'The Progress of Discovery on the more Northern Coast of America,' is the new volume of the Edinburgh Cabinet Library, and, like all the preceding, compiled with great care; the historical and critical part by Mr. Patrick Frazer Tytler, the author of the History of Scotland'; and the natural history by James Wilson. is a capital volume for all who desire to have a well-compiled history of this interesting subject; but for ourselves, we are rather too familiar with the works of the travellers, to feel much interest even in this excellent abridgment.

It

When o'er the warrior's couch we bend and sigh,
Where glory's tenement is spread to die,
Mark life's red fever quiver in its shrine,
And view the bright eye shroud its beam divine.

"He closed his eyes and died," is the meaning of these four lines, we suppose.

'The Literary Rambler; a Monthly Magazine of Literature, Science, and Art; Nos. 1, 2, and 3; Glasgow.'-A cheap publication, with here and there a clever paper, and now and then a print: we have old cathedrals, and ladies' dresses, and popular music: there is much to amuse in the extracts, and to mislead in the criticisms.

Narrative of the Conversion (by the instrumentality of two ladies) of James Cook, the murderer of Mr. Paas. By Mrs. Lachlan.'-We could have forgiven these poor fanatical "ladies," one of whom describes the foul murderer as "the brightest child of God I ever saw. He looks on death with a smile. His exceeding holiness in word, look, and manner, exceed any thing I ever beheld in man." We could have forgiven this -and the handkerchief and the other numberless offences-but when we saw them presumptuously disputing with the authorized minister of the church, to whom the spiritual welfare of the wretched man was entrusted-and heard their mouth-piece, Mrs. Lachlan, defend this obtrusive vanity, because neither the established nor the dissenting clergy do their duty, and read her trading dedication (for which the Stamp Office ought to charge as an advertisement) to Dr. Holloway," the conscientious preceptor of a

select number of young gentlemen, Gordon House, Kentish Town," was indeed beyond our endurance, and we threw the book into the fire.

'Knowledge for the People; or, the Plain Why and Because, by John Timbs,' is a little work we have often before commended. The present volume treats of Botany, Mineralogy, Geology, and Meteorology.

'Our Neighbourhood: or, Letters on Horticulture and Natural Phenomena, interspersed with Opinions on Domestic and Moral Economy.'-This is an American book, and one well worthy of a perusal; it is written with the hope of exciting a love for what is beautiful and useful; and the author has chosen to convey his instruction in the form of letters, which he considers with some reason more suitable for the subject than a more formal kind of composition.

ORIGINAL PAPERS

THE SYLVAN BROOK.

BY MRS. FLETCHER.

(Late Miss Jewsbury.)

WHENCE Comest thou, O Sylvan Brook?
And whither flows thy lisping wave?
From yonder mountain's heathery nook;
And many a mossy bank to lave;
Small, yet embracing smaller rills,
The dancing daughter of the hills.
Nameless to me, yet not unnamed
By others, as thou leap'st along,

But sweeter far the accents framed
By thine own wild and murmuring tongue;
For Fancy on thy pebbled beach
Hears lovely legends in that speech.
Young look'st thou, as if born to-day,
Yet tell'st thou immemorial tales
Of deeds and manners passed away
From these dark hills and bloomy vales:
Yon church and yew, that old appear,
Have risen both since thou wert here.

Old peasants pass thee with a staff-
Old peasants with long silver hair;
Long since, thy waters heard their laugh,
And knew their feet, as children fair;
Yet here hath age but seeming sway,
'Tis thou art old, bright thing, not they.

The shadowing oak, whose turf-clad root
Hath been so long the angler's haunt,
And village minstrel's, with his flute
Preparing for the Sabbath-chaunt ;~
That aged oak-that patriarch-tree-
Is but a child in years, to thee.
The fields and banks that bound thy path,
They, of the ancient earth, have changed;
The landmark, and the harvest, hath,
The lord and serf, been oft estranged;-
The memory of most is gone,
Thou, as of old, art smiling on.

The sighs of grieving hearts are fled;
The hopes and vows of lovers-where?
I see the household of the dead
Lie near me, and I answer-there;
Forgotten there a thousand lives :-
The tiny rivulet survives!

