The hands of Phrosinia Rosabella and Facio Florelli are joined by Rhadamanthea. A thunder-bolt tumbles upon the head of Zingrano Scalezzi; his dependants "follow their leader" in all directions; the curtain falls with the bodies sinking in bright blue fire, and the whole concludes with the Perfect Preservation of the Good! and the Total Destruction of the Wicked!! The reader must throw in all the little touches and peculiarities that he can think of, to make the vraisemblance complete. Highly honoured do we consider ourselves in being thought worthy to chronicle the sublime mysteries of productions so super-eminent. Happy shall we be, if our poor and insufficient laudations and observations should recal attention to those partially forgotten efforts of genius, and spur on the public taste to once more appreciate and seek after them. We are often astonished that the public should pass so over things which court their notice at every turning, lacking, perhaps, the obtrusive impudence and pretension of matters, which by dint of brass and self-assumption, force themselves upon the public eye, and thrust themselves, like forward children, into popularity. There is that ancient and meritorious exhibition, ycleped Punch and Judy, for instance. Highly wronged is Mr. Punch, indeed, and good reason, in faith, has he to complain of the injustice of the public! There is a foreign fellow hight Signor Fantoccini, who has almost thrust him out of his own dominions, viz. the streets of London. I appeal to the British people, and especially the inhabitants of the Metropolis, whether they have not done wrong in allowing one of their most amusing and devoted servants to be brazened away, "Even there where people most do congregate," to make room for continental trickery, French hops, and Italian capers! Punch may very well grieve at the decline of popularity; the bitterness of the reflection, too, is aggravated by the consciousness that it is entirely undeserved. John Bull is, in truth, too easy :-he lets the fashion get the mastery over him, and, like a domineering wife, whose unjustifiable assumption of a dominion properly belonging to the other sex, is passed over, and winked at, with a kind of indolent, good-humoured acquiescence, she abuses her usurped authority. Let Mr. Bull remove the cobwebs from his eyes, and rouse himself out of his lethargy! Time, indeed, it is that he should see that all goes right about his house and property. He does not see how he makes himself responsible for the sins of omission and commission, which ought properly to be saddled upon his servants, dependants, and followers. Let us hope that he will take the hint in the self-same spirit in which it is given; and in the meantime, let the public at large thank us for blowing a trumpet blast (tin trumpet some may say, perhaps ;—but n'importe,) in their ear, in favour of melo-dramas, and melo-dramatic heroes and heroines. 21.1 "WILL THE WATCHER!" "He had been a sailor in his youth, and fought About a mile from the pretty little hamlet of " Arne," on the west coast of England, and a few hundred yards from the sea, lived many years since William Warren; or, as he was more commonly called, " Will the Watcher." He had been a seaman in his youth in the merchant service, but had left the snug craft in which he had served his apprenticeship, for a "Crack Frigate' then fitting at Plymouth for the West Indies, and from that time to the period our tale commences, little had been heard of him at his native place. Old Ben Block, it is true, when he returned with the loss of an arm, which had been carried off by a shot in a severe action between two of our cruisers and a superior French force, spoke of his gallant conduct in the engagement, by which he saved the life of his captain; but at length his name was almost forgotten, and not a little surprised therefore were some of his former neighbours, as they were sitting one fine Summer evening under the shades of the old tree before the "Fisherman's Hut," a neat though small house of public entertainment, enjoying their pipes and ale, to see him trudging down the hollow winding track that led from the turnpike road; and though somewhat aged, and considerably bronzed by tropical climates, yet the same fine straight sturdy fellow he was when he left home seventeen years before. He took up his abode at the "Public," where after staying some days, he learned that the stone-built cottage near "Arne's Mouth," the name of the little stream that empties itself into the sea, or rather is lost in the sands near, was for sale, with its productive garden and orchard, of which, much to the surprise of the gossips of the neighbourhood, he became the purchaser. How he possessed so much money was often canvassed by his acquaintances without success, until they were at length obliged to rest content with the supposition, that it was the unspent accumulation of his prize money, while such unusual prudence in a sailor caused the envious to shrug their shoulders, and hope such was the case, while they darkly hinted at" Sea Robbers," and for their parts could not understand why he should return better off than Jack Topsail, or the other chaps of their own or neighbouring parishes, who came home pennyless, though merry fellows, only to be laid up in "Ordinary," as they expressed themselves, in the Dock Yard where they were launched. How Will really got his money was unknown many years, as he was somewhat moody and irascible, and would bear little questioning on anything, much less inquiry on such a subject. That he had not expended all his means in making the purchase was evident, as he had no apparent mode of earning a livelihood, yet his servant, a little damsel of some dozen years old, was fond of boasting that her master lived as well or better than Farmer Stock of the Manor House, or even 'Squire Beagle himself, and the savoury steams wafted from their tidy little kitchen, between the hours of twelve and one, their usual dinner-time, gave such strength to the assertion, that she was readily believed. Thus they went on quietly and contented