University of Virginia Library

7. THE LORGNETTE.

AUGUST 4, 1850. NEW-YORK. SECOND SERIES—NO. 7.

You must remember, Fritz, how on a certain evening,
many years since, when we two were seated
together on the front bank of the Speaker's gallery,
in the British House of Commons, we listened admiringly
to the terse and blazing castigation,
which was inflicted by an eminent historian, and
essayist, upon the first minister of England. You
will remember that after the orator had closed, with
one of those studied, and euphonious perorations,
which make the final periods of each chapter of his
history of England, ring upon the sense, like the

vibrations of a bell, there rose opposite to him, a
tall, and portly man, who commenced mildly, and
who wore at once a dignity, and an ease of utterance,
that forbade the idea of putting on their possessor
either contempt, or condemnation.

You will recall, how, as he went on, his mildness
gradually spread into a swift, rich river of
eloquence, and the mellifluence of his tones lent
itself to the closely welded links of an artful,
and splendid argumentation, until the reproach
that lay upon him was dissipated, like a mist be
fore the sun, and even the magniloquent talker,
Macaulay, grew small under the eye, and the
speech of the accomplished gentleman, and the
consummate debater—Sir Robert Peel.

Remembering this, with a sentiment of admiration
that can never escape, you will have felt a quick
rush of blood to the heart, at the mention of that
unhappy casualty which has befallen him, and
which has made the British nation as mournful as
ourselves. The most important man in our national
crisis, and the most important man in the
crisis of English, affairs, have passed away, almost
together,—carried into the Night by the same
ground swoop of the black-winged angel of Death!

I love to draw lessons from the events of the
time; and to make even the dark accidents that

overshadow us, give down the grateful coolness of
a moral.

Sir Robert Peel was a commoner; he was the
son of a cotton spinner; he was luxuriously rich;
he was the aptest statesman, and the most admired
man in England. These facts make up a very
good text for an American sermon; and the elucidation
of the text, without any of my sixthlies, or
seventhlies, would go to show that nerve and energy
can triumph over station,—and what is more
to the purpose, can triumph over the indulgences of
wealth.

How many of our rich cotton spinners' sons are
in the road toward making Sir Robert Peels? How
many are counting it any part of their duty, to be
anything else than rich men's sons? How many
of them are laboring toward any nobler end, than a
pretty exhibition of that listless composure, and
that pride, which American wealth is teaching to
its children?

Our money is breeding an abundance of fine
dancers, neat moustaches, and excellently dressed
men; it is possibly refining such, with capital judgment
about a polka, or an aria; but as for that
sort of masculine development, which makes the
will earnest, and the soul big with manly intent,
and with the purpose to make itself felt on mind,

and not merely on grooms, or tailors,—it would be
troublesome to find specimens, who are heirs to
wealth.

Let our rich cotton spinners' sons, who are rioting
in the indulgences that riches bestow, and
boasting the inertia that riches are too apt to induce,
reflect for a while (if their powers of reflection
are not altogether withered up, and gone) on
that sort of nobility—the only real sort—which
takes its measures from the grief of a nation, which
secures its patent by the strength of personal resolve,
and which traces its escutcheon to the fiat of
God!

Let us pass on, Fritz: strong words add heat to
our summer: July sermons may be too long, though
they are rarely too strong. The work I have
sketched for myself needs not so much strength,
as variety of words.

THE COCKNEY IN THE COUNTRY.

You may possibly think, that I choose to convey
the idea, by this scrap from Goldoni, that I am no
cockney myself, although I have seen cockneyisms
in others. On this point, I shall make neither

confession nor denial; indeed, it would little become
me, after being set down by a distinguished city
reviewer, as an `outsider' who gains all his knowledge
of city life from `hearsay,' to put in any
claim to a share of his cockney character; and it
would as little become me to deny all relationship,
when I find myself credited by another penetrating
observer, an intimate knowledge of the town life,
and a thorough understanding of its vices. Thus
you see that circumstances confirm a resort to my
habitual modesty, and interest, as well as diffidence
commend to me, silence.

We may safely legitimate the title of cockney,
although we have got no Bow-bells, and no Cheapside.
But the American cockney, unlike the London
cockney, travels. He does not always dine at
Damm & Francins, or next door to the Customs;
and in the heat of the season, even our Pearl street
man has been seen to drive a `buggy' to Saratoga
Lake, or perhaps to wet his wine at `White's' with
the ice of Niagara.

