MY AUNT PONTYPOOL.
THIS novel is a very singular work. The author has a command of language, which, when the subject is exciting, almost ri-es to eloquence; he has evidently mixed in the world, and, in whatever situation he moves himself, seen something both of high and low ; he has also a good perception of character, although with the truth his portraits have frequently the weakness of naked individuality. But his notions of the events of life appear to have been formed from novels; his numerous discursive remarks are often fiat and tedious; and he affects a quaint minuteness of description, which, instead of being true, is only mean. Hence, My Aunt Pontypool is a hodge-podge ; hut not devoid of interest in its story, and not unpleasant reading—when the art of skipping has been acquired. The tale is laid about the time of the battle of Waterloo; chiefly, perhaps, to introduce a description of the appearance of Flanders when occupied by the hostile armies, and some pictures of the battle itself. The leading circumstances of the story consist of an imprudent marriage, the straitened condition of a supposed disinherited son, a deathbed will secreted by the brother and a rascally attorney, a noble hero-lover, and the difficulties which spring out of such a state of things, together with an abduction of the heroine. All this is pretty well worn thread- bare; but much of it is less Jude than it appears in an abridg- ment, because the author's knowledge in some measure corrects the absurdities of his copies, and the filling-up is better than the outline. His characters, however, are the best part of his book. The thieves and thieftakers are good; the dying housebreaker is very good; the sketch—barely a sketch, a mere indication—of the spunging-house-doorkeeper, capital; and Mr. ‘Villiamson the lawyer, when not engaged in the villany of the novel, not amiss. But the two best and most sustained characters are Colonel Adair and Lord Methwynn the former the model of a poor, proud, honourable, and gentlemanly soldier, whose ideas of what is cor-
rect and regular have been strengthened by military discipline; the latter a polite, good-natured, 'sensible man of the world, who, acting up to the direction of Polonius, is never false to any one, because he is always true to himself, and who, even when for- bidding his son's marriage with Helen Adair, does it with such skilful propriety and delicacy of manner, that even the parties most unpleasantly affected by it must admit that he has behaved fairly and openly. The scene in which he tells his son how he has acted in the affair, and the quiet easy manner in which he subdues him merely by the tact of experience, is too long for extract, and it would suffer by division. We must have re,ourse, to parts which better bear an isolated exhibition.
A COUNTRY ATTORNEY.
Mr. Williamson was announced ; and in walked a broad-made, corpulent man, neither very tall nor very short, but certainly very rosy in the face, with flat and somewhat unmeaning features, only enlivened by a pair of keen black eyes. His hair was short and grizzled, determinedly straight in all its lines, and yet not lying down flat, but standing up here and there, especially upon the temples, with a sort of stiff rigidity, which argued an obstinate disposition in the hair at least, if not in the man. His air was Peculiar; but it was an air easily acquired by successful country attornies,—decided, bustling, not quite bullying, but something near it ; quite confident in his own powers of ridiog, directing, opposing, overcoming, and, if necessary, overreaching anybody with whom he might be brought in contact. In fact, it was the air of habitual suc- cess and petty authority : Mr. Williamson might have been Under-Sheriff of the county, for aught I know to the contrary.
The paunch which he carried before him added to this air ; for though a man may have the air I mention without the paunch, yet the paunch super- added harmonizes well with the air. In his instance, too, it accorded well with a certain assumption of frank bluffness, which was very successful in establish- ing an imputation of honesty under which the attorney laboured in the coun- try; and it is but fair to say, that none but those persons who suffered under the sort of constitutional antipathies which some people have towards toads, butterflies, and eats, and by which antipathies they know that a toad, butterfly, or cat is in the room before they see it, ever supposed that Mr. Williamson was mere or less than lie seemed.
THE RATIONALE OF THE RESURRECTION.
Once or twice, too, he asked, " You do not think I shall die, Adair, do you?
