The Colonel. “ The Misfortunes of the Dauphin.” The late extraordinary attempt to assassinate the person who calls himself the Duke of Normandy, and son of the unfortunate Louis the Sixteenth, is likely to attract attention to this large and specious volume. It is translated from the French by the Hon. and Rev. C. Perceval, who vouches with great enthusiasm for the credibility of the whole narrative. The object which influenced the villain to shoot this man can be but in perfectly known. It would be ridiculous to suppose that he was set on by either the Bourbons or the present government of Paris, and the probability is that the attempt arose wholly from the fury of an irritated Frenchman, disappointed in raising money, and who, finding that beggary would not succeed, determined to revenge himself by blood. The Rector. The mysterious fate of the real son of Louis the Sixteenth naturally lays open the succession to imposture. The darkness thrown over the latter days of that unfortunate infant, the cruelty of the wretch to whose hands he was intrusted, the suddenness of his death, and the savage rapidity with which the dead were then hurried to the tomb, preclude all that authentic evidence which is required to set the public mind at rest with regard to royal succession. The consequence has been, that several pretenders have started up in France, whose claims, however, have been so totally disproved, that the attempt has ceased to be regarded as more than burlesque, and in this class we must include the person who calls himself the Duke of Normandy, until we shall have evidence of a more solid texture than his own ponderous pamphlet. It contains, however, an amusing recital of his claims, his labours, and his prospects; and, among its other features, a showy speech of the Duchess of Berri. On it being observed to her, in La Vendée, in 1832, that she might possibly be going to fight for the Dauphin, who it was reported was not dead, the dashing Duchess answered, “ Whether or not the son of Louis the Sixteenth is still living I cannot know; but, if so, let him declare himself and take his place beside me. be the issue of the rising at the head of which I am about to place myself, I have no intention of fighting but for legitimacy; and, if the Duke of Normandy should re-appear, my son would be only too happy to be the first aid-de-camp of his King.' I would rather that he would live in Edinburgh, a private individual, on 3001. a-year, than that he should ever be seated on a throne under the slightest suspicion of usurpation.” Unluckily the heroine mingled other matters with war, and the cunning of the French monarch, which confined her in a fortress, exhibited in the course of a few months such fruits of her patriotic travel, that the Duchess subsided into the mamma, and the tragedy of insurrection finished in farce. Whatever may The Barrister. “ The Oriental Annual, by Thomas Bacon.” India has always been an interesting country, but two circumstances of a very different import have begun to give it a new interest in British eyesthe threats of Russian invasion, and the steam-communication by the Red Sea. No man of sense will laugh at either. The habitual ill faith of the Hindoo, and the irreconcilable hostility of the Mahometan, will always easily awake the spirit of war in India, and the march of a Rus sian army to the northern frontier, or even the rising of the native powers, under Russian influence, must always put our Indian government into a situation of difficulty, if not of danger. The Colonel. Yet every war in India, since the memorable battle of Plassy, now nearly a hundred years ago, has only added to our territory; in every war an enemy has been broken down, or a great province acquired; until England now reckons under her banner, in an empire extending from the Bay of Bengal to the Himalaya mountains, nearly a hundred millions of men. If this mighty extent be honestly governed, which it is, and this mighty multitude be wisely guided, which we hope it will be, the strength of Russia ten times told might invade it in vain. In the mean time, it is desirable that all possible information on the subject may be given to the people of England, and in this spirit we should encourage the lighter and more graceful works which treat on the manners and landscape of India, as well as the more solid ones which treat on its government and resources. Tilt's “ Oriental Annual ” is at once a highly-decorated and well-written performance. The Rector. “ Motives to the Study of Biblical Literature.” This is a course of introductory lectures by William Goodhugh. The author of the work is a man of learning and ability, who has devoted himself to the illustration of the Scriptures. In his single volume he has amassed a great variety of intelligence relative to the manuscripts, the interpretation, and the antiquities of the sacred books. Dividing his work into two parts, the first six lectures discuss the most interesting topics of the Old Testament; the second part, also containing six lectures, discusses the prominent points of the New, gives a considerable portion of the evidences, a general recapitulation of the books, and finishes hy a valuable index. The general object of the volume is to excite the scholars of England to study the Scriptures in the original tongues. No object could be more important at any time, or more necessary than at the present moment. As the volume is published by subscription, it is to be hoped that the author will receive all the patronage due to labours so meritoriously directed, and so meritoriously pursued. The Barrister. "A New Method of Learning to Read, Write, and Speak a Language in Six Months, adapted to the German,” by H. G. Ollendorf.