present? -- three old women, absolute objects of mockery and laughter to the audience! Nay, this seems, in some degree, to be now their legitimate purpose; for it is not unfrequently the case, that when the spectators are more decorous than usual, some of the witches, by a grotesque action or ridiculous intonation, appeal to them for the customary tribute-a hearty laugh! But it is not always the actors who are in fault. There is one thing which has always especially moved my admiration. It is the marvellous small provocative to laughter which people require when congregated together in large bodies, and when it is quite clear they should do any earthly thing rather than laugh. Here, for instance, where the most solemn attention and breathless anxiety should pervade the house

1st Witch.-Look what I have! 2nd Witch.-Show me! show me! 3rd Witch.-Here I have a pilot's thumb Wreck'd as he did homeward come. 2nd Witch,-A drum! a drum! Macbeth doth come.

Upon this hint, if it be a favourite actor that is expected, a universal uproar or row commences, which lasts until Macbeth comes swaggering and bowing down the stage. If it be not any great or novel favourite that personates the hero, the scene proceeds in the following lively

manner:

3rd Witch.-The weird sisters, hand in hand,
Posters of the sea and land,
Thus do go about, about,
Thrice to thine.

Here the first witch, as a part of the incantation, bows or nods her head thrice, and a general smile instantly suffuses the faces of a majority of those present, in boxes, pit, and gallery, which indisputably proves that nodding the head thrice is essentially and exquisitely comic. 'The second witch continues "and thrice to thine," suiting the action to the word, upon which a general titter ensues. But when the third witch, in obedience to the line, " and thrice again to make up nine," nods thrice more, the great merriment of the audience can no longer be contained, and "Peace! the charm's wound up," is uttered amid a roar of laughter. "By day and night, but this is wondrous strange!" Certes, it would be a merry treat for Voltaire, the blasphemer of Shakspeare, to see many parts of Macbeth acted.

On the stage, in the garbled selection designated Richard III. how much do we miss, or rather, what a one-sided

view is presented to us of the hero. There is no relief in the character, it is scarcely Shaksperian, for it is unmixed evil. All the darker shades are deepened, and brought prominently forward: and the lighter and more agreeable tints sedulously excluded from the picture. We have the "hunchback," the "bottled spider," the subtle tyrant, the hypocrite, and the murderer, at full length; but we miss the lively animated Richard, the blunt, quick-witted soldier, the accomplished courtier, the "princely Glos ter, such as he is to be found in Shaks

peare. We miss all his bitter, though pleasant and not altogether unmerited gibes and jeers at King Edward, his wife, and her relations

"We speak no treason, man; we say, the king
Is wise and virtuous; and his noble queen
Well struck in years; fair, and not jealous :—
We say that Shore's wife hath a pretty foot,
A cherry lip,

A bonny eye, a passing pleasing tongue;
And the queen's kindred are made gentlefolks:
How say you, sir; can you deny all this?"
and twenty other similar passages, and
we lose that respect for him which,
maugre his bad qualities, his energy, his
fiery courage, his constancy, generalship,
and intellectual superiority to those
around him, extort from us, through the
three parts of Henry the Sixth.
ing the long and bloody wars of the
roses, he is almost the only prominent
character who is not at the same time as
weak as wicked.

Dur

The

But of all the acting plays, King Lear undoubtedly suffers most. Sins of omission and commission are here too numerous to be pointed out. There is a radical unfitness too, in the exposure of the infirmity and imbecility of the aged monarch through five long acts, that it is scarcely possible for genius, even of the highest order, to overcome. pity produced by an exhibition of physical decay for any lengthened period, is nearly allied to contempt; and contempt is by no means the feeling with which either the mental or bodily weakness of Lear ought to be regarded. In the closet, we think of him with natural reverence, as 66 a poor, despised, weak, and infirm old man," "fourscore and upwards;" on the stage, the repulsive infirmities attendant on this condition,-shaking, coughing, tottering; or worse than that, the awkward imitations of them by the actor, who is constantly obtruding them on us to shew his knowledge of, and attention to, the part, repel our sympathies. Besides, the madness of Lear is too

