sinks some celestial constellation in the back-with the professional detail." Our experiward distance, raising another landmark ence amply bears out this opinion of Dana. of the heavens' in the onward waste of With little, indeed, that merits censure, mingled sea and sky." We call that a bit or even objection, Dana's work can hardly of fine appreciatory criticism. be overpraised in many respects, for it is a Dana's book is truly sui generis-no superlatively good one, abounding with deep"Voice from the Forecastle," no "Sailor's ly interesting and highly instructive inforLife at Sea," worthy of the theme, had pre- mation, interspersed with remarks and reviously appeared, and none has been pub-flections at once acute, original, suggestive, lished subsequently. The work is, therefore, and intrinsically valuable. It is a book literally unique. It were hard to say whether which any man living might, indeed, have landsmen or seamen read this extraordinary been proud to have written. We would production with greater avidity. We re- willingly say more concerning it, but so member that in Liverpool alone, when the enormously has it been circulated, that we first English reprint - Moxon's edition, we presume nearly all our readers must be thorbelieve-appeared, two thousand copies were oughly familiar with its animated pages. sold in a single day, nearly all of which, as We would therefore merely make one rewe understood, were purchased by seamen. mark, and that is, we do not think any Of course these men bought and read the writer excels Dana in graphic ability to debook with a view to learn what was said of scribe nautical scenes with technical accutheir calling by one of themselves, and capi- racy and surprising clearness of minute yet tal critics they would undoubtedly be! As spirited detail: and in reading any of his for landsmen, the work was to them a spe- vivid pictures of life before the mast, our cies of revelation - it opened up a novel and interest is materially heightened by the hitherto unknown (or, at best, but partially knowledge that all is real-all is truly known) profession, and the interest it ex- descriptive of what actually happened. As cited was naturally proportionate. The Dana says in his preface, his design was "to book is really what its title indicates; and present the life of a common sailor at sea as from the sensible, modest, manly preface, to it really is-the light and the dark tothe grave and highly suggestive concluding gether. We have already said that no chapter (a general and exceedingly valuable work of the same kind of equal merit has essay on the condition of seamen, and the yet appeared, and we can safely assert that mode in which their hard lot may be ame-none ever will appear until another young liorated) there is not a single page which man, who has been as well educated, and does not contain excellent matter. The style possesses as much literary talent as Dana, of writing is very good in a mere literary serves before the mast, and favors the world sense, and well adapted to the subject. No with a vigorous, faithful, and modest narraone can read half-a-dozen pages without feel- tive of his experience of forecastle life. We ing that the narrative is perfectly trustwor-shall gladly hail the advent of Dana the thy and matter-of-fact. The author, indeed, Second! occasionally dwells rather tediously and verbosely on some details of sea-life—that is, he does so in the estimation of practical seamen, as we can personally vouch- but perhaps these very passages are read with as much or even greater interest than any others by landsmen; for we cordially and entirely agree with Dana's own remark in his preface, that "plain matters-of-fact in relation to customs and habits of life new to us, and descriptions of life under new aspects, act upon the inexperienced through the imagination, so that we are hardly aware of our want of technical knowledge. Thousands read the escape of the American frigate through the British channel, and the chase and wreck of the Bristol trader in the Red Rover, and follow the minute nautical manoeuvres with breathless interest, who do not know the name of a rope in the ship, and, perhaps, with none the less admiration and enthusiasm for their want of acquaintance

Herman Melville completes our Trio. A friend has informed us that "Herman Melville" is merely a nom de plume, and if so, it is only of a piece with the mystification which this remarkable author dearly loves to indulge in from the first page to the last of his works. We think it highly probable that the majority of our readers are only familiar with his earliest books; but, as we have read them all carefully (excepting his last production, "Israel Potter," which is said to be mediocre), we shall briefly refer to their subjects seriatim, ere we consider the general characteristics of his style. His first books were "Omoo" and "Typee," which quite startled and puzzled the reading world. The ablest critics were for some time unable to decide whether the first of these vivid pictures of life in the South Sea Islands was to be regarded as a mere dextrous fiction, or as a narrative of real adventures, described in glowing, picturesque, and romantic lan

came "

