their hats _en pot-a-beurre_;
their long rapiers, with their pummels down to their feet, and their
points up to their shoulders; their ruffs stiffened by many rows, and
pieces of garlick stuck in their girdles. The Dutch were exhibited in as
great variety as the uniformity of frogs would allow. We have largely
participated in the vindictive spirit which these grotesque emblems keep
up among the people; they mark the secret feelings of national pride.
The Greeks despised foreigners, and considered them only as fit to be
slaves;[103] the ancient Jews, inflated with a false idea of their small
territory, would be masters of the world: the Italians placed a line of
demarcation for genius and taste, and marked it by their mountains. The
Spaniards once imagined that the conferences of God with Moses on Mount
Sinai were in the Spanish language. If a Japanese become the friend of a
foreigner, he is considered as committing treason to his emperor, and
rejected as a false brother in a country which, we are told, is
figuratively called _Tenka_, or the Kingdom under the Heavens. John
Bullism is not peculiar to Englishmen; and patriotism is a noble virtue
when it secures our independence without depriving us of our humanity.

The civil wars of the League in France, and those in England under
Charles the First, bear the most striking resemblance; and in examining
the revolutionary scenes exhibited by the graver in the famous _Satire
Menippee_, we discover the foreign artist revelling in the _caricature_
of his ludicrous and severe exhibition; and in that other revolutionary
period of _La Fronde_, there was a mania for _political songs_; the
curious have formed them into collections; and we not only have "the
Rump Songs" of Charles the First's times, but have repeated this kind of
evidence of the public feeling at many subsequent periods.[104]
_Caricatures_ and _political songs_ might with us furnish a new sort of
history; and perhaps would preserve some truths, and describe some
particular events not to be found in more grave authorities.

FOOTNOTES:

[89] Baudelot de Dairval, _de l'Utilite des Voyages_, ii. 645. There
is a work, by Ficoroni, on these lead _coins_ or _tickets_. They are
found in the cabinets of the curious medallist. Pinkerton, in
referring to this entertaining work, regrets that "such curious
remains have almost escaped the notice of medallists, and have not
yet been arranged in one class,