The Press. — London, England, 1856-10-11 00:00:00

THE PRESS. OCTOBER 11, 1856. LANDOR'S IMAGINARY CONVERSATIONS. No M.D.CCC.LVI. LANDOR. PALMERSTON. LANDOR.—Good den, Lord. You have bin and red my letter offer ing a stipend to the family of the man who shall do man's work? PALMERSTON.—I saw the letter, Mr. Savage ; and what the deuce made you go and publish any thing so stupid ? LANDOR.—I in earnest, you in sport. And stupidity is the qualifi cation of earnestness. Corpo di Facto !, PALMERSTON.—I tell you what, Mr. Lander, the Home Secretary came to me to know whether we ought not to lock you up. I assure you, without meaning to take any merit for it, that but for me you would have been held to bail by this time in a sum that would have bought the body and soul of any of the fellows you intended to stir up. LANDoll.—Nothing of the kind would have occurred, for I should have given no bail, but gone to your dungeons. And the sonnets I should have written thence would have made the fortune of the Examine, newspaper, and the reputation of British literature. You have prevented my martyrdom, and I hate you, old man 1 5 ..u.mEasToN.- - -Old Man, be hanged! you are ten years my senior ; but do not exercise the right of second childhood to be ungrateful. If I did not send you to prison, I assure you it was with the best inten tions. Don't do that sort of thing again, however. LANDOR.—And wherefor? PALMERSTON.—Because George Grey has not the faintest respect for your Paganism, and Platonism, and Pyrrhonism, and all the rest of it, conceiving you to be a sort of heathen; and he will insist upon ding his duty next time. LANDOR.-4 honour him, and I despise you. He believes ; you scoff. I had expected a different reception. PALMERSTON.—Eh—a policeman, or a doctor from Hanwell ? LANDOR.—OId Lord, you have joked for sixty years, and your face is even as the comic mask, " plaited with mirth." But we cannot almnys laugh. PALMERSTON.—No, we must yawn sometimes, even when reading your " Imaginary Conversations." But what did you expect from me ? LANDOR.—Thanks. PALMERSTON.—For calling? Accept them heartily. lam always glad to see a celebrity. LANDOR.—Palmerston ! Attend. You have spoken this day as if you deemed me a fool. PALMERSTON —Without insisting upon words, which are but matters of detail, I am free to confess, my dear Mr. Lander, that you have not much misinterpreted my sentiments. We are both of us elderly, you know, and need not waste time in compliments. I think you are an awful fool. LANDOR.—I have no anger for you. I may be angry with an equal, or with a superior, if I can find him. But whence your repudiation of the man who is but doing your work ? PALMERSTON.—Mine ! I am not engaged to write verses in the Examiner. LANDOR —Bah ! man. tyrannicide. PALMERSTON.—And what do you mean by my work ? Am I to go about sticking people for 951 ? LANDOR.—Hypocrite ! I had but one hundred pounds, which— PALMERSTON.—Which you had better have sent to your relations in Italy. LANDOR.—What are relations to a philanthropist? D—n relations. I tell you I had one hundred pounds, and I gave what I could to the cause to which you give intrigues, diplomacy, shuffling, bullying, Clarendon despatches, and Queen's ships. PALMERSTON (puzzled) —To Italian liberty ? LANDOR.—To tyrannicide, Lord Premier. No playing with words. PALMERSTON.—By Jove, if you talk such nonsense as that, I shall leave you to Sir George Grey. What have I done to justify such a statement? I spoke of the gold I offered the LANDOR.—You are bold, sir, but truth is bolder. You have agitated the Italian peninsula from end to end, you have sent the blood boiling from the hearts of thousands of men, excited to madness by your demonstrations, and then you affect to reprove me, who have but sought to direct a dagger or two. Truly, my Lord, I begin to despise Sir George Grey, for if he saw his duty in arresting me, you ought long ago to have been in a cell in the Tower. PALMERSTON.—My poor old friend, have you no relatives who will take charge of you ? LANDOR.—The insult passes by me as the wind, tyrannicidical Viscount. PALMERSTON.—ReaIIy, your view of things is rather amusing. LANDOR.—You own its truth, through that hollow laugh. PALMERSTON.—AII nonsense, of course ; but it is not worth arguing with you. fANDOII.—It is easy, very easy, to dismiss a truth in that light manner, but it will turn again and rend you. Come, be honest, own with me that in your private and noble heart you would gladly see the dagger stroke that— PALMERSTON.