Review; indeed we have many witnesses to that effect. Byron wrote the cruel and unfeeling jeu d'esprit :

"Who killed John Keats?

'I' says the Quarterly,
So savage and tartarly,
'It was one of my feats.'"

There is a stanza of the 11th Canto of Don Juan to the same effect, though in a more humane strain. Shelley also took up the cudgels for his deceased friend, under the distinct impression that an article was the cause of his death, and hurled some stanzas of such vin. dictive indignation at the anonymous slanderer of the Review, as must have caused the "nameless worm" to wriggle under the infliction.

We could furnish a long list, headed with such names as Racine and Montesquieu, of authors who are reputed to have absolutely died of Criticism. But Keats was not the victim of Journalism; indeed, we imagine that, were the truth well investigated, many a literary homicide would have to be struck off from the list, and we rather incline to the opinion of Lord Byron, that "he who would die of an article in a Review, would have died of something else equally trivial."

But, although we must acquit the dull-pointed arrows of Blackwood and the Quarterly of the guilt of deliberate murder, sentence of downright injustice must be passed against their reviewers, for their rough handling of a production of such high promise, though imperfect, as Endymion-“ slip-shod Endymion," as a friendly critic happily qualifies it. There was more sense and manliness in Jeffrey's verdict: It is in truth as full of genius as of absurdity." The article of the "Edinburgh" from which we quote, though sufficiently severe, had great influence in awarding to Keats his proper rank among the poets of that poetical day. But it elicited an effusion of jealous spleen from the author of Childe Harold, which we must here record, if only to show the man-worshippers of the Satanic school, how much base clay there entered in the composition of their idol.

Byron writes: "Send me no more Keats, I entreat; flay him alive-if some of you don't, I must skin him myself. There is no bearing the drivelling idiotism of the manikin." And again :-" Nobody could be prouder of the praise of the Edinburgh' than I was, or more alive to their censures, as I showed in English Bards and Scotch Reviewers.' At present all the men they have ever praised are degraded by that insane article. Why don't they review and praise Solomon's Guide to Health?' It is better sense, and as much poetry as Johnny Keats!"

This is preposterous! Byron, the man of bright thoughts unconnected, the spendthrift explorer of an ideal mine of gold, who never could cast his precious ore into one single shapely image-the bard whose desultory verse never rallied around the unity of a poetic conception, is it he who undervalues the incense of the "Edinburgh," because one puff of it had in justice been awarded to the author of Endymion? Pitiful jealousy! Yes, jealousy alone inspired the brutal letter of which we have given an extract. Nothing so vindictive could flow from any other source. Byron felt within his deepmost consciousness, that apart from the wealth of diction of his youthful rival, the latter possessed the rare gift of invention, the true epic power which he himself most miserably lacked. There is a vast conception shadowed forth in “ Hyperion," which, had the precious fragment been completed, would have produced a world-poem. Keats was not confined to his self for a theme, he was not reduced to count the pulses of his neart for an inspiration he could create; he was in the original sense of the word and in the meaning of its etymology-a poet.*

But it was not the obloquy of the press, nor the envious bitterness of a rival, that crushed, though they might wound-the lofty spirit of the youthful bard. We have evidence in the volume before us-we have Keats' own words. Indeed we fear that he received, in a rather too philosophical manner, the censures that descended upon his " pretty piece of paganism." He says: "The attempt to crush me in the Quarterly has only brought me more into notice, and it is a common expression among the book-men, I wonder the Quarterly should cut its own throat.'" And again: "You will be glad to hear that Gifford's attack upon me has done me service-it has got my book among several sets, nor must I forget to mention the present of a £25 note I had anonymously sent me." He alludes to a circumstance that deserves commemoration, if only to suggest imitation.

*The poem of Hyperion, although truncated and shorn of its fair proportion, produces the effect of a mutilated statue by Phidias. We have no words to praise the antique simplicity and awful sublimity of its opening. The passage where the fallen Titans are described, suggests at once a comparison with Milton's devils, and the comparison is nowise to the detriment of Keats. The following lines are Miltonian in the spirit.

