Title: The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Volume 10, No. 276, October 6, 1827
Author: Various
Language: English
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THE MIRROR OF LITERATURE, AMUSEMENT, AND INSTRUCTION.

VOL. X, NO. 276.] SATURDAY, OCTOBER 6, 1827. [PRICE 2d.

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Bristol Cathedral.

[Illustration: Bristol Cathedral.]


                  There is given
  Unto the things of earth, which Time hath bent,
  A spirit's feelings, and where he hath leant
  His hand, but broke his scythe, there is a power
  And magic in the ruin'd battlement
  For which the palace of the present hour
  Must yield its pomp, and wait till ages are its dower.

BYRON.


The cathedral of Bristol is one of the most interesting relics of
monastic splendour which have been spared from the wrecks of desolation
and decay. It is dedicated to the holy and undivided Trinity, and is the
remains of an abbey or monastery of great magnificence, which was
dedicated to St. Augustine. The erection of this monastery was begun
in 1140, and was finished and dedicated in 1148, according to the
inscription on the tomb of the founder, Robert Fitzharding, the first
lord of Berkeley, who, together with others of that illustrious family,
are enshrined within these walls. It was also denominated the monastery
of the black regular canons of the order of Saint Victor, who are
mentioned by Leland as the black canons of St. Augustine within the city
walls. By some historians, Fitzharding is represented as an opulent
citizen of Bristol; but generally as a younger son or grandson of the
king of Denmark, and as the youthful companion of Henry II., who,
betaking himself from the sunshine of royal friendship, became a canon
of the monastery he himself had founded. In this congenial solitude he
died in 1170, aged 75. Such is the outline of the foundation of this
structure, and it is one of the most attractive episodes of the early
history of England; for the circumstance of a noble exchanging the
gilded finery of a court, and the gay companionship of his prince, for
the gloomy cloisters of an abbey, and the ascetic duties of monastic
life, bespeaks a degree of resolution and self-control which was more
probably the result of sincere conviction than of momentary caprice.

The present cathedral is represented to have been merely the church of
the monastery, which was entirely rebuilt in the commencement of the
fourteenth century. The style of architecture in the different parts of
this cathedral is accurately discriminated in the following account from
the pen of Bishop Littleton, F.S.A.:--"The lower parts of the chapter
house walls," says he, "together with the door-way and columns at the
entrance of the chapter-house, may be pronounced to be of the age of
Stephen, or rather prior to his reign, being fine Saxon architecture.
The inside walls of the chapter-house have round ornamental arches
intersecting each other. The cathedral appears to be of the same style
of building throughout, and in no part older than Edward the First's
time, though some writers suppose the present fabric was begun in king
Stephen's time; but not a single arch, pillar, or window agrees with
the mode which prevailed at that time. The great gateway leading into
the College Green is round-arched, with mouldings richly ornamented
in the Saxon taste." From this account it appears probable that the
chapter-house and gateway are all the present remains of the ancient
monastery. The mutilations which the cathedral of Bristol has undergone,
are not entirely to be referred to the era of the dissolution of the
monasteries, since this structure suffered very considerably during
the period of the civil wars. The ruthless soldiers discovered their
barbarism by violating the sacred tombs of the dead, and by offering
every indignity which they supposed would be considered a profanation of
the places which the piety of their ancestors consecrated to religion.
At such instances of the violence of civil factions, the sensitive mind
shudders with disgust.

The cathedral of Bristol is rich in monumental tributes to departed
worth. Among them is an elegant monument, by Bacon, to Mrs. Elizabeth
Draper, the _Eliza_ of Sterne; and the classical tomb of the
Hendersons. Here, too, rests Lady Hesketh, the friend of Cowper; Powell,
of Covent Garden Theatre; besides branches of the Berkeley family, and
various abbots.

The bishopric of Bristol is the least wealthy ecclesiastical promotion
which confers the dignity of a mitre. Its revenue is generally stated to
amount to no more than five or six hundred pounds per annum. In the list
of bishops are Fletcher, father of the celebrated dramatist, the
colleague of Beaumont; he attended Mary Queen of Scots on the Scaffold;
Lake, one of the seven bishops committed to the Tower in the time of
James I.; Trelawney, a familiar name in the events of 1688; Butler, who
materially improved the episcopal palace of Bristol; Conybeare and
Newton, names well known in literary history; with the erudite
Warburton, whose name occurs in the list of deans of Bristol.

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DEBTOR AND CREDITOR.[1]

  The time is out of joint.--_Hamlet._


  A man of my profession never counterfeits, till he lays hold upon a
  debtor and says he _rests_ him: for then he brings him to all
  manner of unrest.--_The Bailiff, in 'Every Man in his Humour.'_


  Run not into debt, either for wares sold or money borrowed; be content
  to want things that are not of absolute necessity, rather than to run up
  the score: such a man pays at the latter a third part more than the
  principal comes to, and is in perpetual servitude to his creditors;
  lives uncomfortably; is necessitated to increase his debts to stop his
  creditors' mouths; and many times falls into desperate courses.

  SIR M. HALE.


"The greatest of all distinctions in civil life," says Steele, "is that
of debtor and creditor;" although no kind of slavery is so easily
endured, as that of being in debt. Luxury and expensive habits, which
are commonly thought to enlarge our liberty by increasing our
enjoyments, are thus the means of its infringement; whilst, in nine
cases out of ten, the lessons taught by this rigid experience lead to
the bending and breaking of our spirits, and the unfitting of us for the
rational pleasures of life. All ranks of mankind seem to fall into this
fatal error, from the voluptuous Cleopatra to the needy philosopher, who
doles out a mealsworth of morality for his fellow-creatures, and who
would fain live according to his own precepts, had he not exhausted his
means in the acquisition of his experience.

I blush to confess, that I have often thought the _habit of debt_
to be our national inheritance--from that bugbear of out-of-place men,
the Sinking Fund, to the parish-clerk, who mortgages his fees at the
chandler's; and that my countrymen seem to have resolved to increase
their own enjoyments at the expense of posterity, with whose provision,
even Swift thinks we have no concern. Again; I have thought that we are
apt to over-rate our national advancement, by supposing the present race
to be wiser than the previous one, without once looking into our
individual contributions to this state of enlightenment. Proud as we are
of this distinction in the social scale, we can record few instances of
contemporary genius, and we are bound to confess that men are not a whit
the better in the present than in the previous generation. Thus we
hoodwink each other till social outrages become every-day occurrences,
and every thing but sheer violence is protected by its frequency; and in
this manner we consent to compromise our happiness, and then affect to
be astonished at its scarcity. In the later ages of the world, men have
learned to temporize with principles, and to sacrifice, at the shrine
of passing interest, as much real virtue as would bear them harmless
throughout life. Hence, of what more avail is the virtue of the Roman
fathers, or are the amiable friendships of Scipio and Lelius, than
as so many amusing fictions to exercise the imaginations of schoolmen
in drawing outlines of character, which experience does not finish.
Friends, like certain flowers, bloom around us in the sunshine of
success; but at night-fall or at the approach of storms, they shut up
their hearts; and thus, poor victims being rifled of their mind's
content, with their little string of enjoyments broken up for ever,
are abandoned to the pity or scorn of bystanders. It is impossible to
reflect for a moment on such a crisis, without dropping a tear for the
self-created infirmities of man: but there are considerations at which
he shudders, and which he would rather varnish over with the sophistry
of his refinement, and the fallacies of self-conceit.

I fear that I am breaking my rule in not confining myself to a few
shades of debt and conscience, with a view of determining how far they
are usually reconciled among us. The task may not prove altogether
fruitless; notwithstanding, to find honest men, would require the
lantern of Diogenes, and perhaps turn out like Gratiano's wheat.

