hours, contemplating and grumbling, by turns, both at myself and things in general.

·

In contemplating, I sit with my legs stretched out, a foot resting on each hob; my mouth open, sometimes even drivelling like an infant, and my eyes fixed upon an angry coal flickering with gas.

Suddenly I start from my reverie, and throw myself into a grumbling posture. My legs are drawn close up to each other, or crossed; my eyes are directed towards my own shrunk shanks; my chin is poked forward; and my upper lip and left nostril screwed up on one side of my face, into a diabolical sardonic grin.'-pp. 339–342.

The author then goes on, in similar dashes of caricature, to paint his hero's miseries in shaving, his toil in dressing, and every shred of his eccentric costume. It is ridiculous to plead, as the author does, a conscientious motive,' as an apology for such details. The disguise is too transparent. The moral of the tale, however, must not be forgotten. Whether the confessions' be genuine or not, the moral to be derived from them is commendable. Marriage-marriage-marriage! This is, after all, the summum bonum of life. Hear this, ye spinsters; hear it ye Blues! Let it be proclaimed at the Union, the Oriental, the University, and the Verulam club houses! The following extract we recommend the latter to get reprinted, framed and glazed, and hung up among their rules and regulations." To single ladies of "a certain age," it will be a source of infinite consolation.

The moral to be deduced from this exposure of myself is obvious :-it is an admonition to all men to be any thing rather than that which I am; to suffer their crosses and cares to drive them to any extremity rather than that of celibacy. If they have experienced distress in life, let them seek a matrimonial alliance of judgment-if not of love: it is the only condition in which they may hope for any true respectability or repose. Again, let them not be too long in fixing their minds on marriage, or they have my example for never being likely to accomplish it all.

If they marry, and yet should meet with causes of dissatisfaction (for in what state will they not?), at any rate their anxieties will be exercised on more worthy subjects than mine are. They will not be rendered frantic because a boot fits a little too tightly, or a dinner is not exactly so well dressed as it might be their minds will not be in that ignoble condition which frets itself about the meanest and most insignificant subjects. If they are men of nervous and irritable dispositions, they will exercise them in a different way-less offensive and less wicked than my own. The slightest inconvenience of noise, or discomfort of any sort, sets me whining, grumbling, and railing, kicking my legs out, and twitching my elbows, in all the indulgence of angry nervousness, as if I were under the operation of galvanism.

I have no satisfactory reflection, which the married man has, that I have promoted the great ordinance of Providence," that the generations of the world shall continue till he sweeps them away." I can claim no share in that blessing which is signally extended to the married state: I am shut out from that happiness which a father must feel in the well-being and success of his sons. I cannot claim the affections and succour of child

ren, to comfort and cherish my declining years-to close my eyes on the pillow of death.'---pp. 365-367.

Doubtless "The Confessions of an Old Maid" will close with a similar burthen.

ART. X. Narrative of the Burmese War, detailing the Operations of Major-General Sir Archibald Campbell's Army, from its Landing at Rangoon in May, 1824, to the Conclusion of the Treaty of Peace at Yandaboo, in February, 1826. By Major Snodgrass, Military Secretary to the Commander of the Expedition, and Assistant Political Agent in Ava. 8vo. pp. 319. 12s. London. Murray. 1827. IT cannot, we apprehend, have escaped the notice of any wellinformed observer of Indian affairs, that the late Burmese war has constituted an entirely novel and most critical epoch in the fortunes of our eastern empire. The moment had arrived when, on the close of the Pindaree and Mahratta war of 1820, the whole of Hindostan appeared securely and thoroughly subjugated to our authority. Not the vestige of any native power seemed to remain in that vast peninsula, which could longer disturb its peace, or endanger the universal supremacy of the British dominion. Just at that moment, petty causes of discord began to arise with a new and barbarous enemy; who previously, although seated on the most vulnerable part of our frontier, and having for above half a century rapidly extended their conquests in our vicinity, had unaccountably failed to awaken the anxiety, or excite the attention of our Indian government. Still, as the aggressions of this people became more and more vexatious, they were met for some years with remonstrances only: until, at length, this forbearance or apathy in our authorities, was all at once succeeded by an abrupt, and even rash determination of offensive war.

