Chapter II: Part 2

One of the first things that her Ladyship does on the morning subsequent to her arrival, is to give notice to her friends of that important event,--a gratuitous piece of kindness altogether, as it seems to us, for it must doubtless have been announced by as many portentous signs as accompanied the birth of Owen Glendower. Nevertheless, in order to make assurance doubly sure, she despatched 'cards to some, and notes to others, after the Parisian fashion,' but previously indulged in a very pretty sentimental fit. This was caused by the first name that met her eye as she opened her 'old Paris visiting book for 1818'--that of Denon, "the page, minister, and _gentilhomme de la chambre_ of Louis XV., the friend of Voltaire, the intimate of Napoleon, the traveller and historian of Modern Egypt, the director of the _Musee_ of France," &c. &c., who, we are informed, used always to be so particularly delighted with her Ladyship's visits to Paris, that he was wont to hail them with his hand, and welcome them with a cordial smile. Alas! death had overtaken him, notwithstanding his friendship with Lady Morgan; and she could no longer expect his salutations. "Other hands were now extended, other smiles beamed now as brightly; but his were dimmed for ever!" How kind her Ladyship is! Fearing her readers might be distressed by the idea, that, in consequence of the decease of Denon, she might have been in some want of welcoming, she has taken the precaution of setting them at ease upon that point, by the above ingenious sentence. In mentioning the reasons of her intimacy with Denon, she employs language of a very singular kind, which, if maliciously interpreted to the letter, might subject her to uncomfortable remarks, though we are sure it is nothing but an effusion of gurgling vanity. It is an instance, however, to what a degree that sentiment, when extreme, gets the better of all sense of propriety and decorum. She says, that even if Denon had not been such a person as she describes him, "still, _he suited me, I suited him_. There was between us that sympathy, in spite of the disparity of years and talents, which, whether in trifles or essentials,--between the frivolous or the profound,--makes the true basis of _those ties, so sweet to bind, so bitter to break_!" It is well for Sir Charles Morgan's peace of mind, that he is acquainted, as he must be, with his wife's frivolity and egotism. How, indeed, he could have allowed her to come before the world with such phraseology in her mouth, we cannot imagine, unless on the supposition that he is such a husband as La Bruyere has described. "_Il ne sert dans sa famille qu' a montrer l'exemple, d'un silence timide et d'une parfaite soumission. Il ne lui est du ni douaire ni conventions; mais a cela pres, et qu'il n'accouche pas, il est la femme, et elle le mari._"

After her Ladyship had "shuddered," and "felt as if she was throwing earth upon Denon's grave whilst drawing her pen across his precious and historical name," she spent about half an hour in weeping, "like a fair flower surcharged with dew," over the names of others of her departed friends, Guinguene, Talma, Langlois, Lanjuinais, &c., until she fortunately recollected that the climate of Paris is one that "developes a sensibility prompt, not deep." Lucky thought! She immediately threw down the visiting-book, threw up the window to let in the climate, wiped from her eyes the tears "which parted thence, as pearls from diamonds dropp'd," and began to think of "all that death had left her, of the 'greater still behind,'--of friends, each in his way, a specimen of that genius and virtue, which, in all regions, and in all ages, make the _ne plus ultra_ of human excellence." Admire the delicacy of the method by which Miladi lets us into the secret of her being a _ne plus ultra_; it is not by a bold assertion, but by a modest inuendo. She keeps company with _ne plus ultras_--birds of the same feather flock together--ergo, she is a _ne plus ultra_ herself. And so she is, but in her own way. "_Il y a malheureusement_," observes a French writer of the present day "_plus d'une maniere de se rendre celebre_,"--"there is, unfortunately, more than one method of becoming celebrated,"--and as this writer is an acquaintance of Lady Morgan, we are half inclined to think he committed that sentence to paper after returning from a visit to _her_ Celebrityship.

We may as well cite here a few more instances of her ingenuity in communicating, obliquely, how distinguished a personage she is,--a quality she possesses in a degree that we do not recollect ever to have seen rivalled. We copy _verbatim_.

"The other day I dined in the Chaussee d'Antin, in that house
where it is always such a privilege to dine; where the wit of
the host, like the _menus_ of his table, combines all that is
best in French or Irish peculiarity; _and where the society is
chosen with reference to no other qualities than merit and
agreeability_."

Speaking of the weekly assemblies at an eminent individual's house, at which she was a constant attendant, she says, they

"Are among the most select and remarkable in Paris.
Inaccessible to _commonplace mediocrity and pushing
pretension_, their visitor must be _ticketted_ in some way or
another" (by writing a "France," or an "Italy," for instance,)
"to obtain a presentation."

With regard to another circle of which she was a large segment, she observes,--

"It is sufficient to have merit, agreeability, or the claims of
old acquaintance to belong to it, but, truth to tell, it is
still so far exclusive, that what Madame Roland calls
_l'universelle mediocrite_, gains no admission there."

Again:--

"I happened one night at Gen. La Fayette's to say that I should
remain at home on the following morning, and the information
brought us a numerous circle of morning visitors; others
dropped in by chance, and some by appointment. From twelve till
four, my little salon was a congress composed of the
representatives of every vocation of arts, letters, science,
_bon ton_," (the Congress of Vienna was nothing to this,) "and
philosophy, in which, as in the Italian opera-boxes of Milan
and Naples, the comers and goers succeeded each other, as the
narrow limits of the space required that the earliest visitor
should make room for the last arrival."

