The Press. — London, England, 1854-09-16 00:00:00

SVPTEMBEit l6, 1854. Sighs are my food ; my drink they are my tears; Clinking of fetters would such music crave; Stink, and close air, away my life it wears ; Poor innocence is all the hope I have : Rain, wind, or heather judge I by mine ears: Malice assaults that righteousness should have. Sure am I, Bryan, this wound shall heal again; But yet, alas, the scar shall still remain. It was one of the accusations brought against him by the malicious Bonner that "he doth "often call to his remembrance his imprison meat in the Tower, Which seemeth so to stick " in his stomach that he cannot forget it ;" which might very well be, considering that his con duct afforded not the slightest ground for suspicion. The life of Wyatt prefixed to his works is well written, and, apart from its biographical interest, supplies some amusing particulars of the social existence of the time. 'Wyatt was in troduced to Court early, and as ho had the advan tages of a handsome person, a ready wit, and skill in all chivalrous pastimes, it is no wonder that he attracted the King's favour. It must be added that his wit was of the unscrupulous kind, best adapted to fall in with the arbitrary humour of the bluff King. Thus, when Henry, with affected concern, spoke of his conscience being pricked by his marriage with Catherine, and the difficulty of obtaining a divorce, Wyatt is said to have exclaimed, " Sad that a man "cannot repent him of his sin without the " King's leave !" When the confiscation of the lands of the clergy seemed likely to breed great discontent, Wyatt suggested to the King "to butter the rooks' nest, and they would "never trouble him," the rooks being the great families of the realm, who would thus acquire au interest in maintaining the Restoration ; and when the King was incensed against Wol sey, Wyatt, we are told, " ups with the story "of the curs baiting the butcher's dog, which " contained the whole method of that great man's ruin." These are clever sayings, no doubt, and prove, as Mr. Bell asserts, that Wyatt jested in earnest; but they scarcely support the exalted view which his biographer would have us take of his character. We can not accept "the honours and trusts heaped " upon him" by Henry as the best proof of his integrity. A better man would have fared worse. To have been so successful a courtier, he must have had some skill in adapting his sentiments to his master's capricious temper. He was free from malice and ambition, of a jovial nature, and friendly disposition, but we find no solid ground for the exalted virtues ascribed to him. It is rather loosely assorted by Mr. Bell that " he passed through an atmosphere of envy " and slander without making a single enemy." The assertion, if true, would prove too much. An honourable man in those times could not hope to escape slanderous tongues; and it is to Wyatt's credit that he excited the enmity of "Master Bonner," who, with Mr Haynes, was sent over to aid him in a special mission to the Emperor Charles V. Bonner, who was jealous of the superiority of Wyatt, subse quently drew up a rancorous accusation against him ; and the investigation into these charges forms a curious chapter in the history of the time. Accused of not having placed his horses at the service of his colleagues, he pleasantly retorts Bat mark 1 I pray you! I lent them not my horses. They never desired to go into the town, to walk or stir out of their lodging, but they , had mule, or horse, or both ready for them, footcloth, and harnessed with velvet of the best that I had for mule or hackney. Marry! it was thought indeed amongst us that Bonner could have been Content to have been upon a genet with a gilt harness. These men came in post, and went again in post. At their part ing my servants had gotten their post-horses ready. Would they have had without necessity my horse to have ridden post! I brought them to their horse. Would they I should have companied them riding in post ? Children would not have played the fool so notably. Was not this a pretty article toward treason to be alleged against me by Bonner? To the charge gravely urged that he had made merry with nuns on a certain occasion, he replied by a home thrust which showed his contempt for his antagonist: — Come on now, my Lord of London, what is my abomi nable and vicious living? Do ye know it? or have ye heard it? I grant Ido not profess chastity; bat yet I use not abomination. If ye know it, tell it here ; with whom, and when? If ye heard it, who is your author? Have ye seen me have any harlot in my house whilst ye were in my company ? Did you ever see woman so much as dine or sup at my table? None, but for your pleasure; the woman THE PRESS. ,that was in the galley; which I assure you may be well seen ; for, before you came, neither she nor any other came above the mast. But because the gentlemen took plea sure to see you entertain her, therefore they made her dine and sup with you ; and they liked well your look, your car ving to Madonna, your drinking to her, and your playing under the table. Ask Mason, ask Blage ( Bowes is dead), ask Wolf, that was my steward; they can tell how the gen tlemen marked it, and talked of it. It was a play to them, the keeping of your bottles that no man might drink of bat yourself ; and " That the little fat priest were a jolly morsel for the signora." This was their talk ; it is not my device. Ask other, whether Ido lie. Descriptive touches like this remind one of the playful portraiture of Le Sage. Wyatt must have been tolerably sure of his cause when he ventured on such ridicule of his antagonist. Acquitted tvith all honour, he was received into higher favour by the King, but did not long live to enjoy it, dying at thirty nine. The facts of his life have been carefully collected, and the critical remarks of Mr. Bell aro marked by great acuteness and knowledge. We have only to complain that his statements are often too general, and that he does not discriminate with sufficient accuracy between principles and particulars. The painter may convey an impression of truth by broad masses of colour ; but the delineator of character must distinguish its finest shades, and even repre sent its accidents, to convey a just conception of it. From an edition of our poets Wyatt could not be omitted, though his merit consists more in tuning our language and in directing attention to poetic studies than in the verse he composed. He smoothed the way for the great poets who followed him in quick suc cession, and prepared men of noble mind and fortune to appreciate and reward their efforts. He set that fashion Which in the next age produced an audience ready to hail the genius of Spenser, and Shakspeare, and Jonson ; and we cannot