The Press. — London, England, 1854-02-11 00:00:00

resulting from actual travel, and it would be well if bookmakers upon China would try to entertain their readers if they cannot instruct them. We once asked the late lamented Mundungus in a college library, " What are you doing with that enormous atlas before you?" " I'm going," was his reply, "to wril don't i n tend t ' Six Months to Sg o there !" ourn in Ken- It tucky,' though is upon a similar plan that the appetite of readers for " facts" about China is catered for. We may cite from his preface the result of Mr. Kesson's reflections about Christianity in China In common with the general public, he read of an insur rection in China with some surprise, especially when to this it was added that the movement was a religious one, having Christianity for its basis, and not only Christianity, but Protestant Christianity ! His inquiries have led him to the conclusion, that here there must be a mistake, and that the rebellion is but feebly charged with the spiritual element. He has, indeed, great doubts whether there exists in China much that is deserving of the name of Chris • tianity at all. It may appear presumptuous to doubt, in the face of so much general belief, and so many sanguine expectations of the future; but the doubt cannot be avoided. It must be recollected that Protestant missions in China do not yet number an existence of fifty years ; and that, until within the last ten years, Canton was the only spot in all the vast empire where the missionary could teach or circulate the religious tract. With the sole exception of Ciiitzlatf, no l'rotestant missionary has yet penetrated into the centre of the empire. To which we have only to say, that the body of Mr. Kesson's volume shows that he has not had enough of facts before him to warrant any decisive induction. In the case of even quasi religious movements, it is imperative to avoid hasty generalisations. What blunders a philo sopher from the antipodes might have made on Father Mathewism ! We need only refer to Doctor Channing's extravagant conjectures about " Teetotalism in Ireland" to see how after events falsify the inferences drawn from the plainest facts by the acutest minds. 138 The Lays of Modern Rome. London: Chapman - - and Hall. AN inexperienced poetaster thought it worth his while to attempt a rivalry with Mr. Macaulay's " Lays of Ancient Rome." We think that he might as well have not pub lished his rhymes. They aro very careless, and exhibit a rebellious disregard of the prescriptive rules and rhythmical traditions of the art of poetry. The idea of the volume was not a bad one. Its author seems to have designed giving a transcript of the enthusiasm excited by the early reign of Pio Nono, and then to have depicted the gradual disen chantment of the Italian mind when it awoke to the reality of its being enchained by a vacillating " successor of St. Peter" who had got no will of his own. But the author has not the powers required for the working out of such a conception. Some miscellaneous pieces are added to his volume ; and when we recollect that he has dedicated his unmusical verses to " the most accomplished scholar of the day, poet, philosopher, and historian, Babington Macaulay, Esquire " (sic), we are surprised to find him printing the following lines, which are nearly the best executed in the volume : LINES DEDICATED TO THE WHIOS. Let two great parties still divide the State, Such was, such is, and such must be our fate ; Some sigh fur progress and some love repose,— These we admire, nor harshly censure those; To serve their country and redeem her fame, With both the generous purpose is the same : But what is here ? a crew without a creed — Men big in promise, but how small in deed Barons who signed the Charter, but abjure The only way to make that charter sure ; Patriots who won Reform, but quite forgot When landlords frown how hard the tenant's lot : But let the clown be honest if he may, They only put the tempter in his way. — Because one Russell nobly liv'd and died, Shall England hallow all the race beside ? A few brief years, the poor deception o'er, These paltry things shall cheat the world no more, — No more a nation be content with shame, Fool'd by the idle mockery of a name; But children, as they read our history, Shall pause to question,—What a Whig could be? Whether at any future time the writer of these poems would be able to enter the Parnassian Club we need not inquire, but " Brookes's" we are certain would black ball him ; and even the Coalition could give him no white beans, after his putting such _~ h. THE PRESS. a conclusion to his volume as the following stanza, the sense of which is nearly as vague as the policy of " the earl" alluded