Now follows—but in vain for Johanna—the full accomplishment of her glorious enterprise, in the coronation of the king at Rheims. Contrary to the obligation of her high mission, she has received into her heart a human passion. Her peace is gone. Here the poet, in order to express the rapid alternations of feeling to which she is a prey, breaks from the even tenor of blank verse into a lyrical effusion of remarkable beauty and pathos. She is sought for to take her part in the ceremony of the coronation; it is now with a feeling of horror that she receives into her hands the sacred banner, which she had borne triumphantly to so many victories.

Amongst the crowd who have flocked from all parts to witness the ceremony, are the family of Johanna, and her old lover Raimond. Her father Thibaut is also there. He has come to save, if yet possible, his child from perdition, whom he still persists in thinking under the influence of wicked spirits, and to have wrought all her wonders by the aid of diabolic enchantments. Now, therefore, when the king, after his coronation, turns towards Johanna, and, in the presence of all his nobility, addresses her as the deliverer of France, this melancholy father rushes forward to reproach and to blaspheme his child. She, heartstricken, and conscious of a secret error, though of a quite different kind from what is laid to her charge, receives in submissive silence, as the chastisement of heaven, the strange inculpations of her parent:—

"Thibaut, to the King. Thou deem'st thyself deliver'd by God's power. Thou art abused—this people of France are blinded! Thou art deliver'd by the devil's craft!

Dunois. Does this man rave?

Thibaut. Not I, but thou art raving; All these, the wise archbishop at their head, Rave, in believing that the voice of heaven Speaks in this wicked girl. Mark, if she dare Maintain, before her father's face, the juggle With which she cheats the people and her king. In the name of the Holy Trinity! Speak! I conjure thee! Dost thou serve with saints, And with the pure in heart?

[A universal silence. Every eye is strained towards Johanna, who stands motionless.

Sorel. God! she is mute!

Thibaut. So must she be before that awful name Which, in the depth of hell itself, is fear'd. She—she a saint! she sent from God! No, in a cursed spot—our magic tree Where devils from of yore their Sabbath keep—Has all this been contrived; there did she sell Her soul to the eternal Fiend, to be With brief vain-glory honour'd in this world. Bid her stretch forth her arm, and ye will see The punctures by which hell has mark'd its own.

Burgundy. Horrible! Yet must the father be believed Who thus against his own child testifies.

Dunois. No, no, the madman shall not be believed Who in his own child vilifies himself.

Sorel to Johanna. O speak! break this disastrous silence! we Believe in thee. We have firm trust in thee. One word from thy own mouth, one only word, Shall be enough. But speak! Denounce, confound This hideous accusation. Do but say That thou art innocent, and we believe it.

[Johanna remains motionless. Agnes Sorel steps back with horror.

La Hire. She is amazed! Astonishment and terror Have closed her mouth. Before such hellish charge Must purity itself recoil with fright.

[Approaches her.

Take courage! Be thyself! The innocent Have their own proper language, and their look Is lightning to consume foul calumny. In noble scorn, arouse thyself—look up—Confound with shame this most unworthy doubt, Which wrongs thy sacred virtue.

[Johanna remains motionless. La Hire steps back. The general horror increases.

Dunois. What scares the people? What dismays the king? Oh, she is innocent! I pledge myself, I pledge for her my honour as a prince. Here do I throw my gauntlet down. Who dares To slander her with guilt?

[A violent peal of thunder is heard. All start back terrified.

Thibaut. God answers! God, Who thunders from above. Pronounce thyself, Child of perdition, guiltless, if thou dar'st—

[A second peal of thunder is heard. The people fly on all sides.

Burgundy. God shield us! What an awful signal!

Du Chatel. Come, come, my sovereign, let us fly this place!

Archbishop to Johanna. In the name of God, I speak to thee. Art silent From pride of innocence, or shame of guilt? If now this voice of thunder testify For thee,—in sign thereof embrace this cross.

[Johanna remains motionless. Repeated peals of thunder. All leave the church except Dunois.

Dunois. Thou art my own bride, Johanna! I Have from the first believed, and still believe. Thee will I rather trust than all these signs, Than even this thunder speaking from above. 'Tis noble pride withholds thee, thou disdain'st Wrapt in thy sacred innocence, these mad Outrageous charges to refute. Disdain so still; confide alone in me, Who of thy purity have doubted never, I ask no word; place but thy hand in mine, In token that thou wilt confide in me, In this arm and thy own good cause.

[He extends his hand. She turns away with convulsive start.

(Du Chatel re-enters, and afterwards Raimond.)

Du Chatel. Johanna d'Arc! The king permits That undisturb'd you quit the town of Rheims. The gates stand open; no man shall molest you. Count Dumois, follow me—you gain no honour in lingering here.

[Du Chatel and Dunois leave

Raimond. Seize on this moment! The streets are empty—give me your hand.

[Johanna looks upwards to heaven, then hastily taking his hand, goes out.

Under the guidance of Raimond, the prophetess and champion, deserted it seems by man and heaven, enters a wood, where she is taken prisoner by a party of English. She is sent a captive to Lionel. But adversity has now reinstated her in all the primitive austerity of her heart; the weakness she has so severely expiated, has left her; she has no heart now but for her country. In vain Lionel promises all—for Lionel, as well as Dunois, loves her; she answers only by denouncing the enemies of France.

A battle is joined under the walls of the tower in which she is imprisoned; she has been bound in fetters of threefold strength; Lionel has gone forth to lead his army, and the fierce Isabeau is her jailer. She holds a drawn dagger over her head. If the king of France conquers, Johanna dies. Nevertheless, she ceases not to pray for his success; and when she hears that the king is so closely beset by his enemies that he is in danger of his life, she implores heaven with such fervour, that power is given her to rend asunder her chains. Snatching a sword from one of her guards, she makes from the tower, and appears on the field of battle in time to rescue her monarch. But she herself has received a mortal wound; she sinks on the ground, and expires in the moment of victory. They cover her with the banners of the victorious army. The curtain falls.

Now, this violent departure from history, in the latter part of the play, is what we chiefly regret in the tragedy of Schiller. The melancholy fate of Joan d'Arc is so inseparably connected with her memory, that we cease to identify the portrait of Schiller with the personage of history. As the tragedy proceeds, we feel that it is no longer our Joan d'Arc that it concerns—so impossible is it for us to forget, that the village maiden of Dom Remi expiated her pious and visionary patriotism in the flames at Rouen. Only half her tragedy has been written; the other half remains for some future Schiller. Nor can we conceive of a better opportunity for the display of the peculiar powers of this poet, than would have been afforded by that catastrophe he has chosen to alter. Was the opportunity felt to be too great? Had the poet become wearied and exhausted with his theme, and did he feel indisposed to nerve himself afresh for scenes which called for the strenuous efforts of his genius? We know that it was not his original intention to make this violent departure from history, and that he came to the determination with regret.

We wish to state distinctly on what grounds we make our objection; because there is current among a class of critics a censure for the mere departure from historical truth—made, it would seem, out of a sensitive regard for history—in which we by no means acquiesce. We have no desire to bind a poet to history, merely because it is history. He has his own ends to accomplish, and by those shall he be judged. As, assuredly, we should not accept it as the least excuse for the least measure of dulness, on the part of the poet, that he had followed faithfully the historical narrative, so neither do we impose upon him a very close adherence to it. We censure the course which Schiller has here pursued, not because he has marred history, but because he has marred his own poem. The objection lies entirely within the boundary of his own art. He has selected a personage for his drama with whom a certain fate is so indissolubly associated, that it is impossible to think of her without recalling it to mind; and this ineffaceable trait in her history he has attempted, for the time, to obliterate from our memory. By this procedure, the imagination of the reader is divided and distracted. The picture presented by the poet is and is not a portrait of the historical figure which lives in our recollection. There are many points of resemblance; but the chief is omitted. And we always feel that it is omitted; for history here is too strong for the poet: he cannot expel her from the territory he wishes to enclose for himself. As well might one describe a Socrates who did not drink the hemlock—as well a Napoleon who did not die at St Helena, as a Joan d'Arc who did not suffer in the flames of Rouen.

Von Hinrich, in his critical work upon Schiller, gives a curious defence of this departure from history:—"The martyrdom," he says, "of the forlorn maiden could hardly satisfy us on the stage. In history it is different; we see these events in their connexion with the past and the future, and we do not abstract some single fact, and judge of it apart from all others. The history of the world is the tribunal of the world. It has justified Johanna; posterity has restored to her the fame and honour of which a malicious fate had for a season deprived her. The poet was obliged to change his catastrophe, in order to introduce, in his own epoch, that finger of justice which, in reality, revealed itself only at a subsequent period."[1]

[1] Part II., p. 183.

