Page images
PDF
EPUB

of the kind of adventures encountered by the heroes of this singular republic:

"On the 31st of March, 1686, they sailed westward from the American coast, and they seem to have commenced their voyage across the Pacific with a short allowance of provisions. 'The kettle,' Dampier tells us, ' was boiled but once a-day, and there was no occasion to call the men to victuals. All hands came to see the quarter-master share it, and he had need to be exact. We had two dogs and two cats on board, and they likewise had a small allowance given them; and they waited with as much eagerness to see it shared as we did.' The first land they made was the Ladrones, where they anchored on the west side of Guahan, about a mile from the shore. The Acapulco ship arrived here shortly after; and it was with difficulty that Swan could dissuade his heroes from attacking her. At Mindanao, the buccaneers were well received. Being frank in manners, and regardless of money, they became great favourites with the natives, who were surprised to see Europeans so free from pride and griping avarice. Each of them had a native comrade, who exchanged names with him, according to the usage of the South Sea; and they were allowed also to have pagallies, or friends of the fair sex, with whom they might share the tender happiness of Platonic attachment. But these were dangerous familiarities among a people deadly in their resentments. While the Cygnet lay at Mindanao, sixteen of her crew died, in consequence, it was supposed, of poison: many more suffered tedious illness from the same cause.'

We are dolts, and unfit to be credited, if any man read the part of the book from which we have culled these passages, without wishing to dip into the tomes of Warren and Dampier. And rich will be his reward, if he yield to the impulse. The style of these old mariners is buoyant as the waves over which they bounded, and not unlike in its sound to their hoarse melody. We anchor in imagination with the unforgotten dead, beneath the shade of tropical forests, and feel the sea-breeze die away upon one cheek, as the land-breeze begins to come fondly and caressingly over the other. The buccaneers were not entirely useless in their day and generation.

"The association of the buccaneers gave rise to a greater number of bold navigations than had ever yet proceeded in an equal space of time from the rival states of Europe. Those who commanded in the South Sea were almost all Englishmen ; and many of them were evidently able seamen, and in other respects men of ability. In the narratives of Dampier and Cowley, the toils and dangers of a maritime life were shown, combined with much to exhilarate and delight; and a voyage round the world was no longer looked upon as a wonderful achievement. Mariners grew more daring, and ceased to associate the ideas of danger and distance."

We can conscientiously recommend this work,

[merged small][ocr errors][merged small][merged small]

THERE is a great deal of sweetness in many of these -poems, and a placid and amiable mind speaks out in all of them; they are, however, deficient in strength. The author, too, has attempted to drag into the confines of poesy some subjects which seem rather out of place in that region. Wordsworth has done an infinite deal of harm to our minor poets. In his Idiot Boy, and his Peter Bell, and some others of his poems, he has confounded the vocations of the poet and the metaphysician; but his imagination has cast such a splendid veil over his ungainly subjects, that it is not easy to detect the mistake. His imitators think they have only to choose similar subjects to meet with similar success; but they are mistaken.

There is much gentle pathos in the conception of the following passage. Eve, encountered by the fallen angel, mistakes him for a messenger of Heaven, but is startled by his faded splendour:

"Comes dimness then over celestial forms,'
Said Eve, that thou art faded-of the brightness

Wherewith thou gloriously wert robed and crown'd,
Thus sadly reft? Has sorrow reach'd to Heaven?'

"Eve, think it not,' he said, but to thy vision
Refer the loss. Looking upon the stream,
Came there not sadness in the sight-the sound,
Came it not also heavy on the wind?
If in the radiant circle of a flower,
Aught dark thou seest, the shade is from thine eyes.
Art thou not now the centre of all grief,
The fountain whence must flow all bitter waves?'
Is from us cast; and the world's cheerful face,
"Alas!' sigh'd Eve, then paleness on the stars
As from a heart inly but ill at ease,

[ocr errors]

Its flowers profuse, and fruits.""
Is faint, and yieldeth not its wonted smiles,

The verses entitled "December Stanzas," are among the best in the book.

DECEMBER STANZAS.

"Sad hang along the sky the heavy clouds,
Obscuring every tint that seemeth glad;
And through the woods forlorn the breezes sigh,
Melodiously sad.

"Fit season were it for the dying swan,
Moving upon the waters in his pain,
To mingle with the sorrow of the year,
His melancholy strain.

