Nor when he describes invidiously, and most ill-naturedly depicts well-known persons of “our set,” as he chooses to denominate it—though we greatly doubt his belonging even to it, trifling, ridiculous and contemptible as it is—so accurately that neither the persons caricatured, nor any who know them, can avoid at a glance recognizing their identity, has he any reason to wonder if his wit be rewarded with the cowhide. When we compare Mr. Charles Astor Bristed’s positive denial of any personality, with his broad and brutal delineation of the Hon. Pompey Whitey, editor of a New York Socialist, Anti-Rent, Abolition, and Ghost-believing journal, ex-member of Congress—we say brutal, because in it he lifts the veil of domestic life, and touches upon matters which, whether true or false, the public has no right to hear of—we know not which most to wonder at, the audacity, or the shortsightedness, of the falsehood.
The attempt at disguise is so feeble that we doubt not the prototype, either of Pompey Whitey or of the Catholic Archbishop Feegrave, could readily obtain exemplary damages from any jury, if he should think it worth the while to break a butterfly upon the wheel.
To show the perfect identity of the persons Henry Masters and Charles Astor Bristed, we shall proceed to quote two or three passages, which are, by the way, singularly good specimens both of the style of the book, with its flippancy and smartness, its insolence and egotism, its blended capability of amusing and disgusting—the revolting effect it must have on every high judgment and right thinking mind, and the power of entertaining the fashionable mob, who delight in scandalizing and abusing their dearest friends, and the vulgar mob, who are always dying to hear something about the fashionables, be it right or wrong.
Mr. Charles Astor Bristed’s money concerns with ex-Lieutenant Law of the British army!
“At that moment Clara appeared, in a dressing-gown also; but hers was a tricolor pattern, lined with blue silk.
“‘A very handsome young couple, certainly,’ thought the Englishman, ‘but how theatrically got up? I wonder if they always go about in the country dressed this way!’ And he thought of the sensation, the mouvemens divers that such a costume would excite among the guests of the paternal mansion at Alderstave.
“Masters, with a rapid alteration of style and manner, and a vast elaboration of politeness, introduced his wife and guest. Ashburner fidgeted a little, and looked as if he did not exactly know what to do with his arms and legs. Mrs. Masters was as completely at her ease as if she had known him all her life, and, by way of putting him at his ease too, began to abuse England and the English to him, and retail the old grievance of her husband’s plunder by Ensign Lawless, and the ungentlemanly behavior of Lawless père on the occasion, and the voluminous correspondence that took place between him and Harry, which the Blunder and Bluster afterward published in full, under the heading ‘American Hospitality and English Repudiation,’ in extra caps; and so she went on to the intense mystification of Ashburner, who couldn’t precisely make out whether she was in jest or earnest, till Masters came to the rescue.”
Mr. Charles Astor Bristed’s purchase of the negro, and his opinion of Southern gentlemen in general. Of which said Southern gentlemen will doubtless die broken-hearted!