Some generous mortal sent him anonymously a beautiful sonnet and a stíll more beautiful £25 note.

Alas for romance! the death of Keats was occasioned by a disease hereditary in his family-consumption; but it was hastened by poverty and perhaps by love. The book before us does not throw much light upon the latter incident, nor do we wish it did. We protest against the curtain of the affections being torn apart, merely because they were those of a man conspicuous for literary talent.

The work now before us is merely a collection of such poems and fragments of poems by Keats as had not yet reached the public eye. Prefixed to these occurs a narrative purporting to give his life, and embodying many of his letters. Some of these friendly com inunications, never intended for the public eye, really deserve perusal; they bear the impress of his peculiar turn of mind and of expression-the sudden melting of conceit into feeling-the quaint and unexpected epithet, the apparent unconnectedness of phraseology whose remote chain thought unexpressed supplies-all these are to be met with in these hasty notes of intimate greeting, and Keats can hardly be accused of introducing these characteristics for effect, into his published works.

The poems in the collection, although not deficient in occasional beauty, are obviously too imperfect, and in many instances too hastily produced, to add much to the reputation of Keats. The tragedy of Otho the Great is monstrous, and what is worse, undramatic. The fragment of the Cap and Bells, though teeming with Spenserian invention, is too trifling is its details. We regret, however, the character of Crafticanto," which bade fair to be an original. Of the minor poems and fragments the merit is fitful and occasional. We have been induced to say more of the collection before us than its merits may warrant, by our deep sympathy for the sweet young poet, who wrote so much and so well; who died at 25, but did not, as his own epitaph implies, leave a name "written upon the waters." His name is written in the hearts of all those who can love and appreciate a young and warm inspiration.

The task of collecting these literary remains had been projected by Shelley; but the author of "Adonais" had hardly ceased to mourn over the grave of his friend, before his own was dug in that same Protestant cemetery at Rome; that beautiful spot of earth, where he had ever wished his "cor cordium" might rest. Thanks to the work of Mr. Milnes, we have now less cause to regret that Shelley's intention was never carried out by him.

We would here express a regret that Mr. Putnam, the enterprising publisher, did not seize this opportunity of giving to the world the first complete edition of the works of

Keats.

VANITY FAIR: A Novel without a Hero. By William Makepeace Thackeray. Harper Brothers, New-York.

"Vanity Fair" is the embodiment of the Maxims of La Rochefoucault. Every thought, every action is traced to one spring-the intensely egotistical instinct of human nature. Mr. Thackeray has been already before the public under the pseudonyme of M. A. Titmarsh. We owe to his pen many humorous sketches: "Jeames' Diary," the "Snob Papers," and several other productions have been acknowledged by him. And although he now appears in a different and more important character, we must welcome him as an old friend, not as a new acquaintance. He is not yet forty years old, but has seen life under many faces. Since he left Cambridge, he has been a painter, an editor, an occasional contributor, and finally a regular man of letters. He has travelled, resided in foreign countries, mixed with all orders of society both at home and abroad, being himself well connected; in short he has enjoyed and improved every opportunity of knowing man; and now, mark the conclusion he has reached-the old, dreary conclusion: "all is vanity!"

For Vanity Fair is the world, and through its booths and busy places of pleasure and sorrow, the author leads the reader with Sentiment on one arm and Satire on the other. Would we could say that Vanity Fair is only the world which Mr. Thackeray has frequented; but we fear that, after all, every world out of Utopia is but a Vanity Fair.

