should say more or less than just enough, touched his chin once more. 'Our business is, I think, ended for the present, my lord duke,' said the queen, and, I trust, to your satisfaction. Hereafter I hope to see your grace more frequently, both at Richmond and St James's.-Come, Lady Suffolk, we must wish his grace good-morning.' They exchanged their parting reverences, and the duke, so soon as the ladies had turned their backs, assisted Jeanie to rise from the ground, and conducted her back through the avenue, which she trod with the feeling of one who walks in her sleep. storm.' 'Front-de-Boeuf?' exclaimed Ivanhoe. 'Front-de-Bouf!' answered the Jewess; 'his men rush to the ruscue, headed by the haughty Templartheir united force compels the champion to pause. They drag Front-de-Bœuf within the walls.' The assailants have won the barriers, have they not?' said Ivanhoe. 'They have-they have!' exclaimed Rebecca-‘and they press the besieged hard upon the outer wall; some plant ladders, some swarm like bees, and endeavour to ascend upon the shoulders of each other-down go stones, beams, and trunks of trees upon their heads, and as fast as they bear the wounded to the rear, fresh men supply their places in the assault. Great God! hast thou given men thine own image, that it should be thus cruelly defaced by the hands of their brethren !' 'Think not of that,' said Ivanhoe; 'this is no time for such thoughts. Who yield?-who push their way? 'The ladders are thrown down,' replied Rebecca, shuddering; 'the soldiers lie grovelling under them like crushed reptiles. The besieged have the better.' 'Saint George strike for us!' exclaimed the knight; 'do the false yeomen give way?' 'No!' exclaimed Rebecca; 'they bear themselves With patient courage, strengthened by the interval which she had employed in mental devotion, Rebecca again took post at the lattice, sheltering herself, how-right yeomanly-the Black Knight approaches the ever, so as not to be visible from beneath. 'What dost thou see, Rebecca?' again demanded the wounded knight. 'Nothing but the cloud of arrows flying so thick as to dazzle mine eyes, and to hide the bowmen who shoot them.' 'That cannot endure,' said Ivanhoe; 'if they press not right on to carry the castle by pure force of arms, the archery may avail but little against stone walls and bulwarks. Look for the Knight of the Fetterlock, fair Rebecca, and see how he bears himself; for as the leader is, so will his followers be.' 'I see him not,' said Rebecca. 'Foul craven!' exclaimed Ivanhoe; does he blench from the helm when the wind blows highest?' 'He blenches not! he blenches not!' said Rebecca; 'I see him now; he leads a body of men close under the outer barrier of the barbican.-They pull down the piles and palisades; they hew down the barriers with axes. His high black plume floats abroad over the throng, like a raven over the field of the slain.-They have made a breach in the barriers-they rush in-they are thrust back!-Front-de-Boeuf heads the defenders; I see his gigantic form above the press. They throng again to the breach, and the pass is disputed hand to hand, and man to man. God of Jacob! it is the meeting of two fierce tides-the conflict of two oceans moved by adverse winds!' She turned her head from the lattice, as if unable longer to endure a sight so terrible. Front-de "Look forth again, Rebecca,' said Ivanhoe, mistaking the cause of her retiring; the archery must in some degree have ceased, since they are now fighting hand to hand.-Look again; there is now less danger.' Rebecca again looked forth, and almost immediately exclaimed: Holy prophets of the law! Boeuf and the Black Knight fight hand to hand on the breach, amid the roar of their followers, who watch the progress of the strife.-Heaven strike with the cause of the oppressed and of the captive!' She then uttered a loud shriek, and exclaimed: He is down!-he is down!' 'Who is down?' cried Ivanhoe; 'for our dear Lady's sake, tell me which has fallen ?' -but no!-the name of the Lord of Hosts be blessed!-he postern with his huge axe-the thundering blows which he deals, you may hear them above all the din and shouts of the battle. Stones and beams are hailed down on the bold champion-he regards them no more than if they were thistle-down or feathers!' By Saint John of Acre,' said Ivanhoe, raising himself joyfully on his couch, methought there was but one man in England that might do such a deed!' 'The postern gate shakes,' continued Rebecca; 'it crashes-it is splintered by his blows-they rush in-the outwork is won. O God!-they hurl the defenders from the battlements-they throw them into the moatO men, if ye be indeed men, spare them that can resist no longer!' 'The bridge-the bridge which communicates with the castle-have they won that pass?' exclaimed Ivanhoe. 