sound of his voice. Profit will also fail, from the lack of purchasers; and poetry, high as it may intrinsically seem, must fall, commercially speaking, to its ancient proverbially unprofitable level. Yet poetry will still be poetry, however it may cease to pay; and although the acclaim of multitudes is one thing, and the still small voice of genuine taste and feeling another, the nobler incense of the latter will ever be its reward. Our readers will now cease to wonder, that an author like the present, who has had no higher aim than to regale the imagination with imagery, warm the heart with sentiment and feeling, and delight the ear with music, without the foreign aid of tale or fable, has hitherto written to a select few, and passed almost unnoticed by the multitude. With the exception of Lord Byron, who has made the theme peculiarly his own, no one has more feelingly contrasted ancient with modern Greece. The poem on the Restoration of the Louvre Collection has, of course, more allusions to ancient Rome; and nothing can be more spirited than the passages in which the author invokes for modern Rome the return of her ancient glories. In a cursory but graphic manner, some of the most celebrated of the ancient statues are described. Referring our readers with great confidence to the works themselves, our extracts may be limited. The Venus restored to Florence is thus apostrophized: "There thou, fair offspring of immortal Mind! Love's radiant goddess, Idol of mankind! Once the bright object of Devotion's vow, Shalt claim from taste a kindred worship now. Oh! who can tell what beams of heavenly light Flash'd o'er the sculptor's intellectual sight; How many a glimpse, reveal'd to him alone, Made brighter beings, nobler worlds, his own; Ere, like some vision sent the earth to bless, Burst into life, thy pomp of loveliness!" Ancient Rome is addressed with much sublimity, and the Laocoon most feelingly pourtrayed. The Apollo, however, is very unjustly dismissed with six of the most indifferent lines in the poem. Many of the Louvre statues being Roman worthies, the poem concludes with the following striking allusion to their restoration: VOL. I. Lift her dread Ægis with majestic frown, Unchain her Eagle's wing, and guide its flight, To bathe its plumage in the fount of Light." The poem more immediately before us is of much greater length, and, we are inclined to think, of higher merit than its predecessor. The measure is like the Spencerian, though different. The experiment was bold, but it has not failed in the author's hands; and the music is upon the whole good. We would willingly quote largely from this poem, but have already outwritten our limits. We have seldom been more delighted than we were with the first nine stanzas, and cannot resist giving the 8th and 9th. VIII. "Where soft the sunbeams play, the zephyrs blow, "Tis hard to deem that misery can be nigh; Where the clear heavens in blue trans "But thou, fair Attica! whose rocky bound All art and nature's richest gifts enshrined, Thou little sphere, whose soul-illumined round Concentrated each sunbeam of the mind; Who, as the summit of some Alpine height, Glows earliest, latest, with the blush of day, Didst first imbibe the splendours of the light, And smile the longest in its lingering ray; Oh! let us gaze on thee, and fondly deem The past awhile restored, the present but a dream." The reader must have recourse to the poem for much that follows in the same strain. The following description is not exceeded, in that force and brilliancy of poetic painting which sets the object before us, by any poetry the age; the passage is introductory to some fine allusions to the Elgin Marbles, which adds much to the elegance of the poem. LXXIV. of "Still be that cloud withdrawn-oh! mark on high, Crowning yon hill, with temples richly graced, That fane, august in perfect symmetry, That round thee spread their deep ethereal blue; And art o'er all thy light proportions throws The harmony of grace, the beauty of repose. LXXV. And lovely o'er thee sleeps the sunny glow, When morn and eve in tranquil splendour reign, And on thy sculptures, as they smile, bestow Each latent grace, developing in light, Catch from soft clouds of purple and of gold, Each tint that passes, tremulously bright; And seem indeed whate'er devotion deems, While so suffused with heaven, so mingling with its beams. LXXVI. But oh ! what words the vision may pour tray, The following lines touch with a glowing pencil the frieze of the Parthenon now so well known: XCII. "Mark-on the storied frieze the graceful train, The holy festival's triumphal throng, Each ray of beauty caught and mingled in the scene. 