SPECTATOR'S LIBRARY.

Uric-Haar Herron?,

Cardinal De Beta. A Literary Curiosity. From the Original Memoirs, by the Author of " The Maid's Husband" and "The Smiths." Newby.

TRAVELS.

The Three Kingdoms: England, Scotland, Ireland. By the Viscount D'Arlincourt. In two volumes Bentley. Ficrioe. The Twins; a Domestic Novel. Heart ; a Social Novel. By Martin Farquhar 'Popper, Author of " Proverbial Philosophy." Esatfey. Sermenno Airs'.

The Anatomy and Philosophy of Expression as Connected with the Fine Arts. By Sir Charles Bell, KM. Third edition, enlarged Murray.

CARDINAL DE RETZ.

IN what sense this publication is called a literary curiosity, the author of The Smiths does not condescend to explain. Assuming that the Memoirs generally attributed to the Cardinal DE RETZ are genuine, they may be "a curiosity," but not exactly "a literary curiosity," for autobiographical memoirs are no rarity. In one sense this translated abridgment or abridged translation of the Memoirs may be called "a curiosity." The author may be tole- rably versant in modern French, but that he can have but a slender acquaintance with the language and literature of the time of DE Rwrz is obvious, from his translating " je lui fis un appel a la comedie," "challenged him at the theatre," whereas it merely means "invited him to take part in the joke "—i. e. a quiet duel of a morning. The process of abridgment appears to have been effected on the simple principle of leaving out passages here and there, without inquiring how the omission affects the clearness of other parts of the narrative. The publication is indeed a curiosity,

in regard to the want of judgment shown by the translator and abridger, who undertook the task though so little qualified for it, and the good-nature of the bibliopole, who undertook the publica- tion of a work so indifferently executed, when the original was so generally known, and composed in a language which all who are likely to take an interest in it can read.

Nevertheless, the titlepage tells a truth. The Memoirs of the Cardinal DE RETZ are a literary curiosity, both on account of the fureur with which they were received upon their first publi- cation, and the doubts which attach to their authenticity.

Their first reception is curious as a piece of literary gossip. We are apt to think that there were no " sensations " in the reading public before our own youthful days—before the time when

mail-coach copies" of the Edinburgh Review, or the last new Waverley novel or poem of Lord BYRON, were in demand. Alas! " vixerunt fortes ante Agamemnona"— there were books more than a hundred years before that time, as gluttonously de- voured. Bear witness a review (for there were reviewers, too, in those days) of one of the early editions of the Memoirs of the Cardinal DB RETZ. "It is scarcely credible," says L'Eu- rope Savaszte for February 1719, "the ardour and applause with which these Memoirs have been received by the public, especially in France. It has already run through seven editions, [the first appeared in 1717,]—the editions of Nancy, of Paris, of Rouen, of Bourdeaux, of Lyons, and this country [Holland.] To bear some people speak of it, there never was a book better written in every respect. Nevertheless, it contains newfangled words, obscure and equivocal phrases, which have no grammatical construction, and periods overloaded and fatiguing. These Memoirs contain matter useful, agreeable, and superfluous : they instruct, amuse, and weary one." From this extract it appears that the reviewers of 1719 understood their business about as well as those of 1844; that they were as wise, facetious and discriminatingly critical. But the avidity with which the Memoirs were caught up did not end here. In 1723, two English translations appeared simultaneously ; and the work had been translated into German still earlier. Fashionable me- moirs, reviews, and small talk about the last new book, are not, therefore, very recently-invented luxuries for the idle and gossiping.

The authenticity of the Memoirs was very soon called in question.

M. DE SENNECEY, "premier valet de chambre de la feue Reine," in his " Remarques historiques, suivies de quelques Observations critiques, cur un Livre intitule Memoires de M. le Cardinal de Bet;" published in the Mercure of August 1718, maintains that they were not written by the Cardinal. DECHAT was of the same opinion ; as appears from his collected works published in 1725, after his death, at Amsterdam, under the title works, VIGNEUL MeolviLLE (or to give him his real name, Nom, D'ARGONNE) has also declared them spurious. These writers rest their opinion upon the contradictions which abound in the work, and still more upon the circumstance that the style is much more modern than that of the time of Cardinal DE Rwrz. LELONG gives no other answer to these objections than " beaucoup de gens ne seront pas de leur avis" ; and QUERAND and other bibliographical and biographical compilers have kept copying each other and taking the authenticity of the Memoirs for granted.

BENNECEY, from his connexion with the Court, (the reader must

Not be startled by his title " valet"—Casucins was King ED- WARD'S " dilect us valettus noster,") probably had information pe- culiar to himself which awakened his scepticism as to the author- ship of the Memoirs ; and DOCHAT was a writer of considerable critical acumen, who had, moreover, an extensive literary corre- spondence. Their main argument—that drawn from the style of the work—is not conclusive; but there are some difficulties in the history of the Memoirs which rather add weight to than detract from it.

