The Sun.
London, England, 1856-12-03 00:00:00

the Royal Council. The Gazette says that the
accounts which some of the journals give of mea-
sures relative to the army are unfounded, and that
to avoid errors in future they would do well to wait
until the measures of the government shall have
been officially announced. The Queen had presented
a magnificent mantle of white velvet and gold to the
miraculous image of Our Lady of Montserrat, which
is held in peculiar veneration by the Catalonians.

MAGAZINES.

Blackwood.—Nothing in the December number
of Blackwood that we can trace from the hand of
any one of Blackwood's chief contributors. Mr.
Warren reviewed, we very well remember, and
reviewed very admirably too, at the time of its
first appearance, Mrs. Harriet Beecher Stowe's
Uncle Tom's Cabin. But—or we are much mis-
taken—his is not the hand which has written the
criticism in the present number of Maga upon
" Uncle Tom's" double, his alter ego, his fetch—
"Dred." Altoiether a criticism, be it said, rather
depreciative than commendatory. Anything but
in the spirit in which The Times declared Dred to
be a second shot right in the Bull's Eye ! Nothing
that we can recognise—from Bulwer Lytton, the
latest as he is also (mais cela va sans dire) one
of the very greatest of the glories of Blackwood !
Nothing that we can confidently father upon Alison
—who may be called the "Political" of Maga !
Nothing—that we can detect—from the pen of
Aytoun—the " Arch Wag" and the Poetic Jupiter-
Tonans of the old Edinburgh ! Yet, with all these
apparent deficiencies, the number before us is read-
able thoroughly ! There for one thing
is a seventh instalment of Mrs. Oliphant's
delightful " Athelings." The principal incidents
in which instalment are—the betrothal of Marian
the Beauty to Louis the Prince I and the rupture
between the humble mercantile family at the Old
Wood-lodge and the corpse-like, sardonic Lord
Winterbourne ! Charlie, the Big Boy, is expected
for a few days down at the pretty sylvan retreat in
Banburyshire—so that we may expect some obstacle
to be thrown betimes, through his instrumentality,
in the way of the proud peer's claim to the bequest
of Aunt Bridget. "Our Indian Empire" is the
title of a rather pompous treatise upon Ilindostan
" A Recent Confession of an Opium Eater " is a
facetious extravagance, in noway comparable to the
famous, dreamy, ecstatic lucubrations of De Q aincy.
" Respectability—A Dialogue," proves to be a
dialogue upon that very suggestive and reputable
theme between Irenceus and Tlepolena us—sprinkled
with a few apposite remarks from the lips of Mr.
and Mrs. Celsus ! Then follows the somewhat
captious notice of " Dred" already mentioned.
It, in turn, being succeeded by a disquisition upon
" The English Ecclesiastical Courts," anything but
as entertaining as the memorable incidental allu-
sions to the same topic introduced in the exquisite
narrative of Mr. Dickens's noblest fiction of all—
to our thinking—David Copperfield ! " The Food
of London" is the subject of the last contribution
but one in this December number of Blackwoott—
a contribution recalling to mind a series of brilliant
articles published in Maga some years back from
the pen of a very clever writer—one Mr. Murray,
if we recollect accurately—a series of papers relat-
ing to our metropolis, which we should marvel-
lously like to see republished in a popular form.
Finally, there is a political chapter, bringing
Maga for 1856 to a close as with a sort of premoni-
tory growl of thunder. " The Political Lull, and
what will break it" is the title. Here is the writer's
explanation of the monetary crisis in France :
"The astonishing development of industrial enterprise
in France, under the fostering administration of Napo-
leon 111., has brought with it perils as well as advantages.
The old hoarding habits of the people have been broken
down—the scattered savings and small capitals, formerly
uselessly locked in drawers or hid in corners, have been
embarked in industrial undertakings; and, crowning the
whole, the gigantic Credit Mobatilier ha
kss
in assumEurope. ed to itse
The
lf
the execution of all the gre wor
Austrian railways are in its Lands ; through an affiliated
company at Madrid, it has advanced large sums to the
Spanish Government, and succeeded in exciting a railway
mania even among the staid and immobile population of
the Peninsula ;—and besides a thousand minor undertak-
ings, it has contracted for the execution of the great Rus-
sian railways, a work involvirg the expenditure of at least
forty-five millions sterling. This outburst of enterprise
and development of the credit system, eminently desirable
in itself, has been carried to a critical height; because the
magnitude of the undertakings is such that nothing but a
combination of favourable circumstances will allow of
their being conducted to a successful close. The progress
of this grand speculative scheme is like that of a boat sunk
to the water's edge with a load of gold. Of course the
more gold that is placed in the boat, the more profitable
the enterprise, if it succeed ; but nothing but calm seas
and fair weather will carry the bark to its haven. The
occurrence of a Continental war at present would cause
those vast speculations to miscarry; and their fall would
probably drag down the whole financial fabric of France,
entailing great suffering upon the people and utterly ruin-
ing the prestige of the Napoleonic Government."l
Hence (it is not unnaturally insisted) Napoleon 111.
is incited by self-interest as well as by more ele-
vated and humane motives to his great work—the
work of his life just now—that of pouring oil upon
the troubled waters of Europe ! Nevertheless, in
spite of all his strenuous efforts to preserve yet a
little while longer the present most precarious Peace,
Napoleon lII.—/gaga fully anticipates—will find
that the signs everywhere visible just now (signs of
trouble and apprehension) will not pass away with-
out producing convulsion. May not the beginning
of the end of this hollow and preposterous Peace
be already recognised in various directions ?—at
Venice in the sullen reception, by his Italian sub
jects, of the young Austrian Emperor—at Neuchatel
in the clashing claims of the Prussian King and
the Swiss Confederation-a-at Palermo in the sudden
apparition in the face of day of the swords and
banners of a Sicilian Insurrection !