But who sees not that, in all such cases, the poet sufficiently and completely reverses the unjust sentence of contemporaries, by representing the sufferer as undeserving of it?—that, by depicting her as innocent, he anticipates and introduces the equitable judgment of posterity? When Schiller had described the Maid of Orleans as pious in heart—as the chosen of Heaven, he had at once reversed the sentence of the court of Rouen. It was assuredly not necessary that he should conceal the fact of any such sentence having been passed, in order to exculpate Johanna: and to exculpate, or to spare, the august judges, was no part of the business of the poet. Socrates dies in prison, denounced as a corrupter of youth. He himself is sufficiently vindicated when he is shown to be no corrupter of youth. Is there any sentiment of equity that would prompt us to suppress the fact, that he died by the public executioner of Athens? Or would it be doing honour to history—to this great tribunal of appeal—to stifle our indignation against the unjust and criminal sentences which she has had to repeal?

No doubt the poet would have had difficulties to contend with, in following the course of history. In particular, as he had chosen to represent Johanna as veritably inspired, he would have been tasked to reconcile this severity of her fate, on the one hand, with the justice of Heaven towards its own missionary; or on the other, with the unblemished character of his heroine. Either Heaven must appear forgetful of Johanna, or Johanna must be represented as having forfeited a right to its protection. But this difficulty Schiller has not entirely escaped in his own plot, and he has shown how it may be encountered. Johanna might well yield to the tenderness of a human passion without forfeiting our sympathy, or incurring a stain upon her moral character; and yet this aberration of heart—this dereliction from the austere purity required by her sacred mission—might, in a theological point of view, be supposed to have forfeited her claim to the miraculous interposition of Heaven in her behalf. So that, in the closing scenes, though Johanna might have no claim on the miraculous favours of Heaven, she would still be a saint at heart, and entitled to our deepest sympathy; and Heaven would receive back, if not its prophetess and champion, yet a noble child of earth, still further purified by more than expiatory sufferings.

This species of difficulty meets us, in one instance, in the tragedy of Schiller, in an unexpected and unnecessary manner. How are we to understand the thunder which is heard in apparent confirmation of the cruel accusation of Thibaut? As a mere coincidence, as a mere natural phenomenon, we can hardly view it; appearing as it does in this atmosphere of wonders. The archbishop seems to think that possibly the thunder might testify for Johanna. But as the effect is to produce her condemnation, it is impossible it could have been intended by Heaven for her acquittal. And yet, if we are to look upon it as corroborating the accusation of the father, it not only passes a very severe sentence upon Johanna, but it sanctions the gross falsehood of this atrabilious parent.

Amongst the continental critics, Schiller's Maid of Orleans has been especially commended as a vindication of the character of Johanna from the vile representation it had endured from the hands of Voltaire. But here, in England, La Pucelle was never more popular than it deserved to be—was never popular at all; no one had taken his impression of Joan d'Arc from this tawdry performance; and we find a difficulty in understanding how Schiller, writing to Wieland, could represent the poem of Voltaire as a great obstacle in his way. As little had we received our impression of Joan d'Arc from Shakspeare's tragedy of the First Part of Henry VI., where she is represented as a mere witch and courtesan, represented, in fact, in the vulgar aspect in which she still probably appeared to an English populace. The subject was with us, when Schiller wrote, new and open; we had received our impression only from history, and history had spoken well of Johanna.[1]

[1] It is thus that Hume concludes his account of her:—"This admirable heroine, to whom the more generous superstition of the ancients would have erected altars, was, on pretence of heresy and magic, delivered over alive to the flames, and expiated by that dreadful punishment the signal services she had rendered to her prince and her native country."

Madame de Stael, after applauding Schiller's tragedy for the restoration it effected of the character of the French heroine, adds:—"The French alone have consented to this degradation of the character of the maiden; even an Englishman, Shakspeare, represents her in the beginning as inspired by Heaven, and afterwards led astray by the demons of ambition." The delineation of the Maid of Orleans, in the first Part of Henry VI., is associated with the greatest name in our literature, and therefore, we presume, must be treated with respect; but it is the only title to respect we can discover in it. We cannot, with Madame de Stael, trace the inspired maid in any part of the play. La Pucelle gives us, it is true, in the commencement, a very good account of herself; as she was playing the part of an impostor, it was not probable she would do otherwise: but her own manner very soon betrays the courtesan; and, when alone, we find her in the Company of no other spirits than such as witches are accustomed to raise.

We were still more surprised to find Schlegel describing the Maid of Orlean of Henry VI. as more historical than the portraiture of Schiller. There is the same amount of fable in both. In Henry VI., we have an echo of the coarse superstition and vulgar scandal of the English camp—in Schiller, the fable is beautiful, and assists to develop a character of exquisite purity.



THE STOLEN CHILD.

A TRUE TALE OF THE BACK-WOODS.

It was towards the commencement of the month December 1825, that I was going down the Mississippi in the steam-boat Feliciana. We had arrived in the neighbourhood of Hopefield, Hampstead county, when one of our paddles struck against a sawyer,[1] and was broken to pieces. We were obliged in consequence to cast anchor before the town.

[1] The local name for large tree-trunks which get partially buried in the mud, one end sticking, up just below the surface of the water. They cause frequent accidents to the steam-boats on the Mississippi.

Hopefield is a small town on the west bank of the river, about six hundred miles above New Orleans, and five hundred below the junction of the Ohio and Mississippi. It consisted, at the time of which I speak, of about fifteen houses, two of which were taverns and shops of the usual kind found in such places—their stock in trade consisting of a cask or two of whisky, a couple of dozen knives and forks, a few coloured handkerchiefs, some earthenware, lead, powder, and the like. Our party was composed of ten ladies, the same number of young men, and several elderly gentlemen. Nothing appears so desirable, during a long voyage in a river steam-boat, as a stroll upon shore; and, as there was nothing to be done at Hopefield, the proposal of one of our number to take a ramble in the forest, was met with unqualified approbation by all the young men. We equipped ourselves each with a rifle, and a bottle of wine or brandy, to keep the vapours of the swamps out of our throats; the son of one of the tavern-keepers, who offered himself for a guide, was loaded with a mighty ham and a bag of biscuits, which we procured from the steam-boat; and, thus provided, we sallied forth on our expedition, attended by the good wishes of the ladies, who accompanied us a few hundred yards into the wood, and then left us to pursue our march.

I have often had the occasion to notice, that the first entrance into one of our vast American forests is apt to reduce the greatest talker to silence. In the present instance, I found the truth of this remark fully confirmed. Whether it was the subdued half-light of the luxuriant wilderness through which we were passing, the solemn stillness, only broken by the rustling of the dead leaves under our feet, or the colossal dimensions of the mighty trees, that rose like so many giants around us, that wrought upon the imagination, I cannot say; but it is certain that my companions, who were mostly on the northern states, and had never before been beyond Albany or the Saratoga springs, became at once silent, and almost sad. The leaves of the cotton-tree, that giant of the south-western forests, had already assumed the tawny hues of latter autumn; only here and there a streak of sunbeam, breaking through the canopy of branches that spread over our heads, brought out the last tints of green now fast fading away, and threw a strange sparkling ray, a bar of light, across our path. Here was a magnolia with its snow-white blossoms, or a catalpa with its long cucumber-shaped fruit, amongst which the bright-hued red birds and paroquets glanced and fluttered.

We walked for some time through the forest, amused more than once by the proceedings of two young clerks from Boston, who saw a wild animal in every thicket, and repeatedly leveled their guns at some bear or panther, which turned out to be neither more nor less than a bush or tree-stump. They pestered our guide with all sorts of simple questions, which he, with a true backwoodsman's indifference, left for the most part unanswered. After about an hour, we found ourselves on the borders of a long and tolerably wide swamp, formed by the overflowings of the river, and which stretched for some five miles from north to south, with a broad patch of clear bright-green water in the centre. The western bank was covered with a thick growth of palmettos, the favourite cover of deer; bears, and even panthers; and this cover we resolved to beat. We divided ourselves into two parties, the first of which, consisting of the New Englanders, and accompanied by the guide, was to go round the northern extremity of the swamp, while we were to take a southerly direction, and both to meet behind the marsh, on a certain path which led through a thicket of wild plum-trees and acacias. Our guide's instructions were not of the clearest, and the landmarks he gave us were only intelligible to a thorough backwoodsman; but as too many questions would probably have puzzled him, without making matters clearer to us, we set off, trusting to our eyes and ears, and to the pocket-compasses with which several of us were provided.

After another hour's walk, during which we had seen nothing but wild pigeons and squirrels, and a few mocassin snakes warming themselves in the sunbeams, which latter, on our approach, drew hastily back under the heaps of dry leaves, we arrived at the southern extremity of the swamp. Proceeding a short distance westward, we then took a northerly direction, along the edge of the palmetto field, with the marsh upon our right hand. It was a sort of cane-brake we were passing through, firm footing, and with grass up to our knees; the shore of the swamp or lake was overgrown with lofty cedars, shooting out of water four or five feet deep, which reflected their circular crowns. The broad streak of water looked like a huge band of satin, and the slightest motion of the leaves was immediately perceptible in the mirror beneath them. From time to time, the least possible breeze rustled through the trees, and curled the water with a tiny ripple. The water itself was of the brightest emerald-green; and the forest of palmetto stems that grew along the edge, was reflected in it like myriads of swords and lances. In the small creeks and inlets, flocks of swans, pelicans, and wild geese, were sunning themselves, and pluming their feathers for their winter flight. They allowed us to come within a score of paces of them, and then flew away with a rushing, whirring noise.

