In the first year, the Arabs teach the horse are the horses which are best able to endure to be led with the réseun, a sort of bridle. hunger, thirst, and fatigue. The horses of They call him then dejeda, and begin to bridle the Arbâa and of the Oulad-Nayl come next him and to tie him up. When he is become after those of the Hamyan. In the Teli, the teni- that is to say in his second year - they best horses, in respect to purity of race, statride him for a mile, then two, then a para-ure, and beauty of form, are those of the sange; and when he is turned of eighteen people of Chelif, particularly those of the months old, they are not afraid of fatiguing Oulad-Sidi-Ben-Abd-Allah (Sidi-el-Aaribi), him. When he is become rebûa telata

66

that near the Mina, and also those of the Ouladis to say, when he enters his third year-Sidi-Hassan, a branch of the Oulad-Sidi-Dahthey tie him up, cease to ride him, cover him hou, who inhabit the mountains of Mascara. with a good djelale (horse-cloth), and make The most rapid in the Hippodrome, and also him fat. On this subject they say: In the of beautiful shape, are of the tribe of Flitas. first year (djeda) tie him up for fear any of the Oulad-Cherif and the Oulad-Lekreud. accident should happen to him. In the sec- The best to travel over stony ground, without ond year (teni) ride him till his back bends. being shod, are those of the tribe of AssasseIn the third year (rebûa telata) tie him up na, in the Yakoubia. This saying is attribagain. Then, if he does not suit you, sell uted to Moulaye Ismail, the celebrated Sultan him." of Morocco: "May my horse have been brought up in the Mâz, and led to water in the Biaz!" The Mâz is a place in the country of the Assassena, and the Biaz is the brook, known by the name of Toufet, which runs through their territory. The horses of the Ouled-Khaled are also renowned for the same qualities. Sidi-Amed-Ben Youssef has said on the subject of this tribe," Long tresses and long djelais will be seen amongst you till the day of resurrection;" praising thus at the same time both their women and their

If a horse is not ridden before the third year, it is certain that he will be good for nothing but for running, at most, which there is no occasion for him to learn; it is his original faculty. The Arabs thus express the thought: El djouad idjri be aaselouh; "The djouad runs according to his breeding." (The noble horse has no need to be taught to run.)

V. You ask me why, if the offspring partakes more of the qualities of the male than of the female parent, the mares, notwith-horses. standing, sell for higher prices than the

horses.

The reason is this; he who purchases a mare hopes that all the while he is making use of her he will obtain from her a numerous progeny; but he who buys a horse derives from it no other benefit than its services for the saddle, as the Arabs never take money for the use of their horses, but lend them gratuitously.

VI. You ask whether the Arabs of the Desert keep registers to record the descent of their horses?

Know that the people of the Algerian Desert do not trouble themselves about such registers, any more than the people of Teli. The notoriety of the facts is quite sufficient; for the genealogy of the blood-horses is as universally known as that of their masters. I have heard say that some families had these written genealogies, but I am unable to quote them. But books of the kind are in the East, as I have mentioned in the little treatise which I am shortly about to address to you.

VII. You ask which of the Algerian tribes are the most celebrated for the purity of race of their horses.

Know that the horses of the Hamyan are the best horses of the Desert, without exception. They have none but excellent horses, because they never employ them either for tillage or for carrying burdens. They use them only for travelling and for battle. These

VIII. You tell me that people have assured you that the horses of Algeria are not Arabian horses, but Barbs..

This is an opinion which falls back again upon its authors. The people of Barbary are of Arab origin. A celebrated author has said: "The people of Barbary inhabit the Mogheb; they are all sons of Kaïs-BenGhilan. It is also asserted that they are descended from the two great Hémiatrites tribes, the Senahdja and the Kettama, who came into the country at the time of the invasion of Ifrikech-el-Malik."

