on his snuff-box to a march played by his lady from his own opera of Edmondo Ironsides, an Anglo-Saxon spectacle with British

music.

The next distinguished personage was the Hon. Harry, an aging tenor, full of airs, (not of music, though,) with a much finer manner than he had a voice, and looks more saucy than supercilious. He had been the "tame man" of fashionable singers for many a long year, and he had been the Rubini of his own set until he far surpassed the great tenore in consequential capers. There was, besides, a spiteful, middle-aged bass, a Mr. Melville, and an old gentleman whom every one declared to be a person of exquisite taste for nothing, however, but his dinners, that I could see or discover. This was the party, with the addition of one more gentleman, who arrived late.

I was looked through.

"Stefano! Ah, non lo conosco!" murmured Lord Gorehampton. He spoke Italian on high days and holydays. He begged to be spared the infliction of any obscure music, and invited Lisa to try her mettle on an aria for William the Conqueror, in the grand opera of The Norman Conquest, written by himself. He kindly sat down to accompany, and I listened to a performance of loathsome length. Such an indecent clattering of ivory I never before gave ear to. It was a mixture of Balfe and Bunn, and a delicious dash of Donizetti's dregs. Shade of Orpheus! had you only heard the imbecile pomp of the conclusion, you would have dashed golden lyre from the seventh heavens down on the nodding head of his lordship of Gorehampton, and have silenced him thus for

ever.

your

He was just finishing his air on the unusual word in an Italian song, Felicità, felicità! when the door opened, and a gentleman entered, and approached the piano.

"Ah, there you are! Good night, Vane. I'm busy, you see, as usual. Just listen to this idea of a Norman-Gothic cadence;" and my lord plunged both his hands into a flat ninth, and then danced up and down like a cat's fugue for a few minutes, then he stopped and looked up.

"It's more Danish, do you know, I think," said Lord Vane, quite gravely.

when is your King Alfred to appear? Can't you get some of the airs sung at the Ancients?'

"Why, no;" said Lord Gorehampton. "You see they won't sing things there till one is dead. It is a great bore that one must die first one's self. Isn't it, now ?"

"A shameful regulation!" said Vane; and, to conceal a smile, he began to examine me. I saw his noble and intelligent face, and longed to be introduced to his notice and love. He soon became absorbed in me. He put me on the music-desk. "You will sing

this for me," he said, to the trembling Lisa. She sat down, and, with a voice veiled with fear of failure, she breathed me forth. I only half existed on paper; it was while floating through space, that I truly lived and felt the joy and glory of life. I passed through those mirrored and gilded chambers, and felt that splendor added no ray to my own brightness. Better to rise up beneath the humble roof of a cabin encircled by loving hearts and longing ears, than under the cold gilding of a palace, with a fool on the music-stool. Lisa could not give me my full honors, but she was true and good, as far as she went. She had the artistic heart of a faithful disciple, and she interpreted clearly the outline of my intentions. Vane listened attentively, and soon after went away. The evening concluded with another selection of airs from Gubba's répertoire, and then we went home; home, to dreary lodgings, such as foreign song-birds must have for their cage in London. And the prospects of Lisa darkened daily; she put me away from her sight, and it was only by a chance opening of my portfolio, that I overheard the following dialogue between Lisa and an old friend, a dancer, whom she had known at Vienna:

Ah, yes, it is a fine thing to be a prima donna! Fancy Giulia getting her two and three hundred a-night, while we have to starve and dance for twenty." So sighed Mademoiselle Carlotta, in a pink gingham, and white satin shoes with orange bindings. "And she is such a vain wretch, and so shabby to the chorus! Fancy her poor women, who attend her in all her deaths and faints, not to speak of other things, never get a farthing from her. And she never pays her Medea and Norma brats; not a bit, poor things! Besides, she is a pest to the prompter, and a disgrace to the profession. Ah, well, it's a fine thing to be a prima donna ! But I don't want to have diamond shoe-ties at the expense of my peace of mind. I could

That evening Lisa sat alone, musing over the past and the gloomy present. She heard voices on the stair, and her landlady entered. She said that there was a lady below asking, she supposed, for lodgings, but that she could not comprehend her; and she begged Lisa to come and help her, for Lisa spoke a little English. A stranger stood on the stair; she wished for lodgings; she had just come from abroad, and was anxious, if possible, to procure them that night. She was established accordingly in a room next Lisa's. She went to bed early, and Lisa saw no more of her that night.

It was about noon next day that a note reached Lisa. It was an offer to her to sing, at the Ancient Concert of the following Wednesday, the piece performed at Lord Gorehampton's. Lisa almost fell on her knees with gratitude, and accepted the engagement without delay. Then, poor girl, she hurried out to buy gloves, a wreath, and a pair of new shoes, and I was left alone.

"Ho, ho!" I thought, "now my time is come. I feel frightened rather. Ahem! I wonder how I shall sound." Lisa came home heated, feverish, and penniless, for she had been more extravagant than seconda donnas should be; and it was with a very uncertain voice that she sang me through, or rather, she had only begun to sing, when the door was suddenly opened and the stranger stood there. She sprang forward

and listened.

