the tongue must have its freedom. Who | Vicksburg. The collection includes every can read Hamlet's soliloquy without speak- speech, all orders of any importance, alt ing it, and suiting the action to the word, letters bearing upon public policy, and the word to the action; or Portia's address, every saying absolutely authentic, and one or Othello's dying speech, or the death of of the most remarkable facts about it is Romeo, or Constance's reproaches to the that the whole can be read through in an Archduke of Austria, or Prince Henry's hour. The terrible publicity to which, speech on the death of Hotspur, or Wolsey's American politicians are condemned to subaddress to Cromwell? And to read Mil- mit,-publicity as of life under a burnington, as Alexander Smith has said, is like glass, is producing the consequence of dining off gold plate in a company of kings. any other tyranny, an unnatural reticence For Spenser one wants an oriel window and as to opinions, concealed by the majority a grand old fireplace.. Dante claims a pe- under a cloud of words, and by General culiar state of mind; and Virgil an apart- Grant under a studious silence, or a grimly ment furnished with classic taste; but in humorous diversion of the talk to the merits the company of Goldsmith, Moore, Long- of the last new trotter. He does not care fellow, Tennyson, Thomson, Gray, Shen- about trotters particularly, but he "talks stone, Scott, we may sit at our ease with trotters," just as Walpole "talked women," our slippers on. Thackeray calls for a little as a subject interesting to all men, but unmore restraint; Byron is appeased with a connected with political issues. Every now hookah and flowery dressing-gown; Pepys and then, however, he has been compelled sometimes almost calls for silk-stockings to break silence, sometimes almost involunand buckles. Dickens we take by the hand tarily, and his utterances, when read todeferentially, but friend-like, as one whom gether, let a flood of light on his character we cannot have misunderstood. We envy and policy. As General Grant will be for those who knew Charles Lamb and Leigh four years Premier of the United States, Hunt and Tom Hood: and how swift the our readers may possibly be interested in time flies! how often the fire must be revelations at least as important to this mended! What a troop of friends we have country as the ideas of the Emperor Napodiscovered after all, on those old book-leon. shelves. Let the wind wail without, let First and foremost, then, General Grant the world go never so wrong with you, is fixedly determined that slavery in all its here is perpetual life and sunshine. The forms shall remain ended, that free labour spiritual presence of the great ones gone with all its consequences shall be the rule remain; they leave behind companionable tokens of their minds; the light of genius is never extinguished-like Aladdin's, the lamp needs no trimming; rub it never so slightly and the spirit is by your side, with its grand messages from the living and the dead, endowing you with the poet's brightest fancies, enriching you with sparkling gems of wit and imagery, ennobling you with the companionship of the holiest and best and purest thoughts, and making you heir in perpetuity to the wisdom of all the ages. JOSEPH HATTON. From The Spectator, 14 Nov. THE New York Tribune published three days before the Presidential Election a very noteworthy contribution, occupying rather more than five columns of small type. It is a collection of the speeches, letters, general orders, and sayings absolutely known to have proceeded from General Grant since his appointment to the command of an army in the field, that is, since the siege of of the Union from Maine to Florida. He is no abolitionist, seems never to have been clear that slavery was a crime, though he entertained no Southern feeling, intimates for the negro as little liking as dislike, and expressly avows that it was a hard task to him to contemplate negro suffrage as a necessity. It is as statesman and American that he is clear the system must end, — end completely and for ever; that the Negro must be recognized officially and socially, not only as a man, but as an American citi zen. The progress of his mind upon this point is very curious. He wrote to Brigadier Parke, while lying before Vicksburg, "Use the negroes and everything within your command to the best advantage," not, be it noted, every person. This distinction proceeded, however, from no contempt for the Black race, such as many Generals at this time did not hesitate to express. "I expect," he writes in January, 1862, "the Commanders especially to exert themselves in carrying out the policy of the Administration, not only in organizing coloured regiments and rendering them efficient, but also in removing prejudice against them," a prejudice which within his terms: issues not foreseen are constantly arising, the views of the public on old ones are constantly changing, and a purely administrative officer should always be left free to execute the will of the people. I always have respected that will, and always shall.” This idea incessantly crops out in his letters, and seems nearly allied with the grand peculiarity of his mind, a love of order and subordination. A mad suggestion was made during the Atlanta campaign to place Sherman above Grant; and Sherman, always loyal, wrote to his chief repudiating the plan. Grant replied, "If you are put above me I shall always obey you, just as you always have me.' "Only those who know the tenacity of soldiers about supersession can adequately comprehend the serene simplicity of this reply, and only those who know how politics are ingrained in prominent Americans can appreciate the letter to Mr. Chase affirming that "no theory of my own will ever stand in the way of my executing in good faith any order I may receive from those in authority over me." He regards "the people" as his ultimate