But, “Mardi” and forget-me-nots have spoiled three good sheets of foolscap, and I fear that I am too much i’ the sentimental vein; let me therefore conclude with quoting a sweet little piece of philosophy, and lay aside these _lender’s books_ for a period.
“A swallow in the spring Came to our granary, and ’neath the eaves Essayed to make a nest, and then did bring Wet earth, and straw, and leaves.
“Day after day she toiled, With patient heart; but ere her work was crowned Some sad mishap the tiny fabric spoiled, And dashed it to the ground.
“She found the ruin wrought, But, not cast down, forth from the place she flew, And, with her mate, fresh earth and grasses brought, And built her nest anew.
“But scarcely had she placed The last soft feather on its ample floor, When wicked hand, or chance, again laid waste, And wrought the ruin o’er.
“But still her heart she kept, And toiled again; and last night, hearing calls, I looked, and lo! three little swallows slept Within the earth-made walls.
“What truth is here, O man! Hath hope been smitten in its early dawn! Have clouds o’ercast thy purpose, trust or plan? _Have_ FAITH _and struggle on_!”
Here endeth the second fifth.—RICHARD HAYWARDE.
_Characteristics of Literature. Illustrated by the Genius of Distinguished Men. By Henry T. Tuckerman. Phila.: Lindsay & Blakiston. 1 vol. 12mo._
Mr. Tuckerman has written many interesting books, but we think the present volume is his most attractive if not his best production. It is characterized by his usual refinement of analysis, wealth of illustration, felicity of allusion, and mellow richness of style, while in the range it evinces over widely varied provinces of thought and character, it indicates more versatility than any of his other compositions. The volume includes a discussion and representation of eleven departments of literature, through a searching examination of as many authors, each of whom is taken as the exponent of a class. Thus Channing stands for the Moralist, Sir Thomas Browne for the Philosopher, Swift for the Wit, Shenstone for the Dillettante, Charles Lamb for the Humorist, and Macaulay for the Historian. The selection of men to illustrate the subjects is, of course, not free from cavil. We should say that Burke was not exactly the man to stand as an expression of the Rhetorician, for his rhetoric, though matchless of its kind, is secondary to his philosophy. He appears to us, even as analyzed by Mr. Tuckerman, in the character of a profound, vigorous and vital thinker, and is no more a rhetorician, in any exclusive sense of the term, than Bacon, Hooker, Taylor, or even Milton. Where style is the _incarnation_ of thought, the visible image of the mind that employs it—and this is its nature in all the greatest authors—the word rhetoric is hardly applicable to it. Macaulay is more emphatically the rhetorician than Burke.