No satisfactory account is given of the original. LENGLIT, in his Mithode pour itudier Fflistoire de la Prance, published in 1714, mentions Memoirs of the Cardinal DE Rs= ; but the question re- mains, are the published Memoirs the same to which Lanot.wr re- fers? VIGNEDL MARVILLE asserts that the Cardinal composed his Memoirs in Latin; and those which we have profess to be the original, not a translation. LELONG mentions a manuscript Memoir of Cardi- nal Dic RETZ, but does not specify any particular library in which it was preserved [" Its sont conserves dans le cabinet de quelques curie= de Paris "] ; and the account he gives of the manuscript does not correspond with the printed Memoirs. The manuscript contained the Cardinal's history from 1636 to 1653; the printed Me- moirs run through his story "even from his boyish days." It is rather a suspicious circumstance, too, that Madame DE SiVIGNE—so warmly attached to the Cardinal, who urged him to write his memoirs and set on others to urge him, and who mentions him so frequently in her letters—says nothing of his having complied with their request. But the most suspicious circumstance of all is the story by which the frequent lacunae in the Memoirs are explained. LliNGLET tells us that the Cardinal had given the amorous adventures of his youth in great detail, "et comme rauteur les avoit communiques a des religieuses, elles les copierent entierement, a la reserve des in- trigues d'amour, que la religion de ces bonnes filles les empecha de transcrire." Later writers (among them, in particular, the author of Notes historiques sur les Memoires du Prince de Tarente) tell a similar story, but substitute Father Ermessort, the confessor of the Cardinal, for "les bonnes tilles." In short, the belief that the manuscript from which the Memoirs were originally printed was composed by Cardinal DE RETZ, will be found, if the evidence be closely scrutinized, to rest upon the assertion of the preface to the edition of Nancy alone ; and this feeble evidence is weakened by the apocryphal character of the anecdote related in order to account for the erasures.

The internal evidence of their authenticity is much stronger. The contemporary evidence of Gm Jou and the Duchesse Ds 'Unlooses establishes the truth of the greater part of the narrative. There are turns of thought and expression in the Memoirs which remind one of the undoubted writings of the Cardinal ; and on the whole, the work, though unequal, is not unworthy of his talents. By long practice, the trick of rendering such writings piquant by speaking of serious subjects, and even of revolting atrocities, in a light and jocular tone, has been brought in France to a pitch of mechanical perfection ; but the style was new when these Me- moirs first appeared. The first persifleurs had talent, though mere persiflage has now become stale and disgusting. The modern style of the Memoirs may justify a suspicion that they have been tampered with, but not that they are altogether spurious. It is to be wished that some person having access to the rich literary- archives of France would thoroughly investigate the question of

authenticity. M. DE MUSSKI,PATHAY published, in 1807, Rt. cherclzes historiques cur le Cardinal De Betz. One would have

imagined that a critical inquiry into the authenticity of the prin-

cipal source of information regarding the Cardinal would have held a prominent part in such " Recherches" ; but M. Moamar- PATHAY, like most modern litterateurs, was more anxious to show

his cleverness than to arrive at the truth : he dispensed altogether with the laborious and thankless drudgery of investigation, and. spun a number of ingenious hypotheses about the Cardinal's cha-

racter, out of his own fancy. The trustworthiness of the account we have of the Cardinal ought to have been the first step in "Recherches historiques" : one Frenchman has told us "cc n'est pie le premier pas qui coute," and M. MUSSET-PATHAY has shown us how little it costs some Frenchmen to take even that step.

VISCOUNT D'ARLINCOURT'S THREE KINGDOMS.

M. D'Aitiaricoturr is an amiable member of that old regime whictr TALLEYRAND so truly characterized as having learned nothing and- forgotten nothing during the long exile and tremendous changes of the Revolution and the Empire. Nature, indeed, has not been unkind to the Viscount. She has given him a sprightly mind, or vivacious animal spirits that serve instead of it ; he has originally been gifted with sense and judgment ; and he appears to have a tolerant spirit, and an easy good-nature, that many people call kindness of heart. But Fortune neutralized these advantages of Nature when she made him a Count, a courtier, and a French Loyalist. He lives in the world, but is not of it. He travels by steam—he even enjoys it ; and he submits to use the other material advantages which the march of mechanics so cheaply offers to its contemporaries. But his heart is not with these things ; and as for the "march of intellect," or "spirit of the age," he repudiates them altogether. Like the Red Indian chieftain crossing the lovely ter- ritory of which the arts and cupidity of the "pale faces" had de- frauded his race, "His eye may roam o'er earth and sky; His soot is in the days gone by."

