an usual, three per Vol. x. p. 580.

cent. a month no uncommon occurrence."

Now the first portion of this allegation is wholly false, and the second is true only of a short period. If Mr. Alison were writing at the present time, he might with equal truth declare, as a general rule, that, in the United States interest is very low; four-and-one-half per cent. per annum is an usual, three per cent. no uncommon occurrence.'

A certain portion of our population will be glad to learn that, in this country "a widow with eight children is sought after and married as an heiress ;" and all will be astounded at the credulity or mendacity of the soi-disant historian who declares that in America "even family portraits, pictures of beloved parents, are often not framed, as it is well understood that at the death of the head of the family they will be sold and turned into dollars, to be divided among the children." And this is history!

Our " common sailors" will be happy to learn that their wages are raised to "four or five pounds a-month ;" and our democrats surprised to hear that "it is generally made an indispensable pledge, with every representative on the [democratic] side, that he is to support the system of repudiation,' and relieve the people of the disagreeable burden of paying their debts." The election for President, he says, takes place on the 4th of March; and he seems to have strange notions with regard to the Veto power; for he declares that, "the President can refuse his sanction to the laws, but by a singular anomaly, though that prevents their execution, it does not prevent them from being laws, and carried into effect when a more pliant Chief of the Republic is elected." It is impossible to make anything but nonsense of this passage; if he means as he has written, then he has put forth an absurdity; if he means that, at a future time, under a new President, Congress may repass a rejected act, and the new Executive may approve it and put it in force, then he errs in calling that an "anomaly,' which may take place in England or France at any time after a change in the Ministry. Our President occupies a position in some respects similar to that of the English Premier, and all the incumbents of the Executive chair are not bound to "follow in the footsteps of their illustrious

predecessors," although Mr. Alison seems to think it an anomaly that they are not. Equally without foundation in truth is our author's assertion, that "that noblest of spectacles, which is so often exhibited in England, of a resolute minority, strong in the conviction and intrepid in the assertion of truth, firmly maintaining its opinions in the midst of the insurgent waves of an overwhelming majority, is unknown on the other side of the Atlantic." With what propriety is the term, "insurgent waves," applied to a legally ruling majority? And if the Americans do, in a political sense, so "crouch to numbers" and "feign acquiescence," as Mr. Alison represents, then how is it that our frequent political changes, State and National, are brought about? The former question indicates a ruling propensity in Mr. Alison to use high-sounding words without regard to their meaning, and the latter points out another instance of his recklessness in assertion, and his wholesale mode of generalization. The scenes presented in the halls of Congress are sufficiently disgraceful, and we blush for our country when we think of them, but our author never lets a good piece of national slander pass from his pen without additions and corrections. According to him, "murders and assassinations in open day are not unfrequent among the members of Congress themselves; and the guilty parties, if strong in the support of the majority, openly walk about, and set all attempts to prosecute them at defiance." Now, unless our memory fails us, the author cannot find a solitary

instance of the crimes which he declares to be so frequent. "All the State judges, from the highest to the lowest, are elected by the people," says Mr. Alison; another sweeping assertion, which we hope may not prove prophetic.

Concerning American manners Mr. Alison remarks, very judiciously:

"The manners of the Americans are the manners of Great Britain, minus the aristocracy, the landowners, the army, and the Established Church." *** 66 They are vain on all national subjects, and excessively sensitive to censure however slight, and most of all to ridicule." *** "The Americans have already done great things; when they have continued a century longer in the same career, they will, like the English, be a proud, and cease to be a vain people." — Vol. x. pp. 628, 629.

This is all true, and Alison is doubtless correct when he

sarcastically compares us with "those classes or individuals who have not historic descent or great personal achievements or qualities to rest upon, and who, desirous of general applause, have a secret sense that in some particular they may be undeserving of it." He has likewise represented truly, though strongly, the restless activity which is the prominent feature of American character.

66

Every thing goes on at the gallop; neither society, nor the individuals who compose it, ever pause for an instant: new undertakings are incessantly commencing; new paths of life continually attempted by the unfortunate; successful industry ardently prosecuted by the prosperous. Projects of philanthropy, of commerce, of canals, of railways, of banking, of religious and social amelioration, succeed one another with breathless rapidity," etc.- Vol. x. p. 592.

