Chapter II: Front Matter (2)

THIRD LECTURE.--In the commencement, there is an unnecessary, and rather affectedly written disquisition of the old question, or rather comparison between poetry and painting, from which nothing is to be learned; nor does it suggest any thing. Nor do we now-a-days want to read pages to tell us what invention is, and how it differs from creation--nor is it at all important in matters of art, that we should draw any such distinction at all. It is far better to go at once "in medias res," and take it for granted that the reader both knows and feels, without metaphysical discussion, what that invention is which is required to make a great painter. Nor are we disposed to look upon otherwise than impertinent, while we are waiting for didactic rules, the being told that "he who discovers a gold mine, is surely superior to him who afterwards adapts the metal for use;" especially when it is paraded with comparisons between "Colombo" and "Amerigo Vespucci," and a misplaced panegyric on Newton. And much of this is encumbered with language that fatigues and makes a plain matter obscure. There is a little affectation sometimes in Mr Fuseli's writing of Ciceronic _ambages_, that is really injurious to the good sense and just thoughts, which would without this display, come free, open, and with power. Some pages, too, are taken up with a preliminary argument--"_whether it be within the artist's province or not, to find or to combine a subject from himself, without having recourse to tradition, or the stores of history and poetry_." We have a display of learning to little purpose, quotations from Latin and Greek, really "nihil ad rem;" the "[Greek: phantasias]" of the Greek, and "visiones" of the Romans. Who that ever saw even one work of Hogarth, the "Marriage a la Mode," would for a moment think the question worth a thought. "The misnamed gladiator of Agasias," seems forced into this treatise, for the sole purpose of showing Mr Fuseli's reading, and after all, he leaves the figure as uncertain as he finds it. He _once_ thought it might have been an Alcibiades rushing from the flames, when his house was fired; but is more satisfied that "it might form an admirable Ulysses bestriding the deck of his ship to defend his companions from the descending fangs of Scylla, or rather, with indignation and anguish, seeing them already snatched up, and writhing in the mysterious gripe." In such fanciful humours, it might be made to mean any thing or any body. And we are, after all, quite at a loss to know whether the _conjecture_ is offered as a specimen of "_invention_." He considers the cartoon of Pisa "the most striking instance, of the eminent place due to this _intuitive faculty among the principal organs of invention_"--we mark these words in italics, not quite certain of their meaning. The work is engraved for Foster, by Schiavonetti; and a wonderful work it is--the work of Michael Angelo begun in competition with Leonardo da Vinci. The original is said to have been destroyed by Baccio Bandinelli; still there are the ancient prints and drawings which show the design, and there is a small copy at Holkham. Benvenuto Cellini--and could there be a better authority?--denies that the powers afterwards exerted in the Capella Sistina, arrive at half its excellence. Mr Fuseli's description is so good, that we give it entire. "It represents an imaginary moment relative to the war carried on by the Florentines against Pisa; and exhibits a numerous group of warriors, roused from their bathing in the Arno, by the sudden signal of a trumpet, and rushing to arms. This composition may, without exaggeration, be said to personify with unexampled variety, that motion which Agasias and Theon embodied in single figures. In imagining this transient moment from state of relaxation to a state of energy, the ideas of motion, to use the bold figure of Dante, seem to have showered into the artist's mind. From the chief, nearly placed in the centre, who precedes, and whose voice accompanies the trumpet, every age of human agility, every attitude, every feature of alarm, haste, hurry, exertion, eagerness, burst into so many rays, like sparks flying from the hammer. Many have reached, some boldly step, some have leaped on the rocky shore; here two arms emerging from the water, grapple with the rock, there two hands cry for help, and their companions bend over or rush on to assist them: often imitated, but inimitable, is the ardent feature of the grim veteran, whose every sinew labours to force over the dripping limbs his clothes, whilst gnashing, he pushes the foot through the rending garment. He is contrasted by the slender elegance of a half-averted youth, who, though eagerly buckling the armour to his thigh, methodizes haste; another swings the high-raised hauberk on his shoulder; whilst one, who seems a leader, mindless of his dress, ready for combat, and with brandished spear, overturns a third, who crouched to grasp a weapon; one, naked himself, buckles on the mail of his companion, and he, turned toward the enemy, seems to stamp impatiently the ground. Experience and rage; old vigour, young velocity; expanded or contracted, vie in exertions of energy. Yet in this scene of tumult, one motive animates the whole--eagerness to engage, with subordination to command. This preserves the dignity of the action, and from a strangling rabble, changes the figures to men, whose legitimate contest interests our wishes." Another example is given--Raffaelle's "Incendio del Borgo"--a good description follows: "the enraged elements of _wind_ and fire," we do not see in the original, not even in the drapery of the woman with her back to us in the foreground. Speaking of this power of "invention," he says--after having, as we conceive, mistaken the aim of Raffaelle in his Madonnas, and Holy families, which was somewhat beyond even the "charities of father, son, and mother"--"Nor shall I follow it in its more contaminated descent, to those representations of local manners and national modifications of society, whose characteristic discrimination and humorous exuberance, for instance, we admire in Hogarth, but which, like the fleeting passions of the day, every hour contributes something to obliterate, which soon become unintelligible by time, or degenerate into caricature, the chronicle of scandal, the history-book of the vulgar." It seems, strangely enough, to have been the fashion among the, in comparison with Hogarth, puny academicians of that day, to underrate that great painter, that moral painter. We really should pity the infatuated prejudice of the man, who could see in the deep tragedy, the moral tragedy, "Marriage a la Mode," any _humorous_ exuberance; or not understand that the passions set forth, and for a moral end, are not "the fleeting passions of the day," but as permanent as human nature--who could see, in such series of pictures, any "caricature," or that their object is to "chronicle scandal." That it is the "history of the vulgar," we dispute not. For it is drama of the vulgar as of the unvulgar--a deep tragedy of human nature; alas! time has not made "_unintelligible_" these _not_ "fleeting passions of the day." As long as man is man, will Hogarth be true to nature; and nothing in art is more strange, than that such opinions should emanate from an Academy, and be either ventured upon or received _ex cathedra_.

