Princess Claudia-Die! and can you die without me? So young and so beautiful! and die! die! but I love you! (in a deep and guttural voice,) Die! (she takes his hand) Cold! is it a dream? Young man, (holding up the piece of shagreen skin, and showing it to the Princess.)-No! let adieu !

us say

Princess Claudia (with an air of surprise.)— Adieu ?

Young man with shagreen skin-Yes; this is a talisman; it accomplishes my wishes and represents my life; see what remains of it! If you continue to look at me, I shall wish-and if I wish there is but this little bit left! just look!

The young Lady, taking the shagreen skin, and holding it over one of the lamps of the orchestra, attentively examines the face of her lover and the last remains of the shrinking talisman; but he (the youth) seeing her thus beautiful from horror and from love, is no longer master of his thoughts.

(Enter, to the sound of organs, the church of Notre Dame and the Cathedral of Augsburg.)*

* For this humanized appearance of Notre Dame and the Cathedral of Augsburg, as well as for the simple and interesting observations of these two elegant churches, I c 10

VOL. I.

Cathedral of Augsburg-Really, my dear NotreDame, your part of Paris is so abominably crowded and filthy, that my new gown is tumbled all over, and my satin shoes covered with mud; but here are these gentry of yours who have been horrifying all my German horrors. I think we ought to preach them a sermon.

Notre-Dame-Yes; let us preach them a sermon !

Cathedral of Augsburg—Oh, 'you all-seductive thieves and virtuous Galerians!

Notre-Dame-Oh, you all-trustworthy governesses and chaste princesses!

Cathedral of Augsburg-Oh, you, Barnave, and you, daughters of Sejan !

Notre-Dame-Oh, you Brulart, who call yourself Count D *** !

Captain Brulart (drawing a pistol from his belt with one hand, and unsheathing his cutlass with the other) Sacre Dieu! what do the old witches mean?

(He shoots Notre-Dame, and runs the Cathedral of Augsburg through the body; then yawn

am indebted to the sublime Author of "Ahasuerus," to whom I refer all gentlemen and ladies who wish to become better acquainted with the language and habits of comets, stars, and public buildings.

ing and wiping his sword, exclaims,)-What a frightful dream! *

(Satan here enters, followed by a number of devils carrying large brooms.)

The Galerian falling down on his knees-Oh God! oh Satan! oh heaven! oh hell!

Leoni (whipping the mitre off Notre-Dame's head and making toward a trap-door)-I shall be off for Venice.

Barnave (gazing tenderly on a little washerwoman who had just handed him a pair of clean worsted stockings.) Accursed be the first who thought of making of horror a profession and a commerce! accursed be the new poetic school with its hangmen and its phantoms; they have overturned my whole being; and here, whilst I have been observing the moral world in its most mysterious influences I have never once remarked that the pretty little Jenny was become a woman."+

66

* This is one of the 'gentillesses' of Captain Brulart. He takes opium, and has agreeable dreams, which he calls ‘his life,' and he murders, tortures, and blows up people, and such like, and after these little accidents-calls out— quel rêve affreux ! '

"A little washerwoman tells her customers she is going to be married." Je fus frappé comme d'un coup de foudre ; il y avait six ans que je la traitais comme un C 11

VOL. I.

The Governess with the Princess in her hand advancing to Satan and curtseying-This young Princess, please your Majesty....

Brulart (pulling his pedigree out of his waistcoat pocket and commencing a soliloquy) "To be or not to be, that is the question." Satan-Not to be, scoundrel-here (to the devils) sweep this dust off my stage.*

CHAOS.

Thus, much of light literature in France is what I have pointed it—a kind of phantasmogoria; not without talent, but without all that renders talent touching and respectable.†

enfant. Je poussai un profond soupir et me levant furieux" Maudit soit," m'écriai-je, " le premier qui s'est avisé de faire de l'horreur, métier et marchandise! maudit soit la nouvelle école poétique avec ses bourreaux et ses phantômes ! ils ont tout bouleversé dans mon être ; à force de me faire observer le monde moral dans ses plus mystérieuses influences, ils m'ont empêché de remarquer que cette jolie petite Jenny n'était plus— un enfant."—L'Ane Mort et la Femme guillotinée— M. Janin.

* See Ahasuerus again, who has introduced this new

scene.

† Monsieur Sue would be forcible if he were not extravagant; Monsieur Balzac graceful and affecting, if he did

But it is far more interesting to inquire into the causes and effects of this strange perversion of ability than to prolong our criticism upon the writing to which it has given birth. To what then are we to attribute these extraordinary productions-and what are they in their turn likely to produce?

In the first place, the popular style which history and other works of information have adopted, has abridged the numbers of light readers, and taken many of the soberer minded and better informed from that class to which the novelist ordinarily addresses himself. The consequences of free institutions has also been to not struggle to be fine, and degrade himself by being licentious. Monsieur Janin is clever, witty, brilliant, but without coherence in his larger works; and, dallying as it were with his own fancies, he resembles the smith, who having used the anvil with force, stops in his labours to amuse himself with the sparks. G. Sand-or, to drop a mask which nobody preserves, Madame Dudevant, is in all respects an extraordinary person, and if she merit the chastisement, wins the admiration of the critic. style is the most eloquent of the epoch; and though on some occasions spoilt by modern affectations, is at others tinged with that antique and sacred colouring which Rome gave to her saints, and Judea to her prophets. As wholes, her works, it is true, are false and forced, but they contain parts, natural, eloquent and true—passages rife with the emotions and the experience of their daring and beautiful authoress.

Her