Letters From England - free ebook by Robert Southey

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Letters From England

Robert Southey

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PREFACE BY THE TRANSLATOR.

PREFACE BY THE TRANSLATOR.

The remarks of Foreign Travellers upon our own country have always been so well received by the Public, that no apology can be necessary for offering to it the present Translation, The Author of this work seems to have enjoyed more advantages than most of his predecessors, and to have availed himself of them with remarkable diligence. He boasts also of his impartiality: to this praise, in general, he is entitled; but there are some things which he has seen with a jaundiced eye. It is manifest th

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LETTERS FROM ENGLAND:

LETTERS FROM ENGLAND:

BY DON MANUEL ALVAREZ ESPRIELLA. TRANSLATED FROM THE SPANISH. IN THREE VOLUMES. VOL. III. THIRD EDITION. LONDON: PRINTED FOR LONGMAN, HURST, REES, ORME, AND BROWN, PATERNOSTER-ROW. 1814. Edinburgh : Printed by James Ballantyne and Co. LONDON: PRINTED FOR LONGMAN, HURST, REES, ORME, AND BROWN, PATERNOSTER-ROW. 1814. Edinburgh : Printed by James Ballantyne and Co....

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PREFACE.

PREFACE.

A volume of Travels rarely or never, in our days, appears in Spain: in England, on the contrary, scarcely any works are so numerous. If an Englishman spends the summer in any of the mountainous provinces, or runs over to Paris for six weeks, he publishes the history of his travels; and if a work of this kind be announced in France, so great a competition is excited among the London booksellers, that they import it sheet by sheet as it comes from the press, and translate and print it piece-meal.

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LETTER LIV.

LETTER LIV.

The Bible.—More mischievous when first translated than it is at present: still hurtful to a few, but beneficial to many.—Opinion that the domestic Use of the Scriptures would not be injurious in Spain. T he first person who translated the Bible into English was Wickliffe, the father in heresy of John Hus, Jerome of Prague, and the Bohemian rebels, and thus the author of all the troubles in Germany. His bones were, by sentence of the Council of Constance, dug up, and burnt, and the ashes thrown i

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LETTER LV.

LETTER LV.

M y morning's walk has supplied me with two instances of English credulity. Passing through St George's fields I saw a sort of tent pitched, at the entrance of which a fellow stood holding a board in his hand, on which was painted in large letters " The Wild Indian Woman ."—"What," said I to my companion, "do you catch the savages and show them like wild beasts? This is worse than even the slave trade!" "We will go in and see," said he. Accordingly we paid our sixpence each, and, to our no small

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LETTER I.

LETTER I.

Arrival at Falmouth.—Custom House.—Food of the English.—Noise and Bustle at the Inn. I write to you from English ground. On the twelfth morning after our departure from Lisbon we came in sight of the Lizard, two light-houses on the rocks near the Land’s End, which mark a dangerous shore. The day was clear, and showed us the whole coast to advantage; but if these be the white cliffs of England, they have been strangely magnified by report: their forms are uninteresting, and their heights diminuti

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LETTER LVI.

LETTER LVI.

I have adhered strictly to J.'s advice respecting the literature of this country, and allowed myself to read nothing but contemporary publications, and such works as relate to my objects of immediate enquiry, most of which were as little known to him as to myself. He smiles when I bring home a volume of Quaker history, or Swedenborgian theology, and says I am come here to tell him what odd things there are in England. It is therefore only of that contemporary and perishable literature which affe

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LETTER II.

LETTER II.

Mode of Travelling.—Penryn.—Truro.—Dreariness of the Country.—Bodmin.—Earth-Coal the common Fuel.—Launceston.—Excellence of the Inns and Roads.—Okehampton.—Exeter. Early in the morning our chaise was at the door, a four-wheeled carriage which conveniently carries three persons. It has glass in front and at the sides, instead of being closed with curtains, so that you at once see the country and are sheltered from the weather. Two horses drew us at the rate of a league and a half in the hour;—suc

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LETTER III.

LETTER III.

Exeter Cathedral and Public Walk.—Libraries.—Honiton.—Dangers of English Travelling, and Cruelty with which it is attended.—Axminster.—Bridport. If the outside of this New London Inn, as it is called, surprised me, I was far more surprised at the interior. Excellent as the houses appeared at which we had already halted, they were mean and insignificant compared with this. There was a sofa in our apartment, and the sideboard was set forth with china and plate. Surely, however, these articles of l

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LETTER LVII.

LETTER LVII.

