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his detects, he has made a name which is
very great now, which extends far beyond the
limits, not only of his country, but of his
country's language,—a name, too, which bids
as fair as any, save two or three of those con.
temporary with it, to flourish enduringly
hereafter.

His present work, " Celebrated Characters,"
appears to be his farewell literary offering to
the reading world. He boasts that he has the
sense to know when to withdraw, and that he
retires, like Rossini, before one faculty is
practically impaired by age. But it has more
than this interest; for it is, in our opinion,
by far the least imperfect prose production of
its author; displaying even more than his
accustomed loftiness of thought, animation of
description and narrative, and felicity of style,
with considerably less of the turgid and de-
clamatory wordiness which disfigures so many
of his earlier compositions. The idea of the
book is simply Plutarch's idea; Lamartine,
however, not incorporating in his labour any
of those parallels and comparisons between
great men which form the most enchanting
and the peculiar characteristic of Plutarch's
immortal " Lives."

Lamartine's attempt in this department
consists '.f an introduction and thirteen bio-
graphies or histories. One of these is by Mme.
de Lamartine—a more imaginative and, we
may add, a more imaginary " life," both in sub-
ject and in treatment, than those which her
husband has offered in its company to the
public. We certainly do not, and cannot, call
it the best article in this miscellany of chroni-
cles. It is a history of the adventures of
Roostam, the Persian Achilles or Hercules
(who flourished, or did not flourish, as the case
may be), the date of whose supposed exploits
precedes by a thousand years the Christian
era. On that part of the book we cannot
spare time to expatiate further.
The other lives are those of Heloisa, the
beloved of Abelard, giving, if possible, the real
and exact career on which Pope has founded
his famous poem—(the love of no woman
ever incurred such publicity or so clear and
so long a remembrance) —of Christopher
Columbus, presenting in miniature what
Washington Irving supplies full length ; of
Cromwell; of Cicero; of Bernard de Palissy; of
Nelson ; of Socrates ; of Guttenberg, the first
printer ; of Fenelon ; of Homer ; of Jacquard,
the weaver; of Joan of Arc, the greatest and
most ill-fated heroine of France or the world.
Among these twelve it is to Nelson that La-
martine gives the place of honour, or at least
the priority of place, in his narrative. Here
are, it will be perceived, topics to suit all
tastes culled with uncontrolled freedom,
merely for the sake of the intrinsic in-
terest they may happen to possess. Those
which will at once attract the greatest
number of readers are, we suspect, this bril-
liant Frenchman's accounts of Cromwell, of
Nelson, of Joan of Arc, of Fenelon, and of the
illustrious, the immortal, the unfortunate
Columbus.

There are some historical points which we
should have wished to discuss with M. Lamar-
tine, but we must forbear. Yet this much we
must say, that, however decidedly Lamartine
may fail in certain definable particulars, his
work breathes throughout a noble, gentle, and
generous disposition, always espousing the hu-
maner view. We consider his estimate of Crom-
well peculiarly solid and sustainable—that he
was a gloomy and brooding fanatic, much rather
than a systematic hypocrite. Men seldom do
exactly what they design to do, and therefore,
when they do very great things, other men are
not more at pause than they themselves are to
account for the prodigious result. This is the
secret of the almost constitutional superstition
remarkable in all the mightiest heroes of his-
tory. Alexander must be the son of Jupiter
Ammon. Sesostris was priest and conqueror.
Julius Cresar could not mount his horse with
out muttering a charm. Walleustein had his
whisperings ; Cromwell his visions ; Napoleon
his days, his hours, his appearances of scenes,
and his awful presentiments; all these men,
and all such, have been believers of strange
and private beliefs, dupes of arbitrary and
personal prognostications. The reader of
Bacon must be struck to find how even
his stupendous intelligence was not free from

615

the visitings of this moral " thirst of the
gazelle." But Cromwell ? Was it not in him,
at least, either pure religion or pure impos-
ture? Neither. For what has religion to say
to his third of September? Where does any
known religion—not to talk of Christianity—
bid men build with triumphant confidence on
their own particular, their own private, appro-
priated, dominant, fated, irresistible days ?
There is real power in Lamartine's record of
our glorious Horatio Nelson, whom he de-
scribes as the greatest naval hero this world
has ever beheld. But Lamartino does not
seem aware of the whole truth of his conduct
at Naples, and relates the story of his tyran-
nical love rather with a poet's than a critic's
pen.

