He

carelessly, mingle with our useful and profitable pursuits; and hence there is never seen in the United States that condensation of thought and effort in the pursuit of gain, which is a prominent characteristic of those classes which in England are thrown upon their exertions for a livelihood, and which the crowded competition for life renders necessary to all such, whether authors, professional men or trades-people, as they are called. Nothing is given gratuitously: literature, advice and minutes are measured by money; courtesy and common civility are limited to the prospect of reward, and the chance of winning a customer from a competitor; garbage and cinders have a commercial value; national institutions only open for pay; and the Tower, St. Fauls, and Westminster Abbey are the recipi ents of shillings; "The tricks of trade" is a necessary phrase in the vocabulary, and are an essential part of the business for which every apprentice pays a premium to learn.

which dictate an opposite course among the way-farers of, not over-taxed labor; hence social relations and enjoyments, England? At the risk of laying ourselves amenable to the relaxation and a disposition to spend money perhaps too charge of defending a national weakness, we will endeavor to expose the spirit of our inquisitiveness, and to show, that when it is changed for manners better suited to his taste, we shall have lost much of our national virtue. The circumstances which we have enumerated as leading to that courtesy among us, which is wanting on the other side of the water, it will readily be perceived, have a close relation to the present subject; but, the chief source of this trait is found in, and is the proof of the want of, that general distrust with which he so hastily and erroneously charges us; and the habitual dwelling of this distrust in an Englishman's bosom, renders our inquisitiveness peculiarly annoying to him. A home-bred American citizen has not habituated himself to question, whether the man beside him in a stage coach, or at the dinner table of a steam-boat, is a haughty lordling above his communion, or a finished swindler of London graduation, interested in concealing his own movements, and dangerous to trust with ours. feels that all around him, are, like himself, plain, unpretend- As before stated, we have not been led to these remarks ing people, upon honest business; each has nothing to con- by any supposition that Mr. Dickens' opinions are imceal, and does not fear to trust his neighbor; the common portant to us. Our object has been to show that our pecusympathy which pervades our people, leads to an inter-liarities are the result of the good in our institutions; that change of information upon each other's business, home, and our republican organization is productive of social, as well as destination. This feeling and practice has greater extent political advantages; and that neither Mr. Dickens nor any as we get remote from the sea-board, and from foreign in- other foreigner is fitted-by his national education, to become fluence. We allude to the American people, and not to the rule for us. We have no disposition to quarrel with those travelled exceptions, who have learned to despise the him for his peculiar views, and we think he has been, conhonesty of home manners, and to cloak themselves in the sidering national prejudice, generous. He has discovered envelopes of imported corruption. There are yet other, food where more illiberal writers have overlooked it. It is popular relations, which sustain and nourish this inquisi- but natural that he should quarrel with our tobacco-spitting, tive propensity and render it an essential part of our na- and inquisitiveness, and that he should not like the rough tional character. Our citizens with a vast continent before roads of our new continent as well as the macadamised them, fulfil the purposes of their destiny, and do not sit ones of old England. We cheerfully take all the scolding down, generation after generation, in one place and to one for these, for his testimony in relation to the Lowell factory pursuit; we scatter from one end of the union to the other girls, and his remark, that, contrasted with his own country, and members of the same family dwell in various and dis-it would be between Good and Evil, the living light and tant points; hence when a promiscuous company is gathered together in a travelling conveyance, each one may have come from the neighborhood of some acquaintance, friend or relative of the other, and by free inquiry and communication, a very pleasant association may be forined between strangers by the bond of a distant mutual friend. We have in much travel throughout our whole country, scarcely ever failed to experience or to witness such discoveries; these impulses foreigners cannot, of course, appreciate.

