The Sun.
London, England, 1846-11-02 00:00:00

No. 16,886. LONDON, MONDAY EVENING N 7 NOVEMBER 2, 1846.

FIFTY POUNDS REWARD.
CAUTION TO BANKERS AND OTHERS.
LOST in MANCHESTER between the hours
of Twelve at noon and Five in the afternoon, on TUESDAY, the
Ist day of April, 1845, a 5001. BANK of ENGLAND NOTE, dated
London, January 12, 1344—T F 94,911, Parking, 5001.—payment of
which is stopped.
The above reward will be paid upon restoration of the Note to Mr.
Richard Beswick, Chief Superintendent of the Manchester Police,
at the Town-hall, Manchester ; or to the Superintendent of the City
Police, chief offices, Old Jewry, London.
Manchester, April 18, 1846.

THE ELECTRIC TELEGRAPH.—The prin-
ciple of this valuable invention is clearly demonstrated by
Professor Bachhoffner in his Morning and Evening LECTURES at
the ROYAL POLYTECHNIC INSTITUTION. Dr. Ryan's CHEMI-
CAL LECTURES, daily, and en the Evenings of Mondays, Wed-
nesdays, and Fridays. The principles and uses of the WORKING
MODELS, and other specimens of the Useful Arts, are explained to
the visitors. The OPAQUE MICROSCOPE. The OXY-HYDROGEN
MICROSCOPE, by CARY. re-produced with the most interesting
objects. The latest DISSOLVING VIEWS, by Charles Smith, are
of great interest and beauty.
Admission, ls. ; Schools, Half-price.

NATIONAL ANTI-POOR-LAW PROVI-
DENT AND BENEVOLENT UNION.
A PUBLIC MEETING will be held on TRIIIISDAT next, at the
London Tavern, Bishopsgate-street, at One o'clock precisely, of gen-
tlemen desirous of bettering the condition of the well-disposed mem-
bers of the working classes.
The Right Hon. the LORD MAYOR in the Chair.

NATIONAL ANTI-POOR-LAW PROVI•
DENT AND BENEVOLENT UNION.

Mr. B. B. CABBELL begs to acknowledge the receipt of letters
from the Clergy, Ministers, and Laity, of various denominations, in
support of the above proposed Institution, but regrets that from the
number an 1 importance of their communications, it will be impossible
to give them due consideration until after the Public Meeting on
THURSDAY next shall have taken place.
Temple, October 30, 1846.

INCORPORATED LAW SOCIETY LEC-
TURES, 1846-47.
THREE COURSES of LECTURES will be delivered in the Hall
of the Society, on MONDAY and FIUDAY Evenings in the Months of
Novasnotur DEOEMBES, JANUARY, FEBRUARY, and MARCH next, at
Eight o'clock precisely.
EQUITY and BANKRUPTCY LECTURES, by SAMUEL MIL-
LER, Esq.
During the ensuing session the subjects of these Lectures will be—
I. On the Jurisdiction of Courts of Equity in relation to Equitable
Mortgages.
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5. The Alterations effected in the Practice of Courts of Equity by
the recent General 0: ders in relation to Appearance and
Answers, Pleas and Demurrers.
6. The Law and Practice of Bankruptcy, with regard to Acts of
Bankruptcy, and the Proof of Debts.
COMMON LAW and CRIMINAL LAW LECTURES, by JAMES
P. WILDE, Esq.
Insurance.—Marine—Fire—Life.
The Sale of G•)ods.
The Law of Guarantee.
The Relation of Husband and Wife.
The Law of Conspiracy.
The Law regulating Unlawful Meetings and Assemblies.
CONVEYANCING LECTURES, by FIELDING NALDER, Esq.
The Origin and Progress of the Law of Real Property.
Estates, their Nature, Qualifies, and Incident., including Estate in
Fee Simple—Estate Tail—Estate for Life—Estate Tail after
Possibility—Curtesy —Dower—Jointure—Attendant Terms
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Common.
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—Deeds deriving their Effect from the Statute of Uses.
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Law Society's Hall, October, 1846.
ROBERT MAUGHAIii, Secretary.

