The Sun.
London, England, 1844-07-31 00:00:00

1 agst Miss Miggs. A dead heat between Queen blab
and Quebec, Naworth third, and Elemi fourth. The de-
ciding heat was not run when our parcel was forwarded.
The Drawing Room Stakes of 25 sovs. each, &c. 3 yrs,
Bst 71b; fillies, Bst 211 h. (28 Subs.), D.R.S.C.
Lord George Bentinek's Croton Oil (Rogers) 1
Colonel Anson's .Toe Lovell 2
Duke of Beaufort's Claude Frollo 0
Lord Chesterfield's Cockfighter 0
Lord Exeter's Algernon 0
7t04 on Croton Oil, who won by half a length. A
fine race with all.
GOODWOOD STAKES.—Betting-9 to 2 agst Franchise,
6 to I agst Croton Oil, 7 to 1 agst Era, 9 to 1 agst Best
of Three, 10 to 1 agst Parthian, 13 to 1 agst Elegance
filly, 12 to 1 agst Murton Lordship, 14 to 1 agst Lucy
Banks. Red Deer declared not to start for this race, nor
in all probability for the Cup.

LITERATURE.
HIGH LIFE IN NEW YORK. 2 Vols.
How, London, 1844.
In these sketchy volumes we have a series of letters
supposed to be written by Mr. Jonathan Slick to his
father, a Justice of Peace in Connecticut, illustrative
of the manners and personal peculiarities of the Yan-
kees, and more especially of the state of fashionable
society in the city of New York. The letters are
written—as the far-famed conversations of Sam Slick
were recorded—in the homely, uncouth dialect of
humble provincial life in America, but have little of
the wit, smartness, and cutting practical sarcasm of
Mr. Halliburton's aditnirable work. The most divert-
ing incident contained in them is the writer's account
of his interview with Fanny Elssler, after one of her
performances at the theatre, and the effect her grace-
ful figure, manners, and picturesque dancing produced
on his mind.

WALKS IN THE COUNTRY.
illoxon, London, 1844.
There are many graceful images, and healthy, un-
affected sentiments scattered through this little un-
pretending volume of poems, which, like all Lord
Leigh's productions, is characterised by quick, ac-
tive feeling, and chaste felicity of verac:Aion. His
poem entitled " The Estate Oak," is a lyric worthy
of Collins, if only for the easy and delightful flow of
its melody.

