Page images
PDF
EPUB

as ours, they would have acknowledged the advantages which our genius presents in winter, and almost been ready to conclude, with old Cleveland, that the sun himself was nothing but

"Heaven's coalery ;

A coal-pit rampant, or a mine on flame."

The ancient hearth was generally in the middle of the room, the ceiling of which let out the smoke; it was supplied with charcoal or faggots, and consisted sometimes of a brazier or chafing-dish (the focus of the Romans), sometimes of a mere elevation or altar (the ἔστια or ἔσχαρα of the Greeks). We may easily imagine the smoke and annoyance which this custom must have occasioned, not to mention the bad complexions which are caught by hanging over a fuming-pan, as the faces of the Spanish ladies bear melancholy witness. The stoves, however, in use with the countrymen of Mons. du Bos and Winckelman are, if possible, still worse, having a dull, suffocating effect, with nothing to recompense the eye. The abhorrence of them which Ariosto expresses in one of his satires, when, justifying his refusal to accompany Cardinal d'Este into Germany, he reckons up the miseries of its wintertime, may have led M. Winckelman to conclude that all the Northern resources against cold were equally intolerable to an Italian genius; but Count Alfieri, a poet, at least as warmly inclined as Ariosto, delighted in England; and the great romancer himself, in another of his satires, makes a commodious fireplace the climax of his wishes with regard to lodging. In short, what did Horace say, or rather what did he not say, of the raptures of in-door sociality, Horace, who knew how to enjoy sunshine in all its luxury, and who nevertheless appears to have snatched a finer inspiration from absolute frost and snow?

I need not quote all those beautiful little invitations he sent to his acquaintances, telling one of them that a neat room and a sparkling fire were waiting for him; describing to another the smoke springing out of the roof in curling volumes, and even congratulating his friends in general on the opportunity of enjoyment afforded them by a stormy day; but, to take leave at once of these frigid connoisseurs, hear with what rapture he describes one of those friendly parties, in which he passed his winter evenings, and which only wanted the finish of our better morality and our patent fireplaces, to resemble the one I am now fancying.

"Vides, ut altâ stet nive candidum
Soracte, nec jam sustineant onus
Silvæ laborantes, geluque

Flumina constiterint acuto:

Dissolve frigus ligna super foco
Largè reponens, atque benigniùs
Deprome quadrimum Sabinâ,
O Thaliarche, merum diotâ.

Permitte Divis cætera ;

Donec virenti canities abest
Morosa. Nunc et campus, et areæ,
Lenesque sub noctem susurri
Compositâ repetantur horâ ;

Nunc et latentis proditor intimo
Gratus puellæ risus ab angulo,
Pignusque dereptum lacertis
Aut digito male pertinaci."

LIB. I. OD. 9.

"Behold yon mountain's hoary height

Made higher with new mounts of snow;

Again behold the winter's weight

Oppress the lab'ring woods below,

And streams with icy fetters bound
Benumb'd and crampt to solid ground.

With well-heap'd logs dissolve the cold,
And feed the genial hearth with fires,
Produce the wine that makes us bold,

And sprightly wit and mirth inspires.
For what hereafter shall betide,
Jove, if 'tis worth his care, provide.

Th' appointed hour of promis'd bliss,

The pleasing whisper in the dark,

The half unwilling, willing kiss,

The laugh that guides thee to the mark,

When the kind nymph would coyness feign,

And hides but to be found again,

These, these are joys the gods for youth ordain."

DRYDEN.

The Roman poet, however, though he occasionally boasts of his temperance, is too apt to lose sight of the intellectual part of his entertainment, or at least to make the sensual part predominate over the intellectual. Now, I reckon the nicety of social enjoyment to consist in the reverse; and, after partaking with Homer of his plentiful boiled and roast, and with Horace of his flowercrowned wine-parties, the poetical reader must come at last to us barbarians of the North for the perfection of fireside festivity, - that is to say, for the union of practical philosophy with absolute merriment, — for light meals and unintoxicating glasses; for refection that administers to enjoyment, instead of repletions that at once constitute and contradict it. I am speaking, of course, not of our commonplace eaters and drinkers, but of our classical arbiters of pleasure, as contrasted with those of other countries; these, it is observable, have all delighted in Horace, and copied him as far as their tastes were con

genial; but, without relaxing a jot of their real comfort, how pleasingly does their native philosophy temper and adorn the freedom of their conviviality, — feeding the fire, as it were, with an equable fuel that hinders it alike from scorching and from going out, and, instead of the artificial enthusiasm of a heated body, enabling them to enjoy the healthful and unclouded predominance of a sparkling intelligence! It is curious, indeed, to see how distinct from all excess are their freest and heartiest notions of relaxation. Thus our old poet, Drayton, reminding his favorite companion of a fireside meeting, expressly unites freedom with moderation:

"My dearly loved friend, how oft have we

In winter evenings, meaning to be free,

To some well-chosen place us'd to retire,

And there with moderate meat, and wine, and fire,
Have pass'd the hours contentedly in chat,
Now talk'd of this, and then discours'd of that,
Spoke our own verses 'twixt ourselves, - if not
Other men's lines, which we by chance had got."

EPISTLE TO Henry Reynolds, ESQ., of Poets and Poesy.

And Milton, in his "Sonnet to Cyriack Skinner," one of the turns of which is plainly imitated from Horace, particularly qualifies a strong invitation to merriment by anticipating what Horace would always drive from your - the feelings of the day after:

reflections,

"Cyriack, whose Grandsire, on the royal bench
Of British Themis, with no mean applause
Pronounc'd, and in his volumes taught, our laws,
Which others at their bar so often wrench;
To-day deep thoughts resolve with me to drench
In mirth, that, after, no repenting draws.
Let Euclid rest, and Archimedes pause,

And what the Swede intends, and what the French
To measure life learn thou betimes, and know

Tow'rd solid good what leads the nearest way.

For other things mild Heav'n a time ordains,
And disapproves that care, though wise in show,
That with superfluous burden loads the day,

And when God sends a cheerful hour, refrains."

But the execution of this sonnet is not to be compared in gracefulness and a finished sociality with the one addressed to his friend Lawrence, which, as it presents us with the acme of elegant repast, may conclude the hour which I have just been describing, and conduct us complacently to our twilight, –

"Lawrence, of virtuous father virtuous son,

Now that the fields are dank, and ways are mire,
Where shall we sometimes meet, and by the fire
Help waste a sullen day, what may be won
From the hard season gaining? Time will run
On smoother, till Favonius re-inspire

The frozen earth, and clothe in fresh attire
The lily and rose, that neither sow'd nor spun,
What neat repast shall feast us, light and choice,
Of Attic taste, with wine, whence we may rise
To hear the lute well-touch'd, and artful voice
Warble immortal notes and Tuscan air?

He who of these delights can judge, and spare
To interpose them oft, is not unwise."

But twilight comes: and the lover of the fireside, for the perfection of the moment, is now alone. He was reading a minute or two ago, and for some time was unconscious of the increasing dusk, till, on looking up, he perceived the objects out of doors deepening into massy outline, while the sides of his fireplace began to reflect the light of the flames, and the shadow of himself and his chair fidgeted with huge obscurity on the wall. Still wishing to read, he pushed himself nearer and nearer the window, and continued fixing on his book till he happened to take another glance out of doors, and on returning to it, could make out nothing. He therefore lays it aside, and

« PreviousContinue »