The Adventures of Sir Launcelot Greaves - Tobias Smollett
THE ADVENTURES OF SIR LAUNCELOT GREAVES
by Tobias Smollett
With the Author's Preface, and an Introduction by G. H. Maynadier, Ph.D.
Department of English, Harvard University
CONTENTS
INTRODUCTION
CHAPTER
I In which certain Personages of this delightful History are
introduced to the Reader's Acquaintance
II In which the Hero of these Adventures makes his First
Appearance on the Stage of Action
III Which the Reader, on perusal, may wish were Chapter the last
IV In which it appears that the Knight, when heartily set in for
sleeping, was not easily disturbed
V In which this Recapitulation draws to a close
VI In which the Reader will perceive that in some Cases Madness
is catching
VII In which the Knight resumes his Importance
VIII Which is within a hair's-breadth of proving highly
interesting will interest the Curiosity of the Reader
IX Which may serve to show, that true Patriotism is of no Party
X Which showeth that he who plays at Bowls, will sometimes meet
with Rubbers
XI Description of a modern Magistrate
XII Which shows there are more Ways to kill a Dog than Hanging
XIII In which our Knight is tantalised with a transient Glimpse
of Felicity
XIV Which shows that a Man cannot always sip, when the Cup is
at his Lip
XV Exhibiting an Interview, which, it is to be hoped, will
interest the Curiosity of the Reader
XVI Which, it is to be hoped, the Reader will find an agreeable
Medley of Mirth and Madness, Sense and Absurdity
XVII Containing Adventures of Chivalry equally new and surprising
XVIII In which the Rays of Chivalry shine with renovated Lustre
XIX Containing the Achievements of the Knights of the Griffin and
Crescent
XX In which our Hero descends into the Mansions of the Damned
XXI Containing further Anecdotes relating to the Children of
Wretchedness
XXII In which Captain Crowe is sublimed into the Regions of
Astrology
XXIII In which the Clouds that cover the Catastrophe begin to
disperse
XXIV The Knot that puzzles human Wisdom, the Hand of Fortune
sometimes will untie familiar as her Garter
XXV Which, it is to be hoped, will be, on more accounts than one,
agreeable to the Reader
INTRODUCTION
It was on the great northern road from York to London, about the
beginning of the month of October, and the hour of eight in the evening,
that four travellers were, by a violent shower of rain, driven for
shelter into a little public-house on the side of the highway,
distinguished by a sign which was said to exhibit the figure of a black
lion. The kitchen, in which they assembled, was the only room for
entertainment in the house, paved with red bricks, remarkably clean,
furnished with three or four Windsor chairs, adorned with shining plates
of pewter, and copper saucepans, nicely scoured, that even dazzled the
eyes of the beholder; while a cheerful fire of sea-coal blazed in the
chimney.
It would be hard to find a better beginning for a wholesome novel of
English life, than these first two sentences in The Adventures of Sir
Launcelot Greaves. They are full of comfort and promise. They promise
that we shall get rapidly into the story; and so we do. They give us the
hope, in which we are not to be disappointed, that we shall see a good
deal of those English inns which to this day are delightful in reality,
and which to generations of readers, have been delightful in fancy.
Truly, English fiction, without its inns, were as much poorer as the
English country, without these same hostelries, were less comfortable.
For few things in the world has the so-called "Anglo-Saxon" race more
reason to be grateful than for good old English inns. Finally there is a
third promise in these opening sentences of Sir Launcelot Greaves. "The
great northern road!" It was that over which the youthful Smollett made
his way to London in 1739; it was that over which, less than nine years
later, he sent us travelling in company with Random and Strap and the
queer people whom they met on their way. And so there is the promise
that Smollett, after his departure in Count Fathom from the field of
personal experience which erstwhile he cultivated so successfully, has
returned to see if the ground will yield him another rich harvest.
Though it must be admitted that in Sir Launcelot Greaves his labours were
but partially successful, yet the story possesses a good deal of the
lively verisimilitude which Fathom lacked. The very first page, as we
have seen, shows that its inns are going to be real. So, too, are most
of its highway adventures, and also its portion of those prison scenes of
which Smollett seems to have been so fond. As for the description of the
parliamentary election, it is by no means the least graphic of its kind
in the fiction of the last two centuries. The speech of Sir Valentine
Quickset, the fox-hunting Tory candidate, is excellent, both for its
brevity and for its simplicity. Any of his bumpkin audience could
understand perfectly his principal points: that he spends his estate of
"vive thousand clear" at home in old English hospitality; that he comes
of pure old English stock; that he hates all foreigners, not excepting
those from Hanover; and that if he is elected, he "will cross the
ministry in everything, as in duty bound."
