The daily exchange. [volume] (Baltimore, Md.) 1858-1861, 1859-06-07
NEW BOOKS,

early, to appear in our regular weekly notice,
which is usually published on Tuesday,
From CusHINGs & BAILEY, 262 Baltimore street
ACADIA; OR, A MONTH WITH THE BLUE Noses. BY FRED
s. CozzENs, author of The SpGrOpgrdSS Papers.
vol. l2mo, PIP; S29 New York: Derby Jackson, ll9
Nassau street. 1859
There is no class to which the trite Latin, c9lum
non a,imum mmant, &C., applies more properly than
to the fraternity of the pen. Your editor-your
wright-your essayist--your letter-wrter-
even your professional man with some tincture Of
learning, in travel resource rather than re-
Taxation, and while professedly seeking for health
is often really in search of money or reputation.
To him, travel is business. Storms arise, rocks
frown, skies are blue, incidents occur, only to be
described. Every bush in a strange land suggests
some reflection. An old fisherman in red cap-a
squaw in a blanket-the merest commonplace and
routine of the country which he is DOING are watch
ed with greedy eye and narrated with unsparng
industry. If health is found the traveller and his
notebook grow fat together, and the expenses of
the trip betrayed by the publication of the
tour. 1t is rather the illness of the author of the
Sparrowgrass Papers which we are to thank for
this agreeable contribution to our light reading
than any passion for adventure on his part. He
wretchedly ill-''a gastric disorder of the most
obstinate kind" drove him from his accustomed
haunts in New York. He started for Bermuda via
Halifax, and being arrived at Halifax he changed
his mind and devoted himself to the Acadan land and
left the "Bermoothes' to their eternal "vexation"
Mr.. Cozzens, need hardly saw, is first rate OBJ
server, and makes the best use of the very slight
materials which fall in his way; not, however, that
there is not much worth noting in the slow old
province of Nova Scotia. The most striking pecu-
he finds Is he curious sons
exists between the different races of Inhabitants
The ancient Acadians in one spot just as they came
out of Normandy, two hundred years ago-negroes
is another not half so well off as their Congo breth-
rem; then Scotch settlement speaking nothing but
Gaelic, and English and Irish all standing aloof from
each other, but reposing in friendly, tranquil and
somnolent loyalty on the mother country We shall
not attempt to follow Mr.. Cozzens in his tour
we intendour readers shall do that for themselves
When the present most unsummerly GOODNESS has
passed, it WILL this volume will be just the thing
with the cigar, the morning gown and slippers
nor do think it would spoil the flavor of cob
Ter julep. Let us pick out brick or two by way
Of specimen.
A Negro Settlement in Nora Scotia
'.We are now approaching negro settlement, -
said my compdgnon de vOyage after we had passed
Il
Deer's Castle; this is rough travelling" In few
minutes we saw a log house percbed on bare bone
OF granite that stood out a ragged hillside and
presently another cabin of the same kind came in
view. Then other scare-crOw editices wheeled in
sight as We drove along; all forlorn, all patched
with mud, all perched on barren knolls or gigantic
bars of granite, high up, like ragged redoubts of
poverty, armed at every window with formidable
artillery of old hats, rolls of rags quilts carpets
and indescribabe bundles or barricaded with
boards to keep out the air and sunshine.
"l GU do not mean to say those wretched novels
are occupied by living beings?" said | to my com
panion.
"Oh yes he replied, with quiet smile, ''these
are your people, your .fugitiucs. !"
"But surely" said l, 'they do not live in those
airy nests during your intensely cold winters?"
pretty hard time of it. Between you and l." he
continued, 'they miserable set of devils; they
won't work, and they shver it out here as well as
they cam During the most of the year they are in
state OF abJect want, and then they very hum
BILE. But in the strawberry season they make a
little money, and while it lasts are fat and saucy
enough. We can't do anything with them they
won't work. There they in their cabins, Just
as you see them, poor, woe-become set of vaga-
bonds; a burden upon the community; of no use to
themselves, nor to anybody else"
Mr.. Picton.
"Presently Picton burst out like flower, on deck
in mass of overcoats, with an lnda-rubber mack
intosh by way of calyx. These were his night
clothes. Picton could do nothing except in full
costume; he could not fish, in ever so snail a
stream, without being booted to the hips; nor
shoot, in ever good cover, without being lack.
eted above the hips He shaved himself in front OF
a silvermounted dressing case, wrote his letters on
portable secretary, drew off his boots with nat
ent boot, jack, brewed his punch with a peripatetic
kettle, and in fact carried little London with him
in every quarter of the globe. 'Well" said Picton
looking around at the fog with low and expressive
whistle, "this is serenen'
Nothing to DO.
