of Biblical Literature, and many other highly important works, which have obtained an extensive circulation, and are greatly prized, we could not but feel interested in this little book, and purchased it accordingly. It has proved full of curious interest, and from it we learnt, that besides having endured from an early age the serious privation of hearing, the author has also suffered the lot of poverty, and, by dint of gallant perseverance and manly courage, he has risen above, and triumphed over both privations. It is, indeed, true that Dr. Kitto's first book was "written in a workhouse." And we must here tell the reader something of his early history. The father of Dr. Kitto was a working mason at Plymouth, whither he had been attracted by the demand for labourers of all descriptions, at that place, about the early part of the present century. John Kitto was accordingly born there in 1804. In his youth he received very little school education, though he learnt to read, and had already taken some interest in books, when the serious accident occurred which deprived him of his hearing. At that time his parents were in very distressed circumstances, and though little more than twelve years of age, the boy was employed by his father to help him as a labourer, in carrying stones, mortar, and such like. One day in February, 1817, when stepping from the ladder to the roof of a house undergoing repair, in Batter Street, the little lad, with a load of slates on his head, lost his balance, and, falling back, was precipitated from a height of thirty-five feet into the paved court below! Dr. Kitto has himself given a most vivid account of the details of the accident in the most interesting work by him, on "The Lost Senses,-Deafness," some time since published by Charles Knight. "Of what followed," says he, "I know nothing. For one moment, indeed, I awoke from that deathlike state, and then found that my father, attended by a crowd of people, was bearing me homeward in his arms; but I had then no recollection of what had happened, and at once relapsed into a state of unconsciousness. "In this state I remained for a fortnight, as I afterwards learned. These days were a blank in my life; I could never bring any recollections to bear upon them; and when I awoke one morning to consciousness, it was as from a night of sleep. I saw that it was at least two hours later than my usual time of rising, and marvelled that I had been suffered to sleep so late. I attempted to spring up in bed, and was astonished to find that I could not even move. The utter prostration of my strength subdued all curiosity within me. I experienced no pain, but I felt that I was weak; I saw that I was treated as an invalid, and acquiesced in my condition, though some time passed, more time than the reader would imagine, before I could piece together my broken recollections, so as to comprehend it. "I was very slow in learning that my hearing was entirely gone. The unusual stillness of all things was grateful to me in my utter exhaustion; and if, in this half-awakened state, a thought of the matter entered my mind, I ascribed it to the unusual care and success of my friends in preserving silence around me. I saw them talking, indeed, to one another, and thought that, out of regard to my feeble condition, they spoke in whispers, because I heard them not. The truth was revealed to me in consequence of my solicitude about a book [Kirby's Wonderful Magazine] which had much interested me on the day of my fall. *** I asked for this book with much earnestness, and was answered by signs which I could not compre hend. "Why do you not speak?' I cried; 'pray let me have the book.' "This seemed to create some confusion; and at length some one, more clever than the rest, hit upon the happy expedient of writing upon a slate, that the book had been reclaimed by the owner, and that I could not in my weak state be allowed to read. "But,' said I, in great astonishment, why do you write to me, why not speak? Speak, speak!' "Those who stood around the bed exchanged significant looks of concern, and the writer soon displayed upon his slate the awful words,-'You are DEAF.'" Various remedies were tried, but without avail. Some serious organic injury had been done to the auditory nerve by the fall, and hearing was never restored poor Kitto remained stone-deaf. The boy, thus thrown upon himself, devoted his spare time,now all his time was spare time,-to reading. Books gradually became a source of interest to him, and he soon exhausted the small and interesting stocks of his neighbours. Books were at that date much rarer than now, and reading was regarded as an occult art, in which few persons of the working class could indulge. The circumstances of Kitto's parents were still very poor, which, with other sources of domestic disquietude, rendered his position for some years very unfortunate. At length, in 1819, about two years from the date of his accident, on an application for relief from the guardians of the poor of Plymouth, the young Kitto was taken from his parents, and placed among the boys of the workhouse. There he was instructed in the art of shoemaking, with the view of enabling him thus to obtain his livelihood. He was afterwards bound apprentice to a poor shoemaker in the town, where his position was very