LITERATURE.
THE QUARTERLY REVIEW. No. CLVI.
Carrying out the principle that extremes meet, the
commencement and the conclusion of the present
number constitute its chief attraction. In the first
article we are afforded a very interesting retrospect
of the origin and prosecution of the " Fortifications
of Paris;" in the last article the reviewer obliges the
world with some additional observations upon the
" Close of Sir Robert Peel's Administration." Upon
the former theme we cannot reflect for a single
moment without entertaining sentiments of the
deepest sorrow, and, to a certain extent, of absolute
humiliation. What might not have been the condition of
France at this moment, supposing those fortifications to
have been in existence during the past two centuries ?
Might not the shackles of feudality have still debased
her population ? Might not her citizens have still
been liable to an endless incarceration at the will of
some arbitrary sovereign, by the signature of a lettre
de cachet? Might not the rights of property have
been still rendered precarious by confiscation,
and the national revenues have been still
sustained by the infliction of despotic im-
posts ? Had Paris been girdled by those
massive battlements, and tiveatened with 2,188
pieces of heavy ordnance awl/ 120 field guns, is it
possible that ,Delaunay would have been compelled
to yield the Bastille ? Would the mob have been
able so readily to reach the tennis-court of Versailles
in 1789, and to drag Louis XVI. into the capital in
that bacchanalian triumph which was inaugurative of
their emancipation ? Would not Lafayette, instead
of pleading at the bar of the Assembly for the resti-
tution of what he designated the constitutional
powers to the monarch, would he not rather have
marched direct upon the metropolis at the head of his
legions and have battered their chimney-pots about
the ears of the Parisians ? It is from the considera-
tion of these facts, from a knowledge that anything
like a successful-combat against a feudal despotism,
or a confederated oligarchy, in the event of either of
those malign authorities having been armed origi-
nally with such repressive instruments as
these fortifications, that we reflect upon their
foundation and completion with such unmitti-
gated sorrow. It is because we are persuaded that
such an auxiliary might, in 1791, have rendered the
royal confederates of Pilnitz triumphant, because
we conceive it might have tended to the yet more
signal debasement of the tiers etat, because, in fine,
in those fortifications we recognise the antagonism of
the grandest struggle for the attainment of constitu-
tional liberty ever adventured in civilised times, that
we are disposed to lament the extraordinary struc-
tures so recently raised round the Fremh capital.
Those embattlements might unquestionably guard
Paris from the invading forces of a Blucher, a Wel-
lington, or an Alexander; but it is infinitely more
than probable they would prevent an outraged people
from punishing the profligate domination of a Ca-
lonne, or of thwarting the peddling inefficiency of a
Necker. We are somewhat puzzled to conjecture
the motives which could have influenced M. Thiers in
acceding to the proposition for their erection during the
recess of 1841. Possibly that sagacious statesman
did not regard them with those apprehensions in a
contingent emergency which lire rendered inevitable
at this advanced period. Possibly the expense which
they had already entailed upon the Exchequer in that
year, namely, 5,600,000/., did not afford him an ade-
quate conception of the enormous sum they have since
required for their completion. The Quarterly Re-
view avouches that these works at Paris will fully
answer the purpose of what its writer supposes to be their
original purpose, of "putting the capital in a cage!"
There's a reflection for the revolutionists of 1830 !
Paris put in a cage I Much valuable information in
castrametation and the science of fortification, par-
ticularly as applied to modern times, and especially
as in reference to our neighbours and their metro-
polis, may be gleaned from this contribution. - In the
terminatingpaper of this number, the most remarkable
feature is a quotation from a work published in 1845,
by M. Capefigue, and entitled Rommes d' Etat. The
predictions of that French historian, while they some-
times evince his discernment, and illustrate, iu a dis-
tinguished manner, that remark of Edmund Burke,
that " foreigners are a kind of contem-
poraneous posterity," are mingled, nevertheless, with
the most egregious and extravagant day-dreams.
What shall we say of that vaticination, "Si l'lrlande
persiste, ce sera M. Peel qui consentira a sa separation,
a son Parlement national, a difaire l'ceuvre de cin•
quainte ans?" What again shall we say of that
companion prophecy, " Que les Radicaux, a leer tour,
persistent, it viendra peut4tre un jour oil M. Robert
Peel accomplira la r4form,e absolue avec le Parlement
annuel, a la fawn de Cobbett et de Hunt ?" If the
felicitous assurance of another paragraph " gee Sir
Robert Peel a tue le parti Tory," may be taken as a
conclusive testimony of M. Capefique s claim to be
considered auracular, Mr. O'Connell may exult in the
anticipated achievement of the repeal ; while the
shades of the great Member for Oldham and of Henry
Hunt will rejoice at the prophetic realisation of their
visions. But not unless. Throughout this article in
the Quarterly we can discern the disappointment of the
agriculturists still rankling under an affectation of re-
signation; we can still discern the animosity
to the late Premier beneath a film of in-
sidious flattery; we can still recognise the
old stubbornness of monopoly renewing itself again
and again, after it had been as repeatedly vanquished
by the indisputable facts and overwhelming logic of
the more intelligent advocates for free trade. We
shall not waste our own time, or that of our readers,
by going over the same arguments which have al-
ready been repeated a thousandfold in our own co-
lumns, and which arguments, though in almost every
disinterested man's mouth, whether in Parliament or
out of Parliament, especially during the past ten
months, this reviewer seems never to have heard.
The old sophisms which Mr. Cobden has exposed long
since, which have been likewise dissipated by Mr.
Bright, Mr. Villiers, and Mr. Milner Gibson, spe-
cious phantoms of objections which have in some in-
stances been laid by the pamphlets of Colonel Thomp-
son, and the letters by Mr. Fox in the League news-
paper, are here revived, as though their flimsiness
were not apparent to ninety-nine per cent, of the
population. In a similar manner the truths of free
trade—apparent as the moon at its full to
almost everybody else—are still utterly invisible
to the writer. When Galileo first published his nun-
cius siderius, declaring among other marvels the ex-
istence of satellites in the vicinity of Jupiter, and the
periodical disappearance and reappearance of spots
upon the disc of the sun, one of that great man's an-
tagonists, a peripatician and a rival professor, gravely
printed a book, in which he declared that he had a
telescope of his own, that he had looked through that
telescope, that the assertions of Galileo Galilei were
monstrous mistatements, that the surface of the sun
was emaculate, that Jupiter was unattended by satel-
lites ! What that peripatician was to astronomy, these
protectionists are to political economy. They have
all the evidences of their senses, all the assurances of
the most eminent authorities, from Dr. Adam Smith
downwards, all the testimony of experience, calling
new-declaredu p o tem t o a
pc kr
innocwlei
p ledsg; e t
yh
ee
t,truitnhffautlunaetsesd of
wtiht
he
their antiquated system, just as Galileo's
enemy was with the exploded doctrines of
hAarni sdtso talge,a
itnhsety
their volu n teaarrisl clos
e declare their eytehsa, presstth they
yt heir
see
and hear nothing which can induce them to forsake
their venerable policy. Notwithstanding this wilful
pertinacity, we are still sanguine as to the acknow-
ledgement of the advantages of an unrestricted corn-
merce even by the bitterest antagonists of the recent
Parliamentary innovations. Not only, however, is
the writer in the Quarterly convinced of the impro-
bability of such a change among the English protec-
tionists, but his scepticism is of a gigantic and cos-
mopolitan order. "On the whole, then," says he,
" we are more and more convinced by all we read,
and see, and hear, from all quarters, that the promise
that our free-trade mania is likely to meet with any-
thing like the reciprocity from any foreign powers
of the New World or the Old, will turn out to be
a lamentable deception." A wonderful conclusion to
arrive at, truly ! Why the very American tariff; over
which he has been exulting in the preceding para-
graph, is a step taken in the right direction. It is
rvcstpattwhhphiolraerehaauaonewtttgerarssrchdweaeaeayi
t.
progression
are being
ecoahceboncieNemepassionti
aolgrant,l:ifgrdefefruo ignorantmd rcicreseeae
adduced. Does
eosuttoefr
votaries
arndnr
orit
ehses
Boatses
mercantileecieptel
sthmrl
fact
gievnainniecnuocitatiootmtpt
operation
is_toelheehy rnsa
eat
instancehto avifrasom
only a single and comparatively unsatisfactory step,
laibneraassurance
s
reviewer
s thesetitineei
hnl
grwea Western
ancient
rrel
nnaahi
endea-
vours hemi-
sphere.
eemeoetroennhaawi
.tesl-
e statesu a te
do f
witht a Italy
the andbs
Cobden,
same
rDwmhoheaenons yfi
he ahee rnee
not
wobatiessiphnki
egrnsaotrt
wioanpnhi
tsdohll
aydtt
uihnpta nht
toa
oat-
second League is on the eve of formation in the
samem
Ib e Iberian aRn peninsula?nhard
o
public reprobation as a political firebrand, and as an
ani s s receivingr
nagkindh
cohf
mot'a gi t aa tl tor
ovationand ah
idtehme aEg ongr
nupee,
he is passing ? As to the "intelligent American
gentleman," (a friend of a friend of the writer in the
Quarterly Review), who designates the farewell speech
of Sir Robert Peel on the occasion of his late retirement
from office " a parting stab to the interests he had

