INTRODUCTION
TO PART TWO: This post follows up on Part One: “Byng-Oh! Jane Austen’s complex
web of ‘encouragement’ & allusion to martyred Admiral Byng” which I wrote 3
weeks ago: http://sharpelvessociety.blogspot.com/2018/05/byng-oh-jane-austens-complex-web-of.html
. In it, I began with background about the tragic execution in 1757 of Admiral John
Byng, who was the victim of cynical scapegoating by the highest levels of the
English government, including the King, for alleged cowardice in naval command
decisions during the Siege of Minorca during the Seven Years War. I also gave
detail as to the present-day efforts by members of the Byng family to finally, officially
clear his name.
I then went
on to discuss the widely recognized contemporary allusions to the Byng
execution by Voltaire in Candide and
by Samuel Johnson in various ways; after which I extended Frank Bradbrook’s
pioneering 1967 insight into what he saw (and I agreed!) Jane Austen as making
an ironic, veiled allusion to the Byng execution, which she subtly coded into one
of Sir Walter Elliot’s absurd speeches in her 1817 (and final) novel, Persuasion.
If the
above very brief summary does not suffice, and you want full context for my new
claims, below, you may wish to read through Part One before you go on. Today, I’ll
present evidence showing two more contemporary literary allusions to the Byng
execution: by Laurence Sterne in his far-ahead-of-its-time, absurdist
masterpiece, Tristram Shandy, and by
Tobias Smollett in his political allegory, Adventures
of an Atom. As it turns out, these allusions intersect in various
interesting ways with those by Voltaire and Johnson which I already addressed
in Part One.
And, for
even fuller context: within a few days I plan to present Part Three of this
series, in which I’ll land the plane, and, building on Parts One and Two,
finally show not only that the Austen family was indirectly connected to the
Byng family, but also that Jane Austen’s allusion to Admiral Byng in Persuasion is, in my considered opinion,
much more pervasive and thematically significant than Bradbrook (or even I,
when I wrote Part One three weeks ago) dreamt of!
To wit:
I see the ghost of the wronged Admiral Byng haunting the entirety of Persuasion, the way the ghost of King
Hamlet haunts Hamlet. And, what’s
more, it turns out that Austen’s allusion in Persuasion to Tristram Shandy,
which I had previously caught glimpses of, is itself also pervasive – precisely,
as I’ve now realized, because Austen, the brilliant reader of other literary
works of genius, understood how Sterne wove his literary focus on Admiral Byng
deep into his masterpiece, via the extraordinary character of Uncle Toby, a character whom Austen
scholars know that Austen knew well (as I’ll also explain in Part Three).
Jumping
ahead for a moment, the essence and main theme of that global allusion by
Austen to both the real life Admiral Byng, and to the fictional Uncle Toby, is,
as I’ll show in Part Three, is -- what else?-- “courage”. You’ll see how Austen
artfully transposed the realm of physical courage in battles of ships to that
of personal courage in battles of the sexes.
That
Austen, in a novel she wrote more than 60 years after Admiral Byng died, placed
him in such a central allusive role, shows how long the literary outcry against
that fatal injustice survived, in Jane Austen’s most naval novel, Persuasion. So I sincerely hope that my
research will assist Thane Byng (who features prominently in Part One, and is,
via Twitter, my contact in the Byng Family) in her/their worthy mission to
vindicate the scapegoated Admiral 263 years after his death.
Now,
with all that as prelude, on with the show.
MAIN
DISCUSSION: At the end of Part One, I
wrote “at the center of that allusive matrix, I will also reveal the identity
of yet another very famous work of 18th century literature by
another famous English author, who engaged, as it turns out, on a massive, if
covert, scale, with the memory of Admiral Byng, cut down so cruelly and
unjustly in martyrdom for an alleged lack of courage which was not at all the
case.”
As an
opening salvo, then, here are the key passages in that very famous work, Tristram Shandy, by Laurence Sterne,
passages which all refer to the protagonist’s repeated references to his Uncle
Toby’s famous, unfortunate groin injury (mirroring the injury suffered by his
nephew Tristram from an ill-timed falling window) suffered at the Siege of
Namur. As you read along, pay extra attention to the verbiage in italics—It
will become clear to you why I selected these passages to show to you, when you
read the remainder of this post.