We might fill pages with similar specimens of her modesty, but we must proceed.

The notes and cards being all despatched, authentic intelligence is at length diffused throughout Paris of her arrival, and such a commotion is forthwith excited as had never been seen even in that city of commotions, since the time the Giraffe made her entree into it, and said to the gaping multitude, "_Mes amis, il n'y a qu'une bete de plus._" Perhaps the sensation might be excepted which was created by "Messieurs les Osages," the American deputation whose "France" has not yet, we believe, appeared in either hemisphere. The Rue de Rivoli was instantly crowded with "old friends" and "intimate acquaintances," _ne plus ultras_ included, besides various others anxious for the honour of an introduction, all striving who should get first into the "_Hotel de la Terrasse_;" and such was the press of visits, dinner-parties, suppers, balls, &c. &c. that for a period her Ladyship could not, as she says, "find leisure to register a single impression for her own amusement, or haply for that of a world, which, it must be allowed, is not very difficult to amuse." In this sentiment we request leave, before going further, to record our unqualified concurrence, and also to state, that we know of no one from whom it could proceed with more propriety and weight than from Miladi. It has been, doubtless, expressed before, by various other book-makers, but never, we feel confident, by one whose career affords fuller evidence of its correctness, or who could adduce more forcible proofs in support of it, should they be required. In such case, the simple fact need only be cited, that "France in 1830" is the work of the same hand which indited "Ida of Athens," some twenty years previous, and which, during that interval, has furnished the world almost annually, with quartos, octavos, or duodecimos.

The accounts that her Ladyship gives of the various festive entertainments of which she partook, constitute the matter of a large number of her pages. If it be true, however, that in order to observe well, one ought to screen one's self from observation, she could have had little opportunity of obtaining acquaintance with the constitution of French society; for, if we believe her own story, there was no social assemblage of any kind to which she went, where she was not the observed of every one, the centre of attraction, the nucleus of excellence. And what information is to be derived from her relation of a ball here, or a _soiree_ there, beyond the very interesting, highly important, and most credible intelligence, that as soon as the announcement of Lady Morgan's name falls upon the ears of the company, everything else is forgotten; a dead silence instantaneously takes place of the conversational hum that before prevailed; all eyes are directed towards the door; LADY MORGAN ENTERS; a buzz of admiration succeeds; she advances with a dignified air towards the hostess, or rather the hostess runs eagerly forward to meet her; she drops a romantic curtesy; she sits down; and thenceforward nothing is thought of by any of the guests but Miladi, and the pearls that fall from her lips. As the French are fond of forming _queues_, or files, for the purpose of avoiding confusion, when there is any great earnestness among a large collection of persons with regard to any object of curiosity, we can imagine the whole assemblage falling into one as soon as she takes her seat, and thus enjoying, each in turn, the coveted delight.--But we mistake; other information respecting French society is communicated, unwittingly however, by her Ladyship. It is this: that they are as fond of ridicule in 1830, as they were in 1816, and as they have ever been. We have little difficulty in believing, that her Ladyship received a vast deal of attention in Paris; still, we must confess, that it appears to us impossible not to be convinced, from her own story, that it was owing to a very different reason from the one to which it is attributed by her self-love. If there is any feature in the French character peculiarly salient or prominent, it is the love of ridicule. "Take care," said a lady to her son, who was on the eve of departure for his travels, "of the Inquisition at Madrid, of the mob at London, and of ridicule at Paris." Nothing that is at all calculated to excite an ironical smile or a sarcastic remark, escapes a "fasting Monsieur's" observation, and even the greatest virtues and genius, if combined with any quality which can afford matter for a joke, will scarcely prevent their possessor from being made a laughing-stock. Napoleon was so well aware of this propensity of his subjects, that he was prevented by it from placing his own figure in the car which surmounts the triumphal arch erected between the Court of the Tuileries and the Place du Carousal, being apprehensive that the wags would avail themselves of the opportunity thus afforded of punning at his expense--_le char le tient_--_le charlatan_. What a delectable tit-bit, consequently, for this appetite of the Parisians, must be a darling little philosopher in petticoats, (not quite sexagenary,) who dabbles in all sciences and arts, and is at the same time a pretender to the pretty affectations and hoydenish manners of a youthful belle! Such a person, especially if she possess that happy opinion of herself, which prevents her from having the slightest suspicion that she can be the object of anything but admiration with all, is regarded by them as a legitimate subject for a _mystification,_ which, in our vernacular, means _hoax_,--_elle se prete au ridicule_, as they say, she lends herself, as it were, to ridicule; and to be convinced that they know how to take consummate advantage of the loan, it is only necessary to glance over "France in 1830." Every one who does so will, we feel confident, understand in the same manner as ourselves, the meaning of that "brilliant welcome," which Miladi, with so much complacency, informs us she received "in the capital of European intellect." From beginning to end, these volumes afford almost continued specimens of perfection in the art of "quizzing," and may therefore be particularly indicated to such as are anxious to acquire proficiency in that way. We are glad that we have at length discovered a description of persons to whom we can conscientiously recommend the work we are reviewing, as calculated to afford desirable information.

