Such men supply our need of wings. They bring us freedom and ideality. They forecast the possibilities of the race, and they rise in esteem in proportion as souls are refined. eloquence are vain to weep their loss:

'It is a woe too deep for tears, when all

Is reft at once,- when some surpassing spirit,
Whose light adorned the world around it, leaves
Those who remain behind nor sobs nor groans,
The passionate tumult of a clinging hope;
But pale despair and cold tranquillity,

Nature's vast frame, the web of human things,
Birth and the grave, that are not as they were.'

Art and

It yet remains to notice the chief of those who, while reflecting the light and shadow of their environment, communicated heat and lustre to this revolutionary period,-Scott, Wordsworth, and Byron.

In America there was yet no national type, and the situation was adverse to art. We were cultured at the outset; but ideality is retarded by the necessities of a new land which absorb passion in the contest with Nature. Imaginative productiveness, after the legendary stage is passed, follows material security and wealth.

Drama. The dramas now produced were a compound of the characteristics of previous schools, excepting the profligacy of the Restoration. Nearly all, while possessed of literary merit, were wanting in the qualities requisite for successful presentation. The first writers of the age-Scott, Byron, Shelley, Coleridge, Wordsworth-adopted the dramatic form, but only to prove how rare a gift is popular dramatic art,— the art of portraying actual life and passion in interesting situations. In the dearth of successful playwrights, plays were introduced from Germany, full of exaggeration and horror, the very antipodes of the sentimental; but after a run of unexampled success they ceased to attract attention. To them, however, we probably owe the five volumes of Miss Baillie, of which only one piece has been acted, though all have been largely read. Jerrold's Black-eyed Susan received a brief but cordial welcome. Talfourd's Ion and Miss Mitford's Rienzi, though they made a stage success, were of a day whose fashion has gone by. Amid the many tragedies which are better fitted for reading than for acting, amid the many in which Dulness lays the ghost of Wit, one shines out like the stars of heaven, more fiery by night's blackness,- the

Virginius of James Sheridan Knowles, the most successful of modern tragic dramatists.

At the opening of this period, Mrs. Siddons, the greatest tragic actress of the English theatre, had passed her prime. Before its close, both she and her brother, Kemble, had withdrawn from the boards. Kean died in 1833.

Macready was left

to transmit to a few some of the traditions which had passed from hand to hand, from mouth to mouth, within the lineal artistic descendants of Garrick and Betterton.

Periodical.-A department of literature now absorbing the productive energy of mind as well as an influence destructive to the drama by superseding the band of critics who had been its body-guard-was the newspaper press. Now, also, as an inevitable necessity, was founded the dynasty of the Reviews, -the Edinburgh, the London Quarterly, the North American, and Blackwood's Magazine. The first ushered in the century, as the organ of the Whigs,-the organ of a progressive and liberal literary and political party. Its zeal led to the establishment of the next and the last by the Tory or Conservative party. Soon the Westminster appeared as a medium for the representation of Radical opinions. These, it is needless to add, were made the exemplars of numerous similar publications. The primary object of most was to furnish thorough criticisms of books, and careful papers on the current topics of politics and reform. As their scope enlarged, contributions were received on any subject to which the writer had devoted special attention. Their limits and popular purpose required that the articles should be condensed and spirited. Hence a peculiar style,— brief, pithy, trenchant, often eloquent, but always positive. Jeffrey, Sidney Smith, and Macaulay were master spirits in the first; Gifford and Southey, in the second; the Peabodys and the Everetts, in the third; Lockhart and Wilson, in the fourth.

The first Daily in the United States appeared in Philadelphia in 1784,—the American Daily Advertiser. The first newspaper in the Northwest appeared in Cincinnati in 1793,—the Sentinal of the Northwestern Territory! The Morning Post-the first penny paper of any pretensions—was started in 1833, with two hundred dollars capital and a doubtful credit, Mr. Greeley being one of the partners, printers, and publishers. In 1833 the first

number of the Sun was issued, with a circulation of three hundred, and comprising twelve columns, each ten inches in length. In after years (1851) the editor and originator said:

In 1835 I introduced steam power, now so necessary an appendage to almost every newspaper office. At that time all the Napier presses in the city were turned by crankmen, and as the Sun was the only daily of large circulation, so it seemed to be the only establishment where steam was really indispensable.'

