The Sun.
London, England, 1846-01-09 00:00:00

LITERA TURE

JTIURRAY'S 110,1lEa,d COLONIAL LIBRAKY.
Nos. AX V., XXVIII , XXIX.
Borrow's Gipsies in Spain—Pats 1. and H.
The Fall of t.,e Jesuits.
Welcome in its present, or in any shape, is Mr.
George Borrow's account of the Gipsies in Spain :"
it carries with it such a freshness, such an animation,
and such an air of truthfulness and nature, as to
arrest our attention and engage our sympathies.
Hence it is, that although it now appears before us
simply a; a reprint, we turn to it again with all the
undiminished appetite of novelty, ready to wander
once more in its wanderings, to conjecture once more
with its conjectures, to laugh with its laughter, to
meditate with its meditations. By its own unassisted
merits this publication has acquired no inconsiderable
popularity, and the secret of its success is merely
attributable to two facts—first, the extreme novelty
of the undertaking; and, secondly, that whatever is
narrated flows from the minute and personal ob-
servations of one intimately conversant with his sub-
ject. Not only are we introduced to the moral
economy and social peculiarities of the Gitanos on
the peninsula, but in the preliminary chapter par-
ticular sections are allotted to the Zigani of Russia,
the same tribe in Hungary, the Roumauni of Wal-
lachia, and the Gipsies who infest all quarters of the
British dominions—all of these people coining unde
the generic denomination of Rommany, a namer
which they apply to themselves and their language.
In the very outset Mr. Borrow confesses to more
than a partiality for this strange and errant race, and
his adventures place these assurances beyond a doubt,
while they stamp the author as a kind of civilised
Banifylde Moore Carew. Still, besides the fascina-
ti(n of this singular affection, which breathes the
spirit of old story-books, and reminds us forcibly of
theintroduction to I3ulwer's " Disowned," we
possess a guarantee in this very circumstance to the
accuracy and copiousness of the writer's information.
And as every one must place reliance upon the de-
scriptions and assertions of Mr. Catlin with respect to
the Red Indians of North America, in consequence of
his long sojournment and association with them, so
must every credence be awarded to the delineations
given by Mr. Borrow of the various Gipsy hordes in
Spain. It were useless to particularise the plan and
features of a work already so familiar to the English
reader; nevertheless, we may possibly be allowed,
without any accusation of detail, to make a cursory
reference to the fragments of Zincali poetry ap-
pended to the Second Part. These fragments have a
peculiar interest, seeing that the, body forth the
rugged, but fiery, characteristics of a very ancient
people ; and though they raise no pretensions to
rythinecal elegance, they have a nerve and energy of
a remarkable kind. " The Pestilence," for example,
though brief almost to meagreness, contains many
fine thoughts and forcible expressions. The opening,
"I'm resolved novv to tell,
In the speech of gipsy-land,
All the horror that betel
In this city huge and grand,"
breaks in upon the imagination with a sternness of
import most appropriate to the theme; and when
it remarks how God, " in the midst of summertide,
his right hand on high did rear," the picture, though
miniature in size, has a gloom akin to that of Mar-
tin ; and this is admirably summed up in the con-
clusion—

" All a sickly aspect wear:
Say what heart such sights could brook—
Wail and woe where'er you look—
Wail and woe and ghastly care."
Altogether, "Borrow's Gipsies in Spain" bears about
it such a newness of tone and material, that it forms
at) acceptable addition to literature, and Mr. Murray
could not well have selected a better book for reprint
in his serial. An accurate translation of the "Fall
of the Jesuits," by Count Alexis de Saint-Preist—(a
happy name, by the way, for such a volume)—forms
the twenty-fifth part of the " Home and Colonial
Library." Time after time have the nations of
Europe been startled by a formal suppression of that
wonderful body of wonderful men, the disciples of
Ignatius Loyola, and time after thine have they risen
uninjured from the opposition of popes and princes,
to extend the influence of their wily and astute prin.
ciples, and assert their claims to power and perpetua-
tion. The epoch of this temporary downfal, which
is chosen in the present narrative, is perhaps the most
important in their history, namely, in the latter part
of the last century. A period more eventful in every
respect, and one of more historical importance, could
not have been selected, and the narrator specifies each
occurrence which led to the gre:'t catastrophe of the
Jesuits with precision and clearness, even to the mo-
ment when Pius VII. issued his bull, Solicitudo orn-
nium ecclesiarunz, in the August of 1814, reinstating
the society in all their former privileges, and re-
establishing them throughout the length and breadth
of Christendom. As a description of the most re•
markable juncture in the status of the most remark-
able association on the face of the earth, this book is
both valuable and interesting.

ANGLO-INDIAN AND COLOMAL
ALMANACK FOR 1846.

To all who are either interested in or are about to
visit our East Indian possessions, this little volume
offers very great attractions. As a civil, military,
and commercial directory over Bengal, Agra, Madras,
Bombay, Singapore, Malacca, Ceylon, China, &c., it
must form a necessary part of the contents of every
eastward valaise. It is cheap, 'A ell•arranged, and as
complete as it possibly could be under all circum-
stances.