Invention, according to Mr Fuseli, receives its subjects from poetry or tradition--"they are _epic_ or sublime, _dramatic_ or impassioned, _historic_ or circumscribed by truth. The first _astonishes_, the second _moves_, the third _informs_." We confess ourselves weary of this sort of classification. They only tend to hamper the writer, painter, and critic. It is possible for a work to admit all three, and yet preserve its unity. And such we believe to be the case with Homer. He is epic and dramatic in one, and certainly historic. It is more ingenious than unquestionable, that Homer's purpose was to "impress one forcible idea of war--its origin, its progress, and its end." Nor will the "Iliad" be read with greater delight, by the reader's reception of such an idea. The drawing forth the purpose of Michael Angelo's design--his invention, in the series of frescoes in the Sistine Chapel--is more happy. That theocracy is the subject--the dispensations of Providence to man--the Creation--life and adoration in Adam and Eve, their sin, their punishment, their separation from God--justice and grace in the Deluge and covenant with Noah--prophets, sibyls, herald the Redeemer--and the patriarchs--the Son of Man--the brazen serpent--and the Fall of Haman--the giant subdued by the stripling in Goliah and David--and the conqueror destroyed by female weakness in Judith, are types of his mysterious progress, till Jonah pronounces him immortal. The Last Judgment, and the Saviour the Judge of man, complete the whole--and the Founder and the race are reunited. Such is the spirit of the general invention. "The specific invention of the pictures separate, as each constitutes an independent whole, deserves our consideration next: each has its centre, from which it disseminates, to which it leads back all secondary points, arranged, hid, or displayed, as they are more or less organs of the inspiring plan; each rigorously is circumscribed by its generic character." The more particular criticism on this great work of Michael Angelo, is very good, and we earnestly refer the reader to it. He thinks the genius of Michael Angelo more generic in its aim--that of Raffaelle more specific. That as M. Angelo's aim was the "destiny of man, simply considered as the subject of religion, faithful or rebellious," admitting only a "general feature of the passions;" so, in the hands of Raffaelle, the subject would have teemed with a choice of imagery to excite our sympathies; "he would have combined all possible emotions with the utmost variety of probable or real character; all domestic, politic, religious relations--whatever is not local in virtue and in vice; and the sublimity of the greatest events would have been merely the minister of sympathies and passions." The latter mode of representing the subject, that of Raffaelle, he considers dramatic. The distinction is, however, doubtful: we do not see why the mode of M. Angelo may not be held to be equally dramatic. The criticism on the comparison between Raffaelle's and Michael Angelo's Adam and Eve, if not quite just, is striking. "The elevation of Michael Angelo's soul, inspired by the operation of creation itself, furnished him at once with the feature that stamped on human nature its most glorious prerogative; whilst the characteristic subtility, rather than sensibility, of Raffaelle's mind, in this instance, offered nothing but a frigid succedaneum--a symptom incident to all, when, after the subsided astonishment on a great and sudden event, the mind, recollecting itself, ponders on it with inquisitive surmise. In Michael Angelo, all self-consideration is absorbed in the sublimity of the sentiment which issues from the august presence that attracts Eve; 'her earthly,' in Milton's expression, 'by his heavenly overpowered,' pours itself in adoration; whilst, in the inimitable cast of Adam's figure, we trace the hint of that half-conscious moment, when sleep began to give way to the vivacity of the dream inspired. In Raffaelle, creation is complete--Eve is presented to Adam, now awake; but neither the new-born charms, the submissive grace, and virgin purity, of the beauteous image; nor the awful presence of her Introductor, draw him from his mental trance, into effusions of love or gratitude; at ease reclined, with fingers pointing at himself and his new mate, he seems to methodize the surprising event that took place during his sleep, and to whisper the words--'flesh of my flesh.'" Not subscribing to any criticism which concludes insensibility of mind to Raffaelle, and which is rather inconsistent with the judgment made by Mr Fuseli, that he was the painter of expression, from the utmost conflict of passions, to the enchanting round of gentler emotion, and the nearly silent hints of mind and character--we look to the object of the painter in this his series of works called his Bible. The first five pictures represent only the act of creation--the Deity, the Creator--all nature, is as yet passive--even adoration, the point chosen by Michael Angelo, might be said scarcely to have begun--the plan is developed, not put in action. As yet, the Deity is all in all--Eve, his gift to Adam, is the last of this division of the series. As in Genesis, there is the bare, short statement, grand from its simplicity, and our knowledge of its after consequences; but in the words unimpassioned--so Raffaelle, that he might make his pictorial language agree with the written book, with utmost forbearance, lest he should tell more, and beyond his authority, in this portion of the series manifestly avoids expression, or the introduction of any feeling that would make the creatures more than the most passive recipients of the goodness of their Maker. Nor is there authority to show, that as _yet_ they were fully, perfectly conscious of the nature of the gifts of life and companionship; and we certainly do not agree with Mr Fuseli, that it was a moment for Adam to show his sensibility to the personal charms of Eve--the pure Adam--nor was he--the as yet untransgressing Adam--to feel fear, in "the awful presence of the Introductor." Raffaelle's aim seems to have been, to follow the text in its utmost simplicity, that the unlettered might read--and this justifies in him the personality of the Creator, and the apparently manual act of his creation, corresponding with the words--"God _made_." The "allegoric drama" of the Church empire, that fills the stanzas of the Vatican, is praised by Mr Fuseli, with a full understanding of the purpose of the painter, and feeling for its separate parts. He does not cavil, as some have done, at the anachronisms. "When," says an able, reflecting, and very amusing author,[2] "Aristotle, Plato, Leo X., and Cardinal Bembo, are brought together in the school of Athens, every person must admit, that such offences as these, against truths so obvious, if they do not arise from a defect of understanding, are instances of inexcusable carelessness." Here we think this writer has missed the key of explanation. The very picture is the history of the progress of mind, through science and philosophy, to the acknowledgment of an immortal being. The very subject amalgamates, in one moral idea, times, epochs, localities. It treats of that which passes over time, and embodies only its results. Mr Fuseli notices not these anachronisms, but says aptly of the picture--"What was the surmise of the eye and wish of hearts, is gradually made the result of reason, in the characters of the school of Athens, by the researches of philosophy, which, from bodies to mind, from corporeal harmony to moral fitness, and from the duties of society, ascends to the doctrine of God and hopes of immortality." The very entertaining author whom we have quoted above, we must here, somewhat out of place, observe, has, with Mr Fuseli, mistaken the character of Hogarth's works. He says--"Hogarth has painted comedy!" and what is very strange, he seems to rank him as a comedian with "Pope, Young and Crabbe"--the last, the most tragic in his pathos of any writer. The invention in the Cartoons comes next under Mr Fuseli's observation. "In whatever light we consider their invention, as parts of _one whole_, relative to each other, or independent _each of the rest_, and as single subjects, there can be scarcely named a beauty or a mystery, of which the Cartoons furnish not an instance or a clue; _they are poised between perspicuity and pregnancy of moment_." We believe we understand the latter sentence; it is, however, somewhat affected, and does not rightly balance the _perspicuity_. We must go back, however, to a passage preceding the remarks on the Cartoons; because we wish, above all things, to vindicate the purest of painters from charges of licentiousness. He sees in Cupid and Psyche a voluptuous history: this may or may not be so--we think it is far from being such; but when he adds, "the voluptuous history of his (Raffaelle's) own _favourite passion_," he is following a prejudice, an unfounded story--one which we think, too, has in no slight degree influenced his general criticism and estimation of Raffaelle. We would refer the reader to "Passavant's Life of Raffaelle," where he will see this subject investigated, and the tale refuted. It is surprising, but good men affect to speak of amorous passion as if it were a crime; by itself it may disgust, but surely coldness is not the better nature. Insensibilities of all kinds must be avoided, even where "Amor," as Mr Fuseli calls him, and Psyche are the subjects. It is the happiest genius that shall signify without offence the necessary existence of passion, and leave purity in its singleness and innocence. How exquisitely is this done by Shakspeare in his "Romeo and Juliet!" He keeps the lovers free from every grosser particle of love, while he throws it all upon the subordinate characters, particularly the nurse, whose part in the drama, in no small degree, tends to naturalise to our sympathy the youth, the personal beauty, and whole loveliness, of the unhappy Romeo and Juliet.

