Examiner and Literary Gazette, The Comic Annual, The Keepsake, and any others of the best annuals, and Bombastes Furioso, with Geo. Cruikshank's illustrations. The parcel to be directed to Dr. Frohrib, Industrie Comptoir, Weimar.'
Among the ingenuous confessions of Fitz-Boodle in 'Fraser,' we are admitted to three romantic episodes, all of them being directed as warnings to over-fervent young men—'Miss Löwe' (Oct. 1842), 'Dorothea' (Jan. 1843), 'Ottilia' (Feb. 1843): none of these tender records of his early German experiences are reprinted with Thackeray's 'Miscellanies.' We learn incidentally in 'Ottilia' the delightful fee accorded to gallant drivers on the occasion of sledging parties, which formed a leading amusement of a Saxon winter. A large company of a score or more sledges was formed. Away they went to some pleasure-house previously fixed upon as a rendezvous, where a ball and supper were ready prepared, and where each cavalier, as his partner descended, has the 'delicious privilege of saluting her.'
Thackeray has turned the observations he made during his residence in the Saxon city to famous satirical account in the construction of his typical Court of Pumpernickel, situated on the Pump rivulet. We meet the most effective sarcastic sketches of the mimic court in various parts of his writings, great and small. It was in these sister Duchies that Pitt Crawley served as an attaché to the British representative. It was while dining at the table of Tapeworm, the Secretary of our Legation there, that the author declares he first learnt the sad particulars of the career of Mrs. Rawdon Crawley, née Rebecca Sharp. It was here, too, in the theatre that he describes first meeting with Amelia, then Mrs. Osborne, attended by her brother Jos. Sedley, with her son George, and his guardian, faithful Major Dobbin; when the little party were sojourning, as favoured visitors, in the famous dominions (stretching nearly ten miles) of his Transparency Victor Aurelius XVIII. The reader will remember being presented, in one of the later chapters of 'Vanity Fair,' with a humorous burlesque of the entire Grand Ducal Court—its belongings, society, administration, foreign legations, politics, fêtes, and what not; with a detailed description of the noble bridge thrown across the Pump by his renowned Transparency Victor Aurelius XIV., whose effigy rises above the erection; his foot calmly resting on the neck of a prostrate Turk, and surrounded by water-nymphs and emblems of victory, peace, and plenty. The prince is smiling blandly, and directing with his outstretched truncheon the attention of the passer to the Aurelian Platz, where this great-souled hero had commenced a palace that would have been the wonder of the age, if the funds for its completion had not been exhausted. A previous introduction to the splendours of Kalbsbraten-Pumpernickel had been afforded the readers of 'Fraser,' where we are informed that it contained a population of two thousand inhabitants, and a palace (Monblaïsir, the rival of Versailles) which would accommodate about six times that number. The Principality furnished a contingent of three and a half men to the Germanic Confederation; only three of whom returned from the field of Waterloo. This army corps was commanded by a General (Excellency), two major-generals, and sixty-four officers of lower grades; all noble, all knights of the order of Kartoffel, and almost all chamberlains to his Highness the Grand Duke. A band of eighty performers led the troops to battle in time of war; executed selections daily, in more peaceful intervals, for the admiration of the neighbourhood; and at night did duty on the stage.
There was supposed to be a chamber of representatives, who were not remembered to have ever sat, home and foreign ministers, residents from neighbouring courts, law-presidents, town councils, &c., and all the usual great government functionaries. The Court had its chamberlains and marshals; the Grand Duchess her noble ladies-in-waiting, and beauteous maids of honour. Besides the sentries at the palace, there were three or four men on duty, dressed as hussars; but the historian could not discover that they ever rode on horseback.
