"A Frenchman Lays Out His Whole Revenue
Upon Taudry Suits Of Cloaths, Or In Furnishing A Magnificent
Repas Of Fifty Or A Hundred Dishes, One-Half Of Which Are Not
Eatable Or Intended To Be Eaten.
His wardrobe goes to the
fripier, his dishes to the dogs, and himself to the devil."
These trenchant passages were written partly, it may be imagined,
to suit the English taste of the day. In that object they must
have succeeded, for they were frequently transcribed into
contemporary periodicals. In extenuation of Smollett's honesty of
purpose, however, it may be urged that he was always a
thoroughgoing patriot, [Witness his violently anti-French play,
the Reprisal of 1757.] and that, coming from a Calvinistic
country where a measure of Tartufism was a necessary condition of
respectability, he reproduces the common English error of
ignoring how apt a Frenchman is to conceal a number of his best
qualities. Two other considerations deserve attention. The race-portrait
was in Smollett's day at the very height of its
disreputable reign. Secondly, we must remember how very
profoundly French character has been modified since 1763, and
more especially in consequence of the cataclysms of 1789 and
1870.
Smollett's vis comica is conspicuous in the account of the
coiffure of the period and of the superstitious reverence which a
Frenchman of that day paid to his hair. In tracing the origin of
this superstition he exhibits casually his historical learning.
The crine profuso and barba demissa of the reges crinitos, as the
Merovingians were called, are often referred to by ancient
chroniclers.
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