—The possession of the modern languages has become so much a matter of necessity since our renewed intercourse with the Continent, that every man desirous of knowing the most powerful, copious, and learned language of that Continent must feel deeply indebted to the author of this volume. Germany has as evidently been designed for the great mine of European learning, as Italy for the cultivation of the fine arts, France for the arts of elegance, and England for the pursuits of the deepest philosophy, and the most active practical labours of commerce and civilisation. The Rector. Ollendorf's method depends on the principle, that in all conversation the question, in a great degree, involves the answer. Thus, on the master's asking the question, the pupil finds that he has little And so more to do than to repeat it, with one or two additional words. He in this manner at once learns the words, the accent, and the few additional expressions which make the difference between asking and answering. And this manner the intelligent student can equally adopt for himself. Thus the form of the exercises ism" Art thou reading ? I am not reading.--Do the sons of noblemeu study ? They do study.- When does your friend study French ? He studies it in the morning.' forth. This practice followed for some time, and the vast variety of examples which the volume furnishes, will necessarily soon make the learner familiar with an immense vocabulary, which, after all, is the great requisite for speaking the language. The volume is very properly and advantageously preceded by an extract from Captain Basil Hall's “ Schloss Hanfield," recommending the system from his personal experience, as at once the most rapid and the most secure, the most facile, and the most complete that has ever assisted him in the acquirement of a modern language. The Doctor. “Heath's Book of Beauty for 1839.”- This book deserves its title. In its subjects, which are taken from some of the most celebrated beauties of the higher ranks, in the elegance of its general decoration, and in the grace and fashion of its authorship, it is worthy of the striking series, of which it sustains the character and the style. Some of the poems are extremely pretty. Those on a portrait of Lady Fanny Cowper in a Spanish dress, by Lady Blessington, are just what they ought to be-light, fond, and fanciful Not a Spanish maiden Art thou, lady fair, Falls with graceful air ; Thou hadst sought the shade, To the serenade; * Where such eyes, whose softness, Like a veil of light, Lustre, else too bright. Art thou, lady fair, Gives a Spanish air. The Rector. “The Protectorate of Oliver Cromwell, edited by R. Vaughan, D.D.” — This is a very important performance, giving a great number of letters relative to the personal and public policy of the great usurper's government, chiefly compiled from the Landsdowne MSS. in the British Museum. It is from this order of authority that a true knowledge of events and their origin can alone be obtained; and one of the most advantageous signs of the revival of historical writing in our time is the new value annexed to such authentic and personal records of the past. The Colonel. The letters are chiefly those of Secretary Thurlow and Dr. Pell, an agent of Cromwell on the Continent, and employed even in the important station of ambassador in the negociations with the Duke of Savoy on the persecution of the Vaudois. They contain a multitude of references to the most striking transactions of the time, and develop the general policy of the great leader of the Commonwealth, with a clearness and interest of the most explicit and satisfactory nature. The Rector. In all transactions of the time of Charles, the great interest now refers to the public characters. We are, in a general sense, beyond the events themselves; they have done their share of good and evil: the Constitution has long since reaped the full advantage of the struggle. The struggle is donemand, like the future harvests which rise with increased fertility from the field of battle--we have long since felt the results even of those times of calamity, in the richer productiveness of British freedom. But the unchanging value is in the characters of the eminent actors in those anxious events--the Clarendons, the Vanes, the Hampdens, the Straffords, the Cromwells; their powerful, nervous, and active faculties, brought out to their fullest energy by the toils of the time, form an example at once startling and elevating, show us of