The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1849-10-09 00:00:00

DANGER OF A MISTAKE IN A NAME,

"Mistakes mighthe madelii names which would far exceed
a joke in their consequences. An old lady wbo was very anxi-
ous respecting a favourite nephew, a student at Catherine
Hall, enquired of his tutor bow be conducted himself. 'Oh
(replied the latter), very well indeed, madam ; he sticks to
Catherine Hall.' Sticks to Catherine Hall does he, the
reprobate : but his lather was just like him, always fond of the
girls.' If the old lady had taken a huff at her nephew stick-
ing to Catherine, and had left her fortune away from him in
consequence, the mistake would have been too serious for the
joke it is."

The Dublin University Magazine. Dublin : James
M`Glashan, 21, D'Olier-street ; and W. S. Orr & Co.,
London.
THIS month's number is excellent. The first article
gives some striking facts, bearing upon the condition of
Ireland, which we have noticed elsewhere. The reviews
of Lord Castlereagh's Memoirs and Correspondence, and
Lord Cloncurry's Correspondence, are most interesting—
the latter especially. The number gives us also the con-
clusion of the beautiful tale, " Philip Marsden ; or. the
Experiment," and two graphic chapters of " The Under-
graduate." We quote from the latter the
CONCLUDING SCENE OF MY FIRST COLLEGE PARTY.
" David Drake had for the last half-hour been discussing
with our host and some others, who were members of the
Boating Club, the necessary qualifications for taking a part in
the eight-oar. In the warmth of his feelings he had become
totally unconscious that a weight of eighteen stone was ap-
pended to his reasoning powers, so had enlisted himself in the
nautical corps, and was expressing great doubt whether he
should hold the coxswain's office or pull the stroke-oar. His
opinion was slightly gravitating towards the latter, when,
without assigning any reason, as if some new idea had sud-
denly struck him, he rose up from his chair and laid hold on
his heaver.
" Where are you going ? ' asked a tall man who sat next
him ; you cannot go down the river to-night.'
" Going?—going straight to my rooms, to be sure,' an-
swered Drake; where else should Igo ?'
" Why, you haven't yet fixed what place you'll take,' urged
the tall man.
" Both—both.' ,-,uttered David, who, in his temporary
exaltation, no &ul,: fancied that he could have upset the gate-
posts of Gaza,. pulled an eight-oar himself, and steered it
into the bargem.
" 6 Come, cc- sit down—you're not going, I'm sure.'
" David, ever, was determined to drink no more for no
man's pleasur;,' so proceeded to move off, like a floating island.
His neighbor;:'. however, who was a great bully, presuming
upon his size and good-nature, took an effectual means of pre-
venting his escape.
" There,' said he, find your way out if you can ;' accom-
panying his words with a weighty blow on the top of Drake's
hat, which crushed it over three-fourths of his face.
" Notwithstanding the feelings of indignation which must
necessarily rise on witnessing an attack so unprovoked, a per-
son could hardly have repressed all emotions of a lighter nature
on seeing an exhibition so ludicrous as that of Drake, as he
stood. His broad features were peering from below his hat,
like the fat face of Falstaff from below the buck's horns. Every
nerve in his body was strung with rage; and muttered sounds
of revenge rolled horrible' within the cavern of his heaver.
David, though good-natured, was no coward, and would resent
an insult as courageously as any mail living. Supported by his
own weight, with his legs slightly apart,
Ile dilated stood,
Like Teneriff or Atlas, unremoved.'
To be sure he slightly swayed; but his feet were firmly planted,
and if he was acted upon by the same trifling vibrations as the
pendulum, his centre of gravity still retained that position
which mathematicians can demonstrate to be the only safe one
for a substance under the influence of attraction. He rocked
like a sturdy oak before the whirlwind, and was based as im-
moveably, so long as no external force was applied. During
this time be was endeavouring, with all his might, to raise the
obstinate beaver, to the infinite detriment of its brim. His
rage increased with his efforts.
" During this struggle, some of the company were evidently
shewing their disgust at the cowardly conduct of the tall man.
Wesley coolly asked him bow he would like to be pitched out
of the window, or stuffed up the chimney like a bundle of
straw; and our Lost, who was a thorough gentleman, ordered
him to leave the room. Now amid this disturbance one of the
company, whose correctness of aim and correctness of thought
were in an inverse ratio, levelled a medlar at the tall man with
all his force. At that very moment Drake had fought through
his difficulty ; and lie was just catching the first glimpse of
light from beneath his hat, when the medlar, missing its des-
tination, squashed on his cheek, and stuck there. It looked
like a knotty excrescence on the rough bark of an oak. It was
thrown with considerable force; and although its softness pre-
cluded any serious damage to the flesh; the mere impulse was
enough to upset Drake's stability. Before that he was slightly
tottering, but firm—excluding pressure from without. No
sooner had it struck him than he threw up his arms, winked
one eye, and staggered back with that ill-omened step which
betokened downward motion. Of course he strove against the
impending disaster; but every backward step brought his cen-
tre of gravity further over the falling point.
" • Order, gentlemen, is the first law of nature—peace—
propriety—Plato'—(hiccup.)
" This was the commencement of an oration from De Were,
who, in the energy of his feelings, had risen from his seat to
allay the clamour and appease the fury of the combatants.
Poor fellow I he saw not the weighty mass moving towards
him. Slow and heavy were the footstepl of Drake; but he
heard them not. Indeed the wine bad not imparted quickness
either to his faculty of hearing or of sight. Taken unawares
as lie was—being moreover less stable than usual—it is easy to
fancy the slight resistance he opposed to the impulse of the
moving mountain. Poor De Vere I he was crushed like a wil-
low before a train of steam-carriages' or a reed before a rocky
mass rolling from the summit of tale Alps—and his oration was
lost for ever I
" Backwards went David, and every step brought him nearer
to the ground. At last, when the awful moment of a downfall
arrived, be was within half a yard from the partition. Now
this was only :a thin wooden wainscot ; so, when the terrific
shock arrived, it splintered in a thousand pieces, as if a bomb-
shell had been levelled against it.
" Gaudetque viam fecisse mina,' said a tallow-complexioned
man, who could talk in Greek or Latin far more fluently than
in English.
" A moment's stillness succeeded the crash; as soon, how-
ever, as we were able to collect our scattered ideas, we per-
ceived a yawning hiatus in the partition, and Drake prostrated
in the adjoining room. On examination we found that it was a
bed-room—that the wretched occupant, unable to sleep, had
been reading in bed, and, which was worst of all, that the
magnitude of Drake was on him like a nightmare—
' Look on the magic loading of this bed!'
No effort of his could move David's enormous trunk—he could
as reasonably have lifted a cheese-press. We hastened to the
poor sufferer's aid ; and, sooth to say, no time was to be lost—
for the studious paleness of his face was turning into a sable
red. The poor fellow, after being relieved of his load, was in
little better plight than the mangled Tybalt,' in the New
Readings of Old Authors'—he seemed rolled into the shape of
an oval pancake.
With much ado, ,e assisted Drake to his own bed, who,
as he inutterea some, indistinct words, about, powder and pis-
tole,' twelve paces acid percussiomtape; Iromediately dropped
into a heavy sleep."

Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine. W. Blackwood and
Sons! George-street, Edinburgh, and Paternoster Row,

•
London.
THE number for this month contains some excellent
papers. including "The Green Hand," part 5; "The
English Mail Coach, or the Glory of Motion"—a plea-
sant sketch—and a few others of more than average
talent. The gem of the number is the conclusion of Sir
E. B. Lytton's splendid tale "The Caxtons." We can-
not resist giving a portion of the last chapter, in which
THE PROFESSION OF THE YOUNG DE CAXTON IS DETERMINED.

" Standing on the hearth, his band in his waistcoat, my fa-
ther said musingly, ' Among the last delusions of Human Er-
ror, I have had to notice Rousseau's phantasy of Perpetual
Peace, and all the like pastoral dreams, which preceded the
bloodiest wars that have convulsed the earth for more than a
thousand years!'

And-to judge by the newspapers,' said I, the same delu-
sions are renewed again. Benevolent theorists go about, pro-
phesying peace as a positive certainty, deduced from that sibyl
book the ledger; and we are never again to buy cannons, pro-
vided only we can exchange cotton for corn.' •
" Mn. SQUILLS, (who, having almost wholly retired from
general business, has, from want of something better to do, at-
tended sundry Demonstrations in the North,' since which he
has talked much about the march of improvement, flee spirit of
the age, and us of the nineteenth century heartily hope
that these benevolent theorists are true prophets. I have
found, in the course of my professional practice, that men go
out of the world quite fast enough, without hacking them into
pieces, or blowing them up into the air. War is a great evil.
BLANCHE (passing by Squills, and glancingtowards Roland.)
—Hush !
Roland remains silent.