"The nightingale singeth in summer woods,
When warm and pleasant is the summer's night,
For the sweet easing of his own full heart,
And for his mate's delight:

"The lark, a speck high up in heaven's clear dome,
Carols, scarce heard upon the flowery earth;
As he would fain bear to the gates of heaven
That seasonable mirth:

"But meeter for this sad season is the cry

Of wild-fowl on the azure-misted main; Or nightly clamour of the wakeful owl, From some hoar ruin'd fane :

"More meet the music of wild ocean-waves,

Or winds that pipe through caves, and broken rocks, Heard by some shepherd of the northern isles, Tending his mountain flocks.

"Ceased has the Robin his soft-warbled strain,

Heard whilst the sere leaves flutter'd to the ground; And brooks which wail'd among the dying flowers Are cold in fetters bound.

"Gone is the green, the delicate summer green, Gone is the lily pale, gone the crimson rose; And the dead beauty of the pass'd year

Lies shrouded in the snows.

"Now thoughts which wander'd through the blooming world,

Back to the heart, from whence they issued, throng,
And by the winter's fire, when winds are loud,
Are poured forth in song.

"And pleasant is it in the time of gloom,
Amidst the wintry tempest and the blight,
Gathering from all the glory of the past
To fill our homes with light."

The Life of Major-General Sir Thomas Munro, Bart, K. G.B., late Governor of Madras. With Extracts from his Correspondence and Private Papers. By the Rev. G. R. Gleig, M. A. Volume Third. 8vo. Pp. 437. London. Colburn and Bentley. 1830.

No offence to Mr Gleig, we think this volume the most interesting of the three. It consists of Sir Thomas Munro's correspondence with Lord Wellington, Sir John Malcolm, Mr Elphinstone, and others, the most distinguished soldiers and civilians in India. Sir Thomas's

letters are full of that racy humour, plain good sense, and comprehensive views, which were the principal features of his character. Taken in conjunction with those of his Indian friends, they afford us an interesting picture of the men who were at that time the leading spirits of that great empire. Sir John Malcolm proses and lectures, just as he does in his books, or in conversation. We entertain the most profound respect for that brave and intelligent commander, but cannot get over the feeling that he likes to display his learning. Colonel Wellesley, on the other hand-we beg pardon-his Grace the Duke of Welling-medical world! I should be forced, in order to escape her ton is plainness itself. He suggests to Munro the propriety of freeing a country from marauding insurgents, in language less elevated than Sir Richard Birnie would employ in giving orders for the apprehension of a common thief, speaks of giving a sovereign prince "a good run," and tells his correspondent that he is "ready primed," and likely to "go off with a dreadful explosion." It is this utter want of pretence, the sure characteristic of true genius, that has always conciliated us to the Duke of Wellington. He performs the most heroic actions with an ease and nonchalance which show that they are to him mere matters of course. If any thing could have raised him in our estimation, it is the frankness with which he has placed in Mr Gleig's hands, for publication, letters from Sir Thomas Munro, criticising in no unfriendly, but certainly in no ceremonious manner, the conduct of the battle of Assaye.

"A WIFE cannot be gifted with a more dangerous talent. Such women be never at rest when their husbands sleep well a-nights; they are never at ease, except when the poor man is ailing, that they have the pleasure of recovering him again; it gratifies both their medical vanity and their love of power, by making him more dependent on them; and it gratifies all the finer feelings of romance. What a treasure, what a rich subject I shall be about ten years hence, when shivering at every breeze, for the laboratory of such a wife! when my withered carcass would be made to undergo an endless succession of experiments for the benefit of the prescriptions, to conceal my complaints when I was really sick, and to go out and take medicine by stealth, as a man goes to the club to drink, when he is unhappily linked to a sober wife. Were Heaven, for some wise purpose, to deliver me into the hands of a nostrum-skilled wife, it would in an instant dissipate all my dreams of retiring to spend my latter days in indolence and quiet. I would see with grief that I was doomed to enter into a more active career consider her and myself as two hostile powers commencing than that in which I had been so long engaged; for I would a war, in which both would be continually exerting all the resources of their genius: she to circumvent me, and throw me into the hospital, and I to escape captivity and elixirs. No modern war could be more inveterate, for it could terminate only with the death of one or other of the combatants. If, notwithstanding the strength of my conjugal affection, the natural principle of self-preservation should be still stronger, and make me lament to survive her, I imagine my eating heartily and sleeping soundly would very soon bring about her dissolution."

