602 MONTHLY REVIEW OF LITERATUBE. 



honest as the Whigs, yet he insinuates the contrary in good set terms, and 

 adds that the cellars of the Carlton Club are indifferently stocked, because, 

 forsooth, the Tories are no longer in office that is to say, because they can 

 no longer apply the public money to pay their wine-merchants' bills. Now 

 this is petty, and we did not expect it, for the general character of the volumes 

 is any thing but virulent. Political differences should never interfere with 

 the relations of private life ; and it is indeed an abuse of party spirit to allow 

 it to engender accusations of moral turpitude which all the world knows to be 

 utterly groundless. 



In the account of the causes of the breaking up of the Literary Union, and 

 the formation of the Clarence Club from its relics, there is inserted a vile libel 

 on Thomas Campbell, which is so very gross that we cannot help supposing 

 it to have proceeded from some personal enmity. He is accused of romping 

 in the club kitchen, at the servants' annual ball, kissing the maids, and hust- 

 ling the widows. If this be true, it was not handsome to rake up the ashes of 

 such a story, with a view to the discredit of a poet of unquestioned merit, 

 whose genius might have purchased him immunity from such an attack. 

 And if it be not true, which we have good reason to suppose is the case, it is 

 as malicious a lie as the devil could have suggested to one of his own dearly 

 beloved. There are many other observations in the chapter on clubs which we 

 find great fault with, and if the author of these volumes is not an already disap- 

 pointed man, a fox abusing the grapes he cannot get at, we think he has ensured 

 himself a most comfortable majority of black balls if he ever be proposed at 

 any one of the societies for a member. The chapter that follows is occupied 

 with the gaming-houses. As this is a subject with which we are in no wise 

 acquainted, either personally or by report, we are not in a situation to cri- 

 ticize the remarks in this section of the work. 



The remainder of the volume discusses the physical and moral condition ol 

 the higher, middle, and lower classes. At least one third part of each of these 

 three divisions is devoted to an investigation of the causes and prevalence of 

 the crime of adultery. Why our author should have made conjugal infidelity 

 so important a subject in a place where we are surprised to find such a matter 

 noticed at all, we cannot conceive. The book is of course intended to be read 

 by young females, married and unmarried, and surely there is no propriety in 

 informing them how frequently this offence is committed, or how lightly it is 

 thought of. It puts us in mind of the Irish hostler, who went to confession, 

 and after running through the catalogue of his sins, was asked by the priest 

 if he never greased the horses' teeth to prevent their eating their oats. " No, 

 your rivrence," said he of the curry-comb, and received absolution. The next 

 time he repaired to the confessional, this was added to the list of wrongs he 

 had done. "How's this ?" said the astonished auditor, " Why ! your riverence, 

 I never knew of it till your riverence put it into my head." We trust, how- 

 ever, that none of Mr. Grant's readers will follow the example of the dishonest 

 hostler. However, setting aside the bad taste of introducing the subject at 

 all, we think he is wrong in his estimate of the frequency of commission or 

 the view taken of the parties by the world. In the first place, we do not think 

 the females of our aristocracy at all more prone to infidelity than those of 

 the other classes of our country-women. If any thing of the kind occurs in 

 high life and is discovered, from the prominent station the parties hold in 

 society they are more liable to be brought before the public eye, and, indeed, a 

 faux pas is seldom committed by a titled lady but sooner or later the news- 

 papers blazon is abroad, and all the world cry out what shocking profligacy. 

 If there be any truth in the assertion of the more frequent occurrence of infi- 

 delity in women of rank than in others, we should be apt to attribute the cir- 

 cumstance to far different causes from those assigned by our author. Our 

 aristocracy have usually more leisure or idle time on their hands than those of 

 the middle classes, and as they are generally well informed and of agreeable 

 manners, that alone would in many cases account for a preference shown them 



