The Press. — London, England, 1856-04-12 00:00:00

r APRIL 12, 1856. t‘ How couldst thou know my utter wretchedness? I lately read it in thy cruel Bonn." ]►ly blood ran cold, and terror fill'd my heart At my own truthless, which had thus beheld What was to be ;—iny labouring brain gave way, And, wild with very horror—l awoke. Even in that piece some morbid influence can be detected. Suryit amari aliquid. He must always show the thorn amidst his flowers. But Heine ought to be tenderly treated, as he was a martyr fur years to cruel physical sufferings. We are sorry tnat the translator did not dwell at greater length upon his author. The ma jority of our English readers would desire to have a snore extended notice of him than Mr. Wallis has prefixed. He merely glanoen at Heine's life in the following way : The life of Heino contains few facts for a biographer. He was born in 1799, of Jewish pareuts, at Dusseldorf, in Rhineland. He studied at Bonn, Berlin, and Gottingen, where he gained his degree as doctor of laws. In 1831 he took up his residence at Paris, to escape the dangers to which his liberal politics exposed him in his own country. Paring the last eight years of his life he was a prey to a painful and hopeless malady, whirl terminated in death in the present year. After arriving at manhood he abjured Judaism, and became a Protestant. But this is not the place for tracking his many variations; after being a pupil of Hegel, and a Pantheist, he lived to declare German philosophy to be pure Atheism, and as such to renounce it. He married a Catholic wife according to the Catholic ritual, an,l subscribed the engagement that the offspring of the wedding should be Catholic ; but so far as his re ligious convictions can be collected from his writings, he died in the faith in which he had been brought up—a Jew. Heine's popularity is not likelt• to diminish . German literature, as his technical com mand of poetical artifices was considerable, .;d there was much human pathos in some of his effusions. He has no exact analogue in oglish letters, though several passages Fecal lose poets of our language who have been versed in German literature. It is not unlikely that this volume will reach second edition, and we recommend that the translator shoull insert a detailed account of Le poet and his works. The Trarts-Caueasian Campaign of the Turkish Army under Outer Pacha. By Laurence Oliphant. London: Blackwoods. fon military men are, we believe, nearly .greed that Kars never need have fallen. The real reasons why Omer Pacha's pr• - •posal for relief was not carried out in the summer likely, Mr. Oliphant thinks, to continue a lystery ; but in his opening chapter he gives a very lucid sketch of the difficulties against whichlthe Turkish commander had to contend. According to his account, the blame 'tould be divided between the French and uglish. Generals Simpson and Pelissier 411 opposed most vehemently the departure the Turkish army from the Crimea, and the ithorities at Paris and in London confirmed teir decision. They also held that an expe lion by way of Erzeroum would be a safer ad more beneficial plan than that pro posed by Omer Pacha. Three or four precious lionths were consumed in these discussions, id though the Blue-book on the fall of Kars yes us all the facts of the case, " there is," tys Mr. Oliphant, " one point of great im portance upon which it is silent " : We learn from its pages that one general proposed to to an army to the relief of Kars, and the reasons are oly stated which induced him to make the proposition, and confidently to predict success. We are further in• firmed who those generals were who opposed the prosecu tion of this design ; but we are nowhere enlightened as to their motives for so doing. When, however, we remember • serious consequences which this refusal involved, and high military authorities from whom it emanated, we oi scarcely allow ourselves to doubt the correctness of the deci,iou at which they arrived. At the same time the corn Aerations by which thee were influenced must hare been weighty and important that it is only a pardonable curiosity if (now that nothing is to be feared from their lisclosnre) we may be permitted to inquire what they Itere. "It is unriecessary," says hord Stratford, "to fill the only lacuna which appears in either the statement on the measures taken for the relief of Kars, drawn up by General Mansfield) or the abstract (of correspondence on same subject by Count Pisani). lam content to leave = circumstances. which are there passel over, to your ordship's recollection and sense of justice. There is little in the present volume relating the purely military operations of the cam ign which we did not know before, and lose interested in such matters will have Ade themselves masters of the details from )thee sources. But the work contains much that i nteresting, and in some respects novel, re At my own What was I And, wild I Even in th be detecte , always she Heine oug a martyr 1, We are sot at. greater jovity of o have a ino! Wallis ha! Heine's lif The life of lie was born Rhineland. where he gait took up his e, which his lib( During the la painful and h the present y. 3 toldiSlll, and place for tract of Hegel, and philosophy to He married ritual, ani an of the weddin ligious convey died in the fa Heine's in German wand, of I and there I his effitsioi English let those poet versed in C It is not a second cc translator t the poet an TA Tram- Army to Oliphant Those mile