money by the stage, and had sufficiently insured his position in his native place, he retired to Stratford, and, as far as we can tell, never wrote any thing more.

Such is the mere outline of Shakespeare's history as given in Mr. Halliwell's new 66 Life." The noble works of his genius remain as one of the monuments of which his country has most reason to be proud, while the property which he collected, together with the temporary profit which he himself derived from it, have long passed away to a variety of owners, and we believe there is not a single portion of it now in the hands of any one who has the remotest connexion with the name and family of the poet. Mr. Halliwell deserves our warmest praise for his industry and discrimination in collecting together the scattered and often unknown materials for his life, and for the talent he has shown in putting them together; and we are not sure if his "Life of William Shakespeare" be not one of the most permanently useful results to our national literature that we shall derive from the interest recently excited by the sale of the house generally reputed to be that in which the poet was born. It will certainly supersede, from the great additions to our knowledge which its author has discovered, and from the superior accuracy with which the various documents are printed, all the previous biographies.

LEONORA.*

THE life and love of the great poet-Torquato Tasso-presented a noble theme for the novelist. Stubborn history has cast doubts upon the poet's loyalty in the matter of love; but the novelist has given unity to the subject and consistency to the hero, by depicting a true and chivalrous allegiance to one dominant passion. According to the author of " Leonora," Tasso sighed only for the daughter of the house of Ferrara, and for her sake was incarcerated for seven long years in the dungeons of St. Ann's. For Tasso's sake the princess refused all other offers, and died.

The author admits that under the influence of coerced solitude, a mental organisation so delicately constituted as that of Tasso's was not proof against the shock, but still his positive madness is not admitted. A giant in intellect, but a mere child in heart, sensitive to an extent that was painful to himself, and still more so to others ; the exceeding irritability of the poet, and his habits of melancholy, are at once well portrayed and satisfactorily accounted for by a life of persecution, disappointment, and crossed love. With all his mental powers, the poet was deficient in self-control. In allowing himself to yield to a hopeless passion for one so far removed from him in rank and station of life, as Leonora d'Este was, he was led away by his fervent and glowing imagination, and by his ardent temperament, from the narrow, but safe paths, in which reason alone would have guided him.

Again, he added to the sources of his frequent dissatisfaction by an uneasy, restless spirit, which he could not control. In every sense of the word a self-tormentor, he allowed each petty insult, each foolish lampoon -and his arch-enemies, Maddalo and Salviati, loaded him with both-to

* Leonora: a Love Story. 3 vols. Henry Colburn.

vex and harass his noble spirit. Noble, too, are the communings of such a spirit-philosophic enough to know that calmness and self-contentment are to be found only in the breasts of those who practise self-control and set their affections on earthly things within their reach, or probably so; and on heavenly things, promised to those who seek them; and yet with too much of this world's ambition within him to be able to tear himself from the society of rank and power.

The history of the poet's aspirings and sufferings is throughout couched in a language and replete with thoughts that ennoble and exalt human nature. The contemplation of elevated themes and subjects-love for the beautiful on earth and in heaven--freedom of religious consciencethe native independence, the inborn wealth and the inherent nobility of genius-and the dominion of the affections over social distinctionsare advocated with great earnestness of purpose, and a deep and eloquent spirit of philosophy. The authorship of this remarkable work is attributed to Lady Boothby.

MR. WARREN'S "NOW AND THEN."*

ANY work from the pen of the well-known author of " The Diary of a late Physician," and of "Ten Thousand a Year," would be sure to excite general curiosity and interest. Independently of its high merits as a literary composition, it is still more so as a seasonable homily. It is the story of a poor man falsely suspected of murder, tried and convicted, but afterwards pardoned, and eventually compensated for his sufferings and rendered happy. Like Bunyan's Pilgrim, in his imaginary progress, the poor man is supported through his troubles and trials by an inflexible, unassailable faith. As the Earl of Milverstoke is proud and powerful to persecute, so the yeoman is patient under long years of suffering, and ever steadily obedient to the will of the Almighty. The story comprises three generations: the worthy and pious old Adam Ayliffe; his unfortunate son, Adam; and his son's child, crippled in body, but highly gifted in intellect.

