The Press.
London, England, 1855-05-26 00:00:00

THE PRESS.

-• •
breath of the meanest spies—the period of the
domestic tyranny of Oliver Cromwell. To
deal with foreigners as Cromwell dealt would
indeed be desirable, but to " rule England"
as ho ruled her would be to revive a govern-
ment in comparison to which that of
James 11. was paternal. The conclusion is, iu
tine, inevitable that in any form of government
a system will no more work without the fitting
men than a plough will act without guidance ;
and M r. Congreve comes to the same result as we
do, when he thinks that power, even despotic,
should be in the " hands of a man competent
" to wield it."

itrt-Hints. Architecture, Sculpture, and Painting.
By J. F. James. London : Sampson Low and Son.
MR. JAMES, without giving us any new or original
views upon art, devotes a great portion of his work
to the consideration of the relation of art to history,
and an inquiry into the political condition most
favorable to its development. His plan involves a
review of the different schools of art which have
flourished and faded, from those of Greece to those
of Italy, and of the influence of the political ten-
dencies of the age upon them, together with remarks
upon the general differences and most conspicuous
analogies of the schools of modern Europe. The few
concluding chapters are devoted to the question of
patronage and a notice of the great compositions of
the old masters. The author is evidently a man of
highly-cultivated taste, loving nature, revering art,
and hating formalism ; and his book, though scarcely
sufficiently artistic for artists, is yet one which every
amateur may read with pleasure.

The Life and Beauties of Fanny Fern. London
Kent and Co. _

A COLLECTION of Fanny Fern's contributitions to the
press in America. Many of them, mere fugitive
pieces, have never before been gsthered together;
and though in the preface we are told that they are
the articles upon which Fanny Fern made her repo•
tation, yet they do not in any way induce us to
change our opinion of her writings. She is lively
and entertaining at first, but after a few pages her
wit., or her pathos, as the case may be, becomes
wearisome and insipid. Her style, too, however well
a.lapted to please the taste of the Americans, is un-
deniably coarse, and far too colloquial to please
English readers. Her sketches, it is said, are very
clever word-paintings of society in America : if so,
we can hardly congratulate the men upon their good
manners, or the women upon their modesty.

PUBLICATIONS RECEIVED.
BOOKS.

Natural Elements of Political Economy. R. Jennings, M.A.
Longroans.
Within amd Without. A Dramatic Poem. George Mac
Donald. Ditto.
The Monarchy of France ; its Rise, Progress, and Fall.
W. Tooke, F.R.S. Sampson Low.
Frank Wilton; or, the Queen's Own. James Grant.
Routledge.

PAMPHLETS.

The History of the Char; isTilove;int. Parts I. to VII.
Holyoake.
An Account of the Library of the Division of Art. Ralph N.
Wornum, Librarian. Eyre and Spottiswoode.
The Dangers of England and the Duties of Englishmen. By
A British Commoner. Bosworth.
Where are we Drifting? Sir Arthur Hallam Elton, Bart.
Hamilton and Adams.

PERIODICALS
Journal qf the Statistical Society. Vol. XVIII. Part TI.
J. W. Parker and Son.
History of Christian Churches and Sects. Rev. J. B.
Marsden, M.A. Part V. Bentley.

WASHINGTON IRVING, says the New York Courier,
is suffering from a casualty sustained on the lkth of
April. Mr. Irving was riding on the river road near
Sunny Side, when his horse took fright and ran away.
The animal's head was towards home, for which he
made at a terrible pace. Mr. Irving kept his seat,
and might have escaped unliart, but as the horse
turned from the main road he fell and threw his
rider, who was taken up stunned by the fall. Mr.
Irving remained insensible for several hours, and,
though for some time in danger, is now (April 21)
considerably better.
THE SEA SERPENT had again exhibited himself,
this time off the capes of Delaware. His snakeship
is reported to be one hundred feet in length. His
appearance was telegraphed to Philadelphia, and an
expedition immediately sent in pursuit of him. A
reward of 1,000 dollars had been offered for his
capture.
A PREMIUM or 5001. for the invention of an
effectual method for preventing the emission of
smoke from the chimneys of multitubular boilers,
has been offered, by advertisement, by the Steam
Colliers Association of Newcastle.