world's eye, for the one was a social chief, and the other was but a private in the ranks, though he had written one or two respectable books. The great man had left to posterity a view of his life and experiences which would be eagerly welcomed by the world on account of its author's eminence, however defective it might be in literary merit; and in the age of the writer, which was also that of turned periods, and balanced sentences, and inversions of verbs, it had many and signal defects. There was not a rule of good style laid down by his friend Blair whom he loved better than he respected-of which his book did not afford numerous and gross violations. Somerville, on the other hand, had rubbed up and polished his style upon two quarto volumes. Here was an opportunity for the small man excelling the great. It was the old idea of the dwarf beating the giant the idea roughly hewn out in Jack the Gaint-Killer and many another fable; for it is always popular as an agreeable surprise, and ever affords the golden vision which flits before ambitious mediocrity; and if the established rules of rhetoric were to be the criterion, doubtless the victory had been won; for of the style of the Reverend Dr Somerville-what shall we say that it is elegant without entirely abandoning a becoming simplicity, expressive without running into diffuseness, and dignified with out incurring the charge of pomposity; while the impartial critic will admit that it maintains a due precision and force in the periods, without being altogether wanting in those lighter graces which please the fancy without altogether offending the judgment, and so forth. During the long hybernation of the two works, however, the times had changed, and the relative position of the two men had in some measure changed with them. The great social reputations of last century were ephemeral, and after a very short period the successive -- events of a busy world buried them in oblivion. The fame of Jupiter Carlyle had become unknown to all but grubbers and exceptional readers, before it was, from a curious concurrence of circumstances, resuscitated by the publication of his long-buried work. Dr Somerville's reputation had in the mean time, on the whole, rather improved. Whoever would draw a pretty sure card in the temple of fame -counting reminiscence as fame-let him write one or two large books, however unreadable they may be. Though they happen to be unappreciated by his contemporaries, yet that may be only because they are beyond the age: a more discerning posterity may do justice, and place the author in his proper niche. Dr Somerville, indeed, took home to himself something very like this consolation, for he attributed the limited renown of his first History to its having been published just as the French Revolution broke out. There was no actual reversal of the judgment of his contemporaries about his literary merits, but his works continued to have a respectable position. They appeared in booksellers' catalogues, "4to, bound in marbled calf, gilt, good clean unused copy." They were seen quoted in the notes of writers who were fond of scattering a large list of authorities at the foot of their pages. Books of that sort are like considerable country mansions-they are conspicuously seen by the passing traveller, who asks whose they are, and sometimes remembers having seen them. Somerville's are books that no one speaks ill of. If the world were divided into those who have and those who have not read them, the latter would doubtless be a considerable majority. But those who had the firmness to achieve the feat, would be shy to confess that their time had been wasted, and those who had not done so could find no fault to find, and would rather indeed be inclined to conceal their ignorance. Thus Somer ville has a name as a respectable author, and a year ago was considerably better known than Carlyle. Dr Somerville affords us some curious and rather candid information as to how he became an author. The many instances of brilliant success among his brethren were likely to stir up the literary ambition of a Scotch clergyman of that day, if he had any. He had the additional motive, that "about this time, pecuniary embarrassments, arising from a variety of causes into which I need not enter, first suggested to me the idea of becoming an author." It is an idea that has entered upon others in a different fashion, driving them, as by a determined destiny, into a certain course of study, inquiry, or thought, and then urging them by an uncontrollable influence to give forth the results to the world. Such is perhaps the true idea of the nature of an author. And though, doubtless, many are the thousands of utterly worthless volumes that, under this continued internal hydraulic pressure, keep flowing out upon the world, yet it is difficult to suppose that there is much good literature got from any other source. Somerville, however, was not afflicted with the uncontrollable internal impulse-he made up his mind sedately to be an author; and we shall see presently one of the incidental consequences of entering by such a method on the arena of literature. "The subject or plan of authorship was the occasion of long and anxious deliberation. Theology would have been most convenient to my taste and habitual course of study, but was not likely to contribute either to my profit or popularity." Gradually he found his way to history, and then, by a further exhaustive process, to the history of the Revolution and the reign of William ; and having thus fixed upon his topic, he set to work doggedly, as Dr Johnson recommends. "I began early in the year 1782 to make out catalogues of all the books necessary to be consulted, and to read and make notes preparatory to the entering on the composition of my projected work. I had obtained permission to draw whatever books I chose to inspect from the Advocates' and the College Libraries. I often resorted to Edinburgh for the purpose of reading and critical research, and carried to the country such volumes as I had not leisure to peruse on the spot. I had nished private libraries-as Minto, Edgerston, and Mellerstain. But from the commencement of my labour, I had foreseen that another visit to London, however inconvenient, would be indispensable, in order to give me access to the most valuable original documents for perfecting my work. I accordingly, after making a hasty sketch of the outline, began to put some detached parts of