miserable; so much so, that an inquiry as to the apprentice's treatment was instituted before the magistrates, the result of which was that they discharged Kitto from his apprenticeship, and he was returned to the workhouse, where he continued his shoemaking. He found a warm friend in Mr. Bernard, the clerk to the guardians, and also in Mr. Nugent, the master of the school; from these gentlemen he obtained loans of books, which were usually of a religious character. He remained in the workhouse about four years; his deafness condemned him to solitude; for, deprived of speech and hearing, he had not the means of forming friends among his companions, such as they were. At the same time, it is possible enough that his isolation from the other occupants of the workhouse may have preserved his purity, and encouraged him to cultivate his intellectual powers to a greater extent than he might otherwise have been disposed to do. Thrown almost exclusively upon his visual perceptions, he enjoyed with an intensity of delight the beautiful face of Nature,-the sun, the moon, the stars, and the glories of earth. In after-life, he said, "I must not refuse to acknowledge, that when I have beheld the moon, 'walking in brightness,' my heart has been 'secretly enticed' into feelings having perhaps a nearer approach to the old idolatries than I should like to ascertain. I mention this, because, at this distant day, I have no recollection of earlier emotions connected with the beautiful, than those of which the moon was the object. How often, some two or three years after my affliction, did I not wander forth upon the hills, for no other purpose in the world than to enjoy and feed upon the emotions connected with the sense of the beautiful in Nature. It gladdened me, it filled my heart, I knew not why or how, to view! 'the great and wide sea,' the wooded mountain, and even the silent town, under that pale radiance; and not less to follow the course of the luminary over the clear sky, or to trace its shaded pathway among and behind the clouds." An exquisitely keen perception of the beautiful in trees, was of somewhat later development, as Plymouth, being by the seaside, is not favourable to the growth of oaks, and had nothing to boast of but a few rows of good elms. Another great source of enjoyment with him at that early period, was to wander about the printsellers and picture-framers' windows, and learn the pictures by heart, watching anxiously from day to day for the cleaning out of the windows, that he might enjoy the luxury of a new display of prints and frontispieces. He scoured the whole neighbourhood with this view, going over to Devonport, which he divided into districts and visited periodically, for the purpose of exploring the windows in each, with leisurely enjoyment at each visit. A young man, so peculiarly circumstanced, and with such tastes, could not remain altogether overlooked, and he was so fortunate as to attract the notice of two worthy gentlemen, who, when he had reached the age of about twenty years, used every exertion to befriend him. One of these was Mr. Harvey, we believe a member of the Society of Friends, well known as an accomplished mathematician, who supplied young Kitto with books of a superior quality to anything he had before had access to. Mr. Harvey, when one day in a bookseller's shop, saw a lad of mean appearance enter, and begin writing a communication to the master on a slip of paper. On inquiry, he found him to be a deaf workhouse boy, distinguished by his desire for reading and thirst for knowledge of all kinds; and that he had come to borrow a book which the bookseller had promised to lend him. Inquiries were made about him, interest was excited in his behalf, and a subscription was raised for his benefit. He was supplied with books, paper, and pens, to enable him to pursue his · literary occupations; and in a short time, having secured the notice of Mr. Nettleton, one of the proprietors of the Plymouth Journal, and also a guardian of the poor, several of his productions appeared in the columns of that journal. The case of the poor lad became the subject of general conversation in the town; several gentlemen associated themselves together as the guardians of the youth; after which Kitto was removed from the workhouse, and obtained permission to read at the public library. A selection of his writings, chiefly written in the workhouse, was shortly afterwards published by subscription, and the young man found himself in the fair way of advancement. He made rapid progress in learning; acquiring a knowledge of Hebrew and other languages, which he imparted to his pupils, the sons of a gentleman into whose house he was taken as tutor. He read largely on all subjects, but his early bias towards theological literature clung to him, and he soon acquired an extensive and profound knowledge of scriptural and sacred lore. At length he was enabled to turn his stores of learning to rich account, in his Pictorial Bible and Cyclopædia of Biblical Literature, which many of our readers may have seen. In his day, Dr. Kitto has also been an extensive traveller; having been in Palestine, in Egypt, in the Morea, in Russia, and in many countries of Europe. "For many years," he says, "I had no views towards literature beyond the instruction and solace of my own