as the profoundest thinker, and one of the ablest The discourses now Mr. REDFIELD, of this city, has reprinted in an elegant form Prof. Aytoun's celebrated work, Lays of the Scottish Cavaliers, the brilliancy and spirit of which have elicited praise from quarters not at all pleased with the political tone of the work. Its fervor and animated verse, not less than its tenderness and pathos, are remarkable among the poetic effusions of the day, and have placed the young author in the very front rank of ballad-writers. We are very glad to obtain in so elegant a form this valuable work. Layard's abridged history of the excavations at Nineveh, a work of great interest, has been handsomely reprinted by Messrs. HARPER & BROTHERs. Kitto's History of Palestine has been republished in a fine 12mo, plentifully illustrated, by GOULD & LINCOLN, of Boston. Kitto's continuation of the admirable Daily Scripture Illustrations, beginning a new series, has been reprinted by Messrs. CARTER & BROTHERS. The new series is to embrace the poetical and prophetical works of the Old Testament, the history of Christ and the Epistles of the New. They are among the best works of their class. Narratives of Sorcery and Magic, from authentic sources—a work of great interest and of historical value-by Thomas Wright, has been republished by REDFIELD. Isaac Taylor's Wesley and Methodism, which is regarded as among the greatest works of this incomparable thinker, has been reproduced by the HARPERS, The Women of Christianity exemplary for acts of Piety and Charity, by Julia Kavanagh, has been reprinted in elegant form by D. APPLETON & Co. It is a work of rare erudition, as well as sound judg ment and excellent spirit. It supplies a much needed contribution to a branch of ecclesiastical history but little cultivated. The delightful work of Miss Mitford, noticed so favorably by the British journals, and one of the most agreeable books of the season, has been republished by the Messrs. HARPER. Those who have sauntered in delighted mood through "Our Village," with this most genial and agreeable author, will know what to expect in this series of gossipy critical and personal sketches. MISCELLANEOUS ITEMS. There have been 7,350 -The following statistics of the productions of the French Printing Houses during the last ten years are interesting. works, in living and dead languages, published during 1851; and during the last ten years 64,568, making an average per year of 6,436 works. The same presses printed in 1851, 485 musical works, and in the ten years, 3,336, or an annual average of 333. There have also been published 1,014 engravings and lithographs, and during the ten years, 13,085, or an average of 1,308. maps and typograhical plans have also been published during the year; during the ten years, 1,005, or a mean of 100 a year. Thus it appears that nearly in every department of press work, the year 1851 is in advance of the average of the last ten years. The grand total of works published in France during these ten years, engravings, musical works, maps, and plans, is 81,994. 133 - The Duke of Wellington's reply to Mr. Huskisson, "There is no mistake," has become familiar in the mouths of both those who remember the political circumstances that gave rise to it, and those who have received it traditionally, without inquiring into the origin of it. This was not the first occasion on which the Duke used those celebrated words. The Duke, (then Earl of Wellington,) in a private letter to Lord Bathurst, dated Flores de Avila, 24th July, 181, writes in the following easy style: "I hope that you will be pleased with our battle, of which the dispatch contains as accurate an account as I can give you. There is no mistake, everything went on as it ought; and there never was an army so beaten in so short a time." - Letters from Stockholm announce the death, at seventy-two years of age, of Baron d'Olinson, the learned Orientalist, an Honorary Member of the Royal Academy of Sciences and Honorary President of the Royal Society of Belles Lettres in that capital. The works by which M. d'Olinson was best known are, that "On the Tribes of the Caucasus," which he published at Paris, and in the French tongue, in 1828, under the pseudonym of Abdul Cassim;-and his "History of Mongolia from Jenghis Khan to Timour," written also in French, and published at the Hague in 1835. A monument has been erected in the church where, but whose names are well known to the musical public everywhere. The Prigioni d'Edim-yard of South Leith church, Scotland, to the memory burgo is the most famous of his operas, among which Rolla, Estella, and Griselda are not unknown. - The Literary Gazette thus notices the arrival and mission of our countrymen, Dr. Robinson:"Professor Robinson is now at Berlin, and expects to be at Beyrout on the 1st of March. He intends to occupy most of his time in visiting the more remote districts of the country, and those villages off the usual routes, which are least known to travellers. Towards the completion of the topography and geography of Palestine, we may expect many new facts to be thus obtained. One of the American missionaries in Syria, the Rev. Eli Smith, and Mr. William Dickson, of Edinburgh, are to join Professor Robinson at Beyrout, and accompany him in the journey. The identification of the site of the Holy Sepulchre, about which there has been much dispute lately, is one object to which special attention will be given. Dr. Robinson was in London, on his route to the continent, and attended the meetings of the Geographical and other societies. We wish that the learned Professor could ascertain the genuineness of the Sinaitic inscriptions, of which, in reviewing Forster's 'One Primeval Language,' we gave an account. Dr. Robinson has expressed great doubts on the subject, but if at all practicable during his journey, he would do good service both to science and religion by either verifying or disproving the conjectures raised by the hitherto imperfect examination of these remains." -It is stated in the last English journals that the Emperor of Russia