99 The other Elgin Marbles are alluded to as follows: To hail thy shore, to worship thy remains; Thy mighty monuments with reverence trace, And cry, "This ancient soil hath nursed a glorious race!" We now take our leave of the author, her again, and earnestly recommend her with a hope that we shall soon meet with work to all the lovers of elegant classical allusion and genuine poetry. Ewing's Geography, 12mo, pp. 300; and Ewing's New General Atlas, roy.4to. Edinburgh, Oliver & Boyd. THE attention paid to the study of Geography is one of the greatest improvements in the modern system of education. Children are now acquainted with the names and positions of the different quarters and countries of the globe, at an age when their parents had scarcely learned to read. It is a study in which they generally take pleasure. Their imagination delights to expatiate over distant regions, and their curiosity is naturally excited by whatever is peculiar to climates and countries different from their own. To give to this curiosity its due direction, and to impart such information as may at once interest and improve the juvenile mind, is a task which requires considerable judgment, and to facilitate which should be the principal object in elementary systems of geography. This object Mr Ewing professes to have had in view in the system now before us; and for the manner in which he has pursued it, he is entitled to the gratitude both of the students and teachers of that useful science. His plan we think judicious; and the information which, with much industry, he has collected in his notes, cannot fail to be extremely useful, both in fixing the names of places more deeply on the pupil's memory, and in storing their minds with useful knowledge; while, by directing their attention to the proper objects of curiosity, it lays a broad foundation for their future improvement. The account of the Solar System, given in the Introduction, is correct and perspicuous, and is well elucidated by the accompanying notes. This part of the work we think particularly valuable. We know the difficulty of imparting to young pupils any accurate idea of the relative magnitudes, distances, and revolutions of the planets; yet, with out some knowledge of these, geography cannot be properly understood. We know, too, that many who undertake to teach geography, are nearly as ignorant of the planetary system as their pupils; and to such persons the short but clear account of it given by Mr Ewing cannot fail to be extremely acceptable. To remove every difficulty out of the way of teachers who may not have had much experience, Mr Ewing has sketched out a method of instruction, which, being varied of course according to circumstances, may be found of considerable advantage. We approve highly of the plan of having a vocabulary at the end of the work, comprehending such names as are liable to be erroneously pronounced, divided, and accented according to the usual mode of pronunciation. We should have liked, however, to see this vocabulary more copious:-in one or two instances the accent is improperly placed. In a work which comprises within so narrow a compass such a variety of materials, it is difficult, if not impossible, to avoid defects. There are some things of importance omitted which should have found a place, and some things inserted which might have been left out. These imperfections may be amended in a future edition.—As it is, the work is highly creditable to the industry and judgment of its author. A New General Atlas has been published by Mr Ewing to correspond with his Geography; and we can very confidently recommend it as by far the most elegant and accurate which we have seen on a similar scale. One decided advantage it possesses over all other atlasses now in use-the advantage of having the boundaries of the European territories accurately delineated, as settled by the Treaty of Paris and the Congress of Vienna. Harrington, a Tale; and Ormond, a 1817. IT is a very common opinion, that when an author has continued to write long, he must either vary the nature of his subjects, or exhaust his invention; and be reduced to the necessity of repeating, in different forms, what he has said before, or of tiring his reader by dull and meagre productions, in the hope that his former celebrity may give them currency. We have heard fears expressed that Miss Edgeworth might have written herself out; and that even her fertile pen might be able to produce nothing in future worthy of her well-earned reputation. For our own parts, we must take to ourselves the credit of saying, that we never en tertained such fears. The resources of real genius we believe to be inexhaustible; and if any kind of writing affords an unlimited variety of subjects, it is that in which Miss Edgeworth so eminently excels. The endless diversity of human life and manners, will always save from the danger of tiresome