The Sun.
London, England, 1838-03-17 00:00:00

the subject. They lie on the surface, and are deficient in
the great charm of criticism, discrimination. The essay on
the " Advantage of living in stirring Times" is far superior,
for it displays not merely erudition, but a philosophical turn
of mind.

S .IBBA TI 0N ; HONOR NEALE, AND OTHER
P OE MS.
London, Moxon„ 1838.

The author of this graceful little volume of poems is a
clergyman, named Trench, who has evidently studied
Wordsworth with deep attention, and formed himself on
the model of that " master of song," though he is no mere
servile imitator, but a gifted and reverential disciple. The
poem entitled a " Walk in a Churchyard" is fully equal to
the best of the Lyrical Ballads, both as regards fancy and
reflection. Thirty or forty years ago, when such a sorry
rhymer as Hayley was the Magnus Apollo of the day, a
work like the present would have won Mr. Trench high
and deserved renown as a poet ; but those times are past.
We have been so glutted with poems of late years, and of
such excellent quality, that we turn from the dainties with
something like indifference, as the sailor turned from the
turtle soup, on which he was obliged to mess five days in
the week, when lying at anchor off the Bahamas. Though
we cannot, therefore, promise the author a circulation pro-
portioned to its deserts, for his present volume, yet we are
sure he will find many judicious admirers, who will look
forward with interest to his next appearance in print.

AN APPEAL ON BEHALF OF YOUNG MEN.

London, Hatchard, 1838.

Under this somewhat quaint title, the author, the Rev.
Stephen Davis, has produced a volume full of good advice
to the rising generation, and in which the best methods of
education are pointed out with force and succinctness.

SAUNDERS' PORTRAITS OF THE REFOR.

II7IIRS.—P.4nr IV.
Saunders, London,
_lB3B.

The present part contains, cleverly engraved, half ength
portraits of Messrs. Byng, Poulett Thomson, and Wyse.
The most characteristic likeness is that of the Right Hon.
Member for Manchester, whose countenance expresses a
world of shrewdness and discretion. In fact, Mr. Poulett
Thomson—as the artist has delineated him—looks just
like one who would think twice before he put himself to any
inconvenience, or perilled his interests by supporting any
measure or principle obnoxious to his patrons—a pecu-
liarity which he has lately fully developed, in his conduct
as respects the Ballot. The Memoirs which accompany
hese portraits are well written, and in a free, impartial
spirit.

THE QUARTERLY JOURNAL OF AGRI-
CULTURE.
Blackwood and Sons.

We would ask no other proof of the general intelli-
gence of as agriculturist, upon matters connected with his
business as a farmer and grazier, than that supplied by a
knowledge of his being a constant reader of this excellent
periodical. Wherever, in our rambles in the country we
meet with the " Quarterly Journal of Agriculture," we are
sure to find ourselves in a neighbourhood where skill unites
with industry to multiply the fruits of the earth with the
least possible toil to the labourer. Not the least of its re-
commendations is that its articles are all written by practi-
cal agriculturists—by persons thoroughly acquainted with
the minutest details of the subjects upon which they write,
and therefore in a condition to obviate those practical diffi-
culties which mere theorists could not even surmise. The
present Number has eighteen articles on agricultural sub-
jects, and six-relating to the Prize Essays and Transac-
tions of the Highland Society.

THE NEW STATISTICAL ACCOUNT OF
SCOTLAND.—No. XVII.
Blackwood and Sons.

The Part of this excellent work, just published, contains
an historical, ecclesiastical, statistical, and general account
of the parishes of Dunino, Kennoway, Wemyss, Burnt-
island, Logic, Largo, and Ballingry, in Fifeshire ; and
Dalmellington, Auchinleck, Straiton, Maybole, Dailly, Gir-
van, Barr, Ballintrae, Stevenson, and Old Cumnock in Ayr-
shire. It is embellished with a beautiful map of Forfar-
shire ; and is altogether a work most creditable to the ge-
neral intelligence of the Clergy of the Church of Scotland.
Were the Irish Clergy to undertake a work of this kind,
and execute it with the fidelity characteristic of these
pages, they would indeed confer a real benefit upon the
nation. Is there no enlightened ecclesiastic in Ireland to
set such an undertaking on foot ? Surely it might be
done in such a spirit of impartiality as to make the truth
known, w►thout hurting the feelings of any class of reli-
gionists.

