nating protagonista, is this.--A private soldier, van Pool (an odd name for a Pole, by the way,) was in love with the wife, or the mistress, of his colonel, who is made known to us only under the chilling designation of L. d. D.; Van Pool deserted, stole the infant daughter of the Colonel, Rozalka, and earned his bread as a rope-dancer, to which profession he brought up Rozalka as his own child. At length, having made his fortune, he has retired avowedly to live upon his means, but in fact, to pursue the more lucrative and less laborious professions of police-spy, robber, and procurer to a powerful and odious Russian, high in office at Warsaw, and called Herr von N.; and the whole romance of the story turns upon Rozalka's persecution by illicit lovers,her endeavours to rouse one of them, whom she intends to love, Prince Jozef Lunowski, to patriotic enterprize in the conspiracy, of which she knows, because her supposed father belongs to it-the dangers and infamy to which that supposed father exposes her-her finding her real father under horrid circumstances, &c. &c., until the catastrophe is brought about by the explosion of the insurrection. These adventures are for the most part vividly painted, although too little connected and explained for our methodical taste. And now, without saying more of the story, the interest of which we should be sorry to spoil for such of our readers as are German scholars, we will give as much analysis and extract as so small a publication is entitled to.

The book is divided, according to a recent German fashion, not into chapters, but into nameless portions, marked 1, 2, 3, &c., each of which generally comprises a scene or an adventure. It opens with the attempt of a noble Pole, whom we took for a youthful hero, but who afterwards proves to be L. d. D., the papa, to re-enter Poland. His name is inscribed, it appears, in a list of suspected persons; and upou presenting his passport, he is detained in a sort of free confinement at the frontier town, till his arrival can be reported to Warsaw, and the GrandDuke Constantine's orders received concerning him. These orders are to send him a prisoner to Warsaw. Whereupon L. d. D. effects his escape, in the carriage and company of the Duchess of G., the Polish widow of a French Marshal, who passes through at the critical instant, and he forces his warder, a Saxon non-commissioned officer in Russian employ, to fly with him.

No. 5. transports us to Dresden, where we are introduced into what is called a Polish Lodge, in other words, a confederacy of Polish exiles under masonic forms; a branch, or affiliated society, we imagine, of the National Freemasonry of Lukazinski. The assembled members learn that an emissary, sent with despatches to their brethren, or superiors rather, in Poland, had been unable to pass the frontier, and it is proposed as the only means of correspondence, to receive into their fraternity the notorious spy Przebracki. Objections are urged on account of Przebracki's known perfidious character; but they are overruled. He is introduced, takes the necessary oaths, rejects the pecuniary reward offered him, undertakes for the delivery of the papers with which he is intrusted to the Warsaw chief of the confederacy, and sets forth, privately regretting that he had been obliged to refuse the money, in order to inspire confidence.

Would not the reader, but for the hint we have given him of our hero's character, have been convinced that the spy meditated the sale of his new to his old employers? We were, and foully did we wrong the patriot. In No. 6, he safely delivers his despatches to Count C., one of the chiefs of that conspiracy, who indulges in a sneer at the masonic proceedings of his Dresden friends, saying whatever happens at Warsaw will happen more suddenly than they imagine; and of this important Count C., we hear no more after he has dismissed our hero, who, having faithfully acquitted himself of his task, goes in search of news. We shall take, as our specimen, his scene with some worthy colleagues, which has, we think, considerable originality, besides being both very characteristic of this "Picture of the times," and a happy illustration, if not of the actual Russian government of Poland, yet of the sort of subaltern tyranny and oppression, which foreign masters can hardly do otherwise than suffer.

Przebracki meets with the Jew Baruch, a brother spy, in company with a captain of horse in his regimentals; and after a few reciprocal taunts upon their profession, in the course of which our hero avows having seen the seeming officer acting in the capacity of groom, he accompanies the worthy pair to the cellar of another Jew, to drink lipc', a beverage of whose intoxicating virtues we entertain no doubt, though we have not the felicity of being acquainted with it even by

name.

As they enter the cellar, Baruch carelessly asks Isn't he here yet?' and is answered in the negative by the landlord.

