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    3 y if^rntiTr? ^LllUiimU

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    3 Y If^Rntitr? ^Llluiimu

    literature

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    The -week Las been saddened by the death of Douglas Jerrold , —earned off suddenly by-one of those acute attacks to which he had been so often liable . We are bereaved of one of our most popular moralists , and most vigorous writers , at a time , perhaps , when we were most feelingly conscious of the power and vitality of his genius . J . ek : ro : ld ' s life seems to have been destined to thwart the theories of system-makers . Born in a seaport town , with a brave and ardent disposition , it was natural that he should take to the sea ; natural , with his love of liberty , that he should resent the oppressions of naval life ; and the young midshipman was taken from the promised glories , and consigned to the humble labours of the compositor . He had tried a brilliant career and failed , and was to be a working man ! But

    if ever genius could be repressed , certainly that of Jerrouo was not of such mould . While he was still a compositor , he showed something of his temper as an author , and soon after delighted the world with a reminiscence of his sea life wedded to art , in Black-Eyed Susan . The dull workman , who was unfit to be an officer , became a brilliant dramatist ; but the playwright , who was then pronounced to be fit to wait upon T . P . Cooke , soon developed powers of satire that have seldom been equalled . Your satirist is often either a crabbed man , having few sympathies with his kind , or a closet man : Jerro : ld was neither ; he was a man of the world ; a man of fine , full heart . His satire , therefore , was used as the weapon on the side of right , and especially on the side of the helpless . His experiences amongst the

    working men had shown him the darker side of society , and he was a reformer ; his sea-life had given him boldness and animation , and had freed him from many restraints that might have bound a mere landsman ; and thus it was that the boy who was not strong enough to be a middy , the man who was too fanciful to be a compositor , became one of our most downright and popular politicians . Perhaps there were few examples of men who more thoroughly negatived the Laputan notion of the day , that capacity can be found , out by ' examination' in school studies . From the necessity of the circumstances his education was irregular , and his temper was of a kind to have rebelled against examination pedantries . Yet who more able to handle facts , and to turn them inside out so as to show their true meaning , than Jerroud ?

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    The last number of the Revue de Paris contains a striking article on M . Leon de Laborde ' s recently published work , De V Union des Arts et de VIndustrie . The author of this work ^ a member of the Trench Commission at the Great Exhibition—was appointed to draw up a report oil the Pine Arts , and the various branches of industry connected with them , and two elaborate volumes , with the above title , are the result . The first volume , devoted to the past , contains an historical sketch of the progress of the arts , with an account of the particular works and general stylo of the various nations represented at the Exhibition . In the second volume , entitled ' The Puture , ' and occupied with the author ' s plans for the re . organisation of the arts , he details minutely and at length the various reforms which the present state of the aits , both fine and industrial , imperatively demand in Prance . Amongst these , at the outset he urges that the people should be trained in art , and the artists educated . Under the former head he

    insists strongly on the doctrine which our own schools of art in connexion with Marlborough House are established to enforce—that thorough elementary instruction in art should , like reading and writing , form an indispensable part of ordinary education . In discussing the latter point—the general education which artists ought to have—he gives a most startling picture of the ' abyss of ignorance in which they are plunged , ' and in which ifc seems they contentedly live . According to M . de Lamorde , many distinguished French artists can scarcely read or write ; and he attributes the present degradation of French art in great measure to this deplorable ignorance Tho Great Exhibition of 1851 proved that in decorative art our neighbours across the water were superior to ourselves : and we are accustomed to think that many branches of art at least arc

    in a nourishing condition in Prance . It is instructive therefore to noto what a low and almost despairing view both author and critic take of the existing state of Frenoh art . Tho critic , M . du Cami > , in particular , complains terribly of the present state of things , and urges the most sweeping reforms . Ho would abolish for instance tho Fronoh school at Home , which he says only perpetuates a disastrous style of painting , destroys originality , and stamps with tho seal of hopeless mediocrity all its distinguished pupils . In tho same way he would at onco suppress the Academy of Pino Arts , as not only useless but dangerous . Ita very existence is a standing oxouso for feobleness and

    negligent execution . " We all know by experience , " ho wickedly says , " that there is no connexion between the works of a master and those of an Academician . In order to bo strong , Art must bo absolutely free ; and its development ; will bo arrested when controlled by a body of men , estimable enough perhaps in many respects , but who on prinoiplo look only towards tho past , rarely see tho present , and systematically doapiso the future . Instead of encouraging original efforts , the Academy , by a natural conservative instinct , denounces and represses thorn . " Delenda eat Academia , thereforo , is his motto . He concludes by a lament over tho present state of Franco nnd tho imp ossibilitv of realizing M . de Laborde ' s industrial and coBthetio reforms while

    she continues so characteristically a military nation . " Figures" T " arc said to have their eloquence , and we conclude with some tliaF „ n explain our whole thought . " The following , according to M . LaborL the yearly average of expenditure given by the budgets for the W \ years : — . a&u ien ARMEK DE TERRE . ARMXOE DE LA PAIX . ARMPP r » w MM Ministere de la Guerre . Lettres et Beaux-Arts . Min ™ deill ? ' 328 , 558 , 042 fr . 3 , 96 G , 443 fr . uSS ^ lJ ? ™ - After this , who will say that Chateaubriand was not right iii declarino- tl disheartening truth—' France is only a soldier ! ' ' ^