"Canta pure!" she cried; and then she leant over the piano, and tears fell over her face. Lisa finished and rose, and the stranger approached the piano, seized me, and kissed me with tears of joy.

"Ti ritrovo ancor!" and then she paused. She laid her hand on the chords; like a prophetess preparing to declare her awful mission she stood. Lo! what sound of unearthly sweetness invested itself in my form! a meaning, new and unexpected, dawned on

ble glory on the ear and heart of the sole listener. She could have fallen down on her face before the form of the Greek, for it was she! Xanthi, the long-remembered, the adored of Spiro, the Ionian girl I had seen years before at Florence, and I had dwelt in her heart ever since. We met like longparted lovers, and I trembled beneath the joy of a full interpretation by a voice and genius of matchless power. I had at last met with my equal; I was fitly mated at last. Ah! were we now to part?

It was the morning of the rehearsal at length, and I trembled for my fate. Poor Lisa, I did thee injustice! At eleven o'clock she came and took me up, looked at me once with tears, and then walked to the door of the next room.

"I am ill!" she said: "you, signora, are the most fit to take my place. See, take my music; my name, too; and, as Lisa, sing this divine song better than poor Lisa herself ever will!"

Joy! joy! I entered the concert-room in Xanthi's hand. That grave audience of dowagers and directors was delighted out of its propriety. But who shall recount the surpassing glories of the Wednesday night, when I was encored by the queen, and lauded by the bishops present, and when a venerable countess was removed in fits to the tea-room, and Field-marshal the Duke of Wellington said, "Good!" twice, and when the Morning Post screamed itself hoarse with admiration next day? But I am becoming quite too confidential.

66

One paragraph more. Xanthi made her appearance at the Opera House, Giulia took the jaundice, and Lord Vane took his leave of a termagant whom he had never loved. The tide of fashion left Giulia stranded on the shore where she had ruled the waves, like Britannia, for some sixteen years.

"I could poison, kill, burn, mangle the wretched woman!" said Giulia to her favorite tire-woman, as she sat glaring over the last tirade of praise. And what is this monstrous song that she sings fifteen times every night? It makes me sick and faint to hear of such sinfulness. I'm sure it's ugly. Tell Costa he must get it for me without delay."

Costa obeyed; the original sheet was procured; again I met the prima donna's eyes, and she read on my brow, Addio, Giulia!

PATON. 2 vols. 8vo.

Already well appreciated by the public, from his works on Servia and Syria, Mr. Paton has here extended and complemented, not only his own preceding work, but also Sir Gardner Wilkinson's Dalmatia, Montenegro, and Herzegovina, by superadding more of the Adriatic coasts, Croatia, and different portions of the Southern provinces of Austria. We need not speak of the high interest of these countries at this era, when the fate of races is at immediate issue on their territories, and much of the future destinies of Europe are involved in the decision. Who are to predominate-Magyar, Croat, or German-and how the Austrian empire is to be recomposed and governed, are mighty questions, upon which Mr. Paton throws new, clear, and important lights; whilst, to the general reader, (in opposition to the political,) his various sketches of travel and society are of a most pleasing and attractive character; and a number of engravings illustrate them in a very satisfactory style. There is also an excellent map.

On the national topics we will merely observe that experience, opportunity, and employment have enabled the author to know what he is writing about; and therefore his views are of much public value. His disapprobation of the Magyar movement, and looking forward to better things from Illyria and the Croat population, we leave, however, for discussion to statesmen who may determine how far in revolutions, like serpents, the heads are moved by the tails; whilst from the more miscellaneous contents we select a few extracts, to indicate the nature of a very agreeable publication.—Literary Gazette.

Memoirs of the House of Brandenburg; and History of Prussia, during the 17th and 18th Centuries. By LEOPOLD RANKE. Translated by Sir Alexander and Lady Duff Gordon. 3 vols. 8vo.

The translators of this work have done it every justice, and its Continental repute is a guaranty of its value and importance. It reflects many new lights upon points of biographical and national interest; and the former, indeed, are most national, for in the characters of the monarchs was concentrated and evolved the rise of Prussia from a secondary to a firstrate German power. The account of the utilitarian soldier, Frederick William, and of his miserable quarrels with his son, Frederick II, is one of the most striking instances; and the author labors hard to paint the tyrannical cruelties of the former, as well as his perverse scheme of princely education, and the consequent foibles and vices of the latter, in as favorable colors as possible. Many documents have been consulted to authenticate this picture. The relations between Prussia and England, con

the beginning to the middle of the last century; and the tidal flux and reflux of the negotiations for intermarriages between the royal families, display very remarkable political data, and show on what odd circumstances the fates and fortunes of a people are often dependent. But we cannot enter upon the vast expanse of Silesian, Prussian, French, Austrian, Spanish, Russian, Swedish, Bavarian, Bohemian and other interwoven systems of policy minutely opened to examination in these volumes. They close the page nearly a hundred years ago; and Frederick's religious, literary, and scientific concerns occupy the last two or three sheets. The foundation of the Academy, the Society of Sans Souci, Maupertuis, Voltaire, and other strange companions, are cursorily noticed, and in the end the theme is wound up in a manner which satisfactorily completes a work, not only of great attraction to the children of German Fatherland, but generally to every European country.-Literary Gazette.

