The Press.
London, England, 1854-11-04 00:00:00

PERIODICAL LITERATURE.

The first paper in Blackwood, upon " Turkey and its
Population," gives much practical information upon
the wants and sufferings of the agricultural class.
Upwards of twenty millions of persons are engaged in
the cultivation of the soil, and hitherto they have been
neglected and oppressed by sultan and pacha, taxed
and persecuted, impoverished and ruined, till at length
the agricultural has in great measure given place to
a pastoral life, and a social revolution is slowly
but surely progressing. The writer considers that,
by a powerful and energetic reform of the existing
abuses, Turkey might be made a great grain export •
ing country. The reviews of " The Census " and
Hacklander's amusing play of The Secret Agent afford
some pleasant reading. " Colour in Nature and Art"
notices M. de Chevreul's late work, whose "pains-
taking experiments," it is supposed, will be of great
use to portrait-painters, in the proper selection of
the accessories best fitted to harmonise with the
portrait. The dialogue between Irenteus and Tlepo-
lemus upon the question of " Peace and War" is
cleverly written. Tlepolemus says, speaking of the
Emperor Nicholas :
As to his sly offer to divide with us the " sick man's"
patrimony, the less we say about it the better, for our
Government certainly did listen to him, and at first ex-
pressed its moral indignation so mildly that he might well
be excused for not attaching much weight to it. Look you
to the numbers of the Times of that date. How ably its
healing articles show that Turkey was in the last stage of
decline This, I cannot help thinking, was the
cause of the aggression upon Turkey, combined with tire
licence of invective iu which our journals and even our
Ministers indulged against the French
.Emperor, making
his future friendship seem impossible.
The concluding paper, "The War and the Ministry,"
is an able and dispassionate review of the past causes
and present prospects of the war:—
Our Ministers (says the writer) from the commencement
of the Eastern embroilment, trusted by far too much to the
efficacy of diplomatic negotiations which, after all, were but
as cobwebs when opposed to the iron will and fixed deter-
mination of the Czar. They used words of compliment
and of faint dissuasion when they should have employed
the language of stern remonstrance and of solemn warning ;
they were ambiguous and weak when they ought to have
been resolute and strong. . . . It is impossible now to
read such despatches as those of Lord John Russell
without feeling that their tone was infinitely below that
which the dignity of the country demanded, or the emer-
gency of the crisis required. . . . In no capacity has
Lord John Russell, unsuccessful in many, failed so signally
as in that of Minister of Foreign Affairs.
In Lord Aberdeen's timid apprehension and unac-
countable dilatoriness the writer conceives that the
real cause of the present war is to be sought.
Notice is then taken of the effect of the Baltic block-
ade, which is characterised as one against our own
people, and not against Russia; as, under the present
" humane system " of Lord Aberdeen, we are
simply taking from Russia, through neutral ports, as
much of her staple produce as formerly, paying at the same
time a double price for it!
Quotations, we see, are made from the PRESS, which
has repeatedly called attention to this subject. Re-
viewing the underhand conduct of Russia, the writer
ably urges the necessity of more vigorous measures
and more decisive policy upon our part against that
power, and sums up upon the present state of events
in clear and forcible words.
The hour for effective negotiation was expended in idle
talk, and in the issue, on our part, of satin paper des-
patches, which were utterly discreditable and highly pre-
judicial to the country, because they left its intentions in
doubt, and so encouraged the aggressor in his immediate
spoliation. The hour for demonstration was allowed to go

_ SATURDAY,

by in taidy movements and hesitating advances.
Loid Aberdeen need be at no pains to assure the country
of his anxious wish for peace—no man doubts that. But
the question really is, whether the means which he and
his colleagues adopted towards that end were wise and
bold, and becoming the dignity of the country, or faint,
weak, and pusillanimous. . . . Wemust have no more
biby speeches in the midst of bloody conflict, no repetitions
of such miserable vindication as the Premier lately uttered
—what we demand—what the country demands—is resolute
action for the future. . . . It is the bounden duty of
Ministers to convene Parliament immediately, in order
that the sense of the country may be taken as to the course
which we ought to pursue. . . . When the ability of
the executive power seems doubtful, or as doubted, it is
time for the deliberative to interfere.

