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LITERARY MISCELLANY.

THE principal new works issued in Great Britain, and noticed by the critical journals, and in which American readers have an interest, are enumerated below.

HISTORY, TRAVELS, AND BIOGRAPHY.

The Life of Hon. Henry Cavendish, with an abstract of his more important scientific papers, presents the only biography of this remarkable philosopher. As marking a phase in the progress of chemistry, it is an important contribution to the history of science. It vindicates, of course, Cavendish's claim to the discovery of the composition of water, and goes into a reply to the celebrated article of Sir David Brewster, in the North British Review, which claimed the honor for Watt. The work is praised as clear, scholarly, and impartial.

Lord Mahon has added the fifth and sixth volumes to his "History of England from the Peace of Utrecht," which extend over seventeen years, embracing the period immediately preceding and during our war of Independence. The Athenæum, after indicating in a comprehensive sketch of the events embraced in this period, its importance as an historical era, remarks of Lord Mahon's qualifi

cations thus:-

"But Lord Mahou is too timid-too conventionally respectable-for such a work. What he has done on a large scale, he has done well enough; just as might be expected from his culture and his political leaning. The tangled web of court and ministerial intrigue is unravelled, exhibited, and knitted up again by him with a minute dexterity to which works like that of Mr. Adolphus can make no pretension. The origin and progress of discontent in America, as they appear to one having no sympathy with revolutions, are traced with a copious preciseness, and in the new light of a purely English without being a high Tory-point of view. The other-perhaps the most essential-part of the historian's task, Lord Mahon has gone over in an extremely brief, vague, and unsatisfactory manner. With the exception of a short chapter on literature and art placed, in the manner of Hume, at the end of his work, as if these subjects had only an incidental and altogether subsidiary connection with the history of the time, some eight or nine pages are all that he devotes, out of nearly eleven hundred, to the entire range of topics embraced in the term 'social history."

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The Literary Gazette speaks of the author and the work in high eulogy:"It is always with extreme satisfaction that we read the announcement that Lord Mahon has accomplished another stage of his journey. From the peace of Utrecht, where his charming narrative begins, up to our own day, we have no classic hiswhich are else like water spilt upon the ground. torian who has gathered up the scattered events, Great deeds are lost without great writers, who can

raise themselves by an effort of the imagination to the high conceptions of the original actor, and can feel both the glow of the iron while in the furnace, and resemble the metal when it has cooled. History, to be sure, deals with the little as well as with the lofty, but he who is equal to cope with the last, will not be vanquished by the former. Mr. Macaulay is advancing upon the heels of Lord Mahon. Yet it must be some years, at least, before he can reach the goal which is Lord Mahon's starting-place; and should he ever tread the same path, he will not, we are convinced, efface the footsteps of his predecessor. That Mr. Macaulay will sustain his honors we have no sort of doubt, but we believe that Lord Mahon will keep his likewise. The only difference will be, that we shall have the pleasure thenceforward of travelling the road with a lamp on each side of us. Nay, great as is Lord Mahon's reputation, we expect it to be greater hereafter."

It may be stated that Lord Mahon, after a deliberate discussion, decides the author of the Junius Letters to be Sir Philip Francis.

D'Israeli's Life of Lord George Bentinck attracts general notice, and meets with diverse treatment. The Athenæum thinks that "dryness and D'Israeli were never so strongly associated as in this volume; about one fifth only of which is interesting to the general reader." The Britannia, on the other hand, regards it as a most successful specimen of biography.

A translation of a new work by the indefatigable German traveller, Kohl, has appeared-Travels in Istria, Dalmatia, and Montenegro-the result of an excursion made during the past year, along the tion had been directed to the inhabitants of these eastern coasts of the Adriatic, partly because attencoasts by some of the events of the late Hungarian war, and partly because our information respecting the territories and inhabitants of Istria, Dalmatia, and Montenegro, is somewhat meagre. The Literary Gazette remarks:

"What we respect in Herr Kohl, is the absence of pretence, and the conscientious matter-of-fact manner in which he proceeds to discharge the limited duties which he has imposed upon himself."

