if he had executed the task we should have had a record emulating in its shameless profligacy the Confessions of Rousseau, the Amours of Faublas, and the Vie of Casanova. But Murray took alarm; and it perhaps was as well for the cause of morality and the reputation of Byron, that the task of drawing up his life should have been ultimately placed in the hands of one who, having been a Whig all his life, knew what would please his party, and has finally given us that idealized portraiture which will convey the "wayward childe " to posterity as a travelling nobleman of average respectability.
The impulsive and versatile character of the genius of Maginn was not favourable for the production of literary work requiring continuity and concentration of effort. In this department, however, Ave must not forget a somewhat remarkable novel from his pen, entitled Whitehall; or the Days of King George IV., an octavo volume, published by W. Marsh, without date (1827), or author's name. This is styled by Jerdan "a singular example of wild genius," and another authority characterized it as "one of the most wild and extraordinary productions of the day, overflowing with madcap wit and quaint humour, and containing sketches of all the leading characters of the time, from George IV. down to Jack Ketch, the hangman. To the last-named office, by an inimitable stroke of humour, is appointed Mr. Tierney, who, having come up to town, with an earnest desire to be made Prime Minister, and having in vain solicited that or some other place, finally, in despair, accepts the office of executioner, and performs the last ceremonies of the law on Mr. Huskisson, who, he tells us, ' amid the acclamations of surrounding thousands, died easily and instantaneously.' This work is very rare, but it will well repay any one who will take the trouble of searching for it through the old bookshops of London."[1] This very curious book, in which a fair joke is somewhat spoiled, it must be confessed, by being wire-drawn through 330 pages and encrusted with a certain amount of ill-nature and coarseness, is noticed in the Qaurterly Review (Jan., 1828), where its true object is pointed out,—"to laugh down the Brambletye House species of novel," and its study recommended to those "well-meaning youths who imagine that a few scraps of plundered antiquarianism, a prophetical beldam, a bore, and a rebellion are enough to make a Waverley novel." The book may, indeed, be regarded as a satire on Horace Smith, and a series of parodies of his socalled historical fictions. Just as a taste of its quality,—and to serve as a pendant to Byron's versified satire on the banker-poet,—I shall transcribe an extract,—the prose portrait of "Sam Hodges":—
"This singular and eccentric man was never seen by strangers, but with astonishment. Nature, which made him by profession a punster, seemed to have intended his very person for a sort of joke. He was about four feet high, and his head was at least a quarter of that size. It hung heavily to one side, and his countenance, of an unearthly paleness, drooped like an overgrown turnip hanging upon a pole. His under jaw projected considerably, and gave him the appearance of a perpetual grin. His lack-lustre eye shot its leaden beams from under shaggy eyebrows, and his locks, untamed by brush or comb, hung in grizzly knots over his wrinkled brow. Lord Byron,[2] with that disregard for decorum of language which so conspicuously marked the conversations of that celebrated poet,