The present is an excellent number of the New
Monthly Magazine. The accomplished editor (Mr.
Harrison Ainsworth) shows no small tact in catering
for the taste of general rea:lers. In " Harry Brown
and the Emperor Nicholas" wo are treated to an
amusing extravaganza from the pen of Mr. Dudley
Costello, in which one of the innumerable Browns
crosses the Russian frontier and meets with divers
adventures, until we find him at a private audience
with the Emperor Nicholas. The conceited tone of
certain recent travellers is amusingly caricatured.
The next article is a closely-written review of Richard
Grant White, the American commentator on
Shakspeare, whose labours threaten to overshadow
the laurels of some of our recent English editors of
the great bard. " Sir Na haniel" is the author of
this essay, and he justly speaks in terms of
praise of Mr. White. The battle of the Aln s
furnishes a subject for the lyre of Nicholas
Michell; but his muse has not been propitious.
We commend the next paper, "A Night of Horror,',
to the notice of our light, popular dramatists for a
capital farce. Keeley or Buckstone would make
audiences roar in some of the passages that follow
from a lady and gentleman having exchanged carpet-
bags, and the lover discovering that his Dulcinea
was indebted to art for most of her charms. But the
gentleman's exercises in poetry were also discovered,
and were thus criticised in his presence:—

" Ali !" I replied, in fearful embarrassment, and must
have looked at the moment as red as a freshlyboiled
lobster—" you really cannot imagine how sorry I am for
your accident ; if we could only—only discover who made
the unfortunate mistake—"
" 1 am certain it was a gentleman," she sail, quickly.
" i found just at the top—" She stopped suddenly and
bit her lips.
" You opened the carpet-bag? "
" Yes, certainly, but of course by mistake ; the pad-
locks are all alike, and I did nut find my error till I—
till 1—"
I knew what was coming now, what must come, for they
had been lying at the top.
" Found a little book ; that is to say, a few sheets of
paper, sewn together, containing poems. Ah, Adolph, if
you had only read the verses—"
I looked up to her in surprise. I had quite forgotten
the confounded verses, but they pleased her. Emilie was
an enthusiastic poetess.
" You would have killed yourself with laughing at the
stuff," the young lady continued, who had now quite re-
covered her calmness. " I have read a good deal of
nonsensical poetry in my time. but never such trash as
this—such moonshine and melancholy—such fancies for
suicide and similar trash. I was rather bold, and read a
few of them; they were too absurd."
We suspect that this article must be from the French
or German, and Messrs. Tom Taylor and Shirley
Brookes have written clever pieces on slighter plots
than are presented to them here. Alexander
Andrews, in the next article, gives us some amusing
anecdotes of the manners of our grandfathers, and of
public amusements during the eighteenth century.
So late as 1768 we read of women fighting for a
wager, and some of the " sports " in fashion were
very gross. The fair " Florentia," in " Polperro,''
continues to narrate her rambles through Corn-
wall, and it is evident that she must be a
charming travelling companion. Then follows a
sketchy, anecdotic paper on " Paris in 1854."
Full justice is done to Mr. Hannay's " Satire and
Satirists, though be is taunted rather sharply with
being an imitator of Mr. Thackeray. The next paper,
" A City's Desolation," reads heavily, but the writer
says that in his next chapters he " will be more gay"—
and we hope so. "The Diary of a Winter in Rome" i
is rather too slipshod, and the author's judgment s
not t.) be trusted. At the close of it there is a
ludicrous criticism on Cicero, which cannot be
accepted. As will be seen, this number of the New
Monthly has a great variety of articles. There is
something for readers of every class. We observe
that the short notices at the end of the number have
been given up.
The Dublin University opens with a very good ac-
count of the " Expedition to the Crimea," com-
piled from the public sources of information, but
well arranged, and giving in detail abetter description
of the "Battle of Alma" than we remember to have
read, particularly as regards the operations of the
French, which have hitherto been rather unfairly
neglected in the English reports of the battle. In
the leading article of one of our morning contempor.

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NOVEMBER 4, 1854.

