The Express.
London, England, 1859-08-12 00:00:00

LITERATURE.

Northumberland and Me Border. By WALTER
Wang. Chapman and Hall.
" Sweet is the pleasure of going home, awe all
know ; but what can equal the pleasure of going
forth ? To rise ere the dawn has lost its rosy blush
on a fine summer morning, and feel that you are free
to go whithersoever you will ; to wander as iodina-
tion prompts for the whole of • summer month, and
with feet as willing to Stir as your head to enjoy
—what pleasure can equal that Before you
stretches • long vista of anticipations; a plan floats
loosely in your mind, to be shaped day by day, or
hour by hour, and there is amuse of power and quiet
satisfaction in the reflection that the shaping depends
chiefly on your own wayfaring capabilities. Where
among robust pleasures can this be matched ? "
So speaks Mr. Walter White; and, with tongues
clioned by London heat, with throats choked- by
dust, with hearts yearning to be quit of
Loudon tails and weary of London pleasures, we say
to him, " Well spoken." He is wisely following oat
a true instinct in the production of such works as
the present. A new and greatly improved
order of guide-books was inaugurated by "A Lou-
donee,. Walk to the Land's Ena ; " sad this pleasant
volume of Mr. White's was soon followed by the
equally pleasant "Month in Yorkshire." Nobody
who may have reed those two books, or either of
them, will need to be told that their author is
eon of those literary tourists who do not obtrude
their personal "views" and prejudices, but who
nevertheless contrive to stamp their individuality on
every page of their writings. The book before us
is altogether worthy to follow the two we have
mentioned. Mr. White may also be congratulated
on having chosen • route that has not been overdone
by pattern travellers. Indeed, it is part of his free,
athletic, impulsive habit of locomotion to avoid the
beaten track ; and we commend his example to all
who have strength and leisure to follow it. Green
fields are becoming every day more and more easily
accessible to the townsman; but pastures new, how
shall they be found, except with • difficulty which
gees on increasing in a ratio with the increase of
travelling facilities ? We are told, for instance,
that there is hardly elbow-room in the
Lie of Wight, and that people are driven
theme to ruminate at Portsmouth. A very pretty
met if inverse pastoral, by the bye, might be made
en the.sbjset of a pair of lovers who have wandered
far from ace noisy throng at Shanklin, Alma Bay,
or Blacking Chine, to seek, among the pleasant
lanes of Portsmouth, a seclusion and retreat from
vulgar eyes, This feverish stock of the holiday
market dose not extend to Northumberland. Ose
may journey thither, and fear no awkward misgiv-
ing/son the point of its having been worth while to
jemmy out of Middlesex, a county which, we may
observe, is not so well known by metropolitans as it
deserves to be. Mr. White would snake a capital
book out of the cockney's country. We suspect
that, bold pedestrian though be be, there is
something due to other means of enjoyment.
Modestly peeping oat here and there are signs, or
hints, of the traveller's faculty of " making himself
at home;" as at Nuttier, for:instance, where the hos-
pitality of Mr. Laces is evidently not thrown away
—and where the guest immediately begins " to sap
the Arms of the children, among whom were four
bonny girls, sharers of their mother's good looks;"
se that we are not surprised to find the same children
vary soon crowding round his knees, to hear his
seep and stories, which are " proper for Sunday."
Agars, his reception by the hostels of the Lord
Crews'. Arms, at Bans borough, goes far to prove the
social best of his nature. Won by the smell of good
cookery, he wins in turn the landlady's goodwill, by
asking leave to sit down with her sad her maids;
and when the time of reckoning arrives, behold,
there is no reckoniag to pay, for has she not bidden
him welcome? Depend on it, the man who can
chronic'. these experiences of travel is not the man
to sit contentedly at home.

Women, Past and Present exhibiting their Social
Vicissitudes, Single and Matrimonial Relations,
Rights. Frielleges, and Wrongs. By JOHN
WADI. Charles Skeet.

This is a very flagrant cue of bookmaking. Mr.
Wads', compilations have generally, we believe, the
credit of being concise, accurate, and fall. His
British History " and " Cabinet Lawyer " are
books of reference to be found in all useful libraries;
sad if his " History and Political Philosophy of the
Productive Classes" wee brought, by a too pretentious
title, into unfavourable comparieoa with such works
as Porter's " Progress of the Nation," it had still the
marks of actual investigation and diligent labour to
recommend it. His new book exhibits very few of
these marks, and is, on the whole, as haphazard and
as disjointed a piece of authorship as we can bring
to our recollection. For some unfathomable reason
which seems to animate philosophers and others,
whenever they speak of, or address themselves to,
women, it has been found impossible to get on with-
out a great deal of sentimental jocosity, and at least
as much of discursive and irrelevant anec-
dote, of a kind which commonly bespeaks attention
by the prefatory " fbis reminds t 1!.." Mr. Wade, in
.seeming the agreeable skittishness which he
evidently conceives to be part and parcel of his
task, does not discard the sober habit of the compiler
and the statistician. The result is that he appears
to be striving to found a new style on a model com-
pounded of Dr. Darwin and Adam Smith. Occa-
sionally he platitudinises on the tender passion, and
this is the sort of language he employs:—" It cer-
tainly tends to sweeten and elevate the feelings, and
exile from the bosom malevolent dispositions. While
sager transforms us into furies, and revenge
Into fiend., love inclines us,"—aod so on.
After all this, it is a little humiliating to be re-
minded that " the indulgence of love and the pro-
euring of food are the two mainsprings of activity in
animal creation." Wide ea are the boundaries of
his theme, Mr. Wade has not kept within them.
Indeed, be has been so far from keeping within
them that he can scarcely be said to have written
specially about women at a/L Take any gossiping
eelsotes•ploto book, such as the "Curiosities" and
ether welosee of Mr. Disraeli, and the title chosen
by Mr. Wade would be just ea appropriate to that se
to this. We have pegeo after pages with such
seanter-headiage as those: Frenchwomen before the
revolution—lbderzt, Grimm; Frenchwomen before
the revolution—lean Jecques Rousseau; French.
women before the revolution—Nl. de Voltaire ;
lio-
glishwomen in the 18th century—Dr. Johnson;
Englishwomen in the 18th century—Dr. Johnson's
Views of Men. Had we space to quote some of
theme pages it would fairly become apparent that
Immo, even if so much se motioned, have little
more to do with the matter in hand then have
hope to do with table beer; and u (or other
cribbed from the Cyclopedia, on the laws
pages
of courtship, ancient and modern,
it is obvious that the subject relates equally to women
sad to men. To speak the truth, we have bad some-
what too mach of these apologies for the existence of
the female sex, even where the apologists have had
diuretic* ~oh k to keep close to their argument.
Weesee...tey they, “ exercises great influence on
society." We deny It; and for the simple reason
that to admit the preposition were to shut woman
mad society altogether. Really, it is high time to
potweive that Marston peculiarly directed to the pa-
teeller of womea's rights too often supposes a week-
s.. which does sot exist in the claim that is &d-
-rooled.

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*am ht. dis lismw and ladisa woman.. M Übe yews tram
1948-410 os IMO is sit down at 23.250,4301. Taw nissi
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from IMO 40 to 1838 S 9 was 2,739.4. W. Taw amount .f . .

iliotionsemionto a aasmtatdall Übe oommiefia lalnglandna
l *dm dais/ dm ram* priod woo 19.0131.097. The banana
of prin.-pal doe to all rho companion from the goveramst et
!Mk et the es 4 of aril last woi 4,189,3811.