T he most remarkable sect in this land of sectaries is unquestionably that of the Quakers. They wear a peculiar dress, which is in fashion such as grave people wore in the time of their founder, and always of some sober colour. They never uncover their heads in salutation, nor in their houses of worship; they have no form of worship, no order of priests, and they reject all the Sacraments. In their meeting-houses they assemble and sit in silence, unless any one should be disposed to speak, in wh

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LETTER IV.

LETTER IV.

Dorchester.—Gilbert Wakefield.—Inside of an English Church.—Attempt to rear Silkworms.—Down-country.—Blandford.—Salisbury.—Execrable Alteration of the Cathedral.—Instance of public Impiety. We started early, and hurried over four leagues of the same open and uninteresting country, which brought us to Dorchester, the capital of the province, or county town, as it is called, because the provincial prison is here, and here the judges come twice a-year to decide all causes civil and criminal. The pr

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LETTER LVIII.

LETTER LVIII.

"I f you would live in health," says the proverb, "wear the same garment in summer which you wear in winter." It seems as if the English had some such fool's adage, by the little difference there is between their summer and their winter apparel. The men, indeed, when they go abroad put on a great coat, and the women wear muffs, and fur round the neck; but all these are laid aside in the house. I no longer wonder why these people talk so much of the weather; they live in the most inconstant of al

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LETTER LIX.

LETTER LIX.

T he English cards are, like the French, fifty-two in number. They differ from them in the figured cards, which are whole-length, and in the clumsiness of their fabric, being as large again, thick in proportion, and always plain on the back. Our names for the suits are retained in both countries; and as only with us the names and the figures correspond, and our words for cards ( naypes ) is unlike that in any other European language, we either invented or first received them from the Orientals.

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LETTER V.

LETTER V.

Old Sarum.—Country thinly peopled,—Basingstoke.—Ruins of a Catholic Chapel.—Waste Land near London.—Staines.—Iron Bridges.—Custom of exposing the dead Bodies of Criminals.—Hounslow.—Brentford.—Approach to London.—Arrival. Half a league from Salisbury, close on the left of the London road, is Old Sarum, the Sorbiodunum of the Romans, famous for many reasons. It covered the top of a round hill, which is still surrounded with a mound of earth and a deep fosse. Under the Norman kings it was a flouri

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LETTER LX.

LETTER LX.

T he commercial system has long been undermining the distinction of ranks in society, and introducing a worse distinction in its stead. Mushrooms are every day starting up from the dunghill of trade, nobody knows how, and family pride is therefore become a common subject of ridicule in England; the theatres make it the object of a safe jest, sure to find applause from the multitude, who are ever desirous of depreciating what they do not possess; and authors, who are to themselves, as one of thei

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LETTER VI.

LETTER VI.

Watchmen.—Noise in London Night and Morning.—An English Family.—Advice to Travellers. The first night in a strange bed is seldom a night of sound rest;—one is not intimate enough with the pillow to be quite at ease upon it. A traveller, like myself, indeed, might be supposed to sleep soundly any where; but the very feeling that my journey was over was a disquieting one, and I should have lain awake thinking of the friends and parents whom I had left, and the strangers with whom I was now domesti

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LETTER VII.

LETTER VII.

General Description of London.—Walk to the Palace.—Crowd in the Streets.—Shops.—Cathedral of St Paul.—Palace of the Prince of Wales.—Oddities in the Shop Windows. My first business was to acquire some knowledge of the place whereof I am now become an inhabitant. I began to study the plan of London, though dismayed at the sight of its prodigious extent,—a city a league and a half from one extremity to the other, and about half as broad, standing upon level ground. It is impossible ever to become

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LETTER LXI.

LETTER LXI.

A most extraordinary conspiracy to kill the king and to overthrow the government has been detected. A certain Colonel Despard and a few soldiers were the only persons concerned. This man had for many years been the object of suspicion, and had at different times been confined as a dangerous person. Whether his designs were always treasonable, or whether he was goaded on by a frantic desire of revenge for what he had suffered, certain it is that he corrupted some of the king's guards to fire at h

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LETTER LXII.

LETTER LXII.

I found my way one Sunday to the New Jerusalem, or Swedenborgian chapel. It is singularly handsome, and its gallery fitted up like boxes at a theatre. Few or none of the congregation belonged to the lower classes, they seemed to be chiefly respectable tradesmen. The service was decorous, and the singing remarkably good: but I have never in any other heretical meeting heard heresy so loudly insisted upon. Christ in his divine , or in his glorified human , was repeatedly addressed as the only God;

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LETTER VIII.

LETTER VIII.

Proclamation of Peace.—The English do not understand Pageantry.—Illumination.—M. Otto’s House.—Illuminations better managed at Rome. The definitive treaty has arrived at last; peace was proclaimed yesterday, with the usual ceremonies, and the customary rejoicings have taken place. My expectations were raised to the highest pitch. I looked for a pomp and pageantry far surpassing whatever I had seen in my own country. Indeed every body expected a superb spectacle. The newspaper writers had filled

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LETTER LXIII.

