It is not our design, of course, to speak at length of any portion of a History which will speak so very eloquently for itself. The narrative commences with the first settlement by the English, proceeds with some details respecting the earliest achievements of the rival French and British colonies, connected with a clear and rapid survey of the condition of the maritime powers of Europe, and after discussing, in a masterly manner, every momentous event in the annals of our Navy, terminates with the contest of 1812. The war of the Revolution is brought to a close about the middle of the first volume, and the more important subsequent occurrences occupy the remainder of the publication. The work, as a whole, has, we think, all the great requisites of a proper History-distinctness of narration, rigorous impartiality, an evident anxiety for truth, and a concise philosophical discussion of fact, rather than a shadowy speculation upon motive. Every similar book, as a matter of course, is liable to objection-to cavil-in regard to its detail; and, in the present case, we have heard occasional censures upon which we scarcely think it necessary to comment. Battles, whether by sea or land, (and battles form our staple here) are seldom witnessed by distinct authorities from the same points of observation, and this fact alone is sufficient to account for a thousand immaterial discrepancies.

In regard to style, let us hear Mr. Cooper himself.

"Some of the greatest writers of the age have impaired the dignity of their works, by permitting the peculiarities which have embellished their lighter labors to lessen the severity of manner that more properly distinguishes narratives of truth. This danger has been foreseen in the present instance, though the nature of the subject, which seldom rises to the level of general history, affords a constant temptation to offend. A middle course has been adopted, which, it is hoped, while some defects of execution may probably be detected, will be found on the whole to be suited to a recital of facts, in the familiar form that, in a measure, the incidents have demanded."

The mere English of our author was never, at any period, remarkable for precision of arrangement, and however easily, in a work of pure romance, such defect may be disregarded, we must own that it derogates very materially from the beauty of an otherwise excellent historic style. In the volumes before us sentences occur, by far too frequently, where positive ambiguity arises from sheer negligence in regard to the ordinary proprieties of grammar.

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Republicanism itself is brought into disrepute, in denying the just rewards of long services to officers, by attaching to it the weakness of a neglect of incentives, an ignorance on the subject of the general laws of discipline, and the odium of injustice. It is by forgetting the latter quality, more through the indifference of a divided power, than from any other cause, that republics have obtained their established character of being ungrateful."

Here is great confusion of expression. By "the latter quality" justice is intended, while injustice is implied.

"A territorial aristocracy, promotion, in both the army and the navy, is the inevitable fruit of favor, or of personal rank."

This sentence, as it stands, is utterly unintelligible, and can only be comprehended at all by placing before it the words immediately antecedent-which are " The nate of the English government is no secret." It now appears that the English government is " a territorial aristocracy." But every properly constructed sentence should have within itself the means of its own (grammatical) comprehension.

“The man who, refusing to adopt remedies that he believes unsuited to his constitution, is discreet, when he carries his system so far as to forget to look for others to supply their places, becomes careless and culpable."

This exceedingly ambiguous proposition is rendered perfectly plain by merely a different arrange ment of the same words.

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The man who is discreet in refusing to adopt remedies that he believes unsuited to his constitution, becomes careless and culpable when he carries his system so far as to forget to look for others to supply their places." But upon this topic quite enough has been said.

Mr. Cooper's observations on the subject of our general marine policy are, we think, among the very best portions of his book. They are strikingly comprehensive in view, and evince a profound knowledge of the true incentives of human action. Our limits will permit us to give but a small portion of his remarks,

“A careful review of these facts and principles must satisfy all who study the subject, that the United States of America have never resorted to the means necessary to develope, or even in a limited sense, to employ their own naval resources. As a consequence, they have never yet enjoyed the advantage of possessing a powerful marine in time of war, or have felt its influence in sustaining their negotiations, and in supporting their national rights in a time of peace. As yet the ships of America have done little more than show the world what the republic might do with its energics duly directed, and its resources properly developed, by demonstrating the national aptitude for this species of warfare.

"But the probationary period of the American marine is passing away, and the body of the peo ple are beginning to look forward to the appearance of their fleets on the ocean. It is no longer thought there is an unfitness in the republic's possessing heavy ships; and the opinion of the country

in this, as in other respects, is slowly rising to the level of its wants. Still many lingering prejudices remain in the public mind, in connexion with this all important subject, and some that threaten the service with serious injury. Of these, the most prominent are, the mode in which the active vessels are employed; a neglect of the means of creating seamen for the public service; the fact that there is no force in commission on the American coast; the substitution of money for pride and self-respect, as the aim of military men; and the impairing of discipline, and lessening the deference for the justice of the state, by the denial of rank.