commanding officer, and asks only that their orders be intelligible and consistent. command rapidly disappeared. Even be-nently improper, to lay down a policy to be fore this General Grant had issued stern adhered to, right or wrong, through an adorders for the protection of coloured sol- ministration of four years. New political diers, informing General Halleck in particular that it was the duty of Union Generals to give the same protection to coloured troops that they do to any other troops in the service of the United States; and one year later he wrote to General Butler that no distinction whatever should be made in the exchange of white and coloured prisoners if regularly enrolled in the Army. He had, morcover, even then, 1862, made up his mind on the political side of the matter, for he wrote on August 30 to the Hon. E. L. Washburne in these emphatic "I never was an Abolitionist, not even what could be called anti-Slavery; but I try to judge fairly and honestly, and it became patent to my mind, early in the rebellion, that the North and South could never live at peace with each other except as one nation, and that without slavery. As anxious as I am to see peace established, I would not therefore be willing to see any settlement until this question is for ever settled." This was written, be it remembered, before Vicksburg had fallen, when it seemed to weak men as if the North must make some concession if peace was ever to be secured. The General himself thought they must yield some points, but not this, and by 1866 his mind had ripened till he was prepared to admit the negro not only to freedom as a reward for State service, not only to freedom as a man, but to equality as a citizen. I never," he said, "could have believed that I should favour giving negroes the right to vote, but that seems to me the only solution of our difficulties." The love of discipline is tempered with great personal kindliness to inferiors, a feeling best illustrated perhaps by his absolute refusal to break four or five officers who had behaved badly, or rather stupidly, in an early affair. They had never, said the General, been under fire before, and they had learned their lesson; and he positively declined even to report them. "Bah!" Upon this, the main point of the whole said Nelson, on a somewhat similar occasion, dispute between American parties, no opin-" boys will duck. I did, till I found it was ion could be more clear; and it is the useless; "-and General Grant seems to be opinion of a man slow to receive new im- of the same temper, a temper not always pressions, not specially philanthropic, not inconsistent with terrible sternness. There perhaps inclined even now to demand more is but one instance of humour, in the poputhan justice for the oppressed, but immova-lar sense, reported in this collection, though bly fixed to secure that. We can quite many of the orders are pervaded by a solconceive General Grant vetoing a Bill to dierlike directness which is almost humour, give negroes land for nothing while hanging and it illustrates the latent sternness in the whites who robbed them of land purchased General's character. It was needful in with their own savings. Colour is to him 1864 to clear, or rather desolate, the Shenno recommendation, but also no disqualifi- andoah Valley, whence the enemy were cation, the only true attitude of mind for drawing large supplies, and Grant informed the ruler of a parti-coloured State. Upon his young General of Cavalry, Sheridan, subsidiary points the President Elect is "the valley must be so cleared that crows equally clear and decisive, and his policy flying over it will for the season have to is perhaps best explained in a sentence carry their own rations,"— a remark that from his letter accepting his nomination by might have come from Cromwell in Ireland. the Chicago Convention: - In times like Precisely the same spirit is manifested in the present it is impossible, or at least emi-his intercourse with the supply branches of the Army, and in his general views upon economy. He early perceived the jobbing which is the curse of all operations in free States, and took peremptory measures to put a stop to it, cancelling every contract not made by himself, abolishing the contract system in favour of direct purchases, sternly rebuking his own father for asking favours, and finally suggesting to Halleck that all fraudulent contractors should be impressed into the ranks, or still better, gunboat service, where they could have no chance of deserting." One of these days, in some hour of extremity, produced mainly by tolerated frauds, we shall establish a sterner law than that, and carry it out, too, with the approbation of all men. The years during which President Grant occupies the White House will clearly not be "good times" for peculators, or for disobedient officials, or for persons who violently disturb the public peace. It is a real relief, amidst the perpetual talk of State rights, President Johnson's democratic proclamations, and, we must add, half-hearted Republican proposals, to come across an opinion as statesmanlike as this. In January, 1867, General Grant recorded the following deliberate opinion on the state of affairs in Texas: "In my opinion, the great number of murders of Union men and freedmen in Texas, not only as a rule unpunished, but uninvestigated, constitute practically a state of insurrection; and, believing it to be the province and duty of every good government to afford protection to the lives, liberties, and property of her citizens, I would recommend the declaration of martial law in Texas to secure these ends. The man being of any colour to say what he likes and do what he likes within the laws, but enforces the laws with the bayonet. Any native or European may talk any treason he pleases in the town hall of Calcutta, and no one will punish; but if he interferes with any rights of any other British subject, white