International Miscellany of Literature, Art and Science, Vol. 1

CAPT. SIR EDWARD BELCHER, R.N., known in the literary and scientific world by his extensive voyages of survey and discovery, is now on a visit to New York, whence he will shortly proceed to Texas. Sir Edward Belcher is a gentleman of remarkable energy of character, and of eminent abilities.

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A LETTER from M. Guizot, assigning the motives of his refusal to appear as a candidate of the Institute for a seat in the Superior Council of Public Instruction, is published by the Espérance of Nancy. The Principles avowed by M. Guizot lead directly to a separation of Church and State.

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JOHN G. SAXE will soon publish a new poem which he delivered recently at the commencement of Middlebury College, with the applause which crowns all his efforts in this way.

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A RE-ISSUE of the Complete Works of Eliza Cook will be shortly commenced in her Journal, and continued weekly until completed.

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THE INSTITUTE OF GOETHE has just been founded by the government of Saxe Weimar. It consists simply of a prize of twenty thousand francs offered to the competition of the literary and artistic world. The first year it will be given to the best among the poems, romances, and dramatic works submitted; the second year to the best picture; the third year to the best piece of statuary; the fourth year to the best piece of music, whether sacred or profane, opera or oratorio. This circle having been completed, the prize will next be given as at the first year; and so on in regular succession. The successful competitor is to remain proprietor of his work, as are all the others. The prize will he allotted by two committees, one at Weimar the other at Berlin. The establishment of the fund was celebrated at Weimar on the 23d of August.

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GIFFORD, some five-and-twenty years ago, declared that all the fools of the country had taken to write plays; and it would appear that all the dull Englishmen of our day have taken to write pamphlets on the slave-trade. The London Times is very severe upon a book just issued by Mr. W. Gore Ouseley, who was several years British Charge d'Affaires at Rio, as such conducted a voluminous correspondence on the subject with the government of Brazil, and might have been expected to have there learned something on the slave-trade worth telling. According to his reviewer he appears, however, to be one of that class of persons described by Sterne, who, traveling from Dan to Beersheba, found all to be barren; and no amount of observation can in any human being supply defective reasoning faculties. So, says the Times, he has little or nothing to say about the Brazilian slave-trade that has not been better said a thousand times before; and when he does venture on a special statement of his own, it topples down the whole superstructure of his argument.

A work of rather more interest is "Seven Years' Service on the Slave Coast of Africa", by Sir Henry Huntley, who, when a lieutenant in the navy in 1831, was ordered to the scene of his observations. Shortly after his arrival, he was appointed to the independent command of a small vessel, in which he visited stations, looked out for slavers, chased them when he saw them, and captured them when he could. A few years subsequently he was nominated Governor of the settlements on the Gambia. His two volumes contain his adventures during the whole or nearly the whole of his seven years' service upon the station; the last closing abruptly in the middle of preparations for a congress of black kings. The public is already familiar with many of the topics, from the occasional narratives of voyages and adventures along the coast. Visits to the commandants of the so-called castles; a description of the European and native mode of life at the settlements; accounts of the slave-stations, the slave-dealers, the slaves, and the slave-trade, together with sketches of more legitimate commerce, and occasional trips to the islands lying off the coast, for change of air and fresh supplies, are frequent features. Sir Henry Huntley's duties sometimes brought him in contact with native chiefs, and continually with slavers, in the search, the capture, and the pursuit. During the latter part of his career, the office of Governor gave great variety and largeness to his subjects; consisting of public business, palavers with native potentates, and matters connected with home policy. In point of literary character this work very nearly resembles the author's "Peregrine Scramble." Indeed, the "Seven Years' Service" is a sort of continuation of that book, without the form of fiction.

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M. JULES LECHEVALIER, known in this country chiefly as one of the foreign Correspondents of The Tribune, but in Europe as an able writer on the Social Sciences, has recently delivered in Paris and Berlin, and in London, (where he is residing as a political exile,) a series of lectures, which will soon be given to the world in a volume, upon the subject of his favorite studies. M. Lechevalier's system, which he denominates "New Political Economy," is based upon the principle of association, in opposition to that of competition and laissez-faire, which constitute the groundwork of the school of the present political economists. In the course of his series he pointed out the gradual tendency of the competitive principle to produce extremes of riches and poverty, and ultimately revolutions, and maintained, that by the adoption of the associative principle alone, society can be preserved from confusion and destruction. He contends that the new political economy, or Socialism, is essentially Conservative, while the present system of unlimited competition, or buying cheap and selling dear, is destructive, M. Lechevalier pretends to base his system on the moral principles of Christ, and maintains that Christianity cannot be practically carried out in any other way. His lectures abound in examples of the working of the two opposing systems.