There is another cause, besides this fondness for ridicule, to which the _mystification_ of her Ladyship may be attributed. Whoever is at all acquainted with her writings, must be aware that she pretends to be a great republican, and to entertain a most orthodox horror of royalism and the appendages thereof, and that she has called the royalist party in France all the hard names she could find in the most approved collection of opprobrious epithets. This circumstance, it is easy to imagine, may have excited a slight desire of revenge in the breasts of some of the younger members of that party.

In her very preface, we have an evidence of her having been the victim of as well concerted and admirably conducted a hoax, as was ever played off upon any one--it surpasses that which was put upon poor Malvolio in "Twelfth Night." After making the remark upon which we have already commented, that a second work on France from her pen could "alone be justified by the novelty of its matter, or by the merit of its execution," she says--

"It may serve, however, as an excuse, and an authentication of
the attempt, that I was called to the task by some of the most
influential organs of public opinion, in that great country.
They relied upon my impartiality (for I had proved it, at the
expense of proscription abroad, and persecution at home); and,
desiring only to be represented as they are, they deemed even
my humble talents not wholly inadequate to an enterprise whose
first requisite was the honesty that tells the truth, the whole
truth, and nothing but the truth."

Oh you wicked wags! If the abolition of capital punishment be effected in France, we hope you will be specially excepted as unworthy of mercy for this cruel plot to make Miladi Morgan expose herself thus to the sneers of an ill-natured world. We think we see you in conclave, laughing and joking over an epistle you have just concocted and signed with the names of half a dozen of the leaders of the liberals, in which her Ladyship is earnestly conjured to cross the Irish and the English channels and hasten to Paris, in order to dispel by the effulgence of her intellectual rays, the mists and darkness that the fiend of ultraism had spread over the political horizon. Seriously speaking, we cannot divine any other than this or a similar manner of accounting for her Ladyship's assertion, that "she was called to the task by some of the most influential organs of public opinion in France;"--she would not certainly affirm what she knew to be false, and the idea that she did receive a bona fide request of the above purport from such individuals, is too absurd to command belief for a moment. Would any one in his senses, who is "desirous of being represented as he is," put in requisition the pencil of an artist by which he would be sure to be caricatured?

The "persecution at home," that her Ladyship affects to have suffered, refers, we suppose, to sundry articles in the Quarterly Review and other Journals, in which she was rather roughly handled. We all know, however, what a pleasant thing it is to deem ourselves the objects of persecution, when it does not interfere with our profit--it is a flattering unction we love to lay to the soul, as it seems to augment our importance--and Miladi appears to have been highly delighted with the persecutions she has encountered. She is continually alluding to the attacks of the Quarterly, and whenever an opportunity occurs, favours us with extracts from them, and now and then she slips in some satirical observation concerning herself from the _Journal des Debats_. The different manner in which she has been treated by the Edinburgh and Quarterly Reviews, is an exemplification of the potent influence which party spirit exercises over those journals. In the latter, one or two of her works have been criticised with overwhelming power, and in a tone and spirit superlatively bitter. In the former, on the contrary, she is spoken of with studied lenity, although the Reviewer is obliged to confess that he is not one of her particular admirers, and seems to be perpetually restraining himself from indulging in the language of raillery and sarcasm. We need hardly add that the political principles which her Ladyship professes to entertain, are the main cause of this discrepancy. For our own part, we conscientiously believe that the English journal has not gone half so far beyond the truth as its Scotch rival has fallen short of it, in their respective strictures. With regard to the republican bursts of Lady Morgan, we cannot help suspecting that there is more affectation and cant in them than sincerity:--she is too anxious to let it be known that she is caressed every where by the _ne plus ultras_ of aristocracy and rank, as well as by those of intellect, and, at the same time, there is too much parade and ostentatious vehemence in her explosions against the royalist party.

As to the other article which her Ladyship says she has received in exchange for her _impartiality!_--"proscription abroad,"--we feel pretty confident that it exists no where but in her own imagination. There it has, doubtless, been engendered by the malice of some ultra in disguise, who has made her Ladyship believe, that the Emperor of Austria, the Grand Signior, the King of Owyhee, and the other despots of the earth, have forbidden, on pain of racking, roasting, and every kind of torture, the importation of her books into their dominions, lest these should be revolutionized by them forthwith. Heaven defend us! we are very much afraid that Lady Morgan will set this world of ours on fire, somewhere about the time when it comes in contact with the comet. It is not mere supposition on our part that her Ladyship deems herself an object of dread to the Austrian government at least;--read what she says apropos of the entree of its ambassador into a ball-room where she was making all the lamps and candles hide their diminished heads. "When his Austrian excellence was announced, how I started, with all the weight of Aulic proscription on my head! The representative of the long-armed monarch of Hapsburg so near me,--of him, who, could he only once get his fidgetty fingers on my _little_ neck, would give it a twist, that would save his custom-house officers all future trouble of breaking carriages and harassing travellers, in search of the pestilent writings of 'Ladi Morgan.' I did not breathe freely, till his excellency had passed on with his glittering train, into the illumined conservatory, and was lost in a wilderness of flowering shrubs and orange trees." Ought not this ambassador to be recalled for his negligence, his want of loyalty, in not attempting to get his fingers about Miladi's 'little neck,' in order to restore his Imperial master to peace and tranquillity of mind? Poor Francis! still are you doomed to be _fidgetty_ on your throne. We think we see you receiving intelligence of the appearance of this last emanation from Ladi Morgan's untiring pen--a mortal paleness overspreads your face, as Metternich rushes into your presence with terror depicted in his countenance, articulating only "Ladi Morgan, Ladi Morgan," having just obtained himself a knowledge of the dreadful fact from an almost breathless courier--in an agony of suspense you gaze wildly at your faithful counsellor, until he has recovered composure sufficient to unfold to you the whole tale of horror. It is told! The monarch in whose hands are the lives of fifty millions of subjects, lies himself, to all appearance, deprived of existence. But see! he revives--his lips move--what are the words which fall faintly upon the ears of the bewildered attendants who have been called into the apartment by the cries of the prime minister? They are words of malediction, of the same purport as those which Henry II. of England uttered against his servants, for their want of zeal in allowing him to be so long tormented by Thomas a Becket, and which caused that prelate's death. But alas! for your repose, Imperial Caesar, it is not so easy at the present day, as in former times, for de Luces and de Morevilles to gratify the vengeful wishes of their masters, and Lady Morgan yet breathes the breath of life (although it is true she did not do it "freely," according to her own account, while in the vicinity of your ambassador in Paris,) to keep your nervous system in disorder, and for the continued vexation of the rational part of the reading world.

