The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser. — Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1855-12-11 00:00:00

SUPPLEMENT TO THE LIVERPOOL STANDARD. ssertion, a denial, a taunt, a compliment, a joke, and fifty other things, became in the present instance, with a significance beyond all power of written expression, our familiar English " I believe you!"—" Haha! You are right I A gentleman lam ! And a gentleman I'll live, and a gentleman I'll die ! It's my intent to be a gentleman. It's my game. Death of my soul, I play it out wherever Igo !" He changed his posture to a sitting one, crying with a triumphant air: " Here I am ! See me ! Shaken out of destiny's dicebox into the company of a mere smuggler ;—shut up with a poor little con traband trader, whose papers are wrong, and whom the police lay hold of, besides, for placing his boat (as a means of getting beyond the frontier) at the disposition of other little people whose papers are wrong; and he instinctively recognises my position, even by this light and in this place. It's well done! By Heaven! I win, however the game g oes ." A ga i n hi s moustac h e went up, and his nose came down. " What's the hour, now ?" he asked, with a dry hot pallor -upon him, rather difficult of association with merriment.—" A little half-hour after mid-day."--" Good ! The President will have a gentle man before him soon. Come ! Shall I tell you on what ac cusation P It must be now or never, for I shall not return here. Either I shall go free, or I thall go to be made ready for shaving. You know where they keep the razor." Signor Cavalletto took his cigarette from between his parted lips, and showed more momentary discomfiture than might have been expected. " I am a'—(Monsieur Rigaud stood up to say it)—l am a cosmopolitan gentle man. I own no particular country. My father was Swiss—Canton de Vaud. My mother was French by blood, English by birth. I myself was born in Belgium. I am a citizen of the world." His theatrical air, as he stood with one arm on his hip, within the folds of his cloak, together with his manner of disregarding his com panion and addressing the opposite wall instead, seemed to intimate that he was rehearsing for the President, whose examination he was shortly to undergo, rather than troubling himself merely to enlighten so small a person as John Baptist Cavalletto. "Call me five-and-thirty-years of age. I have seen the world. I have lived here, and lived there, and lived like a gentleman everywhere. I have been treated and respected as a gentleman uni versally. If you try to prejudice me, by making out that I have lived by my wits—how do your lawyers live—your politicians —your intriguers —your men of the Exchange ?" He kept his small smooth hand in con stant requisition, as if it were a witness to his gentility, that had often done him good service before. " Two years ago I came to Marseilles. I admit that I was poor; I had been ill. When your lawyers, your politicians, your intriguers, your men of the Exchange, fall ill, and have not scraped money together, they become poor. I put up at the Cross of Gold,—kept then by Monsieur Henri Barronneau—sixty-6ve at least, and in a failing state of health. I had lived in the house some four months, when Monsieur Henri Barronneau had the misfortune to die;—at any rate, not a rare misfortune, that. It 'happens without any aid of mine, pretty often." John Baptist having smoked his cigarette down to his fingers' ends, Monsieur Rigaud had the magnanimity to throw him another. He lighted the second at the ashes of the first, and smoked on, looking sideways at his companion, who, pre -occupied with his own case, hardly looked at him. " Monsieur Barronneau left a widow. She was two-and-twenty. She bad gained a reputation for beauty, and (which is often another thing) was beautiful. I continued to live at the Cross of Gold. I married Madame Barronneau. It is not for me to say whether there was any great disparity in such a match. Here I stand, with the contamination of a jail upon me; but it is possible that you may think me better suited to her than her former husband was." He bad a certain air of being a handsome man —which he was not; and a certain air of being a well-bred man—which he was not. It was mere swagger and challenge ; but in this particular, as in many others, blustering assertion goes for proof, half over the world. "Be it as it may, Madame Barronneau approved of me. That is not to prejudice me I hope? His eye happening to light upon John Baptist with this inquiry; that little man briskly shook his head in the negative, and repeated in an argumentative tone under his