may be assured, that it will lead us much farther than we have yet advanced in the knowledge of the immensity of the creation; and that every step it leads us will still more highly exalt our loftiest conceptions of the Deity. When we fill our minds with such contemplations, and then shrink back upon ourselves, with what contempt do we regard our wretched party feuds, and still more wretched sectarian bickerings. The earth we inhabit appears but an atom of dust in the mighty temple which God has erected for his own glory-and with redoubled glory consecrated to the happiness of beings, unnumbered and innumerable. If we know not the immensity of his works, how little have we learned of the all-wise, the all-good, the omnipotent, eternal, and infinite Creator! A. C. From the Dublin University Magazine. THE LATE MRS. JAMES GRAY. SUCH of our readers-and we believe they are very many-who from time to time have with ourselves welcomed Mrs. James Gray's contributions to our pages, will be concerned to hear that she is no longer with us. She died at Sunday's Well, Cork, on the morning of Tuesday, January 28th ult. She had scarcely entered on her thirty-third year, and with every hope of a maturity of powers, to which she was evidently fast attaining-it has been the mysterious will of God to remove her hence. Her death was, like her life, tranquil and happy, and full of peace; it was to a certain extent sudden, but by one, who lived as our friend | lived, could hardly have been unexpected. It is for youth to weep at woe, For age to hoard it in the heart; Though I have had of grief my part. I cannot look without regret Ere noon, amidst dark clouds and strife; With Miss Browne, the power of verse was not only an "accomplishment," as our great Wordsworth terms it; it was an inherent possession. It was born with her, and it lingered with her even through the gloom of a dying chamber. A child of such early promise, it is not surprising her parents, with much pride, sought to second her inclinations; and a selection of these juvenile efforts appeared in 1827, under the title of Mont lished Ada, and in the year after but one, ReBlanc, and other Poems. Next year was pub Mary Anne Browne was born at The Elms, near Maidenhead, Berkshire, on the 24th of September, 1812. The genius for poetry which in after years distinguished her, she exhibited from her cradle; and we have heard her say she could not recollect when she was not clothing her thoughts in verse. Even when of such tender years that her parents thought it too early to have her instructed in writing, she invented a sort of alphabet of her own, of which the letters were grotesque imitations of the characters of print, united with such abbreviations, as necessity com-pentance; which were followed, in 1834, by the pelled her to resort to. This she did for the purCoronal; and, in 1836, by the Birthday Gift. pose of noting down her thoughts; which, with many other individuals of similar gifts, she felt a kind of burden until rècorded. One of these early poems we have chanced on, and we shall print it, not so much that it may be contrasted with later productions, as rather for the purpose of showing her quickness in mental development. Cowley wrote verses, we believe, at fifteen; and Pope and Chatterton even earlier. The lines following, composed at thirteen, and bearing their deficiencies on their head and front, may be listened to, even after theirs whom we have instanced. Sorrowful sentences they are to issue from a mere child's lips; and the words in the concluding stanza "My sun too early risen, must set would now seem almost tinged with a prescient ness: About this time Mr. Browne's family removed from their secluded residence in Berkshire to the town of Liverpool, for the purpose of giving the only son of the house a mercantile education, to which he had destined himself. Higher feelings, however, after a little while swayed him; and his hours of recreation were devoted to studying for our own university, where having received his education with considerable credit, he was afterwards ordained for a field of duty in England. The extended literary opportunities which Liverpool afforded, exercised a very beneficial influence on Miss Browne's mind; and the knowledge of foreign literature, and more especially of German, which she now acquired, opened out to her new domains in the world of thought. Her name, which had now spread itself, brought an easy introduction to the Chorley family, to Dr. Shelton Mackenzie, and other literateurs; and by Dr. her chances in our own magazine. Mackenzie's advice she was recommended to try for June, 1839, opened with a Midsummer AnOur number *The Rev. Thomas Briarly Browne. thology, the first flowers of which were twelve more obvious characteristics of her poetry, which Sketches from the Antique, followed by "a Mer- we then took occasion to point out. There is an chant's Musings," and "a Sonnet to the late exquisite grace in her verse, and a rich melody Adam Clarke" and all by Miss Browne. In the flowing in sweetness like the music of the winding same year, Ignatia was published by Hamilton, brook. There is no dash nor storm in her descripAdams, & Co., of London; and in the year 1840 tions; but, on the other hand, neither have we to a tiny volume