3

CORRESPONDENCE.

A FEW MINUTES' EDITORIAL TALK WITH THE READERELISIONS IN VERSE-FLOWERS IN A LETTER-QUESTION RESPECTING THE AMERICAN LOCUST ANSWERED RECONCILEMENT TO TOWN-LETTER FROM MR HERAUD, ETC.

OUR pile of correspondence has so increased upon us by the omission of a week's answers, that we must notice it this time at the head of the paper, and turn the notice into an "Article." The letters, as they lie heaped before us, remind us of the "conspiracy of the papers" written in the days of the Regent, by the author of the Two-penny Post Bag,' who records the horror of that illustrious personage at the sight, and his dread lest they were "growing upon him" at a rate too formidable to overcome

"As if they said, 'our grand design is¦

To suffocate his Royal Highness.''

The suffocation, however, in the present instance (were we important enough to have the honour of a death so royal), would be of a far pleasanter sort, resembling rather the death of a former illustrious personage, the prince who was drowned in a butt of Malmsey, intoxicating with sweets, leaving us "dead drunk" with honey like a bee, giving us a death of our own choice (if we could choose to die at all when so pleased): for never have we received a more encouraging or flattering stock of letters than at this moment; and the one which we shall notice first, has actually brought flowers in it,—a lump of blossoms from a garden in Wales-scenting the air here in London, and almost making us fancy that the words of the fair writer would become audible, bringing us a voice to match the fragrance

Ambrosial odours, o'er the cheek Celestial warmth suffusing."-Gebir. They now lie before us, fragrant still, though they We wish we could have been plucked for weeks. put the odour into the LONDON JOURNAL. Their colours combine yellow and brown, like the bee's; and, assuredly, if a bee were to come into our room, he would find them out, and plunge into them, and look of a piece with their beauty.

But before we proceed, we must say something of our JOURNAL and its new-year commencements. We promised at the beginning of the year to have some Lives and Travels in it, and have been fearing that the Readers would resent the non-performance of the promise; but they have been true LONDON JOURNAL Readers, good-natured; and, instead of doing so, have said nothing but kind things, and expressed satisfaction with what is laid before them. And we must say for ourselves that, although we have not kept our word in those particulars, we have more than kept it in the general conduct of our undertaking, having written a great deal more than we proposed on our setting out, and feeling certain that we shall continue to do so, though we have learnt, once for all, the imprudence of making specific promises-of which we here accordingly take our leave with a delighted penitence, now and for ever, feeling ourselves able to do our best when least restricted, and happy to discover that our Readers do not care what subjects the paper treats of, provided there is sincerity in the treatment, From the Steam-Press of C. & W. REYN ALL, Little Pulteney-street.]

No. 51.

and good humour. So, off, Restriction! and welcome! the universe, and the coming summer, and all pleasant subjects at will, and loads of good-humoured letters, the writers of which bind us to them for ever by letting us do what we like.

But we must explain a little farther, for we have neither been idle nor acting out of caprice. Our Romances of Real Life' do not fail us, and we verily believe never will, as long as the Reader chooses to have them-and they are popular. The Week' also, from its nature, is sure of its supply, and will be continued throughout its twelvemonth; and for a First Article' subjects being ad libitum, are of course never wanting. But when we came to look about us for Lives,' we found we could not reckon upon a supply always good enough, and though good extracts from Travels are more to be depended on, and we hope to have them still, though not systematically, we discovered that Readers in general like a greater variety, an admixture of shorter pieces than the new arrangements of the JOURNAL Would have permitted, especially comprising as they do, the valuable Shakspeare criticisms of Mr Hazlitt: and our Correspondents also perplexed us with the length as well as goodness of many of their communications, and new books came in, and miscellaneousness of all sorts abounded; so that we fairly did not know what to do with our proposed plan. Instead of the Lives,' therefore, we have enlarged the very brief summaries of character which we intended to give in our Week,' and keeping up what was already approved of, we have let the rest of the JOURNAL take its course, like our old friend the Butterfly in the poet, promising nothing except that we will taste every sweet that we can come nigh, and bring a bit of colour and joy into every homestead that chooses to welcome us.