mind; and under these views, and in the absence of other mental stimulants, the pursuit of it eventually became a passion which devoured all others. I take no merit for the industry and application with which I pursued this object,-none for the ingenious contrivances by which I sought to shorten the hours of needful rest, that I might have the more time for making myself acquainted with the minds of other men. The reward was great and immediate ; and I was only preferring the gratification which seemed to me the highest. Nevertheless, now that I am in fact another being, having but slight connection, excepting in so far as 'the child is father to the man,' with my former self; now that much has become a business which was then simply a joy; and now that I am gotten old in experiences, if not in years; it does somewhat move me to look back upon that poor and deaf boy in his utter loneliness, devoting himself to objects in which none around him could sympathize, and to pursuits which none could even understand. There was a time,-by far the most dreary in that portion of my career,-when an employment was found for me [it was when he was apprenticed to the shoemaker] to which I proceeded about six o'clock in the morning, and from which I returned not until about ten at night. I murmured not at this; for I knew that life had grosser duties than those to which I would gladly have devoted all my hours; and I dreamed not that a life of literary occupations might be within the reach of my hopes. This was, however, a terrible time for me, as it left me so little leisure for what had become my sole enjoyment, if not my sole good. I submitted; I acquiesced; I tried hard to be happy; but it would not do; my heart gave way, notwithstanding my manful struggles to keep it up, and I was very thoroughly miserable. Twelve hours I could have borne. I have tried it; and know that the leisure which twelve hours might have left would have satisfied me; but sixteen hours, and often eighteen, out of the twenty-four, was more than I could bear. To come home, weary and sleepy, and then to have only for mental sustenance the moments which, by selfimposed tortures, could be torn from needful rest, was a sore trial; and now that I look back upon this time, the amount of study which I did, under these circumstances, contrive to get through, amazes and confounds me, notwithstanding that my habits of application remain to this day strong and vigorous. "In the state to which I have thus referred, I suffered much wrong; and the fact, that young as I then was, my pen became the instrument of redressing that wrong, and of ameliorating the more afflictive part of my condition, was among the first circumstances which revealed to me the secret of the strength which I had, unknown to myself, acquired. The flood of light which then broke in upon me, not only gave distinctness of purpose to what had before been little more than dark and uncertain gropings; but also, from that time, the motive to my exertions became more mixed than it had been. My ardour and perseverance were not lessened; and the pure love of knowledge, for its own sake, would still have carried me on; but other influences, the influences which supply the impulse to most human pursuits, did supervene, and gave the sanction of the judgment to the course which the instincts of mental necessity had previously dictated. I had, in fact, learned the secret, that knowledge is power; and if, as is said, all power is sweet, then, surely, that power which knowledge gives is, of all others, the sweetest." In conclusion, we may add, that Dr. Kitto continues to lead a happy and a useful life. He is cheered by the faces of children around his table,-though, alas! he cannot hear their sweet voices. He resides in the beautiful environs of London, that he may be within sight of old trees, without which, he says, his heart could scarcely be satisfied. Indeed, with such love and veneration does he regard trees, that the felling of a noble tree causes him the deepest emotion. But he delights in the faces of men, too, and nothing gives him greater delight than to walk or drive through the crowded thoroughfares of the metropolis. In this respect he resembles the amiable Charles Lamb, to whom the crowd of Fleet Street was more delightful than all the hills and lakes of Westmoreland. "How often," says Dr. Kitto, "at the end of a day's hard toil, have I thrown myself into an omnibus, and gone into town, for no other purpose in the world than to have a walk from Charing Cross to St. Paul's on the one hand, or to the top of Regent Street on the other; or, from the top of Tottenham Court Road to the Post Office. I know not whether I liked this best in summer or winter. I could seldom afford myself this indulgence but for one or two evenings a week, when I could manage to bring my day's studies to a close an hour or so earlier than usual. In summer there is daylight, and I could better enjoy the picture-shops and the street incidents, and might diverge so as to pass through Covent Garden, and luxuriate among the finest fruits and most beautiful flowers in the world. And in winter it might be doubted whether the glory of the shops, lighted up with gas, was not a sufficient counterbalance for the absence of daylight. Perhaps both are best,' as the children say; and