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The Doctrinal Tract and Book Society, Boston, are going forward in the work of re-publishing the old standard works of the New-England theology. They have issued a fine edition of Bellamy and have procured an edition of Edwards the younger. They are now about commencing the stereotyping of Catlin's Compendium, and the whole works of Dr. Hopkins. We wish they would go back a century further, and give us the best works of Mather and his contemporaries.

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There is a political novel by OTTO MULLER, of Manheim, announced, under the title Georg Volker: ein Vreiheits Roman, which is said to give a faithful picture of the Baden revolution, and to open with the rise of the peasantry in the Ottenwald.

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THE DUC DE LA ROUCHEFOUCAULD's celebrated "Moral Reflections, Sentences, and Maxims," have just appeared in a new and very much improved translation, and with notes, pointing out similarities of sentiments in ancient and modern authors, and sometimes proving that Rochefoucauld's good things have been made use of without sufficient acknowledgment, by moderns. There is also an introduction, which dissertates well on the purpose and quality of the reflections. Such books were once very popular; but in this country they have not been much read. We have indeed had numerous editions of "Lacon," and Dr. Bettner's "Acton" has found a thousand purchasers; but the Rev. Dr. Hooker's "Maxims," which, in our opinion, are as good as anything of their kind in the English language, we believe have not attracted attention, and Mr. Simms's "Egeria" has been printed only in the columns of a newspaper.

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A new theory has just been propounded at Paris in a book called "Armanase," (a Sanscrit word, meaning the "Reign of Capacity"). The author asserts the present forms of administrative government are injurious instead of useful to society, and ought to be replaced by institutions of a new and different order. His principle is, that the sovereignty of the individual ought to be instituted for that of governments, and that great associations of mutual assurance may be advantageously substituted for the existing system of management by office-holders. The author shows also that the progress of the natural and mechanical sciences will deliver man from the pressure of the more painful sorts of labor; and that wealth, freed from the barriers which now hinder its circulation, would be distributed freely throughout society. Intellectual property would be seriously guaranteed, and would enrich the men of genius, whose inventions and discoveries are now profitable, not to the authors, but to the capitalists who take advantage of them. By this means an important element of revolutions will be removed. The author proposes, that in order to prevent all suffering, a civil list shall be set apart for the people, who will be the king. This civil list is to be composed of a tax of one per cent., levied on all who have property in favor of those who have nothing. But, says he, let no one imagine that all would be dissolution and ruin in this system, without law or government. Crimes and offenses will be tried by juries, that is to say, by a living code. Property will no longer be seizable for debt, and the courts will become useless. Everybody shall have the absolute right to buy land by paying its possessor ten per cent, on its value: this is to give a chance for carrying on all sorts of grand public enterprises without trouble from the proprietors of little pieces of land. It may perhaps be doubted, whether the "Reign of Capacity" has exhibited any astonishing endowments in that respect.

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THACKERAY, in Pendennis, has given offense, it appears, to some of the gensd'armes of the Press, by his satirical sketches of the literary profession. Those whose withers are unwrung will admit the truth of many pages and laugh at the caricature in the rest. In the last number of the North British Review is a clever article upon the subject, written with good temper and good sense. Hitherto publishers have been ridiculed and declaimed against as "tyrants" and "tradesmen,"—made to bear the onus of "poetical" improvidence, and to sustain the weight of a crime which no author can pardon—the rejection of manuscripts. The authors have painted the portraits of publishers; but an ancient fable suggests that if the lion had painted a certain picture, it would not have been a lion we should see biting the dust.

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M. DE LUYNES is now engaged at Paris in publishing a work on the antiquities of Cyprus. He has discovered a number of inscriptions in ancient Cyprian writing, and is having them engraved on copper. The writing is that which preceded the introduction of the Phoenician character upon the island, and seems to have no affinity either with that or with the Assyrian, which is discovered to have been once used there. The work of M. de Luynes will open a new problem for the philologists. It will be difficult to decipher the inscriptions and language, unless there can be found somewhere an ancient Cyprian inscription, with a translation in some known tongue; but in a time which has read the riddles of the pyramids, nothing of this sort is to be despaired of. M. de Luynes is the last of the great French nobles who makes a worthy use of his riches.