Seeing then, that this trait is the result of a wide spread sympathy; is the best evidence of freedom from distrust, and of mutual confidence, and marks the absence of corruption of character sufficient to destroy this confidence, we trust that this peculiarity may long continue to call forth the ridicule of those travellers whose previous associations and education unfit them to discover the salutary principles and humanizing institutions from which it emanates.

our

deepest shadow." We should be angry with his strictures upon our congress if we did not know that his sentiments might have been copied from our own papers, and it is fully compensated for by his adinission, that among our representatives are men "striking to look at, hard to deceive, prompt to act, lions in energy, Crichtons in varied accomplishment, Indians in fire of eye and gesture, Americans in strong and generous impulse.”

As a literary production the work will not add to his fame; fortunately, it is not necessary to it. His descriptions of places, pigs, negro drivers and travelling companions are true to "Boz" if not to reality, and had the entire work been of this character it would have possessed an interest in which it is now deficient.

"AMERICAN NOTES FOR GENERAL CIRCULATION.

BY CHARLES DICKENS."

One other charge, that of devotion to money, has been The anxiously expected work of Dickens on the U. S., is brought against us, is stereotyped for insertion into every out at last, and its arrvival has created a much greater senBritish author and is conveyed by the expression, "the uni-sation, than its perusal will sustain; for in spite of its taking versal dollar;" Mr. Dickens passes it on. We should scarce title, we much doubt, whether these "Notes" will be taken allude to this but for the absurd inconsistency of such a charge emanating from an English writer. It is true, that we have no classes in our country with their wealth secured by law beyond the consequences of their extravagance, who are removed from the necessity of useful exertion, and need never talk or think of dollars in the abundance of that wealth poured into their coffers by a hard worked population to which the idea of dollars for themselves, is beyond the farthest flight of hope. It is true, that none of us are placed above a care for the means of existence, and it is equally true that those means are within the reach of healthful and

into "general circulation," after the present "run" has been supplied, and the first issue exhausted; being a very depreciated currency, as regards value, to all the other issues from the same quarter; but proving that Dickens has learnt by his trip to America, that secret of Banking, by which, waste paper is converted into good current coin; although, like many of our Bankers, he has lost credit while making cash. By this time, we suppose the work has been swallowed by the whole reading public, and to his enemies, it must have afforded the most intense gratification; for it is one of the most suicidal productions, ever deliberately

published by an author, who had the least reputation to lose. | readable, since nothing written by him is ever totally destiNot that the whole work exhibits the impress of wilful tute of interest; the very blunders and extravagances in it malignity and deliberate injustice towards a nation, from render it amusing; and, in his description of the miseries of which, both as an author and a man, he has received the a sea-voyage and in several other places, we recognize highest favors; but because, it is utterly weak, frivolous, the " Boz" of our early love, although any one, whose and inconclusive throughout, adding another to the many" soul," has ever, “sickened o'er the heaving wave," must proofs of the fact, that he who attempts to perform a task, sensibly feel, that sea-sickness is the last thing in the world for which both his frame of mind, and previous opportunities to make a jest of; and that he who can be guilty of such have rendered him unfit, can only succeed in making him- conduct, could not be serious about any thing whatever. self ridiculous, and detracting from the real merit which As it is our wish to be temperate in our strictures, we would he may possess. As a writer of a peculiar class of fictions, only say, that as soon as Dickens touches the soil of Ameand master of the comic, Boz" has had no rival; but when rica, his good humor deserts him, and he becomes as crusty after a four months' run over a country like ours, he pre- and crotchical a John Bull as possible; in comparison with sumes to pass judgment on our national character and in- whom Captain Marryatt is a courteous gentleman, and the stitutions, amazement at his audacity is only merged into pity Amazonian Trollope a paragon of meekness. One would for his folly, and the reader is irresistibly reminded of a naturally imagine that the chief objects of curiosity with an similar undertaking, which he himself has graphically de- intelligent stranger, would be, the frame-work of our Instiscribed on the part of a certain "Pickwick Club," to per- tutions, and the distinctive traits of our National and Indiform the same service for the "unexplored Parishes" of vidual character, and that to acquire a knowledge of these, England; with a similar result since the Hero of the "Notes the Traveller would frequent places of public resort, the for general circulation," is a fac simile of Mr. Pickwick in Halls of Justice, and of Legislation; and seek information every particular, but the "gaiters" and the benevolence, from conversations with intelligent and enlightened men, which that indivividual is made to possess. who could throw light upon much puzzling to a stranger; does he pursue this plan? On the contrary, the peculiar bent of his mind drives him into Jails and Work-houses, Lunatic Asylums, negro dances, and those haunts of poverty and vice, which lurk in the narrow lanes and by-ways of large cities. Thither, the author of "Oliver Twist" instinctively directs his steps, the morbid anatomy of the hu man mind is his appropriate study, of his healthy action he knows nothing; and we do not despair of yet seeing some useful result arise, from his researches here, long after this impotent attack upon things which he does not understand, has been laughed at and forgotten. As a proof of our assertion, let any one turn to the Book, and he will find, that in his account of his visit to Boston (the first city he visited) seven eighths of the space is occupied, with an account of the Deaf and Dumb Asylum? while Cambridge and its University claim but a passing notice. Worcester and Hartford are despatched in two paragraphs; while a long chapter is devoted to his conversation with patients in the