Narrative of the Voyage of the Rattlesnake, by John Macgillivray-a history of an exploring expe dition sent out in 1846, to complete the survey of Torres Strait, and examining the sea between the Barrier Reefs, New Guinea, and the Louisiade islands, under the command of Capt. Stanley, a son of the late Bishop of Norwich. This voyage made the important discovery of a clear channel, of at least thirty miles wide, along the southern shores of New Guinea. The work, as descriptive of the voyage, and of the countries visited, is highly commended. The Examiner says:

"Mr. Macgillivray has here published one of the best books of travels of its class which has fallen

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under our notice for many years. It is indeed second only to one to which all books of maritime travels are likely to be second for a long time to come, we mean that portion of the Narrative of the Voyage of the Adventure and Beagle' which is Mr. Charles Darwin's. The judicious narrator of the Expedition has been no idle observer of the strange countries and stranger people that were brought under his notice in his four years' peregrination, and hence the public is presented with much varied knowledge, not only regarding his own special scientific pursuits, but relating to the rude and strange men of whom little or nothing was known before, and about whom, it must also be admitted, much remains still to be known."

Others of the best critical journals speak as well of the work.

Memoir of Peer Ibraheem Khan, is a curious work, portraying the life of a remarkable character, who took an active and most important part in the English war in Affghanistan. His character and his deeds are highly praised in Major Herbert Edwardes' interesting account of his campaign on the Punjaub frontier.

Holland's Life of Chantrey, the sculptor, is sharply censured for its inadequacy, by the Westminster: "It is of the very lowest order of the • Memoires pour servir,' redeemed from utter worthlessness by the few facts concerning Chantrey which the local knowledge of the writer has enabled him to rescue from oblivion for the use of the future biographer. The alternate puerility and inflation of Mr. Holland's style, and the seriousness with which he makes all his calculations from the meridian of Sheffield, are at the turning point between the tiresome and the amusing."

The Life and Letters of Barthold George Niebuhr, with Essays on his Character and Influence, by the

Chevalier Bunsen, and Professors Brandis and Loebel, is announced as in press, and is eagerly waited for.

lectures on the same subject. The struggles of the Reformation in the Sclavonic lands of Bohemia and Poland are detailed, and the historical and biographical sketches are admirably drawn.

GENERAL LITERATURE.

Dr. Latham, the celebrated ethnologist, has published two works recently. A Handbook of the English Language, which is commended by nearly all critics. The Athenæum says:

"No man has done more than Dr. Latham to place the study of English on its proper footing. By his philosophical treatment of it, he has raised it to the dignity which it deserves, and shown that, while an essential in the earliest education of children, it is not unworthy to hold a high place in college pursuits. His present work is a sort of medium be tween his large and school grammars. It is rendered much more interesting, as well as more useful, to a student than the school grammar, by containing not merely a greater number of facts, but also a more copious discussion of principles and a fuller explanation of the origin and reasons of particular usages. On the other hand, it is less abstruse and more practical than the large work on the English language."

The other work of Dr. Latham is entitled, The Germania of Tacitus, with Ethnological Dissertations and Notes, which does not receive quite so genial a reception. The Examiner sharply criticises it as follows:

"We fancy that a close ethnological examination, if it could be made, would prove to us that Dr. R. G. Latham and Mr. G. P. R. James come of exactly the same variety under a common stock Both are They will be for ever sprouting and leafing, and clever men, and neither gives himself fair play. they will not let themselves be pruned. They build a mass of books upon a given, not very wide, base; a mass like the body of a top, upon a limited, though durable and solid peg; and down the mass must go, by its own weight, if it be not kept spin

Mr. Dickens' Child's History of England has been reprinted from his Household Words, and is a workning. Dr. Latham, having acquired a certain numof great merit.

The Lives of the Prime Ministers and other Eminent Ministers of State, by J. Houston Browne, is announced.

The Shrines and the Sepulchres of the Old and New Worlds, by Dr. R. R. Madden, a work of great research, is about to be published.