breath, altro, altro, altro, altro—an infinite number of times. " Now came the difficulties of our position. lam proud. I say nothing in defence of pride ; but lam proud. It is also my character to govern. I can't submit ; I must govern. Unfortunately, the property of Madame Rigaud was settled upon herself. Such was the insane act of her late husband. More unfortunately still, she had relations. When a wife's relations interpose against a husband who is a gentleman, who is proud, and who must govern, the consequences are inimical to peace. There was yet another source of difference between us. Madame Rigaud was unfortunately a little vulgar. I sought to improve her manners and ameliorate her general tone ; she (supported in this likewise by her relations) re sented my endeavours. Quarrels began to arise between us ; and, propagated and exaggerated by the slanders of the relations of Madame Rigaud, to become notorious to a 202 .81 the neighbours. It has been said that I treated Madame Rigaud with cruelty. I may have been seen to slap her face—nothing more. I have a light hand; and if I have been seen apparently to correct Madame Rigttud in that manner, I have done it almost playfully." If the playful ness of Monsieur Rigaud was at all expressed by his smile at this point, the relations of Madame Rigaud might have said that they would have much preferred his correcting that unfortunate woman seriously. " I am sensitive and brave. Ido not advance it as a merit to be sensitive and brave, but it is my character. If the male relations of Madame Rigaud had put themselves forward openly, I should have known how to deal with them. They knew that, and their machinations were conducted in secret ; consequenily, Madame Rigaud and I were brought into frequent and unfortunate collision. Even when I wanted any little sum of money for my personal expenses, I could not obtain it without a collision —and I too, a man whose character it is to govern ! One night, Madame Rigaud and myself were walking amicably—l may say like lovers— on a height overhanging the sea. An evil star occasioned Madame Rigaud to advert to her relations; I reasoned with her on that subject, and remonstrated on the want of duty, and devotion manifested in her allowing herself to be influenced by their jealous animosity towards her husband. Madame Rigaud retorted; I retorted. Madame Rigaud grew warm ; I grew warm, and provoked her. I admit it. Frankness is a part of my character. At length, Madame Rigaud, in an access of fury that I. must ever deplore, threw herself upon me with screams of passion (no doubt those that were overheard at some distance), tore my clothes, tore my hair, lacerated my hands, trampled and trod the dust, and finally leaped over, dashing herself to death upon the rocks below. Such is the train of incidents which malice has perverted into my endeavouring to force from Madame Rigaud a relin quishment of her rights; and, on her persistence in a re fusal to make the concession I required, struggling with her—assassinating her !" The above most happily-sketched bit of auto biography appears to us " something new under the sun" of Charles Dickens' literary zodiac ; and, from the force of its suggestive accuracy, and the perfect keeping of its accessories, we are inclined to augur well his dramatic success in the treatment of such characters. From the intro duction it is not unfair to believe that ere " Little Dorrit" is completed, Monsieur Rigaud will be come more familiar to the readers of the work. He comes upon the stage with a strut becoming " the gay, bold-faced villain," and in many of his lineaments there will be readily traced the peculiar features of a criminal whose case, not many years ago, occupied a great portion of the general at tention, and formed a conspicuous object of con sideration in the judicial and other circles of Dublin. Copious, although not numerous, as our ex tracts have already been, we have not been able to introduce any of the leading dramatis persona, with the exception, perhaps, of M. Rigaud, whom as yet we can only conjecture as belonging to that category; but we have not said a word about Mr. and Mrs. Meagles, the type of the English practical man and matron ; of their interesting daughter " Pet," and her singularly-named maid " Tattycoram," a ll o f whom are introduced in the first part, and so pleasingly or amusingly presented as to afford very tempting material for quotation; but we must desist, and in doing so con clude our present observations by advising all to procure the book, and read it for themselves. The Life and Works of Goethe : with Sketches of his Age and Contemporaries, from published