Cooper wrote ten volumes of sketches of European travels, a History of the Navy of the United States, and various treatises on the institutions of America, in which a strong democratic spirit was manifested. In these he does not appear to advantage. He seems to have cherished some of the worst prejudices of the Americans, and, in his zeal for republican institutions, to have forgotten the candour and temper becoming an enlightened citizen of the world. In the department of fiction, however, Cooper has few superiors, and his countrymen may well glory in his name. He ' emphatically belongs to the American nation,' as Washington Irving has said, while his painting of nature under new and striking aspects, has given him a European fame that can never wholly die.

A Virgin Wilderness-Lake Otsego.

On all sides, wherever the eye turned, nothing met it but the mirror-like surface of the lake, the placid view of heaven, and the dense setting of woods. So rich and fleecy were the outlines of the forest, that scarce an opening could be seen; the whole visible earth, from the rounded mountain-top to the water's edge, present ing one unvaried line of unbroken verdure. As if vegetation were not satisfied with a triumph so complete, the trees overhung the lake itself, shooting out towards the light; and there were miles along its eastern shore where a boat might have pulled beneath the branches of dark Rembrandt-looking hemlocks, quivering aspens, and melancholy pines. In a word, the hand of man had never yet defaced or deformed any part of this native scene, which lay bathed in the sunlight, a glorious picture of affluent forest grandeur, softened by the balminess of June, and relieved by the beautiful variety afforded by the presence of so broad an expanse of water.

Death of Long Tom Coffin.

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Lifting his broad hands high into the air, his voice was heard in the tempest. 'God's will be done with me,' he cried: 'I saw the first timber of the Ariel laid, and shall live just long enough to see it turn out of her bottom; after which I wish to live no longer.' But his shipmates were far beyond the sounds of his voice before these were half uttered. All command of the boat was rendered impossible, by the numbers it contained, as well as the raging of the surf; and as it rose on the white crest of a wave, Tom saw his beloved little craft for the last time. It fell into a trough of the sea, and in a few moments more its fragments were ground into splinters on the adjoining rocks. The cockswain [Tom] still remained where he had cast off the rope, and beheld the numerous heads and arms that appeared rising, at short intervals, on the waves, some making powerful and well-directed efforts to gain the sands, that were becoming visible as the tide fell, and others wildly tossed, in the frantic movements of helpless despair. The honest old seaman gave a cry of joy as he saw Barnstable [the commander, whom Tom had forced into the boat] issue from the surf, where one by one several seamen soon appeared also, dripping and exhausted. Many others of the crew were carried in a similar manner to places of safety; though, as Tom returned to his seat on the bowsprit, he could not conceal from his reluctant eyes the lifeless forms that were, in other spots, driven against the rocks with a fury that soon left them but few of the outward vestiges of humanity.

Dillon and the cockswain were now the sole occupants of their dreadful station. The former stood in a kind of stupid despair, a witness of the scene; but as his curdled blood began again to flow more warmly to his heart, he crept close to the side of Tom, with that sort of selfish feeling that makes even hopeless misery more tolerable, when endured in participation with another.

'There was One and only One to whose feet the waters were the same as a dry deck,' returned the cockswain; and none but such as have His power will The old seaman paused, and turning his eyes, which exhibited a mingled expression of disgust and compassion, on his companion, he added with reverence: 'Had you thought more of Him in fair weather, your case would be less to be pitied in this tempest.'

ever be able to walk from these rocks to the sands.'

'Do you still think there is much danger?' asked Dillon.

'To them that have reason to fear death. Listen!

Do you hear that hollow noise beneath ye?' "'Tis the wind driving by the vessel !' "Tis the poor thing herself,' said the affected cockswain, giving her last groans. The water is breaking up her decks; and in a few minutes more, the handsomest model that ever cut a wave will be like the chips that fell from her in framing!'

Why then did you remain here?' cried Dillon wildly. 'To die in my coffin, if it should be the will of God,' returned Tom. These waves are to me what the land is to you; I was born on them, and I have always meant that they should be my grave.'

'But I-I,' shrieked Dillon, I am not ready to die! -I cannot die!-I will not die!'

'Poor wretch!' muttered his companion; 'you must go like the rest of us: when the death-watch is called, none can skulk from the muster.'