And so once more to set out again, with gladsome wings, the happier from just having been doing our duty in a graver shape, a soldier in the ranks of

Captain Pen.' Blessed be thy transforming power, O imagination! that thus beatest Ovid all to pieces, and canst metamorphose ourselves, and to whatsoever shape we please,—provided only we have faith, and a hearty wish for it. By thee this instant, our rainy windows are changed into open ones, the clouds into

sunshine, March into May, and nothing remains of ourselves, but the soul of us, in its Greek shape,the Psyche, or Butterfly aforesaid,-who quivering his wings like the finger-tips of some happy musician, when he is touching two notes at once, in the shake of a joyous symphony (like that of Gia fan ritorno, for instance) rises in the rapture of his anticipations, and issues forth to the blue air, drunk with the scent of gardens.

Thus the fresh Clarion, being readie dight,
Unto his journey did himselfe addresse,
And with good speed began to take his flight,
Over the fields in his franke lustinesse :
And all the champaine o'er he soared light,
And all the country wide he did possesse,
Feeding upon their pleasures bounteouslie,
That none gainsaid, nor none did him envie.

The woods, the rivers, and the meadowes greene,
With his aire-cutting wings he measured wide,
Ne did he leave the mountaines bare unseene,
Ne the ranke grassie fenns delights untride.

PRICE THREE HALFPEnce.

But none of these however sweet they beene, Mote please his fancie, nor him eause to abide ; His choicefull sense with every change doth flit. No common things may please a wavering wit.

We beg leave, however, to disclaim the application of these last four lines; for though we like to "flit," we like also to "abide;" being of a right greedy disposition in matters of luxury, and loving to retain all the goods we have, whatsoever addition we make to the stock. Neither do we like to have any luxury cut short, not even the syllable O; for which reason we have here restored it from the hasty and incapable profanations of the commentators, who took it away from before the word abide-

"Mote please his fancy, or him cause t'abide”

a vile elision—endangering the right reading of the verse, even if intended only as a hint to read rapidly, and not to change the two words into one. Ever while you live, dear Reader, eschew all such perils, and let your ears be aware of the full measures of sweet poesy :

"Mote please his fancy, and him cause to abide." to ă, with swift distinctness if you will, and bide with the greater force in consequence; but never allow a commentator or school-boy critic, proud of his knowing that there are ten syllables in a heroic line, to pretend that two short syllables are not the same as one, and to be written at their full length accordingly. Hear the Italians sing their beautiful words, and mark the melodious relish with which they distinguish every syllable they utter, even while fusing their sweetness together. The Italian heroic measure is the same as ours, only with double instead of single rhyme; yet they have far more vowels than we, not one of which (except in certain conventional and colloquial instances, or when the poet himself chooses) they cut off, sliding them beautifully into one another with articulate smoothness. We have occasionally an instance in our own language, as in that line of Milton's allegro :—

"To many a youth and many a maid
Dancing in the chequered shade."

abide, the y might be cut off here at the word many ; Now, upon the principle of writing t'abide, for to

or the and should be written 'nd in that divine verse

in 'Paradise Lost'-speaking of the powers of music

to

"chase

Anguish, and doubt, and fear and sorrow, and pain." But who would endure this? We may take, if we please, no more time in uttering sorrow and, than if it were written sorrow'nd; but who would lose the two beautiful sounds of the o and a? According to these cutters and maimers (violators of the Ellenborough Act) piano in a verse should be written pano, and fiori, fori. Here is a lovely line of Ariosto, in which Alcina, the magician, is described attracting the fishes to her out of the water :

"Con semplici parole e puri incanti." (With simple sayings and enchantments pure.) The Italians pronounce both the ee's in this line, and both the ii's, and make the verse the sweeter and richer. The two ee's may not be thought the happiest instance of this custom, but they go very sweetly

nevertheless; and the sound of the two ii's may be represented, in English by writing them poory in, instead of poor'in as a commentator would cut it; or it may be shown in another version of the line:"With simple words and easy enchantments pure." Who would like to read eas' for easy in this line, or think the melody improved by it?