- That his account of Joan of Arc should be
full of eloquence no one who has read his
strange episode on Charlotte Corday will be
surprised to hear. Joan offers a thousand
times a nobler subject than the heroine whom
he has immortalised in the " Girondins," and
whom, using perhaps the most audacious
figure of rhetoric that we have anywhere met
in modern literature, he terms " the Angel of
Assassination." But no such strained epithet
is needed by the glorious Maid of Orleans.
A far higher place in history, a purer cause, a
grander career, incomparably more difficult
and more memorable exploits and services,
and, in her cruel death, an end so much more
profoundly tragical, in addition to more illus •
trious gifts and a general character more sub-
lime, render Joan of Arc one of the very finest
themes which the annals of Christendom could
have supplied to exercise the genius of a poet-
biographer.
The great fault of Lamartine is that he is
never, as a historian, to be trusted further
than he can be traced. In the " Girondins,"
for instance, we should like to know what
amount of authorities he could adduce to
substantiate his account of the farewell supper
of Vergniaud and his companions ; and we
should like then to range on the other side
those irrefragable facts which prove the whole
of that scene, with all its circumstantial parti-
culars so glowingly described, to be one un-
mixed fiction of the author's imagination. It
is a monster instance of intrepid fabrication
in a history pretending to be authentic. But
we are glad that we can honestly say of the
present work that we have not detected any-
thing approaching to such licence. On the
contrary, the author has put great restraint
on his imagination ; he has taken great pains
to state leading facts correctly; and hence his
arabesque superstructure of sentiment and
imagery is encrusted to a more solid founda-
tion than usual. And when we remember that
the work recommends itself by the happiness
of its design—always the chief passport to
public favour—we have no doubt that it will
form an important addition to its author's
fame.

616

fluous notes merely to parade his own research
Some will perhaps wish for a few more notes
in the present volume ; but, of the two evils,
he has chosen the lesser ; and we approve of
the example he has given of not stifling our
great authors under commonplace books.
There are nine pages of an introduction to
" The Task," which we have read with much
pleasure for its high-toned feeling and sound
critical perception. How well he describes
the effect of " The Task " on our modern Eng-
lish poetry :
Nor was it only by throwing open the wide domain of
life, and passing from the imitation of models to the in-
vestigation of realities, that this work, remarkable alike in
its origin and its influence, succeeded in extinguishing a
school that was rapidly undermining the legitimate springs
of poetry, and substituting artificial fountains in their place.
The diction, clear, appropriate, and varied, produced as
wide a reformation as the matter. Casting aside the
tawdry modes that prevailed, the coined phrases that had
grown up into a sort of symbolical language, Cowper made
his diction in verse as plain and copious as if he had been
writing prose, demonstrating, at a time when such a de-
monstration was much needed, the possibility of pro-
ducing the highest poetical results through the medium of
the most natural and direct forms of expression. As a
study of pure English alone, " The Task " will always be
reverted to with pleasure and advantage.
A few words illustrating the difference be-
tween Cowper and Wordsworth's mode of
finding the poetical in common life might have
been added; but in the next volume Mr. Bell
may afford room for some remarks on that
subject, and a contrast with Thomson's
" Seasons " would be, perhaps, acceptable to
the general reader. The following passage
evinces careful study of his author :
In the versification of " The Task," Cowper aimed at
entire independence of all models. He expressly disclaims
imitation, although he admits that apparent resemblances
may be sometimes detected in his lines. Wherever such
resemblances exist, Milton is the only poet whose melody
they are likely to recal. Milton was the master whose
music alone filled and satisfied Cowper's ear, and whom
alone he imitated, it can scarcely been said unconsciously.
The whole system of melody upon which this poem is con-
structed is fully developed in Milton, who sustained it
throughout at a higher elevation, without any of those
intermittent periods of flagging energy which here occa-
sionally flatten the verse. But it is only when Cowper
is at his best and grandest that the influence of Milton is
palpably visible. It is in the unusual collocation of a
sentence, in the unexpected inversion, the sudden
break, or rugged sweep of a line that we are forcibly re-
minded of the magnificent innovations of " Paradise Lost."
Such passages, however, are exceptional in Cowper, whose
structure generally follows the course of the thought,
flowing more like melodious prose than deliberate verse.

