The Griffin
The Griffin
Bombay Gazette, 30 August 1820
We received this Review the other day from a Correspondent at Surat, who states that it was brought to him by a dirty Boy, who had picked it up under a hedge.
We cannot inform our Correspondent whether such a Book has been really published or not.
THE GRIFFIN
From the ***** Review. Published at London by Richard Paterson, & Co. 25 Long Lane, Third Edition. – with Plates.
The Work which we are about to review is reported to be the maiden effort of an Indian Subaltern’s Muse, written during the many hours of Solitude and Idleness incident to a Soldier’s life, and under the depression of much mental affliction. We did not therefore look for much erudition – indeed the nature of the Work precluded such a hope – but we expected much amusement, some novelty and some faults, nor have our critical expectations been disappointed, for we found many laughable anecdotes, many new scenes and situations and many errors. It is written in burlesque imitation (if we may use such a phrase when the thing burlesqued is in itself a Burlesque) of Lord Byron’s witty yet shamelessly indecent Don Juan; void of all its richest beauties and destitute also of its licentiousness and depravity. It purposes to relate the life and adventures of a youth sent out to India as a Cadet for the Infantry. We had seated ourselves by a comfortable fire-side, drawn close the window curtains and “while the Bubbling and loud hissing Urn sent up its steamy column,” prepared ourselves for judgment on “The Griffin.” [1] We confess we were somewhat startled at the horrifying title under which it has been ushered into the world, and in some vexation of spirit, looked for a tale of German Horrors, a tissue of deaths heads and blue lights, groans and hollow voices, worms creeping in and worms creeping out, bleeding ghosts, seven-feet monks, gore-stained daggers and bowls of poison, but from this apprehension we were relieved by an old Indian Friend and Co-Critic, who anticipating splendid descriptions of Rajahs, Nawabs, golden Musnuds, [2] jewel’d turbands, houdah’d Elephants, Tigers and Tyfa’s, [3] pecks of Pagodos [4] and lacks of Rupees, [5] earnestly requested us to commence our labours and assured us that a Griffin was not “the fearful wild fowl,” we had imagined but merely a nom de guerre given to any European adventurer until he has passed one year of probation in the climate of the East.
Upon a production of the nature now before us, we would willingly be as little severe as our imperative duty to our Readers will permit, and though the lash might often have been bestowed, for the most palpable carelessness and want of reflection, we would have spared the rod altogether had we not been shocked by the most ridiculous anachronisms; in some places and the most servile imitation, in others, the want of unity thro’ out, and above all by the most unpardonable language in which the Author has attempted to degrade the loveliest part of Creation. That he has written these calumnies from the heart we cannot believe, and while we render this justice to his better feelings, we would warn him of his want of common benevolence, and pity the disposition that could be so palpable, so miserably prejudiced by the impulse of the moment. That there are some females even in India whose turpitude of conduct render them objects of loathing and disgust to every virtuous mind, we are not prepared to deny – but in the general Women (and particularly British Women) whether shivering in the Icy regions of the North or wasting their bloom in the land of the Sun, whether floating on the sea of affluence or stemming the rude tide of poverty, in the zenith of joy, or in the day of agony, in the pomp of Vigor, or in the hour of Death, twine round the stubborn heart of “Lordly Man,” the object of his purest passions, the sharers of his prosperity and distress, the partakers of his joy and his pain, rendering his toils a pleasure, his life a blessing and his home a Heaven!! We trust our readers will forgive us for thus trespassing the honest burst of our feelings upon their patience, but we are sure that every one who peruses that portion of the book we allude to, will join with us in condemning the acrimony which the Author has so wantonly evinced towards those whom he should have considered it his duty to have treated with kindness and his pride to have protected from insult. We trust this lecture will shew him the cruelty and malevolence of his conduct and should it awake in him those pangs of remorse which lead to reparation we shall not reget the trouble we have now taken “to probe and cure the Canker in his heart.” In the hope that such may be the effect of our animadversions we now proceed to the more pleasing part of our duty, that of bestowing praise, and in doing this, we will give our readers an outline of the story and occasional extracts that has struck us as deserving of approbation. The Poem commences with the following: –
Next follows in some very animated verses for which we have not room, an account of a dispute that had (previous to the opening of the Poem) taken place between the Parents of the Griffin, as to his destination; and the altercation ends in the usual style of all Matrimonial controversies, a few tears from the Mother gains the day.
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After enumerating the whole of his Equipment together with taking his passage and settling with the Captain, our Author brings us to the day of his departure from town, and in our opinion beautifully describes the feelings of the youth immediately previous to quitting his home. We have only room for the burst of grief with which he commences it, and we pity the Man, who has ever been similarly situated without experiencing similar sensations.
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After some more equally excellent lines, the Poem goes on –
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Young Daric (such is the Griffin’s name) next bids adieu to his younger Brothers and Sister; [11] among the latter his favourite is distinguished by the excess of her sorrow –
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The journey to Portsmouth, together with an account of his fellow travellers is laughable enough, but we cannot stay for any extracts here, having metal more attractive to attend to. His residence at that place, his embarkation, sailing, crossing the line, &c. &c. occupy several pages and the 1st Canto ends with his arrival at Bombay.