The differences of manner in which the same subject, "the Murder of the Innocents," has been represented by several painters, according to the genius of each, are well noticed. "History, strictly so called, follows the drama; fiction now ceases, and invention consists only in selecting and fixing with dignity, precision, and sentiment, the moments of _reality_." He instances, by a given subject, that were the artist to choose the "Death of Germanicus," he is never to forget that he is to represent "a Roman dying amidst Romans," and not to suffer individual grief to un-Romanize his subject. "Germanicus, Agrippina, Caius, Vitellius, the Legates, the Centurions at Antioch, the hero, the husband, the father, the friend, the leader--the struggles of nature and sparks of hope, must be subjected to the physiognomic character and features of Germanicus, the son of Drusus, the Caesar of Tiberius. Maternal, female, connubial passion, must be tinged by Agrippina, the woman absorbed in the Roman, less lover than companion of her husband's grandeur. Even the bursts of friendship, attachment, allegiance, and revenge, must be stamped by the military ceremonial, and distinctive costume of Rome." For an instance of this propriety of invention in history, reference is made, we presume as much, to Mr West's "Death of Wolfe." Undoubtedly, this is Mr West's best picture. The praise from Mr Fuseli was, in all probability, purely academic; he frequently showed that he did not too highly estimate the genius of the painter. Having given these outlines of general and specific invention in the epic, dramatic, and historic branches of art, he admits that there is not always a nice discrimination of their limits: "and as the mind and fancy of man, upon the whole, consist of mixed qualities, we seldom meet with a human performance exclusively made up of epic, dramatic, or pure historic materials." This confession, as it appears to us, renders the classification useless to a student, and shows a yet incomplete view of arrangement, and specification of the power, subjects, and means of art.