DICK ON DIET AND REGIMEN.
lnittaker, London, 1838.

Another treatise on Diet ! This is about the twentieth
work of the sort that we have been called on to notice
within the last three or four years, so greedy is an English
public of information on dietetic matters. It is dedicated
with singular propriety to an Alderman of the City of
London, the author shrewdly enough conjecturing that in
the estimation of such a man, no species of knowledge can
be half so valuable as that which regards the science of eat-
ing and drinking. The work is penned in an easy, fluent
style, but it is too full of crocbetty theories, as where the
author attributes—we quote his own words—" much of the
unmanly sentimentalism which now offends in Wordsworth's
Bulwer's, Talfourd's, Taylor's pages," to the circumstance
of their not making, like the ancients, "gymnastic exercise,
friction, and baths, a part of their very philosophy !"

THE RIVER AND THE DESERT. 2 Vols.
Colburn, London, 1838.
Under the quaint title of the " River and the Desart,"
Miss Pardee has given us two amusing volumes of travels
and recollections of the Rhone and the Chartreux—in short,
of all that is worth seeing in the south and south-eastern
provinces of France. Her work is written in the form of
letters, and is free from that elaborate ornateness of man-
ner and constant use of gaudy imagery, which disfigured
her otherwise excellent production, entitled the " City of
the Sultan." She here expresses her thoughts in the
simplest and most unadorned language, and indulges in
no set descriptions, but describes the impressions made
on her by the scenery and manners of the various
places she visited, in an easy,
.off-handed manner, just
as she would do in conversation with a familiar friend.
Hence her sketches are full of spirit and vivacity.
Nothing, indeed, can be more effective than her descrip-
tions of Marseilles and the surrounding neighbourhood,
which she visited but a short time after the cholera had
ceased its destructive ravages in that quarter. Her sketches
of Vaucluse, and the enchanting scenery of Avignon,
are not less vivid than picturesque. The designs for the
lithographic engravings with which the " River and the
Desert" are embellished, were, we suppose, furnished by
the authoress herself. They are spirited and vrell selected.

RAFF HALL. 3 Vols.
Colburn, London, 1638.

THE CABINET CYCLOPEDIA, No. C.
London, Longman and Co., 1838.

Three lively, pleasant volumes, written.' n an unaffected
style, and containing one or two characters which the reader
will scarcely fail to recognise as drawn from actual life, not
the still life of books. Mr. Sulivan is the author, a gentle-
man to whom we are also indebted for two volumes of tales
and essays, entitled " Flittings of Fancy," which were pub-
lished a year or two since, and showed that the author had
studied with effect in the school of Addison, Goldsmith,
Mackenzie, and Iring. The present work, if it do much
increase Mr. Sulivan's fame, will, at any rate, not diminish
it. We have no space for extracts, or we could give several
of an amusing character.

This number, or rather volume, brings down the history
of Russia from the death of Catherine the Second in 1796
to the Treaty of Tilsit in 1806—a period as memorable as
any in the Russian annals. The first chapter, which is
exclusively devoted to an examination of the public and
private character of that extraordinary woman, and still
more extraordinary Sovereign, is valuable for the flood of
light which it throws upon the internal state of the empire
during the busy reign of the Czarina. We know of no
history of Russia which we can so well recommend to those
who seek only for a good summary of the leading political
events of that nation, as the one included in the historical
series of Dr. Lardner's Cyclopasdia. A minute history of
the Court of Russia would be invaluable, and we have heard
that Count Nesselrode has collected ample materials for
such awork ; but more than a century must elapse before
the Imperial Government will permit its appearance.