be getting worse and worse, when Waverley appeared. This admirable production gave a new impulse to the old stagers, and called out a whole army of new story-tellers, some of whom seem to have secured a permanent seat by the fire-side. Among the writers of this school, the Author of Brambletye House is by far the best. In knowledge of character and costume, he is but little below his master, though he comes far short of him in vigour, richness, and, of course, originality. We took peculiar pleasure in his narrative, when we found him calling up and causing to pass before us, some of our old favourites; and when he introduced us to Izaak Walton on the banks of the Lea, though we missed the inimitable charm of the honest angler's frank garrulity, we felt every disposition to cavil completely quelled. In one particular, he has succeeded, where the very superiority of his master would have disqualified for success. The heartless and unintellectual buffoonery of the court of Charles II. is represented to the life. The elaborate attempts at raising a joke, the cordial reception given to the emptiest and most barren jests, the license given to frolics too absurd for a schoolboy's mirth; all this is given with excellent tact, and here, we think, the higher genius would have failed.

The Hearts of Steel is a marked but not, we think, a happy imitation of the same master. The writer is, evidently, a man of talent, but he is not, on the whole, expert in the management of fictitious narrative and dialogue. He is forced and unnatural, and produces effect by violence, rather than by dexterity. He has a half-hanged hero and a half-ravished heroine; and the scenes in which they are represented as in the power of Forsythe, independently of a very unpleasant tinge of grossness, are worked up in the worst possible style of the vulgar horrific, and would have prodigious éclat in a new getting up of Three fingered Jack. This novel is described in the preface, as one of a series intended to delineate the character, objects, ' and proceedings of each of the principal insurrectionary confederacies that have, for the last two hundred and fifty years, ' afflicted Ireland.' The Hearts of Steel' was the designation of a daring association,' formed in Ulster, during the earlier part of the late reign, for the purpose of resisting the attempts then making to introduce the oppressive system that has proved so injurious to the other provinces of Ireland. We could have wished that a different form had been chosen for the communication of the facts which the Writer has collected in illustration of the insurrectionary history of Ireland; since we are persuaded that they would have appeared to much greater advantage in the simple garb of truth, than in the ill-adjusted drapery of

fiction. The following statement, though not so exclusively original as the Author seems to think, is important.

'The scenes of the history now submitted to the public, are, like those of " O'Halloran," chiefly laid in the North of Ireland; but the transactions it narrates, are of a date thirty years anterior to those embraced by that work. The majority of the actors in both works belonged to the population of Ulster; the lower and middle classes of whom speak a dialect very similar to that spoken by the Scotch Lowlanders, from whom they are mostly descended. The more perceptible shades of difference between these dialects, consist in the tone and turn of the expression, and the structure of sentences, rather than in the pronunciation of the words, although in this there is also a frequent dissimilarity.

This is a fact relative to the language of nearly two millions of the people of Ireland, which seems scarcely to be known in other countries. Indeed, the degree of ignorance which Irishmen find to exist abroad, in relation to the character and condition of their country and its inhabitants, often surprises them, and, to such as have never travelled from their native island, is scarcely credible. It would seem as if no other idea could be entertained of an Irishman, than that of a rash, superstitious, although sometimes shrewd ignoramus, who can neither speak without making a bull, nor act without making a blunder. It is imagined that the Irish are all Papists and bog-trotters. It is forgot, or rather in most instances it is not known, that in the province of Ulster alone, nearly two millions of people, at least onefourth of the population of the whole Island, are neither the one nor the other.

The characteristics of the immense population of Ulster seem, indeed, by some strange oversight, never to be taken into account by either orators, historians, or travellers, when speaking of Irishmen. The world is scarcely ever informed, that an industrious, prosperous, and intelligent race of men, equal in number to the whole population of Scotland, inhabit the Northern province of Ireland, who possess scarcely a single trait of character resembling that compound of turbulence, rudeness, ignorance, superstition, servility, and awkwardness, which, in the conception of foreigners, constitutes the half-civilized being called an Irishman.' Preface, pp. vi.—viii.