Yet be it so, dear Sylvan Brook,
And flow along as heretofore;
And let each heart, as in a book,
Read in thy bosom, tales of yore;
And sing thou on, till sun and moon
Fall from the heavens,-thy own sweet tune.
Flow on, and bathe each wilding flower
That lives, and dies, and lives again;
Flow on, blessed by the vernal shower,
And morning dew, and summer rain,

A little emblem of that river
Which flows in Paradise, for ever!

SIR WALTER SCOTT.

A clever and characteristic passage in a letter written, we believe, to Mr. Heber at the time of the Roxburghe sale, by Sir Walter, has been kindly sent to us, and cannot fail to interest our readers.

"The Roxburghe sale sets my teeth on edge. But if I can trust mine eyes there are now twelve masons at work on a cottage and offices at this little farm, which I purchased last year. Item, I have planted 30 acres, and am in the act of walling a garden. Item, I have a wife and four bairns crying as our old song has it,

Crowdy ever mair. So, on the whole, my teeth must get off the edge as those of the fox with the grapes in the fable. If I could get a priced catalogue, with purchasers' names, I should hold it a great curiosity."

"Abbotsford by Melrose, 3 May, 1812,"

The following is also interesting. It was ad dressed to Mr. Burn, bookseller, of King Street. The work alluded to was published anonymously, but the letter establishes the certainty of its having been edited by Sir Walter.

"Dear Sir, I have had my time little at command, or I would have earlier replied to your letter of the 7th current. The republication of Franck's Northern Memoirs was superintended by me, in a very superficial manner, to oblige a young friend, Mr. George Huntley Gordon, presently a clerk in the Treasury.

"You are most welcome to the use of the notes, if you desire it; but I am obliged to be so often before the public, that I feel a strong desire to remain anonymous where I have bestowed no pains, and produced no effect; I would not therefore wish my name mentioned.

"I am sorry I cannot give you any light on Franck's history, excepting the superficial hints in the edition. His brain appears to have been a little disturbed with metaphysical refinement, a disease of his period. If any particulars of Franck are to be traced at this day, I have had sufficient experience to know, that the inquiry cannot be in better hands than

JOHN CLARE, THE POET. WE stated some time ago, from authority which we thought decisive, that Lord Milton had bestowed on John Clare for life and rentfree, a snug cottage, and garden and orchard; and as we knew that the poet had some skill in flowers and fruit-trees, we thought the present a generous and suitable one. We are sorry both for the Noble Lord and the humble poet to find we were misinformed. The editor of the Alfred, with better information than ours, says that Clare, indeed, "rents a cottage from his Lordship, but has had no reason to believe that his rent will be remitted;" and adds, what we are sorry to hear, that his poems yielded him no profit, and that fifteen pounds a year is all that he has to maintain a wife and six children on. His health too, we have reason to know, will not allow him to undertake any heavy work. All this, and more, the poet has confirmed by issuing proposals to publish a volume of what he calls "Cottage Poems," by subscription. These are his words, and they are to us most touching ones:

The proposals for publishing these fugitives, being addressed to friends, no further apology is necessary than the statement of facts. The truth is, that difficulty

has grown up like a tree of the forest, and being no longer able to conceal it, I meet it in the best way possible, by attempting to publish these for my own benefit, and that of a large family.

It were false delicacy to make an idle parade of independence in my situation; and it would be unmanly to make a troublesome appeal to persons, public or private, like a public petitioner.

Friends neither expect this from me, or wish me to do it to others, though it is partly owing to such advice, that I have been induced to come forward with these proposals and if they are successful they will render me a benefit, and if not, they will not cancel any obligations that I may have received from friends, public and private, to whom my best wishes are due: and having said thus much in furtherance of my intentions, I will conclude by explaining them.

The book will be printed on fine paper, and published as soon as a sufficient number of subscribers are procured, to defray the expenses of publishing.

The price will not exceed seven shillings and sixpence, and it may not be so much, as the number of pages and the expense of the book, will be regulated by the publisher.