The festivities of Christmas are sadly interrupted, by the murder of Viscount Alkmond, who has only lately returned from his travels. Young Adam Ayliffe is arrested under suspicious circumstances, tried for the murder, and convicted. But the old man is satisfied, notwithstanding the overwhelming force of the circumstantial evidence, of his son's innocence, and he is happily seconded in this belief, by another as good, and as trustful, and as pious, as himself, the parish minister-Mr. Hylton. Driven with ignominy from the presence of the peer, whose mercy they ventured to supplicate, the worthy parishioners were more successful with the secretary of state, and chiefly through Mr. Hylton's exertions, the sentence of death is transmuted to that of transportation.

While the gloom of undeserved punishment hangs heavily over the house of the Ayliffes, the hearts of certain of the female portion of the peer's family are softened by Providence to mercy; the sister and the

Now and Then. By Samuel Warren, F.R.S., Author of "Ten Thousand a Year," and "The Diary of a late Physician." William Blackwood and Sons.

wife of the murdered viscount are led to doubt the guilt of Adam Ayliffe, and, as a partial compensation for his sufferings, to educate his child. The evidence of great intellectual capacity given by this otherwise illfavoured youth subsequently, induces the ladies to place him at Cambridge. There he becomes competitor for the highest honours of the university with the only son of the murdered peer; but the rivals entertain a mutual regard and esteem the one for the other.

At the very moment of this friendly contest, a poacher, formerly living on the Milverstoke estate, is executed for a robbery, and before he dies, confesses that Ayliffe is innocent of Lord Alkmond's death, and that he himself was the assassin. The banished man is recalled to have his heart gladdened, and his years of suffering more than compensated for, by his son's successes; and the old man's faith and piety meet with a just reward in the humiliation for forgiveness, of the old, tottering, heart-stricken, peer-the Earl of Milverstoke.

There is an energy, a sincerity, and a fervour in these pages that indicates inexhaustible power on the part of their author. Öld Ayliffe is a genuine portrait of the high-principled yeoman, the strength and pride of the country; Mr. Hylton is endowed with all that masculine and indomitable strength, which truth and faith can alone impart; and the whole story is a noble illustration of the secret ways of Providence, conveyed in the most interesting and the most effective manner, although "seen," as the author intimates, "through a glass darkly." Eloquent in its language, and inflexible in its purpose, it is, indeed, a work in every way calculated to leave a permanent impression, even upon the most desultory reader.

HAWBUCK GRANGE.*

THE mantle of Nimrod could not have fallen on worthier shoulders than on those of the author of "Jollock's Jaunts and Jollities," of "Handley Cross; or, the Spa Hunt," of "Hillingdon Hall; or, the Cockney Squire." "Hawbuck Grange" will crown a reputation now for some time in the ascendant. There is a sparkling perception of the ridiculous, and a happy skill in description that wins the least sympathising readers with the exception of such irreclaimable matter-of-fact men, as Sylvanus Bluff, who asked the author why he did not write a book upon draining.

The "predigree and performances" of Mr. Thomas Scott, the hero of the story, have to work themselves out with the rides across country and blank day sketches, as doled out by the sentimental huntsman ; not so the great Mr. Tarquinius Muff, to whom we are introduced at once, dressed like a dancing-master, covered with chains and brooches, and who comes after the pretty chattering Miss Ogleby's, instead of after the hounds.

The goose and dumpling hunt is a clever hare-hunting sketch, with dinner to follow-and such a dinner! Lord Lionel Lazytongs-a sportsman in mufti-with cut-away coat, fancy neckcloth, striped vest, and cord pantaloons, and who rides for display, and talks of hunts, but does

*Hawbuck Grange; or, the Sporting Adventures of Thomas Scott, Esq. With eight Illustrations by Phiz. Longman and Co.

not ride after the dogs, is a sketch of a more refined character, but is equally genuine and amusing.

The entertainment met with at the Gold Trap Arms, and the removal of the clock-weights, made to serve two purposes at once, to stop the perpetual cuckoo, and to drive away the cats from an adjacent roof, forms a laughable interlude. The clever Tom is, however, himself done by Captain Cashbox, proprietor of the Stout as Steel hounds, who proffers him the buttons of the hunt, with an intimation that he may send the four guineas when he got home. "Some men," says the thorough-paced Tom, "stand fire better than others." And then he gives an example.

We remember once dining at a great Russian Jew's, whose drawing-room table was garnished with nothing but New Monthly Magazines-New Monthly Magazines in every stage of life, from the well-thumbed "yearling," down to the newly-issued number of yesterday.

Presently the door opened, and Sir Edward Lytton Bulwer, the avowed editor, was announced.

