I will not, however, take instances from our own country of Royal Snobs, but refer to a neighbouring kingdom, that of Brentford--and its monarch, the late great and lamented Gorgius IV.With the same humility with which the footmen at the 'King's Arms' gave way before the Plush Royal, the aristocracy of the Brentford nation bent down and truckled before Gorgius, and proclaimed him the first gentleman in Europe.And it's a wonder to think what is the gentlefolks' opinion of a gentleman, when they gave Gorgius such a title.
What is it to be a gentleman? Is it to be honest, to be gentle, to be generous, to be brave, to be wise, and, possessing all these qualities, to exercise them in the most graceful outward manner? Ought a gentleman to be a loyal son, a true husband, and honest father? Ought his life to be decent--his bills to be paid--his tastes to be high and elegant--his aims in life lofty and noble? In a word, ought not the Biography of a First Gentleman in Europe to be of such a nature that it might be read in Young Ladies' Schools with advantage, and studied with profit in the Seminaries of Young Gentlemen? I put this question to all instructors of youth--to Mrs.Ellis and the Women of England; to all schoolmasters, from Doctor Hawtrey down to Mr.Squeers.I conjure up before me an awful tribunal of youth and innocence, attended by its venerable instructors (like the ten thousand red-cheeked charity-children in Saint Paul's), sitting in judgment, and Gorgius pleading his cause in the midst.Out of Court, out of Court, fat old Florizel! Beadles, turn out that bloated, pimple-faced man!--If Gorgius MUST have a statue in the new Palace which the Brentford nation is building, it ought to be set up in the Flunkeys' Hall.
He should be represented cutting out a coat, in which art he is said to have excelled.He also invented Maraschino punch, a shoe-buckle (this was in the vigour of his youth, and the prime force of his invention), and a Chinese pavilion, the most hideous building in the world.
He could drive a four-in-hand very nearly as well as the Brighton coachman, could fence elegantly, and it is said, played the fiddle well.And he smiled with such irresistible fascination, that persons who were introduced into his august presence became his victims, body and soul, as a rabbit becomes the prey of a great big boa-constrictor.
I would wager that if Mr.Widdicomb were, by a revolution, placed on the throne of Brentford, people would be equally fascinated by his irresistibly majestic smile and tremble as they knelt down to kiss his hand.
If he went to Dublin they would erect an obelisk on the spot where he first landed, as the Paddylanders did when Gorgius visited them.We have all of us read with delight that story of the King's voyage to Haggisland, where his presence inspired such a fury of loyalty and where the most famous man of the country--the Baron of Bradwardine--coming on board the royal yacht, and finding a glass out of which Gorgius had drunk, put it into his coatpocket as an inestimable relic, and went ashore in his boat again.But the Baron sat down upon the glass and broke it, and cut his coat-tails very much; and the inestimable relic was lost to the world for ever.Onoble Bradwardine! what old-world superstition could set you on your knees before such an idol as that?
If you want to moralise upon the mutability of human affairs, go and see the figure of Gorgius in his real, identical robes, at the waxwork.--Admittance one shilling.Children and flunkeys sixpence.Go, and pay sixpence.
