It is a far cry from Cobbett to the founders of the _Edinburgh Review_, who, very nearly at the same time as that at which he launched his _Register_, did for the higher and more literary kind of periodical what he was doing for the lower and vernacular kind. I say the founders, because there is a still not quite settled dispute whether Francis Jeffrey or Sydney Smith was the actual founder of the famous "Blue and Yellow." This dispute is not uninteresting; because the one was as typically Scotch, with some remarkable differences from other Scotchmen, as the other was essentially English, with some points not commonly found in men of English blood. Jeffrey, the younger of the two by a couple of years, was still a member of the remarkable band who, as has been noticed so often already, were all born in the early seventies of the eighteenth century; and his own birthday was 23rd October 1773. He was an Edinburgh man; and his father, who was of a respectable though not distinguished family, held office in the Court of Session and was a strong Tory. Jeffrey does not seem to have objected to his father's profession, though he early revolted from his politics; and, after due study at the High School of his birthplace, and the Universities of Glasgow, Edinburgh, and Oxford (at which latter, however, he only remained a year, deriving very little benefit or pleasure from his sojourn at Queen's College), he was called to the Scottish bar. He practised at first with very little success, and in 1798 had serious thoughts of taking up literary life in London. But he could obtain no footing, and, returning to Edinburgh and marrying a cousin, he fell into the company of Sydney Smith, who was there with a pupil. It seems to be admitted that the idea of a new _Review_--to be entirely free from the control or influence of publishers, to adopt an independent line of criticism (independent, but somewhat mistaken; for the motto _Judex damnatur cum nocens absolvitur_ gives a very one-sided view of the critic's office), and to be written for fair remuneration by persons of more or less distinct position, and at any rate of education--originated with Sydney Smith. He is also sometimes spoken of as the first "editor," which would appear to be a mistake. At first (the original issue was in October 1802) the review appears to have been a kind of republic; the contributors being, besides Jeffrey and Sydney, a certain Francis Horner (who died too soon to demonstrate the complete falsity of the golden opinions entertained of him by his friends), Brougham, and some Professors of Edinburgh University. But no such plan has ever succeeded, though it has been more than once tried, and very soon accident or design showed that Jeffrey was the right man to take the command of the ship. The _Review_ was not ostensibly a political one at first, and for some years Tories, the greatest of whom was Scott, wrote in it. But the