The Press.
London, England, 1854-08-12 00:00:00

grtiant.

THE chew of the Royal Agricultural Society at
Armagh, which opened on Monday in that city, has
been one of the most successful of the exhibitions
ever held by the society. Additional éclat was given
to the proceedings by the presence of the Lord Lieu-
tenant and the Countess of SL Germans, and also his
Grace the Lord Primate, who had from the first
taken the greatest interest in the exhibition.
THE MASTER OF THE ROILS in England, and the
English Solicitor-General, will proceed to [lreland
after the prorogation of Parliament, to be joined
there by the Right Hon. Francis Blackburne, the late
Lord Chancellor of Ireland, and Chief Justice
Monohan, of the Common Pleas. as commissioners
to inquire into the action of the Encumbered Estates
Court in Ireland, and the propriety of conjoining that
court with the Court of Chancery in Ireland.
THE remittances from Irish settlers in Australia
are steadily increasing, at such a rate as to warrant
the belief that they will, before long, equal the sums

759

received from America to enable families in Ireland
to join their relatis es at the other side of the Atlantic.
In a single parish in the county Wicklow, the Austra-
lian remittances, for some time, have averaged nearly
1,0001. per month, chiefly sent by persons who had
emigrated from the mining districts in the county.
THE first division of the 3rd West York Militia
arrived inDublin yesterday week from Liverpool. The
division consisted of :109 men. This regiment was
one of the first raised under the Militia Act of 1852.
MINING ENTERPRISE has lately been very successful
in Ireland so far as established and prudently-
managed companies are concerned. The Mining
Company of Ireland, after a gradual recovery from
the severe depression of the famine, has now reached
a state of prosperity. The Wicklow Copper Company,
devoting itself to a single mine of great productiveness,
is paying a dividend of 65 per cent-on the subscribed
capital. The Berehaven and a few other mines,
some of them in the hands of private capitalists, are
also worked with large profit. A valuable iron-mine
has been discovered on the estate of Lord Carew at
Dysart, in Queen's county.
A TERRIFIC EXPLOSION took place in the theatre at.
Belfast on Monday night, owing to an accident in pre-
paring gas used by a Mr. Grafton, who has opened a
diorama there. A servant of the theatre was, it is
feared, mortally wounded, and considerable injury
was done to property in the neighbourhood.
THE ACTION OF BUTLER V. MOUNTGARRETT ter-
minated at Kilkenny Assizes on Saturday last in a
verdict for the plaint►f. By this verdict, if undis-
turbed on subsequent proceedings, the title and
estates hitherto enjoyed by the defendant are trans
ferred to his cousin. The question of title is now under-
going investigation before a " committee of privileges'
of the House of Lords. The civil right will no doubt'
receive further scrutiny from the superior courts of
law.
THE NUMBER OF ACCIDENTS IN FACTORIES is thus
stated in a parliamentary return just issued :—From
the Ist of October, 1844, to the 30th of April, 1845,
1,030 males and 1,045 females were killed or injured
by such accidents ; and of these 1,938 accidents were
occasioned by machinery. In the year ending April
30, 1846, 2,550 males and 2,510 females were either
killed or injured ; in 1840-7 the sufferers were 2,254
males and 2,336 females ; in 1847.8, 1,460 males and
1,343 females were killed and injured; in 1848-9,
fatal or other accidents happened to 1,678 males and
1,513 females ; in 184950, 1,749 accidents happened
to males and 1,561 to females ; in 1850.1, 2,239 males
and 2,273 females were either killed or injured; in
1851-2 the number of accidents to males was 1,983,
to females 1,895; in 1852.3 the accidents to males
were 2,217, to females 2,077 ; and in the year ending
the 30th April last the accidents were 4,257, of which
4,044 resulted from machinery.

