The Press. — London, England, 1855-01-06 00:00:00

r ~ ~M r ARY 6, 1855• retail merchants, and ninety-three per cent. of wholesale merchants, fail annually in this " cute" country ? " Honesty is the best policy after all," and Barnum may live to find that out. He is in his prime at present, the meridian of his glory. We shall be curious to see bow it will all end There is little else to be said. The book is vulgarly written, hut the anecdotes are good, and the personal reminiscences amusing from their very roguery. Barnum is the great im postor of the nineteenth century. Let us add that he is also the most successful one; and with Americans, success in life, and hard dollars in cash, are the main points of existence. PERIODICAL LITERATURE. lilacktcood opens the year with a vigorous article as the conduct of the war ; the two great measures of the ten days' session are analysed, and shown to be wholly unequal to the emergency of the time. The War Department is severely criticised, but our northern contemporary can scarcely appreciate the utter contempt which the Duke of Newcastle's de plorable inaptitude is regarded in London. A paper on "Civilisation" acutely notices the most material results of the last census. The " Romance of Zaidee " we, for the present, refrain from expressing an opinion on, as it has only reached its second part. M. de Lavergne's work on " Rural Economy" supplies a most ingenious and readable paper. The reviewer, having occasion to notice Arthur Young, extracts a .curious passage from his journal, showing that he :actually saw the electric telegraph in use in Paris in his day. Here is the passage : In the evening to Mons. Lomond, a very ingenious and 'inventive mechanic, who has made an improvement of the jenny for spinning cotton. Common machines are said to make too hard a thread for certain fabrics, but this forms it loose and spongy. In electricity he has made a remark able discovery. You write two or three words on a paper: be takes it with him into a room, and turns a machine en closed in a cylindrical case. at the top of which is an elec trometer, a small, fine pith-ball ; a wire connects with a similar cylinder and electrometer in a distant apartment ; and his wife, by marking the corresponding motions of the ball, writes down the words they indicate, from which it appears that he has formed an alphabet of motions. As tie length of the wire makes no difference iu the effect, a • correspondence might be carried on at any distance — within &nil without a besieged town, for instance or for a purpose murk more worthy, ant a thousand times more harmless, between two lovers prohibited or prevented from Any better commeetion. This, perhaps, in the most singular instance on record of a great practical invention having so long remained neglected. We must quote from this able paper another paragraph, no less remarkable for truth and sound philosophy than for original re flection : Shall we startle the admirers of royal academicians — the lovers of the arts, and more especially the flattering admirers of Sir Edwin Landseer—if we 'my, and some what boldly, too, that in the best sense and feeling of na eare his pictures are not natural ? Nature seems ever to is to take especial care to keep out of sight the necessary cruelty (we say cruelty as not seeing, yet not doubting, the benevolence of the law) by which animal preys upon ennui. Rarely, as we walk the fields or the woods, does 'the perpetration of this destruction become visible ; rarely ,does the death or agony of the creatures present itself. Most animals prey in the night, when man's eyes are ,closed ; and those that perish by day, and are devoured, :are covered in the secrecy of lone places. Nature loves to 'exhibit the cheerful side of life ; the singing-birds come mearest-to human habitations; creatures are mostly seen in enieyment of their life. Nature, kind nature, is fearful to &dent wan too much into the visible operation of the awful secret of death—is cautious not to familiarise him with the general slaughter going on around him, lest he become more cruel than ho is. Now, nature wishes to be painted with this expression of her forbearance. Painters who disobey this injunction deserve not to be called na ture's painters. She will have all cruelty kept out of sight. Sir Edwin Landseer makes the cruelty his subject. We itearcely know a picture from his pencil that is not utterly 'cruel. His works are in defiance of kindliness and 'humanity And is this year's picture better? It is -worse for it must misrepresent royal personages. Our amiable Queen never could have been seen by human eye, smiling as she is about to tread upon the bleeding faces end glazed eyes of the slaughtered creatures heaped upon each other. We ever shall, with the indignation of •oseuded humanity, protest against Finch employment of art. We fully agree in the critics condemnation of the last picture. But in regard to Landseer's general works, we think his censure unjust, though his prin- ciple is excellent. It is surely no objection to Land seer that he chooses the tragic side of nature for representation, especially as by so doing he almost humanises purely animal suffering. Even the "Otter Hunt," to which the critic alludes in another passage, is a ca nine epic, and most surely as admi rable iu its way as the chase of Hector by Achilles round the walls of Troy. Mr. Thackeray's merits as a novelist met with discriminating appreciation. •° Peace and Patriotism " is somewhat "slow " in its THE