are multiplying, our colleges are more nu-led intent upon what was going on, there was merously attended than at any former perfect stillness during prayer, and the most period, Southern school books are sought respectful attention was paid to the discourse. after to replace the superficial and often in- Soon after entering, we had the satisfaccendiary publications of New England, and tion of hearing ourselves prayed for as among we are beginning to find out that vehicles of those steeped in the guilt of slavery, as one thought are wanted through which the South-of a numerous band of murderers and robern scholar can address the reading public. bers, and began to feel a livelier sense of our We cannot but think that the Messenger, individual depravity than had ever before the only original literary monthly now pub-oppressed us. According to Mr. Beecher lished within the Slave-holding States, will we were both a Borgia and a Cataline, and feel the benefit of this agitation of the South- it was gratifying to hear his fervent suppliern mind. Our list of subscribers is con- cation offered up in our behalf-the more stantly increasing, and the time we hope is especially as his unselfish nature led him to not distant when the long cherished wish of say two words for us where he said one for our heart will be accomplished in the circu- himself. lation of the Messenger in every quarter of the Southern States. Towards this end we shall labour unintermittingly and with a cheerful spirit. A few weeks since, we went over, one The rite of infant baptism was celebrated after the prayer was concluded, and while the children were being brought forward, the choir chanted with fine effect "Suffer little children to come unto me and forbid them not," &c. We have rarely heard such exquisite music. As its last notes died away, fine Sabbath morning, from the St. Nicholas the preacher, who had descended into the Hotel to Brooklyn to hear the Rev. Henry aisle, took the first child from the arms of Ward Beecher. They live a lazy life, the its father and letting the baptismal rain fall denizens of the St. Nicholas, and as we had fallen readily enough into the easy habitudes well as we could catch the words) "Harriet upon its sweet little face, pronounced (as of the house during a few days sojourn Stowe. I baptise thee, &c., &c." The rest of there, the hour for service had nearly arrived the cherubs-Susans, Johns, Henrys and before we left the breakfast table. By means Marthas-were then christened in order, and of the cars to the Peck Slip Ferry, however, the ordinance was finished by a prayer in and a brisk trot after gaining the Brooklyn which it was asked that none of these little shore, we managed to reach the church before the services were far advanced. Find- other manner servants of the Prince of Darkones might become slave-holders, or in any ing the main floor of the edifice very densely crowded, we tried the galleries, where we succeeded in obtaining-not a seat, but A place for standing miscalled standing room. ness. Reascending the pulpit, Mr. Beecher then read out a variety of notices, and among them one of a Lecture on the Poetry of Burns, from which, he said, he expected The church itself is a very large one, with great literary entertainment. He then openseats perhaps for 2,500 persons. The galle- ened the sacred volume and announced his ries extend all around the house, the organ text. What this was we do not now recolbeing directly above and behind the pulpit. lect, but the purpose of the discourse was to The pews below are arranged semi-circularly, show that the unbelievers of the present day the aisles radiating from the altar. There would have crucified our Lord had they lived are no decorations borrowed from ecclesiol- in Judea eighteen hundred years ago. The ogy, no irised windows, no oaked carvings, speaker, however, did not confine himself at no Gothic fretwork, no elaborate ceilings to all to his text, but took a wide range over the please the eye of the worshipper within Mr. entire field of polemics and touched every Beecher's meetin' house." It is a plain, topic of present interest in science, governsubstantial, comfortable Ebenezer of the Pu- ment and morals. Of Mr. Beecher's manritans. One could not help observing, too,ner, we cannot give any notion to the reader. that the congregation resembled little the He is beyond all question the most saltatory fashionable attendants of Grace and Calvary. speaker we ever heard. His pulpit consists There was no listlessness, no mere formal of a small desk, elevated upon a platform observance of the services, no melancholy some fifteen or twenty feet broad, and up exhibition of "long suffering," such as is and down this clear space the orator moves seen so often in church as if the absence of with an agility that would do credit to Franthe other Christian virtues was to be com- çois Ravel. In