We regret also to add, that we cannot acquit Mr. Dickens of a wilful plagiarism from an American Author, both in the plan and execution of his work; or he has never read our great national work "Salmagundi," since the "Notes" both in matter and style, bear a most striking similarity to the "Stranger in New-Jersey" by Jeremy Cockloft, Esq., contained in that useful and instructive publication, as any one can perceive, by comparing the two together. Mr. Dickens arrived at Boston about the end of January, and sailed for Europe about the first of June; he therefore spent but four months in the United States; the greater part of which time must have been consumed in travelling from one place to another; since, during that short period he visited all the Northern and Middle states, and several of the Western, taking a flying glance at each, and jumping at bis conclusions, from information, picked up from any idler met by the way-side; much of his time too, consumed in eating dinners, listening to complimentary speeches, and replying to the same; and yet he pretends to enlighten his country-Insane Asylum at the latter place. To the city of Newmen upon the manners, customs and mental peculiarities, York he devotes but one chapter, and during his short stay, of the American Savages, who almost drown him in "to the time he could steal from his "Committee," was spent, bacco spit," and answer Yes Sir" to every possible query not in surveying the magnificent Public Works of that great that can be propounded to them, (see "Notes" passim.) city; but in the "Egyptian Tombs" to the account of which, Having in person made the same tour through the Northern and the particulars of a negro ball at the Five Points, which States, we feel bound to say, that the descriptions of Mr. he relates with infinite gusto, three-fourths of this chapter is Dickens, are fancy-sketches throughout; the inconveniences given; these and the peculiar habits of the New-York Pigs of travel grossly exagerated; and no justice done either to struck Boz as the things most worthy of note and record in the natural advantages or acquired excellencies of that sec- the great metropolis of the United States. Such too is the tion of our union. We do not mean to charge him with case in his travels through the whole country, the chapter having intentionally done this, but think that it arises from on Philadelphia is headed "Philadelphia and its solitary his having measured every thing that inet his eye, according Prison" and Mr. De Tocqueville whose visit to this counto his own preconceived notion; all that corresponded with try, was for the express purpose of visiting our Jails and British taste was good; all that differed from things "at Penitentiaries, saw less of them, and more of the country, home" was necessarily bad; and the eye of the Londoner than this "Traveller for amusement" during his short stay accustomed to the perpetual eclipse of the sun, quarrels with among us. And perhaps one reason of his blind and rooted the fresh, bright appearance of the lovely villages of New- prejudice against the Southern States, which he did not England, because they "look exactly like scenes in a Pan- even visit, may have been the want of Penitentiaries to tomine?" But some may say in vindication; that his short visit in them; for unfair and exagerated as is his account stay in this country did not admit of his writing a work of a of the Northern states, it is kind and flattering in comparimore substantial character? but this is the very thing com- son with his strictures on the Southern, which, as we before plained of; if such were the case, why publish at all, un- stated, be did not even visit, having gone no farther South less the hard dollars of his publishers were of more value than Richmond; candidly confessing, that his prejudices to him than the permanence of his own reputation? and were insurmountable, and that it was therefore useless to there is an old adage, which Mr. Dickens may with profit come; thus acting about as wisely as a man, who should reflect on, relating to persons whose rise in the public fa- bandage both his eyes, and then boast of his clearness of vor, like his own, has been sudden "That he who rises like vision. His very humor fails him upon Southern ground, a Rocket is apt to come down like the stick." Of course as witness his miserable failure at an attempt to be facetious the Book contains some interesting passages, and is very in describing the ride from Potomac Creek; and his whole