it, relative to the most interesting facts, into an extended and correct form, for the purpose of being shown to persons qualified to point out the most authentic channels of information, or of assisting me to obtain them. The specimens I had finished were submitted to the inspection of Sir Gilbert Elliot, who was of opinion that they might be exhibited to my advantage; and he encouraged my perseverance by assuring me of every service in his power to procure materials and promote my success. also access to several of the best-fur "In the beginning of April 1785 I set out for London. My principal object in making this visit to London was to forward my historical labours, and I lost no time in using all the means and endeavours in my power for that purpose. On the recommendation of Dr Kippis, I was admitted a student in the British Museum, attended regularly at the stated hours of admis sion, and inspected all the manuscripts and printed works relative to the most interesting events and political transactions from the Restoration of Charles the Second to the accession of Queen Anne; and I transcribed such portions as contained important information, or quired consideration. In doing this I was subjected to much superfluous labour, as I discovered afterwards, on enlarging the scope of my reading, that many of the papers I transcribed had been already published. Of this description was a small volume containing several holograph letters of King William, apparently written in great haste while he was in the camp with the army. They are short and sensible, and the manuscript shows that he had either little store of paper, or had been frugal in the re use of it. I found all these letters after- original manuscripts, to no less imwards in printed publications." Thus vaulting ambition doth o'erleap itself. This is a kind of accident very apt to happen to those who are not led on in their inquiries by an irresistible influence driving them to investigation and elucidation, but who wish to march up to their conclusions in a grand and imposing manner. The inquirer who is really driven on by a love of investigation and a craving to master the truth, is led by his instinct through the readiest and easiest paths. He devours first all the common books within his reach, and gradually widens his circle, until, perhaps, in the end he may have recourse to manuscript authorities for filling up the little chinks still left. There is a good deal of quackery in the practice of referring to arrays of manuscripts which sometimes throw no new light upon anything; and finding, as has been sometimes our fortune, an author taking the pains to refer to the manuscript of a document which might have been found in a printed collection, we have thought none the better either of his judgment or his learning that he has painfully drawn out of some dirty scraps, very hard to be deciphered, that which, had he known better, he might have found in large comfortable type in Thurloe or Nalson. Some curious instances might be mentioned of documents taken over and over again into print from the original manuscript, by authors and editors ignorant of the labours of their predecessors. For instance, in a folio volume published in 1663, called Cabala Mysteries of State and Government, in Letters of Illustrious Persons and Great Ministers of State, there are several of the most remarkable letters ever revealed to the world, some of the most interesting among them having reference to the mysterious history of Somerset and the fate of Overbury. Not many years ago these were solemnly revealed, from the portant a body than the Society of Antiquaries of England, in whose Archæologia or Transactions they are printed. Again, a gentleman, ambitious of revealing unknown state papers, printed them for the third time from the original manuscript, in a collection, of which, from a feeling of good-nature, we decline to give the name, believing that nobody will suffer any direct injury from reading them there, and believing they are fresh discoveries. Somerville had experience of another difficulty in the use of manuscript authorities. When an author gets access to family papers, it is a hard thing to use them for the purpose of dishonouring the ancestors of the generous owner of them. Those who get at such sources of information have often an opportunity of becoming dire iconoclasts. The great leader, whose name is a byword for all that is patriotic, disinterested, and sublime, is proved by a certain account of charge and discharge, duly receipted, to have been in the pay of his country's enemy. The great statesman who, by his single-minded devotion to constitutional freedom, steered his country safe through the wild storm of revolution, is found to have offered his services to the other cause, and to have kept himself in a position to betray either or both, as it might suit his purposes. The victorious general, the nation's idol, whose country's strains record "the deeds he did, the fields he won, the freedom he restored," is found to have calculated sharply who was the best paymaster, and even to have offered his sword to the enemy. It is amazing how many such things, and also how many petty scandals and disgraces, are found in some stage or other of the pedigree of nearly all the best families; some of whom have consequently a very natural prejudice against antiquaries, especially those of the genealogical kind. It is not a gracious task to find such blots in the escutcheons of the man who has libe rally put his family archives at your disposal. Hence these families' his tories are so frequently imperfect, if they are not positively false, omitting the occurrences which afford the strongest and most effective illustrations of the character of the times. From the same cause history has often been made to abandon the sacred cause of truth, either by stating what is false, or omitting some part of the whole truth. Both personal and party idols must be demolished, and writers must learn to find and tell rigid truth without caring whether it may be agreeable or obnoxious to any existing men, few or many, before the problem of the right nature of historical writing is solved. It is due to the memory of Dr Somerville to say that he made a gallant stand for historical honesty. His intentions were fair, and a calm unbiassed judgment enabled him to carry them out in a manner little pleasing to some of his friends. Of the kind of difficulties which he had