In the characters, likewise, though less than in the scenes just spoken
of, we recognise something of the old Smollett touch. True, it is not
high praise to say of Miss Aurelia Darnel that she is more alive, or
rather less lifeless, than Smollett's heroines have been heretofore.
Nor can we give great praise to the characterisation of Sir Launcelot.
Yet if less substantial than Smollett's roystering heroes, he is more
distinct than de Melvil in Fathom, the only one of our author's earlier
young men, by the way, (with the possible exception of Godfrey Gauntlet)
who can stand beside Greaves in never failing to be a gentleman. It
is a pity, when Greaves's character is so lovable, and save for his
knight-errantry, so well conceived, that the image is not more distinct.
Crowe is distinct enough, however, though not quite consistently drawn.
There is justice in Scott's objection [Tobias Smollett in Biographical
and Critical Notices of Eminent Novelists] that nothing in the seaman's
"life . . . renders it at all possible that he should have caught" the
baronet's Quixotism. Otherwise, so far from finding fault with the old
sailor, we are pleased to see Smollett returning in him to a favourite
type. It might be thought that he would have exhausted the possibilities
of this type in Bowling and Trunnion and Pipes and Hatchway. In point
of fact, Crowe is by no means the equal of the first two of these. And
yet, with his heart in the right place, and his application of sea terms
to land objects, Captain Samuel Crowe has a good deal of the rough charm
of his prototypes. Still more distinct, and among Smollett's personages
a more novel figure, is the Captain's nephew, the dapper, verbose,
tender-hearted lawyer, Tom Clarke. Apart from the inevitable Smollett
exaggeration, a better portrait of a softish young attorney could hardly
be painted. Nor, in enumerating the characters of Sir Launcelot Greaves
who fix themselves in a reader's memory, should Tom's inamorata, Dolly,
be forgotten, or the malicious Ferret, or that precious pair, Justice and
Mrs. Gobble, or the Knight's squire, Timothy Crabshaw, or that very
individual horse, Gilbert, whose lot is to be one moment caressed, and
the next, cursed for a "hard-hearted, unchristian tuoad."
Barring the Gobbles, all these characters are important in the book from
first to last. Sir Launcelot Greaves, then, is significant among
Smollett's novels, as indicating a reliance upon the personages for
interest quite as much as upon the adventures. If the author failed in a
similar intention in Fathom, it was not through lack of clearly conceived
characters, but through failure to make them flesh and blood. In that
book, however, he put the adventures together more skilfully than in Sir
Launcelot Greaves, the plot of which is not only rather meagre but also
far-fetched. There seems to be no adequate reason for the baronet's whim
of becoming an English Don Quixote of the eighteenth century, except the
chance it gave Smollett for imitating Cervantes. He was evidently
hampered from the start by the consciousness that at best the success of
such imitation would be doubtful. Probably he expresses his own
misgivings when he makes Ferret exclaim to the hero: "What! . . . you
set up for a modern Don Quixote? The scheme is rather too stale and
extravagant. What was a . . . well-timed satire in Spain near two
hundred years ago, will . . . appear . . . insipid and absurd
. . . at this time of day, in a country like England." Whether from
the author's half-heartedness or from some other cause, there is no
denying that the Quixotism in Sir Launcelot Greaves is flat. It is a
drawback to the book rather than an aid. The plot could have developed
itself just as well, the high-minded young baronet might have had just as
entertaining adventures, without his imitation of the fine old Spanish
Don.
I have remarked on the old Smollett touch in Sir Launcelot Greaves,--the
individual touch of which we are continually sensible in Roderick Random
and Peregrine Pickle, but seldom in Count Fathom. With it is a new
Smollett touch, indicative of a kindlier feeling towards the world. It
is commonly said that the only one of the writer's novels which contains
a sufficient amount of charity and sweetness is Humphry Clinker. The
statement is not quite true. Greaves is not so strikingly amiable as
Smollett's masterpiece only because it is not so striking in any of its
excellences; their lines are always a little blurred. Still, it shows
that ten years before Clinker, Smollett had learned to combine the
contradictory elements of life in something like their right proportions.