"Cold, cold as death-the sky so bleak That even day-light seems to shiver; And, starting back from icy peak,

The blinking sunbeams quail and quiver. "They smile, those lonely, patient men

Though gladness mocks that scene so drear;
They speak-yet words are spent in vain

Which seem to freeze upon the ear.
"And, when at eve, with downy flake,
The snow-storm drops its veil around,
The weary sleep, the watchful wake,

But both alike in dreams are bound.

"Here Thulia lies a bank of snow,

Each sail hung round with gilded frill,
Festooned with frost, her graceful prow,
And every rope an icicle.

"Amid the fearful stillness round,

Scarce broken by the wind's faint breezing,
Hist! heard ye not that crackling sound-

That death watch-click ?-the sea is freezing?" Being now surrounded by ice, and unable to proceed further, Lt. Walker thanks his frosted little crew for their zealous co-operation, and resolves to return. The vessel is extricated, as by a miracle from the freezing sea and surrounding ice, and safely conducted back into Orange Harbor, where his command is taken away from him.

by permitting the subject of his memoir, wherever practicable, to speak for himself. Mason was uncommonly precocious, and of a mind highly poetical and imaginative; he owed his mastery and control of it, and its direction into proper channels, to the wise and judicious system of management pursued by his Aunt, Mrs. Turner, of Roseneath, near Richmond, Va., with whom he spent his years of childhood. The book would be valuable, could we learn nothing from it save this system. Mason entered at Yale as early as practicable; and though he sought with avidity, all kinds of knowledge, he early evinced a preference for the exact sciences. He attained an intimate knowledge of the higher branches of mathematics; and, in the noble science of Astronomy, he found food for a mind naturally lofty and high reaching. But every where the mode of education that had been pursued with him, showed itself a powerful auxiliary in his struggle for a high place among his fellow men. Attention to minutia, great assiduity, untiring perseverance, all backing a quick mind, and an unyielding will-nothing but the will of God expressed, in this instance, by the hand of death, could have prevented him from being a distinguished man. He died of consumption at the age of 21. Mason's style of composition was remarkably spirited and attractive, and considering his youth and littie familiarity with lore purely literary, almost wonderfully pure and polished. We have seldom read letters the perusal of which has afforded us more gratification than those of Mason. One exhibits so strongly his kindness of heart and rectitude of feeling, that we cannot forbear quoting an extract. It is taken from a long letter to his father, on the occasion (we believe,) of his third marriage,-"In the first place, I must congratulate you, dear father, on that happy change in your prospects by which the comforts and happiness of domestic life are again secured to you, and that the care and attention which scarce any but a wife can afford, are once more yours, whether in sickness or in health. I rejoiced when I heard of it; for the picture of my father, sick, in pain, despondent, lonely and dependent on the indeed assiduous, but yet inexperienced attentions of a single daughter, pained me. I have now no fear but that, with occasional hours of sadness for the memory of one to whom both of us owe a deep debt of gratitude and love, you will resume your former cheerful

The course of this frail vessel, among the ice and frozen seas of the South, equals-nay-taking her size and structure into consideration, surpasses any thing of the kind we have ever read. They had no medical officer on board, and one of the crew, got his ribs broken-they woolded him around with tarred canvas and saved his life. They lost all their thermometers-Lt. Walker then dipped up out of the sea, a tin-pot of water, and hung it in the rigging-determined to keep on South until that should freeze. They did keep on, until they could hear the ice make around them-and before they could extricate themselves, the sea was frozen over. To prevent the ice from cutting a hole in the vessel, as they forced her through it, they had to rip the planks upon which they slept, and hold them over the bows in the place of sheathing. Such were some of the extremi-ness, and hope in the future. As to my own feelings, I ties to which Lt. Walker and his crew were reduced on this remarkable voyage, not an inkling of which has before been given to the public.

