" The gay
overture of "The Eve of the Derby," at a London club, with which the
curtain rises, contrasts with the evening amusements of the _proletaire_
in the gin-palaces of Manchester in a more than operatic effectiveness,
and yet falls rather below than rises above the sober truth of present
history. And we are often tempted to bind up the novel of the dashing
Parliamenteer with our copy of "Ivanhoe," that we may thus have, side by
side, from the pens of the Right Honorable Benjamin Disraeli and Sir
Walter Scott, the beginning and the end of these eight hundred years of
struggle between Norman rule and Saxon endurance. For let races and
families change as they will, there have ever been in England two
nations; and the old debate of Wamba and Gurth in the forest-glade by
Rotherwood is illustrated by the unconscious satires of last week's
"Punch." In Chartism, Reform-Bills, and Strikes, in the etiquette which
guards the Hesperides of West-End society, in the rigid training which
stops many an adventurer midway in his career, are written the old
characters of the forest-laws of Rufus and the Charter of John. Races
and families change, but the distinction endures, is stamped upon all
things pertaining to both.
Pages:
72
73
74
75
76
77
78
79
80
81
82
83
84
85
86
87
88
89
90
91
92
93
94
95
96