Star.
London, England, 1830-04-05 00:00:00

Dffeenntt
I`'S" 4IX:N
.14
arj 4,
Vl6O 114(1

LITERATURE.

The pressure of Parliamentary and local matter, for the
last few weeks, engrossed our leisure and our space too
much to allow us to notice any of the new publications
which now crowd our table in formidable array. We
gladly avail ourselves therefore of the first " open day,"
to record our opinions of a few of those works to which
we have not hitherto been able to pay attention. The
first of our dramatic poets—the bard whose deep and
universal knowledge of nature, and whose thorough in-
sight into the moving springs of human action, gave to
his writings an impress little short of inspiration,—has
said that

" He who the sword of Heaven would bear,
Should be as holy as severe."
flow far we may be justified in regulating our notions
of the critical faculty by such a standard, we shall not
presume to decide ; but to us it appears that the duty of
criticism—whether delegated or assumed—can only fit-
tingly be discharged by a strict and honourable ad-
herence to that principle of impartiality which alone
can give value to the estimates we form, or the opi-
nions we pronounce. Influenced by that feeling, we
proceed to our task; in the performance of which,
however, as we are not vain enough to indulge
the hope of gratifying all parties, so do we earn-
estly disclaim the slightest intention of giving pain to
any. Praise can only be recommended to general ac-
ceptance by its sincerity : or censure be warrantable
when it springs from a sense of public duty.—We take
up our subjects without distinction, just in the order in
which they present themselves to our view : and first,
we are gratified to find, the second volume of
" Travels through Central Africa to Timbuctoo, by
Rrtse Caillie."—This completion of the work for which
the first volume had taught' the world to look with
intense anxiety, has more than realized all the expecta-
tions raised by the importance of its subject, and by the
talent, intrepidity, and enterprise of its highly gifted au-
thor. The circumstances under which the materials for
its composition were acquired—the hardships which
M. CAILLIE underwent—the dangers by which his
wanderings were on every side beset—the expedients
to which he was driven, in the pursuit of his great object,
would in themselves have been enough to have rendered
any publication an object of curiosity and of interest ; but
the acquisition of so much local information, the detail of
so many facts eminently conducive to the advancement of
science, and the vast addition that this volume is calcu-
lated to make to the store of general knowledge, place it
high indeed in the estimation of the learned, and give it
a well deserved rank amongst the standard works of the
class to which it belongs. The only extract which we
can at resent afford from the pages of this admirable nar-
rative, is the traveller's accountofhisarrival at Timbuctoo.
"At length we arrived safely at Timbuctoo, just as the sun was
touching the horizon. I now saw this capital of the Soudan, to,
reach which bad so long been the object of my wishes. On en.
t-ring this mysterious city, which is an object of curiosity and re.
search to the civilized nations of Europe, I experienced an rode.
scribable satisfaction. I never before felt a similar emotion, and
my transport was extreme. I was obliged, however, to restrain my
feelings, and to GOD alone did I confide my joy. With *bat gra.
titude did I return thanks to Heaven, for the happy result which at.
tended my enterprise ! How many grateful thanksgivings did I
pour forth for the protection which GOD had vouchsafed to me,
amidst obstacles and dangers which appeared insurmountable.
This duty being ended, I looked around, and found that
the sight before me did not answer my expectations. I
had formed a totally different idea of the grandeur and wealth
of Timbuctoo. The city presented, at first view, nothing
but a mass of ill-looking houses built of earth. Nothing was to be
seen in all directions but immense plains of quick.sand of a yellowish
white colour. The sky was a pale red as far as the horizon: all
nature wore a dreary aspect, and the most profound silence pre.
railed ; not even the warbling of a bird was to be heard. Still,
though I cannot account for the impression, there was something
imposing in the aspect of a great city, raised in the midst of sands,
and the difficulties surmounted by its feunders cannot fail to excite
admiration."
The Family Classical Library—the fourth number
of which now claims our attention—maintains the favour-
able opinion which even the first appearance of so cheap, so
useful, and so admirably executed a work, could not fail to
propitiate. The incident, which we now select from the
Cyropadia, is one of the most tender and affecting
evidences of a woman's tenderness and a wife's affection
that we almost ever read :
Book 111. ch. I.—When the Armenian and his son, and the
wives and daughters, were taken by Cyrus, Tigranes, who had been
heretofore a fellow-huntsmen with Cyrus, returned from a journey
ainead, and went directly to Cyrus, just as he was; end when he
*saw his father and mother, his brother and sisters, and wife, prison.
en, he wept, as was natural for him to do. Afters long discussion
as to the course which he ought to pursue, Cyrus said to the Arme.
nian, " To have your wife again, what money will you give me ?"
" All that I am able," said he. " What for your children ?"
" And for these, too," said he, " all that lam able." " Here is,
then," said he, " already as much again as you have ; and you,
Tigranes," said he, "at what rate would you purchase the
regaining of your wife ?" Now he happened to be but
lately married, and had a very great love for his wife. " Cyrus,"
said he, " to save her from servitude, I would ransom her at the
expert:* of my. life." " Take then your own to yourself,", said
Cyrus, " I cannot reckon 'that she is properly our captive; for you
never fled from us. And do you, Armenian, take your wife and
children, without paying any' thing for them, that they may know
thiy come free to you." When they came home one talked of
Cyrus's 'wisdom, another of his patience and resolution, another of
his mildness one spoke of his beauty and the tallness of.his person;
and on that Tigranes asked his wife;—" And do you," said he,
" Armenian dame, think Cyrus handsome ?" " Truly, said she,
" I did not look at him." "At whom then did you look ?" said
Tigranes. "At him wbbiaid that to save me from servitude he
would ransom me at the elpence of his own life."
Mount Sinaioitilsoem. By W. Phillips, Middle Tem-
ple.—We are inveterate admirers of literary curiosities :
we have so lonedelighted in the pursuit of them, that
the propensity has become a perfect passion—a second
nature, with us.: but never were our predilections in this
way so much gratified as by once casually meeting
with a Poem (save the mark I)` in heroic verse—the
true " Corsair " couplet—entitled " The Redemption,"
which the Author, witit that innate modesty which is at
once the indication and the concomitant of true genius,
hid completed in some thousand lines or thereabouts;
with the avowed and very laudable purpose of cheat-
.
ening the imaginings, correcting the errors, and
heightening the beauties of MILTON'S Paradise
Lost t We blush to say that this most praiseworthy
• undertaking of modern genius, so far from being ap-
preciated as it deserved, was suffered to fall—u
Johnson says, " still-born from the Press," though
offered to the world in the unassuming form of sixpenny
number* 1.,—Far are we froti'attributing such a design to
the author`of Monist qittai, or of claming his labours with
the ill-fated but ingenious production to which we have
alluded.: but wee do suspect him of an aspiring tendency
total-id thp mountain heights of Fame, without having
catculated Upoti tharuggedness and the difficulties of the
nt, or everyk of prostration from the precipicea
which lie atoot-fall. Still he has the praise of a