testable schemes furnishes a solution to the mul-ment when it is becoming reasonable and founded titude of mysteries that had gradually accu-on something real." mulated. Around this fiend in human form are grouped a party of fortune-hunters, whom she has collected together, that they may hunt to death, i. e. into matrimony, her sister-in-law, a rich young widow, who stands in the way of her schemes, and bids fair to rob her of the fruits of all her labours, by captivating the heart of the paramour for whose sake the guilty wife has so patiently devoted herself to her horrible task. The candidates for the widow's hand, and her "deux cent mille livres de rente," are the only amiable characters that figure in the book. The husband, who is meant for a kind of injured saint, is a poor driveller, who allows himself to be henpecked by a wife whose infidelity he is fully aware of, while he seeks a consolation for his "chagrins domestiques" in the embraces of his cook, who is described as "quelque chose d'héroique et de bon," one whose "courage and admirable pity, and the delicacy of whose sentiments" are held up to the virtuous sisterin-law as deserving of esteem! Is Soulié as accurate in his delineations of the morals as of the manners of modern French society? "It is an admirable faculty of the most perfect creature of God, to be able to conceal his sentiments. It is the principle of all society; and it is horrible to think, and more horrible to say, but it must be admitted, that falsehood is the most necessary ingre dient to the maintenance of social relations. (Le mensonge est l'ingrédient le plus nécessaire au maintien des relations sociales.) Were every man to speak, without reserve, what he thinks of himself, and what he thinks of others, all society would be dissolved at once, even were the motive of vanity alone brought into play, but how would it be if every evil wish, every evil act were displayed in all its nakedness? Be assured, human society could never resist the effect of a general confession; it would make us all fly to the forest again, each man to his own den, where he would, at most, tolerate his wife." "A woman's friend may, by the favour of circumstances, become her lover; but a man she never saw before has much greater chance of success." "True female modesty ought to conceal itself as much as anything else. The hand which adjusts the fold of a robe, draws attention more to what it wishes to conceal than to the virtuous delicacy which prompts concealment." "Lovers have a sensible way of behaving in presence of a formidable rival. Instead of trying to excel him in politeness, accomplishments, and attentions, they make a point of looking cross and sulky, remaining silent in a corner, or saying ungracious and impertinent things to the woman whose preference they are contending for." "Those boast of abstinence who have lost their digestive powers; those boast of chastity whose blood is cold and stagnant; those boast of knowing how to be silent who have got nothing to say. In short, mankind make vices of the pleasures which they cannot enjoy, and virtues of the infirmities to which they are subject." "The first half of our life is spent in desiring the second; the second in regretting the first." ART. XXV.-M. de Goldon. By MADAME DE THIS is an excellent novel; untainted with the should doubt its becoming popular among Parisian novel-readers, but it may be recommended to the English public. It is a tale of fashionable life; the principal characters belonging to the higher ranks of Parisian society, in the time of the empire and the Bourbon restoration. There is among them abundance of error and of crime; though the authoress does not deal in pictures of general and reckless profligacy. There is unbridled passion with its effects and consequences-shame, remorse, and ruin: but there is also exalted principle achieving its noblest triumph-a victory over intense and overwhelming passion. This triumph, indeed, is the great feature of the book; in whose person it is achieved, is one of the most striking we have met with in any work of fiction. The object and partaker of his passion, too, is an exquisite creation; in whom the most feminine softness is blended with angelic piety and unbending rectitude. Their whole history is touching in the extreme, and leaves an impression on the There must be in the mind of a man who can ingly express, such a faith, something not very enviable. deliberately adopt, and thus quietly and unblush- and the character of the young soldier, ART. XXIV.