'No,' replied Rebecca; the Templar has destroyed the plank on which they crossed-few of the defenders escaped with him into the castle-the shrieks and cries which you hear tell the fate of the others. Alas! I see it is still more difficult to look upon victory than upon battle.' JOHN GALT, JOHN GALT, author of The Annals of the Parish and other novels which are valuable as reflecting the peculiarities of Scottish life and manners 'sixty years since,' was a native of Irvine, in Ayrshire. He was born on the 2d of May 1779. His father commanded a West India vessel; and when the embryo novelist was in his eleventh year, the family went to live permanently at Greenock. Here Galt resided fourteen or fifteen years, displaying no marked proficiency at school, but evincing a predilection for poetry, music, and mechanics. He was placed in the custom-house at Greenock, and continued at the desk till about the year 1804, when, without any fixed pursuit, he went to London to 'push his fortune." He had written a sort of epic poem on the Battle of Largs, and this he committed to the press; but conscious of its imperfections, he did not prefix his name to the work, and he almost immediately suppressed it. Galt then formed an unfortunate com The Black Knight,' answered Rebecca, faintly; then instantly again shouted with joyful eagerness: But no is on foot again, and fights as if there were twenty men's strength in his single arm. His sword is broken-he snatches an axe from a yeoman-he presses Front-de-mercial connection, which lasted three years, on Boeuf with blow on blow. The giant stoops and totters like an oak under the steel of the woodman-he fallshe falls!' the termination of which he entered himself of Lincoln's Inn, with the view of being in due time called to the bar. Happening to visit Oxford in company with some friends, he conceived, while standing with them in the quadrangle of Christchurch, the design of writing a Life of Cardinal Wolsey. He set about the task with ardour; but his health failing, he went abroad. At Gibraltar, Galt met with Lord Byron and Mr Hobhouse, then embarked on their tour for Greece, and the three sailed in the same packet. Galt resided some time in Sicily, then repaired to Malta, and afterwards proceeded to Greece, where he again met with Byron, and also had an interview with Ali Pacha. After rambling for some time among the classic scenes of Greece, Galt proceeded to Constantinople, thence to Nicomedia, and northwards to Kirpe, on the shores of the Black Sea. Some commercial speculations as to the practicability of landing British goods in defiance of the Berlin and Milan decrees, prompted these unusual wanderings. At one time, when detained by quarantine, Galt wrote or sketched six dramas, which were afterwards published in a volume, constituting, according to Sir Walter Scott, the worst tragedies ever seen.' On his return he published his Voyages and Travels, and Letters from the Levant, which were well received. Galt next repaired to Gibraltar, to conduct a commercial business which it was proposed to establish there, but the design was defeated by the success of the Duke of Wellington in the Peninsula. He explored France to see if an opening could be found there, but no prospect appeared, and returning to England, he contributed some dramatic pieces to the New British Theatre. One of these, The Appeal, was brought out at the Edinburgh theatre in 1818, and performed four nights, Sir Walter Scott having written an epilogue for the play. Among Galt's more elaborate compositions may be mentioned a Life of Benjamin West, the artist, Historical Pictures, The Wandering Jew, and The Earthquake, a novel in three volumes. He wrote for Blackwood's Magazine, in 1820, The Ayrshire Legatees, a series of letters containing an amusing Scottish narrative. His next work was The Annals of the Parish (1821), which instantly became popular. It is worthy of remark that The Annals had been written some ten or twelve years before the date of its publication, and anterior to the appearance of Waverley and Guy Mannering, and that it was rejected by the publishers of those works, with the assurance that a novel or work of fiction entirely Scottish would not take with the public! Galt went on with his usual ardour in the composition of Scotch novels. He had now found where his strength lay, and Sir Andrew Wylie, The Entail, The Steam-boat, and The Provost, were successively published-the first two with decided success. These were followed at no long intervals by Ringan Gilhaize, a story of the Scottish Covenanters; by The Spaewife, a tale of the times of James I. of Scotland; and Rothelan, a novel partly historical, founded on the work by Barnes on the Life and Reign of Edward 1. Galt also published anonymously, in 1824, an interesting imaginative little