(82)
(To be Continued)
Bombay Gazette, 6 September 1820
THE GRIFFIN
From the ***** Review. Published at London by Richard Paterson, & Co. 25 Long Lane, Third Edition. – with Plates.
CANTO 2nd
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*************
*************
Here follow the several stanzas, that have already received our animadversions, even those we have now extracted are illiberal, cruel and unjust, but if similarly unfounded censures from the pen of a Female, [18] are not only tolerated but meet with approbation, if the Journal of a residence in India be allowed to float down the stream of celebrity, unanswer’d, unnoticed by any Champion of our fair Eastern exiles, we also must decline the Quixotic task; at least for the present. But to the story, after the Ship had anchor’d, the sails all furl’d, night comes on, sleep closes every eye on board except our hero’s and the men on watch; Daric paces the deck, and loses all thoughts of the present in reflections on the past, and anticipations of the eventful future. The sky was cloudless and the moon was shining in mid-heaven.
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And while the Griffin is swinging in his hammock, the Poet takes the opportunity of describing the inhabitants of the Island. The Civil and Military personages are almost individually characterized, how truly so, we know not, the picture strikes us as being too highly colour’d and frequently so much overdrawn as nearly to approach to caricature, he then sums up the Natives in a lump,
(38)
After an enumeration of their vices, and pursuits and which he has given with disgusting minuteness, we are relieved by the approach of morning, and the description of it appears one of the Author’s best specimens of Eastern scenery, but we leave the greatest portion of it out, that it may reach with all the additional effect of novelty, those who may have witnessed and can better appreciate the local interest.
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The Griffin now awakes and hastens with his hands full of letters of recomendation, to land at the Bundér Pier and to present these drafts on hospitality, but before he experiences how duly they are honor’d our author digresses to give an account of the Docks the Light house and the Steam Engine, conducting his hero by the cooperage, thro’ the Apollo Gate and along the Ramparts of which and the Esplanade, of the grass on the one and the perquisites of the other he gives a laughable description; at length the Griffin arrives at the Residence of a friend of his father’s the protejee of his deceased Uncle; the outline of this personage is greatly overdrawn and we trust that no one sat for the horrid likeness.
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After meeting with various incivilities, from the different people to whom he presents his letters of introduction he at last begins to think he must quit the disgusting drudgery and is on the point of proceeding to the Tavern for a lodging, when he determines to make one more attempt, and in this one he is rewarded for all his trouble. The worthy person to whom he now introduces himself receives him in the most kind and friendly manner makes him an inmate in his happy family, consisting of his wife, her married sister and two children. As we are coming to the most interesting part of the Griffin’s life, his first love fit; and as the end of the Canto fast approaches, the Author says, speaking of “the Griffin.”
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Bombay Gazette, 20 September 1820
THE GRIFFIN
From the ***** Review. Published at London by Richard Paterson, & Co. 25 Long Lane, Third Edition. – with Plates.
CANTO 3rd
We now proceed to the third portion of the work or as the author says.
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After a short residence in the family of which he forms a portion, the Griffins habits seem to have varied and his disposition to have become abstracted, gloomy and discontented, evincing much mental disquietude, much restlessness of body and great depression of spirits. We are in the dark about the cause of this for several pages, until the author flashes conviction of his predicament upon us in his own abrupt and outre manner. We heard little of the different personages who form the family groupe, except in general terms of praise, and little suspected that the God of the unerring Bow had been wreaking his blind Vengeance on the heart of our hero but so it proves. – His first acknowledgment of Love to the object of his affections (who by the bye is a married woman) is thus described at least as far as we dare give it.
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We have not time to stay with the “Griffin” any longer at the Presidency and must therefore hasten with him to busier and more interesting scenes. He sails for Panwell [34] having received a peremptory “forthwith” upon which he lays great stress and makes many pertinent remarks.
He describes Panwell hastily and the next day at noon, under a scorching Sun and with a Guide to shew the road he starts to join his battalion at Poona:
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The author now takes an opportunity of describing the miseries attendant upon a first march enumerating more than we think probable tho’ certainly within bounds of possibility, Military Indians will be the best judges of this. The Griffin at last lies down in his clothes his servants and baggage not making their appearance and in a wretched choultree [37] goes supperless to bed. With the dawn of day he ascends the Bore Ghaut, and here the poet seems to find himself upon his strong Ground for he becomes wild as the breeze that blew upon the Griffins blistered face and with enthusiastic delight sings the praises of the Dukhin or as he writes it “Deccan”.