It

We are sure that our readers will sympathize in the sad condition to which the poet is reduced; and we are sure too that Lord Milton, who is as generous as he is rich, will be gentle in the matter of rent with his brother man. must not-nay, it shall not be forgotten-that certain men of this earth pushed the poor uneducated youth, whether he would or not, before the world, quoted his verses, got Gifford to review them, kindly called him the Northamptonshire Poet, and held him up as a person of great genius-in short, an English Burns, though he justified their notice by writing better poetry than what they had formed their judgment upon. No sooner did they see that he was not quite the wonder they had imagined, than they shrunk from his side, and left him on the barren eminence to which they had raised him, to wither in the sun and wind, like a plant plucked up by the roots. We hope such success from these proposals as will remedy this.

OUR WEEKLY GOSSIP ON LITERATURE
AND ART.

THE spirit which the death of Sir Walter Scott has universally awakened, does honour to the country-all men seem anxious to do honour to his memory by some public testimonials: and we are pleased to see that the gentry of the vale of Selkirk have already voted a monument; that the noblemen and gentlemen of Edinburgh, influenced by the eloquence of the young Buccleuch, Jeffrey, and Wilson, have opened a subscription for the like purpose; and we know at this moment, that London is organizing a committee for a similar object: we wish them all success. We hear, that, by his will, the great poet has desired his son-in-law, Mr.Lockhart, to write his life: the admirable life of Burns, from the of the Editor of the Quarterly, no pen doubt influenced his choice, which we think under all circumstances a wise one.

We

have no doubt that many lives will, ere long, be written of that illustrious person; but we can have full faith in none, save that which comes from an official source.

In art there is but little doing, though the chief painters are fully employed. We lately stated that His Majesty had given orders to fulfil his late brother's intentions respecting a collection of the busts of the illustrious men of the land, for the gallery at Windsor. This was contradicted in some of the newspapers; nevertheless the newspapers were wrong: some of the busts are now in preparation, and we have no reason to doubt that the whole will be completed in the course of time. The head of King William III., of the Duke of Marlborough, and others, are in progress. We hear nothing more of the Reform columns of solid granite, nor of the importation of the

HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY.

THE requisite repairs having been completed, which caused a suspension of this Society's popular meetings, the members met for the first time again on Tuesday week, but in consequence of the deserted state of the town, the attendance was not very numerous. A paper

was read on the cultivation of the striped Housainee melon, one of the Persian varieties now principally consisted of dahlias, some of which in such high repute. The flowers exhibited, were exceedingly fine. We especially remarked signated Livick's Incomparable, which was disa variety brought by Mr. Young, of Epsom, detinguished from the rest of its tribe, by having a distinct spot of white at the apex of each of its crimson petals. Five sorts of salvia, a species of erigeron, and the beautiful erica Bowieana, of flowers from the Society's garden. A curious were included in the miscellaneous collection specimen of the cucurbita clavata, or trumpet Marquis of Salisbury-when first received, its gourd, was exhibited from the garden of the length was 3 feet 8 inches, and its circumference 11 inches, and it forms when cooked, an excellent vegetable marrow. The peaches and pears were of the best description, the variety dante d'Automne, was much admired for the among the latter known by the name of Fonrichness of its qualities. The collections of grapes, apples, &c. were also very good.

Major Gen. Monckton was elected a Fellow of the Society.

GREAT ANNUAL MEETING OF THE SOCIETY OF GERMAN NATURALISTS.

Vienna, 23rd September.

THE first public sitting took place on Tuesday last, in the great theatre of the University; an additional degree of éclat was given to it by the presence of Prince Metternich, Marshal Marmont, M. de Montbel, Lord Kerry, and other friends and patrons of science. The most distinguished English naturalist is Mr. Bentham. Between six and seven hundred members of the Society and visitors assisted at the meeting. After an address from Baron von Jacquin, the president for the present year, and the reading of the statutes of the society by Prof. Littrow, M. Burdach of Königsberg read a memoir on the pulsation and throbbing of the heart, Prof. Wawruch, of this university, gave a detailed account of such traces of the cholera as are

preserved in the Old Testament, and Prof. Göppert, of Breslau, descanted on the origin and maintenance of warmth in living plants. -When the meeting broke up, the members resolved themselves into five sections for the purpose of electing their respective chairmen and secretaries, and settling the proceedings for their subsequent meetings. The imperial library and every other public collection in the town have been thrown open for the use of the members.-On Saturday, Prince Metternich received us at a soirée, when he, as well as the Princess, did the honours with great affability. To-day, about 300 of us were conveyed in 38 eilwagens (diligences) to Baden, (a watering-place with sulphur baths, about twelve miles from hence,) where the town gave a handsome dinner, the Arch-Duke Antony paying half the expense. We went to pay our respects, in a body, to the Arch-Duke Charles, and also to the Arch-Duke Antony, who received us very courteously and graciously. To-morrow, the