Our Viscount turns himself to the time when loyalty was an inherent instinct, not a proposition to be solved by estimating merit and calculating advantages : to him the most glorious, in- deed the only glorious public event of the day, is the grave burlesque performed in Belgrave Square by royalty on the tramp. "Henry of France, the descendant of sixty Kings, the progeny of Saint Louis," came to London town.

"He did not arrive," says M. D'ARLINCOURT, "with all the train of sove- reignty, an escort of guards, and the luxury of riches ; but the lustre of his noble simplicity, the modesty of his royal grandeur, gave rise to far more emo- tion in the minds of men than the pomp of uneasy pride and the ostentation of false dignity could do elsewhere. Decked with the majesty of ages, raising a serene and spotless brow amidst the agitations and errors of the time, in boa

on his Bide the glories of the past, the hopes of the present, the justice of the future. The seal of time, his sacred inheritance, is a sceptre which no law can wrest from him—which no state-concussion can ever break. That survives the revolutionary storms like a beacon, which, standing on the tempest-beaten rock, after having seemed to lose itself in the midst of gusts and squalls, reappears more bright and lively, to save the mariner from shipwreck. "The present generation,' it has been said, has advanced beyond those superannuated ideas of monarchical veneration and chivalrous devotedness; it looks with scorn on all that is enthusiasm and poetry ; it sets no store by any thing but numerical values and positive authorities.' Peace, slanderers of our times! An unlocked-for event has destroyed your doctrines."

To a mind constituted like our author's, France under Louis Prnurrs could afford no resting-place. He has therefore spent his time in travelling, and telling his travels to the world. His first pilgrimages were made in the Northern or Middle countries of Europe; but last summer he embarked for England; looked hastily about London where he was lionized a little; started for Dublin by the Birmingham and Liverpool railway ; and having honoured some Irish noblemen by his visits, and examined the Giant's Cause- way, he passed over to Scotland, made a tour in the Highlands, and sped through Glasgow to Edinburgh. Such is the extent of Viscount D'Artmecourer's Three Kingdoms. The matter of a book, however, is of more importance than its nominal form : but there is not much matter in these volumes. The author calls himself a poet, and has written verses; but, to us, his genius seems more rhetorical than poetical, and of an extremely French kind to boot. With such a cast of mind, and such political and social opinions, the Viscount cannot be expected to exhibit things as they really are, or be safely followed in any conclusions be may draw. Every thing sub- mitted to him is more or less changed ; and life and nature represented d la d'Arlincourt. Still, had he made use of his opportunities, and contented himself with describing and com- menting upon what he really saw, the book would have been agreeable, if neither new nor necessary : for he mixed largely in high life, and the remarks of an educated and travelled stranger, however singular his character, have perhaps more suggestion about them than those of a soberer describer. But half of this book consists of old Scotch and Irish legends, with jokes of the Joe Miller school, always Frenchified and often spoiled in the telling ; this matter being further varied by stories. All these the Viscount introduces as being told to him : but if they were all told in their present form, he must have fallen among a successive series of wags who take a mischievous delight in cramming strangers.

The book, however, is amusing; though the amusement is often at the author's expense. For any other purpose than amusement, it is valueless. His statements can never be relied upon. Facts passed through him pass into fictions; not from any wish to misre- present, but from a natural habit of not attending to accuracy, and a practice of rhetorical amplification. This is shown equally in the largest and the smallest matters. Thus, he tells the reader, "I quitted the [Palace] ball-room about two o'clock in the morning, and soon after was on the Blackwall railway." This "soon after" was next day, or at least some five or six hours later—not till seven or eight o'clock. In his critical account of the battle of Culloden, be omits the most fatal error of the Pretender—the delay in or- dering the charge, that exposed the whole line to a deadly fire without the means of returning it ; but which charge the critic describes as taking place at once. The idea of interval, indeed, seems abhorrent to the Viscount. He begins one of his Scotch legends—" About the year 1687, after the victory of Dunbar, one of Cromwelfs Colonels," &c ; which, considering that the battle of Dunbar was fought in 1650, 1687 was doubtless after. At Holyrood he finds out a likeness between the portrait of the Pretender and that of ROBERT BRUCE: which may be true as a fact, but is worthless as an inference, considering the uncertain state of the fine arts in Scotland about 1300. At Loch- leven, he stops in "melancholy reverie," to lament over Queen MART'S immurement by ELIZABETH, long before the English Sove- reign had obtained possession of her rival's person. Of course, this kind of inaccuracy is increased where other than a single fact is in question. The Currency-doctors would be delighted to realize the Viscount's idea of the operation of paper-issues. He seems to think that the notes are never returned, but that each issue goes on adding to our stock of money. He has also discovered that the capital of the Bank of England is more than six millions !

