The Betrothed

image of the author, was unanimously called to the chair, and Jonathan Oldbuck, Esq. of Monkbarns, was requested to act as Secretary.

The Preses then addressed the meeting to the following purpose:—

'Gentlemen, I need scarcely remind you, that we have a joint interest in the valuable property which has accumulated under our common labours. While the public have been idly engaged in ascribing to one individual or another the immense mass of various matter, which the labours of many had accumulated, you, gentlemen, well know, that every person in this numerous assembly has had his share in the honours and profits of our common success. It is, indeed, to me a mystery, how the sharp-sighted could suppose so huge a mass of sense and nonsense, jest and earnest, humorous and pathetic, good, bad, and indifferent, amounting to scores of volumes, could be the work of one hand, when we know the doctrine so well laid down by the immortal Adam Smith, concerning the division of labour. Were those who entertained an opinion so strange, not wise enough to know, that it requires twenty pairs of hands to make a thing so trifling as a pin—twenty couple of dogs to kill an animal so insignificant as a fox?—'

'Hout, man!' said a stout countryman, 'I have a grew-bitch at home will worry the best tod in Pomoragrains, before ye could say, Dumpling.'

'Who is that person?' said the Preses, with some warmth, as it appeared to us.

'A son of Dandy Dinmont's,' answered the unabashed rustic. 'God, ye may mind him, I think!—ane o' the best in your aught, I reckon. And, ye see, I am come into the farm, and maybe something mair, and a whoen shares in this buik-trade of yours.'

'Well, well,' replied the Preses, 'peace, I pray thee, peace. Gentlemen, when thus interrupted, I was on the point of introducing the business of this meeting, being, as is known to most of you, the discussion of a proposition now on your table, which I myself had the honour to suggest at last meeting, namely, that we do apply to the Legislature for an Act of Parliament in ordinary, to associate us into a corporate body, and give us a personi standi in judicio, with full power to prosecute and bring to conviction all encroachers upon our exclusive privilege, in the manner therein to be made and provided. In a letter from the ingenious Mr. Dousterswivel which I have received—-'

Oldbuck, warmly—'I object to that fellow's name being mentioned; he is a common swindler.'

'For shame, Mr. Oldbuck,' said the Preses, 'to use such terms respecting the ingenious inventor of the great patent machine erected at Groningen, where they put in raw hemp at one end, and take out ruffled shirts at the other, without the aid of hackle or rippling-comb—loom, shuttle, or weaver—scissors, needle, or seamstress. He had just completed it, by the addition of a piece of machinery to perform the work of the laundress; but when it was exhibited before his honour the burgomaster, it had the inconvenience of heating the smoothing-irons red-hot; excepting which, the experiment was entirely satisfactory. He will become as rich as a Jew.'

'Well,' added Mr. Oldbuck, 'if the scoundrel—'

'Scoundrel, Mr. Oldbuck,' said the Preses, 'is a most unseemly expression, and I must call you to order. Mr. Dousterswivel is only an eccentric genius.'

'Pretty much the same in the Greek,' muttered Mr. Oldbuck; and then said aloud, 'and if this eccentric genius has work enough in singeing the Dutchman's linen, what the devil has he to do here?'

'Why, he is of opinion, that at the expense of a little mechanism, some part of the labour of composing these novels might be saved by the use of steam.' There was a murmur of disapprobation at this proposal, and the words, 'Blown up,' and 'Bread taken out of our mouths,' and 'They might as well construct a steam parson,' were whispered. And it was not without repeated calls to order, that the Preses obtained an opportunity of resuming his address.

'Order!—Order! Pray, support the chair. Hear, hear, hear the chair!'

'Gentlemen, it is to be premised, that this mechanical operation can only apply to those parts of the narrative which are at present composed out of commonplaces, such as the love-speeches of the hero, the description of the heroine's person, the moral observations of all sorts, and the distribution of happiness at the conclusion of the piece. Mr. Dousterswivel has sent me some drawings, which go far to show, that by placing the words and phrases technically employed on these subjects, in a sort of framework, like that of the Sage of Laputa, and changing them by such a mechanical process as that by which weavers of damask alter their patterns, many new and happy combinations cannot fail to occur, while the author, tired of pumping his own brains, may have an agreeable relaxation in the use of his fingers.'