1.21 “Yes, Madam, it was owing to a blow from a
STONE, broke off by a ball from the parapet of a horn-work at THE SIEGE OF
NAMUR, which struck full upon my Uncle Toby's groin.—Which way could that effect it? The story of that, Madam, is
long and interesting;—but it would be running my history all upon heaps to give
it you here.—'Tis for an episode hereafter; and every circumstance relating to
it, in its proper place, shall be faithfully laid before you:—'Till then, it is
not in my power to give farther light into this matter, or say more than what I
have said already…’ “
1.25: “The
wound in my Uncle Toby's groin, which he received at THE SIEGE OF NAMUR, rendering him unfit for the service, it was
thought expedient he should return to England, in order, if possible, to be set
to rights. He was four years totally confined,—part of it to his bed, and
all of it to his room: and in the course of his cure, which was all that time
in hand, suffer'd unspeakable miseries…the great injury which it had done my
Uncle Toby's groin, was more owing to the gravity of the stone itself, than to
the projectile force of it,—which he would often tell him was a great happiness….”
1.26: “I
have begun a new book, on purpose that I might have room enough to explain the
nature of the perplexities in which my Uncle Toby was involved, from the many
discourses and interrogations about THE SIEGE OF NAMUR, where he received his
wound.
I must
remind the reader, in case he has read
the history of King William's wars,—but if he has not,—I then inform him, that
one of the most memorable attacks in that siege, was that which was made by the
English and Dutch upon the point of the advanced counterscarp, between the
gate of St. Nicolas, which inclosed the great sluice or water-stop, where the
English were terribly exposed to the shot of the counter-guard and demi-bastion
of St. Roch: The issue of which hot dispute, in three words, was this; That the
Dutch lodged themselves upon the counter-guard,—and that the English made
themselves masters of the covered-way before St. Nicolas-gate, notwithstanding
the gallantry of the French officers, who exposed themselves upon the glacis
sword in hand.
As this
was the principal attack of which my Uncle Toby was an eye-witness at NAMUR,—the
army of the besiegers being cut off, by the confluence of the Maes and Sambre,
from seeing much of each other's operations,—My Uncle Toby was generally more
eloquent and particular in his account of it; and the many perplexities he was
in, arose out of the almost insurmountable difficulties he found in telling his
story intelligibly…What rendered the account of this affair the more intricate
to my Uncle Toby, was this,—that in the attack of the counterscarp, before the
gate of St. Nicolas, extending itself from the bank of the Maes, quite up to
the great water-stop,—the ground was cut and cross cut with such a multitude of
dykes, drains, rivulets, and sluices, on all sides,—and he would get so sadly bewildered, and set fast amongst them, that
frequently he could neither get backwards or forwards to save his life; and was
oft-times obliged to give up the attack upon that very account only.
These
perplexing rebuffs gave my Uncle Toby Shandy more perturbations than you would
imagine; and as my father's kindness to him was continually dragging up fresh
friends and fresh enquirers,—he had but a very uneasy task of it.…My Uncle Toby
could not philosophize upon it;—'twas enough he felt it was so,—and having
sustained the pain and sorrows of it for three months together, he was resolved
some way or other to extricate himself. He
was one morning lying upon his back in his bed, the anguish and nature of the
wound upon his groin suffering him to lie in no other position, when a thought
came into his head, that if he could purchase such a thing, and have it pasted
down upon a board, as A LARGE MAP of the fortification of the town and citadel
of NAMUR, with its environs, it might be a means of giving him ease….”
1.37: With
all my heart, replied my father, I don't care what they call you,—but I wish
the whole science of fortification, with all its inventors, at the devil;—it
has been the death of thousands,—and it will be mine in the end.—I would not, I
would not, brother Toby, have my brains so full of saps, mines, blinds,
gabions, pallisadoes, ravelins, half-moons, and such trumpery, to be proprietor
of NAMUR, and of all the towns in Flanders with it.
