without finding a dozen classics." "I ask boldly the question, what is there in the classics, that is realy instructiv and interesting?" He asks triumphantly -the ignorance is amazing,-"What orator ever prepared himself for parliamentary combat over the pages of Cicero or Demosthenes?" 'Having dispos'd of the orators and historians, let us now attend to the classic poets, of what value are they? I answer of none, so far as useful knowlege is concerned; for all must admit, that none is to be found in this class of writers. It is plain that truth is a very minor concern, with writers of fiction. * I am strangely mistaken, if there be not more power, fidelity, and beauty in Walter Scott, than in a dozen Homers and Virgils. *** Mrs. Hemans has written a greater number of charming little pieces, than are to be found in Horace and Anacreon." The activity of Grimké's mind was sometimes in advance of his judgment. He was a happy man in his life,-his benevolence, and the ardor of his pursuits filling his heart. His death was received with every token of respect at Charleston, the preamble to the resolutions of the bar declaring his mild face will no longer be seen among us, but the monuments of his public usefulness and benevolence are still with us, and the memory of his virtues will still dwell within our hearts."* The introduction of the Bible into schools was a favorite idea with him, which he urged in his Phi Beta address. He wrote occasional verses, and a descriptive poem on the Passaic, which is unpublished. As a speaker, he showed great readiness in a copious and fluent style. A brother of the preceding, Frederick Grimké, is the author of a popular political text-book, entitled The Nature and Tendency of Free Institutions, published in Cincinnati in 1848. SAMUEL FARMAR JARVIS. SAMUEL FARMAR, the son of the Rev. Dr. Abraham Jarvis, afterwards bishop of the diocese of Connecticut, was born at Middletown in that State, January 20, 1787. He was educated under the care of his father, and entered the Sophomore class of Yale College in 1802. He was ordained deacon March 18, 1810, and priest April 5, 1811, by his father, and became, in 1813, the rector of St. Michael's Church, Bloomingdale, New York. In 1819 he was appointed Professor of Biblical Learning in the recently organized General Theological Seminary, a position he retained until his removal in 1820 to Boston, in acceptance of a call to the rectorship of St. Paul's church, where he remained until July, 1826, when he sailed for Europe. He remained abroad until 1835, pursuing his studies and collecting books connected with ecclesiastical history. Six of the nine years of his absence were passed in Italy. On his return he filled for two years the professorship of Oriental Literature in Washington College, Hartford. In 1837 he removed to Middletown to take charge, as rector, of Christ church in that place. He resigned this position in 1842, and devoted the remainder of his life to a work which he had commenced immediately after his return from Eu rope. This was a history of the church, a work Collection of Addresses, &c., by Grimké, and Obituary Notices furnished by his family in the Boston Athenæum. especially intrusted to his hands by a vote of the General Convention of the dioceses of the United States, constituting him "Historiographer of the Church." The first portion of his work published, appeared at New York, in 1845, in an octavo volume entitled, A Chronological Introduction to the History of the Church, with an Original Harmony of the Four Gospels.* A great portion of this learned volume is occupied with chronological tables, dissertations on the dates of our Lord's birth, which he places in the year of Rome 747, six years before the commonly received Christian era. In the Harmony of the Gospels the information the narratives contain is given in a consecutive form, embodying the facts but not the words of Scripture; while in four parallel columns at the side, reference is given to the chapter and verse of each of the Evangelists in which the event described is recorded. The first volume of the historyt itself was published in 1850. In it the author traces the course of the divine providence from the fall of Adam, the flood, the calling of Abraham, and the entire Jewish history, to the destruction of Jerusalem by Titus. While the same scrupulous regard to fact is manifested in this as in the introduction, the literary skill, for which no opportunity was afforded in the first, is used to good advantage in the second, the narrative being well written as well as accurate. In the author's own simile, the first volume is the rough stone-work of the foundation, the second is the elaborated superstructure which must satisfy, so far as it can, the eye of the artist as well as the mechanic. In addition to his history, Dr. Jarvis published, in 1821, a discourse on Regeneration, with notes; in 1837, on Christian Unity; and in 1843, a collection of Sermons on Prophecy, a work of great research, forming a volume of about two hundred pages. In 1843 he also issued a pamphlet entitled, No Union with Rome; in 1846 a