"What are we to do?" That eternal question -
1t instantly seemed to double the thickness of the
fog, to arrest the slow movement of the vessel Pic
ton had nothing to do for a fortnight, and had
left home with the sole object of going somew here
where soul and body could rest. "Nothino To do "
was precisely the one thing needful "Nothing to
do is exquisite happiness, for real happiness is but
| a negation. "Nothing to do" is repose for the
body, respite for the mind. 1t is an ideal ham
mock swinging in drowsy tropical groves, apart
from the strife of faction the tolls of business, the
restless stretch of ambition, weath's tinsel pride,
povertys Calling harness. "Nothing to do" is the
phantom ofyoung Imagination, the evanescent
hope that promises to crown
A youth of labor, with an age of ease"
"Nothing to do" was the charm that lured US on
board the "Balakava," and now "nothing to do ]"
was with us like the Bottle-Imp, an incubus still
smaller coin, if such there bel" "Nothing to do"
is an imposture Something to do is the very life
of life, the beginning and end of being "Picton."
said Gone thing we must do, at least, this morn
"What is that?" replied the traveller. eagerly
opening bis macintosh, and drawing it off so as to
be ready to do it.
"Taking into consideration the slow and sleepy
nature of this climate the thickness of the fog the
faint thin air that impes the vessel the early time
of day, and the regulations of the "Balaklava" it
seems to me we shall have to be steadily occupied
for at least three hours in waiting for breakfast
Then Picton got hungry! He was a large, stout
man, wrapped up by multitude of garments to
the thickness of polar bear, and when he got
hungry, it was on scale of corresponding dimen-
sions"
Mr. Sparrowgrass on the Scotch.
''The people of Lousburgh are kind hospita-
BILE, pleasant people, tolerably well informed for
the inhabitants of isolated corner of the world;
but few miles further off we come upon totally
different race: canting. covenanting, oat-eating
oney-griping tribe of secondhand Scotch
Presbyterians: atransplanted, degenerate, barren,
patch of high cheek-bones and red hair, with
nothing cleaving to them of the original stock
except covetousness and that peculiar cutaneous
eruption for which the mother country is so cele-
brated."
Scotchman feeling his Oats.
s'Some learned philosopher has asserted that
when person has become accustomed to one pecu-
liar kind of Diet it will be expressed in the Inca
ments OF his face. How much the constant use of
oatmeal could produce such effect, was plainly
visible in the countenances of McGibbet and his
ady-love. Both had an unmistakable equine cast
McGibbet wild, scraggy, and scrubby, with a inf
on his poll that would not have been ont of nIane
between the of ploughhorse stared at ms INST
such an animal would naturally do, over the ton
of fence; while his gentle mate, who had more Of
the amiable draught-horse in her aspect winked at
us with both eyes from under a close-crimped
frill that bore marvellous resemblance to head
STALL"
Admiration aud Appet,te
"Admiration and convalescent hunger make a
very good team in this beautiful country. You
look out upon the unfathomable Gulf of st. Law
renee, and feel as if you were unfathomabe gulf
yourself You ride through lofty woods, with a
tantalzing prousion of living edibles in your path;
at every moment cock rabbit is saying his prayers
before the horses; at every bosk and boe SPUR
rel stares at you with unwinking eyes, and Rob-
in Yellow bill hops, runs, and flies before the
peur!"
A fare,ceN to the Scotch.
awe left this last outpost of the Scotch settle
ments with pleasure. After ALL there is a secret
feeling of JOY in contrasting ones self with such
wretched, penurious, mismade specimens of the hui
man animal And from this time henceforth shall
learn to prize my own language, and not be car
rled away by any catch penny Scotch synonyms,
such as the tyf for the sky, and the godmn for
twilight And as for poortuh cauld, and paukv
chte, L leave them to those who can appreciate
them: FF
Farewell, farewell beggarly Scotland,
Cold and Deggary poor countrie
II ever cross thy border again,
The muckle dell maun carry me.'n
From the same:
The VIRGINIA SPRINGS, AND SPRINGS OF THE SouTB
AND NEST; By DIR. J. J. MooRMAN. J. B. Lippincott
Co. Philadelphia 1889