In a letter to Mr Kirkman Finlay, he thus expresses

been here, we could have shown him many greater thieves, but none so respectable as Rob Roy. The difference between the Mahratta and the Highland Robs is, that the one does from choice, what the other did from necessity; for a Mahratta would rather get ten pounds by plunder, than a hundred by an honest calling, whether in the Saltmarket or the Gallowgate.

When the first two volumes of this work appeared, we spoke of its contents and execution at some length; at pre-himself in regard to a celebrated townsman: sent we merely offer our readers a few extracts, which "Bailie Jarvie is a credit to our town, and I could almost show the playful sagacity of the gallant deceased. Our swear that I have seen both him and his father, the deacon, first is from a letter dated London, wrote while the young afore him, in the Saltmarket; and, I trust, that if I am cadet was on his way to the land of promise: spared, and get back there again, I shall see some of his "I live very happily, except sometimes when I am tor-worthy descendants walking in his steps. Had the Bailie mented by a tailor's wife, a neighbour of ours. These four or five days past, about four o'clock, a little before I go out to dinner, she opened the door, looked in, and went down stairs. I could not understand her meaning till Tuesday, when she came in at her ordinary time with a large bowl of soup and a penny roll boiled in it. The soup will do you good,' says she; you don't look well, and I am afraid you eat sparingly.' I endeavoured to convince her that I was well enough, but to no purpose; I was obliged to take the soup. I might as well have swallowed melted tallow. I thought to have avoided the soup yesterday; I did not come home till night; but I had the same bowlful to supper last night that I had to dinner the day before. She had been telling the people below, that the young gentleman in the garret is either in a consumption, or starving himself.” The following remarks we earnestly recommend to the attention of certain weak brethren who are apt to mistake sentimental excitement for true piety:

"If James did not find in the study of anatomy, in the wonderful construction of the human frame, a wide field for indulging the contemplations of a religious mind, I should be afraid of his abandoning the hospital for the pulpit. He is so very spiritual, that he seems to follow literally the text of Thank God for all things.' When I opened his first letter, I thought I had got hold of a new litany. In every sentence there was, 'thank God, if it please God, God willing,' and many ejaculations of this sort. I have been obliged to quote his favourite book, to show him the impropriety of such expressions, except in his closet. He is much attached to botany, which, he tells me, gives to a reflecting mind the most exalted ideas of the power of the Divinity. This doctrine, though it is always introduced as an exordium to all botanical treatises, has never made much impression on me, for I never could conceive why a man ought to admire the omnipotence of the Creator in the minute, rather than in the grand, objects of the creation; or why he should be less struck by rivers and mountains, the ocean and the firmament, than by the sexual system of plants. I shall say no more of this till 1 see James, and hear his reasons for worshipping a rose rather than the sun; and if he has not already made a convert of you, I shall then endeavour to bring you over to my more sublime religion."

In another letter, Sir Thomas sketches, with great felicity, one of the worst curses of existence :

"I am thinking, as the boys in Scotland say-I am thinking, provost, that I am wasting my time very idly in this country; and that it would be, or at least would look, wiser, instead of running about the country with camps here, I to be living quietly and doosely at home. Were I now there, might, at this moment, be both pleasantly and profitably employed in gathering black boyds with you among the braes near the Largs. There is no enjoyment in this country equal to it, and I heartily wish that I were once more fairly among the bushes with you, even at the risk of being sticket by yon drove of wild knowt that looked so sharply after us. Had they found us asleep in the dyke, they would have made us repent breaking the Sabbath; although I thought there was no great harm in doing such a thing in your company.'

[ocr errors]

The following short passage seems to us beautifully illustrative of the mingled feelings with which, after a long and active service in the East, our veterans contemplate a return to their native land :

taken a final leave of this country; but I am now, after a "It is nearly twenty years since I thought that I had tour nearly of a thousand miles, sitting in my tent, at the head of one of the passes leading down from Mysore to the Carnatic, at the distance of about a hundred and thirty miles from Madras. I am anxious to leave India, yet I shall leave it with a heavy heart. I have spent so much of my life in it-I am so well acquainted with the people-its climate is so fine, and its mountain scenery so wild and beautiful, that I almost regret that it is not my own country: but it is not my home, and it is time I should go there, whether it is to be in Scotland or in England."

