his own ideas of his talents. make an attempt to set up for himself, fail, and subside into a grumbling drudge. He is one whom heaven hath cursed with just enough of want of principle and cleverness to be able to give himself check-mate. He will one day | paper hack, less for the direct emolument, (though at the end of each week he duly tenders his account and pockets his earnings,) than for the opportunity it gives him of spreading the reports his employers wish to have believed. He will not only say any thing they wish him to say; he will father the lie when exposed, and bear the brunt of public execration with the tranquillity of a martyr. He has also a great reputation for holding his tongue. These qualifications have got him the run of the government offices, and that reputation gets him the patronage of editors. He pockets money with both hands. The publisher pays him for procuring the stories which he is rewarded by their authors for promulgating. He knows where his talent lies, and is contented with the sphere of action for which nature formed him. Cob is quite a different sort of a man. He learned the routine of business in an attorney's office. Nature has given him enough of imitative propensity to acquire the forms of law, but not enough of reason to know when to apply them. Yet he has that commonplace solemnity of word and look, and that steady periodicity in his daily occupations, which pass muster in the eyes of many for business talent. He has a ponderous look about him, so adverse to every notion of levity, as to pass muster for solidity of parts. He is beautifully unscrupulous: he will do or say any thing. If wanted to make one in a quadrille, he will walk through it with the dogged resoluteness of a thief marching to the gallows; if asked (by any one from whom he has expectations) to perform the most menial office, he undertakes the task promptly and without wincing. He is a regular news Cob and Mortimer, however, are mere beginners in political trading. The old experienced adepts-that is, the more successful-are of a higher order of tacticians-of a wider experience. But their portraiture must be the task of another day. MIDDLE TEMPLE, December. LITERARY REGISTER. The City of the Magyar. 3 vols., with Plates. tening to the public gardens, the theatres, or the salons de reception. London: Virtue. SUCH is the title which Miss Pardoe, who appears fond of out-of-the-way names for her books, has assumed for her late travels in Hungary, and the account of her residence in its capital. She does not dally on the road : in the first paragraph we are whisked to Vienna, and set down in Presburg during the sitting of the Diet, when all the political aristocracy of Hungary were assembled in that city. Miss Pardoe, though not an inexperienced traveller, seems at this time to have been accompanied by her mother and other friends. On the very day of their arrival, they accepted the invitation of some of the Magnates, to whom they had letters of introduction; and the first thing with which they were struck was "the extreme beauty of the women." The most beautiful women seen in the circles of Vienna are Hungarians. The Jewesses of Hungary are also remarkable for their beauty. Some of their social usages are as worthy of admiration as their beauty, at least, in a country where conscientious mothers may be heard to complain-" We cannot find leisure to attend to our children for idle morning visiters." The social arrangements of the Hungarian fashionables, like those of the Viennese, appear to me to be the most rational in the world. No morning visits, by which the idle and the désœuvré contrive with us to fritter away the time of their more busy friends, are countenanced among them. No lady receives company before the dinner-hour, which is usually two, or at the latest, three o'clock; and better still, the hostess is punctual, the repast is served at the given moment, and at five the guests are at liberty to take their departure, in order to fulfil their evening engagements, leaving the lady of the house to enjoy the same privilege. Then commences the gaiety of an Hungarian day; visits are paid, new engagements are entered into, the promenades are crowded, and the streets are alive with equipages has Two o'clock appears an early hour to receive dinner visiters, where people have any thing better to do; but the Hungarians are very early risers. Miss Pardoe appears to have bestowed the utmost pains in seeing and hearing, reading, and gathering information, through every possible channel. She had good introductions, was hospitably received, and went everywhere, where a single mite could be added to the sum of her knowledge of the country, and, by consequence, a useful page to her book. She visited churches, convents, theatres, picture-galleries, promenades, prisons, public institutions, the courts of justice, and whatever promised any advantage to the traveller. By these means, she has drawn together a vast amount of agreeable, and, so far as the surface of Hungarian society is concerned, useful information, untainted by prejudice, or by party spirit, which she earnestly disclaims. is accomplished through the agency of money, and nothing by personal service, love, sympathy, and the divine charity which they inspire, the English, nevertheless, like to indulge