The Sun.
London, England, 1855-05-02 00:00:00

vocation which has kept alive in man's fallen na-
ture the worship of the beautiful and the reverence
of the sublime.

Colburn's New Monthly Magazine.—" One or
Two Habits of Young France" is a smart sketch,
which sums up the moat remarkable peculiarities
of a certain class of the French. An amusing ac-
count is given at the end of the false appearances
kept up by various people, which is designated by
the word " blague." " The Women and the
Salons of France" is an interesting article, in which
the subject is viewed in three lights—under the
Empire, the Restoration, and the Monarchy of July.
After descriptions of the various styles that pre-
dominated, and fashions that flourished, it is said
that the nineteenth century is very far removed
from the time when a La Rochefoucauld said to a
Duchess of Longueville—
" Pour rn4riter son cosur, pour plaire ses beaux yeux
J'ai fait la guerre aux roil; je l'aurai faite aux dieux !"
Some account is given of " The Zouaves," in a
paper at the end of the magazine, which it is
likely will be welcome, considering the contra-
dictory statements that have been made concerning
them. In completing the brief notice of their
origin, and summary of their chief exploits, it
is observed that " Alma, Inkerman, numerous re-
pulses of sorties, and other gallant struggles
before the walls of Sebastopol have testi-
fied that they are still the same gallant corps as in
Africa, and their countrymen look to their occupy-
ing on the day of assault the same place which they
did at Constantine and at Zaatcha." " Sarah
Beauclerc," the continuation of the long and com-
plicated story called the " Elopement," becomes
very critical in this number. It is evidently the
intention of the author to decry the system esta-
blished in France of " Marriages de Convenance,"
a plan which is productive of so much misery and
crime. The tale is, however, too tardily narrated;
there is great feeling displayed in some parts, but
the interest would be greater if it was more concen-
trated in detail. "The Parapluie Vert" is a, ludi-
crous anecdote of a man who, many years ago,
paid a visit to the Gallic capital, carrying with
him many articles of vertu, as he thought, in his
wardrobe ; but before all things he valued his
green umbrella. Wherever he went it was his
primary object to look after its safety, and he was
continually losing it and distracting every one
around in seeking it out. At last he lost it for
ever, and the confusion may be imagined. Other
articles of merit are to be met with, conspicuous
among which, in point of interest, may be men-
tioned "Moor Park, as it was and is."

Bentley's Miscellany. Bentley opens with a
retrospect of the Imperial visit, and the cordial
welcome given by the people to their distinguished
guests. A paper en " French War Pamphlets"
takes a raviow of some of the modern political
writers of Paris. Mr. Harrison Ainsworeh con-
tinues his romance of " The Spendthrift," in his
characteristic style. The clever and attractive
author who writes under the title of Monkshood
gives us this month an article " About the Essay-
ists and Reviewers," first of whom he has placed
William Hazlitt. A very interesting sketch is
given of his life and writings, in which it is ob-
served that his character as a man has interfered
with his reputation as a writer. To strangers his
manners were repelling, and to his friends he ap-
pears to have. manifested suspicion and want of
confidence. " Morbidly suspicious, irritably sen-
sitive, he staggered those who knew him slightly
by a seemingly cynical reserve, and those who knew
him well, and prized him sincerely, by a seemingly
capricious distrust." Charles Limb, though one of
his greatest admirers, says, " What bath soured him
and made him to suspect his friends of infidelity
towards him, when there was no such matter, I
know not. I stood well with him for fifteen years.
I never betrayed him, I never slackened in my ad-
miration of him ; I was the same to him though
he could not see it as in the days when he thought
fit to trust mo . . . I wish he would not
quarrel with the world at the rate he does; but
the reconciliation must be effected by himself, and
I despair of living to see that day." The motto
which Hazlitt adopted showed which of his facul-
ties he esteemed most highly, "For I, am nothing
if not critical." The writer takes a brief review of
his lectures on the Elizabethan
,literature, and on
the English Poets. Of the " Spirit of the Age" h e
writes as follows :

