mitted to address the House from the bench on which he sat, but he fairly broke down ere he could reach the pith of his argument. His speech produced a great sensation, though it could not arrest the progress of events. Cuba, the most important conquest which England had ever made, was restored to Spain in exchange for Florida; an arrangement of which, down to the present day, England has good reason to regret the improvidence. It was about this time, or rather in the early part of the following year, that Sir William Pynsent, a Somerset baronet of ancient family, died and bequeathed to William Pitt the estate of Burton Pynsent, with a rental of £3000 a year. The baronet had no personal acquaintance with the legatee it is doubtful whether he had ever seen him; but he was a great admirer of Pitt's public character, and seems to have had no near relatives. So considerable an accession to means not previously abundant proved very acceptable to the recipient; but it did not abate one jot of the mental activity of the man. A martyr to gout, he still played a conspicuous part in parliament, though he steadily refused to become again a member of the cabinet which had so unceremoniously thrown him overboard. Will you the bowels of your countrymen ? will follow the example. There are two lines in 'Be to her faults a little blind; Be to her virtues very kind.' "Upon the whole, I will beg leave to tell the House what is really my opinion. It is, that the mediately. That the reason for the repeal be asStamp Act be repealed, absolutely, totally, and imsigned, because it was founded on an erroneous principle. At the same time, let the sovereign authority of this country over the colonies be asserted in as strong terms as can be devised, and be made to extend to every point of legislation whatsoever. We may bind their trade, confine whatsoever, except that of taking their money out their manufactures, and exercise every power of their pockets without their consent." From 1761 to 1766 Pitt remained excluded from the king's councils. He was, therefore, no party to the ill-judged Stamp Act, which had well-nigh precipitated, by a year or two, the rupture with the North American colonies; indeed, he opposed it when first brought forward vigorously, and contributed largely, by the eloquence and power of his denunciation, in effecting its repeal. The following extract from his speech on the latter occasion well deserves to be re-proceedings of those who, in their abhormembered : "A great deal has been said without doors of the power, of the strength, of America. It is a topic that ought to be cautiously meddled with. In a good cause, on a sound bottom, the force of this country can crush America to atoms. I know the valor of your troops; I know the skill of your officers. There is not a company of foot that has served in America out of which you may not pick a man of sufficient knowledge and experience to make a governor of a colony there. But on this ground-on the Stamp Act-when so many here will think it a crying injustice, I am one who will lift up my hands against it. "In such a cause, even your success would be hazardous. America, if she fell, would fall like the strong man. She would embrace the pillars of the State, and pull down the Constitution along with her. Is this your boasted peace? To sheathe the sword, not in its scabbard, but in It was during this interval, likewise, that the famous disputes between the House of Commons and John Wilkes occurred. Pitt was no admirer of Wilkes; but he still less admired the unconstitutional and impolitic rence of a demagogue and a libeler, forgot what was due to the privileges of parliament, and the undoubted rights of the constituencies. He spoke against the sentence of expulsion, which was, however, as is well known, carried into offect. of the bondage in which the great Whig The king was by this time heartily tired families seemed determined to keep him. His first attempt to emancipate himself, by placing Lord Bute at the head of the administration, had failed. He now endeavored, with the assistance of Lord Rockingham, to shake them off; but Lord Rockingham possessed small influence in parliament, and was quite as much a member of the clique at heart as many who followed more openly in the wake of the house of Russell. No thing now remained, therefore, except to call upon Pitt to form an administration. He did so, "and produced," says Burke, “such a piece of diversified mosaic, such a tesselated pavement without cement; here a bit of black stone, and there a bit of white-patriots and courtiers, king's friends and Republicans, Whigs and Tories, treacherous friends and open enemies; that it was, indeed, a very curious show, but utterly unsafe to touch, and unsure to stand on." Nor would the state of his own health permit the framer of the cabinet to watch, as it was right that he should, over its proceedings. The business of the House of Commons was too much for him, and he passed into the Lords as Earl of Chatham. Had he consulted his own fame more, and what he believed to be the best interests of the crown less, he would have retired from the cabinet as soon as the truth was forced upon him that physical strength enough to guide its deliberations was wanting. He failed to do this; and cannot, therefore, escape his share of responsibility for measures which resulted in the catastrophe which he had on former occasions contributed to postpone. In the year 1767, Charles Townsend in troduced into the House of Commons a bill for taxing America, by levying duties on certain articles which the Americans were not permitted to import, except from Great Britain. We need not so much as refer to the enemy, gave up all for lost, and resolved to have peace on any terms. This was quite as much at variance with Lord Chatham's sense of right as the