The Press. — London, England, 1853-09-17 00:00:00

SzprEmttn 17, 1853. husband. The following passage is very chti ntt•tetistie of OUT Scotch anecdotist : Mary had learned tin•:sing, or the art of being dressed, at the Cottrt of Catharine de Medici, and was herself a woman of the greatest good taste. All the continental fashions of dressing were well enough known amongst the ladies of Scotland long before Brannan.• omie amongst them; but It mar• readily he conceded that the women of the itritlith Islands of the highest no& will never, to th e end of time, be aide to put their giumumts about them with the elegance, grace, and ease which are cot 111 l ion anon wt all women iu Franco, Spain. mid Itnh•. V. jib Itrantome, all that was Vretteh was "beyond improvement. I do not know if the inherent meanness and poverty of the French language. its harsh consonantal and perhaps still mom disagreeable diphthongaounds, have ever been ae knowledged—perhaps they have never been perceived by at Frenchman, for the French an• a thoroughly patriotic people. As to the question ot• language, however, and of c.imparative euphony, there need 1w no hesitation in de. ela•ing the Scottish language of the sixteenth .rntnrl• to have been a very superior language to the French Court lit igitage of any century. - - • _ Our lair readers can afford to smile at this prolohecy :—their eternal' inability "to put " their garments about them." in Dominic Sampson setting up for Beau Hi-unmet' has something exquisitely droll. it is a good joke to have the painter of "elassie " portraits as sure us that the Court language of the Hotel de Ihunhouillet, of Madame do &WI gni'. and of Staid was very inferior to the Seoteh of the sixteenth century. Let us bear Beaullrnee discourse classically on the subject of Npai AND LAW I , OIIEIIIIAW4 IN WOIITA The . forehead--that large and ungracefully-shapeol fore. head—it need hardly he said would have repelled Yetecis or timid° ; it is k Itirhead that might be very becomitr..! in a stupid professor of mathematics. No painter. lett to him self to dm ise n female face. would dare to bestow such a forehead as this upon it. The admiration of spelt foreheads in wonu'll is a depra• vity of modern times, and is yet and ever will be confined to a few seetarians in taste. The aftelents--erritm perhaps on ill, other -ode. but the safe and gentle side—Rightsl for narrow and low ti oreheads. I cannot recollect ill any an. clew writer a pmsN.te in (muse of a large forehead iu a woman. Home calls Lycoris " illustrious" for her slender twehead _ . _ " Innignent fermi . fritute 11.yettridts 1'36 torivt tuilor." Wiakelman, who has noticed this passage in his work on " Ancient All," tells us that the iirvi.k it linen, ahear• the real beauty was wanting, gave ane apl a 'm•anee of liive liness to their foreheads by fastening a band below their hair: and that the beautiful women of Ci►eassia pnalnee the same effect by all ingenious manner of combing down their locks. Petrimins, in his exquisite picture ailme— nt which he has assembled so many points of high lwaa►ty —the naturally curled hair flowing down on her sl bleu, and the eyebrows almost joined, does not forget to describe the forehead ss " very The author does not translate eo•reeth• " insignem " in the quotation fr►mt Horner. The sense in which that word is there evi ►lently used is "conspicuous.•' The French diSthly/114' ill its conventional meaning is the nearest equivalent for it as applied to 1 .yet Our tan. readers will find in these medley volumes lunch light matter (in lofty subjects ; ittul, allowing for tins fattltslhat eriticista must notice. we may say that Mr:Bruce has made ti favourable impression on its, and given us ss desire to meet hint again in authorship. (7►arriot Delmer. A Story if the nay. `.! vols. Tnis hook reminds one of•the story of Cohan bus amt the egg. The author, fi►llmving au ►niginal (lemign, mistakes coarse imitation for successful rivalry. Ife may rely on it that the models he has in his eye are at rut immea• '-arable distance above his gra»l►. The I►oliticnl novel requires a nire eombina- I ion of qualities for success and while nothing is easier than to string together n number of lauliticaal essays, with some rude outlines of lanblie eharacters, and some stale ineidents of past crisis, and give the name of a novel to the jumble—nothing is more diffi cult than to rela•oduee an el►och ao fresh 'in memory 115 to I►e hardly yet past, and to depict it with all the animation of life and force of reality, eunneeting it with exciting passages of domestic life, and making it a medium fin• throwing forth original views on politics and soeiety. and of casting a radiance on recent transactions which surprises even those en gaged in them by revealing secrets of thought a►nd motives to salon which were unknown to themselves until light from without broke in upon the darkness of their mind. THE PRESS. The author ot".l'intries Delmer" is not a novelist in any sense. His " story' . is no story at all : it is without beginning and with. out end. It is wholly destitute of incident or movement. and void