The consequence of this degraded condition of the Church is stupid indifference to religion on the part of the masses, and scepticism among the more enlightened. The confessional is almost deserted. Superstition, though occasionally encountered in gross and besotting forms, can hardly be said to characterize any portion of the people. The Church ritual is attractive on the score of its tinsel splendor, not of its reputed sanctity, and the Te Deum is tolerated, the sermon endured, for the sake of its sequel of horse-racing and fireworks. This condition of things is in itself unspeakably sad; yet it has one hopeful aspect. It almost precludes hostility against any aggressive movement in behalf of a purer faith. The greater portion of both clergy and laity are passively willing that the Bible should be circulated, and the Gospel preached by Protestant divines; while the more sober and reflective of both classes are disposed to hail any remedy for abounding irreligion, and the vices nourished by it. Our author and his colleague were not only everywhere kindly, and often gratefully, received by the laity, but frequently found favor and encouragement from the better and more intelligent of the priesthood, and in some instances from high ecclesiastical functionaries.

Mr. Fletcher offers some well-considered views of the commerce between Brazil and the United States, with suggestions to which it certainly concerns our government and our merchants to give heed.

"Since 1839, Brazil has had steamship-lines running along the whole of her four thousand miles of sea-coast, but it was not until 1850 that steam-communication was established to Europe. It was then that the Royal British Mail Steamship Company, whose vessels start from Southampton, began their monthly voyages; and now Brazil has no less than eight different lines of steamers, connecting her with England, France, Hamburg, Portugal, Belgium, and Sardinia. The United States, which hitherto has been the great commercial rival of Great Britain in Brazil, has not a single line of steamers to any portion of South America; and while England is reaping golden harvests, the balance of trade is each year accumulating against us. With all this so evident, it does seem strange that the General Government of the Union, which has aided in extending our mercantile interests by

subsidies to steamships running to other lands, has been so tardy in regard to South America, and especially unmindful of Brazil. England's commerce with Brazil, since the establishment of her first steam-line in 1850, has increased her exports more than one hundred per cent, while the United States has required thirteen years to make the same advance. Her entire commerce with Brazil, imports and exports, has advanced two hundred and twenty-five per cent since her first steamline was established. Each year the balance of trade is increasing rapidly against us. In 1856, the United States exported to Brazil $ 5,094,904, while in return the United States imported from Brazil $19,262,657; or, in other words, our last year's trading with Brazil left against us the cash balance of $14,167,753, which we had to pay at heavy rates of exchange. England, in 1855, sold Brazil $ 23,000,000, and bought of her in return only $ 15,000,000, thus leaving the latter her debtor. Why is there such a disastrous account against us? British steamers, energy, and capital, and our neglect, have thus advanced the commerce of England. Our Government and our merchants, notwithstanding their boasted enterprise, have done next to nothing to foster the trade with Brazil. Purchasing, as we do, half her coffee crop and the greater portion of her India-rubber, there ought to be an effort on our part to introduce effectually the many productions of our country which we can furnish as well as Great Britain. Our common cottons are better than the imitations of the same manufactured at Manchester, England, and yet labelled Lowell drillings,' and York Mills, Saco, Me.' We can furnish many kinds of hardware and other items cheaper and better than England. The few efforts made by single individuals (as in the case of Mr. N. Sands, Filgueiras, Sands, & Co.) to introduce the labor-saving machines of our country have already resulted in the establishment of four different Brazilian houses in Rio de Janeiro, where one can purchase various articles under the comprehensive name of Genros Norte Americanos. In 1856, the United States purchased one third of all the exports of Brazil, but the imports from the United States into the Empire were not one tenth of the Brazilian imports. This subject demands investigation from individuals and from our Government.". pp. 194-196.

In accordance with these views, Mr. Fletcher, in 1854, made a patriotic effort to introduce the staples of our industry and commerce to the better knowledge of the Brazilians. Being temporarily in this country, he solicited through the press, and by application to individuals, the contribution of specimens of a large variety of manufactured goods, utensils, and

machinery for a public exhibition in Rio de Janeiro of the art and industry of the United States. In many quarters his application was regarded with favor, and in March, 1855, he set sail from Baltimore with his "assorted cargo." A hall in the National Museum was granted him for his exhibition; it was visited by the Emperor and his suite; and such articles as were deemed appropriate gifts to royalty were presented to the imperial family. The results of this most judicious and praiseworthy enterprise can hardly fail to show themselves in the commercial statistics of the present and succeeding years. Certain it is that attention was emphatically drawn to the superiority of some American manufactures, that a new demand was created, and the knowledge of the mercantile resources of our country enlarged and extended; and it may prove that this missionary of the cross will have been the prime agent in righting the balance of trade between our own and the Brazilian ports.

