more elevated manners and refined amusements of the Gothamites themselves. From Philadelphia, Mr. Dickens proceeded to Baltimore and Washington. In the former city his stay was brief. He simply enumerates its various public buildings in a single sentence, and then occupies four or five paragraphs in delineating "two curious cases" which were brought under his observation in the State Penitentiary. In this city, he found the only hotel which af `forded him perfect comfort and satisfaction, though there were many approximations to his beau ideal in other places. "The most comfortable of all the hotels of which I had any experience in the United States, and they were not a few, is Barnum's, in that city; where the English traveler will find curtains to his bed [mark this!] for the first, and probably the last time, in Amer. ica; and where he will be likely to have enough water for washing himself, which is not at all a common case." On reading this sentence we were strongly impressed with the idea, that Mr. Dickens was a physiological phenomenon, exhibiting in his own person the remarkable properties of the opposite mag netic poles; for, while externally he manifested a very powerful attraction for water, internally he manifested a no less decided repulsion towards it; and we afterwards find it a ground of complaint against two or three hotels, that they had nothing but water for "the English traveler" to drink! On his journey to Washington, Mr. Dickens was particularly disgusted with the exuberant use of tobacco which he witnessed on all occasions. We heartily join him in his "counterblast" against the Stygian weed; yet we apprehend, that his practice of frequenting the bar was no less disgusting to some of his fellow travelers, than the use of tobacco on the part of others seems to have been to him. He could not go from New Haven to New York, without "exhausting the stock of bottled beer" on board the boat, and we believe that he even found a bar on board the little steamer between Springfield and Hartford. The habits of Mr. Dickens, in this respect, as our readers have already seen, need no inconsiderable reformation. The appearance of Washington, as it strikes the eye of a Londoner, is facetiously described; though on the whole, he seems to have been in something of an ill humor while visiting the Federal city. Magnificent Distances, but it might with "It is sometimes called the city of greater propriety be termed the city of Magnificent Intentions; for it is only on taking a bird's-eye view of it from the top of the Capitol, that one can at all comprehend the vast designs of its projector, an aspiring Frenchman. Spacious avenues, that begin in nothing, and lead no where; streets, mile-long, that only want houses, roads, and inhabitants; public buildings that need but a public to be complete; and ornaments of great thoroughfares, which only lack great thoroughfares to ornament, are its leading features. One might fancy the season over, and most of the houses gone out of town for ever with their masters. To the admirers of cities it is a Barmecide feast; a pleasant field for the imagi nation to rove in; a monument raised to a deceased project, with not even a legible inscription to record its departed great ness." Our traveler was not very favorably impressed with the appearance of the House of Representatives, though he gives the Senate much credit for its dignity and decorum. His criticisms on these two bodies, though not a little exaggerated, are in the main so pungent, and have so much truth in them, that we cannot refrain from expressing the wish, that they might be read and pondered, not only by the members of Congress, but by all who have any thing to do with sending them there. Our author of course visited the President, and was well pleased with the republican simpli city of the various domestic arrangements at the White House. He satirizes the bustle and parade of a presentation to her Majesty, by contrasting with it the easy and unceremonious introduction to the chief magistrate of the United States. He bears his testimony likewise, to the "decorum and propriety of behavior which prevailed" at the President's levee, even "among the miscellaneous crowd in the hall," thus showing, that there is a tendency in republican institutions to engender the feeling of selfrespect. From Washington, Mr. Dickens proceeded to Richmond, where his stay was short, and concerning which he has recorded nothing worthy of notice. He was particularly pleased, however, with the luxurious and dissipated style of living which he saw, as the reader may judge from the following reminis cences. "It was between six and seven o'clock in the evening, when we drove to the hotel; in front of which, and on the top of the broad flight of steps leading to the door, two or three citizens were balancing themselves on rocking chairs and smoking cigars. We found it a very large and elegant establishment, and were as well entertained as travelers need desire to be. The climate being a thirsty one, there was never, at any hour of the day, a scarcity of loungers in the spacious bar, or a cessation of the mixing of cool li quors but they were a merrier people here, and had musical instruments play ing to them o' nights, which it was a treat to hear again." From Richmond, Mr. Dickens returned to Baltimore, whence he pursued his journey by stage to Harrisburg. There (being moved perhaps by considerations of economy, since the hope of securing an international copy-right law was fast vanishing away) he went on board a canal-boat for Pittsburg, in company with numerous emigrants for the west, and of course received no very favorable impression, either of the comforts of this mode of traveling, or of American society as exhibited in his fellow travelers. Having left Harrisburg on Friday evening, he reached Pittsburg on Monday evening by dint of traveling on the Sabbath, and remained there three days, but he has hardly a word to say about the place. There is nothing worthy of remark in his account of the jour ney by steamboat, from Pittsburg to Cincinnati, except the dissatisfaction which he expresses, because "at dinner there was nothing to drink upon the