A Gossip with our Contributors. There is not one of our correspondents, we verily believe, who will appreciate fully the feeling with which we have yielded to the necessity of omitting from the present number such admirable articles as Thoughts on the Philosophy and Processes of Civilization,' by the author of 'Chivalry and the Crusades ;'' Harry Franco's entertaining narrative of 'The Haunted Merchant;'A Sermon by a Disciple of Democritus ;' Discursive Thoughts on Chowder;' Lines by William Pitt Palmer, Esq., and, several other papers, heretofore referred to. We can only say, that each and all shall attain to the dignity of print' at the earliest possible moment. . . . The merits of· The Pathfinder's Farewell,' by an anonymous correspondent, are swallowed up, as it were, in the original description by Mr. Cooper. A writer of evident ability does himself great injustice by a mere paraphrase of a scene which, in eloquent prose, has wrought ent its triumphs upon the hearts of the reading public; and for this reason, we have frequently declined many otherwise most welcome effusions. One who can pen such stanzas as the following, may well rely upon his original poetical resources:

80.

As I tread again the wilderness through which I was thy guide,

As on Oswego's smiling flood in light canoe I glide:

As I pass the fearful rapids, and dance amid their spray,

As I watch the wily savage, or share the bloody fray,

At morn, at noon, at silent eve, wherever I may be,

I shall think of thee, dear Mabel! I shall ever think of thee!

As holy thoughts within my breast from Nature's beauties rise,

As sounds of music charm the ear, as spring-flowers bless the eyes;

As the odors of the woods around, the willing sense enfold,

As the fall bedecks the forest with its crimson and its gold;

As chirps the gay wood-squirrel, or hums the busy bee,

I shall think of thee, dear Mabel! I shall ever think of thee!'

A Defence of Dandies' comes, we think, from a very prince of that tribe. It is too long, however, for our purpose a brief passage only being within our compass: I am a Dendy, Sir, and am quite willing that you and the public shooki know it. I uphold the honor of my fellows, and mean to have them regarded here as they are in France and Englang. There, Sir, they are considered artists, of a high order. Sir, there are but two classes of people in this world, strial speak"" ing. They are the tailors and the tailored, I am one of the latter. I have made the 'keeping' of dress, Sir, the principal ob ject of my life, hitherto; and now it rather seems as if I could not dress otherwise than perfectly, even if I-desired to do As the great poet animates all the different parts of learning by the force of his genius, and irradiates all the courses of»," his knowledge by the lustre of his imagination, even so does the concrete spirit of taste shine in my exterior, with a beautiful gloss and varnish. My tailor, Sir, studies his art. He reflected upon my last surpassing dress-coat, of royal Prince Albert brown, more than a fortnght after its completion — (though he had studied its proportions for weeks previously) if baj pily any improvement might suggest itself. Indeed, it was with some difficulty, at last, that I obtained the sanspareil garment at his hands, so reluctant was he to part with it. He was a month, Sir, composing the shapes of my last invisible-purple Victoria pants; he was indeed: and when, after mature deliberation, he had accommodated his materiel to every swell and depression of the inferior frame and branches, be held the fabric up with an honest pride that I shall never forget, and exclaimed: This will contain the lower moiety of an human being, with air effect such as I have not until now achieved! The same spirit, Sir, exists in my hatter and my boot-maker. And, Sir, when you shall remark me upon the street, sauntering down the west aide of Broadway, of