"Under the present system of employing the public vessels, none of the peculiar experience that belongs to the higher objects of the profession is obtained. While ships may be likened to regiments as regards the necessity of manoeuvring together, there is one important feature in which they are totally dissimilar. It may be pretty safely thought that one disciplined regiment will march as far, endure as much, and occupy its station as certainly as another, but no such calculation can be made on ships. The latter are machines, and their qualities may be improved by human ingenuity, when their imperfections have been ascertained by experiment. Intelligent comparisons are the first step in this species of improvement.

"It will be clear to the dullest mind, that the evolutions of a fleet, and, in a greater or less degree, its success, must be dependent on the qualities of its poorest vessels; since its best cannot abandon their less fortunate consorts to the enemy. The naval history of the world abounds with instances, in which the efforts of the first sea-captains have been frustrated by the defects of a portion of the ships under their command. To keep a number of vessels in compact order, to cause them to preserve their weatherly position in gales and adverse winds, and to bring them all as near as possible up to the standard that shall be formed by the most judicious and careful commander, is one of the highest aims of naval experience. On the success of such efforts depend the results of naval evolutions more frequently than on any dexterity in fighting guns. An efficient fleet can no more be formed without practice in squadrons, than an efficient army without evolutions in brigades. By not keeping ships in squadrons, there will also be less emulation, and consequently less improvement. "Under the present system three principal stations are maintained; two in the Atlantic, and one in the Mediterranean. On neither of these stations would the presence of a vessel larger than a sloop of war be necessary, on ordinary occasions, provided a force of heavy ships could periodically and unexpectedly appear on all. It is seldom that a single ship of the line is required on any service; and it is certain that a solitary two-decked vessel could have no great influence on those important interests which it is the practice of the rest of Christendom to refer to the agency of fleets. By putting in commission six or eight two-decked ships, and by causing them to appear, from time to time, on all the more important stations this side of the two great southern capes, the country, at no material additional cost, would obtain the several objects of practice in fleets, of comparative trials of the qualities of the most important class of vessels in the navy, of a higher state of discipline, and of a vast improvement in the habits of subordination on the part of commanders, a defect that all experience shows is peculiar to the desultory mode of service now in use, and which has produced more naval disasters in the world than probably any other one cause. In a word, the principal ends of a navy can no more be obtained, by the services of single ships, than wars can be decided by armies cut up into battalions."

Lecture on the Study of History, applied to the Progress of Civilization. Delivered by Appoint ment before the Union Literary Society, May 2d, 1839.

A brilliant and bold production, bearing the impress of the mind of its author. With the tenets, however, here so well supported by Mr. Dimitry we will not altogether coincide. They border somewhat too closely, in our apprehension, upon the eloquent madness of Turgot, Price, Priestly, Condorcet, and De Stael-yet, strange to say, none of these names occur in the Lecture with the exception perhaps, of that of Priestly, in an incidental manner! There can be no doubt, however, at what sparkling fountains our author has imbibed his scarcely tenable notions of the perfectibility of man. For to this end, more than to any other, tend the doctrines and the arguments of the essay. In the position itself we have little faith, but great faith in the ability of our friend to make the best of a bad topic. This, in the present instance, he has undoubtedly accomplished, as the spirited passage annexed will testify more fully than any assertion of our own.

"The highest degree of perfection to which man is, by nature, destined, grows out of the free and complete development of his individuality, under the influences of beauty, goodness, and truth, and of his close and brotherly union with his fellow-laborers on earth. The principle of human perfectibility will, therefore, when fully developed, induce a state in which mind and matter, reconciled to each other, will produce a lofty and splendid harmony; in which each special order of mind will find a corresponding object, and a proper sphere of action and usefulness; in which man, instead of wasting his powers in fruitless strifes, will exert them in subjugating material nature; in which the in

