Letters of a Traveller Part 11

"It is that declaration," said the gentleman, "which has caused a panic among those of the Irish Protestants who were well-affected to the cause of repeal. If the Union should be repealed, they fear that O'Connell, whose devotion to the Catholic Church appears to grow stronger and stronger, and whose influence over the Catholic population is almost without limit, will so direct the legislation of the Irish Parliament as only to change the religious oppression that exists from one party to the other. There is much greater liberality at present among the Catholics than among their adversaries in Ireland, but I can not say how much of it is owing to the oppression they endure. The fact that O'Connell has been backward to a.s.sist in any church reforms in Ireland has given occasion to the suspicion that he only desires to see the revenues and the legal authority of the Episcopal Church transferred to the Catholic Church. If that should happen, and if the principle avowed by John O'Connell should be the rule of legislation, scarcely any body but a Catholic will be able to live in Ireland."

Mr. Wall, to whom our country is indebted for the Hudson River Portfolio, and who resided in the United States for twenty-two years, is here, and is, I should think, quite successful in his profession. Some of his later landscapes are superior to any of his productions that I remember. Among them is a view on Lough Corrib, in which the ruined castle on the island of that lake is a conspicuous object. It is an oil painting, and is a work of great merit. The Dublin Art Union made it their first purchase from the exhibition in which it appeared. Mr. Wall remembers America with much pleasure, and nothing can exceed his kindness to such of the Americans as he meets in Ireland.

He took us to the exhibition of the Royal Hibernian Society. Among its pictures is a portrait of a lady by Burton, in water-colors, most surprising for its perfection of execution and expression, its strength of coloring and absolute nature. Burton is a native of Dublin, and is but twenty-five years old. The Irish connoisseurs claim for him the praise of being the first artist in water-colors in the world. He paints with the left hand. There are several other fine things by him in the exhibition.

Maclise, another Irish artist, has a picture in the exhibition, representing a dramatic author offering his piece to an actor. The story is told in Gil Blas. It is a miracle of execution, though it has the fault of hardness and too equal a distribution of light. I have no time to speak more at large of this exhibition, and my letter is already too long.

This afternoon we sail for Liverpool.

Letter XXVI.

The Lunatic Asylum at Hanwell.

London, _July_ 28, 1845.

Since we came to England we have visited the Lunatic Asylum at Hanwell, in the neighborhood of London. It is a large building, divided into numerous apartments, with the plainest accommodations, for the insane poor of the county of Middles.e.x. It is superintended by Dr. Conolly, who is most admirably fitted for the place he fills, by his great humanity, sagacity, and ingenuity.

I put these qualities together as necessary to each other. Mere humanity, without tact and skill, would fail deplorably. The rude and coa.r.s.e methods of government which consist in severity, are the most obvious ones; they suggest themselves to the dullest minds, and cost nothing but bodily strength to put them in execution; the gentler methods require reflection, knowledge, and dexterity. It is these which Dr. Conolly applies with perfect success. He has taken great pains to make himself acquainted, by personal observation, with the treatment of the insane in different hospitals, not only in England, but on the continent. He found that to be the most efficacious which interferes least with their personal liberty, and on this principle, the truth of which an experience of several years has now confirmed, he founded the system of treatment at Hanwell.

We had letters to Dr. Conolly, with the kindness and gentleness of whose manners we were much struck. He conducted us over the several wards of the Asylum. We found in it a thousand persons of both s.e.xes, not one of whom was in seclusion, that is to say confined because it was dangerous to allow him to go at large; nor were they subjected to any apparent restraint whatever. Some were engaged in reading, some in exercises and games of skill; of the females some were occupied in sewing, others at work in the kitchen or the laundry; melancholic patients were walking about in silence or sitting gloomily by themselves; idiots were rocking their bodies backward and forward as they sat, but all were peaceable in their demeanor, and the greatest quiet prevailed. No chastis.e.m.e.nt of any kind is inflicted; the lunatic is always treated as a patient, and never as an offender. When he becomes so outrageous and violent that his presence can be endured no longer, he is put into a room with padded walls and floors where he can do himself no mischief, and where his rage is allowed to exhale. Even the straight jacket is unknown here.

