While inquisitively observing all the facts referable to geology, ascertaining the relations of the mountains to one another, examining the component substances, the positions of the strata, the formation of glaciers, the traces of ancient or of recent changes and catastrophes, his mind is retained in full and delicate susceptibility to all the graces and solemnities of the scene. He muses and romances while gazing at the cataracts and the dark aspects of desolation. He is captivated into poetry at sight of the hideous ruins of fallen mountains, or of the ethereal celestial tints on the summits of those that are still sublime above the clouds. A simple flower, a solitary butterfly, is not lost upon him; much less the wild appearances and habits of the mountaineers. He ascended, with a toil and dexterity of which he gives animated descriptions, the highest of these mountains, the Pic du Midi, the Maladetta, and the Marboré. Of this last, the highest point is denominated Mont Perdu, which he judges to be the most elevated summit in the whole of the grand chain. The snow rendered it impossible to attain this transcendent point; a circumstance which every reader will regret, after seeing to what excellent purpose he could look around him from the lower ones. It was a great object with him to ascertain from these lofty positions, the general arrangement and gradations of the whole combination of ridges and summits. The traveller's reflections are not always perfectly clear of obscurity, and they sometimes partake of the fantastic. We will quote as a specimen of his ambitious and original manner, some musings in which he indulges on the sublime but most desolate and dreary Maladetta, the very meaning of which denomination is cursed.' He is dwelling on the work of dilapidation and ruin which nature is carrying on continually among mountains. He proceeds, Such is at present the condition of the heights which command the globe. Time, which lightly flies over the rest of the earth, impresses here the deepest traces of his passage; and while elsewhere he conceals from us the rapidity of his course, by hurrying us on more swiftly than the objects which surround us; in the mountains. he displays his terrors, by shaking under our eyes an edifice which to our weakness would appear immoveable, and by changing in our presence those forms which at a distance we were accustomed to regard as eternal. In the plains, an entire year has scarcely the power of awakening us to a sense of its being plunged into the abyss of the past, for Time appears to stop, when he bestows existence, when he develops life, or supports it: we only learn that he is passing on when we see him destroy his work. It is not the spring with her profusion of flowers; it is not the autumn, prodigal of her fruits; it is not the brilliant succession of sunny days, which remind us that the seasons pass away. The melancholy sentiment of their instability affects us only when the leaf is falling, when the days are shortening, and when Nature has shut up the circle of her reproductions. In the rocks, on the contrary, in the mountains which are girded with the frosts of an eternal winter, there is nothing to distract us from the contemplation of the ravages of time. The fatal clepsydra, unadorned with flowers, runs on with an uniform rapidity. Each minute marks upon them its passage; each instant stamps them with the traces of its flight; the snow destroys them without respite; the torrent ravages them without intermis sion: their ruins are tumbling without an interval. Insensible to the spring, and faithful to their own tendency, to perish is their only business; and their front, which dissembles nothing of the power of years, has death alone to speak of; while the rest of nature seems inebriated with a plenitude of life.' p. 284. The propriety of some of these observations will be more apparent after reading his numerous striking descriptions of the marks of convulsion, disruption, and enormous ruin, which displayed themselves to him among the chasms and ravines of the mountains, where vast masses of fallen rocks were flung and heaped in hideous disorder. But however gloomy and almost horrific may be the appearance in some of these scenes among the bases of the mountains, where Nature seems to have been so torn as to disclose parts of its unsightly and enormous skeleton, the aspect of the highest summits has a beauty that seems almost to belong to another world. At Gavarnie our Author came suddenly on one of the views of the Marboré, of which the volume and the height,' he says, 'would make it appear to be very near;' but ́. ⚫ its colour, which partakes of the azure of the high regions of the atmosphere, and of that golden light which lies upon distant objects, is a good warning, that before it can be reached, there were many vallies yet to pass. It is a magnificent picture, set, as it were, in the nearer mountains; and contrasting with them both in form and tint, appears to have been coloured by a more brilliant, a lighter, and more magic pencil; for such as are not acquainted with the mountains of the first order, can have no idea of that golden and transparent hue, which tinges the highest summits of the earth. It is often by this alone, that the eye is informed of their prodigious elevation: for, deceived in its estimation of heights and distance, it would confound them with every thing which, either by its form or situation, is capable of imitating their magnificence, did not this species of celestial light announce that their summits inhabit a region of perpetual serenity.' p. 89. This picture is placed almost close, though without any intention of contrast, to one of a very different kind, taken at the base of the Comelie. Here