Recollections of a Literary Life; or, Books, Places, and People, by Mary Russell Mitford, is in the press of Bentley.

A new historical work by Miss Martineau is announced--a History of the British Empire during the First Half of the Nineteenth Century, to be published in monthly parts.

The ninth and tenth volumes of Grote's History of Greece, republished in elegant form in this country, by Messrs. J. P. JEWETT & Co., Boston, are announced as nearly ready.

ber of respectable ideas connected with ethnology his acquirements in the production of a work upon and language, proceeded to make admirable use of 'the English language.' That work perhaps contained some pomps and affectations-we thought we saw some, but we did not care. The book was a good book, nobody has given us a better of its kind. But having produced this his main joint, Dr. Latham has since been putting it we do not know how many times again upon the public table, cold, hashed, fried, potted. We liked the joint when first served. We did not grumble when it was offered again, cold; we accepted it thereafter, hashed; not many weeks ago, when it came up again fried, we hinted a hope that there remained no other ways of cooking it; and now, Heaven help us, here we have a stew made of the trimmings."

Douglas Jerrold is engaged in issuing a uniform edition of his numerous writings, the second volume of which, containing his "Men of Character,"

England and France under the House of Lancas-originally contributed to Blackwood, has been just

ter, is also announced, from an anonymous source.

Sketch of the Religious History of the Sclavonic Nations, is a new work, by Count Krasinski, who has delivered at Edinburgh interesting courses of

published. Of course, they are well received. The Athenæun knows "of but few better counsels that we could offer in the interest of our readers' good spirits, and of the humanities which delight in wise wit and witty wisdom,' than a recommendation to

add to the list of the Christmas guests, Men of | tives of gratitude for good personally received at Character."

The Fagot of French Sticks, is the title of Sir Francis Bond Head's new work, which we perceive is about to be reprinted by Mr. PUTNAM, of New York. His previous lively and spirited books of travel excite an expectation which this appears to disappoint. Most of the critical journals, except some of those strongly sympathizing with the political views of the author, express this disappointment in greater or less degree. The Examiner thus disposes of it:

the Divine hands, the welfare of the soul as of first importance, temporal welfare of others being also sought. All the characteristics of early Methodism are analyzed in the present volume with a discrimination, and described with a clearness such as we might expect from the philosophical and eloquent author of "The Natural History of Enthusiasm." The Spectator thus sums up the merits of the book:

"The argument is not altogether so close and interesting as it might be. The purpose is sometimes remote, the manner too sermonizing. The work exhibits Books upon nothing are permissible to certain a thorough acquaintance with the lives and writings writers-to men of fancy, whose imagination can of the founders of Methodism, and a living knowcover the barrenness of a theme; to sentimentalists, ledge of some of them as they approached the termination of their career. who can make pathos out of a horn snuff-box, or exA judgment nicely critical tract floods of humor from the first postillion or is exercised upon both, in which charity never dulls grisette; to the philosopher who can draw a moral the acumen, but ever restrains it from passing into bitterness. from the most vulgar objects of life, or to the wit Much thought, moreover, is displayed who can infuse his own comicality into them. But upon the real causes of the success of the Methothe author before us possesses none of these charac-dists, and a good deal of original opinion in the teristics in that eminent degree which entitles him survey of the religious world; which Mr. Taylor's to present the world with two volumes upon nothing. task permits, if it does not require." Of humor, indeed, several of his former writings displayed not a little; but the source has apparently been dried up. We are quite at a loss to discover what kind of impression Sir Francis Head intended to make upon the reader by his present sketches, which are little calculated to instruct, and certainly not vastly to amuse."

The Literary Gazette gives its sincere, though qualified applause.

We are glad to observe that a new edition is preparing for publication of the works of Dr. Isaac Barrow, "compared with the original MSS.," the announcement says, "and enlarged with materials| hitherto unpublished; edited for the Syndics of the University Press, Cambridge."