-Am Rauchen. By ALPHONSE KARR. THE signature of Alphonse Karr is of frequent occurrence to articles in the Feuilleton of the Parisian daily journals; and this little volume appears to be a collection of such articles. They feelings not speedily effaced. are sketches of manners in the form of essays, ART. XXVI. - Horace. Par GEORGE SAND. 1842. maxims, and tales, agreeably, though somewhat flippantly written. In the maxims there is a good deal of point and shrewdness. Here are two or three specimens : "Opinion attaches dishonour to the husband for the misconduct of the wife. The poor husband is like the boy given as a companion to a young prince, and whipped when the prince did not know his les son." THOUGH scarcely equal in poetical power to its predecessors, this novel possesses the advantage of greater distinctness of moral aim. The feverish ambition which leads young men of the present day, more especially in France, to "quit their spheres and rush into the skies" of public life, and to regard any other function than that of government as unworthy of their exertions, is "Love, for the most part, lasts just till the mo-(illustrated in the life of "Horace" : -and its les37 VOL. XXIX. sons are not the less valuable that the character quite insufficient for the wants of so aspiring a of the hero, in spite of all assurances to the con- young gentleman as M. Horace Dumontet, who trary, remains an essential common-place one, is of that class of liberal people who, as Mrs. or is distinguished only by a more than common Gore says, " are never known to deny themselves amount of vanity and selfishness. "The "beau jeune homme," to which species he belongs, is a personage of vastly higher pretensions, though of no more intrinsic worth, than that of the dandy or "lion;" and usually aims to take up a position at once in the worlds of literature and fashion, without any real claims on either. Horace Dumontet is the son of a little provincial "employé" who has been sent to Paris to study the law, but who greatly prefers the indulgences of the passing moment and "dreams of future glory," to the self-denial and regulated industry properly belonging to the noviciate of a laborious profession. anything." He lounges away the time that should be devoted to study, squanders the hard earnings of his parents, contracts debts that he has neither hope nor intention of discharging, and is often indebted to his fellow student for the necessaries of life, but finds his sense of honour too delicate to accord with the fictions of the law. His ambition regards the Chamber of Deputies as the only proper theatre for the display of his talents, and his vanity and idleness dispose him to the choice of literature as the gayest and shortest path to this distinction. Among the various chances in his favour, M. Horace Dumontet also counts one very characteristic of "la jeune France," that of a new revolution. "On the following day I asked him why, if he had such an invincible repugnance to the law, he did not study for some other profession. ""My dear sir,' he replied, with an assurance that did not belong to his age, and that seemed borrowed from the experience of a man of forty, 'at present there is no profession but the law that opens the way ""What do you mean by everything?" ""For the present,' he answered, a seat in the Chamber, but wait a little and we shall see." "From amongst the various professions which may be chosen for a young man, very few parents will be found to select the most modest and the most secure. Vanity and an inordinate desire of wealth are alone consulted, and it is so easy to find examples of success. Why,' said M. Dumontet to his wife, 'should not our Horace get on as well as such or such a one, his inferiors in talents and courage.' Madame Du- to everything." montet was a little alarmed at the extent of the sacrifices required of her by her husband with a view to start her son in this career. But it is difficult to persuade one's self that one has not given birth to a child more intelligent and more favoured by Heaven than any other. Madame Dumontet was a good woman, and a sensible one within the sphere of ideas in which her education had enabled her to move, but beyond this existed an unknown world that she could view only with the eyes of her husband. When he assured her that since the revolution all Frenchmen are equal before the law, that there are no more privileges, and that every man of talent may cleave the press, and arrive at the goal, if he can only push a little harder than those who are born nearer to it, she yielded to these good reasons, fearing to pass for obstinate and prejudiced like the peasants from whom she had her birth." The proposal was no less than to sacrifice 1000 francs, the slowly-accumulated savings of many years, to the grand object of securing for her son a high place in society, by enabling him to study at Paris for a liberal profession. "You are counting on a new revolution, but if it should not happen, how will you manage? Have you a fortune?" ""Not exactly-but I shall have!' ""Oh very well. In that case you will have no occasion to practise. And for the moment I really imagined him to be in a position to justify