Part 11

'KEAN's manner in the first part is that of the miserly, calculating Jew; and it is not until the entrance of Antonio, that we suspect him of aught worse than usury. The sight of Antonio kindles his hatred, and he exclaims, 'Cursed be my tribe, if I forgive him!' We tremble for the merchant, and shudder, as with a sudden change of countenance he smooths the wrinkle of hate from his brow, and turns to his victim with, 'Rest you fair, good Signior.' The speech in which he recounts the bitter scorn, the personal indignities he has received from Antonio, was finely given. It was not said entirely in anger; beneath his indignation could be discerned a malignant pleasure; and when he said, 'Well, then, it now appears you need my help,' his eyes seemed to flash with ferocious joy. The conciliating and jesting manner he assumed while settling the terms of the contract, was admirable, and the performance of the whole scene was without a fault. The passage most deserving praise, in the next act in which he appears, is the trembling eagerness with which he receives the news of Antonio's loss, as he exclaims, almost breathless: 'What, what, what! Ill luck, ill luck?' And even, while in his impious rapture, he thanks God, he still doubtingly asks, 'Is it true; is it true?' But it is in the trial scene that this gifted actor puts forth his strength. With what an unmoved air he listened to the Duke's exhortation to be merciful! His reply was not spoken with violence, in the loudness of anger, but with a horrid calmness in a subdued but chilling manner; and he asked, 'Are you answered?' in a tone of bitter irony. So fiendish a countenance we wish never to look upon, except when we know it is assumed, as when he sharpened the ready knife, and cried with a serpent hiss, 'To cut the forfeiture from that bankrupt there!' We almost quaked before the glance of his demon eye, as he seemed to gloat upon his victim. As he gazed on Antonio, his lips were slightly curled by the bitter smile of satisfied malice; his eyes were bright and distended with the joy of his revengeful anticipations; yet he neither spoke nor moved. We pass over many points, to notice his answer to Portia's suggestion, of sending for a surgeon, lest Antonio bleed to death. 'Is it so nominated in the bond?' And the expression with which he raises his eyes from the paper, and says, with a smile which a devil might own, 'I cannot find it--'tis not in the bond.' As the court proceeds to award the sentence in his favor, his face becomes lighted by exultation; his whole form seems to throb with joy; he bares his hands, and grasps the knife, with convulsive eagerness. But who can do justice to the sudden transition of his manner, the horror-struck, doubting air, the fixed rigid countenance, with which he hears the forbidding clause? When he finds utterance, it is but a sentence of four words which he pronounces. But how are they pronounced! The fingers which had clenched the knife gradually unloose their grasp, and fall nerveless and slowly by his side; the disappointed, dejected, almost exhausted tone, in which he with difficulty articulates 'Is that the law?' Surely this was the perfection of acting. We have beheld COOKE's representation of this character with delight, and have dwelt upon it with pleasure. But, great as it was, compared to KEAN's, it appears a cold performance. Indeed, Mr. KEAN approaches nearer to GARRICK than any actor since his time. KEMBLE has more majesty; COOKE possesses more physical power, and though not a good, yet a finely-modulated voice. COOPER has great advantages both of person and voice; but they are all deficient in that astonishing variety of expression, that power of reaching men's hearts, and causing them to tremble, which distinguishes Mr. KEAN.'

KEAN's power over the feelings of his audiences seems scarcely to have been surpassed by any actor that ever trod the stage. Hosts of admirers speak of him even now with unabated enthusiasm.

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THE subjoined beautiful reflections and yet more admirable poetry are from an essay based oddly enough upon a version of one of the monosyllabic poems of AUSONIUS; a string of verses, in which the last monosyllable of each line forms the first of the next, and the first is the same as the last; so that they may be read over and over again without end. 'We take it,' writes SANDS, 'as a good motto for a paper which we mean to write, without having any precise notion on what subject we shall descant. We mean to make, on something or other, 'a few plain and practical remarks,' as the Rev. Mr. ---- says, when he means to preach a sermon five quarters of an hour long.' The paper thus lightly commenced, closes as follows:

