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No . 418 , MAitcH 27 , 1858 . 1 THE LEADER . 307
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IX > RD ELLESMEftE'S ESSAYS . jr ^ m / s on History , Biography , Geography , Engineering , 4 c . Contributed to the E ^ Quarterly Review . ' Bythe late Earl of Ellesnnere . . Murray . The late Lord Ellesmere was a polished , elegant , amiable writer , a refined scholar , an acute and tasteful critic , and nil these qualities have been . impressed upon the Quarterly Essays now first published in a separate form . Amon- the papers two are on Japanese history and manners , based upon ordinal Dutch narratives , two on art , four on mihtary history and cntic . s . n . One is on Borneo and Celebes , another on Hudson ' s Bay . That on aqueducts and canals * and that oa the Skerry vore Lighthouse , will not be found the least interesting . The volume is one that honours its writer , as a thoroughly genial and cultivated English , gentleman ; it forms fresh , varied , and suggestive reading . _
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THE GEOLOGY OF CENTRAL FRANCE . The Geoloau ami Extinct Volcanoes of Central France . By G . Poulett Scrope , M . P ., &c . Second Edition . Enlarged and Improved . With Illustrative Maps , Tiews , and Panoramic Sketches . Murray . This work is too well known to call for special treatment , although it reaps tears in an improved form with important additions : but there are pointof considerable interest in the history of Mr . Poulett Scrope ' s researches . Soon after the peace of Vienna he resided during three consecutive winters in Italy , observing the volcanic phenomena of Vesuvius , Etna , and the Lipari lakes , examining the structure of the territory west of the Apennines , between Santa Fiora , in Tuscany , and the Bay of Naples , and satisfying himself that volcanic action bad taken place in the pr « -historical period . The doctrines of Werner were then in the ascendant , and it was held that the Hcetz Trap roeks , basalt , clinkstone , and trachyte , were precipitations from some archaic ocean . This Mr . Scrope denied , and Professor Sedgwick and Dr . Clarke partially concurred in his views . In order to carry out the inquiry , he established himself , in June , 1821 , at Clermont , the capital of the Puy de Dome , in Central France , and examined the neighboring districts , revisiting Italy in the following year , and witnessing the celebrated eruption ofVesuvhre , the greatest that has occurred within the century . Upon returning to England in 1823 , he published a volume on the phenomena of volcanoes , which , " unfortunately , included some speculations on theoretic ¦ cosmogony which the public mind was not at the time prepared to entertain . " Moreo ' r book was badl y produced ,, and met with a generally discouraging reception- Still , the main object in view was fulfilled , says Mr . Scrope . " The Werneriam notion of the-Aqueanpi-ecipitation of Trap has never since that date held up its head . " In 1826 , an edition of the Memoir now before us was published and speedily exhausted 1 , but it tvas not until last su-mmer that Mr . Scrope was enabled to renew liis geological scrutiny of Central France , so as to justify himself in reprintingthe work . After expatiating , modestly enough , upon the identity of his original views with those of leading geologists in Great Britain and upon the Continent , he remarks : — "I hnve been fed to suppose that anew edition of my Memoir , wi ; h such emendations and additions as time and further observations , whether of myself or others , might suggest , would be acceptable at the present time . " It is not only a . cceptable ° but is a work which must fascinate every student of geology .