'I can swim,' Dillon continued, rushing with frantic eagerness to the side of the wreck. Is there no billet of wood, no rope, that I can take with me?'

'None; everything has been cut away, or carried off by the sea. If ye are about to strive for your life, take with ye a stout heart and a clean conscience, and trust the rest to God.'

'God!' echoed Dillon, in the madness of his frenzy ; 'I know no God! there is no God that knows me!' 'Peace!' said the deep tones of the cockswain, in a voice that seemed to speak in the elements; 'blasphemer, peace!'

The heavy groaning produced by the water in the timbers of the Ariel, at that moment added its impulse to the raging feelings of Dillon, and he cast himself headlong into the sea. The water thrown by the rolling of the surf on the beach was necessarily returned to the ocean, in eddies, in different places favourable to such an action of the element. Into the edge of one of these counter-currents, that was produced by the very rocks on which the schooner lay, and which the watermen call the 'under-tow,' Dillon had unknowingly thrown his person; and when the waves had driven him a short distance from the wreck, he was met by a stream that his most desperate efforts could not overcome. He was a light and powerful swimmer, and the struggle was hard and protracted. With the shore immediately before his eyes, and at no great distance, he was led, as by a false phantom, to continue his efforts, although they did not advance him a foot. The old seaman, who at first had watched his motions with careless indifference, understood the danger of his situation at a glance, and, forgetful of his own fate, he shouted aloud, in a voice that was driven over the struggling victim to the ears of his shipmates on the sands: "Sheer to port, and clear the undertow! Sheer to the southward !'

Dillon heard the sounds, but his faculties were too much obscured by terror to distinguish their object; he, however, blindly yielded to the call, and gradually changed his direction until his face was once more turned towards the vessel. Tom looked around him for a rope, but all had gone over with the spars, or been swept away by the waves. At this moment of disappointment, his eyes met those of the desperate Dillon. Calm and inured to horrors as was the veteran seaman, he invol

untarily passed his hand before his brow to exclude the look of despair he encountered; and when, a moment afterwards, he removed the rigid member, he beheld the sinking form of the victim as it gradually settled in the ocean, still struggling with regular but impotent strokes of the arms and feet to gain the wreck, and to preserve

RICHARD HARRIS BARHAM.

The REV. RICHARD HARRIS BARHAM (17881845), under the name of Thomas Ingoldsby, contributed to Bentley's Miscellany a series of papers, The Ingoldsby Legends, which were afterwards collected into volumes, and went through several editions. To the third series (1847) was prefixed a life of the author by his son. Mr Barham also wrote a novel, My Cousin Nicholas. The Ingoldsby papers, prose and verse, contain sallies of quaint humour, classic travesties and illustrations, droll rhymes, banter and irony, with a sprinkling of ghost stories and medieval legends. The intimate friend of Theodore Hook, Mr Barham had something of Hook's manner, with a love of punning and pleasantry as irrepressible as that of Hood, though accompanied with less literary power. Few of the readers of Ingoldsby, unless moving in a certain circle, imagined that their author was a dignitary of the Church, a minor canon of St Paul's, a rector and royal chaplain. He appears to have been a learned and amiable, no less than witty and agreeable man.

CAPTAIN FREDERICK MARRYAT.

This popular naval writer-the best painter of sea characters since Smollett-commenced what proved to be a busy and highly successful literary career in 1829, by the publication of The Naval Officer, a nautical tale in three volumes. This work partook too strongly of the free spirit of the sailor, but amidst its occasional violations of taste and decorum, there was a rough racy humour and dramatic liveliness that atoned for many faults. In the following year, the captain was ready with other three volumes, more carefully finished, and presenting a well-compacted story, entitled The King's Own. Though occasionally a little awkward on land, Captain Marryat was at home on the sea; and whether serious or comic-whether delineating a captain, midshipman, or common tar, or even a carpenter-he evinced a minute practical acquaintance with all on board ship, and with every variety of nautical character. Newton Foster, or the Merchant Service, 1832, was Marryat's next work, and is a tale of various and sustained interest. It was surpassed, however, by its immediate successor, Peter Simple, the most amusing of all the author's works. His naval commander, Captain Savage, Chucks the boatswain, O'Brien the Irish lieutenant, and Muddle the carpenter, are excellent individual portraits-as distinct and life-like as Tom Bowling, Hatchway, or Pipes. The scenes in the West Indies display the higher powers of the novelist;