FROM THE LONDON GAZETTE.
Tuesday, August 8.
BANKRUPTS.—WILLIAM %min. NIELD and WILLIAM
HENRY HUGH COLLANERR. Cannon-Street West, City, shawl
warehousemen—CHARLES WILLIAM NORMAN, ShoreditchlllllOTS'
trimming seller—HENßY TURTLE, Mount Etna-place, Mile-end-
road, cheesemonger HENRY TAYLOR, Newbury, Berkshire,
grocer—JAMES Mellott, Sootham_pton, boot and shoe maker—
HENRY COPPINOER, Hawkhurst, Kent., taiIor—EDWARD DAVIZS,
Harrow-road, Paddington, and Park-terrace, Regent's-park. oil
and colour man—THOMAS JOHN HOLLOWAY, Salisbury, rope
manufacturer—THOMAS Kixrrox, Liverpool, carrier—WlLLlAM
ARMSTRONG and WILLIAM OLDROYD HANKRY, Shrew•bury, ,
tailors—GEOßGE HENRY FOURDRINIZR, Shelton, Staffordshire,
paper manufacturer—THOMAS BELSHAM HurroX. Birmingham,
wine merchant—WlLLlAM HOOPER. Bristol, cabinet maker—
GEORGE EDWARDS, Newport, Monmouthshire, grocer—SYßeasx
TROTIIkN, Chipping Sodbury, Gloucestershire, corn dealer—
GEORGE HINGESTON, Lyme Regis, Dorsetahlre.money scrivener
—JOHN SUDDEN aid GEORGE WEBSTER, Bradford, Yorkshire,
woolstaplers—GEOßGE JEzvEs, Sheffield and Manchester, brush
manufacturer.
SCOTCH SEQUESTRATIONS. THOMAS MtL( OLMSOM
DICKSON and Co., Glasgow, merchants--ANnacw Pußvie,
Mlln-
gavie, Stirlingshire, contractor—JOHN COUPER, langloan, La-
narkshire. grocer—PAUL CAMERON, Glasgow, builder—WlLLlAM
SQUAIR, Cantray-mills, Ardersier.
Friday, August 11.

BANKRUPTS.--Ozoeoe l'Artie, Wood-street, Cheapside,
carpet warehouseman—Meetly BENNETT. Christchurch, Hants,
linen draper—MICHAEL Sotoese. Lambeth•walk, china dealer—
FREDERICK HAWSE KING, New Shoreham, carpenter and builder
--JAMES WILD, Hurst, Ashton-under-Lyne, cotton spinner—
JAMES Woveentit, Manchester, eating-housekeeper—THOMAS
MELLOR and SAMUEL EASON, Liverpool, merchanta--Mosett
NATHAN, Liverpool. watch manufacturer dome Frooxe,
Sherborne, breWer—SAMUZI, GARRATT, PelTall-Wbfirf, Corr Wan,
contractor—dome STURRnis, Maidstone, Kent, baker—J *esti
ABRAHAM SMITH, Lambeth, liglitermsn—THOMSl4 FREDERIC
Goonote, Bromley, omnibus proprietor GEORGE LOWRY,
Salford, tlax•spinner—WlLLlAM GELDART, North Shields, ship.
SWINT—EDWARD STAPLES the younger, Soham, Cambridge.
miller—Tawas', BELISHA'S ilurrox, Birmingham, wine and
spirit merchant—WlLLlAM YORKE, Cheshunt, builder.
SCOTCH SEQUESTRATIONS.—FAnQUHARSON and MASON
Edinburgh, brassfounders ROBERT Rein, Leven, Fifeshire,
bOOkhelier—THOMAS GALLOWAY, Olaagovr, baker.

SOME days ago, as the diligence which runs between
Prudes and Olette (Pyrenees Orientales) was entering on
a narrow bridge, called the Pont de Is Bernade, the ear•
riage struck with such violence against a stone post that
eight of the passengers on the outside were thrown oft br
the jolt. Three were killed on the spot ; two are so much
injured that no hopes are entertained of their lives; the
other three escaped with some severe bruises.

760

Yittraturt.