Nevertheless, we have a substantial race of cockneys;—men
who measure everything by New
York;—who compare the country clergy (when
they hear them) to their city doctors,—who look
for Bowery girls among the milkmaids,—who drink
at virgin springs with a sigh for the Croton, and

who, whether you meet them among the wonderful
beauties of the Thousand Isles, or on the wooden
pavements of Montreal, wear the unmistakable
air of New Yorkers. It is hard to describe this air
by words; it is not the coat, or the walk, or the
gesture, or the talk, or the set of the hat,—but it is
something made up of all; and yet so sure in its
intimations, that a practiced observer would be as
much surprised to hear him converse, without mention
of the Exchange, or of Wall street, or of the
Third Avenue, or Croton water, as to find a Bostonian
admit by allusion, or by anything more than a
contemptuous flirt of his coat-tails, that such things
had any existence at all.

Yet in justice to them it must be said, that they
are more cosmopolitan than their brothers of Boston,—who
travel with the habit of their city sticking
to them, because persuaded that habit is not
only better than all discovered habits, but the best
of any possible habit, both as regards body, and
mind. The New Yorker, on the contrary, wears
his colors unconsciously; and not so much from
pride in his mode, as from his inability to leave it
behind him. La mode domine les provinciam;
mais les New Yorkers dominent la mode.

The Bostonian is eternally wrapped up in some
small portion of the Boston atmosphere, on which

he greatly plumes himself; and is very sure that so
long as he wears it, he must inevitably court remark,
and secure admiration. The New Yorker,
on the other hand, though clearly stamped with
the metropolitan mould, and in his secret heart absolutely
certain that no city ever was, or ever can
be, like New York city, is yet comparatively humble
under the weight of his honours, and is not so
anxious to be astonished, as to be satisfied. He is
not averse, on occasions, to venture his admiration
on excellencies, though not quite sure that they
grew up under the warming climate of his Opera,
or his Exchange; and he can bestow a gaze of
wonderment upon Niagara, although the half of it
is on the Canada side, and the other half, not in
`the Park.' But I have not the slightest doubt
that it would add vastly to the appreciation of the
Bostonian, in descending the famous staircase, if
the projector, Mr. Biddle, had been a Bostonian;
and it detracts wonderfully from the beauty of that
frail, gossamer structure which hangs over the
awful abyss, to think that suspension bridges were
neither contrived in Boston, nor are adapted to the
flats of Boston.

All cockneys are bad enough, (and Leigh Hunt
is my authority;) but a cockney who prides himself
on being a cockney, does seem to me to be the most

pitiable of all cockneys. The New York cockney
is green from habit; but the Boston cockney is
green from choice; and by nature, as well as by
`all sorts of paragraphs,' is posted in cockneyisms.[1]

But to return, Fritz; I am to show you something
of our city cockneys; leaving provincialisms
for cooler periods.

Our cockney has great admiration for watering-places
generally, and collaterally of the country—
of which he talks very much, as Goldsmith's Lien
Chi Altanghi talks of the gayeties of London,—
namely, with a great deal of apparent familiarity,
and a great deal more of real ignorance. However
straitened he may be in his purse, he is sure to
husband enough from his Opera and Olympic diversions,
and such like entertainments, for a run to
Newport, or for a Sunday at Cozzens'. On these
occasions he drinks wine, frequently to excess, and
appears of a morning in an old shooting jacket
(much more worn at the elbows than in the armpits,)
or possibly, if of good color, will dash in a

velvet coat. He plumes himself much on the cut
of his whiskers, and is very hilarious, and is almost
always on intimate terms with bar-keepers,
with whom it is his infinite delight to crack jokes.

He also remarks freely and knowingly on all the
company; he cons the register with great scrutiny,
and makes graceful observations in a cheerful
mood, upon the presence of Sally such a one, or
Fanny such another, or Sue such a third,—without,
however, enjoying any further acquaintance
with these ladies, than consists in a familiar knowledge
of their names, and vague notions of their sex
and properties. He dresses fastidiously for his dinner;
and is very easy, though very arbitrary with
the servants; since he imagines it a proof of good
breeding to be very authoritative. He is excessively
indignant at getting a wrong-colored glass
for his hock; and although he has little love for it,
he is a great guzzler of any claret which is sewed
with a label on the bottle.

He brings his own cigars with him, which were
imported by a friend; he is specially knowing about
the Cuba plantations, and boasts an acquaintance
with a Creole proprietor, with whom he has sometimes
taken a glass of Madeira. He is very apt to
know all watering-place people; and has had innumerable
flirtations measured by a promenade in

Cozzens' corridors; or a ride at Newport, with very
accessible young ladies. He is not partial to fishing,
as it blackens the hands, and the blue-fish do
sometimes—bite.

