PORTRAIT GALLERY.

WASHINGTON IRVING.

THE alienation which took place between Great Britain and America, in the year 1775, was not only political but personal. The struggle which resulted in the constitution of the thirteen United States not only disrupted the colonial tie which bound them and the mother country together, but infused an antagonistic element into the feelings and ideas of these rival nations, although they were still essentially identical in origin, in literature, and religion. Britain had been humiliated. She had received the first blow to her pride from a hand she had hitherto beheld as that of a petulant child, and which she had affected to despise; and in order to conceal the chagrin which she really felt at the martial discomfiture and territorial disintegration which had followed the unseemly war of 1775-83, she pretended to smile disdainfully upon the men and novel institutions of the young republic. America, as jealous as Britain was disdainful, and as egotistical and vainglorious in her triumph as the latter was scornful in her defeat, sought, by a strange perversity of nationality, to detach herself in idea, as well as fact, from the motherland. Perhaps in no visible type of the British and American minds are this egotism, this jealousy, and rivalry of nationality so apparent as in the literature of the two countries, although in international politics and diplomatic policy the same spirit prevails. The general unity which actually exists between the two states is produced by commerce; the general antagonism which as really makes the British and Americans two nations, although one people, is the result of diversity of thoughts upon subjects of familiar polity, and of a reciprocal spirit of pride. Authors, more than any other class of men, possess capacities for producing and maintaining either unity or enmity between nations, and, unfortunately, causes of a very personal and exciting nature have operated to array British writers, especially, in opposition to the policy of the United States. When America gained her political independence she did not denude herself of the English tongue; and when her people had no longer cause to study so ardently the tactics of war, they devoted themselves with renewed energy to study the English mind in books. The individuality of the national laws, which were maintained on the one hand and adopted on the other, as they did but generally affect the subjects of Britain and the citizens of the United States separately, were beyond the pale of legitimate criticism, unless to their respective communities; for, however much the mercantile interest of this nation might deprecate exclusive or retaliatory laws enacted by Congress, still it was legitimate for the United States to regulate its own affairs of foreign and domestic policy, if such procedure did not involve an interference with the rights of other people. There are certain attributes of humanity which cannot be confined or cribbed within the conventional boundaries of nations, however, and rights which may extend even into the bosom of a so-called foreign community. There are interests in which all men have a brotherly concern, and which all constitutional laws should heartily and freely concede. Nationalities should never refuse to affirm what assuredly involves the weal of humanity, and nothing that we can conceive of, save religion, can claim a higher respect or wider field of acknowledged right and influence than literature. The influence of British literature has been universally felt and acknowledged in the United States, but the interests of those who produced that literature have long been repudiated and scorned. An international copyright law, which seems so fair and equitable, and which would so materially conduce to produce a unity in American and British literature, and which would soon induce a harmony in the minds of those brother nations, has been long refused by the legislative assembly of the United States, at the instigation of certain interests, and upon the pleas of patriotism and principle, to the palpable sacrifice of the best interests of the American people, of British authors in particular, and humanity at large. The

