Though naturally not of a very strong, fairly believe that no event of his life ever and certainly not of a very robust constitution, he lived, notwithstanding years of laborious exertion and times of almost incessant toil, to see the fruit of his labours; to witness, beside his own personal success, that development of the sciences, and that exaltation of the character of the surgical prefession, for which he had striven. Without trespassing much on a subject that has often been selected as a butt for sarcasm, we may perhaps venture to say that the length of his life was in part the result of his own care. Seeing so clearly as he did how much mental exertion depends on a comfortable physical condition of the body, he considered that carelessness in regard of his health was worse than a waste of time. In his early days he once allowed a too intense application to render him for a while unfit for his duties, but he never, we believe, repeated the mistake. As far as was in his power he so kept his body, that in his old age he was able to enjoy the honours that came upon him.

We have already mentioned, that in 1834 he received the highest political mark that can be bestowed on the medical profession. Had there been other higher ones he would undoubtedly have had them, and as undoubtedly would not have cared much for them. He told his students more than once that they were to seek not political but scientific rank. "Our profession," said he, "is not a political one.' And the words which have been chosen by Mr. Hawkins in which to give a facsimile of Sir Benjamin's handwriting, do not merely express a sentiment put in to grace an introductory lecture; like everything else that Brodie said, they simply spoke his real feelings. In telling the students what they were to look forward to, he was talking of his own desires. Looking back on his own life, he could not but recognize its great success in the wealth, professional reputation, and social rank he had attained to. One thing only was lacking to him-some external token that science as well as the world acknowledged his labours, and was proud of his worth.

His cup might be said to be full when on the 30th of November, 1858, he was elected President of the Royal Society. We may

gave him such pleasure as this. The Royal Society, the nurse of English science, though at times it has suffered from the influence of cliques, has had the good fortune never to degenerate into an Academy. This may partly be attributed to the fact that its fellowship is not restricted to cultivators of pure science, but that intellectual prowess is leavened with the leaven of high social station and of distinguished practical ability. In their President the Fellows have often wisely sought not so much rare success in one branch of science as a catholic appreciation of all kinds of knowledge. In no one could such a quality have been found to a more eminent degree than in Sir Benjamin Brodie. For three years he adorned that office as he had adorned his profession; and it was with the greatest regret that the Council, in November, 1861, unwillingly accepted his unwilling but forced resignation. An affection of the eyes, which even the skill of a Bowman was unable to arrest, was beginning to render him unfit for all active duties. The same cause compelled him to resign the Presidency of the General Medical Council, where his wisdom and experience had been of especial use. The life that had been so rich in works was beginning to fail. His general health, however, continued so far good that he was able to be in London during the winter of 1861-2, and to attend and speak at a meeting of the Royal Medical and Chirurgical Society, when an address of condolence to the Queen on the death of the lamented Prince Consort was voted; a fit subject for his last public speech.

At the end of April he returned to Broome Park, and after a few days was seized with fever. Very soon a malignant affection of the right shoulder began to show itself. He gradually got worse, and on the 21st of October, 1862, he died. His death was such as might have been expected from his life. He, the greater part of whose days had been spent "in the midst of the valley of the shadow of death," who had ever been most earnest in the search for truth, was not likely to have been heedless of the things behind the veil, or to have been unready himself to pass beyond it.

MISS BRADDON.

abated. They are recommended, moreover, as good stimulants in these days of toil and

Conclusion of an Article in the North British worry, and as well fitted for relieving over

Review.

HAVING now passed in review the long roll of Miss Braddon's personages, what port can we make, what judgment must we pronounce? Have we discovered among them one who thoroughly amuses or interests us; one whom we might be tempted to take as a model, or compelled to admire as the impersonation of anything noble in demeanour and lovable in mind? Is there a single page in her writings from which we have derived any gratification or learned anything new? Have we found her to be a creator of new types, a copyist of living personages, or a creator of unnatural montrosities?

taxed brains by diverting our thoughts from the absorbing occupations of daily life.