Then was this struggle instantly carried, without correct information, without due preparation, and with very inadequate means, into the heart of the enemy's country. Not until the honour, the dignity, and even the safety of the British name in India were compromised in the contest, was it discovered, that the imminence of the crisis had been deplorably overlooked; and the very rumour of the advance of a Burmese army on our weakest frontier, was sufficient to plunge the great capital of British India into confusion and dismay. The actual danger of Calcutta was, perhaps, never worth naming; but exaggerated as it was in the imagination of a timid people, it is certain that, by the close proximity of the Chittagong frontier, the metropolis and the whole empire lay very much exposed, and easily assailable from that quarter. Besides, it should never be forgotten, that our Indian empire is maintained far more by the force of opinion, than by the mere physical strength of a few thousands of our countrymen; and that, in the first hour

which should betray to the natives any decided evidence of weakness, our dominion would be instantly shaken to its centre. The insecurity or panic which reached the capital of British India, for the first time in half a century, and in the meridian of our power, was but an inauspicious omen for the commencement of the Bur

mese war.

Whatever censure, however, may attach to the mode in which the war in Ava was originally undertaken, it is but justice to our local authorities in India to declare that, when we were beyond retrievement embarked in the struggle, nothing was left undone to repair the errors of the outset, and to ensure for it a happy termination. Such is the whole tenure of our sovereignty in that country, that when we have once assumed arms, there is no possibility of receding with safety, short of the entire accomplishment of the object avowed. The activity, the vigorous efforts, and the constancy with which the local government persevered in the contest, are really entitled to the highest praise. There was, too, more than one collateral circumstance which perilously deepened the chances that had been staked upon the issue. The mutiny of the Sepoy regiments at Barrackpore, in Bengal, in the beginning of the war, was one of the most dangerous contingencies that ever arose in our Indian history. The native troops in the Bengal Presidency had notoriously conceived a horror both of the Burmese and of their country; and the ostensible discontents of the mutinous, were no more than so many shallow pretexts, to cover their aversion and fear of the service on which they were ordered. The facts and the extent of that mutiny have been variously misrepresented; but we have no doubt, from well authenticated particulars which have reached us, that nothing less than the intrepid promptitude, and the necessary severity with which, after every milder proceeding had failed to recal them to obedience, the mutineers were attacked, and part of them put to the sword, could have averted the general revolt of the whole army of Bengal. Of all the tremendous consequences that must have ensued, it is needless to say, that the total paralysing of our operations in Ava would have been among the very lightest!

But this revolt was quelled by one act of undaunted firmness. The impending danger quickly passed away; and the invasion of Ava proceeded. It proceeded favourably: but not without the experience that the employment of full half of our aggregate European force in India, and the labours of three arduous campaigns, were barely adequate to the successful consummation of a war, which, at the outset, it had been sagely proposed to finish at a blow, with four European battalions, and the capture of a single seaport! But here again arose a new danger. This pressing demand of the war in Ava, by obliging the concentration of half the European force of all British India upon a single point, had drained both the presidencies of Madras and Bengal of their garrisons. This was the juncture

chosen by the ruler of Bhurtpore, in Upper India, to set our power at defiance; and such was the military state of our provinces, that when the local government had strained every remaining nerve to assemble an army for the siege of that formidable fortresswhich alone had formerly arrested the triumph of the British arms in the days of our highest glory-it was found possible to assemble before the place no more than two battalions of British infantry. To these were joined, indeed, a Sepoy force of many thousand men ; but, in the assault of Bhurtpore, we know that not one of the native regiments could be induced to approach the walls, until the king's troops had surmounted the ramparts.

