28. Of the battle of Mungarwar? 29. Of Havelock at Lucknow? 30. Of the relief? 31. Of the city? 32. Of the losses? Of Outram ? 33. Of the British troops before Delhi? 34. What events followed? 35. What was done by Nicholson? By Jones? 36. By Campbell? By Salkeld and Home? 37. By the storming party? 38. What is said of the losses? 39. What was done in the suburbs of Delhi? 40. What was done on the 16th of September? The 17? 41. What is said of the king of Delhi? 42. Of generals Wilson and Penny? Of Greathed? 43. What events followed? 44. What took place at Lucknow? 45. What is said of the siege? 46. Of sir Colin Campbell? 47. Of general Havelock? 48. What took place at Cawnpore? 49. At Lucknow? 50 After the fall of Lucknow ? CHAPTER XL. MATCH OF THE PROGRESS OF LITERATURE, SCIENCE, AND THE Calmly they show us mankind victorious Unveiling our night's illumined face. Sterling. 1. In the middle of the last century, science and literature in England were fast losing all traces of originality; invention was discouraged, research unvalued, and the examination of nature proscribed; it seemed to be generally established, that the treasures accumulated in the preceding age, were quite sufficient for all national purposes, and that the only duty which authors had to perform, was to reproduce what had been thus accumulated, in a more elegant shape, adorned with all the graces of polished style. Tameness and monotony naturally result from a slavish adherence to established rules, and every branch of literature felt this blighting influence: history, perhaps, was in some degree an exception, for Hume, Robertson, but more especially Gibbon, exhibited a spirit of original investigation which found no parallel amongst their contemporaries. 2. The American war first broke the chains that had thus fettered the public mind; passions were excited, party zeal kindled, and in the keen encounters of rival statesmen, an example was set of bidding deliance to all arbitrary rules. Parliamentary eloquence was the first result of the change, and the principal cause of its further extension. While Burke, Fox, Sheridan, and at a later period, Pitt, spoke as their peculiar habits of thought prompted them, not as the rhetoric of schools taught, Cowper and Burns made vigorous efforts for the emancipation of poetry, and substituted the suggestions of nature for the dictates of art. Their success, however, would scarcely have been decisive, had not the American war been followed by a still more terrible convulsion. 3. The French revolu tion shook everything that had been morally as well as politically established in Europe, to the very foundation. There was no principle, however sacred-no institution, however sanctioned by long experience-no rule of conduct, however tried and proved-that was not rudely questioned and fiercely assailed. Hopes were entertained by some, that a new era of social happiness was about to dawn upon the world; others feared that society was about to be rent in sunder, and every sign of civilization destroyed. It is not our purpose to say anything of the political effects produced by the French revolution; its literary consequences, as has been the case with every period of great excitement, were de cidedly beneficial. A total change was wrought in every branch of literature, a change which demanded from every writer vigorous thought instead of elegant expresion. 4 Crapbe, the poet of rustic life in England, derived his im pulse from the American war; but it is to the struggle with France that we owe Coleridge, Wordsworth, and Southeymen alike in their devotion to nature, but different in their modes of testifying that homage, because each has followed the bent of his own mode of thought. The enthusiasm with which these eminent poets hailed the dawn of freedom in France, embittered their disappointment, when they saw the evil uses to which the name of liberty was perverted; they became vehement opponents of the political developement of the French revolution, but they clung fondly to its intellectual principles, and maintained the right of genius to explore untravelled paths, though its course might not be that pointed out by critics. Their example was followed by Montgomery, Byron, Scott, and Campbell; and by a host of other writers whose works have enriched modern literature. The female mind also felt the influence of this mighty revolution, and some of the noblest productions in modern poetry have been written by ladies. We may mention the names of Miss Joanna Bailie, and Mrs. Hemans. 5. There was, however, one species of poetry, the drama, which had little or no share in the success which we have described; in fact, it was almost destroyed by that very means. It is at the moment when a nation is wakening into intellectual life, that the drama most flourishes; men are then eager to receive instruction, and the theatre affords it in the most pleasing as well as the most forcible form. But as civilization advances, other and more efficient means of instruction are provided; the drama loses its influence over the improved generation, just as the picture-books of childhood cease to be valued in youth; it sinks into a mere means of entertainment, and its strength is lost with its high purpose. The periodical press now holds the position that the stage did n the time of queen Elizabeth: that the drama might ad vance, it would be necessary for civilization to retrograde. nd that would be far too high a price to pay even for ano ther Shakspeare. 