of the first honors of the state does not cost some hundreds of thousand francs. The tomb released Mirabeau from his promises, and placed him beyond perils which probably he would not have been able to conquer.

In going out from dinner, we were speaking of Mirabeau's enemies; I found myself beside him, and had not pronounced a word. He looked at me with his countenance of pride, vice and genius, and placing his hand on my shoulder, he said to me, still the impression of this hand, as if Satan had touched me with his clutches of fire. When Mirabeau fixed his eyes on a young, silent person, had he a presentiment of my futurity? did he think that he would appear one day before my mind? I was destined to become the historian of high personages; they have passed before me, without my being called with them to posterity. Mirabeau has already undergone the metamorphoses which have occurred amongst those whose memory remains: carried from the Pantheon to the common sewer, and brought back from the common sewer to the Pantheon, he is elevated as high as time can elevate him.

occupied his mind; but some words escaped which showed the sovereign contempt he had for the men proclaiming themselves superior, in consequence of the indifference which they affect to have for misfortunes and crimes. Mirabeau was born generous; capable of friendship; with an easy, forgiving disposition. In spite of his immorality, he was not able to falsify his conscience; he was only corrupted for himself, his upright and firm spirit did not consider murder a sublimity of the understanding; he had no admiration for slaughter-houses" They will never pardon my superiority!" I feel and blood. However, Mirabeau was proud, and an outrageous boaster; although he made himself a cloth merchant in order to be elected by the tiers état, (the order of nobility having had the honorable folly to reject him,) he was smitten with his patrician birth; a wild bird, whose nest was between four towers, as his father said. He never forgot that he appeared at court; rode in carriages and hunted with the king. He required to be addressed as a count; and clad his servants in fine liveries when every one else renounced them. He cited seasonably and unseasonably his relation, Admiral de Coligny. Le Moniteur having called him Riquet; "Do you know," said he, in a rage to the journalist, "with your Riquet you have thrown all Europe during three days into perplexity?" He repeated this impudent and well known joke: "In another family, my brother the count would be the man of wit and the profligate; in my family, he is the silly, good man." Some biographers attribute these words to the viscount comparing himself, with all humility, to the other members of the family.

Mirabeau was at bottom monarchic; he pronounced these words: "I wished to free the French from the superstition of monarchy, and to substitute a reasonable worship.' In a letter intended to be shown to Louis the 16th, he wrote; "I did not wish to have labored only for a vast destruction." It is however what happened; Heaven, in order to punish us for the bad employment of our talents, gives us the repentance of our success.

Mirabeau moved the public with two levers; on one side he took his point of support in the masses, whose defender he became while he despised them; on the other side, though traitor to his order, he conciliated its sympathy by some affinities of class, and some common interests. That would not happen to a plebeian champion of the privileged classes; he would be abandoned by his party without winning the favors of the aristocracy, by its nature ungrateful and unattainable, when one is not born in its ranks. The aristocracy, moreover, cannot suddenly make a nobleman—for nobility is the daughter of time. From Mirabeau has sprung the school of Mirabeau. Men, in freeing themselves from moral ties, have dreamt that they would be able to transform themselves into statesmen. Those imitations have only produced little wicked men; he who flatters himself to be corrupted and a robber, is but a libertine and a swindler; he who believes himself virtuous, is only contemptible; he who boasts of being a criminal, is only infamous.

Too soon for himself, too late for the court, Mirabeau sold himself, and the court bought him. He staked his renown against a pension and an embassy; Cromwell was on the point of bartering his future fame for a title and the order of the garter. Notwithstanding his elevation, Mirabeau did not value himself high enough. Now that plenty of money and places have raised the price of consciences, there is no mountebank whose purchase

We no longer see the real Mirabeau, but the ideal Mirabeau, such as the painters draw him, in order to give the symbol of the epoch he represented; -he becomes more false and more true. From so many reputations, actors, events, ruins, there remain but three men, each of them attached to each of the three grand revolutionary epochs-Mirabeau for the aristocracy; Robespierre for the democracy; Bonaparte for despotism-the monarchy has nothing. France has paid dear for three reputations devoid of virtue.

Communicated to the Living Age, by a lady in Paris. EARLY RISING AND INDUSTRY OF BIRDS.

THE zeal and perseverance with which some persons devote themselves to the economy of nature, to the developments of science, the observation of animal life especially, either in its structural forms or its habits, prove that there is something perfectly unselfish in human nature; a love of truth for its own sake, absolutely disinterested. The whole history of science manifests this. Bacon, it is true, defiled his mind with the love of lucre, and sullied his great name by acts unworthy of an honest man; but generally the true devotee of science is one who postpones all other gratifications to the end he has in view, simply to explore nature, and to demonstrate her laws.