pirates who reprint British works in America declare that a mutual copyright law would enable British authors to undermine the institutions of America, while under present circumstances the independent republisher can ostracise from the stolen book all obnoxious expressions; and this is extensively admitted as a valid objection to the enactment of a regulation which would assuredly cause the writer on this side of the water to consult his own interests by respecting and writing for America, and which would enable the people of the United States to obtain the original and not the diluted ideas of the author. The refusal by America of this international law has arrayed against the model republic the animosity of the British republic of letters; and instead of mutual interchanges of softening, humanising ideas, the literature of the two countries often presents acrimonious caricatures and depreciatory allusions to each other. The animosity of ideas, although still strong, is now gradually softening, however, and several journals of established fame and worth on the other side of the ocean strongly advocate a law acknowledging an author's proprietory right in literature. Nearly thirty years ago the exclusive principle seemed like a passion in the United States, and the scorn of British authors was as vehement as it was bitterly resented, when Washington Irving arose, not only to render American authorship respectable, but to become the pioneer of a more friendly and intimate relationship between the national minds. Washington Irving, one of the most elegant and classical writers of the English language, is a native of New York, who began his literary career, in conjunction with his friend Mr Spaulding, at a very early age, as a contributor to the periodical press. Unshackled by the restrictive agencies of a stamp or excise act, literature in America, after the separation, became rapidly popularised; and the weekly periodical vehicle was sooner and far more extensively adopted as the medium of the best minds in the United States than was the case in Britain until within a recent period. It was while cultivating his fine taste and chaste ideality in this popular manner that Mr Irving conceived and executed the History of New York, by Diedrich Knickerbocker,' his first independent publication, which appeared in 1812, and not only afforded the liveliest pleasure to the reading public, but led it to expect much from an author whose wit and genuine humour were only excelled by his descriptive ability and elegance of style. Exaggerating the popular ideas of Dutch phlegm and obstinacy, embodying these in several personifications which are as grotesque in appearance as could be conceived; dressing them in the quaint and multiplied attire of burgomasterial amplitude, and placing them in positions of the gravest legislative importance and national peril, the fictitious Diedrich produces a fictitious history, which may be studied with as much profit as the majority of authentic histories, and with infinitely more amusement. The topography and scenic descriptions are spirited and true to the life; the men are as palpable as the reader's own conceptions. Knickerbocker' is not only a witty, humorous book, however, but a satirical book, and its satire is of the most smooth and agreeable kind. The obstinate valour of Peter Stuyvesant was but a type of the heroic, thickheaded chivalry of our ancestors; and the deliberative acumen of the sage Wouter Van Twiller a heavy' illustration of their wisdom. Knickerbocker' opened the door of Britain to its gifted author, and won friendships for him on our soil as well as fame. He visited this country in 1817, and was received and entertained in a manner as becoming to the British literati as it was deserved by so amiable and so accomplished an American author. Perhaps the most delightful of his sojourns was at Ashestiel, and the most earnest and heartfelt of his friendships was for Sir Walter Scott. Furnished with a letter of introduction by Campbell, Washington Irving, while en route for the borders, modestly stopped his carriage at some distance from the house of the minstrel, and sent a messenger to inquire if it would be convenient for the 'Great Unknown' to receive him on his return from Melrose Abbey. Presently the wondrous painter of mankind limped from his

keep, followed by a canine army, and the amiable American was forthwith installed into his home and heart. Scott was wont to speak with rapture of his short personal connection with Irving; and the latter yet recounts with pleasure the incidents of his visit to him who had peopled the Scottish border with a thousand bright idealities, and had rendered its hills and rivers classical for ever.

In 1820 Washington Irving accepted the immunities and privileges of British authorship, and, under the assumed cognomen of Geoffrey Crayon, published his Sketch-Book.' The sensation created by these fresh, vivacious, genial, and happy essays was as pleasant as it was unexpected. The pure, careful style of the author was representative of the pure and careful character of his thoughts. The penetration of a philo opher and the delicacy of a poet were combined to produce those most beautiful commentaries on men and things. Bracebridge Hall,' Letters to Jonathan Oldstyle,' and the Tales of a Traveller,' succeeded in rapid succession his first British-printed book, and he returned to his own land, not only more famous as an author, but as the honoured instrument who had taken the initiative in that brotherly kindness which ought to govern the intercourse of the united people of Great Britain and America. In 1824 Washington Irving was attached to the Spanish legation, and during his stay in Madrid he devoted himself to the study of Spanish literature. In 1828 the fruits of his studies appeared in his most interesting and popular History of the Life and Voyages of Columbus.' In 1829 he published the Chronicle of the Conquest of Granada,' and in 1832 the Companions of Columbus' appeared, followed by the Alhambra.' His Crayon Miscellanies' issued from the press in 1835, and in the same year the Legends of the Conquest of Spain.' In 1836 John Jacob Astor, in conjunction with several other individuals, having determined to establish the American Fur Company' in the pathless wildernesses of the west, Washington Irving availed himself of the opportunity of visiting the unknown country since called Astoria, afforded by the romantic progress of a strong but motley mounted band of trappers, hunters, and other pioneers, whose appearance and manners, and the recapitulation of whose adventures as they bivouacked in the wilderness, offered as much pleasure and as many elements of romance to the mind of the author of the Sketch-Book' as did the more primitive natives of the wild scenes which he had come so far to behold. A spirited and graphic description of the forest, the prairie, and of the half and wholly savage life which he had seen during this visit to the wilds of the 'far west,' appeared in 1836, under the name of Astoria,' and a sequel in 1837 succeeded it, with the title of Captain Bonneville.' France and America present a political phenomenon which does not find a parallel in Great Britain. Men of letters are often chosen, upon the ground of their literary and moral capacities, to occupy offices of trust, and fill high legislative and diplomatic stations. We could not point to a British author who owes to his talents a seat in the House of Commons, or who ever was privileged to interfere with politics in more than an editorial capacity. Monarchical France has taken her ministers and ambassadors from the closets of the hommes des lettres, and republican France and America have erected authors into prominent directors of their political sovereignties. Washington Irving, in his youth, had been employed as attaché to the Spanish legation; in his riper years he was appointed representative of the American republic to the court of Madrid-a situation, the duties of which his brilliant abilities, his sterling virtues, and his elevated urbanity, enabled him to discharge with credit and eclat.