we have nothing but ruins, and these ruins are enormous. A vast declivity of blocks of granite, confusedly piled together, de scends from the very summit of the mountains to the lowest depths of the valley. It is the terrible monument of the fall of almost an entire mountain. These blocks are formed of masses of from ten to a hundred thousand cubic feet each, and are heaped up and suspended one above another, as the little pebbles of our torrents are. The Gave, compressed, repelled, and divided by these ruins, which, with all its fury it cannot stir, escapes with a bellowing sound from amidst them, and adds to the horror of this chaos the tumult of its cataracts, and the thunder of its waves.' p. 87. By a tedious and hazardous ascent of one part of the Marboré, M. Ramond reached the Breche de Roland, a kind of huge gap or gateway in the rocky ridge, which forms, above the clouds, the line of separation between France and Spain; and, which is traversed by no human beings, but a daring race of smugglers, several of whom our Author met in lower passes of the mountains, and admired their bold deportment and intrepid appearance. He records many curious observations which he made on the strata of the snows, and the formation of glaciers in this elevated region. His description of the mountaineer shepherds forms a most striking contrast to the Arcadian style of pastoral. ART. XI. SELECT LITERARY INFORMATION. The Honourable Richard Boyle Bernard, M.P. will publish in the course of a few days, a Journal of his Tour through some Parts of France, Switzerland, Savoy, Germany, and Belgium, during the Summer and Autumn of 1814. Guy Mannering or the Astrologer, in 3 vols. by the Author of Waverley, will certainly appear in the course of February. 1 Dr, Holland's Travels in the Ionian Isles, in Albania, Thessaly, and Greece, in 1812 and 1813. Together with an Account of a Residence at Joannina, the Capital and Court of Ali Pasha; and with a more cursory Sketch of a Route through Attica, the Morea, &c. illustrated by plates: will appear on the 20th of February. Charlemagne; or, the Church Delivered, an Epic Poem, in Twenty-four Cantos. By Lucien Bonaparte, Member of the Institute of France, &c. &c. &c. Translated into English Verse. By the Rev. Samuel Butler, D.D. and the Rev. Francis Hodgson, A.M. will be published in a few days. Mr. Westall's Illustrations of the Lord of the Isles, are expected to be finished early in March. A work by the late Bernardin St. Pierre, the well known Author of the "Studies of Nature," is expected to issue from the French Press in the course of the present Month. It is entitled" Harmonies de la Nature ;" and is directed to an illustration of the wisdom and beneficence of Providence in the Works of Creation, by exemplifying many coincidences and aptitudes which do not occur to ordinary observers. A translation into English from the Proof Sheets, is in progres, and will be published in this country at the same time as the original. The second volume of Mr. Southey's History of Brazil, is nearly ready for publication. A new edition of Mr. Wordsworth' Lyrical Ballads, &c. &c. with additious will appear in a few days. Lord Clarendon's Essays, in 2 vols. foolscap 8vo. are expected in a few days from Edinburgh. Speedily will be published in one volume quarto, the History of the K ngs of England, from the arrival of the Saxons, A.D. 449, to his own times. By William of Malmesbury. Collated with authentic MSS. and translated from the original Latin, with a Preface, Notes, and an Index. By the Rev. John Sharp, B.A. Late of Trinity College, Oxford, Curate of Elstead and Treyford, Sussex. Mr. Forster is about to publish an enlarged edition, with plates, of his researches about Atmospheric Phenomena. The plates are views from nature illustrative of Mr. Howard's Nomenclature of the Winds, &c, Dr. Gregory, of the Royal Military Academy, has in the press, the third edition of his "Letters on the Evidences, Doctrines, and Duties of the Christian Religion," with many corrections and improvements, especially several additional arguments and citations from the Ante Nicene Fathers, corroborating the Genuineness of the Scriptures and the essential doctrines of Christianity. Dr. Gregory has also in the press, the third edition of his Treatise of Mechanics, with considerable improvements, especially in the volume devoted to the construction of machines. There are also printing, and will be published in a few days, Dissertations and Letters by Don Joseph' Rodriguez, the Chevalier Delambre, Dr. Thomas Thomson, Dr. Olinthus Gregory, and others, tending either to impugn or to defend "The Trigonometrical Survey of England and Wales, carrying on by Colonel Mudge and Captain Colby." With notes and observations, including an exposure of Dr. Thomson's contradictions and misrepresentations, by Dr. Gregory. Thomas Myers, A. M. of the Royal Military Academy, Woolwich, has a practical Treatise on finding the Latitude and Longitude at Sea, with Tables desigued to facilitate the calculations, nearly ready for publication. The work forms one volume in 8vo. and comprises the most simple and commodious methods of performing all the requisite astronomical calculations with the assistance of the Nautical Almanack only. We are informed that a gentleman in the North West of England, is preparing for publication, an abridgement of Sir Humphrey Davy's Agricultural Chemistry. It is expected to appear about the middle of the present ycar. A second edition of Mr. Bourn's Gazetteer will speedily be published. Mrs. Hannah More has nearly ready for publication, in two volumes, an Es-` say on the Character of St. Paul. Dr. W. B. Collyer is delivering at Salters Hall, a course of Lectures on the Scripture Parables, which