542 



Monthly Review of Literature, 



[MAY, 



do not gratify your palate, or any other bodily 

 appetite ; and yet it is BO pleasing that you would 

 give something out of your pocket to obtain it, and 

 would forego sonic bodily enjoyment for its sake. 

 The pleasure derived from science is exactly of 

 the like nature, or rather, it is the very same. 

 For what has just been referred to is in fact 

 science, which in its most comprehensive sense 

 means knowledge, and in its ordinary sense means 

 knowledge reduced to a system that is, ar- 

 ranged in a regular order, so as to be conveniently 

 taught, easily remembered, and readily applied. 



Personal Narrative, or Adventures in 

 the Peninsula during the f Far in 1812-13. 

 By an Officer, late in the Staff-corps Regi- 

 ment of Cavalry ; 1827. Though but a 

 barren volume, not however a dull one, we 

 are not unwilling to accept it with thankful- 

 ness. Accounts of other countries are for 

 the benefit of those who stay at home ; we 

 are of the stay-at-home class, and do not 

 care how many books of this kind we have, 

 provided they come authenticated. It is only 

 variety of descriptions it is only the survey 

 of many eyes, that will supply in any thing 

 like a satisfactory manner, to the domestic 

 reader, the use of his own. No one per- 

 son will see precisely with the eyes of ano- 

 ther. One man, too, loves what another 

 scorns ; one gazes where another only glances ; 

 one has no eyes at all for many things we 

 require, and another has prejudices which 

 blind him to more ; one lacks opportunities, 

 or tact, or capacity, which the superior faci- 

 lities or superior talents of another may sup- 

 ply. It is easy to discern the bias of a wri- 

 ter, but not so easy to measure the allowance 

 which we feel must in some degree be made 

 for his representations ; but when we have the 

 representations of scores of travellers, we 

 can not only discern the individual bias, but 

 we have the means of estimating its depre- 

 ciating effect'; by comparing statements, and 

 balancing prepossessions, we arrive at last at 

 a pretty safe result. Therefore, we welcome 

 these and similar publications, though they 

 swell to dozens. 



The writer before us was in the commis- 

 sariat department, and was of course driven 

 frequently from the scene of action ; and in 

 fact seems to have traversed the north and 

 centre of Portugal in all directions ; but of 

 Spain he saw no more than the frontiers, 

 and the line of march of the army to the 

 Pyrenees. He was very young, just escaped 

 from school indeed; and the letters profess 

 to have been written on the spot. He is a 

 little too full of his school-books, and parades 

 his Greek and Latin, and even Hebrew, to say 

 nothing of divers other languages: but if the 

 letters indeed appear as they were written, 

 they are no contemptible specimen of early 

 and cultivated ability. The sentiments he 

 expresses relative to the Portuguese and Spa- 

 niards, and to conspicuous individuals, must 

 of course be received as rather picked up 

 from others than gathered from observation. 

 We were struck with the contrast between 

 his representations of the Portuguese, and 



what appears to be the existing state of 

 things. Then we were welcomed and re- 

 spected ; now we are looked cool upon, and 

 all but insulted. But it is one thing to come 

 and rescue a nation from oppressors, and 

 quite another to put ourselves in so equivocal 

 a position, that we must either be regarded 

 as the friends of. one half the nation against 

 the other, or as usurpers, who seize the coun- 

 try, and resolve to keep it as long as a rival 

 power keeps similar possession of a neigh- 

 bouring country. 



Stories of Chivalry and Romance ; 1 827. 

 This little volume contains six tales, all of 

 them belonging, as the title expresses, to 

 the chivalric order and period. What shall 

 we say of them ? They have no distinctive 

 character ; but the insatiable devourer of fic- 

 tion may very well occupy an hour or two 

 with them. 



A writer of tales lies under great disad- 

 vantages, it must be allowed, compared with 

 the novel writer, though we are perhaps apt 

 to consider the construction of a tale an un- 

 dertaking of inferior pretension. A tale is 

 usually so brief, that a glance suffices for 

 deciding on the proportion or disproportion 

 of its parts the order of its arrangement 

 the bearings of its subsidiary portions on the 

 main story and, lastly the most important 

 of all considerations belonging to it whe- 

 ther the main incident upon which the whole 

 interest hinges, has been used for the same 

 purpose a thousand times or not. If it have 

 been so employed time out of mind, then the 

 extremely narrow limits of a tale bars the 

 possibility of any compensating for the ab- 

 sense of novelty. 



The plot of a novel may, to be sure, be worn 

 to the bone ; but then a novel may have subor- 

 dinate plots episodes, dialogues, discussions, 

 descriptions, and every conceivable variety 

 of subject, and to an extent almost unlimited. 

 The bookbinder too, and the printer, conspire 

 to distract our mental conp-d'oeil of the pro- 

 duction, by dividing it into volumes \ and 

 though the main outline and features of the 

 story may be the thousandth repetition of 

 what we have seen before, yet the fillings- 

 up and shadings-in of the intermediate parts 

 may entirely confound our memories as to 

 the actual prototype. In short, a novel af- 

 fords so much larger a scope for a writer's 

 powers, that if he be capable of excelling in 

 anyway, he may find or make an opportu- 

 nity of bringing these powers conspicuously 

 and effectively forward. As many times as 

 he offends by faults, he may compensate by 

 beauties ; and, at the worst, may leave the 

 final balance of good and bad, in the reader's 

 mind, confounded and undecided. 



Thinking as we do of the difficulties 

 of the tale writer, it seems a matter to 

 be regretted that any body should volun- 

 tarily impose upon himself additional fet- 

 ters by writing with reference to a state 

 of society so peculiar, and so strictly and 

 necessarily limiting the sources of inven- 