Satire and Satirists. Six Lectures. By James
Hannay, Author of " Singleton Fontenoy,"
&c. London: Bogue.
In order to estimate this volume fairly we are
bound to recollect that it is the substance of
spoken lectures, intended fora mixed audience
requiring to be interested and amused. It
reads like the literary table-talk of a man of the
world, hating affectation, and sarcastic in ex-
posing it. Mr. Hannay places his listeners or his
readers at once at their ease. He quickly shows
that he is no reticent and guarded dealer in
opinions, weighed in scruples, according to
apothecary measure. He affects the " plain
speaker " in all things, disdains academical
subtlety, relying on strong natural powers, and
dashes boldly into literary debate.
Racy and readable, " Satire and Satirists" is
not sufficiently critical to support its title.
It is merely a volume of literary sketches,
seasoned with the witty lecturer's sarcastic
" asides" and peculiar mannerisms. The sub-
ject of satire should have been discussed with
more nicety of distinction and precision of
thought than are shown in its pages. In the
opening passage the author says :—" A dis-
" tinct phase of itself in literary story,—a pro-
" duction taking its own place by the side of
" poetry, tragedy, and comedy,—such is satire."
A most unsatisfactory definition, and only too
characteristic of the structural looseness of
the volume. After gossiping about Horace
and Juvenal, ho devotes a whole lecture to
Erasmus, Sir David Lindsay, and George Bu-
chanan ; and, while such familiar names as
Dryden, Pope, and Swift are commented on at
length, Aristophanes and Rabelais are not dis-
cussed at all. So also, though Junius is criti
cised, and some of our living satirical writers
alluded to without much felicity, there is no
reference to Cobbett, who, as a prose-writer, is
as well entitled to satirical celebrity as
Churchill is in verse.
The word satire, both in criticism and con-
versation, is more ambiguously applied than
any other literary term. Philosophers reflect-
ing on human nature and pensively ejaculating
in pentameters their melancholy ethics have
been classed as satirists along with butterfly
writers, flitting about ephemeral topics of
town-talk. Political partisans with passion-
ate likings and hatreds, men of action who
seized a poet's pen as the best weapon against
their foes, have also been included in the same
category. Malignant defamers, writing under
the inspiration of private revenge, dipping
their stilettos in the ink-bottle, have also been
honoured with brevet rank in the same mili-
tant department of literature. Yet between
these different classes there exist most im-
portant distinctions, so wide as to suggest the
idea that a stricter classification should be
made than the conventional one of referring
to one order thinkers and writers with few
Common similarities. To the genius, as in
the case of Pope, who habitually rises into the
philosophic sage, or disports as an inventive
humorist like Butler, or soars into the higher
regions of poetry like Dryden, we feel the
word " satirist " is no adequate expression for
the literary excellence. Where we find
original ideas, sublime apprehension of eternal
truths, and a deep-toned genius for language,
the mens divinior united to the es magna sona-
turum, we feel that the poet has burst beyond
the limits which literary traditions and social
instincts have assigned to the Churchills of
all ages and countries. It is but a loose classi-
fication to talk of Horace and Juvenal, whose
faculties of illustration and invention were so
entirely different not only in degree but in
kind. Nor do we hesitate to say that we sel-
dom think even of Dryden as "a satirist."
We think of " glorious John " in connection
with the glowing thoughts, gorgeous diction,
unrivalled faculty of reasoning in verse, that
invest him with more classical renown than
can be gained in the accusatory mission of the
merely satirical writer.
Having mentioned Dryden, we are bound to
say that with feelings of no common pleasure
wo have read Mr. Hannay's generous vindica-
ti.:u f t1:!4 poet from the aspersions of

THE PRESS.

