The Argosy of Pure
Delight. The Argosy of Pure
Delight. In the 1820s and 1830s there was a mania for books of American travels by English travelers, almost all of them uncomplimentary to the United States and its people. The deluge of such books provoked a very amusing parody, supposedly by the former barber to His Majesty. Here is the first chapter of that book.
Oh! fool that I was, to turn radical, and thus to lose the favor of the best, the kindest, and most royal master, that ever a subject was blest withal! For, by losing the countenance of the king, I lost my office; and by losing my office, I lost the means whereby I got my bread. Ah! woe is me! never shall I smooth such a chin as that of his most gracious Majesty. Never shall I enjoy so fat an office, as the one I enjoyed, when removing the excrescences from the royal face. Would that I had attended to my own proper business, instead of spouting in political clubs, and urging measures of reform. But in an evil hour, I became a radical. I joined the party of Cobbett and Hunt.
And then, what a fool I was! I must have the temerity to recommend to my royal master a radical reform in my own department. I could not be content with the old method of smoothing chins—a method which is sanctioned by time, and which has been approved by the most celebrated tonsors, ever since the flood. This venerable practice it was, that I wished to overthrow. I insisted upon it, that it was too dilatory and too expensive. Simpleton that I was! What had I to do, either with economy in the expenditure of the public money, or expedition in the discharge of the public duties? The money did not come out of my purse, but rather came into it; and no workman who was compus mentus, would be desirous of injuring his own business by the introduction of any more cheap or expeditious mode of performing it. And yet such, I am now sensible, would have been the effect of the reform, I had the temerity to recommend to his Majesty.
But, lauded be his Majesty’s great and royal wisdom! he refused to listen to my new fangled mode of polishing the royal chin: and thus the nation was saved. Yes, Great Britain was saved; but—but George Fibbleton was lost. The barber, who had so long enjoyed the sunshine of the royal favor, was ejected from office!
I was not at first aware of the extent of my loss. I was still a radical; and I said in my heart, His Majesty may go to the devil and shake himself, for what I care. I’ll lather his royal phiz no more. I’m above such low business. I’m a republican in principle, and I’ll emigrate forthwith to the land of freedom. I’ll become a citizen of the United States. There’s no government like the American, where all enjoy a perfect equality of privileges; where the barber is equal to the prime minister, and the prime minister is equal to the President of the nation.
Thus I thought, and thus I acted. But I have had leisure to repent. I left England a complete radical; I return to it a perfect tory. My travels in the United States, have cured me of all hankering after a republic. I am now convinced that a monarchy is the only decent sort of government; and that the old mode of smoothing chins, which has been handed down from time immemorial, is the only true and legitimate mode. It has cost me a great sacrifice of pride to make this admission; but truth is mighty and will prevalebit, as my Latin master used to say.
I owe this candid acknowledgment to his most sacred Majesty. I have indeed felt the heavy pressure of his most royal hand. But I am sure it was laid on in pure clemency; and that if his Majesty had hung me, instead of turning me out of office, it would have been no more than my rank offence justly demanded. But as it is, I feel that I owe a whole life of loyal service to his most gracious Majesty; and that it is my bounden duty, to do all I can, to put down the spirit of reform; to render republicanism odious, and to establish loyalty in the affections of the people. For this purpose, (as well as to recruit my purse, which not being a public reason, I speak it in parenthesis)—I have resolved to publish my observations on the manners, customs, laws, government, and productions of the United States.
In doing so, I but cast in my mite along with those admired champions of truth and loyalty, and those invincible enemies of republics, Captain Basil Hall, Mrs. Trollope, and last, though not least, the learned and Rev. Mr. Fidler; and happy shall I be, if the following pages have the effect of arresting the career of one misguided radical, and of confirming the loyalty of one wavering tory. But above all, I shall be happy, if this, my first feeble attempt in the way of authorship, shall so far meet the favorable views of his most gracious Majesty, that he will, of his most royal grace and favor, deign to reinstate me in my former office of barber to his most royal and gracious Majesty.
