The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1855-09-25 00:00:00

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AND GENERAL COMMERCIAL ADVERTISER

Free," should have caught that infection of frothy
exaggeration which so peculiarly besets the intel-
lectual efforts of our Transatlantic brethren, having
for its aim a singularity mistaken for originality,
a restless eccentricity paraded for distinction.
That Mr. Murray, who is obviously fitted for
better things, has been seized by the Yankee form
of personal vanity, which reveals itself in the
statement of an ordinary circumstance through
the media of extraordinary metaphors, is proved
in numberless instances ; yet in even the most
nauseous of his affected drolleries there is some
such scintillation of mental power as makes us
heartily regret that his capabilities were not con-
trolled by the dictates of a better taste. He seems
to forget that many an observation which passes
for fun, or may be even permitted to do duty for
wit in casual conversation, cuts but a sorry figure
when soberly written out, and phlegmatically laid
before a scrutinising public by the printer. His
exclamation on reaching Cleavland—" Here we
are, and by the powers of Mercury—this exple-
tive originated, I believe, with a proud barometer
7-it is raining cats and dogs, and a host of in-
ferior animals," if uttered in the dripping
circle of travellers momentarily assembled
round the blazing fire of a snug inn,
would under the circumstances have passed for
a lively sally of wit, and would, in all probability,
have been rewarded by a burst of merriment as
loud and genuine as it would have been ephemeral;
but dressed out as it is in the book before us,
as material for rational cogitation, it becomes
vapid and overstrained. So also are his continual
allusion to the boilers of locomotives and steam-
boats under the similitude of the " Hissing
Kettle," and his extravagant pictures of hostels
and hosts ; his overstrained quaintnesses in con-
cluding factitious moralisings, and numerous
other offences against the canons of literary com-
position, which lead in too many instances to a
suspicion of poverty of fancy, while in reality
they may be only the results of indolence—the
misshapen and decrepid progeny of carelessness
and questionable taste.

Enough, however, and more than enough, in
respect to the faults ; let us now see something
more of the author, who with these numerous
drawbacks to success has, nevertheless, furnished
us with a book, out of which many useful lessons
and much valuable information may be readily
extracted. His observations on men and man-
ners, and on social institutions, when he chooses
to examine these, are full of shrewdness, and indi-
cate no small amount of penetration. In pursuing
his investigations, Mr. Murray necessarily
encounters the American social blot of slavery,
which he admits he cannot see the means of
immediately curing. He considers and condemns
the Fugitive Slave Law, and curiously enough
perorates his suggestions for the amelioration of
slavery by proposing that " a proper instrument
for flogging be authorized by law ;" that is, on
the supposition that the odious infliction cannot
be dispensed with. The descriptive powers pos-
sessed by Mr. Murray are of a valuable character,
deriving their chief importance from the stern
and vivid earnestness with which they are em-
ployed ; in this respect forming an interesting
contrast to the flippancy so unpleasantly remark-