a summer afternoon, you will be struck with one thing my unconscious manners. I may know, inteed, that I appear as I would for with my glossy chapeau successfully adjusted, my hair curling over my low coat-collar; my neck-cloth in a tie that no unpractised art could reach; my vest of volcano silk, with lava buttons; my white teeth gleaming faintly through my silky moustache, and lips moist with excitement; my pants every where touching me nearly, and drawing gently upon their yielding straps, like an Arabian courser upon the bridle-rein; and my pedal extremities effulgent with the light of Day and Martin; I say, Sir, that with all these, it would be difficult for me not to know, you know, that I was without my peer upon the trottoir. But, Sir, no one will know that I know it: no, Sir; detain me for a moment; see me, as I salute you, remove my hat with my gloved hand, (French straw-kid,) and enter with me upon that train of meteorological questions and answers which forms the great staple of all polite conversation; and I flatter myself, Sir, that you will encounter a manner so easy and nonchalant, that you will deem it fully equal to the unrivalled exterior I have attempted — not, I admit, with adequate success to describe.' Nature descends to infinite smallness, in the production of a character like this; and yet auch an one will you see, the model of aspiring parvenus and ambitious merchants'-clerks, who revel in his recog. nition, and exult in his approving smile. If you take,' says a recent writer, a large buzzing blue-bottle fly, and look at it in a microscope, you may see twenty or thirty little petty insects crawling about it, which doubtless think their fly to be the bluest, grandest, merriest, most important animal in the universe, and are convinced that the world would be at an end if it ceased to buzz.' We leave the application with the render..... There is an anecdote extant, of a Scot tish gentleman, who was so remarkably obtuse, that his friends could never awaken him to the appreciation of a jest: and on one occasion, an Irishman was remarking to a kindred fellow-Scotchman, that their mutual acquaintance was so dull, that he would not be likely to take a joke, though it were shot but of a cannon.' 'Why,' replied the literal counterpart, 'I do n't exactly comprehend you. How can you shoot a joke or of a cannon? You can't shoot a joke out of a cannon, surely!' We mention this anecdote for the benefit of Cinis, whose comprehension and impudence are by no means on a par. We can spare his criticism. One who aims at literary distinction should be a person of decent parts; and it is not perhaps too much to require that he should be acquainted with the art of spelling. But levity apart how wonderfully various are the effects of literature and of nature upon different individuals! Like the tailor who saw at Niagara only a 'glorious place to sponge a coat,' thousands pass their lives amidst resplendent beauties of scenery, and triumphs of mind, with a total disregard of both. Looking, with two friends, the other evening, from thể terrace-roof of our beloved domicil upon gardens flowering in the breath of May upon moon-lit sails gliding along the East River-upon Brooklyn and its noble Heights, upon which the moonlight rested like a shroud - gazing far over the quiet bay, flecked with white sails, to the blue hills of Staten Island, and beyond the extreme point of Long Island; we beheld the high revolving light at Sandy Hook, twenty miles distant, glimmering and flashing landward and upon the Atlantic. That's Sandy Hook light,' said the first discoverer; and he turned away, giving it no farther thought. 'ls that Sandy-Hook Light-House ?' asked the other-who, although without his peer in the marts of business, has yet a culti vated mind, a fine taste, and a pleasant imagination is that Sandy Hook light?' Pausing a moment, he added: Yes,