Our last quotation is from another letter to Mr Finlay, towards whom he seems to bave entertained a most sincere friendship. We wish he were still at that gentleman's elbow; he might give him some useful hints in the present crisis.

"What castle is this you have got into? I read it Castle Howard at first, but thinking that could not be right, I

have been trying again, and can make nothing of it unless it be Toward or Foward. I believe I must go to the spot in order to ascertain the true name. I hope you have got plenty of knowt, and stane dykes, and black boyds. The dykes are useful for more things than one; they keep us in the practice of louping, they help to ripen the black boyds, and they enable us to parley with the knowt without danger. "You are perfectly correct in your orthography of the black boyds, at least we spelt them your way, when I belonged to the grammar-school between fifty and sixty years ago. I must not do so un-Glasgow-like a thing as not to reply to your recommendation of Lieutenant Campbell of Ormodale. He is a promising young man, but he is out of my hands at present, as he has lately been appointed by the commander-in-chief to a staff office with our troops at Penang, and I have no doubt that he will push his way in the service. I am afraid, from what I have read somewhere lately, of there being twenty-five thousand Irish weavers and labourers about Glasgow, that there can be very few of what you call right proper Glasgow-men left. I suspect that you have not now many of the pure old breed of right proper Glasgow weavers, whom I remember about the Grammar-school wynd and the back of the Relief kirk. They are probably now like a Highland regiment, of which I once heard an old sergeant say, that' what with Irish and what with English, they were now no better than other men.'

[ocr errors]

There is something inexpressibly attractive in the mere outside of Mr Wilson's books. We should at any time The " pararecognise one of them among a thousand. dise of dainty devices" impressed upon the cover of each, in which a thousand little emblems, all full of covert meaning, blend and mingle in the most intricate harmony of outline and colouring, render what was said of his books by a great philosopher of the day-that their outsides had more meaning than the insides of many works of more pretence-nothing more than a simple truth.

His title-pages, too, are admirably calculated to further the intentions of the propagator of a new faith, containing, in general, fully as much matter as the work to which they are prefixed. The reader may form some idea of their copiousness, by consulting the two which we have transcribed above. This idea of throwing the most important part of a work into the title, is not, we conWe have seen something of the kind fess, strictly new. in "broadsides," as well in those of ancient, as in those of modern date. Nevertheless, Mr Wilson has shown— in this bold adoption of a system, against which association was ready to enrol so many prejudices, because he saw how palatable it would be to the community upon whose minds he wished to work—a talent for making the most trifling circumstances contribute to further his ends, that stand second only to original genius.

The caution and sagacity, too, with which he has de

at first only such doctrines as were least likely to startle those whom he meant to make his converts is above all praise. The first number of his series of his truly "National Library”—was Hortator's Simplicity of Health. In this he adopted so happily the tone prevalent among the community he was addressing, that even we were

The Whole Art of Dress! Or the Road to Elegance and Fashion, at the enormous Saving of Thirty per Cent!!! Being a Treatise upon that Essential and much Culti-veloped his system, the tact with which he insinuated vated Requisite of the present Day, Gentlemen's Costume; Explaining, and clearly Defining, by a Series of Beautifully-Engraved Illustrations, the most becoming Assortment of Colours and Styles of Dress and Undress, in all their Varieties; suited to different Ages and Complexions, so as to render the Human Figure most Symmetrical and Imposing to the Eye. Also, Directions in the Purchase of all Kinds of Wearing Apparel: Accompanied by Hints for the Toilette, containing a few Valuable and Original Recipes; likewise some Advice to the Improvement of Defects in the Person and Carriage; together with a Dissertation on Uniform in General, and the Selection of Fancy Dress. By a Cavalry Officer. London. Effingham Wilson. 1830. The Economy of the Teeth and Gums, and the Interior of the Mouth; including the Medical, Mechanical, and Moral Treatment of the most Frequent Diseases and Accidents incidental to the Structure and Function of those most Delicate Parts: With the Means of Correcting and Purifying a Tainted or Unpleasant Breath, and other Personal or Atmospherical Effluvia, arising from Local or Constitutional Causes, or Injuries. By reached its third edition. the Author of the Economy of the Feet and Hands. London. Effingham Wilson. 1830.