Indeed Mr Fuseli proceeds to instances wherein his epic assumes the dramatic, the dramatic the epic, and the historic both. There does seem something wanting in an arrangement which puts the _Iliad_ and _Odyssey_, two works essentially different, in the same category. We do, therefore, venture the opinion, that such distinctions are, more particularly in painting, not available. With Sir Joshua, he considers borrowing justifiable, and that it does not impair the originality of invention. The instances given of happy adoption are the "Torso of Apollonius," by Michael Angelo; of the figure of "Adam dismissed from Paradise," by Raffaelle, borrowed from Massaccio, as likewise the figure of "Paul at Athens;" and for figures of Michael Angelo's, Raffaelle, Parmegiano, Poussin, are all indebted to the cartoon of Pisa. The lecture concludes with some just remarks upon the "Transfiguration," and a censure upon the coldness of Richardson, and the burlesque of the French critic Falconet, who could not discover the point of contact which united the two parts of this celebrated picture. "Raphael's design was to represent Jesus as the Son of God, and, at the same time, the reliever of human misery, by an unequivocal fact. The transfiguration on Tabor, and the miraculous cure which followed the descent of Jesus, united, furnished the fact. The difficulty was, how to combine two successive actions in one moment. He overcame it, by sacrificing the moment of cure to that of the apparition, by implying the lesser miracle in the greater. In subordinating the cure to the vision, he obtained sublimity; in placing the crowd and patient on the foreground, he gained room for the full exertion of his dramatic powers. It was not necessary that the demoniac should be represented in the moment of recovery, if its certainty could be expressed by other means. It is implied, it is placed beyond all doubt, by the glorious apparition above; it is made nearly intuitive by the uplifted hand and finger of the apostle in the centre, who, without hesitation, undismayed by the obstinacy of the demon, unmoved by the clamour of the crowd, and the pusillanimous scepticism of some of his companions, refers the father of the maniac, in an authoritative manner, for certain and speedy help to his Master on the mountain above, whom, though unseen, his attitude at once connects with all that passes below. Here is the point of contact; here is that union of the two parts of the fact in one moment, which Richardson and Falconet could not discover."

It is with diffidence that we would suggest any thing upon a work that has so nearly exhausted criticism; but we will venture an observation, and if we are correct, the glory of the subject is heightened by its adoption. It has ever appeared to us to have purposed showing at one view, humanity in its highest, its divinely perfected state, the manhood taken into Godhead; and humanity in its lowest, its most forlorn, most degraded state, in the person of a demoniac: and this contrast seems acknowledged--abhorrently felt, by the reluctant spirit within the sufferer, whose attitude, starting from the effulgence and the power which is yet to heal him, being the strong action of the lower part of the picture, and one of suffering, throws the eye and mind of the spectator at once and permanently from earth to the heavenly vision, to ascending prophets, and that bright and central majesty, "whose countenance," Mr. Fuseli observes, "is the only one we know expressive of his superhuman nature." This idea of transformation to a higher nature is likewise kept up in the figures of the ascending prophets, and the apostles below.

* * * * *

The Fourth Lecture is in continuation of the subject--Invention; but we have left little space for further remarks. In another number of Maga we shall resume our review of the lectures.

FOOTNOTES:

[1] Perhaps the author of the lectures received this ill opinion of Pausanias from Julius Caesar Scaliger, who treats him as an impostor; but he is amply vindicated by Vossius. He lived in the second century, and died very old at Rome. In his account of the numerous representations of the [Greek: Charites], he seems to throw some light upon a passage in Xenophon's Memorabilia, which, as far as we know, has escaped the notice of the commentators. It is in the dialogue between Socrates and the courtesan Theodote. She wishes that he would come to her, to teach her the art of charming men. He replies, that he has no leisure, being hindered by many matters of private and public importance; and he adds, "I have certain mistresses which will not allow me to be absent from them day nor night, on account of the spells and charms, which learning, they receive from me"--[Greek: eisi de kai philai moi, ai oute hemeras oute nuktos aph auton easousi me apienai, philtra te manthanousai par emon kai epodas.] Who were these [Greek: philai]? Had he meant the virtues or moral qualities, he would have spoken plainer, as was his wont; but here, where the subject is the personal beauty, the charms of Theodote, it is more in the Socratic vein that he refers to other _personal_ charms, which engage his thoughts night and day, and keep him at home. Now, it appears too, that Socrates was taken to see her, on account of the fame of her beauty, and goes to her when she is sitting, or rather standing, to a painter; and it is evident from the dialogue, that she did not refuse the exhibition of her personal charms. It seems, then, not improbable, that Socrates was induced to go to her as the painter went, for the advantage of his art as a sculptor, and that the art was that one at home, the [Greek: tis philotera sou endon]. Be that as it may, it is extremely probable that the [Greek: philai] were some personifications of feminine beauty, upon which he was then at work. Are there, then, any such recorded as from his hand? Pausanias says there were. "Thus Socrates, the son of Sophroniscus, made for the Athenians statues of the Graces, before the vestibule of the citadel," And adds the curious fact, that after that time the Graces were represented naked, and that these were clothed. [Greek: Sokrates te o Sophrotonischon pro tes es ten akropolin esodon Chariton eirgasato agalmata Athenaiois. Kai tauta men estin homoios apanta en estheti. Oi de usteron, ouk oida eph hoto, metabeblekasi to schema autais. Charitas goun, oi kat eme eplasson te kai egraphon gumnas]. Did not Socrates allude to these his statues of the Graces?--_Pausanias_, cap. xxxv. lib. 9.

[2] _The Literary Conglomerate, or Combination of Various Thoughts and Facts._ Oxford: 1839. Printed by Thomas Combe.

SOMETHING ABOUT MUSIC.

Gentle Christians, pity us! We are just returned from a musical entertainment, and, with aching head and stunned ears, sit down and try to recover our equanimity, sorely disturbed by the infliction which, we regret to say, we have survived. Had we known how to faint, we had done so on the spot, that ours might have been the bliss of being carried out over the heads and shoulders of the audience ere the performance had well begun--a movement that would have insured us the unfeigned thanks of all whom we had rescued from their distressing situation under pretence of bearing us off, splashing us with cold water, causing doors to bang impressively during our exit, and the various other _petit soins_ requisite to the conducting a "faint" with dignity.