But, while rendering scanty justice to the work before us, we are exceeding our prescribed limits. A more entertaining and instructive volume has not for a long time been issued from the American press. Its typography is in a style of superior excellence, and the numerous engravings are of subjects well chosen for the purpose of illustration, and admirably executed. Where the book itself has not anticipated our comments and extracts, we are sure that our extracts, at least, will aid in extending its circulation, and enhancing the worthily earned reputation of its authors.

ART. X.-CRITICAL NOTICES.

1. Le Japon Contemporain. Par EDOUARD FRAISSINET. Paris: Hachette. 1857. 16mo. pp. 260.

THIS is a small volume, but eminently entertaining and instructive. M. Fraissinet, unlike French writers of his class, abstains from epigram, and does not amplify his facts by his fertile imagination. His descrip

tions are veracious, and the marvellous portions are as well vouched for as the commonplaces. He cannot, indeed, give a guide-book of Japan, which shall be fit to accompany the red-covered library of "Murrays," but he has done the next thing to this, has told almost everything but the routes and the local stories. The face of the country; its numerous divisions; its vegetable, mineral, and metallic wealth; the habits, customs, industry, culture, institutions, and religion of the people; the stately absurdities of royalty and its etiquette; the relation between king and subject, priest and worshipper; the efforts to colonize and Christianize the land; the scientific traditions of the nation, not few nor unimportant; the puzzle of languages, which no foreigner can unravel, and the secret of practical arts, which no stranger shall find out; the reason for condemning and the reasons for justifying the exclusive policy of intercourse; what Japan has been, and what it is likely to be, this M. Fraissinet attempts to tell as briefly as he may. He expects good results to grow out from the American expedition, though he treats any notion of the subjugation of Japan to a foreign power as ridiculous. His volume is one of the most useful of the excellent series which is establishing the reputation of Hachette in Paris as the rival of Didot.

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2.- Deux Ans de Révolution en Italie (1848, 1849). Par F. T. PERRENS. Paris. 1857. 16mo. pp. 554.

THIS work is the most accurate and impartial history of the Italian struggle in the years of revolution which has appeared in any language. Without concealing his sympathy with their cause and their motive, M. Perrens frankly exposes the mistakes of the Italian patriots, and points out the obvious reasons for their failure. His history will not please those who think that all the blunders of noble men are to be praised, or at least overlooked, or those who are intolerant of acquiescence in the temporary necessity of arbitrary government. It will be denounced by the revolutionists, and perhaps by the ultra republicans, yet it will not therefore find favor with aristocratic theorists. The position of M. Perrens is that of a believer in such constitutional monarchy as the government of Sardinia; and though he longs ardently to witness a united Italy, he expects no counterpart in that peninsula to the States of the American Union.

It is not easy to write a history of the Italian revolution, since the movements of the various states, though simultaneous, were not directly

connected with one another, and in no way harmonious. The want of concord among the separate nationalities and their leaders was, from the first, a fatal omen; and now, each revolt has its separate story. M. Perrens has adopted the pleasant expedient of connecting with the account of each movement the name of some distinguished man, though he does not pretend that in more than one or two instances the name of the man can represent the whole spirit of the movement. With the Roman revolution, the most exciting of all, the name of Mazzini, of course, belongs. This thrilling narrative is somewhat too coldly given by M. Perrens, who does not love Mazzini and the men of his class. It is unfortunate for the Roman republic, that it was overthrown by an army of Frenchmen. No French writer likes to confess the crime of his own nation. Gioberti is a greater favorite with our author, and the Piedmontese enterprise is described with an approach to enthusiasm. Cattaneo and Milan form the subject of a vigorous sketch, in which the cruelties of the Austrians are set in strong relief. Manin, yielding to the force of misfortune, and resigning Venice to her fate, loses no credit with M. Perrens by his dignified despair. Montanelli and Tuscany furnish the dullest section of the book. It needs a genius like that of D'Azeglio to glorify a Florentine rebellion. In the accounts of Poerio and Naples, and of Ruggieio Settimo and Sicily, caution is dismissed, and the historian does not hesitate to call the Bourbons by their right names, and to speak of the puerile and brutal tyranny of the Naples dynasty as it deserves.

So able a work ought to be translated into English.

3.- La Chevalier Sarti. Par P. SCUDO. Paris. 1857. 16mo. pp. 557.

PORTIONS of this musical novel have appeared from time to time in the columns of the "Revue des Deux Mondes," and the readers of that serial will be glad to get the whole in its present convenient form. It has threefold merit. It is an ingenious and well-wrought tale, it is an exciting chapter of history, and it is a comprehensive account of a remarkable but neglected school of art, the Venetian School. The prime purpose of the volume is evidently to vindicate the Queen of the Adriatic, and to prove that, instead of being last among those who have cultivated and magnified the musical art, her claim is justly paramount. We cannot think that Signor Scudo has quite succeeded in this attempt, nor is it probable that Meyerbeer, to whom the book is dedicated, will consent to the pre-eminent excellence of Venice from the evidence here