'A MAN who lives out his threescore and ten years, or lingers beyond that period, must, in the common course of events, see the ordinary revolutions affected by time and death. At the middle of his career, he sees a flourishing family around him; friends and connections formed in his advancing course; attachments begun in sympathy, and cemented by interest. He lives on; and his children are scattered by the accidents of mortality, and their graves are in different countries. His friends have vanished from their former haunts, and the places that knew them, now know them no more for ever. 'He asks of the solitudes, where are they? and the hollow echo answers, Where?' There is no one to sympathize with his remembrances of the past; his infirmities become a grievance, or he thinks them so, to those around him; and he still feels that lingering attachment to life, which answers the philosopher's question, _an mors malum sit_, with the powerful evidence of consciousness. Hope and Memory delude the pilgrim in his journey, by the false colors with which they paint the scene before and behind him. 'Man never is, but always to be blest;' and as the future, depicted by the fancy only, presents unmingled visions of delight, the past, mellowed by time, loses the little inconveniences which jarred discordantly with the passing music of pleasure; and its remembrance makes us regret what when present we neglected. It was under the influence of such reflections, that the following lines were composed. They were written in a prophetic hour by one who died young, and willing to depart:

DELUSIVE world! whose phantom throng Still flit, with juggling smiles, along, To cheat the aching sense; Where, as in man's primeval tongue, Joy hath no present tense!

Joy, decked in unsubstantial hues, The impatient fool for e'er pursues, Till when the form is nigh, The enchantress fair no more he views, And all her colors fly.

But lo! 'tis there! 'tis there, again! He starts anew, on quest as vain-- The enchantress is not there! But like a vampyre from the tombs, Behind, once more, the form assumes Its station in the air.

Thus Hope and Memory still delude; Now with the future's fancied good, Now with the fancied past; Till comes eternal night to brood Above them both at last!

While thus I mused, I heard a voice Of sweet and solemn tone: 'O child of clay!' it said, 'rejoice, Nor woo despair alone.

'For know thine age hath reached its prime: There is a race of men Who do but hail life's summer-time, And sink to earth again. With one swift flame their being burns, And soon their dust to dust returns'-- Blest Spirit! tell me--when?

Again the voice of music spoke: 'There is a happier sphere, Where neither hope nor memory mock, Yet joy is present there; And dreaming souls to bliss have woke'-- Blest Spirit! tell me--where?

'Thou may'st with equal eye behold Hours, days, and years behind thee rolled, Grasping each present Now; Nor dread the moment yet to come, Nor weep o'er pleasure's mental tomb'-- Blest Spirit! tell me--how?

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ALTHOUGH we find ourselves 'at the end of the tether,' we cannot resist the inclination to present the following forceful lines. Possibly the sentiment may be deemed heretical by the very imaginative and the young; but even such, if tasteful and discriminating persons, cannot choose but admire the melody of the verse, and the beauty of the imagery:

THE POETICAL CHARACTER.

IN fiction's devious wilds the heart misled, To dull reality ungrateful turns; Substantial earth's fair plains untempting spread, And day's blest beam with light unlovely burns.

Yet not all Fancy's dreams, most wild and bright, Are worth one day of Comfort's calm routine; And simple Truth, attired in vestal white, Transcends her starry front and garments' sheen.

And constant woman's fond and glowing kiss, And heaven's own workmanship of mortal charms, Are worth whole ages of imagined bliss, Lost in ideal Beauty's airy arms.

The monster brood that cloudy spectre bore To rash Ixion, deem not half so vain As the fond progeny of minstrel lore, Nursed in the womb of a distempered brain.

Why float these visions of delusive birth Before the wanderers on the wastes of time, Ordained to tread the firm, unyielding earth, Nor yet the spires of heaven forbidden climb?

Is it that the soul divine, imprisoned here, Beyond its dungeon bars essays to roam, O'erleaps the due progression to its sphere, Sees forms and shadows of its destined home?

Or, lost to innocence, to truth, to Eden, Did our dark curse not quench each early ray, But leave its broken beams, to light unbidden The checkered mazes of the exile's way?

WE have not exhausted the stores which our obliging friend of 'the Confederacy' has placed at our disposal. When we have more space, we shall resume the desultory series which we are compelled to bring abruptly to a present conclusion.

