selves differing from his original works, and from each other. The Jolly Beggars are not like the House that Jack Built, nor are the Scenes from Bath like either the one or the other.

But what has this to do with Thomas Landseer? Much. The success of Cruikshank—or, to select a more generous motive-the desire to emulate what they felt to be excellent, has stirred up a number of artists to work in the same style. George Cruikshank may now be considered as standing at the head of a school; but, as is generally the case with imitators, it is only the outside that they are capable of apprehending. It is much easier to wear a blue surtout and white nether integuments, than to plan the passage of the Douro. And it is much easier to caricature humanity with a sketchy graver, than to produce such works as George Cruikshank's.

The plates in which Tam himself is introduced, are four in number—the alehouse scene-the first view of Alloway Kirk-the peep through the window—and the gaining the keystane of the brig. We shall first examine the characters throughout, and then speak to the merits of the different pictures. In the scene of his jovialty we can recognise no other expression in Tam's face than a maudlin grin of delight at the landlady ;—on seeing the kirk apparently in a blaze, he looks as if painted from Sadler's Wells representative of the tailor riding to Brentford;—in the kirk, we can see by his parted lips that he is roaring, and nothing more; when clearing the bridge, he reminds us of the face, in some old caricature, of a clown terrified by a turnip-lantern. There is no individuality of character in Landseer's Tam. We see a man laughing, struggling against the wind,-roaring,—and The number of pretty little books, with sixteen pages in a horrible fright, but we see nothing more of him, and of letter-press, and half-a-dozen engravings in this style, there is not even any very strong reason for saying it is the which have of late been published at various prices-from same person in all these situations. It may be remarked one shilling to half-a-crown-is quite astonishing. Mon- here that the vignette, intended to represent Tam, may sieur Tonson, Monsieur Nongtongpaw, Tom King, Tam pass for an Irishman (fed up for a show) flourishing his O'Shanter, and a host of others, have come pouring upon shillelah, or for some English drunkard, pot-valiant from us in quick and dazzling succession. Now, we are far the White Horse, but it has nothing of the Scotch farmer from wishing to deny that the authors of the illustrations in it. The figure next in prominence to Tam is Cuttyin these little works are men of spirit and talent. We sark, who appears in two of the illustrations. The "winmerely mean to say, that if they have abandoned a style some wench and walie" of Burns is metamorphosed in of their own, to adopt what they believe to be that of Mr Landseer's hands to something not unlike one of Cruikshank, they have allowed a good substantial hock Fuseli's most fantastic fays. Her waist is compressed to of bread to swim down the water, while they have been a gossamer thread-her legs are "winnle-straes,”—and snapping at the moonshine in it. We feel ourselves called she is placed in the attitude of a frog, which some goodupon to set them right in this particular, partly by a fool-for-nothing urchin has "spang-hewit."* The idea must ish pity for them, and partly in virtue of our office, by our assumption of which we are pledged to tell people disagreeable truths.

With respect to Robert, the brother of George-the perpetrator of the greater number of that class of works we are speaking of-we do not mean to quarrel with him. He has assisted his brother in a great many of his productions, and has worked himself into his manner. He is exactly like him, except that he is a great deal feebler. They are to each other in such a degree of resemblance as Byron's living and dead Greece. When you see one of Robert's works,

"You start, for soul is wanting there." As, however, Robert never had any manner of his own, nor most probably would have had so good a one as he has got but for the sedulous care with which he formed himself upon his brother, we may spare ourselves the trouble of preaching to him; and as he not unfrequently hits upon a good thought, we will take what we can get from him, and be thankful.