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many volumes, the quality could not always be equal. The nautical humour and racy dialogue could not always be produced at will, of a new and different stamp at each successive effort. Such, however, was the fertile fancy and active observation of the author, and his lively powers of amusing and describing, that he has fewer repetitions and less tediousness than almost any other writer equally voluminous. His next novel, Percival Keene, 1842, betrayed no falling-off, but, on the contrary, is one of the most vigorous and interesting of his 'sea changes.' In 1843 he published a Narrative of the Travels and Adventures of Monsieur Violet, in which fact and fiction are blended with little artistic skill, and which was proved to be chiefly a compilation. Two other works of mediocre character followed-The Settlers in Canada, 1844, and The Mission, or Scenes in Africa, 1845. In 1846 he regained something of his old nautical animation in The Privateersman One Hundred Years Ago.

Captain Marryat made a trip to America in 1837, the result of which he gave to the world in 1839 in three volumes, entitled A Diary in America, with Remarks on its Institutions. This was flying at higher game than any he had previously brought down; but the real value of these volumes consists in their resemblance to parts of his novelsin humorous caricature and anecdote, shrewd observation, and lively or striking description. His account of the American navy is valuable; and so practical and sagacious an observer could not visit the schools, prisons, and other public institutions of the New World without throwing out valuable reflections, and noting what is superior or defective. He was no admirer of the democratic government of America; indeed, his Diary is as unfavourable to the national character as the sketches of Mrs Trollope or Captain Hall. But it is in relating traits of manners, peculiarities of speech, and other singular or ludicrous characteristics of the Americans, that Captain Marryat excelled. These are as rich as his fictitious delineations, and, like them, probably owe a good deal to the suggestive fancy and love of drollery proper to the novelist. The success of this Diary induced the author to add three additional volumes to it in the following year, but the continuation is greatly inferior.

The life of this busy novelist terminated, after a long and painful illness, at Langham, in Norfolk, August 9, 1848. Captain Marryat was the second son of Joseph Marryat, Esq., M.P., of Wimbledon House, Surrey, and was born in the year 1792. He entered the navy at an early age, and was a midshipman on board the Impérieuse when that ship was engaged as part of Lord Cochrane's squadron in supporting the Catalonians against the French. On board the Impérieuse young Marryat was concerned in no less than fifty engagements. After one of these, an officer, who had an aversion to

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1845, and was afterwards engaged in literature, writing in various periodicals - including the Quarterly and Westminster Reviews, the Athenaum, &c.—and he published the following works Biscuits and Grog, The Claret Cup, and Hearts are Trumps, 1848; King Dobbs, 1849; Singleton Fontenoy, 1850; Sketches in Ultramarine, 1853; Satire and Satirists, a series of six lectures, 1854; Eustace Conyers, a novel in three volumes, 1855; &c. Mr Hannay died at Barcelona (where he resided as British consul), January 8, 1873, in the forty-sixth year of his age. We subjoin from Eustace Conyers a passage descriptive of

Nights at Sea.

Eustace went on deck. A dark night had come on by this time. The ship was tranquilly moving along with a fair wind. Few figures were moving on deck. The officer of the watch stood on the poop. The man at the wheel and quarter-master stood in silence before the binnacle; inside which, in a bright spot of light, which contrasted strongly with the darkness outside, lay the compass, with its round eloquent face, full of meaning and expression to the nautical eye. The men of the watch were lying in black heaps in their sea-jackets, along both sides of the ship's waist. Nothing could be stiller than the whole scene. Eustace scarcely heard the ripple of the ship's motion, till he leant over the gangway, and looked out on the sea.