"Shir Edward, shir," said our host, taking up a number as soon as the baronet's back had subsided into still life; "Shir Edward, shir; I do not like dis article of yours, on de state of parties, it is far too something, we forget what, and so he went on, lecturing and commenting on the numbers in succession, till "dinner" put an end to the scene.

When Tom Scott fell in with a blank day, or what was worse, "a choker,”—a cold, cheerless, wet day, without a find, or a run-he would return home, doze over the fire, review the flight of life, and glance at the prospect of the future. These soliloquies generally ended with an ejaculation "Poor Lydia Clifton! If it hadn't been for this hunting, I'd have married you long since." And then he would resolve to end a nineyears' courtship with an offer, and would turn to bed, his mind fully made up, to be done with hunting, and to settle quietly down to matrimony.

But the climax was always delayed by bright, smiling, sunshining weather, till one fine morning Tom received a brief epistle from his Lydia in return for the "fatherly" interest he had always shown in her fate, informing him of her proximate marriage with a sailor cousin.

"Curse these cousins!" exclaimed Tom, dropping the note, and sinking into his easy-chair.

Alas, poor Tom Scott! Hawbuck Grange is still in the matrimonial market. Phiz has saved all trouble of description, and purchasers of his work are alone entitled to view. "They must take Hawbuck Grange in hand in fact."

LEIGH HUNT'S JAR OF HONEY.*

PASSING by Fortnum and Mason's shop, in Piccadilly, the author chanced to see in the window a little blue jar, labelled "Sicilian Honey." A whole world of mythological and pastoral poetry opened upon his mind, and in its train came images of the history and biography of the beautiful island from whence that honey came. He began to think of Theocritus, and Mount Hybla, and the bees; Acis, and Galatea, and Polyphemus; the Sirens, and Proserpine, and the Vale of Enna; and he poured

* A Jar of Honey from Mount Hybla. By Leigh Hunt, Esq. Illustrated by Richard Doyle. Smith, Elder, and Co.

forth the honied exuberance of his fancies, and recollections, and associations, into the pages of Ainsworth's Magazine. These charming papers are now collected together in a volume, of which it has been justly remarked, that a book acceptable at all seasons, is sure to be so at a particular one. The critical press has, indeed, generally admitted the superlative sweetness of this "Sicilian Jar," and it has, by common consent, been placed foremost among the books of the season. The same press

has also, as if by one consent (we may, at least, instance the Examiner, the Atlas, and the Athenæum), agreed to omit the fact of such admirable papers having appeared in the pages of the before-mentioned periodical. Leigh Hunt dedicates his book to Horace Smith, his friend in times of trial and adversity, as to one, who, he says, "will retain, as long as he lives, a heart open to every natural and noble impression." In this, from our knowledge of the estimable author of "Brambletye House," we entirely concur.

The "Jar of Honey" is a volume rich in claims of every kind, and it cannot fail to be admired by all. The binding is at once characteristic and sumptuous, and the illustrations, by Richard Doyle, are as remarkable for their classical taste, as for their graceful and delicate execution.

HENRY DOMVILLE.*

THE history of a younger son proceeds at first spiritedly enough. The social position of young Henry, deprived of the sympathy of guardians, dowagers, and all respectable papas and mammas, is clearly defined. Sir Charles Domville, the perfect gentleman in manners, yet with whom public opinion was a theme of ridicule and contempt; and by whom the honour of politicians and the virtue of women are held at an equally low estimate and Mr. Brereton, the perpetual advocate for the rights of Orangemen, the redresser of the wrongs of Ireland, the extoller of the virtues of Protestants, and the denouncer of the vices of Catholics, are two equally well-defined characters; nor is much wanted to complete the idea of the character of Charles, the elder son, when we find him willing to enter the church because residence was not necessary, and "it need not make any sort of difference."

Burke's philosophical denunciation of worldly vanity and ambition comes like a heavy cloud over this sunshine, but relief is afforded by young Henry's candid acknowledgment, that, at that period, to him a great man was an inferior being to a fine woman, and by his abandoning the company of the orator for that of the lovely Miss Brereton. It is difficult to decide whether the reckless daring manifested by a younger son in falling in love at first sight, or the courage exhibited in aspiring to the affections of a young lady of such high intellectual attainments as "the Brereton" is most to be admired.

Sir Charles Domville's mode of administering justice as a country magistrate is made an excuse for the younger son turning democrat. The bitterness of his position colours every thing alike, persons, things, and events, with the same hopeless and cheerless aspect. On his advent in Ireland,

Henry Domville; or, a Younger Son. By Himself. Two Vols. Chapman and Hall.