guage; but, when the second work appeared, | Next in order-if we recollect rightly as there could no longer exist any doubt that, to the date of publication White although the author was intimately ac- Jacket; or the World in a Man-of-war. quainted with the Marquesas and other This is, in our opinion, his very best work. islands, and might introduce real incidents He states in the preface that he served a and real characters, yet that fiction so largely year before the mast in the United States entered into the composition of the books, frigate, Neversink, joining her at a port in that they could not be regarded as matter-of- the Pacific, where he had been left by- or fact narratives. Both these works contain a deserted from, for we do not clearly comprefew opening chapters, descriptive of foremast- hend which-a whaling-ship, and that the life in whaling-ships, which are exceedingly work is the result of his observations on interesting and striking. board, &c. We need hardly say that the Melville's next work was entitled "Red-name Neversink is fictitious; but, from variburn," and professed to be the autobiograph-ous incidental statements, we can easily learn ical description of a sailor-boy's first voyage that the real name of the frigate is the Unitacross the Atlantic. It contains some clever ed States-the very same ship that capchapters; but very much of the matter, es-tured our English frigate Macedonian in the pecially that portion relative to the adven-year 1812.* The Macedonian, we believe, tures of the young sailor in Liverpool, Lon- is yet retained in the American navy. don, &c., is outrageously improbable, and White Jacket" is the best picture of life cannot be read either with pleasure or profit. before the mast in a ship of war ever yet This abortive work-which neither obtained given to the world. The style is most excelnor deserved much success was followed cellent- occasionally very eccentric and by "Mardi; and a Voyage Thither." Here startling, of course, or it would not be Herwe are once more introduced to the lovely man Melville's, but invariably energetic, and mysterious isles of the vast Pacific, and manly, and attractive, and not unfrequently their half-civilized, or, in some cases, yet noble, eloquent, and deeply impressive. We heathen and barbarous, aborigines. The could point out a good many instances, howreader who takes up the book, and reads the ever, where the author has borrowed remarkfirst half of volume one, will be delighted able verbal expressions, and even incidents, and enthralled by the original and exceed- from nautical books almost unknown to the ingly powerful pictures of sea-life, of a novel general reading public (and this he does and exciting nature, but woful will be his without a syllable of acknowledgment). Yet disappointment as he reads on. We hardly more, there are one or two instances where know how to characterize the rest of the he describes the frigate as being manoeuvred book. It consists of the wildest, the most in a way that no practical seaman would improbable, nay, impossible, series of ad- commend—indeed, in one case of the kind ventures amongst the natives, which would he writes in such a manner as to shake our be little better than insane ravings, were it confidence in his own practical knowledge not that we dimly feel conscious that the of seamanship. We strongly suspect that writer intended to introduce a species of he can handle a pen much better than a biting political satire, under grotesque and marlingspike- but we may be wrong in our incredibly extravagant disguises. Moreover, conjecture, and shall be glad if such is the the language is throughout gorgeously poet-case. At any rate, Herman Melville himself ical, full of energy, replete with the most beautiful metaphors, and crowded with the most brilliant fancies, and majestic and melodiously sonorous sentences. But all the author's unrivalled powers of diction, all his wealth of fancy, all his exuberance of imagination, all his pathos, vigor, and exquisite graces of style, cannot prevent the judicious reader from laying down the book with a weary sigh, and an inward pang of regret that so much rare and lofty talent has been wilfully wasted on a theme which not anybody can fully understand, and which wili inevitably repulse nine readers out of ten, by its total want of human interest and sympathy. It is, in our estimation, one of the saddest, most melancholy, most deplorable and humiliating perversions of genius of a high order in the English language.

assures us that he has sailed before the mast in whalers, and in a man-of-war, and it is certain that his information on all nautical subjects is most extensive and accurate. Take it all in all," White Jacket" is an astonishing production, and contains much writing of the highest order.

The last work we have to notice is a large one, entitled "The Whale," and it is quite as eccentric and monstrously extravagant in many of its incidents as even "Mardi; "

States rated as a 44-gun frigate, but mounted 28 on a broadside, carrying 864 lbs.; her tonnage was 1533; her crew 474 men. The Macedonian (a new ship) was of 38 guns, having a broadside weight of metal of only 528 lbs., and a crew of 254 men and 35 boys. The Macedonian fought most gallantly, and only struck when she had sustained the in fact, like other American frigates of the time, was just frightful loss of 36 killed and 68 wounded. Her opponent,

*It was no disgrace to the British flag. The United

a line-of-battle-ship in disguise!