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    We have often had occasion to remark on the careful study of our recent Literature displayed in its criticism of English authors by the llemie des Deux Mo / ides . The last number contains an article on Longfellow's Hiawatha re max-kable for subtle insight into the peculiar character of the poem , ' genial criticism of its special merits . The writer , M . Emile Mont ^ gut shows a thorough appreciation of the- ' poetic substance and form of Longfellow ' s Indian legend scarcely to be expected in a foreigner , and least of all in a Frenchman . . He pronounc . es Hiawatha to be the most finished poem Loxgfei / low has produced . Of the metre he says : " The melody of the verse rapid and monotonous , is like the voice of Nature , which never fatigues us though continually l-epeating the same sound . Two or three notes compose the whole music of the poem , melodious and limited as the song of a bird . " Describing the general character of Hiawathu , he says : " The feclin" -for nature that pervades the poem is at once most refined and most familiar . The

    poet knows how to give , as a modern , voices to all the inanimate objects of Nature ; he knows the language of the birds , he understands the murmur of the wind amongst the leaves , he interprets the voices of the running streams , aud yet , notwithstanding this poetic subtilty , he never turns aside to minute description , nor attempts to prolong , by reflection , the emotion excited . His poem , made with exquisite art , has thus a double character : it is Homeric from the precision , simplicity , and familiarity of its images , and modem from the vivacity of its impressions , mid from the lyrical spirit that breathes in every page . "

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    We have just received the first number of a new and . most important series of tracts , entitled Blue Books for the Peojile , edited by Mr . Edward Walford , sometime scholar of Balliol College , Oxford . It is on Army education , . being , in fact , an abstract of the report of the Commissioners appointed to consider the best mode of reorganising the system of training officers for the Staff , which was presented to Parliament in February last . This abstract , made with great care and judgment , presents succinctly and compactly the pith and substance of the original report . It is a pocket pamphlet , well printed , the matter well arranged under appropriate headings , aud containing sixty-two pages of instructive and by no means uninteresting reading .

    The subject chosen for the first number of the series is seasonable , the Army Education lleport being of public interest and importance just now , especially as the Horse Guards shows a decided disposition to shuttle out of the subject , and to shirk the recommenda ! ion of the commissioners . Sir De Lacy Lvaxs is to bring the report before Parliament on the 30 th inst ., and it is therefore of the highest importance that the public should be fully informed on the question . Each number of tho new series will be devoted to a single subject , and contain a digest of the blue-books and parliamentary papers connected with it . The idea of thus bringing these hitherto inaccessible stores of valuable information within reach of the public is excellent , and the execution is worthy of the idea .

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    ' The Dead Secret' which since the commencement of the present year lias been the admiration and dcliglit of thousands of readers in Household Ifords , and has held half the homes iu the country in eager expectation and suspense , is concluded this week ; and simultaneously with the appearance of the last chapter in Household Words appears the whole story , revised wall characteristic and conscientious care , in two elegant and substantial volumes beautifully printed by Messrs . Buadduky and Evans . We shall have something to say in detail on this extremely remarkable work of fiction next week . to rcad the story m

    Por the present ., we simply recommend nil our readers rcita entire and porfoot form ; to possess themselves of these two volumes , as an English classic not excelled , wo are bold enough to suy , mi whole range of fiction , for constructive art , for clear und ingenious nurraiioi , for chaste and vigorous stylo , for generous nnd healthful morality , uol «« upon its chapters ( as in novels with a ' purpose' ) like a phylactery , or a Uckci a blind impostor ' s waistcoat , but breathing through tho whoto book « ui _ mosphorc of purity , of kindness , of piety to God und man . A \ o ( M . tho ' Dond Secret' will considerably onlmnco tho high reputation ol tiio nun . not only in England , but in IVanco and Germany , whoro his nuino is iiiici j held in loving honour and esteem .

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    A DANISH STOltY . , f on , the To bo , or not to bet A Novel . By Ilnna Chriatiun Anderson . Translutou r ^^ Danish by Mra . JJuahby . . f Y i \\ q This is rnthor a talu for certain sections of human imliiro timn gonoral mnss of readers . It is u book to bo rocommondod by houih _ at Exeter Hnll during tho May meetings , ^ V-T" nf T onilon inigM golioal Alliance at tho September conclave . A ho Bishop or i-oii jt SiBtribute it from Fullmni Paliiee , nnd tho King ol Prussia would onj j

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    • Critics are notthelegialators , but the judges and police of literature . They do not make laws—they interpret and try to enforce them . —Edinburgh Seviev :.

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    568 THE LEADER . [ No . 377 , Sattjrbat

• Citation
  • Leader (1850-1860), June 13, 1857, page 568, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse-os.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2197/page/16/