The daily exchange. [volume] (Baltimore, Md.) 1858-1861, 1860-07-13
NEW BOOKS.
From Ticknor q Fields. Boston. and for Oh ~,

4 ms is very charming book There are No mara
interesting people than painters and their memoirs
"autobographicar' or collected by coppepi,
hands'are among the most pleasant of that delight
iui oroer OF literature. peculiar interest attaches
10 heshe Tor Americans, since although. born in
London, he was the son of American parents and
II this feeling be still further localized it might be-
long more exclusively to our own State where the
family of the artist for several generations resided
"My father Robert Leslie, and nv mother lydia
BAKER, were Americans; natives of Cecil 'conn,r
in the State of Maryland. Their forefatbers hsii
settled IN that neighbour BOD early in the last can
fury as farmers; my fathers ancestors being from,
scotland ana my mothers from England" -
MS la'her, who was remarkably ingenious
iheehahieian, established himself at Philadelphia as
""'o"-n'aker' and his business prospecting, he
=. eApeuieht 10 take a partner, and went
ni'hseh' with MS family. to London, to make pur
na'.S ior MS mouse. 1t was there that his son
ohafies, as well as others of his children. w &c
BORN rms event occurred on the 10Th November
i''4. on the death Of the partner, Mr. Leslie re-
turned to Philadelphia, where he also. soon of,ar
wards died. The voyage from London ont con.
tributed some of the artists earliest and most =,
markapie experiences. They sailed from Grave
seho on the 18th September, l799 in the shin w ash
ington, large vessel which, in consequence of the
s hport war az that time existing between Franco
anu the United States, was heavily armed and
na'lleu win large crew to protect her from the
ehemys prlVateers and small vessels of war In
consequence OF head winds and other difficulties
| .ney were only clear of land when thew
hao neen aboard thirty-four DAYS. and
nau oeen put short time at sea when thew
were chased py French privateer-a ship which
appeared new and in every respect like frirate
except IN size."a The Washington was commanded
oy ascotchman, Captain Williamson, an old.fasb
Toned SALT who considered one EneGshman
match Tor four French. Finding themselves ont
sailed, the Captain laid by to wait for the enemy
WHO soon came up and commenced brisk ENGAGE
ment, but after frutless struggle sheered off to
RENT, having killed but one man on board of the
American vessel. This suspension of bostties
gave our friends aso,a chance to renew their pren
arations for defence, especially enabling them to
right up their big guns which, being ingenousv
mounted on newly invented and patented carriage,
had nearly all tumbed over on the first fire and 50
become useless for the time The privateer. not
satisfied with the reception he had first met,
came on a second time, after a short interval but
with no better luck being again beaten off and hav-
ing done no further damage, except so cutting up the
hull and rigging of the Washington, hat she was
compelled to put into Lisbon, PORTUGAL to reft 1t
is not often we, have an opportunity to hear the
impressions of an intelligent child, of five years of
age, of a naval battle, derived from personal expe-
rience. All the non combatants had been placed in
| the hold i.H-...-tG "H .'t. ....... .-f.t
| 81 had Often says Leslie, 'looked with awe
down the matches into the gloomy region in which
| we were confined during the battle and had seen
Indistinetly the upright post with notches for the
feet, by which we children were carried down.
My wonder and adm iraton were excited by the
steward. who seemed to me almost to fly up and
down this post by the help of the hand rope, his
frequent visits having other object than to see
that we were comfortable as circumstances per
mitted, to tell us all the best news from the decks
and to bring us reinforcements of gingerbread or
anges and wine. All my notions of war were as
sociated with the then popular piece of music,
| the Battle of Prague which had heard nv eldest
sister play on the piano, and accordingly when l
| heard the groans OF the poor man whose leg was
| crushed, and who brought some where near
| exclaimed there are the cries of the ,cotnded'
| The burial OF the man who was killed made deep
! impression on me, for saw his messmates carry
him to the bow of the ship, and could distinctly
| trace the human form through the white canvas
in which it was tightly sewn up; and this to
me me the first image of death = has never
| as children frightened without cause,
| they are as often in moments of real danger less
alarmed than their elders; and |, tho constitu-
tOnally timid have no recollection of being terri
| he'd with what was going on, perhaps because |
believed the hold to be place of perfect safety [
remember that my brother and amused ourselves
for a q eat part of the time, with playing at hide
and seek among the water casks. with some of the
other children of the passengers. Nv brother in
deed, who was more heroic than |. wanted little
pistol, that he might go on deck and shoot the
naughty Frenchmen My two eldest sisters were
O! an age to understand and feel alarmed for our
situation, and my youngest sister was dangerously
Ill with an attack of the pleurisy and in that state
was taken out of bed and carried below What
must my poor mother have suffered? = =
| w took IiShn p,,ilnt uhoo
board with cooked hat and q high plume of red
feathers, laced ru1es to has shirt and scord bu has
side"
In long foot there is an extremely amusing
account of their residence at Lisbon, which, in con
sequence of the very slow and identified nro-
ceedings of the ship-wrights of that enterprising
port lasted till the 3lst March, taken from the
Recohection8 Of Lisbon by Miss Leslie. We cannot
forbear to give our readers the following eharac-
teristic sketch
ga large house was building next door to ours.