Wesley and Methodism, by Isaac Taylor, reprinted in a handsome 12mo by Messrs. HARPER, New York, obtains a long and highly commendatory notice in the Literary Gazette. The scope of the work is thus stated:

"One division of Mr. Taylor's book relates to the substance of Methodism,' as distinguished from the form of Methodism,' still extant under the name of Wesleyanism, after one of the originators of the movement. The substance of Methodism he states to consist of these four elements-1. A belief, amounting to a vivid feeling, of the truth and importance of the great doctrines of the Christian system. 2. A sense of personal relationship to these truths, felt by each individual, as opposed to the Church idea' of Christianity, beyond which the Church of Rome knows nothing, and to which the Church of England, in all her public offices, gives much prominence. The need of what is called 'experimental religion' is made in Methodism to throw into comparative insignificance all questions of outward form or of ecclesiastical order. 3. The consciousness and the enjoyment of a new life, manifesting itself sometimes in unusual sensations of peace, or love, or joy, sometimes breaking forth into external demonstrations in the rude and unlearned, but in better constitutions leading to growing humility, faith, holiness, and zeal. 4. As an element of the Methodism of the last century was what is termed 'evangelic philanthropy,' an active and diffusive spirit and practice of doing good, arising from mo

Harrison Ainsworth's new serial novel, Mervyn Clitheroe, has appeared.

The Fair Carew; Jacob Bendixen, the Jew, from the Danish, by Mary Howitt; Spiritual Alchemy, or Trials turned to Gold; Anthony, or the Deaf and Dumb Boy; Darien, by Eliot Warburton; The Irish Son, are among the new novels of the month. Buccaneers; Horace Grantham, or The Neglected

AMERICAN Books.

Mr. Young's Version of Béranger, published by PUTNAM, is treated by the Atheneum with as much severity as if the worthy translator were not a native Englishman. After stating some of the peculiar difficulties of rendering such an author as Béranger into English, the critic proceeds :

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"None of these unquestionable general truths seem to have been apprehended by Mr. Young;or else he does not possess the expressive power of the poet who is to render foreign poets. His work justifies both suspicions,--and suggests the ungrateful toil of one who has set himself to copy a cameo with a sledge-hammer,-to touch an enamel with a coach-painter's brush. For the malice of the vaudeville couplet, Mr. Young gives us the homely mischief' of the Clare Market ballad. The tender yet popular singer-the naïf and poignant satirist-the boon companion who wears his vine-wreath, not as a Silenus but as a Faun would wear it,-is here presented as a being little more subtle or accomplished than the rhymesters who versified Marshal Haynau's visit to the Brewery, and who now, like Wisdom, are crying in the streets concerning the antecedents and destinies of Bloomerism. Is not such a character deserved by a versifier who employs such flowers of speech as 'the go,' 'draw it mild,' 'old clo,' 'shocking bad hat,' &c., -and who does not even use his 'vernacular' pure? This, such nondescript words as 'old hunk,' (for 'old hunks,') because a word was wanted to rhyme with drunk,-as Liz,' by way of translating Lisette,' rather drearily illustrate. In brief, want of power, want of poetry, and want of taste characterize Mr. Young's translations."

Mr. Longfellow's new poem, "The Golden Le

gend,' published by TICKNOR, REED & FIELDS, Boston, and republished by BOGUE, is warmly received. The Athenaeum says:—

"A new poem by Prof. Longfellow is sure to be welcome. His fresh imagery, his gracefully chosen epithets, and the delicate beauty of his thoughts, whatever be the mould into which he chooses to cast them, give him an unquestioned place in the Hall of the Poets. His present subject, to whatever objections it may be open as a theme, is peculiarly happy for the choice which it gives him of accessories of scenery and time, and for the variety of material which this choice places ready to his hand. Waving the question of the propriety of a medieval legend in a time when the heart of the world is busy with the labor of Progress which it has in hand, and when the Bard should be doing his part of the work, we recognize Mr. Longfellow's happy treatment of the quaint and picturesque materials on which he has chosen to exercise his muse."