the warmer feelings of humanity, in contemplating the gentle and pious ministrations of the Beguines and Sisters of Charity. From a visit to the convent of the Brothers of Mercy, where there were sixty beds for patients, Miss Pardoe repaired to the convent of the Hospital Sisters. Of a country where every thing, beyond our own hearths, There was no affectation of concealment on the part of the three nuns who came forward to welcome us. They greeted the gentlemen by whom we were accompanied with calm politeness, and led the way along their exquisitely-kept corridors, with a self-possessed and quiet demeanour, more effective against impertinence than a thousand veils. Nothing could be more perfect than the order of every thing around us; and we felt no disposition to smile even at the waxed saints or tinselled virgins which crowded the thickly-set altars. The ward contained thirty beds, the whole of which of the Members of Congress at Washington; but, unfortunately, British readers know and care much less about them, than they, it seems, do about England and English politics. were tenanted; and there was an air of at-home-ness in the arrangements, despite the wan and melancholy looks The Prince Palatine, the Archduke John of Austria, of the patients, which would at once have proved that uncle of the emperor, is the perpetual President of the the hand of woman had been there, even had not half-a-Diet, and, according to Miss Pardoe, the highly popular dozen of the sisters been moving among the sick like Viceroy of Hungary. Miss Pardoe was honoured, by a ministering angels. I looked at them all attentively, special command, to wait upon his Imperial Highness; and I could not detect the slightest expression of sourness or irritation on their countenance; and their whispers and, during the interview or audience, he spoke of " Trawere so soft and low as they bent over the uneasy couches vellers' Tales," and cautioned her against rashness and of the sufferers, that it was impossible to doubt that prejudice in judging of a country whose transition state theirs was really the service of sympathy. had been unfairly represented through hasty and prejudging observation. She has profited by these hints; and there is no bounds to her admiration of the venerable German Prince, the Father of Hungary, who graciously gave them. I have always loved the Beguines in every Catholic country through which I have passed; and the Hungarian sisters did much to deepen the feeling. The very appearance of these nuns was enough to inspire respect. They were so neatly attired; the profusion of linen which relieved their heavy dresses of serge was so pure, and smooth, and spotless; their manner was so gentle, their courtesy so spontaneous, and their smile so meek while there was, moreover, such an honest pride in their mode of explaining to us all their humane and beautiful expedients for solacing the sick, that it was difficult to believe that they had mistaken the true path of worldly usefulness; and that they would have conduced more to the good of their species by mingling in the toil and cares of domestic life. ; Miss Pardoe describes individually the more considerable cities of Hungary, and gives rather a liberal allowance of letterpress to the inundation at Pesth and the criminals in the jails, considering that we have as abundant and rare specimens of the latter at home as need be desired, if there were any one to visit the jails and tell us of them. Players and singers, too, are pretty much the same everywhere, so that slight notice might suffice; The aspect of the hamlets and villages of Hungary and the beggar or rascal nobility, are novel and approbut the gipsies, in a country considered native to them, augurs well for the condition of the people, if Miss Pardoe's observation, on her journey from the capital to priate features. Among the privileges of the fruitful lower branch of Hungarian aristocracy, is the right of Trenschin, be of universal application. There are, she says, Few countries in which the hamlets are so cheerful in passing tolls free. One day, in passing over the bridge of boats which connects Pesth and Buda, Miss Pardoe appearance as those of Hungary: the houses are externally of the most scrupulous cleanliness; the whitesaw a ragged lad asserting his right to the toll-keeper, wash is continually renewed, and the window-frames are as the scion of nobility, to pass free; while the latter generally painted in bright green. The doors are set pointed to the heelless stockings and ragged jerkin of deeply into the walls, in order to throw off the rain, which the young Graf. Instead of replying, the young noble, in these mountain-districts pours down like an avalanche; with an air of dignity, ordered the toll-keeper to take his and the receding arches being neatly formed, give a quaint and comfortable look to the dwelling. A peep hand from his collar, and not stand longer between the into the interior is equally promising; the white or wind and his nobility. The functionary now looked chintz curtains at the windows, the coverings of the beds, grave and doubtful, as if he had presumed too far; and and the cooking utensils are all bright and cleanly look- the young noble was recognised by a peasant passing, ing; but I never ventured on a closer examination, having who, while