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TWO COUNTRY SONNETS
I.—THE CONTRAST
But yester e'en the city's streets I trod
And breathed laboriously the fervid air;
Panting and weary both with toil and care,
I sighed for cooling breeze and verdant sod.
This morn I rose from slumbers calm and deep,
And through the casement of a rural inn,
I saw the river with its margins green,
All placid and delicious as my sleep.
Like pencilled lines upon a tinted sheet
The city's spires rose distant on the sky;
Nor sound familiar to the crowded street
Assailed my ear, nor busy scene mine eye;
I saw the hills, the meadows and the river—
I heard cool waters plash and green leaves quiver.
II.—PLEASURE
These sights and sounds refreshed me more than wine;
My pulses bounded with a reckless play,
My heart exalted like the rising day.
Now—did my lips exclaim—is pleasure mine;
A sweet delight shall fold me in its thrall;
To day, at least, I'll feel the bliss of life;
Like uncaged bird,—each limb with freedom rife—
I'll sip a thousand sweets—enjoy them all!
The will thus earnest could not be denied;
I beckoned Pleasure and she gladly came:
O'er hill and vale I roamed at her dear side—
And made the sweet air vocal with her name:
She all the way of weariness beguiled,
And I was happy as a very child!
July, 1850.T. ADDISON RICHARDS
Original Correspondence
RAMBLES IN THE PENINSULA
No III.
BARCELONA, May 27, 1850
My dear friend—I have been exceedingly pleased with what I have seen and experienced during the time I have already spent in this handsome and agreeable city. At present I have no traveling companion, and have moreover only encountered one of my countrymen (with the exception of the consuls) since my departure from Madrid, in January last. Besides, I seldom hear the United States mentioned, never see any papers, associate almost altogether with Spaniards, and converse chiefly in their language.
The American Consul here (who is by the way a Spaniard) has been very attentive and kind to me. We have taken several walks together, in which he has pointed out to me the most notable edifices of Barcelona. Among these is the magnificent theater called El Siceo, which is one of the grandest in the world. It is certainly the most splendid of the kind I have ever seen. It was built by subscription, at an expense of about half a million of dollars, and is capable of containing nearly six thousand persons. To my regret it is now closed. There is another very fine theater here called El Principal, which is open every evening. Last night I went to see the amusing opera of Don Pasquale, by Donizetti, which was quite laudably performed. In fact I go most every night, as I have nothing else to do, and have an excellent seat at my disposal, with which the consul has been so kind as to favor me. The appearance and manners of the audience are more interesting to me than those of the stage-actors. Besides, I like to accustom my ear to the Spanish, which I now speak with considerable fluency and correctness. I have devoted much study to this and the French language since I have been in Spain, and am now making some progress in the Italian, through the Spanish. I am convinced that no man can properly understand a people without knowing something of their language, which is in a great degree the index of their character. Moreover it is an indispensable condition to comfortable travel.
Among the distinguished characters in town is the famous Governor Tacon, who so admirably conducted the affairs of state in the island of Cuba some years since. He is staying with a particular friend of the consul, who is an immensely wealthy man and lives in the most princely style. I visited the house a few days since, before the arrival of the governor, and was delighted with the splendid taste displayed in the fresco of the ceiling, the stucco of the walls, and indeed with every article of furniture with which the rooms were supplied. On the parterre, or lower roof, was a little gem of a garden, with raised beds, blooming with beautiful plants and flowers, while in the middle was a fountain and on each side a miniature arbor of grapes. Really, nothing could be more charming and luxurious. It was like peeping into the bygone days of fairydom.
