Chapter XXIX: The Squire's Speech (3)

The Dresden Free Conference is still in session, and matters seem as impracticable as the Genius of Mysticism could desire. Enough has transpired to show that the minor Powers have not been alarmed without good reason. The cordial understanding between Austria and Prussia is displayed perhaps too ostentatiously to be altogether sincere; but there can be no doubt that the two governments have combined to aggrandize themselves at the expense of the others. It seems to be determined that the new Executive Committee will be composed of eleven votes, of which Austria and Prussia are each to have two. The Committee of the old Confederation consisted of seventeen votes, of which those Powers had one each, and even then it was complained that their influence was excessive. It is admitted on all hands that any approach to a nearer union is impracticable at present; that the Dresden Conference is quite as incapable of improvising a German Nation, as was that assembly of pedants and pettifoggers that called itself the Frankfort Parliament.----Hostilities have ceased in Schleswig-Holstein, the stadtholderate of which have yielded their functions to the commissioners of the Confederation.----The first trial by jury at Vienna, took place, under the new Austrian Constitution, on the 15th of January.

LITERATURE, SCIENCE, ART, PERSONAL MOVEMENTS, ETC.

UNITED STATES.

The literary incidents of the month have not been very noteworthy. JAMES, the English novelist, has been lecturing at Albany to large and interested audiences. He has bought a residence at Stockbridge, Mass., where he will reside, in the immediate neighborhood of Longfellow, the Sedgwicks, and other literary celebrities. A series of valuable lectures upon Art have been delivered before the Artists of New York, in pursuance of a very excellent plan adopted by their Association. The first of the series was delivered by HENRY JAMES, Esq., and was an excellent critical exposition of the nature and characteristics of Art. He was followed by GEORGE W. CURTIS, Esq., in a fine sketch of the condition and prospects of Art on the Continent. The leading idea of his lecture was that Art never promised more abundant results than now.

Congress at its last session appropriated two thousand dollars to commence the purchase of a library for the use of the President of the United States. It is a little singular that a project so eminently useful should have been so long neglected. Its execution has been now undertaken with spirit, under the direction of Mr. Charles Lanman.

The birth-day of BURNS was celebrated by a public dinner on the 25th of January at the Astor House, in New York. The poet BRYANT was present as a guest, and made a very happy speech, in which he said that the fact that Burns had taken a local dialect, and made it classical and given it a character of universality, was of itself sufficient to stamp him as a man of the highest order of genius.

Mr. HOE, celebrated for his printing presses, has just completed a new one, having eight cylinders, and thus throwing off eight sheets at each revolution, for the use of the _Sun_ newspaper in New York. He was the recipient lately of a public dinner given to him by the proprietors of the paper, at which several of the most eminent literary celebrities in the country were present as guests. The occasion was one of interest: we hope it may be deemed indicative of a growing disposition to tender public honors to the benefactors, as well as to the destroyers, of their race.

The literary productions of the month will be found noticed in another department of this Magazine. Several works of interest are promised by the leading publishers. The Harpers have in press a volume of traveling sketches, entitled _Nile Notes_, by an American, which will be found to be one of the best of its kind. It is written with great vivacity and with very marked ability. Many of its chapters are fully equal to _Eothen_, and the work in its general characteristics is not at all inferior to that spirited and admirable book. The Harpers have also in press a work by Mr. H.M. FIELD, giving a succinct history of the _Great Irish Rebellion_ with biographical sketches of the most prominent of the Irish Confederates. It will find a wide circle of readers. The Harpers are also about to publish MAYHEW'S _London Labor and the London Poor in the Nineteenth Century_, made up of his Letters in the London _Morning Chronicle_ upon that subject, revised and extended. These papers reveal a state of things not at all creditable to the English people or to the age in which we live. As originally published in London they excited great attention and have done much toward arousing the public sense of justice to the poor.

COOPER, the novelist, has a work in preparation upon the Social History of this country. It will probably, however, not be published until fall. Mr. Putnam has in progress a new and very elegantly printed uniform edition of his novels. Another New York house promise a complete edition of Joanna Baillie's poems, with a new edition of Elizabeth Barret Browning.

Prof. AGASSIZ, the celebrated Naturalist, is making a survey of the Florida reefs and keys, in the hope that he may throw some light upon their formation and growth. He is nominally attached to the Coast Survey.

American scholars still continue their valuable contributions to classical learning. Prof. DRISLER, of Columbia College, one of the most thorough and accurate linguists in the country, is engaged upon an _English-Greek Lexicon_, which will be a most valuable aid to the classical student, in connection with similar works by the same author hitherto issued.

In the departments of religious and theological literature, we find indications of renewed activity among the divines of our country. Prof. J. ADDISON ALEXANDER, of Princeton, has a new critical and exegetical work in the course of preparation. Rev. Dr. SPRING will soon publish, through M.W. Dodd, a volume under the title of _First Things_, a series of lectures designed to set forth and illustrate some of the facts and moral duties earliest revealed to mankind. From Rev. Dr. CONDIT, of Newark, we are to have a work entitled _The Christian Home_, setting forth the relations, duties, and benefits of the domestic institution. Rev. H.A. ROWLAND, author of a work on the Common Maxims of Infidelity, has in press a volume under the title of _The Path of Life_.