No such considerations occur to plead for Mr Thomas Landseer; and 'so have at him! We confine ourselves to the present work, as, by this means, our strictures will be, if not so universal in their application, more intelligible from their speciality. To this end, we advise our readers to study this article, with Landseer's Illustrations of Tam O'Shanter before them; and to further this end, we advise them to purchase the book, by which advice we secure the good-will of the publishers-a very important consideration in these bad times. It is no shame to any Englishman that he is unacquainted with Scottish character. Even an artist cannot be expected to seize it by intuition. But it argues something of presumption in one who is totally ignorant of it, to pretend to illustrate a Scottish tale. Mr Landseer is, we presume, one of those unfortunate Cockneys who have been taught, by their nurse, that the Celtic Society is Scotland. Else he would scarcely have introduced a creature in the Highland garb into an Ayrshire alehouse, where such an indecent exhibition has not been known for centuries. But this, and some other inaccuracies, we will forgive, if, on a further examination, we find any thing of the fire and fervour of genius in his composition.

have presented itself to the artist while labouring under a night mare, to which recollections of some opera-dancer gave a visible form. Such a creature could never have made a Carrick farmer "tyne his reason a'thegither." In the print where she is represented plucking off the horse's tail, she is a mere hideous phantasma. Neither Landlord, Landlady, nor Souter-the only other promi» nent personages suggest any further remark than that the two males are exaggerated and the female wooden. Viewed as a composition, the first of these pictures does not afford any great scope for remark. The figures are well arranged, but the strong contrast of narrow patches of deep shade and strong light gives an unpleasing and unsubstantial effect. The action of the horse, in the second print, is spirited, the light from Kirk Alloway well managed, and the accessories judicious; but there is a want of keeping betwixt the quiet of the sky and the racket among the trees, indicative of the cause why Tam holds so fast by his bonnet. The lightning, too, is injudiciously managed-it seems to be striking the traveller's head. The scene within the kirk is the worst of all. The failure in two of the principal characters we have already noticed. Of Satan a great lubberly brute,-we cannot say that he seems either to "glower," or "fidge fu' fain." There is a want of arrangement in the whole, and the effect is misty and unsatisfactory. Retzch's incantation scene seems to have furnished some hints. With regard to the final scene, we have to remark, that the action of the figures seems to us a total misconception. Tam was hurrying on for life or death, too anxiously encouraging his steed, to have time even had he dared to look behind. The witch, in attempting to detain the steed before it overleaped the boundaries of her empire, wrenched off the tail which she had seized for this purpose. The action here is simple, natural, and intense. In Landseer's print, these three great requisites are wanting. Tam looks back like a paralysed lubberly clown, roaring out, as if that could avail him; while Nanny stands on the mare's hock, making faces at him, and pulling out the hair of the beast's tail by repeated handfuls. This is to

An amiable pastime of our well-trained Scottish schoolboys. A frog is placed on one end of a board, which is balanced over another placed upright; the opposite end is struck smartly, and froggie sent tilting into the air,

tally devoid of the tragic earnestness with which Burns has embued even his grotesque personale.—The frontispiece, we find, is meant to embody these lines,

"Our sulky sullen dame,

Gathering her brows like gathering storm,
Nursing her wrath to keep it warm."

Until we consulted the page and line to which we are re-
ferred, the character and expression of the female figure,
the howling attitude of one dog, and the snuffling of the
other, together with the visionary cauldron almost enve-
loped in smoke, had impressed us with the idea that this
was an original design by Landseer, intended to repre-
sent a witch preparing for her aerial flight.

It seems to us to result from these remarks, that Mr Landseer is an artist of considerable skill, with occasional indications of power, but that he has attempted a line in which he is not fitted to succeed. The most grotesque of George Cruikshank's figures are, in one sense, true and real-they embody his vivid feelings, and no more. Mr Landseer has no such intensity in his character, and designs his exaggerations, knowing and feeling them to be such. The consequence is, that, far from being amusing, they are cold and hollow. Why will he attempt to make himself what nature never meant him for? Fields of art, at least as fair, lie within his reach.

Robert Montgomery and his Reviewers. With some Remarks on the Present State of English Poetry, and on the Laws of Criticism. By Edward Clarkson. London. James Ridgway. 1830. Pp. 164.

THIS is an attempt to bolster up Mr Montgomery's reputation, to put court plaster upon all his wounds, and pour down his throat a little of the cordial Balm of Gilead, to make up for the bitters he has been obliged to swallow of late. We cannot have the slightest objection to Mr Edward Clarkson thinking Mr Montgomery the first of bards, and shall not therefore set ourselves to controvert

his arguments. If his opinions are conscientious, which they, no doubt, are, he is the denizen of a free country, and let him retain them by all means. Of all Mr Montgomery's critics, he has singled out two, and thinks that if he answers them he does quite enough. These two are Fraser's Magazine and the Edinburgh Literary Journal. His reasons for paying us this compliment are expressed in the following fair and handsome terms :

question. It is to be hoped, that the other minor reviewers and magazine-writers who have attacked him, will be so polite as to permit my marshalling their more light-armed squad of reasonings under these Coriphæi."