abandoned," we can only answer that the majority
of the countrymen of that great minister look back
to that incident, and to the sentiments then avouched
by him, as the most admirable of his whole public
career. Yes ; let us repeat that noble peroration of
that most memorable address—let us repeat it, not to
constitute it, like the reviewer, a text for invidious
insinuations, but to reanimate, if that be necessary.
the gratitude of the English people to one of their most
self-forgetful benefactors, and one of their most self-
sacrificing patriots.
" I shall leave office, I fear, with a name severely
censured by many Honourable Gentlemen, who, on
public principle, deeply regret the severance of party
ties—who deeply regret that severance, not from any in-
terested or personal motives, but because they believe
fidelity to party engagements—the existence and main-
tenance of a great party—to constitute a powerful in-
strument of government. * * • I shall leave a
name execrated by every monopolist, who, from less ho-
nourable motives, maintains protection for his own in-
dividual benefit ; but it may be that I shall leave a name
sometimes remembered with expressions of good will, in
those places which are the abode of men whose lot it
is to labour, and to earn their daily bread by the sweat
of their brow—a name remembered with expressions of
good will, when they shall recruit their exhausted
strength with abundant and untaxed food, the sweeter
because it is no longer leavened by a sense of injustice.'
Upon those beautiful and elevated anticipations of
Sir Robert Peel, the reviewer raises a multitude of
others of a lowering and ominous character ; he dis-
cerns, as the consequence of the glorious measures
passed under the auspices of that Prime Minister, the
future misfortune and possibly bankruptcy of this
empire, instead of its prosperity and increasing opu-
lence; and from the repeal of the corn-laws, he looks
forward to the abrogation of other laws yet more inti-
mately blended with the elementary principles of the
constitution. With this trepidation we, of course,
have no sympathy
.whatever; but from the establish •
ment of free trade we anticipate the correction of other
and still greater blemishes in our Legislature, and, if
that be possible, the ultimate perfection of this triple
Government. We have commented at such length
upon these two most important and attractive articles,
that we have precluded ourselves from any especial
reference to the remainder. We must however in
justice observe, that the one upon "Education," the
one upon the "Cathedral of Cologne," and another
upon "Constantinople in the Fourth Century," are
eminently worthy of a place in this eminent publica-
tion.

