The Press.
London, England, 1856-02-09 00:00:00

THE PRESS.

Sixteen pages of the present volume of the
" Noctes " aro occupied by North's defence of
Croker. It is really a most artful piece of
writing. It begins thus :

Tickler : Let us exchange such indefinite generalities
for a few pointed particulars, if you please ; else, depend
on't, Fancy will be falling asleep. What is your opinion,
North, of Croker's edition of " Boswell's Johnson ?"
North : The same—generally—as that of the Westminster
reviewer.
Tickler : Ay! And pray what is that?
North : That it is the best variorum edition since the
revival of letters. . _

Tickler: Croker is certainly one of the cleverest and
mutest of living men.
Shepherd : No unlike yourself• sir, I jalouse.
North : He is—and much more. He is a man of great
abilities, and an admirable scholar. But he is much more
than that—he is a political writer of the highest order, as
many of his essays in the Quarterly Review prove—which
are full of the philosophy of history.
The " philosophy of history " was not Mr.
Croker's forte. He was always an acute, but
never a deep, thinker; and his mind wanted
originality. But of his powerful speeches
against the Reform Bill we shall always re-
thin a grateful recollection. Ho carried the
palm of superior eloquence in the Lower
House on that occasion. He showed with
uncommon clearness the thoroughly " party "
character of " the Bill," but he was erro-
neous in his estimate of its final effect
upon England. In the " philosophy of
history" applicable to those times he
was strikingly deficient. He did not know
that the popular abuses were to be conquered
by popular remedies, and that a recurrence to
mere class prejudices was " too late." Sir
Archibald Alison has truly stated in his history
of those days that the Wellington Ministry
and its system tended to class-power, which is
always invidious in a country like England.
That truth was then perceived by a youthful
statesman, •,vho strongly encouraged the Tory
party to counteract the sham " Liberal " mea-
sures of the Whig oligarchy by bringing
forward real popular measures. Mr. Croker
ought not to have been in such despair of the
country as to have quitted the Senate. On
his legs he was a most formidable debater ; and
his appeal to the mace, and allusions to Crom-
well, have often since been ably imitated by
Sir James graham, with at least great his-
trionic effect.

Of the skill with which North panics Mr.
Macaulay's gleaming blade we shall give some
specimens :

North : The reviewer says :—" In one place we are told
that Allan Ramsay the painter was born in 1709 and died
in 1781; in another that he died in 1784, in the seventy-
first year of his age. if the latter statement be correct he
must have been born in or about 1713."

Shepherd : Hoo's that, sir? That maun be a blunter o'
Croker's.

North : No, James ; it is but a dishonest trick of his re-
viewer. The age is stated differently in the two notes; but
one note is Mr. Croker's and one is Mr. Boswells. Mr.
Boswell states colloquially that " Allan Ramsay died in
17M4, in his seventy-tirst year;" Mr. Croker states, with
more precision, that " he Wag born in 1709, and died in
1754," and Mr. Croker is right—see, if you choose,
" Biographical Dictionary," core Ramsay—and thus, be-
cause Mr. Croker corrects an error, the reviewer accuses
him of making one.

And again, this is dexterous :
North : Tickler, lend me your ears. The reviewer says,
" Mr. Croker says, that at the commencement of the inti-
macy between 1)r. Johnson and Mrs. Thrale, in 1765, the
lady was twenty-five years old."
Shepherd : \Vha the deevil cares hoo auld she was ?
Tickler : Well, North, what then?

North: Why, Mr. Croker says no such thing. He says,
" Mrs. Thrale was twentv-five years of age when the ac-
quaintance commenced," but he does not say when it com-
menced, nor when it became intimacy. It is Mr. Boswell
who states that in 1705 Mr. Johnson was introduced into
the family of Mrs. Thrale, but in the very next page we
find Mrs. Thrale herself stating that the acquaintance
began in 1704, and the more strict intimacy might be dated
from 1706. So that the discrepancy of two or three years
which, by a double falsification of Mr. Croker's words, the
reviewer attributes to him, belongs really to Mr. Boswell
and Mrs. Thrale themselves!

The Shepherd's exclamation about the sable
personage, whose name we shall not pro-
nounce, is adroitly interjected, in order to con-
vey an idea to the reader of the littleness of the
points at issue. But, unfortunately, much of
Mr. Croker's own fierce articles turned on
such Lilliputian flaws.

Coming to the loose and inaccurate writing
of Mr. Croker about Byng's execution, it is
interesting to observe the gladiatorial vigour
with which North endeavours to defend him.