Multifarious are the other instances we might cite of the manner in which her simple Ladyship was _mystified_ by the ironical propensities of some, and the malicious ultraism of others, during her visit to Paris in 1829-30. "There are certain characters," observes M. Jouy, "who may be considered as the scourges of whatever is ridiculous (_les fleaux du ridicule_;) they discover it under whatever form it may be hid, and pitilessly immolate it with the weapon of irony," and into the hands of persons of this merciless tribe she seems to have been perpetually falling. We must content ourselves, however, with referring to but one example more; a conversation between herself and a young Frenchman, about Romanticism and Classicism, which she has detailed in her first volume. This is a subject, which, as every one must know, has set all Paris by the ears, and attracts almost as much attention there as the overthrow of one dynasty and the creation of another. Lady Morgan, of course, is a thorough-going _romantique_, and demonstrates the greater excellence of the school of which she deems herself the chief support and brightest ornament, in pretty much the same way as the superiority of modern writers over the ancients used to be proved by the advocates of the former, viz. by two methods, reason and example, the first of which they derived from their own taste, and the second from their own works. At the time she was delivered of her quarto about France in 1810, Paris was still immersed in classical darkness, and it may therefore be fairly inferred that the romantic light with which it has since been illumined, radiated from that same tome. What can be more natural? When she left France, "the word '_Romanticism_' was unknown (or nearly so) in the circles of Paris; the writers _a la mode_, whether ultra or liberal, were, or thought themselves to be, supporters and practisers of the old school of literature;" in the interval of her absence she published a work in which she told the Parisians that Racine was no poet, and gave them other valuable information of the kind, calculated to dispel their classical infatuation:--when she returned, every thing was changed; poets and prosers were vieing with each other in gloriously offending against all rules and canons; Romanticism, in short, was, as she asserts, completely the order of the day. The classical wrath of one man was the source of unnumbered woes to ancient Greece, and why may not the romantic wrath of one woman--a woman too, who keeps autocrats and sultans _fidgetty_ on their thrones, be the cause of a change in the literature of a country? This change, at all events, however it may have been operated, seems to have inspired her with additional courage in her assaults, and additional fury in her anathemas upon the poor French authors whom the ignorant world has hitherto been in the habit of regarding as objects of admiration. She now asserts, in "France in 1829-30," that the whole classic literature of that country is "feeble and unuseful," nay, even fitted to "enervate and degrade;" and in a wonderfully luminous chapter about modern literature, she has shown as clearly as Hudibras could have proved by "force of argument" that "a man's no horse," that Classicism is the ally of despotism, and that it was the policy of arbitrary power to encourage a fondness for the ancient authors!

Fiercely romantic, however, as her Ladyship is, she is mild as a cooing dove in comparison with the male interlocutor in the famous conversation to which we have alluded. This personage completely out-herods Herod; but that he was an ultra in disguise, endeavouring to make her Ladyship write down absurdities, is a conviction which 'fire and water could not drive out of' us;--even she, herself, at one period of the dialogue, can not help doubting whether she "is or is not the subject of what in England is called a hoax, and in France a _mystification_," and when _she_ doubts upon such a point, it would be extremely difficult for any one else not to deem it a matter of certainty. Had we space sufficient, we should transcribe the whole of this colloquy, as it deserves repetition; but we can only give a small specimen of it for the amusement of our readers. The gentleman having informed Miladi, that Racine, Corneille, and Voltaire, are "dethroned monarchs," and no longer tolerated at the Theatre, she asks him what is to be seen or heard there, to which he answers:--

"'Our great historic dramas, written not in pompous
Alexandrines, but in prose, the style of truth, the language of
life and nature, and composed boldly, in defiance of Aristotle
and Boileau. Their plot may run to any number of acts, and the
time to any number of nights, months, or years; or if the
author pleases, it may take in a century, or a millennium: and
then, for the place, the first scene may be laid in Paris, and
the last in Kamschatka. In short, France has recovered her
literary liberty, and makes free use of it.'