The American press had as yet hardly emerged from its swaddling clothes. There can be no surer proof that the general mind is seeking higher aliment, that the love of knowledge is spreading through all classes of the community, than the growth of periodical literature.

Essay. The miscellaneous literature of the period took mainly the form of long essays, most of which first appeared in the Reviews and Magazines. Among the many who thus distinguished themselves a few stand forth preeminent. Highest in the file is the name of Jeffrey (1773-1850), an eminent barrister, a versatile writer, and a brilliant critic. His style is flowing, spirited, and symmetrical, embellished with a copious felicity of illustration, as in the following observations on the steam-engine:

'It has become a thing stupendous alike for its force and its flexibility,- for the prodigious power which it can exert, and the ease, and precision, and ductility with which it can be varied, distributed, and applied. The trunk of an elephant, that can pick up a pin or rend an oak, is as nothing to it. It can engrave a seal, and crush masses of obdurate metal before it,- draw out, without breaking, a thread as fine as gossamer, and lift up a ship of war like a bauble in the air. It can embroider muslin and forge anchors, cut steel into ribbons, and impel loaded vessels against the fury of the winds and waves.'

At times, indeed, his diction is very poetical, as in the following tribute to Shakespeare:

'Although his sails are purple and perfumed, and his prow of beaten gold, they waft him on his voyage, not less, but more rapidly and directly, than if they had been composed of baser materials. All his excellences, like those of Nature herself, are thrown out together; and instead of interfering with, support and recommend each other. His flowers are not tied up in garlands, nor his fruits crushed into baskets, but spring living from the soil, in all the dew and freshness of youth; while the graceful foliage in which they lurk, and the ample branches, the rough and vigorous stem, and the wide-spreading roots on which they depend, are present along with them, and share, in their places, the equal care of their creator.'

In his early days he seems to have been betrayed occasionally into undue severity; but in his latter, to have made criticism a careful, conscientious, discriminating task. Of Hyperion, he said, with genial candor, but too late to cheer the dying poet:

'Mr. Keats is, we understand, still a very young man; and his whole works, indeed, bear evidence enough of the fact. They manifestly require, therefore, all the indulgence

that can be claimed for a first attempt; but we think it no less plain that they deserve it; for they are flushed all over with the rich lights of fancy, and so coloured and bestrown with the flowers of poetry, that, even while perplexed and bewildered in their labyrinths, it is impossible to resist the intoxication of their sweetness, or to shut our hearts to the enchantments they so lavishly present.'

He nobly endeavored to 'combine ethical precepts with literary criticism, and earnestly sought,' as he says, 'to impress his readers with a sense both of the close connection between sound intellectual attainments and the highest elements of duty and enjoyment, and of the just and ultimate subordination of the former to the latter.' Hence the moral suggestiveness of his critical writings, as in the following remarks on the transitoriness of poetical fame:

'When an army is decimated, the very bravest may fall; and many poets, worthy of eternal remembrance, have been forgotten, merely because there was not room in our memories for all.

By such a work as the Specimens, however, this injustice of fortune may be partly redressed, some small fragments of an immortal strain may still be rescued from oblivion, and a wreck of a name preserved, which time appeared to have swallowed up forever. There is something pious, we think, and endearing, in the office of thus gathering up the ashes of renown that has passed away; or rather, of calling back the departed life for a transitory glow, and enabling those great spirits which seemed to be laid forever, still to draw a tear of pity, or a throb of admiration, from the hearts of a forgetful generation. The body of their poetry, probably, can never be revived; but some sparks of its spirit may yet be preserved, in a narrower and feebler frame. . . .