I said that the demeanor of all the patients with whom the Asylum was swarming was peaceable. There was one exception. On entering one of the wards, a girl of an earnest and determined aspect, as soon as she saw Dr.

Conolly began to scream violently, and sprang towards him, thrusting aside the bystanders by main force. Two of the female attendants came immediately up and strove to appease her, holding her back without severity, as a mother would restrain her infant. I saw them struggling with her for some time; how they finally disposed of her I did not observe, but her screams had ceased before we left the ward.

Among the patients was one who, we were told, was remarkable for his extravagant love of finery, and whose cell was plastered over with glaring colored prints and patches of colored paper ornamentally disposed. He wore on his hat a broad strip of tarnished lace, and had decorated his waistcoat with several perpendicular rows of pearl b.u.t.tons.

"You have made your room very fine here," said the doctor.

"Yes," said he, smiling and evidently delighted, "but, my dear sir, all is vanity--all is vanity, sir, and vexation of spirit. There is but one thing that we ought to strive for, and that is the kingdom of heaven."

As there was no disputing this proposition, we pa.s.sed on to another cell, at the door of which stood a tall, erect personage, who was busy with a pot of paint and a brush, inscribing the pannels with mottoes and sc.r.a.ps of verse. The walls of his room were covered with poetry and pithy sentences. Some of the latter appeared to be of his own composition, and, were not badly turned; their purport generally was this: that birth is but a trivial accident, and that virtue and talent are the only true n.o.bility.

This man was found wandering about in Chiswick, full of a plan for educating the Prince of Wales in a manner to enable him to fill the throne with credit and usefulness. As his name could not be learned, the appellation of "Chiswick" was given him, which he had himself adopted, styling himself Mr. "Chiswick" in his mottoes, but always taking care to put the name between inverted commas.

As we proceeded, a man rose from his seat, and laying both hands on a table before him, so as to display his fingers, ornamented with rings made of black ribbon, in which gla.s.s b.u.t.tons were set for jewels, addressed Dr.

Conolly with great respect, formally setting forth that he was in great want of a new coat for Sundays, the one he had on being positively unfit to appear in, and that a better had been promised him. The doctor stopped, inquired into the case, and the poor fellow was gratified by the a.s.surance that the promised coat should be speedily forthcoming.

In his progress through the wards Dr. Conolly listened with great patience to the various complaints of the inmates. One of them came up and told us that he did not think the methods of the inst.i.tution judicious. "The patients," said he, "are many of them growing worse. One in particular, who has been here for several weeks, I can see is growing worse every day." Dr. Conolly asked the name of this patient--"I can not tell," said the man, "but I can bring him to you." "Bring him then," said the doctor; and after a moment's absence he returned, leading up one of the healthiest and quietest looking men in the ward. "He looks better to be sure," said the man, "but he is really worse." A burst of laughter from the patients who stood by followed this saying, and one of them looking at me knowingly, touched his forehead to intimate that the objector was not exactly in his senses.

In one of the female wards we were introduced, as gentlemen from America, to a respectable-looking old lady in black, who sat with a crutch by her side. "Are you not lawyers?" she asked, and when we a.s.sured her that we were only Yankees, she rebuked us mildly for a.s.suming such a disguise, when she knew very well that we were a couple of attorneys. "And you, doctor," she added, "I am surprised that you should have any thing to do with such a deception." The doctor answered that he was very sorry she had so bad an opinion of him, as she must be sensible that he had never said any thing to her which was not true. "Ah, doctor," she rejoined, "but you are the dupe of these people."

It was in the same ward, I think, that a well-dressed woman, in a bonnet and shawl, was promenading the room, carrying a bible and two smaller volumes, apparently prayer or hymn books. "Have you heard the very reverend Mr. ----, in ---- chapel?" she asked of my fellow-traveller. I have unfortunately forgotten the name of the preacher and his chapel. On being answered in the negative, "Then go and hear him," she added, "when you return to London." She went on to say that the second coming of the Saviour was to take place, and the world to be destroyed in a very few days, and that she had a commission to proclaim the approach of that event. "These poor people," said she, "think that I am here on the same account as themselves, when I am only here to prepare the way for the second coming."

