The Sun.
London, England, 1826-07-26 00:00:00

The title of this small volume will sufficiently de.
scribe the nature of its contents ; it contains sundry
papers, essays, and reviews, which we are veritably
assured were rejected by the editors of several well
known ptriodicals; the writers",names we are left to
guess front their initials, or if we please, from their
style ; between both, the reader's sagacity will for the
most part, we doubt not, lead him to a tolerably ac-
curate conclusion. We ,say, for the most part, be-
cause some of the writers are not of such general no-
toriety as to enable us to form a very certain judg-
ment. Suffice it to say, that in those cases where
there are enough marked and known characteristics to
judge by, we think each author sustains his style, re-
putation, and character to perfection. The " Un-
sentimental Journey" of Elia, is admirable; we can-
not conceive what the editor of the " London" can
have been about when he condemned it ; the journey
to town, the steam-boat, the landing, the dream, in
short the whole trip, are absolutely Ella himself!
Cobbett's letter to the Hampshire farmers is perfectly.
inimitable. The Review of Tremain, by Christopher
North, is so perfect a specimen, that the explanation
given in the note is absolutely necessary to account
for its non-appearance in Blackwood. The fact was,
as we are informed, that the conductors of that imma-
culate and amusing miscellany discovered just
in time that the excellent subject of their correspondent's
remarks was, in point of fact the production, not of' a
cockney, nor of any such person, but of a gentleman
not only ofrank; family, fortune, and politieal influence,
but a .Tory and a Minister ! How far they may have
been correct in their information may be doubted :
however, they believed it, and the explanation is satis-
factory, We would recommend all reviewers who
want' a model of cutting up to read this article. The
delightful egotism of Billy Hazlitt in '" The Spirit of
the Age," is ,truly .charming and characteristic. For
one specimen take the following paragraph on nick-
names:—

" But they have another method, which is a still greater
' favourite with them than any of the preceding, and not without
reason, for it is in sonic cases more effective than any other. It
consists in the artillery of nick-gains. A nick-name is at once
irresistible and unanswerable. It is a dab of moral mud thrown at a
man. If thrown skilfully it is sure to stick, and if it sticks it is
sure to.make the bearer of it look ridiculous. If the first Noble-
, mail or the finest gentleman in the land were to walk along
London streets, with a great dab of mud upon his cheek, the very
chimney-sweepers would laugh and " point the finger" at him as
he passed. And precisely so it is with a nick-name. There is
no gainsaying it. It is worse than an " ill-name ;" and those who
give it might as welt swear away a man's life at once, and have
hint hanged outright. And so they would if they dared."
And again the description of his style is the very
happiest exemplification of it..
" We have but little more to say of Mr. Haalitt, and his works.
The Most remarkable feature of his style is, that there is no re-
markable feature belonging to it. He studiously avoids the use of
uncommon and obsolete words ; and never uses a common word
in an uncommon sense. But perhaps it would he impossible to
give a just account of.what his style would seem to aim at being,
without repeating, almost in so many Words, what he has himself
said in describing his notion of " The Familiar Style." We must
therefore refer the reader to that essay, in the second volume of
" Table Talk." How far it is conformable with that notion is
another question. In some particular instances, and where he
has taken paini to make it so, (as for example in the Essay itself
Just referred to), we take it to be the very best specimen of that
style extant; and we agree with him in thinking that style the best.
But generally speaking it falls short of what it aims at being ; or
rather it goes beyond. It is frequently so idiomaticul as to be
quite enigmatical, to all but those who are up to the slang of the
last quarter of a century. It is some times NO very " familiar"
that it " breeds' contempt." Its plainness often borders on ugliness.
In avoiding say thing like an oratorical construction, it is fre-
quently broken into bits. Its periods have no more words than
some writers have clauses. It is any thing but long-winded. It
seems to be written for persons afflicted with asthma. You may
read it aloud while smoking your cigar; puff and paragraph, al-
ternately. Not that we would recommend this practice : for
though not professors of it ourselves; we should conceive that
smoking, like painting, requires' the whole man."
We
have not room to particularize more of these
productions ; except that we cannot for a moment
doubt the identitic of Leigh Hunt in " Boceacio and
Fiametta ; and tat the Review of " Brother Jona.
than," rejected from the Edinburigh,somewhat puzzles
us, inasmuch as .
it is Jeffey to the very life. It strikes
in the book. We cannot refrain
giving the following passage.
" Not to stand shilly shally over it, (which is a mode of treat-
fursom as the best thing
treat-
ment it will bear less than any other,) Brother Jonathan is, we
win venture to say, the most extraordinary work of its kind which
this age of extraordinary works has put forth—in Great Britain '
'we mean : what America or Germany may have produced in this
sort, is more than we ore able to say; and the former of those
for any thing we know to the con-
countries in
particular, may,
catalogue of similar works, written
con-
trary, be able to count a , • • •
by the same hand—or rather hands—. fel we imagine this person
employs both his hands at the same time, one_ on one volume, and
the other on another! At least, we can at the moment hit upon
of no other theory, to explain the extraordinary and headlong rapidity
of style, as w the insane incoherence matter, well
vail throughout these volumes—Which "prevail" hich pre.
throughout them,
as
but which (be it expressly understood) are far from being their
only distinguishing characteristics, and which lire still less the
causes of our feeling called upon to notice them.
i ogo e
saya
In faat, the author of these volumes, whoever he may lie whether
whether this be his ftrstwork
ot‘h‘reahoitiefinofit:isatthhaite,Voalgteaves,
s
(and' or
a sa "ad
the w
least of him, the most origi.
it May, fromp its internal evidence, be chi*
nal writer of his day ; and. we " are greatly
mistaken indeed,. if be
will not turn out to he, without one exception, the moat extraor-
dinary gifted of them
all, as fares mere natural faculties go. How
tion of those faculties, or
far adventitious circumstances may interfere, to frustrate the opera-
nd, is more than we shall pretend to predict, in the present
early stage of one eeptain_.
r • but that no
turn their effects to evil account instead of
ranee with their possessor
drcunistances can ever neutralize them we are confident.
Brother Jonathan, ifit '
must be classed at all, may be placed
ender the head of that
altogether modern anomaly, the historical
novel; and if an expreas object must be 'ene Ito it, it will be
that of illustrating
i the manners of the Americans, and of the New
Englanders n particular, at the commencement of the American
Revolutionary War. And in
faets the work
illustration, in a most striking and.effee doe furnish this
and nye manner;as no
other work does, and no other writer that we are acquainted with
is at' all likely to do. But the truth is, that neither the above,
nor any thing else, can be assigned as the specific object and end
of this singular production,—.which we conceive to have been