domination of the Jesuits, and the novels of
the Vicomte d'Arlincourt, with, perhaps, some
ugly shreds of news from England about
Luddites, and spies, and Thistlewood with
his head off, made the English Milord quite
a different character. He became a stiff-
necked, morose, gloomy Grand Seigneur
terribly affected with a mysterious malady
called Ie spleen (there is a three volume novel
about one Sir Williams, afflicted with that
ailment), travelling austerely about Europe
with a sulky suite, and two fourgons full of
sauces and French cooks. According to
M. de Balzac (when he was M. de Viellerglé)—
who was so fond of depicting English Milords,
that he occasionally wrote himself under the
pseudonym of one Lord R'hoone (!)—the
Milord Anglais lived hermetically sealed
up in a frowning hotel with high walls, a
mulatto porter, fierce wolfdogs, and one little
garden door of egress, from whence he was
supposed to issue to accomplish all sorts of dark
and dreadful deeds. According to M. Casimir
Delavigne, and M. Alexandra Dumas in the
early days of their dramaturgical career, the
Milord had no longer beautiful daughters, but
always one son, Sir Arthur, a villain,
continuously breaking promises of marriage to
confiding French females, and throwing his
helpless offspring on the hands of his papa,
who at first would have nothing to say
to them, and cursed them, his son and
daughter-in-law, with all the forms; but,
ultimately relenting, endowed them with
his enormous estates, and the insignia of
the order of the Bath. The Milord Anglais
of that day had strange fancies for ascending
Mount Vesuvius during eruptions, holding
grim champagne and "Porto" orgies in
the catacombs of Rome, poisoning his servants,
shooting brigands, and writing letters in his
own blood. Horrible nobleman!

The tragic Milord disappeared after the
revolution of July '30, to give place to an
eccentric one. There was a semi-serious one
about 1843, who was supposed to have made
an enormous bet that Mr. Van Amburg
would one day be devoured alive by his wild
animals, and always followed him about from
country to country, and from theatre to
theatre, always occupying the stage box, and
fixing on him the foci of an enormous opera
glass. This Milord had green eyes! In Louis
Philippe's time, however, eccentricity became,
as I have said, the distinguishing character of
the English Milord. He dressed—in the
press, on the stage, and on canvas—in a bell-
crowned white hat, a long loose white greatcoat,
red striped small-clothes, top boots, a
mighty shawl swathed round his flaming
countenance, a plaid waistcoat, an umbrella,
and a pigtail of course. One or more savage
"bouledogues" always lurked at his heels.
His course of life might be summed up with
considerable facility, so regular was it. He
rose at ten, breakfasted off raw beefsteaks
and vin de porto, playing with his bouledogues
and smoking a pipe meanwhile. At eleven
he had the spleen. From half-past eleven to
twelve he betted with his coachman; from
twelve to one he boxed with his groom. From
one to two he drank gin or "grogs." At half-
past two he sold his wife, Miss Kitty, in
Smithfield, with a halter round her neck.
From three to four he drove tandem in Cheapside
—four horses at length. From four to
five he had another refresher of beefsteaks
with "Porter beer." From five till midnight
he bet, drank, smoked, and boxed with other
lords, and after an indefinite number of pipes,
bets, and grogs fell ivre mort against an honorable
barronet, membre de la chambre des lords,
and was carried up to bed by his groom, or
tiger—Joby, Toby, or Paddy. If I have
exaggerated one trait in the character of the
English Milord, tell, oh ye authors of Les
Mystères de Londres, Le Marché de Londres, Les
Voleurs de Londres, and Clarisse Harlowe.
Towards the end of the reign of Louis
Philippe, the Milord Anglais varied the
course of his diary by occasionally oppressing
Ireland, and sucking the life-blood from the
slaves of Hindostan. It also occurred to him
to turn perfidious; "French commerce to
destroy and reserve to himself the empire
of the seas." The Milord was then and for
some time known as a "Pritchard," but the
salient parts of his character remained the
same.

After the revolution of February and the
exchange of visits between English excursionists
and French National Guards, one more,
and, as far as it has gone, ultimate change took
place in the counterfeit presentment of the
Milord Anglais. He became purely but
extravagantly ridiculous, wearing the egregious
costume, and speaking the barbarous balderdash,
of the Salle Bonne-Nouvelle. As such
he flourishes at all the theatres, and in all the
feuilletons of Paris; at Valentino, in
caricatures, and in the Journal pour rire, and as
such is taken for granted, though there are
hundreds of well-dressed Englishmen walking
daily about the Boulevards and the Rue de
Rivoli, offering a fair field for caricature, and
not in the least like him.

Now what ever, I ask, can have propagated,
nourished, perpetuated for nearly a hundred
years this monstrous ignorance of what
Englishmen are like, of what they do, of how
they act, of what are their manners, and
customs. Heaven knows we have prejudices
enough to get rid of, and mistakes enough
to correct in our own country concerning
foreigners; yet, ignorant as we are, I
think were an actor, representing the part
of a Frenchman, to appear in an English
theatre wearing a pigtail and a cocked hat,
eating frogs, and accompanying the operation
with a solo on a dancing-master's kit,
the calumniator would be hooted or pelted
from the stage. With an eleven hours'
route from London to Paris, with railways
and a submarine telegraph, with myriads of