6 The great extension and excellence of our periodical press, both literary and political, is one of the most striking characteristics of the age. Not merely the Reviews and Magazines, but even the common newspapers, display literary merits of a very high order. Men of the most eminent abilities and exalted stations, contribute to our journals; and they consequently hold a high rank in the literature of the age. Reviews, especially, have risen into unexampled eininence, and have maintained their stations by a succession cf articles that tend at once to improve the taste and enlarge the understanding. Some of the periodicals have a circulation which, in a past age, would not have been credited; this is owing to the more general diffusion of education among all classes. 7. The importance of affording useful instruction to every class of the community, is now universally acknowledged; and the progress of education has become so rapid, that there is every prospect that its blessings will soon become universal. And not only is the quantity of instruction increased, but its quality is greatly improved, as might easily be showr by a comparison of our present school-books with those of he last century. It is no exaggeration to state, that the ele ments of a really useful education, may be more easily attained by the poor of the present day, than by the richest of past generations. 8. History, which used to be a mere repetition of what had been previously narrated by others, has called criticism to its aid. Instead of a slavish adherence to authority, we now see writers carefully examine facts, compare evidence, and investigate the motives which might have led original authors to conceal or disguise the truth. Lingard, Hallam, Turner, Southey, and Sir James Mackintosh, have been especially conspicuous for their critical sagacity, in eliciting the truth from conflicting statements; but, notwithstanding their exertions, the English school of historical criticism may still be regarded as in its infancy. 9. Perhaps we may ascribe this deficiency in our histories to the unexampled progress and popularity of romantic literature, owing chiefly to the labours of Sir Walter Scott, who was among the first to unite, in works of fiction, the highest flights of imagination with the realities of life. Novels and romances have ceased to be dangerous and absurd, though they were both, in a period not very remote. Historical ro. mances are to this age, what the historical plays of Shaks peare were to a former period-vivid pictures of our ances tors; representing them, if not exactly as they thought and acted, yet so nearly what they might have been, that they become to us a kind of acquaintances, and seem brought within the sphere of our personal knowledge. 10. Periodical criticism supplies the place of what used to be termed general literature: hence formal works on mental and moral philosophy and the belles lettres are rare. Blair and lord Kames were the guides of our fathers in matters of taste; we have rejected their authority, and defer more to the principles maintained by the leading Reviews. These princi ples, however, are scattered in different essays over a multitude of volures, and no one has yet appeared of sufficient authority to be entrusted with the task of collecting them into a new code. 11. Reid, Stewart, and Brown, were the last great writers on metaphysics; their fame will probably ong remain uneclipsed, for the science of mind seems to have lost its hold on public attention, as indeed have almost all merely speculative studies. What is chiefly desired in the present day, is something practical and immediately useful. 12. Political economy and statistics have occupied the po sition which was once held by metaphysics. Adam Smith was in some measure the founder of the former science, from his investigating the nature and causes of a nation's wealth. Since his day, the subject has engaged the attention of several eminent writers, especially Ricardo, Malthus, and Macculloch. The cultivation of statistics must be the source of all future improvement in the science of political economy, because it is to the table of the statistician that the economist must look for his facts; and all speculations not founded upon facts, though they may be admired and ap plauded when first propounded, will, in the end, assuredly be forgotten. 13. The abstract sciences have made great progress in England during the last few years; principally owing to the great exertions of Airy, Ivory, Peacock, and Hamilton, who have greatly extended the domain of mathematical calculation. In the mixed and applied sciences, also, much has been done, though no very conspicuous discovery can bo mentioned. 14. Astronomy owes much to the great im. pulse it has received from the discovery of a new planet by Sir William Herschell, and it has not been less benefitted by the labours of his son and successor, Sir Jonn Herschell whose investigations into the nature of the displacements |