that is it! With what different feelings has that light been regarded! How it shone to the eyes of the drowning pas sengers and crew of the 'Mexico' and the 'Bristol,' when the winds raved, and 'churned white the waves,' and the roar of the tempest mingled with the noise of the trampling surf on the ice-bound beach, and the shrieks of the dying! And with what agonizing interest, half fear, half hope, has it been descried by many a far-off mariner, when cold on his midnight watch the snow-cloud blew, and the sea-bird, cleaving the adverse storm, shrieked wildly as he cuffed it with his wings!

While the tough cordage creaked, and yelling loud,
The fierce North blustered in the frozen shroud !'

And yet never was there a more welcome sight, than was that same light to me, in the first blush of a June twilight, after a long homeward voyage from Europe. I knew I was not far from my native shores; and I had been watching, for two delicious hours, to see,

in the western sky the downward sun

Look out effulgent from amid the flush
Of broken clouds, gay shifting to his beam;'

... la

and when day faded, and that light, as it were from the fireside of home, streamed upon my eye, far over the blue waters, its sheen went to my heart, like a familiar voice in a strange land.' And from the above contrast of minds, reader which is no fiction, but a literal transcript one may glean a fruitful lesson. Our friend, although a practical man, looks upon nothing in nature or art as indifferent or worthless; and we could not avoid calling to mind, while he was speaking, 'Master Humphrey,' standing thoughtfully amid the river scenes of murky London, and following in thought the turbid Thames in its winding course through the metropolis, far into the green and sunny country; and of Carlyle, taking heedful note of the grim bracket of old iron over a grocer's shop in the Rue de la Vennarie, at Paris; still sticking there; still holding out an ineffectual light of fish-oil: it had seen worlds wrecked, yet said nothing!' Summerfield' aware that this Magazine never embroils itself with the grievances and controversies of polemics? If 'a * distinguished Presbyterian clergyman in this city has publicly insulted a brother in Christ, and withal a stranger on our shores, simply because he was a Methodist,' we would rather be in that brother's place, than in his antagonist's. We must be permitted, at the same time, to question the correctness of Summerfield's' impression, that the exhibition of such illiberality toward this particular sect is by no means a rare occurrence: especially would we disclaim the imputation upon the Knickerbocker, and the distortion of a remark of one of its most popular contributors. The manner, the matter, and the method of American Methodists have been continually improving. They exhibit, as a class, none of the cant of the lower orders of English Methodists. We have never seen, for example, in their journals, any of those 'Pharasaical advertisements,' enumerated by a reviewer: Wanted a man of serious character, who can shave;' ' Wants a place: a young man who has brewed in a serious family ;' Wanted, a coachman, to take care of a barouche, and a pair of horses, of a religious turn of mind !' etc. Nor can there be found among our clergy of this numerous and popular sect, such examples as the Rev. Mr. Stiggins, the Shepherd,' a character, as we have been assured, by no means rare in England. Undue colloquial familiarity in prayer, however, and the enforcement of religious precepts by impro per and oftentimes ludicrous illustrations, are faults of American Methodism, that should, and doubtless will, be eventually rooted out. The following passage, from the lips of a back-woods divine, will exemplify our meaning: 'Yes, my brethren, read your Bible! It's a great and a good book. I want to tell you an anecdote. T' other day, I called to see a poor family in a far-back settlement. I found the man bow-ed down with trouble. I asked him what it was that afflicted him. He said that he was bow-ed down with sorrow, on account of the loss of a fine-tooth comb. His family had greatly suffered for the want of that useful implement. He had se-a-rched and se-arched; but 'twas n't of no use, my brethren; the comb was gone! Seeing a Bible upon a board-shelf, covered with dust an inch thick, I took it down : • There is great consolation in that book,' says I,' for the bow-ed down.' He took it from my hand, and as he opened it, the fine-tooth comb, whose loss he had mourned so long, fell out upon the floor! Ah, my brethren, se-a-rch the Scriptures ! You little know the consolations they contain !'... An anonymous correspondent, whose penmanship would put Cham pollion at fault, has sent us a long communication, upon an article in the Paris Presse,' describing Col. Thorne's Bal Costume, and representing that rich American' as a philosopher, whose contempt for the great is unprecedented,' and to enter whose saloons, the high-born of France are obliged to make the most humiliating concessions.' This statement,' says our correspondent, is ridiculously absurd, and is intended solely for the American market;' and he relates a dialogue between two French gentlemen, at Col. Thorne's - where, there being attractive viands and superb wines, they often visited with great edification to show the real estimation in which the pretensions of our ostentatious countryman are held in Paris: This is quite a select, a distinguished circle,' said one; the parvenus seem to be excluded entirely.' 'Yes,' replied his companion, with a shrug, with the exception of the grand millionaire himself, the company is certainly unexceptionable! As if he had said, 'let but our host absent himself from the fete, and nothing farther need be desired!' We return, as requested, our correspondent's favor through the post-office... 'An Old Reader's caution reminds us of a warning paragraph, just now going the rounds of the press, headed, 'Do not sleep with your Grandmother !' $because physical debility may be transferred from an old crone's body. A more supererogatory piece of advice than that of our friend was surely never tendered to an editor. Has he ever seen any thing in the Knickerbocker to justify so poor an opinion of our taste and discernment 7 We should hope not. Thoughts on Mr. Green's Pro

ject of Ballooning across the Atlantic,' is a gross plagiarism from a London journal; and comes, we have reason to believe, from the gentleman who palmed upon us The Dinner of the Months,' some two or three years since. As our original copyist seems interested in ærostation, we should advise him to take in a little gas, and go up himself. A very small quantity would serve to inflate him.... 'Law and Lawyers' is under consideration. It has merit and humor. The epigraph is capital: If a man would, according to law, give to another an orange, instead of saying, 'I give you that orange,' which one would think would be what is called, in legal phraseology, an absolute conveyance of all right and title therein,' the phrase would run thus: 'I give you all and singular my estate and interest, right, title, and claim, and advantage of and in that orange, with all the rind, skin, juice, pulp, and pips, and all right and advantage therein, with full power to bite, cut, suck, or otherwise eat the same, or give the same away, as fully and effectually as I, the said A. B., am now entitled to bite, cut, suck, or otherwise eat the same orange, or give the same away, with or without its rind, skin, juice, pulp, and pips; any thing heretofore or hereafter, or any other deed or deeds, instrument or instruments, of VOL. XV.

