May raise the floods of passion high, For the Port Folio. LITERARY AND SCIENTIFIC INTELLIGENCE. Mr. Southey has published a third volume of the Remains of Henry Kirk White, which will be eagerly perused by all the admirers of this truly amiable and interesting poet. The first two volumes contained only selections of Mr. White's better pieces, but the present volume, containing his more juvenile and less studied productions, affords us a fairer specimen of his mind and habits. We may possess the biography of more powerful, or even of more precose intellects than Kirk White's, but literature does not afford so fine an instance of the union of early character with early genius. His fervent piety was untinged with any of the extravagance incident to young and ardent minds, and was free from the bigotry and spirit of exclusion with which it is so often accompanied by maturer judgments. The clearness of his intellect, his unwearied and constant industry, so free from the sudden efforts of youth, which relax into inaction or dissipation; and, above all, the astonishing tone of prudence and quiet good sense, which distinguished this highly gifted individual, are most beautifully, but indirectly displayed in the contents of this volume. Pindar, the most difficult of the Greek poets, has been translated, for the first time, by T. Thiersch, into German verse, of the same metre with the original. The translator is faithful; and although the original is rendered verse for verse, yet nothing seems forced, and the Greek text is conformable to the best editions. Mr. Nathan Rosenfeld, a Jewish merchant of Warsaw, a man of deep research and learning, has lately published a history of Poland, written in the Hebrew language. An immense hill or tumulus in the manner of the ancients, will be raised upon a mountain in Poland, to the memory of Kosciusko, whose name will be inscribed on a block of granite, which will be placed at the top of the tumulus. The mountain, with the land that surrounds it to the banks of the Vistula, will be purchased for the purpose of making useful and ornamental plantations, and for building houses for the veterans who served under the General. These veterans will form a colony that will bear his name. M. Kowalski has translated Moliere's comedies into the Polish language. It affords us great pleasure to learn that Dr. James' account of Maj. Long's Expedition (reviewed in our No. for Dec.) is received with that liberality of patronage which it so well deserves. When such men communicate the result of their observations to the public they are entitled to our cordial support, because their laourbs reflect credit on the literature of the country. A MS. of the eighth century, hitherto unknown, of a translation of the Bible into the Georgian language, by St. Euphemius, has been discovered in the convent of Mount Athos. There is an official Gazette, which is regarded as the organ of the Chinese government in every thing that concerns the religion, laws, manners, and customs of that country. No article which has not been inspected by the Emperor, and which has not received his approbation, can be inserted. The least deviation from this rule, even the addition of a syllable, would be severely punished. It contains articles relative to public affairs in that great empire, as well as extracts from memorials and petitions presented to the sovereign, with his replies, orders, and favours granted to the Mandarins and people. It appears every day as a pamphlet, and contains sixty or seventy pages. A collection of all the patriotic proclamations, and of all the acts of the Peloponnesian senate, that have appeared since the commencement of the struggle of the Greeks against their oppressors, has lately been translated from modern Greek into French, by M. Mustoxydi, a learned Greek of Corfu. It will shortly be published, The Count Zenowitsch, a descendant from the ancient Greek emperor Zeno, is now residing at Frankfort-on-the-Main. His eldest brother is governor of Minsk, in Russia. The colonel formerly served under Kosciusko, and since in France. The Zeno family still adopt the armorial bearings of their ancestors. The canal of Alexandria last year received, in honour of the sultan, the name of Mahmondie. It terminates a few steps from Pompey's pillar, and begins near the Nile, and under the town of Saone. Its length is 41,706 toises, its width 15 toises, and its depth 3 toises. One hundred thousand men began it in January 1819; this number was increased the following month to two hundred and sixty thousand; the workmen received a piastre a day. In the month of May thirty thousand other workmen were added, from Upper Egypt; and on the 15th September the work was completed. Six European engineers directed the work. About a year ago, a Bible Society for women was established at Stockholm, at the head of which is the Countess Lowenhjelm. Captain Wulf, translator of Shakspere, has just translated into Danish, lord Byron's Manfred. In the Antologia, a scientific and literary journal, published at Florence, (No. xviii. 1822) we find a version, by Michael Leoni, of some passages in Campbell's Pleasures of Hope. To the same person, the Italians are indebted for translations of the Eneid and Georgics. These are characterized more or less by their fidelity, their versification, and the language, which challenges a comparison with the original text. The version of the Georgics was already known; but that of the Eneid appears to be the favourite of the author. The Italians possess many of them; but none will succeed in banishing that of Caro. We are unable, in this place, to do full justice to the labours of Leoni; but we may remark that he has surpassed all his predecessors in precision. He has endeavoured to imitate the forms, the cadence and the rythm of the original, in which respects his work savours too much of imitation. He does not wish to say a syllable more than is before him. This scrupulousness is the more remarkable, when we compare his version with those of Bondi and Caro; the former of whom has 3,000 verses less, and the latter 5,000 more than Leoni. Mrs. Cambridge, of this city, has issued proposals for publishing a volume of Poems, by subscription, entitled," Poetic Trifles." The editor of the New England Galaxy, proposes to publish a collection of the best verses which have ever appeared in the American Journals-as he has already a prose collection from the same sources-Many evanescent pieces of merit will thus be preserved and embodied, which perhaps may do as much for our reputation on this score, as larger and more elaborate volumes. The patronage received by the editor of the Prose Miscellanies, from the American Journals, has induced the compilation of a second volume, which is now in the press, and will be published next month. Bohemian Literature.—The branch of literature most assiduously cultivated here at present is that of philology and languages. The bookseller Hewel proposes to publish by subscription a German Dictionary, far superior to that of Adelung in comprehensiveness and extent. The second volume of Zimmerman's interesting History of Bohemia, under Ferdinand I. has appeared, and contains an introductory review of the literature of that period. Russia.-Lithography is making rapid progress in this country, where it bids fair to become popular. Prints from Hamburgh are more highly esteemed than those of either Munich or Vienna, to which the pre-eminence is generally allowed-A collection of portraits of celebrated living public characters, chiefly residing at St. Petersburgh, has been commenced by a young artist named Hippius under the title of contemporaries.' Each number of this work contains five subjects, Count Strogonoff, Grilloff, the poet, and Martos a sculptor, who has been honoured with the flattering appellation of the Northern Canova, are among those which have already appeared. |