his confidence." Considering the grandeur of his views, Horace's friend suggests that a little preparatory study, however, might not be unnecessary. ""Study the science of humanity, history, politics - different systems of philosophy and religion." "You mean to say, acquire ideas,' he replied with a smile, and a look of triumphant complacency; 'I have them already, and if I must say so, I believe I shall never have any better-for our ideas proceed from our sentiments, and all my sentiments are great. Yes, sir! Heaven has made me great and good. I know not for what trials it may reserve me; but I say with a pride that can make only fools laugh,-I feel myself generous, I feel myself strong, I feel myself magnanimous, my soul shudders, and my blood boils at the idea of an injustice. Greatness intoxicates me to delirium. I see in it no cause of vanity, but I say um with full assurance, I feel myself of the race of "To any one unacquainted with petty, country town life, and who has never witnessed the incredible dexterity of mothers of families in such circumstances to pinch and scrape in every item of expenditure, it may appear impossible to have got together such a sum out of an income of 3000 francs a year without starv- heroes." " ing husband and children, servants, and cats. But those who have led such a life, or who have observed After this it is not surprising that Horace it closely, know that nothing is more frequent. A proves a genuine scamp: suffering the little woman, without talent, without any lucrative em- virtue that was in him to evaporate in frothy ployment, and with no fortune, has no other way of talk-returning with coldness and brutality the being useful to her family than that of exerting a sin-attac attachment of a woman devoted to him, whilst gular industry in robbing herself, by retrenching every day some trifle from the comforts of her family." Fifteen hundred francs a year are furnished by these means, in order, as is fondly supposed, to open the way to a brilliant career for the son, by supporting him for some years at Paris, where he is to study the law. Fifteen hundred francs are however found subsisting on her humble exertions-forming a "liaison" with a viscountess, with a view to obtain an entrance into the world of fashion-and ignominiously hunted out of it again for his indiscreet boasting of favours valued for no other reason. It is impossible not to feel some disappointment that his manifold offences should in the end meet with no other punishment than that of being dismissed to the obscure life of a country lawyer. Beautifully contrasted with this wretched pretender, is the character of the noble, true-hearted Paul Arsene, and the simple, modest, industrious Eugenie. This volume contains the result of his investigation, and is divided into four parts. The first treats of the original and general signification of the word Lais, which Wolf proves to have been the same as Tune, Song, or Air; and he then shows that the more special meaning which eventually attaches to it, was that of The peculiar opinions of Madame Dudevant a Song or Popular Poem, of an epic or narrative concerning certain social institutions are suffici- character, as distinguished from the Chanson or ently well known to render any remarks on them | Lyric. at present unnecessary. In Horace she has touched with a masterly hand on errors infinitely more prevalent, and therefore more injurious, than those of the St. Simonian theories of marriage. ART. XXVII.-Ueber die Lais, Sequenzen, und Leiche. Ein Beitrag zur Geschichte der Rhythmischen Formen und Singweisen der Volkslieder und der Volks massigen Kirchen und Kunstlieder im Mittelalter. (On the Lays of the Middle Age. A Contribution to the History of the Rhythmic Form, and the Airs to which they were sung, of the popular Songs, &c., of the Middle Ages.) VON FERDINAND WOLF. Heidelberg. 1841. 8vo pp. 516. For its reference to English history and literature-the novelty of its author's views, and those views supported with learning and ability-this Essay on the Lays of the Middle Ages, from the pen of the accomplished Secretary of the Imperial Library at Vienna, seems to us eminently interesting. Ferdinand Wolf is a scholar and a ripe one. His essay on the French Chansons de Geste, published at Vienna in 1833; his edition of the German poem of Friar Rush, privately printed in 1835; his Floresta de Rimas Modernas Castellanas, reviewed in our fortieth number; his numerous learned papers in the German periodicals; and lastly the Alt Deutsche Blätter, edited by him in conjunction with Moriz Haupt, and which does the same good service for the early literature of Germany, as the 'Reliquiæ Antique' of which it is the progenitor, does for that of England; all serve to prove how well he is qualified to treat a subject so much talked of, but hitherto so imperfectly understood the