'I speak for information, Mr. Preses,' said the Rev. Mr. Lawrence Templeton; 'but I am inclined to suppose the late publication of Walladmor to have been the work of Dousterswivel, by the help of the steam-engine.'[3]

'For shame, Mr. Templeton,' said the Preses; 'there are good things in Walladmor, I assure you, had the writer known any thing about the country in which he laid the scene.'

'Or had he had the wit, like some of ourselves, to lay the scene in such a remote or distant country that nobody should be able to back-speer[4] him,' said Mr. Oldbuck.

'Why, as to that,' said the Preses, 'you must consider the thing was got up for the German market, where folks are no better judges of Welsh manners than of Welsh crw.'[5]

'I make it my prayer that this be not found the fault of our own next venture,' said Dr. Dryasdust, pointing to some books which lay on the table. 'I fear the manners expressed in that 'Betrothed' of ours, will scarce meet the approbation of the Cymmerodion; I could have wished that Llhuyd had been looked into —that Powel had been consulted—that Lewis's History had been quoted, the preliminary dissertations particularly, in order to give due weight to the work.'

'Weight!' said Captain Clutterbuck; 'by my soul, it is heavy enough already, Doctor.'

'Speak to the chair,' said the Preses, rather peevishly.

'To the chair, then, I say it,' said Captain Clutterbuck, 'that 'The Betrothed' is heavy enough to break down the chair of John of Gaunt, or Cador-Edris itself. I must add, however, that, in my poor mind, 'The Talisman' goes more trippingly off.'[6]

'It is not for me to speak,' said the worthy minister of Saint Ronan's Well; 'but yet I must say, that being so long engaged upon the Siege of Ptolemais, my work ought to have been brought out, humble though it be, before any other upon a similar subject at least.'

'Your Siege, Parson!' said Mr. Oldbuck, with great contempt; 'will you speak of your paltry prose-doings in my presence, whose great Historical Poem, in twenty books, with notes in proportion, has been postponed ad Grcecas Kalendas?' The Preses, who appeared to suffer a great deal during this discussion, now spoke with dignity and determination. 'Gentlemen,' he said, 'this sort of discussion is highly irregular. There is a question before you, and to that, gentlemen, I must confine your attention. Priority of publication, let me remind you, gentlemen, is always referred to the Committee of Criticism, whose determination on such subjects is without appeal. I declare I will leave the chair, if any more extraneous matter be introduced. —And now, gentlemen, that we are once more in order, I would wish to have some gentleman speak upon the question, whether, as associated to carry on a joint-stock trade in fictitious narrative, in prose and verse, we ought not to be incorporated by Act of Parliament? What say you, gentlemen, to the proposal? Vis unita fortior, is an old and true adage.'

'Societas mater discordiarum, is a brocard as ancient and as veritable,' said Oldbuck, who seemed determined, on this occasion, to be pleased with no proposal that was announced by the chair.

'Come, Monkbarns,' said the Preses, in his most coaxing manner, 'you have studied the monastic institutions deeply, and know there must be a union of persons and talents to do any thing respectable, and attain a due ascendance over the spirit of the age. Tres faciunt collegium—it takes three monks to make a convent.'

'And nine tailors to make a man,' replied Oldbuck, not in the least softened in his opposition; 'a quotation as much to the purpose as the other.'

'Come, come,' said the Preses, 'you know the Prince of Orange said to Mr. Seymour, 'Without an association, we are a rope of sand.''

'I know,' replied Oldbuck, 'it would have been as seemly that none of the old leaven had been displayed on this occasion, though you be the author of a Jacobite novel. I know nothing of the Prince of Orange after 1688; but I have heard a good deal of the immortal William the Third.'