PRESS. reflective philosophy, and "The Story of the Cam paign" comes almost too late, as the narrative is not yet brought down even to Inkermann. But the nar rative is well and carefully written. One of the most striking paper•. in the Dublin Uni versity is that entitled "Foreign Crime and Cre dulity," which selects a few striking cases from the judicial annals of France. The writer remarks, that while crime and folly are simply despised with us, they meet with much congenial sympathy abroad : Taken, of course, with due allowance, the great cha racteristic of British crime and fully is stupidity ; that of continental crime and folly is vivacity. With is, the cri minal and the dupe are commonly the stupidest of their kind—the one a clownish lout, tit for nothing but killing sheep, snaring partridges, or robbing gardens; the other, a gaping servant-maid on the look out for a sweetheart, or an ignorant peasant cast into the huge streets of the me tropolis, where he finds everything so wonderful that he is ready to accept any tale that may be told him. Amid the town-bred portion of the knavish community this observa tion applies with more modification, but it is true in prin ciple notwithstanding. On the Continent, on the other hand, the knave, even in the country, is commonly a man whose lively cleverness has caused him to disdain the or dinary ways of getting a livelihood, or whose physical strength has given him a superiority which tempts him to an unrestrained use of the wild passions of the continental character. As for the dupe, he is usually a person of ex alted imagination, who looks out for miraculous occur rences, or who has thought so long on the wonderful and the unknown, that they have become to him a reality, and he is ready to lend a willing ear to any absurdity in his im patience to grasp them. " And hence," concludes the writer, " amidst all the " boasted enlightenment of the age, not one folly has " disappeared, not one credulity has been anni " hilated ; and crime, so far from diminishing, has " doueled or trebled within the last few years in the " most important States of Europe." The first part of a new tale—" The Lichtensteiners ; or, Convert- Makers "—promises a romantic love-story of the Re formation. The " Educational Experiments in Ire land" is an able review of the National system of education as hitherto pursued in Ireland, and of its failure as compared with the system of the Church Education Society. "How shall we deal with the War?" and " The Session Extraordinary" are both well written. The former, after noticing the general faithlessness of Austria, and the mistakes which the Government have hitherto made in the conduct of the war, observes that There are but two methods in which a war with Russia can be conducted. The invasion of the interior, and the destruction of her strongholds, is one ; to array against her the liberal force of European feeling, is the other. The experience of the great Napoleon should be final as to the possible success of the first of these. The same policy, the same resources, the same snows and ice that over threw the grand army are yet in waiting for its successor. Let us not adventure upon so hopeless an enterprise. The conquest of the Crimea, the occupation of St. Petersburg, would be fatal events to countries constituted like our own ; but in Russia such defeats would be as nothing. Should we lay Sebastopol in ruins, the Czar would point to it as an evidence that we dared not rebuild it. Should we date a despatch from the Neva, an imperial ukase from Moscow would proclaim that city the capital of the empire. lieu! sirs, let us hope to weary out our enemy. This policy is his own. It is in the protraction of the war, its terrible sacrifices, the wounds it inflicts on home happiness and family affection, the injuries to the cause of civilisation ;—it is on these he builds his hopes of subduing ns ; and here, indeed, is the one solitary point in which barbarism is an overmatch for civilisation. Aggressive war on Russia must always prove unrewarding, even where its success has been complete. The wealth of the country is not of a kind to be assailable by forced conscription, nor are the material resources such as could be profitably em ployed by the conqueror. Our true hope in such a struggle as we are now engaged in must lie in arraying against our enemy the whole force and strength of liberal opinion in Europe ; banding together in a holy leagi the states who cherish the sentiments of liberty and thoughts of civilisa tion ; evoking the extinct nationalities of Finland and Poland; and raising, if need he, the vast populations of dissatisfied Germany to assert their freedom. The other paper, very aptly, compares the present Ministry to a sluggard, who, being "too late," has run himself out of breath to overtake his lost oppor tunity, but, panting and exhausted, fails to recover his position, and is compelled to own himself in a desperate strait; and then concludes with an earnest exhortation to the Government to throw themselves heartily into the work of carrying on the war to the utmost damage of the enemy, " irrespe 3tive of theories "of free trade, economy, or mock humanity." We have also the first part of a series upon the dra matic writers of Ireland, in which some interesting facts are detailed relative to the lives and writings of Wilson, Brady, Nahum Tate, Brunel, Boyle, Swift, Congreve, Farquhar, and others. The review of " Hamilton's Edition of the Collected Works of tithe - geld Stewart," is