are well aware that they who attack party, or make a stand against its unthinking violence, expose themselves to the united assaults of all the factions of the day. But we are also convinced that, without at all undervaluing the important services which the principle of party association is calculated to render, its abuses are most carefully to be guarded against; and of this we are quite certain, that a better service cannot be rendered to the people, than to show them how they may most safely as well as most beneficially avail themselves of the advice of great statesmen, namely, by looking to them and taking counsel with them, but also by thinking and resolving for themselves, so as to prevent their councillors from becoming their masters, and administering the state affairs not for the country's benefit but their own.

ART. V.-A Diary in America, with Remarks on its Institutions. By Capt. MARRYAT. 3 Vols. 12mo. London: 1839.

N the spring of 1837, Captain Marryat was looking out for new combinations of human nature. Having exhausted the old world, he bethought him of the new. The puerilities and contradictions of former travellers to the United States, had only provoked and puzzled him. He resolved, therefore, to take the case into his own hands. On his landing, and for three weeks afterwards, New York appeared extremely like one of our principal provincial towns; but he soon altered his opinion. Even 'at New York, the English appearance of the people gradually wore away; my perception of character became more keen, my observance, consequently, more nice and close; and I found that 'there was a great deal to reflect upon and investigate, and that 'America and the American people were indeed an enigma: and 'I was no longer surprized at the incongruities which were to be 'detected in those works which had attempted to describe the country. I do not assert that I shall myself succeed, when so 'many have failed; but, at any rate, this I am certain of, my re*marks will be based upon a more sure foundation-an analysis ' of human nature.' The immediate subject, which this analysis is to explain by reducing it to its elements, is then announced with the same emphasis and precision. I did not sail across 'the Atlantic to ascertain whether the Americans eat their din'ners with two-prong iron, or three-prong silver forks. My "object was to examine and ascertain what were the effects of a democratic form of government and climate upon a people

• which, with all its foreign admixture, may still be considered 'as English.'

These are brave words. The misfortune is, that they have nothing to do, or next to nothing, with the present work, beyond shining in the introduction. They belong to an all hail here'after.' In the last paragraph of the last volume, the reader learns for the first time, from the author, (what, to be sure, he had previously discovered for himself,) that in justice to the Americans,' he must suspend his judgment for the present; for that an examination into American society and govern'ment, and the working out of the problem, are still to be exe'cuted.' The announcement, it must be confessed, comes rather late. We never before encountered an introduction, written, as it were, for the express purpose of leading its readers to expect an entertainment of an entirely opposite description to what the author had provided for them. The constrast between the magnificent feast to which we were asked with all this ceremony, and the light repast which is actually served up, can produce only surprise and mortification, the worse for being gratuitous. Both author and reader lose so much by it, that we sincerely hope we may never meet with an experiment of the kind again. From the same cause, another ridicule attaches to the Diary and Remarks in their present shape. Their pretension to philosophical superiority over former publications on the United States, is absolutely ludicrous.

Cambuscan's story, 'left half told,' unluckily stopped short. As far as it went, it was, however, a striking part-performance of an intended whole. The contrary is the case with Captain Marryat's American story. Nor can we perceive how the first portion is capable of being usefully connected with the second, supposing the second portion to be written in conformity with the original engagement. There are some pleasant stories in this first portion—some (what are meant to be) grave discussions -heavy subjects lightly handled; but there is nothing which can be used as either fact or argument, in any work which shail be seriously designed to show, by competent analysis, the effects of a new government and climate upon an English race. Gossip does not easily become philosophy-least of all, the philosophy of a system. The book which Captain Marryat has given us, is therefore not only not the book, but it is not even a part of the book, which he had promised. While he has not performed a tittle of his undertaking, may it not happen, nevertheless, that he has established the converse, and proved that the undertaking is one which he never can perform? This, we think, Captain Marryat has done—at least it is a point on which, slightly as he

has approached his subject, he has thrown as much light as a reasonable person could desire. Sundry generalizations of human nature and democracy, are interspersed amongst the anecdotes. They are coarse and rash, and can conciliate no confidence towards him as a philosopher. Passing on to his anecdotes, the greater part of them have much less the air of sober history than of petulant and facetious caricature. The bias under which they have been selected, and the temper with which they are narrated are equally fatal to him as an observer. The moral and intellectual nature of a people, is too serious a question to be determined by a superficial judgment, passed upon superficial evidence. A theory of national character, deduced as the positive effects of certain causes, is perhaps the most complicated and baffling subject which man in a state of society presents. It is an enterprise of wonderful ambition and extent. To draw up a correct and complete statement of the various elements which enter into the composition of the character of a nation—to verify the appropriate phenomena-to mark their several classes and proportions, is only to make the first preliminary steps. This is merely the collecting and describing the materials, from which a higher philosophy is to construct a system and reason out its laws. Yet Captain Marryat may depend upon it, that few men are possessed of the wisdom, knowledge, and impartiality, to which it would be safe to trust even this lower work.