Others, again, take different ground. Acre-cording to them the "sensation tale" is no novelty. They boldly avow that all great novels are as sensational as those of Miss Braddon. If called upon they would cite as examples some of the best works of Scott, and a few of the works of Bulwer Lytton, and George Eliot. The Heart of Midlothian and Eugene Aram, Adam Bede and The Mill on the Floss, are unquestionably novels wherein there are incidents as highly coloured as in Lady Audley's Secret or Henry Dunbar. The difference, however, is far greater than the resemblance. These works are truthful taken as wholes, and even the startling occurrences are not at variance with experience and probability. According to Miss Braddon, crime' is not an accident, but it is the business of life. She would lead us to conclude that the chief end of man is to commit a murder, and his highest merit to escape punishment; that women are born to attempt to commit murders, and to succeed in committing bigamy. If she teaches us anything new, it is that we should sympathize with murderers and reverence detectives. Her principles appear to us to resemble very strikingly those by which the Thugs used to regulate their lives.

Applying to her productions the test which we named at the outset, we find that she excels where to excel is no merit, failing utterly in those respects wherein to fail means mediocrity. Of pathos and humour, happy touches and telling sayings, words which depict while they explain, thoughts at once original and impressive, we can discover no traces in her pages. What is conspicuous above all things is the skill with which she groups her materials, and the manner in which she deals with revolting topics, so as to hinder the startled reader from tossing her volume away in sheer disgust. She can tell a story so as to make us curious about the end. Does the power of doing this alone stamp her as a great novelist?

The charge is a hard one; but of its justice we are firmly convinced. The extracts we have given suffice to prove that it is deserved. Let her personages cease to be potential or actual criminals, and they will stand forth as lay figures distinguishable for nothing except the shape of their noses and the colour of their eyes and hair. They excite our interest only so long as they are blameworthy. Her good people are insufferably stupid. Sir Michael Audley, John Mellish,

Sydney Smith would have replied, Assuredly it does. When reviewing Mr. Lister's undeservedly forgotten novel, Granby, he wrote these words: "The main question as to a novel is, Did it amuse? Were you surprised at dinner coming so soon? did you mistake eleven for ten and twelve for eleven? Were you too late to dress? and did you sit up beyond the usual hour? If George Gilbert, Francis Tredethlyn suffer a novel produces these effects it is good; if it does not, story, language, love, scandal itself, cannot save it. It is only meant to please; and it must do that or in does nothing."

Now, the reviewers who have lauded Miss Braddon's novels, apply to them only the test employed by Sydney Smith. They tell us that the plots will hardly bear criticism, that the tone is unhealthy, that the views of life are false and mischievous; but they recommend them to us notwithstanding, merely on the ground that each can be read from the first to the last page without our attention ever flagging, or our interest being

for the sins of others, and seem to suffer deservedly. We can hardly sympathize with fools when their own folly is the cause of their misfortunes. Miss Braddon renders all those who are not wicked so utterly ridicu-lous, that we are tempted to infer she designed to show how mistaken a thing is probity or goodness.

Tested, then, by a purely literary standard, these works must be designated as the least valuable among works of fiction. They glitter on the surface, but the substance is base metal. Hence it is that the impartial critic is compelled, as it were, to unite with the moralist in regarding them as mis