"'_Oui da!_' I rejoined, a little bothered, and not knowing
well what to say, but still looking very wise, 'In fact, then,
you take some of those liberties, that you used to laugh at, in
our poor Shakspeare?'

"'Your _poor_ Shakspeare! your divine, immortal Shakspeare, the
idol of new France!--you must see him played _textuellement_ at
the _Francais_, and not in the diffuse and feeble parodies of
Ducis.'

"'Shakspeare played _textuellement_ at the _Francais_!" I
exclaimed--'_O, par exemple!_'

"'Yes, certainly. Othello is now in preparation; and Hamlet and
Macbeth are stock pieces. But even your Shakspeare was far from
the truth, the great truth, that the drama should represent the
progress, development, and accomplishment of the natural and
moral world, without reference to time or locality. Unknown to
himself, his mighty genius was mastered by the fatal prejudices
and unnatural restrictions of the _perruques_ of antiquity.
Does nature unfold her plots in five acts? or confine her
operations to three hours by the parish clock?'

"'Certainly not, Monsieur; but still....'

"'_Mais, mais, un moment, chere Miladi._ The drama is one great
illusion of the senses, founded on facts admitted by the
understanding, and presented in real life, past or present.
When you give yourself up to believe that Talma was Nero, or
Lafont Britannicus, or that the Rue Richelieu is the palace of
the Caesars, you admit all that at first appears to outrage
possibility. Starting, then, from that point, I see no
absurdity in the tragedy, which my friend Albert de S---- says
he has written for the express purpose of trying how far the
neglect of the unities may be carried. The title and subject of
this piece is "the Creation," beginning from Chaos (and what
scenery and machinery it will admit!) and ending with the
French revolution; the scene, infinite space; and the time,
according to the Mosaic account, some 6000 years.'

"'And the protagonist, Monsieur? Surely you don't mean to
revive the allegorical personages in the mysteries of the
middle ages?'

"'_Ah ca! pour le protagoniste, c'est le diable._ He is the
only contemporaneous person in the universe that we know of,
whom in these days of _cagoterie_ we can venture to bring on
the stage, and who could be perpetually before the scene, as a
protagonist should be. He is particularly suited, by our
received ideas of his energy and restlessness, for the
principal character. The devil of the German patriarch's
_Faust_ is, after all, but a profligate casuist; and the high
poetical tone of sublimity of Milton's Satan is no less to be
avoided in a delineation that has truth and nature for its
inspiration. In short, the devil, the true romantic devil, must
speak, as the devil would naturally speak, under the various
circumstances in which his immortal ambition and ceaseless
malignity may place him. In the first act, he should assume the
tone of the fallen hero, which would by no means become him
when in corporal possession of a Jewish epileptic, and
bargaining for his _pis aller_ in a herd of swine. Then again,
as a leader of the army of St. Dominick, he should have a
fiercer tone of bigotry, and less political _finesse_, than as
a privy councillor in the cabinet of the Cardinal de Richelieu.
At the end of the fourth act, as a guest at the table of Baron
Holbach, he may even be witty; while as a minister of police,
he should be precisely the devil of the schoolmen, leading his
victim into temptation, and triumphing in all the petty
artifices and verbal sophistries of a bachelor of the Sorbonne.
But as the march of intellect advances, this would by no means
be appropriate; and before the play is over, he must by turns
imitate the _patelinage_ of a Jesuit _a robe courte_, the
pleading of a procureur general, the splendid bile of a deputy
of the _cote droit_, and should even talk political economy
like an article in the 'Globe.' But the author shall read you
his piece--'_La Creation! drame Historique et Romantique_, in
six acts, allowing a thousand years to each act. _C'est l'homme
marquant de son siecle._''

"'But,' said I, 'I shall remain in Paris only a few weeks, and
he will never get through it in so short a time.'

"'_Pardonnez moi, madame_, he will get through it in six
nights--the time to be actually occupied by the performance; an
act a night, to be distributed among the different theatres in
succession, beginning at the _Francais_ and ending at the
_Ambigu_.'"

It is here that her Ladyship begins to doubt whether this romantic gentleman was not hoaxing her, and certes it was time; but 'melt and disperse ye spectre doubts!' an attempt to hoax Lady Morgan, impossible! They do quickly pass away, and the conversation is pursued in the same strain, until "Monsieur de ---- one of the conscript fathers of classicism" is announced. No sooner has his name passed the lips of the servant, than the romantic gentleman snatches up his hat, and endeavours to make an exit from the room, in as much consternation as if the "protagonist" himself were about to appear. But Monsieur de ---- the classicist, enters before he can escape; "he draws up." The two then "glanced cold looks at each other, bowed formally, and the romanticist retired, roughing his wild locks, and panting like a hero of a tragedy." What a picture! We venture to affirm, however, that had an attentive observer been present, he would have seen something like a wink or a covert glance passing between the two worthies as they enacted the above scene, which might have led him to suspect that they knew each other better than Miladi supposed: it was only on the previous evening, be it stated, on her own authority, that she had made the acquaintance of the romanticist, whom she describes as having "something of an exalte in his air, in his open shirt collar, black head, and wild and melancholy look." The dialogue that ensues with the classicist after the disappearance of the other, is quite as ridiculous as the foregoing one, and quite as well calculated to give her Ladyship a fit of the "doubts," though it does not appear that she suffered by them a second time. We may mention, before leaving this subject, that when the romanticist told her, in the extract we have just made, that Othello was in preparation for the _Theatre Francais_, he told her truth; but, if we are not very much mistaken, the other piece of information he communicated--that Hamlet and Macbeth are stock-tragedies at that theatre--could only have been related by a gentleman of great fertility of imagination. Othello, we know, was actually performed, and went off tolerably well until the final scene, but then the nerves of the Frenchmen were put to a trial they could not by any possibility endure. The sight of a Moor and an Infidel, endeavouring to smother a lady and a Christian, so completely aroused all the gallant and religious sensibilities of the audience, that shouts of _terrible, abominable_, resounded from every part of the house, and Monsieur Othello was (theatrically) damned for his wickedness. As far as we know, he never showed his copper-coloured visage again at the _Theatre Francais_, but contented himself thenceforward with running after poor Desdemona, and stabbing her behind the scene at the opera, where this minor exhibition of cruelty is tolerated in consideration of the _roulades_, with which he smooths her passage into the other world.