In our youthful days, we all remember to have read a pithy string of
Maxims by Dr. Franklin; and we are accustomed to admire the pertinence
of their wit,--but here their influence too often terminates. Since
Franklin's time, the practice of getting into debt has become more and
more easy, notwithstanding men have become more wary. Goldsmith, too,
gives us a true picture of this habit in his scene with Mr. Padusoy, the
mercer, a mode which has been found to succeed so well since his time,
that, with the exception of a few short-cuts by sharpers and other
proscribed gentry, little amendment has been made. Profuseness on the
part of the debtor will generally be found to beget confidence on that
of the creditor; and, in like manner, diffidence will create mistrust,
and mistrust an entire overthrow of the scheme. An unblushing front, and
the gift of _non chalance_, are therefore the best qualifications
for a debtor to obtain credit, while poor modesty will be starved in her
own littleness. In vain has Juvenal protested--"_Fronti nulla
fides;_" and have the world been amused with anecdotes of paupers
dying with money sewed up in their clothes: appearance and assumed
habits are still the handmaids to confidence; and so long as this system
exists, the warfare of debtor and creditor will be continued.
Procrastination will be found to be another furtherance of the system,
inasmuch as it is too evident throughout life that men are more apt to
take pleasure "by the forelock," than to calculate its consequence. In
this manner, men of irregular habits anticipate and forestal every hour
of their lives, and pleasure and pain alternate, till pain, like debt,
accumulates, and sinks its patient below the level of the world. Economy
and forecast do not enter into the composition of such men, nor are such
lessons often felt or acknowledged, till custom has rendered the heart
unfit for the reception of their counsels. It is too frequently that the
neglect of these principles strikes at the root of social happiness, and
produces those lamentable wrecks of men--those shadows of sovereignty,
which people our prisons, poor-houses, and asylums. Genius, with all her
book-knowledge, is not exempt from this failing; but, on the contrary, a
sort of fatality seems to attend her sons and daughters, which tarnishes
their fame, and often exposes them to the brutish attacks of the
ignorant and vulgar. Wits, and even philosophers, are among this number;
and we are bound to acknowledge, that, beyond the raciness of their
writings, there is but little to admire or imitate in the lives of such
men as Steele, Foote, or Sheridan. It is, however, fit that principle
should be thus recognised and upheld, and that any dereliction from its
rules should be placed against the account of such as enjoy other
degrees of superiority, and allowed to form an item in the scale of
their merits.

(_To be concluded in our next._)

    [1] From _"Cameleon Sketches_," by the author of "_The Promenade round
        Dorking_." In the press.

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AN ENGLISHMAN'S PRAYER


  Grant, righteous Heaven, however cast my fate
  On social duties or in toils of state,
  Whether at home dispensing equal laws,
  Or foremost struggling for the world's applause,
  As neighbour, husband, brother, sire, or son,
  In every work, accomplished or begun,
  Grant that, by me, thy holy will be done.
  When false ambition tempts my soul to rise,
  Teach me her proffer'd honours to despise,
  Though chains or poverty await the just,
  Though villains lure me to betray my trust,
  Unmoved by wealth, unawed by tyrant, might
  Still let me steadily pursue the right,
  Hold fast my plighted faith, nor stoop to give
  For lengthen'd life, the only cause to live.

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ITALY.

(_To the Editor of the Mirror_.)


SIR,--Is your correspondent (see the MIRROR of the 15th of September)
quite right in asserting that Italy has invariably retained the same
name from its first settlement? or would the fact be singular if true?
Virgil, in his first book of the _Æneid_, implies that it had at
least _two_ names before that of Italy. "_Ænotrii_ coluere viri;"
"_Hesperiam_ graii cognomine dicunt;" "Itali ducis de nomine." His
works are not at hand, so that I cannot specify the line; but the
passage is repeated three or four times in the course of the poem, and
the reference, therefore, to it is peculiarly easy.

In other places, as you may remember, he gives it the appellation of
"Ausonia."

Now as to the singularity of the circumstance, supposing it were
otherwise, to what does it amount but this: that when Italian power
extended over the countries of Europe, Italian names were given them;
that as this power declined, these names as naturally fell into disuse;
and the different nations, actuated severally by a spirit of
independence or of caprice, recurred to their own or foreign tongues for
the designation of their territory. While at Rome itself, which, though
often suffering from the calamities of war, still retained a
considerable share of influence, the inhabitants adhered to their native
dialect, and the same city which had been the birth-place and cradle of
the infant language was permitted to become its sanctuary at last.

Y.M.

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SPIRIT OF THE PUBLIC JOURNALS.

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ELISE.

(_By L.E.L._)

  O Let me love her! she has past
    Into my inmost heart--
  A dweller on the hallowed ground
    Of its least worldly part;
  Where feelings and where memories dwell
    Like hidden music in the shell.

  She was so like the forms that float
    On twilight's hour to me,
  Making of cloud-born shapes and thoughts
    A dear reality;
  As much a thing of light and air
    As ever poet's visions were.

  I left smoke, vanities, and cares,
    Just far enough behind,
  To dream of fairies 'neath the moon,
    Of voices on the wind,
  And every fantasy of mine
    Was truth in that sweet face of thine.

  Her cheek was very, very pale,
    Yet it was still more fair;
  Lost were one half its loveliness,
    Had the red rose been there:
  But now that sad and touching grace
  Made her's seem like an angel's face.

  The spring, with all its breath and bloom,
    Hath not so dear a flower,
  As the white lily's languid head
    Drooping beneath the shower;
  And health hath ever waken'd less
  Of deep and anxious tenderness.

  And O thy destiny was love,
    Written in those soft eyes;
  A creature to be met with smiles.
    And to be watch'd with sighs;
  A sweet and fragile blossom, made
  To be within the bosom laid.

  And there are some beneath whose touch
    The coldest hearts expand,
  As erst the rocks gave forth their tears
    Beneath the prophet's hand;
  And colder than that rock must be
  The heart that melted not for thee.

  Thy voice--thy poet lover's song
    Has not a softer tone;
  Thy dark eyes--only stars at night
    Such holy light have known;
  And thy smile is thy heart's sweet sign,
  So gentle and so feminine.

  I feel, in gazing on thy face,
    As I had known thee long;
  Thy looks are like notes that recall
    Some old remembered song
  By all that touches and endears,
  Lady, I must have loved thee years.

_Literary Gazette._

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COLONEL GEORGE HANGER.


Dining on one occasion at Carlton-house, it is said that, after the
bottle had for some time circulated, his good-humoured volubility
suddenly ceased, and he seemed for a time to be wholly lost in thought.
While he "chewed the cud" in this ruminating state, his illustrious host
remarked his very unusual quiescency, and interrupted it by inquiring
the subject of his meditation. "I have been reflecting, Sir," replied
the colonel, "on the lofty independence of my present situation. I have
compromised with my creditors, paid my washerwoman, and have three
shillings and sixpence left for the pleasures and necessities of life,"
exhibiting at the same time current coin of the realm, in silver and
copper, to that amount, upon the splendid board at which he sat.

Having occasion to express his gratitude to his friend and patron for
his nomination to a situation under government (which, had he been
prudent, might have sufficed for genteel support), it is said that the
royal personage condescended to observe, on the colonel's expatiating
on the advantages of his office, that "now he was rich, he would so
far impose upon his hospitality as to dine with him;" at the same time
insisting on the repast being any thing but extravagant. "I shall give
your royal highness a leg of mutton, and nothing more, by G----," warmly
replied the gratified colonel, in his plain and homely phrase. The day
was nominated, and the colonel had sufficient time to recur to his
budget and bring his ways and means into action. Where is the
sanguineless being whose hopes have never led him wrong? if such there
be, the colonel was not one of those. Long destitute of credit and
resources, he looked upon his appointment as the incontestable source of
instant wealth, and he hesitated not to determine upon the forestalment
of its profits to entertain the "first gentleman in England." But, alas!
agents and brokers have flinty hearts. There were doubts (not of his
word, for with creditors that he had never kept), but of the accidents
of life, either naturally, or by one of those casualties he had depicted
in the front of his book. In short, the day approached--nay, actually
arrived, and his pockets could boast little more than the once vaunted
half-crown and a shilling. Here was a state sufficient to drive one of
less strength of mind to despair. As a friend, a subject, a man of
honour, and one who prided himself upon a tenacious adherence to his
word (when the aforesaid creditors were not concerned), he felt keenly
all the horrors of his situation.

