BOOKS.

THE BROTHERS CHAMBERS.* WILLIAM and Robert Chambers were born in the "little old" burgh of Peebles, of which Cockburn said, "as quiet as the grave or Peebles ;" Robert Chambers that in the early years of the present century it was precisely the same as it had been for several hundred years previously ; and an honest old burgher, who by some strange chance visited Paris, and was eagerly questioned on his return as to his experiences," Paris, a' things conseedered, is a wonderful place, but still, Peebles for pleesure !" The boys' ancestors had lived in this quaint, self-satisfied town from time immemorial, and they might have been as moderately prosperous and as little known to fame as any of their respectable woollen- manufacturing progenitors, if they had not had an easy-going father, and some ill-disposed relations who pushed him into ruin.

But they were destined after a career of toil, self-denial, endurance, and perseverance, which forms a noble and pathetic history, to well- earned fortune and well-merited renown. They loved the place, and Robert Chambers has left a most curious, interesting, and humorous sketch of it, and of the celebrities there, in his child- hood, among some fragmentary memoranda apparently intended as notes for a memoir of himself, which it is-much to be re- gretted he did not complete. The simplicity, not devoid of . homely dignity, of the Peebles people is charming, and the place boasted many originals. Here is a sketch of one, a Silas Wegg, without the roguery. The mind of Peebles, when the century was young, was divided between the Peninsular war and the history of the Jews, as related by Josephus, of whose work there was an edition (date 1720) in the town :—

" The envied possessor of the work was Tam Fleck, 'a flichty chield,' as he was considered, who struck out a sort of profession by going about in the evenings with his Josephus, which he read as the current news ; the only light he had for doing so being that imparted by the flickering blaze of a piece of parrot-coal. It was his practice not to read more than from two to three pages at a time, interlarded with sagacious remarks of his own, by way of foot-notes. and in this way he sustained an extraordinary Interest in the narrative. Retailing the matter with great equability in different households, Tam kept all at the same point of information, and wound them up with a correspond- ing anxiety as to the issue of some moving event in Hebrew annals. Although in this way he went through a course of Josephus yearly, the novelty somehow never seemed to wear off. 'Weel, Tam, what's the news the nicht ?' would old Geordie Murray say, as Tam entered with his Josephus under his arm, and seated himself at the family fireside. 'Bad news, bad news!' replied Tam ; 'Titus has begun to besiege Jeru- salem,—its glum to be a terrible business ;' and then he opened his budget of intelligence, to which all paid the most reverential attention. The protracted and severe famine which was endured by the besieged Jews was a theme which kept several families in a state of agony for a week ; and when Tam in his readings came to the final conflict and destruction of the city by the Roman General, there was a perfect paroxysm of horror."

On these occasions the brothers were delighted listeners. Tam Fleck's news was knowledge, and they thirsted' for that in every form, from their earliest days, with an extraordinary eagerness.

How little there was within their reach to quench that thirst, and how hard that little was to get at, it is very difficult for us to realize. Robert Chambers records that his education did not cost his parents ten pounds. William's education cost six, includ- ing books, but at what a price did the boys purchase it ? From Kitty Cranston, who professed to teach children to read the Bible, with only the reasonable exception of leaving out the difficult words, they were transferred to James Gray's burgh school, which seems to have been conducted on savage principles, and accordingly to have fostered savagery,—a drunken teacher, who sang songs about Nelson, whose method of instruction was to let his class bawl verses from the Scriptures at the pitch of their voices, without the slightest meaning or decorum ; and for recreation a free-fight, during which the girls hid themselves under the table, and the boys pelted one another with unbound Bibles.