what admirable vigour human nature is capable, to what absorbing passions it is liable, and with what singular force it may stamp the fortunes of its country in the hour of public fusion-and stamp it for ages. The Barrister. Dr. Vaughan's Introductory Essay on the History of the Rebellion is an able performance. It gives a generally fuir view of the chief predispositions of the times. The characters of Clarendon and the chief royalists are discussed with candour; and, though their generous and manly attachment to the throne, their lofty and natural disgust for the savage insolence of the popular partisans, and their wise and justified alarm at the approach of democracy, are not sufficiently allowed for by the peculiar feelings of the writer, yet the merit of the high old English aristocracy often forces its way, and Dr. Vaughan yields to involuntary enthusiasm. From this gallery of proud and powerful characters, one may be chosen as an example of both the spirit of the age and the powers of the writer.—“On the side of the royalists no man drew his sword more promptly, or wielded it with more determination, than the Earl of Northampton, though, until the approach of the war, he had rarely given much attention to public affairs. As that crisis came on, he relinquished the ease in which men of his rank and fortune generally pass their time; and, before the king had set up his standard at Nottingham, appeared at the head of his followers in Warwickshire, to watch the motions of Lord Brooke. He raised a troop of horse and a regiment of foot at his own cost, and appointed his four sons as officers under him. All the perils and hardships of a soldier's life he endured with the readiness of one who had grown up among them. He often spoke of falling in such a contest, as the noblest end that could await him. At Hopton Heath his horse was shot under him, in a charge which separated him from the main body of his followers, and left him at the mercy of his enemies. When called on to surrender, he answered, in the fulness of his scorn, that he was not born to accept a favour from base rogues and rebels ;' and, irritated by this return, they speedily numbered him with the slain.” The Rector. One of the most characteristic and melancholy circumstances connected with the civil war was its forcing forward into public life many men whose vocation was evidently-for private tranquillity and domestic happiness. The memorable Lord Falkland was a man whose whole life was evidently intended for the study, and who would have made the charm of private society, if he had not been flung into public exertion. The elegance and scholarship of Carnarvon were thrown away in the rough encounters of the field. Sir George Lisle’s grace of manners, and Lord Capel's accomplishments, would have been the delight of their circle in other times. Yet it is remarkable that the gentleness of their minds was found perfectly consistent with the arduous labours of the statesman and the soldier; that the qualities of private life only concealed their faculties of public service, and that the gentlest and most polished of men in ordinary society exhibited the courage of heroes in the field, and the dignity of martyrs on the scaffold. The Barrister. Still those were trying times. The whole must be recorded as one grand error of the nation- -an error in religion which mistook extravagance of dissent for liberty of conscience; an error in polity which mistook popular license for established freedom; and an error in national feeling which mistook the overthrow of monarchy for the birth of Constitution. All the objects of true freedom were on the point of being gained, when partisanship soured the spirit of the people against the king. The zeal of partisanship readily passed from the defects of the Constitution to attack the throne. Individual jealousy, vindictiveness, and ambition rapidly became the true inspirers of the time, and the triumph was fatally consummated in sending the monarch to the scaffold, in mangling religion by the hands of the sectaries, and, as the result of both, in purchasing by the horrors of a civil war, by the guilt of regicide, and by the miseries of an iron despotism, only the privilege of throwing the Constitution, bound hand and foot, at the footstool of Charles the Second, a hypocrite and a profligate. The Barrister. Dr. Vaughan evidently inclines to the belief that Cromwell was long unexcited by any desire of personal supremacy. It is certainly probable, that at the commencement of the national disturbances he did not foresee their termination; or that, when he was a brewer at Huntingdon, and all his military honours were confined to the command of a troop of yeomanry, he did not dream of the time when he should be Lord General; but it is difficult to believe that, when the sword once unsheathed, and he discovered in himself not merely talents to excite the people, but to lead the troops--when he had seen the king's armies driven before his superior generalship, and felt it next to impossible that he should ever be sincerely forgiven, he must not have contemplated was |