According to these two opinions, the people of Barbary are really Arabs. Moreover, historians have established the kindred of the majority of the tribes of Barbary, and their descent from the Senahdja and the Kettama. The arrival of these tribes is anterior to Islamism; the number of emigrated Arabs in the Mogheb is incalculable. When the Obeîdin (the Fatémites) were masters of Egypt, immense tribes passed into Africa, and amongst others the Riahh. They spread from Kaïrouan to Merrakech (Morocco.) It is from these tribes that are descended, in Algeria, the Douaouda, the Aîad, the Mâdid, the Oulad-Mad, the Galad-Jakoub-Zerara, the Djendal, the Attaf, the Hamis, the Braze, the Sbéba, and many others. No one doubts that the Arabian horses have spread in the Mogheb, in the same way as the Arabian families. In the time of Ifrikech-ben-Kaïf, the capire

fat; to give him drink in the middle of the day, keeps him in his present condition."

of the Arabs was all-powerful; it extended especially prefer those horses which are modtowards the west, as far as the boundaries of erate eaters, provided they are not weakened the Mogheb, as in the time of Chamar the by their abstinence. "Such a one," they Hémiarite, it extended towards the east as say, is a priceless treasure." "To give far as China, according to the statement of drink at sunrise, makes the horse lean; to Ben Kouteïba in his book entitled El Mûrif.give him drink in the evening, makes him It is perfectly true, that if the Algerian horses are of Arab race, many of them have fallen from their nobility, because they are only too frequently employed in tillage, in carrying burdens, and in doing other similar hard work; and also because some of the mares have been associated with asses, which never happened under the Arabs of old. So much so, that according to their ideas, it is sufficient for a horse to have trodden upon ploughed land to diminish his value. On this subject the following story is told :

A man was riding upon a horse of pure race. He was met by his enemy, also mounted upon a noble courser. One pursued the other, and he who gave chase was distanced by him who fled. Despairing to reach him, he then shouted out," I ask you, in the name of God, has your horse ever worked on the land?"

He has worked on the land, for four days." "Very well! mine has never worked. By the head of the Prophet, I am sure of catching you."

He continued the chase. Towards the end of the day, the fugitive began to lose ground and the pursuer to gain it. He soon succeeded in fighting with the man whom he had given up all hopes of reaching.

cy!

My father may God receive him in mer-was accustomed to say, "No blessing upon our country, ever since we have changed our coursers into beasts of burden and tillage. Has not God made the horse for the race, the ox for the plough, and the camel for the transport of merchandise? There is nothing gained by changing the ways of God."

IX. You ask me, besides, for our maxims as to the manner of keeping and feeding our

horses.

Know that the master of a horse gives him at first but little barley, successively increasing his ration by small quantities, and then diminishing it again a trifle, as soon as he leaves any, and continuing to supply it at that rate. The best time to give. barley is the evening. Except on the road, there is no profit in giving it in the morning. On this point they say, Morning barley is found again on the dunghill, evening barley in the croup." The best way of giving barley is to offer it to the horse ready saddled and girthed; as the best way of watering a horse is to make him drink with his bridle on. On this point it is said, "The water with the bridle, and the barley with the saddle." The Arabs

66

During the great heats, which last forty days (semaïme), the Arabs give their horses drink only every other day. It is said that this custom has the best effects. In the summer, in the autumn, and in the winter, they give an armful of straw to their horses, but the ground-work of their diet is barley, in preference to every other sort of food. On this subject the Arabs say: “ If we had not seen that horses are foaled by horses, we should say that barley produces them." They say,

From the New Monthly Magazine.
AMERICAN AUTHORSHIP.

It may be for years, and it may be forever; but, recurring to that distinction which is traditional, conventional, and thus far "wellordered in all things and sure," Washington Irving holds it. in possession, and that is nine points of the law.

In effect, he is already installed on the shelf as a classic. His sweet, smooth, translucent style makes him worthy to be known, and pleasant to be read, of all men. Be his theme what it may — and in choice of themes he is comprehensive enough - whether a Dutch" tea and turnout," or a "Siege of Granada ;” a full-length of “ Mahomet," or a crayon sketch of "Jack Tibbetts;" a biography of "Goldsmith," or of "Dolph Heyliger;" a "prairie on fire," or a "Yorkshire Christmas dinner;" a night on the "Rocky Mountains," or a morning at " Abbotsford"