"To have to look back on this as a place of youthful instruc- tion I" exclaims Mr. William Chambers, with readily comprehended , pain. Even at Sloan's, a better class of school, to which the boys were removed, and where Robert soon and easily distinguished himself, violence and cruelty were the custom ; and the same

Memoir of Robert Chambers; with Autobiographic Reminiscences of William - Chambers. London: W. and R. Chambers.

horrid elements were abroad in all the place. It makes one shudder to think of children having been habituated to such,

scenes as those venerable old men recall with horror and disgust ; to think that there was no power in a place where "the Word"

was perpetually upon men's lips to punish such a miscreant as Mr. Chambers thus describes :—" A coarse, bustling carter in Peebles, known by the facetious nickname of 'Puddle Mighty,' used to leave his old worn-out and much-abused horses to die on the public green, and there, without in- curring reprobation, the boys amused themselves, day after day, battering the poor prostrate animals with stones till life was ex- tinct." In such a place, with such companions, those children toiled, and strove for knowledge, extracting it from everything,.—. from the stories of a travelling showman, and the confidences of an ex-serjeant of Volunteers, who told them the history of the- American war ; studying unaided an old pair of globes their father picked up at a sale, and reading through, with an eager delight, one with his arm over the other's shoulders, and with a mutual understanding about the privilege of turning the pages, a copy of the Encyclopedia Britannica, a wonderful and inexhaustible treasure, in whose history there is a touch of pathos to whicl. everyone who loves books must respond. When the Brothers. Chambers were preparing to give their own well-known valuable Encyclopedia to the world, there must have been many a thought in their minds of the far past, when treachery and family troubles, aided by bad debts, drove their parents from their home,—when the family migrated to Edinburgh, almost penni,- less, and the Encyclopedia was sold "to help in satisfying credi- tors." This misfortune befel in Dr. Robert Chambers' twelfth year. Here is his testimony to the beloved book in his advanced age :-

"It was a cumbrous article in a small house, so it had been put up. into a chest, and laid up in an attic beside the cotton wefts, and the, meal ark. I lighted upon the book, and from that time all my spare time was spent besides the chest. It was a new world to me. I felt a profound thankfulness that each a convenient collection of human knowledge existed, and that here it was, spread out like a well-plenished table before me. What the gift of a whole toyshop would have been to most children this book was to me. I plunged into it. I roamed through it like a bee. I hardly could be patient enough to read any

one article, while so many remained to be looked into I pitied my companions, who remained ignorant of what became to me familiar

knowledge What a gain that was to me, not merely in intel- lectual enjoyment, but in mental formation! It appears to me strange that in a place so remote, so primitive, and containing so little wealth, at a time when the movement for the spread of knowledge had not pet been thought of, such an opportunity for the gratification of an inquiring young mind should have been presented."

The charm of the earlier portion of this memoir is enticing to the imagination. We know all that came of the determined courage, patient, pushing industry, and self-respecting endurance of these two boys, whose names are indissolubly connected with the spread of that knowledge they fought so hard for, under con- ditions in comparison with which Mr. Dickens's blacking-label- sticking experiences were luxurious, and which were endured and are recorded in a more worthy, manly spirit ; and the results are delightful to read of, narrated without the least boastfulness, with true brotherly love and simple candour. The catalogue of D. Robert Chambers' literary labours is an astonishing record of steady toil, guided by a pure taste and sound principles. He lived to see an incredibly extensive and rapid diffusion of the ideas and plans which originated with him and his brother, in the days when literature was a luxury for the rich alone, and his hand helped largely to distribute it among his fellows, by bin own works, as well as by his extensive and numerous enterprises. Something higher than respectability attaches to the name of the Brothers Chambers, as the imprimatur of everything which bears that name. " Whatsoever things are good, whatsoever things are honest, whatsoever things are pure" will be found among those selected by them for dissemination among men, women, and children. Their great success was not, in the commercial sense, unchequered ; on the contrary, Mr. William Chambers gives an account of heavy losses, in which he inculcates, in his clear, characteristic manner, some useful lessons and tells some plain truths ; but the high character, the unblemished reputation of the pioneers of popular education has never been lessened, and their