SATURDAY,

In the original edition the statement was made
thus:—

" Nothing," says Mr. Croker, " can be more unfounded
than the assertion that Byng fell a martyr to political party.
By a strange coincidence of circumstances, it happened
that there was a total change of administration between
his condemnation and death, so that one party presided at
his trial and another at his execution. There can be no
stronger proof that he was not a political martyr."

Upon that statement Mr. Ma2aulay struck
hard, distorting what North calls ",what may
" be a verbal inaccuracy," and making it appear
much worse. Professor Ferrier then supplies
a note :

In the subsequent reprints this sentence stands as
follows:—" By a strange coincidence of circumstances, it
happened that there was a total change of Ministry between
the accusation and the sentence, so that one party pre-
pared the trial and the other directed the execution." If
Mr. Croker had originally stated the case in this way there
would have been no ground for Mr. Macaulay's objection,
and no necessity for Mr. North's vindication.
Elsewhere, also, Professor Ferrier gives Nlr.
Macaulay the advantage by printing a long
note from his reprinted essays touching Mr.
Croker's undoubted blunder about Gibbon.
Mr. Macaulay wrote, in the original review :

But we must proceed. These volumes contain mis-
takes more gross, if possible, than any that we have yet
mentioned. Boswell has recorded some observations made
by Johnson on the changes which took place in Gibbon's
religious opinions. " It is said," cried the doctor, laughing,
" that he has been a Mahommedan." " This sarcasm," says

the editor, " probably alludes to the tenderness with which
Gibbon's malevolence to Christianity induced him to treat
Mahommedanism in his history." Now the sarcasm was
uttered in 1776 ; and that part of the " History of the
Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire " which relates to
Mahommedanism was not published till 1788, twelve years
after the date of this conversation, and nearly four years
after the death of Johnson.

There he had his foe on the hip, and hit him
with merciless severity. What could North do
in such a case ? He had to fall back on his
invention, and he V% rote the following astonish-
ing passage :

Tickler : What, does the reviewer doubt that Mr. Croker
is right, and that Gibbon was the person intended ?
North: Certainly not. He adopts, without acknow-
lodgment, Mr. Croker's interpretation, but then turns
round and says, " You have given a bad reason for a just
conclusion." Then why does the reviewer not give a better,
and state why he adopts Mr. Croker's op nion, if he is not
satisfied with Mr. Croker's reason? The fact is, the poor
creature is at his skeleton work again. He found that the
origin of Mahomutedanisni, which sprung up about the
year 600, could not be chronologically included in the first
volume of Gibbon, which ends about the year 300. And
he kindly informs Mr Croker that Gibbon's account of
Mahotnmedanism was not published till after Johnson's
death ; but he chooses to forget that in every page of his
first volume, as of his last, Gibbon takes or makes oppor-
tunities of sneering at and depreciating Christianity, while,
on the other hand, he shows everywhere remarkable
" tenderness " for Paganism and Mahomruedanistn.

But Mr. Macaulay, when reprinting the
essay, took care to sound his lash again, and
alluded specially to North :

A defence of this blunder [Croker's about Gibbon] was
attempted [in likekwood'a Magazine]. That the celebrated
chapters in which Gibbon has traced the progress of Ma-
hommedanism were not written in 1776 could not be
denied ; but it was confidently asserted that his partiality
to Mahommedanism appeared in his first volume. This
assertion is untrue. No passage which can by any art be
construed into the faintest indication of the faintest par•
tiality for Mahommedanism has ever been quoted, or ever
will be quoted, from the first volume of the " History of
the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire."
And Professor Ferrier then quotes Mr.
Croker's own confession, which is made with
singular coolness :

I now incline to believe, as was suggested by Mr.
Macaulay, that it LJohnson's sarcasm about Gibbon's
Mahonimedanism] may have referred to some Oxford
rumours of earlier infidelity.
-

But, in fairness, we must ask, why did not
Professor Ferrier give all the notes in the last
edition (one volume) of Croker's " Boswell's
Johnson"? Mr. Croker there replied at last
to Mr. Macaulay's attacks; and in the index to
that volume may be seen, " Macaulay, Thomas
B„ blunders of ditto, ignorance of," &c., &C.
But we must close these citations, which we
have made to show the rare agility of Wilson,
who had certainly extraordinary versatility of
talent. Recollecting what Mr. Macaulay is
now, we may smile at the parting allusion to
him :

Tickler: Can this be the same pseudo• Samson who
supposes he slew Southey and Sadler—and that he has
now smitten Croker under the fifth rib?

North: The same, and I lament to see a young man of
his endowments a prey to such pitiful impulses of malice,
which, impotent as are the fumblings they excite, cannot
tail to weaken the intellect they degrade down to such