There is no subject which claims greater attention than the judicious education of females. It has justly been considered by some of the most eminent writers, of vast importance that the minds of the gentler sex should be cultivated and enlarged by every practicable means; that the mothers of an enlightened nation should be well prepared to train the mental faculties of their offspring; and that, as the earliest intellectual as well as physical nutriment is derived from the mother by the child, she should be fitted with care for her responsible and momentous duty. Much greater attention is now bestowed upon the culture of the female mind than formerly; and parents generally seem more impressed with the propriety of giving to their daughters a solid education. Accomplishments, which at one time seemed to make up the sum of their acquirements, are beginning to be considered as secondary to those studies which strengthen the intellect and store the mind with useful knowledge. We have no doubt that a change which carries such beneficial consequences into the bosom of every well-ordered family, will gain ground. The importance and the advantages of a thorough course of study for females, in the present enlightened state of society, are too obvious to need enforcement. The parts they have to act in this world's drama, require that their early years of freedom from care and anxiety, should be employed in preparation for the performance of the high duties of their after lives, with ease, with dignity and usefulness. The time has, we trust, arrived when the general cultivation of the female intellect will be deemed, (as it is) absolutely necessary for her happiness, and for the well-being of those whom providence may render dependent upon her guidance, her councils, or her affections—when she will be educated with a view to her becoming the companion, and not the plaything of the other sex. The importance of her position in civilized society, and the vast influence of her benignant qualities, demand that she should be prepared to fill the one, and to exercise the other with dignity and effect.
Our attention has been called to this subject by the encomiums bestowed by many intelligent individuals, on the "YOUNG LADIES SEMINARY at Prince Edward Court House, Va.," which is conducted by Mr. E. Root, in the most satisfactory manner. This institution has been established about four years, and has met with great success, as is shown by the fact that it had upwards of one hundred pupils during the past year. It has been the object of its director to fix upon a thorough course of study, rigidly to be pursued, under the superintendence of the best teachers in the various departments; rendering solid study the main object of attention, but without neglecting those ornamental branches which embellish and refine the more important acquirements. Music and the French language are taught by proficients in each, and in fact every means is afforded at this seminary for giving young ladies a finished education. To build up an institution of this description, where every important branch of study is ably and faithfully imparted, is a work of no ordinary difficulty, as it is one of great public benefit: and Mr. Root and his assistants are deserving of public commendation for the manner in which this establishment is conducted, divested as we believe it to be of the faults too often found in such schools, and which have rendered the epithet "Boarding School Miss," almost a term of contempt. We can conscientiously recommend the Prince Edward Seminary, for its efficient method of instruction—not short and easy, but such as is best adapted to the developement and strengthening of the mental energies—for able and well qualified teachers—a discipline which combines kindness and gentleness with order and propriety—a careful attention to the manners and morals of the pupils—and moderate expense. Believing such to be the characteristics of Mr. Root's Seminary, we have deemed it our duty to call to it the public attention by these brief remarks.
LITERARY NOTICES.
I PROMESSI SPOSI, or the Betrothed Lovers; a Milanese Story of the Seventeenth Century: as translated for the Metropolitan, from the Italian of Alessandro Manzoni, by G. W. Featherstonhaugh. Washington: Stereotyped and published by Duff Green. 1834. 8vo. pp. 249.
The appearance of this work strongly reminds us of the introductory remarks with which the Edinburg Review, thirty years ago, prefaced its annunciation of Waverley. We would gladly appropriate them, were it fair to do so; but "honor among thieves!" Reviewers must not steal from Reviewers; and what is it but theft, when he who borrows, can never have anything worthy of acceptance to give in return?
We may, nevertheless, so far imitate "the grand Napoleon of the realms of criticism," as to congratulate our readers on the appearance of a work, which promises to be the commencement of a new style in novel writing. Since the days of Fielding, unimitated and inimitable—and of Smollett, between whose different productions there was scarce a family likeness, we have had a succession of dynasties reigning over the regions of romance. We have had the Ratcliffe dynasty, the Edgeworth dynasty, and the Scott dynasty; each, like the family of the Cæsars, passing from good to bad, and from bad to worse, until each has run out. Partial movements in the provinces have occasionally set up the standard of rival aspirants: but these have soon passed away. Heroines from the bogs, and heroes from the highlands of Scotland, or the Polish wilds, could not maintain their pretensions, though uniting in themselves all that is admirable both in the civilized and the savage character. Perhaps this was the reason. We like to read of things that may a little remind us of what we have seen in real life. Sir Charles Grandison in the Scottish Kilt, is a startling apparition.
The younger D'Israeli has indeed, occasionally flashed upon us the light of his capricious genius; but one of his caprices has been to disappoint the hope that he had raised. He has shown us what he could do, and that is all. Mr. Bulwer too, in a sort of freak of literary radicalism, has set up for himself. He scorned to add to the number of those who dress themselves in the cast-off habiliments of Scott; and study, as at a glass, to make themselves like him, as if ambitious to display their thefts. He learned the craft of plagiarism in the Spartan school, where detection was the only disgrace. He would not steal, not he, from any but "the poor man, who had nothing save one little ewe lamb, that lay in his bosom, and was unto him as a daughter." He would imitate none but himself, and draw from no other models. His novels are all echoes of each other. There is hardly a page which might not be known for his, nor a favorite character which is not an exhibition of one of the phases of his exquisite self. The variety is between what he imagines himself to be, and what he imagines that he might have been, had he been a cavalier of the seventeenth century, or had circumstances made him a highwayman or a murderer. We are aware that he denies all this, and may be unconscious of it: but his identity can no more be mistaken than that of the one-eyed companion of Hogarth's "idle apprentice." We are aware too, that Mr. Bulwer is a member of a certain literary cabal, who aspire to direct the public taste, and bring all the influence of wealth and fashion and political connexion in aid of their pretensions. He is a sort of literary Jack Cade. "His mouth is the law." We know that the "amphitrion on l'on dire" is always the true amphitrion. But we never expect to travel as caterers for a public journal. We in the south do not do that sort of thing. We are not taught so to "raise the wind." We are not up to perpetual motion, nor to the art of making our living by taking our pleasure. We feel ourselves therefore under no obligation to admire Mr. Rogers's poems, though he be a banker—nor Mr. Bulwer's novels, nor himself, though he be a member of Parliament; nor though his female doublure Lady Blessington, "have the finest bust," and "the prettiest foot," and be "the finest woman in London." We do not put the names of our fine women in the newspapers. The business of female education with us, is not to qualify a woman to be the head of a literary coterie, nor to figure in the journal of a travelling coxcomb. We prepare her, as a wife, to make the home of a good and wise and great man, the happiest place to him on earth. We prepare her, as a mother, to form her son to walk in his father's steps, and in turn, to take his place among the good and wise and great. When we have done this, we have accomplished, if not all, at least the best that education can do. Her praise is found in the happiness of her husband, and in the virtues and honors of her sons. Her name is too sacred to be profaned by public breath. She is only seen by that dim doubtful light, which, like "the majesty of darkness," so much enhances true dignity. She finds her place by the side of the "Mother of the Gracchi," and of her whom an English poet, who well knew how to appreciate and how to praise female excellence, has simply designated as
"SIDNEY'S SISTER, PEMBROKE'S MOTHER."