jury, accruing to one member, and profiting no one, shall be considered, by all, as wrong inflicted on the whole of society; in which the shackling of evil passions will put an end to the conflict between virtue and vice-a conflict which will be survived by a generous emulation, only, among the worthy, to do the most good; a state of rest, which will not be indolent inaction, and a state of action, which shall have ceased to be tumultuous agitation. Then, and then only, shall the promises of the martyr-God be realized. Then, and then only, shall it be truly said of man that he loves his neighbor as himself; for he will love him as a part of a whole, of which he himself is but another part. Then, and then only, shall Japheth's dating seed, as the Roman lyrist calls us, reconquer the symbolical Aiden, forfeited by the common ancestor, exulting in the choice spoils which they shall have gathered during their centuries of toil in the fields of the arts and the sciences. Such is the society which awaits the futurity of the world. Under what combination of circumstance and time it shall be fashioned, cannot be ascertained. But history unerringly points to itreason sanctions it; while, at the same time, it teaches that it shall be given to man to compass its attainment; for reason embodies certain invariable principles which, when once asserted and grasped by the people, are used by them as a resting point for farther and extended operations. In regard to the principles themselves, their progress will no longer consist in variation, innovation, or change; but their immutability shall be the basis of all improvement, which, out of this condition, would be liable to the same oscillations and doubts, in the midst of which man has hitherto all but fruitlessly consumed his powers and his strength. Now, those principles will obtain so soon as natural lawI mean the law deduced from human reason, as a criterion of truth-the law inherent to our sociable nature, and harmonising with humanity in all places and time; so soon as that law, in accordance with the moral law of Christianity, shall have every where supplanted the conventional law, which is not based, however we may try to conceal it, upon the general constitution of human nature, but upon the partial interests of individuals, corporations, cities, provinces, and States—upon the necessity of circumstances and the will of the lawmaker.

That such a society may be realized in a given time we are bound to believe with as much certainty as we believe that we are gifted with the exercise of reason. We must, otherwise, surrender to the harrowing conviction that our appearance here is but an aimless and fantastic farce; that some evil genius, after having engraved in our nature an instinct of that which is impossible, mocks at our insatiable appetences and our panting efforts round a charmed circle, in which we ever return to the starting point; that, after all, the tradition of Tantalus is no fable; and that this world is but a vast gehenna, in which perpetual torture and perpetual disappointment are the inevitable lot of man. But how can we withhold our faith from a doctrine co-extensive with the mind, and brilliant as hope itself? A doctrine for which the Savior suffered on earth; and which martyrs and sages have vindicated with their blood and their lives, offered up in testimony of its truth? Many may view these monitions of history as phantasms of the brain; or brand rational inductions as Utopian dreams. Let them! When the first troglodyte issued from his cavern into the social world, and returned to his fellow-intelligent brutes with the story of civilization abroad, they met his words with derision and scorn! They, bound in the darkness of their caves and the filth of their clay hovels, could not realize the splendors of the palace and the comforts of its life. They too-had the supercilious word, invented by their imitators, been known-they, too, would have exclaimed, Utopia! They, whose inch-deep intellect, or whose all-controlling prejudices, stop at the surface of things, and, viewing the evils only which still afflict society, pronounce the notion of perfectibility to be chimerical and vain, they do not intelligently attend to the sober teachings of reason and truth. Man, as a sensual being, belongs to the world of the senses; and that is an habitual state of war between his physical powers— a bellum omnium contra omnes—a war of all against all. But, again, man, as a rational being, also belongs to the world of mind; and, as such, he is destined, by the law of his spiritual nature, to subdue the material world. The complement of that law will be to defeat the belligerance of material forces; and, at some providential period, to assert the full and definite triumph of reason, and the consequent prevalence of happiness and peace. Individuals now enjoy that triumph of reason and blessing of peace. Why should they not extend to the collective being called society? To argue that it cannot, is to argue that there is no essential law that will equally apply to man in his individual and social capacity: it is to advance an unnatural, an anti-social, and a degrading paradox: it is to strike at the vitality of virtue, through the freedom of man's will, and madly to insult the superhuman wisdom of Him who made man the proxy of his power!"

Francia's Reign of Terror, being a Sequel to Letters on Paraguay. By J. P. and W. P. Robinson. E. L. Carey and A. Hart, Philadelphia.

