Text: William Winston Seaton, “[Review of Southern Literary Messenger for July 1835],” Daily National Intelligencer (Washington, DC), vol. XXII, whole no. 7028, August 21, 1835, p. 2, col. 2

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FOR THE NATIONAL INTELLIGENCER.

SOUTHERN LITERARY MESSENGER. — The eleventh number of this Journal sustains the high promise of the preceding numbers. We know of no Magazine in the country which can compare with it in the amount of valuable matter it contains. A slight improvement also in typographical execution will render it faultless in that respect. When we say all this of a Southern periodical, and of one of so recent a standing as the Messenger, we can hardly believe that we have been able to say so much, and say it conscientiously. But we refer all who doubt us to the Magazine itself. Those who have been so long anxiously looking forward for some literary exertion on the part of the Old Dominion, will see in the columns of this excellent journal the promise of many future triumphs. We will endeavor to give a running comment »n some of the principal articles. Professor Tucker's Valedictory is an admirable address; familiar as it should be, yet profound, and replete with such advice as will be likely to make its way home both to the understanding and to the hearts of his hearers. The Letter on the United States of America, by a young Scotch man, evinces a very just appreciation of our native literature. The opinions of foreigners in matters of this nature are generally more entitled to attention, inasmuch as they are generally more sincere than the judgments of our fellow countrymen. The sketches of Virginia scenery, viz: The Visit to the Virginia Springs and Peter's Mountain are highly interesting. We cannot have too many articles of this nature. The Dissertation on the Characteristic Differences between the Sexes is an essay of no common order. Although No. 2 embraces many points of hazardous and difficult discussion, Professor Dew has not failed to handle them with his customary power and success. We should be pleased to see this dissertation in a more permanent form. It is notion much to say of it that we have seen nothing of the kind more lucidly or more beautifully written. Lionel Granby, Chapter IV. is the production of a poetical mind. The Visionary, a tale by Edgar A. Poe, sustains the high reputation the author has already won as a writer of fiction. The Visionary is decidedly one of his very best effusions.

Although the critical notices in the present number are not as numerous as usual, and include a very small portion of the current publications, still they arc, we think, judicious, and creditable to the editor. The poetry is not, upon the whole, equal to what we have hitherto noticed in the Messenger. Some of the articles are below mediocrity — a few of them very far above it. We observe an admirable poem from the pen of Mrs. Sigourney. The lines in answer to Willis's “They may talk of your love in a cottage” are also very good. We were pleased too with the humor of the Parody on Constance's Song in Marmion. In conclusion we heartily wish success to Mr. White in his very difficult undertaking. As the pioneer, and the fortunate pioneer too, of Virginia's literary do mains, he richly deserves, and will undoubtedly receive, the most liberal patronage and support. S.