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    MAira^l856.1 THE LEADER, 425

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    GRECIAN SCENERY. TAe Scenery of Greece a...

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  • Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.

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    Moore's Journals. 3femoi?-S, Journal, An...

    had . swcaested to Mrs . Longman as proper for her entomological guea $ g , to-day , Soenceand Kirby ; " to wit , flea-pates , earthworms on toast , caterpillars crawling *» crsam and removing tltemselvea , " & c . & c . Called upon me in a hackney-coach . . . . -Smith ' skid * tnafr where he felt he had a good and just claim , he ^ onaidered it always a duty to himself and family to ask , and not to let the world have to say , " If he did fell into adversity * . ' tbafc was his * wn fault , " . What he had hitherto done was all by his oirn exertions , * sjnefth « sr himself nor . any of . his ,, brothers had received a shilling SoTttieir 4 iMtheB . ^ Jn talking of the fun he had had . in the early , times of the Edvng «^ JBep ^/^ wentioned an article on Ritspn , which he and Brougham had written tos » ther , s » adpne : inftan < je of their joint contribution which he gave me was as fol-4 o ^*— < VWetak $ jfi &> granted ( wrote Brougham ) fchaf ; Mr . Ritson supposes Provi-\ denca toJUay ** hadlsonieibare xn producing him-rthough for what inscrutable purng ^< added Sydney ) we , profess ourselves unable to conjecture . " Company at the Xonfimans' ^ bes ^ ies the entomologists ) ,. ; Spottisveood , the Ormes , & c Sung in the "Xyeningaud jcame awayiearlyisb . The road up to Longmans' being . rather awkward , ' jbehaa desiredthp backneytrcoachman to wait . for us at ] the bottom . " It would ^^ ' ^ do ^ jud Sj . ) when your Memoirs come to be . written to have it said , ( He went ' out toL ' diij ? af th ^ hons e of the respectab le publ ishers , Longman and Co .,. and , being pi'iBrttt ^ n ^^ i ^ . payback , wascrushedto , death , by . a large clergyman . '" ,, Again ^ -r ^& tfli this is'exquisitely humourous , quite in the spirit of Charles-Lamb , or Helps : — 11 at made me actuai witn

    of the . '' few things which struck me ( Moore ) in my Greek studies the Other day , " what does the reader think of this :- ^ - > Thucydides thus tersely and sensibly describes the difficulty there is in hitting the true medium in oratory , —^ aXerrdp yap r & fj # rj > io » s ciTrctt' . "To be wet is unpleasant "— "Journah-writers are often uftwide "— - No ¦>• man is always wise , " are . equally terse and sensible . In Greek thiey would have Moore ' s citative sympathy . , . , ...... . ., •„ , ,. We conclude our present notice with a good story ot Gibbon , and next week will borrow more . : ' ' . - Here is an anecdote of William Spencer's which , has just occurred to me . ; The dramatis persona were Lady Elizabeth Foster , • , ; .-. , . ¦• y . ; i

    SeptemOer IBtai- ^ Sydney breakfast ' ry cry wngmng . x wai Obliged to ^ start up from the table . In talking of the intelligence arid concert ; wWtfh Wrd 3-have among each othe " r , cranes and crows , & c , showing that they must fevfe ' sb ' miy ' meanVof c ; omm 1 inicatitig' ^ li « r « h ! ottgh * s , he said , "I dare say they make the same remark of us . That old fat crow there ( meaningtatViteesIf ) -what a prodigiouaincise heiis making ! I havs rib doubt he has some power of communicatfiig , " - > & c ,, & c » / -After pursuing this idea comically for some time , he added , "But we have " the Advantage of them ; they can't put us into pies as we do them ; legs sticking up ' ^ rtir'df the crust , " & c . & c . The acting of all this makes two-thirds of the fun of it ; the 4 uickness , the buoyancy , the self-enjoying laugh . - ¦ - ' . •• hi A few pages before this our pencil has marked one of the characteristic ^ platitudes-of Moore , and we quote it not because it is a platitude , but because it . js a platitude which is often uttered : — . Broached to him my notions Qong entertained by me ) respecting the ruinous effects to literature likely to arise from the boasted diffusion of education ; the lowering of the standard that must necessarily arise from the extending of the circle of judges ; from letting the mob in to vote , particularly at a period when the market is such an object to authors . Those " who live to please must please to live , " and most will write down to the lowered standard . All the great things in literature have been achieved when the readers were few ; "fit audience find and few . " In the best days of English genius , what a comparatively small circle sat in judgment ! In the Italian Republics , in old Greece , the dispensers of fame were a select body , and the consequence was a high standard of taste . Touched upon some of these points to Fonblanque , and he seemed not . indisposed to agree with me ; observing that certainly literature lutmeu iu uuuuimauuu