"I'm thinking, please yer honor, that it is quite time I was let out of this place," said a voice as we entered one of the wards. Dr. Conolly told me that he had several Irish patients in the asylum, and that they gave him the most trouble on account of the hurry in which they were to be discharged. We heard the same request eagerly made in the same brogue by various other patients of both s.e.xes.

As I left this mult.i.tude of lunatics, promiscuously gathered from the poor and the reduced cla.s.s, comprising all varieties of mental disease, from idiocy to madness, yet all of them held in such admirable order by the law of kindness, that to the casual observer most of them betrayed no symptoms of insanity, and of the rest, many appeared to be only very odd people, quietly pursuing their own harmless whims, I could not but feel the highest veneration for the enlightened humanity by which the establishment was directed. I considered, also, if the feeling of personal liberty, the absence of physical restraint, and the power of moral motives, had such power to hold together in perfect peace and order, even a promiscuous band of lunatics, how much greater must be their influence over the minds of men in a state of sanity, and on how false a foundation rest all the governments of force! The true basis of human polity, appointed by G.o.d in our nature, is the power of moral motives, which is but another term for public opinion.

Of the political controversies which at present agitate the country, the corn-law question is that which calls forth the most feeling; I mean on the part of those who oppose the restrictions on the introduction of foreign grain--for, on the other side, it appears to me that the battle is languidly fought. Nothing can exceed the enthusiasm of the adversaries of the corn-laws. With some of them the repeal of the tax on bread is the remedy for all political evils. "Free trade, free trade," is the burden of their conversation, and although a friend of free trade myself, to the last and uttermost limit, I have been in circles in England, in which I had a little too much of it. Yet this is an example to prove what a strong hold the question has taken of the minds of men, and how completely the thoughts of many are absorbed by it. Against such a feeling as that which has been kindled in Great Britain, on the corn-law question, no law in our country could stand. So far as I can judge, it is spreading, as well as growing stronger. I am told that many of the farmers have become proselytes of the League. The League is a powerful and prodigiously numerous a.s.sociation, with ample and increasing funds, publis.h.i.+ng able tracts, supporting well-conducted journals, and holding crowded public meetings, which are addressed by some of the ablest speakers in the United Kingdom. I attended one of these at Covent Garden. Stage, pit, boxes, and gallery of that large building were filled with one of the most respectable-looking audiences, men and women, I have ever seen. Among the speakers of the evening were Cobden and Fox. Cobden in physiognomy and appearance might almost pa.s.s for an American, and has a certain New England sharpness and shrewdness in his way of dealing with a subject. His address was argumentative, yet there was a certain popular clearness about it, a fertility of familiar ill.u.s.tration, and an earnest feeling, which made it uncommonly impressive. Fox is one of the most fluent and ingenious speakers I ever heard in a popular a.s.sembly. Both were listened to by an audience which seemed to hang on every word that fell from their lips.

The musical world here are talking about Colman's improvement in the piano. I have seen the instrument which the inventor brought out from America. It is furnished with a row of bra.s.s reeds, like those of the instrument called the Seraphine. These take up the sound made by the string of the piano, and prolong it to any degree which is desired. It is a splicing of the sounds of one instrument upon another. Yet if the invention were to be left where it is, in Colman's instrument, it could not succeed with the public. The notes of the reeds are too harsh and nasal, and want the sweetness and mellowness of tone which belong to the string of the piano.

At present the invention is in the hands of Mr. Rand, the portrait painter, a countryman of ours, who is one of the most ingenious mechanicians in the world. He has improved the tones of the reeds till they rival, in softness and fullness, those of the strings, and, in fact, can hardly be distinguished from them, so that the sounds of the two instruments run into one another without any apparent difference. Mr. Rand has contrived three or four different machines for making the reeds with dispatch and precision; and if the difficulty of keeping the strings, which are undergoing a constant relaxation, in perfect unison with the reeds can be overcome, I see nothing to prevent the most complete and brilliant success.

