The Press.
London, England, 1857-02-28 00:00:00

THE PRESS.

Lord John made one more attempt—a des-
perate one—to extricate himself from the
toils of the Retiarius he saw in prospect con-
fronting him on the floor of the House of
Commons. He intimates that he should pro
pose a measure for the total and immediate
repeal of the corn laws. Would that plan
meet with Sir Robert's support? Sir Robert's
ingenuity to evade a pledge was quite equal
to Lord John's resolution to extort one.
Again, Sir Rot.ert presented "his humble duty
" to her Majesty ;" again he asserted his earnest
desire "to co-operate in a private capacity in
" the adjustment of the question of the corn
laws ;" but—
Sir Robert Peel humbly expresses to your Majesty his
regret that he dove not feel it to be consistent µ•ith his duty
to enter upon the consitl4ration of this important question
in Parliament, being fettered by fa previous engagement of
the nature of that required from him.

In a subsequent communication Sir Robert
stated more fully his reasons for his reserve.
He could not tell who the new Ministers might
be ; he slid not know what fiscal arrangements
they might propose; he could not consent to
relinquish his power of free and independent
action, &c. Lord John was beaten. In a final
letter to the Queen he enumerated all the
difficulties which would have beset him, and
he retired on the pretence that as Lord Grey
declined to act in a Cabinet with Lord Pal-
merston, he should not have the united sup-
port of his own party. It is probable that so
clever a tactician as Lord John foresaw the
advantage that must result to himself and his
party, by allowing full scope for division and
strife in the Conservative camp. When Sir
Robert Peel came to take farewell of the
Queen, she met him with the welcome ex-
clamation :—" So far from taking leave of you,
" Sir Robert, I must require you to withdraw
"your resignation, and to remain in my
" service."

It is apparent, even on the face of this
memoir, that this was exactly what he desired,
though he had hardly dared to hope for such
good fortune. His exultation appears in a
note he addressed to the Princess Lieven :
" I feel like a man restored to life after his
" funeral service had been preached." He did
not at this time anticipate the resistance he
would have to encounter, nor the sacrifices he
would have t o make.
At the close of this memoir Sir Robert
answers at length the question often put, why
he did not prepare his party for the change
he contemplated, and attempt to reconcile
them to it? His answer is twofold, and in part
contradictory. He states that, but for the
unforeseen events of the autumn of 1845, it
was his intention to have called his party
together, and to have entered into friendly
communication with them on the expediency
of considering a plan of corn law revision
before the discussions of 1846 could com-
mence. That is one answer to the question
(p. 318).
The second answer is that, had he apprised
his supporters of his actual plans previous to
promulgating them in Parliament, he should
only have provoked factious opposition :

I should have had on the part of the most moderate a
formal protest against the course I intended to pursue ; to
the most violent I should have given facilities for organised
opposition; I should have appeared to be flying in the face
of a whole party, and contumaciously disregarding their
opinion and advice after I had professed to consult them ;
hut ( what is of infinitely more importance) I should have
failed in carrying the repeal of the corn laws.
Now I was resolved nol to fail. I did not fail ; and if I
had to fight the battle over again, I would fight it in the
same way.

These two answers, though not absolutely
contradictory, do not well harmonise, as the
disclosure of his intentions might have
afforded time for opposition in the one case
as well as in the other. There is another in-
consistency. Sir Robert. always pleaded the
potato failure as the reason for his change of
views on the corn laws, whereas this memoir
represents him as contemplating eventual
repeal before that event occurred. In a pre-
vious passage t) that last quoted, Sir Robert,
in remarkable words, states that he was well
satisfied to sacrifice his party to the end he
desired to attain :

It was impossible to reconcile the repeal of the
corn laws by me with the keeping together of the
Conservative party, and I had no hesitation in sacrificing

209

the subordinate object, and with it my own political
interests.

