The Sun.
London, England, 1854-08-16 00:00:00

THE NEW SATIRE.

Firmilian • or, the Student of Badajoz. A Spas-
. medic Tragedy, By T. Percy Jones. Black-
wood and Sons.
' Whoever wrote this " spasmodic tragedy" of
Firmilian is evidently one well qualified to—
" Laugh and shake in Rabethlis' easy chair."
For we accept it, at once, not, as a weekly contem-
porary has already somewhat egregiously done, as
a serious effort at the sublime, but as a sly satire
on the spasmodic school of poetry rather popular of
late among certain young poetasters of the present
generation—in other words, as a fresh and lively
illustration of the result of the " one step" beyond
the sublime—into the region of the ridiculous.
The truth of this, we take it, is emblazoned upon
the very title-page. The author's name there given
we receive without an instant's hesitation as a
simple nom de plume. Nay—we are almost dis-
posed to reiterate our recognition of the veritable
" Simon Pure" through the harlequin mask of T.
Percy Jones, of Streatham—no other, let us say
candidly, as we have intimated before in these
columns, no other than W. Edmonstoune Aytoun, of
Edinburgh. We suspected that one of the twin
humorists to whom we have-been indebted so often
long ago for many a hearty guffaw over the gay
" Ballads of Bon Gaultier" we suspected that one
of these delightful humorists had something to do
with the matter now in band upon the occasion
when Firmilian was first introduced to the notice
of the reading public through extracts and critical
commentaries, the latter half solemn, half jocose,
in the May number of Blackwood's Magazine. We
acknowledged our conviction plainly, almost in so
many words, in The Sun of Monday evening, July
the 3d, our conviction that is, that "T. P. Jones"
was the alias of Aytoun, just as " Boz" was that
of Dickens, or as " Drapier" was that of
Swift, or as "M. A. Titmarsh" was that
of Thackeray. . We are only confirmed in
this belief by. reflection and after having read
through the whole Fifteen Scenes, extending
over 153 pages of the spasmodic tragedy of Firmi-
lian, now in its integrity or entirety issued in an
elegant little volume from the Messrs. Blackwood's
establishment. We may be mistaken, of course,
in our conjecture. But we cannot for the life of
us resist the notion that for this clever, humorous,
satirical " poem" we have reason to thank not a
T. P. Jones in the flesh, but a W. E. Aytoun in
the spirit, not a new and more preposterous poet.
ling of Cockaigne, but
Of Mister Colt . • -He who sung
who framed
Of Widdicomb, the wild and wondrous song :"
who chaunted—
" How Wordsworth, battling for the laureat's wreath,
Bore to the dust the terrible Fitzball
How N. P. Willis, for his country's good,
In complete steel, all bowie-knifed at point,
Took lodgings in the Snapping Turtle's womb
:"who, in his own grandiloquent L'Envoy,
thus pre-
pares his reader for the glories of the coming tra-
vestie—
" For you, bright•harped' Tennyson shall sing -
Macaulay chaunt a more than Roman lay ;
And Bulwer Lytton, Lytton Bulwer erst,
Unseen amidst a metaphysic fog,
Howl melancholy homage to the man ;
For you once more Montgomery shall rave
In all his rapt rabidity of rhyme ;
Nankeon'd Cockaigne shall pipe his puny note,
And our Young England's penny trumpet blow."
Open Firmilian, as every book should be opened,
at the beginning, and the method of its madness is
at once apparent. The tragic mask is awry—and
you see at a glance underneath the wrinkling lines
of laughter, the dimpling cheek, and the sparkling
eye of the humorist. The motley of the droll
glimmers out here and there through all the pomp
of the trappings donned by the assumed tragedian.
Firmilian (of course a poet) is seated (of course in
his study) reading—meditating a caracolle upon
the back of poor old hackneyed Pegasus, whereby
" to witch the world with noble horsemanship !"
Preparing, that is to say, for the production of a
poetic masterpiece such as shall [hear him, as he
himself describes it !]
• . recreate stupendous harmonies,
Moro grand in diapason than the roll
Among the mountains of the thunder-psalm."
It is a favourite trick, this, of the Young Poets of
the Now—not, we may well believe, of the Here-
after ! Well, Firmilian, like so many brothers of
the lyre his contemporaries, aspires to write this
grand poem so: often dreamt of of late, as he him-
self represents it—
" To make his song a trumpet, and to shake
The earth to its foundations."
He selects, as the fitting theme for the revelation
of his genius—CAIN—ignoring the existence, to be
sure, of a mere trifle upon the same subject like
Lord Byron's " Mystery. ' But—here is the diffi-
culty recognised by the student of Badajoz on the
instant. How befittingly describe the Remorse of
Cain without having first had experience of remorse
oneself? " Aye, there's the rub." Firmilian
asks himself—plump—in a single line, pregnant
with crimes to come by way of answer, this some-
what startling question—
. " What do I know as yet of homicide?"
His reply is no less tersely expressed, prompt, and
sententious— "Nothing." Doubtless, however,
the words "as yet" have entered his mind as a
consolation. " What do I know as yet of homi-
cide 1" He may compensate by the Future for
any Past and Present deficiency. He may still
make up for lost time. His resolve -is taken—to
do so ! Through homicide he may be enabled at
length to realise remorse—and, having realised it,
he may write becomingly the biblical tragedy Of
Cain. Having recognised this, he naturally enough
puts an end to all his doubts by declaring simply
—" It is resolved." First, however, for something
to inspirit him for the speedily carrying out his
determination.