is not opposed to Lieut. Pim's proposed overland expedition in search of Sir John Franklin, upon any grounds of political feeling toward Great Britain. Lieut. Pim has had an audience of the Czar, who desired him to reduce his proposition to writing. There is no difficulty about the transit across Siberia, but it is thought impracticable to penetrate the countries of the Tchutski and Esquimaux. -The Parisian painter Chavenard has already completed twenty of the fifty great pictures, illustrative of the progress and development of the race, which he was commissioned by Ledru Rollin, when Secretary of the Interior, to paint for the Pantheon. They are fifteen by eleven feet, and are highly praised. of Robert Gilfillan. The pillar bears a profile of the poet, with national and masonic ornaments, he having been at his death grand bard of the Scottish lodges. The inscription bears the date of his birth, 4th July, 1798; of his death, 4th Dec., 1850; and that the monument is erected in testimony" of his worth as a man, and his genius as a writer of Scottish song." THE WESTMINSTER REVIEW.-Our present number contains an article from the January number of the Westminster Review on American Literature, which, having been copyrighted by its author, we are enabled to copy by permission of the publisher in London. Its friendly and candid tone, as well as the intimate knowledge of the literary men and labors of this country it displays, will strike our readers as a pleasant novelty in English journalism, and as an agreeable presage of the leaning of this highly influential Review under its new auspices. It may not be known that with the January number, this work went into new hands-the proprietorship vesting in Mr. John Chapman, long known as an extensive importer and republisher of American works, and a man of letters as well as of business; and the editorial care being intrusted to the competent hands of John Stuart Mill, the celebrated writer on Logic, and for many years one of the principal contributors to the pages of this Review. With the brilliant and fearless staff of writers which the editor relies upon, and the liberal views and purposes of the present publisher, there is reason to expect some decided advance in the literary ability and influence of the Westminster, and perhaps the opening of a new era in the annals of journalism. The Review has become a great social and political power, and none appreciate more truly, or know how to wield more successfully, the influence which the emanations of genius and learning gathered in the Review exert, than those who have now the charge of the Westminster. That a genial tone is to be observed ou subjects relating to America, is evident; and that an enlargement of scope and purpose is also to be aimed at, is not less so. We expect to derive much benefit from its pages in future numbers of our magazine, and feel assured that those who, desiring more of its contents than it will be practicable for us to extract, shall subscribe for it, will find it a suggestive and attractive work, finely ac cordant with the best spirit of the age, and replete with the highest results of scientific and literary culture. The January number of this Review has not yet appeared in America; the publication of two copyright articles in its pages having prevented Messrs. Scott & Co. from issuing it, unless in a mutilated form. Friendly negotiations, we understand, are now pending between those gentlemen and Mr. Jay, of this city, the legal counsel of Mr. Chapman, which will result either in the issue by Mr. Chap man of an English edition for the States, or an arrangement with Messrs. Scott for the continuance of their reprints, on terms beneficial to both parties, and simultaneously with the London copy. We do not know how far our readers may share the feeling, but we confess to an occasional sense of irritation at that necessity which we seem to be under, in these latter times, of perpetually naming and referring to some five or six dead men, the acknowledged glories of the literature of the past. Shakspeare, Milton, Dante, Burns, Goethe-shall we never be able to pass an agreeable intellectual evening without calling one or another of these names to our aid, never be able to indite a paper of thirty pages without requiring the printer to put one or another of these names more than once into type? Are subjects for thought and talk so scarce round about us that we must for ever weave our best conversations out of the matter of these suggestive memories; or are we such timid sailors on the great sea of innumerable things as not to know how to quit the neighborhood of these familiar bays and shores? The evil, if it be such, daily increases. Not only do we never have done with naming and alluding to those well-remembered few; but we shall never have done, it would appear, with The Works of John Milton. A New Edition. London, Pickering, 1851. VOL. XXV. NO. IV. writing and reading express commentations on their lives and works. Perpetually, on opening a new number of a Review, we find a new essay on Goethe or on Byron; perpetually, on glancing at a new sheet of advertisements, we see announced some new volume of literary portraits, done by a cisatlantic or a transatlantic pen. Is this but a passing phase of our literary activity, a fashion recommended by the example of one or two eminent contemporary writers that one could name, and destined to run its course and cease? We do not know; we only note the fact, and confess again that the observation of it sometimes tempts us to the wish that there could be a decree of society forbidding, for some time, all reference to Shakspeare and his companions, and compelling us, both in our conversation and in our authorship, back to that miscellaneous world of substances, passions, and events, whence Shakspeare himself, the greatest niggard known of allusions to preceding writers, drew the materials for a not deficient literature. That we do not exaggerate this view of the case, ought to be evident from the fact that, in the present paper, we deliberately perpe 28 |