Saturday Review.

THE PRUSSIAN ORGANISATION OF WOMEN.

It is scarcely possible to doubt that negotia- | sort, and England cannot afford to interfere tions of some sort have been going on, and per- gratuitously with useless advice and feeble exhaps continue to go on, in order to ascertain pressions of moral praise or blame. Facts must what possible basis of peace there may be, and be looked in the face, and what the successful that these negotiations are either conducted combatant wants and can get must be allowed through, or originated by, England. It is pos- to form the chief item in the calculation of the sible that the efforts of the English Cabinet to terms on which peace is likely to be made. bring about peace are perfectly legitimate. They may be interfering because they are asked to interfere. It may be that France wishes to know the least that Germany will take, or that Germany wishes to know the most that France will give. Lord GRANVILLE has recently had interviews with the representatives of both Pow-While astonishment is being felt at the organers, and if he is appealed to in the proper way, isation of the Prussian army, which is sent forth and sees that he has a fair opportunity of mak- on its mission of invasion without a failure of ing himself useful, he is of course quite right to supplies and with every man knowing his apdo what he can to bring about the end of the pointed place, it may be useful to point out that war. But if this is the position of the English it is not merely in the organisation of the comMinistry, it has much reason to complain of batant services that the Prussian spirit and some of its friends. They represent it as a skill at organising are displayed. We undergrand occasion for English diplomacy to inter- stand that there are organisations at home for fere unasked; they consider that the English the care of the wounded, and of families whose Government should teach the combatants what bread-winners are at the wars, hardly less wonis right and what is wrong, and should tell derful and complete than those of the active Germany what it ought to ask, and France army itself. The women of Prussia are as comwhat it should concede. If either party declines prehensively organized for the care of the to accept the decision of the English Govern- wounded as the men are for military service. ment, then the recalcitrant party is to incur We hear little of their doings, because everyone the moral reprobation of England. This is the in Germany is too busy with the war to write; programme set before the Government as the but the service is diligently and efficiently perheight of wisdom; gratuitous interference rest-formed. So thorough is the organisation that ing on an unlimited power of preaching. Un- the societies know where to turn to for lint and happily the notion is only too English, but no every kind of store that may be of service to the notion could be more desperately foolish. We wounded, the system being nearly as effective are always ready with the cheapest of commodi- for utilising the resources of the country as ties good advice. We stand aloof, and are those of the active army. In the same way the wise, and know what other people ought to do. societies for assisting families whose heads are If they do not do what we tell them they ought called out take such precautions that no case to do, we inflict on them the penalty of our can be overlooked, and the incidental calamities moral reprobation. If they persevere, and not of the Prussian system, by which the citizens only do wrong but succeed by doing wrong, we are drafted to carry on the war, are thus amelpass a kind of moral indemnity-act in their iorated as much as possible. In one or the other favour, and worship their success. Such, under service every Prussian is engaged,— merchants. very bad guidance, has been for a great many bankers, judges, and others devoting their leis years the ordinary course of English criticism ure time on their return from their offices to the and English behaviour towards foreign coun- patriotic duties imposed upon them. Thus tries. We can only trust that this is not the nearly every person in Prussia assists directly course which the Cabinet are now pursuing. It in bearing the burden of the war, the whole is most fervently to be hoped that Lord GRAN- forces of the country being guided at every VILLE will not take England further into the point by a minute and perfect organization. abyss of being the "reverend gentleman "of European society - the person to whose cloth respect is paid, and who is considered in his place when preaching and advising and accommodating things in a superfine black suit, while the people who really do business settle matters in their own way. It is disheartening to think how nearly England has got into such a position in Europe, and nothing could make the resemblance more strong than to remember how confidently and proudly the respectable preaching man would write to other persons like himself, and how they would praise him and love him for what he had done. The world of politics is too stern and real for amiable delusions of this

Economist.

THE fearful destructiveness of so-called "natural" causes of death, as compared with even the most sanguinary battles, is shown by the fact that during the siege of Sebastopol, the French army lost 20,240, men by death in the field or as the result of their wounds, 75,000 from epidemic and other diseases. During the Italian campaign of two months, the French losses were 3,664 killed or mortally wounded, 5,000 from disease.

Nature.

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From The Edinburgh Review.
SAINTE-BEUVE.*

On a gloomy day in the early part of

last November, a modest house in the little

66

of violets deposited upon it; and after one of the executors advancing to the head of the grave had simply uttered the words, Adieu, Sainte-Beuve! adieu, notre ami, suburban Rue Montparnasse, in the Parisian adieu!" he turned to the crowd and thanked them for their attendance-the ceremony capital, was the centre of great but mournful interest. One of the chief literary stars was over, and the mystery of death weighed of France was extinguished. Sainte-Beuve, blank upon the soul in all its dark and unSenator and Academician, who had passed adorned reality. Groups of friends and the greater part of his life in this quiet admirers, however, were observed lounghabitation, was dead, and about five thous-ing about the cemetery, discussing the life and persons of all classes assembled to and the career of the deceased. By most accompany his remains to of these he had been seen in the little study, the grave. Among the crowd were to be remarked which was also his bedroom, in the first poets, historians, novelists, critics, artists, story of his dwelling-house in the Rue and journalists of every grade of distinc- Montparnasse surrounded by his papers tion, together with a body of Parisian stu- and his books. The window, in front of dents and a multitude of citizens of every which was his chair and table, looked class. The assemblage was perhaps the towards the south and down on a small larger by reason of the directions contained garden, planted, we think, with five trees, in the will of the deceased. He had re- of which he was as proud as a lover and quested that his remains should not be sympathiser with Horace and Horatian detaken to any church, that no religious rites sires was bound to be. Through the winshould be observed, and no discourse be dow the author's favourite pigeons might pronounced over his grave. Moreover, his sometimes be seen either flying across the recent speeches in the Senate had found garden or perched upon the sill, where they He was easily great favour with the Liberal party, so that were fed daily by his hand. the funeral itself had something of the na-accessible, and that even to the poor of his ture of a demonstration on behalf of politi- vicinity, who knew him for a charitable cal and religious freedom. The funeral, as neighbour; and few were his visitors who conducted according to the desire of the did not come away charmed by an interdeceased, was for that reason of more than view with the homely-looking man, the usually solemn import. It was but a few marked but not handsome lines of whose steps from the house to the tomb in the neigh-closely shaven face bore during late years bouring Cimetière Montparnasse. After the coffin was lowered, and a single crown

