LOCKHART ON THE AUTHOR OF

"VATHEK "1

[From The Quarterly Review, June, 1834]

VATHEK is, indeed, without reference to the time of life [before he had closed his twentieth year] when the author penned it, a very remarkable performance; but, like most of the works of the great poet (Byron) who has eloquently praised it, it is stained with poison-spots-its inspiration is too often such as might have been inhaled in the "Hall of Eblis." We do not allude so much to its audacious licentiousness, as to the diabolical levity of its contempt for mankind. The boyauthor appears to have already rubbed all the bloom off his heart; and, in the midst of his dazzling genius, one trembles to think that a stripling of years so tender should have attained the cool cynicism of a Candide. How different is the effect of that Eastern tale of our own days, which Lord Byron ought not to have forgotten when he was criticising his favourite romance. How perfectly does Thalaba realize the ideal demanded in the Welsh Triad, of "fulness of erudition, simplicity of language, and purity of manners." But the critic was repelled by the purity of that delicious creation, more than attracted by the erudition which he must have respected, and the diction which he could not but admireThe low sweet voice so musical,

That with such deep and undefined delight

Fills the surrender'd soul.

It has long been known that Mr. Beckford prepared, shortly after the publication of his Vathek, some other tales in the same vein-the histories, it is supposed, of the princes in his "Hall of Eblis." A rumour had also prevailed, that the author drew up, early in life, some account of his travels in various parts of the world; nay, that he had printed a few copies of this account, and that its private perusal had been eminently

1 " Italy with sketches of Spain and Portugal. In a series of letters written during a residence in these Countries." By William Beckford, Esq., author of Vathek. London, 1834.

serviceable to more than one of the most popular poets of the present age. But these were only vague reports; and Mr. Beckford, after achieving, on the verge of manhood, a literary reputation, which, however brilliant, could not satisfy the natural ambition of such an intellect-seemed, for more than fifty years, to have wholly withdrawn himself from the only field of his permanent distinction. The world heard enough of his gorgeous palace at Cintra (described in Childe Harold), afterwards of the unsubstantial pageant of his splendour at Fonthill, and latterly of his architectural caprices at Bath. But his literary name seemed to have belonged to another age ; and, perhaps, in this point of view, it may not have been unnatural for Lord Byron, when comparing Vathek with other Eastern tales, to think rather of Zadig and Rasselas, than

Of Thalaba-the wild and wondrous song.

The preface to the present volumes informs us that they include a reprint of the book of travels, of which a small private edition passed through the press forty years ago, and of the existence of which-though many of our readers must have heard some hints-few could have had any knowledge. Mr. Beckford has at length been induced to publish his letters, in order to vindicate his own original claim to certain thoughts, images, and expressions, which had been adopted by other authors whom he had from time to time received beneath his roof, and indulged with a perusal of his secret lucubrations. The mere fact that such a work has lain for near half-a-century, printed but unpublished, would be enough to stamp the author's personal character as not less extraordinary than his genius. It is, indeed, sufficiently obvious that Mr. Rogers had read it before he wrote his "Italy "-a poem, however, which possesses so many exquisite beauties entirely its own, that it may easily afford to drop the honour of some, perhaps unconsciously, appropriated ones; and we are also satisfied that this book had passed through Mr. Moore's hands before he gave us his light and graceful" Rhymes on the Road," though the traces of his imitation are rarer than those which must strike everyone who is familiar with the "Italy." We are not so sure as to Lord Byron; but, although we have not been able to lay our finger on any one passage in which he has evidently followed Mr. Beckford's vein, it will certainly

rather surprise us should it hereafter be made manifest that he had not seen, or at least heard an account of, this performance, before he conceived the general plan of his "Childe Harold." Mr. Beckford's book is entirely unlike any book of travel in prose that exists in any European language; and if we could fancy Lord Byron to have written the "Harold " in the measure of Don Juan," and to have availed himself of the facilities which the ottima rima affords for intermingling high poetry with merriment of all sorts, and especially with sarcastic sketches of living manners, we believe the result would have been a work more nearly akin to that now before us than any other in the library.