agreed that real reason its relief wt is likely, M mystery ; us a very against whi contend. .4 should be English. both oppose of the Turk authorities their decisi dition by v and more posed by 0 months wet and though gives us all says Mr. ( " portance We learn fi take an army fully stated wh and confident) firmed who th tion of this des their motives f the serious con the high indite can scarcely ail deciz.iou at whi si.lerations by so weighty at curiosity if (iv disclosnre) wt were. "It is up the only lac ton the measui beneral Manst the same sulijo t he eircumstau ordship's recol There is 1 to the pure] Pal= wine those inter made them* other sourec triteresfii THE PRESS. lative to the climate, scenery, and inhabitants of Circassia and Georgia Here is a descrip tion of Prince Michael, a feudal Circassian chief, who is supposed, however, to have strong Russian leanings : I was standing upon the balcony of the French consul's house, when I was surprised by the arrival of a large cavalcade, which came trooping up to the door of the house in picturesque confusion. In the centre of the group, which was composed of about a hundred wild•looking Cir cassians, rode a handsome grey-haired man, whose tall cap of pure white distinguished him from those by whom he was surrounded. There was that in his bearing, moreover, which at once marked him as a chief of note ; and I was not surprised to observe that, on his dismounting, every one of his followers sprung from his horse, and dashed at the great man's bridle, as though vying with one another who should he the first to render him a service. He re ceived their attentions in an easy off hand manner, as if they were his due; and, followed by two or three of his principal squires or serving men, he came up to pay us a visit. his costume was simple but handsome. A long buff•coloured coat of camel cloth was confined round the waist by a leathern girdle, which was ornamented by a few handsomely-mounted weapons. The cartridge-tubes on his breast were of a slate-colour, and richly inlaid with silver. A pair of heavy jack-boots reached up to the thigh, and his peaked cap was trimmed with white fur. The only in congruity about the costume was a black Patin stock and a shirt collar, which painfully detracted from its general effect; indeed, when his cap was off, his jovial rubicund countenance, curly grey hair and whiskers, anti well. rounded chin reposing contentedly between a pair of un mistakable gills, were precisely those of an English country gentleman. Below the neck the savage reappeared, but the boots, though not unbecoming, were a great deal too civilised. There were no such marks of refinement about his clan. Their muscular sun-browned throats were con fined by no paltry invention of modem times; their stal wart legs were enclosed in coarse brown or yellow felt gaiters; their well-shaped feet in red leather moccasins— for though that is a word belonging to another hemisphere, it is the only one which in the least describes their chaussure. Instead of the high cap, some of these wore a species of hood similar to those of the Bedt,uin Arabs, the point sticking out behind, and the ends brought round the neck like a comforter. It was an agreeable variation in the costume, and added to the wildness of their aspect. About a hundred of these men filled the space in front of the house. Lounging between their horses, or squatting in groups by the roadside, they let the nags take care of themselves. Mr. Oliphant'a account of the country in Circe snia and Nlingrelia is highly favorable. It is richly wooded, and the valleys and slopes are covered with fruit trees and corn-fields. The inhabitants, both men and women, are rather shy. Omer Pacha, while his force was collecting at Souchoum, was fond of making excursions into the neighbourhood. This is 14 visit to an "Abkhasian " village : We splashed along, followed by fifty or sixty mounted orderlies, through mud and jungle, until we emerged upon an open space on which a village was situated, when the women and children rushed frightened and cry ng into their konaks, and the men collected round the doors not a little bewildered and astonished at so unusual an appari- tion. However, they soon regained confidence. and came to kiss the skirts of Omer Pacba's coat, and offer us hos pitality. We therefore dismounted at the door of the principal cottage in the village—the only one constructed of planks—and made ourselves comfortable: Omer Pacha, who is eminently gallan•, knocked at the door of a room into which a bevy of fair damsels had bolted themselves, and told them there was nothing to be afraid of. He was obliged to exercise his powers of peranasion for some time before he could induce them to open a chink large enough for us to see the sparkle of their eyes. However they gradually relented, and before we left their shyness had quite disappeared. They spun, embroidered, and netted for our edification, and we were much struck by the inge- nuity they manifested in their female accomplishments. One or two of the girls were remarkably pretty, differing neither in complexion nor in the character of their features from those in our own country. Their hands and feet, which were bare, were very small and delicate. Their costume is by no means so picturesque as that of the men : it consived simply of a sort of loose dr•essing•gown open at the bosom, and confined by a girdle at the waist. Most of the houses are constructed of " wattle and dab," and