The question is observed by Przebracki, who apprehends some snare for himself. But no harm ensues, and the trio drink and game together in perfect good fellowship, till the door again opens to admit a tall man in a blue great coat, and a French page; the former being no other than the Saxon police agent, who had fled with his prisoner L. d. D. Przebracki notices a stolen glance of intelligence between Baruch and the Saxon, who, without noticing our party, complains of being heated, and calls for drink, which the page in broken German declines to share. Baruch's attention is apparently caught by this evidence of the youth's being a foreigner: he addresses him; and the stranger tells that he is page to the Duchess of G., had been sent to France upon family affairs, and on reaching Warsaw, whither the Duchess had come during his absence, had at the post house met this, his fellow servant, who undertook to lead him to their lady's hotel.

"But the good man is a German,' he added, laughing, ' and Germans, I am told, are always thirsty; so I was fain to follow him hither by the way, to gulp down some draughts of this sweet decoction, which, however, I cannot regret, since it has procured me the acquaintance of noble Poles,' he concluded with French politeness."

Baruch and the captain now engage the youth in discourse upon Parisian pleasures, whilst the Saxon drinks, till the page declares he can wait no longer. The Saxon thereupon drains his last glass, and they are going;

"When the captain, who had been anxiously seeking something, spoke to

the landlord; the latter placed himself before the door, and civilly requesting a moment's delay, said, You will excuse me, gentlemen, and not ascribe it to mistrust, if, for the credit of my honest name and house, I am forced to request you would afford the captain, who is known to me as a noble and wealthy gentleman, satisfactory proof that you have not, by mistake, taken his snuff box.'

"All started at these words, and Baruch seemed especially offended.

"Przebracki smiled slily, for he now smelt a plot, and watched what was to follow.

"Why hesitate, gentlemen?' exclaimed the captain. Empty your pockets, shew me their linings to convince me. You are strangers to me, and my box is of great value.'

All empty their pockets accordingly, the French page producing amongst other things a red letter-case. The table is heaped with a mountain of miscellaneous articles, amongst which the captain's wellringed fingers vainly seek his box. Every one then resumes his property, and the page and Saxon depart, grumbling at such treatment. "When they were fairly gone, the captain began in a low voice-Hast got it?'

66 6

666

The box?' asked Baruch.

That is here,' said the landlord, taking it from the stove. "Nonsense--the letter case,' said the captain.

"That I have,' said Baruch, producing the page's red letter case.

"What is that?' asked Przebracki, in seeming surprise. The Frenchman took his letter case away with him.'

"Well acted stupidity,' sneered Baruch.”

Think you this is an ordinary scene of thieving, gentle reader? On the contrary, the actors are the sworn foes of thieves, although Przebracki insinuates that the captain has been a sharper, robber, and murderer. The Russian authorities, suspecting a political secret in the page's mission to France, had ordered the police to get possession of his despatches, and this is the way the order is executed. But the business does not end here--Przebracki purloins the letter case from Baruch, and privately carries it at midnight to the octogenarian Count S—, no member of the national Freemasonry, but an active conspirator against the Russians. The Count treats the police spy, his born vassal, confidentially, and dismisses him with instructions to forge substitute letters that may satisfy the Russians. The spy persuades his friends that his sole object in the theft was to steal their reward and credit. The Count delivers the true letters to the Duchess, and whilst he is still with her, the deluded Russian official, Herr von N., brings her the forgeries, which he tells her the police have just recovered from the thieves who had plundered her page.

We have run to greater length than we had intended, and must end abruptly. We think, however, we have given sample sufficient to recommend our patriotic rogue.

No. XX.

FRANCE.

