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privy to the whole affair of the battle of the Point: They had no doubt, he would have been shot, the first opportunity. Whatever may have been his merit, or demerit, few men have left a name, more universally detested in Virginia, than Lord Dunmore.

MONTANUS.

MANY BOOKS.

[We copy here another pleasant paper of our friend Cæsariensis, alias, Virginiensis, which we find in a late number of the Literary World, (taken from the Newark Daily Advertiser,) and readily adopt as our own.]

What can a man do in an age and country where books are so cheap and multitudinous ? A New York cartman shall have a larger library than Alcuin or Charlemagne. Will any one attempt to read all the fine books noticed or named in the Athenæum or the Literary World? Vain endeavor! It would transcend the powers of the greatest reader living, though he were a second Coleridge or a second Southey. Not to speak of plagiarisms, abridgments, epitomes, repetitions, school-books, scissors-books, classbooks, catalogues, almanacs, transcendental lady-books, old sermons, anniversary orations, and records of pill and sarsaparilla heroes, which are out of the question, there are lively or important works enough streaming through the press to keep a man well employed till the abolition of slavery, if not till the Greek Calends. How can they be read? or what is to take the place of reading them?

In this day, when it is unpardonable for every man not to know everything, how can poor common-headed people keep up with the age? I own it, passes my poor compre

hension. Steam and gold pens have multiplied the power of production, and railways bring the literature of different countries together in vast masses; but what art has increased the cerebrum and cerebellum? What spectacles enable one to read two books at once? What bluestocking can study Heine and Sue while she makes poetry and sings to the guitar; as some belles are said to make their toilette while they despatch their devotions? Some things cannot be done. Life is short, says Hippocrates, etcetera. Overwhelmed by the irruption of so rapidly increasing a literature, and out of breath in trying to keep up with Macaulay, Lamartine, Prescott, Brewster, and Herschel, I have asked myself What way is there out of this? Shall I state some of the answers which have occurred to me?

First, there is the way of Epitome. Read abstracts and abridgments; Iliads in nutshells; merciful self-abridgments by some authors. Lord Bacon is against this. One would not like to have all his company reduced to Sir Hudson Jeffreys and Tom Thumbs; or all his orchard filled with Chinese miniatures of trees. To say truth, I would as soon think of abridging my dinner.

Secondly, there is the way of Elegant Extracts. Excellent persons, the Leigh Hunts and Charles Knights of all ages, have kindly given us bright samples, thousands of brick, out of thousands of houses. You may read through the British poets in a voyage to Charleston, and carry the American poets about as snugly as a shaving-case. But ah, one is still haunted with the capricious wish to see something of Shakspeare which is not in Dodd's Beauties. How do I know but Wordsworth has written something besides the Idiot Boy? Who shall warrant the perfect taste of the most amiable taster, in this feast of the Muses? To be plain, I love my big garden better than the best hothouse bouquet.

Thirdly, there is the way of skimming and dipping; going over books as the butterfly over flowers. I have half a notion that some of the gentlemen whom I see at Munro's and Bartlett's have found this out before me. Coleridge was a giant in this butterfly-business. It has the merit of cheapness; if an adept, you need not cut the leaves. Habitués at public libraries, briefless lawyers, patient but patientless doctors, hover over the tables of new books, and carry home their education. Göethe used to commit to memory the title page of every new book; but this method is now discarded. The skimming way bids fair to be the prevalent way, especially in cities.

How can it be otherwise? You are ashamed not to have read something in the new book. Yet I distrust the method, and have an incurable trick of going from cover to cover. The skimming does not always insure the cream.

More easily said

Fourthly, the way of sticking to a few. than done. The maxims are not hard to be uttered, non multa sed multum, &c., but when it comes to the pinch, one pines for the multa too. "A little farm well tilled," &c., does very well as a pis aller; but think of a little farm in the oak-openings! Think of a small shelf of books, when at Carey's or Putnam's! Wollaston made I know not how many discoveries with a handful of lenses and bits of glass and crystal; but we common folks need a laboratory as rich as Dr. Hare's.

Power-presses cannot make books fast enough for the "daughters of the horse-leech." It was different in days when a lawyer would read through Coke upon Littleton, and young ladies stay from hunting to peruse the Phædo in a bow-window, being caught in the manner by good mousing Master Ascham. But now, your news-critic does not take more than one cigar to the literature of a country; he shakes off the ashes and says: "There, so much for Spain;

now for Portugal." Unless an Omar should rise in the cycle of biography and bibliography, there is no hope of prevalence for the small library plan.

Lastly, there is the way of not reading at all. This is really a Gordian settlement of the difficulty. A man needs to be a good scholar to venture it; otherwise people will think him a dunce. Blind men are very good at this me. thod, as well as numerous emigrants who do not know letters; also those horse-and-dog men whom we see laboring over our meadows in shooting-jackets, agricultural clergymen, nursing fathers in physic, and lawyers who read no. thing that is not in red tape. Good Mr. Editor, before I take the total abstinence pledge, let me make an exception in favor of the Daily. CESARIENSIS.

COLONEL WILLIAM CABELL.

[Observing that several letters of Richard Henry Lee, and other distinguished men of the Revolution, were addressed to this gentleman, we applied to a friend and correspondent of ours for a brief sketch of his Life and Character, which he has, very obligingly, furnished us in the following notice.]

Col. Wm. Cabell, the Elder, of Amherst, was born in May, 1727-30, and died in the Spring of 1798.

He was, in many respects, a remarkable man; but rather distinguished for wisdom in council, and courage and energy in action, than for excellence in speech or writing. When a young man, I believe he served in some of the frontier or Indian wars. He was frequently a Burgess in the old Colonial Assembly, and was conspicuous in all the early movements which led to Independence. On the expiration of the old Government, and while a member of the Convention of 1775, he was, in July of that year, appointed a member of the Committee of Safety on whom devolved the powers of Government before the formation of the first Convention, and was reappointed to the same

office in December following. He was of great influence through this whole region of country, in which he lived, and together with his brother, (Nicholas,) did much to arouse and sustain the spirit of the people through the long and trying season which followed. His own public spirit never waned or flickered, but was kept in constant brightness to the last.

Col. C. was, for many years, the presiding magistrate of Amherst county, which then included Nelson, and, as I have been told, nothing could exceed the dignity, and impartiality, and diligence with which he discharged the du

ties of his office.

Of fine person, commanding presence and carriage, his manners were those of the Gentleman of the Old School in Virginia, which united affability with dignity, and a refinement which proceeded from self-respect and the virtues of the heart, rather than the more external and pretending graces by which those have been too often substituted in these latter times. In a word, he was, I suppose, a favorable specimen of the race of Cavaliers, as they have been termed, who contributed so much to the formation of that part of the Virginia character on which her sons now look back with most complacency. The sphere in which his activity was chiefly expended was less conspicuous than that of many of his compatriots, and, of consequence, his has been rather a provincial reputation; but it was believed by those who knew him, that his force of character and other qualities were such as would have commanded respect, if not success, in whatever theatre they might have been called into requisition.

Col. C. left four sons and three daughters. The eldest son, Col. Samuel J. Cabell, served with eredit in the Revolutionary war, and represented this district in Congress, from 1795 to 1803-The second, Landon C. was never in public life, but was a man of brilliant talents, and large and varied attainments.-The third, Col. Wm. C., Jun., succeeded to the family residence of Union Hill.

His daughters were the late Mrs. Legrand, of Charlotte, of pious memory,-Mrs. Rives (wife of the late Robert Rives, Sen'r, of this county,) since deceased; and Mrs. B., who is still living.

Nelson County.

N. F. C.

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