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pursuing anything like literary occupation. | excellence as a narrator, it can hardly be said am aware that this is all an affair of the that this series of works have added to his nerves, a kind of reaction in consequence of fame, or achieved a permanent popularity. coming to a state of repose after so long mov- Their subjects, which were then fresh, have ing about, and produced also by the anxious feeling on resuming literary pursuits. I feel now become hackneyed-the Spain of Irving, like a sailor who has once more to put to sea, Lockhart, and (greatest of all) of Ford, has and is reluctant to quit the quiet security of become somewhat wearisome to us in the pages the shore. If I can only keep the public in of countless imitation; and Irving's works good-humor with me until I have thrown off are scarcely executed with sufficient research two or three things more, I shall be able to and depth to be of real historical value, indesecure a comfortable little independence, and then bread and cheese is secure, and perhaps pendent of their amusing qualities. They a seat in the pit into the bargain."-P. 362. Savor too much of the bookmaker. He has been to a great extent superseded by countrymen of his own who have followed in the same track; by the more solid merits of Prescott, who has had in his turn to yield the palm to the energy of Mottley. But while falling off in substantial interest, these works were acquiring more and more of circulation and repaying their author more and more in the way of sterling retribution. It is a wellknown phenomenon in the natural history of two remarkable species of men, that while the author is growing in bulk and vigor and approaching to his highest flavor, the bookseller makes prey of him: when the author is out of condition and in a declining state, he in turn feeds on the bookseller. Compare the modest earnings of Irving in his palmiest period, with the sums which he continued to extract from the publishing fraternity—until the mistake was found out-for the heavier productions of his age of exhaustion. They excited the envy of Moore to an almost un

From the recurrence of these" ægri somnia," Irving was effectually relieved, after a hypochondriacal year or two, by the opening of a new career of interest. It is not very clear, from Mr. Pierre Irving's narrative, at what period of the author's life he first began to turn his attention to Spanish subjects and Spanish adventure. They have always had a peculiar and somewhat romantic attraction for American literary men, who trace back the first discovery and conquest of their continent to the subjects of Ferlinand and Isabella. We find Irving in 1825 busy acquiring the Spanish language at Paris: in the following year he starts for Bordeaux with brother Peter, evidently intent on Spanish adventure, and on making a book or two thereout; and the design finally culminates in the "Life of Columbus," in four volumes, undertaken at the end of 1826, and prosecuted with his usual rapidity of execution; which, considering the correctness of his style, was exces-friendly point. sive: Moore says that he wrote about one hundred and thirty pages of the size of those sheets" (of Memoirs of Lord Byron)" with "Left" (he says) "some of the printed of the "Sketch-Book" in ten days, which Irving, to be sent off to America, he having the poet terms "amazing rapidity." For undertaken to make a bargain for me with two years he made Spain his home: wan- the publishers there. If I but make a tenth dered over the greater part of its provinces; of what he has done lately for himself in that fixed his bachelor abode for one winter in the quarter, I shall be satisfied. £3000 he reold pile of the Alhambra, from which sojourn £2000 for his Chronicles of Granada; and on ceived from Murray for his Columbus, and he derived some of his most picturesque and the same two works he has already got £3000 agreeable recollections; and ultimately aban- from the America market, with the, property doned his intention of returning to his native of the copyright there still his own. It is country, and came back to London at the end true that for Murray (according to his own of 1828, on receiving the appointment of Sec-account) they have not been so fortunate, his retary of Legation to the United States in loss on the two publications being (as he says) England. near £3000; which may not be far from the Besides the "Life of Columbus," the fruits truth, as the Chronicles have not sold at all."* of his activity during these years were the "Conquest of Granada," the "Tales of the Irving soon appears to have found his new Alhambra," and so forth. Notwithstand-office peculiarly incompatible with his impaing Irving's charm of style, and occasional

* Journal, vi. 91.

tience of restraint; and in 1832, at the age | visitor from Europe to America.
of forty-nine (the culminating epoch of man's
intellect, according to Aristotle), on Van Bu-
ren's arrival here as minister, he resigned,
and returned to enjoy in his native country
the fame which he had earned in the old
world.