My Uncle Toby was a man patient of
injuries;—NOT FROM WANT OF COURAGE,—I have told you in a former chapter, 'that
he was a man of COURAGE:'—And
will add here, that where just occasions presented, or called it forth,—I know no
man under whose arm I would have sooner taken shelter;—nor did this arise from
any insensibility or obtuseness of his intellectual parts;—for he felt this
insult of my father's as feelingly as a man could do;—but he was of a peaceful,
placid nature,—no jarring element in it,—all was mixed up so kindly within him;
MUT had scarce a heart to retaliate upon a fly.”
END OF QUOTES
FROM BOOK 1 OF TRISTRAM SHANDY
So
what, you say? How do all these references to the Siege of Namur, and the
emphasis at one point on Uncle Toby being “a man of courage”, relate to Admiral
Byng having been executed for cowardice after the Siege of Minorca?
It
turns out that it has been recognized by several modern Tristam Shandy scholars, but is apparently unknown to historians expert
in the Byng execution, and to members of the Byng family, that the above references
to the Siege of Namur were Laurence
Sterne’s code for the Siege of Minorca.
How is this known to be so?
The publication
of Tristram Shandy created such a
sensation, that a flurry of pamphlets quickly appeared within a year or two
afterwards, which picked up on the parodic, postmodern, risqué spirit of TS
itself. One of those pamphlets, Explanatory
Remarks by Dr. Kunastrokius, M.D. (who may have been Sterne himself---if
you sound out the name of the good doctor, you’ll understand why), contained
the following discussion of Chapters
15-17 of Book 1 of Tristram Shandy, a
section which refer several times to the Siege of Namur. Again, as before, pay
particular attention to the all caps and italicized excerpts, and ESPECIALLY
note the sentence in bold faced italics, and the connection made by Sterne
between the two famous Sieges will become clear:
“In England, every coffee-house has its president, who
harrangues the circle that catch his opinions, and support them in their
different districts. ——
"Why,
Sir, I repeat it, what have we to do with continental connections? — Are not
our ships, our floating bulwarks, our only protection? — Could the king of —,
in return for all the assistance we have given him, have made such a diversion
as THE BRAVE CAPTAIN ELLIOT did, in
St. George's channel?"
I say,
Sir, would all the german princes put together, have defeated Thurot?
"Is not our trade, and our navigation, the subject
of this war, — and what is our navigation to the inland
parts of Germany?—trifling,—I repeat it very
trifling. And yet neglect the herring fishery, — that Peruvian sea-mine! and scarce pay any attention
to those elaborate and well digested schemes of the great Henriques!"
—— The
learned, deep sighted, clear witted, eloquent president of ——— coffee-house,
after having made this popular and
sagacious harrangue — laid hold of my worthy friend Mr. Tristram Shandy, —
"Here,
(says he) here is the man after my own heart, — whose political notions are as
clear and self-evident as my own. — There
is the TOUCHSTONE of public measures, — the whetstone of trade and
navigation, and the grind-stone of malversation."
…17: It
may be necessary to inform some of my readers, that we are not yet got out of —
coffee-house, in — street:—No—here we are yet, as attentive as ever to
Mr. Profound,
(that is the gentleman's name in the black full bottom wig, and the green
spectacles) who has by this time thrown
down a dish of coffee in enforcing his argument upon the TOUCH-STONES,
whet-stones, and grind-stones;
taken two pinches of snuff, and opened Tristram Shandy exactly
at page 135.
…Oh excellent metaphor, cried Mr. Profound, (in
extasy) worthy of the great pen from whence it flows! —"That good
chear and hospitality flourish once more; — and that such weight and influence
be put thereby into the hands of the squirality of my kingdom, as should
counterpoise what I perceive my nobility are now taking from them."
Great—Great Tristram!...
What
can he mean here, (resumed Mr. Profound) but pecuniary influence in
elections, particularly in boroughs? and yet there is not one in a hundred
takes it in that sense. I tell you, gentlemen, Tristram Shandy is one compleat
system of modern politics, and that to understand him, there is as much
occasion for a key, as there is for a catalogue to the Harleian library:
I own, that I should not myself
have penetrated so far as I have, notwithstanding my great reading in works of
this nature, if I had not had the opportunity of supping the other evening with
the author, who let me into the whole affair. I advised him
to publish a key, but he told me it was too dangerous.—What is the Siege of NAMUR, which he often mentions, but the Siege of
Fort St. Philip's in Minorca?— or, the wound his uncle Toby received there but
the distress the nation was thrown into thereupon? His application to
the study of fortification, and the knowledge he therein gained, means nothing
else but the rectitude and clear sightedness of the administration which
afterwards took up the reins of government. This is a masterpiece of
allegory, beyond all the poets of this or any period whatever…..”