of Sacred Poetry, containing many complain of what is tame and prosaic, and if we exquisite pieces, was issued by the same pub-are not surprised, we are not at any time left dislishers. appointed. She did not essay high themes, in Nor, while thus engaged in the bright realms which failure is almost necessarily encountered; of fancy, was Miss Browne forgetful of the real but she loved to delineate human griefs and joys, duties of life. Her desires to do good were all of and to paint all those finer feelings which dwell a practical nature. The poor were ever in her re- more especially in the female breast. In all these gard; but she deemed it insufficient to bestow on respects she closely resembled Mrs. Hemans; and them mere feeling or sympathy. Acts were want- the good public, not satisfied with this sisterhood ing, and she gave them these tangible evidences. in genius, sought to establish a similar family conFew thought, on reading her poetry at this time, nection, which did not subsist. They were alike that much of it was penned in the intervals of the in art, but had no other connection, and had never distressing duties of a district-visitor; or that the met. If Mrs. Gray did not possess that proud joy Miss Browne, whom many would have set down in chivalry, which brought to Mrs. Hemans so as a mere sentimental young lady, was day after many heroes from the paladins and troubadours of day visiting the sick and infirm—strengthening the the middle ages, it was because she had exchanged weak-cheering, with hopes of immortality, the dying. it for a reverential acquaintance with the old legends of Greece-its romantic history, and poetic religion. Her poems are the old mythi, finely told us by the pure lips of a woman. The concluding series, given in our number for January, is, perhaps, the best; and with a sad fitness, the last of the Sketches was a "Hymn to Mors." How little deemed we, in the review of these poems to which we have referred, when speaking of the progress the volume sufficiently indicated, and pointing to future triumphs for its author, that it was the last book which should appear from her hands, or that with the incoming year, that head should be pillowed in the silent grave! In 1842, she was married to one in every respect capable of making her happy, a Scotch gentleman -Mr. James Gray Himself the nephew and constant companion of the Ettrick Shepherd; his father before him had been the dear friend of Scotland's great poet, Burns-rarely have father and son enjoyed such honor! The Rev. James Gray was among the first and ablest vindicators of Burns' memory, and he is yet gratefully remembered by his countrymen for such service. He was also one of the earliest to acknowledge the claims of his kinsman, Hogg, and to aid him with literary counsel and encouragement. As one of The eight volumes, the names of which we the founders of Blackwood's Magazine, and among have given, comprise the whole of Mrs. Gray's its earliest contributors, his name must be also writings, which she gathered together; but scathonorably mentioned; and when the project of tered in various periodicals, and in the annuals, is establishing Maga was first bruited, he was among to be found the materiel, both in prose and verse, those proposed for the office of editor. Mr. James of probably two or three more. As a prose wriGray, the younger, spent much of his early life at ter she was hardly known; because, until only Mount Benger-diversified by occasional visits to very recently, in all such contributions, she Edinburgh in Hogg's company, where he found sought the anonymous. Our own pages, however, himself at home with Wilson and Lockhart, and contain many graceful specimens of her power in the other knights of St. Ambrose. "It was curi- this respect; and we believe we violate no confious," our poor friend one day remarked to us, dence in instancing the "Recollections of a Por"that while my scribbling habits brought me in trait Painter." They were from Mrs. Gray's contact with much of the literary genius of Eng-pen; and with only the disguise of an assumed land; my husband should have mixed so much, in his youthful years, with the great spirits of Scotland." profession for the writer, were simple factsthings which had come under her own personal observation. On Miss Browne's marriage, she came to reside Of the many members of the corps of literature in one of the picturesque outlets of the city of whom it has been our fortune-good or ill-to Cork, Sunday's Well; and here all her later poems have mixed with, we knew none who realized to were written. Her little home here was a truly us so entirely the Italian gift of "improvisation." happy one, and though comparatively humble, few She wrote, she has told us, as though from roofs in the adjoining city had so little repining, another's dictation; or as if transcribing from an and so much of tranquil joy beneath them. Here open volume. Her thoughts, in their overflowing she collected the materials for her last volume, richness, yielded abundant supply, and she was Sketches from the Antique, and other Poems, which never at a loss for expression. The poem of our own publishers brought out last year, and Leodine," for example, which contains a hunwhich our readers will find reviewed in our num-dred