for many years; and here often might the old man and his smiling attendant be seen in the warm Summer nights, after their evening repast was ended, sitting beneath the foliage of a flowering_honeysuckle, which covered with its rich luxuriance the cottage wall, and nearly hid the roof itself, while the old man was delighting his youthful listener with tales of the dangers he had passed in his early life, or singing to her the songs of his beloved Ocean, in which it must be confessed he shewed more taste in the selection than his young companion; for while his favorites for told all the striking incidents of" Battle and of breeze," her's was of a more soothing character. The following she would often coax him to sing "The shuddering landsman trembling fears He lies him down in quiet sleep, Though wild winds round him rave; He dies-and fills his loathsome bed- 97 which Will declared must have been made by some "Shore-going" fellow, although for his part he must own that the chap's notion of a " Coral tomb' he didn't dislike, as he would much rather be launched into "blue water when his "log" was run, than be shovell'd up with a parcel of dirt to rot under the foot of any idle "lubber," who didn't know a "mainboom from a marlin spike." His gainful occupations consisted only in digging in his garden, and deep sea fishing, in the latter of which employments he was very expert; and most fine evenings during the season, when there was a slight ripple on the water, might he be seen bending his steps towards the beach, with Sarah caring a little basket containing his beautifully finished lines, in the manufacture of which he not a little prided himself, declaring that even Captain Parsons, though he had the "name," could not exceed his in make; nor was a small old-fashioned square bottle forgotten by his careful companion, lest her kind master should be tempted to stop out late. Will never sold the fish he caught, but would give the surplus away to his poorer neighbours; and many were the prayers offered up after a plentiful meal had blessed the otherwise scanty board of some old and feeble widow, for the welfare of one, rude and wayward as he often was, who in his abundance did not forget the wants of the "poor and needy;" nor was the cheerful voice and sweet smiles of his little messenger less prized by the grateful creatures who benefitted by his bounty, than were the more substantial contents of her basket. Although these employments took up much of his time in fine weather, yet was he not idle during the more boisterous parts of the year, for as sure as there was a gale of wind was he to be seen wrapped in his rough "Norwester," pacing the sands from "Arne's Mouth" to the ledge of rocks which running far into the sea, formed a bold headland about a mile to the westward; there, unmindful of the fiercest gale, or the gathering shades of night, would he wander hour after hour, gazing with steadfast and anxious eyes on the long rolling billows as they fell heavily on the shore, or dashed themselves in whitening foam upon the rocks before him, and from this practice he soon became better known as "Will the Watcher," than by his own name. After living thus for several years, keeping up little or no intercourse with any, Will was supposed suddenly to have become poor; he was seldom seen in his garden, and the Autumn passed away without his having been once on the fishing ground; his boat too, the "Lively Sally," named after his little inmate, of which he used to be so proud, was missing on the beach, and two lovers who had taken a late ramble on the East Clift, reported having seen some strange men, whom he accompanied, launch and row her away, leaving him behind. From these and many other little circumstances his considerate neighbours began, as the Winter set in with unusual severity, to discuss the probability of his being obliged to sell the cottage, and their kindness even went so far as to find a purchaser in Simon Stanley, a young mason, and who was known to possess a few hundred pounds, which he had inherited from his miserly uncle; they also doubted if the old man would not be eventually obliged to apply for parish relief, while some amongst them, who had saved a few pounds, looked forward to the sale of his "goods and chattels," that they might add sundry articles of household furniture to their own scanty stock, on better terms than Tom Bicknell, the village carpenter, would construct them for. No longer did Sarah, now grown a fine and handsome woman, stop to gossip as she made her purchases at Dame Yearbury's shop, so that the good Dame too, kind-hearted as she was, began to remark that her visits were less frequent, and her purchases less abundant than heretofore, while the younger women thought her vastly shabby in her old gown and shawl, and wondered she was not ashamed to appear so before" his honor the Rector" at church. Little did she care for the tattle about herself, but if she overheard a word whispered against the man whose roof had sheltered her from the hard fate of a parish workhouse, who had taken her, a poor and houseless orphan, to his cottage, and, harsh as he sometimes was to others, had even treated her with the kindness of an affectionate parent; then, if any anger could ever ruffle her gentle breast, would the heightened colour and quickened step shew that the illnatured remark was neither unheeded nor unfelt. As the Winter advanced she was heard less of; sometimes a whole week passed without her being seen, and the old man too, although the season was most tempestuous, was never to be met with at his accustomed haunts. Months thus passed, and as the Spring drew on no change was to be seen in the conduct of the inhabitants of the cottage. One morning in the early part of March, the Shepherd of Farmer Stock was out before day-break to attend to his master's flock, which was folded on the sheltered side of the rising which forms the summit of the gigantic Clift, that towers in frowning majesty high above the ledge of rocks to the westward of "Arne's Mouth." There, while hanging over its dizzy edge, he