Emperor gives us a grand dinner in the Palace of Laxenburg, about ten miles from town, on which occasion the eilwagens are again to be provided gratis. On Thursday, M. de Mittrowsky, the Minister of Public Instruction, gives us a grand dinner in town. The Meetings are to close on Friday.

FINE ARTS

THIS is the season of fruits in nature, but of flowers in art: our table is heaped with nosegays and with garlands; with sweet buds and blooms from our own gardens and groves, and with wreaths and posies from other lands: some are all odour, and others all blossom; some are gaudy and garish, others simple and elegant; and on looking a little more closely, we are sorry to say, that not a few are artificial. We shall examine them as they lie, and speak conscientiously of their merits.

success.

THE AMULET.

The editor has given us his usual number of engravings, and selected them with his usual Some are beautiful, nor is there an indifferent one among the dozen. The Gentle Student,' by Newton, is lovely and natural; 'The Duchess of Richmond,' by Lawrence, is very elegant; 'The Evening Star,' from the same pencil, is an attractive thing; 'The Young Navigators,' after Mulready, by the graver of Fox, is all truth and nature; "The Lute,' by Liverseege, is less to our liking, still we cannot censure it; The English Mother,' too, is a sweet performance; so is The Golden Age,' from the same great master; nor should the head which forms part of the title-page be overlooked, or the clever hand, that of W. Edwards, which engraved it: The Theft of the Cap,' by Wilkie, and the Young Navigators,' by Mulready, are our favourites; and Fox and Finden seem to have contended for mastery in the execution.

FRIENDSHIP'S OFFERING.

The subjects selected by Mr. Pringle are very various: we have portrait, history, domestic story, and landscape; some of them too are of high merit; The Christ entering into Jerusalem,' by Martin, only wants space, to rank with his finest performances; The Morning Walk,' is lovely; Unveiling' is, perhaps, a little affected, still it is beautiful; The Female Pirates,' is a joyous affair; 'The Miniature,' is much to our liking, for it has nature, though less lovely than we could wish; 'The Highland Huntsman,' too, may find friends among those who are partial to the tartan; though we wish. he would look to the work in hand; he is too much in attitude. The landscapes, by Parson, are very well; but Turner and Stanfield eclipse every other artist, in the splendour of light and shade.

THE KEEPSAKE.

Both the literature and the art of the Keepsake are of high pretensions: the first is generally written by lords and ladies of high degree; and the other is supposed to be inspired by such polite company, and to have an air of nobility about it. We must say, however, that these advantages appear to be imaginary we have, it is true, some very splendid performances of the pencil; but there are others of an inferior character, and which can only perform the part of foils; and, in truth, we are afraid there is even a charm in this, for the dulness of one, may make another look more beautiful and bright. The Bridemaid,' by Parris, is lovely, with a touch too much of the picturesque; Caius Marius among the ruins of Carthage,' by Martin, is too magnificent a scene, for the scale on which it is engraved; Verrex,' a landscape by Stanfield, almost equals the Fall of the Rhine,' by Turner; but it is inferior to

his Ehrenbrietstein,' which is a magnificent | work, and well engraved by Wallis. 'Mrs. Mailsetter and her two companions, peeping into the post-office letters,' in the Antiquary,' by Richter, is laughable and clever; the Juliet,' by Liverseege, is a touching and lovely thing; but the one most to our liking, for its nature and easy elegance, is 'Rosina,' a lady reading, by Boxall. We could select some others which merit notice, but these are the best; the Flora Mac-Ivor' of Miss Sharpe, is much too tall, and has nothing Highland in her air.

THE PICTURESQUE ANNUAL.

