floated. Loaded my two hundred casks of the author's opinions on a variety of subflour, a few hundred hams, maize, cider, and|jects. They are evidently the result of a the rest of it; took my half a dozen niggers long residence in Louisiana, and thorough and a couple of horses, which neighbour Snap- acquaintance with the men and manners of per let me have on commission, and down the Cumberland into the Ohio and the slimy Mis-that state. Negro and Creole life, the hardsissip, a thousand miles and more. Fine ships and difficulties of the French emitrees, beautiful bottoms, capital soil, thought grants who took refuge in America when I; but too much water, too low for you, Dough-driven from their country by the revolution, by, you like dry land. But when I got down the encroachments of the early American to Natchez and the Walnut-hills, and again settlers, who, while Louisiana was yet a saw something like mountains, it pleased me better. At Natchez I got rid of a hundred Spanish colony, came and squatted themcasks and as many hams, and at Woodville of selves upon her territory, and neither would the rest of my cargo, and the boat into the bar-nor could be expelled by the feeble governgain; looked about in the neighbourhood and ment of the province: in turn, and in atfound a bit of land that just suited; two thou-tractive style, all these matters are touched sand acres, five dollars an acre, five years term. upon. Negro peculiarities, the treatment Hallo, Ralph, thought I, that's the thing for and condition of the slaves, receive a large you. Two thousand dollars a year to pay the share of attention, and the reasoning on the devil's in it if you can't manage that. So I struck the bargain, gave a thousand dollars subject shows both good sense and impartialdown, and went back to Cumberland river with ity. Our author is no abolitionist, at least the Louisville steamer; built another flat-boat, and put on the rest of my plunder and as much meal as I could get, and a dozen horses which I afterwards sold at famous prices, and went down again to Woodville. and built, and cleared, and planted, and soon forgot the Pollys and Peggys, and all the rest of them. And now there I am, and well-established.' in the vulgar sense of the term, as implying a partisan of prompt and indiscriminate manumission. Without defending the principle of slavery, measures that would suddenly exonerate from immediate control, and from the actual necessity of labor, an immense black population, idle and sensual "And well established he was, as any man by nature, may well be deprecated. Such on the Mississippi, and the eight years he had measures would be perilous to the property spent there did him honor. His six negroes and even to the lives of thousands of families." had increased to more than forty, his wilder- Mr. Sealsfield does not profess to put for ness had become a respectable plantation, his ward his own opinions on these subjects, cotton was sought after; not only was his land free of debt, but he had already a handsome although it may without much difficulty be sum in the Planters' Bank, and sent off every seen to which side they lean. His expoyear his hundred and fifty bales 'prime cot-sition of slavery in the Southern States is ton.'" The madcap Doughby runs away, after a few hours' acquaintance, with Howard's sister-in-law, who prefers him to a sickly, yellow-visaged Creole, to whom her father has promised her, and to whom, greatly against her will, she is about to be united. The Creole fires a pistol at Doughby, who is slightly wounded, but for sole revenge contents himself with shaking his disappointed rival nearly out of his senses. The father's forgiveness is with some difficulty obtained, and before the close of the book the wild Kentuckian bachelor is seen to settle down into a comparatively steady benedict. In the three following volumes, which, under the title of 'Planter Life,' and 'Nathan, the Squatter Regulator,' close the series, there is scarcely any plot and comparatively little incident. They are not travels, or novels, or essays, but a mixture of all three; literally what they profess to be, pictures of life, crowded with figures, and displaying conveyed chiefly by sketches and exemplifi cations of negro character, by dialogues and arguments between Creole slaveholders and French abolitionists. No attempt is made to dissimulate the fact, that many of the vices which render the slaves unfit for liberty and for the enjoyment of civil rights, are the result of their unhappy condition. Like all oppressed races, they are cunning and deceitful, rarely susceptible of gratitude for kind treatment, and indeed—a bad trait, this, in their character-they for the most part are least to be trusted when best treated. By fear, rather than by love, must these unfortunates be ruled, and of the means of inspiring the former feeling a cruel abuse is but too frequently made. It would have satisfied the ambition of most writers, especially in days when few novelists put more into their books than is essential to gain a lukewarm acceptance at the hands of publishers and public, to succeed in sketching, and placing in a framework which, although slight and inartificial, is highly agreeable, the distinguishing fea- | sorship, and as to the other nations of Eutures of transatlantic life and character. rope, he must look upon them as poor beFew, we believe, would have striven to do nighted slaves, whose day of liberation is more, and whilst amusing and interesting yet far distant. Some of his sketches of their readers, to advocate principles which European national character and qualities they held for true and holy. The absence are hit off with great spirit and fun. The not only of a healthy, but of