Letter XXVII.

Changes in Paris.

Paris, _August_ 9, 1845.

My last letter was dated at London, in my pa.s.sage across England. I have been nearly a fortnight in Paris. In ten years I find a considerable change in the external aspect of this great capital. The streets are cleaner, in many of them sidewalks have been made, not always the widest to be sure, but smoothly floored with the asphaltum of Seyssel, which answers the purpose admirably; the gutters have been removed from the middle of the street to the edge of the curbstone, and lately the curbstone has been made to project over them, so that the foot-pa.s.sengers may escape the bespattering from carriage-wheels which he would otherwise be sure to get in a rainy day, and there are many such days in this climate--it has rained every day but one since I entered France.

New pa.s.sages have been cut from street to street, old streets have been made wider, new streets have been made, with broad sidewalks, and stately rows of houses hewn from the easily wrought cream-colored stone of the quarries of the Seine. The sidewalks of the Boulevards, and all the public squares, wherever carriages do not pa.s.s, have been covered with this smooth asphaltic pavement, and in the Boulevards have been erected some magnificent buildings, with richly carved pilasters and other ornaments in relief, and statues in niches, and balconies supported by stone brackets wrought into bunches of foliage. New columns and statues have been set up, and new fountains pour out their waters. Among these is the fountain of Moliere, in the Rue Richelieu, where the effigy of the comic author, chiseled from black marble, with flowing periwig and broad-skirted coat, presides over a group of naked allegorical figures in white marble, at whose feet the water is gus.h.i.+ng out.

In external morality also, there is some improvement; public gaming-houses no longer exist, and there are fewer of those uncleanly nuisances which offend against the code of what Addison calls the lesser morals. The police have had orders to suppress them on the Boulevards and the public squares. The Parisians are, however, the same gay people as ever, and as easily amused as when I saw them last. They crowd in as great numbers to the opera and the theatres; the Boulevards, though better paved, are the same lively places; the guingettes are as thronged; the public gardens are as full of dancers. In these, as at the New Tivoli, lately opened at Chateau Rouge in the suburbs, a broad s.p.a.ce made smooth for the purpose is left between tents, where the young grisettes of Paris, married and unmarried, or in that equivocal state which lies somewhere between, dance on Sunday evening till midnight.

At an earlier hour on the same day, as well as on other days, at old Franconi's Hippodrome, among the trees, just beyond the triumphal arch of Neuilly, imitations of the steeple chase, with female riders who leap over hedges, and of the ancient chariot-races with charioteers helmeted and mailed, and standing in gilt tubs on wheels, are performed in a vast amphiteatre, to a crowd that could scarcely have been contained in the Colosseum of Home.

I have heard since I came here, two or three people lamenting the physical degeneracy of the Parisians. One of them quoted a saying from a report of Marshal Soult, that the Parisian recruits for the army of late years were neither men nor soldiers. This seems to imply a moral as well as a physical deterioration. "They are growing smaller and smaller in stature,"

said the gentleman who made this quotation, "and it is difficult to find among them men who are of the proper height to serve as soldiers. The princ.i.p.al cause no doubt is in the prevailing licentiousness. Among that cla.s.s who make the greater part of the population of Paris, the women of the finest persons rarely become mothers." Whatever may be the cause, I witnessed a remarkable example of the smallness of the Parisian stature on the day of my arrival, which was the last of the three days kept in memory of the revolution of July. I went immediately to the Champs Elysees, to see the people engaged in their amus.e.m.e.nts. Some twenty boys, not fully grown, as it seemed to me at first, were dancing and capering with great agility, to the music of an instrument. Looking at them nearer, I saw that those who had seemed to me boys of fourteen or fifteen, were mature young men, some of them with very fierce mustaches.