We had been for some time plodding patiently along, when our attention was suddenly attracted by a slow but continued rustling amongst the palmettos. Something was evidently cautiously approaching us, but whether panther, stag, or bear we could not tell—probably the last. We gave a glance at our rifles, cocked them, and pressed a few paces forward amongst the canes; when suddenly a bound and a cracking noise, which grew rapidly more distant, warned us that the animal had taken the alarm. One of our companions, who had as yet never seen a bear-hunt, ran forward as fast as the palmettos would allow him, and was soon out of sight. Unfortunately we had no dogs, and after half an hour's fruitless beating about, during which we started another animal, within sight or shot of which we were unable to get, we became convinced that we should have to meet our friends empty-handed. It was now time to proceed to the place of rendezvous, on the further side of the palmetto field, which was about half a mile wide. The man who had gone after the bear, had rejoined us, and from him we learned that the brake was bordered on the western side by a dense thicket of wild-plum, apple, and acacia trees, through which there was not the least sign of a path. On arriving there we saw that his account was a correct one; and, to add to our difficulties, the nature of the ground in our front now changed, and the cane-brake sank down into sort of swampy bottom, extending to the northern extremity of the lake. Our situation was an embarrassing one. Before us, an impassable swamp; to our right, water; to our left, an impenetrable thicket; and four hours out of the eight that had been allotted to us already elapsed. There seemed nothing to be done but to retrace our steps; but, before doing so, we resolved to make a last effort to find a path. To this end we separated, taking different directions, and for nearly half an hour we wandered through the thicket, amongst bushes and brambles, tearing and scratching ourselves to no purpose. At last, when I for one was about to abandon the search in despair, a loud hurrah gave notice that the path was found. We were soon all grouped around the lucky discoverer; but to our considerable disappointment, instead of finding him at the entrance of the wished-for road, we beheld him gravely contemplating a cow, which was cropping the grass quite undisturbed by our approach. Nevertheless, this was no bad find, if we could only ascertain whether it was a strayed cow that had wandered far from its home, or a beast of regular habits that passed each night in its master's cow-house. An Ohioman solved the question, by pointing out that the animal had evidently been milked that morning; and as we were debating how we should induce Brindle to proceed in the direction of its domicile, he settled that difficulty also, by firing off his rifle so close to the beast's tail, that the bullet carried off a patch of hair, and grazed the skin. The cow gave a tremendous spring, and rushed through a thicket, as if a score of wolves had been at its heels. We followed, and the brute led us to a tolerably good path through the wilderness, which we had thought impenetrable. It was doubtless the path that was to take us to the appointed place of meeting; and we now slackened our pace, and followed the cow's trail more leisurely. We had proceeded about a mile, when a strong light in the distance made us aware that we were coming to a clearing; and on arriving at the place, we found several maize fields enclosed by hedges, and a log-house, the smoking chimney of which bespoke the presence of inhabitants.

The dwelling was pleasantly situated on a gentle slope, roofed with clapboards, and having stables and other out-houses in its rear, such as one usually finds in backwood settlements of the more comfortable kind. Peach-trees were trailed against the house, in front of which stood some groups of papaws. The whole place had a rural and agreeable aspect.

We were scarcely within the hedge that surrounded the domain, when a brace of bull-dogs rushed upon us with open jaws. We were keeping off the furious brutes with some difficulty, when a man came out of the barn, and, upon seeing us, again entered it. After a few moments, he appeared for a second time, in company with two negroes, who were leading by the horns the very same cow which we had so unceremoniously compelled to become our guide. We greeted the man with a "good-morning;" but he made no answer, merely gazing hard at us with a cold sullen look. He was a tall, broad-shouldered, powerful man, with an expressive but extraordinarily sad, gloomy, and almost repulsive countenance. There was a restless excitement of manner about him, which struck us at the very first glance.

"A fine morning," said I, approaching the stranger.

No answer. The man was holding the cow by one horn, and staring at the tail, from which a drop or two of blood was falling.

"How far is it from here to Hopefield?" asked I.

"Far enough for you never to get there, if it's you who've been drivin' my cow," was the threatening reply.

"And if we had driven your cow," said I, "you would surely not take it amiss? It was a mere accident."

"Such accidents don't often happen. People don't shoot cows, if they haven't a mind to eat other folk's beef."

"You do not suppose," said the Ohioman, "that we should wish to hurt your cow—we, who have no other intention but to shoot a few turkeys for the voyage. We are passengers by the Feliciana—one of our paddles is broken; and that is the reason that our boat is at anchor in front of Hopefield, and that we are here."

This circumstantial explanation seemed to produce little effect on the backwoodsman. He made no reply. We walked towards the house, and, on stepping in, found a woman there, who scarcely looked at us, or seemed aware of our entrance. There was the same appearance of fixed grief upon her countenance that we had remarked in the man; only with the difference, that the expression was less morose and fierce, but on the other hand more mournful.

"Can we have something to eat?" said I to the woman.

"We don't keep a tavern," was the answer.

"The other party cannot be far off," said one of my companions. "We will give them a sign of our whereabout." And so saying, he passed out at the door and walked a few paces in the direction of a cotton field.

"Stop!" cried the backwoodsman, suddenly placing himself before him. "Not a step further shall you go, till you satisfy me who you are, and where from."

"Who and where from?" replied our comrade, a young doctor of medicine from Tennessee. "That is what neither you nor any other man shall know who asks after such a fashion. If I'm not mistaken we are in a free country." And as he spoke he fired off his rifle.

The report of the piece was echoed so magnificently from the deep forests which surrounded the plantation, that my other companions raised their guns to their shoulders with the intention of firing also. I made them a sign in time to prevent it. Although there could hardly be any real danger to be apprehended, it appeared to me advisable to hold ourselves prepared for whatever might happen. The next moment a shot was heard—the answer to our signal.

"Keep yourself quiet," said I to the backwoodsman; "our companions and their guide will soon be here. As to your cow, you can hardly have so little common sense as to suppose that five travellers would shoot a beast that must be perfectly useless to them."

As I left off speaking, there emerged from the forest our other detachment and the guide, the latter carrying two fat turkeys. He greeted the backwoodsman as an old acquaintance, but with a degree of sympathy and compassion in the tone of his salutation which contrasted strangely with his usual rough dry manner.

"Well, Mr Clarke," said he, "heard nothing yet? I'm sorry for it—very sorry."

The backwoodsman made no reply, but his rigid sturdy mien softened, and his eyes, as I thought, glistened with moisture.

"Mistress Clarke," said our guide to the woman, who was standing at the house-door, "these gentlemen here wish for a snack. They've plenty of every thing, if you'll be so good as to cook it."

The woman stood without making any reply: the man was equally silent. There was a sort of stubborn surly manner about them, which I had never before witnessed in backwoodspeople.

"Well," said the doctor, "we need expect nothing here. We are only losing time. Let us sit down on a tree-trunk, and eat our ham, and biscuits."

The guide made us a significant sign, and then stepping up to the woman, spoke to her in a low and urgent tone. She did not, however, utter a word.

"Mistress," said the doctor, "something must have happened to you or your family, to put you so out of sorts. We are strangers, but we are not without feeling. Tell us what is wrong. There may be means of helping you."

The man looked up; the woman shook her head.

"What is it that troubles you?" said I, approaching her. "Speak out. Help often comes when least expected."

The woman made me no answer, but stepped up to our guide, took a turkey and the ham from him, and went into the house. We followed, sat down at the table, and produced our bottles. The backwoodsman placed glasses before us. We pressed him to join us, but he obstinately declined our invitation, and we at last became weary of wasting good words on him. Our party consisted, as before mentioned, of ten persons: two bottles were soon emptied and we were beginning to get somewhat merry whilst talking over our morning's ramble, when our host suddenly got up from his seat in the chimney-corner, and approached the table.

"Gemmen," said he, "you mus'n't think me uncivil if I tell ye plainly, that I can have no noise made in my house. It aint a house to larf in— that it aint, by G—!" And having so spoken he resumed his seat, leant his head upon both hands, and relapsed into his previous state of gloomy reverie.

"We ask pardon," said we; "but really we had no idea that our cheerfulness could annoy you."

The man made no reply, and half an hour passed away in whisperings and conjectures. At the end of that time, a negro girl came in to spread the table for our meal.

After much entreaty, our host and hostess were prevailed on to sit down with us. The former took a glass of brandy, and emptied it at a draught. We filled it again, he drank it off, and it was again replenished. After the third glass, a deep sigh escaped him. The cordial had evidently revived him.

"Gemmen," said he, "you will have thought me rough and stubborn enough, when I met you as you had been huntin' my cow; but I see now who I have to do with. But may I be shot myself, if, whenever I find him, I don't send a bullet through his body; and I'll be warrant it shall hinder his stealin' any more children."

"Steal children!" repeated I. "Has one of your negroes been stolen?"