The day arrived, and etiquette demanded that the proper officer should
examine and report upon the nature of the expected entertainment, a duty
that had been deferred until a late hour of the day. Well was it that
the confiding prince had not wholly dispensed with that form; for verily
the said officer found the colonel, with a dirty scullion for his aide
du camp, in active and zealous preparation for his royal visiter; his
shirt sleeves tucked up, while he ardently basted the identical and
solitary "leg of mutton" as it revolved upon the spit: potatoes were to
be seen delicately insinuated into the pan beneath to catch the rich
exudation of the joint; while several tankards of foaming ale, and what
the French term "bread à discretion," announced that, in quantity, if
not in quality, he had not been careless in providing for the
entertainment of his illustrious guest. Although the colonel's culinary
skill leaves no doubt that the leg of mutton would have sustained
(according to Mr. Hunt's elegant phraseology) critical discussion on its
intrinsic merits, or on its concoction; and although the dinner might
have been endured by royalty (of whose homely appetite the ample
gridiron at Alderman Combe's brewery then gave ample proof), yet his
royal highness's poodles would assuredly have perspired through every
pore at the very mention of what a certain nobleman used to term a
"jig-hot;" so the feast was dispensed with, and due acknowledgment made
for the evident proofs of hospitality which had been displayed.

After various vicissitudes of life and fortune, in Hanger's advanced
age, a coronet became his, and it came opportunely; for he had at length
learned experience, and knowing the value of the competence he had
obtained, he resolved to enjoy it. He had had enough of fashion; and had
proved all its allurements. So he took a small house in a part of
earth's remoter regions, no great way from Somers' Town, near which
stood a public-house he was fond of visiting, and there, as the price of
his sanction, and in acknowledgment of his rank, a large chair by the
fire-side was exclusively appropriated to the peer.--_New Monthly
Magazine._

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ANECDOTES OF UGO FOSCOLO, THE ITALIAN POET.


Foscolo was in person about the middle height, and somewhat thin,
remarkably clean and neat in his dress,--although on ordinary occasions,
he wore a short jacket, trousers of coarse cloth, a straw hat, and thick
heavy shoes; the least speck of dirt on his own person, or on that of
any of his attendants, seemed to give him real agony. His countenance
was of a very expressive character, his eyes very penetrating, although
they occasionally betrayed a restlessness and suspicion, which his words
denied; his mouth was large and ugly, his nose drooping, in the way that
physiognomists dislike, but his forehead was splendid in the extreme;
large, smooth, and exemplifying all the power of thought and reasoning,
for which his mind was so remarkable. It was, indeed, precisely the same
as that we see given in the prints of Michael Angelo; he has often heard
the comparison made, and by a nod assented to it. In his living, Foscolo
was remarkably abstemious. He seldom drank more than two glasses of
wine, but he was fond of having all he eat and drank of the very best
kind, and laid out with great attention to order. He always took coffee
immediately after dinner. His house,--I speak of the one he built for
himself, near the Regent's Park,--was adorned with furniture of the most
costly description; at one time he had five magnificent carpets, one
under another, on his drawing-room, and no two chairs in his house
were alike. His tables were all of rare and curious woods. Some of
the best busts and statues (in plaster) were scattered through every
apartment,--and on those he doated with a fervour scarcely short of
adoration. I remember his once sending for me in great haste, and when
I entered his library, I found him kneeling, and exclaiming, "beautiful,
beautiful." He was gazing on the Venus de Medici, which he had
discovered looked most enchanting, when the light of his lamp was made
to shine upon it from a particular direction. On this occasion, he had
summoned his whole household into his library, to witness the discovery
which gave him so much rapture. In this state, continually exclaiming,
"beautiful, beautiful," and gazing on the figure, he remained for nearly
two hours.

He had the greatest dislike to be asked a question, which he did not
consider important, and used to say, "I have three miseries--smoke,
flies, and to be asked a foolish question."

His memory was one of the most remarkable. He has often requested me to
copy for him (from some library) a passage, which I should find in such
a page of such a book; and appeared as if he never forgot any thing with
which he was once acquainted.

His conversation was peculiarly eloquent and impressive, such as to
render it evident that he had not been over-rated as an orator, when in
the days of his glory, he was the admiration of his country. I remember
his once discoursing to me of language, and saying, "in every language,
there are three things to be noticed,--verbs, substantives, and the
particles; the verbs," holding out his hand, "are as the bones of these
fingers; the substantives, the flesh and blood; but the particles are
the sinews, without which the fingers could not move."

"There are," said he to me, once, "three kinds of writing--_diplomatic_,
in which you do not come to a point, but write artfully, and not to show
what you mean; _attorney_, in which you are brief; and _enlarged_,
in which you spread and stretch your thoughts."

I have said that his cottage, (built by himself,) near the Regent's
Park, was very beautiful. I remember his showing me a letter to a
friend, in which were the following passages:--After alluding to some
pecuniary difficulties, he says, "I can easily undergo all privations,
but my dwelling is always my workshop, and often my prison, and ought
not to distress me with the appearance of misery, and I confess, in this
respect, I cannot be acquitted of extravagance."

Speaking afterwards of the costliness of his furniture, he observes,
"they encompass me with an air of respectability, and they give me the
illusion of not having fallen into the lowest circumstances. I must also
declare that I will die like a gentleman, on a clean bed, surrounded by
the Venus's, Apollo's, and the Graces, and the busts of great men; nay,
even among flowers, and, if possible, while music is breathing around
me. Far from courting the sympathy of posterity, I will never give
mankind the gratification of ejaculating preposterous sighs, because I
died in a hospital, like Camoens, or Tasso; and since I must be buried
in your country, I am happy in having got, for the remainder of my life,
a cottage, independent of neighbours, surrounded by flowery shrubs, and
open to the free air:--and when I can freely dispose of a hundred
pounds, I will build a small dwelling for my corpse also, under a
beautiful oriental plane tree, which I mean to plant next November, and
cultivate _con amore_, to the last year of my existence. So far, I
am, indeed an epicure, but in all other things, I am the most moderate
of men. I might vie with Pythagoras for sobriety, and even with the
great Scipio for continence."--Poor Foscolo! these dreams were far, very
far from being realized. Within a short time after, his cottage, and all
its beautiful contents, came to the hammer, and were distributed. A
wealthy gold-smith now inhabits the dwelling of the poet of Italy. It is
but justice to his friends to add, that there were circumstances which
justified them in falling away from him.

During a great portion of the time I was acquainted with Ugo Foscolo, he
was under severe pecuniary distress, chiefly indeed brought on by his
own thoughtless extravagance, in building and decorating his house. I
have frequently in those moments seen him beat his forehead, tear his
hair, and gnash his teeth in a manner horrifying; and often left him at
night without the least hope of seeing him alive in the morning. He had
a little Italian dagger which he always kept in his bed-room, and this
he frequently told me would "drink his heart's blood in the night." "I
will die," said he, one day, "I am a stranger, and have no friends."
"Surely, sir," I replied, "a stranger may have friends." "Friends," he
answered; "I have learnt that there is nothing in the word; I assure
you, I called on W----e, to know if there was anything bad about me in
the newspapers; everybody seems to be leagued against me--friends and
enemies. I assure you, I do not think I will live after next Saturday,
unless there is some change." At another time he said, "I am surrounded
with difficulties, and must yield either life or honour; and can you ask
me which I will give up?" I have now before me a letter of Foscolo's,
which, after enumerating a long series of evils, concludes thus:--"Thus,
if I have not underwent the doom of Tasso, I owe it only to the strength
of my nerves that have preserved me."