    the present appearances in tue worm or very » . e a w my views . In this loose logic after-dinner talk may reasonably indulge , but not printed talk . Those who talk so forget that the extension of the reading public ? although it of course brings many bad judges , does not exclude the good judges . More people read now than a century ago ; but because the many read are the few excluded ? If the literature for the many becomes of a more facile and popular nature than that of the fit and few audience , is the < raver kind of literature to be altogether banished ? Upon this reasoning , *^ is clear that the . introduction of omnibuses has entirely done away with private carriages . J . Now many poor people ride for fourpence , no rich .. persqn ^ can afford to keep a pair of . horses 1 Of Vv ' qrdawprtt , we get occasional glimpses in these Journals . Here are ' specimena Qi his spoken opinions : — . . Spoke of thei iinmense time it took him to write even the" shortest copy of verseo , — sdmAHmfeswhole weeks wnpU > yed ' 4 tt'Shtaplng"tw 6 or three lines , 'before he can satisfy himstlf with tueir ; structure . Attributed m « ch of this to the unmanageobleness of the English as a poetical language : contrasted it with the Italian in this respect , 1 repeated a stanza of Tassoj to show how naturally the words fell into music of ' -themselves . ' it wire one where the double rhymes , " ella , " " nella , " " quella , " occurred , whtohT . be compared with the moagreand harsh English words " she , " "that , " "this , " # c ., « Sjc ,, „ ,,...,, . Pn the subject of Coleridge , as a writer , Wordsworth gave it as his opinion ( straogely , I think ) that his prose would live and deserved to " live ; while , of his poetry , he thought by no means so highly . I had mentioned the ; ' » "Gen « vieve" as a beautiful thing , but to this he objected : there was too much of the B ^ nap ^ i ^ it . . „• ,,.. -. . .. ¦ - .,. . ¦ . ¦¦ :. ¦ •• . . This takes our breath away . Think of Coleridge ' s insincere , ambitious , and lumbering prose , and of his genuine poetry ! rnrLOLOGiCA ' L . A good deal of talk with Talbot on the affinity traceable between the Celtic language and the Latin and Greek . Thus , in Irish , a man ( Vir ) Tir ? a country ( terra ) , ¦ i and from thence Tireo , the land belonging to Y or Iona . I mentioned Buachaill , a

    : « owherd , from BovkoKos ( which i found remarked by M'Culloch in his " Woatorn ; Highlands ; " and this affinity , aa Talbot said , was found also in bo , the Gaelic and Irish for cow . Fan , a chapel , is another instance , , fanum . Ho pointed out some furious mistakes in German translation made by the reviewer of Meyer's Voyage , in v fan Quarterly{— . "It is well kijpwn . " ( the reviewer makes Meyer say ) *' , that the ' i Chinese ' drink tb ^ ir tea without either sugar , mf lk ?( or rum ; " and then , ni a note , the crttic facetiously asks , "Who do take rum iii their tea ? not , surely , the Ger-. ' m ' ins . " ' The fact ; being , all the while , tn ' a ' tDr . Meyer's words are , u'The Chinese take n ^^ > ^> lk >> ho ^ ^^ ( i . 6 J ' e ^ aW ) ia thoir ' ta ( ft ' . - '' ^ "jtir iviever may have . said Jtd ' hm ^ but he may also have said jRumy for tlio I * <& qrfe ' rto / KQyi < zwe : r ' s query , which he answers w ^ th so" decided p . negative , . WWt bei aijiswercU affirmatively : tlitf Germans do take rum with their tea . , I | fc is ^' n ^ Qd Vound with i \ io milk and sugar , —we presume to give strength , _ jto ^ , Ue Jf i ^ thjicijl cpni ^ puhd which is ofTcred as tea . !! . ii-. il . V < -, m , ll :, i > .... / . I I . Mi . ... I ¦ ^ H K . pHIUJ , . ,,. .: _ ,. . , . Rogers very agreeable . Mentioned tho Duke of Wellington saying to some enthusiastic woman who was talking , ' vx raptu / ea , about tho glories of a victory , " I should . < nifnY < # ta , ftq . j' * Ml 1 » l ^ .. yfet ^^ lTl " ^ P- 'M \ r ~" ' . My $ <>* x Wftdam , a . yi ^ ry is the greatesl . \ 'ttP < fjKft f 1 W ^ « W , OD ^ -l |^ ^ f 8 , ^ ' ¦¦¦ ¦ ' . ' iuu , foif aqom ^ on miatakjejo . euD ^ ose ^ jjat . whatever , iq sa ^ d in Greek or Latin n « W »« rt ^ fiiy ^ iftr ( f ^ f 9 it ^ ,, and , aa mpny things both foUcitpua and waso hayo be < w , asud , in thopc . language' ^ thp delu ^ on is porpetuatcd . Aa a eamplo

    Maira^L856.1 The Leader, 425

    MAira ^ l 856 . 1 THE LEADER , 425

    Grecian Scenery. Tae Scenery Of Greece A...