"One of my niggers, man! My son, my only son! Her child!" continued he pointing to his wife. "Our boy, the only one remaining to us out of five, whom the fever carried off before our eyes. As bold and smart a boy as any in the back woods! Here we set ourselves down in the wilderness, worked day and night, went through toil and danger, hunger and thirst, heat and cold. And for what? Here we are alone, deserted, childless; with nothin' left for us but to pray and cry, to curse and groan. No help; all in vain. I shall go out of my mind, I expect. If he were dead!—if he were lyin' under the hillock yonder beside his brothers, I would say nothing. He gave, and He has a right to take away! But, Almighty God!"—-And the man uttered a cry so frightful, so heartrending, that the knives and forks fell from our hands, and a number of negro women and children came rushing in to see what was the matter. We gazed at him in silence.

"God only knows," continued he, and his head sank upon his breast; then suddenly starting up, he drank off glass after glass of brandy, as fast as he could pour it out.

"And how and when did this horrible theft occur?" asked we.

"The woman can tell you about it," was the answer.

The woman had left the table, and now sat sobbing and weeping upon the bed. It was really a heartbreaking scene. The doctor got up, and led her to the table. We waited till she became more composed, anxiously expecting her account of this horrible calamity.

"It was four weeks yesterday," she began; "Mister Clarke was in the forest; I was in the fields, looking after the people, who were gathering in the maize. I had been there some time, and by the sun it was already pretty near eleven; but it was as fine a morning as ever was seen on the Mississippi, and the niggers don't work well if there's not somebody to look after them—so I remained. At last it was time to get the people's dinner ready, and I left the field. I don't know what it was, but I had scarcely turned towards the house, when it seemed as if somebody called to me to run as fast as I could; a sort of fear and uneasiness came over me, and I ran all the way to the house. When I got there I saw little Cesy, our black boy, sitting on the threshold, and playing all alone. I thought nothing of this, but went into the kitchen, without suspecting any thing wrong. As I was turning about amongst the pots and kettles, I thought suddenly of my Dougal. I threw down what I had in my hand, and ran to the door. Cesy came to meet me:" "Missi," said he, "Dougal is gone!"

"Dougal is gone!" cried I. "Where is he gone to, Cesy?"

"Don't know," said Cesy; "gone away with a man on horseback."

"With a man on horseback?" said I. "In God's name, where can he be gone to? What does all this mean, Cesy?"

"Don't know," said Cesy.

"And who was the man? Did he go willingly?"

"No! he didn't go willingly!" said Cesy: "but the man got off his horse, put Dougal upon it, and then jumped up behind him, and rode away."

"And you don't know the man?"

"No, missi!"

"Think again, Cesy," cried I; "for God's sake, remember. Don't you know the man?"

"No," said the child, "I don't know him."

"Didn't you see what he looked like? Was he black or white?"

"I don't know," said Cesy, crying; "he had a red flannel shirt over his face!"

"Was it neighbour Syms, or Banks, or Medling, or Barnes?"

"No!" whined Cesy.

"Gracious God!" cried I. "What is this? What is become of my poor child?" I ran backwards and forwards into the forest, through the fields. I called out. I looked every where. At last I ran to where the people were at work, and fetched Cesy's mother. I thought she would be able to make him tell something more about my child. She ran to the house with me, promised him cakes, new clothes, every thing in the world; but he could tell nothing more than he had already told me. At last Mister Clarke came.

Here the woman paused, and looked at her husband.

"When I came home," continued the latter, "the woman was nearly distracted; and I saw directly that some great misfortune had happened. But I should never have guessed what it really was. When she told me, I said, to comfort her, that one of the neighbours must have taken the child away, though I didn't think it myself; for none of the neighbours would have allowed themselves such a freedom with my only child. I shouldn't have thanked 'em for it, I can tell you. I called Cesy, and asked him again what the man was like; if he had a blue or a black coat? He said it was blue. 'What sort of horse?' 'A brown one.' 'What road he had taken?' 'That road!' answered the boy, pointing to the swamp. I sent all my niggers, men, women, and children, round to the neighbours, to seek for the child, and tell them what had happened. I myself followed the path that the robber had taken, and found hoof-prints upon it. I tracked them to the creek, but there I lost the trail. The man must have got into a boat, with his horse and the child, had perhaps crossed the Mississippi, or perhaps gone down the stream. Who could tell where he would land! It might be ten, twenty, fifty, or a hundred miles lower down. I was terribly frightened, and I rode on the Hopefield. There nothing had been seen or heard of my child; but all the men got on their horses to help me to find him. The neighbours came also, and we sought about for a whole day and night. No trace or track was to be found. Nobody had seen either the child or the man who had carried him off. We beat the woods for thirty miles round my house, crossed the Mississippi, went up as far as Memphis, and down to Helena and the Yazoo river; nothing was to be seen or heard. We came back as we went out, empty-handed and discouraged. When I got home, I found the whole county assembled at my house. Again we set out; again we searched the forest through; every hollow tree, every bush and thicket, was looked into. Of bears, stags, and panthers there were plenty, but no signs of my boy. On the sixth day I came home again; but my home was become hateful to me— every thing vexed and disgusted me. My clothes and skin were torn off by the thorns and briers, my very bones ached; but I didn't feel it. It was nothing to what I suffered in my mind."

On the second day after my return, I was lying heart and body sick in bed, when one of the neighbours came in, and told me that he had just seen, at Hopefield, a man from Muller county, who told him that a stranger had been seen on the road to New Madrid, whose description answered to that which Cesy had given of the child-stealer. It was a man with a blue coat and a brown horse, and a child upon his saddle. I forgot my sickness and my sore bones, bought a new horse—for I had ridden mine nearly to death—and set out directly, rode day and night, three hundred miles, to New Madrid, and when I arrived there, sure enough I found the man who had been described to me, and a child with him. But it was not my child! The man belonged to New Madrid, and had been on a journey with his son into Muller county.

I don't know how I got home again. Some people found me near Hopefield, and brought me to my house. I had fever, and was raving for ten days; and during that time the neighbours advertised the thing in all the papers in Tennessee, Arkansas, Mississippi, and Louisiana. We had ridden altogether thousands of miles, but it was no use. "No!" continued he, with a deep groan; "if my child had died of the fever, if he had fallen in with a bear or panther, and been killed, it would be bitter, bitter sorrow—he was my last child. But, merciful God—stolen! My son, my poor child, stolen!"

And the man cried aloud, sprang from his seat, and wrung his hands and wept like an infant. Even his wife had not shown such utter agony of grief.

"When I go to work," continued he after a pause, "my little Dougal seems to stand before me, and my hands fall by my sides, as stiff and heavy as though they were lead. I look round, but no Dougal is there. When I go to bed, I put his bed beside mine, and call him, but no one answers. Sleeping or waking, my poor boy is always before me. Would to God I were dead! I have cursed and sworn, prayed and supplicated, wept and groaned, but all—all in vain!"

I have seen many persons suffering from distress of mind, but never did I meet with one whose sorrow was so violent and overpowering as that of this backwoodsman. We did our utmost to console him, and to inspire him with new hope, but he was inconsolable; his eyes were fixed, he had fallen into a sort of apathy, and I doubt if he even heard what was said to him. We ourselves were so affected that our words seemed almost to choke us. Time pressed, however; it was impossible for us to remain any longer, nor could we have done any good by so doing. We shook the unfortunate couple by the hand, promised to do all in our power to learn something of their child's fate, and took our departure.

It was six weeks after the time above referred to, that I found myself compelled by business to make a journey to Natchez. I had often thought of poor Clarke's misfortune, and, in conjunction with my friends, had done all in my power to discover the villain who had robbed him of his child. Hitherto all our endeavours had been fruitless. The facts were circulated in every newspaper, were matter of conversation at every teatable in the country; rewards were offered, researches made, but not the smallest trace of the boy or his stealer was to be found.

It was a bright January afternoon when I landed at Natchez. In company with some acquaintances, I was ascending the little hill between the lower and upper town, when we heard an unusual noise and bustle; and on reaching the summit, we saw a crowd assembled before the door of Justice Bonner's house. Upon going to see what was the matter, we found that the mob consisted of the better class of people in Natchez, both women and men, but especially the former. Every face wore an expression of interest and anxiety; and upon making enquiry, we learned that the child-stealer had been at length discovered—or rather, that a man had been taken up on strong suspicion of his having stolen Mr Clarke's son, of Hampstead county. I was heartily rejoiced at the news and endeavoured to press forward through the throng, in hopes of hearing some particulars; but the crowd was so dense that it was impossible to get through. I stood there for nearly two hours, the concourse all the while increasing, none stirring from the places they occupied, while every adjacent window was filled with eager, anxious faces.