gesture he endeavors always pounded for by that alone: every body seem-to suit the action to the word, as my lord Should Hamlet advises; thus, in illustrating a point | gitimate effect in fraternal strife. by reference to the telescope, he raised his such disaster occur, the Rev. Henry Ward arms as if he held this instrument before Beecher will be among those accountable him and was taking an observation of the for it. It must needs be that offences come, sexton at the door. With an accent unmis- but wo unto him by whom the offence takeably New-Englandish, he reminds one cometh. in every sentence of the Green Mountain Boy on the stage, abbreviating whole into hull and using hum for home. Holmes tells us that Learning Knit her brows and stamped her angry foot Some fifteen or twenty years ago, one Monsieur Jean Baptiste Robinet was proprietor of a restaurant in the city of St. Louis, distinguished above other establishments of the same sort, by the excellence of its larder and cellar, and by the character of its custom. The Universal Yankee Nation had not Mr. Beecher commits this very offence then reached much more than an equality of whenever he has occasion to pronounce the numbers with the old French population, word. and was very far behind them in wealth and In the course of his remarks the speaker social position. At Monsieur Robinet's, cergave us some curious information. He said tain of the elderly gentlemen of the ancien that no doubt there were persons among the règime were accustomed to meet every evenJews who went to hear Christ preach through ing, to play dominoes (which they did to curiosity (just as we went to hear Mr. Bee- perfection,) and to pass judgment on his cher,) and came away very much fatigued wines, cigars, and other refreshments. This with a two hours' Sermon on the Mount! club, as it might be called, gave some éclat What authority the reverend gentleman could to the house, and attracted not a few specgive for saying that the Sermon on the Mount tators, no less curious to know the players was two hours in length, we do not know. than to overlook the game. For the mornThen he told us that he had among his con- ing hours, mine host provided other entergregation men whose yearly income was tainment. About 11 o'clock, he caused to $60,000, and intimated that out of this be set out an ample lunch, composed of diabundance they should subscribe largely vers appetizing and piquant meats and fishes, to the anti-slavery societies. Upon the skilfully impregnated with salt, pepper, muspeople of the South Mr. Beecher came tard, and a thousand other provocatives of down with the most tremendous invec- thirst, for which the English tongue furtive. He denounced them as man-steal-nishes no names. These devices were not ers, as hypocrites, as every thing that is vile without success; and our Gallic Boniface and brutish and despicable. He cried shame was gratified every day to see the increasing upon the merchants of New York who tole- throng of visiters who attended his morning rated the Southern man through cowardly receptions. But at last his tranquil satisfacconsiderations of trade. He inveighed with tion was disturbed by the comings and goings. great fury against the New York clergy who (on) of a new customer, whose expenditure could hold meetings about the Madiai Fam- by no means corresponded to the luxury of ily, while three millions of their fellow beings his tastes, or the vigor of his appetite. Nor under their own government were deprived was Monsieur Robinet the man to submit of the Word of God. It was a crime, said tamely to such foraging as the stranger deMr. Beecher, to tell the negro of an Atone- lighted in. So, after two or three days imment, to teach him his sinful nature and patient silence, our host at length strode offer to him the means of salvation. We up to him and made him a speech. What listened to all these things with becoming he said, may be in some sort committed to composure, bethinking ourselves of the ninth paper. But who can describe the quick play commandment now and then, but we could of his features, the swarthy glow of his comnot repress a feeling of sadness on coming plexion, his restless burning eyes, his groout of the building amid the throng of well- tesque but passionate gestures, and the dressed and intelligent-looking people who liar tone and emphasis with which he delivworshipped there, to think that, week after ered himself?"Sare! you coame-you week, these people were being instructed as eat lonch! eat lonch? begar, you eat, dia religious duty, to despise their fellow-citi-naire, sure! you eat dinaire! you drink zens-even their Christian brethren-of the brandee! by dam, you drink ten cent wort the Southern States, nor could we dismiss brandee! you take cigar! de ver best rè-galie the painful apprehension that one of these cigar! Vot den? (counting on his fingers.) days this