If obscenity and ferocity are found in his fourth novel, they are no
longer found in a disproportionate degree.
There is little more to say of Sir Launcelot Greaves, except in the way
of literary history. The given name of the hero may or may not be
significant. It is safe to say that if a Sir Launcelot had appeared in
fiction one or two generations earlier, had the fact been recognised
(which is not indubitable) that he bore the name of the most celebrated
knight of later Arthurian romance, he would have been nothing but a
burlesque figure. But in 1760, literary taste was changing. Romanticism
in literature had begun to come to the front again, as Smollett had
already shown by his romantic leanings in Count Fathom. With it there
came interest in the Middle Ages and in the most popular fiction of the
Middle Ages, the "greatest of all poetic subjects," according to
Tennyson, the stories of Arthur and his Knights of the Round Table,
which, for the better part of a century, had been deposed from their
old-time place of honour. These stories, however, were as yet so
imperfectly known--and only to a few--that the most to be said is that
some connection between their reviving popularity and the name of
Smollett's knight-errant hero is not impossible.
Apart from this, Sir Launcelot Greaves is interesting historically as
ending Smollett's comparatively long silence in novel-writing after the
publication of Fathom in 1753. His next work was the translation of Don
Quixote, which he completed in 1755, and which may first have suggested
the idea of an English knight, somewhat after the pattern of the Spanish.
Be that as it may, before developing the idea, Smollett busied himself
with his Complete History of England, and with the comedy, The Reprisal:
or the Tars of Old England, a successful play which at last brought about
a reconciliation with his old enemy, Garrick. Two years later, in 1759,
as editor of the Critical Review, Smollett was led into a criticism of
Admiral Knowles's conduct that was judged libellous enough to give its
author three months in the King's Bench prison, during which time, it has
been conjectured, he began to mature his plans for the English Quixote.
The result was that, in 1760 and 1761, Sir Launcelot Greaves came out in
various numbers of the British Magazine. Scott has given his authority
to the statement that Smollett wrote many of the instalments in great
haste, sometimes, during a visit in Berwickshire, dashing off the
necessary amount of manuscript in an hour or so just before the departure
of the post. If the story is true, it adds its testimony to that of his
works to the author's extraordinarily facile pen. Finally, in 1762, the
novel thus hurried off in instalments appeared as a whole. This method
of its introduction to the public gives Sir Launcelot Greaves still
another claim to interest. It is one of the earliest English novels,
indeed the earliest from the pen of a great writer, published in serial
form.
G. H. MAYNADIER.
THE ADVENTURES OF SIR LAUNCELOT GREAVES
CHAPTER ONE
IN WHICH CERTAIN PERSONAGES OF THIS DELIGHTFUL HISTORY ARE INTRODUCED TO
THE READER'S ACQUAINTANCE.
It was on the great northern road from York to London, about the
beginning of the month of October, and the hour of eight in the evening,
that four travellers were, by a violent shower of rain, driven for
shelter into a little public-house on the side of the highway,
distinguished by a sign which was said to exhibit the figure of a black
lion. The kitchen, in which they assembled, was the only room for
entertainment in the house, paved with red bricks, remarkably clean,
furnished with three or four Windsor chairs, adorned with shining plates
of pewter, and copper saucepans, nicely scoured, that even dazzled the
eyes of the' beholder; while a cheerful fire of sea-coal blazed in the
chimney. Three of the travellers, who arrived on horseback, having seen
their cattle properly accommodated in the stable, agreed to pass the
time, until the weather should clear up, over a bowl of rumbo, which was
accordingly prepared. But the fourth, refusing to join their company,
took his station at the opposite side of the chimney, and called for a
pint of twopenny, with which he indulged himself apart. At a little
distance, on his left hand, there was another group, consisting of the
landlady, a decent widow, her two daughters, the elder of whom seemed to
be about the age of fifteen, and a country lad, who served both as waiter
and ostler.