The "Letters on Paraguay" were exceedingly well received by the reading public, and this is a matter not at all to be wondered at. Previous to their publication, little, comparatively, was known of the country they described, and that little was shadowy and vague. We knew that Paraguay existed; that it was an inland region of South America; that it had been the seat of the Jesuits

that it had become independent of the mother country, and finally fallen under the dominion of a certain Doctor Francia. All farther than this has been a knowledge of recent date, due to the literary labors of the Robinsons.

Dr. Francia is, beyond doubt, one of the most remarkable characters of the age, and a man whose entire nature has been misunderstood. An array of startling facts here given, will go far to prove him a stern despot and a blood-thirsty tyrant, rather than the prudent and amiable pacificator which our imaginations have hitherto painted him.

Isabel; or Sicily. A Pilgrimage. By Henry T. Tuckerman. Lea and Blanchard, Philadelphia.

Mr. Tuckerman is known as the author of the " Italian Sketch Book," and of many very readable articles in the magazines and annuals. Without much of profundity, of originality, or vigor, he is more than usually pure in style, and orthodox in sentiment. The present work will, we think, greatly enhance his reputation as a graceful and agreeable writer. The general plan has apparently been suggested by that of Bulwer's Pilgrims of the Rhine-although here the similarity ceases. Frederick Otley, an American gentleman, travels in Europe with the view of alleviating his grief for the loss of a beloved wife, leaving in his southern home a daughter, in charge of her uncle, his brother. The absence of the traveller is long continued, and the daughter, having grown to womanhood, forms the design of surprising him by a visit in Sicily, of which country Otley, in his last letter, expressed an intention of making the tour. The uncle accompanies her on the voyage, and the volume concludes with the re-union of the family. The main, indeed the whole design, is to present the reader with a picturesque account of Sicily, and with the author's own reflections during a tour in that comparatively little travelled portion of the old world. The chain of fiction above mentioned, (which appears to us somewhat supererogatory) is given, says Mr, T., for the purpose of avoiding that egotistical tone from which it is difficult to escape in a formal journal, as well as to obviate the necessity of dwelling upon those unimportant details and circumstances which are common to every tour in Europe, and therefore too familiar to be interesting. There is an air of quiet enthusiasm pervading the whole of this little book, which, insensibly, has its influence upon the mind of the reader-disposing him to think well of Mr. Tuckerman as a man, not less than to be pleased with him as an author. There is much in his character, as we gather it from " Isabel," of the warmest poetical impulse-of a perfectly unaffected romance.

Memoirs of Celebrated Women. Edited by G. P. R. James, Esq., author of De L'Orme, Life of the Black Prince, etc. etc. E. L. Carey and A. Hart, Philadelphia.

In general we dislike such title-pages as this. There is a misty atmosphere of humbug all about them, through which we peer with a suspicious eye. Time was when the duties of an editor were matter of perfect simplicity—at least so far as concerned the public comprehension of these duties; but we have changed all that" as the world grows older, and in every such announcement as we find here, there always lies perdu a very pretty little enigma.

In its solution there are several points to be considered. Sometimes, as in the case of those superb passionate tales the "Recollections of a Chaperon," the work will be written, as well as edited, by a Lady Dacre. Here there is an affectation of modesty-yet the affectation is not altogether ungraceful. Of all the modern editorship this is, beyond doubt, the species least objectionable.

The editorship protective is cf a different class. Here, as in the case of Mr. Willis, (whose fine taste should have taught him more intelligible things,) the author makes a somewhat droll bow to a foreign audience, holding fast (God only knows why) to the arm of a Barry Cornwall. However, there is no harm in the world done, and the worst that can happen is a good hearty laugh on the part of the public.

But there is a third order of this editorial humbuggery which is positively no joke, and which should never be regarded as such by any decent individual. An example is found in the case of the London publisher, Bentley, who had the downright impudence to get up, some time ago, a reprint of our own admirable “Nick of the Woods," and announce it (no doubt to the great edification of Dr. Bird,) as under the editorial supervision of Mr. Benjamin D'Israeli.

In the present instance Mr. James evinces, we think, a sort of half consciousness of being engaged in a rather silly affair. The whole preface has the countenance of un mouton qui rêve. "To day," he says, with the air of an injured man, "it is necessary for an editor to state what he really has done for the work he edits, lest any false impression should be adopted by the public." Having premised thus much, he goes on to show very clearly that in the case now in question he has doneprecisely nothing at all. We could not wish a better commentary upon the whole editorial system.