Speaking of theatres puts us in mind, as the story-tellers say, of a remark made by her Ladyship in the chapter she has devoted to the theatres of Paris, which we wish to notice. She says, "it is strange, that among the many men of genius who have treated the subject of the unities, none should have clearly laid it down, that the great object of dramatic composition is the satisfaction of the audience, no matter by what means." What a fine thing it is to be endowed with uncommon powers of original thought! It is so delightful to be able to belie the assertion, that it is too late now to think of propounding any new idea, every thing having already been said that can be said about any thing! Here, ye croakers about modern degeneracy, here is something that should cover you with confusion and shame. Lady Morgan, after having read all, aye, all, that has been written about a certain subject by all the "many men of genius" who have treated it--which it would only require the lifetime of a Methuselah to do--has discovered an idea relating to it, which is to be found in none of the works of those "many men of genius," and this she has revealed for the edification and astonishment of the world, in the sentence we have quoted above. How every lover of new ideas now living, should bless his stars for having cast his existence in the same period as that of her Ladyship! It is, however, our melancholy duty, to be obliged to deprive our generation of the glory which would be shed upon it by such an intellectual invention as the foregoing. Though it has undoubtedly never been adverted to in any way, since she so asserts the fact, by any of the "many men of genius" who have exercised their minds upon the topic of the unities, yet by a singular chance we have fallen upon something very much like it in the petty effusions of two or three subordinate scribblers, who have presumed to hint at what was not excogitated by their betters. One of those effusions is a paper called a "Preface to Shakspeare," written about fifty years ago, as we have discovered, after long research and a great deal of trouble, by a certain Samuel Johnson, who dubbed himself Doctor, and published likewise, if our investigations have informed us rightly, other works, under the titles of "The Rambler," "Rasselas," "Biographies of the British Poets," &c., and tradition even says that he attempted a dictionary of the English language. Another of those effusions is an "Essay upon the Drama," by a person called Walter Scott, who, it is affirmed, is still in the land of the living, but where he dwelleth, and what other productions he hath printed, we have been able to obtain no clue for finding out. It must indeed be confessed, that neither of those individuals has so "clearly laid it down" as her Ladyship, that the audience should be pleased, "_no matter by what means_," though they certainly have intimated that its gratification ought to be one of the principal objects of a dramatic author. They were foolish enough to think, that to pander to the tastes of an audience, if corrupt and vitiated, is paltry, is despicable; that to consult its inclinations when at war with sound taste or proper decorum, is to do the work of those who are influenced only by a love of sordid gain, reckless of every pure and elevated feeling--that "the end of all writing is to instruct, the end of all poetry, _to instruct by pleasing_." This is the difference between the sentiment of the authors and that of the authoress; but were that same Samuel Johnson now alive, sooner than maintain an opinion in any the slightest manner at variance with one expressed by her Ladyship, he would,--as he was ready to do, according to his own avowal, when asserting something that was denied by persons scarcely more important than himself,--"sink down in reverential silence, as AEneas withdrew from the defence of Troy, when he saw Neptune shaking the wall, and Juno heading the besiegers."

We do not wish to insinuate that her Ladyship has derived any advantage from consulting the pages of either the Preface or the Essay to which we have alluded. By no means. Nothing would be more unjust; for how could she be indebted for any thing to what may be contained in a couple of insignificant pamphlets, whose scarcity is such, that we might almost suppose our copies of them to be the only ones in existence? How they came into our hands, is a point we leave for elucidation to those who find pleasure or profit in unravelling mysteries. There is, to be sure, a wonderful similitude throughout, between her reflections upon the classical and romantic drama, and those which may be read in the Essay; but this circumstance must unquestionably be considered one of those "remarkable coincidences" that every now and then prompt the cry of "a miracle!" It must, else, be accounted for, by supposing that the author of the Essay is gifted with a power over future operations of mind, similar to that which was possessed over future events, by the wizard who warned Lochiel against the fatal day at Culloden, and that he is thus enabled, by his "mystical lore," to make

"Coming _ideas_ cast their shadow before."