No. I. WASHINGTON IRVING. FEW, it may be reasonably affirmed, will demur to the judgment which assigns to Mr. Washington Irving the most distinguished place in American literature. Meaning thereby, not the distinction of incomparable genius in general, nor of preeminent superiority in any special department of authorship; but -without present reference to his personal or intrinsic claims, however great the distinction of extrinsic, popular renown, the external evidence of long-established and world-wide recognition. Wherever America is known to have a literature at all, she is known to rejoice in one Geoffrey Crayon, Gent., as its representative. If an unreading alderman presiding at a public dinner wished to couple with a toast in honor of that literature the name of its most distinguished scion, to each, he brings the same bello stile che, Washington Irving's, we presume, is the as he may say, and has said,* m'ha fatto onore. name he would fix on; not, perhaps, that the His style is indeed charming, so far as it goes. alderman may have read that author much, That is not, possibly, very far, or at least very but that he has read his brother authors less, deep. For it is not a style to compass proor not at all, and, in short, proposes the toast found or impassioned subjects, or to intone in an easy, conventional, matter-of-fact way, the thrilling notes which "sigh upward from as paying a compliment the legitimacy of the Delphic caves of human life." It has which will be impeached by no compotator at not, speaking generally and "organically," the civic board. The alderman's private more than one set of keys, and can give little opinion, he being "no great things" as a meaning to passages demanding diapason granstudent and critic in the belles lettres, may be deur, or trumpet stop. It fluently expresses valued at zero; but his post-prandial propo- ballad and dance music; or even the melliflusition, as the mouthpiece of public opinion, ous cadences of Bellini, and the gliding graces as the symbol or exponent by which society of Haydn; but beyond its range are such rates a name now to be toasted with all the complex harmonies as a Sinfonia Eroica, such honors, is of prime significance. There may tumultuous movements as a Hailstone Chobe American writers who, either in the range, rus. And therefore is it not what one someor the depth, of literary power, or in both times hears it called, a perfect style — unless combined, are actually the superiors of the the perfection be relatively interpreted, quoad author of Rip Van Winkle" and the His- rem, which of itself is a "pretty considerable" tory of New York." He may yield in pictu- concession. But in its proper track it is resque reality to Fenimore Cooper-in dra-eminently delightful, and flows on, not in matic animation to Brockden Brown-in serpentine, meandering curves, but straightmeditative calmness to Cullen Bryant to forward, " unhasting, yet unresting," with Longfellow in philosophic aspiration to Holines in epigrammatic ease to Emerson in independent thought to Melville in graphic intensity to Edgar Poe in witching fancy to Mayo in lively eccentricity to Prescott in accurate erudition to Hawthorne in subtle insight to Mitchell in tender sentiment. He may, or he may not, do all this, or part of it. But, notwithstanding, his position remains, either way, at the top of the tree. Thitherwards he was elevated years ago, by popular acclamation, when as yet he stood almost alone in transatlantic literature; and thence there has been little disposition to thrust him down, in favor of the many rivals who have since sprung up, and multiplied, and covered the land. Mrs. Beecher Stowe is

musical ripple as of some soft inland murmur. Hence a vast proportion of the favor vouchsafed to its master, who has made it instrumental in popularizing subjects in the treatment of which he had scarcely another advantage, or even justification. Quiet humor, gentle pathos, sober judgment, healthy morality, amiable sentiment, and exemplary professional industry have done the rest.

That Mr. Irving was eminently endowed with the mytho-poeic faculty- the art of myth-making-was delightfully evident in the production of "Knickerbocker's History

In the preface to his "Life of Goldsmith," to whose literary influence over himself he applies the address of Dante to Virgil.

deep reflection. Golden age of innocence and
primitive blessedness! when tea-parties were
marked with the utmost propriety and dig-
nity of deportment-no flirting, or coquetting
-no gambling of old ladies, or hoyden chat-
tering and romping of young ones— but when
the demure misses seated themselves for the
evening in their rush-bottomed chairs, and
knit their own woollen stockings, nor ever
opened their lips, unless to say Yah, Myn-
heer,'
"L
or Yah, ya Vrouw," to any ques-
tion that was asked them while the gentle-
men tranquilly" blew a cloud," and seemed,
one and all, lost in contemplation of the blue
and white tiles of the fireplace, representing,
perhaps, Tobit and his dog, or Haman swing-
ing conspicuously on his gibbet, or Jonalı
manfully bouncing out of the whale, "like
harlequin through a barrel of fire." Then
comes Williamn the Testy that "universal
genius"-who would have been a much bet-
ter governor had he been a less learned man
- who was perpetually experimentalizing at
the expense of the state, and reducing to
practice the political schemes he had gath-
ered from Solon and Lycurgus, and the re-
public of Plato and the Pandects of Justinian