a celebrated author of our own time of remark•
able brilliancy and still more remarkable par-
tisanship. The character of another great
celebrity is discussed with great talent, but too
much partiality, by Mr. Hannay. Our readers
are aware how for successive generations the
name of Swift has been vilified by Whig critics.
Yet his works survive their vituperation ; his
style in verse and prose is imitated without
success ; his " Drapier's Letters " remain the
model for popular political writing ; the " Tale
of a Tub " survives in full freshness as the
best piece of Rabelaisian humour in our lan-
guage ; and " Gulliver" stands unrivalled
amidst modern fiction for its complete origin-
ality. Against this literary giant little Lord
Jeffrey flung handful after handful of polished
pebbles. Yet the best piece that ever came
from Lord Jeffrey's pen was his essay on
Swift. Carefully written, with sentences neatly
turned, and with skilfully-sustained incrimina
tion, it is above the average of those over-
praised articles in which obvious thoughts and
foregone conclusions are smoothly expressed
with the simpering sublimity of an oracular
" sub-editor of Providence." Mr. Hannay
makes short work of Lord Jeffrey upon
Swift :

Jeffrey, with his quick Figaro-like tongue, and his
dextrous wrist and arm, was fighting and screeching in those
days, in the blue-and•yellow livery, against all comers,—
Wordsworth, Coleridge, and other men living; and he took
it into his head to do with this dead one as Charles 11. did
with Cromwell and Admiral lllake,—disinter him and hang
his bones. Well, one likes energy even in a hangman ;
and I am not going to say of Jeffrey's essay that it is not a
very capital specimen of its kind. Only, you observe, all
understanding of the man is impossible on the system there
adopted. There is no attempt in Jeffrey's essay to explain
Swift as a problem; it is a brilliant saying and enforcing
of everything about Swift that could possibly look bad in a
conventional point of view. If your mind is made up on
the anti-Swift side, here is pleasant reading for you; if you
are neither Whig nor Tory, but a simple lover of truth and
nature, who wish to know what the phenomenon of Swift's
career meant, here is no help for you.

As "a problem " and " a phenomenon" (as
suggested by Mr. Hannay) is the truest mode
of viewing the extraordinary character of
Swift. In much of what Mr. Hannay has said
about Swift's right to a generous recognition
we agree ; but his pen runs away with him
when instead of weighing his character he
concludes with a panegyric. He says :
Take Jonathan Swift, then, all in all,—with his hopes
and impulses, with his high views of nature, and history,
and duty ; take him for good and evil, in his greatness and
bis littlenesses,—and compare him with the other men of
his time :—I will back him as a specimen of manhood, and
real honesty, and generosity, and nobility of tendencies,
against any of them.
This seems perfectly extravagant, and is
even inconsistent with the lecturer's suggested
view of Swift as " a problem." Glancing
lightly over the " Stella and Vanessa" ques-
tion, Mr. Hannay has taken so lenient a view
of Swift's failings, that we do not recognise
any of the judicial qualities in his estimate of
Vie Dean of St. Patrick's. There are peculiar
considerations on the physical health of Swift,
and his apprehensions of more than one kind
of cerebral disease, which should never be
omitted in forming an estimate of his con-
duct. They are not of a kind proper for oral
discussion in a lecture, but we do not perceive
that Mr. Hannay appreciates their import-
ance.

We think that Mr. Hannay has gone too far
in the constant use of colloquialisms. He
seems to scoff at any ordinary finish of style,
as if it were too finical for his adoption.
In the pungent pages of a popular novel like
" Singleton Fontenoy," constant disregard to
the rules of composition may be excused, but
in a discussion upon literary classics the merely
conversational tone is felt to give an air of
crudeness to the composition. Such a mode
of writing has also the great disadvantage of
obtruding the individualism of the author too
much on the mind of the reader, and the ex-
ample, if followed, would be attended with bad
effects upon style.

Narratives of Some Passages in the Great War
witk France from 1799 to 1810. By Lieut.
General Sir Henry Bunbury, K.C.B. Lon-
don : Bentley.
WE may conscientiously say in limine that this
is a book of great merit and interest, written
with the accuracy of an eyewitness, and the mo

SATURDAY,

desty of a true soldier. The dazzling exploits
of the war in the Peninsula, and the greater
interest that was attached to the stupen-
dous successes which struck down Napo-
leon's power, than to the equally glorious
efforts that were made to prevent its rise,
have left too much in the shade the
achievements of that period which General
Bunbury has illustrated in these outlines of
military history. In that period there were
many gallant soldiers whose names have still
to be rescued, some from neglect and some
from misrepresentation; and the author has
performed the task in a spirit which will
command attention and credence ; for he
is not afraid to censure where it is necessary,
even when it startles our traditional recollec•
tions of those to whom he refers.

