The Press.
London, England, 1857-11-07 00:00:00

It was greatly to the credit of Lord Kenyon that he
went so far in combating the mischievous notions that had
been infused into the Royal mind, and if the opinion then
expressed had been acted upon at the time of the Irish
Union, it would have saved a world of woe to the empire.
But in the life of Lord Tenterden we read:—
I heard Lord Tenterden, without any diminution of my
respect for him, oppose the Catholic Relief Bill,—which,
though a necessary, was a perilous measure,—the ominous
prophecies about which certainly have received some veriica•
bun by subsequent Papal aggression.
It is not so clear that the " world of woe would
" have been saved"; and events have shown
that the doubts of the King had much in-
stinctive sagacity in them.
Of Lord Tenter den's nervousness about
allusions to his family origin it is recorded
•• •

- .
He would voluntarily refer to these among very intimate
friends, but he became exceedingly uneasy when he spore
hended any allusion to them in public. Once, however, he
was complimented upon his rise under circumstances so
extravagantly ludicrous that he joined in the general shout
of laughter which the orator called forth. Sir Peter Laurie,
the saddler, when Lord Mayor of London, gave a dinner
at the Mansion-house to the judges, and, in proposing
their health, observed, in impassioned accents, " What a
country is this we live in! In other parts of the world
there is no chance, except for men of high birth and
aristocratice connections ; but here genius and industry
are sure to be rewarded. See before you the examples of
niyself, the Chief Magistrate of the Metropolis of this
great empire, and the Chief Justice of England sitting at
my right hand—both now in the highest offices in the
State, and both sprung from the very dregs of the
people !"
Lord Campbell characteristically writes Sir
Peter Laurie, " the saddler." In the current
Edinburgh Review the story is told in another
way, and Sir Peter Laurie is reported to have
alluded to himself "as sprung from parents
of the middle class." But the alleged ner-
vousness of Lord Tenterden about his origin
does not tally with the story of him related by
Macready, the tragedian.
We had marked several passages for com-
ment, but space fails us, and we shall have to
criticise before long the literary pretensions of
Lord Campbell. We cannot close this volume
without drawing attention to the enormous
number of law peerages which have been
granted in the last thirty years—to wit, Lynd-
hurst, Plunket, Tenterden, Wynford, Broug-
ham, Denman, Abinger, Stratheden, Cotten-
ham, Langdale, Campbell, Truro, St. Leonards,
Cranworth, and Wensleydale. This is going
too fast. One of these is extinct already
(Langdale), and two (Stratheden and Camp-
bell) will merge in one person. Three or four
of the others are not likely to bo hereditary ;
but, even so, too many law titles have been
given.

Les Dernieres Chansons de Berm:ger. Paris

Perrotin.

WHEN Wrangel., some weeks ago, was gathered
to the dead, it was announced that he had left
a volume of songs in manuscript, and great
indeed was the curiosity manifested in Paris
to see them, not only by the literary com-
munity, to whom anything new from the great
chansonnier ryas naturally of high interest, but
by the political parties who hoped for his lan-
dation or dreaded his satire, and by the ordi-
nary public, of whom he was the idol. The
volume Iwas published at Paris on Tuesday
last, and one of the earliest copies has been
transmitted to us. We have gone over it with
some haste, but with not less interest than
the Parisians themselves will have done, and
we think that it will disappoint expectation.
The literary fraternity will not find in it the
sparkling wit, the fascinating gaiety, or the
unflagging verve which distinguished the
songster's previous productions ; political par-
tisans will search through it in vain for those
stinging, scoffing, scorching effusions which
made his coreligionists exult and his adver-
saries writhe; and the profane vulgar will not
be able to discover in it any of those brilliant
or impassioned expositions of their sentiments
which made his former songs so popular.
" Void lee chansons de ma vieillesse," says he,
at the commencement of his preface, and truly
the hand of old age is in them. They lack
inspiration ; and that labour which even in
his best days his songs cost him is constantly
and sometimes painfully apparent.
The songs which compose the volume have
been written at intervals from so far back as
1834 to so recent a date as 1851. They are
divided into epochs—one from 1834 to 1838,