Part 5

Polypth. Upon my Word, we have a Variety of very elegant Prospects centred in this Point. I could sit here very agreeably a little longer.

Calloph. Nay, if you are inclined to rest, come along with me: I'll carry you to where you may indulge your Humour with great Propriety. Deep in the Retirement of that Wood, the God of Sleep has reared his Habitation, where he will afford you every Convenience to make a Nap agreeable----It comes into my Head that I forgot to carry you to a little Place, which it is hardly worth while to travel back to from this Distance: It is called St. Austin's Cave, and answers its Title very well; it appears quite Cell-like, stands retired, and is made of no other Materials but Roots and Moss. In the Inside a Straw Couch offers you an hard Seat, and the Walls three humorous Inscriptions, in Monkish Verse. You may buy them, bound up with Copies of all the other Inscriptions, in a Six-penny Pamphlet, that will be offered us at the Inn.----There, Sir, is the Temple of Sleep.

Polypth. Why really I must confess Ovid himself could scarce have buried the senseless God in an happier Retirement. This gloomy Darkness, these easy Couches, and that excellent Epicurean Argument above the Door, would incline me wonderfully to indulge a little, if these beautiful Ornaments did not keep my Attention awake. There is wanting too a purling Stream, to sing a Requiem to the Senses; tho' the Want is in some measure made up by the drowsy Lullibies of that murmuring Swarm, which this Shade has invited to wanton beneath it. You would laugh at me, or I should certainly throw myself down upon one of these Couches; I am persuaded I should need no Opium to close my Eyes.

Calloph. I own sleeping is a Compliment as much due to this Place, as Admiration and Attention are to Raphael at Hampton-Court. But try if your Curiosity cannot keep you awake. Come, leave these drowsy Abodes, they are infectious; like luscious Food they will blunt your Appetite before the Entertainment is half over. Walk down that Alley, and pop your Head into the first Door you come to.

Polypth. What the D----l have we got here? What wretched Scrawler has been at work upon these Walls?

Calloph. I assure you, Sir, I look upon this as a very great Master-piece. You must know this House is inhabited by a Necromancer; and that Inscription lets you see the Hand that has been employed to paint it. The Composition, Drawing, and Pencilling, I can allow you, are not the most elegant; yet if the Design and Figures are the Artist's own, I can assure you he has shewn excellent Humour, and an exceeding good Invention. That Consultation is well imagined; and so are these Witches and Wizards; their Employments likewise, their Forms and Attitudes are well varied.---- But I see this is a Scene not suited to your Taste: Our next, I hope, will please you better.

Polypth. Pray, what Building is that before us? I cannot say I dislike the Taste it is designed in. It seems an Antique.

Calloph. It is the Temple, Sir, of Ancient Virtue; the Place I am now conducting you to. You will meet within it a very illustrious Assembly of great Men; the wisest Lawgiver, the best Philosopher, the most divine Poet, and the most able Captain, that perhaps ever lived.

Polypth. You may possibly, Sir, engage yourself in a Dispute, by fixing your Epithets in such an absolute manner; there are so many Competitors in each of these Ways, that altho' Numbers may be called truly eminent, it will be a difficult matter to fix Pre-eminence upon any.

Calloph. You will hardly, I fancy, dissent from me, when I introduce you to these great Heroes of Antiquity: There stands Lycurgus; there Socrates; there Homer; and there Epaminondas. Illustrious Chiefs, who made Virtue their only Pursuit, and the Welfare of Mankind their only Study; in whose Breasts mean Self-interest had no Possession. To establish a well-regulated Constitution; to dictate the soundest Morality, to place Virtue in the most amiable Light; and bravely to defend a People's Liberty, were Ends which neither the Difficulty in overcoming the Prejudices, and taming the savage Manners of a barbarous State; the Corruptions of a licentious Age, and the Ill-usage of an invidious City; neither the vast Pains of searching into Nature, and laying up a Stock of Knowledge sufficient to produce the noblest Work of Art; nor popular Tumults at Home, and the most threatening Dangers Abroad, could ever tempt them to lose Sight of, or in the least abate that Ardency of Temper with which they pursued them.

Polypth. A noble Panegyric upon my Word! why, Sir, these great Spirits have inspired you with the very Soul of Oratory. However, in earnest, I confess your Encomium is pretty just; and I am apt to believe that if any of those worthy Gentlemen should take it into his Head to walk from his Nitch, it would puzzle the World to find his Equal to fix in his Room.----That old Ruin, I suppose, is intended to contrast with this new Building.

Calloph. Yes, Sir, it is intended to contrast with it not only in the Landskip, but likewise in its Name and Design. Walk a little nearer, and you will see its Intention.

Polypth. I can see nothing here to let me into its Design, except this old Gentleman; neither can I find any thing extraordinary in him, except that he has met with a Fate that he is entirely deserving of, which is more than falls to the Share of every worthless Fellow.

Calloph. Have you observed how the Statue is decorated?

Polypth. O! I see the whole Design: A very elegant Piece of Satyr, upon my Word! This pompous Edifice is intended, I suppose, to represent the flourishing Condition, in which ancient Virtue still exists; and those poor shattered Remains of what has never been very beautiful (notwithstanding, I see, they are placed within a few Yards of a Parish-church) are designed to let us see the ruinous State of decayed modern Virtue. And the Moral is, that Glory founded upon true Worth and Honour, will exist, when Fame, built upon Conquest and popular Applause, will fade away. This is really the best thing I have seen: I am most prodigiously taken with it.

Calloph. I intend next to carry you to a Scene of another kind. I am going to shew you the Grotto, a Place generally very taking with Strangers.----I thought that Piece of Satyr would catch your Attention: I hope likewise you will be as well pleased here. This Gate will carry us into the romantic Retirement. What do you think of this Scene?

