fair faces with black patches, as if to shew that the white angel was something akin to the black devil, and was not ashamed to own such relationship.

Pardon me, ye fair, frail creatures! as Moore has wittily said—the “errata” is, after all, the best page in your volume: you err not as we do! there is a grace about your grossest blunders, which laughs all the care and display of man to scorn. God bless you all! and after this, we will not disfigure our chapter with another sentence, for the blessing came leaping unaware from the heart.

The Squire comes home after his successful contest in the election, quite an altered man, as regarded his conduct towards Godfrey; and the following is the scene and sentimentality which ensue :

This change had arisen from some remark made by the wealthy mayor of the borough, respecting the intimacy of the young poet with his daughter. The mayor meant no harm,—he simply inquired of the squire, who his intended son-in-law really was; and then, for the first time in his life, Squire Ingledew heard that rumour had given the hand of Emma to Godfrey. This accounted for the cold, formal shake of the hand, after the "chairing" had taken place. And now we must return to the scene in the hall, after Godfrey had gone, and Emma and her father were left alone.

Unlike his usual manner, the squire came to the matter uppermost in his mind, at once, and said, "Emma, I must no longer encourage the visits of Godfrey Malvern here, agreeable as his company has been to us both. Rumour is already busy with your names, and has given out that I have selected him for your husband, before I have ever even thought of your marrying with any one, at least, not at present. I intend writing him a civil note in the morning, and I am sure he will see at once, how improper it will be to resume Lis visits here."

Now Emma was a young lady who possessed great courage, and no small decision; as to deceit, she had never had occasion to put it into practice, and her reply was a straightforward one, for she was in the right humour to answer :— "You may do as you please, father, but when I do marry, it will be with Godfrey Malvern; and whether you see him again or not, I shall. I scorn to deceive you!-But I have made a solemn vow to God, that I will marry none other than him,-and you may now take what course you please!"

The squire never did anything like another person, and her reply scarcely caused an alteration in his countenance; he merely looked fixedly at his daughter for a few moments, then said, "When you become of age, Emma, if you are of the same opinion as you are now, I shall not attempt to oppose it,but until then, I feel certain that you will do as I desire you. However, please yourself! I made a promise to your mother on her death-bed, that I would never thwart you in your choice of a husband; but remember, I made no promise to assist you afterwards, nor shall I, if you marry without my consent. I have no more to say, so leave me !-You will, I hope, think differently of the matter by morning.-Good night.-There, say no more now," said he, waving his hand: "if you still continue in the same mind, I cannot help it; but once more, remember you have no help from me.”

Enma retired to her chamber,-but not to sleep. As yet she had shed no tear,—had not even displayed a symptom of weakness, nor was there anything

approaching to what is called a sinking of the heart. All this was her father's own fault, for he had neither trained her up to love nor fear him. Up to within the last three years of his life, he had neither thought nor cared for anything, but amassing wealth together. This once attained, he aimed next at power; so that between money and ambition, he had left the mind of his daughter neglected. He loved her as much as it was in his nature to love anything earthly:-next to himself, and saving that self, he loved only her. But even she formed only a leading link in his great chain of ambition,—a chain with which his very heart was fettered, and there kept a cold, iron guard, and held prisoner every nobler emotion. It was one of his chief objects to bring down rank,-to make his daughter the hawk which was to strike at some noble quarry, to see some proud, old, titled family bowed prostrate before his wealth, that he might look on and triumph over their fall, for in his heart he hated to see a man above him; he aspired not to raise himself to the height of the good and great, but to lower them down to his own standard,and on Lord Wildman was his eye fixed, for, although unknown to the young nobleman, he already held the deeds of a heavy mortgage on his estate.

Deprived of her mother, almost before she felt the loss, and left under the care of such a father as we are attempting to portray, no wonder that she dare to disobey him,-that she who had seen all around only waiting to obey her slightest wish-who had never been taught that she, in her proud station, ought also to serve, should at last rebel. Hers was a nature that needed much training; her feelings were too buoyant-her passions had known no check, for as yet she had never before been called upon to make any sacrifice,-she had never been taught to "know herself;" and this was her father's fault.