Fraser.—A facetious, caustic, and scholarly con-
tributor (R. L.), who amused the readers of Fraser
some time back with a humorous treatise upon
" Humbug," takes in hand this mouth, in a some-
what similar strain, the congenial subject of
" Popularity." In justification of his adopting
which as a sequel to his earlier essay, R. L.
maintains, comically enough, that ono is a
sort of offshoot of the other, precisely as Aris-
totle has said of rhetoric and dialectics—warE
avitPatvEL rnv PiropLicqv ow), irapcupvfc Ti riic
atax...r.nc ..a. The paper is a capital hit of dry
banter, pleasantly and sagaciously setting forth the
shams of Popularity. Shirley gives us a sixth and
last " Sketch on the North Coast," in his capacity
as a Naturalist. There is a brief but sufficiently
attractive letter upon "The Denison Case," ad-
dressed to the editor by a no less notable
Nonconformist than the Rev. F. D. Maurice.
A few sweet, delicious " Gleanings from Uhiand"
introduce T. Westwood to our favourable notice,
as a skilful poetical translator. As for the light
article for the month, the magazine story in Fraser
for December " Tho Friends," an episode of
Italian life—the gist of it may be readily enough
conjectured from the headings of the three chapters
--rch. i., 1847 ; ch. ii., 1848-1849 ; ch. iii., 1856
while its style may be imagined no less easily from
the opening phrases—" It was midsummer night
in the year 1847. The moon shone brightly on the
Piazza del Duomo, at Florence. It lit with a pale
glory the Campanile"—and all that sort of thing !
We really wonder that this kind of Rosa-Matilda
romancing has not been long since banished
from pages as pretentious as those of Fraser's
Magazine. The thing is nauseating. There is
a rather interesting article in the December num-
ber of Regina, by the way, upon " Pauli's History
of England "—a history of England by Reinholt
Pauli, already favourably known by his " Life of
Alfred the Great." Dr. Pauli being, in fact, the
continuator of Dr. Lappenberg, as David Hume
found a continuator of his History in Tobias
Smollett. Half-a-dozen other contributions of a
most diversified character lend their charm, just
as they chance to have any, to this new number of
Fraser for December. The whole contents of it
winding up with a political paper, " Foreign and
Domestic"—a contrast to the article on the same
theme in Blackwood, inasmuch as it is upon the
very face of it rather retrospective than anticipa-
tory. ,

DublinUniversily.—"The Fortunes of Glencore"
are still continued, but no great events are recorded
in the present portion. The unhappy recluse,
Lord Glencore, continues to involve himself in new
difficulties,
.in spite of the care of his friends ; in-
deed this time rather serious ones, as he went to
the pavilion and offended the King in some im-
portant transaction then going on. The youthful
hero is not mentioned except briefly—he is still
left in prison. The most curious thing apparent in
these chapters is the account of
'Sir Horace Upton,
whose affectation of ease and nonchalance is won-
derful. Having invited seventeen people to dinner
was not an affair of sufficient consequence to dwell
in his memory, and when reminded of it he did not
disturb himself, but allowed the company to sit
down without him. The astonishment of the
straightforward Colonel Harcourt when he arrived
and found the host in his solitary chamber may be
imagined. The most interesting article in this
number is the biographical sketch of Talma, a
subject attractive iu itself from intrinsic merit, and
rendered still more so from the superior manner in
which it is treated. It is truly said that " Francis
Joseph Talma ranks amongst the most remarkable,
men of the age and country in which he lived.,,
He was not alone in his glory, for he flourished in
a time that saw many great in his own profession.
He was not appreciated in his talents only by those
who were lookers-on, but those of his own craft
recognised his powers. " The applause of ap-
plauded men " was the crowning triumph of his
success. His friendship with John Kemble was a i
circumstance that is creditable to both. e
became acquainted with Edmund Kean Al6O,