any strongly following may serve as an example. It is marked tendency, is a prevalent vice of the a fragment of a sort of journal, written, or novelists of the day. A tolerable plot, dra- supposed to be, previously to the French matic situation, a succession of incident, is revolution of 1830, and soon after a terrific considered abundant stock in trade for a hurricane that has ravaged cotton fields and three volume novel by the majority of au- plantations and swept away houses on the thors who flourish, or it were better said, banks of the Red River. who vegetate, in this fifth decennium of the nineteenth century. In Mr. Sealsfield's "Papa Menou is gone to his plantation with writings, on the contrary, are to be traced my two French guests; nor am I sorry for it, an under current of thought, and the en- as regards the latter. They are restless feldeavor to propagate certain political and lows, these Frenchmen, and thorough cowards. social ideas; and although we can rarely During the storm they were so faint-hearted, chime in with his views or believe in their lost their presence of mind so completely, that possible accomplishment, we admit the en- they were fain to take refuge behind the neergy and ability of his advocacy. A fer-gresses, who made merry, not a little, at their expense; but the next day they were again vent republican, he seeks to convince the heroes, and would have conducted the Italian world of the superiority of the American campaigns better than Napoleon himselfform of government over all others. We Whilst we bustled about with our hands full believe that his success will be very mode-of work, they stood and talked politics, and that rate, that he will find few proselytes amongst the first lord of the English treasury in a finanwith a decision that would have done honor to the reflecting classes of our European pop-cial debate. That might have been borne, but, ulation, and we foresee the downfall, al- oh! the perpetual gesticulation, waving of though not, perhaps, in his lifetime, of the hands, and stamping of feet, and knitting of cherished institutions in whose endurance brows, during these discussions. It seemed he places so fervent a faith. His Utopian as if another revolution of '89 were about to visions melt into thinnest air when opposed break out, or that a brace of Mexican bandits to the experience of centuries; and the very hands were stuck theatrically in their sides, were about to fly at your throat. Now their country in which he has now elected his then their eyes flashed, their fists were clenchabode, the last remaining European repub-ed, their attitudes became heroic, and the lic, existing but by sufferance and rent by stamping and declamation redoubled. internal discords, might serve as a beacon to warn him of the instability of democracy. A French reviewer, already quoted, says that whilst looking down with pity upon European slaves and tyrants, Mr. Sealsfield still holds his transatlantic country tolerably cheap. We think differently.Although wedded to republicanism, Mr. Sealsfield, as a man of strong natural sense and penetration, cannot remain blind to certain disadvantages and inconveniences, the result of the system he upholds; and should be received by him with the same comhis sense of these he occasionally, and, as condition is an assured political and social poposed demeanor. But of this, one necessary we believe, quite unconsciously, allows to sition, which the Frenchman has not yet got, ooze out in his writings. His marked and will find it difficult ever to achieve. His blame and disapproval of European institu- Habeas-corpus Act has left the broken walls of tions are, on the other hand, expressed in the Bastille only to take refuge in the Concierlanguage as energetic as it is often amus-gerie and La Force, and the very consciousing and sometimes exaggerated. England contented, turbulent and peevish. The chaness of his precarious position renders him disand France are the only countries of which racter of a true gentleman can flourish but he takes much notice by name. He was amongst an entirely free people, and in mondoubtless obliged to respect German cen-archical-aristocratical states it will be found to All that is unbearable; diametrically opposed to our notions of the gentleman. And yet they are both of good birth, descendants of historiwhereof the foundation is a consciousness of cal families; but the gentlemanly dignity pendence, is wanting. The true gentleman being a power in the state, the feeling of indeshould always be alike, never lose his composure, but show as calm and unruffled a front to the storm as to the soft breath of the northwestern breeze. The friendly visiter, and the sheriff who bears a warrant for his arrest, exist only in the very highest classes."-Le- | torical romance. Yet where could there bensbilder, vol. iv., p. 116. be a finer field for the highest class of fiction, than the uprising of a people who for three There is much in the habit of danger. centuries had groaned under the most cruel Many a brave seaman, for whom the fire- tyranny; a tyranny unparalleled, perhaps, vomiting flanks of an enemy's frigate have in the history of the world? The sanguino terrors, would feel extremely shy and nary traditions of the great Marquis, who, nervous on a high-mettled hunter, at the from the most exemplary motives, as one of tail of a Leicestershire pack, and with a his historians insinuates, converted into bull-fence country before him. Mr. Seals- shambles the flowery plains and stately field's Frenchmen may have been first-rate cities of ancient Mexico, descended through fellows at a charge of bayonets, notwith- many generations to the latest inheritors of standing that they were so sadly discon- his