BEST'S MEMORIALS.*

LITERARY SPECTATOR.

Mr. BEST is not an everyday author: he is not a bookmaker to order : Is writes because he is full of ideas, and not because he wants a few

1.,sidred pounds and can turn his hand to authorcraft. His works are therefore, th possess some value ; not the shallow smartness of a paiessional writer, but the solidity and the copiousness of a man rho has seen much, felt much, read much, and thought perhaps more than all. Above all the writers who have lately come before us, we Ituuld prefer Mr. BEST. for a companion. We should probably not agree with lihn on one topic in fifty, but how pleasant would be our difference! A Roman Catholtc, of perfect toleration—a learned man, without pretension—an experienced man, not soured with suffering, but softened down by the habit of religious contemplation, a genial kroperament, and a keen perception of humour,—can an antagonist in aroment be found. more perfect than this ? The singularity of this writer's intellectual complexion, his extraordinary scrupulosity, and intense conscientiousness, would add a charm of the most delicate cha- racter to our intercourse.

All the world now knows Mr. BEST'S history : surely every body, with ()mahout a faith, has read the narrative of his conversion ; no one with a heart can have failed to sympathize in the story of the death of his and who has not wondered at his miracles and dreams ? The 7L■Int work continues the autobiographical portrait ; for such, under Lt...rent names, the work is in fact : the Personal and Literary 211eL. ?Mats is only the third volume, of which the Four Years in France is the first, and Italy as it Is the second.

These Memorials are a miscellaneous collection of anecdotes, of thoughts, of memoranda, of conversations, &e. which have occurred Is the author. His travels, his singular position in respect to his

his information, and inquiring turn of mind, have naturally sug- ,t.i.slutl a great variety of topics ; and they are turned to account. We en forgive the author for his collected bon mots, but his puns are ut- terly unworthy of him : we beseech him to strike them out of his writings, and if the habit is unconquerable, let him confine it to the whist-table and fireside ; for he is not only a punster, but a very bad rwe. That he has better taste in bon mots, may be inferred from the Hewing little collection, which we have picked out of' his book, to show the idle reader that Mr. BEST can write on other matters than the articles of the Catholic faith.

WHAT DO THE ARMINIANS HOLD?—" A young, zealous, and conscientious student in Anglican theology, once asked an experienced dignitary, 'Pray, Sir, what do the Arininians hold ? " Hold ?' said his Mentor ; 1-bid? It they hold all the best pieces of preferment in the Church of England.", JESUS CIIRIST ei-decant NOTRE SEIGNEUR.—"At the time when titles were abolished by the French National Assembly, and the convenient term 6-decant 1MS adopted to save each one the trouble of learning a new nomenclature of ail his acquaintance ; when, for want of resorting to this supplemental expe- dient, Mirabeau, designated in the newspapers by his family name instead of his title, complained, Car coquina. de journalisles, pendant trots PM'S entiers, auront desorionte toute l'Europe,—at this time, a Frenchman, being then at the Hague, made use of the expression, Jesus-Christ ei-decant notre Seigneur?, IN BETE DE PLUS.—" A short time before the return of Louis XVIII to his c,ap.ital in 1814, Monsieur (so the French King's eldest brother is fantastically Le:Inated) was sent before him to prepare the way for the restoration of the rtyal family. He was invested with the character of lieutenant-general of the ,;:tagdom, and entered France by its eastern frontier in the rear of the allied session and Austrian armies. The English were fighting their way to Toulouse. The Comte d'Artois, though availing himself of the 'efforts of to?cign forces, wished to conciliate the good will of the French people: he said to the deputations that waited upon him with their addresses, lien n'et ying,e. tit France; id n'y a qu'un Prem....94 de plus= Nothing is changed in !mice ; only there is in it one Frenchman more.' The speech was well ?aped and striking; it was at once prudent, patriotic, and tranquillizing : It Was prone, lauded, and cried up by the partisans of royalty ; it was dissemi- nated everywhere, impressed on medals: nor were these words soon for- ptten ; subsequent changes led some persons to record and reproduce them

!Personal and Literary Memorials, by the Author of" Four Years in France," "Italy Is a Is," &e. (Henry Best, Esq.) London, 1829. •Golburn.

in a mode not very favourable to the cause they once had served. In the winter of the last year, 1827, an animal, called a giraffe, was brought to Paris from the wilds of Africa : it is a sort of camelopard, very tall, and with a neck so long that it can reach to a great height—twelve or fifteen feet above the ground, and feed on the branches of lofty trees. All the world at Paris flocked to see the wild beast. Monsieur, Comte d'Artois, was now King Charles X. Some discontented malicious persons caused a medal to be struck, with the figure of the giraffe on one side, and on the obverse the words Rien West change a Paris ; id n'y a qu'une bete de plus. This cannot be translated; no word in English renders the sense of the French word bete thus employed."

DEUX FOIS NEUF.—" Louis, the eighteenth king of his name, was twice brought back to the French escorted by foreiga bayonets. They said he was deux fois neuf. Neuf means both nine and new : twice nine is eighteen."