EFFINGHAM WILSON, bookseller to the Emperor of all the Russias, one of the most benevolent and disinterested of mankind, has devoted himself to the high and honourable task of preaching the doctrines of Chesterfield in the most benighted recesses of the city of London. There is doubtless something much more imposing in the idea of braving distant seas, and unhealthy climates, to convert and civilize nations who are little raised above the beasts; and yet, to our minds, the privations and discomforts to which a man of a naturally susceptible and highly cultivated taste for the elegancies and refinements of life exposes himself, by taking up his abode midway between the districts of St Giles and Wapping, are infinitely more overwhelming. We ourselves have actually penetrated, on a voyage of discovery, as far as Billingsgate, and must be allowed to know something of the matter. Then, as for the dignity and importance of his vocation, we wish to disparage nobody; but the teaching the shrivelled and smoke-dried plebeians and greasy aristocrats of that distant land to dress and live cleanly, may, to say the least, rank on an equality with the labours of Brougham or Leonard Horner.

deceived, and thought we had got under our hands as rank an old wife of the male sex as ever trembled through life lic sacrifice at the shrine of nonsense, conciliated the conunder the influence of dyspepsia. Having, by this pub. fidence of the inhabitants of the hyperborean regions in which he had settled, his next step was to call to his assistance an old army surgeon, whom he set to preach to the natives the expediency of the culture of the hands and feet. Wilson is a disciple of Lord Byron's school; and believing a fine hand to be the inseparable concomitant of noble sentiment, resolved to try whether, by improving the paws of his neighbours, he might not be able to elevate their minds. In this undertaking he was, we are happy to say, so successful, that the "Economy of the Hands and Feet"-to which, our readers will recollect, we not long ago awarded the meed of praise-has already

Our

Emboldened by success, he endeavoured, with the assistance of the same indefatigable ally, to recommend that some attention should be paid to the beautifying of the teeth and gums. This work was addressed more particularly to the fair sex ; but as, in the course of its precepts, the practice of smoking fell to be discussed, some murmurs were excited in the ward of Billingsgate. zealous and conscientious missionary could not refrain from expressing his detestation of that habit, which had unluckily become a second nature to by far the most athletic and eloquent portion of his fair flock. A timely concession to their prejudices restored tranquillity; and now our daring innovator found that he had advanced so far as to leave himself no power either of retreating or standing still. The spirit of enquiry was roused, and loudly called for a comprehensive and rational treatise on external deportment.

Now it was, although not without some misgivings, that our hero produced his " Whole Art of Dress." The compiler of this new "Augsburg Confession,” is a cavalry officer; for the Missionary establishment of the Royal Exchange, like that of Herrnhuth, contains labourers who have been selected from almost every worldly profession. In all ages of the world it has been found

no easy task to unite the agreeable and the useful, the beautiful with the strictly moral. This has at last been accomplished by the author of the " Whole Art of Dress." We demonstrated last week, no doubt to the entire satisfaction of our readers, that the fundamental, and indeed, the only virtue, is avarice. Now, observe how beautifully our cavalry officer, instructed, no doubt, in the practical school of half-pay, dovetails his ornamental, or (as the Germans would term it) his aesthetical, into our moral theory" The road to elegance and fashion, at the enormous saving of thirty per cent." "Saveall set his mark."

We have not time at present to enter into all the merits of this admirable treatise; but the following recipe for a beautifier of the hair will serve to convince our readers that a refined spirit has presided at its compilation:

[blocks in formation]
[ocr errors]

move along like waves when gently fill'd With tepid warmth, from Thetis' breast distill'd;" announces the important fact, that

"'Tis not ordain'd by nature or by fate, That eagles from the dove should generate;" discovers,

"that Russell made a blunder,

In saying that in Dryden's Sigismunda-r, The feelings of her heart were too excessive;" describes critics as

"Those salty gew-gaws, who so much of late Infused their poison into Gallia's state :" and this he calls writing a satire.

His idea of comfort must be rather peculiar, for he pillows his god of love certainly not on a bed of roses :

"They, who that pretty boy,
In their bosoms to enjoy,
Stole away, and laid his head
In their diamond-studded bed."

We shall no longer detain his "Fugitive Pieces" on their way to oblivion.

The Life of the late William Ritchie, D.D., one of the Ministers of the High Church of Edinburgh, and Professor of Divinity in the University of that City. By the Rev. Thomas Nelson, M. W. S., author of a Treatise on Religion in the Encyclopædia Edinensis, &c. &c. 12mo. Pp. 108. Edinburgh. Waugh and Innes.