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This is all very natural, very spirited and very good and we think the freshness and life that breathe through out the Canto will be much admired; at the same time we regret that the author should have so evidently identified himself with the Griffin. An unknown writer should be aware that but little interest can by this trick be added to the story and even that little must be confined to the limited circle of his own acquaintance, and tho’ he professedly imitates Lord Byron yet this one feature might with great propriety have been omitted and the likeness preserved. [39] Still we do not mean to censure him (the author before us) for this underhand sort of Egotism we merely express our own wishes on the subject he has much amused us and so far we are satisfied. In the course of the Journey we are taken into the caves of Karlee introduced to “the idiotic, bullet-headed Living God” at Chichore [40] and at last brought to Poona on the evening of the 4th of November 1817. [41] The anxiety and impatience of the troops form a good contrast to the alarm and confusion of the Ladies, whose situation and behaviour are well described – tho’ the whole of this, reminds us too much of “the scene of revelry by night in Belgium’s Capital” indeed it is almost a plagiarism. [42] The action takes place, night comes on and victory remains with the British. Great praise is bestowed upon the Leading character on this trying occasion and if the eulogy be deserved, it almost eclipses the lustre of his political Laurels. [43] One or two regiments are highly spoken of. It is on the day subsequent to the battle of Gunesh Kund, [44] that the Griffin first meets with the object of his proper Love. Her appearance is most interestingly described her character exquisitely pourtrayed, the opening of his passion and her confession together with their extraordinary adventures and final disappointment, separation and misery, form one of the most pathetic Episodes we have ever read. We will not anticipate the readers delight which this affecting tale will impart, but proceed to the 4th Canto which opens with a very striking description of the Battle scene.
Bombay Gazette, 25 October 1820
THE GRIFFIN
From the ***** Review. Published at London by Richard Paterson, & Co. 25 Long Lane, Third Edition. – with Plates.
CANTO 4th
That we may not make this extraordinary tale, appear more unconnected than it really is (and that to a very considerable degree) we must apprize the Reader, that “the Griffin” after wandering over the field of battle (alluding to the Victory of Kirkee) writes an account of it and his feelings on the occasion to his friends, and here the Poet has made a sad jumble of the ideas that then pressed upon his mind and his subsequent reflections, for while he is scribbling to his relatives about the Action he tells them that it is Early Day and that his “favorite Planet is alone shining upon” him, and then likens it to the “false Beacon” that ultimately deluded him, this is one of the many inadvertencies with which the Poem abounds, but his lines on the occasion are forcible, and deserve approbation. Alluding to the Morning Star “shining singly in the dark vault of heaven” and growing “paler and yet more pale” until at last extinguished by the rising Sun, he says.
We strongly disapprove of this change of Metre and altho’ it may have been a relief to the Author, which he has taken advantage of the Griffin’s letter to introduce yet (if we may be allowed the Expression) it breaks the Rhythm of our feelings – it puts us out of the beaten path upon which we had so long travelled – it is like getting into a shuffling trot after a delightful canter, it actually made our Indian Co-critic change his position, by taking one foot from the Fender, and throwing his right leg over his left; this was a grievance for a gouty man – he felt it and was for some time sorely displeased with the Author – tho’ we pointed out to him that the lines were good & many of them exceedingly energetic, as we proved to him in the continuation of the Epistle. – The following passage is well wrought up, it describes the battle-ground – which
But as we disapprove almost as much as our friend of this variegated metre in a regular Poem we shall not quote further from this letter but proceed to what are deemed by far the most interesting and best written portion of the Book, it is the whole account of his Entanglement with the chosen mistress of his soul, it breathes throughout an impassioned tenderness, a voluptuousness of feeling, a luxuriance and glowing richness of imagery, at the same time mingled with such paroxysms of mental agony and suffering, that remind us forcibly of the chastened elegance and fancy of Moore, the saddening touches of Montgomery, the love-breathing tenderness of Campbell, and the fearful sublimity and pathos of Lord Byron. [46] After this we have found great difficulty in withstanding the temptation of giving the whole of this beautiful epistle, but it has been suggested to us that by this copiously extracting the sweets of the Book, we are not acting with that justice to the sale of the Work, which we are most anxious to do, and therefore we will content ourselves here by giving our readers two of his little sonnets; [47] one on the departure of his Love which runs thus –
The novelty of the simile in the last stanza but one, equals the felicity of expression by which it is conveyed. The other and only sonnet for which we can now afford room is a beautiful thing. We know not how any one could have written with such feeling and force without having experienced the agony it depicts, it looks too much like reality, too like the disappointment of Juvenile passion, for fiction, and appears to have been composed while the heart was actually, bleeding from the effects of the scene described. In an unguarded moment Carineth (who is the Lady in question) had consented to an interview with the Griffin when all the family had retired to rest. The day proceeding, he had found means to communicate to her that an invincible obstacle prevented their Union, but its nature is not very clear it leads however to their separation immediately after this midnight assignation, the issue of which we are obliged to guess at, from this beautiful delineation of early impressions.
But to proceed with the business of the Poem after describing the plain of Kirkee (we suppose) with great accuracy, at all events with elaborate minuteness, where the Heathenish names of Parbuttee, Gunness-Kund, Singhur and Pair shaunee, [48] shine thro’ several stanzas in huge Capitals, he again touches upon some of the events of the Battle, places the conduct of one or two Officers in rather a ridiculous point of view and then describes a scene as is almost unworthy of belief. The sharers in the Glory of the Day are shewn pouring forth with the dawn of Light, for the purpose of being present while the Official account of the Action is preparing in order to secure honorable mention of their individual merit! Pro pudor! [49] but true or not, let the author speak for himself.