The work itself (which we are told, is by an aunt of the author of Richelieu) is a plainly written compilation of interesting matters, sufficiently familiar to every ordinary reader of history. We have memoirs of Joan of Arc, of Margaret of Anjou, of Lady Jane Grey, of Anna Commena, of Madame de Maintenon, of Elizabeth of England, and of Donna Maria Pacheco.

Advice to a Young Gentleman on entering Society. By the Author of the "Laws of Etiquette." Lea and Blanchard. Philadelphia.

Taking up this volume with a strong feeling of prejudice, induced by a certain ad captandum air in the title, our attention was rivetted by the very initial sentences, and before getting through with the second page we acknowledged the hand of a master. The book is replete with a wordly wisdom even profound; it is the product of a vigorous and cultivated mind, imbued with a thorough knowledge of its subject, and discussing it con amore.

The leading truths here inculcated, are, we think, the more important, because, being through their very nature confined to superficialities, or apparently so confined, the world at large is easily disposed to fall in with those frequent opinions of the grave and learned which declare them inessential. But in this case we challenge the judgment of the tribunal, and will not abide by any decision which shall be "grave and learned." Pour savoir ce qu'il est (Dieu ) il faut étre Dieu même, says the Baron de Bielfeld, in speaking of a more august subject; but the spirit of his remark is abundantly applicable to the present matter in hand. To form any just estimate of the importance of habitual intercourse with our fellows, and, more especially, of an attentive regard to the modelling and polishing of our social habits, we must already be men of the world-we must have felt all the miseries of a mauvaise honte, and have revelled in all the luxury of a disenthralment from its bonds. Upon the evils of an absolutely unsocial existence it is folly to comment. He who has, at any period, entered with heart into the proper spirit of a high society, will find even a temporary withdrawal from its usages (urged, let us say, by necessity, or induced by disgust, or sought for the severer purposes of study) followed by very serious inconveniences, often by poignant mortifications, always by a thorough conviction of man's unfitness for such existence, and of its enervating and debasing influence upon his intellectual powers, if not upon the whole organization of his moral being. Collecting and concentrating in his retirement an imaginary strength, the solitary student makes at length, for some long designed effort, a step into the world of busy life-but this step is feebly and irresolutely advanced. A farther progress fully awakens him to his weakness and his folly. The volition is in abeyance, which should vivify his forces, and impart to them decision. He now feels and perhaps acknowledges his error.

We could name no book whatever, in which are better exemplified the truth of opinions such as these than in the unpretending volume now before us. In almost every respect it is a valuable and exceedingly well written treatise. Among the detailed precepts which form its body there is, perhaps, little to be found which the letters of Lord Chesterfield have not al eady given. But without the offensive heartlessness of those very objectionable writings, this American work equals them, at least, in all their reputable poiats—in vigor of thought and diction, in acumen, in practicability, and in evidences of wordly knowledge.

A Synopsis of Natural History; embracing the Natural History of Animals, with Human and General Animal Physiology, Botany, Vegetable Physiology, and Geology. Translated from the latest French Edition of C. Lemmonnier, Professor of Natural History in the Royal College of Charlemagne, with Additions from the Works of Cuvier, Dumaril, Lacepede, etc. Arranged as a Text Book for Schools. By Thomas Wyatt, A. M., Author of Elements of Botany, a Manual of Conchology, etc. Thomas Wardle, Philadelphia.

Mr. Wyatt is favorably known to the public as the author of an exceedingly well arranged, accurate, and beautifully illustrated" Conchology," and has been mainly instrumental, we believe, in drawing that public attention to the science in this country which is now so obviously manifested. We hope that his success with the present publication will be commensurate with the wider range which he has taken. It cannot be denled that a synopsis such as he now puts forth has been long a desideratum. While there has been no deficiency of school books in any one of the sciences embraced within a proper course of Natural History, it must still have occurred to many as singular, that in a study whose very existence may be said to depend upon method, there should have been, hitherto, no attempt at collecting the parts into an easily discernible whole.

As the work of Mr. Wyatt professes to be simply a translation of the well known Tableaux of M. Lemmonnier, we need say little more in the way of recommendation than that all the useful spirit of the original has been preserved-and this we say from personal knowledge, and the closest