to ON THE PRESENT CRISIS. Britannia! rise in all thy pride, Or ne'er thy flag unfurl: "No little war," the great duke cried; What cries the petty earl? The writer is complimentary to Lord Derby : I'm sorry that you sneer at Stanley, For he is eloquent and manly; And should he save the state, From those that love the commonweal, And feel like you a patriot's zeal, He does not merit hate. Lord Aberdeen does not come off so well. Lord Palmerston is thus glanced at : Lord P n, you've fire and wit, And less require the spur than bit — A clever lad to speak; Your French runs glibly off enough, But still you find your German tough, And blunder at your Greek. But perhaps we have already quoted too ex tensively. The New Testament in Greek, based on the Text of Dr. J. M. A. Scholz; with English Notes and Prefaces, a Synopsis of the Four Gospels, and Chronological Tables, ctc. Edited by the Rev. J. F. Macmichael, B.A , Head Master of the Grammar School, Ripon, Yorkshire. London : Whittaker and Co. Ix addition to the advantage of working on the text of Dr. Scholz, who laboured like a Hercules at the task of collation, the editor has had the assistance of various qualified divines for portions of his anno tations, and has been permitted to make free use of the dates, (Lc., in Mr. Greswell's " Harmonia Evan gelica" and Dissertations. It would be affectation to pretend that we have been able ourselves to test the value of the multitudinous notes to this edition, but as far as we can judge they include the best ma terials and set them forth perspicuously. The Progr?ss of a Painter in the Nineteenth Century. Containing Conversations and Remarks upon Art. By John Burnet, Author of " Practical Hints on Painting," &c. London : Bogue. Tins is a singular, incomplete, but characteristic and interesting work by a well-known writer upon art, more especially upon its mechanical processes. To artists it is especially adapted as a record, probably faithful, of various conversations upon the principles of painting in which the author took part with Wil kie, Etty, Turner, and other of his deceased contem poraries. As a specimen of its materials in this respect we extract the following, being ourselves familiar with the picture referred to, as an exception to Lawrence's usual style : " On the morning Wilkie called, Lawrence asked him into the painting-room to see his friend's portrait, now completed. " Well, it is capital,' said Wilkie,' and only wants a little touch to make it equal to Reynolds, or Vandyke either.' " ' Ah, my dear Wilkie ! we will never, I am afraid, agree upon that little, though I am sure you are in the right. 1 tried glazing upon aeon-amore portrait of Hart Davis of Bristol ; there it stands, and, though the artists like it, I can't satisfy myself ; as a work, to stand the richness of glazing, must be prepared for it in the dead colouring. My style is already, I am afraid, too strongly fixed for me to change, even if my overwhelming engagements would allow me an opportunity. I never can throw away the ad vantage pure white gives to a work of art; and friend Tur ner is now come to the same conclusion.' " Well, you are both the highest authorities,' said Wilkie, ' and Segnier maintains that the old masters didn't glaze ; but I am afraid I must die in the faith I have adopted ; and, like a true disciple, ant anxious to convert every one to the creed I profess.' " tThe truth of this doctrine was afterwards put to the test, by the directors of the British Institution having one year an exhibition of Sir Joshua Reynolds' works in their gallery, and afterwards an exhibition of the portraits of Sit Thomas Lawrence. The Reynolds exhibition was richness itself, and glowing with deep-toned brightness, so muci so that the best portrait by Titian or Rembrandt migh have been interspersed on the walls without gaining tle least ascendancy ; the gallery during the Lawrence exhib tion, on the contrary, looked cold, and many of the pit tures chalky; even the surface, though pure white in tie draperies, had become of a slate-colour, from the absence of a rich vehicle to preserve the white lead from the te flon of the hydrogen in the atmosphere. We perceie the same change has taken place in the portraits by Vm dyke painted in this country, compared with those painted in Italy and Flanders ; it is ascribed by the critics to iis multiplicity of engagements in England, especially in he later time, when many of his works passed through .he hands of his assistants without his afterwards going n-er them. At all events, the flesh tints, especially of hie fe male portraits, have either faded, or, if even glazed. the rich glazings are removed, for they now exhibit a slatelike SATURDAY, colour, both iu the lights