* 1. Tableau de la Poesie francaise au XVIme

Siecle. 2 vols. 8vo. Paris: 1828.

2. Poesies completes. 2 vols. 8vo. Paris: 1869. 3. Critiques et Portraits litteraires. 5 vols. 8vo. Paris: 1836-39.

traces of suffering from a painful inward malady endured with patience, as well as of a lifetime of thought and study. With his black skull-cap, his composed features, and his quiet placid demeanour, he bore no small resemblance to a little somewhat stout abbé of the eighteenth century—a

4. Portraits contemporains et divers. 4 vols. pleasant aspect and manner was indeed his

pressed at first the temptations of a literary career, and commenced the study of medicine. In his first volume of poetry he sets forth, under the pseudonym of Joseph Delorme- the considerations which led him to adopt medicine as a profession.

duced but one work of any length; it were a rudimentary course of education at Bouas hopeless to attempt, by describing the logne, and was then removed to Paris, to track of a bee across the countless flowers the Collège Charlemagne. After a brilliof a garden, to give a flavour of its honey, ant course of academical success, he reas to try to give a notice of the literary qualities of Sainte-Beuve to those who have not read his writings; nevertheless, as his literary career of nearly half a century had points of contact and intersection with those of nearly every great contemporary writer, and as the successive phases of literary and other creeds through which he passed were in a measure common to him and to his time, some estimate of his whole activity may serve not only to render the leading points of his character more apparent, but to show also through what rapid transformations the course of French literature has passed in a single lifetime.

*

Charles-Augustin Sainte-Beuve a pos-
thumous child, was born at Boulogne-sur-
mer, on December 23, 1804. His father
held a civil appointment under Government
in that town, and died in the very year of
his marriage, two months before the birth
of his son.
Sainte-Beuve had written
"Je naquis en deuil,
Et mon berceau d'abord posa sur un cercueil."
The mournful circumstances which attended
his birth probably had some influence on his
nature, for Sainte-Beuve was not gay by
temperament. His father had some taste
as well as erudition; he left a library of
books annotated on the margin with his
own hand, which Sainte-Beuve did not fail
to peruse with the sympathy of a literary
nature and a reverent spirit-it was the
only communion possible with the author
of his existence.

"Si ne dans sa mort meme
Ma memoire n'eut pas son image supreme,
Il m'a laisse du moins son ame et son esprit,
Et son gout tout entier a chaque marge ecrit."

His mother to whose undivided care he was thus left, was the daughter of an English lady, and to her influence may be traced the predilection which Sainte-Beuve evinced for Cowper, Crabbe, and the Lake writers, whose style of poetry he endeavoured to rival in the French tongue. He received

"La raison de Joseph, fortifiee des l'annee par des habitudes serieuses, et soutenue d'une immense curiosite scientifique, s'eleve d'ellememe contre les inclinations du poete pour les dompter. Elle lui parla l'austere langage d'un pere, lui representa les illusions de la gloire, les vanites de l'imagination, sa propre condition, si mediocre et si precaire, l'incertitude des temps, et de toutes parts autour de lui les menaces des revolutions nouvelles. Que faire d'une lyre en ces jours d'orages?— la lyre fut

brisee!"

Nevertheless external circumstances, by which the career of so many authors has been directed to literature, came in to change the fate of Sainte-Beuve. He had succeeded so far in the practice of medicine that, though poor and living an almost solitary life in a humble furnished apartment, he was named an élève externe of the Hospital of Saint-Louis. When M. Dubois, one of his old professors at the Collège Charlemagne, who entertained great hopes of his talents, became editor of the “ Globe," invited the collaboration of his former pupil, Sainte-Beuve responded by supplying some critical articles which attracted attention, and which were especially noticed by a critic of pure and refined taste- M. Jouffroy. M. Jouffroy became his friend and counsellor in the initiatory steps of the literary career which he now resolved to adopting. In 1827 the "Odes et Ballades " of Victor Hugo the first outbreak of that singular genius - astonished the public, and was said to have drawn from Chateaubriand himself the epithet of "enfant sublime," and to Sainte-Beuve was intrusted the task of delivering the judgment of the 66 'Globe." His criticism was favourable, but not without some restrictions in which he signalized the extravagant comparisons,

* The father of Sainte-Beuve, it may be observed, the distorted metaphors and faulty diction, wrote his name de Sainte-Beuve. Sainte-Beuve, however, dropped the particle.

which have continued to characterize the