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He was going with his daughter to see over Beckford's Tower, and invited us to accompany him. Derrick, much against the grain, I fancy, had to talk to Freda, who, in her winter furs and close-fitting velvet hat, looked more fascinating than ever, while the old man descanted to me on Bath waters, antiquities, etc., in a long-winded way that lasted all up the hill.
The vicissitudes which sometimes attend a picture or statue furnish no inadequate materials for narrative interest. Amateur collectors can unfold a tale in reference to their best acquisitions which outvies fiction. Beckford's table-talk abounded in such reminiscences.
Beckford's Travels will henceforth be classed among the most elegant productions of modern literature: they will be forthwith translated into every language of the Continent and will keep his name alive, centuries after all the brass and marble he ever piled together have ceased to vibrate with the echoes of Modenhas. The Poetical Works of S.T. Coleridge. 3 vols. 12mo. London, 1834.
His sad story may be read in a most powerful sketch in the Quarterly Review, attributed to Mr. Lockhart. See Beckford's Vathek, Hall of Eblis. Lady Stafford says: "We were so lucky as to have Sir W. Scott here for a day, and were glad to see him look well, and though perfectly unaltered by his successes, yet enjoying the satisfaction they must have given him." Sharpe's Letters, vol. ii. p. 379.
In this connection, the reader will recall the similar power of Vathek, in Beckford's romance, who killed with his eye, and the story of Racine, whom a look of Louis XIV. sent to his grave.
And here we may allude, en passant, to the prospect of one novelty that ought to interest our opera-lovers who are weary of the usual hackneyed repertoire. Our townsman, Mr. L. H. Southard, the composer of "The Scarlet Letter," has also written an Italian opera, on an Oriental subject, with the title "Omano," the libretto by Signor Manetta, founded on Beckford's "Vathek."
Beckford's triumphant career, of the glories of Fonthill or the later splendours of the Hamilton Palace collection. We should note his purchase of Gibbon's books 'in order to have something to read on passing through Lausanne. 'I shut myself up, said Mr.
Her eyelids were stained with a bluish-black powder, which is the same kind of substance, it is supposed, as that described in a note in Mr. Beckford's Vatheck. Her person was excessively clean, and her apparel flowing, neat, and graceful.
Take Beckford's millions away; make him coin his wits to supply the want of them; and what would have been the result? Perhaps more Vatheks; perhaps things even better than Vathek; perhaps nothing at all. On the whole, it is always wiser not to play Providence, in fact or fancy.
William Beckford's Vathek, that most Oriental of tales, first written in French by a millionaire of genius, should have inspired Martin. Perhaps its mad fantasy did, for all we know there is no authentic compilation of his compositions.
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