of New York." In relation to the infant experiences of the city he depicts, he occupies as notable a position from the positive pole as Niebuhr does from the negative; the German's skill in the use of the minus sign, he emulates in dexterous management of the plus; whatever fame the one deserves as a destructive, the other may arrogate as a conservative, or rather a creator; the former immortalizes himself because he exhausts old worlds, the latter because he imagines new. All honor, then, to the undaunted historian of New York, from the Beginning of the World to the End of the Dutch Dynasty being the Only Authentic History of the Times that ever hath been published; which peremptory" only," so far at least as it excludes other claimants, is a terse and tidy challenge, "which nobody can deny." Equally undeniable is it that, for a historian and chronicler, old Knickerbocker is " a jolly good fellow;" and that even Sir Robert Walpole might have been tempted to revoke and recant his slander on history at large, had he been familiar with such a dainty dish as this. Every pursuivant of useful knowledge is conciliated in limine, by the honest man's assurance, that if any one quality preeminently who introduced the art of fighting by procdistinguishes his compilation, it is that of lamation (an art worthy of Mr. Cobden himconscientious, severe, and faithful veracity- self), and wrought out for himself great re"carefully winnowing away the chaff of hy-nown by a series of mechanical inventions, pothesis, and discarding the tares of fable, which are too apt to spring up and choke the seeds of truth and wholesome knowledge." Inspired by this stern principle, it is beautiful to hear his disclaimer of all records assailable by scepticis:n, or vulnerable by critical analysis-his sublime rejection of many a pithy tale and marvellous adventure - his jealous maintenance of that fidelity, gravity, and dignity which he accounts indispensable to his order. The heroes of the New York mythological on swagger before us in memorable guise. Good Master Hendrick Hudson, for instance, with his mastiff mouth, and his broad copper nose supposed (the latter to wit) to have acquired its fiery hue from the constant neighborhood of the tobacco-pipe; a man remarkable for always jerking up his breeches when he gave out his orders, and for a voice which sounded not unlike the brattling of a tin trumpet, owing to the number of hard nor'-westers swallowed by him in the course of his sea-faring. Walter the Doubter, again, so styled because the magnitude of his ideas kept him everlastingly in suspense his head not being large enough to let him turn them over and examine them on both sides; an alleged lineal descendant of the illustrious King Log: hugely endowed with the divine faculty of silence, and loving to sit with his privy council for hours together, smoking and dozing over public affairs, without speaking a word to interrupt that perfect stillness so necessary to

such as carts that went before the horses, and
patronized a race of lawyers and bum-bailiffs,
and made his people exceedingly enlightened
and unhappy. And, lastly, we have Peter the
Headstrong-tough, sturdy, valiant, weather-
beaten, leathern-sided, and wooden-legged-
a hero of chivalry struck off by the hand of
nature at a single heat- a beautiful relique
of old-fashioned bigotry — a perfect fossil of
effete notions - a peremptory and pugnacious
man, who would stump to and fro about the
town, during political ferment, with a most
war-betokening visage, his hands in his pock-
ets, whistling a low Dutch psalm-tune, which
bore no small resemblance to the music of a
north-east wind when a storm is brewing;
the very dogs, as they eyed his excellency,
and heard his wooden foot-fall, skulking any-
whither in dismay. It argues a significant
talent for ironical composition, and easy bad-
inage in Mr. Irving, that he has sustained to
the last, in this perhaps over-long history, the

The fellow-feeling between these two great men may be illustrated by the annexed passage from Knickerbocker:-"The great defect of William the Testy's policy was, that though no man could be more ready to stand forth in an hour of emergency, yet he was so intent upon guarding the national pocket, that he suffered the enemy to break its head; in other words, whatever precaution for públic safety he adopted, he was so intent upon rendering it cheap, that he invariably rendered it ineffectual.". "History of New York," book iv., c. 4.

quaint tone of subdued comedy and simple
gravity which marks its opening. It abounds
in pungent reflections profitable for later times,
and likely to remain applicable until the last
public quack and parliamentary humbug and
official mountebank shall be no more.
"Salmagundi" belongs to the same

the

earliest stage in the author's literary ca-
reer, and partakes of the same satiric feat-
ures. But the satire is good-natured enough
in both cases, and indeed comes from too
kindly a heart to be impregnated with any
very bitter stuff. What Byron calls

The royal vices of the age, demand
A keener weapon and a mightier hand.
And against such it is not Geoffrey Crayon's
mission to set himself in array.