The Literary Gazette echoes the strain:"Mr. Longfellow has written two books-Hype rion,' in prose, and Evangeline,' in verse-which are sure to keep his name long fresh, wherever the English tongue is spoken. A well-stored mind, a graceful fancy, and glowing heart, are indeed apparent in everything that falls from his pen; but in the works we have named, more especially the latter, the power of moving the affections and stamping indelible pictures on the memory, proclaim the presence of the poet."

Layard's Popular Account of the Discoveries at Nineveh has been handsomely reprinted by Messrs. HARPER AND BROTHERS.

In the compass of a single volume, and at a very moderate price, we have the results of the most interesting series of investigations which have been made in modern times into the history of the past. Four years ago, a single case, not three feet square, in the British Museum, contained all that was known to exist of the two most famous cities of antiquity. A few incidental notices in Holy Writ, and fragments of profane historians of doubtful authority, in which it is impossible in many cases to distinguish fact from fiction, were all the historical records of the first dynasties which ruled the East. Since that time the researches of Layard have brought to light inscriptions and works of art furnishing materials from which there is every reason to hope that the history of Assyria may be constructed upon a basis more satisfactory than that of any nation of antiquity, whose records have not been written by inspiration. This volume, abridged by Layard from his larger work, presents, in a more compact form, all the results and facts of his previous volumes, and cannot fail to prove even more widely acceptable. It contains no change of opinion on any material point, for the views which he at first advanced have been confirmed by his subsequent discoveries, and by the continual progress that has been made in deciphering the ancient inscriptions. It may, therefore, be confidently accepted as presenting an accurate statement of the present state of our knowledge of Assyrian antiquities. Independent of the light thrown on numerous topics of Biblical interest by the discoveries made, the history of the investigations abounds in curious and instructive details of the life and manners of the Arabs, with whom the author was thrown into very intimate rela tions.

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The hundredth anniversary of the Royal Society of Sciences of Gottingen was lately celebrated, at which Mr. Airy, the English Astronomer Royal, was elected an honorary member.

The catalogue of the library of the late Cardinal Mezzofanti has just been published at Rome, in Latin. It is divided into forty-five sections, and contains the titles of works in more than 400 languages, idioms, or dialects. The library cost the learned Cardinal the labor of a long life and no small amount of money, and nothing more complete, curious, or valuable of the kind, exists in the world.

Mr. Harry Luttrell, "a wit among lords and a lord among wits," died at his house in Brompton Crescent on the 19th inst., in the eighty-first year of his age. He was the friend of Sydney Smith and of Mr. Rogers, and the wit who set the table in a roar at Holland House, when Whig supremacy in the patronage of letters was rather laughed at in political circles. Like many other men of reputation for happy sayings, his printed performances do little justice to the talents which he himself possessed.

M. Duprez, so long celebrated as the tenor of the French opera, has become a composer; his first work, an opera, called "L'abime de la Maladetta,” was produced for the first time at the Theatre de la Monnaie, at Brussels, on Monday last.

The principal musical event of the week has been the production of an opera in three acts, by Felicien David, at the Opera National, called La Perle du Brésil It created extraordinary interest in the musical circles and amongst the public, as it is the first piece David, though so widely known by his Desert, his Eden, and other ode-symphonies, has prepared for the stage.

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Dr. Mainzer, a composer of great merits, and a teacher of extraordinary success, died recently at Manchester, at an advanced age.

-Alexander Lee, author of several of the much

admired songs of the day, “Come dwell with me," "Away to the mountain's brow," "The Soldier's Tear," "Come where the Aspens quiver," and many other delightful airs, well known to the musical world, recently died in London, in extreme destitution. A concert for his benefit was to be given, but he died on the very day of the concert. It was thought best to perform the concert, however, and devote the proceeds to paying the proper honor to his memory. They did so, but most of those who tried their voices were too much affected to sing, and the performance was at last brought to an abrupt termination by one of his pupils, who burst into a passion of tears while endeavoring to sing "The Spirit of Good," an air by the departed master.