and halltints. The picture of Govartius in the National Gallery shows his talent; and se. veral portraits of Charles the First, and others of his court, show us that his power of colouring remained with him to the lust, and neither Dobson nor cau approach him.] " The work has also a flavour of Scottish clanship and conviviality which will commend it to the true "Hebronites." In the intervals of tea and toddy there is occasional amusement for the general reader:— " While the tea is brewing, I wish Knox to look at the picture on the easel. I have bereft painting a portrait of a cow—none of your Smithfield brutes ; it is the true Holstein breed, which were the cattle Paul Potter painted. Knox said,— " I have been looking at it ; it seems rather long in the legs.' " That's impossible,' replied our philosopher ; it is traced from one of Marc de Bye's : but as soon as the tea pot is filled I will look at it with you. Too long in the legs say you,' he continued, going up to the easel; ' by heavens! you are right," taking up the picture and laying it fiat on the carpet : ' It was all right two hours ago ; but the heat of the weather, and the weakness of the megulp, and the admixture of too much wax, have caused the legs to run ; it looks as if the poor brute was on stilts. it was Wilkie who advised me to use wax in the megulp, for the purpose of giving a fat, pulpy look to the picture. But I ought to have remembered what a pupil of mine, the Honourable Miss Keppel, told me. She said, a picture of her an cestor, Admiral Keppel, by Reynolds, hung over the dining-room fireplace, and every year she could observe the chin to lengthen.'" Decimal Coinage. By a Retired Merchant. London : Ridgway. THE writer objects to the present monetary system, and supports one fouaded on the decimal principle, but disapproves of the committee's mode of carrying out these views. Instead of pounds (equal to ten florins), florins (equal to ten cents), and cents (equal to ten mils), with the last-named coin, the mil, for a concluding step, he advises pounds, shillings, and centimes—the centime, according to his scale, being equ;l to the one hundredth part of a shilling. We see no advantage, and much inconvenience, in this substitutiin, which, in fact, destroys the decimal no tation, since the next coin below the pound is the twentieth and not the tenth part of that above it. The argument "that accounts will he kept in three " columns instead of four" is childish ; for every schoolboy who understands decimals must see that their use in account-keeping does away with columns altogether. Take an example : £3 15s. O'd. Herz we have six figures, three letters, and a fraction, all to represent a very inconsiderable sum. Let the same be written decimally— £3.77B, andthe necessity for division into columns vanishes. For it makes no difference whether the total be set down thus— V• 778, or broken into separate sums as follows— Florins. Cents. Mils. A:3 7 7 8 except, indeed, that the former is by far the more simple and easy method. The sole objection urged against the committee's decision in which there is any weight (and one which was by them fully con adered) relates to the abolition of that coin with vhich the poor man is most familiar—we mean the penny. But here the " Retired Merchant" coin cides, and passes lightly over the difficulty as one unworthy of copsideration. His main object appears to be the retention, unaltered, of the silver coinage— to which we attachi comparatively little importance. It was stated by the Maser of the Mint that there were in circulation about 236,000,000 pieces of silver coin, worth in all something like 6,000,0001. Of these only the lialf-crowas are required to be called in ; the retention of the rest being perfectly consistent with a decimal notation. The Works of Oliver Goldsmith. Edited by Peter Cunningham. Vol. 11. London Murrny. THE present volume, as the advertisement informs us, contains the inquiry into the state of polite literature published in 1759, when Goldsmith was young and unknown ; and the series of letters en titled " The Citizen of the World," which were written for a London newspaper called the Public Ledger; and contains some of Goldsmith's most popular papers—" Beau Tibbs," "The Night Scene," &c. In respect of the latter, Mr. Cunningham has ful filled his promise of an accurate text by a collation of three editions which Goldsmith himself taw through the press, and to both be has restored various notes which bad been unaccountably emitted. This scrupulous attention we believe to be wisely bestowed on an edition which strictly fulfils the pro mises in its prospectus of a beautiful and legible type, fine parer, compnctness of bulk, and economy of price. r---