Chapter TWENTY: Third (3)

'But they didn't devote the whole evening to music. After a while
they played at forfeits; for it is good to be children sometimes,
and never better than at Christmas, when its mighty Founder was a
child himself. Stop! There was first a game at blindman's buff. Of
course there was. And I no more believe Topper was really blind
than I believe he had eyes in his boots. My opinion is, that it
was a done thing between him and Scrooge's nephew; and that the
Ghost of Christmas Present knew it. The way he went after that
plump sister in the lace tucker, was an outrage on the credulity
of human nature. Knocking down the fire-irons, tumbling over the
chairs, bumping up against the piano, smothering himself among the
curtains, wherever she went, there went he. He always knew where
the plump sister was. He wouldn't catch any body else. If you had
fallen up against him, as some of them did, and stood there; he
would have made a feint endeavoring to seize you, which would have
been an affront to your understanding: and would instantly have
sidled off in the direction of the plump sister. She often cried
out that it wasn't fair; and it really was not. But when, at last,
he caught her; when, in spite of all her silken rustlings, and her
rapid flutterings past him, he got her into a corner whence there
was no escape; then his conduct was the most execrable. For his
pretending not to know her; his pretending that it was necessary
to touch her head-dress, and farther to assure himself of her
identity by pressing a certain ring upon her finger, and a certain
chain about her neck; was vile, monstrous! No doubt she told him
her opinion of it, when, another blindman being in office, they
were so very confidential together, behind the curtains.'

The Ghost of Christmas to Come is the third spirit. It is a stately figure, surrounded in black and impenetrable drapery. It leads SCROOGE into the heart of the city, and he hears his acquaintance talking jestingly of one departed; into the Exchange, and he sees another standing against his peculiar pillar; into a haunt of infamy, where wretches are dividing the spoils and hoardings of the dead; into a wretched room, where a corpse lies shrouded, whose face Scrooge dares not uncover; into dwellings made miserable by the grasping avarice of those who had wealth they could not use; into his nephew's house, shorn of its comforts, where the inmates, care-worn and weary, are wringing their hands with distress; into poor BOB CRATCHIT'S abode, made cheerless by death; and lastly, into a sad churchyard, where, on the stone of a neglected grave, is inscribed his own name! He implores the spirit to say whether these shadows may not be changed by an altered life. Its trembling hand seems to give consent. He pleads earnestly for a more decisive sign, and while he does so, the phantom dwindles down into a bed-post, and SCROOGE sits upright in his bed. Who cannot imagine the conclusion? It is broad day. He looks out of the window: the bells are ringing; the people are going to church; all proclaim it as Christmas Day. The future is yet before him, and he is resolved to make the most of it. The prize turkey is got in haste from the neighboring poulterer's, and sent by a cab to BOB CRATCHIT'S; and SCROOGE hastens off to his nephew's to dinner, where he finds the vision of the spirit realized. SCROOGE from that hour is another and a better man. We have in conclusion but three words to say to every reader of the KNICKERBOCKER who may peruse our notice of this production: READ THE WORK.

WANDERINGS OF A JOURNEYMAN TAILOR THROUGH EUROPE AND THE EAST. Between
the years 1824 and 1840. By P. D. HOLTHAUS, Journeyman Tailor, from
Werdohl, in Westphalia. Translated from the third German edition, by
WILLIAM HOWITT. J. WINCHESTER: 'New World' Press.

An air of great simplicity and truth pervades this wander-book of the German schneider. Mr. HOWITT tells us, that when in the autumn of 1840 he returned to his native village, a great reputation preceded him, and all came, eager to see the brave traveller, and to listen to the relation of his adventures. He never sought purposely to turn conversation upon the subject of his travels, nor to impress an idea of his own importance; but when he was drawn into discourse, it was speedily found that he had noted and deeply impressed on his mind every thing with a truly admirable interest, and an acute spirit of observation, for one of his rank and education; that he had not merely passed through the countries, but had gleaned valuable matter on his journey; various things which he had brought with him testified this interest, such as different kinds of coin, engravings, plans of cities, etc. We have found, on an examination necessarily cursory, the commendatory remarks of the Berlin _Gesellschafter_ upon this work to be well deserved: 'We see in the individual expressions almost every where the evidence of its being the production of immediate observation. There prevails through the whole a noble simplicity and singleness of purpose, a genuinely German sound mode of thinking; here and there is not wanting a humorous and pithy remark. The author sees in every place nature and men without spectacles, and thence it arises that we acquire from his book a more living and actual view of foreign countries, especially of Egypt, Palestine, and Turkey, than was the case from the travelled labors of many a learned and celebrated man. Frequently, nay almost always, it is a fact, that the learned are destitute of the opportunity of acquiring a knowledge of the real life of the people, while it is exactly here that the greatest peculiarity of the manners and customs of foreigners is to be found. Our honest hand-worker lived among the people, and therefore possessed the best means to describe them in graphic characters.' There is something very forcible and comprehensive in the subjoined passage from the author's preface. It is indeed a sort of compendium of the most interesting portion of the writer's journeyings:

'From my youth up, it was my most living desire to see the world.
When I heard or read of foreign lands, I became sad at heart, and
thought: 'Wert thou but of years that thou couldst travel!' Now
are all the wishes of my youth fulfilled. I have made the attempt
by land and water, and that in three quarters of the world. I have
wandered several times through GERMANY, POLAND, HUNGARY, and
WALLACHIA; I was a long time in BUDAPEST and CONSTANTINOPLE; and
undertook, with the money which I had saved there, a pilgrimage
through EGYPT to the HOLY LAND. I kneeled at the BIRTH-PLACE and
the SEPULCHRE of the SAVIOUR; stood in adoration on the holy MOUNT
ZION, on TABOR, GOLGOTHA, and the MOUNT OF OLIVES; bathed in
JORDAN; washed myself in the LAKE OF GENNESARETH; looked in vain
around me on the DEAD SEA for living objects; was in the workshop
of ST. JOSEPH; and in many other holy places of which the sacred
Scriptures make mention. Thence I returned to Constantinople, and
betook myself through Athens, where I worked nearly a year, and
thence through Italy, France, and Belgium, homeward to my
Fatherland.'