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"Here,"

says one of his biographers," he passed his summers, and his winters he spent in New York, in the streets of which Knickerbocker omnibuses rattled by Knickerbocker halls, where Knickerbocker clubs held festivals, and at whose wharves magnificent ships and It was a period of trial for American in- steamers, coming and going every day, also stitutions. South Carolina had just passed bore that immortal name. His bachelor her "nullification ordinance; " President home was enlivened by the presence and atAndrew Jackson was preparing to enforce by tentions of nephews and nieces in abundance, arms, if need were, the maintenance of the and here he continued his literary labors, but Federal system; and Irving himself soon scarcely with the success of former years, and, found occasion to say, "I confess I see so unfortunately, under the pressure of similar many elements of sectional prejudice, hostil- pecuniary wants with those which had urged ity, and selfishness stirring and increasing in him on in the more elastic period of youth. activity and acrimony in this country, that I For the genius of speculation was always bebegin to doubt strongly of the long existence setting him, and his gains, whenever he of the general union." He seems to have made any, were pretty sure to be "locked up had just then the very rare visitation of a fit in unproductive land purchases," or some of interest in political matters. "The grave other equally unprofitable investment. "I debates in the Senate," he says, shortly af- cannot afford any more to travel," he writes terwards, occupied my mind as intensely in 1863; and about the same period the old for three weeks as ever did a dramatic repre- despondency regarding literary success, sentation." But this fit was too alien from thinking "the vein had entirely deserted his natural disposition to last. He refused him,' was apt to beset his solitary hours. to stand for New York City on the" Jackson In one respect, however, he was fortunate. ticket," or even to give a vote. "The more Very few literary men as sensitive as himself, I see of political life here," he says, "the have had so little to endure from hostile critmore I am disgusted with it. There is such icism, or from personal or party spite. His coarseness and vulgarity and dirty tricks min- own inoffensive and genial nature, as well as gled with the rough-and-tumble contest. I his established reputation, seem to have sewant no part or parcel in such warfares." cured him this unusual exemption in his own He gave himself up with increased zest to his country as well as in England. We hardly only favorite occupations—the perpetration trace in the pages of his American life any of long rambling journeys, and the composi- record of this kind of annoyance, except some tion of books there anent. Already in the very insignificant attacks on the ground of first months of his return he had performed too great fondness for England, and one fua tour, gigantic by comparison with his rious onslaught from a jealous North CaroEuropean wanderings, over the western parts linian for "having observed, incidentally, of the Union, including many hundred miles that the Virginians retain peculiarities charof ride through the regions beyond the Mis-acteristic of the times of Queen Elizabeth sissippi; adventures subsequently turned to and Sir Walter Raleigh,"-historical assoaccount in his "Tour on the Prairies," "As- ciations of which he deemed that his own toria," and the " Adventures of Captain Bon-State had the monopoly. neville."

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In 1842, Daniel Webster, under the presiIn 1835, Washington Irving established dency of Tyler, obtained for Washington Irvhimself at a cottage on the Hudson close to ing a nomination as American Minister to the legendary "Sleepy Hollow," and among Spain: an unexpected but not ungrateful the favorite scenes of his youth. This dwel- honor, as, like other men, he seems to have ling-an old mansion of the Van Tassel fam- found the fascinations of that country, when ily, at first called "Wolfert's Roost," once he had become familiar with it, irresistafterwards christened by the fancy name of ible. He remained there three years, during 'Sunnyside," was well known in after years which he witnessed many a strange revoluas the resort of almost every distinguished | tion in the politics of the Peninsula, includ

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ing the downfall of Espartero and the triumph of Maria Christina over the Constitutional party, the rise and the fall of Narvaez; of all which very graphic accounts are given in his correspondence contained in these volumes. The consumption of ministers in this country," he says, "is appalling. To carry on a negotiation with such transient functionaries is like bargaining at the windows of a railway car: before you can get a reply to a proposition, the other party is out of sight." But it was scarcely a happy period of his life. He missed alike the domestic enjoyments of Sunnyside, and the sparkling society and agreeable flatteries of London and Paris. Spanish politics suited him no better

than American :

"I am wearied," he writes, " and at times heart-sick of the wretched politics of this country, where there is so much intrigue, falsehood, profligacy, and crime, and so little of high honor and pure patriotism in political affairs. The last ten or twelve years of my life have shown me so much of the dark side of human nature, that I began to have painful doubts of my fellow-men and look back with regret to the confiding period of my literary career, when, poor as a rat, but rich in dreams, I beheld the world through the medium of my imagination, and was apt to believe men as good as I wished them to

be."