"" A draught of wine ! (Drinks.)
Ha ! this revives me !"
A melodramatic proceeding something kindred
to that of_ Mr. Richard Swiveller, when,
" leaning his left arm heavily upon
the table
and raising his voice and his right leg
after the
manner of a theatrical bandit," he inquired "The
Baron Sampsono Brasso and his fair sister are, (you
tell me) at the Play ?" Or rather still more resem-
bling Mr. Swiveller's behaviour directly after-
wards, when exclaiming, "'Ha ! 'Tis well. But
no matter. Some wine there. Ho !' he illustrated
these melodramatic morsels by handing the tan-
kard to himself with great humility; receiving it
haughtily, drinking from it thirstily, and smacking
new indicating his lips fiercely." As the historian takes occasion
to inform us there and then—much to the amaze-
mentFi
effectsr n i / ioaf n .
the
pßefreshedotatie
n,
Student of Badajoz thus ex
How thrievanle
of the Marchioness. However, to return to
presses
at
winning Remorse through
aatnrhttrhoeu:gunhn
tahlal
Itli f
thekstse taj o,Pyd beside
by his draught of wine, the
efficacy in adding
, and to give the
the rapturous
close
its
s
, force to his resolve, about
Thou purple-lipped L
weight of arrnoulu3
my frame ! There's not a god
LTIAnoi
:
Of the Olympian revel
The foaming cups to Liebe—
Neptune, and fin s heels,
Yaativis 'ereAinGd
atnhyoum'retdest,rong
To see thee trip up iron Ville, how,
ircles ill rn I'd laugh
bhuilslybianegk,Mars,
ProstratewithallhoilsdwNe
IF
ahrofa.Onenly floor !
Down with a clatter on the
Not Jove himself dare risk
ll with thee,
ofLo, 1 (Ir.
Ley
sourik aaili,
grows firm,
Who is it to be ? His be-
LAAosnrldht of the
wthheieezth venom
panthers
venoms
ec!
It is resolved ! Come, then, rayystve.i
Thou raven-mother,—come
and emus Guilt,
With thy black beverage." fill my cup
His betrothed
in inevitable sequence,
the inquiry—
“ Thenßu t cotmhees; i.ctiin e
loved ?—Lilian.
[Both, observe ! slyly -
the " naoated grange."?-111ariana—of
One
beauty ?—lndiana. after
minding one of Tennysonian maidens. 1161.2nother these
His re-
talorienas victims,
y afford him
remorse sufficiently poignant--for his. purpose.
rdeejsetertuedeti(ofnorofthwehpomre.swenotuladtscarcei_
at length upon killino• b -
.0-- y poison
infused into the wine cups at a
say,indicates a l
l eul
forg the first gaY supper that
evenina—his three intimate
resolves
areH thet
the sensual,
friends
and fellow-students, Garcia personalerez Alphonso
D'Aguilar, and Alonzo Oliyarez. T-11
--kis project is
pronounced
carried out, after a squabble about the sensuous, or
rather,e egree
e
julliPcoheatrryinhyofana
upon
time—
and we rejoice to note also for the only time—his
shouldtiFieircmojuiirasne
right to his humorously affected position as a repre-
outburst of gross and exaggerated pruriency, The
passage is absolutely revolting, from its rank volup-
sentative of the Spasmodic School of
tuousness. Reverting to the plot—the deed is, as
we have said, done, and done, too, most effectively,
but not by any means effectually. The
first crime
is committed—Perez, D'Aguilar and Olivarez are
poisoned, dead, even interred—but, alas !
there is
no remorse afterwards for Firmiliau. His earliest
adventure has failed deplorably. He
must try
again—attempt_ some crime of larger and deadlier
atrocity. A hint is happily taken from a conver-
sation overheard by the Student of Badajoz—a
dialogue between a Graduate and a Priest in the
cloisters. The result of this hint, and of Firmiliaies
after meditation over it, is magnificent. He turns
Guy Fawkes on a colossal scale—blows up a whole
cathedral, with its priests and its congregation.
Listen ! The scene is the " exterior of the Cathe-
dral of St. Nicholas—Choir heard chauntin
r, a 'WI .th -
in." Enter Firmiliall :
" How darkly hangs yon cloud above the spire ;
There's thunder in the air—

What if the flash
Should rend the solid walls, and reach the 'fault
Where my terrestrial thunder lies prepared,
414 no, withat octio E 27 Jamul,