J.T.  BARKER.

Deptford.

Literary Gazette.

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NEW BOOKS.

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THE NEW GIL BLAS

[This is, in its way, a clever book with a very un-clever title.  We expected better tact in its author, Mr. Inglis, than the adoption of the title of one of the most successful and least imitable fictions of modern times.  The very title-page provokes a comparison between the Gil Blas of Le Sage, and a string of romantic adventures, by Mr. Inglis; we need not add, much to the disadvantage of the latter.  It reminds us of an attempt to cover the sun with a wet blanket.  At the same time, the merit of Mr. Inglis’s Gil Blas must not be lowly rated.  It abounds with lively incident, pleasant bits and scenes of travel, and world-knowledge very agreeably communicated, while its episodal narratives are of the most wonder-fraught character.  It has all the glitter and gaiety of Spanish life and manners.  The author discourses eloquently of “the charming Andaluz,” and other intriguantes—­absolute Dons of fathers and monsters of husbands—­mingling “bloody-minded assassins,” and hideous wretches, with the sweet emotions of dark eyes, jetty ringlets, and heaving bosoms.  Limbs are lopped off, eyes put out, heads slivered, and blood spilled like water; and there are scenes in dark towers and visions of clanking chains in terrific abundance.  One of the latter description we have abridged and adapted to our pages.  The hero is convicted of murder, upon such evidence as this:—­“We found the poor dead man dead at his feet, and the sword in his hand, covered with blood,—­the murdered man lies in the ante-room run through and through.”  A pretty scene of justice ensues, the fact being that the murdered man was a noted robber who had attacked the hero, and became worsted in the affray.  The sentence is solitary imprisonment for life:]

The unfortunate persons whose crimes have subjected them to the dreadful punishment of solitary imprisonment for life, in any of the southern parts of Spain, are most generally sent to Tarifa.[3] Along both sides of the port, there is a mole nearly half a mile in length; at the extremity of which on either side, and at the entrance of the harbour, stands a huge and ancient Moorish tower, about a hundred and sixty feet in height above the sea.  In this tower, which contains six chambers, one above another, prisoners for life are confined; and thither I was accordingly conveyed.  It is the policy of the Spanish laws, to render the punishment of criminals subservient to public utility; and this is in some degree effected even by solitary confinement.  The prisoners confined in these towers are employed in turns, night by night, in trimming the lamps—­which are a beacon to the vessels at sea.  From each chamber, there is a separate ascent to the summit of the tower; so that the prisoners never see each other, and each in his turn is obliged to remain from night until day-break upon the summit,—­part of his punishment for the destruction of human life, being thus made subservient to its preservation.