One of my friends in Paris has an acquaintance, remarkable for the simplicity of his manners and the kindliness of his disposition, who, like Alexander Wilson and Audubon, delights himself in the history and the habits of the feathered race. M. Dureau de la Malle is not adventurous like our American ornithologists. Linnæus sometimes employed himself with satisfaction upon a few square feet of grass ground, to study the varieties of its vegetable products, and the multitude of insects that find their sustenance upon them; and St. Pierre, in the vitality of a single strawberry plant, beheld with admiration the wisdom and goodness which bestow consciousness and enjoyment in minute and innumerable forms of life. M. de la Malle, in like manner, watches over the affections, the industry, the pleasures, and the distinctive peculiarities of the pretty creatures who have made their resting place under his windows. To do this, for half the year he accommodates his own habits to

POETRY.-Light in the Window, 185.-Song of the Dirt; The Hour is Come, 191.
SHORT ARTICLES.-Charity, 157.-Cloth of Pine-Apple Leaves, 182.-The Clan Munro, 186.

Of all the Periodical Journals devoted to literature and science which abound in Europe and in this country, this has appeared to me to be the most useful. It contains indeed the exposition only of the current literature of the English language, but this by its immense extent and comprehension includes a portraiture of the human mind in the utmost expansion of the present age. J. Q. ADAMS.

LITTELL'S LIVING AGE.-No. 246.-3 FEBRUARY, 1849.

From the Quarterly Review. 1. Physical Geography. By MARY SOMERVILLE, author of The Connection of the Physical Sciences," and "Mechanism of the Heavens." 2 vols. post 8vo. London, 1848. 2. Physikalische Geographie. Vorlesungen gehalten an der Universität zu Berlin in den Jahren 1834 und 1835. Von FRIEDRICH HOFFMANN. Berlin, 1837.

3. The Physical Atlas: a Series of Maps and Illustrations of the Geographical Distribution of Natural Phenomena; embracing Geology, Hydrography, Meteorology, and Natural His tory. By A. KEITH JOHNSTON, F. R. G. S. Edinburgh, 1848.

Folio.

edge of subordinate parts; and this exactness cannot be attained otherwise than by the division of labor we have indicated. We divide to obtain supremacy over the whole.*

Physical Geography-that branch of science which embraces all matter, in all its forms of existence, organized or inorganic, forming the great globe on which we dwell-may rightly take place as one of the highest departments of human knowledge. Spacious, however, though its domain and objects be, and familiar in their connection with other parts of science, it is only lately that its boundary has been defined, and its subjects and subordinate branches, heretofore pursued under these separate connections, been associated under one comprehensive name. So recent, in truth, is their association in any explicit form, that Mrs. Somerville's volumes come before us as the first English work bearing the title, and distinctly comprehending what belongs to this great subject. We possess, indeed, the valuable Physical Atlas of Mr. Keith Johnston, which may well be associated with Mrs. Somerville's book for their mutual illustration. But this Atlas is itself a recent undertaking; and by no means yet known, or studied, commensurately with its merits.

It is welcome to us to receive from the pen of Mrs. Somerville this introduction to Physical Geography as an independent branch of science. This lady, as all our readers know, has earned for herself no common reputation by her earlier scientific writings-to which we have given our tribute of praise in former volumes of this Review, (Nos. 94 and 101.) She brought to the

THE growth of the physical sciences brings with it the same demands as the progress of civilization in the arts of life. New methods and divisions of labor are required to satisfy the call for higher advancement and a more consummate perfection; new names are needed to express and classify these divisions. We find practical illustration of this in the numerous societies which have grown up of late years, professing the separate and especial culture of branches of natural knowledge which, half a century ago, were barely recognized or imperfectly deciphered on the great page of nature. More remarkably still is this principle of subdivision exemplified in the labors and collections of individuals in the field of science, where we find men seeking and earning fame by a devotion to objects which appear utterly trivial to those unused to such researches. The Fauna and Flora of natural history are striking examples. We may smile at the phrase of "illustrious arachnologist" applied to an indefatigable spider-collec-" Mécanique Céleste" of Laplace a mathematical tor of our own day, and marvel at the laborious zeal of M. Robineau in gathering up 1800 species of the genus Musca in the single department of the Yonne. But when we come to regard the completeness which this great branch of science has attained through such particular researches, and the curious and unexpected results derived from minute inquest into the subdivisions of the organic *The only practical doubt to be entertained on this world-the fungi, the algæ, the heaths, the lich- subject regards the recent multiplication of societies ens, the mollusks, of different seas and depths, the professedly devoted to single departments of science. We cannot now object to this as "an over-early and zoophytes, infusoria, &c.-we cannot fail to recog-peremptory reduction of knowledge into arts and methnize the value of these insulated labors, and to applaud the happy diligence to which we owe such exact and abundant knowledge.