There never was an age so prolific of popular poetry as that in which we now live; and as wealth, population, and education extend, the produce is likely to go on increasing. The last ten years have produced, we think, an annual supply of about ten thousand lines of good staple poetry poetry from the very first hands that we can boast of- that runs quickly to three or four large editions-and is as likely to be permanent as present success can make it. Now, if this goes on for a hundred years longer, what a task will await the poetical readers of 1919! Our living poets wiil then be nearly as old as Pope and Swift are at present, but there will stand between them and that generation nearly ten times as much fresh and fashionable poetry as is now interposed between us and those writers; and if Scott, and Byron, and Campbell have already cast Pope and Swift a good deal into the shade, in what form and dimensions are they themselves likely to be presented to the eyes of their great-grandchildren?'

One of the most popular and influential writers of the period was the Rev. Sidney Smith (1771-1845); manly, fearless, independent; scorning hypocrites, pedants, and Tories; sometimes too flippant, sometimes too dogmatical, often a little unjust to his adversaries, but always frank, always himself, using his pen to enforce practical views in the cause of human improvement, and bringing to the aid of logical argument fertility of fancy and breadth of humor. Almost everything which he has written is characteristic. Thus:

'Daniel Webster struck me like a steam-engine in trowsers.'

Also:

'No, I don't like dogs; I always expect them to go mad. A lady asked me once for a motto for her dog Spot. I proposed, "Out, damned Spot!" but she did not think it sentimental enough.'

Again:

'I do not mean to be disrespectful, but the attempt of the Lords to stop the progress of reform reminds me very forcibly of the great storm of Sidmouth, and of the conduct of the excellent Mrs. Partington on that occasion. In the winter of 1824 there set in a great flood upon that town - the sea rose to an incredible height - the waves rushed in upon the houses and everything was threatened with destruction. In the midst of this sublime storm, Dame Partington, who lived upon the beach, was seen at the door of her house with mop and pattens, trundling her mop, and squeezing out the sea-water, and vigorously pushing away the Atlantic Ocean. The Atlantic was roused. Mrs. Partington's spirit was up; but I need not tell you that the contest was unequal. The Atlantic Ocean beat Mrs. Partington. She was excellent at a slop or puddle, but she should not have meddled with a tempest.'

We see that this wit, which has something of levity, is nevertheless earnest. There is a grave thought at the bottom, worth remembering for its own sake-something to reflect upon after we have laughed. Thus:

'I like pictures, without knowing anything about them; but I hate coxcombry in the fine arts, as well as in anything else. I got into dreadful disgrace with Sir George Beaumont once, who, standing before a picture at Bowood, exclaimed, turning to me, "immense breadth of light and shade!" I innocently said, "Yes; about an inch and a half." He gave me a look that ought to have killed me.'

And:

'Yes, he is of the Utilitarian school. That man is so hard you might drive a broadwheeled wagon over him, and it would produce no impression; if you were to bore holes in him with a gimlet, I am convinced saw-dust would come out of him. That school treats mankind as if they were mere machines; the feelings or affections never enter into their calculations. If everything is to be sacrificed to utility, why do you bury your grandmother at all? why don't you cut her into small pieces at once and make portable soup of her?'

He has healthy views of life, and concentrates them into cut and polished diamonds:

'Take short views, hope for the best, and trust in God.'

'Some very excellent people tell you they dare not hope. To me it seems much more impious to dare to despair.'

'True, it is most painful not to meet the kindness and affection you feel you have deserved, and have a right to expect from others; but it is a mistake to complain of it, for it is of no use; you cannot extort friendship with a cocked pistol.`

Moralists tell you of the evils of wealth and station, and the happiness of poverty. I have been very poor the greatest part of my life, and have borne it as well, I believe, as most people, but I can safely say that I have been happier every guinea I have gained.' These marked individual features are delightful. In them, as in a glass, is mirrored the personality of the writer, and we meet a companion where we expect a book.