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PUBLICATIONS AND REPUBLICATTONS . Mn . Jambs Augustus St . John ' s new work , Tlie Education ofthe People , dedicated to Sir John Pakington , has been published this week by Messrs . Chapman and Hall . We reserve until next week a discussion of its contents . The Transactions of the National Association for the Promotion of Social Science , 1857—Inaugural Addresses and Select Papers , have at length appeared . They form a large and handsome volume , published by J . " VV . Parker and Son . The Abbtf Hue has completed his great work on Christianity in China , Tariary , and Thibet . The third volume , issued this week by Messrs . Longman and Co ., carries on the narrative from the establishment of theMantehu Tartar dynasty , to the commencement of the eighteenth century . The Reverend Robert Vaughan has dedicated to tJie memory of his son , the Reverend Robert Alfred Vaughan , a literary monument—two volumes of Essays and Remains , published by J . W . Parker and Son . At present , we simply announce their appearance . Anastasia is the title of a now anonymous poem , in one volume , published this week by Messrs . Longman and Co . From Messrs . Longman and Co ., we lmve received the fifth volume of their cheap edition of Lord Macaulay ' s History of England . Mr . Timbs has produced another volume of light nnd popular texture , School Days of Eminent Men , published by Messrs . Kent and Co ., successors to Mr . Boguc . From Mr . L-. Booth wo have received Naples and King Ferdinand : an Historical and Political Sketch of the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies . With Biographical Notices of the Neapolitan liourbons . Hy Elizabeth Dawbarn . The appendix contains two terrible lista : —" Dead in Prison or in Irons , during the Reign of Ferdinnnd II ., " and " Dead in Exile . " We shnjl return to the volume . An excellent popular volume is The Microscope ; Us Revelations and Applications in Science and Art , by John Ferguson ,, published at Edinburgh , by Messrs . Constable and Co . 1 ts is not so much a compilation as « v compression of useful and attractive matter . The author of n favourite story T ' Julian and his Play fellows , ' hns written 3 V 2 Mri ^ 0 > 5 ^ has an appropriate moral , nnd ia addressed to the sympathies and capacities of the young . Labour and Triumph is a somewhat affected title of » volume on the Me and times pf Hugh Miller , by Thonww JSf . Jirown , published at London nnd Edinburgh by MesBrs . Griffith and Co . It is not n biography , but contains a series of rambling esaaya , not of a very satisfactory character . A fifth edition of Lord Lindsay ' s Letters J ) -om Egypt , Edom , and the Holy
Land , appears in Mr . Bohn ' s Illustrated Library , with an additional preface ^ notes , and numerous engravings . In 'Bohn ' s Scientific-Library' we have the second volume of the seventh edition of The Wonder of Geology , or , a Familiar Exposition of Geological Phenomena ^ by S . A . Mantell , LL . D ., revised and arranged by 1 . Rupert Jones , F . G . S . We had reserved Mr . Grant's Memoirs of Mont rose for more detailed notice ; but it is as well not to discuss the volume , -which appears to be a deliberate compilation from the careful and valuable work of Mr . Mark Napier . Messrs . Blackwood and Co . propose to republish the best tales from the old numbers of Blacfooood ' s Magazine , in sixpenny numbers , in large and clear type , for railway and fireside reading . The first number contain * , How me got up the Glenmutchlcin Railway , and How ice got out of it , by Professor Aytoun ; Vandtrdeckeri ' s Message Home , or the Tenacity of Natural Affection ; and the Floating Beacon . The last originally appeared in 1821 There will now be some rare volumes of stories upon the railway stalls .
The Law of Sinai and Its Ajppoi ? ited Times , is the title of a religious work , by Moses Angel , Head Master of the Jews' Free School , London . The volume is published by Messrs . Tegg and Co .
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OPENING OF ST . JAMES'S HALL . This metropolis is now enabled to boast of possessing- the best and the worst Music Halls in Europe . If it be impossible to match the inconvenience , ugliness , and discomfort of that Pandemonium of fanatics , Exeter Hall , it is , we confidently assert , equally impossible to match the beauty , comfort , and convenience of the new Hall , ranging from Regent-srreet to Piccadilly , which has been springing up , as it were invisibly , at the bidding of that Prospero of architects , Owen Jones . We say it has sprung up , as it were invisibly , for very few even of those who have time to look about them were aware o £ the local habitation or the name of the new Hall , until the all-seeing Times revealed it to the world a week or two ago . Indeed , the initiated few who were permitted to watch the progress of its creation would have hesitated on Wednesday last to pronounce that the network of scaffolding and the ordered confusion of materials , amidst which a chosen brigade of workmen was moving incessant with a bee-like hum , was St . James ' s Hall .