There is no hero to this novel; probably because the male characters, being true copies from Nature, are all below the epic proportions of novel-heroes. What personage is there, in this picture of every day life, that would at all realize the conceptions of the least romantic of fair readers? Not Dobbin, certainly; thongh kind, warm-hearted, generous and a soldier, he is not intellectual enough; and, worse than all, he lisps, and he is not handsome. Not Rawdon Crawley, the heavy dragoon;" he is too heavy by far; a novel hero would be ashamed of the constant luck at cards of Rawdon Crawley: no novel hero ought to live by his wits; if poor, he should meet, in the Xth chapter, some rich old gentleman in want of an heir. Nor will George Osborne do; true, he rides well, dances well, fences well, spars well, and looks very well; but he is frivolous, vain, and intensely selfish. He is a worldling, even in his boyish days: a fair character throughout for Vanity Fair, but no hero; we have no sympathy for him; although he marries poor, sweet Amelia, and thereby gets disinherited, we despise him because he repents of is generosity; the only redeeming trait about him is, that he gets killed in the middle

of the book. The other personages are either too low, or insignificant, or too old, or too mean; in fact, every actor in the cast has some defect that unqualifies him for the part of a hero-precisely as in real life.

But we have two heroines; sweet, kind, tender Amelia is certainly one; soft, yielding creature, she seems out of place in Vanity Fair; yet we do meet once in a while such exceptions. But the other is our favorite; Rebecca Sharp, clever, keen, pliant little "Becky". What though she is heartless, selfish, designing, intriguing; we love her be cause she is talented, energetic-and successful. The adventures of these two women of opposite disposition are the woof and web of the story; all the rest is only nap, but a nap of most excellent quality. We will try to draw out the separate threads, and coil them up into as small a space as possible, advising our readers to buy the cloth itself, if they wish to know more.

Amelia, wealthy John Sedley's daughter, and Rebecca, whose father was a poor, dissipated artist, meet together at school; "Becky," who pays for her tuition by her servi ces, contrives to win the friendship of her sweet companion, and on the day that the latter leaves school, manages to exchange her present position for that of a governess in the family of Sir Pitt Crawley. She enjoys a short respite, however, in a visit to her wealthy friend; and then she makes a desperate attempt at Joseph Sedley, Amelia's brother, a rich East Indiaman. She fails-never mind, reader, this is her first attempt, she will do better bye-and-bye. After drawing largely upon the bounty of her fair friend, she enters the family of Sir Pitt Crawley; and here she makes a fair trial of her talents; she subdues the avaricious old baronet, both his sons, Pitt a hypocrite and Rawdon a profligate; Lady Crawley, her daughters, Sir Pitt's brother, the parson, a swearing, fighting, drinking clergyman, the parson's wife, a medling intriguer, all yield to the ascendancy of her pli ant, yet energetic genius. But she brings all her fascinatious to bear upon Rawdon, who, though a younger brother, expects a large fortune from his aunt, Miss Crawley. The latter, a whig, a free thinker, and a humorist, visits Sir Pitt, and Becky fails not to subjugate her likewise; so that the spinster insists upon taking the favorite to London. There Becky exerts her genius to such good purpose that the aged maiden dotes on her, and that when Sir Pitt, who cannot bear her absence, comes to tell her that he has lost his wife, and proposes to make her Lady Crawley, she is obliged to confess that she is married, being already wedded in secret to his son Rawdon. Did I not say that she would do better bye-and-bye?

But Becky's condition is not much improved by this connection; true, she is Mrs. Captain Crawley; but the aunt revokes her will, Sir Pitt declines giving assistance to his son, and Becky Sharp is obliged to turn sharper in order to live. We next follow the young couple to Brighton, where they meet, among other persons, George Osborne and his wife, Amelia. George has been shamed by his friend Dobbin into marrying her in spite of her father's bankruptcy, thereby incurring the curse of his own father, andwhat is worse in his eyes-getting disinherited. Here Rebecca appears to great advantage, making love to Osborne out of pure deviltry, devising ways and means for raising money and for not paying any bills, and urging her accomplished husband in a career of profitable gambling.

He of Elba happening to escape, our characters are transported to Belgium, where Becky defrays expenses by her fascinations, makes her husband aid-de-camp to Lord Tufto, who is in love with her, becomes the cynosure of all eyes, and artfully contrives to amass quite a sum of money, for fear that Rawdon might get killed at Waterloo-but he does not, although he distinguishes himself.

Here the story becomes dilatory, diffuse, and it loses much of its interest. After all, there is more sense than people are generally willing to allow, in making heroes and heroines marry at the conclusion of a drama or a novel. Laugh as we may at Aristotle and the classic school, some unity is absolutely necessary to make a plot interesting; and human ingenuity has yet devised no plan more successful for preserving the unity of action, than to keep a marriage in reserve for a catastrophe.