instruction would work out its le- You eat dinaire--you drink ten cent wort pecu brandee-you smoke five cent rè-galie cigar, you give me. von . . . dam. . . leet . . .. five... cent. . . piece! Sa-acre ! (jerking off his coat and throwing it on the object of his wrath,) vill you take my coat? vill you take de key of my house? by dam!" We like a good, honest, slashing criticism. now and then, and here is one that Poe himself might have written in his savagest mood. It comes from the New York Express, a paper, we may say, whose reviews of books are always worth reading. ALFRED BUNN IN AMERICA. Philadelphia. A Hart. Mr. Bunn observes like a fool, and writes like a knave. His book is so far beneath honest contempt that it would be a profitless labor to expose its sound ng emptiness, its glaring falsehood, its brazen impudence, and the egregious incapacity of its author to judge of men or things rightly. Where he does happen to speak the truth, it is done so spitefully, that one cannot help seeing the miserable littleness of the man's judgment and honor. It is travellers like this who give the American people such a contemptible opinion of English rectitude of principle and soundness of judgment, and who impress the English people with such a silly notion of American feeling,| habit and character. Bunn was so well pleased with the high feeding and cheap living he got whilst among us, that at the end of his volume he hints broadly at his intention of coming back again. If he does, we fear he is likely to get "more kicks than halfpence." THE WITHERED LEAF. Sever'd from thy tender stalk, Wither'd wand'rer! knowest thou? Whence thou art?-Where goest thou? Nothing know I!-tempests' strife Whelm'd the tree that bore me. Zephyr's fickle breath,-the blast From the mountain's breezy height Wheresoever wafts the wind, On I go-where all beside Like myself are going; There like beauty, frail and brief, The University has sustained a grievous loss in the death of Professor E. H. Courte We have long been familiar with the fol- nay, for the last eleven years the head of lowing little poem from the French, which the mathematical school in that institution. for pathetic sweetness is unequalled by any We have never known a man who combined thing in its line that we know of, but we had all the qualities to be desired in a public innever met till recently with an English trans- structor more happily than Professor Courtelation of it. LA FEUILLE. De la tige détachée Pauvre feuille dessechée Où vas tu?-je n'en sais rien; nay. Thorough master of the abstruse subject upon which he lectured, he had the faculty of imparting his own knowledge to others in a degree rarely witnessed, while the uniform benignity of his manners endeared him to all with whom he was brought into association. The tributes that have been called forth, by his untimely death, from his former pupils, constitute an affecting evidence of his worth as a man and as a Professor. We had the good fortune to be present at the recent opening of the Petersburg Library and to hear the eloquent address delivered. on that occasion by THOMAS S. GHOLSON, Esq. This institution commences under the best auspices, and its well stocked shelves We subjoin the translation, which is from speak volumes for the enlightened liberality the pen of the Quaker Poet, Bernard Bar- and literary taste of the citizens of the glo ton rious "LITTLE COCKADE." Notices of New Works. THE POTIPHAR PAPERS: Re-printed from "Putnam's Monthly." New York. G. P. Putnam & Co. 1853. [From James Woodhouse, 139 Main Street. planders of his "antic disposition!"-how delightful a" Week's Delight!" How the poor, tited man returns in thought, with such a picture before him, to his own boyhood, playing again the games, echoing the hearty laughter, as of old! All the games are old acquaintances and the "Genteel Lady ever genteel" has a real existence perforce of memory: here are the very games we played so merrily: Charades and riddles as at Christmas here, We recollect reading these articles as they appeared | And what's my thought, and when, and where, and how, from month to month, with unusual interest. The first of the series, "Our Best Society," is a scathing satire on the enormities of New York fashionable life, and possesses a finish and strength which we were far from expecting to meet with in anything coming from the pen of the author of "Nile Notes" and "Lotus Eating." In the former of these works, Mr. Curtis scemed to be experimenting on the capacity of the English tongue-the poor language went staggering and floundering like a drunken man, or like the Egyptian Howadji after his third pipe of opium. True, there was a languid, dreamy music about the slipshod sentences which often disarmed the critic, and this merit we pointed out at the time; but the "Nile Notes," and its Syrian confrère, tasked the reader's charity to an uncommon