Here are twenty-six scenes from the pencil of Stanfield; we could pick out six of them, well worth double the money which buys the volume to which they belong. Our chief favourites are, 1, 'Frankfort,' 2, St. Goar,' 3, Bingen,' 4, Andernach,' 5, Coblentz from Ehrenbrietstein,' 6, Ehrenbrietstein' itself. There are, however, a round dozen more, of nearly equal merit; nay, on looking over them again, we see some which we may fairly rank with the six elect, both in airiness and splendour. The gravers of Wallis and Brandard have been busy among these fine landscapes.

THE NEW YEAR'S GIFT.

Mrs. Watts has fine taste in arts and literature; in both she addresses herself to the matter in hand; the engravings of her New Year's Gift are all good, and some of them are excellent. They are nine in number, and the subjects embodied are chiefly of a domestic nature. 1, The Sisters,' by Johannot, has a French look, but full of nature and beauty; 2, 'The Mother of Procida,' by Colin, is easy and expressive; 3, 'The Little Mendicant,' almost reconciles us to some of the better things of Westall, and reminds us of his earlier and better days; 4, 'The invalid Mother,' by Scheffor, is gentle and touching; 5, The French Village School,' by Decamps, recalls our own youthful days, when, all lessons done and difficult questions cleared, we burst out of doors with a shout, and shortened the way home with all manner of pranks and harmless mischief; 6, 'The Introduction of Raphael to the Duchess of Urbino,' is rather a stately affair; 7, The Novice' is very well; but looks like hers may be spared by man-" go to a nunnery, go;" 8, The Kitten's Mishap,' by Howard, is a fine performance; the boy and the old cat, are masterly delineations; 9, The Tambourine Boy,' is the frontispiece. On the whole, we have been much pleased with Mrs. Watts's collection.

The Byron Gallery.—Part III.

THIS we consider the most interesting number of this elegant work. The Witch appearing to Manfred,' by Howard, is truly poetic; there is nothing picturesque or startling; the calm and tranquil grandeur of the meeting is fine. The Boy and Girl,' from the Hours of Idleness,' by Richter, and Parisina,' by Wood, are both of high merit. We cannot, however, commend the Return of Beppo'; the lady affects too much surprise; nay, she has something of a look of horror: now Byron says, that wonder painted her cheek, and that her colour changed; he says nothing, that we remember, of spread out hands and staring eyes. In truth, she was a very cool sort of lady, and in the first moment of her husband's finding her suspicious company, she noticed the change in his complexion, and fell in love with the fine shawl round his head. She was none of your shrieking and starting dames, depend upon it.

Old and New London Bridges. William Edward Cooke has fairly earned himself a name among those who handle well both pencil and graver; and we may well call him the worthy son of a very worthy father.

There is a character of no ordinary kind in these scenes of the bridges; the picturesque effect is the least part of the merit; there is fine grouping, and many touches of character, worthy of more extended landscapes. The demolition of the Chapel Pier,' would make a capital painting.

Tombleson's Views of the Rhine. Half-a-dozen numbers of this wondrously cheap work lie before us; though there are three engravings for sixpence, we cannot say that they are indifferently executed.

THEATRICALS

[Some of our theatrical criticisms should have appeared last week, but, like all other things, they were put aside to make room for the Memoir of Sir Walter Scott.]

DRURY LANE.

A new tragedy has been produced here, called 'The House of Colberg.' Its author is Mr. Serle-known to the town as an actor of sense and ability, and as a writer of considerable talent. The plot is slight-too slight, indeed, to bear the weight of five acts upon its shoulders, notwithstanding the merits of the piece in point of composition. Mr. Macready's acting was clever and energetic, and in some instances powerful in the extreme. All others concerned did their best, and the play was, as it deserved to be, well received. There is so great a lack, at present, of sterling dramatic writing, that it is painful to us to say anything disheartening to one who, like Mr. Serle, has the courage to venture, and the ability to succeed. Still we are forced by truth to express our doubts whether 'The House of Colberg,' will prove permanently attractive. Mr. Serle ought to write for the stage, most undoubtedly; but we question whether he is wise in soaring to the topmost fight. Γνωθι σεαυτον is nowhere more wanted than among authors. Mr. Serle has too much knowledge of the stage, and too much talent, to fail altogether, let him try what he may; but we fear he has not the genius to sustain himself through a five act tragedy, with any well-grounded hope of solid good, either to himself or to the theatre. We shall be glad to find ourselves wrong, and will at any moment cheerfully acknowledge it if proved so. In the meantime, we may safely invite every one who wishes well to the drama, to subscribe his mite towards its encouragement, by paying a clever and industrious man the just compliment of going to see his play.