Mr Clarkson has argued his side pretty well; but his pamphlet is a piece of special pleading from beginning to end, and, as such, much more ingenious than sound.

Four Years' Residence in the West Indies. By F. W.
N. Bayley. London. 1830.

THERE is a good deal of amusing gossip in this book, plenty of flippancy, and a considerable quantity of namby. pambyism. We make one extract :

LITERATURE IN THE WEST INDIES.

"Literature in the West Indies is at a low ebb. Booksellers are hardly known, and books little patronised. Reading is by no means a favourite amusement among the inhabitants. Many of the planters and private gentlemen have tolerable libraries, and superb bookcases to contain them; but I am inclined to think that the valuable volumes, cased, as they generally are, in gilt calf, er Russia, are more for ornament than use; they contribute to furnish the rooms, but very little to improve the understanding, of the West Indians; the fact is, the climate is too hot for study, and their minds are too much fatigued with the cares of business to lead them to seek for relaxation in any but very light reading, and very little even of that. Were I asked, I should give it as my opinion, that the coloured people read more than any other class of inhabitants in the Antilles. They have an innate desire for information, and a wish to acquire knowledge, which is always most praiseworthy, and very often most

successful.

"The publications printed in the West Indies are seldom any other than newspapers and almanacks. Of the former, there are usually two published in each island; though in Jamaica, Barbadoes, and the larger colonies, there are perhaps more. In these, the leading articles are some of them well written, the political remarks strong and inde pendent, and the general arrangement of matter often considerable, and seldom uninteresting. The standard of talent, however, varies greatly in the different islands; the rest. and there are a few that display a vast superiority over Among these, I think I may number the St Vincent Gazette, by Drape, in which the articles are generally as well written as they are badly printed, ex"The London Literary Gazette is opposed, on this occa-hibiting vast talent but little care; and the St George's sion, to the Edinburgh Literary Journal; and Fraser's Magazine to the Imperial. Many others have laboured Chronicle, in which both care and talent are mingled to a hard to show the venomous potency of their criticisms; but very creditable degree. it would be mercy to let them rest in oblivion, distinguished as they are for nought but their intrinsic want of preponderance, when weighed against the all but uniform decision of the town and provincial press. Among other contrasts, I might have opposed the Edinburgh Literary Gazette to the Dublin Literary Gazette; but without calling into question their relative talents, this would only uselessly enlarge the field of enquiry. It is not for the sake of giving undue importance to Fraser's Magazine and the Edinburgh Literary Journal, that I confine myself, in this section of my subject, to them, but because, first, they are really the most talented of all Montgomery's assailants; second, they concentrate all the charges which the others bring against him, and thereby save me the trouble, and the reader the irksomeness, of a devious chase after various literary insects, which, after all, it might be deemed unmanly to crush; for

'Who breaks a butterfly upon the wheel?' Again, these two periodicals are appealed to by their friends with shouts of triumph, as the most able and triumphant

of Mr Montgomery's adversaries-as, in short, settling the

The Edinburgh Literary Gazette is a publication of so extremely limited a circulation, that we seldom hear of it, and are indeed uncertain whether it is still going on. Its chief pretensions consisted in affecting to deny a knowledge of our existence,

"The almanacks are commonly of two kinds; one printed on a sheet for pasting up in the counting-houses of the merchants, and one in a small volume-containing a good deal of useful information-for the pocket.

"The almanacks published in Grenada are the most per fect that have yet appeared, both for the elegance of their typography and the usefulness of their contents; that printed by Baker is illustrated by a neat lithographic drawing, and he deserves great credit for having been the first to produce one with such an embellishment.

