The Press.
London, England, 1853-11-12 00:00:00

THE PRESS.

SKETCHES OF RADICALS.

5. THE RADICAL POET.

I DO not consider the ordinary British Radical very friendly to polite
letters. He is too hard and stern. He prefers "at copy of the Times
newspaper," you know, to the most famous literary productions. He
is not very susceptible to the beautiful generally, but turns everything
to a practical account—as wild roses are gathered annually in bushels to
be used in making chemical drugs That immense hubbub which is made
about the diffusion of knowledge, and so forth, accordingly does not.
lead to a love of literature for literature's sake : no ; letters take their turn
with cotton and little children, and are toed. Knowledge becomes the
slave of agitation as Aladdin summoned the genie to get him dinners.
Thus—does the gifted Plebson, Ph.D., lecture on Shakspeare ?
He does ; and how? Why, " Shakspeare anal his political wisdom
—the " practical instruction in Shakspeare "—these are his themes.
He ransacks the plays for passages wherein—no matter how—anything
is said by any character unfavourable to kings, priests, or lords—and
presto ! he interprets these into attacks by the mighty William on
the political systems of the world. For instance, we quote from the
flay young Laertes,
" I tell thee, ►'huurlixh priext,
A ministering angel shall my aiater
When thou Hest howling,"

and (with a demonic emphasis on the words) proceeds to say that here
we may see how that great intellect loathed the tyranny of the Church !
(Roars of applause.) It is of no great importance what Plebson thinks
of Shakspeare, to be sure ; a modest man may remark, however,
what grand fellows Shakapeare made the feudal potentates to be—
what a noble old tradition it was which made the dramatists, from the
earliest times, choose princes and potentates as their embodiments of
all human excellence ; and how admirably our princely William has
delineated a certain school in the persons of Cade awl his friends.
But I must not linger with the gifted P. I only use him to illus-
trate the character of the Radical poet, who, on the same system, em-
ploys his vision and faculty divine not to write poetry, as poetry, or to
attempt that even, but to set to music (his music, such as it is) all
that Mawker does in philosophy, Bugby in history, Linuner on the
platform, and Ponto Sparks in the Cml. Thus a grand harmony is
maintained. In the orgies of polities, while Bugby prophesies and
yells, and Ponto jumps about like a baboon, and " Evoe," down " with
everything," is the fanatic cry, Squally, the poet, makes the timbrel
resound and the lute quaver in chorus with the crew ; the long-cared
everywhere gather to tlic mighty union of sound. and all goes on in
uproarious unison !
Squally is fond of giving himself fine names. Sometimes he is the
" Tyrtteus of Democracy," or the " Homer of the Movement." Some-
times, his friends having looked out rates in Ainsworth's Dictionary
and found that it signifies prophet us well as bard, and assuming the
premiss that Squally is a genuine bard, hold him up as a " seer," and
wish us to look with reverence on his rhymes. " Roar little louder,"
one of his best-known lucubrations, was played by organs, I believe,
over all England, and is better known than the songs of Merrick,
Tennyson, Shelley, and Withers put together, one reason why I
particularly admire a " popular" reputation in our enlightened day.
A charming chasteness, which rejects all undue ornament, a delicious
characterises the songs of this bard. Here, for instance,
mark :

" Rank shall then have nought to Nay,
Birth shan't make folks prouder;
Wealth won't hinder men from ploy,
Boar a little louder."

Compared with these, you observe, Tennyson's " Splendour falls "
is a ludicrously overwrought picture ; and, indeed, Squally no doubt
considers Tennyson overrated, and that Tom Paine, versified by Cat-
nut, is a higher species of composition than his, altogether.
Imagination is notoriously the highest poetic quality, and the
imagination of Squally is not allowed to lie idle. Does an indolent
and adventurous fellow in the country, after sleeping off the beer of
the morning, sally forth after sunset to nab pheasants, and playfully
maul a keeper with the assistance of his gun, Squally seizes the lyre, and
denounces the tyranny which consigns him to gaol. The lyrists of
antiquity loved the subject of Ixion, and every fellow on a treadmill is
an Ixion to Squally. With the facts he has nothing to do : let a
poacher be mentioned, and his imagination conjures up a picture of a
peaceful cottage, inhabited by a laborious but unfortunate peasant,
who, struggling long with destiny, at last succumbs, and who—who, in
fact, must be turned into that song which Squally has promised the
Regenerator, on the instant.
Squally loved', likewise, to " fraternise" with mankind generally.
He has always the word " brother " in his mouth, or " solidarity of
peoples," or something of the kind. To love your neighbour and to