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    - ** be ** tide < m " I *« mkem * ess » is serious and sound , and that on Br . DoiianV books ibtfut - "T > fet ari-d : Bress very clever and nensiHe , fell of wit -and « uiao « u ^ elicUies . Indeed , : the whole number , is Above the W 1 ~ e ^ f tlw . # w * fcaB ^ ' 2 * 5 er . tao . ^^ ^ sra-capitaltmntber . The paper « n " Japaa"is interestinij . Som * every point of view , but especially from the commercial . The We 4 lOn ^ Vewe ; Bo « ki » " A » d , 4 hat on "J 3 a ^ um" « are to be noted . ^• A * wyn * s < KrBf ^ Sfer * a < Awr » ing tai » ( by the « tfth « rws of Jthe-HHeadof the Family" ) , is concluded , and " Hinchbrook , " a . story by a masculine hand , Shat . promises to . be very good , is " begun . ^ There is also a godd historical paper on MasseVs "History of-the Reign of George HI . "— a book to be read as an antidote to Mactxblake ' s .

    Blackwood , also , has a smart " show-up" 6 f "' Mr . Barnum , " the prodigious showman i and Tail has . another . BntXUickwodS ' s best article ( subtracting , those upon the war ) is one onPj 5 bbieb 7 s " Institutes of Metaphysic" — A'first-rate BlacTiwood-hvCAt review—pleasant arid profitable to all that love ^ peculation on things non-sensible . * The -worst article in the number , in Wery sense , is a praise ofBui-WEB for being un-Bulwerised . In Tail , the paper on " American Poets" contains some choice writing and thinking on poetry and criticism . The " Coffee-houses of the Kestora-4 ion" is a-fine specimen ofalight but sufficiently learned Magazine article . TThe author illustrates his ^ argument with spirit and grace . Undoubtedly we . modern . journalists do the work which was done formerly , viva voce , at Will ' s and Button's , the "Grecian and' White ' s .

    The Dublin University has a varied bill of fare . " The Dramatic Writers oOreland , " ariQiher article on " Yerse . Books , " arid one on Donauoson ' s rt "Varronianus , " are most "worthy of remark . In Beniley ' s Miscellany , the " Adventures of a'Ttourid of Beef" carry us to the Crimea , arid entrap "the peaceable reader into the camp before 'Sebas-* op © l , but they serve to amuse him when he is there . The paper on the " German Almanacks for" 1855 " is well worth reading . ~ The JfationalJIiscellany gives two papers of interest , one on ' Mottoes ^ aridLDevicesr' arid another on the " Charitable Institutions of Paris . "We know of books arid hear rumours of books to come but in the spring . "Such of these as we may mention without damaging our character for dis-¦ eretion and the wisdom of silence , we will gratify our readers by telling them

    Jtiow . "The ever-welcome , fever-young XiEigh ' Hunt is about to give the lovers of poetry something they'Jiave long desired—viz ., a . cdllection of his abest narrative Toems . EmzabetscBabrett Browning andUoBEBT Bkownong are both preparing newToems for this year . Of these we only know 2 Qiat Mrs . "BBOWNiNa's is a narrative Toem . . Miss Jbwsbobt has jl novel ready for publication . We hear also of a volume of Selections from the Writings of Thomas Cablyxe , to be -edftetTby one who will do his work with taste arid discrimination . The death by his own hands of M . Gebabb ihb Nebval , one of the most ^ delicate and fantastic , of 3 ? nench humourists , bas saddened arid amazed all ¦ jBaBisi&riB 'meek . Jle-wats buried on Tuesday amidst tbe profound sympathy arn ^ « ottow of ^ fcostef firiends . We + hope -to be a ble * o . dedicate a word *> r jtvratdhJB memory next week .

    Untitled Article

    JLJVXNG GREECE . £ >* &riec < OffM < mpormne . a Bter « dmoiid'A . bowt . Paris : ; fiaohBtte , It is necessary at length to admit Modern Greece" as a living entity into otti < catalqgueiof nations . "Blessed or cursed with a German king and a native j ^ arUaxaasLt , - a - 'foreign court arid a . national debt- ^ despite the fleeting Jboo » ura > of thesBacinco-bloftkafle ^ -sue-doubted ,-and allowedothers todoubt , ater vitality until-eoavinoed 4 lieraof by tliat great fact called " combined ¦ oocugrtfutie : " Tie aumiwko ( believed ladmeelf < l ) O be of gdass was not unde-« oiwiodqiatUL'kiaifiri » ndiJaaoafceddriua . downlead held him . Many Greeks , who ¦ a / aemoti Jotuwi / tf- ^ for ^ tfcaiset ^ thviAy"" general > -dealers" -4 tre in a state of torn-• ijpoira « y ecstasr ^ aow speak of their -ewintry in' « , ' teme ^ f jplaintive pride , wWWi'Tcowld'T )© amusing if it did nWrmiggeBt meltmchdly rejections . 'Tbere-nerinr- ( OB a-nK > ret ) bBtiiarte feeims ? thmrifoat ofOPhittielh » ism . -We