`The Spirit of the Age' is perhaps the best known
and most generally relished of Haziitt's works. Freely
and without respect of persons he there canvasses his
contemporaries, literary and political ; takes their mea-
sure, and reports it without fear or favour ; nothing ex
tenuates, where they have bad or weak po nts, and sets
down a good deal in rua!ice whether they have or not.
Here his keenness of scrutiny, his talent for portraiture
(which looks so like' that one disregards the exaggera-
tion, the frequent distortion, the heightened colouring),
his skill in comparative anatomy, his bi.ing ridicule, hi.-
enthusiasm of admiration and of bate, the peculiarities
of his style, sharply sententious, eagerly iterativeare
seen to the best advantage. A procession stalks before
us of peers and poets, preachers and politicians ; and the
cicerone calls them all by name so familiarly, and de-
scribes their nature and their arts so vivaciously, that
we cannot choose but see them out to a man, whatever
we may think of his mariner of appraising them. There
is the detested if not dreaded Gifford, retainer to the
muses, a doorkeeper to learning, a lackey in the State'—
Wilberforce, 'anxious to do all the good he can without
hurting himself or his fair fame'—Bentl am, Meditating
the coming age,' and Lamb, ever turning pensive to the
past'—' Eldon plods on through the street, with the best-
natured face in the world, and au umbrella under his arm,
his only fault the inability to say Nay to power—Byron is
seen, making man after his own image, woman after his
own heart,—Wordsworth, reading his own poetry,
while at favourite passages his eye beams with preter-
natural lustre,—Moore converts the wild harp of Erin
into a musical snuff-box,—Godwin strives, in vain, to
pass the Arctic Circle of moral science, and its Frozen
Regions, where the understanding is no longer warmed
by the affections, nor fanned by the breeze of fancy,—
Coleridge's faculties are watched gossiping away their
time, and gadding aboutfrom house to house,—Brougham
screams with high unmitigated voice,'—Jeffrey writes
like one accustomed to public speaking,'—Southey, with
peaked austerity of countenance,' sits upright in his
chair,' turning from reading to writing, by a stop-watch,
—Scott issues what is almost like a new edition of
human nature,' as the only amanuensis of truth and
history,'—and Chambers is seen, in prophetic fury in
the. pulpit,' like Balfour of Burley in his cave, when he
contended with the imaginary Satan, gasping for breath,
and the cold moisture running down his face. The
Spirit of the Age' is the best voucher for Coleridge's
description of its writer, long years before it was written,
as a thinking, observant, original man ; of great power
as a painter of character portraits,' and skilled to 'send
well-feathered thoughts straightforward to the mark
with a twang of the bowstring.' It abounds with proofs
of these straightforward missives, with echoes of the
twang, and sometimes with easternly killing marks, of
the bowstring."

Two papers which follow this interesting article
are both descriptive of foreign wanderings in Egypt
and Italy. A criticism on some of the pictures of
the forthcoming Academic Exhibition tells us that
Mr. Maclise, Mr. Millais, Mr. Egg, and
.many
other well-known names are among the con-
tributors. Mr. Stanfield's admirers will •be
glad to learn that he has produced a com-
panion to the beautiful picture of " The Vic-
tory towed into Gibraltar." The subject is
the siege of San Sebastian, when it was taken, in
1813. Mr. Maclise's picture is au illustration of
the assembled court, in "As you like it." Mr.
Millais's subject is one that must give full display
to his peculiar powers—a fire by night and the
resWe of some children, whose mother watches in
agony their danger. Mr. Egg, in addition to two
pictures illustrative of the " Life" and " Death"
of Villiers, Duke of Buckingham, has a third
picture representing the meeting of Curran s
daughter with the unfortunate Robert Emmett. in
prison. All admirers of Moore will at once re-
member the ballad referring to this unhappy lady,
" She is far from the land where her young hero sleeps."
From these, and many others which are described,
we should feel inclined to concur in the writer s
hope, that the coming Paris Exhibition will not
have interfered with the prospects of the Academy.

Colburn's United Service.—ln connection with
the war we have the narrative of the siege of Se-
bastopol brought down to the latest period—" Six
Months with the Expeditionary Army," a graphi-
cally descriptive paper, and " Destiny ; or, Two
Incidents of InkernAn"—stories of two equally
loyal and heroic foes, who are represented as having
fallen by each other's hand, leaving behind them
youth and beauty to deplore their untimely fate.
Among the remaining papers, " Cuba, Past and
Present," and " The Cam?) at Aldershott," are the
most noticeable. The first presents a faithful
picture of the past and present condition of that
unfortunate island, and the latter describes the
objects of the camp, and offers several practical
suggestions.

The Law Magazine contains an average number
of papers of purely professional interest, together
with au article on "Reformatories ;" a second
showing the desirability of a " National Map" con-
structed on a given scale ; and a third (a continua-
tion) on " L.d. Brougham and Yana : his Profes-
sional and Parliamentary Career."

The Art-Journal.—The principal illustrations of
the May nui!iber are "Cupid and Psyche," from
the picture by Uwins, and " The Battle of Maca-
nee, ' from the picture by Armitage, both in the
Royal collection. The first is an excellent engrav-
ing of a beautiful subject, and the second of a stir-
ring one. " The Temptation," from the statue of
M. Vande Vande, is well engraved, but as a whole
we cannot speak favourably of the figure. Anion