to encounter in this pursuit of truth, take the following specimen : "The Rev. Mr Coxe, in transmitting to me such of the Orford and Townshend papers as he thought likely to convey valuable information relative to public events during the reign of Queen Anne and King William, at the same time accompanied them with restrictive recommendations, which narrowed their usefulness. He insinuated that it would be gratifying to the proprietors if I found myself warranted, by the evidence contained in them, to justify the Whig ministry for rejecting the terms of the peace proposed by Louis XIV. in 1707-9. A very different conviction was the result of the perusal of these papers; and I composed a note to be inserted in the History, transcribing particular passages from the Townshend papers in support of the opinion I have stated in the text, and in impeachment of the sincerity of the Whig junto, who resorted to every pretext and subterfuge to entangle the negotiations and avert the conclusion of a peace, which would have been a deathblow to their influence and authority. But as Mr Coxe, to whom I made known my sentiments, thought that it would be indelicate and offensive to the family to criminate their ancestors upon evi dence furnished by themselves, I found myself under a moral obligation to withdraw the note which, though not essential to sustain the facts I had stated, must have contributed to fortify and confirm them." This passage affords a pleasant little glimpse into the private workshop in which the venerable Archdeacon Coxe prepared his fine array of heavy quartos. In the three devoted to the Life of Sir Robert Walpole, among other small omissions which deprive us of information about that statesman's private life and habits, no mention is made of his second marriage to Miss Skerret, because there were circumstances connected with it not quite consistent with the dignified decorum wherewith an Archdeacon would naturally address himself to the discussion of a First Lord of the Treasury. It must, however, be admitted that this omission has been well compensated by the comments of the Duchess of Marlborough, for the same conditions which made the affair an unpleasant one to the Archdeacon, rendered it intensely delicious to her Grace. Dr Somerville wrote a second historical volume more genially, and more in the spirit of the true artist than his first. That effort, though conceived in a pure spirit of calculating ambition, had warmed his heart towards historical inquiry, and he resolved to move onwards in the direction he had taken, and write the history of the reign of Queen Anne. Though embracing within its fifteen years no revolution or great historical climaxthough it was the reign of as thoroughly ordinary a person as ever held a sceptre-yet it is questionable if any other chapter of British history is so full of noble and refined interest. There were the splendid conquests of Marlborough; the dazzling brilliancy of the wits, the essayists, and the poets. There was a political achievement such as no other country or age had ever witnessed, the union of two great hostile nations by a simple contract, like a partnership between two merchants. There was suspended over the world, throughout all the quiet glories of the reign, the great question, whether at the end of it it was to be the parliamentary settlement of the Crown, or the divine right of hereditary succession, that was to prevail. There was beneath the surface the strange under-current of intrigue and treachery and double-dealing which we are only at this day gradually developing, the consequence of the dubious condition of the succession of the Crown. All this magnificent apparatus of history was sadly in want of its sacer vates. To say that Somerville supplied the want would be too much; it still remains. But undoubtedly his is the best history of Queen Anne's reign that we possess. He was one of the first to put an emphasis on the fact that the party-distinctions of the Revolution and Queen Anne's day are not to be held as applicable to those of George III.; and that the Whig and the Tory of the earlier period were not the political ancestors of the Whig and the Tory of the latter. Somerville's Queen Anne is a solid useful fair book, containing the result of considerable original research and much careful honest reflection. 66 Much as has been said of the enlarged taste for reading, and the greater temptations to follow a literary career in the present day, Somerville's period was one of very considerable prosperity to a certain class of writers. He was offered £300 for the copyright of his Reign of Queen Anne, which," he tells us, was so much beneath my expectation, that I abruptly declined any further conversation on the business." He subsequently entered on terms which he does not specify, but admits to have turned out less advantageous than the round three hundred offered to him 66 cash down; but "the alarming state of public affairs had in the mean time depreciated all literary VOL. XC.-NO. DL. I "My situation in London afforded me the most favourable opportunity of being made acquainted with literary men of lodged in the house of Mr Murdoch, a every description and character. bookseller, with Gilbert Stuart, who had just begun his literary career with great eclat. He had published, some time before, a volume on the Origin and Principles of the British Constitution, and had recently written a review of Dr Robertson's History of Charles V., and he was daily engaged in preparing articles for newspapers and reviews, which he often showed me before they were sent to the press. Our daily visitors at the house of Mr Murdoch were, Mr Mikle, the author of a translation of the Lusiad; Mons. Du Vergy, a pro fligate Frenchman, who had been secretary to De Guerchy, and a friend of the celebrated Chevalier d'Eon, and who was writing novels to keep him out of prison; with others of similar characters and circumstances. I met with the same company, and several authors of inferior note, at the house of Mr Murray, bookseller, Fleet Street, to whose attention and civility I was indebted, both for instruction and pleasure. The extravagant self-sufficiency of his guests, their barefaced reciprocal flattery, and the contempt which they expressed for the most esteemed living authors, often however, principally of Gilbert Stuart, I speak, provoked my indignation. to whom the club assigned an oracular authority. I was astonished at the ef R |