chievous in their tendency, and as one of the abominations of the age. Into uncontaminated minds they will instil false views of human conduct. Such notions are more easily imposed on the unwary than eradicated from the minds which have cherished them. Miss Braddon makes one of her personages tell another that life is a very different thing in reality than in three-volume novels. She has manifested this in her own works. But the fact of this difference is a conclusive proof of their inferiority. A novel is a picture of life, and as such ought to be faithful. The fault of these novels is that they contain pictures of daily life, wherein there are scenes so grossly untrue to nature, that we can hardly pardon the authoress if she drew them in ignorance, and cannot condemn her too strongly if, knowing their falseness, she introduced them for the sake of effect. The Archbishop of York did not overstate the case when, speaking as a moralist, he said at the Huddersfield Church Institute, in November last, that "sensational stories were tales which aimed at this effect simply of exciting in the mind some deep feeling of overwrought interest by the means of some terrible passion or crime. The want to persuade people that in almost every one of the well-ordered houses of their neighbours there was a skeleton shut up in some cupboard; that their comfortable and easy-looking neighbour had in his breast a secret story which he was always going about trying to conceal; that there was something about a real will registered in Doctors' Commons, and a false will that at some proper moment should tumble out of some broken bureau, and bring about the dénoûment which the anthor wished to achieve." Though the foregoing remarks have a general application, yet they apply with crushing force to the present case. It need only be added, as advice to those who either possess or delight to buy such books, that the proper shelf on which to place them is that whereon stands The Newgate Calendar.

We should act unfairly if we left on our readers' minds the impression that we do not regard Miss Braddon as an authoress of originality and merit. In her own branch of literature, we hold that she is without a living rival. The notoriety she has acquired is her due reward for having woven tales which are as fascinating to ill-regulated minds as police reports and divorce cases. Her achievements may not command our respect; but they are very notable, and almost unexampled. Others before her have written stories of blood and lust, of atrocious crimes and hardened criminals, and these

have excited the interest of a very wide cir cle of readers. But the class that welcomed them was the lowest in the social scale, as as well as in mental capacity. To Miss Braddon belongs the credit of having penned similar stories in easy and correct English, and published them in three volumes in place of issuing them in penny numbers. She may boast, without fear of contradiction, of having temporarily succeeded in making the literature of the kitchen the favourite reading of the drawing-room.

From the Examiner, 30 Sept. THE FENIAN FLEAS.

IN "Nicholas Nickleby," Smike and another represent a general rebellion on a country stage. In the present performance of the Plot Discovered, or Erin Preserved," the absurdity is reversed, and it is not the duality but the plurality of the rebels that makes the affair so ludicrous. They are so very many and so very little, or, as the Americans would say, "cruel small." Government lays hold of traitors of the size of fleas, but their name, forsooth, is legion. And it is their boast that, as there is as good fish in the sea as ever came out of it, so there is a fine stock of Fenians left, not withstanding the captures made. And this may be true, for fools, knaves, and dupes always abound.

The idea of this conspiracy was derived from the exhibition of the Industrious Fleas. Those fleas marched like soldiers, fired guns, and performed various evolutions in admirable order. Why should not Irishmen do as much and as well, or even surpass the fleas, upset a mighty Government, and establish a republic under a green flag? So the fleas industriously commenced drilling, organizing, and conspiring. They appointed Captains of hundreds, Colonels, Generals, and what not in that line; and so bold did they feel, so confident of their own strength in disciplined numbers and the coming armada from America, for which a bright look-out is kept, that they made no secret. of their great designs, and thought indeed to strike terror by boisterously proclaiming their treason. Could they realize that unanimity of fleas which Curran thought must be irresistible? And hard to deal with, in one sense, it must be confessed are the fleas, for catching them is not a very nice or dignified business, nor much advanc

ing total suppression. Government gets hold of what it wants, but what is it? A flea, a traitorous flea, a flea of the worst intentions, a flea that would overthrow the throne, a flea that would set up a republic, a flea that would unfurl that green flag appropriate to the sovereignty of the greenest of people.

From the Examiner.

is now, and ever shall be, irresponsible government without end. Philosophers might laugh and sceptics mock, and the valets de chambre of papal and imperial royalty might shrug their shoulders as they dressed and undressed its limbs and saw it quake and totter when the blinds were drawn. But to the public the spectacle was ever reproduced with imposing effect as before, and though the wise grew weary, for a great and varied multitude there was continuity in the spell; and that, too, was something.