immediatey in front he street chiefly occupied
by VIDE deep slough, or mud hole where the
paving stones had sunk or died away; and the
councimen or aldermen, or selectmen (if there are
any such persons in Lisbon, had taken no account
OF IL. w men the weather was uncommony bad,
the carts that brought stone for the building gen
orally stuck fastin this capacious hole The Lisbon
carts were ofvery primitive structure. They had
no close Sides neither had they iron stanchions
like those of drays to keep things from falling
and there along the edges. Though wood is so
scarce in Portugal, there was a great waste
of it in the wheels which had no spokes
but which were solid and massv. like
grindstones; and the axetree revolved with
them grooming or rather shrieking dismally all
the time. The carts were drawn by pair of oxen
winch 1t always required two men to urge along.
The dress of these carmen began by cooked hats and
po,odered hair tostefaly queued aoih Jlue or pink
ribbons; cotton velvet jackets with furnished tinsel
looking ornaments; faded brooches open at the
knees; and their bare Portuguese legs ended as
usual, in old shoes with large snowy buckles
Each driver carried goad, and when the cart load
OF stone got into the slough while one man goaded
the oxen shouting violently something that
sounded like shah! the other went to their heads
and endeavored to brighten the poor beasts out of
the mudhole by making ferocious faces at them
shading also in a loud voice and brandishing his
SUCK. Inc workmen came out of the house to as
sst In eXtrlcatng the cart, and they always had to
90 IN the end what they should have done at the
beginning-unload it of the slabs of stone, after
which the oxen and the empty cart were generally
shahed out of the hole in less than half an hour,
On the llth May they arrived in Philadelphia,
forty-two days from Lisbon, and seven months and
twenty-six days from London.
The spirit which actuated Mr.. Leslie in writing
the work before us, he has thought proper to ex-
plain for himself:
my object has been to preserve in these pages
some reductions of those chiefly ,Chom could
praise, and OF them not the faults and foibles that
are more or less common to all men, but the merits
mat are rare, and on which alone their claims to
| oistlncton rest mention this that NAV not be
charged with dealing too much in panegyric.'
This amable resolution evidently nroceeded
neither from want of discrimination nor from
tendency to toadyism, but must be attributed to a
rennea ana beautiful taste, which in literature
as we" as IN art, rejected all disagreeable and
unharmonlous contrasts. He had the amplest on
portunities for cultivating his naturally sharp pow
ers OF observation by assocaton-in some instances
on the most intimate terms-with many ofthe most
distinguished men of the last fifty years. We have
ghmpses, new and attractive, of Coleridge and
Lamb, Walter Scott, Washington Irving, Sidney
Smith, Samuel Rogers, Ruskin, John Howard
Payne and Wilson, the ornithoogist, among authors;
Sir Robert Peel, the Duke of Wellington, Lords
Melbourne, Holland and Egremont, among states.
men and peers; and Fuse, Westmacott, Flaxman.
Canova, Chantrey, West Constable, the two Cha
Ions, Stothard, Newton, Wilkie Sir Martin Shee.
Turner, Eastlake, Landseer, Haydon. Allston
Morse, &C., &C., among painters and sculptors OF
each OF these distinguished there is some trait
anecdote or bon mot recorded not elsewhere to be
found and well worth the reading. We had marked
many OF these for quotation but prefer to give our
remaining space to the recollections of Coeridpe.
nnr