The Griffin is now ordered off to join a force expected from the Eastward, and in order to lose no time, he determines to travel by night, in his palankeen. This is another gross inadvertency, for our Indian friend at our elbow tells us (with great semblance of being correct) that no Subalterns of so short a standing can afford such an expensive mode of travelling and moreover the attempt to go unguarded at such a time, and in such a place would be impracticable. Our Author however, flings aside all these difficulties, shuts his hero up in his Indian Sedan and thus describes its luxuries – he says it is disgusting when
We were now in hopes of being introduced into the Camp of the 4th division of the Army, but immediately on the Griffin’s arrival at Seroor, he meets with a couple of whom he had some knowledge whilst in England, and with this Lady and Gentleman a most improbable tale is connected; it is of an interesting nature, tho’ too full of German devilry – we will not spoil the interest by garbled extracts, but content ourselves with a description of this married pair –
The rest is not worthy of our Author and we willingly pass over it, and bring our readers acquainted with some of the Operations of the 4th Division of the Army among which the Battle, of Ashtee shines conspicuous. [62] The 5th Canto thus commences descriptive of its Leader.
Bombay Gazette, 6 December 1820
GREAT FOLKS, and the GRIFFIN.
or
Paradise and the Peri at Bombay [63]
To be continued in our next.
Bombay Gazette, 27 December 1820
THE GRIFFIN
From the ***** Review. Published at London by Richard Paterson, & Co. 26 Long Lane.
CANTO 6th
We feel that we have not done justice to the many interesting scenes in the 5th Canto, but our brains became so bewilder’d with the voluminous and minute details of the marchings and countermarchings of the 4th Division of the Army that we feel anxious, (probably as much so as many of the gallant fellows of that Force) to quit “the pomp and circumstance of Glorious War” [79] for the more ignoble (certainly and as certainly more rational) enjoyment, of social Life in Cantonments, tho’ into what Cantonment the Author brings us we are at a loss to discover; we have the choice of three, Poonah, Seroor and Sholapoor, [80] and here again he begins to splash about his personalities with his usual non-chalance and satirical effect we wish he had avoided this – the objects thus satirized may possibly be the mere creatures of his imagination but to us they appear to issue so fresh in feature and with such undoubted impress of real Life that we feel them pass current with us and we stamp’d them accordingly, as genuine. For instance, who could not at the moment of perusal embody and fill up the figure of which he has given us the following most ridiculous outline, who could not fancy he saw the Tarantula bitten Maniac as distinctly before him, as he seems to have danced from the coinage of the Author’s brain? By the way we must inform our readers that the Griffin is attending a Ball as a spectator and after deriving much amusement from the Extraordinary steps some of the party took, to hop into the Good Graces of their smiling Partners he saunters towards the top of the room.
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A whole multitude of characters all equally pourtrayed are presented to us from this Ball room but we have not time to make more extracts from the pages devoted to this Belle assemblee; yet here once more and once for all we must declare most positivily our utter indignation at the style in which he ridicules our fair countrywomen, it is most undignified it is most ungenerous, who with the spirit of a man can help deprecating such sentiments and remarks as the following, and they seem to have been excited only by the very common and every day occurrence, of a Lady jilting him.
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He then proceeds in a strain of irony and sarcasm that we must not quote, and comes at last to.
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But we will not continue this unpardonable language this gross dereliction of man’s first Duty, and gladly do we turn to a letter which the Griffin writes to his friends in Europe; to us, it comes with all the advantage of novelty and even to those acquainted with similar scenes it must bear the stamp of life and spirit, it describes his maiden march with the Army.
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We have already given so much room to this Tale, or as it might be more properly term’d “Sketches of Indian Characters.” That we must conclude our remarks some what abruptly tho’ not more so than the Author finishes his story – Accompanied however with a threat of resuming his labours at some future opportunity. Before we close this review we cannot resist the temptation of giving our Readers the description of his (we say his because the Author most blameably, identifies himself with his Hero, but we mean Daric’s) parting scene with Carineth – How different from the calm chaste and beautiful one in the assignation of the 4th Canto – it forms an admirable contrast to that moonlight interview where every word breathed holy love and every embrace was but a pledge of purity and truth. Here all is doubt, jealousy passion and dismay; the creator of all this mischief is of course a woman – whom he thus describes.
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We do not admire the lengthened detail which this little Expose of personal duplicity (if we may so term it,) occasions – it is one of the many labour’d and tediously spun-out descriptions with which the Poem abounds. – Soon after the rupture between Babille and the Griffin, Carineth, who had watched the progress of the Amour, now treats him with marked reserve and almost merited Contempt – This renders him truly wretched, – at length on the approach of the time when he is ordered way, she after repeated solicitations, grants a final interview, which occasions the following (in our opinion) highly poetical stanzas and we think they will be much admired as the faithful transcript of youthful feelings – perhaps the Author romances a little too much, yet we do not know that we can justly accuse him of hyperbole, when we reflect that his hero after this interview, is left, to wander thro’ the world the victim of a hopeless passion – a prey to miserable and vain regret whilst the object of his affections, enters the pale of matrimony “almost unsought and totally unwoo’d.” [90]
But the reader shall judge for himself. The Griffin thus tells his tale of the preceding night’s occurrences.