table, but great jugs full of cold water," whilst at the same time he complains of the scantiness of the "washing apparatus," thus again illustrating the theory of opposite poles. With Cincinnati he was particularly pleased. While there he had the privilege of, seeing a temperance convention and parade, which he regarded with much interest as holiday concourse," though he felt little sympathy in its peculiar design. a 66 His description of Louisville, his next stopping place, comprises little more than an account of its superb hotel and of the rooting of swine in the streets. Thence he pro ceeded to St. Louis, where he remained long enough to make the discovery, that the city owes much to the influence of the Unitarian church, "which is represented there by a gentleman of great worth and excellence." From St. Louis, he made an excursion to the Looking Glass prairie, and then retraced his steps to Cincinnati. From Cincinnati, his course was to Canada, by way of Sandusky and the lakes. A scene described at one of the towns between Cincinnati and Columbus, may have been admired by some as an illustration of the writer's talent for caricature. We copy a part of the concluding paragraph as another illustration of his love for brandy, and his dislike of any internal application of water. "We dine soon afterwards with the boarders in the house, and have nothing to drink but tea and coffee. As they are both very bad, and the water is worse, I ask for brandy, but it is a temperance hotel, and spirits are not to be had for love or money. This preposterous forcing of unpleasant drinks down the reluctant throats of travelers, is not at all uncommon in America, but I never discovered that the scruples of such wincing landlords induced them to preserve any unusually nice balance between the quality of their fare, and their scale of charges: on the contrary, I rather suspected them of diminishing the one and exalting the other, by way of recompense for the loss of their profit on the sale of spirituous liquors. After all, perhaps, the plainest course for persons of such tender con sciences, would be a total abstinence from tavern-keeping." From Sandusky, Mr. Dickens hastened by steamboat to Buffalo, and thence to Niagara Falls, where he remained two days-spending the time however, on the Canadian side. He was not probably aware, that some of the most magnificent views of the falls are presented from the American bank of the river. His reflections are worth quoting, as a specimen of his descriptive powers, but as the book itself is in the hands of millions of readers, we need only refer to it. If Mr. Dickens had not been educated to the trade of making police reports, he might have been a poet. Mr. Dickens visited Toronto, Kingston, Montreal, Quebec, and St. John's, neither of which places is described very minutely, but all of them more at length, and apparently with far more satisfaction, than any American cities of the same or even greater importance. He is more particular in describing scenery and location, and has far less fault than usual to find with the modes of conveyance, the provisions for refreshment and comfort, and the manners of the people. All this is quite natural. In Canada he was on British ground. From St. John's, our traveler reentered America by way of Lake Champlain, and proceeded imme diately to New York; but having five days of leisure before embarking for England, he made a short excursion to West Point and [New] Lebanon. At New Lebanon, he suffered dreadfully by the misera ble accommodations of the hotel, at which he would have slept had sleep been possible. On Tuesday, the seventh of June, Mr. Dickens embarked in the packet ship George Washington, for his native land. The chapter describing the passage home is pleasantly written, and contains some important suggestions respecting the ship. ping of emigrants. It is followed by a chapter on slavery, embodying some facts, but lamentably deficient in argument and force. The chapter was written for the English market, and would probably have been different, had the author's scheme for an international copyright been successful. The last chapter of the work contains some general remarks on the prominent features of American society, but none of them betray an accurate or philosophic mind. The topics discussed are some of them important, but they are dismissed with a few hasty, disconnected observations. The writer censures that "universal distrust," which he regards as characteristic of the American people, condemns the general character of the newspaper press, laments the prevalence of the "real" to the exclusion of the "ideal," complains of the deficiency of the organ of wit in the American cranium, and the want of that "lightness of heart and gai ety," which abounds in "merry old England," discusses "the prev alence of various forms of dissent," and the tendency of republican institutions to engender the feeling of self-respect. The latter point is illustrated by the independent air of a boot-maker, who came to take his measure as he was enjoying his "book and wine-glass," and with this anecdote, followed with a brief dissertation on cleanliness and health, thecirculation" of "American Notes" is suddenly stopped-the said notes being found completely below par. We regret that Mr. Dickens has published these volumes, for they bear the marks of hasty composition, evince no genius, add nothing to the author's reputation as a writer, and exhibit his moral character in a most undesirable light. It remains that, in concluding this article, we present briefly the judgment which we have formed of Mr. Dickens as a writer. These Notes are by no means a favorable specimen of the talents of the author. They are very carelessly written, and the subject affords but little scope for the exercise of his peculiar powers. Mr. Dickens is unquestionably a man of genius. He possesses in a rare degree a talent for caricature; yet it seems to be almost uniformly under the control of good nature, and is seldom exercised for a malicious purpose. His mind is continually on the alert for the ludicrous; and the faculty to which he owes his greatest success, is a faculty for making exaggerated descriptions of laughable scenes and odd characters. 