PROGRESS OF PUB LICATION.
The Widow's Ottrering should be bought, as being various al.d readable, containing pieces of humour, satire, and pathos, many shrewd observations, much true philosophy, and the result of a searching, and, what is more perhaps, a sensible observation of human life. But if the book had neither variety nor readableness, nor any of the qualities we have described, we should still say that it should be bought ; for it is, we believe, the only legacy which a man of genius, condemned, like so many others of his class, " to toil for the day that was passing over him," has been able to bequeath to his family. The reader who has been tickled into laughter by the satire of Truckleborough Ha// or the Provincial Sketches, will be surprised that a mind struggling with the anxieties attendant upon a family and narrow means, should have had leisure and equanimity to produce what appear to be the emanations of sportive and happy leisure. his surprise should be raised to admiration when he contrasts the healthy tone and just appreciation of things, displayed by WILLIAM Parr SCARGILL whilst enduring the hard and work-a-day cares of life, with the discontent and misanthropy indulged in by others, whose misfortunes, such as they were, were induced by their own mis- conduct.
Earnestly recommending these volumes, it is but right to say, that they chiefly consist of a selection of tales and essays from the author's contributions to annuals and periodicals, the proprietors of which have waived their copyright (sometimes too cheaply purchased !) in favour of the family. But though this cir- cumstance may detract from their freshness, it takes nothing from their value, whilst it adds to their variety. Of short pieces the reader cannot well be tired, if he is not in a humour to be pleased; and they have the further advantage of offer-
ing something in their changing topics which is more likely to bit the mood of the mind at all times than a work limited to one subject. if the reader is not moved by the sad, he can turn to the lively ; and if the lively be insufficient to rouse him, there is the ridiculous hard by.
In looking through the pages of the Widow's Offering, to refresh ourselves with a perusal of one of the few modern authors whose productions tempt a second reading, it struck us that Mr. SCAR- GILL had of late been studying the writings of LEIGH HUNT and CHARLES LAMB, and had imbibed enough of their spirit to flavour his own composition, without in any way changing its natural cha- racter or quality. In the following passage, for instance, from the chapter on Fellows, the sharp and searching intellect of Sc AttotLe seems to be happily tempered by the gentle spirit of ELIA.
THE POOR FELLOW.
Now, hereby we are brought to the acquaintance of another species of fellow .—to wit, the Poor Fellow—another, and yet not another. A worn.out good fellow makes a poor fellow,:and so does a done.up clever fellow. A poor fellow is a kind of waste butt for superfluous pity and the dregs of sympathy : corn- plosion is not kindly administered, but carelessly thrown at him. His name is .mentioned at tables where once be sat gaily and gloriously ; and there starts up at the sound of it a vision of a threadbare coat of doubtful colour, of a napless bat with a crown that flaps up and down in the wind, and with a flabby brim that never will flap up again—a vision of leaky shoes, of greasy trousers, of lantern jaws, and long gray hair ; and the guests say., Poor fellow :" then they drink their wine to drown the thought of him—thus laying the ghost in a red sea. A poor fellow is like a (bone in autumn: there is something passing
melancholy in the slowness of its gait, and there Is in its form and aspect that which tells of a bygone summer—of an evanescent brightness, a temporary flutter and gayety ; but cold winds are come, and heavy clouds hang their damp drapery in a gloomy sky, and the poor shivering drone is creeping to as warm a death as it can find. The pity with which men look upon a poor fellow, is as different from the compassion with which they regard a poor man, as the praise which they bestow on a good fellow differs from the respect with which they treat a goal man. There is something painful in the familiarity of pity and the pertness of a half humorous sympathy. Even the truly generous feel some repugnance in administering to a poor fellow which they do not feel in relieving .a poor man. A poor fellow reminds you of gay days; and there is a thought, not to be surmounted, that some moral obliquities have assisted to form the downward slope into the valley of adversity; While the poor fellow himself feels more deeply than all the contrast of the present with the past: he knows that the past will never be present again, therefore he wishes the present to be past as soon as possible. Poor Fellow ! Drop the curtain—drop the curtain.
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