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We must here take our leave of the Author with mingled censure and praise. Upon the whole we have been well pleased with him and shall be glad to see him come again before us – when we Shall take an opportunity of pointing out the most glaring defects of his Style, and expose to the world the plagiarisms of which he has been guilty. This threat we are sure will not deter him from his purpose of publishing his conclusion of his Tale at the same time it may induce him to be more cautious. We were rejoiced to see some symptoms of amendment in his Anti-woman Mania and as his present work closes with it we shall also make it the Finale of our Review.
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Notes
[1] EDITOR'S NOTE: An imperfect recollection of Cowper’s ‘The Winter Evening’: ‘And while the bubbling and loud-hissing urn / Throws up a steamy column’ (William Cowper, The Task: A Poem in Six Books (London, 1785), p. 139). BACK
[2] EDITOR'S NOTE: Thrones or seats made of cushions. BACK
[3] EDITOR'S NOTE: The word is uncommon; probably ‘taif’, a ghost. BACK
[4] EDITOR'S NOTE: Gold coins. BACK
[5] EDITOR'S NOTE: A lakh is equivalent to one hundred thousand. BACK
[6] EDITOR'S NOTE: Baji Rao II of Poona (1775-1852), Peshwa (first minister) to the Raja of Satara and nominal head of the Maratha Confederacy, an erstwhile ally of the British, was deposed in 1818 following the defeat of Maratha forces at the battle of Kirkee the previous year. BACK
[7] EDITOR'S NOTE: Daulat Rao Sindhia (1779-1827), ruler of the Maratha state of Gwalior. BACK
[8] EDITOR'S NOTE: Leadenhall Street, then site of the headquarters of the East India Company. BACK
[9] EDITOR'S NOTE: Welsh, Stalker and Welsh, of 143 Leadenhall Street, advertised their willingness to ‘SUPPLY, on the very best Terms, every Kind of GOODS, necessary for the Equipment of GENTLEMEN going to INDIA’ (European Magazine and London Review, Vol 44 (Jul-Dec 1803), back matter). BACK
[10] EDITOR'S NOTE: Tobacco. BACK
[11] EDITOR'S NOTE: The sense appears to demand the plural ‘Sisters’ here, but the copytext clearly indicates a singular noun. Such discrepancies are not further noted. BACK
[12] EDITOR'S NOTE: Locations in the Malabar area of south-western India. BACK
[13] EDITOR'S NOTE: Bombay became a British possession in 1661, part of Catherine of Braganza’s dowry on her marriage to Charles II. BACK
[14] EDITOR'S NOTE: Fortified buildings. BACK
[15] EDITOR'S NOTE: In Greek mythology, the Sirens lived on an island in the Mediterranean sea; their songs attracted passing sailors, who were shipwrecked on the island’s rocky shores. The dancer Auguste Vestris, a member of the renowned Vestris family of actors and dancers, had at this time lately retired from performance in Paris and London. BACK
[16] EDITOR'S NOTE: Twenty-five. BACK
[17] EDITOR'S NOTE: Tariff, market rate. BACK
[18] EDITOR'S NOTE: Maria Graham had in 1812 described the women of Bombay as ‘under-bred and over-dressed, and, with the exception of one or two, very ignorant’ (Journal of a Residence in India, 2nd edn (Edinburgh: Constable, 1813), p. 28). BACK
[19] EDITOR'S NOTE: Though there are several varieties of trees and shrubs known as ‘pagoda trees’, the primary reference here is to the pagoda, a ‘gold or silver coin of higher denomination than the rupee’ (OED); the mythical pagoda tree signified for British colonizers of the eighteenth century the potential wealth to be gained in India. Compare, for example, the protagonist of The Grand Master: ‘Filling his knapsack with rupees, / Or fruit from the pagoda trees’ (Quiz, Grand Master, p. 13). BACK
[20] EDITOR'S NOTE: Dher, an individual of low caste. BACK
[21] EDITOR'S NOTE: The small Parsi community of Bombay became successful in the fields of commerce and finance during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. BACK
[22] EDITOR'S NOTE: A sizable Christian population was part of the Portuguese legacy in Bombay, descended from Portuguese migrants or indigenous converts. They were mainly of the lower classes, and were the despair of contemporary missionaries who considered them ‘but indifferent Christians’ who ‘retain in their houses many symbols of the Hindoo mythology, and enter indiscriminately into the pernicious usages of a deplorable superstition’ (Gentleman’s Magazine, July 1819, pp. 27-8). BACK
[23] EDITOR'S NOTE: Milton, Paradise Lost Book II. BACK
[24] EDITOR'S NOTE: A contemporary traveller writes of ‘that extraordinary-looking object, Bhow-mullen rock, which rises, nearly perpendicular, to an immense height, while its centre is rent by an enormous chasm. It towers above the surrounding mountains in a stupendous and romantic form’ (John B. Seeley, The Wonders of Elora; or, The Narrative of a Journey, 2nd edn (London, 1825), p. 35). BACK