"I have often thought that a good monthly periodical would do well in the West Indies; but I have been told that, where the attempt has been made, it has usually proved unsuccessful, from having fallen into personalities, so generally disliked, and yet so difficult to be avoided, in a small community."

grand tours, gives the posts and distances, rates of posting, monies, expenses of living, directions and hints to travellers, and a brief description of the most interesting objects of antiquity, as catalogues (Mr Boyd tells us) of the paintings and statuary are always to be had for a mere trifle, at the different towns. We think this handsome little pocket-companion may be referred to with confidence. There is a new feature, too, in this work; Dr Boyd's medical hints will be found valuable to the traveller. The typography of the book does credit to the London press, and a correct map of Italy accompanies it. A few pictorial embellishments would not have been amiss in a work so worthy of our best recommendation.

steps by which we ascended from the street to the door of our dwelling. A bean had dropped into it by accident, and finding a small portion of earth at the bottom, had struck out roots and leaves. This was a treasure, but one day some heavy-footed monster trampled upon itit withered. Not Jack himself, had he seen his miraculous bean-stalk cut down as he was about to attempt his voyage of discovery to its summit, could have suffered more than I did.

When about ten years of age, it was judged expedient to send me to a school at some distance from home; and there I at last attained what I had so long ardently coveted. Each boy had a border allotted to him in the master's large garden, which he was allowed to manage according to his own fancy. Was I not happy? I felt, as I stood in my little territory, the first dawnings of the pride and pleasure of ownership. I watched with unwearying interest the progress of every plant from its apSe-pearance above the soil, till I collected its ripe seed. I changed continually the arrangement of my flowers. My leisure moments, my little pocket money, all were devoted to my garden. There was a tall tree in the centre of it. During summer, I used to con my tasks, or read Robinson Crusoe, seated up among the branches. My favourite passages were those that described Robinson's horticultural attempts.

A Companion to the Lakes of Cumberland, Westmoreland,
and Lancashire; in a Descriptive Account of a Family
Tour, and Excursions on Horseback and on Foot.
cond Edition. By Edward Baines, Jun. London.
Hurst, Chance, and Co. 1830. 12mo. Pp. 312.
MR BAINES has succeeded in combining in this volume
the accuracy of a Guide-Book, with the liveliness and in-
terest of a Personal Narrative. In the present edition,
he has made some judicious alterations and useful addi-
tions. Knowing something of the districts of which it
treats, we are the better able to recommend the volume
with confidence to our readers.

History in all Ages. London, printed for the Proprie-
tors of Publications on Christian Principles. Joseph
Ogle Robinson. 1830. 12mo. Pp. 520.
THE object of this work is to present an accurate sum-
mary of the history of the world. It is written in the
shape of question and answer, and seems well adapted for
the use of schools, and young people in general.

MISCELLANEOUS LITERATURE.

A CHAPTER ON GARDENS AND GARDENERS.
BEING AN EXCELLENT SUMMER ARTICLE.

Old fool that I am! What has carried me back just now to the days of my boyhood, and set me to describe childish trifles with an eager and accurate gravity, as strongly contrasted with the trifling objects of description, as the wonderful wealth of art lavished by some Flemish painters upon their pictures of still life, with the meanness of the pots and pans which compose them? Strange how trifles will at times assume a burlesque importance in our estimation! I have experienced many crosses of life, but at this moment none touches me so nearly as that it has never been in my power to indulge my passion for gardening. That little spot of groundmy first, my only garden-stands out with a brightness among the recollections of my life, akin to that which, in the mind of our first father, must have attached itself to the only spot where he tasted unalloyed happiness.

I have, however, in the course of my life, managed to derive much enjoyment from the conversation of gardeners, and from lounging about in the gardens of others. Bartoline Saddletree was never happy but when he was in the Parliament House, seeing causes managed, if he had none to manage himself. I have known people to whom the monthly perusal of the Sporting Magazine was a sufficient succedaneum for their inability to join in the sports of the field. Every body has at times met with younkers who wear spurs on Sunday, and who,

"When the circling glass warms their vain heads,
Can talk of horses which they never cross'd,
And fancy fox-hunts where they ne'er shall ride."

I acknowledge myself to be free of the corporation of
Would-be's,"-one of those who long for what they can
never have, and seek at times to cheat themselves, by
dint of conversing with the more fortunate, into a half be-
lief that their wishes are attained. A more innocent self-
delusion than mine can scarcely well be.