Barcelona is one of the best places in Spain for one to be during the observance of remarkable festivals. The celebration of Corpus Christi, which commences on the 30th, is said to be conducted here on a most magnificent scale. Of this I can form some conception from the brilliant procession which I witnessed yesterday afternoon, it being Trinity Sunday. The procession was preceded by two men on mules, over whose necks were strung a pair of tambours, (a kind of drum,) upon which the men were vigorously beating. Then came a priest, bearing a large and elaborately worked cross; after him came the body of the procession in regular order, consisting of young priests in white gowns, chanting as they marched; citizens in black, with white waistcoats and without hats; little girls representing the angels, in snowy gauze dresses with flowers, garlands, and a light azure scarf flowing from their heads; numerous bands of music, some of them playing solemn airs, others quick-steps and polkas; a fine display of infantry, and after all a noble body of cavalry, on fine horses, in striking uniform, each of them carrying a spear-topped banner in their hands. The general appearance of this procession, (each member of which, with the exception of the soldiers, carried a lighted candle or torch in his hand,) marching through one of the superb but narrow streets, while from almost every balcony was suspended a gay "trede," (a scarf-like awning,) either of blue, or crimson, or yellow, the balconies themselves being crowded with clusters of bright-eyed girls,—constituted one of the most brilliant and attractive spectacles that I ever witnessed. Yet they tell me that the procession of Corpus Christi will be infinitely more splendid and elaborate.
I am living here very comfortably. My rooms are pleasant and overlook the charming Rambla. My mornings are generally spent in reading and studying Spanish. At four o'clock my Irish friend and myself proceed to the fine restaurant where we are accustomed to dine: here we meet an intelligent Spanish gentleman, who completes our party, and as he does not speak English, all conversation is conducted at the table in the Spanish language. Dinner being over, we next visit a palverine cafe, where we meet a number of Spanish acquaintances, with whom we take coffee and a cigar. We all sally out together, and walk for an hour or two, either in the environs of the city, or along their mural terrace, overlooking the blue waters of the Mediterranean, closing our promenade at length upon the crowded and animated Rambla. After the theater, a stroll in the moonlight upon this magnificent promenade, and as the clock strikes the hour of midnight we retire, and bathe in the waters of oblivion till morn. My days in Spain are drawing near their end. I am ready to leave, though I shall cast many a lingering thought, many a fond recollection behind; and in future years, I shall sadly recall these hours, which, I fear, can never be recalled. But away with the enervating reflections of grief! Read nothing in the past but lessons for the future. When you think of its pleasures, think also of the cares they produced and the anxieties they cost you. Behold, they are ended, and forever. Have you reaped from them a moral, or have you been poisoned with their sting? Have you not discovered that pleasure is a phantom, which vanishes in proportion to the eagerness with which it is pursued? that by itself it fatigues without satisfying—that it knows no limits or bounds to gratify the restless and unfettered soul—that it is a feeble soil, which, without the sweat of labor and the tears of sorrow, produces nothing but the weeds of sin and the thorny briars of remorse? Have you learned all this, and are you not a wiser and a better man? Let all who have traveled for pleasure answer the question to themselves.
Truly your friend,
JOHN E. WARREN.
The Rev Henry Giles, in a lecture on "Manliness," thus designates the four great characteristics which have distinguished mankind. "The Hebrew was mighty by the power of Faith—the Greek by Knowledge and Art—the Roman by Arms—but the might of the Modern Man is placed in Work. This is shown by the peculiar pride of each. The pride of the Hebrew was in Religion—the pride of the Greek was in Wisdom—the pride of the Roman was in Power—the pride of the Modern Man is placed in Wealth."
Carlyle and Emerson.—They are not finished writers, but great quarries of thought and imagery. Of the two, Emerson is much the finer spirit. He has not the radiant range of imagination or any of the rough power of Carlyle, but his placid, piercing insight irradiates the depth of truth further and clearer than do the strained glances of the latter. A higher mental altitude than Carlyle has mounted, by most strenuous effort, Emerson has serenely assumed.