and twenty stanzas of four lines each, was ber of June last. We shall not now add to the the work of a single evening, yet it abounds in felicitous words and thoughts, and is distinguished "Mr. Gray," says Christopher North," was the first who, independently of every other argument, proved the by the same sweep of melody which characterizes impossibility of such charges [drunkenness] by pointing all her compositions. So facile was she in versito the almost daily effusions of Burns' clear and un-fying, and so almost necessarily were her words clouded genius. For this, and for his otherwise trium-linked to numbers, that when not over-wearied by phant vindication of the character of Burns from the worst the drudgery of pen-work, she would write her obloquy it so long lay under, Scotland ought to be grate-letters home in verse: and we believe the last ful to James Gray."-Blackwood's Magazine, May, thing she laid hand to, was the "Christmas Carol," 1828. addressed to her venerable parents, in which she | cesses for her. But it has pleased God to allot it sent them filial congratulations and prayers for otherwise, and we can only weave this tribute of their good during the new year. How my our regret for her early departure: "These birds of Paradise but long to flee Back to their native mansion." father's old eyes," she wrote, in enclosing us a copy, "will fill with tears, on seeing that though far away from him on that day, he is ever present to my thoughts!" And those aged eyes now can And here is Epidecium more worthy of regard only rain down their weak torrents, that the than anything we have ourselves penned; bearing daughter of such hopes is so soon laid low-no unfamiliar name, but one sufficient of itself to "Gieb diesen," Schiller makes Don Carlos say, commend it to our readers' kind attention :"Gieb diesen Todten mir heraus!" Mrs. Gray's published writings we have enumerated; among her unpublished works, and which she herself destroyed, were some tragedies, also translations of many of Theodore Körner's finest lyrics, and of some of the impressive scenes in the Faust of Goethe. Twice she destroyed much of her literary labor-at her " two great burnings," as she termed them-lest in any way what she had done but for her private amusement, should be set forth in the glaring light of publicity. Once, a little while since, when her German translations, and studies in the language of the Eichenland, perished; and the former case was in earlier life, when the journals and jottings of youth, and the miscellaneous gatherings of idle hours not idly spent, were all consigned to the flames. She no doubt exercised sound discretion with the latter; but we had wished her German studies had come down to us. In furnishing our readers with this brief sketch of our gifted friend, we have purposely kept out of view allusion to that "inner life," into which the public may be excused penetrating. It is so difficult, besides, to observe the true limit in speaking of the departed, that we have spared ourselves in doing so. We regard with revolting shudder the "friend," who is not contented till the sacredness of domestic privacy be intruded on, and every half-spoken wish or word be stereotyped for the cold eve of the stranger. Suffice it, then, that Mrs. Gray's daily life was eminently beautiful. Her tastes were simple, pure, and womanly. The love of nature, which she acquired in the scenes of childhood, in riper years grew into a passion; and flowers, and trees, and the wild birds of heaven were companions of whose converse she could never weary. Her faith was true and unshrinking; and her piety was neither imaginary nor austere. She seemed ever happy, not because she had no cares, but because she felt anxiety to be at once useless and sinful. There was in her disposition much to admire, much to sympathize in; little that one could wish to be altered, and still less that one could desire taken away. The child of impulse very often; her impulses, notwithstanding, were controlled by gentleness and truth; while, in all things, her unselfishness was such as to be regarded by her friends as very characteristic. We have outlined no perfect character, nor was it our desire to do so; for we know nothing could, were it possible, pain the dead more. She knew well the awful distance which divides the creature from the Creator, and she would have shrunk from appropriating, even in idea, what is the attribute of the Infinite alone. The feverish dreams of youth, with all their idle and passionate regrets, had given way to clearer light; and had Mrs. Gray lived, we might have looked for proud suc "TO THE MEMORY OF MRS. JAMES GRAY. Of bird, and stream, and breeze, The spring hath woke her woodland choirs, trees; And touched the sweet but viewless lyros, Why is there sorrow in the home Will catch the song, as from that clime, here. Stranorlar, February, 1845. SONNETS OF THE SIDEWALK. LONG wharf, 't is pleasant on clear bracing days, Of barrels, bales, and boxes, Russia ducks, And walking quick away, lest some might ask, "Halloo, my friend, who said you might go there?" O how much more doth sweetness sweeter seem When stol'n-light more light in sudden gleam! Boston Post. LITTELL'S LIVING AGE.-No. 51.-3 MAY, 1845. 4. Mrs. Caudle's Lectures, 5. Individuality of the Individual,. 