—This is becoming unpleasant. There are subjects on which it is indecorous to joke. LANDOR —And you have discovered that? I should not have credited you with such a belief, to read your speeches. But we are not joking now (exultingly). I have cloven away the rock and un- 973 veiled the statue that existed there. I have found you, 0 Palmerston the other was but your ai►uulacrum, or image. You are in your heart a slayer of tyrants, and you will give me an order on the Treasury for one thousand pounds to be added to my poor ninety-five, and the sound thereof shall go out into all lands, and the hearts of the patriots shall rejoice, and they shall lay hand upon the steel, and with a cry of Palmerston and Landor, they shall strike deep into the hearts of Kings, and-- _ - PALMERSTON (greatly alarmed).—Police, police, police ! (Runs out hastily.) MR. GIBSON'S ACADEMY-MANCHESTER. Hearken, Ministers of England—wily Peel—sagacious Wood— Gentle Lowe—vivacious Vernon—here's a scheme to do you good ! Where the " Free-trade Hall " is rising o'er the factory chimnies high (So, at least, the place is labelle•l—no one knows exactly why) Seek the Manchester emporium —sit at modest Gibson's feet (It will keep you out of mischief—that's to say, of Downing-street)-- Lessons given in elocution—but you need not dread the sneers, Or of Bishops old and drowsy, or of supercilious Peers ; Here is eloquence successful (if it's only " unadorned") With an audience by whom logic, like the letter H, is scorned. " Things not generally known," too, here by learners may be gained— As—that brilliant expectations are of Lewis entertained. Therefore, play no more at statesmen, but remember what you are, Go to school to Milner Gibson, nor again attempt to " star." NEW FASHIONS FOR THE CABINET. THAT celebrated artiste Mr. Vernon Smith, profoundly convinced of the important truth that if a man be made by his manner. he is no less marred or mended by his tailor, according to the congruousness or incongruousness of his costume, and anxious that his colleagues' habiliments should be consonant with the character of their wearers, and be as unmistakeable a reflex of their minds as his own mise is of the capacity of the President of the Board of Control, has drawn up the following suggestions for the use of some of her Majesty's Ministers. VISCOUNT PALM ERSTON. A coat of the kind termed reversible, which may be turned at plea sure (or profit), and a sulphur-coloured vest (a delicate attention to the King of Naples). The old-fashioned pantaloon should now be put on. The clown's motley and the jester's cap and bells to be utterly dis carded. THE MARQUIS OF LANSDOWNE. The Blue and Buff may still be preserved in compliment to the few remaining believers in the exploded superstition of Whiggery, though whether Fox would approve of his livery being adopted by the advocate of the Foreign Mercenary Bill and the defender of the attempt to gag the free press of Belgium, is a question which may safely be left to the decision of his Lordship's favorite authority, the " Barber out of doors." MR. FREDERICK PEEL. A set of feathers brodis on tar d tabolitioniste aux Etats Unlit. General Beatson would suggest in addition a high conical cap of finest blue-wove paper, with the letters D.U.N.C.E. embroidered on the front. Tassells of red tape would complete this coiffure. SIR C. LEWIS. This eminent scholar and brilliant wit might with great propriety appear in the old Roman toga with a paladamentum, a lotus clams, and a calceus incisus. To this costume might be superadded, after dinner, a coronal of flowers or a wreath of myrtle, as betokening the light and joyous character of this airiest of financiers and pleasantest of reviewers. SIR. B. HALL Might produce a favorable impression in the elegant raise of a maitre d'orchestre a la 3fons. Jullien, with curled and oily tresses, a silky moustache, a turndown shirt-collar, and richly embroidered satin doublure to his dress coat. A broken baton, inserted in his button-hole, symbolical of the silence imposed upon his Sunday Bands, might, while conveying a bitter taunt to the fainthearted Pre mier, touch a sympathetic chord in the heart of St. Marylebone. A Baron's Coronet would be at present premature, if not imperti• neut. MR. WILSON. Unsightly as is the modern hat, vested rights should not rashly be interfered with. But, the shop should be sunk as much as possible. The chapeau should be placed naturally on the bench or ou the floor when the House is -to be electrified by some flash of financial eloquence. It should not be held in the hand, by way of advertise ment, with the inside facing the andience, so that the maker's name or the price of the article be not ostentatiously forced upon their notice. It should not be too frequently or too carefully smoothed with the coatsleeve. Nor, on the other hand, should a glaringly shabby sombrero be adopted, as the vulgar proverb might thereby be suggested that the nobler, or the cobler's wife, is always the worst shod in the parish. The coat and continuations usually worn cannot easily be im proved upon. .. O . 4. '