Mr. Bell might have marked the effect of
proficiency in Italian on the verse of Milton.
In " The Task " we often wish for more
luscious sweetness when the lovelier scenes of
nature are described. There is much sound
sense in the introductory preface to the
" Tirocinium " which has always struck us as
being very onesided.
Amongst the miscellaneous notes is one
upon the passage in " Charity " commencing
"And, if a boundless plenty be the robe,
Trade Is the golden girdle of the globe," &c. &c.
Mr. Bell remarks (p. 9) :
The principles of free trade are clearly indicated in this
and the whole of the succeeding passage. Burke had at
this time prepared the public mind for a more enlarged
view of commercial reciprocities, and Adam Smith's great
work, published in 1776, had already initiated the science
of political economy.

We doubt whether Cowper there referred to
" free trade." We think that he rather al-
luded to " commerce " as it is described by
Addison, with exquisite fancy, when he details,
in the Spectator, how a fashionable lady is
indebted for all her elegancies to the inter-
course of nations. All the subsequent allu-
sions of Cowper to "ingenious art," "capricious
taste," &e. &c., seem to us to point to Addison
and not to Adam Smith. When Mr. Fox con-
fessed, in 1787, that he had never read " The
Wealth of Nations" we may doubt whether
Cowper had paid attention to political eco-
nomy.
If the next volume of this edition be equal
in care to the present one we shall have no
hesitation in recommending the " annotated "
Cowper as the best popular edition of the
poet. We much prefer it to that published
many years since by the late James Mout-

gomtuy.
Of Mr. GiLfiliau's edition we need say little
more than that it is not entitled to any praise.
It is at once unsuitable for the library or the
pocket—too inelegant for the first and too
cumbrous for the last. In popular editions

THE PRESS.

our poets should appear in portable forms ;
and Mr. Gilfillan's volumes are as heavy to
the hand, and nearly as ridiculous, as John
Gilpin's memorable stone bottles. He thus
commences his essay:—
Cowper is one of the few poets who at once attained
speedy popularity, and secured permanent power. His
" Task,' we have seen, arose instantly to fame, and his
writings, we believe, are still as much read and relished as
ever they were. No succeeding splendours of genius—no
revolutions in taste—no importations of poetry from abroad
—and no new schools of it at home—have been able to
lessen the reputation of this true poet. Comet aftercomet
has swept over the literary sky ; constellation after con-
stellation of genius has arisen; and still the sweet, large,
solitary star of Cowper burns brightly in the firmament,
and woos many an eye.

Thil first assertion, that Cowper "at once
" attained speedy popularity," is erroneous in
fact and absurd in language. It is the privi-
lege of Mr. Gilfillan to have heard of " sweep-
ing comets " and "sweet stars " (!) that " woo,"
&c. &e. ; and he may, in his other experiences,
have heard of poets that "at once attained"
slow "popularity." He writes of his au-
thor:

In " Expostulation " he drags his country, like a victim,
by the horns to the altar, and plunges the knife to the very
hilt in her forehead ; or whether he lashes London as a
colossal culprit, and tears off thongful after thongful of her
quivering flesh.
- - •

Enough of Mr. Gilfillau. His essay on
Cowper is so full of Scotticisms and strange
phrases, not unmingled with such a vein of
wild drollery, that, as a commentator on Cow-
per, he can be likened only to Tam o' Shanter
trying to write like Thomas Carlyle, and mis-
taking Souter Johnny's snoring for the ap-
plause of the public.

LECTURES ON EDUCATION
(Delivered at the Royal Institut' on of Great Britain).

1. Observations on Mental Education. By
Professor Faraday, F.R.S.
2. On the Importance of the Study of Language.
By Robert Gordon Latham, M.D., F.R.S.
3. On the Importance of the Study of Chemistry.
By Charles G. B.Daubeny, M.D., F.R.S.
4. On the Importance of the Study of Physics.
By Professor Tyndall, F.R.S.
5. On the Influence of the History of Science
upon Education. By William Whewell,
D.D., F.R.S.
London : J. W. Parker and Son.