The result might have been widely different
had Sir Robert cordially assented to the prin-
ciple laid down by Lord Stanley, Out it was
for the Liberal party to carry corn-law repeal,
if carried it must be. There can be little doubt
that Lord John Rudsell's scheme would have
been more liberal to the landed interest, while
the Conservative party would have been saved
front the division which has rendered it power-
less for the last eleven years.
The memoir, notwithstanding its elaborate
statements and justificatory tone, still leaves
On the mind an impression of Sir Robert's
insincerity. He never trusted his followers.
He thought not of convincing, but of managing
them, and treated them as a bundle of preju-
dices to be humoured and cajoled, not as
rational beings to be swayed by truth. It
would have been impossible for a great mind
to have fallen into the contradictions which
marked his career. By his own showing, one
pint of his life was spent in building up pre-
judices, which the other part was spent in
knocking down by Act of Parliament. We
have seen him styled the Great Ambiguity of
his age—he should rather, if the paradox may
be allowed—be styled its Great ➢lediocrity.
That he should have been endowed with so
high and so low an intellect—with a mind so
nearly approaching to originality yet never
reaching it—with an organisation so sus-
ceptible, yet never veined with the electric fire
which transforms clay to genius—must be
classed among the metaphysical mysteries
which are fitter for marvel titan criticism.

The literary merit of the memoirs is less
than we should have expected from Sir Robert's
distinguished talents. The narrative is not
always consecutive, nor is its egotism ever
relieved by a touch of elegance or a striking
thought. As a collection of pieces justificatives,
the memoirs are valuable, but they do not
heighten our estimate of their author's charac-
ter, though they show his great business
talents, and his capacity for the active affairs
of political life, to the best advantage.

Essays, Critical and Imaginative. By Pro-
fessor Wilson. Vol. HI. Loudon : Black.
woods.

THE latest volume of Christopher North's
lucubrations contains seven essays, of which
the first, upon " The Genius and Character of
Burns," occupies about the same space as the
remaining six put together. It is an elabo•
rate eulogy and vindication of the poet from
every species of detraction. The Professor
will not permit a single fleck to rest upon the
brightness of his name, and is dissatisfied
even with the laudatory and discerning critique
of Mr. Carlyle.
In the present essay the poetry of Burns,
his moral character, and his worldly circum-
stances, are all most carefully analysed. Wil-
son and Carlyle both agree in attributing the
excellence and popularity of the first to its
" indisputable air of truth "—its " intense
" life-pervading and life breathing trutll," but
they differ in their estimation of the rank
which it is entitled to hold in the Temple of
Fame. Carlyle thinks that he perfected
nothing, and that only a few gleams from the
light that was within him pierced through the
clouds which darkened his brief career. The
Professor, on the contrary, believes him to
have accomplished some of the most complete
works of art which poetry can boast of; and
as for the clouds, as we shall see presently, if
he does not altogether disbelieve their ex•
istenee, he at least scoffs at the idea of their
extreme blackness. Mr. Carlyle points to
Milton and Locke, and maintains that if
Burns had possessed the same earnest reli-
giousness which these men did, his worldly
distresses would not have hindered him from
producing a great work—but that he lived for
enjoyment, and consequently was oppressed
by physical privations. Wilson, as might be
expected from his own high animal spirits and
keen relish of life, takes a widely different
view. He thinks a great deal too much has
been said about the poet's unhappiness.
" Through life " says Carlyle, "he enacted a
" tragedy, and one of the deepest,"—" he died
" without ever having lived." Wilson holds

210

that Burns must have experienced keen enjoy-
ments in the course of his chequered career:—

In another month Burns brought his wife home to
Ellisland, and his three children, for she had twice born
him twins. The happiest period of his life, we have his
own words for it, was that winter.
But why not say that the three years 116 lived at Ellis•
land were all happy, as happiness goes in this world? As
hippy, perhaps, as they might have been had he been
placed in some other condition apparently far better
a lapted to yield him what all human hearts do most
desire. His wife never had an hour's sickness, and was
shwa cheerful as day, one of those

Ai 4, Sound healthy children of the God of heaven,
whose very presence is positive pleasure, and whose silent
contentedness with her lot inspires comfort into a husband's
heart, when at times oppressed with a mortal heaviness
that no words could lighten. Burns says with gloomy
grzndeur, " There is a foggy atmosphere native to my soul
in the hour of care which makes the dreary objects seem
lager than life." The objects seen by imagination ; and
be who suffers thus cannot be relieved by any direct ap-
pltances to that faculty, only by those that touch the heart
—the homelier the more sanative—and none so sure as a
wife's affectionate ways, quietly moving about the house
affairs, which, insignificant as they are in themselves, are
fdt to be little truthful realities that banish those mon-
wrous phantoms, showing them to be but glooms and
shadows.