At last the door opened, and the prisoner, guarded by two constables, and followed by the sheriff, came out of the house, and took the direction of the town prison. "That is he!" whispered the women to one another, with pale faces and trembling voices, clasping their children tighter, as though fearful they would be snatched from them. The countenance of the culprit was the most repulsive I had ever seen—a mixture of brutal obstinacy and low cunning, with a sort of sneering, grinning, expression. His small green-grey eyes were fixed upon the ground; but as he passed through the lane opened by the crowd, he from time to time partially raised them, and threw sidelong and malicious glances at the bystanders. He was rather above the middle height, his complexion of a dirty greyish colour, his cheeks hollow, his lips remarkably thick and coarse, his whole appearance in the highest degree wild and disgusting. His dress consisted of an old worn-out blue frock, trousers of the same colour, a high-crowned shabby hat, and tattered shoes. The impression which his appearance made might be read in the pale faces of the spectators. They gazed after him with a sort of hopeless look as he walked away. "If that is the man who stole the child," murmured several, "there is no hope. The boy is lost!" I extricated myself from the throng, and hastened to Justice Bonner, with whom I was acquainted, and who gave me the following particulars.

About four weeks after our excursion in the neighbourhood of Hopefield, Clarke had received a letter, signed Thomas Tully, and stamped with the Natchez postmark. The contents were to the effect that his child was still living, that the writer of the letter knew where he was, and that, if Mr Clarke would enclose a fifty-dollar bank-note in his answer, he should receive further information. On receipt of the said sum, the writer said he would indicate a place to which Mrs Clarke might repair, unaccompanied, and there, upon payment of two hundred dollars more, the child should be delivered up.

Upon receiving this letter, the unfortunate father consulted with his friends and neighbours; and, by their advice, he wrote immediately to the postmaster at Natchez, informing him of the circumstances, and requesting that the person who applied for his answer might be detained. Four days afterwards, a man came to the window of the post-office, and enquired if there was any letter to the address of Thomas Tully. The postmaster pretended to be searching for the letter amongst a pile of others, and meanwhile a constable, who was in attendance, went round and captured the applicant. Upon the examination of the letter, it appeared that he was an Irishman, who had some time previously been hanging about Natchez, and had endeavoured to establish a school there. As he, however, had been unable to give any satisfactory account of himself, of where he came from, or what he had been doing up to that time, and as his manner and appearance were moreover in the highest degree suspicious and repulsive, he had not succeeded in his plan, and the few parents who sent their children to him had speedily withdrawn them. He was known at Natchez by the name of Thomas Tully, nor did he now deny that that was his name, or that he had sent the letter, which was written in a practised schoolmasterlike hand. It was further elicited that he was perfectly acquainted with the paths and roads between Natchez and Hopefield, and in the neighbourhood of those two places, as well as with the swamps, creeks, and rivers there adjacent. He was fully committed, till such time as the father of the stolen child should be made acquainted with the result of the examination.

In five days Clarke arrived with the negro boy Caesar. The whole town showed the greatest sympathy with the poor man's misfortune, the lawyers offered him their services free of charge, and a second examination of the prisoner took place. Every thing possible was done to induce the latter to confess what had become of the child; but to all questions he opposed an obstinate silence. The negro boy did not recognize him. At last he declared that he knew nothing of the stolen child, and that he had only written the letter in the hope of extorting money from the father. Hardly, however, had this been written down, when he turned to Clarke, with an infernal grin upon his countenance, and said, "You have persecuted and hunted me like a wild beast, but I will make you yet more wretched than you are able to make me." He then proceeded to inform him of a certain place where he would find his child's clothes.

Clarke immediately set out with a constable to the indicated spot, found the clothes, as he had been told he would do, and returned to Natchez. The accused was again put at the bar, and said, after frequently contradicting himself, that the child was still alive, but that, if they kept him longer in prison, it would inevitably die of hunger. Nothing could persuade him to say where the boy was, or to give one syllable of further explanation.

Meantime the quarter-sessions commenced, and the prisoner was brought up for trial. An immense concourse of persons had assembled to witness the proceedings in this remarkable case. Every thing was done to induce the accused to confess, but all in vain. Promises of free pardon, and even of reward, were made to him, if he told where the child was; but the man maintained an obstinate silence. He at last again changed his story, retracted his previous declaration as to his knowledge of where the boy was, said he had found the clothes, which he had recognised by the descriptions that had been every where advertised, and that it was that which had put it into his head to write to the father, in hopes of making his profit by so doing. In the absence of witnesses, although there was strong suspicion, there could be no proof of his having committed the crime in question. In America, circumstantial evidence is always received with extreme caution and reluctance; and even the fact of the child's clothes having been found in the place the prisoner had pointed out, was insufficient to induce the jury to find the latter guilty of the capital charge brought against him. Many of the lawyers, indeed, were of opinion, that the man's last story was true, that he had found the clothes, and, being a desperate character and in needy circumstances, had written the letter for purposes of extortion. Of this offence only was he found guilty, and condemned, as a vagrant and impostor, to a few months' imprisonment. By the American laws no severer punishment could be awarded. The one, however, was far from satisfying the public. There was something so infernal in the malignant sneer of the culprit, in the joy with which he contemplated the sufferings of the bereaved father, and the anxiety of the numerous friends of the latter, that a shudder of horror and disgust had frequently run through the court during the trial. Even the coolest and most practised lawyers had not been free from this emotion, and they declared that they had never witnessed such obduracy.

The inhabitants of Natchez, especially of the upper town, are, generally speaking, a highly intelligent and respectable class of people; but upon this occasion they lost all patience and self-control, and proceeded to an extreme measure, which only the peculiar circumstances of the case could in any degree justify. Without previous notice, they assembled in large numbers upon the night of the 31st of January, with a firm determination to correct for once the mildness of the laws, and to take the punishment o the criminal into their own hands. They opened the prison, brought out the culprit, and after tying him up, a number of stout negroes proceeded to flog him severely with whips of bullock's hide.

For a long time the man bore his punishment with extraordinary fortitude, and remained obstinately silent when questions were put to him concerning the stolen child. At last, however, he could bear the pain no longer, and promised a full confession. He named a house on the banks of the Mississippi, some fifty miles from Natchez, the owner of which, he said, knew where the child was to be found.

The sheriff had, of course, not been present at these Lynch-law proceedings, of which he was not aware till they were over, but of which he probably in secret did not entirely disapprove. No sooner, however, was he told of the confession that had been extorted from the prisoner, than he set off at once in the middle of the night, accompanied by Clarke, for the house that had been pointed out. They arrived there at noon on the following day, and found it inhabited by a respectable family, who had heard of the child having been stolen, but, beyond that, knew nothing of the matter. The mere suspicion of participation in such a crime, seemed in the highest degree painful and offensive to them. It was soon made evident that the prisoner had invented the story, in order to procure a cessation of his punishment of the previous night.

The fatigues and constant disappointments that poor Clarke had endured, had worn him out, and at last again stretched him on a bed of sickness. His life was for a long time despaired of, but he finally recovered, and shortly afterwards the term of imprisonment to which the child-stealer (for such the public persisted in considering Tully) had been condemned, expired. There was no pretext for detaining him, and he was set at liberty. Clarke was advised to endeavour to obtain from him, by money and good treatment, some information concerning the child. Both father and mother threw themselves at the man's feet, implored him to name his own reward, but to tell them what had become of their son.

"You have flogged and imprisoned me," replied the man, with one of his malicious grins; "you would have hung me if you could; you have done all in your power to make me miserable. It is now my turn."

And he obstinately refused to say a word on the subject of the lost child. He left town, accompanied by Clarke, who clung to him like his shadow, in the constant hope that he would at last make a revelation They crossed the Mississippi together, and on arriving behind Concordia, the bereaved father once more besought Tully to tell him what had become of his son, swearing that, if he did not do so, he would dog him day and night, but that he should never escape alive out of his hands. The man asked how long he would give him. "Six-and-thirty hours" was the reply Tully walked on for some time beside Clarke and his wife, apparently deep in thought. On a sudden he sprang upon the backwoodsman, snatched a pistol from his belt, and fired it at his head. The weapon missed fire. Tully saw that his murderous attempt had failed, and apprehensive doubtless of the punishment that it would entail, he leaped, without an instant's hesitation, into the deepest part of a creek by which they were walking. He sank immediately, the water closed over his head, and he did not once reappear. His body was found a couple of hours afterwards, but no trace was ever discovered of the Stolen Child.[1]

[1] Various particulars of the above incident may be found in the Mississippi newspapers, of the years 1825-6.



M. GIRARDIN.

A word, before we speak of the lectures of M. Saint-Marc Girardin, on a topic which stands at the threshold of dramatic criticism. What is the nature of that imitation of life at which the drama aims, and of that illusion which it creates?

Before the time of Dr Johnson, the learned world were accustomed to insist upon the observance of the unities, on the ground that they were necessary to uphold the illusion of the theatre. The doctor, in his preface to Shakspeare, demolished this argument, by showing that the illusion they were declared so necessary to support, does not, in fact, exist. No man really believes that the stage before him is Rome, or that he is a contemporary of the Caesars. To insist, therefore, upon the unities of time and place, is to sacrifice to a grave make-belief the nobler ends of the drama—the development of character and passion. "The objection," says Dr Johnson, "arising from the impossibility of passing the first hour at Alexandria, and the next at Rome, supposes that, when the play opens, the spectator really imagines himself at Alexandria, and believes that his walk to the theatre has been a voyage to Egypt, and that he lives in the days of Antony and Cleopatra. Surely he that imagines this may imagine more. He that can take the stage at one time for the palace of the Ptolemies, may take it in half an hour for the promontory of Actium."