tale, The Omen, which was reviewed by Sir Walter Scott in Blackwood's Magazine. In fertility, Galt was only surpassed by Scott. His genius was unequal, and he does not seem to have been able to discriminate between the good and the bad. We next find Galt engaged in the formation and establishment of the Canada Company, which involved him in a 6 long labyrinth of troubles; but previous to his departure, Galt composed his novel, The Last of the Lairds, also descriptive of Scottish life. He set out for America in 1826, his mission being limited to inquiry, for accomplishing which eight months were allowed. His duties, however, were increased, and his stay prolonged, by the numerous offers to purchase lots of land, and for determining on the system of management to be pursued by the Company. A million of capital had been intrusted to his management. On the 23d of April (St George's Day) 1827, Galt proceeded to found the town of Guelph, in the Upper Province of Canada, which he did with due ceremony. The site selected for the town having been pointed out, 'a large maple-tree,' he says, was chosen; on which, taking an axe from one of the woodmen, I struck the first stroke. To me, at least, the moment was impressive; and the silence of the woods that echoed to the sound was as the sigh of the solemn genius of the wilderness departing for ever.' The city soon prospered: in three months upwards of 160 building-lots were engaged, and houses rising as fast as building materials could be prepared. Before the end of the year, however, the founder of the city was embroiled in difficulties. Some secret enemies had misrepresented him-he was accused of lowering the Company's stock-his expenditure was complained of; and the Company sent out an accountant to act not only in that capacity but as cashier. Matters came to a crisis, and Galt determined to return to England. Ample testimony has been borne to the skill and energy with which he conducted the operations of this Company; but his fortune and his prospects had fled. Thwarted and depressed, he was resolved to battle with his fate, and he set himself down in England to build a new scheme of life, in which the secondary condition of authorship was made primary.' In six months Galt had six volumes ready. His first work was another novel in three volumes, Lawrie Todd, which is equal to The Annals of the Parish or The Entail. It was well received; and he soon after produced another, descriptive of the customs and manners of Scotland in the reign of Queen Mary, and entitled Southennan. For a short time in the same year (1830) Galt conducted the Courier newspaper, but this new employment did not suit him, and he gladly left the daily drudgery to complete a Life of Byron. The comparative brevity of this memoir (one small volume), the name of Galt as its author, and the interesting nature of the subject, soon sold three or four editions of the work; but it was sharply assailed by the critics. Some of the positions taken up by the author (as that, 'had Byron not been possessed of genius, he might have been a better man'), and some quaintness and affectation of expression, exposed him to ridicule. Galt next executed a series of Lives of the Players, an amusing compilation; and Bogle Corbet, another novel, the object of which, he said, was to give a view of society generally, as The Provost was of burgh incidents simply, and of the sort of genteel persons who are sometimes found among the emigrants to the United States. Disease now invaded the robust frame of the novelist; but he wrote on, and in a short time four other works of fiction issued from his penStanley Buxton, The Member, The Radical, and His Eben Erskine. In 1832, an affection of the spine Placing of a Scottish Minister. It was a great affair; for I was put in by the patron, and the people knew nothing whatsoever of me, and and they did all that lay within the compass of their their hearts were stirred into strife on the occasion, power to keep me out, insomuch that there was obliged to be a guard of soldiers to protect the presbytery; and it was a thing that made my heart grieve when I heard the drum beating and the fife playing as we were going to the kirk. The people were really mad and vicious, and flung dirt upon us as we passed, and reviled us all, and held out the finger of scorn at me; but I endured it with a resigned spirit, compassionating their wilfulness and blindness. Poor old Mr Kilfuddy of the Braehill got such a clash of glaur [mire] on the side of his face, that his eye was almost extinguished. nailed up, so as by no possibility to be opened. The When we got to the kirk door, it was found to be sergeant of the soldiers wanted to break it, but I was afraid that the heritors would grudge and complain of the expense of a new door, and I supplicated