but it is, nevertheless, a very valuable book, mostly clinging to the weather bulwarks. The on account of the unparalleled mass of in- occasional phosphorescence of the yeasty sea cast formation it contains on the subject of the a glare upon their uplifted faces, as a night's history and capture of the great and terrible fire in a populous city lights up the panic-stricken cachalot, or sperm-whale. Melville describes crowd. The ship's bows were now butting, himself as having made more than one cruise battering, ramming, and thundering over and in a South-sea-whaler; and supposing this upon the head seas, and, with a horrible wallowto have been the fact, he must nevertheless ing sound, our whole hull was rolling in the have laboriously consulted all the books trough of the foam. The gale came athwart the deck, and every sail seemed bursting with its treating in the remotest degree on the habits, wild breath. All the quartermasters, and several natural history, and mode of capturing this of the forecastlemen, were swarming round the animal, which he could obtain, for such an double-wheel on the quarterdeck. Some were amazing mass of accurate and curious infor- jumping up and down with their hands on the mation on the subject of the sperm-whale as spokes; for the whole helm and galvanized keel is comprised in his three volumes could be were fiercely feverish with the life imparted to found in no other single work-or perhaps them by the tempest." in no half-dozen works - in existence. We The words we have italicized strike us as say this with the greater confidence, because being intensely poetical, and adapted to conwe have written on the sperm-whale ourselves, vey a vividly truthful idea of the state of a and have consequently had occasion to con- ship desperately battling with a powerful sult the best works in which it is described. gale. We have ourselves repeatedly noted, Yet the great, undeniable merits of Melville's when at sea during a gale, how " the whole book are obscured and almost neutralized by helm" (by which is meant the rudder, tiller, the astounding quantity of wild, mad pas- wheel, steering-barrel, &c.) vibrated in such sages and entire chapters with which it is a manner, that one could judge from that interlarded. Those who have not read the alone of the position of the vessel and the work cannot have any conception of the reck- manner in which the seas struck her, and less, inconceivable extravagancies to which also the manner in which she bore herself; we allude. Nevertheless, the work is through- and not only did the helm, but also the whole out splendidly written, in a literary sense; fabric of the ship, feel" fiercely feverish and some of the early chapters contain what with life," and almost a sentient thing, conwe know to be most truthful and superla-scious of her jeopardy, and of the necessity tively-excellent sketches of out-of-the-way of bravely struggling with the tempest. The life and characters in connection with the landsman may possibly think we are indulgAmerican whaling trade.

To give a fair idea of Herman Melville's powerful and striking style, when he condescends to restrain his exuberant imagination, and to write in what we may call his natural mood, we request the reader's attention to a short extract or two which we select from "White Jacket." We must premise that the frigate is overtaken by an awful gale at midnight, when off the pitch" of Cape Horn, and is in a position of imminent danger. The boatswain called all hands to take in sail :

ing in wild, fanciful rhapsodies; but we appeal to every seaman who possesses a spark of sensibility and of imagination, and he will tell you that what Melville has asserted, and what we assert, is literally true, but must be felt to be understood.

We must give yet another and more characteristic taste of the quality "of our favorite for, with all his faults, we can truly say, "Melville, we love thee still! '' We will select our final specimen from the last chapter of "White Jacket." When the frigate draws nigh to port, at the expiry of her long three years' cruise, and strikes soundings by the deep nine!" the seamanauthor thus describes the feelings of himself and messmates:

66

"Springing from our hammocks," says Melville, "we found the frigate leaning over to it so steeply that it was with difficulty we could climb the ladders leading to the upper deck. Here the scene was awful. The vessel seemed to be sail"It is night. The meagre moon is in her last ing on her side. The maindeck guns had several quarter-that betokens the end of a cruise that days previously been run in and housed, and the is passing. But the stars look forth in their port-holes closed; but the lee carronades on the everlasting brightness-and that is the everquarterdeck and forecastle were plunging through lasting, glorious Future, forever beyond us. the sea, which undulated over them in milkwhite We maintopmen are all aloft in the top; and billows of foam. With every lurch to leeward, round our mast we circle, a brother-band, handthe yard-arm-ends seemed to dip into the sea; in-hand, all spliced together. We have reefed while forward, the spray dashed over the bows the last topsail; trained the last gun; blown the in cataracts, and drenched the men who were last match; bowed to the last blast; been tranced on the fore-yard. By this time, the deck was in the last calm. We have mustered our last all alive with the whole strength of the ship's round the capstan; been rolled to grog the last company-five hundred men, officers and all-time; for the last time swung in our hammocks;

From The Times, 8 Jan.