'Woodstock,' although not equal to the more successful efforts of its gifted Author, is an interesting production, founded on the supposed remains of Rosamond's Labyrinth, and on their equally suppositious application to the purposes of a shrewd machinator.

It is highly probable that a singular piece of phantasmagoria, which was certainly played off upon the commissioners of the Long Parliament, who were sent down to dispark and destroy Woodstock, after the death of Charles I., was conducted by means of the secret passages and recesses in the ancient Labyrinth of Rosamond, around which successive monarchs had erected a Hunting-seat or Lodge.

There is a curious account of the disturbance given to those Honourable Commissioners, inserted by Doctor Plot in his Natural History of Oxfordshire. But, as I have not the book at hand, I can only allude to the work of the celebrated Glanville upon Witches, who has extracted it as a highly accredited narrative of supernatural dealings. The beds of the Commissioners, and their servants, were hoisted up till they were almost inverted, and then let down again so suddenly, as to menace them with broken bones. Unusual and horrible noises disturbed those sacrilegious intromitters with royal property. The devil, on one occasion, brought them a warming-pan; on another, pelted them with stones and horses bones. Tubs of water were emptied on them in their sleep; and so many other pranks of the same nature played at their expense, that they broke up housekeeping, and left their intended spoliation only half completed. The good sense of Dr. Plot suspected, that these feats were wrought by conspiracy and confederation, which Glanville of course endeavours to refute with all his might; for it could scarce be expected, that he who believed in so convenient a solution as that of supernatural agency, would consent to relinquish the service of a key which will answer any lock, however intricate. Nevertheless, it was afterwards discovered, that Dr. Plot was perfectly right; and that the only demon who wrought all these marvels, was a disguised royalist-a fellow called Trusty Joe, or some such name, formerly in the service of the Keeper of the Park, but who engaged in that of the Commissioners, on purpose to subject them to his persecution.'

The principal characters are taken from among the leading men of that eventful time. Cromwell and Charles II., the latter under the disguise of a Scots page, figure conspicuously in the scene, and are portrayed with the Author's accustomed force. The selfish libertinism of the prince is fairly enough exhibited, and his amiable qualities are made the most of, with an allowable partiality. The Protector is brought forward with much skill, and his humanity, intrepidity, and decision are displayed without reserve, though in other respects we can trace somewhat of a disposition to shew him off in a ridiculous point of view. The first interview between Oliver and Wildrake is vigorously sketched, and we should have transcribed part of it, had we not determined to make no extract from volumes which are likely to pass through the hands of so many of our readers. The subordinate characters are well managed, but, in some instances, such as those of Desborough and Harrison, the writer has indulged himself in caricature. The debauched cavalier is an admirable sketch, in which may be traced somewhat of a similar propensity. The old royalist is, we think, rather a failure; and the presbyterian hero, though, on the whole, a spirited delineation, too frequently prefers expediency to principle. The scene in which he recognises the monarch in the person of Louis Kerneguy, is excellent. 2 Z

VOL. XXV. N.S.

Art. VII. 1. A Revision and Explanation of Geographical and Hydrographical Terms. With Descriptions of Winds, Storms, Clouds, Changes which take place in the Atmosphere, &c. By John Evans, Lieut. R. N. 12mo. pp. 179. Price 6s. Bristol, 1824. 2. A Sketch of Ancient Geography. By a Lady. 12mo. pp. 166. London, 1826.

3. A Concise View of Ancient Geography. By W. H. Bond. Maps. 12mo. pp. 68. Price 4s. 6d. London. 1826.

The se

WE have put these small volumes together, for the purpose of saying briefly of the second and third, that they will be found serviceable in the business of education. cond is the more comprehensive: the third is designed as an introduction to Dr. Butler's well known work on the same subject.