I HAVE a love for every thing in the shape of a garden. Even that little square plot at the back of my house, which from the narrowness of its superficies, and the height of its walls, looks not unlike a draw-well, and where a few straggling blades of grass find with difficulty air and sunshine enough to keep them alive, has a corner in my affections. This love I am inclined to regard as in some sort an elementary feeling-an innate attachment, born with me, and wanting but the presence of a suitable object to call it into full activity. From the first moment I knew what a garden was, I felt a longing for some patch of earth, however small, where I might turn up the mould, and plant and water. It was long before I had an opportunity of indulging my inclination. Window-boxes were recommended; but they proved sorry substitutes. I could not stand in them. There was a cellar in my mother's house in which the They are a pleasant set of fellows, your gardeners--both potatoes were kept. One or two of them had rolled into the professional gentlemen and the amateurs. The fora corner, and having lain there unnoticed for a length of mer in particular are less known than they deserve to be. time, they shot out, at last, some long white runners. They belong, in virtue of their breeding and employment, These could scarcely be called vegetation-they were co- to the labouring classes; but there is something in the lourless and leafless but they were something growing, scenes by which they are surrounded, and in the objects and upon the ground, and I watched them as a florist upon which their labour is expended, calculated to awaken would do his rarest flower. Our housemaid was one of the sentiments of romance, and the aspirings after knowthose unfortunate persons who are troubled with a pro-ledge, which are in general trodden down and stifled by pensity to tidiness, and one day when I was at school, the dull routine of mechanical exertion. she swept away my subterraneous garden bodily. I wept, grocer ever known to have his love of learning excited by and refused to be comforted; till one day I observed a a curiosity to know the natural history of the articles he green leaf protruding through a chink between the two | deals in? But where shall we find a gardener who has

When was a

not a smattering of botany?-ay, and a comfortable as- From the gardener, I turn to his territory. Garden sortment of Latin remnants to deck the fag-ends of his are as various as the characters and circumstances of ther sentences? Lawyers, it is true, have something of the proprietors; and although, like them, they have all some same, but their Latin wants the natural grace of the thing in common, each has, at the same time, something gardener's; they speak according to a cold formal system of its own. How different the garden of the cottage, and a proverbially bad system; but with the gar- with its single bush of southern-wood, its two carnations ( dener it is as if some handfuls of Latin words had been and solitary rose, from the extensive piece of ground scattered in his mind, and had there struck root, and walled in from the northern and eastern blasts, with is sprung up in a thousand agreeable varieties, and original numerous fruit-trees, (standard or trained upon the wall groups. But it may be said, that these advantages of and espaliers,)—its thousand flowers of the gayest dys the gardener are common to all agricultural labourers. and richest perfumes,-its hot-houses and green-houses, By no means. There is something too wholesale in the where the fruits and flowers of other regions flourish in ploughman's or the mower's style of working. They do other climates! And how different from both the roya not care for a single plant, but for a whole harvest; and garden, where we wander, now through forest glades, and we never find a mind thus prematurely accustomed to anon among trim parterres, surrounded by artificial ter the contemplation of vague generalities, susceptible of the races, and gay alcoves, where the very water has yielded charms of knowledge. It is in the minute attention to to the power of the artist, and assumes unwonted form individuals required at the hand of the gardener, that we and motion at his bidding! All of these have their peenare to look for the cause of that fine discriminating tact liar charms; but, as it would fill half-a-dozen Journals that leads him unavoidably on the way to learning. If at the least, to expatiate on them all, I must confine my. ¡ Adam had been any other trade than a gardener, I won-self to the enquiry, what it is that gives the garden its der if the tree of knowledge would have been so irresisti- chief and characteristic delightfulness? bly tempting.

Then his sentiment! From the days of Shakspeare, the gardener has been noted for his sentimentality. The only one of Richard the Second's dependants who sympathises gracefully with the miseries of the unfortunate queen, is the gardener. What man, in his rank of life, but a gardener, could have thought of planting a bank of rue on the spot where the queen dropt a tear, in sad memo- | rial of her woes? Then, (not to overwhelm the reader with examples,) is there not in later times the inimitable Andrew Fairservice? There are, we confess it with the deepest regret, some parts of Andrew's conduct which do not easily admit of a defence. He showed, in some instances, signs of a cold and selfish spirit; even his honesty was of a dubious kind; and his courage far from unquestionable. But the worse we make Andrew's character to be, the better for our theory. What other habits and pursuits could have rendered such a man capable of the fine burst of feeling with which he describes to Frank Osbaldistone the beauties of a bed of coleworts by moonlight?

