Current:

Leader (1850-1860), 25th December 1852, Edition Town of 2, Page 1237, Untitled Article

Page 1237
Page 17
17 of 24

On this page

  • Text (4)
  • Transcript

    • 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.

      Additionally, when viewing full transcripts, extracted text may not be in the same order as the original document.

      Untitled Article

      deeper , the great mystery of this world presents other aspects underlying those classifications , and we see how everything , from the lowest to the Whesfc , moves towards Life . Death is a name we give to a change ; but Mature knows no Death ; what we call dead matter , and ignorantly despise , is only dead to our dull senses . Look where we will , we only see Life abounding , Life aspiring , Life triumphant !

      Untitled Article

      A BATCH OF NEW BOOKS . T is no easy task to keep pace with the rapid publications of the " season , " even in . journals specially devoted to literature ; in our own restricted l imits the thing is obviously impossible ; and yet as our readers are kind enough to have some confidence at least in the integrity of our judgments , it is but right that they should have some such brief indication of what to buy , what to read , and what to avoid , as we can contrive for them . This is peculiarly a book-buying season , and from the mass upon our table we select a batch of very various works , addressed to very various wants The Children ' s Books we will speak of next week .

      Among the wants of the season are sumptuous Gift Books , appealing to the purses of godpapas , aunts , and other reminiscent relatives , and claiming a place among the elegancies and graces of a drawing-room . The season has not been so prodigal of such books as heretofore ; but among those produced let a place be reserved for The Poetry of the Year , ( Greorge Bell , ) an elegant and poetic volume , sumptuously got up with all the appliances of the engraver ' s , printer ' s , binder's various arts . It consists of passages from English and American poets , descriptive of aspects of nature and English life during the four seasons ; and illustrated by twenty-two coloured engravings , from the designs of Cox , Duncan , yVeir ,

      Muller , L . E . Barker , Creswick , Hemsley , Weigall , E . V . B . Birkett Poster , Davidson , and others . The designs are of unequal merit , some having the real artistic feeling , others being conventional repetitions of forms and expressions . Birkett Foster charmingly touches oil the " Spring and playtime of the year , " when little villagers gather kmgeups in the thick grass ; and Harrison Weir , with his group of cattle and sheep in the shady summer place , carries us heart and soul into the country . Creswick gives us a glimpse of Windermere , which in itself is a poem . Hemsley rivals Hunt

      in" Little Torn and roguish . Kate Swinging on the meadow gate . " David Cox makes us young again with his " June Day . " The volume is handsome to a fault ; a little less costliness would have increased our comfort ; at present we are so afraid of " soiling it , that we handle it " gingerly . This applies only to the external . A book of more substantial merit and beauty , and one which with all its splendour invites rather than intimidates , is the new edition ot Wordsworth ' s Greece , Pictorial , Descriptive , and Historical , ( W . S . Orr andUo ., ) which the publishers have rightly judged to be an excellent Grift tfoolc . This is more then a new edition of the well-known work . It has been revised and re-arranged by the author , and is enriched—we use the stereotyped phrase with a meaning—by an introductory chapter on ^ reek Art which in the space of seventy pages , illustrated with one hundred and seventy-nine engravings from vases , statues , &c , presents an historical milling of the nroL'ress of Art from its origin to its decline . Here the

      aid of Mr Scharf , so well known by previous works on this subject , has been called in by the publishers most efficiently . As it now stands Wordsworth ' s V ' ictorial Greece is a work of value , as well as a work ot beauty ; it is to be read , nay , studied , and yet it will be conspicuous among the elegancies of the table . There is a sobriety and a taste in the cottinff up which will make it as distinguished among its gaudy rivals , as the plain black coat of Castlereagh was at the Congress of Vienna , amidst the star-covered ministers and ambassadors of other courts . The same publishers send us another Gift Book , of a very different kind , and addressed to a different class , Cuvwrs Animal Kingdom m one large volume , edited by Dr . Carpenter and J . O . Wostwood . It would bo difficult to name a better book to present to young men , to students ,

      to lovers of natural history , to the whole class ot readers , in short , who care for substantial excellence more than for elegance . It is not for the drawing-room , in unite of its many hundred illustrations ; but lor the Btudy whore it will bo a delight and a constant reference . Corners lleane Animal acquired its popularity at once , and has never been superseded ; but , of course , in so progressive a Hcience an that ol zoology it has been necensary , from time to time , to ( correct and enlarge by notes the mistaken and omissions inseparable from no vast an undertaking . Iho way this ban been done in tho edition before us is admirable mid should bfollowed in all similar cane * Cuvier's worl < ih translated ; the original , i and the of

