This catalogue, long as it already is, by no means completes the list of the last three years' gains of pictures for England. Such a record shows how compact with treasures the little island is becoming. And meanwhile, what is America doing in this way? The overestimate of the importance and value of Mr. Belmont's collection in New York shows how far the American public yet is from knowing its own ignorance and poverty in respect to Art.
No praise can be given to the execution of Dr. Waagen's book. His descriptions of pictures are rarely characteristic; his tone and standard of judgment are worthless; his style of writing is poor; his inaccuracies frequent; and his flunkeyism intolerable. It would be an excellent undertaking for a competent person, using Dr. Waagen's book as a basis, to compress the account of the principal private galleries, those which really contain pictures of value, into one small and portable volume,—to serve as a handbook for travellers in England, as well as for a guide to the present place of pictures interesting in the history of artists and of Art. Such a volume, if well done, would be of vastly more value than these heavy four. The usual delightful liberality of English collectors in opening their galleries to the public on certain days would make such a volume something more than a mere tantalizing exposition of treasures that could not be seen, and would render it, to all lovers of Art, an indispensable companion in England. We may add that this liberality might be imitated with advantage by the directors of some collections in which the public have a greater claim. We tried once in vain to get sight of the portraits of Alleyn and Burbage at Bulwich College, and were prevented from seeing the Hogarths in the Sloane Museum by the length of time required for the preliminary ceremonies.
The New American Cyclopaedia. A Popular Dictionary of General Knowledge. Edited by GEORGE RIPLEY and CHAS. A. DANA. Vol. I. A—ARAGUAY. New York: D. Appleton & Co. 8vo.
The design of this work is to furnish the American public with a Cyclopaedia which shall be readable as well as valuable,—possessing all the advantages of a dictionary of knowledge for the purposes of reference, and all the interest which results from a scholarly treatment of the subjects. Judging from the first volume, it will occupy a middle ground between the great Encyclopaedias and the numerous special Dictionaries of Art and Science; and if its plan be carried out with the vigor and skill which mark its commencement, it will, when completed, be the best and most condensed Cyclopaedia for popular use in any language. The guaranty for its successful completion is to be found in the character and abilities of the editors, and the resources at their command. Mr. Ripley is an accomplished man of letters, familiar with the whole field of literature and philosophy, gifted with a mental aptitude equally for facts and ideas, a fanatic for no particular branch of knowledge, but with a genial appreciation of each, and endowed with a largeness and catholicity of mind which eminently fit him to mould the multitudinous materials of a work like the present into the form of a prescribed plan. Mr. Dana is well known as one of the chief editors of the most influential journal in the country, as combining vigorous intellect with indefatigable industry, and as capable, both in the domain of facts and in the domain of principles, of "toiling terribly." The resources of the editors are, literally, almost too numerous to mention. They include the different Encyclopaedias and popular Conversations-Lexicons in various languages,—recent biographies, histories, books of travel, and scientific treatises,—the opportunities of research afforded by the best private and public libraries,—and a body of contributors, scattered over different portions of the United States and Europe, of whom nearly a hundred have written for the present volume, and, in some cases, have contributed the results of personal observation, research, and discovery. These contributors are selected with a view to their proficiency and celebrity in their several departments. The scientific articles are written by scientific men; those on technology and machinery, by practical machinists and engineers; those on military and naval affairs, by officers of the army and navy; and those which relate to the history and doctrines of the various Christian churches and denominations, by men who have both the knowledge of their subjects which comes from study and the knowledge which comes from sympathy.