steady refusal to be influenced by expediency, to lend themselves to party purposes, to employ their wide-spread influence for any other than their clearly-defined aim, the public good, has secured to them an unassailable position in the public respect. The joys, the sorrows, the achievements, the successes of later years, which saw the Brothers Chambers eminent among men, holding high positions in their native country, honoured in foreign lands, valued

friends of all the truly great and worthy of the British Empire, recorded as liberal benefactors to their native place and that of their abode, old men, with all the reverence due to age, and all the vigour of mind which is one of its most precious privileges, having extracted to the utmost the meaning of their early lessons in life, are very interesting to read about. They are so thoroughly satisfactory, and it is so good to see them acknowledged, simply, freely, and gratefully, in this narrative, which is as admirable in point of style as it is full and engrossing in matter.

But the earlier portions are the most curious and captivating. 'They are interspersed with anecdotes and quaint sayings, with little bits of description as minute in detail as a Meissonnier, and shrewd, wise sayings worthy of being placed among those famous Scotch proverbs by whose aid the youth of Peebles combined

instruction and amusement at the small and early parties of the 4' little-old" burgh. Mr. William Chambers has dealt chiefly with the career of his brother, but their lives were so closely allied for so many working years that the history of the one would be less intelligibleswithout the history of the other,—.a fact to which we owe a chapter entitled "My Apprenticeship-1814 to 1819—" which it would not be easy to match, and we fancy impossible to beat, in the records of self-made men. It is preceded by a descrip- tion of the struggling little household in Edinburgh ; the always- -failing father ; the strong-hearted, naturally refined, dutiful, and

loving mother ; the delicate Robert, unfit for a life of labour ; the more robust William, who must not idle any longer (at fourteen), and who endeavours to get himself apprenticed to a grocer at Leith, with the following result :—

" I was ushered into a back room to be examined as to my capabilities. It was immediately seen that I was physically incompetent to fill the situation. The chief qualification in demand was muscular vigour. The boy wanted would have to draw a truck loaded with several hundred- weights of goods, to be delivered to customers, it might be miles dis- tant. Instead of an apprentice, it was in reality a horse that might have been advertised for, or at least an able-bodied porter. I was at once pronounced to be unfit for thjs enviable post ; a day's work with the /barrow or the bottle-basket would finish me. I had better abandon the idea of being a grocer. With these remarks pronounced for doom, I retired, not a little downcast at the unfortunate issue of the expedition, 4ind sorrowfully returned up the Walk to Edinburgh."

'On his way back the boy saw a notice in the window of a book- seller's shop, Mr. John Sutherland's, Calton Street, that an apprentice was wanted, and felt here was the right thing at last. it was the right thing, but it was the beginning of a life so bard that one's heart aches to read of it,—for the lonely, indomitable, 'heroic lad, with the eager soul athirst for knowledge, with Spartan endurance and self-denial, and for the mother, driven by family necessities to some distance from the scene of his merciless toil. How she must have longed for the Sundays, when her sons (Robert was at a school in Edinburgh) would walk to Preston Pans to see her. How proud she must have been of the cheerful industry, the steadiness, the pluck of her boy, who at fourteen _years old was thrown on his own resources, and "never enter- tained the slightest despondency on the subject." All through this work we get glimpses of the mother, and feel how sacred and -dear is her memory to the venerable writer. It runs like a vein of poetry through the details of the struggle and endurance of his early years, and lends to them dignity and pathos.

To dwell at length on his personal share in this memoir, to give it more than the proportion he assigns to it, would be to set aside -the manifest wish of the writer, and therefore we must not yield to the temptation. We resist it, while confessing its strength and predicting its influence on the general reader ; recognizing to 'the full his achievement of the main object of his task, that of presenting his brother to the public as a "zealous and successful student, a sagacious and benevolent citizen, and a devoted lover -of his country."