71

い

what nature or kind soever, to the contrary in any wise, notwithstanding;' with more to the same effect.'... The Trials of a Schoolmaster' are well depicted, but the subject is a hackneyed one. 'Please Sir, mend my pen !'-' please Sir, John Grimes 'a a-pinchin' me !'-' please Sir, may go out, t' git s'm' ice to put 'n my trowse's t' keep m' nose from bleedin' ' etc., are unmistakeable school-room exclamations, and the whole scene is drawn to the life. But for the abovementioned reason, A Pedagogue' will find his MS, at the desk of the publication office... New Dramatic Readings" we shall, with the writer's permission, hand over to Mr. Ranger; and if that capital artist turns them not to good account, in some new comedy of his own, we greatly mistake his appreciation of the intensely ridiculous. Did Histrion' ever hear a new rendering of the following passage: Who's here so base, he would not be a Roman? If any, speak; for him have I offended !' The latest reading runs thus: 'Who 's here so base, he would not he a Roman ? If any, speak for him. Have I offended ?' (ladies and gentlemen ?' understood, of course, with an appealing glance at the audience.) The brilliant effect of the novel pause here introduced, is not unlike that created by the little pursy subactor, who as 'Ratcliffe, in Richard III.,' kept the Park stage waiting, while young Kean, as the tyrant Gloster, was recovering from his horrid dream. In hot haste, and out of breath, he rushed in, and to Richard's nervous ejaculation, Who's there?' he gasped out: Tis I, my lord—the village cock.' And here be slipped his wind, past timely redemption, and gave no salutation to the morn;' as much perverting Shakspeare's text by his awful pause,' as did a royalist divine the litany, during the protectorate of Cromwell: O Lord, who hast put a sword into the hand of thy servant Oliver, put it into his heart also... 'Parties in this Country' is evidently from an alarmist, who cannot be permitted to croak in these pages. Such writers, if friends, as they profess themselves, of the republic, are those from whom the republic should pray to be saved.' A Lover of Reasonable Liberty' reminds us of Swift's upholsterer, who used to sit up whole nights to watch over the British constitution.' His fears are not well grounded;' they are such as Washington prayed his countrymen 'indignantly to frown upon.' Moreover, the writer errs, egregiously, in his 4 statements of fact.' Does not the memorable taunt of the Edinburgh Review, (written only twenty years ago, observe,) demolish the whole basis of the seeming argument of our correspondent's last two pages? In the four quarters of the ́globe, who reads an American book? or goes to an American play? or looks at an American picture or statue? What does the world yet owe to American physicians or surgeons? What new substances have their chemists discovered ? or what old ones have they analyzed? What new constellations have been discovered by the telescopes of Americans? What have they done in the mathematics? Who drinks out of American glasses? or eats from American plates? or weara American coats or gowns? or sleeps in American blankets?' 'A Lover of Reasonable Liberty' is on two horns of a dilemma in his assumptions; and if he can extricate himself to his own satisfaction, even, we will grant him a hearing.

The Sixteenth Volume of the Knickerbocker Magazine

WILL be issued on the first day of July next. The reputation of the work is now such, that nothing farther is deemed necessary to be said, than that its character will be enhanced by every additional means within the power of its conductors. Numbering among its contributors all the more prominent writers of our own country, with several of the most distinguished from abroad; printed in the first style of the art; occasionally embellished with fine engravings on steel; and early circulated in every section of the country; it has received an increase so constant, and acquired a diffusion so wide, that its merits, it is confidently believed, are every where known and appreciated, In addition to the regular CRAYON PAPERS' of Mr. IRVING, and the favors of its unprecedented corps of contributors, the new volume of the Knickerbocker will contain articles from the pens of Mr. DICKENS, or 'Boz,' F. G. HALLECK, ESQ., Mrs. 'MARY CLAVERS,' author of A New Home,' Miss MITFORD, G. W. GREENE, Esq., the American Consul at Rome, and others whose distinguished talents will add new attraction to the work.

A WORD TO DELINQUENT READERS. The unflagging labors, and large cash outlays, necessary to the successful conduct of a Magazine like the KNICKERBOCKER, should be rewarded by prompt payment on the part of its readers. Prohibited by a post-office law from sending bills in the numbers, we take this method of calling on every delinquent reader to do us the SIMPLE JUSTICE to render us the quid pro quo which we have earned by incessant and often disheartening labors, for their monthly amusement and gratification. The new volume of the KNICKERBOCKER will in no case be continued to those subscribers whose delinquency is of such a character as to induce the belief that the reading of the work, and not the paying for it, is their chief rule of right and of action.

NATIONAL ACADEMY OF DESIGN. The exhibition of pictures at the National Academy of Design is to remain open, as we learn, until some time in July. Having found leisure but for a casual stroll through the apartments, we shall reserve for our next number a notice, somewhat in detail, of the exhibition; a collection which, while it contains several wretched daubs, is nevertheless enriched by many beautiful pictures from the pencils of our most eminent painters, and by a large number of very creditable efforts, from the hands of our young and improving artists.