[25] EDITOR'S NOTE: The hill-fort of Karnala, also known as Funnell Hill, was part of the territory held by the Maratha ruler Baji Rao II until it was captured by Colonel David Prother in January 1818. BACK
[26] EDITOR'S NOTE: The mythological Greek hunter Atalanta, noted for her swiftness as a runner, would not marry any man who could not defeat her in a race. Bombay (Mumbai) is located on the island of Salsette; Karanja (or Uran island) and Elephanta are also part of the complex of islands in and around the harbour. BACK
[27] EDITOR'S NOTE: A Zoroastrian, or fire-worshipper. BACK
[28] EDITOR'S NOTE: A covered litter carried by bearers. BACK
[29] EDITOR'S NOTE: A Greek poet of the seventh century. The ‘learned dame’ who is her namesake may be a reference to Mary Robinson (c. 1758-1800), a well-educated, feminist writer and poet who attained celebrity and notoriety for her liaison with the Prince of Wales; she was known as the ‘English Sappho’. See Mary Robinson: Selected Poems, ed. Judith Pascoe (Peterborough, Ontario: Broadview, 2000), p. 149. BACK
[30] EDITOR'S NOTE: The intellectual ‘Bluestocking’ circle of the later eighteenth century included both male and female writers, but the term was eventually reserved for educated women writers. BACK
[31] EDITOR'S NOTE: In Greek mythology, Zephyr is god of the west wind; his mother was Eos, goddess of the dawn. BACK
[32] EDITOR'S NOTE: Well-fashioned, although ‘bien formé’ is unexpected in this context, and probably arrived at through a calque of ‘well formed’. BACK
[33] EDITOR'S NOTE: Now having floated into the whirlpool. BACK
[34] EDITOR'S NOTE: East of Bombay. BACK
[35] EDITOR'S NOTE: Mountain pass. The Bore Ghaut (as it is identified later) between Bombay and Poona was a well-known landmark. BACK
[36] EDITOR'S NOTE: Possibly a typo for ‘yes’. BACK
[37] EDITOR'S NOTE: Travellers’ lodging. BACK
[38] EDITOR'S NOTE: A steep valley or watercourse. BACK
[39] EDITOR'S NOTE: As Byron complained in the preface to the fourth canto of Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage (1818), the parallels between him and his protagonist, and the reading public’s identification of one with the other, rendered futile his half-hearted attempts to make ‘a distinction between the author and the pilgrim’ (Byron: Poetical Works, ed. Frederick Page, rev. John Jump (Oxford: Oxford UP, 1970), p. 226. BACK
[40] EDITOR'S NOTE: The village of Chinchoor was ‘the residence of and … belongs to a person, who, enjoying the distinction of an hereditary incarnation of the Hindoo deity Gunesh, is … known by the appellation of Living God’ (John Clunes, Itinerary and Directory for Western India (Calcutta: Bishop’s College Press, 1826), p. 10). BACK
[41] EDITOR'S NOTE: That is, the day before the battle of Kirkee (Khadki). Sushma Varma’s account notes the ‘unusual tumult and commotion’ in the city of Poona before Baji Rao’s forces attacked ‘the British camp of Khadki from the plain of Ganesh Khind. Thus started the war’ (Mountstuart Elphinstone in Maharashtra 1801-1827: A Study of the Territories Conquered from the Peshwas (Calcutta: KP Bagchi, 1981), pp. 64, 65). BACK
[42] EDITOR'S NOTE: ‘There was a sound of revelry by night / And Belgium’s capital had gather’d then…’ (Byron, Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage, Canto III, in Byron: Poetical Works, p. 212). BACK
[43] EDITOR'S NOTE: Probably a reference to Mountstuart Elphinstone, Resident at Poona 1811-1819, who narrowly escaped an attack by the Peshwa’s forces on the Residency in the opening stages of the battle, and took part in the subsequent action alongside Colonel Burr; in the aftermath of the Peshwa’s defeat he oversaw the administration of the Deccan, publishing his Report on the Territories Conquered from the Paishwa in 1821. Morris’s personal and public writings (see introduction) demonstrate his regard for Elphinstone. BACK
[44] EDITOR'S NOTE: See n. 41 above. BACK
[45] EDITOR'S NOTE: One of a caste group of cultivators or agricultural labourers (kunbis). BACK
[46] EDITOR'S NOTE: Thomas Moore (1779-1852), whose Irish Melodies provided the models for some of Morris’s hunting poems in the Oriental Sporting Magazine; James Montgomery (1771-1854), a poet and writer of hymns; Thomas Campbell (1777-1844), a poet best known for his long poem The Pleasures of Hope (1799); George Gordon, Lord Byron (1788-1824), whose Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage (1812-1818) and early cantos of Don Juan (1819-1824) served as source-texts for aspects of ‘The Griffin’. BACK
[47] EDITOR'S NOTE: This word appears clearly in the text, but the lines to which it refers are organized as four 8-line stanzas. BACK
[48] EDITOR'S NOTE: The placenames listed include a hill named for the goddess Parbuttee (Parvati), the hill and fort of Singhur, the plain of Gunness-Kund (Ganesh Khind), and Paishaunee (Pashan) village. BACK
[49] EDITOR'S NOTE: For shame! BACK