Captain Marryat, as every body knows, is sailor and novelist by profession. Both his old callings stand in the way of his new one. He may be right in saying, 'After all, there is no'thing like being a captain!' Nevertheless, a life at sea is a sorry preparation for judging of a life ashore. Every thing seems to suffer there some sea change.' Upon the great faculties and qualities which it quickens, it also impresses a form and colour of its own. No landsman can have been on board a ship a week, without coming to the conclusion that a sensible house-dog is more like the people he has left at home, than most of his new companions; and that it would be nearly as capable of solving problems on national character. The talents and habits of a novelist, are scarcely less unfavourable. A habitual story-teller prefers invention to description. He delights in sailing before the wind, and letting his humour take its course. He writes for effect;. at one and the same time stiffening his characters into arbitrary consistency, and throwing both persons and things into contrasts beyond what exists in nature. On this account, works of imagination, even when they are professedly founded on or dealing with real life, are too often false and mischievous representations of it. Now, an author is seldom wiser than his works. In

the conversion of a great advocate into a great judge, there is much to overcome and alter, as well as to acquire. But this metamorphosis is not so entire as that through which a successful novelist must pass, before he can turn himself into a philosopher or historian. A tendency to over-confidence is among the risks to which sea-captains and writers of fiction are exposed. The first of these confidences was the ruin of Captain Hall-the second of Mrs Trollope-in their ambitious works upon America. Has Captain Marryat ever asked himself whether he is likely to fare better, from combining in his own person the disqualifications of both ?

It was Mr Mill, we think, who considered himself better fitted to write a history of India, because he had never been there. This paradox was at least intelligible. But that a commentator on a people should visit them for the purpose of observing them for himself, and should resolve, as soon as he had got there, on avoiding them as much as possible, is to take more trouble than the breathing of their air, or the looking at the mere outsides of their existence, can possibly be worth. At a distance, the critic might have collected and compared his hearsays, and arbitrated them without fear or favour: once on the spot, this can no longer be the case. The necessary equanimity and fairness were endangered (perhaps irretrievably) when the bitter sense of having been 'insulted and annoyed from nearly one end of the Union to the other,' had been excited. A larger and more advantageous experience of American society than that of inns and steam-boats, might have corrected these impressions. It was a possibility of which the people, before he made up his mind on them as a whole, were entitled to the benefit. But Captain Marryat got out of humour almost at starting, and denied himself the opportunity. 'I had not (he says) been three weeks in the country, before I 'decided upon accepting no more invitations, even charily as they 'were made.' So much for his acquaintance with the Americans in private. On his visit to Saratoga, he informs us, 'people's pockets were empty, and Saratoga was to let. The consequence 'was, that I remained a week there, and should have remained 'much longer, had I not been warned, by repeated arrivals, that the visiters were increasing, and I should be no longer alone.' So much for his intercourse with the Americans in public. There is a time for all things. The solitary grandeur of the quarterdeck, and the silent musings of the study have their charms; and a passionate longing to fly from the haunts of men, to 'ocean "prairies and wild forests,' is doubtless very fine. But the romance of spleen and sentiment on this occasion, was unfortunately in contrection with the very object of his journey. If we are to

believe Captain Marryat's own account of his moodiness, abstraction, and estrangements, he did not afford himself a chance with the Americans. With the red man, the real gentleman of North America, it would appear that he was more at home.

These flippancies are probably not to be taken to the letter. They show, however, (to say the least of them,) that Captain Marryat very unnecessarily narrowed his sphere of observation; and that what he did observe must have fallen into a crucible ill adapted to the furnishing scientific tests of truth. The levity with which the book is written, is also often disagreeably out of keeping with its professed object, and very embarrassing besides. We protest that we cannot guess whether his notice of nine-pius at Niagara is in jest or earnest. I was very fond of frequenting their alleys, not only for the exercise, but because, among the ' various ways of estimating character, I had made up my mind that there was none more likely to be correct than the estimate 'formed by the manner in which people roll the balls, especially the ladies,' Other incidents are clear of doubt; yet seem but frivolous applications of the ancient maxim, that the way the wind blows will be best seen by throwing up a straw. Thus the evasion of a foolish act against nine-pips, by means of advertising ' ten-pins played here,' is made a Star-Chamber matter. It takes rank as the first illustration of a general assertion-signifying no less, than that every state enactment to uphold the morals, or for the better regulation of society, is immediately opposed by 'the sovereign people.' This, to be sure, is philosophy made easy to the humblest capacity. If Captain Marryat has been compelled, by his wilfulness and exclusiveness, to piece out his argument with insufficient evidence, and with the odds and ends of silly stories, the necessity, instead of being an excuse, is a serious aggravation. Every nation has a Joe Miller of its own. But they are good guide-books only to a certain extent. Our traveller's inclinations were plainly magnetized so powerfully in one direction, (witness his Tower Hamlets canvass, and his mode of accounting for Irish crime in the present volumes,) that whenever he quotes American authority, it is desirable to know who the persons were.

An analysis of human nature being the talisman by which Captain Marryat is to work his wonders-the discovery of what it means will enable us to divine what sort of treasures we are to expect from it. His first and principal point is the identity of human nature. This is a portable maxim, and disposes of numerous dilemmas. For instance, is the question-What good is to be derived from penitentiaries? the answer is- Man'kind have been, and will be, the same.' Are the Eastern