eagle uttering a louder cry, and spreading a broader wing as the storm whirled him,-a man of mighty mind, but shewing its magnificent proportions only as the evil elements stripped it of its robe. The glories and the joys of life disappearing like visions from before him; all that looked rest and security washing away from under his feet; nature seeming to withdraw from him, and this inlellectual giant, like the last man in the Deluge, standing in his melancholy and terrible grandeur alone, the solitary combatant of the storm, that had overwhelmed all beneath, and which was to make him only its last and mightiest victim.

20.-ON THE CANT RELATIVE TO THE IMMORALITY OF THEATRICAL AMUSEMENTS.

In defiance of timid, short-sighted moralists, and the more furious attacks of the puritan and methodist, I trust that theatrical amusements will yet flourish with renovated vigour and luxurious elegance. In the ardour of mistaken, though, I believe, sometimes, well-meaning zeal, the declaimers now under consideration do not remember that the desire of pleasure is a natural, and if not intemperately indulged, a rational principle, which, for wise purposes, has been implanted in the breasts of us all. Heaven preserve us from yielding to the fools who represent that it is unlawful to laugh, and criminal to pretend to be happy; this is an impious idea, which would represent the benevolent Disposer of the Universe as a tyrant, and man as the victim of a severe anticipating destiny,—an idea which could only have entered an imagination clouded by Calvinistic despair, and impervious to the soft rays of hope and mercy. But supposing that the doors of our theatres could be closed, I fear that the divine and the philanthropist would have gained an inglorious and ineffectual victory, by driving the promiscuous multitude of a crowded metropolis to the styes of sensuality and drunkenness, or the recesses of secret sin. But though we may treat with calm contempt more noisy yet less able combatants, we must not deny or forget the merit of COLLIER, and some who followed him. These attacked and drove from the

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stage those impious railleries and obscene allusions, injurious to correct amusement, and disgraceful to national taste, which tainted the dramas of the day, and which too often sully the witty pages of WYCHERLY, Congreve, FARQUHAR, and VANBURGH.

We know how very easy it is from the abuse to argue against the temperate use of an innocent and (properly conducted) a moral amusement; for, does it at all follow from reason, or the nature of things, that the avenues of our theatres must on every side be surrounded by the noisome and polluted dens of prostitution, infamy, and fraud? Surely a well-constructed and efficient police might prevent all this?

21.-LARGE THEATRES.

The alterations which Mr. ELLISTON has lately effected in the interior of Drury Lane Theatre, though not, in one respect, carried to their full and proper extent, are entitled to the highest praise. Formerly, when the critic and dramatic amateur were seated in the brilliant magic circle, to enjoy that, for which most rational men visit a theatre, they found that comfort and the pleasure of distinctly hearing what was said on the stage had been wholly sacrificed to architectural grandeur and vastness of space,-a space, which the woeful experience of past seasons has feelingly told the managers is never, but on the rare occasion of some peculiar temporary stimulus, adequately occupied. Is it not strange that, without paying so dearly for their knowledge, they could not be taught that there is a degree of space, accurately determined by reason and experience, beyond which the human voice, however artificially assisted, or violently strained, cannot, with efficacy, reach? How much soever the rapture of an immense receipt may seize the imagination, or tempt the avarice of a manager, he ought never to lose sight of the prior claims of the public to comfort and amusement, or he will be often obliged to exhibit his gilded lattices, his stuccoes, his pilasters, his processions, his cavalcades, his laughing

gaudy puppet-shew, will suffer mischiefs not easily remedied, from damp space unoccupied, and from freezing currents of air; and all they have in return, is a view of apparently dumb actors, whom they may like to see, but, with the exception of the fiddlers, cannot possibly hear. January 22, 1823.

FLORES HISTRIONICI.

X.-ICYNTHE.

BY SAMUEL L. BLANCHARD.