But it could not be accomplished. We made several awkward attempts, so little like, that their only result was our being threatened with a policeman it we made any more disturbance; so, after a hasty glance round had assured us of the impracticability of making our escape in any more everyday style, we sat down with a stern resolution of endurance--lips firmly compressed, eyes fixed in a stony gaze on the orchestra, whence issued by turns groans, shrieks, and screams, from sundry foully-abused instruments of music; accompanied by equally appalling sounds from flat, shrill signorinas, quavering to distraction, backed by gigantic "basses," (double ones surely,) who, with voices like the "seven devils" of the old Grecian, bellowed out divers sentimentalisms about dying for love, when assuredly their most proximate danger was of apoplexy.

Well, the affair came to an end, as, it is to be hoped, will every other evil in this wicked world; in a spasm of thankfulness we extricated ourselves from the crush, and reached our home, where, under the genial influence of quiet and a cup of coffee, we can afford to laugh at the past, (our own vehement indignation included,) and ruminate calmly on the "how" and the "why" of the nuisance, which appears to us as well worthy of being put down by act of parliament, as the ringing of muffin bells and crying "sweep!"

It is a perfect puzzle to us by what process the standard of music has become so lowered, as to make what is ordinarily served up under that name be received as the legitimate descendant of the harmony divine which erst broke on the ear of the listening world, when "the morning stars sang together;" and, in the first freshness of its creation--teeming with melody--angels deigned to visit this terrestrial paradise, nor turned an exile's gaze to that heaven whose strains were chanted in glad accordance with the murmuring stream, and music of the waving forest--which, in its greenness and beauty, seemed but "a little lower" than its celestial archetype, for

"Earth hath _this_ variety from heaven."

(Blessings on the poet for that line! We have a most firm belief in Milton, and receive his representations of heaven as we would those of a Daguerreotype.)

But it is even so. There is but one step from the sublime to the ridiculous, and this entrancing art, it seems, has taken it; sorely dislocating its graceful limbs, and injuring its goodly proportions in the unseemly escapade. There--we have played over a simple air, one that thrills through our heart of hearts; and as the notes die on our ears, soothing though the strain be, we feel our indignation increase, and glow still more fiercely against this--music, as it is by courtesy called, for Heaven knows it has no legitimate claim to the name!--till it reaches the crusading point, and we rush headlong to a war of extermination against bars, rests, crotchets, quavers--undaunted even by "staves," and formidable inflated semibreves.

We hate your crashing, clumsy chords, and utterly spit at and defy chromatic passages from one end of the instrument to the other, and back again; flats, sharps, and most appropriate "naturals," splattered all over the page. The essential spirit of discord seems let loose on our modern music, tainted, as it were, with the moral infection that has seized the land; it is music for a democracy, not the stately, solemn measure of imperial majesty. Music to soothe! the idea is obsolete, buried with the ruffs and farthingales of our great-grandmothers; or, to speak more soberly, with the powdered wigs and hoops of their daughters. There is music to excite, much to irritate one, and much more to drive a really musical soul stark mad; but none to soothe, save that which is drawn from the hiding-places of the past.

We should like to catch one of the old masters--Handel, for instance--and place him within the range of one of our modern executioners, to whose taste(!) _carte-blanche_ had been given. We think we see him under the infliction. Neither the hurling of wig, nor yet of kettle-drum, at the head of the performer, would relieve his outraged spirit: he would strangle the offender on the spot, and hang himself afterwards; and the jury would, in the first case, return a verdict of justifiable homicide, and, in the second, of justifiable suicide, with a deodand of no ordinary magnitude on the musical instrument that had led to the catastrophe.

There is no repose, no refreshment to the mind, in our popular compositions; they are like Turner's skies--they harass and fatigue, leaving you certainly wondering at their difficulty, but, as certainly, wishing they had been "impossible." There is to us more of touching pathos, heart-thrilling expression, in some of the old psalm-tunes, feelingly played, than in a whole batch of modernisms. The strains go _home_, and the "fountains of the great deep are broken up"--the great deep of unfathomable feeling, that lies far, far below the surface of the world-hardened heart; and as the unwonted, yet unchecked, tear starts to the eye, the softened spirit yields to their influence, and shakes off the moil of earthly care; rising, purified and spiritualized, into a clearer atmosphere. Strange, inexplicable associations brood over the mind,

"Like the far-off dreams of paradise,"

mingling their chaste melancholy with musings of a still subdued, though more cheerful character. How many glad hearts in the olden time have rejoiced in these songs of praise--how many sorrowful ones sighed out their complaints in those plaintive notes, that steal sadly, yet sweetly, on the ear--hearts that, now cold in death, are laid to rest around that sacred fane, within whose walls they had so often swelled with emotion! Tell us not of neatly trimmed "cemeteries," redolent of staring sunflowers, priggish shrubs, and all the modern coxcombry of the tomb; with nicely swept gravel walks, lest the mourner should get "wet on's feet," and vaults numbered like warehouses, where "parties may bring their own minister," and be buried with any form, or no form, if they like it better. No, give us the village churchyard with its sombre yew-trees, among which

"The dial, hid by weeds and flowers,
Hath told, by none beheld, the solitary hours;"

its grassy hillocks, and mouldering grave-stones, where haply all record is obliterated, and nought but a solitary "resurgam" meets the enquiring eye; its white-robed priest reverently committing "earth to earth," in sure and certain hope "of a joyful resurrection" to the slumbering clay, that was wont to worship within the grey and time-stained walls, whence the mournful train have now borne him to his last rest; while on the ivy-clad tower fall the slanting golden beams of an autumnal sun, that, in its declining glory, seems to whisper of hope and consolation to the sorrowful ones, reminding them that the night of the tomb shall not endure for ever, but that, so surely as the great orb of day shall return on the wings of the morning to chase away the tears of the lamenting earth, so surely shall the dust, strewed around that temple, scattered though it may be to the winds of heaven, "rise again" in the morning of the Resurrection, when death "shall be swallowed up in victory."

