The Sun.
London, England, 1842-02-01 00:00:00

FRASER'S MAGAZINE.

d to meet with Captain Siibertash
We are gilt
again, whose lively essay "On Manners, Fashion,
and Things in General' —a comprehensive range
of subjects—is one of the most agreeable papers
in the present Number. The Captain is spe-
cially minute and copious in his remarks on
Courtship and Love-making, and indulges in
divers sage reflections on the good old custom of
‘ shaking hands,".which he assures us, is " now
declining even in England. how much of dm-

ratter," he adds, " is evinced by the manner of
shaking hands! First and foremost, there is the
good, honest shake of the hand, that displays a
free and open nature, wishing you well from the
inmost of the heart. Then there is the cold,
phlegmatic shake, that tells you plainly, ' I don't
care a straw for you.' Then you have the pre-
tended squeeze, which would make you believe
that you are the dearest of mortals to a selfish
fellow who would not walk across the street to
save you from being drowned. Next, you have
the vulgar-minded man, who shakes hands with
you in a friendly manner, wishing you to under-
stand, however, that you owe such extreme
kindness to his great condescension only. There
are so many modes of displaying vulgarity
in the world, that it is not easy to determine
which is entitled to take precedence of the
others, though vulgar condescension is, perhaps,
the most offensive." Not so, it is simply the
most ridiculous. In remarking on marriage, the
author observes, " fortune-hunters, men of low
and second-rate character, make love for money
only, and marry for money; but no gentleman,
no man of gallant feeling ever sold himself for
mere cash." We like much the tone of this re-
mark, though it is not in accordance with the
money-getting propensities of the age. "A -
Letter from Barney Brallaghan to Oliver Yorke"
is the composition of one who has taken prodi-
gious pains to be dull and tiresome in his almost
unintelligible prose. We must do him the jus-
tice, however, to say, that in buniourous verse
he shows to great advantage, and his version of
the song of Brian O'Linn in Greek, Latin, and
English is ingenious in no ordinary degree.
" My Life and Times" is a continuation of Nim-
rod's Autobiography. We subjoin his sketch
of his mother, which conveys a vivid idea of the
peculiarities of the lady of the old school, who is
now seldom to be met with, except in the come-
dies and novels of the last century :
Her sense of female propriety was a little too strict for
the advancing spirit of the age, even, in its then young
days. Not only would some of her broad hints be con-
sidered as unreasonable, if not uncalled-for checks to

youthful mirth and gaiety , but she would, in her ;egatd
for female propriety, and, perhaps, for the benefit of her
daughters, occasionally have recourse to somewhat of the
authoritative in her manner. For example, if she saw
flirtation going on between a young couple, at a ball
or elsewhere, pressed, as she considered it to be, a
little too far, one of her " hems (!)" would act like elec-
tricity upon the happy swains,—at least, prove a damper
for the moment. Then, upon another point associated
with female propriety, she firmly resisted what I have
termed the advancing spirit of the age. I allude to
ladies calling their husbands by their Christian names,
a practice only coming into use •in my younger days.
" How horrible is it," she would say, " how like any state
but the married state, to hear the woman call the man
whom she is bound to look up and respect, by the fami-
liar and vulgar appellation of Tom, or Joe!" And she
was fond of enforcing her argument by an anecdote, on
record, of a Duke of Somerset, of days long since gone
by, who was remarkable for his observance of punctilio
in the marriage state, as well as throughout his entire
doniestic economy. His second Duchess, on some occa-
sion, in public, familiarly tapped him on the shoulder
with her fan • when he turned round, and, with a look
of marked displeasure, said, "My first Duchess was a
Percy, and she never took such a liberty."
In her own deportment—l mean in the carriage of
her person—there was a stiffness and formality observ-
able in the lady I speak of, which would attract notice
at the present day, but which, I conclude, was in
.cha-
racter with those to which lam alluding. I believe, un-
less in illness, she was never seen in what is called a
lounging position in her chair, neither did she ever touch
the back of her carriage with her back,—,a striking con-
trast this to the lolling, I was near saying indelicate,
position in which some of our modern ladies present
themselves in their carriages to the admiring spectators
of the present age—on a warm summer-day especially.
But it was not only to the daughters of her wealthy and
aristocratic neighbours that my good mother would
occasionally offer her advice, as to the propriety of their
conduct; she would occasionally •lecture the poor, who
might apply to her in their distress. One scene of this
description which I witnessed furnishes me with a point
true to our frail nature. A poor married woman was
telling her of some domestic troubles, which she in great
part attributed to the irregularities of her husband.
" Well," said my mother, "you have brought these
troubles on yourself ; I told you not to marry him. I was
sure he would not make you a good husband." "He is
not a good one, to be sure, Madam," replied the woman ;
" but lie is a power better than none."
The "History of a Wet Afternoon" gives the au-
thor, who seems well versed in English literature,
an opportunity ofindulgingin much pertinent poe-
tical criticism. He overrates, however, Tickell's
,Elegy on the Death of Addison, which is a very
common-place, prosaic affair, notwithstanding it
has been honoured with the approbation of
Goldsmith and Johnson. Tickell was a shrewd,
lively man of the world, who could toss off a hu-

mourous poem—as we have seen in his once ce-
lebrated political satire "An ticipation"—as well
as the best of his contemporaries; but he had
not a spark of genuine poetry in his composition.
He was a passable humourist—nothing more.
" A Day and Night among the Mountains" is a
tale told with feeling and simplicity.