The late EDMOND CHARLES GENET, Embassador from the Republic of France to this country at the close of the last century, left behind him, at his decease, a vast amount of papers, consisting of journals of his life, letters from the prominent statesmen and politicians of this country, and correspondence with his sister, the celebrated Madame Campan. It is understood that members of his family are arranging them with a view to publication. From the close social and political relations which M. Genet, after his dismissal from the embassy, bore to the prominent politicians of the Democratic party, there can be no doubt that these papers, if judiciously edited, will throw much light upon the political history of the period preceding the war of 1812.

It is known by those familiar with current Continental literature, that the wife of Prof. EDWARD ROBINSON published, some time since, in Germany, under her usual pseudonym, TALVI, a very full and excellent history of the early Colonization of New England. This work has lately been translated from German into English by William Hazlitt, and published in London. It was published originally at Leipsic in 1847. We presume it will be reprinted here.

Rev. H.T. CHEEVER's _Whale and his Captors_ has been reprinted in London, with a preface by Dr. SCORESBY, who commends it very highly.

EUROPEAN.

The London _Leader_ destroys the romance of Lamartine's visit to England. It seems, according to that paper, that he did not go for the philosophic purpose of studying the country, but to make bargains for the publication of his _History of the Directory_, which he offered for five thousand pounds. The publishers, he urged, could issue it simultaneously in England, France, and Germany, and so secure an enormous profit. "Our countrymen," says the _Leader_, "with an indifference to Mammon worthy of a philosopher, declined the magnificent proposal: and Lamartine returned to France and sold his work to an association of publishers for 12,000 francs, which he hopes to get." He is also to publish a new novel in the _feuilleton_ of the _Siècle_.

EDMOND TEXIER, a French journalist, has published a very lively history of French journals and journalists. It is a small and unelaborate book, but is exceedingly readable. Political writers in France, it will be remembered, are required to sign their names to their articles. The _Vote Universel_ recently contained a strong essay signed by GILLAND. The Attorney-general prosecuted the paper, alleging that the article was written by GEORGE SAND, and citing the bad spelling of Gilland's private letters as a proof that he could not have been the writer. Madame George Sand peremptorily denies having written a line of the article, and avers that Rousseau himself, in a single letter in her possession, makes three mistakes in spelling three lines, owing to the difficult and capricious rules of the French language.

Lady MORGAN has published a pamphlet on the Roman Catholic Controversy. It is in the form of a letter to Cardinal WISEMAN, and is a defense of herself against an attack upon a passage in her book on Italy. In that book she had related a curious anecdote. She said that when Bonaparte entered Italy the enthroned chair of St. Peter, contained in the magnificent shrine of bronze which closes the view of the nave in St. Peter's Cathedral, was brought into a better light and the cobwebs brushed off. Certain curious letters were discovered on the surface, which were deciphered and found to contain the Arabian formula, "There is but one God, and Mahomet is his prophet." Cardinal Wiseman branded this story as "false, foolish, slanderous, and profligate." Lady Morgan gives as her authority for it the eminent _savans_ Denon and Champollion, who saw the inscription, deciphered it, and told its meaning in her presence. Her letter is ably written, and excites attention.--Lady Morgan is said to be the oldest living writer who continues to write: for though Miss Joanna Baillie is some five years, and Rogers perhaps ten years her senior, neither of the latter has touched a pen in the way of authorship for a long time; whereas Lady Morgan, for all her blindness, has, according to the Liverpool Albion, for a good while back, been a regular contributor to one of the London morning journals.

The British government has bestowed a pension of £100 a year upon the widow of the celebrated Belzoni, who died fifteen years ago. The public satisfaction at this announcement is tempered with surprise that the pension was not bestowed fifteen years ago. Mr. Poole, the author of "Paul Pry," and other literary works of a light character, has received a retiring pension of the same amount. Similar pensions have been granted to George Petrie, LL.D., author of "The Round Towers of Ireland," and other antiquarian works; and to Dr. KITTO, editor of the "Pictorial Bible," "Cyclopædia of Biblical Literature," and other works in that department of letters. Dr. Kitto, although deaf from an early age, in consequence of an accident, has traveled over many lands in connection with the Missionary Society.

Letters from Rome announce the death in that city of Mr. Ritchie, the sculptor, of Edinburgh. The circumstances are peculiarly melancholy. It had been the dream of Mr. Ritchie's life to go to Rome; this year he was able to travel, and he arrived in that city in September last, with some friends as little acquainted with the nature of the malaria as himself. With these friends it appears that he made a visit to Ostia; the season was dangerous; the party took no precautions, and they all caught the malaria fever. He died after a few days' illness, and was followed to the grave by most of the English and American artists in Rome.