The following sonnet was written by Ugo Foscolo, in English, and
accompanied the Essays on Petrarch, in the edition of that work which
was printed for private circulation. It was omitted when the volume was
subsequently published, and is consequently known to very few:


TO CALLIRHOE, AT LAUSANNE.

  Her face was veiled; yet to my fancied sight
  Love, sweetness, goodness, in her person shin'd.
  But, oh! I wak'd.----MILTON.


  I twine far distant from my Tuscan grove,
  The lily chaste, the rose that breathes of love,
  The myrtle leaf, and Laura's hallow'd bay,
  The deathless flowers that bloom o'er Sappho's clay;
  For thee, Callirhoe! yet by love and years,
  I learn how fancy wakes from joy to tears;
  How memory, pensive, 'reft of hope, attends
  The exile's path, and bids him fear new friends.
  Long may the garland blend its varying hue
  With thy bright tresses, and bud ever new
  With all spring's odours; with spring's light be drest,
  Inhale pure fragrance from thy virgin breast!
  And when thou find'st that youth and beauty fly,
  As heavenly meteors from our dazzled eye,
  Still may the garland shed perfume, and shine,
  While Laura's mind and Sappho's heart are thine.

_Literary Chronicle._

       *       *       *       *       *


ENGLISH FRUITS.


_The Strawberry_.--Many varieties have been imported from other
countries, and a far greater number have been obtained in this, chiefly
from seeds properly prepared by cross impregnation; by which means, the
strawberry has been wonderfully improved; instance the hautboys,
scarlet, chilli, but particularly the splendid varieties, called
"Wilmot's superb," and "Keen's seedlings."

_The Raspberry_, is also found wild in the British isles, on its
native site, (with its companions, the bramble, and dewberry)--its
shoots and fruits are diminutive, though the flavour of the berry is
rich. No plant requires the skilful hand of the pruner more than this;
of all others, it is, perhaps, the most viviparous, throwing up,
annually, a vast redundancy of shoots, which, if not displaced at the
proper season, would impoverish not only the fruit of the present, but
also the bearing wood of the next year. The Dutch fruiterers have been
successful in obtaining two or three fine varieties from seeds; and as
this field of improvement is open, no doubt further exertions will bring
forth new and valuable sorts.

_The Gooseberry._--No domesticated fruit sports into greater
variety than this: the endless lists of new sorts is a proof of this,
and many large and excellent sorts there are, particularly the old
Warrington red.

_The Cherry_.--Cultivation has accomplished wonders in the
improvement of this beautiful native fruit. Instead of a lofty
forest-tree bearing small bitter fruit, it has been long introduced to
our orchards, is changed in appearance and habit, and even in its manner
of bearing; has sported into many varieties, as numerous as they are
excellent--nor is such improvement at an end: several new varieties have
lately started into existence.

_The Plum_.--The lowest grade of this class of fruits is the almost
useless sloe in the hedge; and none but those in some degree acquainted
with the matter could, on beholding the acidous, puny sloe, and the
ample, luscious magnum bonum plum, together, readily believe that they
were kindred, or that the former was the primitive representative of the
latter. The intermediate links of this connexion are the bullace,
muscle, damacene, &c., of all which there are many varieties. In
nurserymen's lists, there are many improved sorts, not only excellent
plums, but excellent fruit,--the green gage and imperatrice are
admirable.

_The Pear_, was originally an inhabitant of European forests: there
it grew to be a middle-sized tree, with small leaves, and hard,
crude-tasted, petty fruit: since its introduction and naturalization in
the orchard, it has well repaid the planter's care. The French gardeners
have been long celebrated for their success and indefatigable
perseverance in the cultivation of the pear; almost all our superior
sorts are from that country. The monastic institutions all over Europe,
but particularly in France, were the sources from whence flowed many
excellent horticultural rules, as well as objects.

(_To be concluded in our next_.)

       *       *       *       *       *



THE MONTHS


[Illustration: OCTOBER.]


  On the woods are hung
  With many tints, the fading livery
  Of life, in which it mourns the coming storms
  Of winter.

  PERCIVAL.


Change is the characteristic of the month of October; in short, it
includes the birth and death--the Alpha and Omega--of Nature. Hence, it
is the most inviting to the contemplatist, and during a day in October,
the genius of melancholy may walk out and take her fill, in meditating
on its successive scenes of regeneration and decay.

Dissemination, or the _sowing of seed_, is the principal business
of this month in the economy of nature; which alone is an invaluable
lesson, a "precept upon precept" to a cultivated mind. This is variously
effected, besides by the agency of man; and it is a satire on his
self-sufficiency which should teach him that Nature worketh out her way
by means that he knoweth not.

Planting, that agreeable and patriotic art, is another of the October
labours. Here, however, the pride of man is again baffled, when he
considers how many thousand trees are annually planted by _birds_,
to whom he evinces his gratitude by destroying them, or cruelly
imprisoning them for the idle gratification of listening to their
warbling, which he may enjoy in all its native melody amidst the
delightful retreats of woods and groves. This leads us to the October
economy of birds. "Swallows are generally seen for the last time this
month, the house-martin the latest. The rooks return to the roost trees,
and the tortoise begins to bury himself for the winter. Woodcocks begin
to arrive, and keep dropping in from the Baltic singly or in pairs till
December. The snipe also comes now;" and with the month, by a kind of
savage charter, commences the destruction of the pheasant, to swell the
catalogue of the created wants and luxuries of the table. "One of the
most curious natural appearances," says Mr. L. Hunt, "is the
_gossamer_, which is an infinite multitude of little threads shot
out by minute spiders, who are thus wafted by the wind from place to
place." In this manner spiders are known to cross extents of many miles.

The weather becomes misty, though the middle of the day is often very
fine. Hence it is the proper season for the enjoyment of forest scenery.
The leaves, which, towards the close of September, began to assume their
golden tints and gorgeous hues, now lecture us with their scenes of
falling grandeur; and nothing is more delightful than in an autumnal
walk to emerge from the pensive gloom of a thick forest, and just catch
the last glimpse of an October sun, shedding his broad glare over the
varied tints of its leaves and branches, for the sombre and silvery
barks of the latter add not a little to the picture. "The hedges," says
the author already quoted, "are now sparkling with their abundant
berries,--the wild rose with the hip, the hawthorn with the haw, the
blackthorn with the sloe, the bramble with the blackberry; and the
briony, privet, honey-suckle, elder, holly, and woody nightshade, with
their other winter feasts for the birds."

October is the great month for _brewing_--that luxurious and
substantial branch of rural economy; and many and merry are the songs
and stories of nut-brown October to "gladden the heart of man," with the
soul-stirring influence of its regalings. Hops, too, are generally
picked this month.

October in Italy is thus vividly described: "It was now the beginning of
the month of October; already the gales which attend upon the equinox
swept through the woods and trees; the delicate chestnut woods, which
last dare encounter the blasts of spring, and whose tender leaves do not
expand until they may become a shelter to the swallow, had already
changed their hues, and shone yellow and red, amidst the sea-green
foliage of the olives, the darker but light boughs of the cork-trees,
and the deep and heavy masses of ilexes and pines."

       *       *       *       *       *



Astronomical Occurences

_FOR  OCTOBER, 1827._

(_For the Mirror_.)

Mercury is in conjunction with Jupiter on the 7th at noon: he is too
near the sun to be observed this month.

Venus passes her superior conjunction on the 7th, at 10 h. morning,
thenceforward she sets after the sun, and becomes an evening star. This
interesting planet makes a very near appulse to Jupiter on the 16th at
1 h. morning.