yield the same kind of grateful change as the alternation of the seasons offers." Thus, what we, who have our hearing entire, regard as a great calamity, has in Dr. Kitto ceased to be regarded as such. The condition has become natural to him, and his sweet temper and steady habits of industry, enable him to pass through life honourably and usefully. He is content to spend his remaining years in silence. A noble and a valuable lesson to all young men, is the life of such a diligent self-helper as Dr. Kitto. TOO LATE! THE expenditure of the sum of £12 10s., according to an eminent engineer, would have prevented the Holmfirth catastrophe. Our readers will remember that, not long ago, the Holmfirth reservoir burst its banks, and the waters, sweeping down the narrow valley at midnight, suddenly drowned some eighty persons, and destroyed half a million pounds worth of property. The commissioners were long meditating the repair of the leaking embankment; they were ready to spend the £12 10s. for the purpose, but they deferred until it was TOO LATE, and then all repairs were needless. TOO LATE might be written on many of our public schemes of meditated repair and reform. The mischief to be apprehended is obvious enough. Many eyes are directed towards the swollen waters, and to the cracks and rents in the embankment which still keeps them pent up. Some call out for repairs, and they are answered that "it is time enough!" And this goes on from year to year, until at length down comes the flood at midnight, and the inhabitants of the valley only awake to find that all their attempts at repair have come TOO LATE ! 66 are the words "Too late," wrote Dr. Arnold, which I should be inclined to affix to every plan of reforming society in this country. We are ingulphed, I believe, and must go down the cataract.' Dr. Arnold was too hopeless. Even since his day, much has been done towards repairing the rents in our social fabric; and many other things remain to be done. Still, to the anxious and earnest man, matters seem to get mended so slowly, and often so clumsily, that he cannot help falling into a state bordering almost on despair; and he groans out that "it will be all too late." The old story of the Sybil and her books often comes up in the progress of the ages. Men in power refuse to give heed to the distant mutterings of danger. They will scarcely bestir themselves ere the danger has openly shown itself, and made itself felt; and when this is the case, it is almost always too late to remedy its causes. The governing classes of France were found quite willing to remedy the horrible mischiefs of society in that country about the end of last century; but they would not bestir themselves until their own lives and properties were in danger, and then it was all too late! Society was then going rapidly down the torrent! England was willing to do her American colonists justice after they had risen in rebellion and worsted our armies. But "too late" was the universal answer of the colonists to our overtures for reconciliation. The rubicon had already been passed, and reconciliation become a fallacious dream. The same words might be written on many of our schemes of social amelioration. When the mischief is done, we purpose to undo it. But it is done. "When the steed is stolen, shut the stable door!" Let little children be left unrestrained, undisciplined, and surrounded by all manner of inducements to bad living; they grow up thus, fall into evil ways, commit criminal acts, and, in course of time, are put into gaol. Then it is that our concern for them begins; and we now put them under training and discipline. But it is all too late. The habits have been fixed; the character has been formed; the criminal has been made. It is too late to reform him--we have begun at the wrong end. We cannot make him live his life back ward. Try and reform an evil habit--that of drunkenness, for example. In nine hundred and ninety out of the thousand cases you will fail. The habit is the life. It has wound itself in and through the life as an integral part of it; and you cannot tear it out. Or, try to make a habitually unvirtuous person virtuous. It cannot be done. The habit has been ingrained in the thoughts, the feelings, the passions, and poisoned the whole nature. It is too late to reform. The only safe way is, so to educate and bring up children as to prevent evil habits being formed. This is beginning at the right, and not at the wrong end. How many good resolutions have been formed too late! "Oh, that I had begun earlier!" is the miserable outcry. Every day that has passed by has rendered the chances of amendment more hopeless. But life cannot be unlived, nor can habits once formed be uprooted. The victim is bound in chains as of adamant. He is immured in the tomb which he himself has dug. Too late! the curse of life! Could we but read How oft were found Engraven deep, those words of saddest sound (Curse of our mortal state!), Too late! Too late! dispel our fears-to enlarge the measure of our faith, and proclaim "the sure supremeness of the Beautiful." It has been to us also a source of wonder that a poet of such rare powers and singular merit should not have achieved a wider appreciation among Englishmen than he has yet obtained. It is true that he has long been familiar with "the