sermon, The Colonies of Heaven; and in 1847 a volume containing a Reply to Dr. Milner's End of Religious Controversy. He also contributed a number of learned and valuable articles to the Church Review. His progress in the History of the Church and the other useful labors of his life, was interrupted by his death, March 26, 1851. Dr. Jarvis was a fine classical as well as biblical scholar. He also took a great interest in Art, and collected during his European residence a large gallery of old paintings, mostly of the Italian school, which were exhibited on his return for the benefit of a charitable association, and were again collected after his death in the city of New York to be dispersed by the auctioneer's hammer, with the large and valuable library, which included a number of volumes formerly owned by the historian Gibbon. * A Chronological Introduction to the History of the Church, being a new inquiry into the True Dates of the Birth and Death of Our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ; and containing an original Harmony of the Four Gospels, now first arranged in the order of time, by the Rev. 8. F. Jarvis, D.D., LL.D. New York: Harper & Brothers. 1845. 8vo. pp. 618. The Church of the Redeemed, or the History of the Mediatorial Kingdom, 2 vols. containing the First Five Periods; from the Fall of Adam in Paradise to the Rejection of the Jews and the Calling of the Gentiles. By the Rev. S. F. Jarvis, D.D., LL.D. Boston: Charles Stimpson. 1850. 8vo. pp. 662. * WILLIAM CRAFTS. WILLIAM CRAFTS was born at Charleston, S. C., Jan. 24, 1787. "Owing," says his anonymous biographer, somewhat grandiloquently, "to the precarious and evanescent character of the schools in Charleston," his early education suffered somewhat from the frequent change of teachers. He appears to have made up for juvenile disadvantages when in the course of education he reached Harvard, as he had a fair reputation there as a classical scholar, and judging from his advice subsequently to a younger brother, went still deeper into the ancient languages. "I hope," he writes, "that you will not treat the Hebrew tongue with that cold neglect and contemptuous disdain which it usually meets at Cambridge, and which is very much like the treatment a Jew receives from a Christian." His chief reputation among his fellows was as a wit and pleasant companion. He returned to Charleston, was admitted in due course to practice, and the remainder of his life was passed in the duties of his profession and those of a member of the State Legislature, to which he was frequently elected. He was a ready speaker, and a large portion of the volume of his Literary Remainst consists of his orations on patriotic occasions. In 1817, he delivered the Phi Beta Kappa address at Harvard. These productions, as well as his prose essays, are somewhat too florid in style and deficient in substance for permanent recollection. Passages, however, occur of pleasing ornament and animation. jm Crafts The His poems are few and brief. The two longest are Sullivan's Island, a pleasant description of that ocean retreat, and The Raciad, in which the humors of the ring are depicted. An extract from "Kitty" follows, on the plea that "in New York they have Fanny, in Boston Sukey, and why should we not have Kitty in Charleston!" There are also several agreeable lyrics. Monody on the Death of Decatur was written immediately after the intelligence of the Commodore's death was received, and published the day following, a circumstance which should not be forgotten in a critical estimate. It is not included in the collection of his writings. He also wrote The Sea Serpent; or Gloucester Hoax, a dramatic jeu d'esprit in three acts, published in a pamphlet of 34 pages 12mo. Crafts was a constant writer for the Charleston Courier, and a number of his communications, some mere scraps, are printed in the volume of his "writings," but call for no especial remark. Crafts died at Lebanon Springs, N. Y., Sept. 23, 1826. The fallen conqueror of the wave- Come, savage, from the Lybian shore, Britannia!-noble-hearted foe- It shook with thunder-and it streamed with blood For Blakely, slumbering in victorious sleep, Long shall our nation boast-for ever mourn for thee. Another hero meets his doom; Thou starry streamer! symbol of the brave, ELIZA LESLIE ELIZA LESLIE was born in Philadelphia, November 15, 1787. Her father was of Scotch descent, the family having emigrated to America about 1745, and was by profession a watchmaker. He was an excellent mathematician, and an intimate friend of Franklin and Jefferson, by the latter of whom he was made a member of the American Philosophical Society. He had five children, the eldest of whom is the subject of this sketch. Another is Charles R. Leslie, who has passed the greater portion of his life in England, and holds the foremost rank among the painters of that country, his line of art being somewhat analogous to that of his sister in literature, a like kindly and genuine humor and artistic finish pervading his cabinet pictures and her "Pencil Sketches." Her other brother is Major Thomas J. Leslie, U. S. A. When