he paid his kreutzer, saluted the young Graf. received a hint of caution not to be disregarded, in seeing the maternal or fraternal care with which members of "It was really broad farce," says Miss Pardoe, "to see the same family, seated on the sunny side of their cot- the respectably-clad, comfortable-looking toll-keeper oftages, relieved each other after the Spanish fashion, offering those apologies to the offended noble, who, at certain uncomfortable colonists. Miss Pardoe gives a full and very interesting account of the Hungarian Diet. She was in Presburg during the sitting of the chambers, into which, at least into the lower chamber, as in France and America-we had almost said wherever representative government prevails, save in England-women are admitted, and decorum in manners and dress is preserved. The galleries were crowded with ladies, some of them the wives and daughters of the first nobility. Theoretically, the political institutions of Hungary are free, though their efficiency is counteracted by a variety of causes. The Hungarians enjoy one privilege which our Radical constituencies will envy: the deputies, or representatives of the counties, must vote as their constituents direct, though it should be against their own judgment. In Hungary, the higher and richer nobility are generally found enrolled in the Opposition or Liberal party; the Tory Members of the Diet, the unpatriotic Hungarians, being generally found, as might be expected, among the placemen of Vienna and the officers of the emperor's household. Miss Pardoe gives as minute an account of the leading Members of the Diet, as Miss Martineau did length, graciously raised his tattered cap, in token of magnanimous forgiveness." Like our own nobility, those of Hungary are exempted from imprisonment for debt; and, accordingly, the Jews are careful never to take the personal security of a magnate. Christians should be equally prudent, especially in countries where "all men are equal in the eye of the law." In Hungary there is no disguise. The peasantry are styled the "wretched tax-paying multitude," and there is no talk of equality before the law. This is honest. Funerals are oddly managed in Pesth. Crowds of females attend in full dress, of the gayest colours. A funeral is a party of pleasure. Miss Pardoe gives a wonderfully clear and an ample account of the condition of the peasantry, social and political; and of the agriculture, commerce, and internal resources of Hungary. For information on these topics, she acknowledges, in the preface, her obligations "to several distinguished individuals," whom she is not permitted to name. We regret that she has not followed the archduke's advice, and visited the castles of the rural nobility,and told us of their domestic life; which would have been of more value than the catalogue of the semi-barbarous Esterhazy treasures; yet, taken as a whole, her work is entitled to great praise; and as it cannot be accounted invidious to compare an author with herself, we may frankly say that we consider this, by many degrees, the best book which its author has yet produced. NEW ANNUALS. The Juvenile Annual. If stories must be written to illustrate prints, instead of the good old practice of prints being designed and engraved to illustrate stories, the publishers of the newfashioned and very pretty gift-books ought, at least, to consult, and give some scope to the taste and judgment of the literary artists, in their selections. But whatever pictures may be laid before Mrs Ellis, the editor of "The Juvenile Annual," she announces her determination to render the work for which she is responsible," as much an historical work as the plates will admit ;" and also, that it shall be of enduring usefulness; not a mere toy of the year, but fitted for a place in the "Juvenile Library." She, moreover, confesses, that had circumstances admitted, she would often rather have talked of the shepherds and flocks of Bearn, among whom she has been sojourning, than have described feudal castles. In the meanwhile, The Annual gives a pleasing variety of prose and verse, which, we have a notion, the juveniles will relish quite as much as the history with which they are threatened, and of which they have here some striking specimens, interwoven with the descriptions of An Old English Hall, Lochleren Castle, and Mount St Michael. The Drawing-Room Scrap-Book. Mrs Howitt may now, in her second year, be presumed to have fairly entered upon her duties as the literary successor of Miss Landon. Most unlike, these ladies, whether in the original structure of their genius, or in their course of mental culture and discipline, yet each fulfils her function: the one, the lofty and brilliant charmer; the other, the delightful companion and affectionate instructor. No one can furnish a more rich and varied pictorial banquet than the publishers of this Annual; and to their pictures, it is the business of Mrs Howitt to attach verses. If we do not always find her so much at home as in past days, while amid the sweet and simple domestic scenes, and heart-suggested themes of her spontaneous choice, her genius yet finds scope in this less congenial walk; and if she shall add but little to her modest fame by this new work, she must yet contribute largely to the enjoyment of her readers. Oh, wild-traditioned