And how fared the gauger? Why, he did his work.
Carrie says, " His farm no longer occupied the principal
part of his care or his thoughts. It was not at Ellisland
that he was now in general to be found. Mounted on
horseback, this highminded poet was pursuing the de-
faulters of the revenue among the hills and vales of Niths-
dale ; his roving eye wandering over the charms of nature,
and muttering his wayward fancies as he moved along."
And many a happy day he had when thus riding about the
country, in search of smugglers of all sorts, zealous against
all manner of contraband. He delighted in the broad
brow of the day, whether glad or gloomy, like his own fore-
head ; in the open air whe.her still or stormy, like his own
heart While " pursuing the defaulters of the revenue," a
gauger has not always to track them by his eyes or his
nose Information has been lodged of their whereabouts,
and he deliberately makes a seizure. Sentimentalists may
see in this something very shocking to the delicate pleasures
of susceptible minds, but Burns did not; and some of his
sweetest lyrics, redolent of the liquid dew of youth, were
committed to whitey brown not scented by the rose's attar.

Why, then, we ask again, such lamentations for the fate
of Burns? Why should not he have been left to make his
own way in life like other men gifted or ungifted? A man
of great genius in the prime of life is poor. But his
poverty did not for any long time necessarily affect the
welfare or even comfort of the poet, and therefore created
no obligation on his country to interfere with his lot. He
was born and bred in a humble station ; but such as it was
it did not impede his culture, fame, or service to his
people, or, rightly considered, his own happiness ; let him
remain in it, or leave it as he will and can, but there was
no obligation on others to take him out of it. He had
already risen superior to circumstances—and would do so
still ; his glory availed much in having conquered them ;
give him better, and the peculiar species of his glory will
depart. Give him better, and it may be, that he achieves
no more glory of any kind ; for nothing is more uncertain
than the effects of circumstances on character. Some mon,
we know, are specially adapted to adverse circumstances,
rising thereby as the kite rises to the adverse breeze, and
falling when the adversity ceases. Such was probably
Burna's nature—his genius being piqued to activity by the
contradictions of his fortune.

In answer to his own question, " How
" could honoured Thomas Carlyle bring him-
" self to affirm that Burns had no religion ?"
the Professor is not quite so successful. Burns
certainly does not seem to have had that kind
of religion which Carlyle means by the word,
that mixture of moral resolution and isolated
spiritualism which distinguished the authors
of " Paradise Lost," and the " Human Under-
standing " ; and he had that healthy genial
appreciation of physical joy which is con-
fessedly a lure to licentiousness, when neither
subdued by incessant bodily toil, nor chastened
by the higher influence of liberal education.
All things considered, we think it much to his
credit that he was not worse. He cordially
appreciated the fun, and the adventure, and
the romance, which attends on conviviality
and gallantry ; but he saw the practical misery
of its results: and whereas, under similar cir-
cumstances, many a man would have sunk
into the confirmed sot, Burns remained erect
to the last. As Wilscn well remarks, had ho
lived to be sixty, his follies would have been
no more remembered than those of many
another grey-headed elder mho walks among
us with respect and reverence, which, were
his hot youth alone present to our minds,
must be changed into very different sen-
timents.
The second essay, entitled "Christopher on
Colonsay," is replete with the Professor's
peculiar drollery. It purports to be the nar-
rative of a trottingnuttch ridden by the Pro-
fewr 94 hits famous grey cob, Coloneay,
1.116111111&„.

THE PRESS.

against a professional jockey on a thorough-
bred mare. The story, we are informed by
the editor, is founded upon fact. Wilson
actually did ride such a race, and won it, too ;
but it. is here embellished with a variety of
humourous incidents, which in their own
style are fully equal to either Lever or
Dickens.