Lays of the Middle Ages. The divided, contradictory, and ofttimes, uncertain opinions which he met with in those writers who have treated upon that peculiar class of our French and middle-English popular poetry, called Lais or Lays, in all that regarded their name, origin, character, form, mode of recital, and connection with other classes of poetry, -determined him to enter into a full investigation of these points, so that he might be enabled to clear up, as far as possible, the obscurity in which this interesting branch of popular poetry seemed to be involved. The second division treats of the form of the original Lais, or Popular Songs, and their relation to the later epic Lays, or words of the Romance writers. In this division, and the notes which accompany it, the connection between the form of the Popular Song, and the Songs of the Church, is developed with great learning and acuteness. The third division treats of the manner in which the Lais or popular songs, and likewise those narrated poems of the later writers which bore the same name, were recited; and in this the writer shows, that from their very nature the original Lais were sung or chanted with and without instrumental accompaniments. The manner in which the latter lays, or Lais historiques, were recited, appears on the other hand to have depended somewhat upon their form. With regard to those which are composed in rhyming couplets (to which division all the French and the majority of English works belong) he clearly shows that they were by no means intended to be sung, but merely read or recited. While on the other hand, the middle English Lays in six, nine, or twelve line stanzas, with tail rhyme, were, at least after the decline of their popularity among the nobles, as certainly sung, or at all events recited with musical accompaniments; to which purpose, from their more popular and metrical form, they were certainly better adapted. The fourth, and by far the largest division of the work treats of those lyrical pieces or Chansons, which likewise received the name of Lais; of the genetic-historical foundation of their being so called; and of the elementary or internal relation which these Lais bear to the older poems so entitled, and to the German Laichen. In this part of the work the connection which exists between these secular poems and the Songs of the Church is most fully discussed; and in the course of his examination into the points of resemblance which exist between these apparently disconnected materials, the author displays a knowledge, and exhibits views of the history of the musical portions of the Service of the Church, which cannot fail to interest and instruct all who seek for information respecting that important subject. From this brief notice of Ferdinand Wolf's admirable Essay, which, we should add, is accompanied by eight fac-similes of early music, and by nine musical supplements, our readers may judge of the sincerity of our wish, that some one duly qualified for the task would furnish a translation of it to the English public. a TABLES OF FOREIGN LITERATURE. HUMBLE in itself as is the labour of drawing up Chronological Charts of the differ ent literatures of Europe, we believe that a series of such tables will be found exceedingly serviceable. We know the value of such assistance to literary study and history, having experienced the inconvenience of being without any similar map of the entire route before us, showing the whole of it at a glance. Such brief chronologies or outlines of the history of a particular literature greatly assist the memory, and help to exactness without fatiguing attention by a number of insulated dates. They may be referred to immediately; and they show who were the contemporaries of the respective writers, which cannot be ascertained from a biographical dictionary; besides which, they serve as specific indexes to works of the last-mentioned kind. The Table may at any time be filled up, as it were, by merely reading the articles in such a dictionary, seriatim, according to chronological order. It is for the above reasons-should it be thought necessary for us to assign anythat we now introduce a new and somewhat unusual feature in the Foreign Quarterly, and commence a series of historical Tables. In some instances, a single Table will suffice for the whole of a literature, but in the case of France, Germany, Italy, &c., the literary map must be subdivided into convenient portions. And as we do not profess to publish these individual parts in any strict order, we begin with a Table of Italian Writers who have died since the commencement of the last century, bringing it down, as nearly as our materials for it will enable us to do, to the present time; and including in it a few names which, although not strictly literary ones, are those of individuals eminent in art, or otherwise distinguished. |