In his geographical description of the United States Mr. Alison makes no mention of the great lakes, although two are entirely within our border, and we have at least an equal share in the remainder: but when he comes to describe Canada, a British province, he is never weary of glorying in the magnificent chain of great lakes which he seems to think are exclusively within its boundaries. So enraptured does he become in contemplating Canada, that he predicts she will one day conquer the United States; or, in his own words, "assert the wonted superiority of Northern over Southern nations." Perhaps she may, but neither Alison nor any one else can know anything of the matter. There is such a thing as British "vanity;" nothing else could have induced our author to print his bellicose suggestion.

Although Mr. Alison has sufficient reason, as a military historian, to be proud of the soldiers and sailors of his country, he is not satisfied with pure truth, but falls into the same one-sided mode of relating battles which is so common among our own writers and orators. He always represents circumstances to be favorable to the Americans and unfavorable to the British, in order to palliate British defeat or enhance British glory. By way of giving advice to the British Government, he does state, concerning the action between the Chesapeake and Shannon, that the latter was manned by a picked crew, more numerous than usual, who had long been trained by Capt. Broke for the

very purpose of doing what had never yet been performed, capturing an American frigate. But he neglects to state, what is equally well known, that the Chesapeake had an inexperienced crew, just shipped, and of whom many had never been at sea. He is more unfair still in his account of the capture, by a squadron of British frigates, of the frigate President, which he coolly declares was fairly beaten by a single frigate, the Endymion. It is well known that this same victorious frigate was so roughly handled as to be obliged to fall back out of reach of the President, who could not stop to take possession of her, but continued her flight in her crippled condition until she was overtaken by a fresh frigate of the enemy. Because one or two broadsides from this new antagonist sufficed to bring down the stars and stripes, Mr. Alison sagely concludes that the President was beaten before, or she would not have surrendered so soon to her new enemy. He seems to think an American frigate ought to be able to beat, in detail, a whole British squadron, without being crippled herself; that she should be able to commence each successive action with undiminished forces: and he makes no account of the

remainder of the British squadron which was pressing all sail to come up into action. Really, for Mr. Alison to boast of the result of this battle, must to most minds only demonstrate to what straits he was driven to find matter, in the naval encounters of the war, with which to soothe wounded British vanity. For ourselves, we should not, in this review, have noticed these instances of our author's unfairness, were it not to add one or two more items to the proof we have already adduced, that he is unworthy of the confidence which should be bestowed upon an accurate and impartial historian. Alison is not a historian, but a partisan political writer.

It is to be presumed that Mr. Alison is more to be depended upon in his European chapters, than in that portion of the work devoted to America, in preparing himself for which he apparently spent but little time, and of the blunders contained in which we have given the reader a very few of the many specimens which might be gathered. But, if some of his European critics tell the truth, he is not trustworthy even in European affairs. He has himself acknowledged numerous errors in his early

editions, by lately publishing a new one, "revised and corrected." Now it is certainly better to correct errors than to allow them to remain uncorrected; but it would be better still, more dignified and faithful, besides being more just to those who purchase the books and imbibe the errors, to see that none are put forth. Errors are not easily removed from the mind when once imbibed. How many of Mr. Alison's first readers those who first patronized his work, and set him up in the world as a historian — will ever peruse his corrected edition? One does not often read twice over ten octavo volumes of from eight hundred to a thousand pages each. Mr. Alison puts forth hastily, while yet in a crude state, the first volume of a "History of Europe," so called, and, like the modern serial novelwriter, hurries volume after volume before the public in an equally uncorrected state, to take advantage of the interest which his former volumes may have excited. Certain friends, acquaintances and gullible individuals among the public, purchase his first edition as it comes out, volume by volume. From them he receives his first encouragement, by them he is first made known to the world. When he has finished his work, and drawn fifty dollars apiece from the pockets of said friends, acquaintances and gullible individuals, he finds leisure to do what should have been done before publication, namely, to revise and amend his manuscript, and correct his proof-sheets. A new and ostensibly perfect edition appears, with which the remaining portion of the public is supplied, while the old purchasers are left with ten worthless volumes on their hands. In this pre

dicament stand many American libraries: the work, imported at an exorbitant price, now remains on their shelves an almost useless incumbrance. For if the new edition be what it purports to be, (which is greatly to be doubted ;) if it is to become a standard historical work, then must all large libraries in Europe or America be furnished with copies of it, whether they possess the defective edition or not. We beg leave to suggest that it would only be honest in Mr. Alison to make the offer to his first customers of exchanging the old for the new edition.

The style of Mr. Alison is ambitious, high-sounding, but often empty, very unequal, and frequently decidedly bad. Long, parenthetical periods, and even ungrammatical