sure on Sir George Prevost, who, after forcing
our ill-appointed fleet on Lake Champlain into action, refused to allow
Brisbane and his brigade of "Peninsulars" to take the fort of
Platsburgh, an enterprise easy of achievement, and which would have
placed the captured ships, and the victorious but disabled American
flotilla, at the mercy of the British. But we have not space to follow
the Ranger across the Atlantic, nor is it essential so to do; for,
although he gives some amusing sketches of Canada and the Canadians, the
earlier portion of his book is by far the most interesting, and
certainly the most carefully written. We could almost quarrel with him
for defacing his second volume with perpetual and not very successful
attempts at wit. We have rarely met with more outrageous specimens of
punning run mad, than are to be found in its pages. Barring that fault,
we have nothing but what is favourable to say of the book. Its tone is
manly, and soldier-like, and it is creditable both to the writer and to
the service, by which, during the last thirty years, our stores of
military and historical literature have been so largely and agreeably
increased.

FOOTNOTES:

[3] _Adventures of the Connaught Rangers, from 1808 to 1814._ By W.
GRATTAN, Esq. London. 1847.

LORD SIDMOUTH'S LIFE AND TIME.[4]

To read a memoir of the late Lord Sidmouth, is like taking a walk
through Westminster Abbey. All the literature, is inscriptions; all the
figures are monumental; and all the names are those of men whose
characters and distinctions have been echoing in our ears since we had
the power to understand national renown. The period between 1798, when
the subject of this memoir made his first step in parliamentary life as
Speaker, and 1815, when the close of the war so triumphantly finished
the long struggle between liberty and jacobinism, was beyond all
comparison the most memorable portion of British history.

In this estimate, we fully acknowledge the imperishable fame of
Marlborough in the field, and the high ability of Bolingbroke in the
senate. The gallantry of Wolfe still throws its lustre over the
concluding years of the second George; and the brilliant declamation of
Chatham will exact the tribute due to daring thought, and classic
language, so long as oratory is honoured among men. But the age which
followed was an age of realities, stern, stirring, and fearful. There
was scarcely a trial of national fortitude, or natio