original ground of the war. He resolved, therefore, to oppose the motion; and rose from a sick bed, to which he had been long confined in the country, that he might carry his design into force. He proceeded to London, and sat in the Lord Chancellor's room till informed that the business of the debate was about to begin. Let the editor of the work which we are here reviewing tell the rest : "He was then led into the House of Peers by two friends. He was dressed in a rich suit of black velvet, and covered up to the knees in flannel. Within his large wig, little more of his countenance was to be seen than his aquiline nose and his penetrating eye, which retained all its native fire. He looked like a dying man; yet never was seen a figure of more dignity; he appeared like a being of a superior species. The Lords stood up, and made a lane for him to pass to his seat, whilst, with a gracefulness of deportment for which he was so eminently distinguished, he bowed to them as he proceeded. Having taken his seat on the bench of the earls, he listened to the speech of the Duke of Richmond with the most profound attention. "The reverence-the attention-the stillness of "After Lord Weymouth had spoken against the address, Lord Chatham rose from his seat slowly and with difficulty, leaning on his crutches, and supported by his two friends. Taking one hand from his crutch, he raised it, and, casting his eyes the consequences of this measure; but it is been enabled to come here this day to perform toward Heaven, said, 'I thank God that I have due to Lord Chatham not to place out of my duty, and to speak on a subject which has so record, that, as the scheme was none of his, deeply impressed my mind. I am old and infirm he hastened, in 1768, to mark his disapprobave one foot, more than one foot, in the grave val of it by withdrawing from the Govern-1 have risen from my bed to stand up in the ment. It is just, also, to bear in mind, that cause of my country-perhaps never again to almost from the date of his return to power speak in this house!" till his resignation he labored under the pressure of a malady, which though not, perhaps, such as deserves to be described as an aberration of intellect, entirely unfitted him from taking part in public affairs. The portion of blame which attaches to him, as compared with that justly attributable to his colleagues, is very small. But if he erred in suffering himself to be made an involuntary party to the beginning of the strife, he more than made amends by the unwearied zeal which marked his efforts to heal theAnd so it proved.' breach. In 1770, his health being somewhat re-established, he returned to public life; and as a peer of parliament advocated measures of conciliation, which were unhappily rejected. At last, as is well known, the Government, which had repeatedly declined to entertain fair and honorable propositions from the House was most affecting; if any one had dropped a handkerchief the noise would have been heard. At first Lord Chatham spoke in a very low and feeble tone; but as he grew warm, his voice rose, and became as harmonious as ever; oratorical and affecting, perhaps more than at any former period, both from his own situation, and from the importance of the subject on which he spoke. He gave the whole history of the Ameri can war; of all the measures to which he had objected; and all the evil consequences which he had foretold; adding at the end of each period, "In one part of his speech he ridiculed the apprehension of an invasion, and then recalled the remembrance of former invasions,- A Spanish invasion, a French invasion, a Dutch invasion, many noble lords must have read of in history; and some lords (looking keenly at one who sat near him) may remember a Scotch invasion.' 666 My lords,' continued he, I rejoice that the grave has not closed upon me; that I am still alive to lift up my voice against the dismemberment of this ancient and most noble monarchy! Pressed down as I am by the hand of infirmity, I am little able to assist my country in this most perilous conjuncture; but, my lords, while I have sense and memory, I will never consent to deprive the royal offspring of the House of Brunswick, the heirs of the Princess Sophia, of their fairest inheritance. Where is the man that will dare to advise such a measure? My lords, his majesty succeeded to an empire as great in extent as its reputation was unsullied. Shall we tarnish the lustre of this nation by an ignominious surrender of its rights and fairest possessions? Shall this great kingdom, that has survived, whole and entire, the Danish depredations, the Scottish inroads, and the Norman conquest; that has stood the threatened invasion of the Sspanish Armada, now fall prostrate before the house of Bourbon? Surely, my lords, this nation is no longer what it was! Shall a people that, seventeen years ago, was the terror of the world, now stoop so low as to tell its ancient inveterate enemy, Take all we have, only give us peace? It is impossible! "I wage war with no man, or set of men. I wish for none of their employments; nor would I co-operate with men who still persist in unretracted error; or who, instead of acting on a firm, decisive line of conduct, halt between two opinions, where there is no middle path. In God's name, if it is absolutely necessary to declare either for peace or war, and the former cannot be preserved with honor, why is not the latter commenced without hesitation? I am not, I confess, well informed of the resources of this kingdom; but I trust it has still sufficient to maintain its just rights, though I know them not. My lords, any state is better than despair. Let us at least make one effort; and if we must fall, let us fall like men!' "When his lordship sat down, Earl Temple said to him, You forgot to mention what we talked of, shall I get