Scotland ! Thy mountain-glens are tragedies, "The dowie dens of Yarrow," "The Annan-water wan," "The deep mill-dams o' Binnorie," Where sailed "the milk-white swan ;" The lovers' bloody meeting On "Fair Kirkconnel lea :" Land of the Bruce and Wallace, Where fiery hearts have stood, And, for their country and their faith, Like water poured their blood; Where wives and little children Were steadfast to the death, And graves of martyr-warriors Are in the desert heath. Land of the social virtues Where the tiller of the sod Saith to his lowly household, 'Come, let us worship God." Oh, mind-ennobled Scotland! Unto her children's heart! I marvel not that all the world Oh, land of moor and mountain! Of treeless straths and trackless wilds, I love thy mournful mosses, Where sounds the plover's wail; I love the gray mist hovering I love the castle gray and stern, To hear Old Scotland's name! Howitt has written some tender, critical, or commendaTo a beautiful little vignette, Auld Robin Gray, Mrs tory remarks; and to a splendid beauty, whose portrait forms the frontispiece to the work, and whom she has christened Katherine Airlie, verses of a somewhat ambitious cast. In The Bridal Ere, she has caught no mean portion of the spirit and melody of her lamented prede cessor: She'll be a Bride to-morrow! The village is astir ; Old dames, and men, and maidens, And speak the morrow fine; For the bride shall have good luck, they say, On whom the sun doth shine: And the laughing, brawny ringers, The old church-tower shall reel, Be this the omen of all coming time, In honour of the bridal! She'll be a bride to-morrow!- Is busied 'mong his kin. With a brave old English welcome, As if than of these kinsfolks No other thought he had. But he thinketh on the dowry, All counted out in gold; And he thinketh on the bridegroom's lands- Which dignify the bridal. She'll be a bride to-morrow!- And the portly mother, sweet accord She knoweth where they be ; All under lock and key, To come forth for the bridal. She'll be a bride to-morrow! That is but tokened now ;- Oh, happy be that bridal! These are sweet, and they will be favourite lines. A few lingering relics of L. E. L. are still embalmed in the Scrap-Book. One affixed to the portrait of a missionary's wife, who, for aught that we can recollect, is that of her kind and candid friend, Mrs Fletcher, (Miss Jewsbury of Manchester,) will be prized as among the last, if not the best, of Miss Landon's compositions. Coming to us now, as is here finely said, "like the scent of the violet, after it is withered." THE MISSIONARY'S WIFE. BY L. E. L. Not through the quiet shadows of our vale Have I pursued thy path Not where the violet rises on the gale, Not where the green fields in the summer shine. White was our little dwelling, all around Were kindred, ancient friends, and countrymen; Than when the childlike brook laughed through the glen. Has not the rosy morning heard our hymn, And when the twilight's purple shades were dim To spread THY WORD from rise till set of sun, Till the One God be known from clime to clime, And the great work of Christian love be done. "The Drawing-Room Scrap-Book for 1841" has a fair number of the portraits of distinguished men, selected so as afford variety. As a poet, Aikenside a statesman, Brougham-with a soldier, a physician, and several historical pictures, and numerous fine landscapes. It is attired in rich crimson silk and gold, and will, no doubt, be glittering on many English and American tables even before this notice is abroad. Moore's Poems. Volume II. We are glad to find that, in his prefatory notices, Mr Moore is becoming rather more communicative. Many of the poems (which are now, for the first time, properly arranged) are connected with his visit to Bermuda and North America, some forty years since; and his recollections of that period furnish a text for many pleasant anecdotes of his tour. He accompanied Mr Merry, then the British Ambassador at Washington, and attended him when his credentials were delivered to Jefferson, whom they found sitting with General Dearborn and a few more officers, and all in the same homely costume, comprising slippers and Cunnemara stockings,-in which array Jefferson received Mr Merry, "much to that formal Minister's horror." Nor are we sure, but that, at that period, Mr Moore himself might be somewhat shocked at the coarse and careless garb of the man who drew up the Declaration of American Independence. His friends, during his stay in the states, were of the Federalist or Anti-Democratic party: and he acknowledges that he imbibed some of their prejudices. Indeed, he confesses, that he was for the moment sceptical as to the soundness of the Liberal creed. Mr Moore subsequently visited the Falls of Niagara, and some of the Indian tribes. He gives, with an account of them, the history of that universal favourite, "The Canadian Boat Song." If Mr Moore be the author of any national poetry, or any of the hitherto anonymous splendid "Rebel" lyrics of the era of 1798, there is as yet no trace of them among his acknowledged juvenile poems; and it is indeed highly probable, that his muse was always nearer of kin to the Greek Anacreon than to the Teutonic Körner, or yet the Gallic Beranger. The volume is embellished with the most dainty and delicate devices, somewhat in