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    A pbil 11, J-85¥. J THff LEADER. 355

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    THE MAN WITH THE PAPER MASK. Jtmius Lord...

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    Spott1swoode's¦ Taltantasse Journey. A T...

    clustered domes , to Ufa , bosomed amid tufted trees , the bare and silent steppes , the wondrous pine forests , the Bashkir camps and the Asiatic glitter of Astrakhan . We rank it , for freshness and accuracy , with tbo works of Oliphsut and Danby Seymomr , although , of course , Mr . Spottiswoode's experiences -vrere more lightly spread over a large surface- ' . ; he travelled only for a few months * but he made the best use of his brief opportunity , lie had studied the reports of previous writers , and , in the presence of a strange people and a little-known country , sought only impressions of life and nature ; - H was far frorn his design to judge of social or government institutions . At , least , he ha ? not included any political speculations among the first-fruits of his tarantasse journey . As usual upon quitting Moscow , Mr . Spottiswoode betook himself to Nizhni , journeying thence by steam down the broad , shallow , shifting Volga . Passing a . village of the mystic Old Believers- —a sect of heretics—he notices that they a-biure tobacco and potatoes , the former as a

    -transubstantiation of the Devil himself , the hitter as the forbidden fruit , and the flesh of the accursed Iscariot . This singular people has been forcibly dispersed , and will probably melt away among the eastern solitudes of the empire , It was an abrupt transition from their village to Kazan , where a half-ripe Orientalism , mellows the aspects of the JNorth . Here was procured the tarantasse , a four-wheeled vehicle resembling a broad , low-built boat , truncated at both ends , with a coach-box and a tented leathern hood , but neither springs nor seats ; storing this ponderous carnage with such comforts as are relished by hungry travellers , including Cheshire cheese purchased in the bazaars-of Kazan , Mr . Spottiswoode , with his courier and his coachman , started , arid was speedily rattling along the savage Siberian road , a great broadway hewn in the forest , with measureless depth of sunless pine cloisters-spreading on either side . Now and then he was jolted over a rough timber bridge ; once the woods seemed to have taken lire ; next , in the chill , grey morning , a long line of drab-clad figures was seen marching under tbe trees towards Siberia—an instalment of the annual ten thousand

    exiles , of whom one in four perishes on the road . At the post-houses and inns , civilization seemed to be taking a parting glance at the tarantasse ; occasionally a meadow appeared brightly between lire masses of forest ; then a huge Russian town , ornate and bulky , varied the lengthening view . From Ekaterinburg , on the Siberian frontier , the tarantasse was driven in a south-eastei'ly direction { but Mr . Spottiswoode felt that the tints of the country on that side of the Ural were those of Asia , that the sun he saw in the early morning was as yet invisible in Europe , in Palestine , in Egypt , iii the Syrian desert ; it might have just touched the eastern headland of Arabia . Speedily , however , he was among the non-Russian populations beyond Ufa , the . liines-and poplars of Orenburg , and entering upon a journey of more than a thousand miles through an uncultured region . At this point he interrupts the narrative by a succinct and informing sketch of the tribes Inhabitin . sc Eastern Russia , a chapter in which he develops his ethnological views . We might here discuss with him the points of affinity between the

    Tatar and Mongolian races ; but it is unnecessary . The ethnography of those countries has hitherto been very imperfectly explored ; we are satisfied that much remains to be elucidated with respect to the ori ginal links between these nations and those of Mongolia . The Kirghiz hordes especially seem the kindred of other nomades , from whom , by certain theorists , they have been somewhat arbitrarily separated . Mr . Spottiswoode hesitates between Abbott and Pallas to decide as to their cruelty . M . de Levchine , whose authority is of weight , supplies interesting testimony on this subject . As to their women , although their minstrels sing of them as whiter than snow , " with cheeks red as blood , hair dark as night , and eyebrows black as characters traced by a Mopllah ' s pen , Abbott affirms them to havu complexions- resembling beetroot , faces ever furious by crimson , features naturally coarse , the figures of bears , and the dress of torn toadstools . Mr . Spottiaw : oode corroborates Abbott , except , we should think , as to the torntoadstool metaphor .

