The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1853-07-19 00:00:00

London : Clarke, Beeton, and Co

An American lady, Metta Victoria Fuller, has
called in the aid of the now universal novel to sup-
port the Maine Liquor Law. Like all works of
fiction written for the express purpose of maintain-
ing a system, whether of politics or theology, "The
Senator's Son" is essentially a false production. It
possesses all the worst features of the least tem-
perate teetotal literature : burning bowels and deli-
rium tremens haunt every passage of the book—all
the noblest natures are represented as being defiled
and destroyed—every picture drawn by the artist
is black and revolting. Hence the work is horribly
monotonous and maudlin. The life delineated by
Miss Fuller is not the real life around her. Stump
orators in the teetotal interest have long ago worked
up her most striking exaggerations, so that her
sketches have not the merit either of being original
or fresh to the public.
In thus noticing " The Senator's Son," we deem
it proper to state that, from our experience in that
section of the Old World in which we live

we are

quite as well aware of the immense prevalence of
drunkenness as Miss Fuller can possibly be, and
quite as desirous, perhaps, to see the evil removed.
But we must emphatically dissent from the idea
that this object can be promoted in the smallest
measure by the publication of distorted pictures of
human life such as those perpetrated in " The
Senator's Son."

The Dublin University Magazine

Contains one especially noteworthy paper this
month, in the shape of a furious " pitch" into the
new poet, Alexander Smith, which is coupled with
a right pleasant and genial discourse on the life and
writings of poor Edgar Poe. The reviewer, in
criticising Mr. Smith, tells many wholesome truths,
by which, we are confident, a man possessing so
much sterling good sense as the young Scottish
bard will benefit. But we must enter our decided
protest against the tone of levity which pervades the
review. It is evident from the first line to the last
that the writer has been labouring hard to poke
fun at Mr. Smith ; and we are sorry that there is
even worse than the absence of a becoming serious-
ness in the paper. If space permitted, we might
attempt to prove that the alleged plagiarisms from
Longfellow, Shelley, and others, are no plagiarisms
at all, and can only he classed with those extraor-
dinary literary coincidences which occur in the
works of the highest in the sky of song. And
when the reviewer mentions the introduction of
songs into the " Life-Drama," " which, without
the wit or melody, have a thousand times the
warmth and amativeness of those of Mr. Thomas
Little," he knows perfectly well that this is a great
exaggeration. The sneers at the "Herschel of the
Critic"—by whom. we presume, the Rev. George
Gilfillan is meant—are very ungenerous. We had
thought the "literary gentleman" of the Examiner
would not have found a companion in the mean and
contemptible course of prejudicing Mr. Smith and
his works because he happened to be first intro-
duced to public attention by Mr. Gilfillan. The
merits of the Dundee pastor, or of any London
periodical, have nothing to do with the character
of Mr. Smith's first book ; and, if it is to be re-
viewed, let. it be disassociated from all outward
circumstances, And taken at ite true value. How-

ever, there is one consolation in the pleasing fact
that "A Life-Drama," has already reached a second
edition; and such a notice as that in the Dublin
must now produce more good than harm both to
poet and publisher.

The New Bond of Love. New York : Published
for the Author. 1853.
We have here 113 pages, crammed with the
wildest absurdities that ever flowed from the pen of
an insane Yankee. We are not surprised that the
book has no printer's name attached to it. It
ought never to have been printed. The author,
denouncing the selfishness of humanity as the root
of all evil, proposes that a bond of love be esta-
blished, each member of which shall devote one
month in the twelve to the service of his or her
fellow-creatures who require assistance. If the
world is not willing to accede to this proposal, then
there is but one alternative left :
" But if there should be no answer ; if the black stream
should roll on sluggishly, doggedly ; would the heavens
frown if a holy being were to make a supreme effort and
concentrate in his bosom all the nameless sufferings of
millions and millions who are gone, of millions and mil-
lions who are living, of millions and millions who are to
come, and shout forth in agony and despair—Stop the
supplies ! Let there be no new beings produced before
the black stream is stemmed."
The author of these ravings intimates that
humanity is to be regenerated by the influence of
the "noble new world." One passage from the
modest Yankee on this head, and then we have done
with him :