him to let it be as it was; we were therefore obligated to go in by a window, and the crowd followed us in the most unreverent manner, making the Lord's house like an inn on a fair-day with their grievous yelly-hooing. During the time of the psalm and the sermon they behaved themselves better, but when the induction came on, their clamour was dreadful; and Thomas Thorl, the weaver, a pious zealot in that time, got up and he that entereth not by the door into the sheepfold, protested, and said: 'Verily, verily, I say unto you, but climbeth up some other way, the same is a thief and a robber.' And I thought I would have a hard and sore time of it with such an outstrapolous people. Mr Given, that was then the minister of Lugton, was a jocose man, and would have his joke even at a solemnity. When the laying of the hands upon me was a-doing, he could not get near enough to put on his, but he stretched out his staff and touched my head, and said, to the great diversion of the rest: This will do well enough timber to timber;' but it was an unfriendly saying of Mr Given, considering the time and the place, and the temper of my people. Of the long list of our author's works, the greater part are already forgotten. Not a few of his novels, however, bid fair to be permanent, and The Annals of the Parish will probably be read as long as Waverley or Guy Mannering. This inimitable little tale is the simple record of a country minister during the fifty years of his incumbency. Besides many amusing and touching incidents, the work presents us with a picture of the rise and progress of a Scottish rural village, and its transition to a manufacturing town, as witnessed by the minister, a man as simple as Abraham Adams, imbued with all old-fashioned national feelings and prejudices, but thoroughly sincere, kind-hearted, and pious. This Presbyterian worthy, the Rev. Micah Balwhidder, is a fine representative of the primitive Scottish pastor; diligent, blameless, loyal, and exemplary in his life, but without the fiery zeal and kirk-filling eloquence' of the supporters of the Covenant. Micah is easy, garrulous, fond of a quiet joke, and perfectly ignorant of the world. Little things are great to him in his retirement and his simplicity; and thus we find him chronicling, among his memorable events, the arrival of a dancing-master, the planting of a pear-tree, the getting a new bell for the kirk, the first appearance of Punch's Opera in the country-side, and other incidents of a like nature, which he mixes up indiscriminately with the breaking out of the American war, the establishment of manufactures, or the spread of French revolutionary principles. Amidst the quaint humour and shrewd observation of honest Micah are some striking and pathetic incidents. Mrs Malcolm, the widow of a Clyde shipmaster, comes to settle in his village; and being 'a genty body, calm, and methodical,' she brought up her children in a superior manner, and they all get on in the world. One of them becomes a sailor; and there are few more touching narratives in the language than the account of this cheerful, gallant-hearted lad, from his first setting off to sea, to his death as a midshipman in an engagement with the French. Taken altogether, this work of Galt's is invaluable for its truth and nature, its quiet unforced humour and pathos, its genuine nationality as a faithful record of Scottish feeling and manners, and its rich felicity of homely antique Scottish duffle apron and his red Kilmarnock night-cap-I mind Thomas was standing at the door with his green phrase and expression, which to his country-him as well as if it was but yesterday—and he had seen men is perhaps the crowning excellence of the author. In the following passage, the placing of Mr Balwhidder as minister of Dalmailing is admirably described: and it was a heavy day to me; but we went to the After the ceremony we then got out at the window, manse, and there we had an excellent dinner, which Mrs Watts of the new inn of Irville prepared at my request, and sent her chaise-driver to serve, for he was likewise her waiter, she having then but one chaise, and that not often called for. But although my people received me in this unruly manner, I was resolved to cultivate civility among them; and therefore the very next morning I began a round of visitations; but oh! it was a steep brae I found the doors in some places barred against me; that I had to climb, and it needed a stout heart, for in others, the bairns, when they saw me coming, ran crying to their mothers: Here's the feckless MessJohn;' and then, when I went in into the houses, their parents would not ask me to sit down, but with a scornful way said: 'Honest man, what's your pleasure here?' Nevertheless, I walked about from door to door, like a dejected beggar, till I