Mr. Beckford, like "Harold," passes through various regions of the world, and, disdaining to follow the guide-book, presents his reader with a series of detached, or very slenderly connected sketches of the scenes that had made the deepest impression upon himself. He, when it suits him, puts the passage of the Alps into a parenthesis. On one occasion, he really treats Rome as if it had been nothing more than a post station on the road from Florence to Naples; but, again, if the scenery and people take his fancy," he has a royal reluctance to move on, as his own hero showed when his eye glanced on the grands caractères rouges, tracés par la main de Carathis?... Qui me donnera des loix ?-s'écria le Caliphe." England's wealthiest son" performs his travels, of course, in a style of great external splendour.

Conspicuus longé cunctisque notabilis intrat

Courts and palaces, as well as convents and churches, and galleries of all sorts, fly open at his approach he is caressed in every capital -he is fêté in every château. But though he appears amidst such accompaniments with all the airiness of a Juan, he has a thread of the blackest of Harold in his texture; and every now and then seems willing to draw a veil between him and the world of vanities. He is a poet, and a great one too, though we know not that he ever wrote a line of verse. His rapture amidst the sublime scenery of mountains and forests in the Tyrol especially, and in Spain-is that of a spirit cast originally in one of nature's finest moulds; and he fixes it in language which can scarcely be praised beyond its deserts-simple, massive, massive, nervous, apparently little

laboured, yet revealing, in its effect, the perfection of art. Some immortal passages in Gray's letters and Byron's diaries, are the only things, in our tongue, that seem to us to come near the profound melancholy, blended with a picturesqueness of description at once true and startling, of many of these extraordinary pages. Nor is his sense for the highest beauty of art less exquisite. He seems to describe classical architecture, and the pictures of the great Italian schools, with a most passionate feeling of the grand, and with an inimitable grace of expression. On the other hand, he betrays, in a thousand places, a settled voluptuousness of temperament, and a capricious recklessness of self-indulgence, which will lead the world to identify him henceforth with his Vathek, as inextricably as it has long since connected Harold with the poet that drew him; and then, that there may be no limit to the inconsistencies of such a strange genius, this spirit, at once so capable of the noblest enthusiasm, and so dashed with the gloom of over-pampered luxury, can stoop to chairs and china, ever and anon, with the zeal of an auctioneer— revel in the design of a clock or a candlestick, and be as ecstatic about a fiddler or a soprano as the fools in Hogarth's concert. On such occasions he reminds us, and will, we think, remind everyone, of the Lord of Strawberry Hill. But even here all we have is on a grander scale. The oriental prodigality of his magnificence shines out even in trifles. He buys a library where the other would have cheapened a missal. is at least a male Horace Walpole; as superior to the "silken Baron," as Fonthill, with its York-like tower embosomed among hoary forests, was to that silly band-box which may still be admired on the road to Twickenham. . .

He

We have no discussions of any consequence in these volumes: even the ultra-aristocratical opinions and feelings of the author-who is, we presume, a Whig-are rather hinted than avowed. From a thousand passing sneers, we may doubt whether he has any religion at all; but still he may be only thinking of the outward and visible absurdities of poperytherefore we have hardly a pretext for treating these matters seriously. In short, this is meant to be, as he says in his preface, nothing but a "book of light reading"; and though no one can read it without having many grave enough feelings roused and agitated within him, there are really no passages

to provoke or justify any detailed criticism either as to morals or politics...

We risk nothing in predicting that Mr. Beckford's Travels will henceforth be classed among the most elegant productions of modern literature: they will be forthwith translated into every language of the Continent-and will keep his name alive, centuries after all the brass and marble he ever piled together have ceased to vibrate with the echoes of Modenhas.