Mr. James has probably written more than any other living English author. We have not now a list of his works, but a London bookseller advertises a set of them, as “nearly complete,” containing one hundred and twenty-three volumes. Many of them are historical, and one is poetical; but the greater number is composed of novels and romances. These last have some excellent qualities which distinguish them from nearly all other works of their kind, especially from the romances of Walter Scott. They are truer as histories than the chronicles and biographies of the author of Waverley. Whatever incidents he may invent, Mr. James draws his real characters with scrupulous fidelity. Philip Augustus, Richelieu, and Henri IV. are great historical pictures, of which the details are imaginary, but the general impression given so correct that a man may learn nearly as much by reading them as from Sismondi’s History of France for the periods to which they relate. While Scott’s histories are as unworthy of credit as his novels, James, in his historical writings, is singularly careful as well about their minutest incidents as their principal effect, so that he is in a way one of the best of living historians. Of The Life of Edward the Black Prince we have not space for a review; but we have found it exceedingly interesting, and we gladly commend it to the favorable attention of our readers.
The United Irishmen, their Lives and Times. By R. R. Madden, M. D., author of “Travels in the East,” “Infirmities of Genius,” etc. Two vols. 12mo. Philadelphia, Lea & Blanchard.
Any work descriptive of the characters and events of the great Irish rebellion of 1798, must possess considerable interest. The volumes before us, while they are written with a kindness and candor which distinguish few of the chronicles of the stormy period to which they relate, are constructed so carelessly, are so destitute of continuity and method, as to deserve little praise for their literary execution. The notices of Emmett, Lord Edward Fitzgerald, the brothers John and Henry Sheares, to whose fate the indignant eloquence of Curran imparted such interest, and many others will, however, enchain the reader’s attention and well reward him for laboring through the more heavy passages. It is estimated by the most moderate judges that the number of persons slain during the rebellion was not less than seventy thousand; twenty thousand on the side of the government, and fifty thousand on that of the insurgents; and it is generally admitted that more were murdered in cold blood than fell on the fields of battle. The judicial investigations which followed were mere mockeries, and the whole conduct of the triumphing government so atrocious as to shock the sensibilities of the whole civilized world. The history of these scenes cannot yet be written. Doctor Madden has but added material to the accumulating stores which await some laborious and skilful writer of the next century. His work will fulfill its office by attracting a momentary attention to the subject, and afterward by appearing as an authority in quotations on the margins of a successor’s pages.
The Man of Fortune, and other Tales. By Mrs. Gore, Author of “Greville,” “Preferment,” “The Lover and the Husband,” etc. Two vols. 12mo. Philadelphia, Lea & Blanchard.
Female writers have generally a superior tact in painting manners; a discerning eye for the lights and shadows of social life; and their pictures of the family or the ball are marked by a certain detail which we seldom find in the writings of the other sex. Mrs. Charles Gore has an excellent reputation for this kind of ability. Her characters are well drawn, the interest of her stories is well sustained, and their moral is always correct. Of the volumes before us we have read but a moiety, though enough to see that they are worthy of their author. The first contains The Man of Fortune, and Ango, or the Merchant Prince; and the second, The Queen’s Comfit Maker; A Legend of Tottenham Cross; The Young Soldier, or Military Discipline; A Lucky Dog; The Fatal Window; The Railroad; The Mariners of the Pollet; The Wife of an Aristocrat; Neighbor Grey and her Daughter; and The Jewess.
Romantic Biography of the Age of Elizabeth, or Sketches of Life from the Byways of History. Edited by William Cooke Taylor, LL. D., Author of “Natural History of Society,” etc. Two vols. 12mo. Philad. Lea & Blanchard.
We have room only to announce the appearance of an American edition of this work, and to remark that it is a collection of the most entertaining memoirs in our language.