We have taken up too much space, we fear, in explaining this matter; but the subject beguiled us, and we have assumed, with an insolence common to periodical editorship, that the Reader is to let us do as we please.

Now then to do very much as we please, and lay before him the letter of our fair Correspondent from Wales, who gives a variety of pleasant information.

"No one reads with greater delight the LONDON JOURNAL, or is more grateful for the instruction she receives from it, than she of the verdant valley in l'ultima Cambria.' When one Monthly part' is duly conned, she counts the days till the next arrives. The first vol. is complete, and in nothing wanting save -may she with great humility suggest to the Editor, that an Index would tend much to economize the time and patience of its admirers? The Editor's poetical wand has conjured up a January's garden worthy of Boccaccio's magician; but the mildness of our northern winters has not only tempted several of our usually migratory birds to remain in their summer quarters, but also has blessed us with a greater variety of flowers than is to be found in the 'Household Almanac,' which probably took its list from the recorded produce of some 'olden days' January flowers, for now the pale primrose' and ranunculus unfold most sweetly their petals to our slanting sun, though with less luxuriance of bloom than to its stronger rays. The aconite, or wolf's-bane, opened rejoicingly its yellow buds, as soon as the sweet south' breathed on the frost-bound soil;' all these, of course, will flourish in the February's garden; but there is one of the botanist's monsters that blossoms when snow is on the ground, all unmindful of it, to the end of February, or later still-it is the winter double violet: its colour is a very pale lilac.

"But a still more precious plant, that blossoms in the open air, without requiring attention, is the Callycanthus Precor: some of its flowers shall be herewith enclosed, though in their withered state they can give but a fuint notion of the humbly coloured blossom's singularly fragrant scent when freshly plucked. Its first buds opened at the close of November, when the leaves were still clustering thick upon the shrub; since that time, every tiny twig, every branch, has been clothed with flowers that none the wood mote see;' and in this beautiful (or rather, more odorous than beautiful) state it will remain till March wanes, or April dawns.

"The writer takes this opportunity of answering the question that heads the article in No. 41-'The American Locust'-which interesting insect is not the same as the noisy, chirping, nay, often stunning, Cigala of the south, which she has many a time chased in Italy: it differs little from our northern grasshopper in size and appearance, but she cannot

our intention to oppose any great public good, or any advancement of individual right. Singular indeed would be such a contradiction of half the spirit of our life. What we recommeud is, not the desertion of any just claim, public or private, but that we should take along with us every possible cheerfulness and goodwill, both as a means of prosecuting our claim the better, and as a noble resource always, including a heart-home to retreat upon in case of the There are helpers in a spirit of cheerful sanguineness as well as of spleen; and though we would not undervalue the latter in case of necessity, far less be ungrateful to what its worthies have done for us, we think the former stand the better chance of being more just and persuasive, and of putting an end to the constant re-actions of anger and violence. But to the letter of our fair friend.

worst.

January 29.

"As I know, dear sir, you are pleased to hear of any good arising through your instrumentality, I must tell you your papers have been the means of reconciling both me and my sister to town. We are lovers of the country: it was there we first drew our breath, were nurtured, and have spent the greater part of the years we have numbered: and although it is a sweet constraint which binds us to this city, it being the present abode of those we most fondly love, yet our hearts yearned for their native haunts, with their silence and solitude. Nay more, we determined to find no beauty in anything external which London could yield. We despised a small garden, because it was not a large one; thought a flower in a window a mockery of the love of rural life; and would scarcely take a walk in the suburbs, because the fields boasted not the picturesque beauty of those we had left, where "Nature seemed to sit alone." But your papers, dear sir, have taught us otherwise, and made us resolve to content ourselves with the sources of gratification we possess, without sighing for those beyond

our reach."

friction of the wings together, as is the case with the more musical sounding tones of ours.

:

"The real Egyptian locust of the Scriptures is still to be found in Malta; and the writer understands that in Arabia it abounds. In Malta she kept one for some time it measured above two inches long, was in form a common grasshopper, but of a brilliant green, with wings long enough to be able to take a flight of from one to two hundred yards, and thickly covered with black cabalistical characters. It would devour the leafy parts of a lettuce leaf in about ten minutes, or less time."