" The love of truth which comes down from heaven
may be misunderstood in the Old World, because there
the people are nothing, but here the people are every-
thing; and, unmolested by the selfish lamentations of
disappointed demazogues, or the frantic sobs and sighs of
fanatical day-dreamers, they can well afford to give a
hearing to everybody; since they know that to make them
act against their own convictions is in the power of
nobody. This love of truth is the almighty swayer of
their convictions ; the love of truth is written upon the
face of your citizens ; the love of truth is written upon
the graceful faces of your women."
This is pretty tall swagger, even for an American.
We are afraid that the perpetrator of these para-
graphs, instead of founding a new bond of love,
had better be intrusted by his friends to the salutary
bonds of a strait-jacket.

Ballads and Lyrics. By Robert Bower. Edinburgh

Jathes Hogg.

A well-meaning, but a mistaken man is Mr.
Robert Bower. A rather imperfect judgment as to
the value of his own handiwork, or the praise of
inconsiderate friends, has made him fancy that he
is a poet, and accordingly he has plunged at once
into publication. We wish we had it in our power
to praise his volume; for he is an amiable person,
we can imagine, and is evidently wishful to make
his literary abilities subservient to the best pur-
poses. But an amiable and well-intentioned man
does not constitute a poet, as a few samples from
Mr. Bower's sky-blue volume will amply attest.
"The Infanticide" is a painful piece of work,
opening thus :

" Born in a dismal den,
Where thieves and robbers dwell,
She grew in want and wickedness ;
How sad her tale to tell !

" Her mother—let us draw
A veil o'er aught of her :
Her father—drunkard, sluggard—
'Scarce from his glass would stir."
Mr. Bower is a Scotsman, we presume, and, doubt-
less, from his circle of acquaintances has drawn
the picture delineated in the last line. But this
thirsty parent,—if his abiding place was Edinburgh,
he must have been "one in fifteen," we fancy—
deepens the complexion of his guilt by sending out
his girl to beg and steal :
" For crimes when put in jail,
She felt it little pain ;
So soon as she was free,
She went and stole again.
"At length she had a child,
Then she began to think ;
And thus she thought as she
Stood by a river's brink :

" 1 Shall this child also grow
Like me, in want and sin ?'
She kissed the little babe,
And then she threw it in.

"They hanged that guilty mother,
And all the world said,
'Twas just that she should die,
Because the child was dead !"
Verily, thou lovest simplicity, Mr. Bower. Thy
lines are quite Wordsworthian,—all the words
without any worth in them • with all the apparent
purility, and not a spark Of the poetry which dis-
tinguishes the effusions of the bard of Rydal.
We do not know whether Mr. Bower has come to
his courting days yet ; but we hope that if he has
not he will, before entering on that agreeable epoch
in his history, modify his idea of a kiss. It is at
present positively frightful to contemplate. For,
says he—depicting a fierce, tempestuous night—
" The wild winds seemed to kiss
The waters of the stream."
Rough work this, Mr. Bower. We have heard of

wild winds lashing the waters into billowy wrath,
and it requires certainly a long stretch of the imagi-
nation for a man at the Ormes Head on a stormy
night to fancy that old Bill Boreas and his fickle
crew have come down on a love expedition to have a
quiet night's caressing of the waves. But our
author is not very choice in the selection of his
figures. Here is another example :
" With matchless fury Douglas fought,
His sword, of wondrous weight and length,
Unto the earth assailants brought,
Like saplings crushed by woodman's strength.
" But, lo ! like mighty vessel stranded
Upon a rock amid the water,
He struck—he fell; his double-handed
Weapon ceased its horrid slaughter."
The author states his aspiration to " frame a song,"
superior to all that ever have been penned :

" Breathing the spirit of vitality ;
tEolian-harp-like let it be,
Such as Apollo sung—
Soft and impassioned—harmonious and sublime--
Worthy of existence in remotest time."
Mr. Bower is probably a nice young man—the
favourite correspondent, mayhap, of some north
country blue-stockings, but we fear that he never
will be a poet, while we fervently hope that we
have seen the last of him—at least in print.