Jupiter is in conjunction with the sun on the 18th at 10-3/4 h. evening.
He is afterwards a morning star, preceding the sun in his rising.

The Georgian planet, or Herschel, ceases from his retrograde movement on
the 4th, and appears stationary till the 11th, when he resumes a direct
motion. He is still in a favourable situation for evening observation.
Its great distance from the earth, and the long period of its revolution
round the sun prevent any rapid change in its situation among the fixed
stars; the place therefore which the Greorgium Sidus occupied in
Capricornus in July, (see MIRROR for that month) is so contiguous to
that planet's present position, that the observations then made may be a
sufficient guide for the present month. Its slow motion among the fixed
stars makes it participate in that daily change which is common to them,
hence the planet may be observed in the same place a few minutes earlier
every night. It comes to the south on the 1st at 7 h. 16 min., and on
the 31st at 5 h. 26 min. evening.

The moon is in opposition on the 5th; in apogee on the 11th; in
conjunction on the 20th; and in perigee on the 23rd. She is in
conjunction with Saturn on the 13th at 3-1/4 h. after with Mars on the
18th at 2 h. morning; and Jupiter and Venus on the 20th, with the former
at 1-1/2 h. and the latter at 11 h. afternoon, also with Mercury on the
21st at 10-1/2 h. afternoon.

The Solar luminary is eclipsed on the 20th at 3 h. 47 min. afternoon. He
is above the horizon during the whole time the central shade is passing
over the disc of the earth, but the moon having nearly 2 deg. southern
latitude at the time of true conjunction, in middle of the eclipse, it
will be invisible not only to us but to the whole boreal hemisphere of
the globe. He enters Scorpio on the 24th at 4 h. 36 min. morning.

From the observations made upon the annual eclipses, it appears that the
period of the moon is now shorter, and consequently that her distance
from the earth is now less than in former ages, and this has been
considered as an argument against those who assert that the world may
have existed from eternity; for it was hence inferred that the moon
moves in a resisting medium, and therefore that her motion must by
degrees be all destroyed, in which case she must at last come to the
earth. But M. de la Place has shewn that this acceleration of the moon's
period is a necessary consequence of universal gravitation, and that it
arises from the action of the planets upon the moon. He has also shewn
that this acceleration will go on till it arrives at a certain limit,
when it will be changed into a retardation, or in other words, there are
two limits between which the lunar period fluctuates, but neither of
which it can pass.

PASCHE.

       *       *       *       *       *



Fine Arts.

       *       *       *       *       *

HANS HOLBEIN.


Holbein is the man who has been hitherto considered as the most
brilliant genius Switzerland has produced in the art of painting. He
is here universally believed to have been a native of Switzerland. His
earliest biographers, Mander and Patin, asserted that he was born at
Basel, and they have been copied by all our biographical dictionaries.
Another biographer, however, appears, himself a Swiss, and known as the
author of some other clever works, and proves, on the most satisfactory
evidence, that Holbein was born 1498, at Augsburg, in Germany; but that
his father, a painter too, came to Basel between 1504-8, probably at the
invitation of the magistrates of Basel, as they required a painter to
decorate their newly-built council-hall.

Holbein gave early proofs of his aspiring talent. When fifteen years
old, he exhibited an oil-painting, which, though defective in colouring,
raised high expectations by its clearness and softness of execution.
This painting is still to be seen in the public library at Basel, and
bears the date of 1513. Of the same year, a sketch, with the monogram
HH, is extant, representing three watchmen with halberds. His two
brothers were also painters; only a few paintings are left of the elder,
Ambrose, and none of the younger brother Bruno; both died prematurely.
In the year 1520, Holbein was presented with the freedom of the town of
Basel.

Switzerland held constant communications with Germany and the
Netherlands, but less with Italy. A number of painters lived at that
time in Germany, whose names have not been recorded by any German
Vasari, and their master works have been long neglected. In Holbein's
time Albrecht Durer enjoyed the primary reputation. Martin Schoen had
preceded him at Colmar, in Alsace; Manuel painted at Bern, Hans Asper at
Zurich, and at Basel itself there were other painters besides Holbein.
Half a century before him the _Dance of Death_ had been painted,
after the disaster of a plague, on the walls of a church-yard at Basel.

The council-hall at Basel gave occupation to architects from 1508 till
1520. It is believed that Holbein painted three of the walls, only one
of which (hid behind old tapestry, and discovered again in 1817) has
escaped the ravages of time. It represents M. Curius Dentatus cooking
his dinner, whilst the Samnites offer silver plates with money. "The
last Judgment," where a pope, with priests and monks, sink into the
flames of hell, is not the work of Holbein, but was done in 1610, during
good Protestant times.

A good number of stories are told of Holbein. Unable to pay his debts in
a tavern, he discharged the bill by decorating the walls with paintings
of flowers. Another time, for a similar purpose, he covered the walls
all over with "the merry dance of peasants;" and in order to deceive one
of his employers, he painted his own legs beneath the high scaffolding,
that the watchful citizen should not suspect his having abandoned his
work to carouse in wine-cellars. Here our biographer gravely says, "a
man of spirit could not be expected to sit quietly painting the whole
day long in the heat of the sun, or in the rain; if he saw a good friend
go to the tavern, he felt disposed to follow him." Holbein did not keep
the best company; but in this he resembled Rembrandt, who said, that
when he wished to amuse himself, he avoided the company of the great,
which put a restraint upon him; "for pleasure," he adds, "consists in
perfect liberty only." Holbein no doubt felt a contempt for the great
people of his time, as they did not understand much about his art, which
he valued above all things.

Holbein's wife, and he married early, was a perfect Xantippe, too shrewd
to be despised, and not handsome enough to be admired. In the library at
Basel is a family picture of Holbein, in which she is introduced, almost
unconscious of the two children about her; but Holbein very shrewdly
forgot to paint himself there. But he took care of the interests of his
family, and obtained them a pension from the magistrates of Basel,
during his stay in England. This pension was paid for past services, and
in order to induce him finally to fix his residence in Switzerland.

The absence of matrimonial felicity was probably an additional motive
for Holbein to seek employment as an itinerant painter. He visited
several Swiss towns, but certainly never saw Luther and Melancthon, so
that the portraits of Luther and Melancthon exhibited in Italy, Germany,
and England, as works of Holbein, cannot be genuine; and it is very
improbable that he should have copied the works of Lucas Cranach, who
several times painted the portraits of those lights of the reformation.
Erasmus was frequently painted by Holbein; and as those portraits were
sent as presents to the friends of Erasmus, Holbein's name became known
all over Europe.

Holbein came to England in the year 1526, and Sir Thomas More wrote to
Erasmus that he would take care of him. Sir Thomas received him into his
own house at Chelsea, and there Henry VIII. saw him one day, when paying
a visit to the former. He took him instantly into his service, gave him
apartments in the royal palace, and a salary of 30_l_. a-year.
Holbein's long residence in the house of Sir Thomas More had a good
effect upon him; for although Erasmus describes the women of England as
"nymphae divinis vultibus, blandae, faciles," yet Holbein seems to have
resisted those temptations in London, which rendered his conduct at
Basel so reprehensible. Holbein twice revisited Switzerland, once in
1526, the second and last time in 1538: the zealots had just destroyed
all the images; and even some painters, infected with the spirit of the
age, had declared they would rather starve, than break the second
commandment. In England the same work of devastation took place; but
Henry VIII., notwithstanding, gave Holbein abundance of work, as he had
to paint all his royal consorts in succession, besides a number of
portraits for English noblemen.