The next letter is from another fair Correspondent, and is one of those which stand in our first class of welcome communications, because they tell us of good positively effected, and objections reconciled. We take this opportunity of observing, that when we preach the doctrine of making the best of things, and fetching out all which they can yield, far is it from

mit me to furnish you with the means of correcting

them.

The 3rd line of the 8th stanza of The Ice Course' should run-" Far thy Cothurnus' sound." This is but a trifle.

F. In the description of "Dudael," 12th line should begin-" Bare and of life devoid," not "Base,' &c.; 19th line should have been printed, "Were as a sealed fountain," not "seal'd fountain." The ed should be sounded, else the rythm were imperfect. In the 20th line you have "broke," instead of “brake.” You who know how much euphony depends on the skilful alliteration of the vowel sounds, will forgive me mentioning an apparent trifle like this. Its importance may be felt, however, by examining the structure of two or three consecutive lines-e. g.

-the vigorous blood,

Was shackled, and the rivers of the heart
Were as a sealed fountain, and the veins
Parch'd became brittle like to glass, and brake,
Or hardened into marble."

Most of these corrections respect sound-those in the next quotation, extracted from the 'Descent into Hell,' regard sense. In the 9th line for "compart"

read "compact." In the 14th line for « barren stamp" read "barren stump." In the 26th line a semicolon destroys the grammar of the verse: the passage should run

"and, all dusk as the sad night, The regal pall hangs the broad shoulder o'er, Frozen in gorgeous folds, and moveless quite." "?

In a preceding line the printer's devil has spelt 'glazing” glasing—Poor devil! he has to bear much blame-this, however, will not break his back. "Aught" also he has changed to "ought." As to this, he may plead difference of opinion.

You are at perfect liberty to do what you like with this letter. And believe me, my dear Sir,

Yours very sincerely, JOHN A. HERAUD. The communications with which we have been

favoured by W. D. C. shall appear in the SUPPLE

We must positively be immodest, and print the following passage from the letter of our friend J. W. D. "The JOURNAL," quoth the cordial pen of this gentleman, "seems to many friends and myself to increase in interest and beauty : I earnestly hope that its success bears some proportion to its merits. We intend to celebrate its approaching anniversary, in, I trust, its own spirit, and wish it a long life and a merry. Pray read some more poems with us, after the fashion of that delightful reading of the Eve of St Agnes,' many of the beauties of which were then, to me at least, disclosed for the first time." We do not wonder that our Correspondent thinks the JOURNAL increased in interest and beauty, seeing that it has become more miscellaneous, and has to boast of such articles as those of Mr Hazlitt, Mr Webbe, &c. By the way, also, talking of Lives,' we give this week an excellentLife of Pythagoras,' by Mr Godwin, from his book on the Necromancers.' But pieces of biography by men of genius are rare things to get at.

The Snow-drop' next week. By the way, will the proprietor of the Englishman' allow us to ask why it is not sent to our office regularly? The price, to be sure, is nothing; but we do not find it so easy to secure a regular service of it, where we live, as he may imagine. The same question to our old and respected friend Tait.' It is hard that he should not be one to join the unpolitical meeting of good wills in this JOURNAL, when influential editors, of other parties, are not averse from acknowledging the claims of our neutral ground.

The great Tory

their Christian names; and partly, indeed, by the uncommon lustre they attain by their very commonness, to make us at all squeamish in helping ourselves to their generic appellation at ordinary times. Who will ever think of confounding Smith, in the abstract, with Adam Smith, or Sir Sidney Smith, or the Reverend Sydney Smith, or James and Horace Smith, or Dr Southwood Smith, or any other concretion of wit, bravery, or philosophy?

By this time, following, as we talk, our friend Jack up the road, we arrived at the first suburb tea-gardens, which he, for his part, passes with disdain; not our friend, John Smith, be it observed, for his philosophy is as universal as his name; but Jack Smith, our friend of the new hat and boots. And yet he will be a philosopher, too, by-and-by; and his boots shall help him to philosophize; but all in good time. Meanwhile, we who are old enough to consult our inclination in preference to our grandeur, turn into the

HINTS FOR TABLE TALK.
No. VII.