      « . as regarT I ^ ntS « retained ; additions instead be . ng thrown into fbot-neleH ( always a distracting plan or the reader ) , , s in « ori . m-nfi » 1 info the text but designated by brackets , which enclose them ; on oU : 'l ^ er correclLn . ar ^ in brie f " footnotes Tho whole HU . vjeet 1 ms boon distributed among four zoologists-Mr Blyth uiidertaki « the Mammalia . HirdH , and . Keptiles ; Mr . . Kobert M »«! , « I . he J ^ J and lUdiata ; Dr . < ieor K « . Johnston the Mollusen ; ami Mr . 1 . O Wch w < k 1 the Insect * . J * y U . oir aid many of the dosses and orders havo n i - iiive » tiirnted , and many new sprees added . Dr . Carpenter and Mi . ta hI iu this edition have « o . ie over the work of the . r predecessors

      and brought it down to the latest discoveries . On looking over ,, illH RiniL Museum of Natural History , we exclaim with Marlowe h . lew" Infinite richer in a lit . tlo room , " and think with a fli tf h , what heaps of books that have en ^ ed our time would we ' bave exchanged for this ! What a book , t would have hoen ( or our boyhood ! " What a treasure foe our hIikIioiih youth ( omparod with tho valL of mich a of Natures wlu . t are Annuals and keepsakes ,

      survey ( i \ tl Hooks , and the rent , will , their furtive splendour o ( K dt and eiij ? nivinir ? Respected Reader , if you are opening your purHeOrHon . etlMi . fr more than ostentation , and if v » u want ; to benefit your K o « Iho .., nephew , ( Ffiindsoit or brother , open it for a Cuvicr I .. . , k iCSlg from the Gift Books par excellence to thono that may bo

      bought , borrowed , or stolen ( ad libitum ) , there is a pretty little volume ofEdqar Poe ' s Poetical Works ( Addey & Co . ) , with an editorial preface by James Hannay , and some illustrations by Wehnert , Hulme , Grodwin , and Weir—good , bad , and indifferent . Of the Essay , m which Mr Hannay sketches the leading traits of the poet ' s life and genius , we must express but a qualified opinion . It is livoly as an essay , and rmdly enough presents some of the main features which the reader ot Foe will bo called upon to consider '; but the tone is questionable , and the defence attempted to be set up for Poe ' s drunkenness and dissipation is a violation of all ethical judgments . Poe was a man who could not restrain himself . Lord of himself and his own greedy senses he was not . Let the thing be

      owned ; let it be judged with as little harshness as may be possible ; but let no shadow of ' defence be set up for it on the ground that he was a poet and a passionate worshipper of the Beautiful ! If sottishness and disrespect of duties are to be reprobated in sots and scamps , they are doubly hideous in men who , having within them the refining fire ot genius , are not refined—in mon who , loving the Beautiful m their poems , realize the Ignoble in their lives—in men " who know the right , . yet tho wronS pursue . " We touch this point , we will not dwell on it . I he estimate V Poe ' s genius formed by Mr . Hannay strikes us as exaggerated , and he is peculiarly unfortunate , we think , in calling the verses to " Helen Horatian in their finish . Finish is scarcely the term for verses that have

      imperfections in metre , laxity in rhyme , and an obscurity in expressionfaults which the second and third of the three stanzas possess . lne volume is a curious one , and deserves its place on poetical shelves . _ Professor George Long is editing a scries of Grammar School Classics ( Whittaker & Co . ) , which promises to be a series of considerable value . He is a ripe scholar , a man well versed in the requirements ot school editions , a man of sharp , imperious , independent judgment , who nas , moreover supreme contempt for verbose annotations and critical trining ; and his edition of Ceesar's Commentaries , now before us , we can emphatically commend as brief , practical , careful , erudite , and adapted to its aim . desired in the sh of portable voLume ot

