MORE MAGAZINES.
Blackwood has three papers on the Eastern Question, which will, we dare say, comfort the souls of Tories, and one of which, " Foreign Opinion on England in the East," is worth reading, because it contains the opinions of many eminent foreigners, as expressed in conversations with Mr. Senior, but there is little else in the number except the stories, and the review of " New Books," which is always brightly done, and always gives us a sense of liking for the writer's freshness and spirit, even when we least agree with him. There is, in fact, for once, rather too much of politics in the magazine, and politics of a single kind, reflections on a subject of which we are all, perhaps, unconsciously growing weary.
The University Magazine is not quite so good as it has been lately. The series of " portraits " is continued by an account of Mr. Charles Reade, rather too uncritical, the novelist being credited with "supreme brain-power, united with singular per- ception and an exuberant imagination ; " and there is a curious disjointed essay on Mr. Maurice, by a writer who knew him well, and though no disciple, entertained for him much of the regard he inspired in most human beings. He gives strong testimony to the sincerity of Mr. Maurice's belief in the creeds, and even says that nothing angered him like the suggestion that he was too good to believe them thoroughly. The notice is not a cordial one, and the writer underrates Mr. Maurice's intellect, but it is worth reading, as showing what sort of impression he made on a hard, sceptical mind, utterly without reverence either for him or for his faith.
The Cornhill, besides its second story, " For Percival,"—which has become very good, full of dramatic situations, and of an in- sight we had hardly expected, though we had recognised the author's light, cynical, Thackerayan touch,—has " A Study," "Daisy Miller," by " Henry James, Junior," who may or may not be a real person. Whichever he is, the author is wasting observation of the keenest kind, and a delicate sense of humour, on a very thin story, which might have easily been developed into some- thing charming, and which, even as it is, is the most attractive sketch of manners that has appeared this year or two. We cannot imagine anything better of the soufflet kind of literary food, and it is the speciality of the Cornhill restaurant just now, that its soufflets are so exceedingly good. Nobody else gives us any, and though they are not needful for sustenance, still they make dinner, though it is so often repeated, a very pleasant occupation. Magazine life is apt to be monotonous, and a sketch like this, though there is nothing in it, relieves the monotony, and relieves it with a pleasantness which all who have any taste for literary gourmandise will at once acknowledge. The padding in the Cornhill is a little dull, and we object entirely to morsels of Portuguese ballad being thrown at our heads. Nobody is bound by any social etiquette to affect to understand Portu- guese, and nobody not a wine-merchant—except Macaulay, by the way, who read everything, and said he would read the " Lusiad" again, because then he might find it out why it was not supposed to be dull stuff—knows Portuguese.
Macmillan has not much in it, unless it be Professor Max Miller's lecture on Fetishism, the interest of which is impaired by the Times' reports ; but there is a fine defence by Matthew Arnold of Dr. Johnson's claim to the gratitude of all readers of English prose, and a curious account of Broadmoor by Dr. D. Hack Tuke, which leaves on the reader the impression that, although a leniently managed place, it is one into which little hope enters. It is pleasant to learn that very few criminals acquitted on the ground of insanity are really sane ; but Dr. Take, like other specialists, evidently thinks there is a good deal of insanity in the world, and would still further diminish the safeguards against being locked up. He thinks the power of arresting suspected lunatics is insufficient, and would have " a power vested in the Commis- sioners in Lunacy to appoint, on application, two medical men, familiar with insanity, to examine a person under such circum- stances. Their certificate that he or she ought to be placed under care should be a sufficient warrant for admission into an asylum, and they should not be liable to any legal consequences. It should not be necessary for the signers of the certificate to adhere to the usual statutory form. The Commissioners should have power to grant an application of this kind, whether made by a member of the family or by a respectable inhabitant of the place in which the alleged lunatic resides, his respectability, if neces- sary, being attested by the mayor." Unpopular persons would, we fear, under that system, find it difficult to avoid a lunatic asylum. Mr. A. Wilson supplies a valuable account of the Eng- lish importation of articles of food, from which it appears that we now import over £160,000,000 worth a year, and are distinctly eating more, head by head, than we did, while our own produc- tion tends slightly to decrease. Mr. Wilson doubts if the country is now saving money, and thinks that any serious decrease in the demand for our manufactures might reduce us to great and even dangerous straits, a view which we think too pessimist, but which is valuable amidst the chorus of self-exaltation in which the Tory party is encouraging the country to indulge.