a pleasantly-written notice of the career of the great Scotch professor. In Fraser, among many good papers, will be found one upon "The Latest Acquisition of Russia," which deserves much attention. It appears that for many years Russia has been silently extending her dominion in the neighbourhoodav of the sea the of Okotsk ; and that, ing at length passed 19 rugged and difficult chain of mountains which form the boundary line between the Chinese empire and her own Asiatic possessions, she has appropriated the valley of the Amoor, a noble river with a course for 2,240 miles, commands its naviga tion by several steamers, has collected ships-of-war in the harbour at its mouth, and, finally, has began a system of fortification of that harbour which will threaten soon to rival Cronstadt or Sebastopol! The acquisition of this enormous tract of country, above 1,000 miles in length, and in some parts as much as 500 miles in width, proves in a remarkable manner the steady and consistent aggression of Russia. "England," concludes the writer, "demands Minis " tars who will oppose the designs of Russia with alt " their energy and intellect." The other articles are amusing. "Field Sports in Foreign Lands " glances at some recent books of travel by sportsmen ; a paper on the Crimea reviews in a military spirit the cam paign of 1854; " Alectryomania " reviews the princi pal varieties of poultry ; there are more "Dutch Ballads ;" a tale under the taking title of the " Hos pital Nurse ;" and a review of the "Ten Days' Ses sion," which very illogically praises the Government for all they have done, but admits that they bungle whatever they undertake. The present number of Bentley's Miscellany is remarkably spirited. " The Winter in the Crimea" is written with practical knowledge of the severity of that clime ; but, unfortunately, the information it affords only tends to confirm the opinion that, what ever has been done for the benefit of our army upon those bleak heights, has been done after the time it was required. There are also the fist four chapters of a new novel, "The Spendthrift," a tale of the last century, by Mr. Ainsworth, in the style which has made the author so popular as a romancist ; several light, amusing articles, a biographical notice of the late Mr. Lockhart, and a review of Waller and his works. With an abundant supply of genuine magazine literature and amusing stories in Colburn's New Monthly, we have yet two or three sound papers of graver interest, and, in p.1.-ticular, that upon Turkey, in which the governor .it, revenue, and resources of that country are reviewed in a lucid and instinctive manner. The writer appears to consider that the Turks, on the whole. have progressed equally with other nations, a view, we are afraid, hardly borne out by any practical experience which we have yet had of our allies. "The Elopement" is a gcod story of the war, and "Wanted, a Wife " a lively little extra vaganza. The Art-Journal commences a new series with the enterprise which has raised this publication to so high a place in our periodical literature. The plates of the Royal Gallery of Art will be published in this journal after the subscribers' copies have been taken and the plate been cut down. In the present num ber Reynolds's Duchess of Devonshire and Stanfield's " Mount St. Michael" are given. The whole collection will be published in the journal in the same manner as the Vernon Gallery was pub lished previously. It is a remarkable evidence of the good faith observed towards the subscribers of this journal, that in no case in the engravings of the whole Vernon collection was there disappulntment as to the appearance of the promised plates in their due order, except in one instance, when the engraver was, alone to blame. and Mr. Hall had used every effort to insure punctuality without success. The present number of the Art-Journal is very attractive, both for its letter press, steel plates, and wood-engravings. The first number of a new periodical, The Literary Mail Coach, presents a favourable appearance. The papers are written in a semi-satirical tone, the pro fessed aim of the periodical being to afford enters tainment, avoiding serious or political subjects. The Old Chelsea Bun house. 'A Tale of the Last Century. By the Author of " Mary Powell." London : Arthur Hall, Virtue, and Co. A pleasantly-written story of the manners of the earlier portion of the last century, affecting the style of the period and exhibiting a facsimile as to letter press of the better-printed class of books of that time. There is more ingenuity than utility in such exercises as these imitations. Certainly the period chosen for the " Old Chelsea Bun-house" is not one affording much information as to manners or public events; on the contrary, we are disposed to think that there never was a time which even the contemporary novelists ventured to treat with less real knowledge of the actual manners and habits of the higher classes. There is a suspicious conventional sameness about their descriptions of the " Lady Bettys " and the " Lord Dukes" which lead rather to the belief that one lay-figure had set for them all than that the writers knew much of the classes they undertook to paint. Of the book before us we can say that, quantum valeat, the author has succeeded in giving as fair a picture of the period as any of the authors of the five-Volume novels of the time, with this additional merit that the picture is evolved by means of a pretty story of domestic life. .ti;.• ,