produced. The formula was laid down long since by a master hand, a man of vigorous imagination, great powers of observation, and an unrivalled facility and energy of expression. It is of little consequence to his fame whether Scott invented the historic novel : if he did not, he certainly performed for that class of writing what Shakespeare did for the historic drama: he gave it life and force; he informed it with a spirit that was the result of learning impregnated with genius. He also resembled the founders of our great drama, in impressing upon the literature of his century his formula and method. As with the dramatist so it is with the historical novelists, each work seems to be a fainter production, and, like the worn impression of an engraving, to grow so dim at last as not to retain any of the light and shade, force and effect of its original.

Mr. James is almost the last of his race, at all events the last who has any attraction for the public, and when he ceases (which probably will only be with life), the direct impetus given to literature by Scott will have effected its last vibration. We were, however, about to account for Mr. James's facility of production, and to do so were compelled to introduce the source from whence he drew his method. Nothing can be more close than his imitation of his great progenitor in his mechanism, but in style how different! The same admixture of high and low characters, the same resort to scenes of mixed ranks; the same use of history, and the same elongated and elaborated description and adventurous changes of fortune and events. But with all this, unfortunately nothing new is to be found in the initation; nothing even varied in principle: in fact no new store of observation is opened of human character or physical circumstances. Different names are given to the same persons and things, though there may be a little bungling and shifting of characteristics. A swaggerer may be made courageous, a Rashleigh may be made sentimental, or a Rob Roy even prudent; but such incongruous novelties only add to the artificiality of the fiction, and prove the poverty of the imitator's invention. The patterns have been given by the great originator, and are copied to the minutest particulars of phraseology. The best criticism of an imitation is to be found in the parodies of the wits, and admirably have they been given in a contemporary periodical which bears the name of a great parodist with the pencil. In such parodies pages of criticism are condensed, and the falsity of the mechanism fully displayed.

It may and has been said, and in particular reference to the author we treat of, that quantity is a sign of genius. But if this were the case, there are or have been authors of "the famed Minerva press quite equal in this point to Mr. James. In fact quantity ceases to be astonishing, when it is considered that the whole of the world and mankind are daily and hourly generating trifling varieties. If the whole of the proceedings of the English civil war could by any miracle be all circumstantially narrated, they would make many thousands, perhaps many millions of historical novels. If, as with the novelist, every

house is to be described first externally and then internally :-" There stood upon the slope of a gentle hill, in a picturesque part of England, an old brick mansion," &c. &c. "In the well-sanded parlour of a small but neat inn," &c. If, we say, all these particulars are to be described, and not only residences and localities, but dresses, viands, peculiarities, family history and connexions, with all the necessary and unnecessary conversation accompanying every event and action, together with an unbounded license of historical and moral dissertation, it seems rather to be surprising that anything like a complex story can be evolved within the moderate compass of "three volumes small octavo," than that it should be poured through countless histories. In truth, the historical novel has been a wonderful invention to the professional author, the bookseller, and the learned, who have thus been provided with a mechanical substitute for imagination and genius, that has turned us into a nation of readers and writers.

In the present novel, the outlines of character are more dim than usual. Arrah Neil, the heroine we suppose, as she gives name to the work, is the most passive of heroines. Her introduction to the reader is equivocal enough, and the mystery is kept up till late in the third volume. It is said "her garb appeared, to be that of poverty;" and in the same sentence we are told "she was bare-headed, bare-legged, and bare-footed," an appearance certainly of poverty. The usual quantum of disguised noblemen, swaggering cavaliers, talkative landladies, canting roundheads, appear and disappear through the three volumes. In one particular the author has swerved from the usual mode, and his characters, with a little of the puritanical cant excepted, speak good drawing-room English of the present year of our Lord. The tone, as it may be termed, of the fiction has no tinge of age in it; and no where is this so lamentably perceptible as in the small pieces of verse purporting to be the outpourings of gallant cavaliers. Modern sentimentalism of the worst kind is here predominant, and how Mr. James could perpetrate them, if he has ever read the real effusions of the period of the time, as exemplified in the poems of Carew, Suckling, Lovelace, and Waller, we are at a loss to understand. In avoiding what certainly has become a wearisome nuisance-the canting repetition of a few hackneyed phrases of the period-Mr. James has gone to the opposite extreme.