MAGAZINE DAY .
BLACKWOOD.
Curious and most charming is the article entitled
" Luigia de Medici"—an article conceived and written
in a gentle and loving spirit. For those individuals
who are not familiar with Florentine biography it
may be as well to premise at once, that the beautiful
maiden whose name is here mentioned was the fourth
daughter, and the seventh and youngest child, of
Lorenzo the Magnificent and his wife Clarice Orsini.
Consequently, the ever-memorable and ever-glorious
Cosmo de Medici, him whom the grateful citizens of
Florence christened Pater Patrice, was the great-
grandfather of Luigia. The purpose of the writer is one
which cannot fail to enlist all the sympathies of those
who can sympathise with the sorrows of one of the
most extraordinary geniuses Italy or the world ever
saw. It is to demonstrate the fact that Michel
Angelo Buonarotti—the sculptor, the architect, the
painter, the poet, that wonderful man, merely to
mention whom Sir Joshua Reynolds conceived to be
the most fitting and dignified mode of terminating
his lectures as President of the Royal Academy—it
is to prove that the heart of this great man loved in
his youth, that it loved with an ardour proportioned
to the intensity of his high nature, that his affection
was not improbably reciprocated, that the object of
his devotion was none other than Luigia
de Medici, and that her premature decease
tended to confirm and enhance the anvterity of the
character of Michel Angelo. More o ' laity, cer-
tainly, does not exist in the biograph ny man of
comparable celebrity with reference tote early de-
velopment of his disposition, and the tribulations to
which he was subjected at the very outset of his
career, than that which shrouds the history of the
boyhood of Angelo. It is generally regarded as
questionable, whether the passion which he himself
indicates in his writings was real or supposititious. It
is presumed by many that his poetical productions
were rather the embodiment of his vagrant medita-
tions than the outpourings of human emotion. The
theme of his verses—
" The form of beauty and the soul of grace,"
is conceived by the majority of scholars to have been
a merely visionary object of his adoration. From
these prevalent opinions the writer in Blackwood
altogether dissents; and, although Buonarotti was
most scrupulous never to reveal the name of the being
to whom his poetry was particularly addressed, or, in-
deed, to indicate, in any way, the identity of her
whom to have loved under his circumstances
would have been regarded as a grievous presumption,
this writer, from a variety of collateral circumstances,
is persuaded that it could have alone been Luigia. In en-
deavouring to " carry his point," he quotes largely from
the delicious sonnettos and madrigales of Michel Angelo
—pieces which, supposing his chisel and brush to have
been wholly inactive, would inevitably have acquired
for him a very considerable celebrity as an emulator
of the fame of Petrarch. It is in truth, solely because
their lustre is eclipsed by the transcendant glory of
his creations in high art, that these poems are now so
little appreciated, and so generally unknown. After
a perusal of those sonnets it will be impossible for the
most fastidious to gainsay the merits of Buonarotti
as an author, and but few will be adventurous enough
to deny that they were dictated at moments when his
whole soul was excited with positive admiration, with
actual trepidation, or with real woe. Living under
the roof of his patron, the Magnificent Lorenzo, and
forming one of his household, Michel Angelo never-
theless conquered himself so far as to have main-
tained a strict silence upon what was nearest to his
heart. The Laura of Petrarch, the Caterina of
Camoens, the Eleonora of Tasso, the Beatrice of
Dante, exercised no more fascination over the minds
of those great poets than did Luigia over that of
Buonarotti. To that devotion the affection of
Abelard for lleloise was most earthly, that of
Rousseau for Madame Warens most inane,
that of Waller for Sacharissa most fantastic.
And when we remember the premature death of
Luigia immediately before the downfal and banish-
ment of her once illustrious house; when we call to
our recollection that noble epitaph written by him
upon her dissolution, and which the writer in Black-
wood calls, with much truth, "sublime"—words that
are placed in the mouth of the deceased—"/ was a
mortal, now lam an angel. The world knew me for
a little space, and I possess heaven for ever. 1 rejoice
at the glorious chance, and exult over the death which
struck, to lead me to eternal life I"—when we remember
these things, and remember also that pathetic exclama-
tion of Michel Angelo--" Children I shall not have,
except the works I shall leave behind me," we cannot
regard this incident in the history of letters without
the most peculiar interest. We are grateful to the
writer of Blackwood for this elegant contribution, and
to the editor for its insertic,n. In two other respects,
however, this month, we are disappointed with "Chris-
topher North." We are disappointed with him for the
admission of such articles as those entitled " Advice
to an intended Serialist" and " Things in General "
into the generally fastidious Maga. We re-
member well a dinner being given some
few years ago at Edinburgh to Mr. Charles Dickens,
we remember " Christopher North " was in the chair,
and we particularly well remember how that same
" Christopher North " uttered a well-deserved pane-
gyric upon Mr. Dickensesphtehaetai
tahlgfloeyerrnefi
for
rs
appears
was
thegea
sae
rnesgi
oueutsuopt l
ieeeuvdusi
to
gentleness
evinced
and
en
ucin
dae
OHaikTAI nhsniifeheosndoaterdnahwrairtepetl
hreioaitoiipftyn:sfie,
tnsirew surprisedgeetnanhisnstoedeh realityn
called adm wn.
most
rd has:i
wt:
vulgaritync
nothingwhAyd vulgar
gvl arn tergiversationpumi
zeogeresmore
tof
i onm s slang
ge
andpersonality part b a
anld_ of
and Hfael l
sf.ofrogueltso
ffhihsi former
Serialist e ulo,-,
to
be havem o
whos et v e
against
causticl s
supposedencountered.w andhoi
whom
funny,n t
oe
the
hbeleert
is
'bi uCevidently
nh
rememberedern‘
intended
' .'t'do ice to an Intendedm by
proxy!
• isD eveniDickens
e then s
du ep r dt
oa s
theh.
derisionlt is
ofn
theattempt
public,
sd tt
voholduend is‘i.
,tCharles•
vely de-
signated,ighht_owei:Tl:r. ,
8 the kitten
ng
quality
ot
fh e o
tfs
he re i candour.a lai
TShmeitwh..ortl„hsTG, hoeordet_wßiaa
recipient
the person
d,,1
began it," &c., prove sufficiently Jean" intendedc. pasqui-
nade• on the
article
is
ntor the
ec
redeeming
e•
e emmentioned;r ei
• mistakingci
evv
whichi t without te transcrib-
ingshou should
h preserved—Glade to join you—Cup of existence
mony
_,.
n evident true t.of •
. sle Jingle.
—Gall at bottom,'
Isa
of the '
nade upon the
Morp.enßinigngoo,s.
written. The
article we should not
'twore the kitten"
won't you take a drop of
a considerable
mightl vent somethink
sorry to do.
be enabled to
—" that's my
on my toes !" We could
summat"—" I thought you
'cos you vos a
such nonsense was really printed
scarcely credit that
in the pages of our venerable Ebony, and were fain
givele peofirttitoiengosfamitp;
' n to the wrapper, where, sun
to turn for corroboration
portrait of the old sage, sur-
roundedenough, there was the
garland of thistle, and above,
"ru'—in eun"—"
by his immortal
treadin'