The social triumvirate was composed of Mr. Fillet, a country practitioner
in surgery and midwifery, Captain Crowe, and his nephew Mr. Thomas
Clarke, an attorney. Fillet was a man of some education, and a great
deal of experience, shrewd, sly, and sensible. Captain Crowe had
commanded a merchant ship in the Mediterranean trade for many years, and
saved some money by dint of frugality and traffic. He was an excellent
seaman, brave, active, friendly in his way, and scrupulously honest; but
as little acquainted with the world as a sucking child; whimsical,
impatient, and so impetuous, that he could not help breaking in upon the
conversation, whatever it might be, with repeated interruptions, that
seemed to burst from him by involuntary impulse. When he himself
attempted to speak he never finished his period; but made such a number
of abrupt transitions, that his discourse seemed to be an unconnected
series of unfinished sentences, the meaning of which it was not easy to
decipher.
His nephew, Tom Clarke, was a young fellow, whose goodness of
heart even the exercise of his profession had not been able to corrupt.
Before strangers he never owned himself an attorney without blushing,
though he had no reason to blush for his own practice, for he constantly
refused to engage in the cause of any client whose character was
equivocal, and was never known to act with such industry as when
concerned for the widow and orphan, or any other object that sued in
forma pauperis. Indeed, he was so replete with human kindness, that as
often as an affecting story or circumstance was told in his hearing, it
overflowed at his eyes. Being of a warm complexion, he was very
susceptible of passion, and somewhat libertine in his amours. In other
respects, he piqued himself on understanding the practice of the courts,
and in private company he took pleasure in laying down the law; but he
was an indifferent orator, and tediously circumstantial in his
explanations. His stature was rather diminutive; but, upon the whole, he
had some title to the character of a pretty, dapper, little fellow.
The solitary guest had something very forbidding in his aspect, which was
contracted by an habitual frown. His eyes were small and red, and so
deep set in the sockets, that each appeared like the unextinguished snuff
of a farthing candle, gleaming through the horn of a dark lanthorn. His
nostrils were elevated in scorn, as if his sense of smelling had been
perpetually offended by some unsavoury odour; and he looked as if he
wanted to shrink within himself from the impertinence of society. He
wore a black periwig as straight as the pinions of a raven, and this was
covered with a hat flapped, and fastened to his head by a speckled
handkerchief tied under his chin. He was wrapped in a greatcoat of brown
frieze, under which he seemed to conceal a small bundle. His name was
Ferret, and his character distinguished by three peculiarities. He was
never seen to smile; he was never heard to speak in praise of any person
whatsoever; and he was never known to give a direct answer to any
question that was asked; but seemed, on all occasions, to be actuated by
the most perverse spirit of contradiction.
Captain Crowe, having remarked that it was squally weather, asked how far
it was to the next market town; and understanding that the distance was
not less than six miles, said he had a good mind to come to an anchor for
the night, if so be as he could have a tolerable berth in this here
harbour. Mr. Fillet, perceiving by his style that he was a seafaring
gentleman, observed that their landlady was not used to lodge such
company; and expressed some surprise that he, who had no doubt endured so
many storms and hardships at sea, should think much of travelling five or
six miles a-horseback by moonlight. "For my part," said he, "I ride in
all weathers, and at all hours, without minding cold, wet, wind, or
darkness. My constitution is so case-hardened that I believe I could
live all the year at Spitzbergen. With respect to this road, I know
every foot of it so exactly, that I'll engage to travel forty miles upon
it blindfold, without making one false step; and if you have faith enough
to put yourselves under my auspices, I will conduct you safe to an
elegant inn, where you will meet with the best accommodation." "Thank
you, brother," replied the captain, "we are much beholden to you for your
courteous offer; but, howsomever, you must not think I mind foul weather
more than my neighbours. I have worked hard aloft and alow in many a
taut gale; but this here is the case, d'ye see; we have run down a long
day's reckoning; our beasts have had a hard spell; and as for my own hap,
brother, I doubt my bottom-planks have lost some of their sheathing,
being as how I a'n't used to that kind of scrubbing."
The doctor, who had practised aboard a man-of-war in his youth, and was
perfectly well acquainted with the captain's dialect, assured him that if
his bottom was damaged he would new pay it with an excellent salve, which
he always carried about him to guard against such accidents on the road.
But Tom Clarke, who seemed to have cast the eyes of affection upon the
landlady's eldest daughter, Dolly, objected to their proceeding farther
without rest and refreshment, as they had already travelled fifty miles
since morning; and he was sure his uncle must be fatigued both in mind
and body, from vexation, as well as from hard exercise, to which he had
not been accustomed. Fillet then desisted, saying, he was sorry to find
the captain had any cause of vexation; but he hoped it was not an
incurable evil. This expression was accompanied with a look of
curiosity, which Mr. Clarke was glad of an occasion to gratify; for, as
we have hinted above, he was a very communicative gentleman, and the
affair which now lay upon his stomach interested him nearly.