THIS is one of the smallest books that it has fallen to our lot to review; and yet the author has, by a happy

power of condensation, managed to concentrate, within its narrow limits, a greater quantity of twaddle than much larger works can boast of. Its material bulk is a happy type of its intellectual pretensions. A considerable portion of its little length is occupied with the details of some uninteresting squabbles in the Divinity Hall of Edinburgh during the incumbency of Drs Hunter and Ritchie. If it was the author's intention to pourtray the spirit which animated the teachers and taught at that period, he has, with a singular felicity, managed to omit every characteristic feature. There was occasionally something excessively piquant in the criticisms of the first-mentioned professor upon the exercises of his pupils. For example, we remember to have heard of one theologian whose exegesis elicited from the old gentleman some such remarks as these:-"I canna say that I am sae fameeliar wi' the Latin tongue as I ance was, and as I ought to be. But if I remember right, some o' the verbs used to be irregular. Now, it strikes me, sir, that a' your verbs are regular." This same exemplary pattern of regularity, we have been further informed, subsequently distinguished himself by attainments equally wonderful in the Gaelic language. Mr Nelson must have been one of his contemporaries—could he favour us with his name?

[blocks in formation]

THIS is a tale of domestic life, simply and sensibly told. We feel an interest in the author, who has found time to compose it, without declining the laborious duties which accrue to the mother of a large family, whose rank is above the lower, although scarcely belonging to what are called the middle classes. Had we found nothing in the book to praise, we should, under these circumstances, have passed it over without remark, but we are happy to find that we can conscientiously recommend it.

Full Annals of the French Revolution of 1830. By William Hone, Author of "The Everyday Book," &c. &c. 8vo. Pp. 128. Third Edition. London. Thomas Tegg. 1830.

It is no proof of the cleverness of this work that it has reached a third edition. It is sold for half-a-crown, and, at the present moment, the most insufficient narrative of the Parisian Revolution would fetch that sum. But Mr Hone's work has really deserved its rapid sale. It is neatly and intelligently got up, ornamented with spirited woodcuts, and almost exhausting the subject. The best praise we can give it is to say, that it is in every way worthy of the established reputation of the clever author of "The Everyday Book."

[blocks in formation]

The Sonnets of Shakspeare and Milton. Post 8vo. Pp. some admissions made by the writer in the earlier part of

186. London. Edward Moxon. 1830.

We are happy to possess these, our favourite sonnets, In such an elegant form. We trust that the taste which the publisher has shown in getting up this little volume, and also Charles Lamb's Album Verses, may soon acquire for him such a run of business, as shall leave him no time to gratify us with such elegant nicknacks. are of those who love books elegant in their form, as well as valuable in their contents, and we therefore welcome such an enterprising and tasteful publisher as Mr Moxon.

We

The French Revolution in 1830. A Comic Poem. By
F. W. N. Bayley, Esq. With Portraits of Louis
Philippe I., General la Fayette, and Prince Polignac.
London. Alfred Miller. 1830.
Monsieur Nontongpaw. Illustrated by R. Cruikshank.
London. Alfred Miller. 1830.

The Devil's Visit. A Poem, from the Original Manuscript. Illustrated by eight Engravings on Wood, after Designs by Robert Cruikshank. London. William Kidd. 1830.

THE French Revolution was no joke. We are the less surprised to find that Mr Bayley has failed in his attempt to make one out of it.We should have preferred the genuine old ballad of Nontongpaw to the stanzas that have been substituted for it. Robert Cruikshank has failed in his Frenchmen, but John Bull and his pug-dog are genuine.-If we were the Devil-as we are only his masterwe should feel devilishly annoyed at the d-d liberties which some rhymesters and caricaturists have been taking of late, and exclaim, with a sister spirit, "Leave me, leave me to repose."

PERIODICALS FOR OCTOBER.

The Westminster Review, No. XXVI.-The New Monthly and London Magazine, No. CXVIII– Blackwood's Magazine, No. CLXXII.-The Monthly Magazine, No. LVIII.-The United Service Journal,

No. XXII. Parts 1. and II.-The Asiatic Journal, and Monthly Register for British and Foreign India, China, and Australia. New Series. No. X.-La

Belle Assemblée, No. LXX.