Had these been mere mistakes, into which all strangers are liable to fall, they would have been unworthy of notice ; but they indicate the loose character of a writer's mind. They may also induce caution in receiving his statements generally. When this kind of error is found in matters we understand, we think it possible that errors may occur in the description of courtly life, though the Viscount is perhaps more at home there. Here he is at

THE QUEEN AND HER BALL.

I bad only been a short time in London when her Majesty Queen Victoria gave a grand ball. In order to obtain an invitation, I ought to have been in- troduced at court; but as, since my arrival, there had been no levees, I had no opportunity of being presented. I was lamenting this disappointment when I received a card from her Majesty, who condescended to dispense with the usual

etiquette in my favour. • •

The Queen had already entered the ball-room, and had the extreme kindness to make several inquiries after me, the string of carriages having delayed my arrival. The French Ambassador, the Comte de St. Aulaire, hastened to pre- sent me to her Majesty. She was seated on a throne at the end of one of the galleries of the Palace, and was surrounded by the principal ladies of her court : among them was the Princess Clementine of Saxe Coburg, daughter of Louis Philippe, who had recently arrived with her husband from Portugal. The Queen wore a white dress, trimmed with bouquets interspersed with precious atones. Her coiffure was composed of flowers and diamonds, forming a toilette ((the richest and yet most simple elegance. Her smile was most affable, and

her personal appearance extremely gracefuL Rising at my approach, her Ma- jesty condescended to address me in French ; which, as well as almost all the European languages, she speaks admirably, and expressed herself in the most flattering manner. I had thus, to my great satisfaction, a favourable oppor- tunity for contemplating her. Her features beamed with hope and happi- ness. * •

In her husband she possesses the handsomest prince of the age; and this husband is entirely devoted to her, adoring her as a mistress and respecting her as a master. In the heir to her throne she possesses a son whom she idolizes, adding another to the many joys which fall to her share ; while her own character displays the firmness of a man with the attractive gentleniss of a woman. A people, enthusiastically prostrate at her feet, attribute to her none of the evil, and bless her for 1 the good that occurs. What a destiny, and what an existence!

PRINCE ALBERT.

On being presented to Prince Albert, who condescended to question me re- specting my travels in Europe, I spoke to him at some length-AL his-brother, in whose company I had supped with the King of Saxony, when the Prince came to Dresden to introduce his wife to that court; the newIrmarried Princess was daughter of the Grand Duke of Baden. Queen Victoria's hus- band is, as is well known, a remarkably handsome man, such as the imagina- tion of a romance-writer would select for the model of the heroes he presents to his admiring readers. He is said to be serious and cold : I found him, on the contrary, full of animation and courtesy. His mode of expressing himself was as pleasing as his reception of me was affable. He speaks French most elegantly.

THE QUEEN'S DANCING.

Accustomed to the fetes of Paris, where it is usual to walk through a quadrille, I was delighted to witness a ball where real dancing was in fashion. The orchestra was perfect, and the coup d'oxil of the ball-room dazzling. The Queen of England has the prettiest little foot in the world, and she dances in the most charming manner : it is said, moreover, that, being mistress of every accomplishment, she sings enchantingly. How many crowns at one and the same time are hers!

In each of the salons of the Palace a throne and dais were erected. As soon as the youthful Sovereign had finished dancing in one apartment, she recom- menced in the next, her arrival in and departure from each room being an- nounced by the national air of " God save the Queen." All this gave a new impulse to the fete, as, from her Majesty's constantly changing her position, each of the ladies seated in the different salons bad the satisfaction in turns of seeing her pass close to them.

When in Ireland, the Viscount, in company with Mr. GRATTAN, attended the monster-meeting at Tara. He subsequently had a private interview with O'CONNELL ' ' who could not be expected to spare so rich and rare a victim for gullibility. The whole story is too long, and, sooth to say, too inane for quotation ; but we will take O'CoNNELL's mode of oratory, ijustrated both from mathe- matical and natural philosophy. "It would be impossible to conceive (without having seen it) how an orator could be heard and applauded by an assembly of from two hundred thousand to three hundred thousand men. I will try to explain it. If a stone is thrown into a pool of water, it will form around itself a circle, then another, and then a third, a fourth, a fifth, a sixth, a seventh, indeed an indefinite number. Let us begin from this point. O'Connell speaks slowly and with an audible voice. Each sentence of his discourse ends with a phrase which forms • condensed summary of the whole. When this phrase is spoken, he pauses. The firatcircle formed around him hears' applauds, and repeats it to the next circle ; which, in its turn, applauds, and repeats it still farther. Thus a telegraph of human voices conveys O'Connell's thoughts to five hundred thousand hearts at once' with the rapidity of lightning ; and from one end of the meeting to another, he finds himself listened to, heard, and applauded."