The Press. — London, England, 1856-02-23 00:00:00

184 fittraturt. The Rise of the Dutch Republic. A History. By John Lothrop Motley. Three Vols. London: John Chapman. MR. MOTLEY is an American, and, like his countryman Prescott, prefers to appeal, in the first instance, to the English rather than to the American public. Why is this ? Is it through distrust of American taste or libe rality? A country so large and so prosperous as America ought surely to hold out some encouragement to native authors. By refus ing to recoguise international copyright, it is doing all it can to deprive itself of a national literature. Its cheap books just come to Lord Bacon's old story of the cheap brooms. It is cheaper to steal than to buy. We never heard of Mr. Motley before. We fancy he is new to literature, yet his " His tory " is a work of which any country might be proud. It has faults and defects, the former more noticeable than the latter ; but, allowing for all these, he has produced a really noble narrative. He is entitled absolutely to the merit he claims for himself' in his preface; ho is " industrious and earnest," but we rate his qualifications more highly. He has elo quence, discrimination, and that most valuable of all faculties for historic composition, the talent of sifting, dissolving, and combining authorities, so as to produce a narrative in which the elements they furnish are em bodied—but embodied in such a way as to yield another and far more sterling result that their separate materials could supply. Chemists know that the most valuable pro ducts of nature are those which are composed of substances useless or noxious in their simple state. Poisonous gases become vital air when judiciously combined. It is the same in history. By the synthetic process falsehood results in truth ; and the best his torian is he who understands the art of coo bing what is in itself valueless, and of blend ing all the rainbow hues of prejudice and partisanship into the light which illumines without discolouring the past. In this constructive art we assign a high and distinguished place to Mr. Motley. He has diligently examined all sources of informa tion connected with his subject; he has com bined them in the proportions which they deserve ; and he has given us by far the most copious, animated, and on the whole authentic, narrative extant of the " Rise of the Dutch Republic." His book is better than its title. It is an expanded biography of the memorable career of William the Silent, the great Prince of Orange—a man who, considering the in credible difficulties he had to encounter, and the mighty events in which he bore a part, stands without a parallel in the world's his tory, or is only to be paralleled by Luther— the one the great champion of political, as the other was of religious freedom. In his " Historical Introduction," Mr. Mot ley traces the history of the Netherlands from the earliest recoris to the abdication of Charles V. This introduction is not the best part of the work. Many writers who can detail admirably find themselves unable to mass. The history itself commences with the accession of Philip 11. ; traces the regency of Margaret of Parma; the disorders which occurred during her rule ; the viceroyalty of Alva : the terrible tyranny of the Council of Blood ; the armed resistance of Orange ; the first dawn of freedom in the Dutch provinces; the fierce strife •kith the Spaniards, and the sanguinary successes of the latter; the gradual progress of William in spite of the greatest defeats end misfortunes, until the fatal aim of an assassin cut short his magnanimous career, though not until a great part of his work had been done. The author does not shun those episodes which flow from the natural course of his sub ject, nor does he unduly court them. He tra verses in part the same ground that has been recently gone over by Mr. Prescott in his "Life of Philip II." We have compared those portions of the histories which relate to the same events; and, while the palm must un doubtedly be given te Mr. Prescott for correct- THE PRESS. Iness and regularity, the superiority must be assigned to Mr. Motley for vigour and anima tion. When he errs it is on the side of enthu siasm. Substantially he is fair, but he is warm, and he is too apt to needlessly assert his principles, and to inveigh against tyranny and its excesses. From the period of the death of Egmont and Horn he has the field to himself, and his narrative increases in vivacity and interest as William the Silent takes a more prominent place in his page. The latter portion of his history is indeed the best written, the most free from the repetitions and superfluities which disfigure portions of his book, and the most eloquent, distinct, and pie turesque in expression. It is not easy to give any just conception of a work extending to neatly two thousand pages by a few extracts, more especially when, as in this case, the merit of the work consists, not in the finish of particular passages, but in the unbroken continuity