Authors and Books
The Literature of Supernaturalism was never more in request than since the Seeresses of Rochester commenced their levees at Barnum's Hotel. The journals have been filled with jesting and speculation upon the subject,—mountebank tricksters and shrewd professors have plied their keenest wits to discover the processes of the rappings—and Mrs. Fish and the Foxes in spite of them all preserve their secret, or at least are as successful as ever in persuading themselves and others that they are admitted to communications with the spiritual world. For ourselves, while we can suggest no explanation of these phenomena, and while in every attempted explanation of them which we have seen, we detect some such difficulty or absurdity as makes necessary its rejection, we certainly could never for a moment be tempted to a suspicion that there is anything supernatural in the matter. Such an idea is simply ridiculous, and will be tolerated only by the ignorant, the feeble-minded, or the insane. Still, the "knockings" are sufficiently mysterious, and if unexposed, sufficiently fruitful of evil, to be legitimate subjects of investigation, and he who under such circumstances is so careful of his dignity as to disregard the subject altogether, is as much mistaken as the gravest buffoon of the circus. We reviewed a week or two ago "The Phantom World," just republished by Mr. Hart; the Appletons have recently printed an original work which we believe has considerable merit, entitled "Credulity and Superstition;" and Mr. Redfield has in press and nearly ready, an edition of "The Night Side of Nature," by Miss Crowe, author of "Susan Hopley." This we believe is the cleverest performance upon ghosts and ghost-seers that has appeared in English since the days of Richard Glanvill; and with the others, it will be of service in checking the progress of the pitiable superstition which has been readily accepted by a large class of people, so peculiarly constituted that they could not help rejecting the Christian religion for its "unreasonableness and incredibility!"
"Some Honest Opinions upon Authors, Books, and other subjects," is the title of a new volume by the late Edgar A. Poe, which Mr. Redfield will publish during the Fall. It will embrace besides several of the author's most elaborate æsthetical essays, those caustic personalities and criticisms from his pen which, during several years, attracted so much attention in our literary world. Among his subjects are Bryant, Cooper, Pauldings, Hawthorne, Willis, Longfellow, Verplanck, Bush, Anthon, Hoffman, Cornelius Mathews, Henry B. Hirst, Mrs. Oakes Smith, Mrs. Hewitt, Mrs. Lewis, Margaret Fuller, Miss Sedgwick, and many more of this country, beside Macaulay, Bulwer, Dickens, Horne, Miss Barrett, and some dozen others of England.
Mr. Dudley Bean occupies the first two sheets of the last Knickerbocker with a very erudite and picturesque description of the attack upon Ticonderoga by the grand army under Lords Amherst and Howe, in "the old French War." Mr. Bean is an accomplished merchant, of literary abilities and a taste for antiquarian research, and he is probably better informed than any other person living upon the history and topography of all the country for many miles about Lake George, which is the most classical region of the United States. He has treated the chief points of this history in many interesting papers which he has within a few years contributed to the journals, and we have promise of a couple of octavos, embracing the whole subject, from his pen, at an early day. We know of nothing in the literature of our local and particular history that is more pleasing than the specimens of his quality in this way which have fallen under our notice.
Mr. William Young, the thoroughly accomplished editor of the Albion, is to be our creditor in the coming autumn for two hundred songs of Beranger, in English, with the pictorial illustrations which graced the splendid edition of the great lyrist's works recently issued in Paris. Mr. Young may be said to be as familiar with the niceties of the French language as the eloquent and forcible editorials of the Albion show him to be with those of his vernacular; and he has studied Beranger with such a genial love and diligence, that he would probably be one of his best editors, even in Paris. In literal truth and elaborate finish, we think his volume will show him to be a capital, a nearly faultless, translator. But Beranger is a very difficult author to turn into English, and we believe all who have hitherto essayed this labor have found his spirit too evanescent for their art. The learned and brilliant "Father Prout" has been in some respects the most successful of them all; but his versions are not to be compared with Mr. Young's for adherence either to the bard's own meaning or music. In pouring out the Frenchman's champagne, the latter somehow suffers the sparkle and bead to escape, while the former cheats us by making his stale liquor foam with London soda. We shall be impatient for Mr. Young's book, which will be published by Putnam, in a style of unusual beauty.
Dr. Achilli, whose history, so full of various and romantic vicissitudes, has become familiar in consequence of his imprisonments in the Roman Inquisition, is now in London, at the head of a congregation of Protestant Italians. He has intimated to Dr. Baird his intention to visit this country within a few months. He resided here many years ago.
