with fiery colour, and finally unmould and dislimn with a collapse as sudden as the motions of that eddying breeze under which their vapoury architecture had arisen.' De Quincey had a peculiar vein of humour or irony, often breaking out where least expected, and too long continued. This is exemplified in his paper on Murder as one of the Fine Arts,' which fills above a hundred pages, and in other essays and reviews; but the grand distinction of De Quincey is his subtle analytical faculty, and his marvellous power of language and description. Joan of Arc. What is to be thought of her What is to be thought of the poor shepherd-girl from the hills and forests of Lorraine, that-like the Hebrew shepherd-boy from the hills and forests of Judea-rose suddenly out of the quiet, out of the safety, out of the religious inspiration, rooted in deep pastoral solitudes, to a station in the van of armies, and to the more perilons' station at the right hand of kings? The Hebrew boy inaugurated his patriotic mission by an act, by a victorious act, such as no man could deny. But so did the girl of Lorraine, if we read her story as it was read by those who saw her nearest. Adverse armies bore witness to the boy as no pretender: but so did they to the gentle girl. Judged by the voices of all who saw them from a station of good-will, both were found true and loyal to any promises involved in their first acts. Enemies it was that made the difference between their subsequent fortunes. The boy rose-to a splendour and a noonday prosperity, both personal and public, that rang through the records of his people, and became a by-word amongst his posterity for a thousand years. until the sceptre was departing from Judah. The poor, forsaken girl, on the contrary, drank not herself from that cup of rest which she had secured for France. She never sang together with them the songs that rose in her native Domrémy, as echoes to the departing steps of invaders. She mingled not in the festal dances at Vaucouleurs which celebrated in rapture the redemption of France. No! for her voice was then silent. No! for her feet were dust. Pure, innocent, noble-hearted girl! whom, from earliest youth, ever I believed in as full of truth and self-sacrifice, this was amongst the strongest pledges for thy side, that never once-no, not for a moment of weaknessdidst thou revel in the vision of coronets and honours from man. Coronets for thee! O no! Honours, if they come when all is over, are for those that share thy blood. Daughter of Domrémy, wheu the gratitude of thy king shall awaken, thon wilt be sleeping the sleep of the dead. Call her, king of France, but she will not hear thee! Cite her by thy apparitors to come and receive a robe of honour, bat she will be found en contumace. When the thunders of universal France, as even yet may happen, shall proclaim the grandeur of the poor shepherd-girl that gave up all for her country-thy ear, young shepherd-girl, will have been deaf for five centuries. To suffer and to do, that was thy portion in this life; to do-never for thyself, always for others; to suffer-never in the persons of generous champions, always in thy own: that was thy destiny; and not for a moment was it hidden from thyself. Life,' thou saidst, is short, and he sleep which is in the grave is long. Let me nse that life, so transitory, for the glory of those heavenly dreams destined to comfort the sleep which is so long.' This poor creature-pure from every suspicion of even a visionary self-interest, even as she was pure in senses more obvious-never once did this holy child, as regarded herself, relax from her belief in the darkness that was travelling to meet her. She might not prefigure the very manner of her death: she saw not in vision, perhaps, the aerial altitude of the fiery scaffold, the spectators without end on every road pouring into Rouen as to a coronation the surging sinoke, the volleying flames, the hostile faces all around, the pitying eye that lurked but here and there until nature and imperishable truth broke loose from artificial restraints; these might not be apparent through the mists of the hurrying future. But the voice that called her to death, that she heard for ever. Great was the throne of France even in those days, and great was he that sat upon it; but well Jona knew that not the throne, nor he that sat upon it, was for her; but, on the contrary, that she was for them, not she by them, but they by her, should rise from the dust. Gorgeous were the lilies of France, and for centuries had the privilege to spread their beauty over land and sea, until, in another century, the wrath of God and man combined to wither them: but well Joanna knew, early at Domrémy she had read that bitter truth, that the lilies of France would decorate no garland for her. Flower nor bud, bell nor blossom would ever bloom for her. On the Wednesday after Trinity Sunday in 1431, being then about nineteen years of age, the Maid of Arc underwent her martyrdo:n. She was conducted before midday, guarded by eight hundred spearmen, to a platform of prodigious height, constructed of wooden bulets, supported by hollow spaces in every direction, for the creation of air-currents. The pile struck terror,' says M. Michelet, by its height." There would be a certainty of calumny rising against her-some people would impute to her a willingness to recant. No innocence could escape that. Now, had she really testified this willingness on the scaffold, it would have argued nothing at all but the weakness of a genial nature shrinking from the instant approach of torment. And those will often pity that weakness most. who in their own persons would yield to it least. Meantime there never was a calumny uttered that drew less support from the recorded circumstances. It rests upon no positive testimony, and it has a weight of contradicting testimony to stem. What else but her