The Sun.
London, England, 1850-01-28 00:00:00

THE. HEROIC SPIRIT,

"A new pole-star had start: Al up in the bright vista of
their future, glowing with the golden hues of glory, it
was the source from whence have flown the countless
streams of high promise, that have finally merged into
the oce an t f immortality; it was the stem from whence
have sprung the blossoms of varied beauty that have
subsequently ripened into fruits of fame; in fine, it was
the heroic feeling, which reviled, persecuted, and op-
posed, has flourished and still flourishes amid every dis-
udvantage. Change has not tarnished its glory, ages
have not effected its annihilation; that which illumined
the infancy of time shall survive till time itself shall ba
no more; not even at the end t f creation can we look for
its extinction, for that existence into which a divine es-
sence has been infused is essentially et?rnal, and indi-
genous to immortality. Its progress has been marked
by all that has raised the character of the world—by
nothing that has lowered it. Among its votaries are
clasei the demi-gods

' Around its shrine
Are ranged for evermore the tuneful nine.'

"All most high in hurrauity; all most excellent on
earth; all enrolled under its flaming banners.
It, annals are adorned by a glorious company of
apostles, by a goodly fellowship of prophets, by a noble
army of martyrs. It numbers in its hits of glory, it
counts in its ranks of fame, sages, poets, philosophers,
patriots, warriors, legislators; all—all who have been
imbued with its influence; all who have been inspired
with its zeal. The catalogue comprises centuries and
tens of centuries—the sphere of action, the extended
globe. Is there, who gainsays its puissance ? exists
there, who underrates its achievements? Survey its
empires, and behold its doings.
" It has been opposed as was never opposed any other;
but yet it is immaculate and imperturbable. It has sur-
vived the most dangerous of all attack, derision; un-
moved, unmoveable—unextineeuishcd, unextinguishable
—unchange.l, unchangeable. It has outlived its oppo-
nents; woe t) all enemies, ineffable scorn is their meed,
and oblivion shadows their graves.' Would some de-
wed; what is this vaunted effigy, this far-famed pro-
digy; the representation of vivid lustre, the impersona-
tion of exalted majesty? Read the records of the pen.
nan, the lore of a,_;tiquity, the ruling destiny, the active
agent has been one glorious feeling—the heroic prin-
ciple. It is the spirit that has produced everything
that is great, everything that is noble, in all ages and
in all countries; since first the course of time began
since first the earth revolved in ether. It is the spirit
that has created all the immortal ones in history, in all
its divisions, ancient and modern, sacred and profane.
It is the spirit that piled the funeral pyre of Thermo-
pyle • the spirit that led Eustace from the walls of be-
sieged Calais; the spirit that illumined the last moments
of a More, and that glittered round the prison of a dying
Socrates."

But that our observations upon the merits of
" SilwoOd" have already extended to a length so
considerable, we should have descanted with par-
ticular emphasis upon perhaps the finest descrip-
tion and the most striking incident in the two
volumes, we mean the intellectual triumph achieved
by the hero as a forensic orator. Already, however,
we have sufficiently analyzed the fiction to render its
more prominent excellences conspicuous to our readers
even }Afore their perusal of the work itself; inso-
much so, that it scarcely needs our assertion that
the novel reveals ability capable of being developed
into—a reputation.

WHITE JACKET; or, THE WORLD in a
MAN- OF- WAR. By Herman Melville. 2 Vols.
Herman Melville is indefatigable. hardly have
we finished the perusal of one of his compositions be-
fore another is issued from the press. Unlike some
writers, however, his activity in nowise impairs the
interest of his " yarns " or the attraction of his style.
From the imaginative to the practical is to the author
of " Typee" but one step; he turns with facility from
the description of the marvellous regions
of Mardi, and the chronicle of the impos-
sible adventures of the voyage thither, to
detail with a minute fidelity the adventures of
a sailor-boy (vide " Redburn"), or to exhibit the
peculiarities of the world of a man-of-war (vide
" White Jacket"). The chapters contained in these
volumes are the supposed revelations of a sailor in the
American navy, yclept White Jacket, on account of
his extraordinary outer-covering, of which we are
told—

"It was not a very white jacket, but white enough, in
all conscience, as the sequel will show.
"-The way I came by it was this.
" When our frigate lay in Callao, on the coast of Peru
—her last harbour in the Pacific—l found my; elf with-
out a grego, or sailor's surtout; and al, toward the end
of a three-years' cruise, no pea-jackets could be had
from the purser's steward; and being bound for Cape
Horn, some sort of a substitute was indispensable; I
employed myself, for several days, in manufacturing an
outlandish garment of my own devising, to shelter me
from the boisterous weather we were so soon to en-
counter.

