THE ALBUM.

No. I.

ON ALBUMS.

THE elegant and ingenious author, from whom we

have taken our motto, has made much research concerning the nature and origin of Albums. The information he gives us shews how great are their antiquity and dignity; and as we, of course, are rather chary on these points, we shall draw from the stores of his erudition to give our readers proper ideas on the subject.

In the infancy of the art of Albuming, "the virgin page, "destined to receive the contributions of all comers, instead of being bound in morocco, edged with gold, and secured with an ornamented lock, was no more than the surface of the wall of a frequented place, on which those who thought they had wit, and were fond of shewing it, gave vent to their cacoethes scribendi. This, the rude origin of all Albums, is of very ancient date; so much so, indeed, that the Antiquaries tell us, it gave rise to the work of Hippocrates, which was but a medical Album. The sick, who thronged to the temple of Esculapius, used to write on the walls their maladies, and the means by which they had been cured; these inscriptions were collected by Hippocrates, who from them formed his book, which may thus be considered the VOL. I. PART I.

B

earliest Album on record. This practice of writing on walls also obtained among the Romans; for in the ruins of Herculaneum is a guard-house, the walls of which are covered with this sort of inscriptions. The traces which remained were, unfortunately, too imperfect to permit much to be taken down from them, but they were still amply sufficient to shew what had been their cause. We can conceive few things more interesting than the transcript of these writings would have been. The discovery of Herculaneum has shewn us more of the interior economy of Roman life than any author who has come down to us: and it is natural it should be so; for authors would scarcely write of what to them must have been vulgar or common-place. But in the scribblings of the soldiers on the walls of their guardhouse, would, probably, have been traced some of the passing topics of the moment: or, at all events, the general spirit and manners of the Roman soldiery of that period. These things give a freshness and reality to the times they tell of, which will scarcely permit us to believe that so many ages have since passed; though it is that very lapse of time which gives interest and dignity to what in themselves were, probably, but the overflowings of indecency and coarseness.

In more modern days, the invention of glass has, in some degree, superseded the custom of which we have been speaking; for ambitious spirits reflect, that writing on the window, instead of on the wall, not only proves the possession of a diamond, but prevents the erasure of their wit, unless it be attended with the destruction of the glass itself on which it is inscribed.

To this succeeded the custom of travellers leaving traces of their having been on spots to which some strong interest is attached, or at which there is difficulty or

danger in arriving. M. de Jouy cites Montmorenci as belonging to the former class, and the top of the steeple at Strasburgh, to the other. We can well understand that Montmorenci

that place which you know,

"Is so famous for cherries and Jean Jacques Rousseau.'" must be able to boast of multitudinous inscriptions of this kind; and, we doubt not, they bear ample marks of the flood of bad taste to which the very mention of the name of Rousseau so often gives rise. All the fadeurs of sentimentality are sure to overwhelm you when Rousseau chances to be talked of; and a pilgrimage to Montmorenci is precisely the opportunity of giving loose to them unboundedly. We confess that we have no great reverence for this place, or its former inhabitant. Whatever may be the beauty, and we admit that it is great, of Rousseau's writings which do not speak of himself, his Confessions have caused him to lose in his own person, all power of exciting in us any feelings but those of ridicule and disgust. The doings of which Montmorenci is the scene, are calculated, we think, only to excite laughter, except in the instances-and they are not few-in which they become odious and revolting.

That the persons who mount the steeple at Strasburgh should wish to leave their names there is, we think, very natural. When a man chooses to encounter a great danger from the sensible and satisfactory cause that he wishes to brag of it afterwards, he is never backward in giving every possible publicity to his achievement. To this we attribute the numberless inscriptions on the top of the Strasburgh steeple. It most undoubtedly comes into the class of "places at which there is danger in arriving," for it narrows so much towards the top, that the steps are passed to the outside, and from that point

the ascent is so difficult that it is not unfrequent for the climber to loose his hold, and fall the five hundred feet which are between him and the earth. In consequence of this, you are not allowed to break your neck without an especial permission from the Mayor; who, like the Dervise in a fairy tale, at first dissuades you from undertaking the perilous adventure, but, on being pressed, ends in giving you the talisman necessary to enable you to be dashed to pieces. Those who survive the ascent naturally wish to leave a proof of their having firmness of foot and hand, nicety of eye, and steadiness of brainwe bar all bad jokes on the latter quality-sufficient to carry them up a place from which the nerves of a maintop-man of a seventy-four would almost shrink; the more especially as if they were to delay the recording their exploit till they got safe down again, it might, very possibly, be never recorded at all. The weathercock on the steeple at Strasburgh, therefore, is an Album.

The first Album consisting of fragments, written by various persons in a blank book, was, we believe, that kept on the Alps, by the successors of St. Bruno. In this, every traveller at his departure was asked to inscribe his name, and he usually added to it a few sentences of devotion, of thankfulness to his hosts, or of admiration of the scene around him. This register was kept for several centuries, and in its pages will be found a large proportion of names which have earned themselves immortality. As M. de Jouy truly observes, minds of that stamp would have all their energies raised and ennobled in such a scene; the ideas which then flowed from their pen would be those which the magnificence of nature always excites in a high soul; and we can well understand that the monks should call those

thoughts inspired which were produced in circumstances such as these. It is much to be lamented that this curious and most interesting register should have been lost. It is supposed that the monks carried it with them at the period of their emigration, but little is, in fact, known concerning it. There is a book of the same kind now again kept at the passage of the Alps, but how long must it be before it can possess the treasures which the accumulation of ages had given to the old one!

This, probably, gave rise to the modern Albums; and even these, frivolous as many of them are, we think possessed of great interest. Into some, selections from favourite authors are admitted; and there requires little more than a tolerable portion of good taste to make them pleasing. But those which consist entirely of original contributions are the more ambitious class, and are indeed, curious. Drawings, music,-scraps of poetry, and fragments of prose,-sentiment, wit, and no wit at all,-all these come into the composition of an Album; and all these are, of course, stamped with the various shades of intellect, from genius down to silliness and stupidity. "On demande de l'esprit à tout le monde, et personne n'est assez impoli pour se dire en droit d'en refuser."

Albums are usually kept by women; perhaps because they have the most power of raising contributions; or, it may be, from a book of this sort being so convenient a vehicle for complimentary prettinesses to the fair owner. The great ambition is to have names of literary eminence in their collections, and we have known writers of reputation undergo woeful persecution for "something for my Album." A poet especially can never escape without the payment of his tribute-stanza; indeed, we now