If the delusion of the theatre, we will add, should, at certain moments, reach such a point that we may be said to believe ourselves transported to the place represented on the stage, this, not being a continuous delusion, cannot be disturbed by the mere changing of the scene; it will not the less take place at the promontory of Actium, because we had felt it, five minutes before, in the city of Alexandria.

Since the appearance of the celebrated preface to Shakspeare, it has been the habit of critics to speak, not of a delusion, but of an imitation, which is felt to be an imitation, and which pleases us in great part by this perceived resemblance to an original. "It will be asked," continues Dr Johnson, "how the drama moves, if it is not credited? It is credited with all the credit due to a drama. It is credited wherever it moves, as a just picture of a real original—as representing to the auditor what he would himself feel if he were to do or suffer what is there feigned to be suffered or to be done. The reflection that strikes the heart is not that the evils before us are real evils, but that they are evils to which we ourselves may be exposed."[1] * * * The delight of tragedy proceeds from our consciousness of fiction; if we thought murders and treasons real, they would please no more. Imitations produce pain or pleasure, not because they are mistaken for realities, but because they bring realities to mind.

[1] Cours de Litterature Dramatique; ou de l'Usage des Passions dans le Drame. Par M. SAINT-MARC GIRARDIN, Professeur a la Faculte des Lettres de Paris, &c. &c.

This appears to us a very indifferent account of the matter. In the far greater number of instances, we can never have formed any conception of an original of which the actor and the scene are supposed to present us a picture. Who that witnesses the play of Venice Preserved, has formed any other image of Jaffier or Pierre than what the actors are presenting to him, or may already, on some previous occasion, have presented to him? Even when the characters are strictly historical, the imagination is little better provided. The spectator does not refer to any faint conception in his own mind of a Brutus, or a Mark Antony, and then derive his pleasure from watching how closely the mimic representation imitates the original. Very often the scene must present something entirely new to the imagination, and yet the pleasure is not diminished on this account. A simple man, who has never seen the interior of a palace, never looked on royalty, never beheld even a veritable courtier, feels no embarrassment when he is suddenly called to witness the pomps and miseries of "imperial tragedy."

The imitation of the drama is not that of any specific original; it is a mimic scene, having human nature for its type. It has a life of its own, constructed from the materials which the records and observations of real life have supplied. In order to move us, it needs no reference to any recognised original. It is there in virtue of the vesture of humanity in which it is clothed, and makes its appeal at once and directly.

It is usual to speak of all the fine arts as imitative arts. The term is not always applicable, and, when most applicable, requires explanation. What does the poetry of sentiment imitate? What does a song imitate? How can the term be applied to all that class of poetry where the writer pours out his own reflections and feelings? The poetry of Wordsworth or of Burns can no more be said to be imitative, than the conversation of the same men, when, in their hours of intimate intercourse, the one may have given expression to his philanthropy, and the other to his friendship. But where the term is most applicable, it requires to be used guardedly. Even in painting and sculpture, the artist does not imitate the object in its totality—does not strive to make an approximation to a fac-simile—but he selects certain qualities of the object for his imitation. The painter confines himself to colour and outline; the sculptor abstracts the form, and give it us in the marble.

Accordingly, when we stand before a statue, we do not think of a man, and then of the statue as the imitation of this original; but the statue is itself clothed with some of the qualities of the human being, which give to the cold marble that half-life which we feel the moment we look upon it. In the same manner, when the dramatist puts his characters on the stage, they are not imitations of any definite originals, but they are invested with certain accidents and attributes of humanity, which give them at once the interest we feel in them, and set them living and moving in their own mimic world.

And this mimic world is capable of creating an illusion—not such as Dr Johnson combated—but of a kind he does not appear to have taken into account. The doctor is triumphant when he denies the existence of that theatrical delusion presupposed as a ground for the unities. We do not, as soon as the curtain rises, believe ourselves transported to Rome, nor do we take the actor upon his word, and believe him to be Caesar the moment he proclaims his imperial dignity. The illusion of the theatre springs directly from the passion with which we are infected, not from the outward pomp and circumstance of the stage. These, even on the most ignorant of spectators, produce barely the sentiment of wonder and surprise, never a belief in their reality. The real illusion of the drama begins, so to speak, not at the beginning, but at the end; it is the last result, the result of the last vivid word which sprung from the lips of the actor; and it diffuses a momentary reality over all that stage apparatus, animate and inanimate, which was there only as a preparation for that vivid word of the poet.

When the curtain rises, we see very plainly—quite unmistakeably—the boarded stage before us. It may fill with men and women most gorgeously attired, and these may proceed to declare their rank and condition, and the peculiar dangers which environ them, and still there is nothing better before us than the boarded stage and the talking actor. But, by and by, the word of passion is uttered, and the heart beats, and the wooden stage is seen no more, and the actor is forgotten in his griefs or his anger, and the fictitious position is a real life, and the pomp and circumstance of the scene, if not believed in, are no longer questioned. We are not perhaps at Rome, nor is that Mark Antony—for we never knew Mark Antony to recognise him—but this mimic world has assumed an independent life and reality of its own. When, indeed, the passion subsides, and the eloquence of the poet is mute, things revert to their matter-of-fact condition, the actor is again there, and the boards of the stage again become visible.

To the passage we last quoted from Dr Johnson, some other objections suggest themselves; but, as we have not quoted it in a polemical spirit, but merely to illustrate our own position, we have no wish to enter upon them. One remark only we will make, and that because it admits of a general application. Dr Johnson describes the sympathy we feel at the theatre, as the result of a reference to what our own personal feelings would be in the situation we see represented on the stage. The auditor represents to himself "what he would himself feel, if he were to do or suffer what is there feigned to be suffered or to be done. The reflection that strikes the heart is not, that the evils before us are real evils, but that they are evils to which we ourselves may be exposed." We do not think that, in order to sympathize with what takes place on the stage, or in real life, there is any necessity for this circuitous proceeding. We do not detect in ourselves this constant reference to our own personality, and, least of all, in those moments when we are most moved. It is enough that there be a vivid conception of any passion, for this passion to become for a moment our own. If this reference to our probable feelings, in such or such a position, were necessary, how is it that we men sympathize so promptly and so keenly in the distresses of the heroine? We certainly do not, for instance, set to work to imagine ourselves women and mothers—which would be a difficult exercise of the imagination—before we feel the grief of Constance for the loss of her child. In short, we at once assume to ourselves the passions of another; we do not wait, as it were, to try them on; to make experiment how we, with all our dispositions, natural and acquired, should feel in the supposed predicament.

It is far from our intention to give a full and methodical account of the lectures of M. Saint-Marc Girardin, the perusal of which led us to a reconsideration of some of our critical principles. They are far above mediocrity, distinguished by strong sense and vivid expression. Their principal feature is the just and animated protest they contain against the literary taste of the present day in France; a taste for the perverted, the horrible, the monstrous; a taste that welcomes Victor Hugo with outstretched arms, and retains but a frigid recollection of Racine. With this literary taste is intimately connected an unhealthy and feverish condition of the moral sentiments, against which the lecturer directs his most eloquent attacks; so that his book may be commended for its sound ethical as well as critical instruction. The circumstance that the lectures were delivered before the University of Paris, renders this strain of remark still more appropriate and useful.

Such a strain of remark, based as it is upon general principles, cannot be useless in our own country; although we do not suspect that the same perverted taste which meets its reproof in these lectures is common amongst us. Were we called upon to describe the malady under which our countrymen labour in respect to literary taste, we should describe it as a state of torpor and lethargy, rather than of virulent disease. It is indifference, more than any morbid taste, which an imaginative work would have to struggle against in this country. There is little necessity here to guard the public against any species of literary enthusiasm; certain writers of very dubious merit may be extensively read, but they are not esteemed. It is only necessary to listen to the conversation that goes on around us, to be convinced that the extensive circulation of a book has ceased to be a decisive proof even of its popularity. We seem too idle, or too busy, to give attention to a thoughtful literature which is not at the same time professional—and we have too much good sense amongst us to admire the sort of clever trash we are contented to read and to talk about. For something in leisure hours must be read. A book must be had, if only as a companion for the sofa, if only to place in the hand, as we place the ottoman under our feet, to steady and complete our repose.

We will at once introduce a striking quotation from the author before us, which has immediate reference to the Lucrece Borgia of Victor Hugo. To those who have not read the play it is only necessary to observe, in order to understand what follows, that Victor Hugo, with that violent effort after a moral novelty which distinguishes him, has chosen to represent the infamous Lucretia Borgia as under the influence of maternal love, while in all other respects she fully sustains her odious and infernal reputation.