ASSOCIATION OF IDEAS-MERCANTILE REMINISCENCES
-CITY GATHERING THE EVERY-DAY WALK-THE
REGULAR OLD GENTLEMAN-THE REGULAR STAGE
-OMNIBUS-HORSEMEN-CAB-CARRIAGE-FAMIL-

IAR FACES SHOPS-HOUSE TO LET-DOOR WASHING CROSSING SWEEPERS-EYE-SORES-THE HOUSE IN CHANCERY.

Ir is truly said that the most barren and monotonous object may be clothed with associations which will make it a source of pleasure. The city clerk in his counting-house glances over the row of accountbooks big with the transactions of the firm for perhaps the last half century, adorned and dated with every "Anno Domini" since 17-, and their regularity fatigues his eye, and he would fain find relief in a strange face, or at the window, but it is dimmed, or grained, and impenetrable to the visual organs. But the merchant himself looks with far different

ing the window, that his appearance excites as little emotion as the opposite houses. Yet, if it be your desire, you may make him a "peg whereon to hang a tail" of observations and reflections. Remark the day he wears some new garment; if it be a dirty morning, does he not pick his steps with greater nicety? Does he wear a more thoughtful or a more gay countenance than usual? Speculate in your mind as to what may have been its cause.

When you get into the road, the accustomed omnibus passes with the same, or nearly the same, passengers; but this vehicle is not so favourable for observation as the regular stage-the driver of which you may almost claim acquaintance with. A constant passenger occupies the half of the coach-box, who considers he has an acknowledged right to the seat, and would be as greatly surprised at anyone taking possession of it, as at a stranger entering his house unbidden. Should you be caught by a sudden shower, you perhaps take the stage or omnibus.

and not much garden; but worlds of beer, and tobacco-pipes, and alcoves; and in a corner behind some palings there is (we fear) a sound of skittles. May no clergyman hear it, who is twisting his thumbs, or listening to the ring of his wine-glasses. How hot the people look! how unpinned the goodly old dames! how tired, yet untired, the children! and how each alcove opens upon you as you pass, with its talk, smoke, beer and bad paint! Then what a feast to their eyes is the grass-plat! Truly, without well knowing it, do they sit down almost as much to the enjoyment of that green table of Nature's in the midst of them, as to their tobacco and "half-and

the hundreds, the tens, and the units of each year, he is reminded of some profitable speculation, or unfortunate loss; some great bankruptcy, or time of panic; some season when the stocks were very high, or another in which they were equally low; from transactions he is led to the persons connected with them, and so on through an interminable maze of life and circumstance. He feels anew the joy upon his first lucrative speculation, and the grief upon the first serious loss experienced by his firm; and bounding from

intruder, not being a regular passenger.

Every regular equestrian you recognise as he passes you on the road. There is one or two worth remarking. The old gentleman on a short thick-set bay cob, with a footman at a respectful distance-generally at a walking pace, but occasionally it quickens into a gentle amble. Should you, by any chance, be five minutes or so later than usual, you will meet the servant returning, leading his master's steed by the

in the evening to bring the old gentleman back. The rich merchant in his carriage, the stock-broker in his

rest of the week; the first bit of grass, of any size, which they come to from home; and here they stop and are content. For our parts, we wish they would go further, as Smith does, and get fairly out in the fields; but they will do that, as they get freer, and wiser, and more comfortable, and learn to know and love what the wild-flowers have to say-to them. At present how should they be able to hear those small angelical voices, when their ears are ringing with stocking-frames and crying children, and they are but too happy in their tired-heartedness to get to the first bit of holiday ground they can reach? *We come away, and mingle with the crowds returning home, among whom we recognise our friend of the twisted cane, and his lass; who looks the reddest, proudest, and most assured of maid-servants, and sometimes "snubs" him a little, out loud, to show her power; though she loves every blink of his eye. Yonder is a multitude collected round a methodist preacher, whom they think far "behind his age," extremely ignorant of yesterday's unstamped, but "well-meaning,” a “poor mistaken fellow, sir :” and they will not have him hustled by the police. Lord X should hear what they say. It might put an idea in his head.