The first personal narrative relates to the
unfortunate campaign in North Holland in
1799, when the armies of England and Russia
were allied against the advancing power of the
French Republic. In this expedition the
Duke of York, long the mark for that popu-
lar slander against individuals which the
Whigs were so dextrous in using, became the
victim of the blunders or the treachery of the
Administration of the day. Great comman-
ders sent out by great statesmen were finally
required to oppose the mighty power that had
almost enslaved the world but the most gal-
lant spirits can do little in the field or on the
ocean if they are trammelled by the fears or
interests of superannuated clerks who may
have been made ministers at home. The
slanders against the Duke of York have taken
such root that the noble and kind hearted
prince will probably share the fate of some
other victims of historic ignorance, the tide of
falsehood being too full to stem. Yet here is
an impartial account by one who was present
with the Duke of York in the disastrous cam-
paign of Holland :
When Dumourier quitted Antwerp, Lake advanced with
his brigade of Guards to that city, and he there met three
weak battalions of the line which arrived from England
under the command of Ralph Abercromby. The whole
(barely mustering altogether 3,000 rank and file) moved
onwards to Bruges and Ghent, while large bodies of
Hanoverians and Hessians in British pay were arriving
successively in the same neighbourhood. Thus was
formed an army of about 17,000 men, which was placed
under the command of the Duke of York. Six or seven
squadrons of light dragoons and some artillery arrived
from England in May, and the columns then moved
forward to co-operate with the Austrians on the frontier.
But such was the condition of the British infantry at
this time, that two of Abercromby's regiments were left
behind, as being unfit to appear in the presence of an
enemy !
As the British and Hanoverian troops were involved in
the disasters which fell upon the allied army in tha cam-
paigns of 1793 and 1794, a popular outcry was raised in
England against the Duke of York. Men were ready to
attribute our failures to his unfitness for command, and
even our Ministers appeared to assent tacitly to a judg-
ment which served to throw upon the shoulders of his
Royal Highness much of the blame which ought to have
rested on themselves. Theirs was the fatal plan of
besieging Dunkirk ! theirs the shame of its failure.* In-
sisting on this selfish project, they drew off not only the
Duke of York's force, but some 13,000 subsidised Aus-
trians likewise, from the great army of the allies, which
had been up to that time successfnl in its operations, and
was pressing with an overpowering strength upon the de-
feated and disheartened enemy. With this fatal separation
of the armies began the tide of disaster which swept the
allies within twelve months beyond the Rhine.
General Bunbury's account of the Dutch
campaign forms one of the most lifelike pieces
of military narrative we have ever met with.
His talent in describing the country made the
scene of operations, often essential to the
better understanding of the occurrences re-
lated,—has seldom been equalled by military
writers. As an instance we may particularly men-
tion the advance of Sir Ralph Abercromby's co-
lumn to Hoorn, with the incident of the panic.
(pp. 10 to 23.) Nor is the general at all deficient
in the power of sketching personal character.
After enumerating the " council " with which
the unfortunate Duke of York was encum-
bered, and for the blunders of some members
of which he suffered, General Bunbury gives
the following sketches of the Duke and Sir
Ralph Abercromby :
To this council, rather than to the Duke of York alone,

• Our Government had promised to the Duke the co-operation
of a squadron which should attack and bumbird Dunkirk from
seaward, while he assaulted the time-worn fortifications from
the land aide. Admiral Macbride was lying with this squadron
in the Downs; but so far was the Duke from tneeung shV
assistance from the navy, that his lines, during the fortnight
which he spent before the town, were exposed to a cannonade
from half-a-duren gun-boats and Dunkirk privateers: LOrd
Chatham was then at the head of our Admiralty.