The first German edition of fifteen hundred copies of the work was at once exhausted; a second speedily followed; a third was soon announced; and the fourth is doubtless ere this before a wide class of German readers. We cheerfully commend the book to the public acceptance.

BENTHAMIANA: OR SELECT EXTRACTS FROM THE WORKS OF JEREMY BENTHAM. With
an Outline Opinion on the Principal Subjects discussed in his Works.
In one volume, pp. 446. Philadelphia: LEA AND BLANCHARD. New-York:
WILEY AND PUTNAM.

This work contains a copious selection of those passages in the works of JEREMY BENTHAM which appear to be chiefly distinguished for merit of a simply rhetorical character; which, appearing often in the midst of long and arduous processes of reasoning, or in the course of elaborate descriptions of minute practical arrangements, demanding from an active mind severe thought and unflagging attention, have scarcely had their due weight with the general reader, nor secured their just meed of admiration. He was singularly careless, writes his editor, in distributing his pleasing illustrations of playfulness, or pathos, or epigrammatic expression. His 'mission' he considered to be that of an instructor and improver; and the flowers which, equally with more substantial things, were the produce of his vigorous intellect, he looked upon as scarcely worthy of passing attention, and deserving of no more notice than to be permitted to grow wherever the more valued objects of his labors left them a little room. The volume comprehends a vast variety of sound opinion, and able though brief argument upon themes which relate to the social, moral and religious well-being of mankind. Touching the style of the writer, as evinced in these selections, we should say that it was formed mainly upon a due avoidance of prolixity, (an observance not always characteristic of BENTHAM'S writings,) concerning which he himself very justly remarks: 'Prolixity may be where redundancy is not. Prolixity may arise not only from the multifarious insertion of unnecessary articles, but from the conservation of too many necessary ones in a sentence; as a workman may be overladen not only with rubbish, which is of no use for him to carry, but with materials the most useful and necessary, when heaped up in loads too heavy for him at once.' A useful hint this, to unpractised writers.

THE CORRESPONDENCE BETWEEN BURNS AND CLARINDA. With a Memoir of Mrs.
M'LEHOSE, (CLARINDA.) Arranged and edited by her Grandson, W. C.
M'LEHOSE. In one volume, pp. 293. New-York: R. P. BIXBY AND COMPANY.

We have no doubt that the contents of this well-executed little volume are altogether authentic; full particulars relative to the custody and authenticity of the correspondence and the state of preservation of the original manuscripts being given in the preface. But we are very sorry to say so much against the book as this fact implies. It would be far better for the reputation of the immortal Bard of Scotland, if some hereditary friend, chary of his undying fame, were to come before the public with a pamphlet disproving entirely the agency of BURNS in this correspondence. To those who are acquainted with previous records in the private history of the world-renowned poet, it is painful to convict him, out of his own mouth, of duplicity in matters of the heart; of insincerity in the profession of simultaneous passion for various lovers; and of other acts which are alike indefensible and disreputable. We must needs marvel too that the 'CLARINDA' of the correspondence should have been doomed by a near descendant to the exposure inseparable from the revelations of this volume. That the treatment which she received at the hands of one whose duty it was to 'love, cherish, and protect' her, was equally undeserved and inexcusable, we can well believe; but that the 'platonic attachment,' which sprung up in a night, like the gourd of JONAH, and gradually waxed to 'passion at fever-heat,' was justified by these facts, or sanctioned by propriety, or that its history in detail is calculated to elevate the character of woman, or exercise a healthful moral influence, we have just as little reason to doubt. There is a sprinkling of verse in an appendix, which BURNS was good enough to praise. It is of that kind 'which neither gods nor men permit;' and is conclusive, not of BURNS'S judgment, but of his 'tender' sycophancy.

EDITOR'S TABLE.

SOME 'SENTIMENTS' ON SONNETS, WITH SUNDRY SPECIMENS.--Thanks to our ever-welcome correspondent, 'T. W. P.' for his pleasant, pertinent and improving sentiments on sonnets. Arriving at too late an hour for a place among our guests at the _table d' hôte_, perhaps he will not object to sit at our humble side-table, and converse familiarly with the reader; since, as honest SANCHO remarked of the Duke, 'Wherever _he_ sits, there will be the _first place_.' Our friend has a fruitful theme. How many borrowed prose-passages have we seen, with their original brightness dimmed or deflected in a sorry sonnet! Nine in ten of our modern examples in this kind, when one comes to analyze them, will be found to consist of stolen ideas, combined with what SOUTHEY would call 'bubble, and bladder, and tympany.' But perpend the subjoined: 'Ever since the fatal days of PETRARCH AND GUIDO CAVALIANTI, mankind have suffered more or less from the chronic infliction of Sonnets. With them indeed the complaint was constitutional, and came in the natural way; under so mild and gentle a form withal, that little danger was to be apprehended for Italian temperaments, except a degree of languor, general debility, and a disagreeable singing in the ears. It was only when it worked its way into English blood, that the virus assumed its most baneful character. SHAKSPEARE, among other illustrious victims, was afflicted by it in his youth, but seems to have recovered during his residence in the metropolis. Possibly the favor of the royal hand might have proved more beneficial than that of the Earl of Southampton. Perhaps he was _touched_ for it by ELIZABETH, as JOHNSON was by Queen ANNE for the scrofula. However that may be, we know very well that the disorder is now rooted among us, and that every week produces decided cases of Sonnets, sometimes so severe as to be intolerable. In this condition of the mental health of our country, since the evil cannot be cured, it were a work at once philanthropical and patriotic, so to modify it and regulate its attacks, that it may settle down into a moderate degree of annoyance, like the lighter afflictions of mild measles and mumps. We can always calculate upon the duration of each 'fytte,' as none ever exceeds the fourteenth spasm. When the just dozen-and-two convulsions are past, the danger is over, and the offensive matter may be removed by a newspaper, or discharged into some appropriate magazine. There is good reason for designating the complaint as a _periodical_ one.