It will naturally be said, that as Mr. James is enabled to get his books purchased and published, there must be some quality in them; and this is not to be denied: and that power we think consists in a certain moderation of style that never offends, and a capacity of reflecting that very inane but very uninteresting portion of society, whose passions have been rubbed down or completely obliterated by education and the habits of the class they belong to. With such, strong emotion and high passion are mere boisterous vulgarities, and therefore they have no sympathy with them. A very slight event, and a comparatively trifling excitement, are sufficient to interest; and thus, like the phlegmatic Dutch

man, when floating down his "lazy Scheldt," any occurrence in so slow a voyage is sufficient to interest his attention. There is undoubtedly a movement in the stories of the class of novels we are describing, but very much of the same kind as that enjoyed by the Dutch voyageur. It is on this principle alone we can account for such works gaining readers. We are bound to add though, that, if there is nothing stirring or suggestive in Mr. James's works, they are innocent and harmless reading, and their interest for numerous readers is proved by their large circulation.

Githa of the FOREST. A Romance. By the Author of “Lord Dacre, of Gillsland," &c. 3 vols. post 8vo. London: E. Churton.

THIS novel is not so entirely on the Scott principle as Arrah Neil, having a considerable intermixture of the Radcliffe style. Picturesque but fanciful descriptions, escapes, plots, and secret caverns and subterranean passages, form more the staple commodity, following the vague imaginings of the "Mysteries of Udolpho" rather than the Dutch minutiae of the Waverley school. The authoress (for it is said to be a lady, and the execution seems to verify the assertion) has however so far complied with the demand of the age as to be tolerably correct as to her dates and costumes; and has that superficial correctness which arises from referring to a good chronology and the numerous delineations of Saxon costumes and utensils. The manners and sentiments are the usual mixture of those of the nineteenth century, inlaid here and there with a characteristic gathered from the chroniclers. Of the development of human character in its half barbaric state, we find no signs whatever. Of the strange and powerful condition of the human being in a phase of society admitting of the almost unlimited indulgence of the impulses and the will, there is no manifestation. If there were we should hail it as a genuine fiction, and its revealment would be a valuable addition to the knowledge of ourselves. It is true there is a sufficiency of brutal violence and sanguinary outrage, such as is attributed to all savages; but of that extraordinary mixture of motive and conduct to be found in man in such a state, in which side-by-side must have been ranged the most apparently contradictory qualities, there is no trace; and consequently we have no character painting that is any way serviceable. On the contrary, the characters are cut to pattern, acting sentimentally in accordance with some beau-ideal of the authoress.

Notwithstanding that we find it wanting, with most of its fellows, in the genuine requisites of such a composition, yet it must be said that it has more of the circulating library interest than many others. There is a vehemence almost amounting to vigour in some of its scenes and dialogues. The story, though full of improbabilities, is sufficiently clearly defined to create some interest, arising from the personal events being made to predominate over the historical. On closing such books one cannot but wonder that minds desirous of excitement should not

turn to the pages of real history, and especially to some of the modern historians who, like Thierry in his "Narratives of the Merovingian Era," have given to the stern and powerful reality all the light and shade of fiction, and who have, as said heretofore, raised up a romantic vision in accordance with facts. From the perusal of such works the mind rises refreshed and invigorated, conscious that it has derived knowledge of the most valuable kind; not of mere facts, but of human nature and human conduct.

THE LIFE OF LORENZO DE MEDICI, called the Magnificent. By WILLIAM ROSCOE. With a Memoir of the Author. New Edition, 12mo. London: * D. Bogue.