The
overarching point I want you to take away from the above quoted passages (in
Sterne’s novel, and in “Dr. Kunastrokius’s” explanatory pamphlet), is that
Uncle Toby’s groin injury suffered at the Siege of Namur is indeed Sterne’s code
for Admiral Byng’s execution after the Siege of Minorca; and that Sterne goes
out of his way to defend Uncle Toby’s “courage”.
What I’ll
also be addressing in Part Three (which, as you see, will be pretty crowded!) is
the literary reason why I italicized the references to “touchstones” –hint: it
has to do with another famous literary character who waxes eloquent about
courage – and I also bet some of you did guess why I put “the brave Captain Elliot”
in all caps!
But
now, let me move right along to the other
contemporary literary allusion to the execution of Admiral Byng, which is found
in the following quoted passage in The
History and Adventures of an Atom, by Tobias
Smollett, his short, 1769 political allegory, in which he transposes
England to Japan in order to skewer the villains in the English government who scapegoated
and then in effect murdered Admiral Byng:
“Fortune
had not yet sufficiently humbled the pride of Japan. That body of Chinese which
defeated Koan, made several conquests in Fatsissio, and seemed to be in a fair
way of reducing the whole island. Yet the court of China, not satisfied with
this success, resolved to strike a blow, that should be equally humiliating to
the Japanese, in another part of the world. Having by special remonstrances
already prepossessed all the neighboring nations against the government of
Japan, as the patrons of perfidy and piracy, they fitted out an armament, which
was intended to subdue the island of Montao, on the coast of Corea, which the
Japanese had taken in a former war, and now occupied at a very great expense, as
a place of the utmost importance to the commerce of the empire….
….The
council being at last waked by the clamors of the people, who surrounded the
palace, and proclaimed that Motao was in danger of an invasion ; the
sea-sey-seo-gun, Ninkom-poo-po, was ordered to fit out a fleet of fune, for the
relief of that island; and directions were given that the commander of these
fune should, in his voyage, touch at the garrison of Foutao, and take on board
from thence a certain number of troops, to reinforce the Japanese governor of
the place that was in danger.
Nin-kom-poo-po for this service
chose the commander BIHN-GOH, a man who had never signalized himself by any act
of valor. He sent him out with a squadron of fune ILL-MANNED,
WRETCHEDLY PROVIDED, AND INFERIOR IN NUMBER to the fleet of China, which was by
this time known to be assembled, in order to support the invasion of the island
of Motao. He sailed, nevertheless, on this expedition, and touched at the
garrison of Foutao, to take in the reinforcement; but the orders sent for this purpose from Nob-od-i, minister for the
department of war, appeared so contradictory and absurd, that they could not
possibly be obeyed; so that BIHN-GOH
proceeded without the reinforcement towards Motao, the principal fortress of which
was by this time invested. He had been accidentally joined by a few
cruisers, which rendered him equal in strength to the Chinese squadron, which
he now descried. Both commanders seemed
afraid of each other. The fleets however engaged; but little damage was done to
either. They parted, as if by consent. BIHN-GOH
made the best of his way back to Foutao, without making the least attempt to
succor or open a communication with Fi-de-ta-da, the governor of Motao, who,
looking upon himself as abandoned by his country, surrendered his fortress,
with the whole island, to the Chinese general. These disgraces happening on the back of the Fatsissian disasters,
raised a prodigious ferment in Japan, and the ministry had almost sunk under
the first fury of the people's resentment. They not only exclaimed against the
folly of the administration, but they also accused them of treachery; and
seemed to think that the glory and advantage of the empire had been betrayed.
What increased the commotion, was the terror of an invasion, with which the
Chinese threatened the islands of Japan. The terrors of Fika-kaka had
already cost him two pair of trunk hose, which were defiled by sudden sallies
or irruptions from the postern of his microcosm; and these were attended with
such noisome effluvia, that the bonzas could not perform the barbal abstersion
without marks of abhorrence. The emperor himself was seen to stop his nose, and
turn away his head, when he approached him to perform the pedestrian exercise….