of even that. faint interest whieh would lead a novel-reader to take up the second volume on laying down the first. Its diameters are abstntetions so stiffly manufactured as not to have an out ward seniblattee of humanity ; its action is a more theme: its dialogue is such matter as veteran politicians might talk If they were as sharp ns the author, and , like bun, could ponder an hour before pro timing a sentenee; and its descriptions of what I'm meant for the leading features of out-of-door life in ottr day—as Radical meet ings, elute •ering canvass, Epsom-race Downs, and the Operft—are so commonplace that. there is seareely a penny-a-liner of the streets who won'd be eontent to own them. even for the sake of claiming his fee. lay no ineky accident do we ever mute upon a pas sake indicative of imagination, humour. • pathos, or even, to speak plainly, of that coin mon faculty of observation possessed by 'amity nine hundmdths of mankind. For such a person to attempt the produetion of " a story "of the clay "is manifestly absurd. From first to last the great. everlasting "condition-ol' " England " question is uppermost in his thoughts, and in the discussion of it he per plexes himself as as his refuters. lie leaves it. for a few minutes but to eonsider the comtition-of-Franee, or condition-of-Earope, or eondition-ofThe-world question. The only holy of the book is always talking of " poor " human nature: . and the gentlemen as regn gularty indulge in crib - ism and persOlmje. Had be but passed the threshold of the ',oilfi eld lite he pretends to depiet, he would have known that men engaged In active affairs have little time for that reflection which he supposes to make up their whole existence. When his figures meet on the Epsom Mee -4.olll'Se, they are supposed to enter into a subtle disquisition on the state of parties — the sentiments they utter bearing about as timeh likeness to those of the personages in tended, as the diseordant tones of the speaking automaton, exhibited lay an ingenious t iermati some years ago in Piecadilly. resembled the tones of the human voice. !set our readers judge how much this conversation, supposed to pass between poor Miler and lleord John ltussell—when the littler formed his Ministry on the downfal of Peel—is like reality : Charles, with his sliscontent. iwnetretiel to the Premier. who was too notch absorbed in high red weighty consider atlons to lw yes.% attentive to little things, or eonsideride to little men. fie had heen aft tut-fur...l and treriose ha pretensions. that his impulse W 1 ,14 10 beat them down rattli• Isssiy. Charles revered the et ste.simin far more than he loved the man ; and lic, in morn, %allied the defence, bed retired the inteiii.reties• .it the wit. "I v. isle nhu•orely, 1 ielinvis" said t h e Try tnirr, " Imat Was btrgyr ; but it is filled, you see, almost b(1,0. (my Ir iiwpore, " I WWI' no ambition to thrnat noriellaniongat the cam pany.'• said Delmer, " unless you think ino worthy to pull nu oar." " You do not suppose that the framer of it ministry has merely flue delightful task of choosing the fittest capnvit to fill each place. Mr. lioliner? The eotmNtii tional machine is worked in iutiuener•—we town} wHnnnce• power, your inigini.or %mail say wu• ttttt st ernabine the " I cannot but think, my lonl," futhl (liarl•y, firmly, "that the ntomt salutary end effertiye inflotenee is that e‘ereittetl by a post ably filled, an nihninifunttien Nkilfally e•tnelticted." " Very tritc, sir, though ',harp. Hut I have not the • ode None& that Sir ittilicit Peel bus, for example, who can composes ministry of sll his talents, and gel his great barker, to 0441 contentedly on sinecures." " It is, no doubt. his grent aelvata tatty'." 1 1 164 ('hates. dt Yl . v. '' Whits ar e Wings, Mr. Delmer. and cannirt hv changed tool W liiggisni is homed on 111,111.1 We, Nherraa PI .114011. /41.1.11iling to the nriooviacy one day. the middle elas!W% the next., the 111'11111e illeinther is 14 pin y. us the }F rench soy, rnir. It ix it host for one voyage, which one voysio• reelitent has *lowly performed : nod the Im•st that the captain can do %mail be to pen off his crew. Wheretut the. Whipo have a permanent nient, mooted in the soil. in the tail fantiliv., the old traeli• thins. and in a posit to noutimilate rind viols , low of all the standing infltiences of the country. Wit thew is a difficulty in managing and combining all this ‘trenctit eind alhownners Skold(' made for any mue who under takes the task—allowances to which the head of a transit ion party, like Sir Robert PIA'S, 11.11 Illy • • • • Charles prot(stod. " Wky •ot rli) out the Radical game ?" continued the 473 *mot matt. lim.lening itt hi* irony.vie gm men who make a good thing of it, who 4 . 11111 a mighty iitntlition ttj titutnK the 1.4 . 11`11111 Whigs. alnd denounteing *h Family aunt. %%11‘.11 the) et4lle lAt avntlindl 41. Tils•% tIIII4Ii %kith all the .mile. of friewil‘lop. Thee lit Ill• yen PIM gently nrin eote•iileration. These gent An' 1 , 9 •-4 let oiling fin - th the htionl at our moment to threaten and the twit t• Mx my life. we are mien of hi I. e„wirto• mt.r with them." Whether vi•ur spools liv , wri.is ironical: - said t 'harlot, rising out hamiliti. " I must say I fi n d your more gay than eouttiaerate, and more witty that, polite. 