These are favourable and selected specimens of the tale; for we might cite passages, especially where the life of the author is depicted, where an attempt is made to convey a vivid idea of the necessities and resources of litterateurs, and to introduce the reader to the secrets of the book-making trade, from the penny publications, through the whole periodical circle, up to your portly volumes, which appear to us to be, not merely wearifully long and tiresomely repeated, but to approach puerility and the most common commonplace. In these parts of the work Mr. Miller appears to have been writing for the information of country cousins; and to some of such readers Godfrey Malvern's experience may be instructive. But to many of those in whose estimation the Basket-maker has established a high footing, and whose permanent good opinion he must be most desirous to possess, we fear there will be found, in his literary gossip, grounds for disappointment, and even for the charge of silliness.

Still it is to be borne in mind that many passages in the life of the author must be akin to those which have actually occurred in the experience of one who has expressed himself to the following effect, in his touching and candid preface to a "Day in the Woods:" "That the world is overstocked with authors, is not to be doubted; but it is equally true, that it is too full of basket-makers. Many portions of the volume were written amid the fatigue and exertions conVOL. III. (1842.) No. 1.

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sequent upon several hours' daily perambulation in the streets of the metropolis, in unsuccessful endeavours to dispose of his baskets, when his spirit was subdued by poverty and disappointment; when even hope had deserted his dwelling, and despair sat brooding by his hearth. He had long before this been an adventurer on the uncertain sea of literature; but the periodical skiffs in which he embarked, had many of them been wrecked, and he was cast upon a desolate shore, on which grew a few osiers, and by clinging to them and weaving them together, he was just saved from the returning waves which have devoured numbers of his struggling companions.

It was some six years ago when Thomas Miller gave this simple piece of autobiography; since which time he has achieved many literary triumphs, and earned for himself a high reputation amongst the living sons of song, and men of letters.

We hope and trust that the earnings have not alone been the breath of praise and the trumpetings of fame. His station now in the rank of the publishers of the metropolis, we take to be evidence of a worldly condition in some measure adequate to his aspirings, when he called upon those who might object to his devotedness to literature to point out some other path that led not to the jaws of want and wretchedness, and he would follow it. Glad indeed shall we be if any notice of ours, regarding Mr. Miller's calling, shall direct to his house of business. We believe there is not a publisher in London who can exhibit such an inviting catalogue and display of books coined in the seller's brain, and fashioned by the bibliopole's hand, as meet the eye at No. 9, Newgate-street. There you will find "A Day in the Woods," with its pleasant and truthful description of scenery, its tender and sweet memories of impressions deeply engraven by nature, and its fine bursts of imagination in rich verse, as well as in a prosaic form which may be called green and leafy. There you will meet with "Beauties of the Country," partly a compilation tastefully and congenially done, and partly an original work breathing abundantly of many things that are purely rustic. "Rural Sketches" presents kindred beauties and excellences; with manifest tokens of improvement in literary craftship. There you receive from the romancer's own hand "Royston Gower," and "Fair Rosamond," fictions holding a higher place in the school of Scott than any that have come in the great magician's wake. We might enumerate sundry other productions of this man of industry, each of them displaying incontestible proofs of genius, cultured and chastened in the school of experience and just observation; and all of them abounding with the truth of nature, with sympathy for man, and with infecting sentiment,-humorous, tear-drawing, and exalting by turns.

Our animadversions relative to certain portions of Godfrey Malvern, ought also to be qualified by bearing testimony to the manly

sincerity of our author, and to the good faith which uniformly characterizes his purpose. He does not think it enough to be amusing and to be merely harmless. His manifest desire is to improve the heart, to purify and to elevate the imagination; and he whose aim is so properly directed, if possessed but of a little of Mr. Miller's talent and taste, can never fail of benefitting his fellow men; nor, in his sketches and illustrations of character, of infusing life and blood into them.