We intend, one of these days, provided our remarks attract sufficient attention, to publish a volume upon this subject. We have the materiel by us and about us; and as soon as we can make arrangements with Mr. POH for a puff in the 'North-American Review,' or the 'Southern Literary Messenger,' we shall broach the affair to Mr. FIELDS, the enterprising publisher. We have moreover desired Mr. WHIPPLE to write to his friend Mr. MACAULAY in England, who will doubtless be proud to foster American letters by a hoist in the 'Edinburgh.' There is only one other thing absolutely requisite for the success of the book, and that is the appearance of this article in the KNICKERBOCKER. Befriend me then with your fine taste, renowned HERR DIEDRICH! and give me room. I shall not dive deeply into the matter now; but for the good of my young countrymen, the labor of whose brains is incompatible with a fruitful development of whiskers, I wish to put forth a page of advice that may save them a world of fatigue. It is common with those who are far gone in this tuneful disorder to set up late o' nights and tipple coffee. Under my new system, I will engage that they may retire to bed on mulled-punch nightly, at eleven, and yet effect all that they now perform with the greatest injury to their eyes and complexions. But _pocas pallabras_--enough of this preface: will not the thing speak for itself? There needs no farther introduction for these brief extracts from the aforesaid work:

THE EASIEST WAY OF DISCHARGING A SONNET.

A SONNET (as before stated) consists of fourteen and no more spasms. They are calm, deliberate twinges, however, and upon a homoeopathical principle, the great object should be to get over each one in the calmest possible manner; _idem cum eodem_. The thing cannot be treated too coolly, for its very essence is dull deliberation. The name sonnet is probably derived, through the Italian _sonno_, from the Latin word for sleep, in allusion to its lethargic quality. The best mode of encouraging the efflux of the peccant humor is for the patient to have a cigar in his mouth. The narcotic fumes of tobacco are highly favorable to its ejection. The first step then is the selection of rhymes. Fourteen of these in their proper order should be written perpendicularly on the right hand of a smooth sheet of white paper. When this is done, it is necessary to read them over, up and down, several times, until some general idea of a subject or a title suggests itself. Great care must be taken, in the selection of rhymes, to get as original ones as possible, and such as shall strike the eye. Still greater should be the precaution not to choose such incongruous rhymes as may not easily be welded together or amalgamated into one whole by the mercury of fancy. For instance, it would be well to avoid coupling such words as moon and spoon, breeze and cheese and sneeze; Jove and stove; hope and soap; all which it might be difficult to bring together harmoniously. Here the artist, the man of true science, will discover himself. SHELLEY affords a good choice of rhymes; chasm and spasm; rift and drift; ravine and savin, are useful conjunctions. If you have a ravine, it will be very easy to stick in a savin, but you must avoid a _spavin_, or your verse may halt for it. This we call being artistical. _Benissimo!_ then. Having fixed upon your subject, all you have to do is to fill up the lines to match the ends, and this, in one evening's practice, will become as easy, the same thing in fact, as the filling up of the blank form of an ordinary receipt.

But the most expeditious and surest way of procuring a good Sonnet is the Division of Labor System. This has often been unconsciously practised by modern poets, but it has never been explicitly set forth till now. Every body knows that even in the fabrication of so small a thing as a needle, the process is facilitated by dividing it among a number of hands; as to one the eye, to another the point, to one the grinding, to another the polishing. In the same way, to render a sonnet pointed and sharp, to polish it and insure it against cutting the thread of its argument, the work should be performed by two or more. Every sonnet, in short, ought to be a translation. I do not say a translation from the German or any other jargon, but a translation from English--from one man's into another man's English. It is absurd for one workman to do both rhyming and thinking. In this go-ahead age and country, that were a palpable waste of time. Take any 'matter-ful' author, cut out a juicy slice of his thought, and make that your material. Trim it, compress it, turn it and twist it upside down and inside out, vary it any way but the author's own, and you will be likely to effect a speedy and wholesome operation. What a saving of time is here! Who will be silly enough to manufacture his own thinkings into verse when the world is so full of excellent stuff as yet unwrought in the great mine of letters? Let us not burn up our own native forests while we can fetch coals from Newcastle. What a pleasant prospect for readers too! A man may be sure _then_, that a sonnet shall contain a thought. He will not be gulled into experiments upon decent-looking, respectable dross and plausible inanity. He shall not dig hungrily for an idea, and be filled with volumes of wind. With the fourteenth pang his anxiety shall be over, and he shall drop asleep satisfied; _tandem dormitum dimittitur_.