The author wished, he tells us in his preface, to retrieve the moral deformity of Lucretia Borgia by the beauty of the maternal sentiment; he wished, according to his own energetic expression, 'to place the mother in the monster.' Here let us make a distinction. I admire the tenderness which the most ferocious animals have for their offspring, and when the dying lioness covers her young with her wounded and bleeding body, I admire and am moved. But a woman who is a mother ought, in her tenderness to her children, to have more intelligence, more of elevation of thought, than the lioness. Instinct is not enough; there must be a sentiment, a sentiment which does not exclude, but perfects and purifies the instinct. Thus, when in Florence, a mother cast herself in desperation before the lion who had taken her child, and the lion, astonished at her despair, or perhaps comprehending it, replaced the infant at her feet, it was instinct which impelled the mother, and it was probably instinct in the lion which responded to her. But good instincts, whatever admirable actions they may occasionally produce, are but the germ and commencement of human virtues; they are indeed radically distinguished from human virtue by this, that, of themselves, however strong, they are sterile: a good instinct dwells by the side of a bad without effort to reform or to purify it, and equally without danger of being itself perverted. One virtue only in a vicious character might convert it entirely to virtue, as one vice only in a virtuous might lead it to utter depravation. But an instinct, however good, supports without disquietude the neighbourhood of evil, and it is thus that, in Lucretia Borgia, the mother and the monster are placed side by side, without affecting, without combating each other. Now there is nothing less natural, and nothing less dramatic than this mutual toleration. Characters wherein good and evil are mixed together, are dramatic, only because the conflict of opposite sentiments which takes place in the mind, is brought before the view of the spectator. But where, in Lucretia, is the struggle between good and evil? At what moment does the maternal virtue enlighten and purify this soul lost in darkness? When does this transfiguration take place, so marvellous and yet so natural? * * *

It is singular, and marks the change which has taken place in our moral notions. Formerly poets gave to their personages one only vice or passion, taking care in other respects to render them virtuous, in order that they should be worthy of interest; at the present day, our poets give their personages I know not how many passions and vices, with one only virtue as a counterpoise. And this virtue, weak and solitary, is by no means charged with the task of purifying the corrupted mind in which it has by chance been preserved. It carefully respects the independence of those vices which permit it to dwell with them. Neither is it commissioned to inspire an interest in the spectator; because it is vice which now inspires all our interest, thanks to a certain noble and proud bearing which has been assigned to it, and which has been imitated from the heroes of Lord Byron.

M. Girardin, it will have been remarked from the above extract, is disposed to reproach our Lord Byron as the source from which some of his countrymen have drawn their dark inspiration. This may be true. But without defending our Byron from charges to which he is manifestly exposed, let us say thus much for him, that in his poetry he was still too much a classic not to be a worshipper of the beautiful; that he did not court for itself the monstrous, the ugly; his mind did not willingly associate with what was revolting in outward form or human passion. If there was any thing Satanic, as some were pleased to express it, in his poetry, he was not, at all events, of the hobgoblin or demoniac school. It was the Satan of Milton, with its ruined beauty and clouded dignity, that had taken possession of his imagination. He delighted to depict the pride, the love, the generosity, of hearts at war with man, and not on too good terms with heaven; but still it was their pride, their love, their generosity, that occupied his imagination. They are bad men; he takes care to tell us so himself; but he has not the heart to make them act otherwise than as noble fellows while they are under his guidance. The Corsair, from his very name and profession, is a declared criminal; but this once said, the poet occupies himself and his reader with nothing but what is generous and heroic in Conrad. Byron had no disposition, had a certain antipathy, to paint the virtuous man; but it was a virtue, nevertheless, that attracted his pencil. He felt it necessary, as a preliminary condition, to remove his hero from the category of good men; but this being fairly done, he resigned himself to the natural bent for what is good and great. A Borgia, whether male or female, in all its native deformity, was not the subject to allure him.

Nowhere is the rebuke of M. Girardin of certain of his contemporaries, more dignified, or more justly merited, than where, discoursing on the manner in which the moderns have delineated paternal love, he reproves that exaggeration and falsification which has represented the father describing the affection he bears to his daughter in a style of language devoted to another species of love. Nothing can be more odious and offensive than to transgress, even in language, the bounds between the two affections, and to put into the mouth of a parent, as Victor Hugo and Balzac have done, a style appropriate to the lover speaking of his mistress. But we will not quote these passages from M. Girardin, because they will require long quotations in order to justify the censure contained in them. At the close of the lecture upon paternal love, we find the following general remarks on the composition of a modern French drama; and the slightest acquaintance with this drama will enable the reader to appreciate their justice and analytic accuracy:—

Formerly a dramatic character was an assemblage of qualities good and bad, which, on the one hand, were in conflict amongst themselves, and, on the other, were subjected to some superior law of religion, of honour, or of patriotism. This twofold struggle constituted the interest of the person brought upon the scene, and this superior law, which he strove to accomplish, constituted the morality of his character. According to the incidents of the piece, each passion might take the ascendant, none being represented as irresistible; and the moral law which predominated over the drama, did not prevent this play of the passions—it being visibly suspended during the whole piece over the heads of the personages, and receiving its fulfilment only at the close. In the present day dramatic characters are composed differently. Instead of representing the whole of the character, and the struggle between its good and evil passions, one only passion is selected, which is made violent, irresistible, fatal, the absolute mistress of all the others; that is to say, a part is taken instead of the whole. At the same time the moral law which, in the ancient drama, (i.e. the drama of Racine and Corneille,) sustained also a struggle against the passions—this law which those even avowed who transgressed it, which had always its place in the piece, whether through virtue or remorse—this law also disappears before the ascendency of the sovereign passion. No counterpoise of any kind, whether on the side of rival passions or on the side of duty. What remains, then, to struggle against this arbitrary passion? Nothing but chance—circumstance—the hazard of events. And thus it is that, in the modern drama, the interest resides rather in the strange complication of events than in the shock of opposite passions. The poet has only the power of chance, a power sovereignly capricious, to contend against the passion he has chosen to represent. And thus it is that the modern drama has something also of arbitrary and fantastic. Incidents and theatrical effects are accumulated, but the incidents do not spring from the natural movement of the passions brought upon the stage; they have no longer their cause in the characters of the drama; they issue from the fancy of the poet, who, feeling the necessity of arousing his spectators from time to time, complicates the action after a strange fashion, and aims always at surprise.

M. Girardin has a lecture upon suicides, in which he attacks that sentimentality—a mixture, in reality, of weakness and impatience—which in modern literature, and in modern life, often conducts to suicide. The following passage will be acknowledged to be eloquent, and even poetic, unless our translation of it shall have entirely obscured its beauty. After having described the proud and philosophical suicides of ancient Rome, he adds:—

There is another species of suicide more in credit in our days, which is rather occasioned by the weakness and impatience of men than by the violence of their passions, or the eccentricity of their philosophies. This species of suicide is so much the peculiar malady of our times, that we are tempted to think that men are now for the first time infected by it. But no; there exists a literature which has already expressed this our state of restlessness and disquietude, which has described men consuming with melancholy in the midst of riotous joys, and seeking suicide rather as the natural termination of their career than the remedy of their evils. It is the literature of the fathers of the church.

I find amongst the homilies of St Chrysostom a certain Stagyra who was possessed by a demon. To be possessed by a demon is certainly not a malady of our times; but yet we do not wander from our theme. For the demon of Stagyra—it is melancholy, despondency, or, in the much more powerful expression of the Greek, it is athumia—exhaustion of all energy, all vitality of the soul. This is the demon of Stagyra. He is one of those sick and agitated souls who think they belong to the selected portion of mankind, because they want the energy of the vulgar; who contrive for themselves pleasures and afflictions apart from the rest of the world, and who (last trait of weakness and impatience) at once despise and envy the simplicity and the calm of those whom they call little souls. Stagyra, in order to deliver his spirit from its disquietudes, had entered into a monastery; but neither there did he find the peace and lightness of heart which he craved; for man finds at first, in solitude, that only which he brings to it. Stagyra complains to the saint—and the complaint is curious, for it indicates the knowledge of a cure for the evils which torment him, and shows that Stagyra, like many other patients, had neither resolution to support his disease, nor to accept its remedy. 'You complain,' says St Chrysostom, 'that while you, with all your fasts, and vigils, and monastic austerities, have failed to appease your disquietudes, others who, like yourself, had been tormented by the demon of melancholy, while living in the midst of idle pleasures and luxurious indulgence, have found a remedy in marriage, and felt themselves cured the moment they became fathers.' A sentence this full of sound instruction. It is not, then, because life is devoid of pleasure, that men are the prey of melancholy. That demon pierced, it is true, like a gnawing worm, through all the luxuries of the Roman world; there was no resource against it, either in beautiful slaves, or Ionian dances, or magnificent repasts, or the combats of gladiators, or Milesian tales, or the voluptuous pictures which garnish the walls of Pompeii and Herculaneum. Athumia poisoned all, and the demon possessed the voluptuary in the midst even of the debauch. But if, fatigued with these alternate pleasures and disgusts, he adopted regular and simple manners, married and had had children, then, as if by enchantment the demon quitted him. No more despondency, no more bitterness. The spirit of the possessed was revived, refreshed, renewed by the caresses of his children. There is no demon, not even the demon of melancholy, which dares to encounter the presence of a little child. There is in the innocent fresh breathing of these creatures, something mortal to evil spirits, and a cradled infant in the house is sure talisman against all demoniac possession.