AUSTEN HENRY LAYARD, whose enterprise has opened a new field for historical research, was born in Paris, March 5, 1817. His father, who was Dean of Bristol, filled a high civil office in Ceylon, between the years 1820 and 1830. The early years of the future explorer of Nineveh were spent in Florence, where he early acquired his artistic tastes and skill as a draughtsman. On returning to England, young Layard commenced the study of law, but his love of adventure rendered this profession distasteful to him, and he abandoned it. In 1839 he left England, with no very definite object in view, visited Russia and the North of Europe, and spent some time in Germany. Thence he took his course toward the Danube, and visited the semi-barbarous provinces on the Turkish frontier, which form the debatable ground between the Orient and the Occident. In Montenegro he passed some time, aiding an active young Chief in his efforts to ameliorate the condition of his subjects. From hence he passed into the East, where he led the life of an Arab of the desert, and acquired a thorough knowledge of the languages of Arabia and Turkey. We next find him in Persia, Asia Minor, and Syria, where he visited almost every spot made memorable by history or tradition. He now felt an irresistible desire to penetrate to the regions beyond the Euphrates, to which history and tradition point as the birth-place of the wisdom of the West. At Constantinople, he fell in with the English Embassador, Sir Stratford Canning, by whom he was encouraged to undertake and carry on those excavations amid the Assyrian and Babylonian ruins, which have conclusively demonstrated that a gigantic civilization had passed away before what we are accustomed to call ancient civilization dawned, a civilization stretching back almost to the days when the ark rested upon Ararat; a civilization which was old when the pyramids were young. And, what is still more remarkable, the relics of this civilization are more perfect and beautiful in proportion to the remoteness of their date, the earlier of these ancient sculptures being invariably the noblest in design, and the most exquisite and elaborate in execution.

In 1848, Mr. Layard visited England for a few months, where, notwithstanding the monthly attacks of an aguish fever contracted in the damp apartments which he was obliged to inhabit while prosecuting his excavations at Nimroud, he prepared for the press the two volumes of his Nineveh and its Remains, executed the drawings for the hundred plates, and a volume of inscriptions in the cuneiform character for the British Museum.

The last survivor of Cook's voyage, a sailor named John Wade, is said to be now begging his bread at Kingston-on-Thames. He is within a few months of completing his hundredth year, having been born in New York in May, 1751. He was with Cook when he was killed on the Island of Hawaii; and is said to have served at the battles of Cape St. Vincent, Teneriffe, the Nile, Copenhagen, Camperdown, and Trafalgar.

An interesting collection of sketches, by members of the Sketching Society has been opened to the public. This society numbers among its members the two Chalons, Bone, Christall, Partridge, Stump, Leslie, Stanfield, and Uwins. What gives to the present collection a unique interest is that they are entirely impromptu productions, three hours being the limit allowed for their completion. At each meeting of the society the president announces a subject, and the drawings are made on the spot.

Sir Roger de Coverley's chaplain is familiar to the recollection of all. He has lately found an imitator. The Vicar of Selby announced a few weeks since, that he should that day commence reading the sermons of others, as there were many productions of the ablest divines which were altogether unknown to his parishioners; and he thought the time spent in writing so many new sermons might be more usefully employed in other matters connected with his profession. He then proceeded to read a sermon which he said he had heard preached at the University with great effect.

Professor OWEN, in 1840, had submitted to him for examination, a fossil body, which he was enabled to identify as the tooth of some species of whale. It was subsequently discovered that certain crags upon the coast of Suffolk, especially one at Felixstow, contained an immense quantity of fossils of a similar character, which examinations, undertaken by Owen and Henslow, showed to be rolled and water-worn fragments of the skeletons of extinct species of mammals, mostly of the whale kind. This discovery has been shown by a recent trial in the English courts, to be of immense pecuniary value. A Mr. Lawes took out a patent for the manufacture of super-phosphate of lime, as a substitute for bone-dust, for agricultural purposes, by applying sulphuric acid to any mineral whatever, known or unknown, which might contain the phosphate of lime. It was found that these fossil remains contained of this from 50 to 60 per cent., and Mr. Lawes undertook to extend his patent so as to include the production of the super-phosphate from them. In this he was unsuccessful, the court deciding that he could not claim a monopoly of all the fossil remains in the country. It was shown on the trial, that an income of more than $50,000 a year has been derived from the use of this phosphate.

A number of classical works of decided interest have recently been published; among them are: _Platonis Opera Omnia_. This new edition of Plato is edited by Stallbaum, whose name is a sufficient guarantee for the faithful editorial care bestowed upon it. It is in one volume, small folio, uniform with the edition of Aristotle by Weisse, and that of Cicero by Nobbe.--Lachmann's edition of _Lucretius_ supplies a want which has been long felt of a good critical edition of the philosophical poet. The volume of the text is accompanied by a critical commentary in a separate volume.--The second part of the second volume of Professor Ritschl's edition of _Plautus_ containing the "Pseudulus," has appeared. The editor has the reputation of being the best Plautinian scholar in Germany. He has spent years in the preparation of this edition, having undertaken an entirely new recension of the works of the great dramatic poet.--_Corpus Inscriptionum Græcarum._ This important work, under the editorial charge of the veteran Böckh, with whom is associated Franz, is rapidly approaching completion. The third part of the third volume is published. A fourth part, which will complete the work, is promised speedily.

From the press of the Imperial Academy at St. Petersburgh has appeared the first volume of a collection of _Mohammedan Sources for the History of the Southern Coasts of the Caspian Sea_. The volume contains 643 pages of the Persian text of the history of Tabaristan, Rujan, and Massanderan, by Seher-Eddin, edited, with a German introduction, by Bernhard Dorn, Librarian of the Imperial Library. It gives a history, commencing with the mythical ages and ending with the year 1476, of the various dynasties which have ruled those regions, which have scarcely been brought within the light of authentic history, but to which we must look for the solution of many interesting problems in relation to the progress and development of the race. The editor promises forthwith a translation of the history, with annotations.