No. 3. The essay upon Coleridge is very
much what the reader would anticipate from
Wilson's powers and predilections. It is more
peculiarly noticeable on account of a passage
upon odes, which we here transcribe :

We do not know that there is a truly great ode in our
language; but there are many noble ones, and among
them must be placed ono of the three odes of Coleridge.
Laud to the skies, ye who choose, the odes of Dryden and
Pope ; but to our eyes they are lost before they reach the
lower strata of clouds. Were we to liken them to balloons,
we should say that the silk is well inflated, and better
painted ; but that the aeronauts, on taking their seats, are
too heavy for the power of ascension, so that luckily the
cords are not cut, and the globes are contented to adhere
tt the thedal earth. Gray's odes are far finer, and, though
somewhat too formal, perhaps, the Welsh bard is full of
Greek fire. Some of Mason's choruses are sonorous, and
swing along not untnajestically ; and Torn Warton canght
no small portion of the true lyrical spirit—witness his
Kilkerran Castle song. But Collins far surpassed them
all—and his odes are all exquisitely beautiful--except his
Ode to Freedom, and it is sublime. Let us call it, then,
and contradict ourselves, the only truly great ode in the
English language. Wordsworth's Ode on the Immor-
tality of the Soul is pervaded by profoundest thought—
philosophical in its spirit throughout—in many parts
poetical in his very finest vein—and in some, more than
is usual with him, impassioned ; but the poet does not
carry, much less hurry, us along with him—the move-
ments are sometimes too raw and laborious, though
stately and majestic—and though often many of the tran-
sitions are lyrical—nay, though, as a whole, it is a grand
lyrical poem, it is not an ode, and nobody will call it so
who has read Pinder. His " Dion " is an ode, but is
deficient in impetuosity ; and that image of the swan on
Locarno's wave, beautiful as it is in itself, is too elabo
rate for its place, nor yet enough original to open with
such pomp such au ambitious strain. But we shall have
an article un odes in an early number—in which we hope
to make good all we have said, and far more—and shall
not then forget Campbell, who, in our estimation, stands
next to Collins.

North here surely underrates Dryden, and
does him great injustice by placing him as an
ode•writer merely on a level with Pope. In
the general assertion that we have few fine
odes, we agree with him ; and also in the
opinion that those of Collins are the best.
But before we assent to the dictum that we
have only one truly great ode in the language,
we insist upon a very rigid definition of the
term. Carlyle calls " Scots wha hae "an ode ;
and Shelley's " Skylark " is known by the same
title. If neither of these belong legitimately
to the genus " ode," Wilson may bein theright.
If they do, then we consider there are at
least two other truly tine odes in our literature.
If the latter should be classed among the
" exquisitely beautiful," rather than the
" truly great," that cannot be said of Burns's
lyric, in which opinion we suppose the Pro-
fessor would agree with us. Shelley's own
opinion was that Coleridge's " France " was
the finest ode in the language.
The three following essays, upon Tupper's
"Geraldine," De Berettger's "Helps and
Hints," and Macauls.y's " Lays of Ancient
Rome," are all, of course, good, but call for no
special remark. The first is a well-merited
castigation of the impertinent and presump-
tuous continuer of " Christabel "; the second
an amusing resume of a work that in these
days of garottiug really deserves fresh notice,
being a collection of advice in regard to going
through the world generally, and particularly
to the traversing of lonely roads or thief-
haunted Londsn streets. The review of
Macaulay does hint no more than justice; and
is a very agreeable proof that where real
excellence was manifested Wilson would throw
off' political feeling, and praise with unshackled
generosity.