help according him that kind of welcome which is given to those who precede a glorious pageant. though their part be only to clear its path. History of the Ottoman Pmpire. I3y S. Jacob, A. 8.; Colonel Procter; Rev. J. E. Riddle, M.A.; and James M'Conechy. London and Glasgow : Griffin and Co. THIS work is published as a volume of "The " Encyclopiedia Metropolitana," and as it con tains a survey of the Ottoman power, from its appearance in Persia in the eleventh century to the present day, it affords us a convenient opportunity of noticing the chief points in the history of one of the most remarkable empires which ever existed in the world. The scope of the volume is even larger, as it commences with the foundation of Byzantium by Con stantine, and gives an animated narrative of the Crusades ; but it is only with the portion relating to Turkish annals that we propose to deal. It is douLted by many whether the Turkish power is not near its fall ; but a glance at the past shows that the rate is en dowed with singular vitality. In the various revolutions of the East the Turk has played a part not less conspicuous than the Norman has borne in the history of the West,* and, singularly enough, the two greatest warriors of the Crusades who met in personal conflict on the plains of Syria belonged by descent to these two warlike races. The first Turkish kingdom whereof history speaks had its seat in the Mountains of Siberia. The famous iron mines of that country were worked by a Turkish people, who forged arms of the metal. They were tit servitude, but soon learned to wield with effect the arms they made. Under their chief, Ber tezena, they sallied from their native moun tains, gained great victories, and made splen did alliances, extended their arms to China, and sent ambassadors to the Court of Justi nian. " The annual ceremony," writes Gibbon, " in which a piece of iron was heated in the " fire, and the smith's hammer wat succes• " sively handled by the King and his nobles, • This resemblance in certainly not purely fanelfill. It Is snggested by the narrative of Gibbon, though not expressed by him—" While Apulia and Sicily were subdued by the Norman lance, a swarm of these Northern shepherds (the Turks) over spread the kingdoms of Persia t their princes of the race of Seljuk erected a splendid and solid empire from Samareand to the confines of Greece maid Egypt, and the Turks have main tained their dominion in Asia 711 innr. till the rictorieett Crescent has been planted on the dome of St. Sophia." 881 " recorded for ages the humble profession and " national pride of the Turkish nation " In the seventh century their cavalry were com puted at millions. The Emperor Heraclius promised his daughter Eudocia to the head of their nation as the price of his aid against the l'ersians, and received an immediate succour of 40,000 Turkish horse. Their empire lasted only about two hundred years : the race, how ever, subsisted, though its power was lost, and two or three centuries later the Turks founded a second and more powerful empire, which, rising iu Bokhara, extended its rule from tho vicinity of the Indus to the Black Sea. It is justly observed in this volume that of " the throe " great Tartar nations, the Huns, the Moguls, " and tho Turks, who have spread their devae " tations and dominion over the largest and " most populoua portion of the civilised world, " the last alone have retained existence as an " independent people." In their early history they are remarkable for their populousness and for the rapidity with which their numbers recover from the ravages of war. \Alen Mahmud, tho Turkish con queror of Hindostan, reined in Ghizni, he asked a chief of the Se 'ukian Turks Who dwelt in Bokhara what al his people could afford him in ease of need?— " Send this," said the Turk, holding forth an arrow, " and fifty thousand horsemen will repair to your standard; add another from my quiver and the number will he doubled; if you need further aid, &spate,' my bow through our tribes, and two hundred thousand mounted warriors will obey the summons." Mahmud listened to the answer with deep alarm, but the storm of invasion was averted until his death. On the death of Mahmtid his son was routed by the Turks in the deciiite battle of Zendecan, and the victors chose the grandson of Seljuk (the head of their race) as their King (1088). Togrul Beg, the first So'dim of this people, founded a great empire *ith marvellous facility, and his conquests were confirmed and extended by the yet more famous Alp Arslan, the "valiant lion," his successor. The warlike ardour of the Saracens had long since exhausted itself. Their career of eon quest, which lasted for just a hundred years, was checked by the battle of Tours, and never recovered the blow. The caliphate, which had attained its highest glory under Itaroun al Raschid, weakened by a succession of feeble princes, by divisions and wars, and by the ferocity of its Turkish mercenaries, sorely needed a protector in the eleventh century, when the new Turkish power arose. The Seljuk princes came to its aid ; and from this time the empire of Mohammed may be con sidered as transferred from the Saraoenio to the Turkish race. Alp Arslan, at the head of his innumerable cavalry, overran Armenia, defeated the Emperor Rorrumus Diogenes in a pitched battle, and made him captive, and tore from the Roman empire, never more to be reunited to it, the whole of Asia Minor. Under Malek Shah, the son of Alp, the Selju kian kingdom attained its highest splendour. One of his lieutenants invaded Palestine and took possession of Jerusalem ; and the cruel treatment by the fanatical Turks of the Chtis tian inhabitants and Latin . pilgrims gave it mighty impulse to the crusading spirit of the West. On the death of Malek Shah, in 1092, his kingdom was divided, and the Seijukian dynasty gradually vanished from vie* ; but the Turks were not the less the real upholders of the Mohammedan power. To their fortu nate division the first successes of the Cru saders may in great part be ascribed ; but when Saladin, a young Curdish chieftain, was selected by his uncle—an experienced Turkish commander—as the head of the Turcoman forces, and the last Fatimite caliph was set aside in his favour, the Holy War took a different turn, and, in the contest of the two most warlike races of the world, the Crusaders yielded to the superior numbers of their foes. The invasion of Zengis Khan, the most ex tensive and resistless of which history has preserved record, seemed completely to sub merge the Turkish power. The feeble sue cessor of Saladin and the small Seljukian kingdoms disappeared it's the storta; but it is a striking instance of the elasticity of the 'ruttish race that it again asserted its claim