THE DISLOYAL ALPHABET.—" When the terms of the treaty which followed the restoration of the King were known, the French amused themselves by composing what they called the alphabet of the Restoration, La Nation Fran- caise a. b. C. The French pronunciation of these letters suggests to every one the word abaissee. Quarante-trois Deputements c. d. (cedes.) Le ininisti'xe e. b. t. As the aspirate in the word hebete is not sounded, you have only to pronounce the three letters to arrive at the sense. La glairc des arinees Francaises f. a. c. (effacee.) These are a few specimens of this nuzuraise plaisanderie that greeted the restored monarch."

DR. WOODDESON, VINERIAN PROFESSOR OF LAWS AT OXFORD.—" AS he was, for a professor of civil law, rather a hold rider, he tried to make his horse more manageable, by leaping him over a bar. This he did so cleverly, that a punster exclaimed, Ah Dickey, if you had but been brought up to the bar on horseback !' The punster was Dr. John Shaw, editor of the Argonautica of Apollonius Rhodius."

Da. IloastE.—" Dr. Horne, President of Magdalen College, and Bishop of Norwich, sometimes condescended to a jocularity, which others, as highly placed, but of minds not so playful and good-natured, would have thought beneath them. An undergraduate waited on him, according to rule, to ask leave out of college, saving he was going to Coventry : Better to go, than be sent,' said the President."

Such are but a very few of the mots of a book that contains far bet- ter things,—the account of PALEY, for example, in the same vein ; and in another the description of the author's school-days in his nine years al Lincoln School ; but above all do we admire the noble senti ments which we find scattered all over the book on the great subject of toleration. Let the reader turn, for example, to the article on Dissen ters (xii.), and that on SHELLEY. (lx.), which is as beautiful as it is benevolent. Can he be a Roman Catholic who writes thus, and still more, a Catholic who imagines he shares the sentiments of his church ? The "Conversations of PALEY" will show us how little formal bio- graphy teaches of the real man : we refer to ME ADLEY.S Memoirs of PALEY, which, in the ample compass of an octavo volume, does not tell its half so much as a page of these Memorials.

We add to our quotations the short article on SHELLEY, to which we have already referred.

PERCY BYSSHE SHELLEY.—" About a fortnight after I had been settled at Florence, in my apartment in the Palazzo-Niccolini, at the beginning of July 1822, at the approach of the hour of retiring to rest, I was detained by the appearance of a coming-on thunder-storm—a sight I always love to witness. I walked about my great hall and along the gallery ; seven large mullioned windows permitted me to enjoy the almost unintercepted flashes of lightning, while the spacious rooms re-echoed the thunder. The storm increased in violence : the lightning was no longer forked and darting, but an eq.epa.o:¢18, leszeact4s, almost continuous, that wrapped in flame the statues and orange trees of the garden, and cast a flashing glare on tine busts and armorial shield of the family Niccolini, and on one female figure in marble, larger than that stood at the upper end of the gallery.I went to the other side of the apartment : the dome of the cathedral was illuminated ; but it was too near, and the view was too much bounded for it to be picturesque. I returned to the gallery to have a larger plaga coal.. Opposite to tine furthest window of the hall, Antoine had set up a high and wide screen, to partition off for him- self a sort of butler's pantry : the window not being duly fastened, burst open; the screen fell flat on the floor, and when this loud resounding was past, the wind howled fearfully through the hall : so dreadful was the lightning, that I dared not draw nigh to shut the window. I spent more than an hour in the delight of this terrible excitement.

" On that night, on the coast, at forty miles distance, Percy Bysshe Shelley was shipwrecked. What horrors were endured by tine friends who knew of his clangor! What thoughts have since crowded into my own mind ! I knew him not, but I admire and pity him.

"

'But Shelley,' say the bigots, who receive their faith from a tyrant, a tyro, and a tigress, Shelley was an Atheist.' True: they wino have the bold- ness to set up altar against altar ; to tear the seamless robe of Christ; to dis- trust his promised help, and to charge his spouse, the Church' with faithless- „ ness and adultery ;—these men can he struck with horror at the Atheism of Shelley, and drive him from among them. Was his heart less warm, was his disinterestedness less sincere, was his conscience less pure than theirs ? A young, an ardent, an impetuous mind, rejects control, refuses to submit to an authority which has itself spurned authority; he refuses to acquiesce as a mere formalist in dogmas of whose truth he is unconvinced : Inc rushes into error ; hut into error, which his example, and that of many others, has prowll may he allied with genius, may be compatible with benevolence, msy is adorned by the observance of social duty. How is such a man to be reclaimed ? "Shame to the self-applauding age and country to which he belonged !- tine attempt is made by vioiatina, in his regard, the clearest laws, the most sacred right of nature. Tine An'thor of Being has established, by the course of his providence, that relation which the parents hold with those is 150 iIelie from them their existence; and ito truth of revealed religion is more cic:ir than the voice which speaks to the heart of the father, impressing seminal which no other can feel, imposing duties which no other can discharge, ex- citing gratitude which can he paid to no other, because by no other can it be claimed. Enough : the storm is hushed; let all but the genius of Shelley be silent."