got the almous deed of a civil reception, and-who would have thought it! from no less a person than the same Thomas Thorl that was so bitter against me in the kirk on the foregoing day. me going from house to house, and in what manner I was rejected, and his bowels were moved, and he said to me in a kind manner: Come in, sir, and ease yoursel'; this will never do the clergy are God's corbies, and for their Master's sake it behoves us to respect them. There was no ane in the whole parish mair against you than mysel', but this early visitation is a symptom of grace that I couldna have expectit from a bird out of the nest of patronage.' I thanked Thomas, and went in with him, and we had some solid conversation together, and I told him that it was not so much the pastor's duty to feed the flock, as to herd them well; and that, although there might be some abler with the head than me, there wasna a he within the bounds of Scotland more willing to watch the fold by night and by day. And Thomas said he had not heard a mair sound observe for some time, and that if I held to that doctrine in the poopit, it wouldna be lang till I would work a change. I was mindit,' quoth he, 'never to set my foot within the kirk door while you were there; but to testify, and no to condemn without a trial, I'll be there next Lord's day, and egg my neighbours to be likewise, so ye 'll no have to preach just to the bare walls and the laird's family.' length enabled to return to Scotland in some style. and visit the place of his nativity. This Scottish jaunt is a blemish in the work, for the incidents and descriptions are ridiculously exaggerated. But nothing can be better than the account of the early struggles of this humble hero-the American sketches of character with which the work abounds the view it gives of life in the backwoods-or the peculiar freshness and vigour that seem to accompany every scene and every movement of the story. In perception of character and motive, within a certain sphere, Galt stands unsurpassed; and he has energy as well as quickness. His taste, however, was very defective; and this, combined with the hurry and uncertainty of his latter days, led him to waste his original powers on subjects unfitted for his pen, and injurious to his reputation. The story of his life is a melancholy one; his genius was an honour to his country, and merited a better reward. The Windy Yule, or Christmas.—From The Provost. In the morning, the weather was blasty and sleety, waxing more and more tempestuous, till about mid-day, when the wind checked suddenly round from the nor-east to the sou-west, and blew a gale, as if the Prince of the powers of the air was doing his utmost to work mischief. The rain blattered, the windows clattered, the shop shutters napped, pigs from the lum-heads came rattling down Still the lift gloomed, and the wind roared; and it was as doleful a sight as ever was seen in any town afflicted with calamity, to see the sailors' wives, with their red cloaks about their heads, followed by their hirpling and disconsolate bairns, going one after another to the kirkreally sorrowful, and full of a sore anxiety to think of winners were battling with the tempest. My heart was what might happen to the town, whereof so many were in peril, and to whom no human magistracy could extend the arm of protection. Seeing no abatement of the wrath of heaven, that howled and roared around us, I put on my big coat, and taking my staff in my hand, having tied down my hat with a silk handkerchief, towards gloaming I walked likewise to the kirkyard, where I beheld such an assemblage of sorrow, as few men in situation have ever been put to the trial to witness. The Ayrshire Legatees is a story of the same cast as The Annals, and describes (chiefly by means of correspondence) the adventures of another country minister and his family on a journey to London to obtain a rich legacy left him by a cousin in India. The Provost is another portraiture of Scottish life, illustrative of the jealousies, contentions, local improvements, and jobbery of a small burgh in the olden time. Some of the descriptions in this work are very powerfully written. Sir Andrew Wylie and The Entail are more regular and ambitious performances, treble the length of the others, but not so carefully finished. The pawkie Ayrshire baronet is humorous, but not very natural. The character of Leddy Grippy in The Entail was a prodigious favourite with Byron. Both Scott and Byron, it is said, read this novel three times-no slight testimony to its merits. We should be disposed, however, to give the preference to another of Galt's three-volume fictions, Lawrie Todd, or the Settlers, a work which seems to have no parallel, since Defoe, for apparent reality, know-yard, to look at the vessels where their helpless