What will not the inspiring confidence of true genius * , aided by the unconquerable energy of British capital , skill , and labour in harmonious co-operation ,, effect ? Time and the Lour are defied when the man and the will are of tb . e true metal . The presence of Owen Jones as he sat all Tuesday and all Wednesday night , wakeful , vigilant , devoted , was to his chosen band of artificers , lik e the presence of a great commander to his tried battalions—an encouragement , an example , an earnest of success . At six o ' clock on Thursday evening the workmen were in possession ; at eight o ' clock the Prince Consort , who had come to do honour to the occasion , was admitted into a perfect palace of enchantment and delight , and a brilliant assemblage was already exchanging congratulations on the absolute success of an achievement of art and enterprise sufficient alone to vindicate the genius and the enterprise of a mu « h abused nation and a much maligned century . It was a proud evening for tlie great artist who , although celebrated throughout Europe by monumental classics of illustration and research , such as liis great work on the Alhambra , and the ' Grammar of Ornament , ' and known to all the civilized world as the great colourist of the Crystal Palaces of Hyde Park and Sydenham , although enjoying the highest rank in his profession , and the admiration and esteem of all his brethren , yet has never , perhaps , enjoyed until now a sufficient opportunity of recording durably the sure result of profound kuowledge vivified by a bold and original genius . It is worthy of remnik that neither the critics nor the public willingly accord to any man more than one talent , and so Owen Jones , having identified himself with a marvellous reproduction of the Alhajniuiia , is for ever exposed to hear every successive creation of las hands described as ' Alhambresque . ' Nothing can be more ignorant or absurd than this inevitable commonplace as regards the St . James ' s Hall . In conception and design it is absolutely and entirely original : the style is neither florid Gothic , nor fancy Mauresque ; it is the unindebted invention of an artist of tho nineteenth century , who , with the whole grammar of ancient , mediaeval , and modern art at his lingers' ends , has the courage and the ability to press into the service of beauty and utility all the latest acquisitions of science , and all the newest , processes of mechanics which distinguish an eminently inventive and mechanical epoch . It may bo that the architect haa certain predispositions , but the rare and peculiar merit- of his work is , to our thinking , not so much the masterly adaptation , of all forms of beauty in nature aiml in art , as that due and equal combination of the useful and the beautiful , which is the characteristic of our age . We were saying the other day that hitherto the two simple and apparently important conditions of hearing- and breathing had been left to chanco by architects . Tho laws of ventilation nnd acoustics remained to lie discovered . An eminent Italian , architect has written volumes on the subject , nnd constructed theatres , admirable in every other respect . Now , in St . James ' s Hall , Mr . Owen Jones h « s completely satisfied theso two primary and hitherto unattainable conditions of 8 UCC 08 S . Never and nowhere has tho science of sound been so completely mastorcd \ never and nowhere has an audience sat and listened in such ease and comfort as in St . James ' s Hall , liheumatism itself need fear no airs from hcavon , nor blasts from hotter places , in a temperature which seems to set the most restless thermometer at rest ; and while the fairer portion of tho audience , who come to bo seen as well as to aee , arc permitted to revel in all the boundless expanse of hoop and skirt , and the general public , who come to see as much as to hear , gaze from spacious and airy galleries on natural angels , glowing like a flush of flowors in a garden , tho critic , -who comes to drink in dainty draughts of melody and to suisso the subtlest modulations of stringed and vocal harmony , bathes his soul in the full , clear , liquid stroam of sound , pTnetr 7 iting " arth 1 r 6 ugli a vaso of c " i ^ yfltTiinnfcl" -reffonnTit- \ vithout- 'echo-or- » ever ^ benUlon . it was remarked on Thursday evening that not an ajijmgt / iatura , oven in tho softest passages , wua luat to the remotest hdurer ; nnd that grandly impressive as wore tho choral oflects and the majestic tumult of the full orchestral . / brl < 0 « t »< 0 , perhaps the exquisite tendurnosa and delloiicy of the more subdued and tranquil music w » ih even moro fully enjoyo ^ and more- completely established tho suecoss of the Hall . Mr . bjaw umoT , it muat bo confessed , had a formidable rivul in Mr . Owen Jones on this occasion . The attention of tho
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Leader (1850-1860), March 27, 1858, page 307, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2236/page/19/
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