Chapter V (3)

As respects the Allies, Todleben uniformly credits the French army with more of every military quality than the English, save personal courage alone. From the commanding general to the lowest private, every technical detail of duty seems to have been better done by the French. At the height of the siege, it became "a war of sorties" on the part of the Russians, and Todleben says,--"_Apropos_ of those sorties, it is indispensable to make the remark here, that the French guarded their trenches with much more vigilance, and defended them with incomparably more tenacity, than the English. It frequently happened that our volunteers approached the English trenches without being perceived, and without even firing a single shot, and found the soldiers of the guard sitting in the trench in the most perfect security, far from their firelocks, which were stacked in piles. With the French, matters were quite different. They were always on the _qui vive_, so that it rarely happened we were able to get near them without having been remarked, and without having to receive beforehand a sharp fire of musketry."

This, however, as Russell remarks, was when the English army was at its lowest condition of neglect; but that simply transfers the indictment to another count. And it is interesting to observe, that Russell's claim for the English army and Todleben's claim for the Russian army come at last to about the same point, namely, that the individual soldier is in each case tough and resolute to the last degree. But this is only the beginning of the merits of the French array, which to individual courage superadds all that organization can attain.

As to the poor Turks, they are dismissed with much the same epitaph which might long since have been written for our colored troops, if some of our Department commanders had been suffered to have their way:--"As to the Turks, the Allies despised them, and the English used them as beasts of burden; in short, they lost three hundred men a day, till they almost perished out, and the remains of their army were sent away."

In view of the grander issues of our own pending contest, with its vaster scale of munitions and of men, one cannot always feel the due interest in successive pages about battles like "Little Inkermann," where the total of Russian killed and wounded comprised twenty-five officers and two hundred and forty-five men. But it is not numbers which make a contest memorable. Even the mere contemplation of the Crimean War had an appreciable influence on the military training of the American people; and the clear narratives of Todleben, written "in his usual elaborate engineering way, in which every word is used like a gabion," form a good sequel to that unconscious instruction.

_Vanity Fair._ A Novel without a Hero. By WILLIAM MAKEPEACE
THACKERAY. With Illustrations by the Author. New York: Harper &
Brothers. 3 vols. 12mo.

In the novels of Thackeray, essay is so much mixed up with narrative, and comment with characterization, that they can hardly be thoroughly appreciated in poor editions. The temptation to skip is almost irresistible, when wisdom can be purchased only at the expense of eyesight. We are therefore glad to welcome the commencement of a new edition of his writings, over whose pages the reader can linger at his pleasure, and quietly enjoy subtilties of humor and observation which in previous perusals he overlooked. The present volumes, published by the Harpers, are among the most tasteful and comely products of the Cambridge University Press. Printed in large type on tinted paper, elegantly bound in green cloth, and with a fac-simile of the author's autograph on the cover, every copy has the appearance of being a presentation copy. No English edition of "Vanity Fair" is equal to this American one in respect either to convenience of form or beauty of mechanical execution. The illustrations are numerous, well engraved, and embody the writer's own conceptions of his scenes and characters, and are often deliciously humorous.