Since my arrival I have seen the picture which Vanderlyn is painting for the Rotunda at Was.h.i.+ngton. It represents the Landing of Columbus on the sh.o.r.es of the New World. The great discoverer, accompanied by his lieutenant and others, is represented as taking possession of the newly found country. Some of the crew are seen scrambling for what they imagine to be gold dust in the sands of the sh.o.r.e, and at a little distance among the trees are the naked natives, in att.i.tudes of wonder and wors.h.i.+p. The grouping is happy, the expression and action skillfully varied--the coloring, so far as I could judge in the present state of the picture, agreeable. "Eight or ten weeks hard work," said the artist, "will complete it." It is Vanderlyn's intention to finish it, and take it to the United States in the course of the autumn.

Letter XXVIII.

A Journey through The Netherlands.

Arnheim, Guelderland, _August_ 19, 1848.

After writing my last I was early asleep, that I might set out early the next morning in the diligence for Brussels. This I did, and pa.s.sing through Compeigne, where Joan of Arc was made prisoner--a town lying in the midst of extensive forests, with here and there a n.o.ble group of trees; and through Noyon, where Calvin was born, and in the old Gothic church of which he doubtless wors.h.i.+ped; and through Cambray, where Fenelon lived; and through fields of grain and poppy and clover, where women were at work, reaping the wheat, or mowing and stacking the ripe poppies, or digging with spades in their wet clothes, for it had rained every day but one during the thirteen we were in France, we arrived in the afternoon of the second day at the French frontier. From this a railway took us in a few hours to Brussels. Imagine a rather clean-looking city, of large light-colored buildings mostly covered with stucco, situated on an irregular declivity, with a shady park in the highest part surrounded by palaces, and a little lower down a fine old Gothic cathedral, and still lower down, the old Town Hall, also of Gothic architecture, and scarcely less venerable, standing in a n.o.ble paved square, around which are white and stately edifices, built in the era of the Spanish dominion;--imagine handsome shops and a good-looking people, with a liberal sprinkling of priests, in their long-skirted garments, and throw in the usual proportion of dirt and misery, and mendicancy, in the corners and by-places, and you have Brussels before you.

It still rained, but we got a tilbury and drove out to see the battle-ground of Waterloo. It was a dreary drive beside the wood of Soignes and through a part of it,--that melancholy-looking forest of tall-stemmed beeches--beech, beech, nothing but beech--and through the Walloon villages--Waterloo is one of them--and through fields where wet women were at work, and over roads where dirty children by dozens were dabbling like ducks in the puddles. At last we stopped at the village of Mont St. Jean, whence we walked through the slippery mud to the mound erected in the midst of the battle-field, and climbed to its top, overlooking a country of gentle declivities and hollows. Here the various positions of the French and allied armies during the battle which decided the fate of an empire, were pointed out to us by a young Walloon who sold wine and drams in a shed beside the monument. The two races which make up the population of Belgium are still remarkably distinct, notwithstanding the centuries which have elapsed since they occupied the same country together. The Flemings of Teutonic origin, keep their blue eyes and fair hair, and their ancient language--the same nearly as the Dutch of the sixteenth century. The Walloons, a Celtic race, or Celtic mixed with Roman, are still known by their dark hair and black eyes, and speak a dialect derived from the Latin, resembling that of some of the French provinces. Both languages are uncultivated, and the French has been adopted as the language of commerce and literature in Belgium.

If you would see a city wholly Flemish in its character, you should visit Antwerp, to which the railway takes you in an hour and a half. The population here is almost without Walloon intermixture, and there is little to remind you of what you have seen in France, except the French books in the booksellers' windows. The arts themselves have a character of their own which never came across the Alps. The churches, the interior of which is always carefully kept fresh with paint and gilding, are crowded with statues in wood, carved with wonderful skill and spirit by Flemish artists, in centuries gone by--oaken saints looking down from pedestals, and Adam and Eve in the remorse of their first transgression supporting, by the help of the tree of knowledge and the serpent, a curiously wrought pulpit. The walls are hung with pictures by the Flemish masters, wherever s.p.a.ce can be found for them. In the Cathedral, is the Descent from the Cross, by Rubens, which proves, what one might almost doubt who had only seen his pictures in the Louvre, that he was a true artist and a man of genius in the n.o.blest sense of the term.