LETTER LXIII.

I went yesterday evening to the Synagogue. Never did I see a place of worship in which there was so little appearance of devotion. The women were in a gallery by themselves, the men sate below, keeping their hats on, as they would have done in the street. During the service they took from behind their altar, if that word may be thus applied without profanation, certain silver—utensils they cannot be called, as they appeared to be of no possible use,—silver ornaments rather, hung with small rattl

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LETTER IX.

LETTER IX.

Nothing is now talked of in London but the fate of Governor Wall, who has just been executed for a crime committed twenty years ago. He commanded at that time the English settlement at Goree, an inactive and unwholsome station, little reputable for the officers, and considered as a place of degradation for the men. The garrison became discontented at some real or supposed mal-practices in the distribution of stores; and Wall seizing those whom he conceived to be the ringleaders of the disaffecte

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LETTER X.

LETTER X.

Martial Laws of England.—Limited Service advised.—Hints for Military Reform. The execution of Governor Wall is considered as a great triumph of justice. Nobody seems to recollect that he has been hanged, not for having flogged three men to death, but for an informality in the mode of doing it.—Yet this is the true state of the case. Had he called a drum-head court-martial, the same sentence might have been inflicted, and the same consequences have ensued, with perfect impunity to himself. The ma

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LETTER LXIV.

LETTER LXIV.

F rom From Jew to Infidel—an easy transition, after the example of Acosta and Spinosa. When the barriers of religion had been broken down by the schism, a way was opened for every kind of impiety. Infidelity was suspected to exist at the court of the accursed Elizabeth; it was avowed at her successor's by Lord Herbert of Cherbury; a man unfortunate in this deadly error, but otherwise, for his genius and valour and high feelings of honour, worthy to have lived in a happier age and country. His br

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LETTER LXV.

LETTER LXV.

I t is amusing enough to hear these people talk of the pride of the Spaniards, when they themselves are as proud as the Portugueze. The Dons, as they call us, are, in their conception, very haughty, jealous to excess, and terribly revengeful, but honourable and right rich; therefore they like to deal with us in time of peace, and the slightest rumour of war makes every sailor in the service think he is infallibly about to make his fortune. So whenever the government begin by going to war with Fr

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LETTER XI.

LETTER XI.

Shopmen, why preferred to Women in England.—Division of London into the East and West Ends.—Low State of domestic Architecture.—Burlington-House. I have employed this morning in wandering about this huge metropolis with an English gentleman, well acquainted with the manners and customs of foreign countries, and therefore well qualified to point out to me what is peculiar in his own. Of the imposing splendour of the shops I have already spoken; but I have not told you that the finest gentlemen to

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LETTER XII.

LETTER XII.

Causes of the Change of Ministry not generally understood.—Catholic Emancipation.—The Change acceptable to the Nation.—State of Parties.—Strength of the new Administration.—Its good Effects.—Popularity of Mr Addington. The change of ministry is considered as a national blessing. The system of terror, of alarm, and of espionage, has been laid aside, the most burthensome of the taxes repealed, and a sincere desire manifested on the part of the new minister to meet the wishes of the nation. It must

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LETTER LXVI.

LETTER LXVI.

T he English say that their palaces are like hospitals, and their hospitals like palaces; and the exterior of St James's and of Greenwich justifies the saying. I have seen this magnificent asylum for old seamen, which is so justly the boast of the nation. As it was my wish to see the whole course of the river through the metropolis, I breakfasted at the west end of the town with W. who had promised to accompany me, and we took boat at Westminster bridge. From no part of the river are so many fin

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LETTER XIII.

LETTER XIII.

Dress of the English without Variety.—Coal-heavers.—Post-men.—Art of knocking at the Door.—Inscriptions over the Shops.—Exhibitions in the Shop-windows.—Chimney-sweepers.—May-day.—These Sports originally religious. The dress of Englishmen wants that variety which renders the figures of our scenery so picturesque. You might think, from walking the streets of London, that there were no ministers of religion in the country; J— smiled at the remark, and told me that some of the dignified clergy wore

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LETTER LXVII.

LETTER LXVII.

O ne of the great philosophers here has advanced a theory that the nervous and electric fluids are the same, both being condensed light. If this be true, sunshine is the food of the brain; and it is thus explained why the southern nations are so much more spiritual than the English, and why they in their turn rank higher in the scale of intellect than their northern neighbours. Spanish gravity is the jest of this people. Whenever they introduce a Spaniard upon the stage, it is to ridicule him fo

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LETTER XIV.