During a lapse of years, it is somewhat tiresome to trace how Sir Pitt dies, leaving the baronetcy to Sir Pitt junior, who also inherits the fortune of his maiden aunt, Rawdon being cut off with £100; how George Osborne gets killed at Waterloo, and how his widow, sweet Amelia, finds, in due time, some consolation in the birth of George O., junior; how fat Joseph Sedley goes to India, leaving a small annuity to support his bankrupt father and family; how kind, warm-hearted Dobbin also betakes himself to the East Indies, after performing certain acts of generosity seldom witnessed in Vanity Fair; and how Rebecca and her husband, after shining and gambling at various places on the continent, finally return to England, Becky having artfully compromised his debts there, at a trifle on the pound.

With the return of Becky to London, the story becomes once more lively and interesting. By dint of skill, impudence, perseverance and intrigue, our heroine achieves a wonderful standing. She subjugates the Marquis of Steyne, a new and very interesting character, makes a free use of his cash and of his influence, moves in the first circles, is smiled upon by royalty, and completely succeeds in obtaining the great aim of her life,

and asserting for herself that rauk in society which she conceives is due to a woman of her talents. She has a son whom she hates, and sends to school under the wing of the marquess; and she intrigues to obtain a government appointment for her husband; but just as the latter's name is about to be gazetted, just as "Becky" has gathered a nice private purse, her edifice of fortune is demolished at one blow. Poor Becky, she is like a spider in a well regulated household; she weaves a web most industriously, only to see it swept off by an evil genius. Lord Steyne, who has no idea-the old rake-of dealing out cash and influence forever without return, gets Rawdon arrested on a small debt, and leaving the latter to mope at a spunging house, visits his wife most assiduously. But as the guilty pair are enjoying their opportunity, they are surprised by the sudden appearance of Rawdon, who has been liberated by Lady Pitt Crawley. A grand scene ensues; Rawdon, the vulgar wretch, knocks the marquis down, strips Becky of her jewelry, and scatters her private purse to the winds. No duel follows, however; the matter is hushed up. Rawdon is sent to govern a distant island, where he dies after a few years, and Becky is left to shift for herself on about £300 a year. After a few efforts to rise superior to her fate, she almost gives up, and becomes a perfect vagabond, travels from city to city in rather disreputable company, and finally takes to small gambling, rouge, and cognac.

Meanwhile Amelia's life has been quiet, sedate and obscure. She lives in poverty with her broken down parents, and her only consolation is her George, so like-too like we think his father. But a better day is coming; her mother dies, her son is taken care of by his wealthy grandfather, and Joseph, fat, rich Joseph, her brother, returns from India, with lank, lisping Dobbin, who has been twelve or fifteen years in love with Amelia. Fat Joseph unties the strings of his fat purse and makes Amelia keep house for him. That is not all; her old father dies, leaving her—a little more leisure; and old Osborne likewise makes his final exit, leaving her considerable property. Who happier now than sweet Amelia, with her dear boy and plenty of means? One day, our happy party, including Dobbin, take into their heads to travel, and Pumpernickel, in Germany, being recommended for fat Joseph's damaged liver, they establish themselves there, and begin to enjoy life.

Thither also the novelist leads "Becky," to bring about his catastrophe. She re-asserts her old dominion over Amelia and her corpulent brother, and although Dobbin opposes her, brings about his marriage with her old friend. For her own part, she captivates her former admirer, Joseph, so completely, that although they do not marry, she extorts all his property and kills him-with kindness probably-in a wonderfully short time. Fortified with wealth, she returns to England, where she silences envy, leads the fashion, and begins to entertain some esteem for her neglected son, who, through a series of providential demises, has succeeded to the title of his uncle.

