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    " bullying- them into benevolences . But no ' improvement' of modern days would astound Hm so much as the : proposal of his " beloved cousin ; Queen Viotobia , to confer the Garter upon tte Boi&ax—upon the Saeadin of our day . How a Christian Queen could in"troduce the Arch- Infidel into that most exclusive order ^ -t Kat sacred " band which has hitherto fceen limited to kings , nobles , and the bastards of royalty—so consistent and practical a yrince would be unable to comprehend ; and it would' be very difficult to explain to him the reason why . It isnot in the mere technicalities -thatwe

    see the difficulty . It Has been asked , indeed , low you can place "the Grarter upon the leg of a potentiate who dpes not wear - stockings ? But more difficult manoeuvres than that have Been' successfully attempted . In Naples we lave more than once seen , a crown , placed upon a thing ; without a head . Besides , we are not sure that the Grarter originally was a gartery and the fae . t that it is so called rather affirms , than otherwise , the pretty but apocryphal legend of the Countess of Saiis-BtJBT . That part of the insignia -was first

    called ' belt' as well as garter ; and it is much more probable that among , the furniture of the Order would be the badge , sword , and belt , than the badge , swordj and garter . But if Edward -were engaged in contemplating bis Order , —if the little incidentof the Countess really happened at the ball , —if he saw a lady more beautiful than charity , and more "virtuous than virtue , blushing at -the rude glances of the knights , it is by no means inconsistent with his character that he should

    seize the occasion of rebuking their uriknightly manner cy making them wear , in the most Honourable Order of his country , for evermore , that same garter as the anost distinguishing" badge . To this dayjj and back to the earliest days of stockings , it has been the practice to work quaint devices u pon that article o f dress which the Knights , of the Order wear upon the leg ; and Queen Viotoeta wears upon her arm—another reason for supposing that Ei > waed suffered the belt to become a garter , and adopted the motto whieh might have been woven on the g-entler band .

    It is not the oath that could impose the difficulty- ; for the oath has been , changed many times , and could be changed as often . " We may yet have the Emperor of China . admitted to the Order , and breaking a saucer upon his admission , as our own Lord Mayor , it is well known , until the present reign , counted hobnails in proof of Iris legitimate authorit y . There is nothing , we venture to affirm , in the statutes which can exclude the Sultan . It certainly is not his personal character : he will find amon erst the

    Knights Shakspeabts ' s notorious Sir Johit PaestAjPF , whom real history represents as si very ordinary knight , though contemporaries did accuse him of treachery and cowardice . He will find also the Emperor 3 N " iohoiiA . b , who broke every knightly rule by breaking his word to the Order , and nevertheless was not expelled . It is not the putting of ' MahoundV arms in "Windsor Ghapel that is the trouble ; though the fact will , indeed , mark the ascendancy of the * Broad Church '

    ,, •^ * what end introduce the Sultan aa ^ eivtnmgest knight in the ancient Christian Enghak Ocder- P Wo do not know what the *! Y ? * 1 ^ teildfid to moan ; tu t w& well know wiiat , it ; dJoea . Bttetta ; . Nothing ,: except that ABB-TBL-MisDam toU be aUo te ^ £ KQt alter his , name-.

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    CONGBATULA . TIONS ; Two or three old notions there are , connected ¦ with ' the'richer and poorer classes , which are ¦ unaccountable . With reference to the poorer classes ^ it is an established maxim that they drink to excess , beat their wives ^ and neglect their children ; that small class excepted which comes under ' charitable institution' care With reference to the richer classes , the received way of writing at them is to deplore the fate of daughters married heartlessly to coronets , and to furnish forth a story with illustrations of the platitude that wealth does not bring happiness . We have always

    wondered how a . universally intoxicated working class produces , regularly , suck immeasurable results of industry ; how half a dozen magistrates can dispose of all the cases of outrage occurring in a depraved population of three millions ; and how every trade in the threa kingdoms ia fully supplied with apprentices by children-neglecting fathers . Assuming that half the villany practised , is concealed , that artizans and labourers are frequently inebriated when they are not fined for it , that numbers of children grow into criminals through the inattention" of their paronts , we musfc nevertheless believe that there , ia an immense power of sober and self-denying application at work , or else England , would not be what it is . We -will leave that topic at present . The point more immediately suggested by the aspects of the season is—the immense num-

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    books ^ as upon malefactors ; but what do the booksellers deserve ? There are two classes of them , at least , that ought to be marked for surveillance . The one class is composed of certain shilling-volume publishers , the other of magazine manufacturers , especially those of a philanthropic tinge . As to cheap literature , we are persuaded it is what the best literature mil come to , and the sooner the better , good cheap books having a strong effect in driving bad cheap books out of the

    was published by himself . When comic publications - — imitations of . JPurick —were in vogue , many a bloek of boxwood was cut with very few impressions taken from it . Consequently , the thing was thrown into the market . It turns up on the railway stall . You find a portrait of Sir Peteb IiAinirE doing duty as- the ruined banker in a tale of City life .

