subject of the work, Dr. Granville so admirably combined the utile with the dulce in that volume, that few readers could be indifferent to its attractions, regarded either as a book of instruction or amuse

ment.

In the volumes now before us, containing the Midland and Southern Spas, with the principal sea-bathing places, the author has completed his laborious task in the most satisfactory manner, whether we regard the clearness and comprehensiveness of the details, or the lively and entertaining sketches of places and persons with which they are accompanied. There has been so much that was empirical in the employment of mineral waters as a means of cure, that a proper inquiry into their efficacy was very much required. This Dr. Granville has undertaken, and his experience of their effects, and personal observation of them at home. and abroad, were advantages which no other member of his profession enjoyed to the same extent. He is not satisfied with noting their results on others. He adds a minute examination of their operation on himself, and in every case produces the most careful chemical analysis that can be procured. In the course of his travels in England, he has had the good fortune to discover one or two springs of peculiar character, the curative influence of which he mentions in the highest terms; and he describes so fully the qualities of wells and wateringplaces that ever had any repute, that it is impossible for a patient requiring such a remedy to be at a loss which to select.

Beginning his present volumes with a seasonable dissertation on seabathing, the author proceeds to describe the features of a wateringplace near Liverpool, now rising into repute under the title of New Brighton. Crosby Waterloo next obtains his attention; and afterwards the better known Buxton and Matlock. The Monkswell chalybeate, the Woodhall Spa, the Willoughby new baths, and the Tenbury water are then brought under review, which in their turn make way for Leamington, Malvern, Stratford-on-Avon, and Cheltenham-all of which are contained in the Midland division.

The Southern commences with Gloucester Spa, proceeds to Clifton hot-wells, thence to Bath, and after a sufficient examination of this once fashionable city, the author describes Melksham Spa, Somerset sea-bathing places, Nottington and Radipole Spas, and Bournemouth. Then come the sea-bathing places,-the Isle of Wight, Brighton, Hastings, Dover, and Tunbridge Wells, with several others, boasting either of mineral springs, or accommodations for bathing in the sea.

We are not aware of any medical tour, like this of Dr. Granville's, written for the express purpose of making known the various resources this country possesses in mineral waters; yet no work could be more wanted; and we cannot too highly commend the spirit which has influenced the author throughout his arduous labours to make the people of England acquainted with the many boons of this invaluable nature Providence has bestowed upon them. We have only to add that the volumes are embellished with many excellent wood engravings by Orrin Smith and at the present season, when a large portion of society make their annual migration to the sea-side and to the mineral springs, it is impossible to imagine a work likely to be more welcome.

TOM BOWLING.*

THE well-known query of the love-sick Juliet as to the significancy of names, every day receives an answer completely opposite to her sentiments on the subject. Look where we will, in all the affairs of life, but in literature more than in anything, the name is "the all in all." That you may as well hang a dog as give him a bad name, is not more true than that you may as well burn your MS. as not to publish it with a good one. In that department of letters which has been distinguished by the name of "polite," or in words more easily understood, that branch of publication which has most pretensions to be con sidered popular, the prominent object of which is amusement, this is a law every prudent author is sure to respect. In novels a promising title-page has helped many a lame dog of this genus over a style, which would without such assistance have been insurmountable; but nothing appears to be in such high favour in this attractive nomenclature, as a name having already possession of the public mind, connected with a fair proportion of pleasing associations. Under this impression it is that those who stand sponsors for these works send them forth to gain the suffrages of the world.

There are few sources that have been so fruitful to them as our favourite songs and ballads-one by the way, which although already largely drawn upon, seems exhaustless. A novelist at a loss for a subject has only to obtain that lilliputian corpus poetarum "a penny warbler," to find in its pages the germs of a whole circulating library. Where can be found a finer example of a military hero, than that immortal lady-killer,

"The captain bold of Halifax who lived in country quarters."

As for his hapless inamorata, so familiar to the lovers of the pathetic, as "The Unfortunate Miss Bailey," there is at least three volumes of the deepest interest in the poet's development of her history. Perhaps some objections might be made by the fastidious to the unsophisticated nature of her exit, but though not exactly orthodox, we think it ought to be retained. The catastrophe would lose half its eminently tragic character divested of it, and we are of opinion that the gallant gay deceiver might have taken" to drinking Ratafie" with a perfect oblivion of his crime, had not this homely but effective way of meeting the king of terrors been adopted by his interesting victim. But if it be requisite that the hero should be in the other service, there is the admirable story of “Jack Oakum," requiring scarcely anything but the proper beating To be sure, Jack is in a more humble way of business than he of Halifax, but in these enlightened days the lower in the scale of society is the hero, the more popular will be his adventures-Jack Shéppard to wit. Now it has been stated that to every Jack there is a Gill -merely hinting here, that very few Jacks are satisfied with less than half a gallon-we are assured, that in this matter the gods had not been forgetful of Mr. Oakum. But the poet as far as his first verse, shall speak for himself,

out.