What is it, in fact, which man requires, in order to escape from this athumia, this exhaustion of the heart? Hope—a future. He must have a faith in the future. This is the nourishment of his soul; without it he cannot live, he despairs and dies. Well, the very charm of children, that which has ranked them, from of old, amongst the blessings of God, is this, that they form the future of every family— that they sustain in every house that sentiment by which the soul of man lives. Children represent the future, and in a form the most joyous and attractive. It is this which constitutes their irresistible fascination—it is this which sheds around their little heads that light of happiness and joy which reflects itself on the countenances of the parents—which warms the heart—which gives to the poor the force to labour, and to the miserable the force to live. Blessed be infancy, which chases the demon!—Blessed be infancy, which keeps alive in each family the sentiment of hope, indispensable to run as the air and the light!

Amongst the faults of his contemporaries, M. Girardin remarks a disposition to materialize the expression of passion, depicting it constantly by violent physical distortions; and also, a tendency to carry that expression to the extremity of rage, where, as he finely observes, all distinction between the various passions is lost, and man deserts his rational nature.

According to the ancient classic imagination, when passion becomes excessive, the man disappears; and this, he adds, is the foundation of what we call the philosophy of the Metamorphoses of Ovid.

In the course of this censure he makes use of a common-place expression, which, we think, includes a common-place error, and therefore we pause for a moment to take notice of it. "It is the pretension of modern art," he tells us, "to say all. What then is left to the imagination of the public? It is often well to trust to the spectator to complete the idea of the poet or the statuary."

This is a mode of expression frequently made use of. Even Lessing has sanctioned it, when in his Laocoon, he speaks of "the highest expression leaving nothing to the imagination."

The leaving something to the imagination can mean this only, that the expression of the artist is suggestive, and kindles thought, and in fact conveys more than is found in its literal interpretation. Now, whatever is highest in art, and especially in poetry, is pre-eminently suggestive; and the highest expression does in fact leave most, or, in other words, suggest most, to the imagination. M. Girardin, in common with many others, speaks of this suggestive quality, the characteristic of the highest form of art, as if it were the result of a voluntary surrender of something by the poet to the reader, as if it were an act of moderation on his part. Surely the poet does not proceed on the principle of saying half, and permitting us to say the other half—out of compliment, perhaps, to our understanding, and as a little bribe to our vanity. The more vivid and powerful his expressions, the more must he leave, or rather the more must he give, indirectly as well as directly, to the imagination of the reader. He will sometimes even bestow what he himself never possessed. The great poet, in pouring out his feelings, must always give something less and something more than was in him at the time.

It has been the fashion to illustrate the principle of leaving something to the imagination, by the ancient picture of the sacrifice of Iphigenia, where we are told that Agamemnon, the father, was painted hiding his face in his robe. The expression of grief and horror had been given in the countenance of the other bystanders, and it was left to the imagination to divine what passion would have been seen depicted on the face of Agamemnon if that robe had been torn aside. Lessing, and after him M. Girardin, have indeed given a different account of the intention of the painter. The Greek artist, say they, sedulously avoided that distortion of features through excessive grief, which was incompatible with beauty of form. They would tone down the expression, as Lessing argues that the sculptor did in the features of Laocoon, until it became consistent with the lines of beauty. Timanthes, therefore, finding that, in order to render with fidelity the expression of Agamemnon, he must admit such a distortion of the features as would violate the rule, chose rather to veil the countenance. But we would suggest that something else must have weighed with the artist; for if it was an acknowledged principle of Greek art rather to sacrifice a portion of the passion, so to speak, than to admit a distortion of the features, why should Timanthes have felt any scruple, in this instance, in modifying the expression of the father's countenance in obedience to a known rule of art? Why should he have thought himself obliged to resort to the expedient of concealing the face?

We make bold to adopt neither one account nor the other. We neither believe that Timanthes concealed the expression of the father's face upon some principle of "leaving it to the imagination of the reader," nor that he acted in obedience to the rule of art which Lessing lays down with so much ingenuity. We are persuaded that Timanthes painted Agamemnon in the attitude he did, simply because it was the most natural—because it was, in fact, the only attitude in which it was possible to conceive a father present at the sacrifice of his own daughter. Other spectators might have looked on with different degrees of grief or horror, but we feel that the father could not look; he must veil his head. This natural attitude, bespeaking the grief it only seemed to hide, was no doubt highly expressive.

And in this point of view, it may afford no bad illustration of that suggestive language of poetry, which sometimes throws the veil, not to conceal the passion, or to leave it to another imagination to discover, but as the best means of betraying it.

We repeat that we do not profess to give any thing approaching to an analytical review of the lectures of M. Girardin; the illustrations, being taken from the poetry of another nation, would often require a length of explanatory detail quite inconsistent with our limits. We persist, therefore, in regarding them in the one point of view already indicated-namely, as a protest against certain vitiated tastes and deleterious sentiments which prevail at the present day.

We again revert, therefore, to the lecture upon suicide, for the sake of a remark that we find there upon Werther, and on its celebrated author. It is rarely that we hear any one speak out so plainly upon Goethe. After speaking of the "moral vitality" which supports the fatigues and inures us to the self-denials of life, he says:—

There are characters, on the contrary, who we perceive, at first sight, are predestined to die. Ardent and enthusiastic, wanting force and patience—life is evidently not made for them. Such is Werther. Goethe had not created him to live, and he knew this well; so that when some German author, I know not whom, undertook to correct the catastrophe of the romance, and make Werther live instead of committing suicide, Goethe said—'The poor man has no idea that the evil is without remedy, and that a mortal insect has stung our Werther in the flower of his youth.'

What is this mortal insect that has stung the youth of Werther? Mistake it not, it is the spirit of doubt, the spirit of the eighteenth century; and it is not Werther only that the insect has stung—it is Goethe himself. Goethe belongs to the eighteenth century; he is its disciple, its heir; he is, like it, the sceptic, but he is also the poet. It is this which conceals his universal doubt. Besides, as he perceived, with that admirable tact which accompanies his genius, that his scepticism would injure his poetry, he has laboured to correct its influence, and, for this purpose, has called to his aid all the resources of art and science. He has adored nature, he has been a pantheist, he has distributed God everywhere, to compensate for not having him in his own heart; he has adored Greece, and rendered a sort of worship to beauty such as the Greeks conceived it, and endeavoured to find an enthusiasm in the arts; he has adored the south, and sung the Land of the orange grove, because the south is the region of strong faiths, and is repugnant to scepticism; he has adored the middle ages, because they were ignorant of doubt, everywhere he has sought to cure the wound of that insect which had stung his youth. But no; his scepticism pierces through all his enthusiasm, and the very variety of his inspirations proves his indifference. He is neither philosopher, nor devotee, nor Christian, nor pagan, nor courtier, nor citizen, nor of times ancient or modern, nor of the north, nor of the south-or rather, he is all these at once. He is the echo of nature, he repeats to us all her harmonies; but he fails to add that utterance, which unites so well with the harmonies of the world the utterance of his own heart. Ask of Goethe to represent man and nature in all their variety and extent, and he will do it. There is one thing you must not ask of him—himself. This self fails in Goethe; not the self which knows it is a great poet, and will to be one; but that other self, which has a thought, a principle to contend for, which, in short, believes in something. It is there the insect stung; both in Goethe and in Werther.

After discussing the character of modern French literature, there remains the important question to determine, how far the state of literature represents the state of society—how far the one is a faithful picture of the other. Upon this subject M. Girardin concludes his volume with some excellent remarks; but here we must also conclude our notice of this interesting work.



LORD ELDON.

In a free country, if there ever was or will be a truly free country besides our own, the life of every public man ought to be written. All would supply a lesson of more or less value; and it is upon lessons of that order that the vigour of the rising generation can alone be trained. Undoubtedly, in the mixed qualities of human nature, there might now and then be formidable displays; the development of the heart might often startle the eye which looked to it for healthy action; the machinery of the mind would require to be examined with the hand of charity as well as the hand of science: but the general result must be knowledge—always interesting, and often of the highest value; for the tendency of manners is, to disappoint that research. The habits, the associations, almost the general peace of society, unite in covering the actual nature of man with a uniform aspect. The unquestionable effect of civilization is, not merely to smooth the inequalities of the surface, but to conceal the actual material—the rough, the hard, the cold, or the pernicious within. But there is no one operation of man, by which human nature is so deeply and so distinctly penetrated and tested, as a true narrative of the career of men acting a prominent part in the world. History is comparatively feeble to this powerful searcher. Its heroes and heroines are placed so palpably on a stage; its dramatis personae are so distant and so disciplined; its positions are so openly arranged for effect, that the nearest approach is only conjecture, as the nearest approach to reality is only illusion. Courts and campaigns are not human life. Kings and ministers, in their court pageantry, are scarcely more entitled to the name of human beings. They are factitious forms, showy spectacles, glittering effigies. But strip off the state costume; stand beside them while they are unconscious of a spectator; enter into their minds; seize their motives; measure their impulses: it is only then that we discover their affinity to the family of man, and by their vigour and virtue model our own.