Miss Leslie was five years old she accompanied her parents to London, where they resided for six and a half years, her father being engaged in the exportation of clocks to this country. The death of his partner led to his return. On the voyage home the ship put into Lisbon, and remained at that port from November to March. They finally reached Philadelphia in May. The father died in 1803. Miss Leslie early displayed a taste for books and drawing. She was educated for the most part at home by her parents. "Like most authors," she says in an autobiographical letter to her friend Mrs. Neal, "I made my first attempts in verse. They were always songs, adapted to the popular airs of that time, the close of the last century. The subjects were chiefly soldiers, sailors, hunters, and nuns. I scribbled two or three in the pastoral line, but my father once pointing out to me a real shepherd, in a field somewhere in Kent, I made no farther attempt at Damons and Strephons playing Elica Leslie Miss Leslie did not appear in print until the year 1827, and then it was as the author of Seventy-five Receipts for Pastry, Cakes, and Sweetmeats. The collection had been commenced some time before, "when a pupil of Mrs. Goodfellow's cooking school, in Philadelphia," and was in such request in manuscript that an offer to publish was eagerly accepted. The book was successful, and the publisher suggesting a work of imagination, the author prepared The Mirror, a collection of juvenile stories. It was followed by The Young Americans, Stories for Emma, Stories for Adelaide, Atlantic Tales, Stories for Helen, Birthday Stories, and a compilation from Munchausen, Gulliver, and Sinbad, appropriately entitled The Wonderful Traveller, all voluines designed for children. The American Girl's Book was published in 1831, and has steadily maintained its position since. Among the first of her stories for readers "of a larger growth" was Mrs. Washington Potts, written for a prize offered by the Lady's Book, which it was successful in obtaining. The author subsequently took three more prizes of a similar character, and at once became a constant and most popular contributor to "Godey and Graham." Miss Leslie also edited the Gift, one of the best of the American annuals. Her only story occupying a volume by itself, and approaching the ordinary dimensions of a novel, is Amelia; or, A Young Lady's Vicissitudes. Miss Leslie's magazine tales have been collected in three volumes with the title of Pencil Sketches. She has also published Althea Vernon, or the Embroidered Handkerchief, and Henrietta Harrison, or the Blue Cotton Umbrella, in one volume; and, each in a separate pamphlet, Kitty's Relations, Leonilla Lynmore, The Maid of Canal Street, and The Dennings and their Beaux. During her career as a tale writer Miss Leslie has not forgotten the unctuous and delectable teachings of Mrs. Goodfellow, and has followed up the success of the seventy-five receipts by a much greater number, in The Domestic Cookery Book, 1837, of which over forty thousand copies have been sold; The House Book, 1840; and The Lady's Receipt Book, 1846, which have also had great success. In 1853 she published The Behavior Book, one of her pleasantest volumes, combining the solid good advice of her works on domestic duties with the happy vein of humor of her sketches. THE MONTAGUES IN AMERICA-FROM MRS. WASHINGTON POTTS. "Pray, sir," said Mrs. Quimby, "as you are from England, do you know anything of Betsey Dempsey's husband?” "I have not the honor of being acquainted with that person," replied Mr. Montague, after a withering stare. "Well, that's strange," pursued Aunt Quimby, "considering that she has been living in London at least eighteen years-or perhaps it is only seventeen! And yet I think it must be near eighteen, if not quite. May be seventeen and a half. Well, it's best to be on the safe side, so I'll say seventeen. Betsey Dempsey's mother was an old schoolmate of mine. Her father kept the Black Horse tavern. She was the only acquaintance I ever had that married an Englishman. He was a grocer, and in very good business; but he never liked America, and was always finding fault with it, and so he went home, and was to send for Betsey. But he never sent for her at all; for a very good reason, which ¦ was that he had another wife in England, as most of them have no disparagement to you, sir." Mrs. Marsden now came up, and informed Mrs. Potts in a whisper that the good old lady beside her was a distant relation or rather connexion of Mr. Marsden's, and that though a little primitive in appearance and manner, she had considerable property in bank-stock. To Mrs. Marsden's proposal that she should exchange her seat for a very pleasant one in the other room next to her old friend Mrs. Willis, Aunt Quimby replied nothing but “Thank you, I'm doing very well here." Mrs. and Miss Montague, apparently heeding no one else, had talked nearly the whole evening to each other, but loudly enough to be heard by all around them. The young lady, though dressed as a child, talked like a woman, and she and her mother were now engaged in an