uniformity the writer who can observe them with accuracy, and delineate them with effect. Of the two tales with which she has recently favoured the public, the merits and the faults are diametrically opposite. In the one we have a well devised story, the interest of which is sustained to the conclusion-but have comparatively little variety of character: in the other, the story is less ably digested, while the exhibition of character is more ample and masterly. The one is a fancy-piece, in which the powers of the artist are evidently exerted to impart to her figures a magnitude and colouring beyond the reality of life; the other is a study from nature, in which the portraiture is in general correct, but in which the pencilling is perhaps too minute, and some things are brought forward to view, which might have been more discreetly thrown into shade. The motive which induced Miss Edgeworth to write the tale of Harrington, does honour to her candour and humanity. She had received a letter from an American Jewess, complaining of the illiberality with which the Jewish nation had been treated in some of her former works; and feeling that the censure was merited, she adopted this public method of doing them justice. The prejudices which are still cherished, we fear, to a great extent against that unhappy race, may be regarded as the greatest reproach on the liberality of this enlightened age. A people, so long the special objects of the Divine dispensations, with whose history our earliest and most sacred associations are interwoven, on whose religion our own was ingrafted, whose country was the scene of all its most interesting events, and who, even in their dispersion, afford the most striking illustration of that superintending Providence by which they are to be finally restored-might well be regarded with a degree of veneration did they not occur to our memories as the obstinate and merciless persecutors of Christ and of Christians, rather than as the once favoured and peculiar people of God. Nor is it to be denied, that the violent persecutions to which throughout Christendom they have been exposed in their turn, the disabilities under which they labour, and their complete separation from the rest of the community, have kept alive their spirit of hostility to the professors of the Christian faith, and engendered habits which may warrant, in some measure, the opinion generally entertained of their character. Were the representation given of them by Miss Edgeworth to obtain general credit, that opinion would speedily be changed. We regret, for the sake of this oppressed and injured people, that her zeal has in this case rather outrun her judgment; and that, by representing all her Jewish characters as too uniformly perfect, she has thrown a degree of suspicion over her whole defence. But it is time to give our readers some account of the tale. The hero of it, Harrington, had been frightened at a very early age into a horror of the Jews, by the dreadful stories told of them by his nursery-maid, who employed their name as a bugbear to reduce him to obedience, whenever he was inclined to be refractory. His aversion to them was afterwards increased by many incidental circumstances, and in particular, by the prejudices of his father, who, in his capacity of Member of Parliament, had taken a decided part against the famous bill for the naturalization of the Jews. It was not till the sixth year after he had been at school, that an incident occurred which led him to regard the Jews with less dread, and was the commencement of that intimate acquaintance with some individuals of that race, which gradually converted his antipathy against them into respect and affection. We shall relate the incident in his own words. 60 Schoolboys, as well as men, can find or make a party question, and quarrel out of any thing, or out of nothing. There was a Scotch pedlar, who used to come every Thursday evening to our school to supply our various wants and fancies. The Scotch pedlar died, and two candidates offered to supply his place an English lad of the name of Dutton, and a Jew boy of the name of Jacob. Dutton was son to a man who had lived as butler in Mowbray's family. Lord Mowbray (with whom Harrington had been brought up from their childhood) knew the boy to be a rogue, but thought he was attached to the Mowbrays. Reminding me of my early declaration at my father's table against the naturalization of the Jews, Mowbray easily engaged me to join him against the Jew boy; and a zealous partizan against Jacob I became, canvassing as if my life had depended upon this point. But in spite of all our zeal, and noise, and cabal, it was the least and the most simple child in the school who decided the election. This youngster had in secret offered to exchange with the Jew pedlar a silver pencil-case for a top. Jacob, instead of taking advantage of the child, explained to him that his pencil-case was worth twenty tops. On the day of election, this little boy, mounted upon the top of a step-ladder, appeared over the heads of the crowd, and, with an eagerness which fixed attention, related the history of the pencilcase, and ended by hoping, with all his heart, that his friend Jacob, his honest Jacob, might be chosen. Jacob was elected; Mowbray and I, and all our party, vexed and mortified, became the more inveterate in our aversion to the successful candidate. And from this moment we determined to plague and persecute him, till we should force him to give up.