subtle and refined, almost too sacred, for the stage. The superhuman touches of pathos and passion are too exquisitely fine and delicate for the atmosphere of a theatre. We get too deeply interested to endure the thought that it is but counterfeit "well-painted passion" we are looking on; and, in the excited state of our feelings, applause becomes impertinence, and the other noises of a playhouse loathsome. Whenever other wri. ters for the stage have failed, it has been from lack of means-from an inability to conceive or express what the passion or situation required; but Shakspeare has done more than succeed; in the exercise of his immortal powers, he has at times, risen to a pitch that has rendered it impossible for mortals of more limited faculties, even in their happiest moments of inspiration, to give other than a poor and imperfect illustration of bis meaning. Of all his characters, this is most conspicuous in Lear. In these latter days, no man, save Kean, has succeeded in giving even a faint idea of the crazed monarch; all other attempts have been little better than pitiable. I do not say this dictatorially. There are many, I doubt not, better qualified to judge than myself, who think differently. I quarrel with no man's opinion, but elaim the right of expressing and retain. ing my own. Those who are much in the habit of attending the theatre, get inured to dramatic butchery of all sorts, and can sit and see, even with a smile on their countenance, Othello, Richard, Hamlet, Macbeth, and other of their acquaintance, "savagely slaughtered;" but even the most seared and case-hardened play-goer must feel that an illjudged attempt in Lear is little better than profanation.

I am by no means contending that Lear should never be played, but have only been endeavouring to point out some of the difficulties and disadvantages attendant thereon: yet I had almost forgotten the principal drawback. On the stage, the Fool, (so called) the best and wisest, if not the wittiest, of Shakspeare's fools, is altogether omitted. All his pithy sayings-his scraps of doggerel, with a deep meaning in them his shrewd commentaries on the folly of the king, and the ingratitude of his daughters-all gone "at one fell swoop." We miss him sadly, for he is not only the most sensible, but best hearted of fools; and there is something peculiarly touch ing in his unflinching adherence to the fortunes of his master, at the same time

that he has judgment to see his interest lies the other way, and shrewdness to give such keen and bitter counsel as this for the desertion of fallen greatness— "Let go thy hold when a great wheel runs down a hill, lest it break thy neck with following it; but the great one that goes up the hill, let him draw thee after. When a wise man gives thee better counsel, give me mine again. I would have none but knaves follow it, since a fool gives it." He seems too, to have a quicker insight than any around, as to "how the world wags;" for when Kent asks,

"How chance the king comes with so small a train ?"

he chides his dullness of perception by the stocks for asking that question, thou answering, "An' thou hadst been put in hadst well deserved it." In the last extremity, when the poor monarch is fury of the elements, we still hear of "unhousel'd," and exposed to all the poor Motley

Kent.-But who is with him?

Gent.-None but the Fool; who labours to outjest

His heartfelt injuries.

What a picture is presented to the imagination by these few words-“ none but the fool" of fallen greatness on the one hand, and unswerving fidelity on the other.

this affection is at least reciprocated; It is gratifying to know that for Lear, even after his "wits begin to tnrn," exclaims

"Poor fool and knave! I have one part in my heart

That's sorry yet for thee!"

But we might pursue this subject to "the Crack, of doom;" or at least, to

speak more prosaically and sensibly, we and unreasonable length. The gist of might continue it to a most tiresome what we have been endeavouring to show, is, not that Shakspeare should be played less, but that he should be read more; to point out to those who him for the most part through the meare contented to become acquainted with dium of the stage, how much they lose by such a procedure; and to prove that some of his plays, from their high and peculiar nature, are fitted for the closet

backs upon the pleasure of seeing him alone; and to expose a few of the drawacted, occasioned by the carelessness or incapability of those who have the charge of dramatic entertainments.

WILLIAM COX.

OLD SONGS.

Mark it, Cesario, it is old and plain;
The spinsters and the knitters in the sun,
And the free maids that weave their thread with
bones

Do use to chaunt it.-Shakspeare.

It is the freshest

I like an old song. piece of antiquity in existence; and is, moreover, liable to no selfish individual appropriation. It was born far back in the traditionary times, so that its parentage is somewhat equivocal; yet its reputation suffers not on that account, and it comes down to us associated with all kinds of fond and endearing reminis cences. It melted or gladdened the hearts of our forefathers, and has since floated around the green earth, finding a welcome in every place humanized by a ray of fancy or feeling, from "throne to cottage hearth." It has trembled on the lips of past and forgotten beauty; and has served, in countless wooings, as the appropriate medium for the first fearful breathings of affection. The youthful maiden has broken the silence with it in many a lovely, lonely dell; and the shepherd has chanted it on the still hillside. The rude sailor has filled up the pauses of his watch by whistling it to the shrill winds and sullen waters; and it has bowed the head, brought the tear to the eye, and recalled home, and home thoughts, to the mind of many a wanderer on a distant shore. It has been heard in the solitudes of nature, and at the crowded, festive board. It has refreshed the worn-out heart of the worldling, and awakened "thoughts that do often lie too deep for tears," in the minds of the moody and contemplative. It has been a source of consolation and joy to those who have passed away; it comes unexhausted to us; and it will glide gently down the stream of time, cheering and soothing as it goes, from generation unto generation, till utilitarianism becomes universal, and music and poetry fade into a dimly remembered dream. Yet a true-bred, moth-eaten antiquary would sacrifice it, if he could, for a copper coin fifty years its senior!