argument whether the flirtation of the Duke of Risingham with Lady Georgiana Melbury would end seriously or not. To my certain knowledge," said Miss Montague, "his Grace has never yet declared himself to Georgiana, or to any one else." I'll lay you two to one," said Mrs. Montague, "that he is married before we return to England.” "No," replied the daughter, "like all others of his sex he delights in keeping the ladies in suspense.” "What you say, Miss, is very true," said Aunt Quimby, leaning in her turn across Mr. Montague, " and considering how young you are you talk very sensibly. Men certainly have a way of keeping women in suspense, and an unwillingness to answer questions even when we ask them. There's my son in-law Billy Fairfowl, that I live with. He married my daughter Mary eleven years ago, the 23d of last April. He's as good a man as ever breathed, and an excellent provider too. He always goes to market himself; and sometimes I can't help blaming him a little for his extravagance. But his greatest fault is his being so unsatisfactory. As far back as last March, as I was sitting at my knitting in the little front parlor with the door open (for it was quite warm weather for the time of year), Billy Fairfowl came home carrying in his hand a good sized shad; and I called out to him to ask him what he gave for it, for it was the very beginning of the shad season; but he made not a word of answer; he had just passed on, and left the shad in the kitchen, and then went to his store. At dinner we had the fish, and a very nice one it was; and I asked him again how much he gave for it, but he still avoided answering, and began to talk about something else; so I thought I'd let it rest awhile. A week or two after, I again asked him; so then he actually said he had forgotten all about it. And to this day I don't know the price of that shad." The Montagues looked at each other-almost laughed aloud, and drew back their chairs as far from Aunt Quimby as possible. So also did Mrs. Potts. Mrs. Marsden came up in an agony of vexation, and reminded her aunt in a low voice of the risk of renewing her rheumatism by staying so long between the damp newly-papered walls. The old lady answered aloud, "Oh! you need not fear, I am well wrapped up on purpose. And indeed considering that the parlors were only papered to-day, I think the walls have dried wonderfully (putting her hands on the paper)-I am sure nobody could find out the damp if they were not told." "What!" exclaimed the Montagues; "only papered to-day (starting up and testifying all that prudent fear of taking cold, so characteristic of the English). How barbarous to inveigle us into such a place!" "I thought I felt strangely chilly all the evening,” says Mrs. Potts, whose fan had scarcely been at rest five minutes. The Montagues proposed going away immediately, and Mrs. Potts declared she was most apprehensive for poor little Lafayette. Mrs. Marsden, who could not venture the idea of their departing till all the refreshments had been handed round (the best being yet to come), took great pains to persuade them that there was no real cause of alarm, as she had large fires all the afternoon. They held a whispered consultation, in which they agreed to stay for the oysters and chicken salad, and Mrs. Marsden went out to send them their shawls, with one for Lafayette. By this time the secret of the newly-papered walls had spread round both rooms; the conversation now turned entirely on colds and rheumatisms; there was much shivering and considerable coughing, and the demand for shawls increased. However nobody actually went home in consequence. "Papa," said Miss Montague, "let us all take French leave as soon as the oysters and chickensalad have gone round." Albina now came up to Aunt Quimby (gladly perceiving that the old lady looked tired), and proposed that she should return to her chamber, assuring her that waiters should be punctually sent up to her "I do not feel quite ready to go yet," replied Mrs. Quimby. "I am very well. But you need not mind me. Go back to your company, and talk a little to those three poor girls in the yellow frocks that nobody has spoken to yet except Bromley Cheston. When I am ready to go I shall take French leave, as these English people call it.” But Aunt Quimby's idea of French leave was very different from the usual acceptation of the term; for having always heard that the French were a very polite people, she concluded that their manner of taking leave must be particularly respectful and ceremonious. Therefore, having paid her parting compliments to Mrs. Potts and the Montagues, she walked all round the room, courtesying to everybody and shaking hands, and telling them she had come to take French leave. To put an end to this ridiculous scene, Bromley Cheston (who had been on assiduous duty all the evening) now came forward, and, taking the old lady's arm in his, offered to escort her up stairs. Aunt Quimby was much flattered by this unexpected civility from the finestlooking young man in the room, and she smilingly departed with him, complimenting him on his politeness, and assuring