- Mme. Sieber, widow of the celebrated music publisher, and mother of the composer of that name, died the day before yesterday in Paris, at the age of 101.

-Liszt, the celebrated pianist, has published an elaborate work entitled Lohengrin et Tannhauser de Richard Wagner, which develops and defends what is known as Romanticism in music. Dr. Liszt is one of the men of genius who adorn a not very rich period. In executive music-as offering that interpretation which approaches towards and enhances creation-he is without a peer. In picturesque and high-toned eloquence as a writer he is little less distinguished. His new work excites justly great attention.

- Two new original English operas are forthcoming-one by Mr. E. Fitzwilliam, and "Charles II.," by Mr. McFarren.

-Mr. Charles Horsley has made considerable progress in a new Oratorio, on the story of "Joseph." This evidences a facility and enterprise worthy of all recognition in a day when so many who would fain be composers abstain from efforts to produce works of a high order because writing is not immediately profitable, or who desire from some other equally prosaic motive to avoid the struggle which is part of every artist's training and experience.

Signor Schira is said to have been nominated Mr. Bunn's musical director for the coming season at Drury Lane.

Rumor mentions operas by Mr. Balfe and by Mr. Benedict as works which probably may be performed. We believe that the former gentleman has long had in his hands a libretto by Mr. Bunn, identical in subject with that of Signor Verdi's "Rigoletto"-founded on M. Victor Hugo's tragedy, "Le Roi s'amuse."

- At the recent inauguration of the statue of William the Conqueror at Falaise, his native place, the music was wholly composed for the occasion by M. Auber.

The death of Dr. Mainzer recently took place at Manchester. As a man, he was amiable, intelligent, and engaging-with those touches of the picturesque in his composition and of warmth in his temperament which persuade many whom it would be no easy matter to convince, and which are essential to the immediate success of a popular orator. Dr. Mainzer's published compositions are few and unimportant.

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Beche, Director General of the British Geological Survey, on the benefits of Industrial Education. The day following, Dr. Lyon Playfair, the Professor of Chemistry of the institution, delivered a very able lecture on the national importance of studying and promoting Abstract Science as a means of giving a healthy progress to industry. The next day, Mr. Edward Forbes, who is the Professor of Natural History, delivered another lecture on the importance of the study of Natural History in the various branches. of Industrial Art, particularly instancing the importance of paleontological knowledge in leading to a correct knowledge of the coal-measure strata. The courses of lectures under Professors Playfair, Forbes, and Hunt have begun; those by early in January. The whole enterprise is one of Professors Ramsay, Smyth, and Percy are to begin great promise.

A new edition of Mr. Watt's splendid illustrations of the Geometrical Mosaics of the Middle Ages. The artists of Paris are engaged in subscribing for a monument to M. Daguerre.

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An interesting paper was recently read before the London Statistical Society, on the duration of life among the clergy. The facts showed a very favorable duration of life among the clergy. The clergy of rural districts have an advantage of more than two years over those of cities and towns, and the married of more than five years over the unmarried. The duration of life among the clergy in the last three centuries appears to have been remarkably steady, with signs of recent improvement, The last table of the series contrasted the average age at death of popes, archbishops, and bishops of the Established Church and Romish saints. The popes, being appointed very late in life, attained the greatest mean age, exceedabout a year-the latter surviving the Romish saints ing that of the English archbishops and bishops by by about two years. This abbreviation of life in the case of the saints of the Romish calendar, may probably be attributed in part to celibacy, in part to the ascetic practices to which some of them were addicted.

- Sydney Smith discourses thus on puns:-" They are, I believe, what I have denominated them--the wit of words. They are exactly the same to words which wit is to ideas, and consist in the sudden discovery of relations in language. A pun, to be perfect in its kind, should contain two distinct meanings; the one common and obvious, the other more remote; and in the notice which the mind takes of the relation between these two sets of words, and in the surprise which that relation excites, the pleasure of a pun consists. Miss Hamilton, in a book on education, mentions the case of a boy so very neglectful that he could never be brought to read the word patriarchs; but whenever he met

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