THIS is the first issue of a series of reprints, to be called the European Library. It surpasses in cheapness any yet issued, and the size and mode of printing are tasteful and convenient. Mr. Roscoe, notwithstanding the advances made in many departments of literature, is still unrivalled as the historian of Italian literature, and his "Life of Lorenzo" has justly become a standard work. The present edition has been judiciously superintended by Mr. Wm. Hazlitt, whose labours of this kind we have had frequent occasion to notice, as performed with judgment and taste. In the present instance he has rendered the work still more popular by translating the Latin, Italian, and French notes, removing a mass of cumbrous matter thought to be illustrative by its too partial author, giving occasionally notes from new sources, and a well-condensed Memoir. It is only necessary for those cultivating this class of literature to see the book, to purchase it: though we cannot but fear that it is given at a price that can repay no one connected with it, and that it will produce a destructive competition with works bearing a deservedly high price for copyright.

LECTURES, addressed chiefly to the Working Classes. By W. J. Fox. Volume II. London: C. Fox.

We have already expressed our admiration of the first volume of these Lectures, and, so far from finding reason to alter our opinion, we find new reasons for maintaining it. The subjects of the present series are equally interesting, and the mode of treatment equally powerful. They differ from most lectures by the simplicity and copiousness of their style and details. They are the outpourings of a mind filled with all kinds of knowledge, well digested by the intellectual process to which it has been for years submitted. They have none of the flimsiness of orations got up for the occasion; and no doubt their eloquent utterer proceeds from his usual occupations to his rostrum, without anything like preparation. The details of modern politics, literature, and even of science, seem as familiar as his glove to him, and he imparts it with a corresponding grace and ease. The working classes, therefore, are greatly indebted to him for his noble conversation, for it is more

like that than the common preaching of lectures, and there is not a cultivated gentleman in the land but might derive instruction and delight from either his information or his reflections, however much some might dissent from his political principles.

His moral courage is admirable; for it is not only that he maintains his principles fearlessly, but he has that rarer kind of boldness which advocates the supremacy of those whom the long-continued attacks of their opponents, aided by the universal caprice of mankind, have at last succeeded in degrading in the public estimation. His defence of Paine, and also of Godwin, are admirable instances of his advocacy of men whose talents have been underrated, and the memory of whose exertions, in a time when it was dangerous to be just, have been allowed too much to fall towards oblivion.

We were about to particularise, as peculiarly excellent, some certain of the Lectures, but on again turning through them we cannot do so. Whether treating of living poets or dead politicians, he is equally instructive and entertaining.

Every man sympathising with the improvement of the condition of the multitude will rejoice in this book, and is bound, as he would prove himself genuine in his philanthropy, to aid its dissemination. It must scatter seeds of thought wide and far, which will produce the most beneficial results to all classes of the community.

THE VOICES OF THE CHURCH, in reply to Dr. F. Strauss, Author of "Das Leben Jesu;" comprising Essays in Defence of Christianity, by Divines of various Communions. Collected and composed by the Rev. J. R. BEARD, D.D. &c. 8vo. Nutt.

THIS work consists of eight essays, the product of different divines, French, German, and English, in reply to Dr. Strauss's tenets, as promulgated by himself and his followers. The subject itself is of great importance, and these essays are worthy of it, being the productions of the most learned and able theologians. It is impossible, with our narrow space, to enter into anything like a review of such a profound subject, and such subtle and learned treatises; all that can be done is to direct attention to the publication, as affording the best, if not the only means of gaining a knowledge of the controversy now raging in the German states; a controversy likely to be most important in its results, by either modifying the tenets of the reformed religion, or even the Christian faith itself. Since the works of Paine, there has been no work which so openly as Strauss's has attacked the received notions regarding Christianity. But whilst Strauss is immeasurably superior to Paine in point of philosophical argument and profundity of reasoning, he has the advantage of being a churchman and a priest, who only opens a new interpretation of Revelation. He declares himself a sincere and zealous believer in Christianity, and asserts that "he conceives as an idea what the people believe as a history." It was in 1835 that Strauss put forth his "Life of Jesus," which caused him to be