Not to anticipate farther our forthcoming book, nor to forestall the critics in any more extracts, we shall lay before the reader two or three samples of work done according to this system. CARLYLE has furnished our raw material. His pages are so full of poetry that little time need be expended in selecting a fit piece for working up. See now if these be not sonnets which BOWLES might have been proud to claim. Each one is warranted to contain a thought; an hour or so would suffice for the completion of half a dozen such. Observe too, that little deviation is necessary from the original, the words falling naturally into both rhythm and rhyme. We commence with a few translations from Carlyle. The initial specimen is taken from Herr TEUFELSDRÖCKH'S remarks on BONAPARTE. This is the passage:

'The man (NAPOLEON) was a Divine Missionary, though unconscious of
it, and preached through the cannon's throat this great doctrine:
_La carrière ouverte aux talens_; 'The Tools to him that can
handle them.' · · · Madly enough he preached, it is true, as
Enthusiasts and first Missionaries are wont, with imperfect
utterance, amid much frothy rant, yet as articulately perhaps as
the case admitted. Or call him, if you will, an American
Backwoodsman, who had to fell unpenetrated forests, and battle
with innumerable wolves, and did not entirely forbear strong
liquor, rioting, and even theft; whom notwithstanding the peaceful
Sower will follow, and as he cuts the boundless harvest, bless.'

SARTOR RESARTUS: BOOK II., CHAP. VIII.

SONNET I.--NAPOLEON.

Napoleon was a Missionary merely,
Who through the cannon's throat this truth expressed,
Unconsciously, divinely and sincerely,
_The Tools to him that handles 'em the best._
Madly enough, indeed, the man did preach,
Amid much rant, as all Enthusiasts do,
And yet with as articulate a speech
As the strange case, perhaps, allowed him to.
Or call him a Backwoodsman, if you will;
Who, forced to fell unpenetrated woods,
And doomed innumerable wolves to kill,
Got drunk sometimes, and stole his neighbor's goods;
Whom will the Sower follow ne'ertheless,
And as he cuts the boundless harvest, bless.

Or let us try the following description of the Hotel de Ville in the French Revolution:

'O evening sun of July! how at this hour thy beams fall slant on
reapers amid peaceful woody fields; on old women spinning in
cottages; on ships far out on the silent main; on Balls at the
Orangerie of Versailles, where high-rouged dames of the palace are
even now dancing with double-jacketted Hussar officers; and also
on this roaring Hell-porch of a Hotel de Ville. Babel-tower, with
the confusion of tongues, were not Bedlam added with the
conflagration of thoughts, was no type of it. One forest of
distracted steel bristles endless in front of an Electoral
Committee.'

FRENCH REVOLUTION: BOOK V., CHAP. VII.

SONNET II.--THE HOTEL DE VILLE.

O evening sun of most serene July!
How at this hour thy slant refulgence pours
On reapers working in the open sky,
And women spinning at their cottage doors,
On ships far out upon the silent main,
On gay Versailles, where through the light quadrille
Hussars are leading forth a high-rouged train,
And on the hell-porch-like Hotel de Ville.
Not Babel's tower with all its million tongues,
Save Bedlam too therewith had added been,
To mingle burning brains with roaring lungs,
Could feebly imitate that dreadful din;
One endless forest of distracted steel
Bristling around that mad Hotel de Ville!

Or to return to Professor TEUFELDRÖCKH'S vast chaos of ideas. Let us try another passage therefrom:

'It struck me much as I sat beside the Kuhbach, one silent
noontide, and watched it flowing, gurgling, to think how this same
streamlet had flowed and gurgled through all changes of weather
and of fortune, from beyond the earliest date of history. Yes,
probably on the morning when JOSHUA forded Jordan; even as at the
midday when CÆSAR, doubtless with difficulty, swam the Nile, yet
kept his Commentaries dry; this little Kuhbach, assiduous as
Tiber, Eurotas or Siloa, was murmuring on across the wilderness,
unnamed, unseen.'

SARTOR RESARTUS: BOOK II., CHAP. III.

SONNET III.--ETERNITY OF NATURE.

One silent noonday, as I sat beside
The gurgling flow of Kuhbach's little river,
Methought how, even as I saw it glide,
That stream had flowed and gurgled on forever.
Yes, on the day when JOSHUA passed the flood
Of ancient Jordan; when across the Nile
CÆSAR swam (hardly, doubtless, through the mud,)
Yet kept his Commentaries dry the while,
This little Kuhbach, like Siloa's rill,
Or Tiber's Tide, assiduous and serene,
Ev'n then, the same as now, was murmuring still
Across the wilderness, unnamed, unseen.
Art's but a mushroom--only Nature's old;
In yon grey crag six thousand years behold!

From the same chapter of the same book we venture one more extract. It is where the Professor is full of grief and reminiscences; where, reflecting on his first experience of wo in the death of Father ANDREAS, he becomes once more spirit-clad in quite inexpressible melancholy, and says, 'I have now pitched my tent under a cypress-tree,' etc.:

SONNET IV.--BLISS IN GRIEF.

Under a cypress-tree I pitch my tent:
The tomb shall be my fortress; at its gate
I sit and watch each hostile armament,
And all the pains and penalties of Fate.
And oh ye loved ones! that already sleep,
Hushed in the noiseless bed of endless rest,
For whom, while living, I could only weep,
But never help in all your sore distress,
And ye who still your lonely burthen bear,
Spilling your blood beneath life's bitter thrall,
A little while and we shall all meet _there_,
And one kind Mother's bosom screen us all;
Oppression's harness will no longer tire
Or gall us there, nor Sorrow's whip of fire.