1 INVI. 1 ever given n'a.on to 1w s. mblressell'" "NnY. 1 hshilor *. no auger. Pardon me if I have allowed myself to draw a general Isirteait that has neither resem blance nor eonnertien with yen. lint such litotes as those or hvit week try temper, and diabolize a titan. Nii gam 11.141 VOrt to 11444.111 r a Meplieoitheles. tie•it week premietNlitp would do it falter than t teethe and Itynin together. WO, in sober truth. there it no pn..t vneant ..fyonr talent , . %Vottlil on try. ailnimistra. Mitt abroad*" I ennnot givt. our the Irish to try powers of conciliation npon. hat there are the lonians ; reputation might he made by teaching them the statute of vottatittutional got velment." " Von adjurer my ambition, 1 see, to the tlrook !Wends. If 1 hio-e any Went, it is to deal with Englishmen. Ito• rand our shores, l.hierty and reform run only he taught and achieve d with the bayonet. I must decline maktug tiso of such a selionlmaster." " Patient's', then, and etnitillenee, is all that I can re• commend." The author himself could not desire flu to select a fairer sample of his powers. The reader has only to imagine all the elltlillensl'A tit all timer" athseting a tone of Nlll/11111C , s. Anil talking of "Whigs. Family Compacts. Nlephis toplielen, liuethr, Byron. and the tireek kalends," with occasional variations on "Cob den, Roebuck, and Itaines--11liehelet and Lamennais—Peel and this Pope—the Ulynnen of the Tuileries " (liow original !), and other catchwords equally he will hare an adtultiale notion of the whole I „ Yet the book ham a kind of talent, though essentially distinct from that which is claimed for it, the talent of the ensayint. who, eolifineil to him denk, dwells on political illeapi,—Na affected by the movements of party.-40 the exellision all lievonil them. The narrowness of mind which such a habit of thought induees —especially when there in no capacity for origins% ,it estiglit . --Teets" out emitimially in the stock notions and eourentional phrase," of the author. Thus, he talks of "11111 "'will ocrity of Castlereagh—the massacre of Peter 100--the cant of loyalty omit relit;' --of 'fury stupidity—University jargon," ire in what we take to be real unconsciousness that noel" olil-tiolioned Nita in now discredited by the 1111'11 WllO clime attempted t4llllllke it aruihlhlu for damaging their opponents. etddlyc gh it in to " Tory %timidity that ho i, indebted fOr one of his best passagen. The Olen of thin paragraph on cotton Nitwit be new to our readers, but they may not be sorry to nee it adopted by a Radical sorilie , '' Misery, - says lla•nry Heine, "thy name iM cotton ''' lle meant it murely when it had reached that perteet state .1 (jay and flowery elothitm which antigen. the riot 111111 1,111114 1114 . 11' 1111 1 K1114, which vivea them fur the tint 1111 y .et' wear the relietedalmwe Ida gaitt butterfly, but whirl, is arnreely it rids• ere it In•rotovs a inv. final even as a rotor ittliirils Pllll a TllM . k 1441111;g intaireol iiirlemeney 111 either boat or 4•01/1. Tido. it from its birth. mail sorely risso•rotecal was so etopionioly watered with human testa. The slave has sown it, the slays has hoot! it, Om Imolai, troop, ler Ilto• a hip of it tinter, have picked it. It is 01414 51iii.1.4•41 sin•vtilitior 4.11 the Mcrowy, ,new oar Nouilta•c. wen. eon yetis with the broker anal with the gramer to Inoinapoliye, and mnnlole, alienwith vile are made anal honest 1111.14 slang, tooth diatillinv tears of lOttrrolool. It then 1411111 . 11 the mill, of which the hartiolriyen urine, has coil rlllat.•4l that tostwctli tlo.- in' • eaaa.t of the material, 111111 the probable price of Ilia• paTt'a - etral throe Is a from , lion of a flirthiniz per 'animal to Is• ..14•11)4•11,44 • co no ittereamo• air to ilotottoisit this frnero,,o, off 14 four. thing are lilted. 0111V4. Nllll 1.111.• 111 1 11 , 11 6. !OHM!. I. 1N• goterrous, therefore. 44, 111n14 to gfreit.l bum down is !wok, and who ham *doubt in -.win an 14114•11,11111,0 11.11 Itrewite 14 !thistle of carnet., ,l a ne 011111 111.. 1411. 111/./11101 l'fkllbmhlfenl•l', the impossibility ri Any taw ten no alla•• of hoentilhog alther nt /4111111t11 1 11. than tin ti0n.1itt...44 • itre their follam•loilsoilo•rs . awl alert astro the result " * ---iyeltholi disaipaltone ii they nro- rodent allot Isrip•t• tiny] of the aliirsipatool of thaay i 41.• 11 • W1 Lsll etamples all 111.1111111. 441111 antet mid 'warms . .., with elaildhassi forced to preeoelty. and pausal !might Ilia• viers, even in aeoptirliig the strailineits, off more iithuneeal plea, how is it to lie eicpeeferl • to produce morality. or that fialitiabition of all morality anal well•beinif, flue rentilarniral nod tool lions eon l lIOUit ai of 5E11411 There is point too- well polished before it came into the author's bawls- -in the reflec tions on the peace humbug (vol. ii., 2111, 2921 mill we mead wish Mat pregnant passage ant tilt: danger of that system whieh makes money