up?' Lord Chatham replied, No, no; I will do it by and bye.' "The Duke of Richmond then replied; and it is said that, in the course of his speech, Lord Chatham gave frequent indications of emotion and displeasure. When his grace had concluded, Lord Chatham, anxious to answer him, made several attempts to stand, but his strength failed him, and, pressing his hand to his heart, he fell backward in convulsions. The House was immediately thrown into a state of the greatest agitation, and an adjournment was at once moved and carried. Lord Chatham was first taken to the house of Mr. Sargent, in Downing Street; and when he had in some measure recovered, he was removed to his own residence at Hayes; where, after lingering for a few days, he expired on the 11th of May, in the seventieth year of his age. On the evening of his death, the House of Commons, on the motion of Colonel Barré, voted him a funeral and a monument in Westminster Abbey at the public expense. A few days afterward, an annuity of £4000 was settled upon the heirs of the Earl of Chatham, to whom the title should descend; and a public grant of £20,000 was made for the payment of his debts." We regret that our limits will not permit us to pursue this interesting subject further. The Modern Orator is, however, a work which can well afford to stand or fall upon its own merits; and we heartily recommend it to the careful study of all who either delight in observing the forms and shapes which genius of the highest order once took in others, or are themselves desirous of catching a ray from the fires which still continue to burn, even amid the ashes of the mighty dead. STATISTICS OF FRENCH LITERATURE. Ir is calculated that from the 1st Jan., 1840, to the 1st August, 1845, there were issued from the press in France 87,000 new works, volumes, and pamphlets; 3700 reprints of ancient literature and French classic authors; and 4000 translations from modern languages-one-third of the latter from the English, the German and the Spanish coming next in numbers, and the Portuguese and the Swedish languages having furnished the smallest contributions. Nine hundred dramatic authors are named of pieces produced on the stage, and afterward published; 60 VOL. XVIIL NO. IV. only of comedies and dramas not acted. Among the published works are 200 on occult sciences, cabalism, chiromancy, necromancy, &c., and 75 volumes on heraldry and genealogy. Social science, Fourrierism, communism, and socialism of all sizes; 6000 romances and novels; and more than 800 works of travel. According to a calculation, for which the authority of M. Didot's (the publisher) name is given, the paper employed in the printing of all these works would more than twice cover the surface of the 86 departments of France. 88 From the Westminster and Foreign Quarterly Review: THE JASMIN, THE MODERN TROUBADOUR. Las Papillotos (The Curl-papers) de Jasmin, Coiffur, de las Académios d' Agen et de Bordéou. Agen: Prosper Noubel, 1843-1845. EVERYBODY has heard of the Troubadours, and most people have some notion of their own as to who and what they were. These notions, however, are, we suspect, rarely definite, and still more rarely just. Wonderful, on comparison, would be the discrepancy between them-amusing would be the variety in its conceptions, which, on this as on many other questions, that respectable class termed "well-informed people" would exhibit. A few learned men are tolerably acquainted with the subject, and know the rank in the history of literature to which the troubadours are entitled, but we believe they are few indeed. Most people associate with the name of these minstrels only confused and misplaced ideas of ladye-loves, bowers, a peculiar garb, the dark ages and guitars. Their works are less known than those of the Fathers. The Druids do not possess a more dim and shadowy existence in the imagination of the mass. Many have no farther acquaintance with the matter than that, like a bandit, a pilgrim, or a Jew, a troubadour makes an excellent character for a fancy ball. But however different may be the opinions entertained on other points connected with the troubadours, on one at least there would probably be all but unanimity; nearly all, we are persuaded, would agree in asserting that the time of those worthies is long since gone by, and that it is centuries since the last of the tuneful brethren sang his latest lay. Men, nevertheless, often coincide only in their errors, and this we proclaim to be one. The golden age of the troubadours may be past, but the race is not extinct; time may have modified the externals, but he spirit remains. For, dwelling in their very country and singing in their very language, differing in short from his predecessors in little more than this, that he far excels the best of them in genius, there exists at this present day a real living troubadour; his name is Jasmin, and we have seen him. The poetry of this singular man is not known in this country as it deserves to be. A short notice of it, indeed, appeared some years ago in a weekly periodical, and one or two of his smaller pieces have even been translated into English; but we are persuaded, that by a great majority, even of those best acquainted with modern French literature, the poet of Agen has never been heard of. In France itself his reputation is not so widely or so universally spread as is that of many of his contemporaries much his inferiors in merit; nor, indeed, is it wonderful that it should be so, when we consider that the language in which he writes is now looked on only as the patois of a province, and that it is, in fact, nearly unintelligible to those who know no French but French of Paris. Yet, notwithstanding this serious disadvantage, the sterling excellence of his poetry has won a way for it; and if, with the mass, it is not everywhere so popular