The gas-lights begin to shine; the tide of the crowd grows thinner; chapel-windows are lit up; maid-servants stand in door-ways; married couples carry their children, or dispute about them; and children, not carried, cry for spite, and jumble their souls out.

As for Smith, he is in some friend's room, very comfortable, with his brandy and water beside him, his coloured handkerchief on his knee, and his boots

intermittent.

• Intermit-"To grow mild between the fits or paroxysms." -JOHNSON.

LOVE AND EGOTISM.

Egotism works on others for its own-love, for those other's sake. Egotism demands, love in its very deeds finds, its reward. Love embraces all things, and finds them in the one-God. Egotism sees all things for, and in all creation sees but, one thingself. Love, in short, is power; and egotism, fear, weakness. Outline of a National System of Educaion (a book worthy the attention of the reflecting).

mediocre capacity; it is but an exercise of the faculty of memory, of which all are possessed in a greater or less degree.

From the time when the rising sun throws its rays upon the cross and dome of the majestic cathedral of St Paul, to the bustling hour of mid-day, there is a constant influx of human life from the suburbs to

there gathers to a focus.

66

the centre of the city; the population of the district As the sun again is on the wane, the rays of human life diverge to all the country adjacent, within the compass, perhaps, of the Map of ten miles round London." The greater part of these persons are pedestrians—some take an omnibus, some the regular stage, some are in gigs, some on horseback, and a few in their own carriages; hackney cabs are never used, unless an individual has overslept himself in consequence of a previous night's carousal, and then endeavours to redeem the time by the help of four extra feet.

I have now in my eye those persons who tread and retread the same path, day after day, month after month and year after year-and to whom everything on the way is as familiar as the alphabet. I will suppose myself to be one of the pedestrians; that my residence is between two and three miles of the Exchange, near which is my office of business; that my way is a well-frequented road; that I am punctual to my time in setting out; and that I have gone in the morning to the city, and returned from thence in the evening every day, Sundays excepted, for a dozen years or so; and, moreover, that having found the nearest way between the two points, by sundry experimental journeys at first, I have always kept to that one road. One would be apt to say, that the monotony of such a course was fatiguing, and its familiarity wearisome.

Beloved Lector, it is not so." The same road, trodden every day at the same hour a thousand times, will, on the thousand and first time, be found interesting and entertaining.

In the first place, rising from the table after breakfast, you walk to the window to see what tone of countenance the weather bears. At that moment you see a precise old gentleman, rather stout, walking with a regular pace, which neither betokens hurry nor loitering; if there is the least chance of rain, he carries an umbrella under his arm-if fine weather, a stick of rather knotty wood, with a head like a vulture's beak, worn white and smooth by constant use. You have become so accustomed to his figure pass

You meet the same faces, six inches square, behind. morning after morning; and anything remarkable catches at once. about any of these stranger acquaintances your eye The impression which these faces leave upon your mind is very indecisive, altogether local, and you know them only at the usual place of

passing on the road; should you meet one of them in company, or in an out-of-the-way quarter, you are quite puzzled to think where you have seen the face before. You feel confident that you have seen it; but whether as an old acquaintance, a stage-coach

companion, or how else, you cannot determine. You have cut an old crony, or been guilty of a breach of are annoyed, too, lest you should, unintentionally, good manners, or good feeling. Oftimes you cannot accustomed spot on the daily peregrination. May unravel the mystery till you again meet him at the

not the same perplexity have occupied his mind with regard to yourself, which is likewise at the same moment explained?