in legible characters, No. CCCLXXIII. The paper
headed " Things in General " has likewise
several blemishes, but with these it has
many sensible and sagacious observations.
The reflections upon the Montpensier marriage, for
example, are shrewd and timely. The remarks upon
the English press in general, and upon the London
daily press in particular, are deserving of especial
attention. But when the writer expressly goes out
of his way to call the eminent members of the British
Association "twaddling ninnies," and speaks of the
" childish inanity" of their exhibitions, we conceive he
is stepping somewhat out of his province. He says
that scarcely anything is to be heard at such annual
assemblages except " senile garrulity, the gabble of
ignorant eulogy, or virulent, envious depreciation and
detraction." And this is said, moreover, with a vivid
recollection of the masterly address of Sir Roderick
Murchison, with the admirable tribute uttered by
Lord Palmerston, and with the attendance of such
men as Herschel, Oersted, and Buckland at the
:ate meeting in Southampton ! Senile garrulity !
Twaddling ninnies ! The writer is, moreover, ex-
ceedingly morose with Mr. Dickens. He guar
rels with the first number of " Dombey and
Son," because of Mr. Chick humming to himself
Right loorul ; and yet he, himself, in page 635,
obliges the reader with " Bow, wow, wow, wow !"
He objects to the painful minuteness of Mr. Dickens's
style of description ; and yet, in page 626, he him-
self tells us that he took with him into the country
"a stock of Lee's port and sherry—six pounds of real
tea—three bottles of whisky—four of anchovy paste
—two pounds of mustard, &c. &c.," as if any one
cared one straw about the contents of his larder,
wine-cellar, spice-box, and so forth ! Again, he is
excited to indignation by Mr. Dickens giving us such
an elaborate account of a race between two watches,
and yet he himself fills an entire column of the maga-
zine with a highly interesting harangue delivered by
himself (the writer) to his (the writer's) dog, and
wherein the said dog is addressed as " a little sinner,"
as "doggy," and by other equally sensible titles.
When we find him at another moment quoting that
comical passage about Dombey's son, who, lying
in his cradle with his little fists curled up and
clenched, "seemed in his feeble way," says "Boz," " to
be squaring at existence for having come upon him so
unexpectedly," when we find the writer transcribing
this in large letters, placing three notes of admiration
after it, and calling it " the brutal idea of a prize-
fighter," we perceive that he has no capacity what-
ever for appreciating what is extravagantly humour-
ous. In other respects this article is pleasant and
readable. " Prussian Military Memoirs" is an agree-
able contribution. The " Marlborough Dispatches,"
and " A New Sentimental Journey," are continued
with spirit ; and these, with a trenchant criticism on
" Mohun Lal's Life of Dost Mohammed Khan," and
a laborious inquiry into the " Operation of the Eng-
lish Poor-laws," compose a very varied and rather
unequal number of Blackwood.