6. Novel Appliances of War, 7. Governor Fox, . PAGE 201 Spectator, 202 Monthly Review, 203 The Critic, 218 Edinburgh Tales, . POETRY.-Ballad, 220-Lament of D'Israeli; Belief and Doubt, 221-Lines, 248. CORRESPONDENCE. In this number we publish what we promised some months ago, a very interesting article upon Baron Swedenborg. About many of his religious opinions, especially upon his claim to direct inspiration, the mass of our readers would differ from the followers of the Baron, and there would be no ready way of bringing such pretensions to any satisfactory test. But the publication which is here reviewed, makes for Swedenborg very extraordinary claims as a discoverer in natural science, which appeal to the knowledge of a very numerous class of persons who have no religious sympathy with him-and it would appear to be easy to ascertain whether they are well founded or not. Some of the wonderful instances of alleged supernatural knowledge will be interesting to all, whether they believe or disbelieve. We give a little Punch which came by the Great Western, and hope that our next number may be made up from the April magazines expected by the Boston steamer. MR. MONCKTON MILNES, M.P., is preparing a life of Keats; for this purpose, all the necessary papers have been placed in his hands by the family. He is also going to bring out, at his own expense, a sumptuous edition of Keats' works. This is a rare, but proper tribute from one poet to another; rare, perhaps, because poets are seldom able to af ford such tributes. Ir has been stated that a pension on the civil list has been granted to Mr. Thomas Hood, the distinguished comic writer. We understand, however, the fact to be, that a pension of 100l. a year has been conferred on Mrs. Hood, the wife of that gentleman, in consideration of his great literary merits, and the infirm state of his health. - Observer. 50. BOOKS RECEIVED. Messrs. Harper & Brothers have sent :: No. 23 of the ILLUMINATED BIBLE. THE GAMBLER'S WIFE.-Select novels, No. HARPER'S ILLUMINATED SHAKESPEARE, Nos. 47-48. ISABEL; OR, TRIALS OF THE HEART-for the Young. MAN AT ARMS. By G. P. R. James. Vol. 7, Select novels. VERONICA; From the German of Zschokke. ARTHUR'S LADY'S MAGAZINE for May. We have not been able to look over this work, but can recommend it from the character of the editor. From Saxton and Kelt, Boston. KRUITZNER, The German's Tale. By Miss Lee. This is a handsome edition of a popular book. THE MANAGING WIFE. By Mrs. Ellis. A PLEA FOR THE SABBATH. By Judge Hall of Delaware. This is addressed to the Lawyers of the United States. THE PALAIS ROYAL. An Historical Romance. By John H. Mancur; author of Henri Quatre; Tales of the Revolution, &c. W. H. Colyer, New York. We have not read this Historical Novel, by an American author who appears to emulate the industry and talent of James, but a friend, to whom we gave it, assures us that it is well to the labors of the author. much better than the novels of the day. We wish SMITH'S WEEKLY VOLUME, Nos. 11-15. These numbers of this weekly reprint contain the conclusion of the Quaker Family, and Literary Ladies of England, by Mrs. Elwood. This is not yet finished, but contains much very attractive matter, about persons to whose characters and memory every reader of English literature attaches great interest. H. B. is engaged on a new and extensive work, not of caricatures. He is to give portraits, in his SILLIMAN'S AMERICAN JOURNAL OF SCIENCE own peculiar style, of all the celebrated men of science, literature, art, and politics. A letter-Dr. Hare's remarks on a recent speculation by AND ARTS, No. 98, contains-Galvanography; press sketch will accompany each portrait. Faraday; Zinc Mines in New Jersey; Dr. Morton on a Fossil Crocodile in New Jersey, and on a second series of Ancient Egyptian Skulls; Catalogue of Connecticut Shells; Meteoric Stars Fossil Footmarks in Pennsylvania; Idea of au Atom; Drift Ice and Currents of the Atlantic ;: 1 Meteoric Iron fell in New York; Various Reports | put a stop to the slave-trade. They only force and Journals-and much Miscellaneous science. Messrs. Jordan & Co., Boston. PROSPECTS OF SLAVE-TRADE SUPPRESSION. THE Constitutionnel reports that the Duc De Broglie has instructions to propose, as a substitute for the anti-slavery right of search, a blockade of the African coast by combined squadrons. As this is precisely our arrangement with the United States, the proposal, and its adoption too, are highly probable. The absurdity of a crusade against slavers will then have reached the climax : three men-of-war maintained to do the work of one! Let us endeavor to realize the extravagance of the arrangement by supposing it adopted in our domestic police. Let us imagine that, as a concession to young Ireland, Irish pickpockets are only to be arrested by Irish policemen; and that Scotland claims to be put on the same footing as Ireland. In that case, our police, detective and ordinary, must cruise in threes; and a preliminary inquiry into the nationality of each delinquent must be instituted, to determine whether the Scotch, the English, or the Irish policemen, is to apprehend him. The delicacy and danger of analogous discussions, where stout and wellarmed frigates, manned by hardy and more than