THE LIFE AND WRITINGS OF EBENEZER PORTER MASON, Interspersed with Hints to Parents and Instructors on the training and education of a Child of Genius. By Dennison Olmsted, Professor of Natural Philosophy and Astronomy in Yale College, 1 vol. 12mo. Dayton & Newman, New York, 1842.

We have always reprobated the idea of publishing to the world the lives of nameless men, whom the blind partiality of some friend or kinsman, has elevated into a hero or man of genius; and, when our eye first fell upon the title of this book, we must confess that we ranked it among this class of publications, and commenced its perusal with a feeling somewhat akin to that which would be indicated by a sneer. But in the progress of what we commenced as a task, we soon found that our disposition to sneer, was exceedingly unphilosophical, and, in this case, entirely uncalled for. This is the Life of a Young Man of real and undoubted genius, edited by Professor Olmsted, of Yale College, with great good taste and judgment. The author has avoided the fault of most Biographers, by obtruding upon the reader, his own observations and reflections as little as possible, consistently with a due performance of his task, and

shall not be ashamed, but rather proud to call any one mother, or any sisters, whom my father chooses as wife and daughters; and I assure you I long not a little to reach home, and welcome by these names, my new friends." Mason's temper and disposition appear to have been perfect, and he must have been a source of great pride and pleasure to his relatives and friends. We have fallen quite in love with his character. We thank Professor Olmsted for his book; and we shall consider that if by our praise of it, we can obtain its general perusal, we shall have cast a pebble upon the great pile raised to human benefit and plea

sure.

FIRST PRINCIPLES OF NATURAL PHILOSOPHY. Being a familiar introduction to the study of that science, for the use of Schools and Academies. By James Renwick, L. L. D., Professor of Natural and Experimental Philosophy and Chemistry in Columbia College. New-York: Harper & Brothers-82 Cliff street-1842.

This is an enlargement and improvement upon a former work of the kind. Its author is favorably known to the government and the public for his profound and practical and scientific attainments. He was employed as one of the commissioners for running the North-Eastern boundary line; and his services have, on several other occasions, been called into requisition by the Federal Government; on this,

SOUTHERN QUARTERLY REVIEW, NO. III, 1842.

as well as on these occasions, the Professor has acquitted with the adventures which befell, are well told in the Biog himself with credit. He has produced in the instance be- raphy-and the reading public owe Mr. Hubbard much, for fore us, a very useful book for schools and colleges. The reviving and dressing up in so handsome a manner, these extension of science, like the multiplication of our wants, entertaining and instructive sketches. and increase of business, has created the necessity for a division of study, as well as of labor. A single generation back, and it was common to see the same individual following as one branch of business, occupations which are now divided among two or more, and are rightly considered as so many distinct and separate trades or callings. So it is with school books and college education-instead now of attempting to make students proficients in all, or any one branch of science, the most their teachers aspire to, is to clear away the rubbish from their young minds, and to lay, on a good basis, the foundation of science, so that the pupil may be prepared, when he leaves Alma Mater, to take up this or that branch of science, and study it with profit; it is then, that any thing like proficiency is attained. In this view, Renwick's Natural Philosophy is a good foundation book for students, and as such we commend it. It is for sale at the book-store of Messrs. Smith, Drinker and Morris.

The publication of this work, our readers will recollect, was commenced in New-Orleans. It has been removed to Charleston, S. C., whence the number before was issued. A work of the kind is needed for the South-and we should be glad to see it well sustained. It is in a fair way to establish a reputation--go on and prosper, say we. The contents of the present number are I. The Ancient Egyptians.