Mn. CAx'roN.—War is a great evil ; but evil is admitted by
Providence into the agency of creation, physical and moral.
The existence of evil has puzzled wiser heads than ours, Squills.
But, no doubt, there is One above who has His reasons for it.
The combative bump seems as common to the human skull as
the philo-progenitive ; if it is in our organisation, be sure it is
not there without cause. Neither is it just to man, nor wisely
submissive to the Disposer of all events, to suppose that war
is wholly and wantonly produced by human crimes and follies
—that it conduces only to ill, and does not as often arise from
the necessities interwoven in the framework of society, and
speed the great ends of the human race, conformably with the
designs of the Omnipotent. Not one great war has ever deso-
lated the earth, but has left behind it seeds that have ripened
into blessings incalculable.
Mn. SQUILLS, (with the groan of a dissentient at a "
17e-
monstration.)—Oh ! oh! OH !
_ _

Luckless Squills l Little could he have foreseen the shower-
bath, or rather douche, of erudition that fell splash on his head,
as he pulled the string with that impertinent Oh! oh! Down
first came the Persian War, with Median myriads disgorging
all the rivers they had drunk up in their march through the
East—all the arts, all the letters, all the sciences, all the notions
of liberty that we inherit from Greece—my father rushed on
with them all, sousing Squills with his proofs that, without the
Persian War. Greece would never have risen to be the teacher
of the world. Before the gasping victim could take breath,
down came Hun, Goth, and Vandal, on Italy and Squills.
" , What, sir,' cried my father, don't you see that, from
those eruptions on demoralised Rome, came the regeneration
of manhood ; the rebaptism of earth from the last soils of pa-
ganism ; and the remote origin of whatever of Christianity yet
exists, free from the idolatries with which Rome contaminated
the faith ?'

"Squills held up his hands, and made a splutter. Down
came Charlemagne—paladins and all ! There my father was
grand I What a picture he made of the broken, jarring, savage
elements of barbaric society. And the iron hand of the great
Frank—settling the nations, and founding existent Europe.
Squills was now fast sinking into a coma, or stupefaction; but,
catching at a straw, as he heard the word Crusades,' he stut-
tered forth, I there I defy you l'
"' Defy me there!' cries my father; and one would think
the ocean was in the shower-bath, it came down with such a
rattle. My father scarcely touched on the smaller points in
excuse for the Crusades, though he recited very volubly all the
humane arts introduced into Europe by that invasion of the
East ; and showed how it had served civilisation by the vent it
afforded for the rude energies of chivalry—by the element of
destruction to feudal tyranny that it introduced—by its use in
the emancipation of burghs, and the disrupture of serfdom.
But he showed, in colours vivid as if caught from the skies of
the East, the great spread of Mahometanism, and the danger it
menaced to Christian Europe—and drew up the Godfreys, and
Tancreds, and Richards, as a league of the Age and Necessity,
against the terrible progress of the sword and the Koran. You
call them madmen,' cried my father, but the frenzy of nations
is the statesmanship of fate! How know you that—but for the
terror inspired by the hosts who marched to Jerusalem—how
know you that the Crescent had not waved over other realms
than those which Roderic lost to the Moor ? If Christianity
had been less a passion, and the passion had less stirred up all
Europe—how know you that the creed of the Arab (which was
then, too, a passion, might not have planted its mosques in the
forum of Rome, and on the site of Notre Dame? For in the
war between creeds—when the creeds are embraced by vast
races—think you that the reason of sages can cope with the
passion of millions? Enthusiasm must oppose enthusiasm.
The crusader fought for the tomb of Christ, but he saved the
life of Christendom.'

My father paused. Squills was quite passive; he struggled
no more—he was drowned.