Professor HEINRICH EWALD, of Göttingen, has just put forth a translation of and commentary upon the Gospels of Matthew, Mark, and Luke, marked by that free dealing with the sacred text characteristic of the Rationalistic school. He proposes to himself the task of separating what he supposes to be the original substance of the evangelical narrative from subsequent additions and interpolations--"to free the kernel from the Mosaic husk." The author had intended to delay the publication of this commentary until after the publication of his History of the Jews; but he thought he perceived in the present state of religion in Germany, and especially in the alarming decline of the religious element among the masses of the people, a call upon him to furnish an antidote--such as it is. In the preface he takes occasion to make some severe criticisms upon the politics of the day, and in particular those of Prussia.

OBITUARIES.

JOHN JAMES AUDUBON, the Ornithologist, died at his residence a few miles from New York, on the 27th of January. He was born in Louisiana, about 1775, of French parentage, traces of which were apparent through life in the foreign intonation with which he spoke the English language, although he wrote it with great vigor and correctness. He early manifested that enthusiastic love of nature, which subsequently became his ruling passion, and the mainspring of all his endeavors through life. In the preface to his "Ornithological Biography," he gives a vivid sketch of the growth of his fondness for the winged creation. "None but aerial companions," says he, "suited my fancy; no roof seemed so secure to me as that formed of the dense foliage under which the feathered tribes were seen to resort, or the caves and fissures of the massy rocks to which the dark-winged cormorant and the curlew retired to rest, or to protect themselves from the fury of the tempest." With increasing years, a desire for the actual possession of his favorites grew up in his mind. But this longing was nowise satiated by the possession of them dead: with their life their charms were gone. At this period his father showed him a book of illustrations--of no very high artistic excellence, we may well believe. A bush thrown into certain solutions, in a particular state, will cause crystalization. The young enthusiast's mind was in such a state--the vague desires, the indefinite longings crystalized around that Book of Illustrations. He longed to be a creator. To imitate by lines and colors the beings he loved, became the passion of his life. But like all true artists, he was at first doomed to experience the disappointment of being unable to realize his ideal: his drawings so far from truly representing the originals, were even inferior to the engravings in his book. Every year he made hundreds, which he regularly burned upon every succeeding birthday.

In his sixteenth year he was sent to Paris to pursue his education. There he studied drawing under the revolutionary painter David. But his heart was ever in his native woods, and after a stay of eighteen months he gladly returned. His father now gave him a farm near Philadelphia, at the junction of the Pekioming Creek and the Schuylkill. Here he married, and entered into mercantile transactions, apparently with ill success. He was in the forests when he should have been in the counting-house, if he would succeed in business. His friends looked askance at him, as one who only made drawings when he might have made money. They were doubtless correct in their estimate of his capacity. That indomitable spirit which bore him thousands of miles through the untrodden wilderness, softened the earth or the branch of a tree for his bed; "bore bravely up his chin" when he swam the swollen stream, with his rifle and painting materials lashed above his head--was doubtless adequate, if directed to that end, to have gained any given amount of money. Pegasus made an indifferent plow-horse; and Audubon but a poor trader. So after ten years of this divided pursuit, one bright October morning found him floating down the Ohio in a skiff in which were his wife and child, his scanty wares, and a couple of negro rowers. He set up his household gods at Henderson, Kentucky, where he resided for some years, and engaged again, with a partner, in trade. Still he was accustomed to make long excursions, with no companion but his dog and rifle, a tin box strapped to his side containing his brushes and paints. All this while his collection of drawings, which was subsequently to constitute the "Birds of America," grew under his hand; yet strange to say, the thought of publishing never entered his mind.

One spring day in 1810, a stranger entered the counting-room of Audubon, presented specimens of a book he was preparing, and requested his patronage. The stranger was Alexander Wilson, and the book was his "American Ornithology." Audubon was about to subscribe for it, when his partner asked him, in French, why he did so, assuring him that his own drawings were far better, and that he must be as well acquainted with the habits of American birds as the stranger could be. Wilson asked if Audubon had any drawings of birds. A large portfolio was exhibited: and the veteran ornithologist could not avoid the conclusion that his own efforts were far surpassed. He became sad, and though Audubon showed him every attention, loaned him drawings, and accompanied him through the neighboring woods, the thought of being excelled was more than he could bear. He departed, shaking the dust from his feet, and entered in his diary that "literature or art had not a friend in the place."

The year following, we find Audubon far down among the bayous of Florida, still engaged in collecting materials for his work; yet still, apparently, with no definite purpose of publication. Of the next ten or twelve years of his life, we have no particular accounts. But we understand that he has left behind him an autobiography, which will doubtless be made public, and which we venture to predict, will exceed in interest and adventure the lion-king Cumming's African exploits, springing as Audubon's did from high devotion to science, instead of the mere animal instinct of destruction. All this while his great work was growing. But in a single night the result of the labor of years was destroyed by a pair of rats, who selected a box containing two hundred drawings, with more than a thousand figures, as a place in which to rear their plundering brood. "The burning heat," says he, "which rushed through my brain was too great to be endured without affecting the whole of my nervous system. I slept not for several nights, and the days passed like days of oblivion, until the dormant powers being aroused into action through the strength of my constitution, I took up my gun, my note-book, and my pencils, and went forward to the woods as gayly as though nothing had happened." In three years his portfolios were again full.