fancied he heard some sound beneath, and fearful for the safety of one of his charge that might have strayed from the flock, or fallen over the precipice, he called his trusty dog and sought in the darkness the narrow, but well known path, that led to the rocks below. This undertaking, which to the timid would have been dangerous in day-light, was of little peril to one who had climbed the rugged sides of those sea-washed hills from his boyhood, for Jeffery Hayman was an expert" Crags-man," and in ought but the deep-rooted belief in spirits, and the "good people," as the "fairies" were called, was a bold and determined fellow, and was not to be deterred by a little personal danger from attempting to save one of his flock from a watery grave; besides, at the foot of the path that led to the rocks was a small patch of greensward, that sometimes afforded for a few days in the Summer, pasturage for his sheep, and he was in hopes that he might there find the straggler. Sending his dog before him in search of the wanderer, he carefully descended the winding track and soon found himself at the foot of the hill; there seating himself on a massive fragment of rock, which in the day-light would have commanded the whole of the plot of ground and a small sandy bay beside it, formed by an indented hollow in the reef of rocks before him, he remained awhile listening to the sighing of the wind, which now almost lulled, came softly from the Ocean, while ever and anon the breaking of some mighty wave on the rocks around told of the late force of the now spent gale; sometimes, too, a vivid flash of lightning would light up the whole expanse of the Ocean, looking like a vast caldron as its troubled waves tossed the white foam on the shore. He had been seated but a few minutes before he distinctly heard a long wild shriek, then his dog's quick bark, followed by a howl of pain, and ere he could start up to seek the cause, the faithful animal rushed towards him, and crouching at his feet, no efforts could induce him to leave the protection of his master. Jeffery Hayman, as we have before said, was bold in ought of this world, but from the bad character of the place, said to be haunted by the ghost of a ship-wrecked mariner, whom the lawless dwellers on the coast had murdered for the valuables he had about him, and feeling certain that the unearthly cry he had himself heard was that of the murdered seaman, he quickly retraced his steps and made the best of his way to his own snug cottage on the other side of the farm, which he reached just as the sun had struggled through the heavy clouds that had hung like a veil on the hill tops. Shortly after the Shepherd had sought his home, Sarah was awakened by the heavy step of her master on the stairs, followed by his calling to her to strike a light, and come down. What was the cause of his early summons she never told; but that they were astir betimes on that morning was known by some of the villagers seeing a light through the crevices of the windowshutters as they passed the cottage before day-break on their way to the beach, to look out for any of the wreck of a ship that had been seen in the offing the evening before, and was reported to have gone to pieces, or foundered during the gale of the previous night. The following week Sarah was to be often seen at the Dame's shop, who, kind-hearted soul, began to think that her previous absences could not have arisen from poverty, but that the old man had gone to the market town for his supplies unknown to the neighbours; and though the poor woman felt the dignity of her establishment somewhat hurt by such an idea, yet the now smiling Sarah, buying a new Sunday gown, and hinting about choosing silk for a best bonnet as the Spring drew on, soon set matters to rights with her and the rest of the inhabitants of the hamlet. One day she told the old lady that her master had been gone a week to see an old friend at Plymouth, who was ill, and that she expected him home that night, and on the following morning she called again, all life and spirits, and astonished her by saying, that Will had come home the evening before bringing with him a little girl, the only child of his friend who was dead, and that she would in future live with them. As years passed on less and less was seen of " Will the Watcher;" for after the morning of the Shepherd's flight from the rocks, he was never on the beach, and by degrees too, even his garden ran wild, shewing how little pleasure he found in his former favourite occupations; rumours also were circulated that he had taken to drinking; and the kegs of contraband spirits that his neighbours knew were left by the smugglers at his door, gave an appearance of truth to the tale which his haggard look and tottering steps, if by chance he was seen outside his cottage, fully confirmed. A change too came over the once light-hearted Sarah. Her laugh was now never heard as of old by the fishermen, as they returned from their evening tasks; and, if asked if she was unhappy, her faint smile gave but weak denial to the supposition which the traces of tears in her swollen eyes too often confessed. Annie, the child, seemed the only happy one of the three, and even she checked her merry laugh whenever the old man was near. Things thus went on, when one dark and lowering night, about ten years after Annie's arrival at the cottage, William Warren and Sarah were seated, looking out on the storm which began to rage around the house. He had been long ill, and his constant attendant feared that the Spring would find Annie and herself the only inhabitants of the cottage, in which in her early life she had spent so many happy hours. "Sarah," at length the old man feebly said, "it was just such a night years' since, when "Nay, nay, sir," exclaimed his companion, "Why think of that dreadful night! and besides," and she said, rising from her chair, and soothingly taking his hands between her's-" Besides, you know, sir, you have often told me he was dead before he reached the shore?" "Dead! who said he was not?"-and then he said after a pause, in a low |