But we are borrowing too much from our embryo volume. Patience, dear Public! until we can find a publisher. In the mean time, examine the specimens we have presented to you. Can any one tell us where to look for sonnets, more satisfactory than these? We congratulate our country on the prospect of our soon having an American literature. Let our industrious young aspirants try a work in which they may succeed in producing something of sterling value. A year or two will suffice to turn half the plodding prose writers of Britain into original poets. Every brilliant article that appears in the Quarterly might here renascent spring forth like Arethusa, in a new and more melodious voice; bubbling up in a pretty epic or stormy lyric. See, for example, how easily SIDNEY SMITH might be done into rhyme:

SONNET V.

I never meet at any public dinner
A Pennsylvanian, but my fingers itch
To pluck his borrowed plumage from the sinner,
And with the spoil the company enrich.
His pocket-handkerchief I would bestow
On the poor orphan; and his worsted socks
Should to the widow in requital go
For having sunk her all in Yankee stocks;
To John the footman I would give his hat,
Which only cost six shillings in Broadway:
As for his diamond ring--I'd speak for that;
His gold watch too my losses might repay:
Himself might home in the next steamer hie,
For who would take him--or his word? Not I.

'LEGENDS OF THE CONQUEST OF SPAIN.'--Some eighteen years ago, a work in a single volume, entitled as above, and written by the author of the 'Sketch-Book,' was issued from the press of MURRAY, the celebrated London book-seller. It would seem to have been put forth as a kind of _avant-courier_ of 'The Chronicles of the Conquest of Granada;' but unlike that elaborate work, was never republished in this country, and has never been included in any of the complete editions of Mr. IRVING'S writings. We are indebted to the kind courtesy of a gentleman who has been spending some months with our distinguished countryman and correspondent at Madrid, for a copy of the book, which he obtained at that capital. We have good reason to believe that it has been encountered by few if any readers on this side the Atlantic. A very stirring extract from its pages will be found elsewhere in this Magazine. Mr. IRVING introduces the legends to his readers with a few prefatory sentences, in which he states that he has ventured to dip more deeply into the enchanted fountains of old Spanish chronicle than has usually been done by those who have treated of the eventful period of which he writes; but in so doing, he only more fully illustrates the character of the people and the times. He has thrown the records into the form of legends, not claiming for them the authenticity of sober history, yet giving nothing that had not a historical foundation. 'All the facts herein contained,' says the writer, 'however extravagant some of them may be deemed, will be found in the works of sage and reverend chroniclers of yore, growing side by side with long acknowledged truths, and might be supported by learned and imposing references in the margin.' To discard every thing wild and marvellous in this portion of Spanish history is to discard some of its most beautiful, instructive, and national features; it is to judge of Spain by the standard of probability suited to tamer and more prosaic countries. Spain is virtually a land of poetry and romance, where every-day life partakes of adventure, and where the least agitation or excitement carries every thing up into extravagant enterprise and daring exploit. The Spaniards in all ages have been of swelling and braggart spirit, soaring in thought, and valiant though vainglorious in deed. When the nation had recovered in some degree from the storm of Moslem invasion, and sage men sought to inquire and write the particulars of the tremendous reverses which it produced, it was too late to ascertain them in their exact verity. The gloom and melancholy that had overshadowed the land had given birth to a thousand superstitious fancies; the woes and terrors of the past were clothed with supernatural miracles and portents, and the actors in the fearful drama had already assumed the dubious characteristics of romance. Or if a writer from among the conquerors undertook to touch upon the theme, it was embellished with all the wild extravagances of an oriental imagination, which afterward stole into the graver works of the monkish historians. Hence the chronicles are apt to be tinctured with those saintly miracles which savor of the pious labors of the cloister, or those fanciful fictions that betray their Arabian Authors. Scarce one of their historical facts but has been connected in the original with some romantic fiction, and even in its divorced state, bears traces of its former alliance. The records in preceding pages are 'illuminated' by these prefatory remarks of our author, if their _truth_ be not altogether established! How the Count JULIAN receives the account of the dishonor of his child, and his conduct thereupon; and how DON RODERICK hastens, through various tribulation, to his final overthrow; will be matter for another number. Meanwhile the reader will not fail to note the great beauty of the descriptions, which in the hands of our great master of the power and beauty of 'the grand old English tongue,' assume form and color, and stand out like living pictures to the eye.