thatched with the stalks of Indian corn. The charms of the Trans-Caucasian young ladies are a frequent theme with Mr. Oli. phant. If the result of peace be as is pre dicted, to throw open the shores of the Black Sea to the commerce of the West, let us humbly hope that some of these pretty faces may find their way to England Beauty is now scarce in the corps de ballet, and a Circassian prima-donna might more than compensate Mr Gye for the loss of Covent Garden. Game of various kinds is also very plentiful in the splendid natural preserves of the Abkhasian and Minizrelian hills, and, though shooting was for some reason forbidden, the author seems to have occasionally waged war on the pheasants and woodc.icks with considerable success. Prince Michael, whom we have be wentioUed, invited Ir. 353 Oliphant and some other English officers, with the Duke of Newcastle, to a grand day's sport in his private demesne; but the cover was so thick, and the dogs and beaters so bad, that nothing was done—the only head of game killed being a deer, by a splendid shot faun the Duke himself, who at least in that insiunce was true to his mark. Altogether, it is difficult to realise the fact that we are accompanying Mr. Oliphant with an invading army through a wasted territory. The dangers he encounters are just enough to give zest to his adventures—and his greatest hardships are to sleep in a pigstye and go with out tobacco for a week He is, however, a spirited and agreeable writer, and his " Trans Caucasian Campaign " has given us a better notion of what these countries really are than any of the previous works which the war has generated. An incident on the night before the battle of the Ingour must conclude our notice As engineer officers are scarce in the Turkish army, or at all events as none were forthcoming upon that occasion, Colonel Simmons gave me a lesson in battery-making, and sent me to Skender Pacha to get the men and gabions ne cessary for one battery, while he superintended the con struction of the other. About ten o'clock p.m. I found Skender with his reserves, bivouacked near the wood ; and he, supposing me in the dark to be ao officer, gave me not only a working party of two hundred men, but a regiment of infantry and two field-pieces. a command with which was considerably astonished and overwhelmed. However, I thought it would scarcely be discreet to undeceive him, so we marched off, and half an hour afterwards were silently and vigorously at work on the bank of the river, within about a hundred yards of the Russian sentries. We had almost filled our front row of gabions when the Turkish major whispered that be saw the Russians coming down to the river in force. This was a most startling announce ment. I certainly saw, through the darkness, three black lines drawn up upon the opposite shore. As my experience in military matters was exactly that of most other Lincoln's inn barristers, and my knowledge of Turkish did not include a single word of command, the thought of the two geld-pieces and the regiment of infantry began rather to trouble me—more particularly as the artillery officer sug gested something that I did not in the least understand. However I peremptorily ordered him not, and discovered, to my intense relief, on looking through my opera glass, that the Russians were, in fact, three rows of lugs, which successive floods had stranded upon the bank. Its own merits and the popularity of its author's name will carry this work into many circles. Memorials of Captain Halley Vicars, 97th Regiment. By the Author of " The Victory Won." London : Nisbet and Co. THIS little volume is making a prodigious noise in religious circles (its sale is now in the twentieth thousand), owing to the character of its subject and to the nature of its contents. Captain Vicars was at once an enthusiastic pietist and a Crimean hero. The fervour of his devotion was evidently pure ; it left him without gloom, though with some austerity, and it did not interfere with the active discharge of his professional duties. It cannot be denied that in both army and navy there exists a strong prejudice against officers who seem to have mistaken their vocation. It is not that " re ligious officers " are unpopular or disrespected because they are pious ; but it often happens that their enthusiasm is ill-regulated. No one co ild ever suspect the Duke of Wellington as being in any respects careless about sacred duties, but we cannot forget that there is written evidence as to his dislike of " Method . " ists in the army." Captain Hedley Vicars, though enthusiasti cally religious, was a thoroughly good officer, and was honourably zealous in the discharge of his duties His death was one of the most glorious amongst those of the many heroes who dyed the Crimea with their blood. On the 22nd of March, 1955, a Russian division of 15,000 men issued after nightfall from Sebastopol, and approached the British lines from the Mamelon, coming up the ravine on the right of the British line. At first they were supposed to be the French, and Hedley Vicars was the first to discover that they were Russians. With a coolness of judgment that won him praise from all quarters, he ordered his men to lie down until the Rus sians came within twenty paces ; then, raising the war shout, "Now, 97th, on your pins, and charge," he dashed forward at the head of two hundred men, hurling himself against a column of two thousand ! He was shot through the breast, but he sboutvd, " VOW, - . A