Seriously, however, the observations of her Ladyship on this head, furnish as nice an instance of plagiarism as we recollect. The best of the matter is, that after filling nearly a couple of pages with remarks, amongst which not a single original idea is to be found, save perhaps the rather novel one, that "in Macbeth the interest is suspended at the death of Duncan, and does not revive until that of the tyrant is at hand;" she winds up with saying, "obvious as this train of reasoning appears, _it has been overlooked equally by the opponents and the sticklers for the old canons of criticism_; a lamentable instance of the influence of authority, and of the spirit of party, on the judgments of the most cultivated minds." This is a sample of modest assurance in perfection. There is another "remarkable coincidence" in these volumes, between the biography they contain of General Lafayette, and an article about "the Nation's Guest" in a number of the North American Review for 1825. But we leave it to our contemporary to take her Ladyship to task for this appropriation of his property.

In our foregoing remarks we have confined ourselves, in great measure, to some of those portions of the volumes before us, which are most susceptible of ridicule, though we have adverted to only a few even of those--there are others, however, that would require a graver tone. The sickly sentimentalism about Ninon de l'Enclos, La Valliere, Madame d'Houdetot, and other strumpets--such "free" conversations as those which are detailed at page 138, in the first volume, and page 108, in the second; especially as they were held in the presence of a young girl, her Ladyship's niece, who was doubtless one of the chief causes why so many gentlemen came "_pour faire leurs hommages_" to the aunt--and various expressions upon matters appertaining to religion, deserve reprehension in no measured terms. But we have not space enough at our disposal to bestow any further notice upon these, or to glance at other parts of "France in 1829-30," although we have reaped but a small portion of the harvest which it contains.

And this is the writer who pretends to enlighten the world upon the "state of society" in one of the greatest countries of the earth! This is the work by means of which she flatters herself that such an object is to be effected,--and this too, (_proh pudor!_) is the kind of work that can be republished in our country with a certainty of success! Should the fact come to the knowledge of posterity, what will be thought of the literary taste of this generation? We have, however, a cause for consolation--if that can be termed consolation which ministers only to selfish vanity, and is a source of pain to every better feeling--in the assurance that the literary history of future times, judging from the experience of the past, will present similar instances of depravity of intellectual appetite. We wonder now, how our ancestors could have relished what we regard with indifference if not with disgust, in the same way that our taste in some respects will be a matter of surprise with our descendants, and as theirs will be with those by whom they may be succeeded on the stage of life. Every age, since books have been written and books have been read, has furnished, and we may therefore assert, every age will furnish, reason upon reason for making the remark of the philosophic author of the "Caracteres," that not to hazard sometimes a great deal of nonsense, is to manifest ignorance of the public taste--"_c'est ignorer le gout du peuple, que de ne pas hasarder quelquefois de grandes fadaises_." We do not wish to deny that Lady Morgan has been gifted with a modicum of talent; even in the work before us, there is occasional evidence of natural ability, which, had it been properly cultivated and modestly employed, might have earned for her honourable fame. But what advantage--we speak, of course, with reference to reputation; as to pecuniary profit we have no doubt that she has found her account in her '_fadaises_,' or else they would not have been multiplied to such an extent--what advantage, we ask, has she derived from her faculty of scribbling, except that she has made herself pretty widely known, and ridiculed wherever she is known? Presumptuous ignorance, and overweening conceit, have, in her case, completely _nullified_, nay worse, have converted into a curse, in some respects, what was intended every way for a blessing. If Lady Morgan would forego her mongrel idiom, and use the English language; if she would confine herself to subjects with which she has some acquaintance; if she would substitute a simple in the stead of her inflated style; and above all, if she could forget herself, she might write tolerably well; but there are too many _ifs_ to render it probable, or even possible, that the defects to which they relate will ever be overcome. This being the case, we take leave of you, Miladi, not with the _au revoir_ of which you are so fond, but with the parting salutation of Louis the Fourteenth to James the Second, when sending him with an army to recover his forfeited crown, "Adieu, and may we never meet again."

ART. II.--_Physiologie des Passions, ou nouvelle Doctrine des Sentimens Moraux_; par J. L. ALIBERT. Chapitre XI. de l'Ennui. _Physiology of the Passions; or a New Theory of Moral Sentiments._ Chap. XI. of Ennui.

This book is neither exact nor eloquent. The thoughts are not precise; the expressions are vague; and, of consequence, the reasonings of no value. The attempts at rich displays of imaginative power are contrasted with a want of invention; and illustrative stories, of feeble execution, are lavished abundantly in lieu of physiological facts. The volumes are too insipid to cheat an idle hour of its weariness; they rather engender fatigue than relieve it. The author will never enter the true elysium of glory; he has not substance enough to proceed straight up the ascent; but will certainly be "blown transverse into the devious air." Like most of the literature of the day, this new Theory of Moral Sentiments is essentially transient. It will pass, like anti-masonry, without producing an era.

Yet the chapter on Ennui is tolerably sensible. It is neither brilliant nor acute; but gives a superficial sketch of that state of being with considerable accuracy. To be sure, it is not from a Frenchman, that the best account of ennui should be expected. Of all nations of Europe, the French have the least of it, though they invented the word; while the Turks, with their untiring gravity, their lethargic dignity, their blind fatalism, their opium-eating, and midnight profligacies, have undoubtedly the largest share. But the Turks are only philosophers in practice; the theory they leave to others. Now next to the Turks, the English suffer most from ennui. Do but hear the account which their finest poetical genius of the present century gives of himself, when he was hardly of age.