His sketches of heads, now existing at Kensington, of various people who
lived at the court of Henry VIII., and among them one of that monarch,
are exquisite productions. Imitations of the original drawings have been
published by J. Chamberlaine, fol. Lond. 1792. One picture of Holbein is
supposed to be in Surgeons' Hall. Some wood-cuts to Cranmer's Catechism
(1548) were made by Holbein. Our biographer, who had never seen the work
himself, was led by Walpole [_Anecdotes of Painting_] to believe,
that all the wood-cuts were from Holbein.

With respect to the famous "Dance of Death," the biographer tells us,
what we have already stated, that the painting on the wall of the
church-yard at Basel is not the work of Holbein; the costumes are of a
time anterior to Holbein. There was also a "Dance of Death" painted on
the wall of a convent at Bern by Manuel, who lived a little before
Holbein. Only on the supposition that the "Dance of Death" at Basel was
Holbein's work, could that of Bern be said to be the first of its kind.
But, on comparing the costumes, it appears again, that the "Dance of
Death" at Bern must have been painted subsequently to that at Basel. No
"Dance of Death" of an earlier date was known, until another was
discovered on the wall of a convent of nuns at Klingenthal, on the right
bank of the Rhine, at Basel. This bears the date of 1312, and is
therefore a whole century prior to the other, which cannot have been
painted before the year 1439. It has been supposed, that the idea of the
"Dance of Death" was taken from certain processions very much in vogue
during the middle ages; and it is singular enough, that up to this day,
in funeral processions in Italy, long white robes are used, which wholly
cover the head, with only two holes for the eyes. But the coincidence of
another plague at Basel, which, about the year 1312, destroyed above
11,000 people, renders it more than probable that the artist availed
himself of the impression which such a dreadful mortality must have made
on the minds of all the surviving, to represent how inexorable death
drags to the grave, in terrible sport, rich and poor, high and low,
clergymen and laity.

On the authority of Nieuhoff, a Dutchman, who came over to England with
William III., Mr. Douce asserts, that Holbein had painted the "Dance of
Death" on the walls of Whitehall. Borbonius might then have had in mind
this painting, when he mentioned the "Mors picta" of Holbein; but three
biographers of Holbein, Mander, Sandrart, and Patin, were in England
before Whitehall was destroyed by fire, and make no mention of this
painting, although Mander speaks of other paintings of Holbein,
particularly the portrait of Henry VIII., that were preserved at
Whitehall. Mander states, that he also saw at Whitehall the portraits of
Edward, Maria, and Elizabeth, by Holbein, "die oock ter selver plaetse
te sien zyn."

Sandrart, whose work was published in 1675, also mentions the paintings
of Holbein at Whitehall. Is it credible, that three travellers, two of
whom were distinguished artists themselves, should have been at
Whitehall, and seen there the paintings of Holbein, without taking
notice of the "Dance of Death," if it had been in that place?

Holbein died of the plague in London, 1554.--_Westminster Review_.

       *        *        *        *        *


When I see the spirit of liberty in action, I see a strong principle at
work; and, this for awhile, is all I can possibly know of it. The wild
gas, the fixed air, is plainly broke loose; but we ought to suspend our
judgment until the first effervescence is a little subsided, till the
liquor is cleared, and until we see something deeper than the agitation
of a troubled and frothy surface. I must be tolerably sure, before I
venture publicly to congratulate men upon a blessing, that they have
really received one.--_Burke_.

       *        *        *        *        *


If we must lash one another, let it be with the manly strokes of wit and
satire; for I am of the old philosopher's opinion, that if I must suffer
from one or the other, I would rather it should be from the paw of a
lion, than from the hoof of an ass.--_Addison_.

       *       *       *       *       *

[Illustration: The Central Market, Leeds.]



THE CENTRAL MARKET, LEEDS.


As one of the most elegant and useful buildings of the important town of
Leeds, and as characteristic of the public spirit of its inhabitants,[2]
the above engraving cannot fail to prove acceptable to our readers;
while it may serve as an excitement to similar exertions in other
districts.

The Central Market, is erected on the site of the old post-office, at
the north-east corner of Duncan-street, the foundation stone of which
was laid in 1824. The whole site was excavated, and is divided into
cellars, arched and groined, with a spacious area round the whole, for
the convenience of access to each, and lighted by powerful convex lenses
from the interior of the building. Over these is the principal
building--an enclosed market-house, with twenty shops round the exterior
for butchers and others, and twenty others corresponding in size with
them, fronting the interior. The space within these, on the ground
floor, is fitted up with twenty single stands for fruit and vegetables.
Three sides of the square form a spacious gallery, commodiously fitted
up with thirty-six stands of convenient dimensions, as a Bazaar. The
interior is lighted and ventilated by three rows of windows, one row on
the Bazaar floor, and two rows in the roof. The roof, the carpentry of
which has been pronounced a master-piece, is supported by twelve
cast-iron columns and sixteen oak pillars, and is 34 ft. 6 in. high; the
height from the floor to the upper point of the ceiling being 54 ft. 4
in. The size within the walls is 138 ft. by 103 ft. The principal
entrance is at the south front from Duncan-street, on each side of which
are three large shops fronting the street, with a suite of six offices
above. Over this entrance is an entablature richly embellished with fine
masonry, and supported with two Ionic columns, and two pilasters or
antaes, 30 ft. high. In the centre of the front, as well as within the
market, it is intended to place a clock. The outer boundary of the
market, which forms three sides of the square, and is separated from
the enclosed market by a carriage road, consists of twenty-five shops
devoted exclusively to butchers and fishmongers. At the south-west
corner of these is an hotel; at the south-east corner, near Call-lane,
are two shops, with offices above; and, in another part, a house for the
clerk of the market. There are four pumps on the premises, and the floor
of the interior is so contrived and fitted up with proper drains, that
it can be washed down at pleasure. The whole will be lighted with gas.

The architect of the Central Market is Francis Goodwin, Esq., and it is
but justice to say, that it is highly creditable to his taste and skill.
The front is of the Grecian order, and perhaps the largest piece of
masonry in the county of York, with the fewest observable joints. It is
expected to prove an advantageous investment.

    [2] Too much praise cannot be conferred on this and similar instances
        of provincial improvement; while it is much to be regretted
        that such praise cannot be extended to the _metropolis_ of
        England; for, strange to say, LONDON is still without a
        market-place suitable to its commercial consequence. Hence,
        Smithfield market is almost a public nuisance, while its extensive
        business is settled in public-houses in the neighbourhood; and the
        hay market, held in the fine broad street of that name, but ill
        accords with the courtly vicinity of Pall Mall and St. James's.
        It is, however, to _fruit and vegetable markets_ that this
        observation is particularly applicable: for instance, what a
        miserable scene is the area of _Covent Garden market_. The
        non-completion of the piazza square is much to be lamented, while
        splendid streets and towns are erecting on every side of the
        metropolis. How unworthy, too, is the market, of association with
        Inigo Jones's noble Tuscan church of St. Paul, "the handsomest
        barn in Europe." To quote Sterne, we must say "they manage these
        things better in France," where the _halles_, or markets are among
        the noblest of the public buildings. Neither can any Englishman,
        who has seen the markets of Paris, but regret the absence of
        fountains from the markets of London. They are among the most
        tasteful embellishments of Paris, and their presence in the
        markets cannot be too much admired. Water is, unquestionably, the
        most salutary and effective cleanser of vegetable filth which is
        necessarily generated on the sites of markets; but in London its
        useful introduction is limited to a few pumps, and its ornamental
        to one or two solitary _jets d'eau_ in almost unfrequented
        places. It should be added, that in Southwark, an extensive and
        commodious market-place is just completed, and the tolls are
        proportionally increasing. A similar improvement is much wanted in
        Covent Garden, by which means many of the evils of that spot would
        be abated, and instead of seeing Nature's choicest productions
        huddled together, and being ourselves tortured in the scramble and
        confusion of a crowd, we might then range through the avenues of
        Covent Garden with all the comfort which our forefathers were wont
        to enjoy on this spot, or certainly with comparative ease.--ED.