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Several years ago, the death of a citizen of New York placed at the disposal of the surprised author a handsome fortune, which enabled him to retire from the labours of political life to that elegant yet simple rusticity so conge nial to his tastes and nature, and to gratify his gentle benevolence, as well as his longing for the life-giving leisure so essential to the cultivation of literature. The person who bequeathed this fortune to Washington Irving did not know him in person; he knew that part of him, however,

which was superior to personality-that soul which, breathing in his works, found entrance to the deepest fountains of the world's hearts, and stirred them up to love mankind in general, and himself in particular. Washington Irving yet lives in his native state, to adorn humanity with his virtues, and exalt it by his example. He is admired and loved by all who can appreciate the English language in its purest and most elegant combinations, and adapted to the finest thoughts, and who have been privileged to call him friend.

One beautiful characteristic of the books of Washington Irving is that they are consistent representations of himself. The elegance and purity of his style are rescripts of the elegance of his manners and the purity of his morals; and the fresh sympathetic sweetness of his written sentiments is but the effusion of his noble good heart. In wit and humour he resembles Sterne; but it cannot be said of him as it was said of the author of the Sentimental Journey,' that he could weep for an ass, yet smile as his mother wept.' The essays of Washington Irving have been compared to those of Addison for richness and variety of fancy, and for classic delicacy of style; while in vigour of composition and variety of sparkling metaphor they excel those of the author of the Vicar of Wakefield.' It is certain that Washington Irving has cultivated style with as much care as did the essayists of the Spectator' and Tatler;' but at the same time he has cultivated those sentiments upon which style is essentially dependent. Style is abstractly the peculiar manner in which a writer develops his conceptions through the medium of language; but at the same time it possesses attributes independent of words. Words themselves are insufficient to characterise the thoughts of a writer, and must possess some peculiarity of form and combination dictated by the writer's feelings, and, when written, representative of those feelings, before they can be designated as a peculiar style. Some styles are acquired, others are spontaneous; the latter belongs to what is termed genius, and of that character is Washington Irving's. It was dictated by his heart, modified by his taste, and not only became the vehicle of his conceptions, but of his sentiments also. We know of no living author who resembles Washington Irving so much as Dickens in sly humour and genial sympathies, and of no dead one with whose modes of feeling, thought, and expression his so coincide as with those of Sterne. No man in America has sought so earnestly to create a friendly feeling with Great Britain as Washington Irving, and as an individual, perhaps no one has so eminently conduced to effect so patriotic and so noble a purpose. Although devotedly attached to his country, and proud of his country's institutions, he was not wedded to the follies or crimes of his nation, nor had he any sympathy for the demagogueism that was not only political but literary.

The contents of his Sketch-Book' had appeared in an American periodical, but it was left to the author to reap the advantage arising from a republication of that popular work in this country, whose writers had been less honourably and ceremoniously used by the trade' of the United States. British booksellers were gentlemen as well as British authors. They repudiated transatlantic piratage, they disclaimed all sympathy with it in their own land; and seeing and feeling this principle as an author, Washington Irving sought to inoculate his countrymen with it as a patriot. Superior to the despicable subterfuge that would sustain the rejection of an international copyright law upon the plea of British enmity to republican institutions, he sought to render his country's laws, in reference to literature, more accordant with the spirit of the great republic of letters. There are writers in America who aspirate for the nationality' of American literature, and seem as though they desired the invention of a new language, in order to destroy the popular vehicle by which their country's mind becomes conventionalised according to the model of British thought. Washington Irving knows that so long as we speak the common language of Milton and Scott, and so long as we can claim a common ancestry, so long will there be community of literature, which is the