If he should venture to the `Point,' he is sure to
have some acquaintance in the army, who happens
there at the same time, and who is distinguished
for having conducted some extraordinary Anabasin
retreat, or for having been captured by a distinguished
Mexican General. He is sure to make the
most of his epauletted acquaintance; and counts it
a good investment to ply him with porter, (faute de
vin) for the honor of the gilt shoulder pieces at his
elbow.

In parenthesis, let me say, Fritz, that the officers
of our army are with few exceptions, gentlemen, both
unassuming, and well-informed; and it behoves
them much, to thrust out of their social alliance
such recreants as will over-drink at a public table,
or carry their impudence with a beastly swagger.
No amount of battle glory, however falsely, or fairly
made up, and however currently reported, can atone
for impertinence and a braggart assumption, that
bespeak ignorance of those social amenities, which
distinguish a well-bred man from a brute.

And while alluding to this place of summer festivity,
let me remark upon the admirable, philo

sophic discretion of that discipline which refuses to
the host at the Point, all sale of wines, while it permits
a retail of cordials.[2] I strongly suspect the
order must have been drawn up by some old veteran
of the wars, and of the bottle, whose stomach
had become parched with the use of ordinary drinks,
and who could only titillate his toughened mucous
membrane, with the fiery qualities of Curaçoa, or
of Kirschwasser. As it is, the visitant has to sigh
for his claret, and satisfy his cravings with most
villainous ales, or with the hellish broth of a government
cordial. I feel quite sure that this temperance
schedule could not have been drawn up
either by Mr. Hawkins or by Horace Mann.

To come back to our cockney;—if amorously disposed,
West Point is hardly the place for his triumphs,—except
a triumph over the bottle. Cadet
rank and military service are, if I may judge from
no little observation, extraordinary promoters of
gallantry; and judging from what meets the
stranger's eye, at the periodic government `hops,'
Mars is not the only divinity, that makes the Lares
of the barracks; for, to say nothing of Bacchus,
whom they have stripped of his vine-leaves, and

crowned with porter carbuncles, that would have
made the Greek god blush deeper than the reddest
of the Lesbian vats,—they pay worshipful obeisance,
and an evening gun, to Venus.

I think, indeed, that it would be hard to name a
spot, where indifferent beauties, and middle-aged
women, are so sure of meeting with undisguised
admiration, and of finding their souls rekindled (if
ever kindled before) into a spirit of flirtation, as
among the comely boys, who love, by leave of the
orderly sergeants, and who cultivate their temperance,
with the commandant's cordials. The Polytechnics
with their graceful chapeaux, and the St.
Cyr men, with their crimson stripes, are, you know,
`taking fellows' even in a Paris salon; but their
appetites are somewhat cloyed by that life of the
town, to which our cadets are strangers. The rigidity
of the Spartan Ephori could not devise a better
incentive to noble propensities, than their mountain
air, their salted diet, and their comparative
winter isolation. These together, naturally create
an ardor for the greeting of their summer visitors,
which, if it breed a little wantonness in the women,
is surely no fault of the cadets—whatever may belong
to the cordials.

At Saratoga, the cockney is as much at home as
at Pearl street, or upon Broadway. He knows, perhaps,

the wealth, family, and acquirements, of half
who are at the Springs. He drinks the water
for form's sake; and he dances, and goes to
the raftered chapel, for the same. His favorite
quarters are at the United States, and his favorite
position, a seat upon the back corridor of a morning,
and upon the front corridor of an afternoon, in
full view of the approaches to the parlor. He is on
intimate terms with the head waiter, who is
sure to greet him with a chuckle and with a tip of
his cap. He consults him privately about the ladies
who are at the house, and forms his opinion of
their habits and character very much by the confidential
revelations of the chief waiter, or the still
more confidential revelations of the chamber-maids.
He strolls by the Union with an air of proper dignity
and superiority; and is never to be caught
listening to the morning music at the Springs. He
is not versed in agricultural matters, if indeed there
were any such in the neighborhood, to be versed in;
and he has as little appreciation of an improved
plough, as of an improved mind.

He is eager to get hold of the morning papers,
as if he had great interests at stake, in the state of
trade or in the sales at the board. He courts great
familiarity with the newspaper correspondents; although
he professes to gentlemen not in that line,

(and with some show of justice) great contempt for
them. He is not especially literary, although he
reads Dumas' works, and an occasional number of
the Home Journal, or of the Lorgnette.

