The Sun.
London, England, 1848-11-02 00:00:00

BENTLEY'S MISCELLANY.

The very first page of Bentley this month presents
to our view a most effective drollery by Leech, " Dr.
Dodge in the Apple-room." The school eclogue, of
which this is an illustration, is a dry quaint bit of
humour. George Hodder dishes up a Tete de veau,
au snvon. Abraham Elder furnishes an account of
marvellous wild beast tamer; and Alfred Crowquill
gives a humorous fairy tale, of which the genius of
Crochet is the heroine. These are the lighter ar-
ticles. As a transition from the gay to the grave, we
have Albert Smith's "Recollection of a Cheap Tour."
The corps of Bentley is rich in tourists. Mr. War-
ren continues the narrative of his "Adventures on the
Banks; of the Amazon ;" and the author of " Way-
side Pictures," continues his delightful reminiscences
of Normandy and France. Avranches and Mont
St. Michel are the subjects on which he treats
in this number. His picture of the gloomy
old fortress Mont St. Michel is admirable,
and the legends which he relates of the old Mount
are full of interest, and are excellently well told.
His picture of Avranches, with its hilly streets,
muddy lanes, and picturesque neighbourhood, is a
perfect daguirreotype. The following observations on
the character of the English residents at Avranches
are well worthy the study of all who desire to settle
in remote Continental or Channel islands, or even out-
"
of-the-way English watering places, "to live cheap.
The seeker of " cheap living" presents everywhere
the same characteristics :

"It is a strange thing that we cannot agree amongst
ourselves in settlements which we select for our own
convenience, and where it is so essential to our comfort
to promote cordiality and good-fellowship. But an
Englishmaa carries with him, wherever he goes, two
obstinate antipathies : first, a disrelisb, or contempt, for
everything that is not English ; second, a freezing sus-
picion and distrust of everything that is. He moves in a
repellant atmosphere, shuts himself up in a crust of
prejudices, and has a way of disdaining the people,
whose resources he has come to eat up, and at the same
time of shunning his own countrymen, which is irre-
concilable with common sense. He dislikes the French
because they are French, and avoids the English because
they are English. Such is literally the logic of his
national aversions. In places like Avranehes, which
are selected on the common ground of cheapness, this
latter antipathy shows itself in its most unworthy
aspect. An Englishman will have it believed that every-
body has come there for economy, except himself; and
his conduct implies a sort of superi, rity over them
which must be unintelligible to people like the French,
who never suffer such considerations to interfere with
their sympathies, or interrupt the flow of social inter-
course. The prevailing occupation of a community that
thus sits in judgment on itself is scandal of the meanest
kind. Each individual seems to think the depreciation
of other people's character indispensable to the elevation
of his own. lie shines by the force of contrast. He
makes out his case, not upon its own merits, but by
damaging the case of the gentleman over the way.
Next-door neighbours supply the whole business of life.
They cannot dress, dine, walk without being exposed to
an'incessant inquisition. Habitual defamation gradually
splits up the little colony into factions that have their
distinct, circles holding no intercourse with the rest, and
waging against each other that bitterest of all species of
warfare, which, not content with open manifestations of
derision and hostility, penetrates to the secrets of house-
holds, and strikes its shafts into the eore of domestic life."
We have yet another traveller to whom to pay our
homage—Mrs. Ward, who in the " Emigrant Party"
breaks, comparatively speaking, new ground, and
introduces us to the Boers and Hottentots, and Kafirs
of the wilds of Southern Africa. Mrs. Ward is a
most agreeable traveller, and we trust that this will
not be the last Treck of which she will give
us a narrative. This number is likewise
rich in biography. Besides an account of
the latter years of the Emperor Charles V.,
we have an interesting biography of Maria Edge-
worth, and another of poor Captain Marryat, the
latterillustrated by a life-like portrait. We have
also an elaborate review of the Fairfax manuscripts,
which may likewise, perhaps, be classed under the
head of biography. Maxwell continues his painful
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Lord Eldon—" The law of arrest for debt is a per- f
mission to commit greater oppression and inhumanity [
than are to be met in slavery itself,"