A new farce, in two acts, called Mr. and Mrs. Pringle,' was produced here on Tuesday last. We must, on account of the matter left over from last week, defer a detailed notice of It is attributed to Don Telesforo de Trueba. It was highly and deservedly successful, and will, we should hope, prove attractive.

it.

COVENT GARDEN.

THIS house opened on Monday week under the management of M. Laporte. Some alterations have been made in the interior arrange

ments.

The new chandelier is very splendid. The performances of the season commenced with The Merchant of Venice,' in which the young gentleman we mentioned before, made his

appearance in Shylock. He has certain requisites, and a certain aptitude for the stage, but, owing to want of experience, there is necessarily so much uncertainty mixed up with these certainties, that he must do as others have done before him, and submit to two or three years of rough-riding in the country, to form his paces and fit him for London harness. Miss Sydney made her first appearance on these boards in Nerissa, and acquitted herself to the expressed satisfaction of the audience. Miss Ellen Tree acted Portia-she was received with that hearty welcome, which her sweet face must

command from all who have the good fortune to look upon it, and she proved, by the excellence of her acting, that the welcome would still have been deserved, had nature been less bounti ful to her. The other established favourites received the customary compliments of the season" as they entered. The play was followed by a new afterpiece by Mr. Planché, which the bills, if we remember rightly, call A Military Spectacle'-they might have called it a pair of spectacles, for, in point of splendour, it equals any two we ever saw and saw through. It is founded on an incident in the early life of Marlborough; and a scene between Marshal Turenne and Young Churchill, admirably acted by Mr. Warde and Mr. Forrester, was honoured with well deserved applause. The first act ends with a ball-room scene, which is so magnificent, that the Easter piece will be troubled to beat it, and the second with a storming, which includes the best and most real-looking fighting we ever saw on the stage. The love part of the business has not been neglected-Estelle (Miss Taylor) is the daughter of a Major Marsin (Mr. Bartley). Her cousin Victor (Mr. Perkins) is in love with her, but she is in love with Churchill, the handsome Englishman; and then he, as the dramatist will have it, is in love with somebody in England-and so the poor girl disguises herself as an officer-joins the storming party-abandons all hopes but the forlorn one-and is blown up. Miss Poole played a little drummer who has been a boy about the Palace of St. James's, and who affects the manners and language of the great people he has been accustomed to see. The character is somewhat outré, but perhaps not too much so for a piece of this nature, and, whether so or not, the audience applauded its excellent representation by this clever girl, without stopping to inquire. M. Laporte enacted a serjeant with great humour and good humour; and the opening scene of the second act, in which he and the little drummer form the garrison of a mill, make a prisoner, stand an attack, and capitulate upon terms of their own dictation, was ably sustained by both of them. This piece was, as we have said, highly successful, but we should have liked this to have been left for the press to say. We had hoped better things from M. Laporte, than to have seen him fall into the old managerial vice of associating a national theatre with Quack Doctors and Blacking-makers. We take leave once more to remind the managers of Covent Garden and Drury Lane, that the only theatre which never has disgraced its bills by puffing, is the Olympic, under the management of Madame Vestris. And it is well known, that such has been her success, that she has gained almost as much money as they have lost.

A new Hamlet, and, as we understand, candidate for tragic honours generally, made his bow to a London audience on Monday last. As we were prevented from seeing him, we can only report what we have heard, but that is so favourable that it would be unjust to withhold it. We understand, then, that Mr. Butler has considerable advantages both of figure and face; that he played the first three acts of his arduous character in a manner which was admitted to be faultless, but that he was not so successful in the last two. This has been explained in some measure by a necessity under which he laboured of humouring his voice to conceal the consequences of a cold. If this be so, we may, after the warm reception which Mr. Butler met with, not unsafely pronounce him, unseen by us, a valuable acquisition to the stage.

ADELPHI THEATRE.

THIS bazaar of fun, horrors, and strong scenic effects, also re-opened for business on Monday week. The first piece was a new ro