In 1824, Audubon found himself at Philadelphia, on his way to the great lakes. Here he was introduced to Lucien Bonaparte, who seems to have induced him to determine upon the publication of his work. A year and a half of happy toil ensued, enlivened by a new object. He had loved and wooed Nature for her own dear self; but now he began to feel presentiments that his bride would raise him to a throne among the immortals. In 1826 he set sail for England. His first feeling was that of despondency. What was he, whose acquirements had been won by the solitary wanderings of more than a quarter of a century, amid lonely forest solitudes; what could he be in comparison with those who had been trained and taught by intercourse with civilized life? But these feelings were of brief duration. The wonderful backwoodsman was warmly welcomed by the best and wisest men of Europe. Cuvier was his admirer, Alexander von Humboldt became his cherished friend and correspondent. "The hearts of all," wrote Wilson, "warmed toward Audubon, who were capable of conceiving the difficulties, dangers, and sacrifices that must have been encountered, endured, and overcome, before genius could have embodied these, the glory of its innumerable triumphs."

And so Audubon was encouraged to publish his work. It was a vast undertaking. It would take sixteen years to accomplish it; he was now somewhat declined into the vale of years, and would be an old man when it was completed; and when the first drawings were put into the hands of the engraver he had not a single subscriber. But his heart was upborne by reliance on that Power, on whom depends success. After three years spent in Europe, he returned to America in 1829, leaving his work in process of execution in Edinburgh. Toward the close of 1830 his first volume, containing one hundred plates, every figure of the size and colors of life, was issued. It was hailed with universal applause; royal names headed his subscription list, which, at one thousand dollars each, reached the number of 175, of whom eighty were Americans. His name was enrolled among the members of the learned Societies of Great Britain and the Continent, and the world claimed him among her great men.

In the Autumn of 1831, Audubon visited Washington, where he received from Government letters of protection and assistance, to be used at all national ports, revenue, and naval stations. Having been delayed by sickness, he proceeded upon his expedition toward the close of the following summer. He tracked the forests of Maine, explored the shores of the British provinces, bringing back rich spoils; and returned to Charleston, to spend the winter in the preparation of his drawings and the accompanying descriptions. In 1834 he published his second volume. The three following years were passed in exploring expeditions, mostly to the South, one of which was to Florida, another to Texas, in a vessel placed at his disposal by Government, and in the preparation of his drawings and descriptions. At the close of this period he published the fourth and last volume of plates, and the fifth of descriptions. The whole work contained 435 plates, comprising more than a thousand figures of birds, all drawn of the size of life, in their natural attitudes and circumstances, and colored from nature.

In 1839 Audubon commenced in this country the republication of the "Birds of America," in seven large octavo volumes, which were issued during the succeeding five years. Before the expiration of this period, however, he commenced the preparation of the "Quadrupeds of America," of which he had materials for five large volumes: in the literary department of which he was assisted by Dr. Bachman, of Charleston. This has recently been concluded, and forms a monument to his memory hardly less imposing than his earlier work. In the meanwhile, though more than sixty winters had passed over his head, he projected an expedition to the Rocky Mountains, with all the adventurous spirit of his youth. But he perhaps over-rated his physical capabilities; at least the expedition was not made. The concluding years of his life were passed on the beautiful estate of Minniesland, upon the Hudson, some ten miles from New York. For several years his health had been giving way, until the time when he passed from earth to the still land of the immortals. His was a happy life. He had found his vocation, and pursued it for long years, earnestly, faithfully, and triumphantly. The forms of beauty which won his early love, and drew him into the broad forests, he brought back to cheer us who can not follow his footsteps. He has linked himself with the undying loveliness of Nature; and, therefore, his works are a possession to all men forevermore.

JOSEPH BEM, the famous Polish General in the late Hungarian war, died at Aleppo in the early part of December. It is somewhat singular that during the whole course of hostilities he declared his conviction that he should survive until the year 1850. Bem was born in 1795 at Tarnow in Gallicia. Having completed his education at the Military School in Warsaw, he entered the army, and served as lieutenant of artillery in the divisions of Davoust and Macdonald. On the conclusion of peace, he remained with the Polish army, who were now in the Russian service, where he attained the rank of captain and adjutant, and was finally appointed teacher in the Artillery School at Warsaw. Dissatisfied with his position, he applied for a discharge, which was granted; but for some unexplained cause he was summoned before a court-martial, and sentenced to an imprisonment of two months. From 1825 to the outbreak of the Polish insurrection in 1830, he resided at Lemberg, where he busied himself with mechanical and mathematical studies. When the rising of the Poles took place, he hastened to Warsaw, was appointed major, and obtained the command of a regiment of flying artillery. For his distinguished services at the battles of Igania and Ostrolenka he was raised successively to the rank of lieutenant-colonel and colonel, and received the command of the Polish artillery. At Ostrolenka he was wounded, but as he lay upon the ground, he directed the movements of his guns. When the cause of Poland was lost, he headed the first emigration to France, where the greater portion of the next eighteen years was spent. In 1833 he entered into negotiations with Don Pedro of Portugal to raise a Polish regiment for his service; but the project was unsuccessful; and Bem incurred the suspicions of his fellow exiles, by one of whom an attempt was made to assassinate him. The following years he passed in France and England, where we trace him by several treatises which he published upon the organization of artillery, the manufacture of powder, the distillation of brandy, the modes of working in wood and metal, and a system of mnemonics. He also taught languages, for a time, for very scanty pay, at London and Oxford, but was obliged to abandon this occupation in consequence of a surgical operation for the extraction of a bullet; for a time he was in receipt of the few shillings weekly which the Polish Association were able to bestow upon destitute exiles. The bread of exile which Dante found so bitter, was sweet compared with that which Bem, for long years, was forced to taste. He made an attempt to establish a Polytechnic Company, near Paris, which failed from the want of adequate funds.