" It was nothing more tl.au a white duck frock, or
rather shirt; which, spreading on deck, I folded double
at the bosom, and by then making a continuation of
the slit there, opened it lengthwise—much as you would
cut a leaf in the last new novel. The gash being made,
a metamorphosis took place, transcending any relatod
by Ovid. For, presto! the shirt was a coat!—a strange-
looking coat, to be sure; of a Quakerish amplitude
about the skirts; with an infirm, tumble•down collar;
and a clumsy f.ilsess about the w►istbands; and white,
yea, white as a shroud. And my shroud it aterwards
came very near proving, as he who reads further will
find.

"But, bless me, my friend, what sort of a summer
jacket is this, in which to weather Cape Horn? A very
tasty, and beautiful whit linen garment it may have
seemed; but then, people almost universally sport their
linen next to their skin.

" Very true; and that thought very early occurred to
me; for no idea had I of scudding round Cape Horn in
my shirt; for teat would have been almost scudding
under bare poles indeed.
"So, with many odds:and ends of patches—old ocks,
old trowser-legs, and the like—l bedarned and bequilted
the inside of my jacket, till it became, all over, stiff and
padded, as King James's cotton-staffed and dagger-proof
doublet; and no buckram or steel hauberk stood up more
stoutly.
"So far, very good; but pray, tell me, White-Jacket,
how do you propose keeping out the rain and the wet
in this quilted.grego of yours? You don't call this wad
of old patches a Mackintosh, do you?—You don't pre-
tend to say that worsted is water-proof?
"No, my dear friend; and that was the deuce of it.
Water-proof it was not, no more than a sponge. In-
deed, with such recklessness had I bequilted ray jacket,
that in a rain-storm I became a universal absorber;
swabbing bone-dry the very bulwarks I leaned against.
Of a damp day, my heartless shipmates even used to
stand up against me, so powerful was the capillary at-
traction between this luckless jacket of mine and all
drops of moisture. I dripped like a turkey a' roasting;
and long after the rain-storms were over, and the sun
showed his face, I still stalked a Scotch mist; and when
it was fair weather with others, alas! it was foul weather
with me."

Without giving any continuous history, White
Jacket skilfully contrives, by describing the cha-
racters of many of the officers and men on board the
Neversink, and, by relating many incidents which
occurred on board that vessel, to give (which is the
avowed object of the work) an idea of the world of a
man, of-war appertaining to Uncle Sam. "In the
year 1843," says the preface, " the author shipped
as a common sailor on board of a United States
frigate, then }ying in a harbour of the Pacific Oeean.
After serving on board of this frigate for more than a
year, he was discharged with the rest of the crew
upon the vessel's arrival home. His man-of-war
experiences and observations have been incorporated
into the present volumes. But these volumes are not
presented as a journal of the cruize." White Jacket
commences his history with the frigate's weighing
anchor at the last hartour in the Pacific, for the home-
ward-bound passage, by the way of Cape Horn.
First he gives us a full, true, and particular account
of the white jacket which we have spoken of
above; then he proceeds to initiate us into
the various divisions of a man-of-war's
crew, sheet - anchormen, after-guard, waisters,
&c. &c. Poor White Jacket laments, and with good
reason, on the perplexing variety of numbers which a
sailor has to bear in mind. First he is given the
number of his mess ; then his ship's number, or the
number to which he must answer when the watch-
roll is called ; then the number of his hammock, then
the number of the gun to which he is assigned, be-
sides a variety of other numbers. Then follow some
life-like sketches of various incidents on board,—the
Commodore who stalked the deck in solemn silence :
I have serious doubts," Llays White Jacket, " whether
for the most part he was not dumb. And not only did
he seem dumb himself, but his presence possessed the
strange power of making other people dumb for the
I