breadledge of human nature, and fertility of invention. The history of a real individual, a man named Grant Thorburn, supplied the author with part of his incidents, as the story of Alexander Selkirk did Defoe; but the mind and the experience of Galt are stamped on almost every page. In his former productions our author wrought with his recollections of the Scotland of his youth; the mingled worth, simplicity, pawkiness, and enthusiasm which he had seen or heard of as he loitered about Irvine or Greenock, or conversed with the country sires and matrons; but in Lawrie Todd we have the fruit of his observations in the New World, presenting an entirely different and original phase of the Scottish character. Lawrie is by trade a nailmaker, who emigrates with his brother to America; and their stock of worldly goods and riches, on arriving at New York, consisted of about five shillings in money, and an old chest containing some articles of dress and other necessaries. Lawrie works hard at the nailmaking, marries a pious and industrious maiden-who soon dies-and in time becomes master of a grocer's shop, which he exchanges for the business of a seedsman. The latter is a bad affair, and Lawrie is compelled to sell all off, and begin the world again. He removes with his family to the backwoods, and once more is prosperous. He clears, builds, purchases land, and speculates to great advantage, till he is at But In the lee of the kirk many hundreds of the town were gathered together; but there was no discourse among them. The major part were sailors' wives and and the mothers drew their bairns closer in about them, weans, and at every new thud of the blast, a sob rose, as if they saw the visible hand of a foe raised to smite them. Apart from the multitude, I observed three or four young lasses, standing behind the Whinnyhill families' tomb, and jaloused that they had joes in the ships, for they often looked to the bay, with long necks and sad faces, from behind the monument. of all the piteous objects there, on that doleful evening, none troubled my thoughts more than three motherless children, that belonged to the mate of one of the vessels in the jeopardy. He was an Englishman that had been neither kith nor kin; and his wife having died about a settled some years in the town, where his family had month before, the bairns, of whom the eldest was but nine or so, were friendless enough, though both my gudewife, and other well-disposed ladies, paid them all manner of attention, till their father would come home. The three poor little things, knowing that he was in one of the ships, had been often out and anxious, and they were then sitting under the lee of a headstone, near their mother's grave, chittering and creeping closer and closer at every squall! Never was such an orphan-like sight seen. When it began to be so dark that the vessels could no longer be discerned from the churchyard, many went down to the shore, and I took the three babies home with me, and Mrs Pawkie made tea for them, and they soon began to play with our own younger children, in blithe forgetfulness of the storm; every now and then, however, the eldest of them, when the shutters rattled, and the lum-head roared, would pause in his innocent daffing, and cower in towards Mrs Pawkie, as if he was daunted and dismayed by something he knew not what. Many a one that night walked the sounding shore in sorrow, and fires were lighted along it to a great extent, but the darkness and the noise of the raging deep, and the howling wind, never intermitted till about midnight; at which time a message was brought to me, that it might be needful to send a guard of soldiers to the beach, for that broken masts and tackle had come in, and that surely some of the barks had perished. I lost no time in obeying this suggestion, which was made to me by one of the owners of the Louping Meg; and to shew that I sincerely sympathised with all those in affliction, I rose and dressed myself, and went down to the shore, where I directed several old boats to be drawn up by the fires, and blankets to be brought, and cordials prepared, for them that might be spared with life to reach the land; and I walked the beach with the mourners till the morning. As the day dawned, the wind began to abate in its violence, and to wear away from the sou-west into the norit; but it was soon discovered that some of the vessels with the corn had perished; for the first thing seen was a long fringe of tangle and grain, along the line of the high-water mark, and every one strained with greedy and grieved eyes, as the daylight brightened, to discover which had suffered. But I can proceed no further with the dismal recital of that doleful morning. Let it suffice here to be known, that, through the haze, we at last saw three of the vessels