which are open, or opening, as you pass, how the You may further take notice of the different shops display of goods in the windows varies with the season, taste, or fashion; or as some particular holiday or festival comes round that affects the trade, how every appropriate article is blandished forth to tempt a purchaser. A newly opened shop is a redletter observation-you watch the rise and progress, or decline and fall of the successful or unsuccessful tradesman on your route, as if you had an interest in the concern. On the first appearance of a bill in a window__" This house to let," you naturally give it

a more particularly inquiring look, to ascertain the motive for removal, or to see the commencement of the packing-up operations. As quarter-day approaches you are sure to observe some indications of a bustle-like the hum of the bees in the hive before

they swarm-and on the day itself, at a good distance, you catch sight of the half-loaded waggon,-chairs, tables, stools, and other articles of furniture lying about the pavement before the door, interspersed with straw, ropes, and rush matting. Having seen the departure of a tenant, you cast your eye on the house every morning to see if it be let, of which you have token by the removal of the bill. The new tenant also undergoes your scrutiny, and for a few mornings you give them a passing glance, to see if they appear comfortable in their new abode, and what kind of people they are.

There are also certain regular servant-maids, which

you take note of, on their knees (not at their devotions, but) "washing the door," as they say, but properly, the pavement before the door. By the by, I may mention that an Esculapian friend of mine informed me, that a large portion of the inmates of the Metropolitan hospitals were servants with ulcerated knees, which had been caused by continually kneelng on stones and boards, to wash and scrub them. Is there no remedy, or rather preventive, for this?

At the dirtiest crossing on your road, you usually give the sweeper a few halfpence on dirty days, and he or she is most likely a character. These mendiA cants, with "characters," always come best off. common-place beggar, I should think, sel dom gets much, at least in comparison with one who has a "character." Crossing-sweepers perplex one's eleemosinary faculties: one cannot bestow largess upon them all, and it is difficult to say who is the most deserving. I moreover feel as if I had no right to walk upon the swept part, unless I give something,

and am sometimes inclined rather to walk in the mud. Although the sweeper depends on the casual bounty of passers by, and has no legal right to a tollthe trouble he bestows in keeping a passage clean appears to give him a shadow of a moral right, and I have an idea of trespass when I avail myself of the convenience without paying the price.

F In the course of your daily route, there is sure to be some pimple on the fair face of nature, some blotch on the countenance of art, which acts as a continual eye sore to you. Some wrong spelt name in a sign board-something out of the perpendicularsome two lines not parallel, which ought to be sosome building with wings, which are not equal-or else some awkwardly divided name and trade over a FISH-Monger" double shop front (such as " Cheese. "Green. . WHITE Grocer" “Carpenter and MERRY- Undertaker.") But the greatest of all eye-sores is "house in chancery "-There it stands, dull, dirty, and dilapidated; the windows broken and the stones which have been thrown at them resting on the sills-the foundation rotten, and the roof broken in-it stands like a corpse among the living. I have but touched upon what has occurred to me as most likely to be observable in every walk, as there are, of course, particular things peculiar to every locality, and remarkable to each individual.

a

BOOKWORM.

Our correspondent has written to us to correct two errors of the press in his last communication. Purrititi should be Parritch; and Calestes ambo, Calebes ambo (Bachelors both, not Cælestials). The latter mistake was the Editor's, who could not see through a certain blot which happened to be upon the word, and thought that the designation might possibly refer to some jovial membership of a club, or some such thing, in which people take high-flying appellations from the exaltation of their animal spirits.

CHARACTERS OF SHAKSPEARE'S PLAYS.

BY WILLIAM HAZLITT.

NO. X.-TIMON OF ATHENS.

"Follow his strides, his lobbies fill with tendance, Rain sacrificial whisperings in his ear; And through him drink the free air

more striking than that of the sudden falling off of his friends and fortune, and his naked exposure in a wild forest digging roots from the earth for his sustenance, with a lofty spirit of self-denial, and bitter scorn of the world, which raise him higher in our esteem than the dazzling gloss of prosperity could do. He grudges himself the means of life, and is only busy in preparing his grave. How forcibly is the difference between what he was, and what he is described in Apemantus's taunting questions, when he of comes to reproach him with the change in his way

life!

"What, think'st thou,

That the bleak air, thy boisterous chamberlain,
Will put thy shirt on warm? will these moist trees
That have out-liv'd the eagle, page thy heels,
And skip when thou point'st out? will the cold
brook,

Candied with ice, caudle thy morning taste
To cure thy o'er-night's surfeit? Call the creatures,
Whose naked natures live in all the spight
Of wreakful heav'n, whose bare unhoused trunks,
To the conflicting elements expos'd,
Answer mere nature, bid them flatter thee."