ALTHOUGH We do not regularly notice the labours of the periodical press, we keep a steady eye upon them, and muster them now and then, by way of calling their attention to the appalling fact. They are all getting confoundedly political, by which means they uniformly cheat us, with whom it is matter of conscience to eschew all such pestilent discussions, of at least one-half of the price we pay for them. If, indeed, they could say any thing to the purpose-But there's no use in grumbling.

The Westminster Review is in great force this time. Metaphysics, biography, antiquities, criticism, travels, medical disquisition, and politics, succeed each other with abundant and pleasing variety. There is, too, a unity of feeling and principle running through all the articles, which, although little likely—from the exclusive creed of the editors-to add to the popularity of the work, certainly enhances its value. We like to see a constant reference to first principles in writers of all kinds. The most laboured article is that which professes to discuss Mr Mill's Analysis of the Human Mind. It is an able article, too, but rather manages to give the ostensible subject the go-by. The first half discusses the importance of mental and moral science; the last presents us with a view of the late physiological discoveries regarding the nervous system. One brief paragraph only is allotted to mental analysis in general, and Mr Mill's doctrines in particular; and even this short passage contains a glaring contradiction to

his essay. He speaks at one place of a "power of continuous attention" capable of being strengthened by exercise. But when he comes to lay down his metaphysical creed, he tells us, that "sensation, association, and naming, are the three elements which are to the constitution of mind, what the four elements, carbon, hydrogen, oxygen, and azote, are to the composition of the body." Which being interpreted, means, that upon a careful analysis, all the mental phenomena will be found resolvable into these three. What then becomes of his "power of continuous attention?" It is not a sensation, it is not association, it is not naming. It is something admitted by the writer to exist, and recognised by common consciousness as distinct from, and independent of, the other three. It is a manifestation of the class of mental phenomena, recognised by Descartes and Stewart as that in which the difference between mind and matter is most apparent, to which belongs the power of self-examination-a power which developes itself late in all, never in many. This power does not seem to have yet developed itself in any one Westminster metaphysician, and consequently, these gentlemen cannot be listened to in discussions respecting that science. Their talents entitle them to attention upon almost every other question, but in this they have made too frequent appeals to the "argumentum ab ignorantia," to be entitled to any deference. The best articles after this, (for, with all its faults, it is the work of no common mind,) are the review of Jefferson's Memoirs, and that of Alexander's Travels, (which contains some capital hits.) The articles entitled, London Bridge, Hydrophobia, and Novels and Travels in Turkey, are also good. On the whole, this number is well calculated to corroborate the estimate we have all along formed of the Westminster Review-a

work of the very first-rate talent, from most of whose opinions in morals, religion, politics, and criticism, we have the honour to dissent.

The New Monthly for October, is one of the best and most readable numbers we have seen for some time.

We

know not whether the conversation between Byron and Shelley, on the character of Hamlet, be historical or fic

titious; but it is highly characteristic, and contains many Guide" is good; so are " A Tale of Bordeaux," and "The beautiful and just remarks. The "Little Peddlington

[ocr errors]

Prison Breaker." Mr Galt has a manifesto in this It has been a rule number-amiably characteristic. with me, not to notice publicly either favourable, ignorant, or malicious criticism ;"-and these three are the only categories under which criticisms of Mr Galt's works can be ranged! Engaging modesty!

Blackwood contains one article, "The Moors," that would, “cut out in little stars,” make the fortune of halfa-dozen of the rest of the Magazines. The article on Bentley is also good, but we had enough of the old gentleman before. The rest of the Number is humdrum. The Monthly Magazine goes on with unabated spirit. "The Golden City" would have been excellent if it had been a little curtailed. The "Musing Musician" is a beautiful pendant to Milton's "Penseroso;"" The Irish Priest and his Niece," and "Father Murphy's Dream," are powerful, but we do not like to see imaginative literature made polemical-this is to "clip an angel's wing," The minor articles are all good.

We regret that our first notice of so excellent a work as "The United Service Journal" must necessarily be brief. We regard ourselves, however, as only leaving our card at present-we will dine with the gentleman some of these days. The present number is double charged, and consequently goes off with a devil of a crack. Part I. contains an interesting extract from an original letter of General Burgoyne, descriptive of the battle of Bunker's Hill. There is in Part II. an account of the burning of the colours of the second battalion of the King's regiment, finely illustrative of the chivalrous spirit which animates our army.

1

« PreviousContinue »