TAIT.
A perfectly astonishing title is given to the fore-
most article in this number of Tait—" Pas,sages in
the Life of a Literary Blackguard." It is the exten-
sion of the biography of the notorious " Pietro Are-
tino," as given in the commencement of that great
Biographical Dictionary issued by the Society for the
Diffusion of Useful Knowledge, and which if pro-
perly supported by the public might even yet be a
splendid national work. And a wonderful " black-
guard" this same Pietro was unquestionably; a
villain, a poltroon, a debauchfte a parasite, a mercenary
swordsman under Giovanni Medici, a public mendi-
cant when residing in Venice, an insolent charlatan
in the very title-pages of his books, a calumniator, a
liar, a publisher of infamous sonnets and obscene en-
gravings—a fellow who abused his friends when they
were overwhelmed with misfortune, and who after a
life illustrated with the perpretration of almost every
imaginable atrocity received extreme unction when
stretched upon his death-bed, and perished with that
brutal jest upon his lips, that, seeing his body was
now well oiled, his attendants would do well to keep
the rats from eating him ! The writer of this article
in the magazine observes at the outset that he intends
it to constitute a kind of literary scarecrow. He
had remarked " a battered leaden statue of a half-
naked man on horseback," in the area fronting the
Edinburgh courts of justice, and finding that
it was erected to the memory of the " pious"
and " unconquered" King Charles the Second,
he declares that the very sight of it was " enough to
make any man, for the moment, a republican:' Con-
ceiving that a wholesome moral might be extracted
from the contemplation of such a sculptured effigy,
and that some sound lessons in government might be
drawn from the mere inscription, he looks for an
analogous memento and warning in the department
of literature. For the nonce he hits upon Pietro
Aretino; and undoubtedly he could not have selected
a more appropriate scoundrel. There is something
infinitely astonishing in the history of this remark-
able person. Perfectly uneducated, and without even
the semblance of good principles, he adventures, at
the ripe age of five-and-thirty, upon the fabrication
of a literary celebrity. Without genius, without
even any very remarkable talent, without being
scholarly, without patronage, without money, without
character, he nevertheless fabricated for himself a
fame which extended over every portion of Europe,
and penetrated even into Asia, and assumed a con-
spicuous position in the dawning of the sixteenth
century. He was the friend of Titian, of Tinto-
retto, and of nearly all his most illustrious
contemporaries ; he was the correspondent of the va-
rious Italian princes, of the monarchs of Germany,
France, Poland, Portugal, Spain, and England ; he
was the stipendiary of all the leading statesmen of the
time ; he frequently received bounties from the cof-
fers of Sultan Solyman, and drew largely upon the
spoil of Barbarossa the pirate. He styled himself
" The Scourge of Princes" while penning the most
pitiable and sycophantic petitions to the different so-
avtertehiegnens
d;
ohfednseigunmeednhtaimlasdeelfn'w‘ PitehtefraltahiteieTa
;ruatphpteenlldeerd"
to his name the epithet " The Divine," though his
whole life was notoriously mean and vicious • and at
other moments called himself " Peter, by the grace
of God a Free Man," though he battoned on the fickle

favour of kings. Anythinimore astonishing, whether
for deliberate audacity, for utter degradation, or for
flagrant immorality can scarcely be adduced in the
whole range of letters. The contributor has done
well in producing this biographical paper ; it will
serve a high purpose ; it will be the warning he de-
sires it to be, and will demonstrate by the gloomy
contrast of crime, the lustrous purity of virtue.
" the Belle " is concluded with much sprightliness,
and we have a promise of the termination of Mrs.
Gore's story in December. Among the poetical con-
tributions for this month we cannot discern a single
verse worthy of commendation. " The Dove "is so
weak and tame in its nature that we conjectured it
must be what Bottom calls a " sucking dove," Some
of the rhymes are especially vile, for instance the
second and fourth " bind " and " joined," which
imply a cockney euphony, as thus :

"Hail, emblem of the dearest tie
That human hearts can bind,
Love's all-devoted constancy
When kindred souls are jined !"
"The Tairy Ladye's Love," again, reminds us of
the everlastingly still small voice. The translation
from the French of Augusta Barbier, in which
France is typified as a mare, and Napoleon as a
demon-rider, breathes terribly of the orange peel and
sawdust of Franconi's. The best verse is that descrip-
tive of France, young, vigorous, and untainted, at the
period of the Republic :
" The eye of fire set in her slender head
Shot forth a tameless ray ;
Reared up erect the whole world she dismayed
With her shrill savage neigh."
An elaborate analysis of Dr. Brown's "Ethical Lec-
tures," and a careful review of Dr. Alexander's
"Switzerland and the Swiss Churches," together with
several other literary notices of less pretension,
complete the light literature of Tait for November.
The political article for this month is almost as great
a curiosity as in October; it is now, however, con-
fined to the consideration of Irish destitution and our
foreign diplomacy. With reference to the present
condition of Ireland, Tait gives rather too bitter a
home thrust to both landlords and peasantry—it de-
clares that "every Irishman is from this moment a
pauper or a semi-pauper, supported half by work,
and half by extras from the parish"—the landowners
praying for grants to improve their land by drainage,
and so forth—the peasantry pleading for grants to
pay them Government wages for Government employ-
ment. Supposing it were literally true that all
Irishmen were paupers, this is surely not the
moment for the announcement of that pain-
ful fact, for flinging the reproach in the
teeth of our countrymen across St. George's
Channel. The Irish are starving ; let us wait till they
be extricated from that abyss before we dream of
balancing the interests of the state. The observations
which follow upon our foreign relations are singular
enough. We transcribe one paragraph :
" The function of Government, in regard to foreign
affairs, is the same as its function in regard to domestic.