NEWTOA'S REPEII7 ORY OF PATENT L.V-
VEA TiONS.

This monthly catalogue of improvements or in-
ventions in arts, sciences, and manufactures, conti-
nues to be conducted on the sane plan as heretofore.
By this plan it combines clearness and neatness,
while it i., moreover, sufficiently copious in its details
to satisfy the curiosity of all those to whom it more
particularly addresses itself. On these accounts it is
worthy of every support and encouragement.

EXTRAORDINARY DREAM, AND
DISCOVERY OF A DEAD BODY IN CON-
SEQUENCE. _

An Inquest was held before George Hinchliffe, Esq.,
Coroner, at the Scott's Arms, King's Hill-fields, near
Darlaston, on Saturday, the 13thk day of December,
on view of the body of a young girl, fourteen
years old, named Phcebe Devey, who was rather of im-
becile mind, and who had been missing from the house
of her friends ever since the previous Wednesday week,
and no trace of her could be discovered. From the evi-
dence of John Garvey, a moulder, living at Gospel Oak,
it appeared that about five o'clock of the 12th of De-
cember he awoke from a dream, in which he dreamt
that he saw a female named Mary Ann Perry, who
lives in the neighbourhood, taken out of a coal-pit, near
King's Hill-fields, which has ceased working, and which
the witness Garvey had to pass in a morning in going to
his work. He told his wile, who was in bed with him,
what he had dreamt, and she desired him to hold his
noise, as it was ill-luck to tell his dreams fasting.
Garvey left home to go to work about nine o'clock the
same morning, and when ha got near the coal-pit in
question, saw the sister of Mary Ann Perry, to whom
he also told his dream, and she burst out a laughing at
him. Garvey soon afterwards passed the pit; but he
immediately turned back and looked into it, it being
only sixteen yards deep, he saw something lying at the
bottom, and on throwing a stone in, it drops upon ;
some-
thing soft. Garvey became frightened, and
a ran
nt
to
fifty
foundery, where the men were at work, about
k n
yards from the spot, and said he thought there was a
man or woman' in the pit, and two of the workmen re-
turned with him- to the mouth of it. They threw some
stones down, which fell on something soft. Garvey then
went again to the foundery, for a light and some string,
which on being lowered down the pit, the body of a per,
son was seen at the bottom. A man named Michael
Keeling was let down the pit, when he discovered at the
bottom of it the body of a young female, quite dead.
On being brought to the top, it was discovered to be
when
knee,en t
that of the deceased, Phcebe Devey, The body was con-
veyed to the house of her friends, where it underwent
werewas b foundoke n that
and
that her
on
tphairgthicualnadr
leegx,aamnidnaatilosno
herthere was a slight wound her r 9
head, all of which
might be occasioned in case she had walked into the pit.
There were no other marks or appearance of violence on
her person; and the jury, after
alengthened and patient
investigation, returned a verdict " That the deceased was
found dead at the bottom of a coal pit, but how or by
what means she came there no •
evidence appeared to the
jurors.”—Staffordshire Advertiser.

MYSTERIOUS DISAPPEARANCE.-011 Friday, the
26th ult., a girl, eleven years cf age, named Sarah Ann
Malthouse, who re,sidedvith her parents in Monk-terrace, in
the suburbs of this city, disappeared, and has not since been
heard of. Her mother had cent her on an errand, and she never
returned. The girl, who has dark eyes and hai-, had on at
the time a blue merino dress and a black apron, but no bon-
net; a light-clovred silk handkerchief was also thrown
across her shoulders. Inquiries have this week been
made at Leeds among her friends respecting her, but with-
out success, and the mother yesterday made au application
to the York magistrates for advice in the matter, when they
recommended her to issue placards in some of the principal
:owns in the county. We hope this paragraph will meet
the eye of some one who can give such information as will
lead to the discovery of the girl.—York Herald.

THE LATE BOILER EXPLOSION. ANOTHER
DEATIL—About eight o'clock on Sunday morning another
death, making the total number fifteen, was added to the list
of victims by the late calamitous explosion at the mill of
Messrs. Rothwell and Kitts. The deceased was a little girl,
named Ann Hardman, aged eight years, who was crossing
the factory yard, and had got to the door of the house where
ghee lived, when the explosion took place.—Munclaster
Guardian.

THE FREEDOM OF ELECTlON.—Alderman Gibbs
has been elected—that is to say, has elected himself again—
churchwarden of Walbrook. He proposed himself, seconded
himself, voted for himself, and declared himself elected. He
then returned thanks in a neat speech to himself in the glass,
and concluded by giving three cheers for himself. In the
evening the Hon. Gentleman dined with his constituents.
Covers were laid for one.—Puxch.

There are now living no less than fourteen persons
who have held the office of Clerk of the orchuince, namely :
—Lord Shaftesbury, Mr, Ward, Sir George Clerk, Mr. Per.
cival, Sir Henry Hardinge, Right Hon. C. T. D'Eyncourt,
Right Hon. T. F. Kennedy, Colonel Maberly, Col. Sir A. L.
Hay, Admiral Sir Edward Owen, Admiral Dundas, Hon.
colonel Anson, Captain Bolder°, and Lord Arthur Lennox.