lying on their beamends, with their masts broken, and the waves riding like the furious horses of destruction over them. What had become of the other two, was never known; but it was supposed that they had foundered at their anchors, and that all on board perished. The day being now Sabbath, and the whole town idle, everybody in a manner was down on the beach, to help and mourn, as the bodies, one after another, were cast out by the waves. Alas! few were the better of my provident preparation; and it was a thing not to be described, to see, for more than a mile along the coast, the new made widows and fatherless bairns mourning and weeping over the corpses of those they loved. Seventeen bodies were, before ten o'clock, carried to the desolated dwellings of their families; and when old Thomas Pull, the betherell, went to ring the bell for public worship, such was the universal sorrow of the town, that Nanse Donsie, an idiot natural, ran up the street to stop him, crying, in the voice of a pardonable desperation: 'Wha, in sic a time, can praise the Lord!' THOMAS HOPE. THOMAS HOPE (1770-1831), the author of Anastasius, was one of the merchant-princes whom commerce led to opulence, and who repaid the compliment by ennobling his origin and pursuits with taste, munificence, and genius. He was one of three brothers, wealthy merchants in Amsterdam. When a young man, he spent some years in foreign travel, visiting the principal places in Europe, Asia, and Africa. On his return he settled in London, purchased a large house and a country mansion (Deepdene, near Dorking), and embellished both with drawings, picture-galleries, sculpture, amphitheatres for antiques, and all other rare and costly appliances. His appearances as an author arose out of these favourite occupations and studies. In 1805, he published a folio volume of drawings and descriptions, entitled Household Furniture and Decorations. The ambitious style of this work, and the author's devotion to the forms of chairs, sofas, couches, and tables, provoked a witty piece of ridicule in the Edinburgh Review; but the man of taste and virtù triumphed. A more classical and appropriate style of furniture and domestic utensils gained ground; and with Mr Hope rests the honour of having achieved the improvement. Two other splendid publications proceeded from Mr Hope, The Costume of the Ancients (1809), and Designs of Modern Costumes (1812), both works evincing extensive knowledge and curious research. In 1819, Mr Hope burst He had forth as a novelist of the first order. studied human nature as well as architecture and costume, and his early travels had exhibited to him men of various creeds and countries. The result was Anastasius, or Memoirs of a Modern Greek, written at the close of the Eighteenth Century, in three volumes. The author's name was not prefixed to the work-as it was given forth as a veritable history-but the secret soon became known, and Mr Hope, from being reputed as something like a learned upholsterer or clever draughtsman, was at once elevated into a rivalry with Byron as a glowing painter of foreign scenery and manners, and with Le Sage and the other masters of the novel, in the art of conducting a fable and delineating character. The author turned from fiction to metaphysics, and composed a work On the Origin and Prospects of Man, which he did not live to see through the press, but which was published after his decease. His cosmogony is strange and unorthodox; but amidst his paradoxes, conceits, and abstruse speculations, are many ingenious views and eloquent disquisitions. He was author also of an Essay on Architecture, not published till 1835-an ingenious work, which went through several editions. Mr Hope died on the 3d of February 1831, and probate was granted for £180,000 personal property. Beckford and Vathek are the only parallels to Mr Hope and Anastasius in oriental wealth and imagination. Mr Anastasius is one of the most original and dazzling of modern romances. The hero is, like Zeluco, a villain spoiled by early indulgence; he becomes a renegade to his faith, a mercenary, a robber, and an assassin; but the elements of a better nature are sown in his composition, and break forth at times. He is a native of Chios, the son of Greek parents. To avoid the consequences of an amour with Helena, the consul's daughter, he runs off to sea in a Venetian vessel, which is boarded by pirates and captured. The pirates are in turn taken by a Turkish frigate, and carried before Hassan Pasha. Anastasius is released, fights with the Turks in the war against the Araonoots, and accompanies the Greek dragoman to Constantinople. Disgrace and beggary reduce him to various shifts and adventures. He follows a Jew quack-doctor selling nostrums-is thrown into the Bagnio, or state-prison - afterwards |