"With pleasure drugged he almost longed for wo,
And e'en for change of scene would seek the shades below."

The complaints of a young man in the bloom of life and the vigour of early hope, cannot excite much sympathy. But he interests all our feelings, when in the fullest maturity to which Lord Byron was permitted to attain, he still draws from his own bosom the appalling picture of unalleviated feelings, and describes the horrors of permanent ennui, in language that was doubtless but the mournful echo of an unhappy mind.

"'Tis time this heart should be unmoved,
Since others it has ceased to move;
Yet, though I cannot be beloved,
Still let me love.

My days are in the yellow leaf;
The flowers and fruits of love are gone;
The worm, the canker, and the grief,
Are mine alone.

The fire that in my bosom preys
Is like to some volcanic isle;
No torch is kindled at his blaze--
A funeral pile.

The hope, the fears, the jealous care,
The exalted portion of the pain
And power of love I cannot share,
But wear the chain."

Such was the harassed state of Lord Byron's mind, at the epoch of his life which seemed to promise a crowded abundance of exciting sensations. He had hastened to the consecrated haunts of classic associations; he was struggling for honour on the parent soil of glory; he was surrounded by the stir and tumult of barbarous warfare; he had the consciousness, that the eyes of the civilized world were fixed upon his actions; he professed to feel the impulse of enthusiasm in behalf of liberty; and yet there was not irritation enough in the new and busy life of a soldier, to overcome his apathy, and restore him to happy activity. He only sought to give away his breath on the field, and to take his rest in a soldier's grave.

The literature of the day is essentially transient. The rapid circulation of intelligence enriches the public mind by imparting and diffusing every discovery; and the active spirit of man, quickened by the easy possession of practical knowledge, rightly claims the instant distribution of useful truth. But with this is connected a feverish excitement for novelty. The world, in the earliest days of which accounts have reached us, followed after the newest strains; and now the lessons of former ages, though they have a persuasive eloquence for the tranquil listener, are as blank and as silent as the grave to the general ear. The voice of the past, all musical as it is with the finest harmonies of human intelligence, is lost in the jangling din of temporary discussions. Philosophy steals from the crowd, and hides herself in retirement, awaiting a better day; true learning is undervalued, and almost disappears from among men. It would seem, as though the wise men of old frowned in anger on the turbulence of the petty passions, and withdrew from the noisy and contentious haunts, where wisdom has no votaries, and tranquillity no followers. In the days of ancient liberty, the public places rung with the nervous eloquence of sublime philosophy; and the streets of Athens offered nothing more attractive than the keen discussions, the piercing satire, and the calm philanthropy of Socrates. But now it is politics which rules the city and the country; the times of deep reflection, of slowly maturing thought, are past; and now that erudition is a jest, ancient learning an exploded chimera, and elaborated eloquence known chiefly by recollection, the ample gazette runs its daily career, and heralds, in ephemeral language, the deeds of the passing hours. The age of accumulated learning is past, and every thing is carried along the rushing current of public economy, or of private business.--Life is divided between excited passions and morbid apathy.

And is this current so strong, that it cannot be resisted? Are we borne without hope of rest upon the ebbing tide? Can we never separate ourselves from the theory, and with the coolness of an observer, watch the various emotions, motives, and passions by which the human world is moulded and swayed? Can we not trace the influence of the changes and chances of this mortal state on the character and minds of mortal men?

Life is a pursuit. The moralists, who utter their heathenish oracles in the commonplace complaints of a heathenish discontent, tell us, that we are born but to pursue, and pursue but to be deceived. They say, that man in his career after earthly honours, is like the child that chases the gaudy insect; the pursuit idle; the object worthless. They tell us, that it is but a deceitful though a deceptive star, which beams from the summit of the distant hill; advance, and its light recedes; ascend, and a higher hill is seen beyond, and a wider space is yet to be traversed. And they tell us, that this is vanity; this the worthlessness of human desire; this the misery and desolation of the human heart. But how little do they know of the throbbings of that heart! How poorly have they studied the secrets of the human breast! How imperfectly do they understand the feebleness and the strength of man's fortitude and will! If the bright object still gleams in the horizon, if the brilliancy of glory is still spread on the remotest hill, if the distant sky is still invested with the delicate hues of promise, and the gentle radiance of hope, pursuit remains a pleasure; and the pilgrim, ever light-hearted, passes heedlessly over the barren wastes, and climbs with cheerful ardour each rugged mountain. But suppose that brilliant star to be blotted out of the sky; suppose the lustre of the horizon to have faded into the dank and gloomy shades of a cloudy evening; suppose the pursuit to be now without an object, and the blood which hope had sent merrily through the veins, to gather and curdle round the desponding heart. Then it is, that life is abandoned to persecuting fiends, and the springs of joy are poisoned by the demons of listlessness.

The scholar and the Christian have theirs guarantied against despair. The desire for intelligence is never satisfied but with the attainment of that wisdom which passes all understanding; and the eye discerning the bright lineaments of its perfect exemplar, can set no limits to the sacred passion, which recognises the connexion of the human mind with the divine, and places before itself a career of advancement, to which time itself can never prescribe bounds. But it is not with these high questions that we are at present engaged. We have thrown open the book of human life; we are to read there of this world and its littleness, of the springs of present action, of the relief of present restlessness.