the style of Stothard. Legendary Tales of the Highlands. By Sir Thomas These volumes form a Sequel to Sir Thomas's amusing or romantic HIGHLAND RAMBLES. The design is the same, and so is the frame-work; the Dominie, Clifford, Grant, the Sergeant, and the AUTHOR, being still the dramatis persona-or interlocutors. Some of the Legends, or Tales of Highland chivalry, are of goodly length; and these abound in romantic incident, and traits of the olden times, when the king held court at Snowdon or Holyrood. But there are several sketches of a homelier and more mirthful kind, which will find not less favour in many eyes. The Scotch can still sympathize with the distresses of Sergeant Archy Stewart, ludicrous as they may appear in the eyes of "ceevilized men wi' breeks on their hinderlins,” as Bailie Jarvie says. For our own part, so much do we enjoy the early trials and adventures of the brave "Shon Smith," the sergeant of Our tasks were closed with words that praise and pray. I the Old Black Watch, that we are extremely uneasy lest his mongrel, uncouth, but expressive dialect should | Wild-Flowers from the Glens. By E. L. L. gedy in Five Acts. By Mrs Gore. If movement and passion be the life and soul of the acted drama, Mrs Gore has been completely successful in this play, at least so far as one of the uninitiated may pronounce in the closet on the effects of the stage. The opening scenes of "Dacre" are full of vivacity; and the reader is at once plunged into the heart of the action. The age is the latter years of the reign of Henry VIII.; and its subject is historical. Thomas Fynnes, lord Dacre of the South, suffered death when a very young man, less for the crime with which he was charged, than because his large estates tempted the insatiable rapacity of the king and his courtiers. The Child and the Hermit. By C. M. This is an attempt, by an English lady, to continue, in an English spirit, Mrs Austin's translation of the exquisite German tale, The Story without an End. This she does pleasingly and successfully, and in a style which is better adapted to juvenile readers than the German work; and yet we have heard of young children understanding, or having that glimmering, twilight perception, which nourishes imagination-the Fairy Queen and the Pilgrim's Progress; not the bare narrative, but Child and the Hermit is, however, a very sweet producthe double meaning; the allegory and the facts. The tion. It is Barbauldish in tone; and it is neatly and tastefully embellished. How much more worthy of the choice of those who select for the young, is such a little work as this, or another, now before us, entitled—Tendrils Cherished, or Home Sketches, than those half-comic, half-satirical, slang productions, with cuts to suit, which are about as wholesome for the expanding moral and imaginative faculties of children, as gin and cayenne however, a dash of sermonizing in Tendrils Cherished, would be nutritious to their growing bodies. There is, which does not heighten its usefulness as a juvenile work. By R. Montgomery Martin. To give a mere outline of the drama would convey any thing rather than a just idea of its beauties. The main incident seems defective,-Dacre taking the guilt of murder upon himself to screen his friend, the betrothed of his sister, and hoping to elude the penalties of the Analysis of the Bible with reference to Social Duties. law because he is a peer of the realm, has influence at court, and is dreaded by the king. But failing this blemish, the play is finely wrought up, and contains many of the nobler elements of tragic interest. It breathes, moreover, in the trial scenes, and those in which the baseness, servility, and rapacity of the courtiers are exposed, a generous spirit of independence and liberal sentiment; and is, altogether, a thoroughly English drama in spirit and in details. The Gipsy King, and other Poems. By Richard The principal piece is a fine descriptive poem; and the miscellaneous verses show that this member of the family shares in the genuine talent which distinguishes the name of HOWITT. Pelham, or the Adventures of a Gentleman. Sir Edward Bulwer's popular novel has been published by Mr Colburn, uniformly with the editions which Messrs Saunders & Otley have lately published of "Rienzi" and "Maltravers." The new feature is a preface, in which the author gives excellent and manly advice to young authors, and literary aspirants of all kinds, to every word of which we can cordially subscribe. In running over the leaves of "Pelham," we are reminded of its beauties and of its faults; and the worst of them is not the affectation of puppyism-for that is a common lure to catch vulgar readers. What a satire on aristocracy is Pelham's mother; and what an excuse for the juvenile heartless profligacy of the race of Pelhams, is having been cursed with such mothers! Her letters to her son ought to form the appendix to those of Lord Chesterfield. : This is a valuable little manual of Biblical precepts, on the various duties of life, arranged alphabetically :as on Almsgiving; Anger; Brotherly Love; Charity, Children, Conduct, &c. It will be found a desirable book to keep lying at hand for reference. Baronetage of the British Empire. A tabular work, zealously maintaining the honour and dignity of the baronetage, and the privileges of the order. |