       *        *        *        *        *



_THE SELECTOR_;

AND

LITERARY NOTICES OF

_NEW WORKS_.


RISE AND FALL OF NAPOLEON.


With his passions, and in spite of his errors, Napoleon is, taking him
all in all, the greatest warrior of modern times. He carried into battle
a stoical courage, a profoundly calculated tenacity, a mind fertile in
sudden inspirations, which by unhopedfor resources disconcerted the
plans of the enemy. Let us beware of attributing a long series of
success to the organic power of the masses which he set in motion. The
most experienced eye could scarcely discover in them any thing but
elements of disorder. Still less let it be said that he was a successful
captain because he was a mighty monarch. Of all his campaigns, the most
memorable are,--the campaign of the Adige, where the general of
yesterday, commanding an army by no means numerous, and at first badly
appointed, placed himself at once above Turenne and on a level with
Frederick; and the campaign in France in 1814, when, reduced to a
handful of harassed troops, he combated a force of ten times their
number. The last flashes of imperial lightning still dazzled the eyes of
our enemies; and it was a fine sight to see the bounds of the old lion
tracked, hunted down, beset, presenting a lively picture of the days of
his youth, when his powers developed themselves in the fields of
carnage.

Napoleon possessed, in an eminent degree, the faculties requisite for
the profession of arms; temperate and robust, watching and sleeping at
pleasure, appearing unawares where he was least expected, he did not
disregard details to which important results are sometimes attached. The
hand which had just traced rules for the government of many millions of
men would frequently rectify an incorrect statement of the situation of
a regiment, or write down whence two hundred conscripts were to be
obtained, and from what magazine their shoes were to be taken. A patient
and easy interlocutor, he was a home questioner, and he could listen--a
rare talent in the grandees of the earth. He carried with him into
battle a cool and impassable courage; never was mind so deeply
meditative, more fertile in rapid and sudden illuminations. On becoming
emperor he ceased not to be the soldier. If his activity decreased with
the progress of age, that was owing to the decrease of his physical
powers.

In games of mingled calculation and hazard, the greater the advantages
which a man seeks to obtain, the greater risks he must run. It is
precisely this that renders the deceitful science of conquerors so
calamitous to nations. Napoleon, though naturally adventurous, was not
deficient in consistency or method; and he wasted neither his soldiers
nor his treasures where the authority of his name sufficed. What he
could obtain by negociations or by artifice, he required not by force of
arms. The sword, although drawn from the scabbard, was not stained with
blood, unless it was impossible to attain the end in view by a
manoeuvre. Always ready to fight, he chose habitually the occasion and
the ground. Out of fifty battles which he fought, he was the assailant
in at least forty.

Other generals have equalled him in the art of disposing troops on the
ground. Some have given battle as well as he did; we could mention
several who have received it better; but in the manner of directing an
offensive campaign he has surpassed all.

The wars in Spain and Russia prove nothing in disparagement of his
genius. It is not by the rules of Montecuculii and Turenne, manoeuvring
on the Renchen, that we ought to judge of such enterprises. The first
warred to secure such or such winter-quarters; the other to subdue the
world. It frequently behoved him not merely to gain a battle, but to
gain it in such a manner as to astound Europe and to produce gigantic
results. Thus political views were incessantly interfering with the
strategic genius; and to appreciate him properly we must not confine
ourselves within the limits of the art of war. This art is not composed
exclusively of technical details; it has also its philosophy. To find in
this elevated region a rival to Napoleon, we must go back to the times
when the feudal institutions had not yet broken the unity of the ancient
nations. The founders of religions alone have exercised over their
disciples an authority comparable with that which made him the absolute
master of his army. This moral power became fatal to him, because he
strove to avail himself of it even against the ascendancy of material
force, and because it led him to despise positive rules, the long
violation of which will not remain unpunished.

When pride was hurrying Napoleon towards his fall, he happened to say,
"France has more need of me than I have of France." He spoke the truth.
But why had he become necessary? Because he had committed the destiny of
the French to the chances of an interminable war; because, in spite of
the resources of his genius, that war, rendered daily more hazardous by
his staking the whole of his force, and by the boldness of his
movements, risked in every campaign, in every battle, the fruits of
twenty years of triumph; because his government was so modelled that
with him every thing must be swept away, and that a re-action
proportioned to the violence of the action must burst forth at once both
within and without. The mania of conquest had reversed the state of
things in Europe; we, the eldest born of liberty and independence, were
spilling our blood in the service of royal passions against the cause of
nations, and outraged nations were turning round upon us, more terrible
from being armed with the principles which we had forsaken.

At times, this immense mass of passions which he was accumulating
against him, this multitude of avenging arms ready to be raised, filled
his ambitious spirit with involuntary apprehension. Looking around him,
he was alarmed to find himself solitary, and conceived the idea of
strengthening his power by moderating it. Then it was that he thought of
creating an hereditary peerage, and reconstructing his monarchy on more
secure foundations. But Napoleon saw without illusion to the bottom of
things. The nation, wholly and continually occupied in prosecuting the
designs of its chief, had previously not had time to form any plans for
itself. The day on which it should have ceased to be stunned by the din
of arms, it would have called itself to account for its servile
obedience. It is better, thought he, for an absolute prince to fight
foreign armies, than to have to struggle against the energy of the
citizens. Despotism had been organized for making war; war was continued
to uphold despotism. The die was cast; France must either conquer
Europe, or Europe subdue France.

Napoleon fell: he fell, because with the men of the nineteenth century
he attempted the work of an Attila and a Genghis Khan; because he gave
the reins to an imagination directly contrary to the spirit of his age,
with which nevertheless his reason was perfectly acquainted; because he
would not pause on the day when he felt conscious of his inability to
succeed. Nature has fixed a boundary, beyond which extravagant
enterprises cannot be carried with prudence. This boundary the emperor
reached in Spain, and he overleaped it in Russia. Had he then escaped
destruction, his inflexible presumption would have caused him to find
elsewhere a Baylen and a Moscow-- _History of the War in the
Peninsula, from the French of General Foy._

       *       *       *       *       *


ROBINSON CRUSOES.


At one of the islands belonging to Juan de Ampues, the pilot ran away.
Cifuentes and his crew, all equally ignorant of navigation, made sail
for San Domingo, were dismasted in a gale of wind, and driven in the
night upon the "Serrana" shoals; the crew, a flask of powder and steel,
were saved, but nothing else. They found sea-calves and birds upon the
island, and were obliged to eat them raw, and drink their blood, for
there was no water. After some weeks, they made a raft with fragments of
the wreck, lashed together with calf-skin thongs: three men went off
upon it, and were lost. Two, and a boy, staid upon the island--one of
whom, Moreno, died four days afterwards raving mad, having gnawed the
flesh off his arms: the survivors, Master John and the boy, dug holes in
the sand with tortoise-shells, and lined them with calf-skins to catch
the rain. Where the vessel was wrecked, they found a stone which served
them for a flint; this invaluable prize enabled them to make a fire.
Two men had been living upon another island two leagues from them, in
similar distress, for five years; these saw the fire, and upon a raft
joined their fellow sufferers. They now built a boat with the fragments
of the wreck, made sails of calf-skins, and caulked her with their fat,
mixed with charcoal: one man and the boy went away in her: Master John,
and one whose name has not been preserved, would not venture in her:
they made themselves coracles with skins, and coasted round the shoals,
which they estimated at twelve leagues long. At low water there were
seventeen islands, but only five which were not sometimes overflowed.
Fish, turtle, sea-calves, birds, and a root like purslane, was their
food. The whites of turtle-eggs, when dried and buried for a fortnight,
turned to water, which they found good drink: five months in the year
these eggs were their chief food. They clothed themselves and covered
their huts with calf-skins, and made an enclosure to catch fish,
twenty-two fathoms long, with stones brought out of the sea--and raised
two towers in the same laborious way, sixteen fathoms in circumference
at the base, and four in height, at the north and south extremities of
the island: upon these they made fires as signals. To avoid the crabs
and snails which tormented them at night, they slept in the day time.