The last piece in the volume, " A Few
Words on Shakespeare," though short, is one of
Wilson's finest efforts. Assuming Macbeth,
Othello, Hamlet, and Lear to be Shakespeare's
masterworks, he gives us a brief dissertation
upon each, ;Melt, indeed, touches " the root of
" the matter.' We would especially recom-
mend to our readers the character of Othello
at page 423. At the conclusion of this essay
we find the following remarks :

The whole character of our life and literature seems to
us to show in our cultivated classes a disposition of
imagination to peparate itself U9M real life, and to go over

SATURDAY,

into works of art. It may appear to some a mattes cie
little consequence ; and perhaps they will think that it is
then beginning to confine itself to its right province. Ws
think there are many who will not be 60 easily satisfied;
and to whom it will appear that such a separation, if it be
indeed taking place, cannot be effected without grievous
injury to the character of our minds. We think it possible
that the great overflow of poetry in this age may be in part
from this cause. And there seems to us already a great
disappearance of imagination from the character of all stir
passions.
But life is still strong. And wherever men are assem-
bled in societies, and are not swallowed up in sloth or
most debasing passion, there the great elements of our
nature are in action : and much as in this day, to look
upon the face of life, it appears to be removed from all
poetry, we cannot but believe that, !n the very heart of
our most civilised life—in our cities—in each great
metropolis of commerce—in the midst of the most
active concentration of all those relations of being which
seem most at war with imagination—there the materials
which imagination seeks in human life are yet to be
found. _

It were much to be wished, therefore, for the sake both
of our literature and of our life, that imagination would
again he content to dwell with life—that we had less of
poetry, and that of more strength; and that imagination
were again to be found as it used to be, one of the elements
of life itself; a strong principle of our nature living in the
midst of our affections and passions, blending with, kind-
ling, invigorating, and exalting them all. Then might the
spirit of dramatic literature he revived.
The one greet fact that strikes us in connec-
tion with these observations is that the value of
everything oral has declined. The drama has
declined ; so has the pulpit; so has oratory,
whether forensic or senatorial. With regard
to the two latter, men find it so much better
to be sure that they are not misled by
rhetoric, than to be temporarily excited by
eloquence, that a written argument is now
worth fourfold a spoken one. Pulpit oratory
has declined because there is no longer :my
one to convince. Open infidelity is not
tolerated in the upper classes ; and the Church
has never set about the task of converting the
lower ones by the force of eloquence. The
declension of the drama remains to be ac-
counted for. It proceeds, we think, from
much the same causes as the decline of all ob-
jective poetry. Life, if not less romantic)
really, is certainly less full of mystery and ad-
venture than of yore. The publicity now
given to all crimes, even in their minutest
detail, renders fictitious tragedy flat and
familiar. The best novels are now not tragic
novels. They rather partake of the character
of the Attic new comedy And in this par-
ticular department we doubt if the stage has
materially declined. Her Majesty is a
patroness of the theatre ; and we fully believe
that if its hours were accommodated to modern
habits, and the houses reduced in number, so
that three or four of our present race of good
actors could be got together, a play might be put
upon the stage in a style that would not dis-
grace the performances of „sixty years since.'

General Count de Coward. By Henry de
Riancey. Paris : Dentu.

GENERAL COUTARD is a lucky man. Born of
humble parents, he at an early age enlisted
in the army as a common soldier, figured in
the wars of the Republic and the Empire,
passed through the different grades to that of
general, obtained honours, and then, after the
fall of the Empire, served the restored Bour•
bons with zeal and fidelity until they were
politically extinguished by the revolution of
July, 1830, and he with them. In all this
there is nothing extraordinary, and scores of
men might he named in France who have run
nearly the same career with infinitely greater
éclat than ho (lid. But whilst such men have
left no other record of their deeds than what
is contained in official despatches, and in the
newspapers of the day, General Coutard has
been honoured by a biography of 400 octavo
pages from an author whose writings are of
the class that arc read and preserved ; and,
consequently, his name, has become known
to thousands of the present generation who
had never heard of it, and stands a fair chance
of reaching posterity. Truly, he is lucky.
The book displays a good deal of literary
art. As a matter of course, it makes the most
of its hero's exploits, when, as soldier of the
Republic and Empire, fighting was his voca-
tion ; it speaks with marked sympathy of his
political services to the Bourbons, and of his
veneration for them after their overthrow; it,
in a word, shows that both as schlipl: 4114