      Nearly all that can be ape a elegant extracts is contained in the Bead-ings in Italian Prose Literature , hi a Aubrey Bezzi ( J . W . Parker & Son ) , with the biographical sketches appended to them ; and we have rarely seen a more useful work ot the kind than Dr . Bernays' German Conversation Booh ( J . W . Parker & konj , which consists of scenes from the German prose dramatists , accompanied by translations on the opposite columns . If it will give the beginner but a dreary idea of German comedy ( true , though dreary ) , it will initiate him into the real language , and not mislead him , as " Conversations usualldobhrases and idioms never heard out of such books .

      y , y p The Letters of an Englishman on Louis Napoleon ( H . G . Bohn ) were worthy of being reprinted , for their remarkable vigour and eloquence , no less than for the manly protest they make against the disgraceful spirit which has animated the coup-d ' etat . Speculation is busy as to the authorship of these Letters , and all sorts of impossible names are suggested ; for the benefit of future inquirers anxious to establish the identity of the modern Junius , we will make one remark . The writer is either a Frenchman or a man who has lived so long in France , and amid French ideas , that his style ( otherwise so brilliant ) is , so to speak , tmpregnated with

      Gallicisms . From the firsflettcr we select these : speaking of the Republican party , he says , " France will always have to count with it , " which is not English . Again , he says , " They consigned foe primary teachers to absolute be ^ ary " meaning teachers in the grammar schools—Scales prtmatres Louis Napoleon he calls " the proscribed of the Monarchy—the recalled of the Republic ; he bad given , indeed , few gages to order ; and Napoleon ' s instruments , " reckless men , of as desperate fortunes as those of the Elyse ' e itself . " These , and hundreds of similar phrases , read like translations from the French ; but the following is not only French in

      expression , it is intensely French in thought : " The logic of crime is retribution . " We cannot close this hasty notice , however , without giving the reader a specimen , Avhich may be placed beside almost any passage in Junius : — " If this man \ s reign is destined to continue , even for a brief duration , the world will witness the most heterogeneous jumble of despotism and ot demagogy , of socialism ami corruption , that history ban ever chronicled . The bribery of Walpole , the theories of labour of Louis Blanc , the stockjobbing of the worst days of Louis Philippe , the ferocity of Alva , the deportations of the Czar , the razzias of Algeria , will all meet in one marvellous system of anarchy , that will be called Imperial Government . Its great aim and object " are to gag the country and to ' rig' the market ; and under ( his patent of tranquillity and order France will be one vuat military hell , with Louis Napoleon for it « croupier . "

      Untitled Article

      COIUiKI'S UFIO AND ACTS IN IIUN (; AR . Y . My TJfo mid Acts in ( lumjarj / , in Uu : Xcurs IH 18 and IH Li ) , liy Arthur Corgni " Two voIb . ' ' Uoguo . A . Refutation of some of tho I'riuci / xtl . Missttttumtints in ( Hh't / f-i ' s " Lifa and Acts . " ' By dit'oriiti lvinH , y , ' liilo dlcmoml in tho 11 imjmriuu Army of Imlopoinloinro . [ conomi imtcu a ittu : i . !¦ :. ' ]• In tho two previous notices of ( Jorgei ' n book we have traced the remarkable career of its author from Szolnolt to Sehwechat , from that disastrous day to the retreat upon ( Hen , and from thence across the Danube to Waizen . Here we found him issuing a proclamation to Ih ' h h-oopH of a character hostile to that national government to which ho owed allegiance , and netting up distinctly , under the rover of legality and patriotism , the standard of personal ambition as tho Ihimih of a . military party . From Waizen we tracked him through the defiles of Mm mountain towns , and defending thenco into the southern connli . 'M . We left him " dcHpainn / jf , on the threshold of n reckoning wilh the pant , " while tho dashing bmverjr of ( Juyou was forcing tho lh-anyi . Mzl < o |> hhh alone , with a , mere handful of mon ! At this juncture , the perception of tlnngerH near nt hand had put hope to Might in the heart of ( Jortfei , mul lie stood Hell-reliant in despair . Ho

      Untitled Article

      Boo Loader , . Nob . 1 U 8 and I'M ) .

      Untitled Article

      Pb cbmbbb 25 , 1852 . ] THE LEADER , >« W

  • Citation
    • Leader (1850-1860), Dec. 25, 1852, page 1237, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse-os.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/vm2-ncseproduct1966/page/17/