The Press. — London, England, 1858-08-21 00:00:00

liar°ld The Scott d t o see paragel " novel when idolatr which Scott's It is s t mt. iocalcul provoke party 1.4 was a je lent and especial way--t 1 whidl border 1 his do : moorage thought write a opinion form of was tru Jac worshii his pol minim pitiahlt learnt so far I Rtories arehite bad an fault w loncim of mai chant and "'. Tory He wi ledged capaci power was u thougl lively irritab Scott past' posse of Ir ship " jud "the ing." " alb Littl paves tribu "sup defic' obtai have to su Jean butit He strut and dean pow' dccli beta jugs and " fa: ," be have an a drat dui Ti a ma deco: 1, , ( and hot hctt 0)0 onl crit gen phi x‘c I Ivcc Th 11111 THE PRE S S, AUGUST 21, 1858. Harold " the poet paid a brilliant compliment to The Ariosto of the North." Recollecting what Scott did to raise the Novel, it is truly digusting see the way in which that great man is dis paraged in this work, professing to treat of " novels and novelists." It is still more offensive 'ten the writer prostrates himself in abject idolatry before Mr. Dickens. Here is the way in Yhich Mr. Jeaffreson attempts to pronounce upon Scott's character : it is difficult to form a correct estimate of Sir Walter Solt. The man was a mass of contradictions ; the writer, iiicalculably great, though his achievements too often provoke censure. In politics he was a narrow bigot of a pa rty whose principles were prejudices, and whose zeal vas a jealous hate of all opponents ; yet he was a beneve at and philanthropic ti an. History was the study he especially cultivated, but he persisted in reading it only one w ay—that, namely, which accorded with the sentiments vbibi he had imbibed in the nursery from ballads and border legends. Even when he was compelled to surrender dogmas before an array of facts, he had not the aourage to silence the whisperings of eld associations of thought, and boldly to declare the truth. He declined to write a biography of Queen Mary of Scotland, " because his opinion was contrary to his feelings." What a striking form of intellectual cowardice and dishonesty! and yet he was truthful, and of a high courage ! Ere he lisped, he was Jacobite; and when he became the enthusiastic worshipper of Ueorge IV., he salved the wounds of his politico-romantic faith by continual assertions, that that monarch acquired a title, dr jure, on the death of the pitiable Cardinal of York. Such a man of course never learnt the great lessons of the past. He was an antiquarian, so far as his imagination would allow him to be ; war songs, stories of the feuds, olden ruins, armour, media:yid architecture, costumes, social customs,—with all these he bad an uncommon acquaintance ; but lie was as much at fault when describing the life, the vital needs, and the longings of the remote ages in which he placed the scenes of many of his novels, as be was when he discussed the character and tendency of the French in Paul's Letters, and "The Life of Napoleon," or when he poured forth Tory jargon for the last time, on the Jedburgh hustings. fie was widely, but not well read; and be often acknow ledged it with grief. Of judgment, the logical faculty, the capacity of mastering a wide range of thought, and the power of following out a chain of reasoning to its end, he was utterly devoid. He was a superficial thinker ; and though he was endowed with an ever active imagination, a lively brain, and a more than common share of nervous irritability, he altogether lacked earnestness of thought. Scott " never learnt the great lessons of the past"! Why, the master faculty which Scott possessed was his power of lighting up the past — of bringing it before the reader's mind with singular vividness. He was utterly devoid of "judgment," and " the logical faculty," and "the power of following out a chain of reason ing." He was " a superficial thinker," and he " altogether lacked earnestness of thought." Little does Mr. Jeaffreson know that in such a passage he was rendering an extraordinary tribute to the genius of Scott. For if with his "superficiality," and " want of earnestness," and deficiency in logical thought, Scott was able to obtain such great triumphs, how amazing must have been the mighty powers which caused him to succeed in spite of his imputed defect ! Mr. Jeaffreson ought not to be too facile in attri buting a want of logical thought. Oh ! that some god the gift would gie us, To see out selves as others see us ! He does not seem to be aware that the con structive power required for carrying on a plot, and arranging the contrasted forms of the dramatis persona, cannot be possessed without power of " logical thought." The fact that Scott declined to write the life of Mary Queen of Scots because "his opinion was contrary to his feel ings;' has no relation to intellectual cowardice and dishonesty. " lie was an antiquarian, so " far as his imagination would allow him to " be." Here a little " logical thought " would have taught Mr. Jeaffreson that imagination is an aid, and not an obstacle—a torch, and not a drag-chain to an antiquary. Elsewhere the detractor writes : There was notoing of the philosopher in him. He was a man of honour, and what in Scotland was regarded as a it eently God-fearing man, although a novel-writer, but eared nothing for truth, immutable and everlasting, and he never passed through a fit of religious fervour, —his zeal was all for the Tory parts, there was none of it for th e Lord of Hosts. He cherished an amiable g.mdwill to the bodies of his fellow-creatures, hut cared. 