LETTER XIV.

Description of the Inside, and of the Furniture, of an English House. One of the peculiarities in this country is, that every body lives upon the ground floor, except the shopkeepers. The stable and coach-house either adjoin the house, or more frequently are detached from it, and the kitchen is either at the back of the house on the ground floor, or underground, which is usually the case in large towns, but never, as with us, above stairs. They wonder at our custom of living on the higher floors

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LETTER LXVIII.

LETTER LXVIII.

I had prepared for you an account of a pseudo-prophet who excited much attention in London here at the beginning of the last war, when, almost by accident, I was made acquainted with some singular circumstances which are in some manner connected with him, and which therefore should previously be told. These circumstances are as authentic as they are extraordinary, and supply a curious fact for the history of the French Revolution. We were talking one evening of the Abbé Barruel's proofs of a con

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LETTER XV.

LETTER XV.

English Meals.—Clumsy Method of Butchery.—Lord Somerville.—Cruel Manner of killing certain Animals.—Luxuries of the Table.—Liquors. The English do not eat beef-steaks for breakfast, as lying travellers have told us, nor can I find that it has ever been the custom. The breakfast-table is a cheerful sight in this country: porcelain of their own manufactory, which excels the Chinese in elegance of form and ornament, is ranged on a Japan waiter, also of the country fabric; for here they imitate ever

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LETTER LXIX.

LETTER LXIX.

M y former letters must have shown you that these English, whom we are accustomed to consider as an unbelieving people, are in reality miserably prone to superstition; yet you will perhaps be surprised at the new instance which I am about to relate. There started up in London, about the beginning of the late war, a new pseudo-prophet, whose name was Richard Brothers, and who called himself King of the Hebrews, and Nephew of God. He taught, that all existing souls had been created at the same tim

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LETTER LXX.

LETTER LXX.

I n the early part of the thirteenth century there appeared an English virgin in Italy, beautiful and eloquent, who affirmed that the Holy Ghost was incarnate in her for the redemption of women, and she baptized women in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of herself. Her body was carried to Milan and burnt there. An arch-heretic of the same sex and country is now establishing a sect in England, founded upon a not dissimilar and equally portentous blasphemy. The name of this woman is Joa

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LETTER XVI.

LETTER XVI.

Informers.—System upon which they act.—Anecdotes of their Rascality.—Evil of encouraging them.—English Character a Compound of Contradictions. They talk here of our Holy Office as a disgrace to the Spanish nation, when their own government is ten times more inquisitorial, for the paltry purposes of revenue. Shortly after his last return from Spain, J— stept into a hosier’s to buy a pair of gloves; the day was warm, and he laid his hat upon the counter: a well-drest man came in after him for the

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LETTER XVII.

LETTER XVII.

The Word Home, said to be peculiar to the English.—Propriety of the Assertion questioned.—Comfort.—Curious Conveniences.—Pocket-fender.—Hunting-razors. There are two words in their language on which these people pride themselves, and which they say cannot be translated. Home is the one, by which an Englishman means his house. As the meaning is precisely the same whether it be expressed by one word or by two, and the feeling associated therewith is the same also, the advantage seems wholly imagin

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LETTER LXXI.

LETTER LXXI.

W hether the Coxcomb be an animal confined to Europe I know not, but in every country in Christendom he is to be found with the same generic character. There is however no country in which there are so many varieties of the animal as in England, none where he flourishes so successfully, makes such heroic endeavours for notoriety, and enjoys so wide a sphere of it. The highest order is that of those who have invented for themselves the happy title of Fashionables. These gentlemen stand highest in

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LETTER LXXII.

LETTER LXXII.

I was fortunate enough this morning to witness a very grand and extraordinary sight. As D. and I were walking towards the west end of the town, we met an acquaintance who told us that Westminster Abbey was on fire. We lost no time in going to the spot; the roof was just smoking sufficiently to show us that the intelligence was true, but that the building was no longer in danger. The crowd which had collected was by no means so great as we had expected.—Soldiers were placed at the doors to keep o

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LETTER XVIII.

LETTER XVIII.

Drury-Lane Theatre.—The Winter’s Tale.—Kemble.—Mrs Siddons.—Don Juan. There is nothing in a foreign land which a traveller is so little able to enjoy as the national theatre: though he may read the language with ease, and converse in it with little difficulty, still he cannot follow the progress of a story upon the stage, nor catch the jests, which set all around him in a roar, unless he has lived so long in the country, that his ear has become perfectly naturalized. Fully aware of this, I desir

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LETTER LXXIII.

LETTER LXXIII.