Upon the breaking out of the revolutions of 1848, we find Bem in the thick of the conflict. On the 14th of October he made his appearance at Vienna, where he endeavored to organize the revolt in the Austrian capital. Here he could never have anticipated success; but he was aware that resistance in Vienna would give the Hungarians time to arm. Finding the cause hopeless in Vienna, he betook himself to Kossuth, at Comorn. Here he had some difficulty in proving his identity; but at length Bem succeeded in winning the confidence of the Hungarian ruler. At Pesth, where he concerted future operations with Kossuth, another attempt was made to assassinate Bem by a young Pole who had conceived the idea that he had betrayed the popular cause at Vienna. From Pesth Bem was dispatched by Kossuth to Transylvania, in order to organize the revolt against Austria. The transactions in Transylvania formed perhaps the most brilliant portion of the whole Hungarian war. In the course of ten weeks, with a newly raised army, always inferior in force to the enemy, by a series of hard fighting and skillful manoeuvres, he placed Transylvania in the hands of the Hungarians. The accession of Russia to the side of Austria was decisive of the contest. Bem, sorely pressed in Transylvania, was summoned by Kossuth to assume the command in chief; and at Temesvar, on the 10th of August 1849, he lost the last battle of Hungary; though he here displayed the highest qualities of the soldier and the general. The Austrians were repulsed at all points, mowed down by the terrible fire from the Hungarian artillery, which Bem had posted with his accustomed skill; but his troops were exhausted, and a fresh body of Austrians under Prince Lichtenstein, decided the day. "A single draught of wine to each hussar," said Guyon, "would have saved the battle." In the rout which ensued, Bem, who was weakened by his wounds, was thrown from his horse, and broke his collar bone. The day following the disastrous battle of Temesvar, Kossuth resigned the dictatorship into the hands of Görgey, who two days after, on the 13th of August, surrendered his whole army, consisting of 24,000 men with 144 pieces of cannon, to the Russians.

Bem at first made some efforts to prolong the hopeless contest; but it was in vain, and on the 17th of the month he bade farewell to the country from which he had hoped so much. Kossuth, Dembinski, Bem, and some others took refuge in Turkey, where their residence or extradition was made a political question by the powers of Europe. In the anticipation of being given up, Bem embraced Mohammedanism, and entered the Turkish service, under the name of Murad Bey. There is nothing to wonder at in this procedure. His one principle through life had been hatred to Russia, and to this he would not hesitate to sacrifice any and every other consideration; his only religion was to avenge his country upon the Czar; if that could be done, it mattered little to him whether it was effected under the banner of the cross or the crescent. He persisted to the last in his profession of Mohammedanism, and was buried with military honors, greatly lamented by the Ottoman government, into whose military organization he had introduced many beneficial reforms. Bem possessed military genius of a high order; he was bold and rapid in his decisions, fertile in resources, whether to take advantage of a victory or to retrieve a defeat. He clearly perceived that the most effective arm in modern warfare is artillery, the service of which he always superintended in person. Previous to a battle he appointed the positions his guns were to assume, examined and leveled them in person, whence he was nicknamed, by his German legion, "the Piano-forte player." At the time of his death, he had reached his fifty-sixth year, but the severe exposures which he had undergone, and his numerous wounds, gave him the appearance of a still greater age. As a man, all who knew Bem were enthusiastic in his praise. Generous in disposition, gentle and modest in demeanor, he inspired deep personal attachment in all with whom he came in contact.

VISCOUNT ALFORD (John Hume Cust) died on the 2d of January. In 1849 he succeeded to the vast Bridgewater estates, and assumed, by royal license, the name of Egerton, in place of that of Cust. He was a member of the House of Commons from 1836 to 1847. He inherited an estate from the late Earl of Bridgewater, under a will of very singular character. By this document it was provided that unless Lord Alford should, within five years, succeed in gaining a rank in the peerage higher than that of earl, the estate should go to his brother, with a like condition, which also failing, it was to pass to another branch of the family.

