OF

THE author of Notre Dame de Paris, if we except the celebrity which that masterpiece of the romantic-grotesque obtained for him here as well as in his own country, is not otherwise familiarly known to the English public. True his recent appearance as a picturesque, political, and somewhat crotchety tourist, upon ground travelled over by every traveller of this travelling nation, may have extended his name in " perfidious Albion," though we question whether Le Rhin ever excited sufficient interest to induce the amateur of light literature to any further acquaintance with it than such as was furnished by contemporary criticism. Light literature, indeed! alas, for the lover of it, who, arranging himself in his fauteuil, playfully flourished his paper-cutter, and gave himself gracefully to a few hours' light reading of Monsieur Victor Hugo's saunter along the Rhine! Only think, reader (if you ever did read the book) of its piles of architectural disquisition; recollect the powerful measures of technical phraseology emptied upon your head; the archæological mystifications and symbolical chiffres every now and then bewildering you; the whole shelves and chests-full of historical

VOL. XXIV. NO. IV.

lore hurled down before and around you, and which, cut, clipped, cracked, broken, splintered, made your path on the banks of the exulting and abounding river rough as a road of Macadam under repair, strewed, moreover, with the baggage and heavy movables of politics; and then imagine the treat which the Letres à un Ami must have afforded to that not inconsiderable class-the loungers in literature. REGINA, ever benignant and considerate, relieved that luxurious tribe from the necessity of victimising themselves by acquainting the public with perhaps as much of the book as the public would have cared to know. We are, however, far from denying the possession of interest to The Rhine. It contains some charming descriptions, brilliant bursts of eloquence, and the political brochure (for such it is) with which it winds up shows (much as we dispute its fanciful analogies and dissent from its conclusions) considerable dexterity of arrangement and cleverness in getting up a case; yet, notwithstanding, we must believe that it was not calculated for popular perusal among our countrymen, and consequently, as far as the British public is concerned, has add

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