1. PROFESSOR FARADAY'S lecture is a strenuous
and much-needed protest against pseudo-
philosophic quackery the assumption of
scientific knowledge by those who have it not.
He traces the extravagant belief in impossible
things, such as table-moving, spirit-rapping,
and the like, to a want of proper mental educa-
tion, of that kind in which each man must be
his own teacher. Even our senses mislead us
if not corrected by judgment. The association
of ideas, or the intuitive and involuntary habit
of assigning a cause for that which we see,
makes us confound what we actually witness
with our inferences therefrom. A more se-
rious cause of error is the desire to believe.
Where a supposed discovery is in question
nearly all persons become partisans, and
nothing is received which does not square
with preconceived notions. The most accurate
thinkers are not free froni this propensity, but
they become conscious of and strive against it,
while the mass of mankind obey it blindly
without so much us feeling its power:—

It is my firm persuasion that no man can examine him-
self in the most common things, having any reference to
him personally, or to any person, thought, or matter related
to him, without being soon made aware of the temptation
and the difficulty of opposing it I will simply
express my strong belief that that point of self-education
which consists in teaching the mind to resist its desires
and inclinations until they are proved to be right is the
most important of all, not only in things of natural philo-
sophy, but in every department of daily life.

The simple yet not easy remedy is, to insist
on a suspension of judgment in every case un-
til the conditions of the proposed problem are
known. This is in other words to say, that
in many matters where the conditions cannot
be fully known we should conclude only that a
conclusion is at present impossible to us,
absolutely reserving our judgment until it
can be formed on more sufficient data. In
other cases, where some decision is imme-
diately necessary, we should recollect that it

SATURDAY,

is a decision, as it were, provisionally an-
nounced, and founded on probabilities only ;
but liable to retractation if, by the discovery of
new facts, the balance of probability should
be made to incline the other way. These
operations are, of course, extremely distaste-
ful to the untrained mind, which loves to re-
pose on an assumed certainty, escaping thus
the labour of thought. But they are necessary,
and it is the want of power to conduct them
in the generality even of educated persons
that makes the fortunes of so many specu-
lators in science, and brings ridicule on our
country and age. To such dabblers in novelty,
pretended discoverers of new powers in na-
ture, and the unconscious dupes who encou-
rage them, the following sensible warning is
given :

A man who makes assertions, or draws conclusions, re-
garding any given case, ought to be competent to investi-
gate it. He has no right to throw the onus on others, de-
claring it their duty to prove him right or wrong. His
duty is to demonstrate the truth of that which he asserts,
or to cease from asserting. The men he calls upon to con-
sider and judge have enough to do with themselves, in the
examination, correction, or verification of their own views.
The world little knows how many of the thoughts and
theories which have passed through the mind of a scientific
investigator have been crushed in silence and secrecy by
his own severe criticism and adverse examination ; that in
the most successful instances not a tenth of the sugges-
tions, the hopes, the wishes, the preliminary conclusions
have been realised. And is a man so occupied to be taken
from his search after truth in the path he hopes may lead
to its attainment, and occupied in vain upon nothing but
a broad assertion ?

In a word, the onus probatuli should ho on the
assertor, not on those who doubt or dispute
his word. If asked, " Can you disprove my
hypothesis ? " the inquirer's reply should be,
" Perhaps so, perhaps not ; but, in the first
" place, can you prove it?"

2. The study of languages, says Dr.Latham,
is one thing—that of language another. They
require different mental powers : great compa-
rative philologists have been in general but
moderate linguists. Languages are worth
studying only as a key to the knowledge con-
tained in them—the abstract science of philo-
logy deserves attention on its own account.
When we see how different nations have con-
nected ideas apparently dissimilar, as evi-
denced in the formation and derivation of
words, much light is thrown on the opera•
tions of the human mind. But how is
this study to be pursued ? Not through ordi-
nary grammars, which are mere bundles of ar-
bitrary rules, insufficiently illustrated by ex-
amples. Dr. Latham thinks that in most cases
one classical language instead of two is enough
to learn, but that this one should be learnt
thoroughly. " One of the few things that are
" more useless than a little Latin is a little
" Greek."