power, and in the nineteenth century a certed by his Louisianian hurricane, which, Calleja was found, ready to vie for cruelty according to his own showing, was an aw with the Cortes of the sixteenth. It was ful exhibition. Earthquakes and hurricanes reserved for Mr. Sealsfield, doubly qualified are exceptionable cases. We do not, how-by an intimate acquaintance with the counever, understand him seriously to impeach try and its people, and by the possession of the courage of the French as a nation; and extraordinary descriptive powers, to throw if he did so, we must totally differ with into the form of a romance the terrible anhim. But his assertion that the character nals of the struggle for Mexican independof the true gentleman is to be met with ence, and at the same time to give to the only in a free country, by which he evi- European public the most striking picture dently, as the passages we have put into of Mexican life and manners with which we italics clearly show, understands a republic, are acquainted. Never were we more is to us both novel and diverting. We have certainly not been accustomed to seek in American character that happy blending of chivalrous honor, dignified tone, and engaging manners, which is considered to constitute the gentleman por excellence. Neither the conduct of the United States as a nation, nor the specimens of their population whom we have had opportunities of observing, have forced upon us the conviction that democracy is a good cradle of gentlemanly feelings and manners. The time may perhaps come when we shall acquire that conviction. We shall be happy to see it arrive. deeply interested and strongly impressed by any book, than by the Viceroy and the Aristocracy,' and we should be accused of exaggeration did we here record the meed of praise which we believe it to deserve. The author's previous works had not prepared us for this one. Written, for the most part, in the light, sketchy style of which we have given specimens, they had not led us to expect from the same hand a production of such extraordinary power as this Mexican romance. Before entering further upon its merits, let us briefly glance at the state of Mexico in the year 1812, the period which Mr. Sealsfield has, with peculiar felicity, selected for his story. Numerous and various in their nature have been the books on Mexico written and Accelerated by the premature discovery published within the last twenty years, and of the plot, which was betrayed by a conto several of the most worthy, reference spirator upon his death-bed, the first revoluwas made a few months ago, in the pages tionary outbreak in Mexico, in the autumn of this Review. Residents and travellers, of 1810, was confined, with few and unimdiplomatists and men of science, have in portant exceptions, to the Indians and turn given us valuable information concern- colored population. A large number of ining the condition, politics, and prospects of fluential Creoles, implicated, and who were the most extensive and important of Span- to have taken a leading part, in the insurish American states; the revolution has had rection, alarmed at its premature developno unworthy historian in Robinson; Mexi- ment, drew back in time, and the insurgent can society, habits, vices, and virtues, have army, which speedily amounted to upwards been anatomized in their minutest details of a hundred thousand men, undisciplined, by the clever pen of an accomplished and and in great part unarmed, saw itself deintelligent Scotchwoman. But to no Eng-prived of those best able to direct its opelish writer has it occurred to make the ter- rations and check its excesses. The parrible and extraordinary scenes of the Mex-ish priest, Hidalgo, who first gave the sigican revolution the ground-work of an his- nal of revolt, and lighted up the flame des 1846.] THE WRITINGS OF CHARLES SEALSFIELD. with others still more weighty and impor- It is whilst tined to consume him, was incompetent to ers an active correspondence with Creole guide or control the motley mass of insur- noblemen of patriot opinions. gents, who, infuriated by a long series of this was the state of parties, during the caroppressions and cruelties, swept through nival of 1812, and when the principal inthe land like raging madmen, indiscrimi- surgent leader, Morellos, had approached nately exterminating both Spaniards and to within a few leagues of the city of MexCreoles. The latter, for the most part well ico, that Mr. Sealsfield opens his romance Viceroy and the Aristocracy.' disposed to the revolution, saw themselves of the compelled, for their own preservation, to The latter are the Creolé nobles, the former side with these against whom they would is Vanegas, a Spanish grandee of the first willingly have drawn the sword: they uni- class and captain-general of the royal ted with the Spaniards to repress a revolt, armies. Whilst opposed to the French in which, had it succeeded, would have auni- the Peninsula, this officer had lost, rather, hilated the white population, and thrown it was affirmed, by treachery than through the government of the country into the lack of courage and ability, the two imporThe re- tant actions of Cuenca and Almonacid. hands of the Indians and castes. bellion was suppressed; the fearful retribu- Of a highly influential family, and allied tion exercised by the conquerors may be read in the pages of Robinson and others, who have been taxed with exaggeration, but to whose narratives persons acquainted with the inherent cruelty of the Spanish character, and with the unscrupulous and sanguinary nature of Spanish colonial administrations, will perhaps see little reason for refusing implicit credit. The victims of fury and revenge were reckoned by tens