AMERICAN PTYALISM: 'QUID RIDES?'--A pleasant correspondent, whom our readers have long known, and as long admired and esteemed, in a familiar gossip, (by favor of 'Uncle SAMUEL'S mail-bag,) with the Editor, gives us the following 'running account' of his ruminations over an early-morning quid of that 'flavorous weed' so well beloved of our friend Colonel STONE. It is in some sort a defence of American ptyalism, and in the tendency of its inculcations, reminds us of the arguments in favor of the cultivation of a refined style of _murder_, which should constitute it one of the fine arts, to which we gave a place many months back: 'After having in my broken dreams perambulated every part and parcel of the universe, and then tossed about for hours on an ocean of bodily discomforts, each a dagger to repose, and mental disquietudes, of which any one was enough to wither all the poppies of Somnus, I rose about four o' my watch, and commenced chewing the narcotic weed of Virginia. For you must know that in childhood almost, through a precocious mannishness and a desire of experimental knowledge, I commenced the habit of tobacco-chewing, and the vice born of a freak, has 'grown with my growth,' till now it holds me as in a 'vice' screwed up and secured by a giant. (Please observe that there's a pun in that last sentence.) Where the conventionalities of society compel me to attidunize my appearance and customs into the stiffness of gentility, I puff the Havana; but when the privacy of my own room or the solitude of the roads and fields permit me to vulgarize to my liking, I thrust a ball of 'Mrs. MILLER'S fine-cut,' or a fragment of the 'natural James' River sweet,' between the sub-maxillary bone and its carnal casement, and then masticate and expectorate 'à la Yankee.' or 'more Americano.' Pah! oh! fie! for shame! and all other interjections indicative of horror, or expressive of disgust. '_Quousque tandem?_' Beg your pardon, Mrs. TROLLOPE. '_Quamdiu etiam?_' I implore your commiseration, Captain BASIL. '_Oh, tempora! oh, mores!_' Have mercy, illustrious and praise-bespattered, and almost Sir-Waltered BOZ. Do not, under the uneasy weight of glory, and in the intoxicating consciousness of a right to the oligarchic exclusiveness of the goose-quill 'haute volèe,' strike right and left among your sturdy democratic adorers, because they choose to convert their mandibles into quid-grinders, and their [Greek: chasmat' odontôn] into ceaseless jet d'eaux of saliva. Reflect that the 'quid' assists in a philosophic investigation of the 'quiddities' of things, and that from this habit alone perhaps we have made such advances in casuistry as to have discovered equity in repudiation, freedom in mobocracy, and the sword of justice in the bowie-knife. Chewing is eminently democratic, since all chewers are 'pro hâc _vice_' on a perfect equality, and a 'millionaire;' or, for that matter, a 'billionaire,' if we had him, would not hesitate to take out of his mouth a moiety of his last 'chew' and give it to an itinerant Lazarus. What can be more admirable than this 'de bon air' plebeianism, and universal right-hand of fellowship? Does not he who extends among the people the use of this democratizing weed, emphatically give them a '_quid_ pro quo?' Are not slovenliness and filth the virtues of republics, while neatness and elegance are vices of court-growth, and expand into their most ramified and minute perfectness of polish only in the palaces of kings? Furthermore, oh laurelled and triumphant PICKWICK! if expectoration be filthy, it must be because the 'thing expectorated' is unclean; and if so, is it not more decent to become rid of the 'unclean thing' by the readiest process, than to retain it, making the stomach a receptacle of abominations? And are you, Sir Baronet of the realm imaginary, subject to no gross corporeal needs and operations? And if, as you will say, you perform those foul rites in a state of retiracy, are you not adding the sin of hypocrisy to your preëxistent guilt? If it has succeeded to you, as to few penny-a-liners, to have emerged by the sale of your Attic-salt from the attics of Grub-street into the 'swept and garnished chambers' of the Regent, and if after quaffing the ale of Bow-street, procured by caricatures of Old Baily reports, you have sipped your hockheimer, while standing, scarce yet unbewildered, in the gas-light splendor reflected from the 'vis-á-vis' mirrors of Almack's, yet do not exalt yourself above all that is fleshly. Reflect that you, so lately unrivalled, can now see a EUGENE SUE whose brow is umbraged by laurels of a more luxuriant and lovely green. Cease your expectorations of bile upon a great people; admit that mastication of the 'odorous vegeble' is a Spartan virtue; and we will again vote you an Anak in the kingdom of pen and paper. Then again shall we be led to believe that your praises and your vituperations are equally unpurchasable. Then once more shall we think you would swallow no golden pill, nor suffer your throat to be ulcerated by a silver quinsy.'

GOSSIP WITH READERS AND CORRESPONDENTS.--If any of our readers are desirous of looking into the _rationale_ of irrationality, to employ a highly 'unitive' phrase, let them take up, if they can command it, the '_Annual Report of the Managers of the New York State Lunatic Asylum_,' one of the clearest and most comprehensive documents in its kind that we have ever perused. It proceeds from the capable pen of A. BRIGHAM, M. D. the superintendent and physician of the institution, and is full upon the definition, causes and classification of insanity; the size and shape of the heads of the patients; the pulse; description of the building; daily routine of business, diet, labor, amusements, religious worship, visitors, suggestions to those who have friends whom they expect to commit to the care of the asylum, etc., etc. The cause of insanity in _fifty_ out of two hundred and seventy-six patients is attributed to religious anxiety, produced by long attendance on protracted religious meetings, etc. Want of sleep is decidedly the most frequent and immediate cause of insanity, and one the most important to guard against. 'So rarely (says the superintendent) do you see a recent case of insanity that is not preceded by want of sleep, that we regard it as almost the sure precursor of mental derangement.' As evidences of the difficulty of arranging the insane in classes, founded on symptoms, Dr. BRIGHAM gives us the following synopsis of individual peculiarities noticed among certain of the inmates of the Asylum:

'In addition to emperors, queens, prophets and priests, we have
one that says he is nobody, a nonentity. One that was never born,
and one that was born of her grandmother, and another dropped by
the devil flying over the world. One has had the throat cut out
and put in wrong, so that what is swallowed passes into the head,
and another has his head cut off and replaced every night. One
thinks himself a child, and talks and acts like a child. Many
appear as if constantly intoxicated. One has the gift of tongues,
another deals in magic, several in animal magnetism. One thinks he
is a white polar bear. A number have hallucinations of sight,
others of hearing. One repeats whatever is said to him, another
repeats constantly words of the same sound, as door, floor. One is
pursued by the sheriff, many by the devil. One has invented the
perpetual motion and is soon to be rich; others have already
acquired vast fortunes: scraps of paper, buttons and chips are to
them, large amounts of money. Many pilfer continually and without
any apparent motive, while others secrete every thing they can
find, their own articles as well as those of others. A majority
are disposed to hoard up trifling and useless articles, as scraps
of tin, leather, strings, nails, buttons, etc., and are much
grieved to part with them. One will not eat unless alone, some
never wish to eat, while others are always starving. One with a
few sticks and straws fills his room with officers and soldiers,
ships and sailors, carriages and horses, the management of which
occupies all his time and thoughts. Some have good memory as
regards most things, and singularly defective as to others. One
does not recollect the names of his associates, which he hears
every hour, yet his memory is good in other respects. One says he
is THOMAS PAINE, author of the 'Age of Reason,' a work he has
never read; another calls himself General WASHINGTON; and one old
lady of diminutive size calls herself General SCOTT, and is never
so good-natured as when thus addressed. One is always in court
attending a trial, and wondering and asking when the court is to
rise. Another has to eat up the building, drink dry the canal, and
swallow the Little Falls village, and is continually telling of
the difficulty of the task.'

