LAMENT OF AN IRISH PROTESTANT EMIGRANT. BY SHARA. LAND of my birth! my home, my home- Land of my youth and earliest loves, For I must leave thy shore; I shall return no more! Each tall green tree, each little bird- May well, my own, my father land, --- To one who knows that they may live While he must leave his native land, How oft upon a summer's eve, My daily labour done, I've watched thy hills and smiling plains, And thought if I might live and die In the same faith my fathers died, That I would ask no more. And now my weary heart would break Through the wild forests of the west your But, oh, my children, for sakes E'en though my heart too truly says, For wicked and ungodly men The scoff, the sneer, the bitter word, The sword, the flaming brand All these await one of my faith On this my native shore : My children, I must bear you hence, Our rulers, too-those unto whom No more in princes can we trust, But, oh, there is a mightier power, His heavenly kingdom we may gain, GALLERY OF LITERARY CHARACTERS. No. XLVIII. CHARLES MOLLOY WESTMACOTT, ESQ. THE Commencement of the history of the Great Captain of the Age is enveloped in a sort of cloud; for, like William the Conqueror, Don John of Austria, the brave Dunois, Sir Richard Falconbridge, Marshal Berwick, Marshal Beresford, Marshal Saxe, an immense number of the nobility of all nations, including all beginning with the prefix of Fitz-and by no means excluding a host of others who do not sport that distinguishing monosyllable-he may, we believe, blazon a baton sinister in his arms, as securely as if he were Duke of Grafton, Richmond, Buccleuch, or St. Alban's. Westmacott, we understand, has written his autobiography, which would, no doubt, be an exceedingly amusing and entertaining book, if he would tell the truth and the whole truth. That he should tell nothing but the truth would be by no means necessary: who could tie himself to such a strictness? or, if he did, where would be the advantage? But we bargain for the truth and the whole truth; and let it be, if he pleases, in fairy fiction dressed. If we do not much mistake his history, he is son of the late facetious Dick Westmacott (the statuary) and the pretty widow of Kensington, Mrs. Susannah Molloy, who kept the King's Arms, close by the gate, some forty and odd years ago. Old Westmacott reared him as his own, sent him to St. Paul's under Dr. Roberts, passed him through the Royal Academy, and educated him as an artist; but, at the death of the father, his son, Richard Westmacott, the sculptor, ruled in his stead, and left the original of our portrait to shift for himself as he could in the world. With family quarrels we have nothing to do; but we are certain that the tracing of C. Westmacott's life, from the period when he was sent penniless from his father's house to the present moment, when he is a prosperous gentleman, would be a strange eventful history. Publish it by all means, Mr. Westmacott, and save us the trouble of squeezing such an encyclopædia of incidents into a page. He has gone through all the turns of life-theatrical, journalist, artistical (if that is the fit word);-can boast that he wrote a piece, painted the scenes, and played a part in it-been the depository of secrets, in all these departments, innumerable and, unless we are much deceived, of secrets in other quarters of a higher and a stranger kind. With them, however, we shall not meddle; having at present only to introduce Mr. Charles Molloy Westmacott to our readers in his capacity as the Editor of the Age, a situation which he has for some seven years filled-and a perilous post it is. He sits in our sketch in firm port and defiance of all and sundry who will venture to question his judgments on their lives or characters; beneath his foot is deposited an unhappy couple of the volumes of his antagonist Bulwer, which he is crushing without mercy; under his right hand, as in propriety bound to do, lies the AGE, outspread in all its amplitude, with the ink-bottle close by, whence its varied contents are to flow. Beside him is a cabinet stored with communications many and strange, destined no doubt in due time to see the light of day, and astonish the hearts of the natives. But by far the most characteristic touch of the whole sketch-and our readers may be perfectly assured that Croquis in introducing it has not ventured on doing so from his own inventive genius, but faithfully copied from the life-is the knowing horsewhip in his hat. You see at once that it is no trifle. end inserted in the hat sinks so decidedly, and the lash