of thousands; at last the tiger was glutted, and then the relative position of the three parties in Mexico was this. The Spaniards, still cherishing feelings of hatred against all who had dared to assail their hitherto undisputed rule, looked with suspicion and dislike upon the Creoles, who, they well knew, would far rather, had circumstances permitted, have sided against, than with them. They considered them as traitors in intention, if not in deed, and treated them with greater contempt and contumely than before. The Creoles, or at The principal personages in the romance least the more enlightened and patriotic of their number, to whom decorations and are Vanegas and his family, especially his titulos de Castilla were insufficient baits to sister-in-law, a worldly beauty, ambitious become partizans of the Spaniards, watched and intriguing; the Count St. Jago, an enthe march of events, and worked in silence lightened and high-hearted Creole nobleand darkness towards one great end, the in- man, and Vicente Guerero, a muleteer, crease of their power and influence in the who by his talents and ardent patriotism has army and the country, by which alone, as risen to be an influential chief of the insurthey justly considered, could a revolution gents. The characters are all admirably be brought about that should establish worked out, well drawn, and consistent. Creole supremacy. The Indians and castes, The scenes in which Guerero figures are momentarily stunned by the terrible chas- amongst the most interesting. We may intisement inflicted on them, were yet far stance the first two chapters of the book, from abandoning the game as lost, and nu- than which we know not where to look for merous parties of insurgents still kept up a any thing more strikingly original. Durdesultory warfare with the Spanish troops.ing the carnival, Guerero ventures in disLearning wisdom from experience, they guise into the city of Mexico, and causes watched and waited, avoiding decisive ac- to be performed a sort of double sotie or tions, and maintaining through their lead- masquerade, in the first part of which is figured forth the wretched condition of the Mexican people, writhing beneath the vampire-like oppression of Spain. ture, more likely to appeal to their tastes and feelings than the grim drama enacted in the street. Its object is to expose the vices and weakness of Ferdinand VII, and "It was a party of twelve persons, fantasti- to convince the Creoles of his unworthically attired in the costumes of the various In-ness to reign over them. We are griev dian tribes, and who were grouped round a carro, or two-wheeled cart, in so picturesque a manner that it was easily seen they followed the direction of some intelligent head. The Indians were in mourning, and acted as pallbearers: upon the cart itself were two figures, in whom the attributes of the ghastly and the comic were so strangely blended as to inspire the beholder with mingled feelings of curiosity and horror. One of the figures lay stretched at full length upon the car; it was a torso, from whose breast, and from the stumps of its mutilated limbs, blood was continually dropping, which, as fast as it fell, was greedily licked up by figures masked and disguised as Spaniards. There still seemed to be life in the victim, for it groaned and gave out hollow tones, and struggled, but in vain, to shake off the monster that crouched like a vampire upon its body and dug its tiger claws into its breast. The monster was as strange to behold as the sufferer. It had the cowl and the gloomy countenance of a well-fed Dominican monk; on one side of it was a blazing torch, on the other a yelling hound; its head was covered with a brass basin, intended probably to represent the barber helmet of Cervantes' knight. Above this helm waved a pair of wings, not unlike those which the fancy of old heralds has bestowed upon the griffon; the back ended in the tail of the coyote, or Mexican wolf, and the claws with which the monster ripped up the torso's breast were those of a caguar." A plain enough allegory, but lest any should not seize it, Guerero appears masked in the street where it is exhibited, and gives a commentary on it, in the witty and popular style likely to take with the crowds of the lower orders-amongst whom, however, are many Creoles-who throng to the strange spectacle. Suddenly, from a far distant balcony, resounds the cry of Vigilancia!' Vigilancia! is echoed from mouth to mouth. Vigilancia repeats Guerero, thanks, señoras y señores,' and with a bow and a smile he disappears. The crowd close round the cart, and when the alguazils arrive, a few fragments of wood and paste-board are all that remain of the pageant. 6 ously tempted to extract, but must resist for "It was in vain: his voice was drowned by the cries of fury of the Indians. At that moment the vesper bells of Cholula were heard to ring, and those of the villages of the plain chimed in with a harmony indescribably soothing. "Ave Maria! murmured the Indians. 'Ave Maria!' repeated Metises and Zambos; and all, friends and foes, let their blood-dripping hands fall, sank their wild and furious glances to the earth, and whilst they mechanically seized and kissed the medals of the VirFrom the street the daring partizan goes gin of Guadalupe that hung around their to the Trespana coffee-house, then throng-necks, they commenced praying in loud moed with revellers, and makes his way into a notonous tones, Ave Maria! audi nos peccadores! room where a party of young Creole nobles are playing monté. Before them he causes to be performed a comedy of a refined na "And, as though the sound of the bells were commands from on high, these furious men bowed their heads, uplifted and folded their |