A gardener's sentiment, we confess, is rather peculiar. It is not allied to love-it does not affect the brotherhood of kindred creatures whose pulse beats back to ours. It is rarely that you hear of a gardener in love. They inherit a portion of that mysterious dower which rested upon those who in old times studied the habits and properties of plants. Penetrating into the hidden secrets of nature, | and approaching more nearly to converse with the spiritual world, they feel the mantle of its unimpassioned nature cast around them, and walk among men with less of their frail and feverish passions. It is but seldom that you see a wife and children viewed as welcome inhabitants of a garden.

The amateur differs little from the professional gardener, except in his being sometimes a man of more education, and, in general, free from the cares and anxieties of mercantile speculation. He, too, is, for the most part, a bachelor. Now I know there is a prejudice, in general but too well founded, against this class of society; but the gardener ought to be made an exception. He is not like other Benedicts, selfish and engrossing; he has an active and benevolent spirit, and would fain see all people happy. It is true that he loves his flowers better than any thing else-except, perhaps, his cat and his old housekeeper; but then he likes people to come and see his garden, and he is always ready to impart a share of his rarest treasures to those who can appreciate and enjoy them. He is hale and happy, for he is a nursling of the free air as much as any of his flowers and shrubs. He is the friend and particular acquaintance of every bird that builds its nest in his leafy corners. He cannot abide any thing that is harsh or ill-natured. Politics are his aversion; a news paper enters not his door,

An idea has gone abroad in our days, that gardens ought to be imitations of nature;-a most absurd notion, and indicative of a want of feeling for the true charm sí the garden. Our picturesque gardeners profess to create beautiful landscapes. The truth is, that they create poor and paltry attempts at something very fine. Natural scenery is a creation on too large a scale to be aped by the handiwork of man. But not only has this false direction of gardening talent spoiled our larger gardens, it has exercised a detrimental influence on the smallest. Since it has been laid down as a first principle, that arti|ficial gardening shows a false and a vitiated taste, and since the fashion of laying out gardens in what is called the natural style can only be practised on a large scale, such persons as have only a rood or two of land, have for some time contented themselves with rearing fruits and herbs, and an occasional flower, esteeming it in vain to attempt any thing ornamental on so small a scale. A square plot of ground is measured off and surrounded with walls. From the centre four straight gravel walks are drawn perpendicular to each of the walls. At a distance of a couple of yards from each wall, a walk is laid out parallel to it, these four walks forming a lesser square enclosure within the greater one. All the walks are bordered on either side with their edgings of box-wood, two inches in height. Fruit-trees and gooseberry bushes are planted at regular intervals, and in formal rows. Flowers are also planted at regular distances, so as not to incommode each other. This may be a good nursery, but it is not a garden. Its effect is stiff, bare, and unsatisfactory.

The true garden is a place which a man has set apart før himself, and filled with all the rarest plants. These cannot be arranged or distributed in a natural way, for their very assemblage in such quantities shows that man's hand has been busy upon them. But still there is room for ornamental arrangement, although it must be in consonance with the artificial character of the whole collec tion. A little quaintness is rather an advantage than a drawback. The first requisite in a perfect garden is, that we should feel, when we are in it, shut in from the external world. This is best effected by circling its utmost limits with the tallest shrubs, which serve to screen the garden from the prying eyes of neighbours, and afford, in the summer time, a pleasing and umbrageous canopy. The next requisite is, that there should be plenty of plants. They ought to be rather crowded than otherwise, so as to convey an impression of a rich and luxuriant vegetation. In the arrangement of the walks, formality neither can nor ought to be entirely avoided. The feeling inseparable from a garden, we have said above, is, that it is a storehouse of vegetable wealth ; and our walks ought to be arranged less with an eye to picturesque effect, than to the commodious approach they afford to our dow