Its sole office is to protect the citizen or subject in the
free exercise of his lawful rights, and compel him to dis-
charge his lawful duties. The merchant, or any other
person who ventures abroad for profit or pleasure, re-
tains his claim for protection upon his native Govern-

In ,nt. The merchant, or other, who remains at home,
but engages in negotiations with subjects of other Go-
vernments, or with subjects of his own resident abroad,
must, if they refuse to fulfil their engagements, endea-
vour to force them through the ministry of his own. The
limited business of Government, outside of its own domi-
nions, is to take care that the persons and property of its
subjects are safe. To this end fleets and military stations,
on distant shores, aro maintained, in order that the police
of the high seas may be maintained, or aid kept at hand
in the vicinity of barbarous tribes who respect not the
laws of civilized nations. To this end consuls are main-
tained in great trading ports and inland emporia, and
diplomatic envoys at seats of government. The busi
ness of our admirals and commandants at our military
stations is to serve as a substitute for police in regions of
the world's surface where there is no established go-
vernment ; to protect all Britons, tray( !hug on their
lawful occasions by sea or by land, from assaults of
pirates or robbers at all times ; from assaults of national
forces with whom we may he at war; from aggressions
on the part of belligerents when neutral. The business
of our consuls is to see that justice be neither denied nor
unduly withheld, nor sold at an extortionate price to
British subjects, within limits to which they are ap-
pointed; and to promote the business of residents at
home from whom their rights are withheld. The busi-
ness of diplomatic agents (by whatever name known), at
seats of government, is to care for the personal immu-
nities of their fellow-subjects within the territories of
the Government to which they are accredited; to.nego-
tiate for the reform of any laws or ordinances militating
against the interests of their country; to watch any alli-
ances or hostilities which the Government near which
they are, may contract or engage in; and, under the
direction of the Foreign Secretary, to endeavour to give
affairs such a turn as to avert any partial restrictim
upon our commerce that might be the result of the one,
or any accidental dangers to the persons and property of
British subjects that might proceed from the other."
So far unquestionably the writer has enumerated
some of the principal responsibilities and duties of the
agents of the Foreign Department ; but he has en-
tirely overlooked two very important points upon
which the Spanish marriage encroaches—we mean
the preservation of the balance of power in Europe,
and the prevention of the violation of solemn treaties.
The balance of European power is endangered by
this alliance between the royal families of Spain and
France ; a solemn treaty is violated by disregarding
the stipulations of the one signed at Utrecht ; and
when England protests in dignified and decisive terms,
France evades the interference, first by an ungenerous
silence, and secondly by a deceitful subterfuge. Never
had England more cause for complaint or indig
nation.