But these melancholy fits were counteracted by a full appreciation of what no man estimated better than himself—the rich substitute which Memory affords in advanced life for decayed Imagination:

throws a soft coloring on the past, until the
very roughest places, through which I strug-
gled with many a heart-ache, lose all their
sixty-second birthday finds me in fine health,
Here my
asperity in the distance.
in the full enjoyment of all my faculties, with
my sensibilities still fresh, and in such bux-
om activity that, on my return yesterday from
the Prado, I caught myself bounding up-stairs
three steps at a time, to the astonishment of
the porter, and checked myself, recollecting
that it was not the pace befitting a minister
and a man of my years. If I could only
retain such health and good spirits, I should
be content to live on to the age of Methuse
lah."-Vol. iii., p. 307-8.

of President Polk and the Democratic party
In consequence (we fancy) of the accession
to power, he gave up his appointment in
1846, and Romulus M. Sanders, of North
Carolina, reigned in his stead. In August
that year he paid his last fleeting visit to
England, and in September "bade adieu for-
ever to European scenes."

With his return to his native country from Spain the present volumes end. The adventurous portion of his life had ceased. His later years were chiefly spent in executing the task of collecting and republishing his vari ous works, and in the production of his its merits, but is not one of those composi"Life of Washington," which has no doubt tions by which he will be ultimately remembered. He enjoyed to a very advanced age his quiet domestic happiness at Sunnyside, dying in 1859. His countrymen honored him in life, and are justly proud of the more cosmopolitan honors which he achieved in the We do not quargeneral world of literature.

"I am now," he says, at sixty-two, "at that time of life when the mind has a stockrel with Mr. Rufus William Griswold, author of recollections on which to employ itself: of" The Prose Writers of America," when and though these may sometimes be of a mel- he reminds us that "Irving's subjects are as ancholy nature, yet it is a' sweet-souled mel- three American and two Spanish to one Engancholy,' mellowed and softened by the lish; the periods of his residence in Ameroperation of time, and has no bitterness in it. My life has been a checkered one, crowded ica, Spain, and England, in the years of his with incidents and personages, and full of literary activity, bear to each other about the shifting scenes and sudden transitions. All same proportion; and the productions which these I can summon up and cause to pass have won for him the most reputation, even before me, and in this way can pass hours in Europe, are not only such as had no models together in a kind of reverie. When I was in the literature of the Old World, but such young my imagination was always in the ad- as could only have been written by one inti vance, picturing out the future, and building mately acquainted with the peculiar life and castles in the air: now memory comes in the place of imagination, and I look back over manners by which they were suggested; the region I have travelled. Thank God! nor even for informing us that "his style the same plastic feeling which used to deck has the case and purity and more than the all the future with the hues of fairy-land, grace and polish of Franklin; without the

intensity of Brown, the compactness of Cal- will assert for him rather a modest place houn, or the strength and splendor of Web- in that great Parthenon of literary renown ster." But, leaving these special causes of which will one day arise when the political admiration to his countrymen, and withdraw-distinctions which now divide the great Briting, for our part, any claim to appropriate ish race are forgotten, or become of secondary him on the ground of his intense fondness for import, in comparison with that pervading the domestic life, the society, the traditions, unity of language, usages, and associations the classical writers of our little England, we which fuses it all in one.

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Has a right that same to construe from that party's point of view;

That's to say, provided always its construction's so far fair

As to rest within the limits of the sense the text will bear.

Bootless is that right exerted; act upon't, for aught we care.

Of a government the basis, if the governors are wise,

In the confidence not only of the governed, mind you, lies;

But as much, and, I may rather say, in fact, a great deal more,

In respect for its authority, which force must first restore :

Then pacific moral virtues we may try, but not before.

Those demands which you invite us so politely to concede,

But express our august master's gracious will; they do, indeed.

They're ukases long ago decreed in his imperial brain:

That is where they are at present; that is where
they must remain.

Ere we can say more about them order must in
Warsaw reign.

You for Poland ask a charter, framed with points
in number six,

Much his majesty thinks of them, but that they'll result in "nix,'

Wont restore the reign of order, wont appease unquiet souls,

Wont keep down a population, whom, save terror, naught controls,

For they don't express the wishes of the sanguinary Poles.