H e who ventures to criticise a foreign language should bear in mind that he is in danger of exposing his own ignorance. "What a vile language is yours!" said a Frenchman to an Englishman;—"you have the same word for three different things! There is ship, un vaisseau ; ship (sheep) mouton ; and ship (cheap) bon marché ."—Now these three words, so happily instanced by Monsieur, are pronounced as differently as they are spelt. As I see his folly, it will be less excusable should I commit the same

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LETTER XIX.

LETTER XIX.

English Church Service.—Banns of Marriage.—Inconvenience of having the Sermon a regular Part.—Sermons an Article of Trade.—Popular Preachers.—Private Chapels. The ceremonies of the English Church Service are soon described. Imagine a church with one altar covered with crimson velvet, the Creed and the Decalogue over it in golden letters, over these the Hebrew name of God, or the I.H.S. at the pleasure of the painter, and half a dozen winged heads about it, clumsily painted, or more clumsily carv

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LETTER XX.

LETTER XX.

Irreverence of the English towards the Virgin Mary and the Saints.—Want of Ceremonies in their Church.—Festival Dainties.—Traces of Catholicism in their Language and Oaths.—Disbelief of Purgatory.—Fatal Consequences of this Error.—Supposed Advantages of the Schism examined.—Clergy not so numerous as formerly. The religion of the English approaches more nearly than I had supposed, in its doctrines, to the true faith; so nearly indeed, in some instances, that it would puzzle these heretics to expl

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LETTER LXXIV.

LETTER LXXIV.

T he last day of my abode in London was the most painful of my life. To part from dear friends, even for a transitory absence, is among the evils of life; but to leave them with a certainty of never meeting again, was a grief which I had never till now endured. Sixteen months had I been domesticated with J., as if I had been a brother of the family. When the children, as they went to bed last night, came to kiss me for the last time, I wished I had never seen them, and all night I remained wakef

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LETTER LXXV.

LETTER LXXV.

F rom Bath to Bristol is three leagues; the road crosses the river Avon by an old bridge, and continues for some way along its banks, or at little distance from them. Half a league from Bath is the house wherein Fielding is said to have written Tom Jones; it stands by the way side, in a village called Twyverton, and I did not look at it without respect. We had a fine view of the river winding under a hill which is covered with old trees, and has a mansion on its brow, opposite to which, on our s

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LETTER XXI.

LETTER XXI.

Show of Tulips.—Florists.—Passion for Rarities in England.—Queen Anne’s Farthings.—Male Tortoise-shell Cat.—Collectors.—The King of Collectors. Yesterday I went to see a show of tulips, as it is called, about three miles from town. The bed in which they were arranged, each in its separate pot, was not less than fifty varas in length, covered with a linen awning the whole way, and with linen curtains at the sides, to be let down if the wind should be violent, or the rain beat in. The first sight

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LETTER LXXVI.

LETTER LXXVI.

W e took our seats on the coach roof at five in the morning, and before we got out of the city received positive and painful proof that the streets of Bristol are worse paved than those of any other city in England. The road passes by the church of St Mary Redclift, which is indeed wonderfully fine; it is built upon broken ground, and there are steps ascending to it in several directions. I remember nothing equal to the effect which this produces. Women were filling their pitchers below it from

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LETTER XXII.

LETTER XXII.

English Coins.—Paper Currency.—Frequent Executions for Forgery.—Dr Dodd.—Opinion that Prevention is the End of Punishment.—This End not answered by the Frequency of Executions.—Plan for the Prevention of Forgery rejected by the Bank. English money is calculated in pounds, shillings, pence, and farthings; four farthings making one penny, twelve pence one shilling, twenty shillings one pound. Four shillings and sixpence is the value of the peso-duro at par . It is in one respect better than our mo

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LETTER XXIII.

LETTER XXIII.

Westminster Abbey.—Legend of its Consecration.—Its single Altar in bad Taste.—Gothic or English Architecture.—Monuments.— Banks the Sculptor.—Wax-work.—Henry the Seventh’s Chapel.—Mischievous Propensity of the People to mutilate the Monuments. All persons who come to London, from whatever part of the world they may, whether English or foreigners, go to see Westminster Abbey, the place of interment of all illustrious men; kings, admirals, statesmen, poets, philosophers, and divines, even stage-pl

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LETTER XXIV.

LETTER XXIV.

Complexion of the English contradictory to their historical Theories.—Christian Names, and their Diminutives.—System of Surnames.—Names of the Months and Days.—Friday the unlucky Day.—St Valentine.—Relics of Catholicism. The prevalence of dark hair and dark complexions among the English is a remarkable fact in opposition to all established theories respecting the peoplers of the Island. We know that the Celts were light or red-haired, with blue eyes, by the evidence of history; and their descend

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LETTER XXV.