1 rush for their souls. His art, perfect master as Ile Wna of it, was to him eventually a trade and when hell 'ln for money he did not hesitate to push bad goods upon tho market. That is an odious style of writing, and worthy only of a bagman caricaturing the style of a critic. Scott was a philosopher, of the humane, genial, and practical kind; but he was not a Ailosnphe. His views on religion and morals "ere br oa d an d catholic, and such as might have The held b y a t h orough Church of England man. -the gross way in which this offensive writer says that Scott had no zeal for the Lord of Hosts is coarse, canting, and contemptible beyond de scription. The whole account of Scott, indeed, is like a cross between Reynolds and Spurgeon. But Scott is de.AI, and Grub-street literature cannot obtain compliments, or cards, or even a nod of the head, from the genius that is no more. Living geniuses have, along with their laurels, good houses, good company, and good fare, and they can never want small trumpeters to be assiduous in swell'lg the chorus of admiration. Mr. Dickens is plastered with eulogy in the fol lowing style : There is not a human heart in these islands, so fruitful of wretchedness end depravity, which Dickens has not at some time or other influenced fur the better ; not a home, however humble End tenanted with evil passions, that his good genius does not occasionally visit, like a peace angel, garnishing, setting in order, and sanctifying with pleasant words of hope. Amongst us there is not a grinding task- master who'would not - have been more exttrtionati; there is not, a mean nature that would not have been more selfish, and there is not a flippant worldling who would not have been more enamoured of frivolity, had Dickens never lived to write. Was not his influence so invariably for good, that we feel he is powerless to exercise it for wrong, it would be tearful to contemplate it. Of Sir Edward Lytton and the Chancellor of the Exchequer the author of these " clumsy volumes " has written in the style of a stupid and snarling pamphleteer. Ile attempts to be effective with personalities, but his points are too blunted, and his combustibles are too damp to go off. It is not worth while dwelling on the numerous errors and the gross unfairness of the criticisms on these two distinguished men of genius. We stated some of these blunders in our first article, and space is 'wanted to expose Mr. Jeaffreson in detail. Of Mr. Disraeli's " Life of Lord George Bentinck" it is said here, in allusion to the chapters describing Sir Robert Peel : Death came, and robbed the nation of one of the most heroic sons she had ever possessed; the dreaded reaction could no longer be delayed ;—and on the first opportunity, the occasion of writin the memoir of a friend and coadjutor in politics, Mr. Disraeli spurned the dead clay and insulted the memory of him whose brightest fame commenced with his death. It so happens that, by the confession of friend and foe, the finest picture of Sir It. Peel painted in pen and ink was from the pen of the Chancellor of the Exchequer in the " Life of Lord George Bentinck." It is false and calumnious to say that Mr. Disraeli "spurned the dead clay." The reverse is the fact. " The greatest member of " Parliament that ever lived" is the rank assigned by Mr. Disraeli to Sir Robert Peel ; but Mr. Jeaffreson perhaps never saw the book. We take our leave of " Novels and Novelists" with the sincerest regret that the false taste of the age should have led a gentleman of Mr. Jeaffre son's ability into the composition of so crude and gossipping a work. A Manual of British Archaeology. By Charles Boutell, M.A. London : Reeve. WHATEVER opinion may be entertained of the doctrinal value or ecclesiastical importance of the Anglican movement of 1833, there can be no doubt that in some of its minor accessories it was the means of effecting much that was useful and good. Without pursuing the subject into all its details, we may observe, for instance, that it gave a wonderful impulse to the pursuit of antiquarian learning of all kinds, as illustrated by monuments and relics of every description from a seal up to a cathedral. The study of archaeology in general as distin guished from the Christian branch of it profited by the new ardour thus evoked, and the vast remains of early Druidism or the scientific castrametation of Roman occupants were explored by the same hands that took off impressions of brasses, or applied the leaden tape to the mouldings of a Gothic doorway. Both Univer sities shared in the fever of research : Oxford contributed her "Parker's Glossary," and Cam bridge her " Ecclesiologist " ; monographs of