select few"-people of literary taste and means sufficient, to whom the cost of a book is a matter of small moment; but the general public who are debarred from cultivating an author's acquaintance until his works have gained an extended celebrity, and been reprinted in "cheap editions," or extracted into the columns of popular journals at present scarcely know the name of Lowell. We rejoice, then, to find that, at length, the writings of this author have been reproduced in a form and at a price which commend them to the intelligent and thoughtful of all classes. So highly do we esteem Lowell as a poet, that we readily join the editor of the edition before us-Mr. Scoble-in the well-grounded hope and earnest desire that ere long he may count "as many admirers on this side of the Atlantic as he already numbers in the United States," where, we are told, "his reputation is deservedly great." It will be well, however, before entering upon the poems in detail, to state one or two facts touching the personal concerns of our author. James Russell Lowell is the son of a clergyman of Boston-a city in the State of Massachusetts, which has acquired the title of the literary capital of America. He was born in the year 1819, and finished his education at Harvard College, one of the principal seats of learning of the Western Republic. On quitting the university, he entered the legal profession, but appears to have practised very little, if at all. Literature seems to have had more potent charms for his mind, and from the time referred to until the present, he has been, in one way and another, honourably connected with the periodical press of his native country. Several of the leading magazines have availed themselves of his contributions in prose as well as poetry-although it is in the latter that he excels-and for some years past he has conducted a monthly serial "with marked ability." A collection of his poems was published in this country about eight years since, but, owing to its dearness, obtained a very small circulation, and was soon forgotten. The most lengthy poems in the volume are,"The Vision of Sir Launfal," a romance, founded upon the search for the "San Greal or Holy Grail, the cup out of which Jesus partook of the last supper with his disciples;" and a metrical tale, also of a romantic character, entitled "A Legend of Brittany." The latter of these works is, to our thinking, by far the better of the two-it is certainly the more original and distinctive. It is written in the modern stanza, over which Lowell is a complete master, and for ease and elegance of rhythm, the Legend may safely challenge comparison with the works of any living poet-American or English. Nor is this its only noticeable feature. The incidents of the story are everywhere interwoven with rich gems of thought, which lie so thickly clustered, and sparkle and glitter so brilliantly, that reflection is unable to keep its pace with the reader's mere outward eyesight. The hero of this tale, Mordred, is a Templar knight, who, by the vows of his order, has sworn to eschew marriage; the heroine, Margaret, is "a simple herdsman's child." Of the Templar we are told that, He had been noble, but some great deceit Margaret, on the other hand, was as unsuspecting as she was pure; and having spent the whole of her days, from infancy upwards, amid the beauties of nature, her mind had grown into the likeness and similitude of the objects round about, from which it gained its nourishment. To use the words of Lowell: 66 She dwelt for ever in a region bright, Peopled with living fancies of her own, So fair and holy a creature as Margaret, was ill adapted for serious conflict with the powers of evil, or to successfully guard herself from the devices of 'the dark proud man" her lover; but "such power hath beauty and frank innocence," that when he first beheld her, his baser feelings were at once subdued-her angel purity disarmed all criminal intent and he inwardly cursed that "cruel faith" to the behests of which he had sacrificed the sacred instincts of his manliness. It is an "o'er sad tale" this Legend of Brittany. The darker emotions eventually triumphed in Mordred's breast, and gentle Margaret fell. Time rolled along, and as one evil deed leads to its successor, the knight was hurried forward to the perpetration of a still more frightful outrage, in order to avoid the consequences of his former crime. Fearing that the discovery of his victim's shame might also lead to his own detection-and dreading disgrace for having violated his celibate vow-he murdered Margaret at the old trysting-place--the spot where many of their happiest hours had been spent. The rest of the poem is of a supernatural character, and cannot be well described. It is, however, replete with beautiful passages-high and lofty teachings-grand lessons of charity, which "a world with Levite eyes" might read and study with advantage. The minor poems of Lowell are all well worthy of mention-it is almost impossible, indeed, to choose between them; but, if we must needs give preference to any, it will be "A Glance behind the Curtain," in which we are introduced to Cromwell and Hampden in earnest conversation on the state of England during the reign of Charles the First, and in which the motives that actuated those noble men are laid bare to