extent: and gave little indication of auything else in the writer than a highly-sensuous turn of mind, and a rare mastery of the Tennysonian metrical philosophy. "Lotus Eating" was a great improvement, and now the "Potiphar Papers" has obliterated all recollection of the crudities of the Howadji. The great bulk of the volume is capital-and for the sake of Kurz Pacha we can pardon the somewhat prosy letter from Paris. The Pacha is an admirable piece of machinery, and one is not long in doubt after reading of his sayings and doings, what hand delineated in Harper's Magazine the immortal Don Bobtail Fandango. Mr. Curtis has no rival in this style of writing-this malicious and naïve pleasantry, as the French would say:-and we know of nothing better done than the concluding paragraph of the preface. The book should be read and pondered by the good people of Gotham. It is no fancy sketch-but the mirror held up to nature. as Alfred Tennyson, thinking about his boyhood, makes in a spirit of learned research and illustrated with apt Walter Vivian say:-all are explained, and dwelt upon example in the "Week's Delight." But let us descend from rhapsody, and simply say that this little volume is very excellent of its kind. It is one of those ten thousand juveniles which have become of late years so popular, not addressed at all to grown people, but cast in the exact mould to reach the hearts of children. Success to every such innocent delight of childhood : ---we welcome the new child-literature, and give it our helping hand, and wish it all success. "A Week's Delight" comes to us from the Appletons and has in addition to its pleasant reading matter, a very tasteful "outside." A WEEK'S DELIGHT: or Games and Stories for the Parlor and the Fireside. New York: D. Appleton & Co. 1854. [From A. Morris, 97 Main Street. Edited and Life of BENJAMIN ROBERT HAYDON, Historical Painter, The extracts we have given from this work in prece ding pages of the present number of the Messenger will give the reader a taste of its quality. Haydon was a man with whom life was a hard-fought struggle and the only moments of ease he ever knew he owed io a degrading patronage, which rendered it impossible for him to really enjoy them. A tinge of morbid sentiment ran through his whole career, and whoever follows it in his own diary, will be prepared, long before the close, for the melancholy suicide in which it terminated. There is much in these volumes, however, to repay perusal and we consider it one of the most notable publications of the day. POEMS BY JOHN G. SAXE. Fifth edition. Enlarged. Among "the mob of gentlemen who write" in rhyme in this country, we have an especial liking for SAXE. His forte, as every body knows, is humorous versification, wherein he combines the dexterity of Tom Ingoldsby with much of the comicality of Hood. We can faney him to have been born with a pun in his mouth, and we feel quite certain that his "compositions" at school must have afabounding fun as his, as Dogberry said of reading and forded great entertainment to his preceptor. Such This a charming little juvenile: we have read nothing so pleasing for a long while, and the simple fact that we have had an hour's "delight" over its pages, is no small compliment we beg to assure our readers. The critic of this good year of grace 1854, his a hard time of it :-so many important works in all departments of literature come under his notice, and his time is so fully occupied with the consideration of ambitious volumes of every description, that he finds very little leisure to bestow upon “ juveniles." If a book like the present attracts his attention, and makes good its claim to a full hour of his overtasked time and attention, it is pretty safe to say writing, "comes by nature," and if Saxe had not been that there is something in it. We assure the readers of the scholar that he is, it would have manifested itself in the Messenger that there is something in A Week's some agreeable way for the amusement of his fellow men. Delight"—unambitious as the title sounds. It is simply Education, however, has sharpened his wit to so fine a a work for good little girls and boys, and professes no point that it may be said of him whenever he discusses a higher end than pointing out to them the means of subject, rem tetigit acu. Like Hood, too, Saxe has a spending winter evenings pleasantly :-this it worthily a command of pathos as well as of humour, and can call accomplishes, and in a way which none but a woman forth tears as readily as grins. Witness the following could have devised. Fairy tales nl games, fun and lines, with which we dismiss his volume, commending it humer, Charlie Bolton, the wag, and the merry little ap- to the favor of our readers— BEREAVEMENT. Nay, weep not, dearest, though the child be dead, From these dark scenes of sorrow, sin and strife; The few that deck this dreary world of