meek, saintly demeanour won, from the enemies that till now had believed her a witch, tears of rapturous admiration? Ten thousand men,' says M. Michelet himself, ten thousand men wept ; and of these ten thousand the majority were political enemies knitted together by cords of superstition. What else was it but her constancy, united with her angelic gentleness, that drove the fanatic English soldier-who had sworn to throw a fagot on her scaffold as his tribute of abhorrence, that did so, that fulfilled his vow-suddenly to turn away a penitent for life, saying everywhere that he had seen a dove rising upon wings to heaven from the ashes where she had stood? What else drove the executioner to kneel at every shrine for pardon to his share in the tragedy? And if all this were insufficient, then I cite the closing act of her life as valid on her behalf, were all other testimonies against her. The executioner had been directed to apply his torch from below. He did so. The fiery smoke rose up in billowy columns. A Dominican monk was then standing almost at her side. Wrapped up in his sublime office, ne saw not the danger, but still persisted in his prayers. Even then when the last enemy was racing up the fiery stairs to seize her, even at that moment did this noblest of girls think only for him, the one friend that would not forsake her, and not for herself; bidding him with her last breath to care for his own preservation, but to leave her to God. That girl, whose latest breath ascended in this sublime expression of self-oblivion. did not utter the word recant either with her lips or in her heart. No, the did not, though one should rise from the dead to swear it. JOHN WILSON CROKER. The last and most indefatigab'e of the origina' corps of the 'Quarterly Review' was MR. JOHN WILSON CROKER (1780-1857). He was a native of Galway, his father being surveyor-general of customs and excise in Ireland, and he was educa ed at Trinity College, Dublin. His first literary attempts were satirical-Familiar Epistles on the Irish Stage,' 1804; and an Intercepted Letter from Canton,' or a satire on certain politicians and magnates in the city of Dublin, 1805. These local productions were followed by Songs of Trafal gar,' 1806, and a pamphlet, entitled 'A Sketch of Ireland, Past and Present,' 1807. Sir Walter Scott, in his Life of Swift,' has copied one passage from this 'Sketch,' which appears to be an imitation of the style of Grattan. Character of Swift. On this gloom one luminary rose, and Ireland worshipped it with Persian idolatry; her true patriot-her first-almost her last. Sagacious and intrepid. be saw-ho dared; above suspicion, he was trusted; above envy, he was beloved; above rivalry, he was obeyed. His wisdom was practical and prophetic-remedial for the present, warning for the future. He first taught Ireland that she might become a nation, and England that she must cease to be a despot. But he was a churchman; his gown impeded his course, and entangled his efforts. Guiding a senate, or heading an army, he had been more than Cromwell, and Ireland not less than England. As it was, he saved her by his courage, improved her by his authority, adorned her by his talents, and exalted her by his fame. His mission was but of ten years, and for ten years only did his personal power mitigate the government; but though no longer feared by the great, he was not forgotten by the wise; his influence, like his writings, has survived a century; and the foundations of whatever prosperity we have since erected are laid in the disinterested and magnanimous patriotism of Swift. Mr. Croker studied law at Lincoln's Inn, but getting into parliament for the borough of Down-patrick (1807) he struck into that path of public life which he was fitted to turn to the best advantage. in 1809 he took a prominent part in defending the Duke of York during the parliamentary investigation into the conduct of His Royal Highness, and shortly afterwards he was made Secretary to the Ådmiralty, an office which he held for nearly twenty-two years, until 1830, when he retired with a pension of £1500 per annum. In 1803 he published anonymously The Battles of Talavera,' a poem in the style of Scott, and which Sir Walter reviewed in the second volume of the Quarterly Review.' In the same style Mr. Croker commemorated the Battle of Al uera,' 1811. This seems to have been the last of his poetical efforts. He was now busy with the Quarterly Review.' Criticism, properly so called, he never attempted. His articles were all personal or historical, confined to attacks on Whigs and Jacobins, or to the rectification of dates and facts regarding public characters and events. He was the reviewer of Keats's 'Endymion' in 1818, to which Byron playfully alluded: Who killed John Kents? But this deadly article is only a plece of abuse of three pages, in which Keats is styled a copyist of Leigh Hunt, more unintelligible, almost as rugged, twice as diffuse, and ten times more tiresome and absurd than his prototype.' Lady Morgan's Italy is despatched in the same trenchant style. But one of Mr. Croker's greatest 'feats' in this way was mortifying the vanity of Fanny Burney or Madame D'Arblay, who wished to have it believed that she was only seventeen when her novel of Evelina' was published. She is said to have kept up the delusion without exactly giving the date; but the reviewer, knowing that she was born at Lynn, in Norfolk, had the parish-register examined, and found that the fair novelist was baptised in June 1752, and consequently was between twenty-five and twentysix years of age when 'Evelina' appeared, instead of being a prodigy of seventeen. Mr. Croker's success in this species of literary statistics led him afterwards to apply it to the case of the Empress Josephine and Napoleon; he had the French registers examined, and from them proved that both Josephine and Napoleon had