HISTORIC FANCIES. Colburn, London, 1844.
The spirit that pervades this volume, the prose as
well as the poetical portion of it, is of a most catholic
and tolerant character ; indeed the author, in some
instances, pushes his love of toleration to excess,
which in the discussion of historical matters is a fault
that should be as seduously guarded against as an
indulgence in the antagonist quality, for truth never
lies in extremes, but is always found in the mean.
The work is evidently the production of a young
writer, thoughtful, ardent, and well-informed, and
amid much that is brilliant in expression and gene-
rous in sentiment, contains also much that is erro-
neous in opinion anti exaggerated in the portraiture
of character. Thus, speaking of the favourite policy
of Cardinals Richelieu and Mazarin, Mr. Smythe
says :—" Upon his attaining the Ministry, Richelieu
found the King only the first of his nobles. He resolved
to make him somethingmore. He undertook to concen-
trate all the power which he saw dissipated amongmany
great feudatories and lords. His policy was to
confound and equalize all classes below the King. But
not satisfied to dedicate his own life to this object, he
devolved his power upon his successor, Mazarin, whom
he himself had formed, who was instigated by the
same motives, and who sprung, like himself, from the
Democracy ; inherited, with instinctive zeal, his
hatred and his views of the Aristocracy. But the sa-
gacious policy of the Cardinals was not destined to be
continued by-the great king whom they had made.
He took pains in nothing so much as in rebuilding
what they had pulled down, in raising up what they
had so skilfully destroyed." Surely this is a very
erroneous view of the policy of Louis the Fourteenth!
So far was this sagacious monarch from opposing
himself to the system of Richelieu and Mazarin, that
he carried it out to its fullest extent, for
while he gratified his noblesse by showy pri-
vileges and courtly marks of esteem, he took care
to deprive them of all substantial power, and reduced
them to the most abject state of dependence on his
arbitrary will. It was not by destroying, but by
rigidly following up the political system of the Car-
dinals, that he was enabled with perfect truth to make
that memorable boast, " L'etat c'est moi !" Never,
in the whole history of France, were the aristocracy
with all their pompous titles and imposing wealth,
such mere impotent shadows, as during the long reign
of the Grande Monarque. In a clever, brilliant sketch
of Mirabeau—who, however, is rated infinitely beyond
his deserts—our author takes occasion to remark that
Casimir Perier, the leading statesman of the year
1831, possessed " an energy anti a genius only in-
ferior to Mirabeau's." This is high praise, but as-
suredly it is not warranted by facts. The French
Minister was a man of fierce impatience and un-
bounded pride—arrogant, egotistical, and determined ;
but he wanted the comprehensive views, the practical
sagacity, the impassioned eloquence, and dauntless
intrepidity of the great leader of the Revolution, while
as regards " genius," he had not an atom of it in his
composition. He was the mere mouth-piece of the
Bourgeoisie—the congenial advocate of their narrow,
selfish theories of legislation, and died a victim to
chagrin at his inability to control a movement which
he could not comprehend. In his biographical
sketches of Couthon and St. Just, Mr. Smythe, ap-
parently from a desire to be thought original in hi 3
opinions, takes far too liberal a view of the character
of these two Republicans. So far was the former
from having anything of a " Roman of free Rome"
about him, that he was wholly made up of artifice
and plausibility—a twaddling, maudlin sentimen-
talist, who could shed tears over his lap-dog,
while with a dry eye he daily consigned scores
of his countrymen to the scaffold. As for St.
Just, he was a hard, merciless, pedantic dogmatist,
an advocate of principles of which he had never con-
sidered the tendency ; cruel from want of human
sympathies ; and " lofty"—as our author assures us he
was—only in his sublime self-conceit. That he was
" intrepid" we will not venture to deny ; but his was
not moral courage —the noble feeling that sustained
Vergniaud and the other Girondists in the last
memorable night of their existence—but the brute
courage of the bull-dog, originating solely in the
utter absence of imagination and the finer instincts of
our nature. The truth is, that with a few rare ex-
ceptions—such as Mirabeau, Roland, Carnot, Verg-
niaud, and perhaps Danton—the whole of the French
Revolutionary chiefs were a set of unmitigated
quacks and vagabonds, who had talent enough to
enable them to pull down a vicious system, but were
destitute of the political sagacity requisite to con-
struct an enlightened one on the ruins. As, on the
whole, we prefer Mr. Smythe's poetry to his prose,
we shall confine ourselves to an extract from his beau-
tiful poem entitled " Mary Stuart's Last Prayer :"
A lonely mourner kneels in prayer before the Virgin's fane,
With white hands crossed for Jesu's sake, so her prayer may
be vain.
Wan is her cheek, and very pale—her voice is low and faint—
And tears are in her eyes, the while she makes her humble
plaint.
0 little could you deem, from her sad and lowly mein,
That she was once the Bride of France, and still was Scot-
land's Queen.
0, Mary Mother !—Mary Mother !—be my help and stay I
Be with me still, as thou !last been, and strengthen me to- dayl
For many a time, with heavy heart, all weary of its grief,
I solace sought, in thy blest thought, and ever found relief:
For thou, too, wert a Queen on earth,—and men were harsh
to thee !
And cruel things and rude, they said,—as they have said of
me I

0, Gentlemen of Scotland l 0, Cavaliers of France !
How each and all had grasped his sword, and seized his an.