LETTER XXV.

Vermin imported from all Parts.—Fox-Hunting.—Shooting.—Destruction of the Game.—Rural Sports. The king of England has a regular bug-destroyer in his household! a relic no doubt of dirtier times; for the English are a truly clean people, and have an abhorrence of all vermin. This loathsome insect seems to have been imported from France. An English traveller of the early part of the seventeenth century calls it the French punaise ; which should imply either that the bug was unknown in his time, or

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LETTER XXVI.

LETTER XXVI.

Poor-Laws.—Work-Houses.—Sufferings of the Poor from the Climate.—Dangerous State of England during the Scarcity.—The Poor not bettered by the Progress of Civilization. With us charity is a religious duty, with the English it is an affair of law. We support the poor by alms; in England a tax is levied to keep them from starving, and, enormous as the amount of this tax is, it is scarcely sufficient for the purpose. This evil began immediately upon the dissolution of the monasteries. They who were

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LETTER XXVII.

LETTER XXVII.

Saint Paul’s.—Anecdote of a female Esquimaux.—Defect of Grecian Architecture in cold Climates.—Nakedness of the Church.—Monuments.—Pictures offered by Sir Joshua Reynolds, &amp;c., and refused.— Ascent.—View from the Summit. The cathedral church of St Paul’s is not more celebrated than it deserves to be. No other nation in modern times has reared so magnificent a monument of piety. I never behold it without regretting that such a church should be appropriated to heretical worship;—that, like

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LETTER XXVIII.

LETTER XXVIII.

State of the English Catholics.—Their prudent Silence in the Days of Jacobitism.—The Church of England jealous of the Dissenters.—Riots in 1780.—Effects of the French Revolution.—The Re-establishment of the Monastic Orders in England.—Number of Nunneries and Catholic Seminaries.—The Poor easily converted.—Catholic Writers.—Dr Geddes. The situation of the Catholics in England is far more favourable at present than it has been at any period since the unfortunate expulsion of James II. There is an

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LETTER XXIX.

LETTER XXIX.

Number of Sects in England, all appealing to the Scriptures.—Puritans.—Nonjurors.—Rise of Socinianism, and its probable Downfall. The heretical sects in this country are so numerous, that an explanatory dictionary of their names has been published. They form a curious list! Arminians, Socinians, Baxterians, Presbyterians, New Americans, Sabellians, Lutherans, Moravians, Swedenborgians, Athanasians, Episcopalians, Arians, Sabbatarians, Trinitarians, Unitarians, Millenarians, Necessarians, Sublaps

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LETTER XXX.

LETTER XXX.

Watering Places.—Taste for the Picturesque.—Encomiendas. The English migrate as regularly as rooks. Home-sickness is a disease which has no existence in a certain state of civilization or of luxury, and instead of it these islanders are subject to periodical fits, of what I shall beg leave to call oikophobia , a disorder with which physicians are perfectly well acquainted though it may not yet have been catalogued in the nomenclature of nosology. In old times, that is to say, two generations ago

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LETTER XXXI.

LETTER XXXI.

Journey to Oxford.—Stage-Coach Travelling and Company. The stage-coach in which we had taken our places was to start at six. We met at the inn, and saw our trunks safely stowed in the boot, as they call a great receptacle for baggage, under the coachman’s feet: this is a necessary precaution for travellers in a place where rogues of every description swarm, and in a case where neglect would be as mischievous as knavery.—There were two other passengers, who, with ourselves, filled the coach. The

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LETTERS FROM ENGLAND:

LETTERS FROM ENGLAND:

BY DON MANUEL ALVAREZ ESPRIELLA. TRANSLATED FROM THE SPANISH. IN THREE VOLUMES. VOL. II. THIRD EDITION. LONDON: PRINTED FOR LONGMAN, HURST, REES, ORME, AND BROWN, PATERNOSTER-ROW. 1814. Edinburgh : Printed by James Ballantyne and Co. LONDON: PRINTED FOR LONGMAN, HURST, REES, ORME, AND BROWN, PATERNOSTER-ROW. 1814. Edinburgh : Printed by James Ballantyne and Co....

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LETTER XXXII.

LETTER XXXII.

High-street, Oxford.—Dress of the Oxonians.—Christ Church Walk.—Friar Bacon's Study.—Lincoln College.—Baliol.—Trinity.—New College.—Saint John's.—Mode of Living at the Colleges.—Servitors.—Summer Lightning. D . has a relation at one of the colleges, to whom he dispatched a note immediately upon our arrival. By the time tea was ready he was with us. It must be admitted, that though the English are in general inhospitable towards foreigners, no people can be more courteous to those who are properl

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LETTER XXXIII.