and vigorous march of the narrative. Nevertheless, we must allow Mr. Motley to speak for himself. He de scribes with admirable effect the leading inci dents of the great struggle in the Netherlands. Every reader must recognise the nervous eloquence of the following paragraph, nar rating the commencement of what is known as " the Spanish Fury at Antwerp" : At about an hour before noon nearly every living man in the citadel was mustered for the attack, hardly men enough being left behind to guard the gates. Five thousand veteran soldiers, besides six hundred cavalry, armed to the death, sallied forth from Alva's citadel. In the counter scarp they fell upon their knees to invoke, according to custom, the blessing of God upon the devil's work which they were about to commit. The Eletto bore a standard, ono side of which was emblazoned with the cnici tied Saviour, and the other with the Virgin Mary. The image of Him who said, " Love your enemies," and the gentle face of the Madonna, were to smile from heaven upon deeds which might cause a shudder in the depths of hell. Their brief orisons concluded, they swept forward to the city. Three thousand Spaniards, tinder their Eletto, were to enter by the street of St. Michael; the Germans, and the remainder of the Spanish foot com mended by Romero, through that of St. George. Cham pagny saw them coining, and spoke a last word of encou ragement to the Walloons. The next moment the compact mass struck the barrier, as the thunderbolt descends from the cloud. There was scarcely a struggle. The Walloons, not waiting to look their enemy in the face, abandonel the posts which they had themselves claimed. The Spaniards crashed through the bulwark as though it had been a wall of glass. The Eletto was first to mount the rampart ; the next instant he was shot dead, while his followers, undismayed, sprang over his body and poured into the streets. The fatal gaps, due to timidity and carelessness, let in the destructive tide Champagny, seeing tnat the enemies had all crossed the barrier, leaped over a garden wail, passed through a house into a narrow lane, and thence to the nearest station of the German troops. Hastily collecting a small force, he led them in person to the rescue. The Germans fought well, died well, but they could not reanimate the courage of the Walloons, and all were now in full retreat, pursued by the ferocious Spaniards. In vain Champagny stormed among them ; in vain lie strove to rally their broken ranks. With his own hand he seized a banner from a retreating ensign, and called upon the nearest soldiers to make a stand against the foe. It was to bid the flying clouds pause before the tempest. Torn, broken, aimless, the scattered troops whirled through the streets before the pursuing wrath. Champagny, not yet despairing, gallopped hither and thither, calling the burghers everywhere to rise in defence of their homes : nor did he call in vain. They came forth from every place of rendezvous, from every alley, from every house. They fought as men tight to defend their hearths and altars ; but what could individual discipline avail against the compact, discipliaed, re-istless mass of their foes? The order of defence was broken there was no systein, no concert, no rallying point, no authority. So soon as it was known that the Spaniards had crossed the rampart, that its six thousand defenders were in full retreat, it was inevitable that a panic should seize the city. Their entrance once effected, the Spanish force had separated, according to previous arrangement, into two divisions—one half charging up the long street of St. Michael, the other forcing its way through the street of St. Joria. " Santiago, Santiago ! Espana, Espana! is sangre, s carne, a Negri, b sacco !" St. James, Spain, blood. flesh, fire, sack ! such were the hideous cries which rang through every quarter of the city, as the savage horde advanced. The descriptive power of the author never tires. When stirring scenes are to he nar rated, his pen is ever warm, fertile, and fluent. He judiciously preserves those little incidents which contribute to the reality and force of great events, while he discards the isolated trivialities which have no real significance. The tyranny of Philip was so detestable that we can readily forgive the abhorrence with which it is spoken of. On the barbarous sack and slaughter of Naarden the author remarks It is not without reluctance, but still with a stern deter mination, that the historian should faithfully record these SATURDAY, transactions. To extenuate would bn base—to exaggerate impossible. It is good that the world should not forget how much wrong has been endured by a single harmless nation at the hands of despotism, and in the sacred name of Csod. There have been tongues and pens enough to narrate the exce..ses of the people, bursting from time to time out of slavery into madness. It is good, too, that those crimes should be remembered, and freshly pondered. But it is equally wholesome to study the opposite