The superintendent prefers a classification founded upon the faculties of the mind that appear to be disordered; and he thinks he could place all his patients in one of the three following classes: _Intellectual Insanity_, or disorder of the intellect without noticeable disturbance of the feelings and propensities; _Moral Insanity_ or derangement of the feelings, affections, and passions, without any remarkable disorder of the intellect; and _General Insanity_, in which both the intellectual faculties and the feelings and affections are disordered. The State Asylum is a fine imposing edifice, delightfully situated near the pleasant village of Utica, in Oneida county, and is becoming greatly distinguished for success in the treatment and cure of insanity. · · · WE heard a little anecdote at a _bal costumé_ the other evening, (whether from the dignified and stately HELEN MACGREGOR or the beautiful MEDORA, we 'cannot well make out,') which is worth repeating. A retired green-grocer, rejoicing in the euphonious name of TIBBS, living at Hackney, near London, sorely against his will, and after warm remonstrance, finally yielded to his wife's entreaty that he would go in character to a masquerade-ball, given to the 'middling interest' by one of his old neighbors. He went accoutred as a knight, wearing his visor down. What was his surprise on entering the room, to find first one and then another member of the motley company slapping him familiarly on the back, with: 'Halloa! TIBBS! who thought to see _you_ here! What's the news at Hackney?' In dismay that his ridiculous secret was out, he hurried from the scene, and hastened home in a state of great excitement from the mortification to which he had been subjected. 'I _told_ you I should be known,' said he to his wife; 'I _knew_ I should!' 'No wonder!' she replied; 'you've got your name and residence on your steel cap: 'Mr. TIBBS, Hackney!'' He had forgotten to remove the address which the London costumer had affixed to it as a direction! · · · HOW many thousand times, in thinking of the onward career of our glorious and thrice-blessed country, have we felt the emotions to which our esteemed friend and contributor, POLYGON, gives forceful expression in the closing lines of a beautiful poem of his, which we have encountered to-day for the first time:

'Oh! long through coming ages, born
When _we_ shall slumber cold and still,
The sultry summer will adorn
The verdant vale and hazy hill;
And Autumn walking even and morn
Through bearded wheat and rustling corn,
See Plenty from her streaming horn
His largest wishes fill.

'Europe's rich realms will then admire
And emulate our matchless fame,
And Asia burn with fierce desire
To burst her galling bonds of shame!
Greece will resume th' Aonian lyre,
And Rome again to heaven aspire,
And vestal Freedom's quenchless fire
From the pyramids shall flame!'

* * * * *

There is a sort of pathetic humor in the following parody by PUNCH upon the prize exhibitions of cattle in England. A more forcible exposition of the different condition of the human and brute animal in that country could not well be conceived. It must be premised that a large hall is fitted up with pens on either side, and over the head of the occupant paste-board tickets are appended by the Poor Law Commissioners, detailing their names, weights, ages, the regimen to which they have been subjected, and other particulars; as thus: 'PETER SMALL. Aged forty. Weight at period of admission twelve stone. Confined three months. Present weight nine stone. Fed principally on water-gruel. Has been separated from his wife and children in the work-house, and occasionally placed in solitary confinement for complaining of hunger. Employment, breaking stones.' 'JANE WELLS. Aged seventy. Weight five stone; lost two stone since her admission, one month ago. Gruel diet; tea without sugar; potatoes and salt. Has been set to picking opium.' 'JOHN TOMPKINS. Aged eighty-five. Has seen better days. On admission, weighed eleven stone, which has been reduced to eight and three-quarters. Diet, weak soup, with turnips and carrots; dry bread and cheese-parings; a few ounces of meat occasionally, when faint. Came to the work-house with his wife, who is five years younger than himself. Has not been allowed to see her for a month; during which period has lost in weight two ounces on an average per day. Employed in carrying coals.' Faithful portraits, no doubt, of thousands who crowd the thick-clustering pauper-houses of England, who have

'No blessed leisure for love nor hope,
But only time for grief!'