3. Dr. Daubeny advocates the teaching of
chemistry, partly as tending to develop the
reasoning powers, % hereby it becomes useful
to that large class of students who find ab
stract mathematical science repulsive—partly
as promoting habits of close observation,
which in all conditions of life are rarer than
they ought to be. He thinks—and in this we
agree with him—that the idleness of so many
young men at Oxford and Cambridge is chiefly
due to the studies exclusively pursued there
being, until the last few years, confined to ono
class. Minds of what is called a " practical"
tendency—that is, those which cannot relish
abstract truths, but turn with pleasure to the
work of observation and experiment—find no
scope for activity in classical or mathematical
reading. Chemical science is for such intel-
lects as appropriate a training as auy, while
their pursuance of it would deduct nothing
from the stock of other learning acquired at
the universities, since under present ar•
rangements they usually spend their time in
idleness.

4. An eloquent and somewhat rhetorical plea
for physical science as a branch of education,
varied and illustrated by anecdotes of the lec-
turer's own experience. The matter is familiar,
the style emphatic, the conclusion just,
though perhaps pushed too far. Professor
Tyndall states that a young man, a Master of
Arts, had complained to him that up to the
age of twenty he had been left in utter igno-
rance of the phenomenon of phyz,ical science,
the twelve previous years having been devoted

JULY 1, 1854.

to the exclusive study of classics. This is ma-
nifestly wrong ; but qufere, did the fault lie
with the university or the student?

5. The influence of scientific discovery on in-
tellectual education is Dr. Whewell's subject,
a proposition more fully stated as follows :

- -
The proposition is this—that every great advance in
intellectual education has been the effect of some consi•
derable scientific discovery, or group of discoveries.
Every improvement of the mental discipline of those who
stand in the forefront of humanity has followed some
signal victory of their leaders—every addition to the
means of intellectual culture has been the result of some
extraordinary harvest, some more than ordinary bounty of
the intellectual soil, bestowed on the preceding years.

The first great onward movement of which
history makes mention is that headed by
Socrates and Plato, and opposed by the
sophists of their time. These latter were not
necessarily the unprincipled or shallow de-
claimers which we are wont to represent them.
Their morality was the average morality of
most ages and countries ; they professed to
cultivate the intellect ; they were masters of
the art by which a subject is illustrated and
an audience persuaded. But their teaching
lacked substance. In logic they were del
cient They could fence with words, but not
demonstrate; and the necessity as well as the
possibility of a stricter mode of reasoning was
the real reform introduced by the new philo-
sophic school. Where were these learnt?
Dr. Whewell answers, "In the study of
" geometry." And on this study accord►ngly
they delighted to dwell, magnifying its impor-
tance, and even pronouncing it indispensable
to the acquirement of real knowledge. It was
here that

they had had placed before them examples of real and
certain truth—they had been admitted to contemplate
clear and indisputable truths—truths which they could de-
monstrate to be true—truths which they could trace to
principles of intuitive evidence—truths which it did not
appear to be speaking too highly of, if they called them
necessary and eternal.

We know for certain that the age of Plato was
one of great geometrical discoveries in Greece ;
and in the teaching of Plato we witness their
result. He who entered seriously upon this,
then new, science could not fail to per-
ceive

that there was a certain and solid truth ; a knowledge
which was not mere opinion ; science which was more
than seeming: that man has powers by which such truth,
such knowledge, such science, may be acquired ; that
therefore it. ought to be sought, not in geometry alone, but
in other subjects also ; that since man can know, cer•
tainly and clearly, about straight and curved in the world
of space, he ought to know—he ought not to be content
without knowing—no less clearly and certainly, about
right and wrong in the world of human action
Since the mind can thus reason to certain truths, it must
have in it the principles of truth, and whence did it derive
them? Since it can know what it has not learned from
the senses, it must have some other source of knowledge;
and how much is implied in this ! Since it can conceive
and bring forth eternal truths, how can it be the child of a
day, a transient creature, born one moment and perishing
the next?

The principle endures to the present time ;
for in England, as in every country where
a high standard of education prevails, no
one is held to be thoroughly taught whose
mental discipline does not include at least
some elementary knowledge of mathemati-
cal truth.