capacity and cultivation, which enabled her to present to English readers an admirable summary of the spirit, methods, and results of this great work. To the "Mechanism of the Heavens" succeeded her volume on the "Connection of the Physical Sciences;" unassuming in form and pretensions, but so original in design, and perfect in

ods;" but we firmly believe that the result of this division has often been to starve rather than foster the objects of pursuit, thus detached from their former connections. That private patronage which, by a proud peculiarity of England, gives basis to these institutions, is hampered by the multiplicity of demands upon it; their government becomes feeble or partial from the same cause; and the labors of individuals, admirable in themselves, often lose their due weight and circulation by being parcelled out question of degree; but we repeat our own conviction among various subordinate receptacles. It is simply a that the division has been carried to an injurious extent, and believe that the same judgment might be extended to other public institutions, with which our actual state of society is crowded and perplexed.

execution, as well to merit the success of eight | ceasingly by the close and compact series of facts editions, each carefully embodying all of augmen- which form the burden of every page. There is tation that science had intermediately received. no sufficient repose for the reader's mind, nor Though rich in works on particular sciences, and illustration enough to refresh the attention. As richer still in those eminent discoveries which es- respects the work before us, we are perfectly sentablish the relations amongst them, yet had we sible that this more copious illustration could not not before in English a book professedly under- have been attained without enlarging or otherwise taking to expound these connections, which form altering its plan. In adverting to the fact, therethe greatest attainment of present science, and the fore, we do so rather in the way of explanation most assured augury of higher knowledge beyond. than censure; freely admitting that in the same Mrs. Somerville held this conception steadily be- compass it would have been impossible to concenfore her; and admirably fulfilled it. Her work, trate the same amount of knowledge more clearly indeed, though small in size, is a true Kosmos in and efficiently. The canvass must be larger, if the nature of its design, and in the multitude of details of outline and coloring are required to enter materials collected and condensed into the history into the picture. it affords of the physical phenomena of the uni- This wider canvass, though unhappily incomverse. In some respects her schéme of treating plete, is afforded in the " Physikalische Geogthese topics so far resembles that since adopted raphie" of Frederic Hoffmann-lectures delivered by Humboldt, that we may give Mrs. Somerville in the University of Berlin in 1834 and 1835, and, credit for partial priority of design, while believ-after his premature death, published in the volumes ing that she would be the last person to assert it which we have placed at the head of this article. for herself.

The lectures gained high reputation when delivered, and their merits as a clear and animated exposition of this great department of science are well attested by the published work. The previous pursuits and travels of Hoffmann prepared him for the undertaking, and his proximity to Baron Humboldt—the father, as he may fairly be termed, of physical geography-was well calculated to foster and facilitate the studies thus di

We may briefly notice here her style in treating scientific subjects, inasmuch as our comments will apply equally to the volume just mentioned and to those now before us. Few writers have shown so remarkable a continence as to all superflucus words and phrases. Not upon any formal principle, but from that native simplicity which is a quality of genius, Mrs. Somerville never indulges in those covenanted passages of preface or perora-rected. tion in which authors often "labor only to osten- To Germany also we owe the first execution of tation." She goes at once to the work in hand; a Physical Atlas-that of Berghaus-which has fully prepared and informed; clear and exact in been followed in our own country by the larger her methods; and always preferring perspicuity and more complete one already alluded to; dilito ornament. In treating of the mutual relations gently elaborated from the best and most recent of the physical sciences she conducts her reader sources of knowledge, and ably executed in all its to the generalizations of which we have spoken, | parts. Such works are as essential to the study not with any pomp of announcement, but by those of physical geography as are experiments to the clear and certain steps of induction which, better chemical student, or models and diagrams to inthan any artifices of language, raise the mind to struction in the mechanical sciences—or, what is the height of the subject, and engage the imagi- more pertinent in this case, as common maps to nation with visions of higher knowledge yet to common geography. Their linear delineations to come. When writing on astronomy she allows the the eye is an admirable shorthand-writing, conveystars to speak for themselves, in all their sublim-ing impressions to the mind far more explicit and ities of number, space, and time; not defacing the forcible than any mere descriptions can afford; history of the heavens by those gorgeous epithets suggesting comparisons and relations, and giving which we find in some modern treatises-words of facilities of reference, which can in no other way earthy origin, and which rather debase than elevate the grandeur of the theme. Such is the character of her works throughout-a character perfectly compatible with great merits of style, and passages of much natural eloquence.

be equally attained. This very conviction of their value would lead us to urge upon Mr. Johnston the expediency of some reduced form of his great Atlas, which, though detracting in a certain degree from its completeness, might render it In these days of diffuse writing we are loth to more accessible to common readers, and more usesay anything which may seem to point at brevity ful, therefore, in illustration of the volumes before as a fault, and especially where the subject is so us, and of future writings on the same subject. vast that it can only be embraced by severe con- The original Atlas, however, ought to have a densation. If viewed, however, as an elementary place in every good library. We know no work work, Mrs. Somerville's treatise on Physical containing such copious and exact information as Geography must be considered as hardly copious enough for the great mass of readers. What her clear understanding unfolds in a sentence would be a theme to other writers. Though arranging her subjects well, yet does she tax the memory too un

to all the physical circumstances of the earth on which we live; nor any of which the methods are so well fitted for the instruction of those who come ignorantly to the subject.

What, then, is Physical Geography, and what