"Jack Oakum courted a young damsel,

None but her ran in his sconce ;

She was called Squinting Nan of Wapping-"

Tom Bowling. A Tale of the Sea. By Captain Frederic Chamier. R.N. Author of "The Life of a Sailor," "The Spitfire," &c.

August.-VOL. LXII. NO. CCXLVIII.

2 P

The reason why this "heroine in humble life" was called by this peculiarity is explained by the poet in the next line with a simplicity and comprehensiveness, it is utterly impossible to have excelled,

"She was called squinting Nan of Wapping,

'Cause she seed two ways at once."

We are not aware that the principal female figuring in any work possessing pretensions to sentiment, has ever yet been distinguished by such a gift of double vision; but as a highly affecting incident related in the song, to which we beg to refer the reader, depends entirely upon it, it is absolutely essential it be retained in the novel. If more tragic materials are wanted, where can we meet them in such abundance as in the affecting narrative of "Billy Taylor," in the doleful chronicle of the loves of Clutterbuck and Higginbottom, or in the supernatural terrors that surround the memory of Giles Scroggins and Molly Brown? Then for a tale of nautical perils, what subject affords such scope as "the Bay of Biscay O!" Quieter materials might be gathered from "the Old Commodore," and the most touching sentiment pervades the story of "Tom Starboard." There is no necessity, however, of confining our attention to sea-subjects. A good Scottish novel, of the excruciating pathetic cast, might be easily made from the text of "Auld Robin Gray." "Nora Creina" would make a most delightful ultra-romantic Irish heroine, and if an English subject should be thought most desirable, we cannot recommend a hero more likely to become a general favourite than he who so touchingly was wont to sing his own sorrows, in the familiar phrase

"All round my hat I wears a green willow."

These observations have been drawn from us by the title of Captain Chamier's very pleasant novel at the head of this notice, and we do not despair of their doing the state some service, in the shape of similar attractive works. We are of opinion that not to blind horses exclusively is a hint as good as a wink; the latter having been long esteemed as the most comprehensive of telegraphic communications. With this exceedingly pertinent introduction then, we beg leave to play the gentleman usher to "Tom Bowling," merely reminding the literary coteries that though they may already have some acquaintance with this "darling of our crew," through his prolific parent, the late Mr. Dibdin, his adopted father has done so much for him, forwarding his advancement so handsomely (absolutely from before the mast to no less a dignity than that of an admiral) insuring his happiness by the affection and possession of "a black-eyed Susan" of first-rate nautical manufacture, securing his safety through all sorts of treachery, the most dreadful storms, the most frightful shipwrecks--"perils in the imminent deadly breach"-slaughter, fever, duels, the hottest engagements, and amid the worst dangers of fire and flood, whilst on land or afloat, placing around him personages of such infinite variety of character that it was utterly impossible for any one so constituted not to obtain from them either profit or amusement, and conferring on him so many other signal advantages, that before his, Mr. Dibdin's claim as to "the making of him," shrinks into absolute nothingness. As no sufficient idea of these stories of personal adventure can be obtained from any other source than a perusal, we cannot do better than recommend this plan to our readers, premising that if they are in the humour to be

pleased, not even the launch of "the Trafalgar" could have afforded them greater satisfaction than they may obtain from witnessing the career of the three-decker Captain Chamier has launched, under the popular name of "Tom Bowling."