Mies of Wednesday last we noticed a very disagree-
able sneer at the " want of foresight" evinced by Lord
Raglan in not having intimated to Admiral Lyons
"his desire that the Agamemnon should meet him at
" Balaklava, as soon as it was resolved to transfer the
"basis of operations to that harbour." This e.ccusa-
ti is unconsciously answered in the present article
of the Dublin, in which it is clearly explained that
the allied generals had intended to land their siege-
train and materiel at Belbeek, but, finding a strong
fortified work commanding the mouth of the river,
they at once altered their whole plan of operations,
and " with an ability and celerity deserving the highest
" admiration executed a flank march to Balaklava."
During the first night of the march, Lieut. Manse,
who was expected by Lord Raglan, arrived with des-
patches from Admiral Lyons, and immediately re-
turned with orders for the squadron to come round
to Balaklava. Considering that the distance by sea
from the mouth of the Alma to Balaklava is so
trifling, and can be reached in a few hours, we really
cannot see any such extraordinary want of foresight,
or " lamentable oversight," in the arrangements of Lord
Raglan. It is to be regretted that those who know
so little about the operations of war, and apparently
less of the distance that a steam-ship can accom-
plish in a few hours, should find fault with the
arrangements of others who have the experience of
a lifetime in the profession to back their judgment.
The concluding paragraph in this article, we see,
extracts a passage from the PRESS upon the death of
Marshal St. Arnaud. Of the other papers, nine in
number, "The Slingaby Wedding" is an amusing
little story, and the two sketches of Wolsey and
Cardinal Ximenes are good in their way. Wolsey
the writer represents as the founder of the " Balance-
of-Power " system in European diplomacy, and one
of the greatest men and most enlightened diplomats
that England has ever produced. The characteristic
sketch of Ximenes we think we have met with before
inpresscott's "Reign of Ferdinand and Isabella."
The " Greek Dramatists " is a well-written paper, and
the "Reopening of the Danube" is a pleasant little
brochure upon the main points of Lord Aberdeen's
past and present policy with regard to Russia and
Turkey :
England, nay Europe (says the writer), has to thank
Lord Aberdeen for the treaty of Adrianople, the most
disastrous treaty that history has ever set down in her
almanack, new or old—a treaty designed in fraud, gained
by fraud, signed in fraud, used for fraud We
'pay possibly have at the opening of next session protests-
'ions of the perfect confidence of the Government in the
good faith and upright intentions of the Emperor of
Russia; but Russian good faith, and upright intentions,
and " longanimity," are not quite in favour in the olfactory
nerves of the British public ; nor is Lord Aberdeen.

Fraser opens with a long review of the novel called
" Heartsease." The critic commences with express-
ing his sense of the lofty mission of a novelist:—

To the novel alone we must now look to fill amongst us
the place of the epic poem of earlier days; in like manner
to affect the mind with an admiring revential love of virtue,
and to impel the soul to aspire after goodness. This is the
work which the novelist has set before him, the vocation
to which he is called, and it is one which the most aspiring
genius need not disdain, since, worthily performed, it
gives him an influence over his fellow-men, equal in power
and enduring iu effect to any that was ever wielded by his
ancestors, the rhapsodists and bards of remote ages, or the
dramatists and poets of times nearer our own.
He thus panegyrises the powers of the author before
him, and gives copious extracts from this new pro-
duction of the author of the " Heir of Redclyffe;"
but we cannot concur with him. The reviewer also
over-estimates the "reception which Miss Austen's
" novels met with on their first appearance." Lieu-
tenant Royer's " English Prisoner in Russia" is the
subject of the second article, and the lieutenant is
sarcastically criticised, and is taught the lesson that
the critical, like certain of the European powers, can
exercise the knout. " London Stout " is discoursed
about in the next paper, and we are introduced to
Truman and Hanbury's brewery. We must say that
these descriptions of great factories are allowed to
intrude too much into periodicals which ought to he
devoted exclusively to science or literature. " A
Handful of Italian Patois Books," by one of the
family of " Smatterling," is light and lively, but too
careless and colloquial in its tone for a review.
"General Bounce" is continued by the author of
1‘ Digby Grand;" we must hint that the writer is
getting rather heavy, and we hope that he has not
exhausted the vein. His manner of telling a story
is becoming less dramatic. In the article on "Land-
scape painting in England " there are some sound
views put forward. The following observation is
worth notice:—
Landscape-painting in England has culminated in a
school of naturalist painters, who are unrivalled through-
out the world. And the same principle has been working
its way gradually through all classes—this love of Nature.
The causes are many. Civilisation, after it reaches a cer-
tain point, becomes weary of courts, and camps, and
crowded streets, and pants for " fresh fields and pastures
new"—for the purling stream and the flowery mead. Ex-
citement produces exhaustion, and the patient sighs for
and country air. This feeling is leavening our

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