GOSSIP FROM AN AMERICAN LADY IN PARIS.--We derive the subjoined pleasant gossip from a young and gifted American lady, at present resident in the French metropolis. We hope to be similarly favored, whenever our fair correspondent shall find leisure from the demands of society to transcribe her fresh 'jottings-down' for our pages: 'WE went to the Hotel des Invalides this morning to see the plans in relief of the fortified towns of France. They are exhibited to the public only during one month in the year. The plans of those cities I have visited interested me particularly. They are so minute that Miss L----, who accompanied us, had no difficulty in finding the country-house near Toulon where she spent some months last year. I was much struck by the plan of Embrun, in Dauphiny, that little town celebrated in both history and romance by the pilgrimages so frequently made to it by devout Catholics. It is strongly fortified and built on a rock of semi-circular form, which rises so perpendicularly on one side from the meadows which lie below, that one would suppose it must have been hewn away by the hand of man. I was much interested, too, by the plan of Mont St. Michel, in Normandy, the celebrated prison, built on a rock, which the tide separates twice a day from the main land, and where the political prisoners condemned after the _émeuté_, in May, 1839, are confined. We were looking at the plan of a fort, on the pedestal of which the name had not been labelled as on the others, when a soldier standing near informed us it was that of Ham, where the nephew of NAPOLEON is now a prisoner. It is in Picardy, which I am told is the most arid and unfruitful province in France. It is built around a quadrangular court, or I should rather say there are three buildings and a terrace which form a hollow square. The prince, who is said to be a remarkably good horseman, is allowed to ride on this terrace, which is not shaded by trees; indeed, if this plan be correct, which I suppose it must be, as it has just been made, there is but one tree within the precincts of the fortress.... In the evening, my friend, Madame D---- took me to the house of the Polish Princess CZARTORYSKI. Prince ADAM CZARTORYSKI is from his birth, his wealth, and his character, one of the most illustrious of the Polish refugees. His life has been checkered by every extreme of good or ill. In early youth, he served in the army of the republic of Poland. He was at one time the captive of CATHERINE II., and in 1831 was at the head of the provisional government of Poland. After the total defeat of the Polish army, Prince and Princess CZARTORYSKI with some difficulty made their escape, with their three children, the youngest of whom was not a year old. The Princess had not even a change of linen with her, and no time to collect her jewels, which were brought to her after she had reached the Austrian frontier, by a soldier, whom she had never seen before, and who refused to tell his name. It is impossible to imagine a greater contrast than that offered by the present mode of life of the Prince and Princess, and the splendor by which they were formerly surrounded. Prince ADAM was one of the richest proprietors, and possessed not one, but several, of the most magnificent palaces in Poland, and was accustomed from childhood to every comfort and luxury which wealth could devise. The house he now inhabits is as simple as possible; but he remains at home every Monday evening for the purpose of seeing his friends and countrymen; and his _salon_ is always crowded with the most learned men and most fashionable women in Paris. These weekly receptions are attended with but very little expense here, as tea and lemonade are the only refreshments it is the custom to offer. Prince CZARTORYSKI is a most venerable-looking man of about seventy. The expression of his face is habitually melancholy, but at times he is very animated in conversation. Like most Poles, he speaks low and very slowly. I remarked that he was particularly polite and attentive to young people, which in a man, who, from his various misfortunes and trials, can take but little interest in general society, is, I think, very striking. The Princess, who must be almost thirty years younger than the Prince, is very lady-like and prepossessing in her manners. She is much beloved by her _compatriotes_: her efforts to relieve those who are in distressed circumstances being unceasing. She employs all her leisure hours in embroidering; and her embroidery, which is more beautiful than any thing of the kind I have ever seen, is sold at a bazar, which is opened during the last week of every year; new-year's day being the time when the French make those presents to their friends which in England and in our country are made on Christmas day. All the ladies of the Princess's acquaintance of course contribute to her bazar; and those who are remarkable for their beauty or their talents, are invited by her to keep the stalls. * * * MRS. B----, whose son, a lad of about sixteen, is now engaged in attending the _cours de religion_, or religious lectures of M. COQUEREL, one of the clergymen of the Reformed Church of Paris, took me this morning to hear one of the lectures. M. COQUEREL is the nephew of the celebrated HELEN MARIA WILLIAMS, by whom he was educated. He is the most eloquent, and I believe the most learned, clergyman in Paris. I had been much pleased with his sermons, and was therefore very glad to have an opportunity of hearing one of his lectures. His class was composed of about thirty young men, of different ages, from sixteen to twenty-five. He has written a little book called '_Cours de Religion_,' which he makes use of in his lectures. The method he adopts is this: He reads a paragraph from this little volume, and then comments upon it, and explains or developes it, often relating interesting anecdotes suggested to him by the subject, or asking questions which the foregoing lectures enable the scholars to reply to. The young men take notes, write them out at home, and bring these papers to Mr. COQUEREL at the next lesson. The lectures for young men take place twice a week, from October to May, and those for young ladies at different hours during the same period. The scholars are admitted to take the sacrament at Pentecost. M. COQUEREL is a most active and industrious man. Beside several volumes of sermons, and innumerable papers for different religious journals, he has published a very useful work, called '_Biographie Sacrée_,' in which every name mentioned in the Bible is to be found. His manner is very animated; and as each lecture lasts but an hour, it is impossible that the attention of the young hearers should become weary.... 'APRIL 19th. Went to the exhibition of paintings by living artists, which is now open at the Louvre. The most beautiful picture there, is one by M. COGNIET; 'TINTORETTO painting his dead Daughter.' The biographers of the great master inform us, that he had a daughter who evinced great talent for painting, to whom he was devotedly attached, but who died when young. M. COGNIET has chosen the moment when TINTORETTO, rising from his easel, on which rests the unfinished portrait, stands gazing on his beloved daughter, who is lying on a bed in the fore-ground of the picture. The father is almost _de face_, but the lower part of his figure is concealed by the bed. A crimson curtain falls behind him, and forms a rich but not gaudy back-ground to the picture and, by throwing a slight reflection on the daughter's face, relieves the whole from that disagreeable effect, which, with less judgment and good taste on the part of the artist, it must have produced, without taking from it the solemnity which the subject required. This is, on the whole, almost the only picture of the modern French school which pleases me entirely; in which there is no exaggeration of expression or gesture, and which deserves to be compared to those of the modern school of painting in Germany. I have no doubt that the circumstance of an exhibition taking place every year is a great disadvantage to young artists, who hurry to finish a picture for that occasion, in order that their names may be mentioned in the journals, and that they may obtain a celebrity which lasts but a few weeks. If the exhibition took place but once in five years, I am convinced we should see more fine pictures at the Louvre. Among the portraits I remarked one of Major POUSSIN, who resided for so many years in the United States. It is painted by Mademoiselle GODEFROID, a pupil of GERARD, and is a very good likeness. I was struck by a portrait of M'lle de FAUVEAU. This lady is of a noble family of Brittany, and is well known for her devotion to the cause of the DUCHESS DE BERRI, and for the talent she has displayed in the art of sculpture. She is neither young nor handsome; she is dressed in the costume of a peasant of Brittany, a sort of _blouse_ or loose frock, with her hair cut short in a strait line across her forehead, as we sometimes see it in the portraits of the early French kings. There is a portrait of the DUKE OF ORLEANS at the Louvre. It was painted from memory by SCHEFFER, a very clever artist. Some of the fruit-pieces and portraits, _au pastel_, in colored chalks, are very beautiful. Indeed, the French excel in this style of drawing. Among the paintings on porcelain we particularly admired a Holy Family, copied from one of the old masters. It is a perfect bijou. The day after our visit to the Louvre, Mrs. R---- took me to the _atelier_ of Mr. HEALY, the young American artist. His portrait of WASHINGTON, copied from one by STUART, gave great satisfaction to LOUIS PHILIPPE, and has been placed in one of the historical galleries at Versailles. Mr. HEALY has now a beautiful picture of two of Colonel THORNE's daughters, which he is retouching, at his room. The attitudes, particularly that of the eldest of the young ladies, are very graceful, and the whole picture in very good taste.'