"Vanity Fair," though it does not include the whole extent of Thackeray's genius, is the most vigorous exhibition of its leading characteristics. In freshness of feeling, elasticity of movement, and unity of aim, it is favorably distinguished from its successors, which too often give the impression of being composed of successive accumulations of incidents and persons, that drift into the story on no principle of artistic selection and combination. The style, while it has the raciness of individual peculiarity and the careless ease of familiar gossip, is as clear, pure, and flexible as if its sentences had been subjected to repeated revision, and every pebble which obstructed its lucid and limpid flow had been laboriously removed. The characterization is almost perfect of its kind. Becky Sharp, the Marquis of Steyne, Sir Pitt Crawley and the whole Crawley family, Amelia, the Osbornes, Major Dobbin, not to mention others, are as well known to most cultivated people as their most intimate acquaintances in the Vanity Fair of the actual world. It has always seemed to us that Mr. Osborne, the father of George, a representation of the most hateful phase of English character, is one of the most vividly true and life-like of all the delineations in the book, and more of a typical personage than even Becky or the Marquis of Steyne. Thackeray's theory of characterization proceeds generally on the assumption that the acts of men and women are directed not by principle, but by instincts, selfish or amiable,--that toleration for human weakness is possible only by lowering the standard of human capacity and obligation,--and that the preliminary condition of an accurate knowledge of human character is distrust of ideals and repudiation of patterns. This view is narrow, and by no means covers all the facts of history and human life, but what relative truth it has is splendidly illustrated in "Vanity Fair." There is not a person in the book who excites the reader's respect, and not one who fails to excite his interest. The morbid quickness of the author's perceptions of the selfish element, even in his few amiable characters, is a constant source of surprise. The novel not only has no hero, but implies the non-existence of heroism. Yet the fascination of the book is indisputable, and it is due to a variety of causes besides its mere exhibition of the worldly side of life. Among these, the perfect intellectual honesty of the writer, the sad or satirical sincerity with which he gives in his evidence against human nature, is the most prominent. With all his lightness of manner, he is essentially a witness under oath, and testifies only to what he is confident he knows. Perhaps this quality, rare not only in novel-writing, but in all writing, would not compensate for the limitation of his perceptions and the repulsiveness of much that he perceives, were it not for the peculiar charm of his representation. It is here that the individuality of the man appears, and it presents a combination of sentiments and powers more original perhaps than the matter of his works. Take from "Vanity Fair" that special element of interest which comes from Thackeray's own nature, and it would lose the greater portion of its fascination. It is not so much what is done, as the way in which it is done, that surprises and delights; and the manner is always inimitable, even when the matter is common.

_Seaside and Fireside Fairies._ Translated from the German of
George Blum and Louis Wahl. By A. L. WISTAR. Philadelphia:
Ashmead & Evans.

These pretty fairy stories peep at us out of German-land through a pleasant, clear translation, and they remind us how easily the supernatural and loves to dwell in airborn castles. The beautiful instinct of reverence common to child-life is readily taken advantage of by writers for the young; but where in England we find in stories some angel-mother who discovers the treachery of her governess and teaches her own children, or a rotund uncle who tips the boys, providentially, as it seems, in Germany the protectors of children possess no nearer abode than the land of Fairy, and their presence is as rare as that of the Indian "Vanishers." Perhaps, even among American children, the tales which approximate more nearly to their experience hold the strongest attractive power; yet, in the wide range of the commingled races of the United States, there must be many children who long for stories of that dear Dream-land familiar to their thoughts, and to whom these stories would be a happy era in childhood's experience.

RECENT AMERICAN PUBLICATIONS.

Lectures on the Science of Language, delivered at the Royal Institution of Great Britain, in February, March, April, and May, 1863. By Max Mueller, Fellow of All-Souls College, Oxford; Correspondent de l'Institut de France. Second Series. With Thirty-One Illustrations. New York. C. Scribner. 12mo. pp. 622. $3.00.

Meditations on the Essence of Christianity, and on the Religious Questions of the Day. By M. Guizot. Translated from the French, under the Superintendence of the Author. New York. C. Scribner. 12mo. pp. 356. $1.75.

The Beautiful Widow. By Mrs. Percy B. Shelley. Philadelphia. T. B. Peterson & Brothers. 12mo. pp. 244. $2.00.

The Differential Calculus: with Unusual and Particular Analysis of its Elementary Principles, and Copious Illustrations of its Practical Application. By John Spare, A. M., M. D. Boston. Bradley, Dayton, & Co. 12mo. pp. xx., 244. $2.00.

Vest-Pocket Lexicon. An English Dictionary of all except Familiar Words; including the Principal Scientific and Technical Terms, and Foreign Moneys, Weights, and Measures. By Jabez Jenkins. Philadelphia. J. B. Lippincott & Co. 18mo. pp. 563. 62 cts.

The American Conflict. A History of the Great Rebellion. By Horace Greeley. Volume One. Hartford. O. D. Case & Co, 8vo. pp. 648. $5.00.