    • SKjarObJy'tnow . aianglo ^ genuine . convert . When once a man adopts that j < jreed it influences his mind for ever , noanatter what are his disappointments ¦ ftrid . jriiacalculatiomB . There are hundreds of people who speak of Greece with . 'all .. the bitterness of lovers talking . of the . mistress who has rejected tfjaQgb , 'bwt wfeo-ttaketcace to aaark * at -the ; > j 8 a « ie time . that they are ready to etann . to * bpi old fcJly at aiword . onst « ign . tXhis seems at firat inexplicable ; . dbrotke Jjoodiem Qneek ^ though anything bubthet ruffian he 4 his been somei ^ masfmnftmd t'iB' hy noitneans , when ^ Mnliarly Jbnown , -a lovable individual . 'Hw'Wtenae e ^ otnsm , hisfeelief ; inHWsioimi Bupetiority—oontpasted'with his imiAble pbKtrcal position and imperfect intellectual culture—« wo « ld appear .-calculated to repnal the -very nien ^ ou most -perseveriagly admire— ' -the

    Ttefined , and clasBically educated . But these dupes—we shall . presently re - . Strict the . meaning of that word—move in a medium of' their own , through rtvJnfch they see the world clothed in certain unrearcolours , arid are often as ¦ faoftpabje of diMtinguiRhing tihaaicotillencas of the ppesent timeas tlie defects <© f the peuiod tbat Buaxfced its lapse by Olympiads . To them -names are Abittgs ; mxd it would -be jtbsnnd from . this to . Argue , their imbeoility . Groat ¦ tmtwat g amaAI depaptaooontoiiave the ^ oome fault , 'without whioh they would IbefiM oommoa'anen ^ andof « omn * on men wHbo can pull . a dial from their yflfee' ^ « M « d M > Tgne'that "bocaase " ^ hs"ten no 'twill toe eleven in an honr , Tieavefv'ktKmB' wu < hnvo -cnoufth . 'When our state is perfect , and only t » hen , shall wobe entitled to disciird the servicoa of those who talk enthtisiatfticftlly ' ? f-tiiberty , ' -ViBtore ^ vand Democracy , and other things Bynonymons and

    beautiful , and shame us by relating how they flourished of old . Meanwhile , let us forgive them if they receive Vlachs as model men because they call themselves Athenians , and are ready to embrace the first Greek who vociferates enthusiastically of freedom and nationality , with a medal of Nicholas under his waistcoat . . „ , . „ „ , , . ¦ , A x , When we insinuate that the Philhellenes who have been ready to take up the cause of a particular nation because it grows on the same soil that bore men we air revere , are dupes , -we merely mean that their affection is exaggerated and liable-to lead them into error . Although the Greeks are less amiable than many races equally weak , they have various claims to notice , and various sterling virtues . Above all , they have the advantage of position ; and when they have learned the rudiments of politics , must necessarily become important in the Mediterranean . Nor will they be left to work out and the hand of will

    their destiny unassisted . But the sympathies Europe be first directed towards nationalities , -which suffer infinitely more , but with admirable patience adjourn the discussion of their own grievances until the great * nemy of freedom is put down . M . Edmond About , whose volume we have before us , does not seem ever to have been a Philhellene . He belongs to a younger and more sceptical class . The enthusiasm which he imagines himself to have felt before his visit was evidently a literary preparation , or a vague reminiscence . At any rate , his first experiences deprived the Greeks of any corner they'may have retained in his heart . He tries still to do justice to them , and in his general observations says far too -much ; but , in fact , 4 ie has looked under the varnish , and finds them to be made of common wood . Even when he endeavours to defend the physical beauties of the country from the aspersions of two satirical officers who had made observations thereon through

    eighteen-ineh telescopes , as they passed on postal service as near Cape Matepan-as charts-allow to be sate , he is obliged . to say : — " if an enchanter or a -capitalist were-to transmute the Moreainto a new Normandy , he would earn . nothing-but the unanimous maledictions of artists . " We cannot here pause to explain why the country of the sun , though admirable for the poet , iiTfor the artist a delusion and a snare ; but must say that this excuse for the deplorable idleness and indifference of Greece , which has kept her one of the most unproductive regions in Europe , is inadmissible . Even If artists were to be driven * nad , the slopes of the Morea should be ; forested ; but it is useless to repeat the advice . M . Tiersch—we trust that our memory does not deprive the learned gentleman of a consonant—explained the whole matteiTin the most elaborately satisfactory manner before Otho blessed the shores of Hellas with his presence—in a book written as a manual for the new king- —but the only ' result has been that the unhappy country is still more-denuded than of yore .