falsified their ages. This fact, with other disparaging details, the reviewer brought out in a paper which appeared on the occasion of the late emperor's visit to England-no doubt to mortify the new Napoleon dynasty. In the same spirit he assailed Soult when he visited this country-recounting all his military errors and defeats, and reminding him that the Duke of Wellington had deprived him of his dinner at Oporto in 1809 and at Waterloo in 1815. The duke is said to have been seriously displeased with the reviewer on account of this mistimed article. Two of the later contributions to the Review by Mr. Croker made considerable noise. We refer to those on Macaulay's History and Moore's Memoirs. In the case of the former, Mr. Rogers said Croker attempted murder, but only committed suicide.' With Moore the reviewer had been on friendly terms. They were countrymen and college acquaintances; and when Lord John Russell published the poet's journals for the benefit of his widow, a generous man, who had known the deceased, would have abstained from harsh comments. Croker applied the scalpel without mercy; Lord John ventured a remark on the critic's safe malignity; and Croker retaliated by shewing that Moore had been recording unfavourable notices of him in his journal at the very time that he was cultivating his acquaintance by letters, and soliciting favours at his hands. Lord John's faults as an editor were also unsparingly exposed; and on the whole, in all but good feeling,. Croker was triumphant in this passage-at-arms. No man with any heart would have acted as Croker did, but he was blinded by his keen partisanship and pride. He was a political gladiator bound to do battle against all Whigs and innovators in literature. Mr. Disraeli has satirised him under the name of Rigby' in his novel of Coningsby.' Mr. Croker, however, did service to literature by his annotated edition of Boswell's 'Life of Johnson;' and his publication of the Suffolk Papers, the Letters of Lady Hervey, and Lord Hervey's Memoirs of the Court of George II.' He wrote 'Stories from the History of England for Children,' which had the merit of serving as a model for Sir Walter Scott's Tales of a Grandfather,' and he collected some of his contributions to the Review,' and published them under the title of Essays on the Early Period of the French Revolution.' At the time of his death he was engaged in preparing an edition of Pope's works, which has since passed into the abler hands of the Rev. Whitworth Elwin. HARRIET MARTINEAU. The following notice of MISS MARTINEAU appeared in Horne's 'Spirit of the Age: Harriet Martineau was born in the year 1802, one of the youngest among a family of eight children. Her father was a proprietor of one of the manufactories in Norwich, in which place his family, originally of French origin, had resided since the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes. She was indebted to an uncle, a surgeon in Norwich, for her education. She has herself ascribed her taste for literary pursuits to the extreme delicacy of her health in childhood; to the infirmity (deafness) with which she has been afilicted ever since, which, without being so complete as to deprive her absolutely of all intercourse with the world, yet obliged her to seek occupations and pleasures within herself; and to the affection which subsisted between her and the brother nearest her own age, the Rev. James Martineau, whose fine mind and talents are well known. The occupation of writing, first begun to gratify her own taste and inclination, became afterwards to her a source of honorable independence, when. by one of the disasters so common in trade, her family became involved in misfortunes. She was then enabled to reverse the common lot of unmarried daughters in such circumstances, and cease to be in any respect a burden. She realised an income sufficient for her simple habits, but still so small as to enhance the integrity of the sacrifice which she made to principle in refusing the pension offered to her by government in 1840. Her motive for refusing it was, that she considered herself in the light of a political writer, and that the offer did not proceed from the people, but from the government, which did not represent the people. It is said in another account that when pressed on this subject by Lord Melbourne, she declined to accept a pension, the proceeds of a system of taxation which she had condemned in her works. The literary career of Miss Martineau displayed unwearied application, as well as great versatility of talent and variety of information. It commenced in 1823, when she published Devotional Exercises for Young Persons.' From this time till 1831 she issued a number of tracts and short moral tales, and wrote some prize essays, which were published by the Unitarian Association. Two works on social questions, 'The Rioters' and 'The Turn Out,' were among the first attempts to expound in a popular form the doctrines of political economy. In 1832-34 she produced more valuable Illustrations of Political Economy, Taxation,' and 'Poor Laws. A visit to America next led to Society in America,' 1837; and Retrospect of Western Travel,' 1838, both able and interesting works. In the same year she published a Letter to the Deaf, and two small 'Guides to Service,' to which she afterwards added two more domes. tic manuals. To 1838 also belongs a small tract, 'How to Observe.' In 1839 appeared Deerbrook,' a novel, containing striking and eloquent passages, one of which we subjoin: Effects of Love and Happiness on the Mind. "There needs no other proof that happiness is the most wholesome moral atmosphere, and that in which the immortality of man is destined ultimately to thrive, than the elevation of soul, the religious aspiration, which attends the first assurance, the first sober certainty of true love. There is much of this religious aspiration |