"'Tis fit his trophies should be rife
Around the place where he's subdued;
The gate of death leads forth to life."

But we are wandering sadly from our subject; it is perhaps quite as well that we have done so, for we should have become dangerous had we dwelt much longer on it. We were on the point of wishing (Nero-like) that our popular professors of the tuneful art had but one neck, that we might exterminate them at a blow, or hang them with one gigantic fiddle-string; but now, thanks to our episode, our exacerbated feelings are so far mollified, that we will be content with wishing them sentenced to grind knives on oil-less stones with creaking axles, till the sufferings of their own shall have taught them consideration for the ears of other people.

But music, real music--not in the harsh, exaggerated style now in the ascendant, but simple, pure, melodious, such as might have entranced the soul of a Handel, when, in some vision of night, sounds swept from angelic harps have floated around him, the gifted one, in whose liquid strains and stately harmonies fall on our ravished ears the echoes of that immortal joy--such we confess to be one of our idols, before whose shrine we pay a willing, gladsome homage; though now, alas! it must be in dens and caves of the earth, since _modern_ heresy has banished it from the temple of Apollo.

See how Toryism peeps out even in the fine arts! _Even_ did we say? They are its legitimate province; "The old is better," is inscribed in glowing character on the portals of the past. Old Painting! See the throbbing form start from the pregnant canvass--the "Mother of God" folding her Divine Son to her all but celestial arms--the Son of God fainting beneath a load of woe, not his own. Old Poetry! Glorious old Homer, with his magic song; and sturdy, oak-like in his strength, as in his verdure, old Chaucer. Old Music! Hail, ye inspired sons of the lyre! A noble host are ye, enshrined in the hearts of all loyal worshippers of the tuneful god. And yet (we grieve to confess it) we, even we, spite of all our enthusiasm, have been seen laughing at "old music," the aspiring psalmody of a country church singing-pew.

Oh, to see the row of performers, the consequential choir, transcending in importance (in their own eyes) the clerk, the curate, the rector, and even the squire from the great hall, majestic and stern though he be, with his awful wig and gold-headed cane! There are the fubsy boys--copied apparently from cherubim--who, with glowing, distended cheeks, are simpering on the ceiling, _doing_ the tenor, with wide open mouths that would shame e'er a barn-door in the village; their red, stumpy fingers sprawling over the music which they are (not) reading. The pale, lantern-jawed youths, in yellow waistcoats and tall shirt-collars, who look as if they were about to whistle a match, are holloing out what is professionally, and in this instance with most distressing truth, termed counter. "Counter" it is with a vengeance; and not only so, but it is a neck-and-neck race between them and the urchins aforesaid, which shall have done first. The shock-headed man, with chin dropped into his neckerchief, and mouth twisted into every _un_imaginable contortion, as though grinning through a horse-collar, has the bass confided to his faithful keeping; and emits a variety of growls and groans truly appalling, though evidently to his own great comfort and satisfaction. The bassoon, the clarinet, the flute--but how shall we describe them! Suffice it to say, that they appeared to be suffering inexpressible torments at the hands of their apoplectic-looking performers; who were all at the last gasp, and all determined to die bravely at their posts. And then the entranced audience, with half-shut eyes and quivering palms! Oh, it was too much; we lost our character typo irretrievably that day; half suppressed titters from the squire's pew were not to be borne. In that unhappy moment we sinned away some quarter of a century's unrivalled reputation for good manners and musical taste. Old Fiddlestrings never forgave us, never did he vouchsafe us another anthem, spite of our entreaties and protestations, and the thousand and one apologies for our ill-timed merriment, which our fruitful brain invented on the spot. To his dying day he preserved the utmost contempt for our judgment, not only in this department of the fine arts, but also on every other subject. Not to admire his music, was condemnation in every thing--an unpardonable offence. We, who had been his great friend, patron, (or rather he was ours,) to whom he had so often condescended on the Saturday evening to hum, whistle, and too-too over the tune--of his own composing--that was to be the admiration of the whole parish on the succeeding day--we were henceforth to be as the uninitiated, and left to find out, and follow, as we best might, the very eccentric windings of his Sunday's asthmatic performance; which always went at the rate of three crotchets and a cough, to the end of the psalm, which he took care should be an especial long one.

Poor old man! we see him now, with his unruly troop of Sunday scholars (in training for some important festival, to the due celebration of which their labours were essential) singing, bawling we should say, out of time and tune, to the utter discomfiture of his irritable temper, (there is nothing like a false note for throwing your musical man into a perfect tantrum,) and the bringing down on their unlucky heads a smart tap with the bow of his violin, which led the harmony. There they stood with their brown cheeks and white heads, fine specimens of the agricultural interest; each one of them looking as if he could bolt a poor, half-starved factory child at a mouthful--but certainly no singers. It was beyond the power even of the accomplished old clerk himself to make then such--an oyster, with its mouth full of sand, would have sung quite as well; but still he laboured on with might and main--with closed eyes, and open mouth--delightedly beating time with his head, as long as matters went on not intolerably; for David's musical soul supplied the deficiency in the sounds that entered his unwearied ears. And then he sang so loud himself, that he certainly could hear no one else, his voice being as monopolizing as the drone of a bagpipe--or as a violent advocate for free trade! Happy urchins when this was the case! for they were sure to be dismissed with the most flattering encomiums on their vocal powers, when, if truth must be told, the good old man had not heard a note.