THE DUKE OF NEWCASTLE (Henry Pelham Fiennes Pelham Clinton) died Jan. 12, at the age of 66. He was one of the most consistent and unbending of the Tory conservative nobility of England, and a most strenuous opponent of every measure of reform. He said of himself that "on looking back to the past, I can honestly assert that I repent of nothing that I have done. _Vestigia nulla retrorsum._ Such has been the cradle of my opinions: time may have matured them, and given them something like authority; at all events, the sentiments that might have been doubtful, are now rootedly confirmed." Thus incapable of learning by experience, of becoming wiser as a man than he was when a boy, his political career was thoroughly consistent. He was alike opposed to Catholic emancipation, the repeal of the Test Act, and any modification of the Corn Laws. When Lord Lieutenant of Nottinghamshire, he refused, in spite of the positive demand of Government, to insert in the commission of the peace the names of two gentlemen who were not members of the Established Church. When the Reform Bill was in agitation, he stood up manfully for the rotten boroughs which enabled him to return six members to the House of Commons, the disfranchisement of which cost him a large sum which he had invested in property of which the franchise constituted the main value. His hereditary possessions were very large, and by his wife he obtained estates to the value of £12,000 per annum, besides personal property to the amount of £200,000; yet, owing to extensive purchases of unproductive estates, he was embarrassed in pecuniary matters. Apart from his narrow and bigoted politics, his character was marked by many noble and excellent traits.

FREDERICK BASTIAT, the leader of the free-trade party in France, died at Rome, on the 24th of December. He was a member of the National Assembly; and his death was hastened by his severe and protracted labors during the last session. His essays, bearing the general title of _Sophismes Economiques_, originally published in a periodical, the _Journal des Economistes_, of which he was editor, have been made known to the American public through the columns of the _Evening Post_, which is a sufficient guarantee of their authority with the upholders of that policy.

W.H. MAXWELL, the Irish novelist, died at Musselburg, near Edinburgh, December 29. In early life he was a captain in the British army, and noted for his social qualities. He subsequently entered the Church, and obtained the benefice of prebendary of Balla, a wild district in Connaught, with an income, but no congregation or official duties. Among his works we recollect "Hector O'Halloran," "Story of My Life," "Wild Sports of the West," and many humorous sketches in the periodical literature of the day.

PROFESSOR SCHUMACHER, the Astronomer of the Observatory at Altona, died on the 28th of December, in his 71st year. For many years he conducted the _Astronomische Nachrichten_, in which capacity he was well known in the scientific world. He had been successively Professor of Astronomy at the University of Copenhagen, and Director of the Observatory at Manheim, in Baden. From 1817 to 1821 he measured the length of the degree of longitude from Copenhagen to the western coast of Jutland, and that of the degree of latitude from the northern extremity of Jutland to the frontiers of Hanover. He subsequently executed for the English Government the measure of the difference of longitude between the observatories of Greenwich and Altona.

Literary Notices.

_The Howadji; or, Nile Notes_ (published by Harper and Brothers), is a new volume of Oriental travels, by a young New-Yorker, describing a voyage on the Nile and the marvels of Egypt, with a freshness and originality that give it all the fascination of a romance. Speaking in the character of the Howadji, which is the name given by the Egyptians to foreign travelers, the author describes a succession of rare incidents, revealing the very heart of Eastern life, and transporting us into the midst of its dim, cloud-like scenes, so as to impress us with the strongest sense of reality. He does not claim the possession of any antiquarian lore; he has no ambition to win the fame of a discoverer; nor in the slightest degree is he a collector of statistical facts. He leaves aside all erudite speculations, allowing the moot points of geography and history to settle themselves, and gives himself up to the dreamy fancies and romantic musings which cluster round the imagination in the purple atmosphere of the East. His work is, in fact, a gorgeous prose-poem, inspired by his recollections of strange and vivid experiences, and clothed in the quaint, picturesque costume which harmonizes with his glowing Oriental visions. No previous traveler has been so richly imbued with the peculiar spirit of the East. His language is pervaded with its luxurious charm. Bathed in the golden light of that sunny clime, his words breathe a delicious enchantment, and lull the soul in softest reveries. The descriptive portions of the book are often diversified with a vein of profound and tender reflection, and with incidental critical allusions to Art, which have the merit both of acuteness and originality. From the uncommon force and freedom of mind, exhibited in this volume, with its genuine poetic inspirations, we foresee that a brilliant career in letters is opened to the author, if his ambition or tastes impel him to that sphere of activity.

_Crumbs from the Land o' Cakes_, by JOHN KNOX (published by Gould and Lincoln), is a rapid sketch of a tour in Scotland, by an enthusiastic admirer and native of that country. It makes no pretensions to originality or literary skill, but written without affectation, and from recent actual experience, it makes a very readable volume. The title is quaintly explained in the preface. "Crumbs are but trifles, though a morsel of manchineel may poison a man, and the same quantity of gingerbread may tickle his palate; but the crumbs here presented do not belong to either class. All Scotchmen know that the cakes for which their native land is celebrated are made of oatmeal (baked hard); which, though substantial, are very dry: this consideration will show the propriety of the title. It is also appropriate in another respect, for the writer is conscious that these fragmentary notes of travel in his native country are, in comparison to the richness of the materials and the subject, but as the crumbs to the loaf."

Ticknor, Reed, and Fields, Boston, have published a third volume of DE QUINCY's _Writings_, comprising his _Miscellaneous Essays_ on sacred subjects, of which the quaint peculiarity of the title is suggestive of the bold, fanciful genius of the author. Among them, we find "Murder, considered as one of the Fine Arts;" "The Vision of Sudden Death;" "Dinner, Real and Reputed," and others, all redolent of the strange imaginative conceits, the playful toying with language, and the startling intensity of description which characterize the Visions of the English Opium Eater.