II. The Creole Case.
III. Classical Literature.
IV. Lord Bolingbroke.

V. Mexico and Texas.
VI. The Chinese.

VII. Channing's Duty of the Free States.
VIII. Bulwer's Zanoni.

IX. Mott's Travels in Europe and the East.
X. Whewell on the Inductive Sciences.
XI. Rhode Island Affairs.

XII. Critical Notices.

THE NEW WORLD AND THE BROTHER JONATHAN.

These two mammoth weeklies are doing prodigies in the way of circulating cheap literature. Any English or European work that is at all popular in its character, is snatched up by one or the other of these enterprising papers, and before the royal ink has fairly dried upon it, it is pushed through our yankee presses, and hawked about the towns and villages in the remotest corner of the repub

The Messrs. Harper have done well to add this work to their valuable series of American Biography. As the work appeared from the hands of Dr. Belknap, though well written and popular, it was susceptible of improvement. The recent discoveries of important papers, has thrown a better light upon the history of many names mentioned in it; and it has been improved upon, and corrected of many errors, by Mr. Hubbard;-is now put forth in a new dress, and a more attractive form than ever. These sketches commence with Byron, Medoc, Zeno and Columbus, and end with the Winthrops, the Calverts, and Penn. Among the num-lic, at one twentieth of its European cost-we are rejoiced ber, is an interesting sketch of Raleigh-that rare spirit whose bravery was first tried at the battle of Rimenant, where his men, "being more sensible of a little heat of the sun than any cold-fears of death" threw off their armor and clothes, and gained a victory in their shirts. "Twas said of him-" he lived like a star, and like a star which troubleth copy-right. the firmament, he fell."

to see these papers sending forth in this way, such very useful and practical works as Leibig's Animal and Vegetable Chemistry, and others which we might name. Such books as these cost a guinea in England; here, they cost three-fips. So much for the non-existence of an international

LIBRARY OF SELECT NOVELS.

The Messrs. Harper are putting forth at rates equally as cheap, and in a more convenient form, the most choice EnWe have before us eight glish works, under this title. numbers of the series being from No. 3 to 10 inclusive. To our readers it is only necessary to mention their titles.

No. 3. Devereux.

No. 4. Paul Clifford.

No. 5. Eugene Aram.

No. 6. The Last Days of Pompeii.

No. 7. Czarina.

No. 8. Rienzi.

No. 9. Self-Devotion.

In 1531, one Martinez, a Spaniard was turned adrift in South America, for some offence-he was taken by the natives, and carried many days blind-folded to their " 'golden city of Manoa." He travelled in it, a day and a half, before he reached the palace of the Inca. The houses were roofed with gold, and the city was watered by a lake that washed a bed of golden sands-and he called it "El Do. rado" the gilded place. The marvellous stories which this vagabond told on his return, and repeated on his deathbed, dazzled the civilized world with golden dreams, and called out many expeditions to the Banks of the Oronoco in search of "El Dorado." Sir Walter the leader of several, thus advertises for followers. "The American soldier shall fight for gold, and pay himself, instead of pence, with plates of halfe a foote broade, whereas, he breaketh his bones in other warres for provant and penury. Those dollars. Verily this is cheap reading. These reprints are The whole eight volumes costing, by retail, less than two commanders and chieftains that shoote at honor and abundance, shall find them more rich and beautiful cities, to be had at the Book-store of Messrs. Smith, Drinker and more temples adorned with golden images, more sepulchres filled with treasure, than either Cortez found in Mexico, or Pizarro in Peru." But instead of gold, he brought back stories of headless men; and reported that the "Ampagotos had images of gold of incredible bignesse." Having almost reached the "gilded city," he was encouraged by what he did see, or thought he saw, and went back again "to teach envy a new way to forgetfulness." These and other like stories,

Morris.

No. 10. Nabob at Home.

VIRGINIA BAPTIST PREACHER-No. 12, for December. This number completes the first volume. It contains two sermons one by Elder W. F. Broaddus, on Ministerial Deportment-the other by Elder E. Estes, on Prayer. Under the able superintendence of Elder H. Keeling, it has attained a high reputation.