THE GERMAN LANGUAGE.*

WE entertain a high opinion of Herr Ollendorff as a teacher of his own language, from the ability we have observed in his works, but we cannot help being sceptical as regards the short time in which proficiency in the German language is promised. We have not forgotten the six months of laborious plodding we passed in endeavouring to master the difficulties of German, and when we had become tolerably satisfied with the advances we had made, we addressed a communication in his native tongue to a German scholar, who in a few minutes most satisfactorily convinced us that what we had written might as readily pass for Arabic as German, for it was quite as like one as the other. Much has been advanced in favour of the comparative ease with which this language may be studied, but except in those extraordinary instances where there exists a wonderful facility in the acquisition of languages, we are of opinion that few exist so difficult for a foreigner to get thoroughly familiar with as the one to which we have alluded. Here, as in all other cases of the same kind, a residence of the scholar where German alone is spoken will shorten the labour more than one half. Of the numerous systems that have been put forth to secure this acquisition, very few are entitled to the estimation with which we regard the two thick volumes Professor Ollendorff has lately published, of which, the last is now under our consideration. He seems to grapple with the many difficulties of his subject, and places it before the student in a gradual but certain progression, so that with ordinary application, a satisfactory degree of knowledge of German may readily be obtained. This we regard as a great boon, for it opens to the reader an intellectual store capable of greatly enriching his ideas, and increasing his field of observation. We only caution him against expecting to become a proficient without going through a course of hard study.

In the words of Ollendorff," he must, until he is completely master of the mechanism of the German language, exercise himself in conjugating by degrees: 1. the auxuliary verbs; 2. the active verbs; 3. the passive verbs: 4. the neuter verbs; 5. the reflective verbs; 6. the impersonal verbs; 7. the compound verbs, referable and unreferable; 8. the verbs that take the verb seyn, to be, for auxiliary; and 9. all the irregular verbs. Once master of the mechanism of conjugations, the learner need no longer conjugate each particular tense, but only the four principal tenses, viz., the present, the imperfect, the perfect, or the pluperfect, and one of the futures. He may then commence to read some of the German authors, still however without discontinuing the study of the method. The Course of Literature at the end of this volume, containing a selection of pieces, arranged according to their respective difficulties, may then be resorted to."

A New Method of learning to Read, Write, and Speak a Language in Six Months, adapted to the German for the Use of Schools and Private Teachers. Part Second. By H. G. Ollendorff, Professor of the German Language and Literature.

JAMES HATFIELD.*

THAT part of England known to the lovers of the picturesque as "the lake country" has exercised a most important influence over modern English literature. It was from that quarter that "the scholastic" in poetry received a shock from which it is to be hoped it will never recover, and all the familiar machinery of that pseudo-classic style which our verse writers borrowed so largely from the French, forced to make way for images drawn directly from the exhaustless sources of nature. For the first time, since about the close of the sixteenth century, there appeared evidences of poetical genius declining all artificial assistance, and obtaining a knowledge of the classical and romantic by a careful observation of the true, the good, the beautiful, as they exist in the world we inhabit. The imagination instead of dealing as had been customary with the most palpable fictions, held acquaintance with facts alone, and a tide of genuine thought and feeling came welling forth into the intellectual treasury of the country, which at last obtained such a volume as had only been excelled in the days of Shakspeare, Spenser, and Milton. The channels through which this invaluable change was first introduced, were minds of the highest poetical character-Wordsworth and Coleridge. They had resided in the vicinity of scenes possessed of all the finer features of sublimity and beauty, in which the thoughts could dwell at ease on the simple loveliness of pastoral life, as it exists in the valley, or soar with facility to the wildest regions of the ideal, to be found in the more imposing attributes of mountain, lake, and wood. The only error into which the first of these truly great men fell, was in the occasional use of matters of fact too familiar to be available for poetical purposes. It was this feature in his early ballads that was for a long time the source of so much ridicule. Lord Byron was one of the foremost in the attack made upon the lake poets upon this point, yet it is no less singular than true that all the sterling qualities of his lordship's poetry were derived from the same natural influence so strongly prominent in the productions of those he decried. In his case, no less than in that of Shelley, the poetical impressions partook largely of the characteristics of the writer, but the sensual earnestness of the one, or the romantic adoration of the other, cannot disguise from the attentive observer that all which is genuine in their reflections is homogeneous with the best examples of the lake school. We should not have entered upon this subject here were it not that the celebrated individuals we have mentioned as the reformers of our modern poetry figure in these volumes in connexion with the singular story developed in their pages, in a manner that cannot but give the work the highest interest. There are few, we should think, who do not wish to be better acquainted than they are with the intellectual society of Keswick, that circle in which Wordsworth, Coleridge, Southey, and many other of our profoundest thinkers were the leading spirits; and although our friend" the Opium Eater" may be said in some measure to have drawn the curtain from before this distinguished coterie, he has only shown sufficient to make us eager for a closer acquaintance. In the pages of James Hatfield there is a laudable endeavour to satisfy public curiosity on this point, and we have no doubt that it will be generally considered a great recommendation. But

* James Hatfield and the Beauty of Buttermere: a story of Real Life. S vols.