LETTER XXXIII.

S chool and college are not united in the English universities. Students are not admitted till their school education is completed, which is usually between the age of seventeen and nineteen. Four years are then to be passed at college before the student can graduate; and till he has graduated he cannot receive holy orders, nor till he has attained the age of twenty-two years and a half. Formerly they went younger: the statutes forbid them to play at certain games in the streets, which are exclu

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LETTER XXXIV.

LETTER XXXIV.

T he coach by which we were to proceed passes through Oxford between four and five o'clock in the morning; we left our baggage to be forwarded by it, and went on one stage the preceding day, by which means we secured a good night's rest, and saw every thing which could be taken in upon the way. Two of our Oxford acquaintances bore us company: we started soon after six, and went by water, rowing up the main stream of the Isis, between level shores; in some places they were overhung with willows o

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LETTER XXXV.

LETTER XXXV.

W ere I an epicure, I should wish to dine every fast day at Worcester. The Severn runs through the town, and supplies it with salmon in abundance, the most delicious of all fish. You would hardly suppose that there could be any danger from sea-monsters in bathing at such a distance from the mouth of the river, which is at least five-and-twenty leagues by the course of the stream; yet about thirty years ago a man here actually received his death wound in the water from a swordfish. The fish was c

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LETTER XXXVI.

LETTER XXXVI.

Y ou will look perhaps with some eagerness for information concerning this famous city, which Burke, the great orator of the English, calls the grand toy-shop of Europe. Do not blame me if I disappoint you. I have seen much, and more than foreigners are usually admitted to see; but it has been too much to remember, or indeed to comprehend satisfactorily. I am still giddy, dizzied with the hammering of presses, the clatter of engines, and the whirling of wheels; my head aches with the multiplicit

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LETTER XXXVII.

LETTER XXXVII.

T he mail coach which communicates between Bristol and Manchester, leaves Birmingham at a reasonable hour in the morning. These coaches travel at a rate little short of two leagues in the hour, including all stoppages; they carry four inside passengers, two outside; the rate of fare is considerably higher than in other stages; but a preference is given to these, because they go faster, no unnecessary delays are permitted, and the traveller who goes in them can calculate his time accurately. Ever

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LETTER XXXVIII.

LETTER XXXVIII.

J. had provided us with letters to a gentleman in Manchester; we delivered them after breakfast, and were received with that courtesy which a foreigner, when he takes with him the expected recommendations, is sure to experience in England. He took us to one of the great cotton manufactories, showed us the number of children who were at work there, and dwelt with delight on the infinite good which resulted from employing them at so early an age. I listened without contradicting him, for who would

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LETTER XXXIX.

LETTER XXXIX.

A place more destitute of all interesting objects than Manchester it is not easy to conceive. In size and population it is the second city in the kingdom, containing above fourscore thousand inhabitants. Imagine this multitude crowded together in narrow streets, the houses all built of brick and blackened with smoke; frequent buildings among them as large as convents, without their antiquity, without their beauty, without their holiness; where you hear from within, as you pass along, the everlas

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LETTER XL.

LETTER XL.

W e left Chester yesterday at noon, and embarked again upon a canal. Our last navigation had ended by transferring us to a coach; we had now to undergo a more unpleasant transfer. The canal reached the Mersey, a huge river which forms the port of Liverpool, across which we had about three leagues to sail in a slant direction. A vessel was ready to receive us, on board of which we embarked, and set sail with a slack wind. At first it was pleasant sailing,—the day fair, a castellated hill in full

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LETTER XLI.

LETTER XLI.

K endal , though less populous and less busy than the noisy manufacturing towns which we have left behind us, is yet a place of thriving industry, and has been so during some centuries. The most interesting fact connected with its history is this; after the death of Henry VIII. his daughter, the pious Mary, being deeply concerned for the state of his unhappy soul, would fain have set apart the revenues of this parochial church as a fund for masses in his behalf. She consulted proper persons upon

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LETTER XLII.

LETTER XLII.

F rom Penrith to Keswick is four leagues and a half; and as we were told there was no place where we could breakfast upon the way, we lay in bed till a later hour than would otherwise have beseemed pedestrians. The views were uninteresting after such scenery as we had lately passed, yet, as we were returning to the mountainous country, they improved as we advanced. Our road lay under one very fine mountain called Saddleback, and from every little eminence we beheld before us in the distance the

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LETTER XLIII.

LETTER XLIII.