[50] EDITOR'S NOTE: That is, seeking to be mentioned in orders in recognition of their actions during the battle. BACK
[51] EDITOR'S NOTE: Roman symbol of victory. BACK
[52] EDITOR'S NOTE: The Hindu goddess Lakshmi and the elephant-headed god known also as Ganesha. BACK
[53] EDITOR'S NOTE: Dawk (dāk) refers to ‘transport by relays of men and horses’ (Hobson-Jobson), but is more usually found in the context of the postal system by which letters were thus delivered. BACK
[54] EDITOR'S NOTE: A torch, carried by a bearer alongside the palanquin. BACK
[55] EDITOR'S NOTE: Byron, Don Juan, Canto I, stanza 61 (Byron: Poetical Works, p. 644). BACK
[56] EDITOR'S NOTE: A losel, or lozel, is a worthless person, a scoundrel (OED). BACK
[57] EDITOR'S NOTE: The law courts in London dealing with matrimonial cases, among other matters. BACK
[58] EDITOR'S NOTE: The heroine of Samuel Richardson’s Pamela: or, Virtue Rewarded (1st pub. 1740) was a servant who maintained her ‘virtue’ by resisting the advances of her employer, Mr. B; her steadfastness was eventually rewarded with marriage to him. BACK
[59] EDITOR'S NOTE: A possible translation is ‘if the cat itself growls’ – this would require the nominative ‘feles’ rather than the genitive ‘felis’, but the text is clear at this point. BACK
[60] EDITOR'S NOTE: Shakespeare, Hamlet, Act 3 Scene 2. BACK
[61] EDITOR'S NOTE: Valeria Messalina (d. 48 AD), executed for conspiring against her husband, the Roman emperor Claudius. BACK
[62] EDITOR'S NOTE: Baji Rao was defeated by East India Company forces at the battle of Ashti in February 1818, and surrendered some months later. BACK
[63] EDITOR'S NOTE: The Peri, a spirit in Persian mythology, is represented in Thomas Moore’s Lalla Rookh (1817) as yearning for entry to Heaven; ‘Paradise and the Peri’ constitutes one of the three sections of the poem. BACK
[64] AUTHOR'S NOTE: I hope this will not be deemed a misnomer for one who is obliged to get fat upon promises! BACK
[65] AUTHOR'S NOTE: A very expressive term for an invitation to Dinner! BACK
[66] EDITOR'S NOTE: Sion, Mazagon and Mahim all refer to locations around Bombay; the village of Parell may have given its name to the bungalow named ‘Non Parell’, one-time residence of Sir John Malcolm (1769-1833), then political agent in Central India and later Governor of Bombay. See James Douglas, A Book of Bombay (Bombay: Bombay Gazette Steam Press, 1883), p. 346. BACK
[67] EDITOR'S NOTE: In central Bombay. BACK
[68] EDITOR'S NOTE: The elite of society. BACK
[69] EDITOR'S NOTE: See n. 38 above. BACK
[70] EDITOR'S NOTE: European Regiment. This and the marginal numbers opposite the following lines (all authorial paratexts) identify the regiments whose colours are referenced in the text. BACK
[71] AUTHOR'S NOTE: The third Regiment is know by every Sepoy as the Kallee Pultun [black regiment] from their black facings, – BACK
[72] AUTHOR'S NOTE: Bombay, so called by the author of the “Griffin”. BACK
[73] EDITOR'S NOTE: In this context spies or scouts; more usually messengers. BACK
[74] AUTHOR'S NOTE: There is an Anachronism here for which an Apology is due. The sound of the Nagaras and the sight of the streamers, and Flags were mentioned by the Gallant officer who fought and won the Battle of Ashtee, while “the brilliant charge of the Auxiliary Horse” took place some time previous near to Seroor and there are many eye witnesses who can vouch for the truth of the incident here alluded to, as well as the successful issue of that intrepid attack. [Brigadier General Lionel Smith, the officer commanding the East India Company forces at the battle of Ashta, mentions the sound of the enemy nagaras, or drums, in his dispatch of 21 February 1818 (Asiatic Journal, August 1818, p. 198).] BACK
[75] EDITOR'S NOTE: Āftāb gīr, a sunshade. British lore regarding these encounters includes an incident where Baji Rao required an ‘aftabgeer, or skreen from the sun’ to be taken down ‘otherwise the English would send a cannon ball through it’. See James Grant Duff, A History of the Mahrattas, vol. 3 (London, 1826), p. 438. BACK
[76] EDITOR'S NOTE: Daric’s activities of the day take place around the Fort area of Bombay, headquarters of the East India Company’s military and civil operations in the Presidency. BACK
[77] AUTHOR'S NOTE: A Tailor-like sort of conveyance that few residents in Bombay have not had cause to execrate. BACK
[78] AUTHOR'S NOTE: I believe this comparison will need no comment. [Presumably Morris expected his readers to share his opinion of Parsis. One of his ‘Observer’ columns refers to a correspondent named ‘A GRIFFIN’ who was cheated by his ‘Parsee Servant’ (‘Observer VIII, Bombay Gazette, 18 November 1818).] BACK
[79] EDITOR'S NOTE: Shakespeare, Othello Act 3, Scene 3. BACK
[80] EDITOR'S NOTE: All provincial military stations located at varying, but in each case considerable, distances from Bombay. BACK
[81] EDITOR'S NOTE: His occupation as a surveyor suggests that Pomponious is named for the Roman geographer Pomponius Mela (fl. c.43 AD). BACK