half-hostile crews, stand in the place of our imaginary policemen, can be easily imagined. Yet it is not easy to see what substitute can be found for this clumsy and extravagant plan. The right of capturing and destroying slavers presupposes a right of search; and this right the United States will only allow to be exercised in the case of their own vessels by their own men-of-war. France, we may be sure, will never rest until the concession be made to her national pride that has been made to the national pride of the United States. The three-policemen system is indeed the only possible one, if we persist in our quixotic project of suppressing the slave-trade by force of : arms. The absurdity may not stop here: Spain, Portugal, and Brazil, may insist on having their policemen too. There is another cross-grained impediment about to be laid in our path. It is a legacy from John Tyler. On his political deathbed, that virtuous and great statesman, passing in review his shortcomings in office, has bethought him of his neglect to struggle against the slave-trade. To make amends, he has at the last moment caused a searching inquiry to be instituted by his agents in Brazil into the way in which it is carried on. The investigation has not added much to our previous knowledge; but it has enabled John Tyler to devise a plan for the better suppression of the slavetrade and bequeath it to the heir of his honors. Like many other "convertites" of his class, John Tyler is more touched with the sins of others than with his own-he shows more anxiety to correct the backslidings of Great Britain than of the United States; and, with all the emotion of Mother Cole, the dying sinner hopes "that her Britannic Majesty's government will upon a review of all the circumstances stated in these despatches, adopt more efficient measures for the suppression of the trade, which she has so long attempted to put down, with, as yet, so little success. The hypocrisy and general falsehood of this cant are rank. But there is a substratum of truth in it. Experience shows that our cruisers cannot the crimps to take three cargoes for one; and to give up the two supernumerary cargoes to supply laborers to the British possessions. The French and American cruisers against slave-ships had no good-will to the work from the beginning; and the idea that Great Britain alone derives any benefit-however trifling and dearly-bought that benefit may be from this thief-catching on a large scale, will not increase their liking for it. The system of armed intervention to suppress the slave-trade is rapidly breaking up. It is true, there is little danger that the trade will under any circumstances again be legalized by France or the United States. France has little interest in it; and her anti-slavery interests, backed by the manufacturers of beet-root sugar are strong enough to prevent its resumption. In the United States there is a paramount interest hostile to its resumption. The non-slaveholding states will not hear of it; and in the slaveholding states the home breeders of slaves will claim protection against the imported article. The landowners of the southern states will struggle as resolutely for a monopoly in the growth of slaves, as the landowners of England for a monopoly in the growth of wheat. The recent insurrections in Cuba have rendered many of the inhabitants averse to further importations of slaves; and in Brazil, it is only the sugarplanters on the coast-the debtors and thralls of the speculators in slave-importation-who are much interested in the perpetuation of the slavetrade. Beyond its actual limits, the slave trade is not likely to extend, as within those limits it has been found impossible to narrow it by the means hitherto pursued. Now would be the time to try something rational.-Spectator, 22 March. THE MANIA OF COLLECTING.-In the first impression of Hogarth's "March to Finchley," dedicated to the King of Prussia, one letter in his Majesty's name was accidentally omitted, a copy of which sells for ten times the sum of one that has "Prussia" with two s's! The late Queen (Charlotte) had one of them at Frogmore. Thus "The Vinegar Bible," or the folio copy, which, in the headings of the pages, reads "The Parable of the Vinegar," instead of "The Vineyard," is another literary curiosity. The late Duke of Sussex possessed a copy of this, as of every other that is rare and curious from more intrinsic merit. Another example is the early edition of Littleton's Latin Dictionary, (noticed before,) p. 31, where the translation of " condog," for "concurro," occurs as the blunder of a literary amanuensis.-Poynder's Literary Extract. his flock, "when I explained to you, in my last CHARITY."I fear," said a country curate to charity sermon, that philanthropy was the love of our species, you must have understood me to say the collection. I hope you will prove, by your 'specie,' which may account for the smallness of present contribution, that you no longer labor under the same mistake."-16. CALLING OUT.-When Sir John Elliott, the physician, was dining with Dr. Armstrong, Sir John was, very early in the repast, called out. Armstrong, on losing the quiet enjoyment of his friend's company, muttered out roughly, “I did not think you would have sent for yourself so soon."-16. |