Mr. Evans's is a more original production: it must have cost him much pains, and requires that we dismiss it with somewhat more of ceremony, than the preceding useful but mechanical compilations. The frequent occurrence and uncertain application of hydrographical terms, is at times a matter of annoyance to those who, like ourselves, have only a landsman's knowledge of nautical affairs; and we strongly recommend this very excellent manual as a sufficient and interesting guide. We shall support our opinion by an extract or

two.

'ROCKS.

Roc. Roche. French. Rocca. Italian. Johnson.

Are insulated masses of stone rising above the surface of the

ocean.

They are very dangerous to vessels when but a few feet above the sea, and more so when even with its surface at a distance from land.

'Sunken Rocks are those which lie beneath the surface of the sea, and are still more to be dreaded by seamen than either of the others, as there is, frequently, nothing to indicate their presence.

The charts in general use are studded with doubtful rocks, shoals and islands, said to have been discovered by various mariners, which have the term Vigie* applied to many of them.

These undetermined dangers, whether they have existence or not, keep the minds of navigators ever on the alert, and, on this account, perhaps, their supposed sites on the chart may be useful. But although we might suppose that the vessels of Maritime Europe have navigated sufficiently every part of the Atlantic, so as to have left no portion of it unknown, yet we find the same caution now

* A French word, signifying the watch (at sea) corresponding with our "look out."

thought requisite, which was practised by the early Dutch and Spanish navigators; to whose reports, perhaps, we may correctly attribute most of these doubtful dangers.

That many of these spots have existence, seems very probable; and, perhaps, it would be imprudent to be incredulous upon so nice a point, as it is better to undergo a little trouble in using due precaution on approaching their supposed situations, than to run the hazard of encountering peril from a careless disregard of them.

To shew the propriety of such conduct, we may adduce the circumstance respecting the authentication of the existence of the Esquirques in the Mediterranean, which, for a long time were considered doubtful, yet, at last proved fatal to his Majesty's ship, Athenienne, 64, her excellent captain, and the greater part of the officers and crew, in the year 1806.

'We have been informed that Captain Rainsford had doubted the existence of these rocks, from the circumstance of having cruised near the supposed position, some time previous, when commanding a brig of war, without having seen any thing that indicated such to be there. When his ship struck on them, he was examining the chart, and pointing out to his master and an officer of the army, their supposed position, observing that, if they had existence, the ship must then be close to them.

The Esquirques were determined by the survey of Captain Durban, R.N. to be in latitude 37° 47' N. and longitude 10° 46' 30" E. They are now found to consist of two reefs of very large rocks, bearing strong marks of being volcanic productions; and lying two miles north and south of each other.

As the subject is one of great interest, we shall further enlarge upon it by the addition of some instances of the fortuitous discovery of other marine dangers of the same description.

In the Crooked-Island passage, which had been the common route of our homeward-bound Jamaica fleets for many years, an isolated rock was discovered in 1807, by the Chesterfield Packet having accidentally struck upon it, when under the convoy of the Bellona Government Schooner, commanded by the late Mr. Edgecombe.

His Majesty's ship, Medusa, Captain Sir John Gore, struck upon a rock situated in the sea near Gibraltar, but which had been long considered doubtful: a similar circumstance to that related of Captain Rainsford, is told, on this occasion, of Sir John Gore. He was standing on the gang-way when his ship struck, and had just before observed to Mr. Smith, the master, that, if the Rock existed in the spot indicated by the chart, they could not be far from it.'

pp. 59-61.

From the second division, we shall extract a part of the article Hurricane.' After having given some curious calculations, made on this subject by Sir Home Popham, Mr. Evans relates from MS. authorities, the following details.

The Hurricane experienced by H. M. S. Centaur, Captain H. Whitby, was in latitude 26° 17' N. and in longitude 57° 42* W. the