The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1856-1888, 1857-03-19
THE PACIFIC
Commercial Advertiser.
The British Reviews.

feeling OF this country has perhaps 10 sympathy. All
our politics and politicians, our book publishers and
book writers would stagnate if they had to wait three
months for critical exposition in a hundred and fifty
pages of ably written and expensive literature. We
had rather have our paragraphs not quite so neatly
turned, our rhetoric less polished, our argumentsan and
decisions shorter and more condensed, and then take
them in regular and moderate doses before eating in
the morning. 1t is even true that We have scarcely a
Monthly or u Weekly, if we except those of the latter
made up from the Dailies-of any important political
weight. To the last we look for all our light on these
subjects, or most of it, at a price so low that poverty
can enjoy it as well as riches, and perhaps we may add
Of Il kind so poor that every thoughtful mind feels
quite at liberty to laugh at its effulgence, if not now
and then compelled to deplore its success in dazzling
the multitude.
The ebb and flow of English blood seems more even
and slow than ours. If Sidney Smith wishes to repair
the civil and social abuses of the government, he does
not attempt to organise q New York Herald or Tri-
6une, like a troop of light artillery, against it, but
builds up q massive stronghold in the shape of the
Edinburgh ReUie1v, from which four times a year,
great guns are Illuminated over the heads Of the peo-
pie, flashing discontinue in the faces of It's antagonists
and lighting with mirthful hope the countenances of
all true friends of humanity and human rights. OF
course when the wit and intellect that. give these
shafts such a death-dealing power seem likely to pre-
vail, the conservative party must follow suit, and
forthwith the Quarterly appears in London, to neu-
tralise the influence and combat the decisions of its
prototype. Then the ultra radicals, for whom the
genial liberality and love of right which the ELiaburgh
displays, are not strong enough, while the other re-
view is in the hands of their exact a~ntipodes, must
also have an organ, and the Westminister enters on
its brilliant but not very well-regulated career. And
lastly, the Free Church interest of the Scotch CAPT.
tai, discovers it's want Of similar means to reach the
public mind, and under its auspices is commenced
with Chalmers as editor, the North British, famed
for its many clear and talented eXpositionS of scientific
and religious truth.
Here we have the origin in q few words of these
much-dreaded monarchies of theliterary world. They
have always been and are yet in able hands. The
nrocpnf n1itOp of tho Ac3Fb P-tfrcb Do,;m. 10 D.of
Fraser, who has among his contributors Sir David
Brewster, Isaac Taylor, Mr.. Senior the Political Econ
omist, DR.. Whewell of Cambridge, the Archbishop of
Dublin, Mason of the London UniveI sity, Gregg,
Charles Kingsley, DR.. Samuel Brown the chemist,
Mansel one of the Oxford Board, Professors Cunning
ham and Blackle, Tulloch, principal Of the University
of st. Andrews, and the Duke of Argyle, the great
friend and patron of the Reriep. The Westminster
RerieU is under the direction of several writer's of the
liberal school both male and female, with John Chap
man the American Bookseller In London, at its head,
as editor and publisher, The London Quarterly, so
long under the management of Lockhart, is now edited
by the Rev. WhitWell Elwyn, who has been a contrib
utor to the ReUie1o for some time past, and whom
Lockhart strongly recommended as his successor. Sir
Edward BulWer Lytton, often so roughly handled in
this Rerie0, is now one of its chief contributors.
Whether the ReUieucS continue to hold the unques-
toned dominion that once was indisputably theirs,
there is perhaps some reason to doubt. But as con-
tanning the views of the ablest minds of Great Britain
on all the leading topics of the day, they will ever
and everywhere be read with profit and interest.
BtGc6wood's Magazine, which processes t~hestrong
est Tory principles, is more miscellaneous in contents
than the ReUielCS, including narratives real and fcti-
tious, biography and poetry. As its publishers have
recently stated, it g edits ITSELF Professor Aytoun,
son-in-law of the late Prof Wilson, its longtime
editor, is one of its principal contributors, and was
supposed to have succeeded to the editorial chair.
The mistake only proves that the .Magusine has a
selfsustaining power, quite sufficient to maintain it's
ancient and worldwide reputation; for it was never
more able or interesting than ut the present time.
The American reprints of these works, we may
add, are furnished to subscribers at about one-third
the cost of the originals in England.-Countrg Gent
ENGLAND's PowER.-The following extracts from
Emerson's 'English Traits graphically portrays
the secret of the material greatness of England
HThe power of machinery in Great Britain, in
mills, has been computed to be equal to six hundred
million men, one man being able by the aide of steam
to do the work which required two hundred and fifty
men to accomplish fifty years ago. The production
has been commensurate. England already had this
laborious race, rich soil, water, wood, coal, iron, and
favorable climate. Eight hundred years ago, COM
merce had made it rich, and it was recorded,
g England is the richest of all the northern nations"
But when to this labor and trade, and these native
resources, was added this goblin Of steam, with his
myriad arms, never tired, working night and day
eyerlastlngly, the a}naSsing of property has run out of
all figures. 1t makes the motor of the last ninety
years. The steam-pipe has added to her population
and wealth the equivalent Of four or five Englands.
Forty thousand ships are entered in Lloyd's lists.
-HN JNN ~ 'NANNN AN0 SOAS I'll I'LL wv hIt111OI 1
quarters in the time Of the Stuarts, to thirteen millions
in 1854. a thousand million of pounds sterling are
said to compose the floating money of commerce. But
q better measure than these sounding figures is the
estimate that there is wealth enough in England to
support the entire population in idleness for one year.
The wise, versatile, ~alLgiying machinery makes
chisels, roads, locomotives, telegraphs. Whitworth
divides q bar to a millionth of an inch. Steam twines
huge cannon into wreaths as easily as it braids straw,
and vies with the volcanic forces which twisted the
strata. 1t can clothe single mountains with ship
oaks, make sword-blades that will cut gun-barrels in
two. In Egypt it can plant forests, and bring rain
after three thousand years. Already it is ruddering
the balloon, and the next war Will be fought in the
air. But another machine more potent than steam,
is the Bank. 1t votes an issue of bills, population is
stimulated, and cities rise. It refuses loans. and
emigration empties the country, trade sinks; revolu-
tons break out; Kings are dethroned. By these new
agents our social system is moulded. By dint of
steam and OF money, war and commerce are changed.
Nations have lost their old omnipotence; the patriotic
tie does not hold. Nations are getting obsolete; we
go and live where we will. Steam has enabled men
to choose what law they will live under. Money
makes place for them. The telegraph is a 1imp-band
that will hold the Fenris-wolf of war. For now, that
q telegraph line runs through France and Europe,
from London, every message it transmits makes
stronger by one thread the band which war will have
to cut.
The introduction of these elements gives new re-
sources to existing proprietors. A sporting duke NAV
fancy that the state depends on the House of Lords
but the engineer sees that every stroke of the steam,
piston gives value to the dukes land. fills # with