" So,' resumed Mr. Caxton, more quietly—' so, if later wars
yet perplex us as to the good that the Allwise One draws from
their evils, our posterity may read their uses as clearly as we
now read the finger of Providence resting on the barrows of
Marathon, or guiding Peter the Hermit to the battle-fields of
Palestine. Nor, while we admit the evil to the passing genera-
tion, can we deny that many of the virtues that make the orna-
ment and vitality of peace sprang up first in the convulsions of
war!' Here Squills began to evince faint signs of resuscitation,
when my father let fly at him one of those numberless water-
works which his prodigious memory kept in constant supply.
Hence,' said he, hence not unjustly has it been remarked
by a philosopher, shrewd at least in worldly experience—
(Squills again closed his eyes, and became exanimate)—" It is
strange to imagine that war, which.of all things appears the
most savage, should be the passion of the most heroic spirits.
But 'tis in war that the knot of fellowship is closest drawn;
'tis in war that mutual succour is most given—mutual danger
run, and common affection most exerted and employed; for
heroism and philanthropy are almost one and the same!"'
(Shaftesbury.)
" My father ceased, and mused a little. Squills, if still living,
thought it prudent to feign continued extinction.
" Not,' said Mr. Caxton, resuming—' not but what I hold it
our duty never to foster into a passion what we must rather
submit to as an awful necessity. You say truly, Mr. Squills—
war is an evil; and woe to those who, on slight pretences, open
the gates of Janus,
—" The dire abode,
And the fierce issues of the furious god."'
" Mr. Squills, after a long pause, (employed in some of the
more handy means for the reanimation of submerged bodies,
supported himself close to the fire in a semi-erect posture, with
gentle friction, self-applied, to each several limb, and copious
recourse to certain steaming stimulants which my compassion-
ate hands supplied him,) stretches himself, and says feebly,
" In short, then, not to provoke further discussion, you would
go to war in defence of your country. Stop, sir—stop, for
God's sake ! I agree with you—l agree with you! But, fortu-
nately, there is little chance that any new Boney will build
boats at Boulogne to invade us.'

" MR. CARTON.—I am not so sure of that, Mr. Squills.
(Squills falls back with a glassy stare of deprecating horror.)
I don't read the newspapers often, but the past helps me to
judge of the present.
" Therewith my father earnestly recommended to Mr. Squills
the careful perusal of certain passages in Thricydides, just pre-
vious to the outbreak of the Peloponnesian War. (Squills has-
tily nodded the most servile acquiescence,) and drew an inge-
nious parallel between the signs and symptoms foreboding that
outbreak, and the very apprehension of coming war which was
evinced by the recent lo paeans to peace. And, after sundry
notable and shrewd remarks, tending to show where elements
for war were already ripening, amidst clashing opinions and'
disorganised states, he wound up with saying, So that, all
things considered, I think we had better just keep up enough
of the bellicose spirit, not to think it a sin if we are called upon
to fight for our pestles and mortars, our three per cents,
goods, chattels, and liberties. Such a time must come, sooner
or later, even though the whole world were spinning cotton,
and spinning sprigged calicoes. We may not see it,Squills ;
that young gentleman in the cradle, whom you have so lately
brought into light, may.'
" And if so,' said my uncle abruptly, speaking for the first
time—' if indeed it is for altar and hearth Pi
" My father suddenly drew in and pished a little, for he saw
that he was caught in the web of his own eloquence.
" Then Roland took down from the wall his son's sword.
Stealing to the cradle, he laid it in its sheath by the infant's
side, and glanced from my father to us with a beseeching eye.
Instinctively Blanche bent over the cradle to protect theNeo-
gilos • but the child, waking, turned from her, and, attracted
by the glitter of the hilt, laid one hand lustily thereon, and
pointed with the other, laughingly, to Roland.
" Only on my father's proviso,' said I, hesitatingly. For
hearth and altar—nothing less !'
" ' And even in that case,' said my father, add the sheld to
the sword I' and on the other side of the infant he placed Ro-
land's well-worn Bible, blistered in many a page with secret
tears.
" There we all stood, grouping round the centre of so many
hopes and fears—in peace or in war, born alike for the Battle of
Life. And he, unconscious of all that made our lips silent, and
our eyes dim, had already left that bright bauble of the sword,
and thrown both arms round Roland's bended neck.

" ' Herbert,' murmured Roland; and Blanche gently drew
away the sword—and left the Bible."

The Colonial Magazine. London : John Mortimer ;
Strand.

THE present number is an interesting one ; and discusses
some subjects of great importanceto the colonist. Amongst
these are the questions of " Banking in India," " Cotton
from India," " Railways in India," and " Steam to Aus-
tralia." The opening article is a notice of "The Book
of the Cape," reviewed by us last week.