… In this general consternation, Foksi-roku stood up, and
offered a scheme, which was immediately put in execution. "The multitude,
my lords," said he, "is a many-headed monster--it is a Cerberus that
must have a sop: it is a wild beast so ravenous, that nothing but blood will appease
its appetite: it is a whale that must have a barrel for its amusement: it is a
demon to which we must offer up human sacrifice. Now, the question is, who is
to be this sop, this barrel, this scapegoat? Tremble not, illustrious
Fika-kaka—be not afraid -your life is of too much consequence. But, I perceive
that the cuboy is moved --an unsavory odour assails my nostrils—brief let me
be—BIHN-GOH
must be the victim — happy, if the sacrifice of his single life
can appease the commotions of his country. To him let us impute the loss of Motao. Let us, in the mean time,
soothe the rabble with solemn promises that national justice shall be done; let
us employ emissaries to mingle in all places of plebeian resort; to puzzle,
perplex, and prevaricate; to exaggerate
the misconduct of BIHN-GOH; to traduce his character with retrospective
reproach; strain circumstances to his prejudice ; inflame the resentment of the
vulgar against that devoted officer ; and keep up the flame, by feeding it with
continual fuel."
The speech was heard with universal applause:
Foksi-roku was kicked by the dairo, and kissed by the cuboy in token of
approbation. The populace were dispersed by means of fair promises. BIHN-GOH
was put under arrest, and kept as a malefactor in close prison. Agents were
employed through the whole metropolis, to vilify his character, and accuse him
of cowardice and treachery. Authors were enlisted to defame him in public
writings; and mobs hired to hang and burn him in effigy. By these
means, the revenge of the people was artfully transferred, and their attention
effectually diverted from the ministry, which was the first object of their
indignation. At length matters being duly prepared for the exhibition of such an
extraordinary spectacle, BIHN-GOH underwent a public trial, was unanimously
found guilty, and unanimously declared innocent; by the same mouths condemned
to death, and recommended to mercy; but mercy was incompatible with the designs
of the administration. The unfortunate BIHN-GOH was crucified for
cowardice, and bore his fate with the most heroic courage. His behavior
at his death was so inconsistent with the crime for which he was doomed to die,
that the
emissaries of the cuboy were fain to propagate a report, that BIHN-GOH had
bribed a person to represent him at his execution, and be crucified in his
stead.”
END
QUOTE FROM SMOLLETT
Now you
know why I used “Binh-Goh” in my Subject Line (and why my mind was blown by the
spooky coincidence that I used “Byng-Oh” in the Subject Line of Part One, even
though at that time I wrote Part One, I had absolutely no idea about Smollett’s
“Bihn-Goh”!).
[And
now I find I have yet another blog post to write in the near future – about the
(to my mind, obvious) allusion by Gilbert to Smollett’s Atom, when Gilbert
wrote The Mikado more than a century after
Smollett wrote his work. The parallels are overwhelming, most of all with the
faux Japanese names that poke sharp fun at the real life English rulers they
represent. So I look forward to finding out more about the satire of the late
19th century England government that Gilbert must have been writing
via The Mikado, following in the
footsteps of Smollett’s satire of 18th century England.]
But back
to Admiral Byng, I’m not quite done with Part Two. It seems very clear that Smollett
wrote his Atom after having read Tristram Shandy, written several years
earlier. Perhaps Smollett felt that Sterne had been too coy in his “Siege of
Namur” coding, and so he made it crystal clear that it was Admiral Byng he was
defending. But, there may be good karma in Smollett being inspired by Sterne,
given that I believe it highly likely that Smollett provided Sterne with
inspiration to use the Siege of Namur as code for the Siege of Minorca.
How? Just
check out the following passage in Smollett’s History of England, written not long after Byng was executed, and
not long before Sterne wrote Tristram
Shandy. The title is “The French take Namur in Sight of King William”, but
wait till you get to Smollett’s final assessment of what happened.