If any musical man expect, from the title to this, a learned article, he will be egregiously disappointed. I have no pretensions to treat this subject scientifically, being, indeed, admirably qualified, in this age of confessions, as far as want of knowledge goes, to write the "confessions of an unmusical man.' As regards flats and sharps, I am truly little better than a natural; and as for

quavers, semi-quavers, and other subtler divisions, if there be any, I am as ignorant of them as the ass that crops his thistle off the common, and brays in whatsoever note nature prompts him. But what of that! Music is not altogether a mechanical science; and there are profounder sympathies in the heart of man than the orchestra think of. There is no more nauseous animal in existence than your musical coxcomb, who has all the terms and technicalities of the art at his tongue's end, without the glimmering of an idea concerning the human passions, the deep feelings, and the keen and delicate perception of the beautiful, on which that art is founded. Proportionably to be admired is the man who, after spending years in study and research, and successfully fathoming and mastering all difficulties, never dreams of considering his laboriously-acquired knowledge as more than merely an accessory, not a principal, in the delightful science he has made his study. The former are, as a naturalist would express it, "in theatres and at concerts-common; " the latter is of a species scarce all over the world.

There may be loftier flights—a higher species of fame, than that attained or aimed at by the song-writer; but there is no one to whom honour is more gladly rendered by the mass of mortals. His claims come into notice, for the most part, in a genial season-when friends are met, and the glass and sentiment and song go round; when gladness swells the heart, fancy tickles the brain, and mirth and good-humour sparkle from the eye;-when Bacchus has almost closed up criticism's venomous optics, and laid hyper-criticism quietly under the table ;-when the fine-strung nerves are exquisitely alive to all pleasurable sensations ;-then it is that divine music, wedded to still diviner poesy, can, in an instant,

"bid the warm tear start, Or the smile light the cheek ;" and then it is that the memories of the masters of song are pledgsd with a fervour that the ethical or epic poet may despise, but can never either expect or hope for, from the partiality of his cooler admirers. Next to Shakspeare there is no one whose memory is more fondly treasured than that of Burns. Independently of being intensely loved and revered wherever a Scottish accent is heard, social societies are formed in every country in which his language is known, to

keep that memory fresh and green. And he well deserves it. Perhaps his songs are the best ever written. He has not the polish, the refinement, the exuberance of imagery, or the sparkling fancy of Moore, but he excels him in humour and pathos. They are, however, both glorious fellows; and it must be a narrow heart that cannot find room for admiration of more than one. If the lyrics of Burns do not, as yet, strictly come under the designation of "old songs," they at least will do so, for they have the germ of immortality within them. It is almost impossible to dream of the time when "Auld Lang Syne" will not be sung. He had his faults (I am no Scotchman), and in turning over his pages, besides occasional coarseness and bad taste, you sometimes meet with a verse, that, "not to speak it profanely," bears a striking resemblance to utter nonsense; for instance, (though what could be expected from ords to such a tune-" Robin Adair !")

"Down in a shady walk,
Doves cooing were,
I mark'd the cruel hawk
Caught in a snare:
So kind may fortune be,
Such make his destiny!
He who would injure thee,
Phillis the fair!"

But if your admiration of the poet begin to falter for a moment, perhaps the very next page brings you to " Highland Mary." "Ae fond kiss and then we "A man's a man for a' that," "Mary Morrison," or, that song with out a name, commencing

sever,

"Here's a health to ane I lo'e dear, Here's a health to ane I lo'e dear; Thou art sweet as the smile when fond lovers meet,

And soft as their parting tear-Jessy !” Burns has done for Scottish song what Scott has done for Scottish historymade it known and renowned in every portion of the globe; and had "auld Scotland" never produced any other names of note, these two are amply sufficient to honour and glorify her through all time.

What are generally known by the name of "Irish songs," the "Paddy Whackmeracks," and "Barny Brallagans" of the pot-house and the playhouse, bear ten times less resemblance to the genuine melodies of the "green isle," than even the majority of regular stage Irishmen do to the existing natives. Both are merely broad English caricatures. The soul of Irish music, beyond that of all other national music, is me