Nights like these make a man meditative; and sailors are more serious than is generally supposed; being serious just as they are gay, because they give themselves up to natural impressions more readily than other people. At this moment, the least conventional men now living are probably afloat. If you would know how your ancestors looked and talked, before towns became Babylonish, or trade despotic, you must go and have a cruise on salt water, for the sea's business is to keep the earth fresh; and it preserves character as it preserves meat. Our Frogley Foxes and Pearl Studdses are exceptions; the results of changed times, which have brought the navy into closer relation with the shore than it was in old days; and sprinkled it with the proper denizens of other regions. Our object is to shew how the character of the sailor born is affected by contact with the results of modern ages. Can we retain the spirit of Benbow minus that pigtail to which elegant gentlemen have a natural objection? Can we be at once polished yet free from what the newspapers call 'juvenile extravagance?' Such is our ambition for Eustace. Still, we know that Pearl Studds would go into action as cheerfully as any man, and fears less any foe's face than the banner of Levy, and we must do him no injustice. Such nights, then, Eustace already felt as fruitful in thought. If he had been pining for a little more activity, if he had drooped under the influence of particular kinds of talk, a quiet muse on deck refreshed him. The sea regains all its natural power over the spirit, when the human life of the ship is hushed. In the presence of its grand old familiar majesty you forget trouble, and care little for wit. Hence, the talk of the middle watch, which occupies the very heart of the night, from twelve to four, is the most serious, the deepest, the tenderest, the most confidential of the twenty-four hours; and by keeping the middle with a man, you learn him more intimately than you would in any other way. Even Studds in the middle watch, at least after thewatch-stock,' or refreshment, was disposed of, grew a somewhat different man. A certain epicurean melancholy came over the spirit of Studds, like moonlight falling on a banquet-table after the lamps are out! By Jove, sir,' he would sigh, speaking of the hollowness of life generally; and he was even heard

to give tender reminiscences of one Eleanor,' whose fortune would probably have pleased him as much as her beauty, had not both been transferred in matrimony to the possession of a Major Jones.

happy, in similes, a few of which we subjoin. Hannay was very profuse, and often very

Detached Similes.

Many a high spirit, which danger, and hardship, and absence from home could never turn from its aims, has shrunk from the chill thrown on its romantic enthusiasm. The ruder the hand, the more readily it brushes away the fine and delicate bloom from the grape. And the bloom of character is that light enthusiasm which makes men love their work for the beauty in it-which is the essence of excellence in every pursuit carried on in this world.

From nil admirari to worldly ambition is only a short step. It is an exchange of passive selfishness for active selfishness—that's all.

Consistency. There may be consistency and yet. change. Look at a growing tree, how that changes! But for regular consistency, there's nothing like a broomstick; for it never puts out a fresh leaf.

a

There were signs of energy about the boy, which on small scale predicted power. Mr Conyers studied them, as Watt studied the hissing of a tea-kettle, descrying far off the steam-engine.

Could he place him but safely under the influence of one of the leading ambitions of mankind? A ship goes along so merrily with a trade-wind.

A party is like a mermaid; the head and face may enchant and attract you, and yet in a moment you shall be frightened off by a wag of the cold, scaly, and slimy tail.

(Of Sir W. Scott.) We do not hear so much of him as his contemporaries did, of course; but just as we don't have any longer yesterday's rain, which is the life of to-day's vegetation.

(Of Thackeray's poetical vein.) He was not essentially poetical, as Tennyson, for instance, is. Poetry was not the predominant mood of his mind, or the intellectual law by which the objects of his thought and observation were arranged and classified. But inside his fine sagacious common-sense understanding, there was, so to speak, a pool of poetry-like the impluvium in the hall of a Roman house, which gave an air of coolness, and freshness, and nature, to the solid marble columns and tesselated floor.

MRS CATHERINE GRACE FRANCES GORE.

In

This lady (1799-1861) was a clever and prolific writer of tales and fashionable novels. Her first work, Theresa Marchmont, was published in 1823; her next was a small volume containing two tales, The Lettre de Cachet and The Reign of Terror, 1827. One of these relates to the times of Louis XIV., and the other to the French Revolution. They are both interesting, graceful tales-superior, we think, to some of the more elaborate and extensive fictions of the authoress. A series of Hungarian Tales succeeded. 1830 appeared Women as they Are, or the Manners of the Day, three volumes-an easy, sparkling narrative, with correct pictures of modand fashion; and some rather misplaced deriern society; much lady-like writing on dress sion or contempt for 'excellent wives' and 'good sort of men.' This novel soon went through a second edition; and Mrs Gore continued the same style of fashionable portraiture. In 1831, she issued Mothers and Daughters, a Tale of the