as on the banks of the Garonne, its beauties have universally been appreciated, at least, by the more competent and discerning. The most distinguished critics of the capital itself, not always too ready to discover or to recognize provincial merit, hailed him with enthusiasm, when, rambling like a true minstrel, he appeared amongst them reciting his verses; and in the difficult saloons of a city, where unaided genius to be successful must be genius indeed, the Gascon bard conquered for himself a fame of which any man might well be proud. Ampère, Charles Nodier, Saint-Beuve, and Lamartine were among the loudest in their praises; the last, indeed, went so far as to say that Jasmin was "the truest and greatest poet of the age;" and the exaggerated terms of this testimony must not be allowed to detract from its real value. As for his native Gascony, where the language in which Jasmin writes is not only well understood, but, as being now the patois of the people, is to them peculiarly expres sive and heart-touching, he is there held in universal honor. His countrymen of that province are intensely proud of him. He is to them what Burns is to the Scottish peasantry, only, he meets with his honors in his lifetime. Fêtes and banquets await him when he visits any of their towns, multitudes crowd to hear him recite his poems, his progress from place to place is a perpetual triumph, and the unabating enthusiasm that everywhere greets him shows that the fame which Toulouse, the city of Clemence Isaure, acknowledged years ago by presenting him with its golden laurel, has since been successfully maintained. Agen is a small town prettily situated on the reedy Garonne. In its principal square is to be found a small shop, the front of which, shaded by an overhanging blind of blue cloth, bears the legend, "Jasmin. Coiffeur de jeunes gens." For, the truth must be told, "the truest and greatest poet of the age" keeps a shop, and is a hair-dresser the fingers that sweep the lyre handle also the scissors, and scraps of verses serve to test the heat of curling-irons. Can such things be? Can a man who is a hairdresser hope for immortality? Has he any right to bear up against the prejudices to which he must feel himself obnoxious? That ploughmen and shepherds may tune their pipes and sing, we can all readily understand; idyls and georgics come naturally from their occupations; but a hair-dresser-with all due respect to the worshipful company of barbers-seems inexorably forbidden to make any acquaintance with the muse, more especially if he be hight Jasmin, to remind us of his own oily perfumes, and if, farther, he entitle his writings, "Curl-papers," to suggest more homely ideas still. Let no Latinist punster quote to us the line, Dum canimus sacras alterno pectine nonas, to us there is no profession so prosaic as a barber's, and for a poet to be found among its members is indeed a prodigy. But Jasmin is that prodigy. The little room behind his shop is full of gifts, presented to him in homage of his genius; admirers in every social and intellectual rank have sent their offerings, and kings are among the contributors. He writes after his name, "Member of the Academies of Agen and Bordeaux." At his button-hole he wears the ribbon of the legion of honor-in his case, at least, bestowed upon no unworthy grounds. And the little table beside his counter is covered with favorable reviews by critics whose judgment is stamped with authority, mingled with complimentary letters from correspondents whose approbation is indeed high praise. All these Jasmin makes no ostentation either of exhibiting or of concealing; he has not been spoiled by the flattery he has received; but he is conscious of his own merits, and disdains the mock modesty it would be affectation to assume. In appearance he is a fine manly-looking fellow, in manners he is hearty and simple. From the first prepossessing, he gains upon you at every moment, till when he is fairly launched into the recital of one of his poems, and his rich voice does justice to the harmonious Gascon in which they nearly all are written, the animation and feeling he discovers become contagious; your admiration kindles; cold as you may generally be, you are involved in his ardor. You forget the shop in which you stand; all idea of his being a hair-dresser vanishes; you rise with him into his superior world, and experience in a way you will never forget, the power exercised by a true poet pouring forth his living thoughts in his own verses. Amongst Jasmin's productions is a piece. entitled Mous Soubenis,-My Souvenirs. It appeared in 1832. Nothing can give a better idea at once of the man and of the poet than this work; for it not only yields us a retrospect of his life, but exhibits in a peculiar degree the mixture of pathos and humor, of playfulness and passion, which distinguishes him. We shall, therefore, make the acquaintance of the modern troubadour by means of this autobiography. We translate word for word when we quote in prose. Aged and broken, the other century had only a couple of years more to pass upon earth, when, at the corner of an old street, in a house where dwelt more than one rat, on Thursday in Shrovetide, behind the door, at the hour when they toss pancakes, of a hunchbacked father and a lame mother, was born a baby, and that baby was I." The hunchbacked father was a tailor; and, though he could not read, he too was a poet, of a much lower degree, however, than his son. He composed burlesque and occasional couplets for the charivaris common in the country; but none of these effusions have come down to us-the poor tailor-satirist rests mute and inglorious. Though a thin, weak child, yet "nourished by good milk, and nestling in a warm cradle stuffed with lark's feathers," Jasmin grew, "just as if he had been the son of a king." At the |