The plan of the editors implies a perfect neutrality in regard to all controverted points in politics, science, philosophy, and religion; and though they cannot avoid controversy as a fact in the history of opinion, it is their purpose to have the Cyclopaedia give an impartial statement of various opinions without an intrusion of their own or those of their contributors. In considering how far, in the first volume, they have succeeded in their general design, it must be remembered that a Cyclopaedia which shall be satisfactory to all readers alike is an ideal which the human imagination may contemplate, but which seems to be beyond the reach of human wit practically to attain. Besides, each reader is apt to have a pet interest in certain persons, events, topics, beliefs, which stand in his own mind for universal knowledge, and he is naturally vexed to find how their importance dwindles when they appear in relation to the whole of nature and human life. In respect to Biography, especially in a Cyclopaedia which admits lives of the living as well as the dead, and to whose biographical department a great variety of authors contribute, there is an inherent difficulty of preserving the proper gradation of reputations. Doubtless, many an American gentleman will find that this Cyclopaedia gives him an importance, in comparison with the rest of the world, which time will not sanction; and doubtless, some of the dead _A_s, if rapped into utterance by the modern process of spiritual communication, would complain of the curt statement which coffined their souls in a space more limited than that now occupied by their bodies. The biographies, however, of John Adams, John Quincy Adams, Addison, Aeschylus, Mark Anthony, Alfieri, Akenside, Allston, Agassiz, and a number of others, are evidently by "eminent hands," and, as compared with the rest, are treated with more fulness and richness of detail, with an easier and more genial mastery of the subjects, and with less fear of being redundant in good things. Still, most of the biographies serve the primary purpose of the work as a book of reference, and contain as large an amount of information as could well be crammed into so limited a space.
Such a variety of minds have been engaged on the present volume, that among its twenty-five hundred articles will be found every kind of style, from austere scientific statement, to brilliant wit and fancy. Two subjects, never before included in a Cyclopaedia in the English language, namely, Aesthetics and Absolute, are ably, though far too briefly treated. Entertainment is not overlooked in the plan of the editors, and there are some articles, like those on Almacks, Actors, and Adventures, which contain information at once curious and amusing. The article "Americanism" might have been made much more valuable and pleasing, had the subject been treated at greater length, with more insight into the reasons which led to the establishment of an American verbal mint, and with a more complete list of the felicities of its coinage. The articles which refer to bodily health, such as those on Appetite, Age, Aliment, Total Abstinence, contain important facts and admirable suggestions in condensed statements. Agriculture, Agricultural Schools, and Agricultural Chemistry are evidently the work of writers who appreciate the practical wants of the farmer, as well as understand the aids which science can furnish him. Two divisions of the globe, Africa and America, come within the scope of the present volume, and, though the special reader will notice in the articles devoted to them some omissions, and some statements which may require modification, they bear the general marks of industry, vigilance, and research. The paper on Anaesthetics is evidently by a writer who meant to be impartial, but still injustice is done to the claims of Dr. Jackson, and we trust that in the next edition some of the statements will be corrected, even if the whole question of the discovery is not more thoroughly argued. It seems curious that a discovery which destroys pain should be a constant cause of pain to every person in any way connected with it. It may not be within the province of a Cyclopaedia to undertake the decision of a question still so vehemently controverted; but we think it might be so stated as to include all the facts, harmonize portions at least of the conflicting evidence, and put some people "out of pain." We must attribute it to a careless reading of the proof-sheets that the editors have allowed the concluding paragraph in the article "Adams" to intrude village gossip into a work which should be an example to American scholarship, and not a receptacle of newspaper scandal.
In conclusion, we think that the impression which an examination of the present volume, considered as a whole, leaves on the mind is, that the editors have generally succeeded in making it both comprehensive and compact,—comprehensive without being superficial, and compact without being dry and dull. As a book for the desultory reader, it will be found full of interest and attractiveness, while it is abundantly capable of bearing severer tests than any to which the desultory reader will be likely to subject it. Minor faults can easily be detected, but we think its great merits are much more obvious than its little defects. The probability is, that, when completed, it will be found to contain articles by almost every person of literary and scientific note in the United States; for the wide and friendly relations which the editors hold with American authors and savans, of all sects, parties, and sections, will enable them to obtain valuable contributions, even if the general interest in the success of an American Cyclopaedia were not sufficient of itself to draw the intellect of the country to its pages. As a work which promises to be so honorable to the literature of the country, we trust that it will meet with a public patronage commensurate with its deserts.