Polypth. Why really, Sir, it is quite a Novelty: This Profusion of Mirrors has a very extraordinary Effect: The Place seems divided into a thousand beautiful Apartments, and appears fifty times as large as it is. The Prospects without are likewise transferred to the Walls within: And the Sides of the Room are elegantly adorned with Landskips, beyond the Pencil of Titian; with this farther Advantage, that every View, as you change your Situation, varies itself into another Form, and presents you with something new.

Calloph. Don't you think that serpentine River, as it is called, is a great Addition to the Beauty of the Place?

Polypth. Undoubtedly it is. Water is of as much Use in a Landskip, as Blood is in a Body; without these two Essentials, it is impossible there should be Life in either one or the other. Yet methinks it is a prodigious Pity that this stagnate Pool should not by some Magic be metamorphosed into a crystal Stream, rolling over a Bed of Pebbles. Such a quick Circulation would give an infinite Spirit to the View. I could wish his Lordship had such a Stream at his Command; he would shew it, I dare say, to the best Advantage, in its Passage thro' the Gardens. But we cannot make Nature, the utmost we can do is to mend her.----I have heard a Scotch Gentleman speak of the River, upon which the Town of Sterling stands, which is as remarkable a Meander as I have ever heard of. From Sterling to a little Village upon the Banks of this River, by Land it is only four Miles, and yet if you should follow the Course of the Water, you will find it above twenty.----There is an House likewise that stands upon a narrow Isthmus of a Peninsula, formed by this same River, which is mighty remarkable: The Water runs close to both Ends of it, and yet if you sail from one to the other, you will be carried a Compass of four Miles.----Such a River winding about this Place, would make it a Paradise indeed!

As we are got into the North, I must confess I do not know any Part of the Kingdom that abounds more with elegant natural Views: Our well-cultivated Plains, as you observed before, are certainly not comparable to their rough Nature in point of Prospect. About three Years ago I rode the Northern Circuit: The Weather was extremely fine; and I scarce remember being more agreeably entertained than I was with the several charming Views exhibited to me in the northern Counties. Curiosity indeed, rather than Business, carried me down: And as I had my Time pretty much to myself, I spent it in a great measure in hunting after beautiful Objects. Sometimes I found myself hemmed within an Amphitheatre of Mountains, which were variously ornamented, some with scattered Trees, some with tufted Wood, some with grazing Cattle, and some with smoaking Cottages. Here and there an elegant View likewise was opened into the Country.----A Mile's riding, perhaps, would have carried me to the Foot of a steep Precipice, down which thundered the whole Weight of some vast River, which was dashed into Foam at the Bottom, by the craggy Points of several rising Rocks: A deep Gloom overspread the Prospect, occasioned by the close Wood that hung round it on every Side.--I could describe to you a Variety of other Views I met with there, if we here wanted Entertainment in the Way of Landskip. One, however, I cannot forbear mentioning, and wishing at the same time that his Lordship had such Materials to work with, and it could not be but he would make a most noble Picture.----The Place I have in view is upon the Banks of the River Eden (which is indeed one of the finest Rivers I ever saw). I scarce know a fitter Place for a Genius in this Way to exert itself in. There is the greatest Variety of garnished Rocks, shattered Precipices, rising Hills, ornamented with the finest Woods, thro' which are opened the most elegant Vales that I have ever met with: Not to mention the most enchanting Views up and down the River, which winds itself in such a manner as to shew its Banks to the best Advantage, which, together with very charming Prospects into the Country, terminated by the blue Hills at a Distance, make as fine a Piece of Nature, as perhaps can any where be met with.

Calloph. I admire your Taste in Landskip extremely; you have marked out just such Circumstances as would take me most in a View. I am I find almost as enthusiastic a Lover of Nature as you are. Yet tho' I can allow her to have an excellent Fancy, I do not think she has the best Judgment. Tho' Nature is an admirable Colourist, her Composition is very often liable to Censure. For which Reason I am for having her placed under the Direction of Art: And the Rule I would go by should be Mr. Pope's;

--Treat the Goddess like a modest Fair, Not over-dress, nor leave her wholly bare.

Suppose, therefore, we leave your romantic Nature, and continue our View of her here, where she is treated according to this Prescription of the Poet.----That Building is called the Temple of Contemplation; those Bas-relief Heads it is adorned with, are, I assure you, extremely good ones.

Polypth. Pray, Sir, what kind of a Building have we yonder, that struck our Sight as we crossed that Alley?

Calloph. We will walk up to it if you please: It is a Chinese House.

Polypth. A mighty whimsical Appearance it makes truly.

Calloph. In my Opinion it is a pretty Object enough, and varies our View in a very becoming manner. Its cool stand upon the Lake, and those canvas Windows, designed as well to keep out the Sun, as let in the Air, give us a good Notion of the Manner of living in an hot Country. It is finely painted in the Inside: Will you look into it?

Polypth. Finely painted indeed! Our Travellers tell us the Chinese are a very ingenious People; and that Arts and Sciences flourish amongst them in great Beauty. But for my Part, whenever I see any of their Paintings, I am apt, I must confess, in every thing else to call their Taste into question. It is impossible for one Art to be in Perfection, without introducing the rest. They are all Links of the same Chain: If you draw up one, you must expect the rest will follow. Cognoscitur ex socio, is an old Rule you know in judging of Men; and I believe it may be applied with as much Propriety in judging of Arts. It is hardly to be imagined that any Art, perfect in its Kind, would claim any Kindred, or even bear to keep Company with such a wretched Art of Painting as prevails amongst the Chinese: Its whole Mystery consists in dawbing on glaring Colours: Correctness of Drawing, Beauty of Composition, and Harmony of colouring, they seem not to have even the least Notion of.