"I'll assure you, sir," said he, "this here gentleman, Captain Crowe, who
is my mother's own brother, has been cruelly used by some of his
relations. He bears as good a character as any captain of a ship on the
Royal Exchange, and has undergone a variety of hardships at sea. What
d'ye think, now, of his bursting all his sinews, and making his eyes
start out of his head, in pulling his ship off a rock, whereby he saved
to his owners"----Here he was interrupted by the captain, who
exclaimed, "Belay, Tom, belay; pr'ythee, don't veer out such a deal of
jaw. Clap a stopper on thy cable and bring thyself up, my lad--what a
deal of stuff thou has pumped up concerning bursting and starting, and
pulling ships; Laud have mercy upon us!--look ye here, brother--look ye
here--mind these poor crippled joints; two fingers on the starboard, and
three on the larboard hand; crooked, d'ye see, like the knees of a
bilander. I'll tell you what, brother, you seem to be a--ship deep
laden--rich cargo--current setting into the bay--hard gale--lee shore--
all hands in the boat--tow round the headland--self pulling for dear
blood, against the whole crew--snap go the finger-braces--crack went the
eye-blocks. Bounce daylight--flash starlight--down I foundered, dark as
hell--whiz went my ears, and my head spun like a whirligig. That don't
signify--I'm a Yorkshire boy, as the saying is--all my life at sea,
brother, by reason of an old grandmother and maiden aunt, a couple of old
stinking--kept me these forty years out of my grandfather's estate.
Hearing as how they had taken their departure, came ashore, hired horses,
and clapped on all my canvas, steering to the northward, to take
possession of my--But it don't signify talking--these two old piratical--
had held a palaver with a lawyer--an attorney, Tom, d'ye mind me, an
attorney--and by his assistance hove me out of my inheritance. That is
all, brother--hove me out of five hundred pounds a year--that's all--what
signifies--but such windfalls we don't every day pick up along shore.
Fill about, brother--yes, by the L--d! those two smuggling harridans,
with the assistance of an attorney--an attorney, Tom--hove me out of five
hundred a year." "Yes, indeed, sir," added Mr. Clarke, "those two
malicious old women docked the intail, and left the estate to an alien."
Here Mr. Ferret thought proper to intermingle in the conversation with a
"Pish, what dost talk of docking the intail? Dost not know that by the
statute Westm. 2, 13 Ed. the will and intention of the donor must be
fulfilled, and the tenant in tail shall not alien after issue had, or
before." "Give me leave, sir," replied Tom, "I presume you are a
practitioner in the law. Now, you know, that in the case of a contingent
remainder, the intail may be destroyed by levying a fine, and suffering a
recovery, or otherwise destroying the particular estate, before the
contingency happens. If feoffees, who possess an estate only during the
life of a son, where divers remainders are limited over, make a feoffment
in fee to him, by the feoffment, all the future remainders are destroyed.
Indeed, a person in remainder may have a writ of intrusion, if any do
intrude after the death of a tenant for life, and the writ ex gravi
querela lies to execute a device in remainder after the death of a tenant
in tail without issue." "Spoke like a true disciple of Geber," cries
Ferret. "No, sir," replied Mr. Clarke, "Counsellor Caper is in the
conveyancing way--I was clerk to Serjeant Croker." "Ay, now you may set
up for yourself," resumed the other; "for you can prate as unintelligibly
as the best of them."
"Perhaps," said Tom, "I do not make myself understood; if so be as how
that is the case, let us change the position, and suppose that this here
case is a tail after a possibility of issue extinct. If a tenant in tail
after a possibility make a feoffment of his land, he in reversion may
enter for the forfeiture. Then we must make a distinction between
general tail and special tail. It is the word body that makes the
intail: there must be a body in the tail, devised to heirs male or
female, otherwise it is a fee-simple, because it is not limited of what
body. Thus a corporation cannot be seized in tail. For example, here is
a young woman--What is your name, my dear?" "Dolly," answered the
daughter, with a curtsey. "Here's Dolly--I seize Dolly in tail--Dolly, I
seize you in tail"--"Sha't then," cried Dolly, pouting. "I am seized of
land in fee--I settle on Dolly in tail."