BREAK DOWN OF ABSOLUTISM. POLITICAL and ecclesiastical absolutism is cutting but an indifferent figure just now. Right Divine, when it had little else to say for itself, used to boast of its peculiar claim to consistency, its councils being held with It vexes us to see treason reduced so low closed doors, and the motions of its will being that the law cannot stoop to deal with it undisturbed by outward interference. If it without some compromise of its dignity. Is seemed sometimes to err, at least it might there no artificial way of raising the affair, always demand the respect due to tenacity and giving it some show of consequence, of purpose and to unchangeability of aim. fictitious though it may be? Bulwer Lyt- Its resolution once taken, popular importuton tell us of a Hidalgo of mighty pride nity and protest broke in idle foam at its and small means, who used to wear magni- feet, and though it might pay dearly now fying glasses when he dined off a bunch of and then for its exalted obstinacy, there was cherries, to the end that he might seem to something imposing to vulgar ears in the be eating fruit as big as pumpkins. By solemn iteration of non possumus, whether similar process could the fleas be magnified uttered at Vienna or the Vatican; as to the size of elephants? No, their number though men heard the voice of a mysterious forbids, and fleas will be fleas, Fenians fate declaring As it was in the beginning, Fenians, no matter what is done to make more of them. But there is one expedient by which may be escaped the humiliation of confessing that the treason grappled with has not mounted above the condition of a. lawyer's clerk, and has its general level in the degree of shop-boys. It is to give the prisoners their rank in the Fenian Army in posse. There is a Colonel now in custody who was in a Union Poor-house last winter. By all means give him his Fenian rank to sink other circumstances. There are Generals, too, no doubt, whose capture would sound well but for the mention that one is a But the spell is broken; the orchestra no tailor, another a costermonger, another a longer plays in tune; the scenes don't fit; muffin-man, and so on. We are told, too, and a painful dissipation of delusion is caused that there is a Field-Marshal, nothing less, by the apologetic announcement in commonwho escaped from the Widow Cormack's place accents that the oft-repeated piece has, cabbage garden (when rebellion succumbed through unavoidable circumstances, been to a sergeant's guard of policemen) dis- discontinued, and that the public must be guised as a lady's maid. Let him have his satisfied with something different instead. baton. Why indeed grudge anything that Even Apostolic Vicars and Kaisers in this can elevate this egregious nonsense? As- degenerate age find themselves in want of sume their honours if they have them not. money; and when they do, they are forced, Perhaps there is a President of the coming like other people, to put their finest first Irish Republic in some mean calling, and principles of government into their pocketwould it not dignify the prosecution to books, and try what they can get for them set forth his high pretensions in the indiet-upon mortgage. In their hearts they doubtment? The thing is now insufferably low less never mean to part with them for good. and mean, and something must be done to give it, if not the reality, at least the show of some elevation. But alas! we fear it is impossible. "Fleas are not lobsters, d-n their eyes," swore Sir Joseph Bankes, according to the witty Peter Pindar; and fleas never will be anything but fleas or Fenians, nor is it possible to make decent traitors of such poor stuff.

The ultimate right to fall back upon them and to repudiate the temporary bargain as usurious is silently reserved. But in the meantime necessity has no law; so the Pope and the Emperor allow it to be quietly understood that they are open to an offer from the surviving relatives of those they shot and hanged the other day for presuming to parley with them.

truth was said to be a lie, and the people FENIANISM ITS DANGER AND
suffered. Whenever on-lookers from afar
ventured mildly to intimate their doubts of
the absolute wisdom of Absolute Power,
courtly politicians were sure to tell us that
high reasons of state rendered the denial of
popular claims necessary, and that in the
end it would be seen how sagacious and pro-
found was the imperial policy. Every
specious show of liberal concession made
from time to time by the Austrian Govern-
ment was extolled as a new proof of the
gradual spread of constitutionalism, and of
the superior merit of reform proceeding

THERE is one point about this Fenian movement upon which English opinion is, we think, at least partially in error.