    M . Aibout , who writes in an off-hand -way to suit the taste of railway readers in France , but who has evidently studied his subject as if he had meant to make a book big enough to please a Dutchman , has common sense on his side when he tells us that the inhabitants of Greece are still , for the most part Greeks . There is no record of any extermination of the old race ; and we need not refer to the ingenious sp > eculations of M . Milne Edwards ibr authority to say that a people remaining on its own soil , even if it receives a great foreign mixture into its blood , has a tendency to throw off the strange element and return to its original type . However , it is certain that there has been some degeneracy—rather . mental and moral than physical and if " those tall youths , with slender figures , oval countenances , vivacious eye , and lively tnind , who fill the streets of Athens , are certainly of the same family that furnished models to Phidias , " as M . About maintains , of the has dete

    it must be admibfced the female part population greatly - riorated . Yet even here exaggeration must be guarded against ; we have seen Greek ; ladies " ripe and reaX" who most certainly have rivalled Aiiadyomene ^ ^ before' theT 66 ~ early visitof Liicina . They were still marvellously beautiftil , though with traces of life , which is ^ suffering , that marble refuses to receive , and evidences of soul that we seek in vain beneath the fathomless stone eye-ball . On the whole , however , M . Abont's description is correct ; Greek women are generally ugly and vulgar , and totally destitute of grace ; so that the lover ' s invocation , " Stoop , O ye mountains , that I . may sec Athina , my charmer , who walks like a goose , " calls up a picture as well as a . smile . " The Greeks have exactly as much passion as is necessary for them to maketise of what mind they possess ; and they have as much mind as any people in ; the world , there being , so to speak , no intellectual labour of which they are incapable . " The reader is necessarily surprised to meet this passage in a book which speaks of Greece throughout in a spirit of depreciation that is almost unjust . Is it a sign of remorse , a slip of the pen , or a polite

    concession to Athenian friends ? In any case , being an almost complete description of a perfect people applied to one of the most -deficient in Europe , it must be rejected «» toto . The Gx * eek people are , on the contrary , oversupplied with-passion ; they are inexorable in hutred , unbounded . in ambition , insatiable in vanity ; but , during a long period of slavery , they have learned to bury their feelings , and to affect the indifference which'M . About believes to be their characteristic . ^ As to their intelligence , it is certain they have groat aptitude in committing to memory the formulae of science , but Kke all otfier Orientals , they are incapable of applying them practically unleBs under ; foreign direction . A Greek may eeem perfect imaster of all the principles of politics and diplomacy , but if , when callud -upon to apply them to the present crisis , he affects to do more than say plaintively that the rayas are an oppressed people , and that Nicholas is their only friend , depend upon it he dissimulates and has a purpose to servo . Mark one curious circumstance , reader : no-Greek ever raised his voice for suffering Italy , or Hungary , or Poland . The following little narrative , "which wo take franx . M . About , iniirUfc receivo a . hundred corroborations : —

    ¦ At the 'epoch of txny . arrival . in iGroece ( February , 1862 ) thevo were * t Athonn twenty- 'flveoritihirty Polos , Trho , after having boen engaged in tho Italian war , had found ill : that maugro country a still more meagre hospitality . . The cliinato did not suit th « n ; Aaarl y all euflfercdfrom tibvor ; and allwofudihavo died of hunger but lor the generality- of . a <*< reek , M . N ^ gnia , who supplied ' thorn * -with the money nocosHary to establish « -ridingssohool . . They carried it on at . a loss , and M . N « Jgria hi two yearn spent 30 , 000 fames ; ihowevor , they lived . Tho people of ^ Uhons , who cannot understand that good-can bo done wUboat interested motives , accnsodM . Ndgrib of uou-

    Untitled Article

    ¦ rga £ . T 3 BDE XEADiEIL [ 8 ATUBI& 1 Y ,

• Citation
  • Leader (1850-1860), Feb. 3, 1855, page 114, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2076/page/18/