will be put to press immediately, and form the fourth volume of his Lectures. Bishop Horsley's Sermons on ancient prophecies of the Messiah dispersed among the heathens, and four discourses on the nature of the evidence borne to the fact of our Lord's resurrection, are printing in an octavo volume. G. J. Parkyns, Esq. has in the press, Monastic Remains, in two 8vo, volumes, illustrated by numerous engravings. Mr. John Scott is preparing for the press, a History of the Public Events of Europe, from the commencement of the French Revolution to the restoration of the Bourbons. Memoirs on European and Asiatic Turkey, from the manuscript journals of modern travellers in those countries, edited by Robert Walpole, A. M. are printing in a quarto volume, illustrated by engravings. The Rev. William Kirby and William Spence, Esq. are preparing an Introduction to Entomology, or Elements of the Natural History of Insects, which is intended to introduce that delightful science in a popular dress to the British naturalist. Dr. John Clarke has in the press, Commentaries on the Diseases of Children, in an octavo volume. The Paris Spectator, containing observations on Parisian manners and customs at the commencement of the eighteenth century, translated from the French, is printing in two duodecimo volumes. A Translation of the Travels of Ali Bey in Morocco, Tripoli, &c. between the years 1803 and 1807, written by himself, is in the press; and will form two quarto volumes, illustrated by about a hundred plates. Scripture Genealogy and Chronology, exhibiting, in regular order, the various families and tribes mentioned in the B.ble, from Adam to the birth of Christ, will shortly appear in the same size as the Scripture Atlas. The third and fourth volumes of the Memoirs of the Margravine of Bareith, are in the press. British Biography of the Eighteenth Century, including Lives of most of the eminent characters of the present age, interspersed with much original anecdote and criticism, is printing in three thick octavo volumes. Robert Southey, Esq. has in the press, a new edition of his Poems, in three voJumes, including the Metrical Tales and some pieces never before published. The Rev. J. B. A. Gerardot, late rector of S. S. Cyr and Julitta, in the bishopric of Soissons, and now of Liverpool, will speedily publish a new edition of his Elements of French Grammar, with appropriate Exercises. A new edition, with notes and illustrations, is nearly ready, of Letters from a Gentleman in the North of Scotland to his Friend in London, first published in 1754. This is the work so often quoted in the "Lady of the Lake," and stated to be an authentic record of the habits and manners described in 'Waverley." In a few days will be published, in Bvo. with a plan and map. The Cam. paign of Paris in 1814; to which is prefixed, a Sketch of the Campaign of 1813; or, A brief and impartial History of Events, from the Invasion of France by the Foreign Armies, to the Capitulation of Paris and the Dethronement of Buonaparte; accompanied by a Delineation of the principal Traits of his Character, and the cause of his Elevation. Compiled from authentic Documents, and the Testimony of Eye-Witnesses. Translated from the French of P. F. F. J. Giraud. In the Press, the second edition considerably improved, in one Volume 8vo. with large Plans, &c. 10s. 6d. boards, a Circumstantial Narrative of the Campaign in Russia, embellished with Plans of the Battles of the Moskwa and MaloJaroslavitz. By Eugene Labaume, Captain of the Royal Geographical Engineers, Ex-Officer of the Orduance of Prince Eugene, Chevalier of the Legion of Honour, and of the Iron Crown; Author of an Abridged History, of the Re public of Venice. This Work has created an extraordinary sensation in France. It is not merely a dry Narrative of Battles, but abounds with the most beautiful descriptions of affecting and interesting scenes, of which the Author was an eye-witness: therefore we presume it cannot fail to interest all classes of readers. In the press, and in the course of March will be published in 1 vol. 4to. The Remains of the late John Tweddell A.M. Fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge, with a selection of his Letters written from the Continent, and an account of the extraordinary disappearance of his MSS. and Drawings, edited by the Rev. R. Tweddell, A.M. We understand that next month will be published in one Vol., 8vo. "A Memorial offered to her Royal Highness the Princess Sophia Electoress and Dutchess Dowager of Hanover, containing a delineation of the Constitution and policy of England, with Anecdotes concerning remarkable Persons of that time: By Gilbert Burnet, Bishop of Salisbury." Now first published, by per mission of His Royal Highness the Prince Regent, according to the ori ginal in the Royal Library at Han over.-To which are added some Letters from Burnet and Leibnitz, and fac-similies of the hand writing of those two distinguished men. In the Press, and speedily will be published, Epistles, and other Poems. By T. Grinfield, of Trinity College, Cambridge. In the press, The World without Souls, revised and corrected with the addition of a new chapter, printed uniform. ly with the Velvet Cushion: the fifth edition. By J. W. Cunningham, M. A. Vicar of Harrow. The Rev. Mr. Eustace is now in Italy, collecting materials for a third volume of his highly interesting and popnlar work, "A Classical Tour, &c." reviewed in ourNumbers for November and December. We are compelled by waut of room, to defer our List of New Publications. The articles on Whitaker's Visitation Sermon, Wardlaw's Lectures, Philosophical Transactions, Salt's Abyssinia, Colquhoun on Spiritual Comfort. &c. are at press, and will appear in our next Number. |