him that he was a real gentleman, and trying also to make out the degree of relationship that existed between them. "So much for Buckingham," said Cheston, as he ran down stairs after depositing the old lady at the door of her room. "Fools of all ranks and of all ages are to me equally intolerable. I never can marry into such a family." The party went on. "In the name of heaven, Mrs. Potts," said Mrs. Montague, "what induces you to patronize these people?" Why, they are the only tolerable persons in the neighborhood," answered Mrs. Potts, "and very kind and obliging in their way. I really think Albina a very sweet girl, very sweet, indeed; and Mrs. Marsden is rather amiable too, quite amiable. And they are so grateful for any little notice I take of them that it is really quite affecting. Poor things! how much trouble they have given themselves in getting up this party. They look as if they had had a hard day's work; and I have no doubt they will be obliged in consequence to pinch themselves for months to come: for I can assure you their means are very small, very small, indeed. As to this intolerable old aunt, I never saw her before, and as there is something rather genteel about Mrs. Marsden and her daughter-rather so, at least, about Albina-I did not suppose they had any such relations belonging to them. I think, in future, I must confine myself entirely to the aristocracy." "We deliberated to the last moment," said Mrs. Montague," whether we would come. But as Mr. Montague is going to write his tour when we return to England, he thinks it expedient to make some sacrifices for the sake of seeing the varieties of American society." "Oh! these people are not in society," exclaimed Mrs. Potts, eagerly. "I can assure you these Marsdens have not the slightest pretensions to society. Oh! no; I beg of you not to suppose that Mrs. Marsden and her daughters are at all in society." RICHARD HENRY DANA. THE family of Mr. Dana is one of the oldest and most honored in Massachusetts. The first of the name who came to America was Richard Dana, in 1640; he settled at Cambridge, where six generations of the family have since resided. The poet's grandfather on this side of the house, Richard, was a patriot of the times preceding the Revolution, and known at the bar as an eminent lawyer. His son was Francis Dana the Minister to Russia, and Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of Massachusetts, a man of honor, high personal sense of character, and of energetic eloquence. He married a daughter of William Ellery of Rhode Island, the signer of the Declaration of Independence, by which union his son and the celebrated Dr. Channing were cousins. Judge Ellery once described to his grandson, the poet, the aroused sense of honor which he witnessed in Francis Dana, in his rebuke of an impudent lawyer at the bar, who had charged him with an unfair management of the case. "In opening his reply to the jury," said Mr. Ellery, "he came down upon the creature; he did it in two or three minutes' time, and then dropped him altogether. I thought,' added he, "I felt my hair rise and stand upright on my head while he did it."* On the mother's side Dana's family runs up to the early poetess Anne Bradstreet, the daughter of Governor Dudley. His grandfather Ellery married the daughter of Judge Remington, who had married the daughter of that quaint disciple of Du Bartas. Dana's uncle, Judge Edmund Trowbridge, also married one of the Dudley family. The writer of the biographical notice of R. H. Dana, Jr., in Livingston's Sketches of Eminent American Lawyers (Part iv. 702), thus characterizes the old school of Federalism to which Francis Dana belonged. "He possessed a large fortune for that day, chiefly in lands, and kept up, in his manner of life, the style of the olden time, which has almost passed out of the memory of our degenerate age. He used to ride to court in his coach, and would have thought it undignified to travel the circuits unattended by his private servant. In politics he was what would now be styled a high-toned Federalist of the old school-though the words imply far more than the mere adherence to certain political views, and siding with a particular political party. They have a much broader signification. The old Federal gentry of New England was chiefly composed of educated men, whose minds had been cultivated by the study of the eminent English lawyers, and who still retained some of the feelings of their own immediate ancestors. It must be confessed that they looked upon themselves less as the representatives, than as the temporal guardians of the people. They endeavoured to preserve what they conceived to be necessary distinctions in society, and in the municipal movements of government. They had a notion that the accidents of birth and education imposed upon them peculiar duties in the commonwealth-the duties of restraining the mass of the people by the force of dignity, and elevating them by their example. The honor of the state, the direction of its energies, the regulation of its manners, the security of its laws, and the solemnities of its religious observ. |