Such is the bare outline of a story told with the most marvellous richness of lively detail, elegant phrase, and humorous situation. Once in a while, while reading this work, we had occasion to ejaculate mentally, "Boz come again-no more, no more of that.” But aside from the occasional influence of school and prevailing taste, Mr. Thackeray is original; so much so, that it is with diffidence that we venture a hint that "Becky" may possibly have been suggested by a character in Sue's "Mathilde," whose name we forget. But Sue's characters are abstractions or chimeras, while Thackeray's are of human flesh and blood. Our author is too cynical to indulge in the melting mood; yet, in perusing Vanity Fair, the reader will occasionally experience that delightful involuntary thrill which the pathos of Sterne and Dickens so often produces.

We are sorry to learn by the title page that the illustrations are "by the author;" they are very many and very bad. We presume, however, that they are copies of the originals.

FALLACIES OF THE FACULTY: With the Chrono-Thermal System of Medicine. By Dr. Dickson, of London. Edited by Dr. Turner, of New-York. Second American Edition, stereotyped from the Fifth London Edition, 8vo., pp.224. New-York: H. Long & Brother. When Lord Byron, who had a great horror for blood-letting, and who lost his life in Greece in consequence of violating a promise made to his mother, never to allow himself to be bled, used to speak of medicine as the "destructive art of healing," the expression was looked upon simply as an autithetical flourish, which contained less truth than poetry in it. Could the bard witness the strictly mathematical and logical manner in which this work strives to prove his position to be true, he would be seen to greet it with an emphatic "I told you so!" People generally have an innate perception that blood-letting is unnatural and pernicious; but the difficulty has hitherto been to demonstrate this truth to the understanding by an argumentation at once philosophical and satisfactory. The favor which Dr. D's effort has received is strong evidence in its behalf. While five editions have been demanded in London and two in New-York, we see that it has been translated

into the German, Swedish, and French languages, and that the most respectable periodi cals abroad are not backward in bestowing upon it the meed of applause. The present edition is dedicated, by permission, to Mrs. General Gaines.

ESSAYS ON THE PROGRESS OF NATIONS, in Productive Industry, Civilization, Population and Wealth. Illustrated by various statistics. By Ezra C. Seaman. Baker & Scribner, 145 Nassau-street.

This is a very elaborate work, comprised in a handsome octavo volume, embracing a great variety of statistical matter of considerable interest and use to most people. They are, however, for the most part used by the author as illustrating the protective system, of which he is an advocate. As that system is now so utterly exploded throughout the commercial world, and its monopoly and deleterious influence upon general industry so universally acknowledged, the arguments advanced in the work fall to the ground, and leave with the reader regrets that so much skill and industry should not have had a more stable foundation. We intend hereafter to recur to the work.

COTTAGES AND COTTAGE LIFE; containing places for country-houses, adapted to the means and wants of the people of the United States; with directions for building and improv ing; for the laying out and embellishing of grounds; with some sketches of life in this country. By C. W. Elliott. H. W. Derby & Co., Cincinnati; A. S. Barnes & Co., New-York.

The judicious expenditure of money in the construction of cheap country-houses is a great object with a large class of persons in this country. Much money and vexation may always be avoided by commencing understandingly in the first instance. To do so, the pursuit of the information afforded in the work before us is indispensable, and it will doubtless be appreciated, not only by those who build, but by those who buy, live and dwell in the many beautiful cottages with which the face of our country is annually be coming more thickly dotted.

MAN AND HIS MOTIVES. By George Moore, M.D., Member of the Royal College of Phy. sicians, &c. Harper Brothers.

This work, forming No. 26 of Harper's New Miscellany, is recommended to favorable notice by the former publication of the same author. It is of a religious tendency, being lessons drawn by the writer from the phases of the mind as developed on the sick bed, which he rightly asserts tells the man almost as much as the martyr's pire.

HOME INFLUENCE: A Tale for Mothers and Daughters. By Grace Aguilar. Harper Brothers.

This is of the class of religious novels, and possesses much general interest. The scene is laid in Wales, and the plot is well developed and carefully sustained.

THANKFULNESS: A Narrative comprising passages from the Diary of the Rev. Allan Temple, author of "Records of a Good Man's Life." Harper Brothers.

A very clever and interesting work.