But, in fact, both in the operations before Bhurtpore, and in the Burmese war, the native troops were of little more use than to swell the array of our lines. Whether from the belief that Bhurtpore was impregnable, and from the dread which the natives of India had conceived of the Burmese, or else from a degeneration of their ancient qualities, in neither case did the Sepoys uniformly display that boasted valour and patient fortitude, for which they had been famed in former wars. Late experience has revealed circumstances in the state of discipline, and the whole condition of the native army, which, our government may be assured, urgently demand most serious consideration in their vital influence upon the durability of our Indian power. To this subject we may, perhaps, find a more fitting opportunity to revert; suffice it now to say, the events before us proved that, on the British troops alone could reliance always be placed; and on the occasion of Bhurtpore, the safety of India may positively be said to have been committed, at the bayonet's point, to two weak British battalions. The pledge was nobly redeemed and nothing ever impressed the people of India with more wonder and awe of our power, than the energy and rapidity with which the reduction of Bhurtpore-that living reproach of our pride-was accomplished. But if the assault of that fortress had unhappily failed, there is good reason to believe, that all the subjugated native powers of India would have risen against our yoke; and that, in six months, the flames of insurrection would have burst forth throughout the whole extent of the peninsula.

Amidst such collateral dangers of mutiny and war, in the heart of our own possessions, was the struggle in the Burmhan empire steadily prosecuted. In itself, the contest was attended with all the difficulties which defective intelligence-scanty supplies-a tropical climate, whose deluging rains were fatal to the European constitution-a most intricate and desolated country-a hostile population—and an active and harassing enemy, could oppose to an invading army. Yet no obstacle was sufficient to shake the resolution of the British leader, or to damp the ardour and patience of his followers. An advance was accomplished through six hundred miles, for the most part of forest and swamp, which were pierced only by blind tracts and bridle paths, and in the face of an

enemy always ten times superior in numbers; and the terms of peace were at last triumphantly dictated by the invaders, almost at the gates of the capital of Ava. Thus was the struggle ultimately crowned, certainly with honour, perhaps with more solid advantage-but, in any case, not without an immense sacrifice of invaluable lives. For the hundreds of our gallant spirits, who fell in the prodigal devotion of their courage, the soldier might perhaps be permitted to have desired only a more illustrious field and a worthier foe the cost of blood and the misery of families, are seldom held to dim the lustre of victory. But the far greater number of our countrymen who perished in these campaigns, died, not in the elation of victory and the vigour of manhood, but of fatigue and exposure to a baneful climate, and in lingering, wasting disease. A calculation of the THOUSANDS of these victims would woefully balance the gain of success: but the real amount of their number will never, we suspect, willingly be proclaimed to the public of Great Britain.

:

Of the deeply interesting operations of a struggle so peculiar and important, some authentic history was of course highly desirable; and the narrative, which Major Snodgrass has given in the unpretending volume before us, fully answers every purpose that could possibly be wished. It is a clear, simple, and, we doubt not, a most faithful detail. The writer's official and confidential situation, which attached him to the person of the commanding general, gave him a perfect acquaintance with every movement of the army and every event of the war; and it is evident that his work is to be received as a publication from the highest authority. His style admirably befits the "round unvarnished tale" of a soldier: it is sufficiently correct, without the slightest ambition of ornament or "fine writing." What he has to say is generally delivered in plain, unaffected, matter-of-fact language; and, if he is ever betrayed into a grandiloquent expression, the reader will observe with a smile the occasion and the subject. It is only in describing the boastful preparations of the Burmhan leaders, or the immense masses of their array, that he has caught for a moment the spirit of that tumid phraseology, in which, to judge from some papers in his appendix, no oriental people more curiously excel, than the subjects of his golden-footed majesty of Ava. But in relating the most daring achievements of our own troops, or explaining the most remarkable skill of their leader, nothing can be more modest or unassuming than his manner.

Such are the merits of Major Snodgrass's volume: its defects, if so they may be termed, are very excusable. In a work of this kind, we are to look neither for the critical examination of measures of doubtful expediency, nor the prominent exposure of military and political faults. The author has of course avoided all discussion of the kind; and he takes for his business only the relation of facts, the detail of operations, and the description of the people and the