Turn now from Greece to Rome. The Ro-
mans, a fighting, working, always busy race, did
nothing for abstract science. But there was
one science which for its practical usefulness
was cultivated and held in honour among
them—that of jurisprudence. Here they were
really originators
Or rather, it was they who made the subject a science—
who gave it the precision of a science, the generality of a
science, the method of a science. And how effectually
they did this we may judge from the fact that the jurispru•
dence of Rome is still the basis, the model, the guide, the
core of the jurisprudence of every civilised country—of our
own, less than most, but still, in no small degree, of our
own. The imitators and pupils of the Greeks in every
other department of human speculation, in jurisprudence
the Romans felt themselves their masters. Cicero says
proudly, but not too proudly, that a single page of a Roman
jurist contained more solid and exact matter than a whole
library of Greek philosophers.
And the law, before enunciated, holds good
here also. The discoveries of a few Feat
minds impressed themselves on the national
teaching :

The law of Rome was the main part of the education of
the Roman youth. Cicero reminds his brother Quintins
that they bad learnt the old laws and the formula, of legal
proceedings by heart, as a sort of domestic catechism or

THE PRESS.

nursery rhyme. Every Roman of eminence spent the
early part of his morning in giving legal opinions to his
clients—not like our justices of the peace when appealed to
as a magistrate but as an adviser and protector; and every
young member of the aristocracy had to fit himself for this
office. Every young Roman of condition was a Roman
jurist. And the study of the law, thus made a leading
branch of a liberal education, continued so through the
middle ages—continues so still.

Throughout Europe the principles of the civil,
or Roman, law are still appealed to ; they
occupy our universities ; they influence,
though they have ceased to control, the deci-
sion of our courts. These two branches of
knowledge do, in fact, comprise nearly all that
can be done in the way of mental discipline :

A young man well imbued with these, the leading el,
mute of Athenian and Roman culture, would, we need
not fear to say, be superior in intellectual discipline to
three•fourths of the young men of our own day on whom
all the ordinary appliances of what is called a good educa-
tion have been bestowed. Geometer and jurist, the pupil
formed by this culture of the Old World might make no
bad figure among the men of letters or of science, the
lawyers and the politicians, of our own times.

Dr. Whewell next proceeds to discuss the in-
fluence of modern sciences—the inductive
process, the examination of natural phe-
nomena, and the practice of logic on educa-
tion. He ends with a caution against the
misuse, or undue appropriation, of scientific
terms—a topic of great importance, admitting
of fuller treatment

1. The Palatial Works of the late Catherine
Grace Godwin. Edited, with a Sketch of

her Life, by A. Cleveland Wigan. Lon-
don: Chapman and Hall.
2. Lyra Australis; or, Attempts to Sing in a
Strange Land. By Caroline W. Leakey.

London : Bickers and Bush.
3. The Sweet South ; or, a Month at Algiers.
By Eleanor Darby. London : Hope and
Co.
4. The Titans of To-day, and other Poems. By
the Author of " Sesostris." London : Hope
and Co.
5. Poems. By Philip Chaloner. London :
Saunders and Otley.
6. A Poem and a Pamphlet. London : Chap-

man and Hall.
7. Poems. By Melanter. London : Saunders

and Otley.
WE must throw together in one notice a number
of poetical books on our table, though they
have little other connection than that they are
all in rhyme. They range from what we take
to be a two-guinea quarto to a sixpenny
pamphlet, and, if they show nothing else, afford
evidence of the abundant facilities given to
authors to place their works before the public,
and so far relieve us from all fear of any Mil-
ton remaining mute and inglorious in our day.
1. Here we have a handsome quarto volume
richly bound in scarlet and gold, and profusely
illustrated. The name of Catherine Grace
Godwin must be familiar to most readers of
light literature, her first work having been
published in 1824 ; and, from that period till
her death in 1845, she was a constant contri-
butor to annuals and magazines, and occasion-
ally issued a volume of her own. She enjoyed
the friendship of Wordsworth, who paid her a
higher compliment than indiscriminate praise
would have conveyed. On receiving "The
Wanderer's Legacy, and other Poems," he read
them attentively and criticised them closely.
On the whole his judgment was highly favour
able. " Destiny " and "The Monk of Carnal-
doli" in his opinion "evince extraordinary
powers." His criticism, conveyed in a long
letter, is now published for the first time, and
adds value to a volume which, apart from the
decorations lavished upon it by artist, printer,
and binder, is intrinsically interesting, and
must gratefully remind surviving friends of the
amiable and accomplished authoress.

