narrow indeed would be the views that we acquired. Of what
value is a vast acquaintance with the material details of a war, if we
are ignorant as to the causes which brought it about, or the reasons why
the nations were warring? 'Ah yes,' perhaps you may exclaim, 'but
politics and history are all one, for the former creates the latter.'
Precisely: so that in order to obtain a knowledge of the one, we must
deviate to the other. Sharon Turner in his 'History of England during the
Middle Ages' passes abruptly from the death of King Henry the Second to
the military spirit of Mohammedanism, from the Troubadours to the early
dissipations of King John, and devotes two of his five volumes to the
Literature of England with copious examples of early poetry. It is all
history, yet how indispensable are the side-tracks.

It is a subtle art, however, this knowledge of how and when to digress,
and not easy to be learnt. Gerard de St. Amand died of grief in his
middle age because Louis XIV. could not bear his reading of a poem on the
Moon, in which he praised the King for his skill in swimming. On the
other hand Madame de Stael obtained almost all the material for her
literary work by a consummate skill in directing the digressions of
conversation. Upon whatever subject her pen was engaged, that was the
theme to which she led all talk.

Sir Thomas Browne's famous letter 'To a friend upon occasion of the death
of his intimate friend' is a masterpiece of the art of digressing. Surely
it is one of the quaintest letters of condolence ever written, if indeed
it were ever intended to be such, for it has that stamp of careful
literary composition which is usually so apparent in all letters written
with a view to publication. The friend in question died of a consumption,
and Sir Thomas recapitulates his disease, symptoms and death; contrasting
each feature with the celebrated examples of history; moralising and
discussing the opinions of the ancients upon these points as he goes
along; and showing by his own experience that a man 'after a cough of
almost fifty years, in whom all the lobes adhered unto the Pleura,' might
yet die of stone in the bladder. Doubtless the friend to whom the letter
was indited was highly edified by the aged doctor's learning, yet one
cannot conceive that he would be greatly consoled by being informed, when
discussing the patient's cough, that 'in cetaceous Fishes, who have large
and strong lungs, the same is not obs