This feeling was too true ever to have been changed. The language was changed, and no tongue could pour out more showy declamation on the multitude; but, when loosed from the handcuffs of party, no man laughed more loudly, or sneered more contemptuously, at the squalid idol to which he had so long bowed the knee.
Another fragment has its value in the illustration of his kindness of heart:—
"A portion of my time I have set apart every day for thinking of my absent friends. Though this is a duty that does not give much trouble to many, I have been obliged to confine it, or endeavour to confine it, within proper bounds. I have therefore made a resolution to avoid any reflections of this sort except in their allotted season, immediately after dinner. I am then in a tranquil, happy humour, and I increase that happiness by presenting to my fancy those I love, in the most advantageous point of view. So that, however severely I treat them when they intrude in the morning, I make them ample amends in the evening. I then assure myself that they are twice as agreeable, and as wise and as good, as they really are."
Whether the author of Tristram Shandy would have been a great orator, if he had begun his career at the Bar, may be a question; but that Curran could have written admirable Shandian chapters can scarcely be doubted by those who have observed the exquisite turns of his speeches from grave to gay; or perhaps even those who now read the few words which conclude the story of Dr du Gavreau. This man was one of his casual acquaintances, a French fugitive, who ran away with a Parisian woman of a different faith. Whether they married or not is dexterously veiled. The woman died, leaving a daughter; but, whether married or not, their child would have been illegitimate by the existing laws of France. The widower had often been pressed by his friends to return to France, but he determined never to return, where his child would be stigmatised.
"I did not know the particulars," says Curran, "till a few days since, when I breakfasted with him. He had taken his little child on his knee, and, after trifling with her for a few moments, burst into tears. Such an emotion could not but excite, as well as justify, some share of curiosity. The poor Doctor looked as if he were conscious I felt for him, and his heart was too full to conceal his affliction. He kissed his little 'orphan,' as he called her, and then endeavoured to acquaint me with the lamentable detail. It was the hardest story in the world to be told by a man of delicacy. He felt all the difficulties of it: he had many things to palliate, some that wanted to be justified; he seemed fully sensible of this, yet checked himself when he slided into anything like defence. I could perceive the conflict shifting the colours of his cheek, and I could not but pity him, and admire him for such an embarrassment. Yet, notwithstanding all this, he sometimes assumed all the gaiety of a Frenchman, and is a very entertaining fellow."
In all these breaks of the story, and touches of feeling, who but must recognise the spirit of Sterne?
The volume is a grave volume, and treats of high things with equal grace and gravity; but Curran was an eccentric being, and his true history must always be mingled with the comic.
"I have got acquainted," he says, "with a Miss Hume, who is also an original in her way. She is a relation of the celebrated David Hume, and, I suppose on the strength of her kindred, sets up for a politician as well as a sceptic. She has heard his Essays recommended, and shows her own discernment, by pronouncing them unanswerable, and talks of the famous Burke by the familiar appellation of Ned. Then she is so romantic, so sentimental! Nothing for her but goats and purling streams, and piping shepherds. And, to crown all, it sings like a nightingale. As I have not the best command of my muscles, I always propose putting out the candles before the song begins, for the greater romanticality of the thing."
Then, as to his relaxations—
"You will perhaps be at a loss to guess what kind of amusement I allow myself: why, I'll tell you. I spend a couple of hours every night at a coffee-house, where I am not a little entertained with a group of old politicians, who meet in order to debate on the reports of the day, or to invent some for the next, with the other business of the nation! Though I don't know that society is the characteristic of this people, yet politics are a certain introduction to the closest intimacy of coffee-house acquaintance. I also visit a variety of ordinaries and eating houses, and they are equally fertile in game for a character-hunter. I think I have found out the cellar where Roderick Random ate shin of beef for threepence, and have actually drunk out of the identical quart which the drummer squeezed together when poor Strap spilt the broth on his legs."