KARS.

find almost hopeless the difficulties of transporting artillery, shot, and shell for the purposes of a prolonged siege.

defeated General explained it. "Having learned," wrote Mouravieff, "that Omer Pasha was with a large force at Batoum; I judged it necessary to attack at once. It may be said that the Russian thus told his adversary what it would be best for him to do, and that it would be wise to follow up a move that had had such immediate and striking effects. But Mouravieff, perhaps, did not know the weakness of the Turkish army. Even now it is difficult to understand that it should have been so ill provided. A loan had been raised and money was not wanting, the powers of the General were ample, and a Mushir is not generally scrupulous in making requisitions. Transports were in readiness; even the Turkish vessels of war had been turned into troop and provision ships. But the fact, though unexplained, is not the less certain, that the Turkish army was destitute of the means which alone could render possible so hazardous a march across the ridges of Lazistan. The invested city fell, and its reconquest is a task for the futere.

OUR correspondent at Constantinople, in the letter which we publish to-day, gives So impracticable is the route from Batoum some interesting particulars of the heroic that even the tide of inland commerce passes defence of Kars, which, if possible, increase along the circuitous channel of Trebizonde our regret that its brave garrison and its and Erzeroum. The road between these two noble leaders did not meet a more worthy places turns the most difficult ranges, and is fate. Leaving, however, what is now, un- accordingly chosen by the caravans even for happily, beyond recall, we may with more the traffic with the Russian provinces. Omer advantage consider the nature of the country Pasha in earlier years distinguished himself which must one day be the scene of a stub- highly in mountain warfare. That Mouraborn contest, and the prospects of the next vieff gave him credit for the ability to pass campaign. The Russians may be looked the mountain barriers that lie between upon as holding a long line of positions in Batoum and Kars is evident from the attack defence of their Asiatic provinces. Their in September, and the despatch in which the extreme left is now strengthened by the capture of the Turkish fortress, and the command of a great extent of country to the west and north. Their right rests upon the spurs of the Caucasus, which strike off southward from the great chain, and merge into the Armenian district of mountains. The Suramin Pass, which defends Tiflis and the valley of the Cyrus, is the most important position in this part of their line, while before it, at a distance of some 70 miles, is Kutais, which will probably be strongly fortified long before the allies are in a condition to invest it. Between Kutais and Kars is the pashalic of Akhaltzik, a region of wood and mountain, thinly peopled and ill suited to be the theatre of offensive warfare. It almost follows as a necessity that an allied army operating for the conquest of Transcaucasia should attack the Russians at one of the two extreme points, with a view either to the reduction of Gumri or to a direct march on Tiflis. With respect to a campaign in Armenia for the recapture of Kars there are strong reasons for hesitation. All that before told against the Russians is now in their favor. They are on the defensive; they hold not only Kars, but the Soghanli Mountains, across which the road from Erzeroum passes at a height of 4,000 feet above the sea. From a mere glance at the map one is apt to inquire why Erzeroum should always be spoken of as on the road from Kars to the sea. It stands to the south-west of the captured fortress, is equally inland, and far away from the Russian frontier and the parts where the war is carried on. But it must be observed that in that Alpine region the nearest way is often closed by insurmountable obstacles. The chains of hills run at right angles between Batoum and Kars; the passes are at very great heights above the sea, and filled during nearly the whole year by the snows which have drifted down from the But it is probable that no skilful soldier loftier peaks. Furthermore, the descent will advise the repetition of an Armenian from the plateau is very precipitous towards campaign. When Omer Pasha went to the north, and an army from Batoum would | Suchum-Kaleh he commenced a campaign

Should an advance on Kars be resolved on, it is probable that the longer but easier route of Erzeroum must be adopted. It must be remembered that Kars is as much defended by climate as Cronstadt. The world will probably never know the losses of Mouravieff in his relentless blockade, and yet the Russians had been for months on the spot, and were in the neighborhood of their own resources. The allies will have to march against the new Russian stronghold through a devastated country, where operations are only possible from June to September. It is of the greatest necessity that in such an enterprise the road by which men and supplies are brought should be open as long as possible. It is only the route by Erzeroum and Trebizonde which fulfils these conditions.