ours: Though much it seems a wonder and a woe That one so loved should be so early lost, And hallowed tears may unforbidden flow To mourn the blossom that we cherished mostYet all is well; GOD's good design I see, That where our treasure is, our hearts may be! THE LOST PRINCE: Facts tending to prove the Identity of Louis the Seventeenth, of France, and the Rev. Eleazar Williams, &c. By JOHN H. HANSON. New York: G. P. Putnam & Co., 10 Park Place. [From J. W. Randolph, 121 Main Street. our readers. Mr. James Woodhouse, 139 Main Street, is the Richmond Agent. BUSY MOMENTS OF AN IDLE WOMAN: New York: D. The idle woman" to whom we are indebted for these agreeable sketches is understood to be a Southern Lady widely known for her beauty and accomplishments, and occupying a shining position in the beau monde. Whoever she may prove to be, there can be no question that she has talents of a very high order. Perhaps the most noticeable trait in her present book is the familiarity displayed with the tone of conversation employed in high life, and the perfectly natural way in which the characters employ those phrases of frantic exaggeration and stupendous hyperbole which we hear in the "drawing rooms" of our modern "aristocracy." We should like to overhear a tete-a-tete between the "idle woman' and one of the dandies "in society;" it would probably be as entertaining as her next volume. UP THE RIVER. By F. W. SHELTON. Author of Rec- The articles originally written by Mr. Hanson for Putnam's Monthly concerning the Iroquois Dauphin have been expanded to a goodly sized volume in the present publication. There is a great deal of patient research and ingenuity wasted in the treatise which will hardly convince any body but Mr. Eleazar Williams of the bypothesis set up. Mr. Hanson, however, is thoroughly in love with his subject, and has introduced some new evidence to fortify the rather weak demonstration which was so cut to pieces by the critics twelve months ago. Those As a record of country life, this volume will prove a who became parties to the quarrel on one side or the other, happy accession to the rural department of literature will find the volume interesting, while the facts concern- which has been so largely added to, of late, by Miss Cooping the early history of the North West, which Mr. Han-er, Wilmot, Willis, the author of "Up Country Letters," son has accumulated in his chase after a Bourbon, will reward the impartial reader. THE YEMASSEE. A ROMANCE OF CAROLINA. By W. We are rejoiced to see this new and comely republication. Mr. Simms's novels have never had full justice done them, either at home or abroad, yet they will make a larger figure in the department of fiction, when the history of American Literature comes to be written, than those of any other author, Mr. Cooper only excepted. The Yemassee is a story of striking incident, vigorous narrative and animated dialogue. It refers to a period full of material for the novelist, and perpetuates phases of character that might else have been lost to posterity. The present edition is inscribed to Dr. Samuel Henry Dickson of Charleston. The ART-JOURNAL for December is a superb number and fitly closes the magnificent volume for 1853. The opening plate is an exquisite representation of Raphael's Madonna, and is of itself worth a whole year's subscription. Persons who have a taste for engravings should by all means take the ART-JOURNAL. The announcements for 1854 give assurance that the excellence of the work wi!! be maintained both in letter-press and illustrations, and we cannot too strongly commend it to the favour of and the lamented Downing. Mr. Shelton is a charming writer, as his former works have abundantly shown, and in his present sketches all his most agreeable qualities are pleasantly exhibited. The book is dedicated in a graceful letter to Louis Gaylord Clarke, the Editor of the Knickerbocker, in which magazine its contents were originally published. NOTES ON THE STATE OF VIRGINIA. BY THOMAS JEF- Mr. Jefferson's Notes on Virginia is a book of worldwide celebrity. This new edition of it is especially valuable, as having been prepared for the press by the author himself, and as containing many notes and maps never before published. The typography does credit to the Richmond printer, Mr. C. H. Wynne, who executed it. We are indebted to Messrs. D. Appleton & Co., of New York for a superb library edition of the Spectator just issued from their ever busy press. It is printed on paper of the very finest quality and with a clearness and accuracy of typographical execution that leaves nothing to be desired. A fine copy of the Spectator for the shelves of the Library has long been wanted, and the six volumes now before us are therefore destined to a very grateful acceptance on the part of the reading public. They can be found at the bookstore of Mr. James Woodhouse, 139, Main Street. |