or coloured, his whole following, or his whole nation, could not save him from arrest and punishment. Unswerving justice is the basis of order, there is no justice either in Texas or in London if the civil officers of the law can be defied by arm force, and the next President of the United States, it is clear, does not intend they should be. We only wish we could be as certain of the next Premier. General Grant comes out in these letters, and orders, and no, not speeches — sayings, a soldier politician of the best sort, a man gentle, kindly, and considerate, but with a vein of wrath in him, a man who surveys politics as he would a valley, without seeing every tree, but missing no strategic point, a soldier who is aware that there must be force somewhere to keep society together, but a politician who is determined that that force shall be the Law, framed and modified by the representatives of the people. We congratulate the United States on a Premier who dislikes waste, even when the wasteful support his party, and will put down murderers even when they plead the sovereign rights of States. From The New York Evening Post. CAL PREFACE-INTERESTING RECOLLEC- WE give below Mr. James Grant Wilson's Preface to the new edition of Halleck's Poems, issued by D. Appleton & Co. necessity for governing any portion of our NEW EDITION OF HIS WORKS — HISTORIterritory by martial law is to be deplored. If resorted to, it should be limited in its authority, and should leave all local authorities and civil tribunals free and unobstructed until they prove their inefficiency or unwillingness to perform their duties. Martial law would give security, or comparatively so, to all classes of citizens, without regard to race, colour, or political opinions, and should be continued until society was capable of protecting itself, or until the State is returned to its full relation with the Union. The application of martial law to one of these states would be a warning to all, and, if necessary, could be extended to others." It will come to that at last, and every day's delay does but exasperate the evil. As we have maintained from the first, the States which will not allow order to be restored must be governed temporarily as India is governed, by a government essentially military, which permits any hu "In this volume will be found all the poetical writings of the late Fitz-Greene Halleck included in previous editions, together with a score of poems which the editor has succeeded in recovering from various sources, and which are marked by the characteristic grace and melody of his most admired compositions; also several translations from the French, German, and Italian, that now appear in print for the first time. Among the pieces never before published are a number of juvenile productions, which may be recognised by the dates appended to them. Between the earliest poem contained in this collection and the latest, a period of three score and three years intervened. The Tempest' was on Broadway, and throughout the city; they were, in short, a town topic. The two friends contributed other pieces; and when the editor again expressed great anxiety to be acquainted with the writer, and used a style so mysterious as to excite their curiosity, the literary partners decided to call upon him. Halleck and Drake accordingly, one evening went together to Coleman's residence, in Hudson Street, and requested an interview. They were ushered into the parlor; the editor soon entered; "The Croakers,' that now appear for the young poets expressed a desire for a few the first time with Halleck's poetical writ- minutes' strictly private conversation with ings, are the joint production of the attached him, and the door being closed and locked friends, Fitz-Greene Halleck and Joseph Dr. Drake said: 'I am Croaker, and this Rodman Drake. The origin of these gentleman, sir, is Croaker Junior.' Colesprightly jeux d'esprit, as eagerly looked for man stared at the young men with indeseach evening as were the war bulletins of a cribable and unaffected astonishment, at latter day, may not be without interest to length exclaiming: My God, I had no idea the author's troops of admirers. Halleck that we had such talents in America!' and Drake were spending a Sunday morn Halleck, with his characteristic modesty was ing with Dr. William Langstaff, an eccentric disposed to give to Drake all the credit; apothecary and an accomplished mineralo- but as it chanced that Coleman alluded in gist, with whom they were both intimate particularly glowing terms to one of the (the two last mentioned were previously Croakers that was wholly his, he was forced fellow-students in the study of medicine to be silent, and the delighted editor conwith Drs. Bruce and Romayne), when Drake, for his own and his friends' amusement, wrote several burlesque stanzas To Ennui,' Halleck answering them in some lines on the same subject. The young poets decided to send their productions, with others of the same character, to William Coleman, the editor of the Evening Post. If he published them they would write more; if not they would offer them to Major M. M. Noah, of the National Advocate; and if he declined their poetical progeny, they would light their pipes with them. Drake accordingly sent Coleman three pieces of his own, signed Croaker,' a signature adopted from an amusing character in Goldsmith's comedy of The Good-natured Man.' To their astonishment a paragraph ap- "Hundreds of imitations of the Croakpeared in the Post the day following, ers' were daily received by the different acknowledging their receipt, promising editors of New York, to all of which they the insertion of the poems, pronounc- gave publicly one general answer, that ing them to be the productions of su- they lacked the genius, spirit, and beauty perior taste and genius, and begging the honor of a personal acquaintance with the author. The lines To Ennui' appeared March 10, 