Notes and Queries, Number 202, September 10, 1853: A Medium of Inter-communication for Literary Men, Artists, Antiquaries, Geneologists, etc.Various
History
Notes and Queries, Number 202, September 10, 1853: A Medium of Inter-communication for Literary Men, Artists, Antiquaries, Geneologists, etc.
Various
Questions and answers -- Periodicals
"When I ask [says Sackville to Ferdinand], didst ever thou consult
A chief, till now, and wait the sage result?
When Aalm's camp was deluged all in rain,
And floods rusht o'er an undistinguisht plain,
To thy flint heart remonstrances were vain:
What, then, avail'd neglected Marlbro's prayers!
His instances? His unremitted cares?
The Elector's stables had sufficient room,
Stalls, without end, anticipate the doom
Of British chargers, forced to march, at noon,
Beneath their riders' weight and scorching sun."
Swinney then gives in a note what he calls the genuine queries proposed
by Prince Ferdinand, with Sackville's answer: which answer is nearly
as void of distinct meaning as the poetry, but in favour I think of
risking a battle. The general purport, however, foreshadows what
Swinney's conclusion would have been--that Sackville, the friend of
the British soldier, protested against the frauds by which they were
robbed and starved; protested against their being called on to do all
the work, and run all the risks of the campaign; and disdains to humour
or flatter Prince Ferdinand. These were, in brief, the explanations
given by Sackville's friends as the cause of his disgrace--Granby
the favoured, a gallant soldier indeed, but a mere soldier, being
comparatively indifferent about such commissarial matters, and much more
easily deceived by the cunning of the selfish Germans and English. This
intention is made still more clear in another note, wherein Swinney
states:
"We may be enabled to account for a certain disgraceful event,
in some future observation of ours, equally to _the honour
of the person disgraced_, and to the innocent cause of that
disgrace."
Under these circumstances there can be little doubt that Sidney
Swinney, D.D., was the party alluded to by Junius; as little, I think,
that Swinney had before, and long before, spoken to Lord George
Sackville,--must have been dear to Sackville, as one of the few who
had served under, and yet had a kind word to say for him,--had said it
indeed, and was about to repeat it emphatically. That Swinney was the
fool Junius asserted, the extract already given must have abundantly
proved; but I will conclude with one other, in which he not only
anticipated Fitzgerald, but anticipated the burlesque exaggerations in
the "Rejected Addresses:"
"Horse, Foot, Hussars, or ere they march review'd.
...
The Foot, that form the first and second line,
All smartly drest, like Grecian heroes shine;
Their bold cock'd hats, their spatterdashers white,
And glossy shoes, attract his ravish'd sight."
T. S. J.
* * * * *
TOM, MYTHIC AND MATERIAL.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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