Still there are follies e'en for him to chase,
And yield, at least, amusement in the race.

So that, although it is not for him, "good
easy man, full surely," to confront and ap-
prehend gigantic vice stalking in the streets,
or to extinguish the "guilty glare" blazing
from what threaten to be "eternal beacons of

consummate crime," yet he can speak on the
hint,

Are there no follies for my pen to purge?
Are there no fools whose backs deserve the scourge?
And, albeit, the fools have nine lives, and
kind Geoffrey's scourge, or cat, hath only one
he lays it on with what appetite he may
He certainly has the gift d'apercevoir le
ridicule, et de le peindre avec grace et
gaieté." And as certainly, he has had no
such evil communications" with a mocking
spirit as to corrupt his "good manners,
freeze his warm heart.

66

or

pices of Sir Walter Scott," and by the agency of the prince or booksellers, John Murray. This Sketch-Book he compares with that of a wayward travelling artist, who, following the bent of his vagrant inclination, copies objects in nooks, and corners, and by-places: the result being a volume crowded with cottages, and landscapes, and obscure ruins, but neglectful of St. Peter's, or the Colosseum, the cascade of Terni, or the bay of Naples, and without a single glacier or volcano in the whole collection. This absence of aught

volcanic or violent removes the sketches from participation in Diderot's judgment, that les esquisses ont communément un feu que le tableau n'a pas. C'est le moment de chaleur de l'artiste, &c." Look not in these esquisses for feu or chaleur. They are the placid, dreamy droppings of a limner's truant crayon, wandering over the paper at its own has; the collector's design being that it sweet will. Variety the collection designedly should contain something to suit each reader, to harmonize with every note in the gamut of taste. "Few guests," argued he, in ardown to a varied table with an equal apperanging his Miscellany -"few guests sit tite for every dish. One has an elegant horror of a roasted pig; another holds a curry or a devil in utter abomination; a third cannot tolerate the ancient flavor of venison and stomach, looks with sovereign contempt on wild fowl; and a fourth, of truly masculine those knick-knacks here and there dished up for the ladies. Thus each article is condemned in its turn; and yet, amidst this variety of appetites, seldom does a dish go away from the table without being tasted and relished by some one or other of the guests." Is pathos your passion? There is "The Widow and her Son," to ope the sacred source of sympathetic tears the affliction of a widow, aged, solitary, destitute, bereaved of her last solace and there is "The Pride of the Village," a love-tale, and a tale of sorrow unto death *Speaking of the above "sense of the ridicu- prose elegy, most musical, most melancholy, lous," and of the art of painting it with vivacity on as pretty a low-born lass as ever ran on and mirth, Madame de Staël adds: "Ce n'est pas the green sward. Is humor to you a metal là le genre de moquerie dont les suites sont les more attractive (though every true taste for plus à craindre; celle qui s'attache aux idées et aux sentimens est la plus funeste de toutes, car pathos involves a hearty relish for humor, elle s'insinue dans la source des affections fortes and vice versa)? There is the discursive et dévouées." DE L'ALLEMAGNE, IV., § ii. This chapter on "Little Britain". that heart's wise saw," in its warning against the pervert- core of the city, that stronghold of John Bulling tendencies of satire, reminds us of a "modernism, as it seemed to Mr. Crayon, looking as instance." Thomas Moore, a man of as gay and usual through colored spectacles, so that he kindly a disposition as the author of "Salma- here recognized a fragment of London as it gundi," had attained a far greater renown as a satirist, and with far greater pretensions to that was in its better days, with its antiquated "bad eminence," when, apprehensive of its cor- folks and fashions, where flourish in great roding power, as well on agent as patient, he wrote preservation many of the holiday games and in his diary (1819): "Resolved never to have customs of yore, and where still revisit the anything more to do with satire; it is a path in glimpses of the moon not a few ghosts in fullwhich one not only strews, but gathers thorns." Five years previously, Lady Donebal had urged bottomed wigs and hanging sleeves, or in laphim to take the same resolution, on the same pets, hoops and brocade. Such a Little Britain grounds. was hardly to be found in Great Britain when

Hitherto Mr. Irving had catered for the New World. He was now to identify himself with the literators of the Old, by publishing "The Sketch-Book," under (to use his own words) "the kind and cordial aus

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a