    The trade m second-hand woodcuts is considerable , the use made of them "being abominable . It is not two years-since a great manufacturer of cheap publications was accustomed to take a monthly expedition to Paris ; , where he bought the old blocks at the offices of illustrated periodicals , and returning ^ employed his clerks to ' write up-to them , ' which was done with much educational flourish and infinite deception . Having been used in England , the wood engravings

    were next exported to America , and we have lately encountered them in this third form , illustrating a third class of ' literature . ' The same building has figured as a Eock Temple in India ,. the Interior of a Tomb in Egypt , and the Approach to the Napoleon Shrine in Paris . We Have met with-the same figure as Zaideb , as the heroine of a Spanish stoiy , and as the daughter of Hebodias ; and-we should not be surprised to behold its fourth appearance as a Princess of Oude . -

    The present is the season for such manufactures . They have an open market . They glow upon the stalls . But the woodcuts are not so bad as the letterpress they illustrate . This is- often got up with the most pernicious facility , the writers themselves ridiculing- the publishers who issue their cold-pressed verbiage as the educational feature' of some deplorably illiterate

    miscellany . ^ Fortunately , an exposure that was effected by one or two of our contemporaries a year or ] two ago broke up some of the merchant princedoms of penny and twopenny literature ; but the imposture has been transformed into the shilling volume shape , and thrives in fancy covers . Half these fancy covers represent only so much nonsense , puffed off by praises which were never written except by the nonsense-dealers themselves .

    field . But it seems to be considered that , to make up a volume for a railway stall , nothing more is' necessary than a few forgotten slcetches from old periodicals , some grossly bad illustrations , and a chimerically repulsive yellow cover . When the process has been advanced thus far the most disgusting part remains—the composition of a puff . A carious change has taken place in this respect , formerly , the least scrupulous advertizer ' was careful to quote his authority , and the list of testimonies ran thus : — The

    vorld : will writhe under this satire . "Wormwood Mercury . " We are much , deceived if this poem does not become inunor"izX . "—Tin Trumpet . " Since Hoknee , -we remember no novelist so successful . "—Gauntry Cousin . Cl The essay is a gush of intellectual glory . ' ' ——Earihern 'Vessel . Now , whatever the absurdity was , somebody had wiitten , printed , and perhaps paid for it . Even the

    ' everlasting immortality' of a particular ' work of travels' was really attributed to it by an evening paper . But , tit present , that necessity seems abolished . We take up a batch 01 reprints in dragon ' s blood board covers , and learn from the fly-leaf , " These are the happiest efforts of their author . " The same fly-leaf presents other literary intelligence . Some ghastly parody of Oooee'r ' s Red Indian romances in

    embellished wrapper is pronounced : ' . " a most thrilling tale of extraordinary adventures , " one of the weekly aniraalculae lending even the sanction of its name to the imposture . Then , a mass of epileptic comedy on the late war is offered , " so truthful that the reader can hardly imagine the story to be a fiction . " " The most delightful boolc of travels ever written" is next ia the list , followed by '¦ " of the most deh ' glitfully written tales , we have ever read "—' the said tve being the composer of the fly-leaf , or the critic of some unacknowledged gazette . We have no

    information , moreover , as to the name and weight of the reviewer , who recommends a shilling selection of sketches as the companion volume of the London Labour mid the London J ? oor , or as to the authority which affirms Lily and Love to be a specific for the moral complaints of children ; or with respect to the claims of a youthful American authoress " to rank among the first writers of the day 5 " or as to " the other productions" of a talented lady , which are to be surpassed by her last production . Well may the great publishing houses , dreading to be confounded with these concocters of puffs , exclude '' critical opinions and laudatory noticed" from their catalogues .

    One of the worst consequences of this traffic is , that no book published in America is too bad to be republished as a shilling volume in England . It is announced as a story which sold ten thousand copies in one day ab New York . The cover is of burning crimson , imprinted with a white Bchool-gixl , and , oil the fly-leaf , criticism is anticipated

    by the- remark , coolly and loftily written , that " This entrancing story will be read by the ruddy light of every Christmas fireside throughout the kingdom . ; " , " No mother should , allow her daughter to reach a marriageable age without reading this xomance . " Our last specimen , it sliould bo observed , relates to a story by an English writer , and

    BOOKSELLERS' AJttJLTBRA . TIIONS Thbub ia : a peat : a ^ orlty for saying that witica , ehould da ahaxpi justice * upon bad

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    fflS TIE LMDEIt [ ISTb ; 38 % SatuThsay ,

• Citation
  • Leader (1850-1860), Sept. 13, 1856, page 878, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse-os.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2158/page/14/