picture. Tyranny, ever young and ever old, constantly reprodu3ing herself with the same stony features, with the same im posing mask which she has worn through all the ages, can never be too minutely examined, especially when she paints her own portrait, and when the secret history of her guilt is furnished by the confessions of her lovers. The perusal of her traits will not make us love popular liberty the less. Never was any country so cruelly persecuted as the Netherlands under Spanish rule. The wonder is, that the people were submissive so long, and that they did not earlier rally under William's banner, and drive their ferocious oppressors from their soil. One of the most animated chapters in the work is that devoted to the history of Don John of Austria. The characters of the hero of Lepanto and of William are effectively con trasted : There stood the young conqueror of Lepanto, his brain full of schemes, his heart full of hopes, on the threshold of the Netherlands, at the entrance to what he believed the most brilliant chapter of his lire—schemes, hopes, and visions doomed speedily to fade before the cold reality with which be was to be confronted. Throwing off his disguise after reaching Luxemburg, the youthful paladin stood con fessed. His appearance was as romantic as his origin and his exploits. Every contemporary chronicler, French, Spanish, Italian, Flemish, Homan, have dwelt upon his personal beauty, and the singular fascination of his manner. Symmetrical features, blue eyes of great vivacity, and a profusion of bright curling hair, were combined with a person nut much above middle height, but perfectly well proportioned. Owing to a natural peculiarity of his head the hair fell backward from the temples, and he had ac quired the habit of pushing it from his brows. The custom became a fashion among the hosts of courtiers, who were but too happy to glass themselves in so brilliant a mirror. As Charles V. on his journey to Italy to assume the iron crown had caused his hair to be clipped close, as a remedy for the headaches with which at that momentous epoch he was tormented, bringing thereby close-shaven polls into extreme fashion, so a mass of hair pushed backward from the temples, in the style to which the name of John of Austria was appropriated, became the prevailing mode wherever the favorite son of tne Emperor appeared. Such was the last crusader whom the annals of chivalry were to know—the man who had humbled the crescent as it had not been humbled since the days of the Tancreds, the Baldwins, the Plantagenets—yet, after all, what was this brilliant adventurer when weighed against the tranquil Christian champion whom he was to meet face to face ? The contrast was striking between the real and the ro mantic hero. Don John had pursued and achieved glory through victories with which the world was ringing—Wil liam was slowly compassing a country's emancipation through a series of defeats. He moulded a commonwealth and united hearts with as much contempt for danger as Don John had exhibited in scenes of slave driving and carnage. Amid fields of blood, and through webs of tor tuous intrigue, the brave ;.nil subtle son of the Emperor pursued only his own objects. Tawdry schemes of per sonal ambitit n, conquests for his own benefit, impossible crowns for bis own wearing, were the motives which im pelled him, and the prizes which he sought. His existence was feverish, fitful, and passionate. " Tranquil amid the raging billows," according to his favorite device, the father of his country waved aside the diadem which for him bad neither charms nor meaning. Their characters were as contrasted as their persona. The curled darling of chivalry seemed a youth at thirty-one. Spare of figure, plain in apparel, benignant, but haggard of countenance, with temples bared by anxiety as much as by his helmet, earnest, almost devout in manner, in his own words, " Calvtis et Calvinists," William of Orange was an old man at forty three. It is only by perusal of the work that a fair estimate can be formed of the author's learn ing, energy, and eloquence. We regret that his matter was not subject to more diligent revision befiwe being committed to the press. the style would be improved 1 y pruning. Great historians are sparing of their words, and rarely allow a superfluous epithet to escape them. But there is so much life in Nlr. Motley's narrative, and such fascination in his subject and in his earnest though somewhat rude flow of language, that we give a cordial welcome to his labours, and hail him as a writer of striking original power. Viewing the extent of his subject, and the breadth and vigour of its treatment, we are inclined to think that he has produced the greatest his• torical work which has yet issued from the United States. Our acknowledgment of his success is made with the more candour, as we could not peruse his volumes without sincere admiration of the intellectual vigour and un questionable talent for historical narration which they evince in an eminent degree.