[82] EDITOR'S NOTE: Euclid of Alexandria, whose work forms the basis for the discipline of geometry. Charles Hutton, A Course of Mathematics …for the use of the gentleman cadets in the Royal Military Academy At Woolwich (London: Robinson, 1798) went through several editions in the first half of the nineteenth century. BACK
[83] EDITOR'S NOTE: Religious (Hindu, Muslim) or caste (Parwari, dher) groups within the army; Maratha soldiers recruited from the area of Western India surrounding Bombay. BACK
[84] EDITOR'S NOTE: The East India Company’s army was paid ‘batta’, or field allowance, when on active service; and received half that allowance when in cantonments. BACK
[85] EDITOR'S NOTE: Prize Committees’ tardiness in the calculation and payment of prize money due to individuals after specific campaigns or victories was a perennial cause of complaint. Ten days later, the Bombay Courier printed a letter citing these lines (stanza 56), and demanding answers: ‘Will none of the Prize Agents alluded to, take the trouble of refuting an assertion so openly proclaimed? Is nothing to be done with all the lacs of rupees realized by the Army during the late War? Why, Mr. Editor, I understand a Subaltern’s share will amount to some thousands – a sum that might make many a melancholy rogue almost an Eligible, who now languishes in the gloom of obscurity and debt’ (13 January 1821). The letter is signed ‘Expectans’, datelined Poonah, 7 January 1821, and includes the same quotation from Burns favoured by ‘Curioso’ (Bombay Gazette, 27 September 1820), whose letter is reprinted below. Either or both might be the work of an interested reader, or the work of Morris himself. BACK
[86] EDITOR'S NOTE: ‘L’utile secret que mentir à propos!’ (Pierre Corneille, Le Menteur (1644), Act 2, Scene 6). Babille has learned what Corneille’s protagonist Dorante terms the useful secret of lying. BACK
[87] AUTHOR'S NOTE: Tantalus. [A figure of Greek mythology, whose fate was to have the water for which he thirsted always recede beyond his reach.] BACK
[88] EDITOR'S NOTE: In Greek mythology, Prometheus stole fire from the gods, and was chained to a rock in consequence while an eagle fed on his liver every day. BACK
[89] AUTHOR'S NOTE: We killed a grey serpent which glitter’d in the Dark and emitted a rattling sound evidently intended by providence to warn other animals of its approach. Campbell’s missionaries travels in South Africa [See John Campbell, Travels in South Africa (London, 1815), p. 36]. BACK
[90] EDITOR'S NOTE: The phrase in quotation marks echoes the words used to describe the same episode in ‘To C— B—’ – ‘Leapt to another’s arms – unsought – unwooed’ – and has not been further identified. BACK
[91] EDITOR'S NOTE: ‘Men some to business, some to pleasure take; / But every woman is at heart a rake’, Alexander Pope, ‘An Epistle to A Lady’ (1735), ll. 215-216 (Alexander Pope: Selected Poetry, ed. Pat Rogers (Oxford: Oxford UP, 1998), p. 112). BACK
[92] AUTHOR'S NOTE: Related in Dunlop’s history of fiction. [John Dunlop, The History of Fiction, vol. 1 (Edinburgh: 1814), p. 181; Morris conveys the substance of Dunlop’s account of the fate of Merlin, drawn from Arthurian romances, in ll. 218-230 below.] BACK
[93] EDITOR'S NOTE: The Shakespearean character whose late conversion to the idea of marriage is the culmination of the Beatrice and Benedick sub-plot of As You Like It. BACK
[94] EDITOR'S NOTE: In John Tobin’s play The Honey Moon (London, 1805), Duke Aranza marries Juliana, a woman who is of the view that ‘Man was born to wait / On woman, and attend her sov’reign pleasure!’ (18). Tricked by him into believing that he has married under false pretences, and is without rank or means, she agrees to abide with him for a month in poverty, and thereby undergoes a ‘metamorphosis’, coming to believe that ‘modesty, in deed, in word, and thought, / Is the prime grace of woman; and with that, / More than by frowning looks and saucy speeches, / She may persuade the man that rightly loves her; / Whom she was ne’er intended to command’ (71). BACK
[95] EDITOR'S NOTE: Act III of The Honey Moon includes the following speech by Duke Aranza on women’s dress: ‘I’ll have no glittering gewgaws stuck about you, / To stretch the gaping eyes of ideot wonder, / And make men stare upon a piece of earth / As on the star-wrought firmament – no feathers / To wave as streamers to your vanity – / Nor cumbrous silk, that, with its rustling sound, / Makes proud the flesh that bears it. She’s adorn’d / Amply, that in her husband’s eye looks lovely – / The truest mirror that an honest wife / Can see her beauty in!’ (55). BACK
[96] EDITOR'S NOTE: The final canto of Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage had been published in 1818. BACK
[97] EDITOR'S NOTE: ‘Farewell and applaud’ – the concluding words of Roman comedies. BACK