Three years after the other went way, John's sufferings began to affect
his reason: in a fit of despair, he applied to the devil for that relief
his prayers had failed to bring; and, rising in the dark, he fancied the
devil was close to the hut. John awakened his companion, and taking a
crucifix for protection, ran praying to the other end of the island.
About a fortnight afterwards, John thought he heard his visiter again,
but did not see him. And it now pleased God to relieve them: they saw a
ship, and made a great smoke upon their tower, which was seen. John and
his companion were carried to the Havannah, where their appearance and
story attracted great attention. John was twice sick during the eight
years, both times in August, and both times bled himself.--_Southey's
Chronological History of the West Indies._

       *        *        *        *        *


FIRST APPEARANCES OF MISS STEPHENS AND MR. KEAN.


During this memorable era of the British Stage, Mr. Hazlit was engaged
as theatrical reporter to the _Morning Chronicle_, newspaper, then
conducted by Mr. Perry, and printed on the exact site of the MIRROR
office: in his _Table Talk_ he gives the following portraiture of
their theatrical successes:--

What squabbles we used to have about Kean and Miss Stephens, the only
theatrical favourites I ever had! Mrs. Billington had got some notion
that Miss Stephens would never make a singer, and it was the torment of
Perry's life (as he told me in confidence) that he could not get any two
people to be of the same opinion on any one point. I shall not easily
forget bringing him my account of her first appearance in the
_Beggar's Opera_. I have reason to remember that article: it was
almost the last I ever wrote with any pleasure to myself. I had been
down on a visit to my friends near Chertsey, and, on my return, had
stopped at an inn at Kingston-upon-Thames, where I had got the
_Beggar's Opera_, and had read it overnight. The next day I walked
cheerfully to town. It was a fine sunny morning, in the end of autumn,
and as I repeated the beautiful song, "Life knows no return of spring,"
I meditated my next day's criticism, trying to do all the justice I
could to so inviting a subject. I was not a little proud of it by
anticipation. I had just then begun to stammer out my sentiments on
paper, and was in a kind of honey-moon of authorship.

I deposited my account of the play at the _Morning Chronicle_
office in the afternoon, and went to see Miss Stephens as Polly. Those
were happy times, in which she first came out in this character, in
Mandane, where she sang the delicious air, "If o'er the cruel tyrant
Love," (so as it can never be sung again,) in _Love in a Village_,
where the scene opened with her and Miss Matthews in a painted garden of
roses and honeysuckles, and "Hope thou nurse of young Desire," thrilled
from two sweet voices in turn. Oh! may my ears sometimes still drink the
same sweet sounds, embalmed with the spirit of youth, of health, and
joy, but in the thoughts of an instant, but in a dream of fancy, and I
shall hardly need to complain! When I got back, after the play, Perry
called out, with his cordial, grating voice, "Well, how did she do?" and
on my speaking in high terms, answered, that "he had been to dine with
his friend the duke, that some conversation had passed on the subject,
he was afraid it was not the thing, it was not the true _sostenuto_
style; but as I had written the article" (holding my peroration on the
_Beggar's Opera_ carelessly in his hand) "it might pass!" I could
perceive that the rogue licked his lips at it, and had already in
imagination "bought golden opinions of all sorts of people" by this very
criticism, and I had the satisfaction the next day to meet Miss Stephens
coming out of the editor's room, who had been to thank him for his very
flattering account of her.

I was sent to see Kean the first night of his performance of Shylock,
when there were about a hundred people in the pit, but from his masterly
and spirited delivery of the first striking speech, "On such a day you
called me dog," &c. I perceived it was a hollow thing. So it was given
out in the _Chronicle_, but Perry was continually at me as other
people were at him, and was afraid it would not last. It was to no
purpose I said it _would last_: yet I am in the right hitherto.
It has been said, ridiculously, that Mr. Kean was written up in the
_Chronicle_. I beg leave to state my opinion that no actor can be
written up or down by a paper. An author may be puffed into notice, or
damned by criticism, because his book may not have been read. An artist
may be over-rated, or undeservedly decried, because the public is not
much accustomed to see or judge of pictures. But an actor is judged by
his peers, the play-going public, and must stand or fall by his own
merits or defects. The critic may give the tone or have a casting voice
where popular opinion is divided; but he can no more _force_ that
opinion either way, or wrest it from its base in common-sense and
feeling, than he can move Stonehenge. Mr. Kean had, however, physical
disadvantages and strong prejudices to encounter, and so far the
_liberal_ and _independent_ part of the press might have been
of service in helping him to his seat in the public favour.

       *       *       *       *       *



THE GATHERER.


  "I am but a _Gatherer_ and disposer of other men's stuff."--Wotton.

       *       *       *       *       *

INSANITY.


A French physician, in a recent work on the moral and physical causes of
insanity, noticing the influence of professions in promoting this
affliction, brings forward a curious table, showing the relative
proportion of different professions in a mass of 164 lunatics. It runs
thus:--merchants, 50; military men, 33; students, 25; administrateurs et
employés, 21; advocates, notaries, and men of business, 10; artists, 8;
chemists, 4; medical practitioners, 4; farmers, 4; sailors, 3;
engineers, 2. Total 164.

Never were the afflictions of Insanity more vividly portrayed than in
the following lines from _Churchill's Epistle to Hogarth_:--


  Sure 'tis a curse which angry fates impose,
  To mortify man's arrogance, that those
  Who're fashioned of some better sort of clay,
  Must sooner than the common herd decay.
  What bitter pangs must humble genius feel,
  In their last hour to view a Swift and Steele!
  How must ill-boding horrors fill their breast,
  When she beholds men, mark'd above the rest
  For qualities most dear, plung'd from that height,
  And sunk, deep sunk, in second childhood's night!
  Are men indeed such things? and are the best
  More subject to this evil than the rest,
  To drivel out whole years of idiot breath,
  And sit the monuments of living death?
  O galling circumstance to human pride!
  Abasing thought! but not to be deny'd.
  With curious art, the brain too finely wrought,
  Preys on herself, and is destroyed by thought.
  Constant attention wears the active mind,
  Blots out her pow'rs and leaves a blank behind.

       *        *        *        *        *


MACADAMIZATION.


  The cost of converting Regent-street,
  Whitehall-place, and Palace-yard, into
  broken stone roads, has been               £ 6,055 8_s_. 3_d_.

  Value of old pavement taken up and
  broken for that purpose                    £ 6,787 7_s_. 0_d_.

                                             ------------
                                             £12,842 15 3
                                             ------------

_Parliamentary Papers._

       *        *        *        *        *


SILK


According to a late statement of Mr. Huskisson, the silk manufacture of
England now reaches the enormous amount of fourteen millions sterling
per annum, and is consequently after cotton, the greatest staple of the
country.

       *        *        *        *        *


NEW LAMP.


At a recent meeting of the Royal Institution an ornamental lamp was
placed on the library table, the elegant transparent paintings and
spiral devices of which were kept in rotary motion by the action of the
current of heated air issuing from the chimneys of the lamp, which
contrivance is well adapted to a number of purposes of ornamental
illumination.

       *       *       *       *       *


First and last there have been 120,000 copies printed of "Domestic
Cookery, by a Lady," (Mrs. Rundell;) and 50,000 "Receipt Book," by the
same authoress.

       *        *        *        *        *

_Printed and Published by J. LIMBIRD, 143, Strand, (near
Somerset-house,) and sold by all Newsmen and Booksellers._

       *        *        *        *        *





*** End of this LibraryBlog Digital Book "The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Volume 10, No. 276, October 6, 1827" ***

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