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From The Spectator, 8 Aug.
THE OPPORTUNITY OF THE NORTH.

fuse with disdain to accept the oligarchy as its masters, decline without fear to take them back as equals, and impose a boundary on THE public mind is swinging round once their action which will render the triumph more a little too fast. The Confederate loan, of freedom ultimately secure. There can be which just before Gettysburg was quoted at no reasonable doubt that the North, if it a fractional premium, has this week been pleases, may now secure the boundaries of sold as low as thirty-five discount, and the the Potomac and Mississippi. The retreat tremendous fall is a true index of the decline of Lee renders another attempt at the offenof confidence among the friends of the South. sive a most dangerous undertaking. The loss Observers, as usual, are watching events in- of Vicksburg and Port Hudson brings the stead of studying the forces which produce line of blockade close to the very heart of the them, and give to the capture of Vicksburg Confederacy, and releases 130,000 men, who, the importance which, with much less reason, undoubtedly, if the Washington Cabinet they assigned to the rout of Bull Run. There please, can clear the western bank. They seems to us, we confess, a dangerous exag- may do even more than that. If the Presi geration in this view. The special strength dent's proclamation is carried out steadily to of American democracy-the lax organization its logical conclusion, i.e., the freedom of which makes it, like other fluids, hardly com- every black man, they may re-organize socipressible, has, indeed, preserved the North ety from the Mississippi to the Rio Grande. from a most serious danger. Imagine the They may so fill the country with free setresult of a French encampment for three days tlers, so ally themselves with the classes who in Kent, and contrast it with the result of dislike slavery as a competing form of labor Lee's weeks of unresisted invasion. The per-like the Germans of Texas-so completely severance of the North, the dully grand per- beat down the power of the small caste very sistence which is the attribute only of men which is really devoted to the "institution," who are at once Anglo-Saxon and free, has, that they may turn the vast regions between it is true, at last asserted its superiority over the great river and the Pacific into sources the aristocratic coherence which is the strength of strength. We are not certain, the infinite of the South. While the latter is reeling contingencies of war being considered, that with fatigue, feeling day by day the loss of this would not be their wiser course. The the nervous force which has supplied the North would possess a vast and coherent docomparative deficiency of muscles, its rival is minion large enough for all ambitions, and but gathering strength-only beginning to growing every day in the strength and the feel that heat of the blood which enables quiet riches derived from immigration and toil. men to display their full activity. The South The South, always dangerous as a subjugated is bleeding at every pore, while the North is enemy, would as an independent State within only sweating; and if the contest continues those bounds be at worst but a weak foe, under its present conditions, victory more or with its dreams all over, its leaders discredless complete is only a question of time. For ited, its society slowly disintegrating under the thousandth time in history observers will the influence of the freedom hemming it all be compelled to acknowledge that when the around. No fugitive slave law would be concontest is one between climates victory never ceded in the treaty, and the North, without remains with the children of the sun. But a Slave State within its limits, would soon the time is not yet, and as yet there is no learn to feel that pride in protecting a fugiproof that the conditions of the contest will tive slave which it already feels in defending always remain the same. The triumph of the a fugitive Hungarian,-a pride of national North is the more reasonable probability, but strength wholly apart from philanthropy. it is not as yet the fact. Slavery might then be inserted, like hereditary titles or offices, among the institutions prohibited even to the individual States, and the extension of that great evil would be once for all forbidden. A powerful North, ruled by a completely free society, a weak South tending always towards freedom, slavery placed in bonds tightening with every suc ceeding year, free society enabled to extend itself south and west-this will seem to Englishmen, at least, no inglorious conclusion even to so vast a contest, and this may, we believe, be enforced. The South, it is true, asserts that rather than submit to such terms it will perish in the field; but it has little

What has been gained, as it seems to us, ⚫ who are friends of the North not for the cause they are striving to secure, but for the cause which is bound up in theirs, is simply this. Amidst almost incessant defeat, and in spite of every adverse circumstance, of unlucky generals and incompetent statesmen, of the grossest treachery within and the most strenuous ability without, the incoherent but free society of the North has advanced thus far; it can dictate the permanent boundary between free and slave institutions, it can, as it were, chain up the South within limits in which its social system must rot. It can re

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