their difficulties; and while this declaration must make all respect their candor, it will heighten admiration for the talent, learning, and patriotic feeling pervading this gem in their nation's literature. One word more must be added for the American reader. The horrors and ravages of war are herein portrayed with a vividness which our style of composition seldom allows. The peculiar delicacy of feeling, and the refined sensibility, so decidedly feminine in the Mexican character, have given them a pre-eminence over some others in this species of delineation. They, therefore, indulge in it, not drawing from their imagination, but from memory, to give life and truth to the picture. At the outset, therefore, it must be declared, to prevent a misconception of many passages, that this work has no fancy in it whatever. It is purely fact, and fact too well known, in sorrow, sometimes, to the whole American army. The poetical descriptions have the additional charm of being no less true than beautiful. The chapter on the abandonment of Tampico is the only article in which there is much of the prevailing style in Mexican political disquisitions. Its literary merit is in its being a fair specimen of the prolific partisan press of that country, and will, no doubt, suffice for the curiosity of strangers. The other portions of the book are on a far higher and much more unusual standard. In conclusion, a remark has to be made on the sufferings and scourges of the Mexican army in some of their marches. These are so singular that some will suppose them fanciful; while, on the other hand, the American soldiers may believe them painted in darker colors in the translation. For, with the exception of hunger, the same kind were, at different" times, undergone by the whole American army. They may seem inclined to declare that no Mexican could so well have portrayed their privations. But in answer it may be asked, where is the American possessing the peculiar talent and the dearly bought information, who could surpass, or even imitate some of these descriptions? When it is desirable to know what the Americans suffered in Mexico, this work can be consulted: for what the Mexicans have written of their countrymen will apply to the Americans. NEW YORK, December, 1849. THE AMERICAN EDITOR. |