The same house have issued a neat duodecimo edition of GOETHE's _Faust_, translated by HAYWARD, of which the curious aesthetic and philological merits are well known to every German scholar. It is an almost literal transcript of the original into English prose, but executed with such a profound appreciation of its spirit, such nice verbal accuracy, and such exquisite handling of the delicate mechanism of language, as to present a more faithful idea of the wild and marvelous beauty of the great German poem, than the most successful translation in verse. According to Mr. Hayward's theory of translation, "If the English reader, not knowing German, be made to stand in the same relation to Faust as the English reader, thoroughly acquainted with German stands in toward it--that is, if the same impressions be conveyed through the same sort of medium, whether bright or dusky, coarse or fine--the very extreme point of a translator's duty has been attained." The loudly-expressed verdict of competent literary judges (so far as we know without a dissenting voice), and the numerous editions it has gone through on both sides of the Atlantic, are ample proofs of the felicitous and effective manner in which the translator has completed the task thus imposed upon himself. The Preface and Notes attached to this volume, show the vivacity of his genius, and his rich stores of choice learning.

_Lavengro: The Scholar--The Gipsy--The Priest_, by GEORGE BORROW (published by Harper and Brothers, and George P. Putnam), is the title of certain portions of the unique autobiography of the erratic author of "The Bible in Spain." Among the many things which he professes to have aimed at in this book, is the encouragement of charity, and free and genial manners, as well as the exposure of humbug in various forms. The incidents related are in accordance with this design. Borrow's early life was filled with strange and startling adventures. With a taste from the cradle for savage freedom, he never became subject to social conventionalisms. His soul expanded in the free air, by the side of running streams, and in the mountain regions of liberty. He received the strongest impressions from all the influences of nature. He was led by a strange magnetism to intimacy with the most eccentric characters. An ample fund of material for an interesting narrative was thus provided. He has made use of them in his own peculiar and audacious manner. A more self-reliant writer is not to be found in English literature. He has no view to the effect of his words on the reader, but aims only to tell the story with which his mind teems. Hence his pages are as fresh as morning dew, and often run riot with a certain gipsy wildness. His narrative has little continuity. He piles up isolated incidents, which remain in his memory, but with no regard to regular sequence or completeness. On this account he is sometimes not a little provoking. He shuts off the stream at the moment your curiosity is most strongly excited. But the joyous freedom of his spirit, his consummate skill as a story teller, and the startling eccentricities of his life, so little in accordance with the tameness and dull proprieties of English society, give an elastic vitality to his book, and make it of more interest to the reader than almost any recent issue of the English press.

Harper and Brothers have commenced the publication of a new series of juvenile tales by JACOB ABBOTT, entitled _The Franconia Stories_. The first volume, called _Malleville_, is a very agreeable narrative of life in New Hampshire, abounding in attractive incidents, and related in the fresh and natural style for which the author is justly celebrated. This series is intended by the author to exert a kindly moral influence on the hearts and dispositions of the readers, although it will contain little formal exhortation and instruction. He has no doubt hit upon the true philosophy, in this respect, nothing being so distasteful to a young reader as the interruption of the narrative by the statement of a moral, unless he can contrive to swallow the sugar, while he rejects the medicine. Mr. Abbott relies on his quiet and peaceful pictures of happy domestic life, and the expression of such sentiments and feelings as it is desirable to exhibit in the presence of children. He is far more sure of the effect aimed at by this method, than by any insipid dilutions of Solomon or Seneca.

_The Practical Cook-Book_ (published by Lippincott, Grambo, and Co.) is the title of a new work on gastronomic science, by a Lady of Boston, which brings the taste and philosophy of that renowned seat of the Muses to the elucidation of the mysteries of the cuisine. The young housekeeper will be saved from many perplexities by consulting its lucid oracles.

Edward H. Fletcher has published a new edition of the celebrated _Discourse on Missions_, by JOHN FOSTER, delivered in 1818, before the London Baptist Missionary Society, with a Preliminary Essay on the Skepticism of the Church, by Rev. Joseph P. Thompson, of the Broadway Tabernacle. It is republished in this country with a view to counteract the impression since made by the extraordinary writer, in his critique on Rev. Dr. Harris's popular work, "The Great Commission," in which Foster alludes to the missionary enterprise in terms of disparagement, giving the opposers of evangelical missions and evangelical religion the sanction of his great name, and the authority of his latest opinions. In the opinion of the Editor, no better refutation of his argument can be given than is contained in the Missionary Discourse from Mr. Foster's own pen. Being written in the maturity of his intellect, and regarded by himself as one of his most successful efforts, it may be taken as a more authentic expression of his opinions than the letter to Dr. Harris, which was written in his old age: an old age rendered gloomy and morose by seclusion from the world, and by the failure of the schemes which he had fondly cherished in more ardent years. The character of the Discourse is tersely summed up in a short paragraph by Mr. Thompson. "In the thoroughness of its discussion and the comprehensiveness of its view; in the clearness and strength of its reasoning, and the force and beauty of its diction; in the glow of its sentiment, and the sublimity of its faith, this discourse stands at the head of productions of its class, as an exhibition of the grandeur of the work of missions, and of the imperative claims of that work upon the Church of Christ. There is nothing in it local or temporary, but it comes to Christians of this generation with all the freshness and power which thirty years ago attended its delivery." The Preliminary Essay by the Editor is a vigorous and uncompromising attack on the prevalent skepticism of the Church in respect to the obligations of the Missionary Enterprise.