that is visible outside curvets with so much ease, that we cannot be deceived as to the nature of the "tool"-it is loaded, and no mistake. The Great Captain of the Age we see is determined not to be trifled with; and if inquisitive personages come in his path, he is prepared with an answer. The He is a pluck little fellow, who has pushed his way actively in the world. He is desperately neglected in a quarter which owes him the deepest gratitude; but he has fought in his paper the battle of the Tories as open-mouthedly and as freely as he could—and that is open-mouthedly and freely enough, in all conscience. So may he still, through many a lengthened stage, FATHER PROUT'S PLEA FOR PILGRIMAGES, AND HOSPITABLE RECEPTION OF SIR WALTER SCOTT WHEN HE VISITED THE BLARNEY STONE. "Beware, beware Of the black friar, Who sitteth by Norman stone; For he mutters his prayer In the midnight air, And his mass of the days that are gone."-BYRON. SINCE the publication of this worthy man's "Apology for Lent," which, with some account of his lamented death and well-attended funeral, appeared in our last Number, we have written to his executors--one of whom, we learn, is Father Mat. Horrogan, P.P. of the neighbouring village of Blarney; and the other, our elegiac poet, Father Magrath—in the hope of being able to negotiate for the valuable posthumous essays and fugitive pieces which we doubted not had been left behind in great abundance by the deceased. These two disinterested divines, fit associates and bosom companions of Prout during his lifetime, and whom from their joint letters we should think eminently qualified to pick up the fallen mantle of the departed prophet, have, in the most handsome manner, promised us all the literary and philosophic treatises bequeathed to them by the late incumbent of Watergrasshill: expressing, in the very complimentary note which they have transmitted us (and which our modesty prevents us from inserting), their thanks, and those of the whole parish, for our sympathy and condolence on this melancholy bereavement, and intimating at the same time their regret at its not being in their power to send us also, for our private perusal, the collection of the good father's parochial sermons; the whole of which (a most valuable MS.) had been taken off for his own use by the bishop, whom he made his residuary legatee. These "sermons" must be doubtless good things in their way, a theological μsya bavμa, well adapted to swell the episcopal library; but as we confessedly are, and suspect our readers likewise to be, a very improper multitude amongst whom to scatter such pearls, we shall console ourselves for that sacrifice by plunging head and ears into the abundant sources of intellectual refreshment to which we shall soon have access, and from which Frank Cresswell, lucky dog! has drawn such a draught of inspiration. "Sacros ausus recludere fontes !" for assuredly we may defy any one that has perused Prout's vindication of fishdiet (and who, we ask, has not read it con amore, conning it over with secret glee, and forthwith calling out for a red-herring?) not to prefer its simple unsophisticated eloquence to the oration of Tully pro Domo suá, or Barclay's Apology for Quakers. After all, it may have been but a sprat to catch a whale, and the whole affair may turn out to be a popish contrivance; but if so, we have taken the bait ourselves: like Festus, we have been "almost persuaded," and Prout has wrought in us a sort of culinary conversion. Why should we be ashamed to avow that we have been edified by the good man's blunt and straightforward logic, and drawn from his theories on fish a higher and more moral impression than from the dreamy visions of an "English opium-eater," or any other " fessions" of sensualism and gastronomy? If this "black friar" has got smuggled in among our contributors, like King Saul among the regular votaries of the sanctuary, it must be admitted that, like the royal intruder, he has caught the tone and chimed in with the general harmony of our political opinions - no Whigling among true Tories, no goose among swans. Argutos inter strepere anser olores. con How we long to get possession of the "Prout papers !" that chest of learned lumber which haunts our nightly visions! Already in imagination it is within our grasp; our greedy hand hastily its lid "Unlocks, And all Arcadia breathes from yonder box!" In this prolific age, when the most unlettered dolt can find a mare's nest in the domain of philosophy, why should not we also cry, Eupnaus! how much of VOL. IX. NO. LIII. N N |