* * * * *

Our umqwhile New-Haven friend, who commented upon our 'light gossip' a few months since, will pardon us for quoting, in corroboration of the exculpatory 'position' which we assumed in alluding to his animadversions, the following remarks by the author of the 'Charcoal Sketches,' JOSEPH C. NEAL, Esq.: 'Gossip, goodly gossip, though sometimes sneered at, is after all the best of our entertainments. We must fall back upon the light web of conversation, upon chit-chat, as our main-stay, our chief reliance; as that _corps de reserve_ on which our scattered and wearied forces are to rally. What is there which will bear comparison as a recreating means, with the free and unstudied interchange of thought, of knowledge, of impression about men and things, and all that varied medley of fact, criticism and conclusion so continually fermenting in the active brain? Be fearful of those who love it not, and banish such as would imbibe its delights yet bring no contribution to the common stock. There are men who seek the reputation of wisdom by dint of never affording a glimpse of their capabilities, and impose upon the world by silent gravity; negative philosophers, who never commit themselves beyond the utterance of a self-evident proposition, or hazard their position by a feat of greater boldness than is to be found in the avowal of the safe truth which has been granted for a thousand years. There is a deception here, which should never be submitted to. Sagacity may be manifest in the nod of Burleigh's head; but it does not follow that all who nod are Burleighs. He who habitually says nothing, must be content if he be regarded as having nothing to say, and it is only a lack of grace on his part which precludes the confession. In this broad 'Vienna' of human effort, the mere 'looker-on' cannot be tolerated. It is part of our duty to be nonsensical and ridiculous at times, for the entertainment of the rest of the world. If we are never to open our mouths until the unsealing of the aperture is to give evidence of a present Solomon, and to add something to the Book of Proverbs, we must for the most part, stand like the statue of Harpocrates, with 'Still your finger on your lips, I pray.' If we do speak, under such restrictions, it cannot well be, as the world is constituted, more than once or twice in the course of an existence, the rest of the sojourn upon earth being devoted to a sublimation of our thought. But always wise, sensible, sagacious, rational; always in wig and spectacles; always algebraic and mathematical; doctrinal and didactic; ever to sit like FRANKLIN'S portrait, with the index fixed upon 'causality;' one might as well be a petrified 'professor,' or a WILLIAM PENN bronzed upon a pedestal. There is nothing so good, either in itself or in its effects, as good nonsense.' Upon reading the foregoing, we laid Mr. YELLOWPLUSH'S 'flattering function' to our soul, that after all, we need not greatly distrust the reception of our monthly salmagundi, since one good producer and critic may be held as in some sort an epitome of the public; and especially, since any one subsection of our hurried Gossip, should it chance to be dull, or void of interest, may be soon exhausted, or easily skipped. · · · WE observed lately, in the pages of a monthly contemporary, an elaborate notice of the poems of ALFRED TENNYSON, who has written many somewhat affected and several very heartful and exquisite verses; and were not a little surprised to find no reference to two of the most beautiful poems in his collection; namely, the 'New-Year's Eve,' and its 'Conclusion.' The first embodies the reflections of a young maiden, sinking gradually under that fell destroyer, CONSUMPTION. It is new-year's eve, and she implores her mother to 'call her early,' that she may see the sun rise upon the glad new year, the last that she shall ever see. How touchingly the associations of nature are depicted in these stanzas:

To-night I saw the sun set: he set and left behind
The good old year, the dear old time, and all my peace of mind;
And the New-year's coming up, mother, but I shall never see
The blossom on the black thorn, the leaf upon the tree.

There's not a flower on all the hills: the frost is on the pane:
I only wish to live till the snow-drops come again:
I wish the snow would melt, and the sun come out on high;
I long to see a flower so before the day I die.

The building rook will caw from the windy tall elm-tree,
And the tufted plover pipe along the fallow lea,
And the swallow will come back again with summer o'er the wave.
But I shall lie alone, mother, within the mouldering grave.

Upon the chancel-casement, and upon that grave of mine,
In the early, early morning the summer sun will shine;
Before the red cock crows from the farm upon the hill,
When you are warm asleep, mother, and all the world is still.

When the flowers shall come again, mother, beneath the waning light,
You'll never see me more in the long gray fields at night:
When from the dry dark wold the summer airs blow cool,
On the oat-grass and the sword-grass, and the bulrush in the pool.

You'll bury me, my mother, just beneath the hawthorn shade,
And you'll come sometimes and see me, where I am lowly laid.
I shall not forget you, mother, I shall hear you when you pass,
With your feet above my head in the long and pleasant grass.

I have been wild and wayward, but you'll forgive me now;
You'll kiss me, my own mother, upon my cheek and brow;
Nay, nay, you must not weep, nor let your grief be wild,
You should not fret for me, mother, you have another child.

If I can I'll come again, mother, from out my resting-place;
Though you'll not see me, mother, I shall look upon your face;
Though I cannot speak a word, I shall hearken what you say,
And be often, often with you, when you think I'm far away.

Good-night, good-night! when I have said good-night for evermore,
And you see me carried out from the threshold of the door,
Don't let Effie come to see me till my grave be growing green:
She'll be a better child to you than ever I have been.

She'll find my garden-tools upon the granary floor:
Let her take 'em: they are hers: I shall never garden more:
But tell her, when I'm gone, to train the rose-bush that I set
About the parlour-window and the box of mignonette.

The poor girl's prayer to 'live to see the snow-drop,' in the spring-time, is answered. The violets have come forth, and in the fields around she hears the bleating of the young lambs. She is now ready to die, and knows that the time of her departure is at hand, for she has had a 'warning from heaven.' The reader should have sat by the bed-side of one slowly fading away by consumption, and have heard the wild March wind wail amidst the boughs of leafless trees without, rightly to appreciate the faithfulness of these lines:

'I did not hear the dog howl, mother, nor hear the death-watch beat,
There came a sweeter token when the night and morning meet:
But sit beside my bed, mother, and put your hand in mine,
And Effie on the other side, and I will tell the sign.

All in the wild March-morning I heard the angels call;
It was when the moon was setting, and the dark was over all;
The trees began to whisper, and the wind began to roll,
And in the wild March-morning I heard them call my soul.

For lying broad awake I thought of you and Effie dear;
I saw you sitting in the house, and I no longer here;
With all my strength I pray'd for both, and so I felt resign'd,
And up the valley came a swell of music on the wind.

I thought that it was fancy, and I listen'd in my bed,
And then did something speak to me--I know not what was said;
For great delight and shuddering took hold of all my mind,
And up the valley came again the music on the wind.