Shirley, by the author of Jane Eyre, has been translated into French, and is appearing as the feuilleton of the National, newspaper. Mr. LIVERMORE, one of our most learned bibliopoles, has a very interesting article upon Public Libraries, in the last North American Review. He notices in detail several generally inaccessible reports on the libraries of Europe and this country; after referring to the number and extent of libraries here and elsewhere, and showing that in this respect we rank far below most of the countries of Europe, though second to none in general intelligence and the means of common education, he urges the institution of a large national library, and sees in the foundation of the Smithsonian Institution a prospect that the subject is likely to receive speedy and efficient attention.
PROFESSOR JOHNSON, author of the well-known work on Agricultural Chemistry, has been delivering lectures upon the results of his recent tour in the British Provinces and the United States, in one of which he observed, "In New Brunswick, New England, Vermont, New Hampshire, Connecticut, and New York, the growth of wheat has almost ceased; and it is now gradually receding farther and farther westward. Now, when I tell you this, you will see that it will not be very long before America is unable supply us with wheat in any large quantity. If we could bring Indian corn into general use, we might get plenty of it; but I do not think that the United States need be any bug bear to you." Prof. J. was in New York last March.
CHARLOTTE CUSHMAN, with Miss Hayes, the translator of George Sand's best works, was at the last dates on a visit to the popular poetess of the milliner and chambermaid classes, Eliza Cook, who was very ill. Miss Cushman is really quite as good a poet as Miss Cook, though by no means so fluent a versifier. She will return to the United States in a few weeks to fulfill some professional engagements.
Rev. Mr. MOUNTFORD, an English Unitarian clergyman, who recently came to this country, and who is known in literature and religion as the author of the two very clever works, "Martyria" and "Euthanasia," has become minister of a congregation at Gloucester, in Massachusetts.
BENJAMIN PERLEY POORE, author of "The Life and Times of Louis Philippe," &c., invited the corps of Massachusetts Volunteers, commanded by him in the Mexican campaign, to celebrate the anniversary of their return, at his pleasant residence on Indian Hill Farm, in West Newbury, last Friday.
Rev. WARREN BURTON, a graceful writer and popular preacher among the Unitarians, has resigned the pastoral office in Worcester to give his undivided attention to the advocacy of certain theories he has formed for the moral education of the young.
RICHARD S. MCCULLOCH, Professor of Natural Philosophy at Princeton College, and some time since melter and refiner of the United States Mint, has addressed a letter to the Secretary of the Treasury, in which he states that he has discovered a new, quick, and economical method of refining argentiferous and other gold bullion, whereby the work may be done in one-half the present time, and a large saving effected in interest upon the amount refined.
THE LATE SIR JOSEPH BANKS lies buried in Heston Church. There is neither inscription, nor monument, nor memorial window to mark the place of his sepulture; even his hatchment has been removed from its place. Surely, as President of the Royal Society, a member of so many foreign institutions, as well as a man who had traveled so much, he should have been thought worthy of some slight mark of respect.
ELIHU BURRITT is presented with the Prince of Wales in one of the designs for medals to be distributed on the occasion of the great Industrial Exhibition in London; and the Athenæum properly suggests that such an obtrusion of the "learned Blacksmith" (who has really scarce any learning at all) is "little better than a burlesque."
HORACE MANN, President of the late National Convention of the friends of education, had issued an address inviting all friendly to the object, whether connected with and interested in common-schools, academies, or colleges, to meet in convention at Philadelphia on the fourth day of August next.
LIEUT. MAURY says that the new planet, Parthenope, discovered by M. Gasparis, of Naples, has been observed at Washington, by Mr. J. Ferguson. It resembles a star of the tenth magnitude. This is the eleventh in the family of asteroids, and the seventh within the last five years.
GEORGE WILKINS KENDALL is now in New York, having visited New Orleans since his return from Paris. His History of the Mexican War, illustrated by some of the cleverest artists of France, will soon be published here and in London.
Mrs. FANNY KEMBLE has left this country for England, on account of the sudden illness of her father, Charles Kemble, of whose low state of health we have been apprised by almost every arrival for a year.
M. BALZAC's recent marriage, at his rather advanced period of life, finds him, for the first time, an invalid, and serious fears are now entertained for him, by friends and physicians.
ORESTES A. BROWNSON has received the degree of LL.D. from the R.C. College, Fordham.