T he Lakes which we were next to explore lay south-west, and west of Keswick. We took an early breakfast, provided ourselves with some hard eggs, slung our knapsacks, and started about seven, taking the horse-road to Lodore. The morning promised well, there was neither sun to heat us, nor clouds enough to menace rain; but our old tormentors the flies swarmed from the hedges and coppices by which we passed, as many, as active, as impudent, and hardly less troublesome than the imps who beset St An

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LETTER XLIV.

LETTER XLIV.

W e were now to leave the land of lakes and turn our faces towards London. T he regular road would have been to have returned to Penrith, and there have met the stage; but it would cost us only half a day's journey to visit Carlisle from whence it starts; and a city whose name occurs so often in English history, being the frontier town on this part of the Scotish border, was deserving of this little deviation from the shortest route. For Carlisle, therefore, we took chaise from Keswick, the dist

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LETTER XLV.

LETTER XLV.

F rom Borough-Bridge, which is a little town full of good inns, we took chaise in the morning for York. The road was a straight line over a dead flat; the houses which we passed of red brick, roofed with red tiles, uglier than common cottages, and not promising more comfort within. York is one of the few English cities with the name of which foreigners are familiar. I was disappointed that its appearance in the distance was not finer,—we saw its huge cathedral rising over the level,—but that was

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LETTER XLVI.

LETTER XLVI.

F rom From Alconbury-Hill to Cambridge is two short stages,—we passed through Huntingdon, the birth-place of Oliver Cromwell, and travelled over a dismal flat, the country northward being one great fen. The whole of these extensive fens is said once to have been dry and productive ground reduced to this state by some earthquake or deluge, unremembered in history. Tools found beneath the soil, and submersed forests, are the proofs. A century and half ago they began to drain them, and the draining

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LETTER XLVII.

LETTER XLVII.

T hree leagues from Cambridge is the town of Newmarket, famous for its adjoining race-ground, the great scene of English extravagance and folly. They who have seen the races tell me it is a fine sight:—the horses are the most perfect animals of their kind, and their speed is wonderful; but it is a cruel and detestable sport. The whip and the spur are unmercifully used. Some of the leading men of the turf, as they are called, will make their horses run two or three times in as many days, till eve

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LETTER XLVIII.

LETTER XLVIII.

D uring my travels I have missed the sight of a popular election. That for Middlesex has been carried on with uncommon asperity; it is the only instance wherein the ministry have exerted their influence; for, contrary to the custom of all their predecessors, they have fairly trusted themselves to the opinion of the people. Here, however, they have taken a part,—and here they have been beaten, because they stood upon the very worst ground which they could possibly have chosen. The English have a

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LETTER XLIX.

LETTER XLIX.

T he caprice of fashion in this country would appear incredible to you, if you did not know me too well to suspect me either of invention or exaggeration. Every part of the dress, from head to foot, undergoes such frequent changes, that the English costume is at present as totally unlike what it was thirty years ago, as it is to the Grecian or Turkish habit. These people have always been thus capricious. Above two centuries ago a satirist here painted one of his countrymen standing naked, with a

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LETTER L.

LETTER L.

L ady Mary Wortley Montagu, the best letter-writer of this or of any other country, has accounted for the extraordinary facility with which her countrymen are duped by the most ignorant quacks, very truly and very ingeniously. "The English," she says, "are more easily infatuated than any other people by the hope of a panacea, nor is there any other country in the world where such great fortunes are made by physicians. I attribute this to the foolish credulity of mankind. As we no longer trust in

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LETTER LI.

LETTER LI.

I shall I shall devote this letter to a full account of the theory of Animal Magnetism, which was put a stop to in France by the joint authority of the Church and State, but had its fair career in England. The Lectures of Mainauduc, who was the teacher in this country, were published, and from them I have drawn this detail: According to this new system of physics, the earth, its atmosphere, and all their productions are only one, and each is but a separate portion of the whole, accasionally prod

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LETTER LII.

LETTER LII.

T he conclusion of the extraordinary book from whence I have condensed the summary of this prodigious quackery, is even more extraordinary and more daring than the quackery itself. It may be transcribed without offence to religion, for every catholic will regard its atrocious impiety with due abhorrence. "I flatter myself," says this man at the close of his lectures, "you are now convinced that this science is of too exalted a nature to be trifled with or despised; and I fondly hope that even th

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LETTER LIII.

LETTER LIII.

I n the year 1729 a great rent was made in the ragged robe of heresy. Wesley and Whitfield were the Luther and Calvin of this schism, which will probably, at no very remote time, end in the overthrow of the Established Heretical Church. They began when young men at Oxford by collecting together a few persons who were of serious dispositions like themselves, meeting together in prayer, visiting the prisoners, and communicating whenever the sacrament was administered. Both took orders in the Estab

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