remarkable buildings showed themselves in popular literature, and picnics were dignified by a definite purpose beyond that of eating, drinking, and flirting, through the investigation bestowed upon the mouldering ruins or half-obliterated earthworks which had long been their accustomed but unheeded localities. In all this, no doubt, there was much that was trifling, much that was pedantic, much that was but the imitative concession to a prevailing fashion ; but there was, also, much that was of enduring value both in method and result. Those who took up such subjects without any real taste for or apprecia- 803 tion of them, or who were daunted by the dry labour which every subject, however apparently attractive, involves on being conscientiously studied, were at last thrown out and distanced by the real and energetic workers, and the class of true antiquarians became more and more de fined. The mass of their literature, however, had all this while one on accumulating until it was of itself sufficient to fill a library. A vast quantity of writing on all such matters thus came to exist, buried in magazines, reviews, newspapers, county histories, reports of meetings, and the like,—not to mention more elaborate works on special topics, through which no one but an adept in the science, or who, as lawyers say, had " noted up" his information from time to time, could possibly find his way. The persons who can really thread with confidence these heterogeneous storehouses of knowledge are comparatively few in number, but there are many others who feel a liberal curiosity about the antiquities which lie close about their place of residence or which they may meet with in their autumn tour, and who would feel very glad of some useful manual to which they could turn, as the scholar does to his Adams, or Potter, or Smith's Dictionary, when he wants to refresh his memory after a ramble through Rome or Pompeii. Mr. Boutell has the merit of having come forward to supply this want with a manual of an exceedingly useful and interesting character. We have no room for extracts, but we may say that the style is remarkably neat and concise, without being dry. The author shines in classification, and though, from the small size of his work, it has of course been im possible for him to give anything like a list of the individuals composing the genera and species which he has laid down, still these divisions themselves arc so complete and so clearly ar ranged that we have been unable to think of any kind of antiquarian object which could not be referred to one or other of his sections. llis book contains eleven chapters, the first two of which are devoted to " Architecture" ' and " Architectural Accessories," and the third and fourth to " Sepulchral Monuments" and " Heraldry." Then we have in chaps. v., vi., and vii., " Seals," Coins," and "Illuminations and Inscriptions." Arms and armour, costumes and ornaments, occupy the next two chapters, and we arc finally instructed in the varieties of ceramic and other arts applied to manufac tures of a miscellaneous character. The only point iu the arrangement we should be disposed to alter would be the last section of all, where under " miscellaneous subjects " ancient earth works are included. These deserved a chapter to themselves, and if it were placed first, and one or two similar slight transpositions made, some kind of chronological order, from the savagery of a " British Camp" to the civilization of " English Shipping in the Middle Ages," might also be maintained. We should also have thought that the nomenclature of English Gothic invented by Rickman might well have been abandoned for that which is based on the names of the kings under whom each style was prevalent. But this is a minor point. Mr. Boutell's work will, we have no doubt, find a place on the tables of many a parsonage and country house, as well as form part of many a traveller's luggage. There era twenty beautiful illustrations, none of which appear (as is so often the caie) to have done duty before, and many of them are brilliantly embla zoned in colours. There are also three excellent indexes—a great merit. Turning over the leaves of this book, however, has set us thinking whether Mr. Boutell might not undertake some thing of the same kind on a larger scale. Why should there not be a book of reference on British archwology of the same extent and value as those which we have on the antiquities of Greece and Rome ?—and why should not Mr. Bou+cll under take the editorship of one ? The dictionary form is in many respects objectionable, but if Mr. Boutell were to obtain a few coadjutors, who would each be responsible for a section,—one for ceramics, another for coins, and so on,—and a thoroughly minute index were appended to the whole, the result would be a work which we are convinced would be exceedingly popular as well as historically useful, and which would save the searches through county histories and other bulky works which the elucidation of any object of interest now requires. We hope some liberal and sagacious publisher may take the matter into consideration I