1819, and the others in almost daily succession; those written by Mr. Halleck being usually signed Croaker Junior,' while those which were their joint composition generally bore the signature of "Croaker and Co.' 66 The remark made by Coleman had excited public attention, and the Croakers' soon became a subject of conversation in drawing-rooms, book-stores, coffee-houses, 6 tinued in a strain of compliment and eulogy that put them both to the blush. Before taking their leave the poets bound Coleman over to the most profound secrecy, and arranged a plan of sending him the manuscript, and of receiving the proofs, in a manner that would avoid the least possibility of the secret of their connection with the Croakers' being discovered. The poems were copied from the originals by Langstaff, that their handwriting should not divulge the secret, and were either sent through the mail or taken to the Evening Post office by Benjamin R. Winthrop, then a fellow-clerk with Mr. Halleck in the counting-house of the well-known banker and merchant, Jacob Barker, in Wall Street. of the originals. On one occasion Coleman showed Halleck fifteen he had received in a single morning, all of which, with a solitary exception, were consigned to the waste basket. The friends continued for several months to keep the city in a blaze of excitement; and it was observed by one of the editors, that so great was the wineing and shrinking at the "Croakers" that every person was on tenter-hooks; neither knavery nor folly has slept quietly since our first commencement.' Of this series of satirical quaint chronicles of New York life half a century ago, Halleck, in 1866, said 'that they were good-natured verses contributed anonymously to the columns of the New York Evening Post from March to June 1819, and occasionally afterward.' The writers continued, like the author of Junius, the sole depositaries of their own secret, and apparently wished with the minstrel in Leyden's Scenes of Infancy,' to with her greatest poet. Nothing finer has been written about Robert than Mr. Halleck's poem,' said Isabella, the youngest sister of the Ayrshire bard, as she gave the writer, in the summer of 1855, some rosebuds from her garden, and leaves of ivy plucked from her cottage door, near the banks of the bonny Doon to carry back to his gifted friend. Neither will those exquisitely beautiful and tender lines, so familiar to all, in which the early death of his chosen companion and literary partner, Dr. Drake, was mourned by Mr. Halleck, Among the Croakers' will be found three be soon forgotten. They are, and will hitherto unpublished pieces from the continue to be, an enduring monument to of Mr. Halleck; and in lieu of the original both the poets, wherever the English lansignatures, the author of each poem is now guage is read or spoken. Like Thomas for the first time made known by the letters Campbell, whose poetical writings he so Hand D; when both letters occur they much admired, Fitz-Greene Halleck gave indicate the joint authorship of the literary to the world but few poems partners; or, to quote Halleck's familiar forever,' to be prized and cherished by his words to a friend, that we each had a fin- countrymen through the coming ages and ger in the pie.' generations, with "Save others' names, but leave their own unsung.' 66 6 pen Fitz Greene, a descendant of Peter Halleck or Hallock, one of thirteen Pilgrim Fathers who landed at New Haven, Connecticut, in 1640, and of the Rev. John 666 ' heirlooms Earth's and sea's rich gems, "He gave his honors to the world again, "The arrangement of the poems, as Eliot, the Apostle to the Indians,' who made by the poet in the last edition of arrived at Boston, Massachusetts, in 1631, 1858, has been closely followed in this volwas one of the earliest, as he was among ume, without reference to their chronologthe most eminent, of American poets. He ical order; and in other particulars the left no son to wear his honors or to per-present publication has been made to conpetuate his name, but, unlike his favorite form to Mr. Halleck's wishes, as expressed Roi d'Yvetot, there is little danger of his to the writer at their last interview, but a being peu connu dans l'histoire.' When few weeks before all those whose privilege it was to know the genial poet, and to have been honored by his friendship, shall have passed away, and when the enduring granite obelisk which now marks his grave shall have crumbled to dust, the name and fame of the sweet singer who celebrated in immortal song the glories of the modern Epaminondas will remain fresh and green, not only in the country of his birth, but in the land of Bozzaris. In England, his Ain-recognised as having appeared in all previous editions, while the notes to Fanny' and The Recorder' are, with a few slight alterations and additions, substantially Mr. Halleck's; and to him, therefore, the editor trusts will be awarded the credit for whatever may be found among them worthy of praise." wick Castle,' "Home of Percy's high-born race,' will long preserve his name from oblivion; while in Scotland, the song he sang in praise of Burns will forever connect him "The share of the editor in this volume can scarcely be regarded too slightly. He cannot even claim the credit for the notes, as a portion of them were prepared by the poet himself. Among the notes to the mis cellaneous poems, the first nine will be A BOAR-HUNT IN BURGUNDY.-Towards | behind me and took the plain towards the marsh noon, to my surprise, five boars got up, out of in the direction followed by the boars. I fired range, and crossed into marsh lands beyond the instantly and down she fell. I then drew my Aube. I stood watching their movements till knife and approached with caution. On arrivthe mist concealed them, and was preparing to ing within a few paces of the spot I perceived quit the cover, when a half-grown sow rose close she was wounded in the sille, and lay on her |