At Paris literature is said to be rendering itself independent of political changes, and to be resuming something of its former activity. Indeed we see the latter must have taken place from the flood of novels and memoirs that has lately deluged us, and it is but fair to conclude that when writers are so animated and so busy, readers are not asleep over their productions. The title of Victor Hugo's new drama has at length reached the expectant ear of the public, and Le Roi s'amuse is now in rehearsal. This young and fertile writer has also in preparation a new volume of poems and two new novels. The title of the first novel is Quinquengrogne, and the author has received 15,000 francs for it from the booksellers Gosselin and Renduel. But what is the meaning of this strange word Quinquengrogne? The author himself explains it in a letter to his publishers:-"La Quinquengrogne is the vulgar name of one of the towers of Bourbon L'Archambault. This novel is intended as the completion of my views on the arts of the middle ages, of which NotreDame de Paris gave the first part. Notre-Dame de Paris is the cathedral, or ecclesiastical architecture; Quinquengrogne is the Donjon, or military architecture, which succeeded it. In Notre-Dame it was my more particular object to depict the priestly middle age; in Quinquengrogne I have attempted the same for the feudal middle age; the whole, be it well understood, according to my own ideas, which, whether good or bad, are my own." Le Fils de la Bossue will appear afterwards.

The numerous

M. de Salvandy is now busy on a History of Cromwell. memoirs and documents, says our Parisian informant, which have appeared in England within these few years on the English Republic and the Protectorate will not be neglected by the new historian, but the light in which he exhibits his hero and the times will form the chief interest of the work.

M. de Balzac announces, as nearly terminated, two new volumes, entitled Scenes de la Vie Militaire, which are, in fact, intended as a tale of the grand army. The idea is good, and we hope the author will henceforward abandon tales of obscenity and impiety.

"The English Story Teller" has found an imitator at Paris, and the bookseller, who has undertaken the speculation, announces the names of Janin, Balzac, Chasles, Rabon, Mme, de Baur and Lady Morgan as among the Conteurs who will figure in his pages. This new Decameron will be entitled Salmagundi.

A new work, under the title of Souvenirs de Paris et de Vienne, will shortly appear, containing a complete history of the Duke of Reichstadt, founded on authentic documents.

M. Arnault, of the Académie Française, has announced his Mémoires as shortly forthcoming; they are said to be rich in anecdote.

A translation into French of the whole works of Goethe is announced for publication. The first part will appear in October.

M. de Blainville has been elected Professor of Comparative Anatomy at the Museum of Natural History, in the room of Cuvier, whose place as Perpetual Secretary to the Academy of Sciences has also been filled up by the election of M. Dulong by a great majority.

We mentioned in our last that it is proposed to erect a monument, by public subscription of all who honour genius and talent, to the memory of Cuvier, in his native town of Montbeliard. Subscriptions, it is now announced, are received by eminent bankers in the principal cities of Europe, and by the publishers of this Review, at No. 30, Soho Square. A detailed prospectus will shortly be circulated.

M. de Humboldt has just addressed a letter from Berlin to the Academy of Sciences at Paris, communicating some interesting intelligence respecting his friend and fellow-traveller M. Bompland, who, it appears, was at Buenos Ayres in May last, and preparing to return, as soon as possible, to France. He was then in expectation of immediately receiving his collection of objects in natural history found in Paraguay and the Portuguese Settlements, all of which he intended to forward to the Museum of Natural History at Paris; and to these he meant to add his general herbal, and the geological results of his travels. While at Buenos Ayres he had made many excursions to Monte Video, Maldonado, and Cabo-Santa-Maria. His botanical collections will include two new species of convolvolus, the roots of which possess all the medicinal qualities of salep. He hopes also that the School of Medicine will make some experiments on the roots of three very bitter species of bark from a plant belonging to the family of the Simaroubées, and which have been employed with the happiest results in cases of dysentery and gastric derange

ments.

GERMANY.

A complete edition of Spindler's Novels and Tales is announced for publication at Stuttgardt. At the same time the publishers promise a new novel by the same author.

A Collection of the Earlier Latin Poets, in one volume, 8vo. is announced by Brönner of Frankfurt.

Much new light is said to have been thrown on the character and private life of Wallenstein by a little volume recently published, entitled Wallenstein's Privatleben: Vorlesungen in Museum zu München gehalten, von Prof. Julius Max Schottky.

ITALY.

Maffei, the translator of many of Schiller's Tragedies into Italian, has recently performed the same office for the Messiah of Klopstock, and, from the specimens we have seen, we should pronounce the translator to have succeeded in no common degree.