-Without one thought or look of malice or revenge, he stood before us Thursday after Thursday, enduring all that our barbarity was pleased to inflict, he stood patient and long suffering, and even of this patience we made subject of fresh reproach and taunt.” Lord Mowbray, notwithstanding all this hatred and persecution of poor Jacob, had the meanness to get deeply into his debt, especially for two watches, which he had taken upon trial, and which he had kept for three months without paying for them. Jacob in vain represented that, if he did not get the money, he should himself be thrown into prison; he was only insulted and threatened; and was at length obliged to appeal to the higher powers. Mowbray was publicly reprimanded, and sentenced to pay Jacob for the watches in three days, or to be expelled from the school. Only "The next Thursday evening after that on which judgment had been given against Mowbray, when Jacob appeared in the chool-room, the Anti-jewish party gathered round him according to their leader's instructions, who promised to shew them some good sport at the Jew's expense. give me fair play,' said Mowbray, and stick close, and don't let the Jew off, for your lives don't let him break through you till I've roasted him well.'-' There's your money,' cried Mowbray, throwing down the money for the watches, take it, aye, count it every penny right;-I've paid you by the day appointed; and, thank Heaven and my friends, the pound of flesh next my heart is safe from your knife, Shylock.'-Jacob made no reply, but he looked as if he felt much. Now tell me, honest Jacob,' pursued Mowbray, honest Jacob, patient Jacob, tell me, upon your honour, if you know what that word means, upon your conscience, if you ever heard of any such thing: don't you think yourself a most pitiful dog, to persist in coming here as you do, to be made game of for twopence? 'Tis wonderful how much your thorough-bred Jew will do and suffer for gain! We poor good Christians could never do this much now-could we, any soul of us, think you, Jacob ? Yes,' replied Jacob, I think you could-I think you would.' Loud scornful laughter from our party interrupted him he waited calmly till it was over, and then continued.. Every soul of you good Christians would, I think, do as much for a father, if he were in want and dying, as mine is.' There was a silence for the moment: we were all, I believe, struck or touched, except Mowbray, who, unembarrassed by feeling, went on with the same levity of tone as before: A father in want! Are you sure, now, he is not a father of straw, Jacob, set up for the nonce, to move the compassion of the generous public?-Well, I've little faith, but I've some charity-here's a halfpenny for your father to begin with. While I live, my father shall ask no charity, I hope,' said the son," &c. Jacob, is your father good to you?' said one of the little boys. He is a good father, sir,-cannot be a better father, answered Jacob: the them in an instant before Mowbray saw tears started into his eyes, but he got rid of them, I suppose, for he went on in the same insulting tone: What's that he says? Does he say he has a good father? If he'd swear it, I would not believe him: a good father is too great a blessing for a Jew!' One flash of anger crossed Jacob's countenance; but the next instant he looked up to heaven with gratitude, then down on think so, sir: if man does, to that I subMowbray, and calmly said- God did not mit. Submit, and be dd,' said Mowbray." The insolence of this young persecutor at length excited the indignation of young Harrington, who, notwithstanding his violent prejudices against the Jews, undertook the defence of For a reason, afterpoor Jacob. wards discovered to be of the most generous kind, Jacob refused, on being asked by Mowbray, to tell his father's occupation or his name. This, of course, exposed him to additional abuse. "There was a large fire in the schoolroom; Mowbray, by a concerted movement between him and his friends, shoved the Jew close to the fire, and barricadoed him up so that he could not escape, bidding |