New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1881-07-08
NEW PUBLICATIONS.


large svo. Pp. 707 COS. D. Appleton Co.
In his speech on the trial of Warren Hastings,
Sheridan spoke of " the luminous page of Gibbon."
and when his friends rallied him upon this lit OF
fattcry 10 the historian who sat in the gallery he
replied. meant voluminous" Not n few readers
since that time have felt that the substituted
epthet is not mhoy undcscrved and yet Gibbon
gave the history of the whole civilized world during
tho long period of transition from ancient TO mod
ern institutions together with history OF the rise
and spread of q new wOrld-conqnerng religion,
within a compass scarcely greater than that OF MIR.
Jefferson Daviss account of O. The bise and Fall of
the Confederate Government" The feature Of this
work indeed is it's appalling length and very full
criticism of the performance might be given in the
form CT an attempt to show how and why its length
is so great for such inquiry touches the heart of
MIR. Daviss methods and involves almost every Pc
cuarty of his work.
One reason for this undue elaboration is found in
the fact that Mr.. Davis has definite notion of
what he would be at. He probably knows the diff
ference between history and autobiography, but he
fails to make the distinction in choosing materials
for this work. He panses in narration of histori-
cal events which is designed explain the origin of
secession and war, i'll order to tell what his
home pursuits were when he was for a time out of
political Office. He not only quotes from his own
speeches, which are perhaps part of history, but
relates anecdotes of his accidental meeting with Mr.
Clay and of the dignity with which he repealed
tain suggestions made to him. He fills many of his
pages, in brief, with matters which concern only
Mr.. Jefferson Davis, and which have proper
place outside of that gentleman's autobiography
proper place, certainly, in such treatise this
purports to be.
Mr. Davis's manner. not less than his matter, is at
times photographed rather than historical. One
thing suggests another to him. and after the
of the autObiographer he follows the suggestion
without due consideration of his main purpose. This,
az j., civ f1oin
ample will be found page 6S4, of the second
volume Mr.. Davis is narrating the events which
brought the war to an end. and telling particularly
of his attempt to collect cavalry force about him mt
Charlotte, n. Co. after Lees surrender. He suddenly
remembers that there of Morgan's men
among these troopers, and this fact reminds him of
Morgans death, and prompts him to say--wholly
without possible connection with the matters in
. hand:
Among the .atrocious cowardly acts of vindic-
tive malice which marked the conduct of the enemy
none did or could surpass the brutality with which
the dying and dead body of Morgan treated.
Hate, the offspring Of fear they might feel for the
valorous soldier while he lived but even the gnoble
passion, vengeance, might have been expected to
stop when life was extinct
There is throughout the book a tendency thus to
misplace matters which it is difficult to account for,
except upon the hypothesis that the author has put
everything down paper when it has occurred to
him. and has not taken the trouble to revise and
arrange his matter into consecutive and orderly
treatise. Even in his account of tho events of
time he violates the chronological order, constantly
writing in single chapter sometimes on a single
page, of occurrences which were widely separated
in time and utterly unrelated in significance 1t is
difficult therefore, to escape she conviction that Mr..
Davss controlling purpose has been autobiography
cal, although he intimates nothing of the kind IN
writing of his Objects and apparently unconscious
of the fact.
If this controlling purpose had led Mr. Davis to
N-rifa arfch in OF fIaro bo
to complain because his life and his charac-
ter are by without interest as subjects of
attentive study but unfortunately he has not done
this. He has written that his work is an Incon-
gruous mixture of history autobiography and argu-
ment in somewhat unequal proportions, and such a
composite work is by no means attractive to any
class of readers.
very large part of the work is devoted to the
discussion of those political and constitutional
questions which involved in the quarrel out
of which the war<2rew, and there is sense in which
this very elaborate going of old and familiar
arguments is interesting. The discussion affords
materials for psychological study of unusual
sort 1t reveals to the peculiar state of mind of
who has stood still in thought and opinion for
twenty years, while all the rest of the world has
been learning something, and it brings back to us
that DID, logic-chopping, har-splitting argumenta-
tive South which we all knew in youth, but
which was long ago embalmed in tradition. The
mummy comes back to us here, galvanized into a
semblance of life, which is worthy of curious atten-
ton. AS of old it cares little for facts if it has
logical premise in hand. An priori demonstration
is to it conclusive against any amount of inductve
proof. That which must be is, while that which is
may or may not be- for aught that the mummy of
the old South cares.
For an illustration of what mean the reader
has only to turn to any of the chapters in which the
origin and constitutional relations of the war are
discussed. We suppose that there is no other man
living who does not know that the war grew ont of
African slavery. 1t was not begun with the POSI-
bity of emancipation directly in view of course
and this or that secondary may have contrib
used to the determination of the exact time and
manner of the struggle; but the broad fact remains
and is recognized by all men except Mr. Davis, that
there would have been fierce sectional dispute
no geographical politics, secession and no war; if
African slavery had not existed in one part of the
country and had not sought to extend itself to other
parts Of 1t. Mr. Davis nothing whatever for
this fact. He denies and supports his denial with
elaborate ingenious and not unintcresting logical
jugglery of the kind with which the country was so
familiar just before the He insists that the North
was covetOus of dominion, ambitious to rule the
South and that this the real of the quarrel
while slavery questions were merely pretexts The
cry of alarm which was set up in the North
mt the proposed extension of slavery to the terri
tore was, Mr.. Davis still thinks a false and illog-
tca one, and he sustains his position very prettily
by q sophism not less than seventy years old in
American politics That is to say, he argues as was
argued in 1911, with reference to Indiana Territory
that the opening of the territories to slavery would
not have increased the number of slaves in the
try, and therefore would not have been an extern
sion of slavery at all Curiously enough. Mr. Davis's