`Scene-the Ruins of a Grecian Temple.-Enter EUCELION.
Euc. Heard I not sounds? sounds like the richest tumult
O'er striving waters, when the sense is fill'd,
And borne above the instrument of song!
I felt my soul departing, and the death

Of that loud voice a hundred echoes mourned.
"Twas not of earth, and yet it sprang amidst
These ruins! Then a solemn tone was heard,
Smooth as the silence into which it died,
Whispering of life, and breathing o'er the heart
A thrilling mockery, as if the hand

That ruled that world of melody, and gave
Its lightest pressure to the strings that woke
The soul of love, and spread its spirit thro'
This air of beauty and of night, had sunk,
Unconscious, by the side of some sweet form,
Born of the moonlight, and as chaste as it.
No sound is here: no harp, no voice, no form,
Rests in the wordless grandeur that is flung
Like a mute dream about me. I am lost;
I view this scene with wonder, and an awe
Creeps on my limbs, and tells me I am mortal!
Ye once proud columns, and ye scattered shrines,
Ye broken emblems of unburied fame,
How grand ye rose, how beautiful decline!
Ye sculptured forms of marble, scarce less real
Than those who lived, your breathing likenesses,

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Ye perish silently, unmourned by men;
Yet skies weep o'er ye, and the unborn hours
Shall pity while they doom ye to decay!
Here all of greatness and of glory dwelt,
Whose names die not with marble, but are hung
In thoughts of immortality; and those
Who fought and fell upon the hallowed field,

Where freedom rose above the blood-sprung vapours,
And those who filled the cloud-girt minds of men
With truth, and might, and grandeur, such as shine
On god-like aspects, and in god-like hearts,
Are imag'd in these marbles, which once wore
A charm that spoke of sense and soul beneath,
But veiled o'er by sleep all cold and dreamless;
And yet it seemed not death like that which man
Drew on his fellow.

Soft, oh! lips and heart

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(Low music is heard.)

Yield to that sound! It rises there, and bows
My soul to its fine power, as it spreads

Delight on earth and air, whereof it comes.

Oh, night, how still thou art! Oh, sky, how pure!
And this, the voice of one that dwelleth there,
Is purer and more gracious. I could die :
Oh, let me die and gaze on sparkling forms,
And see the spirit that destroys my mind
With more than music, for it must be bright
And lovely as the climes which it inhabits!
I sleep, or in the beauty of yon beam

These wild eyes trace a being which my thoughts
Had shaped thus heavenly: it moves, and yet
The impure earth it presses not, but glides
Happy, and robed in holiness, and lips,
Not as the lips of woman are, but hued

With more of loveliness, breathe on the night;
And eyes not lit by passion, yet more rich

Then

had perceived at a little distance, advances to a broken column near which he is standing.)

My heart is touched

With fear that quivers not, nor my warm cheek
Makes bloodless; I will speak-yet, should my words
Startle the noiseless shadow from its haunt,

As night-dreams tremble into space, whene'er
The air's wild sigh but sounds its warning-no,
Let me gaze silently, for with those eyes,
My heart, thou too wilt perish!

(The music ceases, and the figure remains motionless.)
The tone falls

Slow to its rest, and yet its mistress keeps

Her fine attraction thro' me, and the heart-spell
Grows with the light that formed it; light that streams
From eyes whose lids could shroud it not: the charm
Hath too much truth to die upon a word,
One word of life-the longing of my soul
My lips shall lightly breathe.-Star of the skies,
Spirit of other worlds, who com'st in form

Earthless, and fairer than the night that's o'er thee,
Who seem'st the creature of a faithless thought,
Shaped in an unreal print, yet holier far
Than all reality's bright life-proud forms,
Speak to a mortal, one whose voice doth dare
To ask the import of thy coming-speak!

A clay-stampt being seeks to win a sound

From lips whose young bloom is unkiss'd. Oh, speak!
By the clear heav'n, of which thou art a part-
By love of which thou art the spirit-by
The clime thou dwellest in, and by the air-
By night and by the stars-by the still sleep
That covers this dim world-by all the looks
Of angels upon men, and by their hearts,
Their smiles and feelings, spirit, speak to me!
Spirit. EUCELION!

Euc. Speak!

Spirit. What would'st thou hear?
Euc. From whence

Thou com'st, and what thy being?

Spirit. I must trace