BENTLEY'S MISCELLANY.
Bentley opens this month with the first chapter of
a new novel by Cooper, entitled " Captain Spike ; or
the Islets of the Gulf." The scene is laid in America
in the present day, and in the opening chapter we
have an account of the sailing of Captain Spike in
his good ship Molly Swash, from Manhattan. The
Swash is a suspicious sort of craft, which has in
former days been employed as a privateer, and Cap-
tain Spike himself seems to be more of a smuggler and
pirate than of a regular trader. His mate, Mulford, is
evidently intended to be the lover of the tale, and the
heroine, Hose Budd, is, with her aunt, embarked in
the Molly Swash. The crew are rough and ready,
and old Josh, the negro steward, is the " funny "
man, at least of this chapter. The Molly Swash, in
sailing through the passage of "Hell Gate," is pur-
sued by a boat containing two men, whose approach
it is evident Captain Spike has some reason to dread,
and in endeavouring to avoid them, he runs his vessel
upon the Pot rock. We are glad to meet
with Cooper at sea once more. It is his
native element, and even in this single chapter he has
managed so to enlist the interest of the reader, that
having once begun it, it is impossible to lay it down
until the whole has been devoured. Maxwell continues
his " Brian O'Linn," and the " Flaneur " his Recol-
lections of Paris. The Faubourg St. Germain is the
subject of his present paper, and admirably does he
sketch the characteristics, physical and moral, of the
old aristocracy, who since the revolution of 1830
have voluntarily relegated themselves to that quarter.
The process of amalgamation, however, is rapidly
going on ; the poverty of these proud, but poor ex-
clusives, forces them to wink at the mesalliances which
their children contract with the rich Bourgeoisie of
the other side the river, and ere twenty years are past,
the ancienne noblesse will be extinct as a social class.
They are bigoted without being religious, and their
morality is of that peculiar character which dis-
tinguished the Court of Louis XIV., or that of our own
Charles II.; but their society is the most delightful
in the world.
" In no society in Paris is that light, frothy, cham-
pagne-like essence, called French fashionable chit-chat,
bandied backwards and forwards in such lively and witty
battledoor banter, as in this. It is as different frcm its
counterfeit in other regions, and more especially in other
countries, as light French wines are from Eng;ish brown
stout. some there are who may prefer the latter ; but
still even they must own that it is heavy. To attain to
the necessary perfection in this most glittering orna-
ment of good French society it is required to be alive to
everything passing—to be ignorant of nothing, past,
present, and future—to touch lightly upon all subjects
with ready versatility, and as lightly let it fall again—to
find the right word for every thought, for everyeCircum-
stance, for every feeling, for every shade of rank or po-
sition (and the word chosen must be sharp as a needle's
point, if it be not expected to recoil back upon its utterer
with all the heaviness of its bluntness)—to err not in the
slightest shade—to skim gently over the whole surface,
and yet in skimming catch the cream. And nowhere is
this perfection attained in so eminent a degree as in the
salons, where men and women can causer of the society
of the Faubourg St. Germain—nowhere has this rapid
flitting of witty conversation, this ease and grace in
flattery and repartee—this babble so smooth, and yet so
cutting, so light, and yet, in the materials necessary for
its fabrication, so solid, so heterogeneously and yet so
nicely compounded, appear to have been so complete a
study, and with such successful results, all unstudied as
it appears. Are little children taught to converse as
they are taught to learn grammar? We almost might
suppose so, to see what masters they are in the art, when
they are grown up."

Alfred Crowquill discourses pleasantly upon a
subject which, as Christmas approaches, is to many
persons anything but pleasant, " The Little Ac-
count ;" and W. Jerdan gives us a pleasant comedy
of errors arising from the circumstance of Lords
Yarborough, Harborough, and Scarborough being
once upon a time all located in the same hotel. He
entitles it " Titular Confusion ; the Borough-title
Terminus." We have a very graphic account of the
ceremony of "Taking the Veil" at Naples, by the
author of " Italian Scenes." It is valuable, as show-
ing the light in which the educated and polished
classes in Catholic countries look upon these cere-
monies. In this instance, the nun was of a noble
family. The elite of the beau monde of Naples at-
tended the ceremony as they would have attended an
opera or any other spectacle. During its progress
the Papal Nuncio who officiated made audible com-
_

.
plaints of the draught of cold air from the grating of
the convent to which he was exposed, and requested
the abbess to have the doors and windows closed, and
to hasten the toilet of the new nun, and at its con-

elusion the invited guests assembled In the hall of the

convent :--

" This was a complete morning soirée, in which all
was done on the most liberal and handsome scale,
nothing could be more recherche, or more profuse, than
the refreshments that were handed round every instant;
ices, jellies, creams, cakes, bonbons, every imaginable
species of sweetmeat was there, in a style that would
have shamed many a ball room. To my astonishment,
there was even punch a la Romaine, a fact which went

far to prove to me that the nuns were much less igno
rant of the ways of the world than I had imagined. The
reunion was now all vivacity and animation, the society
had amalgamated, the ladies apparently determined to
make up for the silence of the preceding two hours,
laughed, and sipped ices, and chattered with inimitable
rapidity; the cavalieri on their part were all gallantry
and attention, while two or three went round the circle,
presenting every one with a little brochure of compli
mentary verses addressed to the nun, which had been as
usual composed and printed for the occasion; I glanced
over them, and saw that they were in the same strain as
the predica, a recapitulation of the Epithalamium, in
rhyme. Suddenly the usual cannonade of petards was
fired off, before the convent gates, stunning us, like a
park of artillery, filling the whole room with smoke, and

silencing every one, and everything, for the moment ;
but it was only for the moment, for no sooner was it
over when the noise of tongues and glasses began again.
It was nearly one o'clock, and no one seemed disposed to
move till the nuncio's equipage drove up to the steps,
when he rose, and as the sposa stooped to kiss his hand,
he presented her with a beautiful silver crucifix, which
he requested her to keep as a memoria, and then he bid
adieu to the abbess and the rest."

Albert Smith puts in a pleasant plea for Boulogne,
between which and Margate, Ramsgate and Brighton,
he draws a comparison more after the manner of
"Boz" than of Plutarch ; and Dr. W. C. Taylor gives
us a " Biographical Sketch of Sarah, first Duchess
of Marlborough," a portrait of whom, engraved by
Cook, from the original picture by Sir Godfrey
Kneller, at present in the gallery at Althorp, illus-
trates this number. The other illustrations are by
Leech—the first, a scene from Cooper's new novel of
"Captain Spike;" the second, a scene from " Brian
O'Linn."

FRASER.
It has long been evident that the great majority of
the Conservative party are thoroughly disgusted with
the mad vagaries of Lord George Bentinck and his
little band of Impracticables; and we are, therefore,