I wonder what becomes of one when one dies? whether one begins to feel again directly, or how ?" " In regard to the degree of your danger," replied Henry Adair, " the sur- geon would not give any decided opinion this morning ; but as to what becomes of the soul after death, we may be very sure that not the apparent interval of an instant takes place between our loss of consciousness here and our waking in the wide world of eternity. Even supposing that a hundred millions of years were to elapse between the moment of our death and the moment at whichi we are roused to judgment, those long years would not seem to us even the space of one minute. Time is an invention of our own; or, at the utmost, is but marked by the consciousness of passing events. As soon as that consciousness is at an end to any one, fur him time is annihilated also. Depend upon it, whether judgment follow instantly upon death, or thousands of years intervene, man will perceive no difference, and to him it will be immediate."
• BIT OF WATERLOO.
The two most exciting scenes on earth are a Spanish bull-fight and a general battle. It is in vain that reason tells us, we are there to witness the most ex- travagant acts of human folly, to see the most extraordinary remnants of bar- barism which are yet to be suet with on earth. It is in vain that humanity lifts her voice, and that common charity speaks of cruelty and ferocity, and ap- peals to our heart against deliberate bloodshed and wholesale murder ; still in the heart of man there is some principle which takes part with dating, and courage, and constancy, under every shape ; and we gaze upon the bull-fight or the battle with a thousand fine and noble enthusiasms, excited in our mind by acts that are in themselves barbarous, cruel, and unreasonable. Let those investigate the matter who can, and divine how and why such strange effects are produced in such strange ways, in our strange state of being ; at all events, such were the feelings which affected Henry Adair, as he stood on a little height, not very far to the right of the English centre, viewing the field of Waterloo about twelve o'clock on the 18th of June.
When first he rode up, there was a sort of cynical smile upon his handsome bp, as reason had yet liberty to talk to his heart about the scene lie was going to witness, and to rebuke him for taking either part or interest in acts which he condemned and affected to scorn ; so that the sneer was partly directed against himself, partly against those who were even then engaged in slaying each other. When lie looked over the field too, and saw what it was—a few slight undulations of the ground, with a paved road and an orchard—ha asked himself if it were not absolutely madlike and absurd for sixty thousand human beings to plant themselves on a ridge of molehills to defend the way to another molehill ; while a hundred thousand men, talking a different tongue, tried to force their way through, and both parties employed all their wit and ingenuity to throw large and small pellets at each other's heads, or to poke holes or cut gashes in each other's carcases. Thus the smile darkened on his lip for a mo- ment, as with a clear and marking eye be gazed over the battle which had not vet reached its height ; but as he turned toward a small group of officers beside him, and saw one bard-featured man whom he instantly recognized as the Commander-in-Chief' , looking with calm serenity of aspect over a field on Which his honour, his fame, his life, the safety of his native country, the des- tiny of a world, were at that moment cast—when he saw a cannon-ball plough up the earth beneath his horse's feet, without causing a muscle to move in that calm, stern face, he felt sensations beginning to rise in his heart which banished the cynical smile from his lip ; and his eye naturally followed the eagle eye of the Duke, as he gazed upon the first struggle which was then taking place at Hougomont. To the glance of Henry Adair, little was to be gathered from what he beheld. Ile could indeed see column after column of the French advancing against that particular spot, and he could well understand the importance of the post to the British army. Ile could see also flashes of flame and volumes of smoke issue forth from the contested point ; but he could not at all divine which party were gaining the advantage of tire other. Still, however, the interest in his breast was growing intense, and he could not but fear that the immense force of the French, which was pouring down upon the small British advanced post, would overwhelm the little knot of his countrymen, who, when the smoke for an in- stant cleared away, might be seen in the gardens and orchards of the eleiteau. At that moment:however, the Duke spoke a word to one of the officers near. The other galloped off, and the very next instant a battery on the right opened its fire upon the French column which was advancing on Hougomont by the little cross-road from La Belle Alliance to :Werke Braine.
The Duke kept his eye for a moment fixed upon the column, the head of which was instantly thrown into confusion by the English fire. " Piety ser-
vice! " be said ; Very pretty service! " and turned his eye at once towards the left, where the French battalions were beginning to be agitated, as if to commence a second attack there.
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