The Doctor asked whether he had been at the Opera?
His answer was a violent and ear-jarring squeak, by way of imitating Italian singing. Nevertheless, he said that he began to like it a great deal better than he had done at first.
He now missed Richard, the Doctor’s youngest son,[1] and, upon being told that he was gone to school, clapped his hands, and cried, “O, learn book? ver well.” Then, putting his hands together, and opening and shutting them, to imitate turning over the leaves of a book, he attempted to describe the humour of some school that he had been taken to see. “Boys here;” he cried: “boys there; boys all over. Master call. One boy come up. Do so,—” muttering a confused jargon to imitate reading. “Not ver well. Ver bad. Master do so!”
He then described the master giving the boy a rap on the shoulder with the book. “Ha! ha!—Boy like ver bad! not ver well. Boy do so;” making wry faces. “Poor boy! not ver dood. Boy ver bad.”
When the Doctor wished to know what he thought of English horses, and the English mode of riding, he answered, “Omy like ver well.” He then tried to expatiate upon riding double, which he had seen upon the high road, and which had much astonished him. “First,” cried he, “go man; so!—” making a motion as if mounting and whipping a horse. “Then here!” pointing behind him; “here go woman! Ha! ha! ha!”
The Doctor asked when he had seen the beautiful Lady Townshend, who was said to desire his acquaintance.
He immediately made a low bow, with a pleased smile, and said, “Ver pret woman, Lady Townshend; not ver nasty. Omy drink tea with Lady Townshend in one, two, tree days. Lord Townshend my friend. Lady Townshend my friend. Ver pret woman, Lady Townshend: ver pret woman Mrs. Crewe: ver pret woman Mrs. Bouverie: ver pret woman, Lady Craven.”
Dr. Burney concurred, and admired his taste. He then said, that when he was invited anywhere they wrote, “Mr. Omy, you come—dinner, tea, supper.—Then Omy go, ver fast.”
Dr. Burney requested that he would favour us with a national song of Ulitea, which he had sung to Lord Sandwich, at Hinchenbrook.
He seemed much ashamed, and unwilling to comply, from a full consciousness now acquired of the inferiority of his native music to our’s. But the family all joined in the Doctor’s wish, and he was too obliging to refuse. Nevertheless, he was so modest, that he seemed to blush alike at his own performance, and at the barbarity of his South Sea Islands’ harmony; and he began two or three times before he could gather firmness to proceed.