The manners are everywhere preserved with distinct truth. The poet and painter are very skilfully played off against one another, both affecting great attention to the other, and each taken up with his own vanity, and the superiority of his own art. Shakspeare has put into the mouth of the former a very lively description of the genius of poetry and of his own in particular:

"A thing slipt idly from me.
Our poesy is as a gum, which issues

From whence 'tis nourish'd. The fire i' th' flint
Shows not till it be struck: our gentle flame
Provokes itself and like the current flies
Each bound it chafes."

The hollow friendship and shuffling evasions of the Athenian lords, their smooth professions and pitiful ingratitude, are very satisfactorily exposed, as well as the different disguises to which the meanness of selflove resorts in such cases to hide a want of generosity and good faith. The lurking selfishness of Apemantus does not pass undetected amidst the grossness of his sarcasms and his contempt for the pretensions of others. Even the two courtezans who accompany Alcibiades to the cave of Timon are very characteristically sketched; and the thieves who come to visit him are also "true men" in their way.An exception to this general picture of selfish depravity is found in the old and honest steward, Flavius, to whom Timon pays a full tribute of tender

ness.

Shakspeare was unwilling to draw a picture "all over ugly with hypocrisy." He owed this character to the good-natured solicitations of his Muse. His mind was well said by Ben Jonson to be the "sphere of humanity."

The moral sententiousness of this play equals that

Would cast the gorge at, this embalms and spices To th' April day again.".

One of his most dreadful imprecations is that Which occurs immediately on his leaving Athens:

"Let me look back upon thee, O thou wall, That girdlest in those wolves! Dive in the earth, And fence not Athens! Matrons, turn incontinent; Obedience, fail in children; slaves and fools, Pluck the grave wrinkled senate from the bench, And minister in their steads. To general filths Convert o' th' instant green virginity! Do't in your parents' eyes. Bankrupts, hold fast; Rather than render back, out with your knives, And cut your trusters' throats! Bound servants, steal : Large-handed robbers your grave masters are, And pill by law. Maid, to thy master's bed: Son of sixteen, Thy mistress is i' th' brothel. Pluck the lin'd crutch from thy old limping sire, And with it beat his brains out! Fear and piety, Religion to the Gods, peace, justice, truth, Domestic awe, night-rest, and neighbourhood, Instructions, manners, mysteries and trades, Degrecs bse vances, customs and laws, Decline to your confounding contraries; And let confusion live!-Plagues, incident to men, Your potent and infectious fevers heap

On Athens, ripe for stroke! Thou cold sciatica,
Cripple our senators, that their limbs may halt
As lamely as their manners! Lust and liberty,
Creep in the minds and manners of our youth,
That 'gainst the stream of virtue they may strive,
And drown themselves in riot! Itches, blains,
Sow all th' Athenian bosoms; and their crop
Be general leprosy: breath, infect breath,
That their society (as their friendship) may
Be merely poison !"

Timon is here just as ideal in his passion for ill as he had before been in his belief of good. Apemantus was satisfied with the mischief existing in the world, and with his own ill-nature. One of the most deci

sive intimations of Timon's morbid jea'ousy of appearances is in his answer to Apemantus, who asks him,

"What things in the world can'st thou nearest
compare with thy flatterers?
TIMON. Women nearest: but men, men are the
things themselves."

Apemantus, it is said, "loved few things better than to abhor himself," This is not the case with Timon, who neither loves to abhor himself nor others. All his vehement misanthropy is forced, uphill work. From the slippery turns of fortune, from the turmoils of passion and adversity, he wishes to sink into the quiet of the grave. On that subject his thoughts are intent, on that he finds time and

Ancients,' and is indeed seasoned with greater variety. Every topic of contempt or indignation is here exhausted; but while the sordid licentiousness of Apemantus, which turns everything to gall and

the sea-shore, contrives his funeral ceremonies amidst the pomp and desolation, and builds his mausoleum of the elements:

"Come not to me again; but say to Athens,