But he is gathered to his fathers, and now sleeps beneath the sod in the quiet churchyard of----. We well remember his funeral. 'Twas a lovely day in spring when the long, lifeless trees and fields were bursting into all the glory of May--for May was spring then, and not, as now, cousin-german to winter; while the gay sunbeams played lovingly, like youth caressing age, on the low church-tower, gilding the ivy that waved in wild luxuriance around it. Slowly moved on the lowly train that bore to the "house appointed for all living" the mortal remains of one whom they well loved, and whose removal from among them--essential as he had always seemed to the very identity of the village--was an event they had never contemplated and which they now, in its unexpectedness, sorely lamented. The village choir preceded it, singing those strains which poor David's voice had so often led; and surely, for once, the spirit of the old man rested on his refractory pupils; for rarely have I heard sweeter notes than those that swelled on the balmy air, as the dusky procession wound its way across the heath, waving with harebells, and along the narrow lane, whose hedges were beginning to show the first faint rose, till it reached the church porch, where the good rector himself was waiting to pay the last token of respect to his humble friend; while groups of villagers were loitering around to witness the simple rites. Entering within the church, again was the voice of melody heard, and again was as sweetly chanted that mournful psalm, which is appointed, with such affecting appropriateness, for the burial of the dead. "I said, I will take heed to my ways, that I offend not in my tongue; I will keep my mouth, as it were, with a bridle, while the ungodly is in my sight." Then came the dull, hollow sound of "earth to earth, dust to dust, ashes to ashes;" and so, amid many tears, (and we confess our eyes were not dry,) closed the grave over one who, despite some innocent, though mirth-provoking failings, was honoured by all who knew him for the stern, unbending integrity of his character, and the strictness with which he fulfilled all the duties of life. David was an _honest_ man, one whose "word was as good as his bond," who "promised to his hurt, and changed not." Would that as much might be said of many who move in a higher sphere, and make far larger professions of sanctity than he did! But he shall be remembered, when their names are blotted out for ever.

"Only the actions of the just
Smell sweet in death, and blossom in the dust."

The music which we hear in our social intercourse, is too generally--we say it in grief, but in truth--detestable. "Like figures on a dial-plate," sit the four-and-twenty Englishmen and Englishwomen, who have been drawn together to receive their friend's hospitality; till the awful silence convinces the host that some desperate effort must be made to break the spell, and that the best thing is some music to set them a-talking. Some _mimini-pimini_ Miss is in consequence selected as the victim, (or rather, the victimizer,) and requested to "pain" the company. She fidgets, bridles, and duly declines, at the same time vigorously pulling off one of her gloves in evident preparation for the attack. After much pressing, she reluctantly yields to what she had from the first made up her mind to do; takes her seat at a grand pianoforte, behind a couple of candles and an enormous music-book, and--crash go the keys in a thundering prelude, (the pedal, and every other means of increasing the noise being unscrupulously resorted to,) which, after superhuman exertions, lands her in what, to our affrighted and stunned ears, is evidently the key of Z flat! Who would have thought those delicate hands could thus descend with the vigour of a pavior's hammer on the unhappy ivories, that groan and shriek beneath the infliction, as though fully sensible of the surpassing cruelty with which they are treated.

But hark! she sings--"Rome, Rome, thou art _n'more_," (_sic_)--a furious scramble on the keys, with a concluding bang--"On thy seven hills thou satt'st of yore,"--another still more desperate and discordant flourish, which continues alternating with her "most sweet voice," till she has piped through the whole of her song: when the group around, apprehensive of a repetition of the torture to which they have been subjected, overwhelm her with thanks and expressions of admiration, under cover of which they hurry her to her seat. Such is the stuff palmed off on us, varied as it is by glees, screamed out by four voices all in different keys; solos, squeaked out by stout gentlemen, and roared by pale lanky lads of eighteen; duets by young ladies, who accidentally set out on discordant notes, and don't find out the mistake till they come to the finale; with occasionally a psalm crooned by worthy sexagenarians, guiltless alike of ear and voice, but who, seeming to think it a duty to add their mite to the inexpressible dissonance, perform the same to the unmixed dismay of all their hearers.

We would far rather hear an unpretending street organ than such abominations; and, indeed, some of the itinerant music is, to our unsophisticated ears, sweet beyond expression, especially when accompanied, as it is sometimes, by a rich Italian or reedy German voice; for whose sake we can forgive the tuneless squalls that too often greet our ears from ambulatory minstrels, be they of the Madonna, or fishy, Dutch-swamp style of beauty. A sweet-toned street organ, heard in the distance, when all around is still, is not a thing to be despised, by those who have music enough in their souls to respond to the slightest touches of Apollo's lyre. If the heart be but attuned to harmony, it will vibrate to the simplest notes, faint though they be, as by the wafting of the evening breeze among the chords of a neglected harp, sadly hung upon the willows; it will cherish the feeblest idea, and nurture it into perfect melody. As love begets love, so does harmony beget its kind in the heart of him who can strike the keynote of nature, and listen to the wild and solemn sounds that swell from her mysterious treasure-house, and echo among her "eternal hills," while the celestial arch concludes and re-affirms the wondrous cadence. But these are secrets revealed to none but her loving worshipper; he who, with a reverential homage, seeks the hidden recesses of her temple, to bend in awe before her purest shrine. From him who lingers heedlessly in her antechamber with faint loyalty, they are deeply veiled, and the glowing revelations of her favoured ones seem but as the recital of a dream to his cold heart: for "to _love_ is to know."