The Dodd Family Abroad. London : Chapman and

Charles Lever was by some critics supposed to be
running dry ; but his present work proves the sup-
position to have been a signal mistake. To our
mind The Dodd Family Abroad is one of the best
stories that ever flowed from his fertile pen ; and
we are much mistaken if it does not long survive
the mere circulating-library fame which it is sure
to catch in the present, and stand out in the future
as one of the best classics of the nineteenth century.
From the part for July we cull a few proofs that
Harry Lorrequer is still as fresh, funny, and buoyant
as of yore :

THE PLEASURES OF SOLDIERING.

Soldiering has always struck me as an insupportable line
of life. I have no objection in the world to fight the man
that has injured me, nor to give satisfaction where I have
been the offender ! But to go patiently to work to learn
how to destroy somebody that I never saw and never
heard of, does seem absurd and unchristianlike altogether.
You say, " He is the enemy of my country, and con-
sequently mine." Let me see that ; let me be sure of it.
If he invades us, I know that he is an enemy ; but if he
is only occupied about his own affairs—if he is simply
hunting out a nest of old squatters that he is tired of—if
he prefers to live under the " Cock," or, maybe, " the
Drone-bee," what have Ito say to that ? So long as he
stays at home, and only "gets drunk on the premises,"
I have no right to meddle with him. It's all very well to
say that nobody likes to have a disorderly house in his
neighbourhood. Very true ; but you oughtn't to go in
and murder the residents to keep them quiet !—There's
the mail gone by, and I have forgotten to send this off !
It's a wonderful thing how living in Germany makes a
man long-winded and tiresome. It.must be the air, at
least with me, or the cookery, for I am perfectly innocent
of the language. The " mysterious gutturals," as
Macaulay calls them, will ever be mysterious to me !

A PROPOSAL OF MARRIAGE.
di why, it's a proposamlmofms
fromi the Police."
marriage "
exclaimed Papa,
3";:apryd
Egad,lA n thoughtnsea.
iit is,"
1 si
lt,
ha,
escuruieadnjmon James. "It's
an offer to you,
vonter of the Order of Wolfenschafer,
Freiherr von Sehweinbraten and Ritter
the Cock of Tubingen ,maketh hereby, and not the less, that
with future-coming-time-to-be-proved-and-experienced
a offer
affection, of the profound humilityof himself,
with ail his to he named and enumerated belongings,
in effects and majorats, to the lovely and very beautiful
Miss, bothtiful
Miss, the first daughter of the Venerable an
Honourable the Lord Dodd de Dodsborough.",
" Pray stop, James," said I ; " this is scarcely a fit-
ting matter for coarse jesting, nor is my heart to be made
the theme for indelicate banter."
" The letter is a gem," said be, and went on : " 'The
so-named A. von W., overflowing with a mild but in.
heaven-soaring and never-to-earth-descending love, ex.
pecteth, in all the pendulating anxieties of a never-at-
any-moment-to-be-disturbed devotion,-' "
" Papa, I really beg and request that I may not be
trifled with in this unfeeling manner. The Baron's in-
tentions are sufficiently clear and explhisicit E, nonglish pistolary
r are we now
engaged in the work of correcting e
style."
This I said haughtily, Kitty ; and Mister James at last
thought
.... proper to recaver some respect for my feelings.
4,
h 7, I never stunpected you could take the thing
seriously, dear Mary .&nne," said he. "If .1 only
thought----,, -
" And pray, by not, Ames ? I'm sure the DAIEOifI