From the intimations which Mr. Lawrence has given us of the contents of several of Mr. Wheaton's unpublished despatches, it will be seen that he performed with singular fidelity that part of the duty of a foreign minister which requires him to keep his government well informed of every occurrence of public moment, political, statistical, or commercial, which falls within his observation. Elaborate despatches upon over-land communication with the East, by the way of Egypt, and across the Isthmus of Panama; upon the resources of China, on occasion of the opening of that sealed empire to the intercourse of the world in 1842; upon the claims of the representatives of Paul Jones on the government of Denmark, for prizes sent into Norway and delivered up to Great Britain, during the Revolutionary war; upon the anomalous relations of the Prussian government with its Catholic subjects; and other important questions and subjects, are referred to by Mr. Lawrence. These brief indications of the contents of Mr. Wheaton's despatches authorize us to anticipate a rich harvest of instruction in the comprehensive publication, which Mr. Lawrence permits us to expect from his pen.

We have in the introduction to this article spoken of the first publication of Mr. Wheaton's great work, of which Mr. Lawrence now presents to us this much improved edition. In 1841 the first edition of the "History of the Progress of the Law of Nations in Europe from the Peace of Westphalia to the Congress of Vienna,” prepared as a prize essay for the Institute of France, was published at Leipzig, in French. Two successive and greatly improved editions were published on the Continent, and an English translation appeared at New York in 1845. This work forms the pendant to the elementary treatise, and, though from the nature of the subject not admitting the same methodical treatment, is filled with a learning not to be found collected in any other volume. It was the subject of an honorable notice in France from the pen of Mr. Pinheiro-Ferreira, the learned and acute editor of Vattel and Martens, and furnished the text of an elaborate article on the law of nations by Mr. Senior, in the Edinburgh Review (Vol. LXXVII. p. 303), in which a well-deserved tribute is paid to

Mr. Wheaton's character as a lawyer, historian, statesman, and publicist.

It is scarcely necessary to state that the talents and learning thus displayed by Mr. Wheaton acquired for him a distinguished name in Europe. He was elected, during his residence at Berlin, a foreign member of the Prussian Royal Academy of Sciences; and in 1842 received the same compliment from the French Institute, of which he was chosen a corresponding member, of the Section of Jurisprudence. Thus honored abroad, he was not less appreciated at home, and he enjoyed the distinction - almost solitary in the diplomatic service of the United States — of having during a period of twenty years, without intermission, been employed to represent the country, to the entire satisfaction of several successive administrations, and through two political revolutions involving a general change of public officers at home and abroad.

In this state of things, and, to borrow the language of Mr. Lawrence, “at the height of his celebrity, and when he might justly have looked for a transfer to one of the great courts of Paris or London, where his experience and peculiar acquirements might have been more useful to his country, he received an intimation from the Secretary of State (Mr. Buchanan) of President Polk's intention to terminate his mission to Berlin, with a view to the appointment of a successor; and the opportunity was afforded him of anticipating his removal by a voluntary resignation." As a general principle, we do not object to short terms of diplomatic service. They may be attended with some inconvenience in particular cases, but there are counterbalancing advantages. Whether desirable or not, no other system is practicable in this country. But surely exceptions to the general rule should be made in cases of distinguished merit, and the removal of Mr. Wheaton, under all the circumstances of the case, was a most discreditable sacrifice to the exigencies of party. It excited astonishment in Europe, but happily wrought no injury to the reputation of Mr. Wheaton, at home or abroad. He was received with merited honors on his return to his native country, and was soon invited to a lecturership on International Law in the Law School of the University at Cambridge. This appointment would no doubt

have resulted in his establishment as a permanent professor of the Law of Nations in the Dane Law School; but all calculations of this kind, as far as Mr Wheaton was concerned, were speedily disappointed by his death on the 11th of March, 1848.