But surely of all instruments, the violin, first-rately played, is the most--yes, we will say it--heavenly. Hark! to the clear, vocal melody, now rapturously rising in one soul-exalting strain, anon melting away in the saddest, tenderest lament, as though the soft summer breeze sighed forth a requiem over the dying graces of its favourite flower; then bursting forth in haughty, triumphant notes, swept in gusts from the impassioned strings, as though instinct with life, and glowing with disdain. Any one may see that painters are no musicians, else had they furnished their angels not with harps--beautiful and sparkling as the sea-foam, as are their most graceful chords--but with this, of all instruments the most musical, whose tones admit of more variety than any, (the Proteus organ alone excepted,) and whose delicious long-drawn notes must entrance every one not absolutely soulless. Oh, they are excruciatingly delightful! And yet you shall hear this identical violin, in the hands of an everyday performer, emit such squeals and screams as shall set your teeth on edge for a twelvemonth, curdle your whole frame, and make you vehemently anathematize all benevolent institutions for the relief of deafness.

Verily your violin is an exclusive instrument, and approachable by none but the eldest born of Apollo, who, in all the majesty of hereditary prerogative, calmly sway the dominions of their sire; while usurpers (as is the meed of all who grasp unrighteous rule) are plunged in utter confusion and ruin.

Warming with our theme, and impatient to manifest our royal descent, in a paroxysm of enthusiasm we clutch our Cremona, clasp him lovingly to our shoulder, and high waving in air our magical bow, which is to us a sceptre, bring it down with a crash, exulting in the immortal harmony about to gush, like a mountain torrent, from the teeming strings; when lo! to our unmitigated disgust, it glides noiselessly along its hitherto resounding path, for--ye gods and little fishes!--some murderous wretch, at the instigation of we know not what evil sprite, has _greased_ the horsehair, for which we solemnly devote him to the "bowstring," the first time he is caught napping.

Well, it is over now, and we find ourselves once more on earth, after knocking our head gainst the stars; and, ---- ---- bless us! we have sat the fire out, having precisely one inch of candle left to go to bed by.

Good night, dearest reader. Can you find your way in the dark?

M. J.

THE PURPLE CLOAK; OR, THE RETURN OF SYLOSON TO SAMOS.

HEROD. III. 139.

I.

The king sat on his lofty throne in Susa's palace fair,
And many a stately Persian lord, and satrap proud, was there:
Among his councillors he sat, and justice did to all--
No supplicant e'er went unredrest from Susa's palace-hall.

II.

There came a slave and louted low before Darius' throne,
"A wayworn suppliant waits without--he is poor and all alone,
And he craves a boon of thee, oh king! for he saith that he has done
Good service, in the olden time, to Hystaspes' royal son."

III.

"Now lead him hither," quoth the king; "no suppliant e'er shall wait,
While I am lord in Susa's halls, unheeded at the gate;
And speak thy name, thou wanderer poor, pray thee let me know
To whom the king of Persia's land this ancient debt doth owe."

IV.

The stranger bow'd before the king--and thus began to speak--
Full well, I ween, his garb was worn, and with sorrow pale his cheek,
But his air was free and noble, and proudly flash'd his eye,
As he stood unknown in that high hall, and thus he made reply--

V.

"From Samos came I, mighty king, and Syloson my name;
My brother was Polycrates, a chief well known to fame;
That brother drove me from my home--a wanderer forth I went--
And since that hour my weary soul has never known content!

VI.

"Methinks I need not tell to thee my brother's mournful fate;
He lies within his bloody grave--a churl usurps his state--
Moeandrius lords it o'er the land, my brother's base born slave;
Restore me to that throne, oh king! this, this, the boon I crave.

VII.

"Nay, start not; let me tell my tale! I pray thee look on me,
And, prince, thou soon shalt know the cause that I ask this gift of thee;
Round Persia's king a bristling ring of spearmen standeth now,
But when Cambyses wore the crown--a wanderer poor wast _thou_!

VIII.

"Remember'st not, oh king! the day when, in old Memphis town,
Upon the night ye won the fight, thou wast pacing up and down?
The costly cloak that then I wore, its colours charm'd thy eye--
In sooth it was a gorgeous robe, of purple Tyrian dye--

IX.

"Let base-born peasants buy and sell, I gave that cloak to thee!
And for that gift on thee bestow'd, grant thou this boon to me--
I ask not silver, ask not gold--I ask of thee to stand
A prince once more on Samos' shore--my own ancestral land!"

X.

"Oh! best and noblest," quoth the king, "thou ne'er shalt rue the day,
When to Cambyses' spearman poor thou gav'st thy cloak away;
The faithless eye each well-known form and feature may forget,
But the deeds of generous kindness done--the heart remembers yet.

XI.

"To-day thou art a wanderer sad, but thou shalt sit, erelong,
Within thy fair ancestral hall, and hear the minstrel's song;
To-day thou art a homeless man--to-morrow thou shalt stand--
A conqueror and a sceptred king--upon thy native land.

XII.

"A cloud is on thy brow to-day--thy lot is poor and low,
To all who gaze on thee thou seem'st a man of want and wo;
But thou shalt drain the bowl erelong within thy own bright isle,
A wreath of roses round thy head, and on thy brow a smile."

XIII.