Anecdotes of the Aristocracy, and Episodes in Ancestral Story. By J. BERNARD BURKE. 2 vols.

Some books, from their being of a kind to lift and lay down during any small vacant space of time, and furnishing enough of various entertainment to beguile the patch of day or night in a pleasant manner, have been called Parlor Books; and this is one of them par excellence. You cannot dip into it anywhere without finding something to interest and amuse you. There are hundreds of tragical or touching tales, curious anecdotes, remarkable legends and traditions, historical facts, family relics, and other miscellanies, which are all the more attractive from being generally authentic, and the rest not invented, but derived from old beliefs and transmitted stories. Some have made much public noise before, but others are collected from less known sources, and form, with the more notorious, a melange altogether of delectable light reading, not without a considerable proportion of instructive information.— Literary Gazette.

The Old Judge; or, Life in a Colony. By the Author of "Sam Slick." 2 vols.

The majority of these papers appeared in Frazer's Magazine, and the author has remodelled and added to them for this mode of connected publication. This would have been sufficient to recommend the work to us, devoted admirers as we are of the Clockmaker; but he has increased our obligation, by giving us six or eight new chapters, full of his usual humor, keen acuteness, and insight into haman life and character. These chapters are the 1st, 6th, 8th, and 9th, in the first volume, and the 19th, 20th and

works would amply deserve a more extended notice of its contents than we can possibly supply at present, in consequence of the pressure of matter. Mr. Stirling's work comprises a history of Painting in Spain from the first origin of the art to the present day. It enumerates all the works of the Spanish painters which are now extant, and supplies materials for judgment on their merits, which either to the artist, the collector, or the traveller, will be invaluable. The sister arts of Sculpture and Architecture are also incidentally illustrated, and the work is furnished with extensive indices, and adorned by some very excellent engravings of the principal Spanish painters, and of a few of their most striking works. Even the general reader will find in Mr. Stirling's pages much to interest and gratify him, from the biographical character of the work, and the numerous anecdotes which it contains.

Mrs. Jameson's book, which is also richly and abundantly illustrated with wood-cuts and engravings, will be found eminently useful as a book of reference to travellers, and also to those who are engaged in the study of paintings. It brings together all the Legends of the Saints which are ordinarily to be found represented in Sculpture and Painting, with a view to the explanation of the subjects which continually meet the eye in all old works of art. It will be found useful in directing modern artists to the appropriate symbols and representations of sacred and legendary subjects.

We regard these two works as indispensable to every one who is engaged in the study of the Fine Arts-English Review.

Travels in the Great Desert of Sahara, in the Years 1845 and 1846. By JAMES RICHARDSON. 2 vols.

8vo.

There is a good deal of amusement and information to be obtained from these volumes-though they might be advantageously subjected to a winnowing machine. Mr. Richardson gives a graphic account of life in the desert-and his very carelessness at times renders the picture more actual and full than it would otherwise be. His repetitions and varying impressions of the same external circumstances and things give a reality to the picture he draws; though some of them might have been omitted with advantage. We could have spared,

too, his own observations-especially those which have a quasi-religious character-and a great portion of the sublime and the sentimental might have remained unwritten. Despite, however, all this, there is really a great deal of what is useful and agreeable in the book; and it may be read with pleasure by any one who will excuse the follies in which extreme conceit has at times led the author to indulge.-English Review.

RECENT BRITISH PUBLICATIONS.

A New Historical Tale, by Sir E. Bulwer Lytton-the conclusion of King Arthur.

Mordaunt Hall, by the author of Emilia Wyndham.
Vols. 3 and 4 of the Castlereagh Papers.
Part 3, of Chateaubriand's Memoirs of his own Time.
Sam Slick's New Work, The old Judge.
The Highlands and Islands of the Adriatic, by A. A.
Paton, Esq.

California; or Four Months among the Gold Diggers, by J. Tyrwhitt Brooks, M. D.

A reprint of Bryant's What I saw in California.
The Bird of Passage; or Flying Glimpses of Many
Lands, by Mrs. Romer.

The Apostolical Acts and Epistles from the Peschito, by J. W. Etheridge, M. D.

Sir Aymer, a Poem in four Cantos.

The Western World, or Travels in the United States
in 1846-7, by Alexander Mackay.
Correspondence of Schiller and Korner, edited by
Leonard Simpson, Esq.

Six Months' Service in the African Blockade, by
Lieut. Forbes, R. N.

Harmony of History with Prophecy, by Josiah Conder.

Raphael, or Rays from Life, from the French of Lamartine.

"The Rock of Rome, wherein the fundamental traditional dogma of the Roman Catholic Church is confronted with the obviously true interpretation of the Word of God; and proved to be nothing more nor less than a mere invention of Antichrist, and to be forthcoming from the pen of James Sheridan Knowles."

Sir George Staunton is about to give the public the result of his examinations on the various modes of rendering the word God in the Chinese language.