    In sjk days Mr . Spottiswoode gained a familiar knowledge of the city of Astrakhan * the Star of the Desert , beloved by the Oriental tribes . Situated where a river , after a course of full three thousand miles , empties into an inland sea with a const of incomparable beauty , Astrakhan is connected by commercial roads with the Baltic and the Caucasus , Tiflis and Buku , and presents a dramatic variety of population , contrast , and colour : — "We were for the moment almost bewildered , ami could scarcely reulise the fact , although at the same time we could r . ot for a moment divest ourselves of the idea , that wo were in the land of the Kalmucks and Kirghiz , the steppes of the Caspian ;

    aud that the only roads were , one by -which we hud arrived , lending homewnrds it id true , but little short of 2000 miles before it brought us to the frontier ; tbe other along the sea-shore to a region unparalleled in boauty , scarcely surpassed in grandeur , almost untrodden by travellers , —a region about which so many reminiscences and interests , both historical and political , have ever clustered ; where traces of old language and dialect that have elsewhere long since died out may still le found ; where fragments of old manners , customs , and religions still linger , like the last wreaths of the morning mist , which hang entwined about the peaks of this their mountain home .

    Mullions , arabesques , gveen-gold-staxred domes , cupolas , spires , planted groves , huge painted gates , red and yellow , tawny sand , aaid the innumerable variegations painted by the encaustic pencils of the sun , confer on Astrakhan the appearance of Oriental antiquity . Mr . Spottiswoode , however , was soon awuy in Kalmuck tents , or calculating the produce of the Volgsin and Caspian fisheries , or analyzing the Tatar nationalities ; but hid notes are most strikingly interesting when they touch upon the life of the nomado people . He is now referring to the Kalmucks : — The -women enjoy a liberty and independence unknown in Moslem countries , bat still not unlimited , oa the following extract from one of their favourite fablea will show .

    At < v council of the birds , summoned to deliberate about th « inarriugo of their ' khan , one member , having arrived Late , was culled upon for an explanation ' of his want ot punctuality . And having pleaded the length of his journey , he proceeded to aay that ho had in the course of it observed threo things . First , that there are more nights than < lays { fox the clouds and foga convert intervals , which should rightly be , cIjivk , into nights . Secondly , that the dead are rnoro numerous than the living ; became

    those who sleep are as dead . And thirdly , that there are more women than men ; because husbands who obey their wivea are but women . If the reflective European inquire further how the Kalmuck philosopher explains these anomalies in the physical and moral -worlds , lie will hold up his open hand , and say , some fiugers are loug , aud some are short . " His tenth chapter , purports to be an account of a Buddhist temple and ritual by a pilgrim . It is an ingenious and faithful restoration of religious manners and dialogues ; but we have no space for further extracts . The book contains much more than we have noticed , and is remarkable as opening in deep and clear perspective , the scenery and life of a . region so curious and so little known as Eastern Russia .

    A Pbil 11, J-85¥. J Thff Leader. 355

    A pbil 11 , J-85 ¥ . J THff LEADER . 355

    The Man With The Paper Mask. Jtmius Lord...

    THE MAN WITH THE PAPER MASK . Jtmius Lord Chatham : A Biogrctpliy . By William Powe . London : trubner and Co . Mr . Dowe has been pleased to revive the Junian controversy . Having proved to his own satisfaction that the oratorical Great Commoner of the ' Junian epoch was also the Great Demagogue of the Press , he lias , thrown his proofs into shape and given them to the world . The form in . which he has put forward his argument is that of a biography of the fiery : Earl whom he . move than suspects to be the popular oracle of those days , " setting forth , " as he tells us , " the condition of English politics precedingand contemporary with the Revolutionary Juniaii period , and showing that the greatest orator and statesman was also the greatest epistolary writer of the age . " It is the misfortune of this notorious nonibiis umhra which

    electnhed Great Britain during the short period it stalked through the country , that inquisitive persons have-not'been ' ¦ '¦ content with the shadow , but must get at the substance , even though that substance be but a name . Nearly a , century has elapsed since the first letter . was ¦ published , yet the curiosity of not a fw is as rife ; as ever to discover who the man with the impenetrable mask could be ; and what is still move curious , historians and political writers of every degree have felt themselves bound to enter the lists , and earn their spurs by a tilt against this unknown knight . Lords Campbell and Mahon , Mr . Macaulay , Sir David Brewster , and a crowd of critics might be mentioned , who have done their best to bring the discussion to an cud . But this is not so astonishing as the crowd of personages who have been marshalled upon the scene and made to answer to the name of the great Junius . Almost every writer of that day who had acquired a little