lancholy. It is, perhaps, too fine a distinction to draw, but of the serious melodies of the three nations, perhaps the English airs are most characterized by mournful sadness-those of Scotland by pathos and tenderness-and those of Ireland by a wild, wailing melancholy, of an almost indescribable character. But words are poor expositors in such cases: Let any one play a few airs from each, and they will probably furnish him at once with the distinction here attempted to be drawn. I would humbly suggest "Coolin," or "Silent, oh Moyle," as the strongest instances I can think of on the part of Ireland. The English, it is said, have no national melody, and perhaps this is true of that portion of the country from Dover to the borders; but long prior to the presence of the Normans, who changed the manners and injured the pithiness of the language of the natives, the British had melodies marked by great simplicity and sweetness. Who does not remember the beautiful song, Ayr hyd y nos," familiarly known as "Poor Mary Ann?" -then there is that fine air, "Of a noble race was Shenkin," and many others, which may be found in Parry's Welsh Melodies. These are still to be met with in many a quiet and sequestered glen amid the fastnesses of Wales, where the harp of the Druids took sanctuary, and where the poetry and melody of that mysterious sect are still preserved. It is no wonder that at the inpouring of the heterogeneous and mercenary Norman flood, the pure native melodies became corrupted, and were nearly swept away; yet, notwithstanding, the splendid church music of the English excites the deep admiration of Europe; and their glees and madrigals have never been excelled. Purcell, Locke, Jackson, and Arne, have written many charming melodies: but to come nearer to the present day, if I may venture an opinion, I would say that justice has scarcely been done to Shield, a sound, manly composer, who has left a number of things behind him which really and truly deserve to live and flourish amid the mass of musical compositions that, fungus-like, hourly spring into existence, and as rapidly decay. "The Thorn," "Let Fame sound the Trumpet," "Old Towler," "Heaving the Lead," "Ere round the huge Oak," and a number of others, if they cannot justly lay claim to any great degree of imaginative beauty, have at least an infusion of genuine melody-a body,

ay, and a soul, that will long preserve them from oblivion.

Shakspeare's songs, for the most part, have been fortunate in being married to good music; some of them almost better than they deserve. Whether in ridicule or not of the song writers of his time, he certainly made too liberal a use of the "heigh hos" and "ninny nonnys." Next to Ariel's pretty fancy, "Where the bee sucks, there lurk I," the one with the most freedom and lyrical beauty is, to my taste, Under the Greenwood Tree," But it loses half its effect when transplanted from the forest of Arden, and sung in a modern room, amid long coats, cravats, decanters, and etiquette. Neither does it assimilate better with boisterous mirth and whiskey punch. Yet it is an ill-used song, even on the stage. It is too operatically given. Your Amiens is generally (like the majority of male music-mongers) a stiff limbed piece of humanity, who understands singing, and little else; he generally takes his station about four feet from the foot-lamps, and there, with elongated physiognomy, and one arm protruded towards the pit, goes through his work with most clock-like precision. To parody a beautiful simile, it is "mu sic breathing from a wooden block;" all which is very unlike the free-hearted lord whom we imagine, throwing himself at the root of some antique oak, and, in a fine, mellow voice, trolling forth, until the old forest rang again, his most joyous invitation. But this may be amended when, amid the other astonishing improvements of the times, leading vocalists shall be endowed with joints and ideas. Next to this, I like the one now invariably put into the mouth of Rosalind, and christened the "Cuckoo Song."

ink, and paper, and composes a satire in which the moral or corporeal excellencies of his antagonist are properly celebrated, and recites it in his house and about his immediate neighbourhood, until his domestics and neighbours are acquainted with each line and period. He then publicly challenges his rival to a keen encounter of their wits at some place and time designated, when and where he chants his invective with a drum accompaniment, his family and acquaintance swelling the chorus, and joining in the most pungent and biting paragraphs. He hurls all sorts of epigrams and iambicks against him, and endeavours to enlist the laughers on his side. When he is out of breath, the other party commences, and tries to turn the laugh against the challenger; his partizans are zealous in applauding his sallies, and encouraging him by their shouts ; while either has got any thing to say, the contest continues, and he who, by the majority of votes, has had the best of the wordy war, is declared to have received satisfaction for his wounded honour, and to have turned the tables upon his opponent.”

We consider that there is a deal of good sense in this amoibæan mode of warfare, and shall hereafter set down the inhabitants of Greenland as among those sagacious individuals who "understand satire." We are not apprised whether there are any newspapers established in these cold and frozen regions; if there be, their editors must have a glorious time of it, as every witty sally would be necessarily appreciated, no good thing can ever fall to the ground, and what Mrs. Malaprop calls" ironing" must flourish exceedingly.

ABSURD WAGERS.

The city of Charleroi has been made conspicuous as the scene of some singular wagers. Monsieur S. staked a considerable sum that he would ride ten leagues on horseback before a snail could crawl ten inches over a marble table sprinkled with powdered sugar. The same gentleman made another bet with one of his friends, that he could remain the longest up to the neck in the river Sambre. After he had been six hours in the water, Monsieur S. sent for his nightcap, as it was his intention to remain there all night, upon which his rival gave up the contest.