“…Having reviewed his army, which amounted to about one hundred and twenty thousand men, [France’s King Louis] undertook the siege of Namur…The citadel was deemed one of the strongest forts in Flanders…The place was well supplied, and the governor knew that king William would make strong efforts for its relief, so that the besieged were animated with many concurring considerations. Notwithstanding these advantages, the assailants carried on their attacks with such vigour that in seven days after the trenches were opened, the town capitulated and the garrison retired into the citadel.”
So far
so good, but now here’s where we read how King William at Namur, from a
position of greater strength than Byng held at Minorca, failed to act, very
much as Admiral Byng did -- but being King, he was never put on trial – and, in
the “Bad History Repeats Itself” category, read the final sentence in
particular, to see that another underling, the governor of besieged Namur, who
took the fall instead of the King, who apparently could do no wrong!:
“King
William, being joined by the troops of Brandenburgh and Liege, advanced to the
Mehaigne at the head of one hundred thousand effective men, and encamped within
cannon shot of Luxembourg’s army, which lay on the other side of the river.
That general however had taken such precautions, that the king of England could
not interrupt the siege nor attack the French lines without great disadvantage.
The besiegers, ENCOURAGED by the presence of their monarch, and assisted by the
superior abilities of Vauban their engineer, repeated their attacks with such
impetuosity that the fort of Cohorn was surrendered after a very obstinate
defence, in which he himself had been dangerously wounded. The citadel being
thus left exposed to the approaches of the enemy, could not long withstand the
violence of their operations; the two covered ways were taken by assault. On the twentieth of May the governor
capitulated, to the unspeakable mortification of king William, who saw himself
obliged to lie inactive at the head of a powerful army, and be an eye-witness
of the loss of the most important fortress in the Netherlands. Louis having
taken possession of the place, returned in triumph to Versailles, where he was
flattered with all the arts of adulation; while William’s reputation suffered a
little from his miscarriage, and the prince of Barbason incurred the suspicion
of treachery or misconduct.”
And, as
you can see from my putting “ENCOURAGED” in all caps, I wonder whether Voltaire,
like Sterne, also read the above description of English regal hypocrisy, and
borrowed that verb, and put it in Candide,
to such everlasting ironic effect!
One
last (scholarly irony). I should not have been the first scholar to connect all
of the above dots.
In “The
Eastern Tale and the Candid Reader in 18th Century Europe: Tristram
Shandy, Candide, Rasselas”, RSEAA 17-18 67 (2010), Prof. Ros Ballaster began as
follows:
“Voltaire’s
Candide, Samuel Johnson’s Rasselas and the first two volumes of Laurence
Sterne’s Tristram Shandy appeared in 1759. All three works pursue an agenda of
practical scepticism. Textual allusions to the Mille et une Nuit inform the
ambivalent pursuit of sceptical reading in these works.”
Later
in that same article, Ballaster then wrote:
“Voltaire’s
Candide sees the lady Cunegund and her mother raped and their bellies cut open…Candide’s
Leibnizian tutor Pangloss is hanged…the lovely princess of Palestrina narrates
the story of the excision of her left buttock as a sacrifice for the
cannibalistic survival of 20 Moroccan Janissaries…South-American monkey-lovers
who bite the buttocks of their mistresses…, the
execution of an admiral at Portsmouth to encourage his fellow combatants to
fight in chapter 23 (a reference to
the execution of Admiral Byng for his failure to relieve the English garrison
at Minorca against the French).
In the first two volumes of
Tristram Shandy, we hear of Toby’s injury in his groin from a stone broken off
by a cannonball from a parapet at the Siege of Namur, his corporal Trim’s wound in the
left knee from a musket ball at the battle of Landen, while Tristram’s nose is
damaged in his violent delivery to the distress of a father who theorises that
the fineness of the human soul depends on the temperature and clearness of the
liquor in the cerebellum requiring that the head not undergo severe compression
in childbirth.”
Ballaster
writes about Admiral Byng in the subtext of Candide
in one sentence, and then about Uncle Toby at the Siege of Namur in the next sentence—but she did not
realize that Admiral Byng was the subtext of Uncle Toby as well.
And
that provides a perfect moment to end Part Two, and promise that I’ll do my
best to end the suspense created above, and deliver Part Three so that you’ll see
how Jane Austen paid her respects to Admiral Byng in Persuasion!
Cheers,
ARNIE
@JaneAustenCode
on Twitter
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