66 It may be said of him, as Dryden said of rare Ben Jonson," that "humor is his proper sphere." Such a sentence, we are aware, would assign to him no very lofty niche in the temple of Fame. No man would think of placing the author of Tristram Shandy as high as the author of the Task. Yet in conformity with this estimate of the nature and rank of our author's genius, we are much inclined to regard the "Posthumous Papers of the Pickwick Club," as his chef d'œuvre. It is to the Pickwick Papers-a work of mere fun, for which the epithet comic is quite too dignified-a work having no aim but to make the public laugh, as laughter from the pit and galleries greets the broadest kind of farce-that Mr. Dickens owes his chief renown. In that work, every character, every scene and incident, is in perfect harmony with the whole. Mr. Pickwick and his associates, Mrs. Leo Hunter and the elite of Eatanswill, the Wellers elder and junior, Mrs. Bardwell and her boy, the scenes of the election and those of the law-suit, are all of a piece; and it is not to be wondered at, that with the aid of Cruikshank, (whose "illustrations" are a great help to the story,) they have become so well known, and have furnished so much food for unmalicious merriment. The later works of Mr. Dickens are less exclusively humorous; in fact, they deal not unfrequently in the stern and sad realities of life. But while they thus indicate another kind of talent, and show, as is often shown, that the broadest humor and the most resistless pathos may be nearly allied, they are deficient in respect to unity in the design and harmony in the effect; and the reader feels that a certain violence is done to truth and nature. The hero of the tale is commonly selected from the lower walks of life, perhaps is taken from the parish workhouse, and in spite of the most untoward circumstances, notwithstanding the baneful influences by which he is surrounded, without instruction or sympathy, deprived of the counsel and example of judicious parents and friends, perhaps even against the vicious example of those who gave him birth, he appears to the world a model of excellence, adorned with every virtue and grace, and wins his way to respectability and fortune. So rare, however, are such instances of selfguardianship and promotion in real life, in fact so contrary are they to our experience, that however deeply we may be interested in the story of such a character, we cannot at the same time resist the impression that it is altogether unnatural. This perfect character, so serious, consis tent, and virtuous, this idealized representation of all that is admira ble in human nature, is surrounded continually by the most grotesque figures conceivable-by mere distortions and caricatures of humanity, extravagant in their virtues, or hideous in their deformity-and yet passes through life without being in the least affected by their influence. Thus in the "Old Curiosity Shop," little Nell, whose character is almost too lovely for earth, was trained up under the influence of a poor old man-her grandfather-shattered in intellect, addicted to gambling and theft, the bosom friend and then the victim of a hideous dwarf, whose character is even more deformed than his person. The grouping of such figures together, though it may serve to heighten the contrast between them, renders the whole picture unnatural, and even painful. One character-the center of the picture-is drawn and colored with ideal and even supernatural beauty, while every thing else upon the canvass is laughably or hideously grotesque. There is a remarkable similarity among the late productions of Mr. Dickens, which indicates a lack of invention. Oliver Twist, Nicholas Nickleby, and even little Nell, in their origin, education, adventures, and varied fortunes, in the class of society to which they belong, the characters by which they are surrounded, the scenes of vice and temptation into which they are thrown, in their fortitude under trials, their scrupulous adherence to those moral principles which are discarded by all around them, and in all the essential features of their history, have many striking points of resemblance. In the two former particularly, Mr. Dickens seems to have done like those preachers who sometimes give us the same sermon on different occasions, unVol. I. 11 der different texts, and in different covers. Of We are by no means insensible to the many tokens which these later works exhibit, of a better and higher kind of genius than that which wrote the Papers of the Pickwick Club. However improbable or unnatural may be the structure of the story and the grouping of the characters, each character is generally life-like and well sustain. ed. Some characters have a highly tragical effect. That of Fagin, for example, would hardly suffer by a comparison with Shylock. little Nell we have already intimated an opinion. Perhaps she might be ranked with such creations of genius as Desdemona. Her devo tion to her aged grandfather, when the poor insane old man was driven from his home by the rapacious Quilp; her clinging to him in all his wanderings, as, haunted by the fear that some one was pursuing him, he hurried from one village to another; her self-denial, to procure for him the means of subsistence; her anxiety to keep him from the gaming table, when the sight of cards at a village inn had rekindled his old passion so fiercely that, to partake in the game, he even stole from her little purse the few pence which she had hoarded to buy him bread; the quietness with which she endures privation, hunger, cold, and the neglect of the proud; all these, with a thousand other evidences of a soul ennobled and mature, in the most delicate, flower-like frame, endear her to the heart, and engrave her image there in lines which cannot be effaced. And when, weary and worn with her wanderings, she comes to die in that quiet village, where she had just found sympathy and friends, and is buried in that old church-yard, where she had loved to wander, we cannot refrain from mingling our tears with those of the village children, who weep over the fresh sod that covers her. |