At a small watering-place, or country town, he
becomes, by the cut of his hair, and the tie of his
cravat, an Apollo; scarce less worshiped than the
marble divinity of the Vatican. You will find him
on occasions at such places as Stonington, or Richfield,
astonishing the plain townspeople, and wearing
such airs toward humble visitors, as put him at
once beyond the pale of association. And at such
comparatively retired quarters as the Bellevue of
Newport, or the white palace of Montauk, I have
myself been put to the blush by the manifest attainments
and superiority of a cockney, whose education
would have been high, if it had been equal
to that of the Ward schools, and whose manners
were grafted upon a John street stock.

But this genus is but one of an exceedingly large
family, of a still larger class, and may with propriety
come under the tribe of vagrant and unmarried
cockneys. Or, if I were to class him in the manner
of the naturalists, (without strict Linnæan accuracy)
it would be—class mammalia, order bimana,
family pachydermata, and tribe vagrantes.
Another tribe of the same family, is made up of such

cockneys as, with a little advance of years and vigilance
in matrimonial speculation, conceive an impulsive
and not extraordinary fondness for the
country. This eagerness frees them from all
ordinary restraints, and their ignorance from all
the ordinary proprieties. They indulge their architectural
fancies either in a gaunt town-house of
flaming brick, looking warmly from the green fields;
or, with a pseudo taste, cultivated by as much artistic
reading, and lie between the covers of Mr.
Downing's `Village Residences,' they order a Gothic
cottage, and stew in low chambers under sharp
roofs, exposed to a broiling sun, with exquisite
satisfaction.

Our Gothic friends do not seem to be aware, that
the English models, from which their style is
copied, are protected by a lower temperature, by a
moister climate, by thicker walls, and, in many instances,
by that best of non-conductors, a heavy
thatch.

Our city cockney does not ordinarily extend his
Gothic cultivation beyond architecture; and he
will plant his array of gables, crotchets, and finials,
upon a lawn as mathematically square, and as geometrically
arranged, as the town lots, or as the
charming country seats of the Dearman estate.
Under his wife's tuition, he will perhaps enrage

with a frenzy for flowers; he will fill a green-house
with cactuses and japonicas, and spoil all the sweet-briars
in the neighborhood, with his studies at
grafting. The ailanthus, and catalpa, are our
cockney's favorite trees; while anything like such
native magnificence as an old oak, with its underlying
sod, half gray with the decaying acorn cups,
or an elm, whose limbs sway in the wind, like the
weird arms of a giant, are out of his fancy, and out
of his regard.

He has a passion for bow windows, which give
views `down the road;' and he adds effect to his
hall lamp, and his plaster statuary, with glass
stained blue and yellow. He puts a dovecote upon
a pole, by suggestion of his English gardener; and
buys a pair of Guinea fowl, that eat off his tube-roses.
He purchases Chaptal and Loudon for his
library, and reads the Herald and Eugene Sue.
He goes into town for relaxation, and comes to his
cottage to be miserable, upon a pretty lounge of
knotted grape-vines.

A letter which has come to my hand, Fritz, from
very much such a country liver, will perhaps interest
you; and as it makes new developments
about the country life, and as it seems to have
been written by a shrewd fellow, who has an eye to

trumps, I shall give it the dignity of an independent
chapter.

LETTER FROM A COCKNEY.

I quite like the manner of Rusticus, and shall be
charmed to receive the pictures he speaks of. I
must caution him, however, against too great severity;
a cockney is always an ill-tempered judge.
And I, as you know, Fritz, find my affections going
back too strongly to the old days, when the homestead
was rich in blossoms, and the moonlight shadows
played—fairy-like—upon the ancestral lawn,
to forget the generous remembrances that cling
there yet, or to throw the shadow of a single wanton
sneer upon the simplicity of a country life.

As the years thicken upon a man, and the stifling
air of great cities, and the blaze of wide and swift
travel, furrow his brow, and sprinkle his head with
white, nothing can be more grateful to him than
the memories of that artless and wild rusticity
which lighted his boyhood with the smiles of

health, and which crowned his youth with strength
and gladness.

And as he looks forward toward that awful
bourne, from which none return, there is something
in the thought of lying at last under the trees that
grow old and die, and spring again; and beside the
brooks that murmur softly, as they did when he
was young, and as they will do, when his body is
dust,—which reconciles him even to the grave; and
which carries his hope from the trees and the brooks
up to that Power, whose wisdom and strength they
adorn, and whose mercy and goodness they show
forth continually.