    preeminence over Ins fellow men was put forward as the ' author of the letters . Some asserted it was George Grenvilje , the leader of the Liberal party ; some , James Grenville ; others , that it was Lord Temple ; and others , again , that it was Charles Lloyd , private secretary of George Grenville . Exclusive of these , howeveiywe meet with a host in the same predicament—John Wilkes , Home -Tooke , Jlacaulay , Boyd , Burke , Bane , Llood , Grattan , Francis , Maclean ,. "Glover ,. Delolme , Lord Shelburne , the Duke of Portland , Sir W . Jones , Gibbon , Sam Dyer , General Xee ' , ' .-Gerard Hamilton , J . Roberts , Lord Ashburton , Lord Camden ,. James Tlollis , Dr . Wray , Horace Walpole , Lord Loughborough , W . Greatrakes , Rev . P . Hosenhagen , John Kent , Bishop Butler , Lord Chesterfield , Lord George Sackville , Dr . Francis , Thomas Lowe Lyttleton , and even Dr . Johnson and Peter Pindar have been dragged into the arena .

    Mr . Dowe undertakes to dispose of tbe principal characters in this heterogeneous mass by analyzing then- pretensions to the Junian glory . The others , too lmmble to attract attention , he passes over without n single glance . Those whose claims ho deigns to notice are Burke , 'Lord Gtioi-ge Saekville , Lord Ashburton , Thomas Lord Littleton—a feeble imitation of Lord Rochester—and Francis ; but all these he contemptuously sets aside for his own favourite . The hypothesis of Britton , that the letters of Junius wcxe the joint production of Lord Ashburton , Lord Shelbourne , and Coloael Barre , falls to the ground , from t ] ie smgie fact tuat the sccret would scarcel y have been kept inviolate had three been concerned in it . The other evidence needs scarcely be sifted after the utter improbability that the authorship could have been withheld from the world had more than one been

    entrusted w . ith it . Macaulay , and with him are several other able critics , affirm that Philip Francis was the writer of these letters . Thoy affirm , that the handwriting of the MSS . is the handwriting of Francis , slightly disguisod . In comparing tbe position , pursuits , and connexions of Junius with those of Francis , they draw a close analogy : —Thoy assert that Junius was acquainted with the technical forms of the Secretary of State ' s Oflice ; that he was intimately acquainted with the business of the War Office ; that during the year 1770 he took notes of speeches delivered in the House of Lords ; Unit he bitterly resented the appointment of Mr . Chamier to the place of Secretary at War , and that he was bound by some strong tie to the first Lord Holland . Turning to the career of Philip Francisit is

    , well known that he was for some time in the Secretary of State ' s Office that he was subsequently chief clerk of the WarOlIicc ; that he heard the speeches of Lord Chatham during the year 1770 ; that he resigned his office from resentment to Mr . Chamior , and that he was introduced to public life by Lord Holland . The objection that Philip Francis wrote in his other correspondence nothing that could indicate him to bo capable of writing the letters of Junius , Macauluy meets b y a direct denial , and also shows that every man must write his best and his -worst work , and that if we criticize the letters af Junius himself we shall find ' sufliciunt irregularities iu tho style to overthrow tho objection .

    The idea that Lord Chatham was Junius is not ori ginal , although Mr . 13 owe has worked it out more elaborately than any of his predecessors . He takes , too , a larger range of inquiry ; and instead ' of confining his examination to the Letters of Junius , he rambles through the correspondence of "Atticus , " « Poplicola , " " Anti-Sejanus , " " Anti-Stuart , " "Mncnon " Anti-Vaii league , " "Modestus , " & c ; and tracing the authorship to one aource , builds up a theory of cunning and subtlety on the part of the writer worthy of Machiavelli himself . This argument is ingenious but tortuous , and it requires no small amount of credulity to submit to it , All tho points of coincidence in feeling and opinion between Jiuiius aud Chatham , of course are made tho most oi ; and with great plausibility . The disgusted re-

• Citation
  • Leader (1850-1860), April 11, 1857, page 19, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse-os.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/cld_11041857/page/19/