The name of this book is in shockingly bad taste. After being inundated with the burlesque in the shape of Life in London, Life in Paris, Life at Crockford's, Life in Philadelphia, and a variety of other Lives, all partaking of caricatura, it is not easy to imagine a title more sadly out of keeping than one embracing on the same page this so travestied word Life and the—Pictured Rocks of Lake Superior. We have other faults to find with the work. It contains some ill-mannered and grossly ignorant sneers at Daniel O'Connell, calling him “the great pensioner on the poverty of his countrymen,” and making him speak in a brogue only used by the lowest of the Irish, about “the finest pisantry in the world.” The two lithographs, (Picture Rocks and La Chapelle) the joint work of Messieurs Burford and Bufford, are abominable in every respect, and should not have been suffered to disgrace the well printed and otherwise handsome volumes. In the manner of the narrative, too, there is a rawness, a certain air of foppery and ill-sustained pretension—a species of abrupt, frisky, and self-complacent Paul Ulricism, which will cause nine-tenths of the well educated men who take up the book, to throw it aside in disgust, after perusing the initial chapter. Yet if we can overlook these difficulties, Life on the Lakes will be found a very amusing performance. We quote from the close of volume the first, the following piquant Indian Story, narrated by an Indian.
As our adventures are thus brought, for the day, to a premature close, suppose I give you an Indian story. If any body asks you who told it me, say you do not know.
Many years ago, when there were very few white men on the lake, and the red men could take the beaver by hundreds upon its shores, our great father, the president, sent a company of his wise men and his warriors to make a treaty with the Chippewas. They did not travel, as the poor Indians do, in small weak canoes; no, they were white warriors, and they had a barge so great she was almost a ship. The warriors of this party, like all our great father's warriors, were exceeding brave; but among them all, the bravest was he whom the white men called the Major, but the red men called him Ininiwee, or the Bold Man. He was all over brave—even his tongue was brave; and Waab-ojeeg himself never spoke bolder words. For a while the wind was fair and the lake smooth, and the courage of Ininiwee ran over at his mouth in loud and constant boasting. At last they came to the mouth of Grand Marais, and here a storm arose, and one of the wise men—he was tall and large, and, on account of the color of his hair, and for other reasons, the Chippewas called him Misco-Monedo1—told the warriors of our great father to take off their coats and their boots, so that if the great barge was filled with water, or if she turned over, they might swim for their lives. The words of Misco-Monedo seemed good to the warriors, and they took off their coats and boots, and made ready to swim in case of need. Then they sat still and silent, for the courage of the Major no longer overflowed at his lips; perhaps he was collecting it round his heart. They sat a long while, but at last the guide told them, ‘It is over, the warriors are safe.’ Then, indeed, there was great joy among the white men; but Ininiwee made haste to put on his coat and his boots, for he said in his heart, ‘If I can get them on before the other warriors, I can say I am brave; I did not take off my boots nor my coat; you are cowards, so I shall be a great chief.’ Ininiwee put on his coat, and then he thought to have put on his boots; but when he tried, the warrior who sat next him in the barge shouted and called for the Misco-Monedo. He came immediately, and saw that Ininiwee, whom they called the Major, in his haste and in his great fright, was trying to put his boot on another man's leg.
1 Red Devil.
RUSSIA AND THE RUSSIANS.
Russia and the Russians; or, a Journey to St. Petersburg and Moscow, through Courland and Livonia; with Characteristic Sketches of the People. By Leigh Ritchie, Esq. Author of “Turner's Annual Tour,” “Schinderhannes,” &c. Philadelphia: E. L. Carey and A. Hart.
This book, as originally published in London, was beautifully gotten up and illustrated with engravings of superior merit, which tended in no little degree to heighten the public interest in its behalf. The present volume is well printed on passable paper—and no more. The name of Leigh Ritchie however, is a host in itself. He has never, to our knowledge, written a bad thing. His Russia and the Russians has all the spirit and glowing vigor of romance. It is full of every species of entertainment, and will prove in America as it has in England, one of the most popular books of the season. In this respect it will differ no less widely from the England of Professor Von Raumer than it differs from it in matter and manner, the vivacious writer of Schinderhannes suffering his own individuality of temperament to color every thing he sees, and giving us under the grave title of Russia and the Russians, a brilliant mass of anecdote, narrative, description and sentiment—the profound historian disdaining embellishment, and busying himself only in laying bare with a master-hand the very anatomy of England. It is amusing, however, although by no means extraordinary, that were we to glean the character of each work from the respective statements of the two writers in their prefaces, we would be forced to arrive at a conclusion precisely the reverse. In this view of the case Leigh Ritchie would be Professor Von Raumer, and Professor Von Raumer Leigh Ritchie. We copy from the book before us the commencement of a sketch of St. Petersburg, in which the artist has done far more in giving a vivid idea of that city than many a wiser man in the sum total of an elaborate painting.
St. Petersburg has been frequently called “the most magnificent city in Europe,” but the expression appears to me to be wholly destitute of meaning. Venice is a magnificent city, so is Paris, so is St. Petersburg; but there are no points of comparison among them. St. Petersburg is a city of new houses, newly painted. The designs of some of them may be old, but the copies are evidently new. They imitate the classic models; but they often imitate them badly, and there is always something to remind one that they are not the genuine classic. They are like the images which the Italian boys carry about the thoroughfares of London—Venuses de Medici and Belvidere Apollos, in stucco.