The Gentleman's Magazine publishes a paper on " Domestic Slave-dealing in Turkey," which is said to be the work of a writer with great experience of the subject, but which does not add much to the existing knowledge, except on two points. One is that the slave-dealers carry on an extensive system of kidnapping free children,—indeed this is the main source of the supply of white slaves ; and another is that Turks do recognise a certain inherent inferiority in the negro races. We never remember to have seen this statement before, and it is certainly opposed to the root-idea of Mahommedanism and to the direct teaching of the Prophet ; but it is very positively made, and by a very temperate writer :—
"I have been speaking here of all women slaves generally, and not only of the blacks, of whom wives are not often jealous. Still, it does happen, though rarely, that a pacha has a coloured son by a dark mother. When this occurred in the family of Mehemit Ali, Pacha of Egypt, it chanced that the succession to the Viceroyalty fell to that very eon by seniority of age, but his mixed parentage being but to apparent in his dusty complexion, his right was passed over in favour of the relative next in age. In fact, the Tasks do not consider the blacks by any moans on an equality with themselves, nor do they think it necessary or advisable to give them the power to read and write ; and the black (with some notable exceptions) seems quite willing to be in the lowest stratum of the human family, quietly contenting himself or herself with doing the simple duties that fall to their lot, in general not toiling hard, bat following a wearying, unvarying round in a druiging, hopeless way that is painful to witness."
We suspect still there is some mistake, the succession in Egypt being a matter of political importance too great to allow of any " passing over." Indeed, we have always heard, and his look certainly bore out the story, that Abbas Pasha had negro blood in his veins. He was probably murdered, but it was after he had inherited the Pashalic.
Belgravia, besides its four stories, one of which is by Wilkie Collins and another by Thomas Hardy, has two excellent serious papers, one in particular, " The Great Tropical Fallacy," by J. Arbuthnot Wilson, as good a piece of writing as we have seen for many a year. We do not suppose Mr. Wilson expects us to take all his statements quite seriously, or to believe that tropical scenery can never be seen except under a burning sun, or to credit that nobody in the tropics ever sees an alligator, an iguana, or an antelope in its native state. It is, however, useful to put the non-romantic side of the case about the tropics before the Eng- lish reader, and Mr. Wilson has put it with a force which may well drive the believer in tropical scenery and tropical luxuries. back to Charles Kingsley for consolation. We suspect, moreover, he feels a nuance of remorse which is very becoming, and which peeps out in sentences like this. Mr. Wilson has been saying that he could find no flowers, or fruits, or animals sufficient to justify the popular belief, and then he says :— " Of course, in Jamaica, as in every other tropical country, we may find a fair sprinkling of handsome flowers and brilliant birds. The night-flowering cereus, with its great white hanging blossoms and rich, luscious scent, forms the very ideal of a tropical plant ; bright- coloured orchids grow here and there on solitary trees in the remoter woods ; and a few cultivated hybiacus bushes surround the negro huts. Humming-birds flit rapidly from tree to tree ; while a pretty little red- and-green tody, the tropical robin, may sometimes be seen perching on a wayside bough. Golden lizards sun themselves on the trunks, protruding now and then the orange pouches beneath their sky-bine necks ; burnished beetles crawl among the underwood ; and butterflies as lovely as our own brimstones, emperors, peacocks, or admirals, gleam through the foliage of the mountain sides. All these, and more than these, I freely grant. But they only count as a small item in the total account, far loss numerous than the corresponding beauties of our own island. Thousands of such plants and animals have been sedulously gathered from all countries to form our great European collections, anti therefore, I confidently say, if you wish to see the tropics in their glory, take a cab or a ,flacre, and go to Regent's Park or to the Jardin des Plantes."
That last sentence is a horrid cockneyism, but it contains a truth. Mr. Forster's paper on " The Mystery of Edwin Brood," though, we confess, it does not greatly interest us, who thought "Edwin Drood" poor, and have nearly forgotten its drift, will interest those who were caught by a certain weird horror in the tale. It is an effort to state its inevitable conclusion, is very well and carefully worked out, and is, we are inclined to believe, accurate as to the main point,—the fate of Edwin Brood. We cannot, however, agree with Mr. Forster as to the merit of the tale—curiously enough, he himself points out bow Dickens used up old materials in it—nor do we believe many will agree with him, except those few who think of Dickens as a novelist, and not as the greatest of English humourists. How much humour is there in "Edwin Drood?"
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