and unpublished sources. By G. H. Lewes. London : Nutt. The two volumes which Mr. Lewes has con structed out of the great mass and still rapidly accumulating collection of materials connected with the literary life and history of Goethe form a valuable addition to the literature of the day. The author has obviously employed great pains upon the work, and has brought to bear upon it a mind capable of exercising the most vigorous condensation without impairing the lucidity of his narrative, and to prastice compression while he carefully preserves the beauty of symmetry. In executing his task he has performed a Jove in such a manner as to confer a upon the English reading public. studying and perseverance in masters , ject are clearly manifested in the hal which he has been enabled to present before the world. The result of his applied labours is the production of a containing all that the general reader know, and that has been put before pleasing and perspicuous light. Like many of the world's most di.. men, Goethe was the son of a clever and tempered woman, who, while recogelf pride as well as maternal solicitude the of future greatness which her gifted sell at an early period of his boyhood, was prompt and skilful i n ren d er i ng assistance development of his peculiar genius. Jo: quick in discernment, she delighted to • stories for her son's amusement ; and these of a fanciful charact er , th ey became 'll°' nating for the opening intellect of her son, and he and hi s mo th er b ecame , fr° , early period of his life, devoted and 1 0 ' panions. In the biography before us many illustration s o f th e p rover b, t hat ~ is father of the man," but in none, ' this better illustrated than in the anni of MOTHER AND SON. His mother spoiled him somewhat. On Suncl' while the family is at church, Master Wo lfgr self in the kitchen, which looks up the street. begins to fling the crockery into the str e et, de) smashing music which it makes, and stimulat e probation of the brothers Ochsenstein, who from over the way. The plates and dishes ' way, as his mother returns : she sees the housewifely horror melting into girlish sY' hears how heartily the little fellow laughs • and how the neighbours laugh at him. (80 1,; This genial, indulgent mother employed b e t story-telling to his and her own delight. "N 'T ' and water, I represente d under the forms °.f and to all natural phenomena I gave a mew/il ea almost believed mo re f ervent l y t h an my l i tt le we thought of paths w hi c h l e d f rom star to e', ar we should one day inhabit the stars, and th; great spirits we sho u ld meet t h ere, I was es el; hours of story-tellin g as th e children thenlee quite curious about the future course of m y 0 0 tion, and any invitation which interrupted the was disagreeable. There I sat, and there W' me with his large black eyes; and when the his favourites was not according to his faneY' angry veins swell on his temples, I saw him tears. He often burst in with But, mother, won't marry the nasty tailor, even if he does kl And when I made a pause for the night, prof. tinue it on the morrow, I was certain that be meanwhile think it out for himself, and so be lated my imagination. When I turned the sto to his plan, and told him that he had found do t ment, then he was all fire and,fl ime, and one little heart beating underneath his dress! It who made a great pet of him, was the col ideas as to how the story would turn out, nested these to me, and I turned the storY these hints, there was a little diplomatic seceelro) which we never di sc l ose d. I h a d t h e pleasure( af my story to the delight and astonishment ° l op and Wolfgang s aw w i t h g r ow i ng eyes the fa,tics own conceptions, and li s t ene d with enthtle° l '; What a charming glimpse of mother and sod • e The beautifully ex p resse d f ee li n g °I and filial attachment implied in the, picture, although sufficiently evinced ' sage quoted, receives additional inter(' fact that the marriage of Goethe's ! not been one of love, at least on th e r . 1 1 bo side ; and that her boy having bee° - b she was but eighteen years of age, - u p tog' of both m a y b e sa id to have grool. s u e " I and my Wolfgng," says she, 111 bee s; " have always held fast to eac h o ther, were sioll were both young together," an e x Pi - w hi c l timent which has some novelty, 1)11 , foi seems little reason to doubt, human P OI,' the principles and affections of ed i tc o From infancy, Goethe was accustomed into abstruse metaphysical inquiries, and r is deeply , [DECEMBER 11, ,R 11, l'' 'Ctly, 'med a 13 1 E'er a great ih e • Dill . 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