    GRECIAN SCENERY . TAe Scenery of Greece and ike Islands . Illustrated by Fifty Views , Sketched from Nature , Etched on SteeL and Described en route . By William Lin tori . / ' . Published by the Artist . Mi : Uijrrdw ' s volume is a gallery of Grecian landscapes . He has Selected the fifty views engraved from upwards of three hundred , sketched during fifteen months' wanderings is almost every district ot Greece . The publication of such a work has , in our time , become a rarity . " Illustrated Toura " are for the most part , executed in lithography , which , unless coloured , has a rou ^ h and woolly appearance , while , if richly tinted , as in the Egyptian groups of Prisse , or in the superb art-pieces of Owen Jones , is so costly as to be , to the general eye , only accessible through the printsellers' windows . Mr . Linton ' s views in Greece and its islands are lightly and freely drawn on steel , with more of softness and finish than the ordinary hard and untinted etchings , and less of heaviness and monotony than is usually found in elaborate line-engraving . They represent a large variety of scenes and subjects—the grey plain of Marathon , the Delphian cliffs , Castaly , Callirhoe , and the Styx , the snow-white pillars of Sunium , moonlight at Levadia , the white houses and lemon-groves of Kalabrita , Athens , and the Acropolis , Thebes , Argos , Sparta , Corinth—whatever is most , beautiful and most famous in the scenery and history of the land where Nature Played at will ' "

    Her virgin fancies , Wild _ above rule or art . — Several travellers have endeavoured to draw from Greece the materials of an illustrated portfolio . Among the earliest was Sir George Wheeler , who , with M . Spon , made a comprehensive tour of the Levantine district . His narrative , though pompous , is interesting , but his engravings resemble . the rough chalk studies of an amateur , buildings being laid on skies , and doors on walls , in utter contempt of perspective , aerial and linear . Ho " was followed , a century afterwards , by Stuart , who , possessing a thorough knowledge of architecture , brought home a description of the architectural antiquities of Greece , which long remained unsurpassed , and even unrivalled . He introduced , however , few plates , confining his illustrations to the Athenian capital . These ., few , however , exhibited a remarkable advance beyond the style of Sir George AVheeler , w } io , though a competent antiquarian , was , as an artist , destitute of faculty . They lire , ^ oreover ^ cafcfttflv engraved . During the progress of the French Revolution , several Engltsb scholars explored the ancient Grecian sites ,. Dr . Clarke , C ploneJLJLeak j ^ Sir William Gell , Dodwell , and Laurent being among the most distinguished . Of these , Dodwell was the bnly one who pretended to give an artistic illustration to his travels . His work was embellished with large aquatfnfcsy which to his contemporaries appeared effective , but . which , in comparison with the line-engraving and chromo-lithograplry of 1856 , are not merely gaudy , but frivolous . Miller ' s engravings of YVilliams ' s sketches were , perhaps , the best for the use of the traveller until Mr . Luiton published , ^ his beaiitilul volume ; but the plates are small , and . JLhe text consists , exclusively , of classical quotations . Mr . Linton ' s work is upon a , bolder scale , ( Vyi $ i the illustrations , he gives a narrative of his own journey , brightened . by inter > ludes from the poets , fortified by references ito travellers and oxiticakuAnd . varied by pleasant anecdotes and glimpses of inodem . Grecian ) life , l alia began his tour , as he advises all persons to ? 4 > eguY < itj at Athens ; . apptfoaobiag -H 7 ifw . il t . fc p . t . vRv « ll « r .- if he be an enthusiast ; eniors all ' the

    opprotoriatalinfatures that belong to the headlands of tho Moreaj 1 algefton , toWenttg ^^ OVttr Maina , Cytheraeii , the Spartan heights , and the Cyclades , just as "' ft siBiwo of solemn awe" belongs to the Colisseum , or miasma to the Grotto ' 'del Cane . If he could enter Attica at Sunium ; instead of steaming b y to P ' raeds , he might step into Greece across a threshold of marble ; but it is enpuigh to see the throne of Xerxes , the monument of Salamb , and finally the Acropolis aud the Parthenon , with the greeu background of Hymettus , ftnd , tf > e Pentelican hill . Mr . Linton describes tho actual state of Atuei ^ an < Uho prodigious dilapidation of the ancient remains . When Spon and Wheeler visited it , in 1676 , tho Parthenon was nearly entire ; it is nowairagment . J 56-tween the Turks and the dilettanti , between barbarism and rapacity r statues and temples havb been so defaced and mutilated that , in some'case »^« it .. is scarcely possible to estimate their proportions . Even fingers and tvet £ ehn and noses , htwe been purloined , as relics ° rtt * ttq « e bfau ^ , ^ r ^ Jrtjtt ^ aiucious to exhibit their appreciation of typical aH . . ^ o guar ^ S lrist Ao nprpctuations of this pilf ^ ig sy stem , Uip ArchlfiologlCijl SocttMr flfAf ^ was established » omo years ago ; each member ¦ VWf 0 . M ;^ fiS ?» , by all possible means , the removal . qf . a , isjn ^ e , V'rppmu ,, f ^ fW WwL PP Gcroeoej Among the presidents of this Associ ^ ipn . are ^ h ^ . k ^ ngft . of ri Prussia and Denmark , and among tho members * itho Engtoh , Ti * . wnjp h ,,,, A , imerM ^ p » and Russian ambassadors . King- Othoy in 18 » 4 ^ by a . noyal and ^ wwou ,

• Citation
  • Leader (1850-1860), May 3, 1856, page 17, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse-os.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/cld_03051856/page/17/