MONTHLY REVIEW OF LITERATURE. 235 



and swore when he was angry : his every action becomes public property. 

 We demand a thorough description of him, and must be, somehow or other, 

 indulged. If the immortal bird from whose wing any one quill was filched 

 with which he wrote any one line, could be identified, we should proclaim at 

 once a solemn exhibition of the same, appoint a committee to consider the 

 propriety and expediency of embalming it, and forthwith consecrate it a 

 formidable rival to the cackling preservers of Rome itself. 



While we welcome these letters as being Sir Walter's, we cannot but 

 marvel at the manifest independence of delicacy exhibited by the Rev. R. 

 Polwhele, in thus publishing matter mainly respecting himself ; wherein he 

 and his poem, " Local Attachment," figure in most amiable colouring ; and 

 the confessed plagiarism of Sir Walter from the said poem is touched 

 upon with such kindly and parental vanity. The reverend gentleman omits 

 no opportunity of advertising himself ; as the gratifying fact, that " Arch- 

 deacon Nares was much pleased with my review of Marmion in the British 

 Critic," will amply shew. The republication of a review of a poem of his, 

 entitled " Fair Isabel," which we confess we never heard of till this day, is 

 a masterly step in the art of book-making. We may mention also the re- 

 production of an " Autobiographical memoir of Sir Hussey Vivian," as a 

 considerable move in that art, the particular connexion between which and 

 letters of Sir Walter Scott we are puzzled to discern. On the whole, this 

 volume, deriving interest only from its association with that great name, can 

 be perused only with that feeling ; and the reverend editor must rest satis- 

 fied that he has done his best to render the reputation of his friend subser- 

 vient to his own vanity and interest. 



HINTS TO A FASHIONABLE MOTHER. BY AN EMINENT PHYSICIAN. 

 A very useful work, and dedicated to a quarter where female education, 

 with a view to the prospects and character of women, is shamefully neglected. 

 Advice of this nature cannot fail to be beneficial. 



FRENCH WINES AND POLITICS. BY HARRIET MARTINEAU. 



ANOTHER of Miss Martineau's illustrations of political economy, admi- 

 rably written with the same philanthropic, and though we differ with Miss 

 Martineau on some considerable points, we cannot be blind to the excellence 

 of her intentions; to the ardour of which, rejecting a certain judgment, may 

 be attributed, we imagine, our dissent. 



t 



THE WESTERN CORONAL. BY MRS. CHILD. 



A COLLECTION of pieces by the well-known authoress of various works for 

 children, prose and verse ; remarkably pretty, and written with great 

 elegance and feeling. 



THE INVISIBLE GENTLEMAN, 



WE think it had been better for the reputation of the author of " Chartley 

 the Fatalist," and the " Robbers," if the " Invisible Gentleman" had never 

 made his appearance. He is a personage for whom we can feel no possible 

 interest : an individual, in short, whose only claim to our respect is the 

 facility he possesses of withdrawing his person from our presence so expe- 

 ditiously, and in so summary a manner, that barring or kicking him out is 

 quite unnecessary. We rarely remember to have met with a less prepos- 

 sessing or more intolerable young man. A joke he hardly seems to under- 

 stand, much more wishes to execute ; and it is our opinion, be it known, he 