We have done little more in the preceding pages than to condense the interesting account given by Mr. Lawrence of the professional and diplomatic career and labors of Mr. Wheaton, necessarily limiting ourselves almost wholly to a narration of the leading facts, and omitting much matter of interesting detail. We have left ourselves no space for any further analytical notice of the work of which the title is given at the head of our article, and which, as we have observed, was reviewed in our journal on the appearance of the first edition. It now appears, as we have stated, in a highly improved form, containing not only the latest revisions of the distinguished author, but the careful and learned annotations of Mr. Lawrence. In the latter portion of the Introduction, he has incidentally adverted to events bearing upon the great questions of public law discussed in the work, and which have occurred since it received the last corrections of its author. The most important of these are the occupation of Rome by a French army; the Hungarian revolution, and the right claimed by the United States to inform themselves of its progress by a confidential agent; the overture of France and England to the United States to join in a tripartite convention relative to Cuba; and the pending contest in Eastern Europe. In the annotations upon the text in the body of the work, Mr. Lawrence has carefully pointed out the incidents which have occurred within the last seven years, illustrative of his author, and especially the important changes in the maritime law of nations which have been made since the commencement of the present war,-the recognition by the belligerents of the principle of "free ships, free goods," without its antithesis, - the abstinence from privateering, - the respect paid to the property of one belligerent found within the jurisdiction of the other at the breaking out of the war, and the encouragement given to the continued prosecution of commerce within lawful channels, both by the belligerents and neutrals.

In the Appendix to the work Mr. Lawrence has brought together much valuable matter. The first article is a very learned and instructive note upon the subject of naturalization. To this succeeds the act of the last session of Congress to remodel the diplomatic and consular system of the United States, a law containing some valuable provisions, and making desirable changes in the present system, but standing itself in need of careful revision and amendment, as is sufficiently seen in the report of the Attorney-General upon its construction. The next article of the Appendix consists of the important debate in the House of Commons on the 4th of July, 1854, the chief value of which lies in the learned and manly speech of Sir William Molesworth. This is followed by some addenda to the notes, the most important of which refer to our relations with Cuba.

Of the present edition of Mr. Wheaton's work, about a third part is from the pen of Mr. Lawrence, who has discharged the office of editor and commentator with signal fidelity, intelligence, and success. He not only shows himself familiar with the subject as treated in the pages of his author, but also well acquainted with the entire literature of the law of nations. Whatever is furnished by the English and Continental writers who have succeeded Mr. Wheaton, by Phillimore, Wildman, Manning, Reddie, and Polson, by Ortolan, Hautefeuille, and Fœlix, is judiciously drawn upon by Mr. Lawrence. The diplomacy and legislation of our own and foreign countries are carefully examined, and, in short, the work is made in his hands we think it not too much to say - what its lamented author would have made it, had he lived to the present time.

ART. II. Pictures of Europe, framed in Ideas. By C. A. BARTOL. Boston: Crosby, Nichols, & Co. 1855. 12mo. pp. 407.

FOREIGN travel is getting to be so common an experience, and one which consumes so much muscle and money, that it is high time more attention were paid to the means of making it profitable to the minds, as well as easy to the bodies, and economical to the purses, of the nomadic tribe. Almost every traveller, indeed, drops his tribute of sober counsel into the public ear, but it usually goes in with so much else that he has brought home for the same worthy channel, that neither the particular contributions nor the general sum of advice can be found at the time when we are in actual want of them. Americans have a special call to travel. It is the peculiar privilege of their birth in the New World, that the Old World is left them to visit. The European can have no sympathy with the ardor of their longings to see what their whole education has been occupied with teaching them about. The spirit of travel is in the very bones of our countrymen, and usually bursts out much too early for their own good. A foreign tour is the dream and purpose of every educated man and woman on this side the Atlantic. And yet little has been said respecting the subject of foreign travel, as one admitting of general consideration; little attention has been given to the inquiry how to travel, -in what company, at what age, for how long a time, with what aims, and in what spirit. We propose to set some more competent teacher the example of supplying this deficiency, by laying out in a gossiping way, and under cover of the very interesting work before us, — to which in the course of this article we shall ask careful attention, — some of our own views of travel. We claim no experience, and shall affect no oracular wisdom; but the foreign tourist who has so far suppressed his vanity as not to trouble the public with a volume, has an indefeasible right to inflict an article upon them, if he can manage the editor of the quarterly that gives it birth.

Travelling, and making books of travel, are so nearly iden