The sketch-book of Geoffrey Crayon, gent[pseud.] together with Abbotsford and other selections from the writings of Washington Irving .. . ns, or nicknames. In this way they havewhimsically designated, not merely individuals, but nations;and, in their fondness for pushing a joke, they have not sparedeven themselves. One would think that, in personifyingitself, a nation would be apt to picture something grand, heroic,and imposing; but it is characteristic of the popular humor ofthe English, and of their love for what is blunt, comic, and 162 JOHN BULL 163 familiar, that they have embodied their
The sketch-book of Geoffrey Crayon, gent[pseud.] together with Abbotsford and other selections from the writings of Washington Irving .. . ns, or nicknames. In this way they havewhimsically designated, not merely individuals, but nations;and, in their fondness for pushing a joke, they have not sparedeven themselves. One would think that, in personifyingitself, a nation would be apt to picture something grand, heroic,and imposing; but it is characteristic of the popular humor ofthe English, and of their love for what is blunt, comic, and 162 JOHN BULL 163 familiar, that they have embodied their national odditiesin the figure of a sturdy, corpulent old fellow, with a three-cornered hat, red waistcoat, leather breeches, and stout oakencudgel. Thus they have taken a singular delight in exhibit-ing their most private foibles in a laughable point of view;and have been so successful in their delineations, that thereis scarcely a being in actual existence more absolutely presentto the public mind than that eccentric personage, John Bull. 2. Perhaps the continual contemplation of thecharacter thus drawn of them has contributed to.
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Keywords: ., bo, bookcentury1900, bookdecade1900, bookidsketchbookofgeof14irvi