2. A volume of nearly 300 pages, containing a
number of short poems, which pleasingly re-
mind us of the gentle and pious muse of Mrs.
Hemans, though without her sweep of wing.
The authoress in a short preface, evincing mo-
desty and good taste, expresses a " timid hope
" that they may prove a faint ' footprint in the
" sands of time.'" Whether that be so or

617

not, she has produced much sweet verse, gene-
rally pervaded by a tone of subdued melan-
choly. The following lines prettily indicate
that hope which female writers of refined sen-
timent are usually happy in expressing :

As reapers cut the yellow sheaves,
As fall the sere and autumn leaves,—
The ground their bed of death;
As snows beneath a winter sun,
As fades the light when day is done,
As melts the vapour's breath ;
So would I die, so pass away:
I could not, would not live alway !
But in my breast a restless thing,
As fluttering bird that beats her wing,
Strikes hard to burst away.
It would not be content to die,
It longs a►d strives to soar on high,
To bright and fadeless day !
To where the sky gains brighter hue
Than that which stays the eath•bound view !
For flight, uncaged and free, it longs,
To sing on high its native songs—
More clear and animate.
Its heaven•plumed wing it could not stoop,
As meaner things of earth, which droop
And are annihilate ;
Rut, circling wide, would farther sweep,
Beyond yon Married ether deep !
3. This "metrical outpouring" of Mrs. Darby's
"impressions" was only written because what
she saw at Algiers was " far too poetical to be
" described in prose." If other reasons are
wanting, the fair authoress refers us to the fea-
thered tribes and the running brooks. "Ask
" the birds why they sing, and the fountains
" why they flow Is it not because they can
" not help it?" Very true ; but the birds don't
make puns when they sing ; parrots might,
but they do not sing sweetly ; and a poet
should not aspire to be compared to a parrot.
It is not witty to call Algiers "All-Jeers," and
if it were it is not original. One Jonathan
Swift had done so a hundred years ago, when
his great intellect was decaying, and he
amused himself by buffoonery with the simple,
unwise, clever schoolmaster Sheridan. Some of
the lyrics at the close of the volume have, we
see, been set to music. Sound in such compo-
sitions is considered, we presume, of more
importance than meaning. Schamyl, the Cir
cassian hero, is made to inquire after his
" gallant young bird," his " brave boy," and
further,

"Where my fair stag•eycd Circassian bride ?"
a difficult question to answer, for we believe
Schamyl, like another hero who long waged
successful war against Russia—Charles XII.
of Sweden—never was married, and has a de-
cided antipathy to women.
4. In " The Titans" there is evidence of
vigorous capacity, but we prefer the " other
poems." There is force in the following
sketch of John of !lamella flitting like a
phantom giaour through the forest gloom to
vindictive death:—

Who is he that rides madly
Through forest and flotal ?
Too brave to be base,
And too proud to be good ;
With bent brow, all bared
To the tempest's wild din,
And white lip set firm
As the spirit within.
Ride, John of Ravella,
From fear thou art free,
Since the wife thou didst cherish
Was faithless to thee ;
What reck'st thou of tempests?
Thy heart is a flame,
Since the brand of dishonour
Was set on thy name.

5. The introduction to this volume furnishes
a notable example of the strength of the poetic
passion. The author left for the Australian gold-
fields in 1852, entrusting his precious MS with a
friend, and promising to send over funds for
its publication, should he prove fortunate. We
suppose his adventure succeeded, and that a
few handfuls of gold-dust, or a parcel of nug-
gets, has been expended in setting this volume
before us. We can readily imagine the eager-
ness with which the author at the diggings
will await a critical judgment on his labours,
but we fear he is doomed to some disappoint-
ment as to the sensation they will excite. The
principal poem is in the Byronic style, and
penned with some point and passion. It is
quite spirited enough to please friends, and
shows the writer to be aclever fellow with cleat
sense and ready wit. But there our commen-
dation ends. On the whole we like his prose