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SIR ROBERT PEEL left full and specific directions in his will for the early publication of his political memoirs; and ordered that the profits arising from the publication shall be given to some public institution for the education of the working-classes. He believed his manuscripts and correspondence to be of great value, as showing the characters of the great men of his age; and directed that his correspondence with the Queen and Prince Albert shall not be published during their lives without their express consent. He confided the task of preparing these memoirs to Lord Mahon and Mr. Cardwell. Their duty will, however, be comparatively light, though delicate, from the admirable and orderly state in which he left his papers.

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MR. JOHN P. BROWN, author of "The Turkish Nights Entertainments," recently published by Putnam, is now on a visit to this country as the Secretary of the Commissioner of the Sublime Porte, Captain Ammin Bey.

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EUGENE SUE'S new romance "The Mysteries of the People," has been prohibited in Prussia.

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M. BURNET DE PESLE has just published the first part of his Examen Critique de la Succession des Dynasties Egyptiennes, a work to which competent critics assign a high value. He follows the method of Champollion, rejecting hypotheses and admitting only the testimony of the historians and monuments. At the same time he treats his subject with independence and originality, though he advances nothing for the sake of novelty. The second part of the work will be devoted to the discussion of the ancient inscriptions, dynasty by dynasty, and reign by reign.

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WASHINGTON IRVING is claimed by the English as by both birth and spirit a British author. In the question of copyright lately before the Vice Chancellor, the case rested in part upon a plea that Mr. Irving's father was from the Orkneys and his mother from Falmouth, so that, though he was born in New York, he was not an alien. Still, our "Diedrich Knickerbocker" was Colonel Irving once, and served in this capacity against the king, and it will not he safe for him to establish the position assumed by his publisher.

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M. ARAGO, having completed his love-labor in honor of Condorcet, is again abstracting from scientific pursuits a portion of his time, to prepare a memoir upon the acts and doings of the Provisional Government of 1848 of which he was a member. It is said to be a curious work which will enlighten much that is yet dark in the history of that period, throwing additional obloquy upon some members, and relieving others of a portion of that which they have hitherto borne. M. Chemiega is also engaged upon his own account in similar historical labors.

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DR. OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES, on the 9th of September, delivered a poem, described by a correspondent of the Commercial Advertiser as one of his finest compositions, before a large audience, assembled to dedicate a rural cemetery at Pittsfield, Mass.

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M. DUGANNE, some of whose songs and dramatic pieces have the ring of true metal, has just completed a satire entitled "Parnassus in Pillory," and with the motto, "Lend me your ears." We have seen some advance sheets of it, which are full of wit and spirit.

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SOUTH CAROLINA has always been prolific of epics. Those of Mr. Simmons, Dr. Marks of Barhamville, and some others, have been tried, and-the court of criticism has now before it from the same quarter "America Discovered, in Twelve Books."

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JOHN NEAL has given notice of his intention to write a history of American Literature "in two large octavo volumes," and he invites authors who are not afraid to show their books, to send them to him at Portland without delay.

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"GERMANIA, ITS COURTS, CAMPS AND PEOPLE," is the title of a brace of volumes by "the Baroness Blaize de Bury." And who, pray, is the Baroness Blaize de Bury? A writer in The Leader answers after this wise:

"Why, sir, she is somewhat of a myth, making her avatars in literature with all the caprice and variety of Vishnou or Brougham; her maiden name of Rose Stewart has not, that we can discover, been stained with printer's ink, but we trace her as 'Arthur Dudley' in the Revue des Deux Mondes writing upon Bulwer and Dickens, we next find her as 'Maurice Flassan' in Les Français Aeints par eux-mémes. Rumor further whispereth that she had a finger in 'Albert Lunel,' one of the eccentricities of an eccentric law-lord, which was hurriedly suppressed, one knows not why; in the Edinburgh Review she wrote a paper on Molière, and for Charles Knight's Weekly Volume a pleasant little book about Racine, on the title-page of which she is styled 'Madame Blaize Bury;' since that time you observe she has blossomed into a Baroness de Bury! Let us add that she is the wife of Henri Blaze, known as agreeable critic and the translator of Faust, that she is said to be a great favorite with the author of 'Albert Lunel,' and that she has the two novels 'Mildred Vernon' and 'Leonie Vermont' placed to her account: how many other shapes she may have assumed we know not; are these not enough? Whether, after all, a flesh-and-blood Madame de Bury exists is more than We can decide. Une supposition! what if, after all, she should turn out to be Lord Brougham himself? The restless energy of that Scottish Phenomenon renders everything possible. He does not agree with Pliny's witty friend, that it is better to be idle than to do nothing—satius est otiosum esse quam nihil agere."

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