25 JANUARY 1829, Page 13

We wish we could say any good of an historical

novel called the Castilian, in three volumes, written by a Spaniard. It is the His- tory of PEDRO the Cruel, King of Castile. It is useless to say what there is not in the book: what there is, is a crowd of histori- cal personages and historical events, which pass before the reader, in and out, without exciting, any more interest than the idle scenes of a pageant. Our Black Prince, we should observe, is a promi- nent character ; and those who wish to see an account of a very early Peninsular war, carried on by the English in Spain, may refer to the Castilian.