We have spoken of Mr. Miller's education in the school of experience; alluded to what we hope were the forever bygone hardships of his lot; and have quoted his strongly appealing, and, we doubt not, minutely accurate, account of a miserable locality in the suburbs of London. Ere concluding our few remarks, we shall merely add, as a proof of the sincerity and permanency of his sentiments and sympathies, the sentence which immediately follows the extract already given from the autobiographical preface. "He then took refuge in one of those silent alleys, of which there is no lack in 'busy London,' where hearts break daily, whose deep feelings are wholly unknown to the gay and prosperous; where many a tear gushes forth unheeded, and many a sigh is breathed, which finds not an echo beyond the desolate dwelling of the sufferer."

ART. VII.-Introductory Lectures on Modern History, delivered in Lent Term, 1842, with the Inaugural Lecture delivered in December, 1841. By the late THOMAS ARNOLD, D.D., Regius Professor of Modern History in the University of Oxford, and Head Master of Rugby School. Parker, Oxford.

WHEN the late head master of Rugby School was inducted to the professional chair of Modern History at Oxford, there was in all probability an universal feeling of satisfaction at such an appointment being made. Every man who reflected at all upon the subject, felt no small pleasure in the idea that a mind of such capacity and almost startling energy was about to develop itself at last in its proper sphere. That such was the general feeling may be gathered from the eager crowds which awaited the opening of the schoolsnot only the students themselves, but visitors from all parts-old and young-the teacher and the taught-nay, even the fairer sexall thronged alike to listen to the theses of so celebrated an historian as the author of the lectures before us.

We ourselves from our sanctum sanctorum-from the narrow precincts of our literary "snuggery," breathed many an aspiring sigh after that intellectual feast, and we hailed with joy the intelligence that the publication of the lectures would place its substance at least within our reach and that of many thousands.

While, however, we pay homage due to the historian and the savant, we must distinctly protest against being thought to coincide in many of the opinions and "idées" of our author, as respects his views upon the political constitution of both church and state. Like him, however, we would, on the present occasion, shun all controversial topics, and hasten forward to the consideration of the work itself, considered as an assistant and guide to those bent upon the acquirement of the interesting and noble science of history.

It would but ill become us to alter and endeavour to improve the definition that Dr. Arnold has laid down of "History" in his Inaugural Lecture. He has a right to define that or any other word in the way that pleases him, provided that he keeps severely to that definition throughout the course of his work. We cannot here help expressing a wish that this practice of laying down, at the commencement of a work, what ideas particular words convey to the author's mind, were more generally followed, especially by controversial writers. How many an angry pamphlet-how many a ponderous tome would have been spared the world if this practice had universally obtained!

Dr. Arnold defines history first as "The Biography of a Society," and in a succeeding page, qualifying this definition still farther, he terms it "The Biography of a Political Society or Commonwealth.' In order to arrive at this definition, he probes deeply into the commonly-received and popular acceptation of the word, bringing forward (as instances of the careless way in which it is sometimes applied) the soi disant histories of "families," "institutions," or "societies." But let him speak for himself.

"Take for instance any common family, and its members are soon so scattered from one another, and are engaged in such different pursuits, that although it is possible to write the biography of each individual, yet there can be no such thing, properly speaking, as the history of the family."

Here we cannot altogether agree with him. By analogous reasoning it should seem that there is, "properly speaking," no History of the World, taken as one great whole, but histories merely of each and every constituent part of that whole. But by what name shall we designate that fund of information which is collected from the history of every particular State or Nation? Even to keep to his own example, surely it is possible to form from the adventures and pursuits of each member of a family, however scattered and separated it may be in its objects of interest, such a digest or collection of events and their consequences, as might be called The History of that Family, and perhaps could hardly with accuracy be styled anything else.

The first lecture contains valuable directions to the student desirous of obtaining a knowledge of modern history. The professor