view. Then we have an Ode-an Elegy on the Death of Dr. Channing-L'Envoi-Rhocus, and the Ghost-Seer-a remarkable poem that we have never previously met with. We must not either omit to name his Sonnets, nor a few other short pieces; such as "Rosaline,' "6 'Allegra,' ," "The Shepherd of King Admetus," and "Irene." Yet, in thus particularizing, we must not be understood as condemning those left behind-among which there is quality enough to make a modern poet's reputation. The classic fable of "Prometheus" has been ably handled by Lowell; although the same subject has been already used by many of our best writers. The theme is so fertile and suggestive, that artists, painters, sculptors, and poets, seem still to consider it a common and inexhaustible property, equally adapted for their various purposes. We can best notice the minor pieces collectively. The poet must not be judged of wholly by the style, but also by the spirit and design of his verse. We shall therefore cull a few passages which show at once the artistic abilities of our author-his power of versification, and manifest at the same time the aims and purposes of his muse. Lowell has himself a lofty sense of the poet's mission, and condemns, in earnest and impassioned language, those who degrade their calling, or devote their labours to unworthy and ignoble ends. He thinks, too, that in the every day walks, and amid the actualities of life, are to be found themes of soul-stirring human interest, which cannot fail to enlist the best sympathies of the true poet; and that the exigencies of modern society, moreover, loudly demand his aid. In "An Ode he tells us, There still is need of martyrs and apostles, There still are texts for never-dying song: What made thy great forerunners free and wise. And roll thy songs down like a gathering fountain, Again, in L'Envoi, the same view is expressed with additional emphasis : Never had poets such high call before, Lowell has no admiration for the hollow conventionalities of fashionable life; in his contempt of forms and observances he is somewhat swayed towards the other extreme. In the Ode from which we just now selected a short extract, there is the following magnificent passage : Among the toil-worn poor my soul is seeking He who would be the tongue of this wide land Whose eyes, like windows on a breezy summit, Who doth not sound God's sea with earthly plummet, And find a bottom still of worthless clay; Who heeds not how the lower gusts are working, And sees, beneath the foulest faces lurking, One God-built shrine of reverence and love; Who sees all stars that wheel their shining marches Where the encircling soul serene o'erarches The moving globe of being like a sky; Who feels that God and Heaven's great deeps are nearer Him to whose heart his fellow-man is nigh, Who doth not hold his soul's own freedom dearcr Than that of all his brethren, low or high; Who to the right can feel himself the truer For being gently patient with the wrong, Who sees a brother in the evildoer, And finds in Love the heart's-blood of his song ;- The "coming man," the "true Apostle of Humanity," it would appear, from the preceding extracts, should be looked for among those of earth's children who dig and hew-who toil and spin-rather than in the upper ranks, or even among the learned and refined circles of society. We find the same idea (the heroism of humble life), slightly modified at times, running through the whole of his poems. For example, it is asserted in the piece entitled “An Among the untaught poor, Lowell's faith is vital and ever active; it peeps out from every shade, and exhibits itself prominently in every tinge of sunshine-it is more or less observable in every delineation of human character portrayed by his pencil. The poorest and the richest, the highest and the lowest, even the most ill-cared-for and despised of the sons of men, are in some degree possessed of and moved by the spirit of goodness. The "most fitting triumph" of poetry, he considers, is to show that good ever "lurks in the heart of evil." And this faith has its wider phases. Wherever he turns his eyes-in all the spheres, in men and matter, in mind and morals-he observes the workings of God's universal law, by which all things are impelled and guided towards their rightful destiny, and made to subserve the universal happiness of sentient existence. Beattie has well exclaimed Of chance and change, O! let not man complain, And Lowell thus forcibly expresses himself to the same effect. He says: The time is ripe, and rotten-ripe, for change; I do not fear to follow out the truth, Let us speak plain: there is more force in names My God when I read o'er the bitter lives The above passages are from " A Glance behind the Curtain," and are put into the mouth of Cromwell, although we half suspect they were intended to have a modern significance and application. Lowell is a patriot-one of the truest stamp-one that will tell his country of her faults as of her virtues, rather than gloss over her national vices and laud her demerits to gain the empty applause of the unthinking. Slavery the execrated domestic institution of America-has roused his fiercest indignation, which has found vent in several small poems. Apropos of this subject, we are reminded of a loss the purchasers of the edition we are dealing with must |