siduously charms its victims to destruction; but its tendency is directly the reverse of such an intention. The rapturous enjoyment derived from the use of the narcotic is so much more fully and forcibly described than the retributive torture, that the reader, at the conclusion of the work, on casting up accounts, and balancing the happiness and the misery, finds the former so decidedly to preponderate, that he lays aside the narrative with a determination to follow, on the slightest temptation, the author's evil courses; and even the most vivid descriptions of the physical and mental agony and prostration of the opium eater, when he is paying the sharp penalty of his excesses, are so startling and wildly terrible, and take such a strong hold on the imagination, that most persons of exciteable temperaments would rather experience the novelty of such strong sensation, than continue to drag on the burdensome weight, and dull monotony of ordinary existence. Moreover, Mr. De Quincey's individual history is little qualified to deter others from the habit he condemns; for, in spite of his protracted and excessive indulgence, he has arrived at extreme old age with his commanding intellects unimpaired.

"Klosterheim" is well worthy of perusal. It is by no means a fiction of the first class, or a fair sample of its author's genius; but it is pleasant reading, and is rendered peculiar by an attention to those traditionary rules for grouping, and "effect," which produce some of the most striking features of modern dramas. Indeed, whilst reading "Klosterheim," we are insensibly conveyed into a theatre, where we find ourselves looking at actors on the boards.

ANNA HARRIET DRURY.

THIS lady, descended from the ancient family of Drury of Suffolk, has conferred lustre on her historic name by her

beautiful writings. In 1847 she published a volume of poetry entitled "Annesley, and other Poems," and from that time up to the present date she has wielded her pen with as much industry as success. Her works of prose fiction are "Friends and Fortune, a Moral Tale," "Eastbury; a Tale," "The Tun by the Sea-side; an allegory," "Light and Shade; or the Young Artist," and "The Blue Ribbons; a story of the last century."

SARAH ELLIS.

THE works of this lady are all of them more or less amusing, and have, perhaps, produced as much animated discussion over tea-cups as the writings of any other living female writer; but the best and most interesting of them would be quite as pleasant and do quite as much good, if they could be freed from the distressing superabundance of small moral purpose under which they labour. Still, their objects are invariably amiable, and the means by which they endeavour to reach them are often very ingenious. We understand that Mrs. Ellis has been not less successful as a schoolmistress than as an author.

Mrs. Ellis, whose maiden name was Stickney, was educated as a member of the Society of Friends. In 1837 she married the Rev. William Ellis, the South Sea Islands Missionary, and author of "Polynesian Researches." Her principal works are "The Women of England ;" "The Sons of the Soil;" "Family Secrets ;" "The Daughters of England;" "The Wives of England;" "The Mothers of England;" "Pictures of Private Life;" "Look to the End ;"" Prevention better than Cure;" "Temper and Temperament;" "Social Distinctions;" "The Bennett's Abroad;" "Rawden House," &c., &c.

STEPHEN WATSON FULLOM.

MR. FULLOM is unquestionably one of the most prominent and successful authors of the day. To a natural facility with his pen, and extensive information on history, classical literature, and the exact sciences, he adds, humour, a discriminating knowledge of mankind, and a practical acquaintance with all that relates to authorcraft as a business, that enables him judiciously to select his subjects, and to treat them in a manner best calculated to attract and gratify readers. The consequence of this somewhat rare combination of qualities is that his books are not only well written, but are also well read. Of his powerful novels "The Great Highway," "The Daughter of Night," "The King and the Countess," and "Men of the World,” we have not space to speak at length. "The Great High" is the best known, having since its first appearance way in 1854 passed through five editions, But, perhaps, his reputation, as a man of letters, is derived less from his works of fiction, than from his "Marvels of Science and their testimony to Holy Writ "-a work that obtained for its author the Gold Medal of Honour from the King of Hanover, and of which an eighth edition has been published -and from his learned and entertaining "History of Woman."

L. E. GASKILL.

MRS. GASKILL, author of "Mary Barton," published in 1848, "The Moorland Cottage," "Ruth," "Cranford," "North and South," and the "Life of Charlotte Brontë," is the wife of a much respected Unitarian minister. To pass by this lady and her beautiful works with only a few lines seems much like impertinence, but, unfortunately wẹ

have not space to express at greater length our deep grati tude to her for often rousing us in moments of selfishness or apathy to a healthy sympathy with the desolate and distressed, and our warm admiration for every thing that has come from her pen. With a tender heart, a lively imagination, rare moral courage, high aspirations, and winning simplicity, as well as startling force of diction, Mrs. Gaskill possesses every quality requisite for a novelist of the very highest order. If her "Life of Charlotte Brontë," has a fault, it arises from her making too liberal a use of epistolary documents, and in not relying more on her own unusual gift of nervous and skilful narration. The publication of this life has, it is needless to say, been the source of much pain and unkindly feeling, the expressions of which have in some cases been injudicious and even unmannerly. The friends of the late Revd. Carus Wilson felt themselves aggrieved by the portrait of that gentleman in "Jane Eyre," and the "Biography," and one clergyman took upon himself to declare Charlotte Brontë was guilty of calumniously aspersing a good man in speaking of Mr. Wilson as the victim of spiritual pride. The proof which this Quixotic champion of the Revd. Carus Wilson's spiritual graces adduced in behalf of the accused, was singularly amusingconsisting as it did for the most part of a letter written by an unknown lady, to the effect that she had never discovered anything like Pharisaical arrogance in Mr. Wilson, and that she thought Miss Brontë was altogether wrong. It never struck the sagacious counsel that by this step he did not clear the character of his protégé, but only put the blindness and insensibility of one lady in opposition to the accurate observation of another, who was not only peculiarly gifted with a power of reading character, but whose cute sufferings bore witness to the correctness of her pinions. By the same reasoning it could be shown that ncle Tom could not have been flogged to death because black

Sambo had never received a lash ; or that a certain English King never died of eating lampreys, because his chief minister never eat any; or that A could not have died of small pox, because B had never been vaccinated.

GEORGE ROBERT GLEIG-THE REV.

Ar one time the novelist was looked on with distrust in every rank of society, and while the zealously devout did not hesitate to call him "a child of Belial," and a host of other unpleasant names, even the charitable deemed him a representative of worldly-mindedness. Indeed, in certain obscure sects, the writer of prose fiction still retains this vague, fabulous, reputation of wickedness; and only the other day the writer of these pages was not a little amused with reading a broad-side posted on a wall by some society `for the promulgation of the Christian virtues, which warned all good people to avoid the company of "play-actors, infidels, scoffers, novelists, and all other followers of impious callings." This evil fame, however, must, in these days, be fast dying out, even amongst the flocks presided over by Chadbands and Stigginses, when the most zealous and effective of our clergy are found amongst the ranks of novelists.

The Rev. George Gleig, the son of a Scottish bishop, was born in 1796, and after being educated at Oxford, entered the army as an officer of the 85th Regiment of Light Infantry. He served in the Peninsula, and in the campaign of Washington, being severely wounded at the taking of that city. Retiring from the service on half-pay, he was or dained, and in 1822 he was presented by the Archbishop of Canterbury to the living of Ivy Church, Kent. In 1844 he obtained the chaplaincy of Chelsea Hospital.

In 1846

VOL. II.

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