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THE IRISH SKETCH-BOOK.--This capital work by 'Mr. M. A. TITMARSH,' otherwise W. M. THACKERAY, Esq., author of 'The Yellowplush Correspondence,' has just been published by Mr. WINCHESTER, at the 'New World' office, in a very neat little pamphlet-volume, illustrated with numerous engravings, from the pencil of the author. Our readers have had repeated evidences of the high estimation in which we hold the writings of Mr. THACKERAY; and they may trust our judgment in this, that they will find the volume before us to be second to no previous work of the writer. It is, in fact, Ireland on canvass; its various cities and towns; its ludicrous modes of travel, and more ludicrous travellers; its wretched poverty, its generous hospitality; its suffering, and its indomitable good-humor. We were not until now aware that Mr. TITMARSH was 'given to song' as well as to romance and painting; but his 'Peg of Limavaddy,' a handsome kettle-scrubber, who handed him his 'rummer' of ale, and laughed so joyously at an accident which befel it, establishes the 'soft impeachment:'

'PRESENTLY a maid Enters with the liquor Half a pint of ale Frothing in a beaker. Gods! I didn't know What my beating heart meant, Hebe's self I thought Entered the apartment. As she came she smiled, And the smile bewitching, On my word and honor, Lighted all the kitchen!

'With a curtsey neat Greeting the new-comer, Lovely, smiling Peg Offers me the rummer; But my trembling hand Up the beaker tilted, And the glass of ale Every drop I spilt it; Spilt it every drop (Dames who read my volumes, Pardon such a word,) On my what-d'ye-call 'ems!

'Witnessing the sight Of that dire disaster, Out began to laugh Missis, maid, and master. Such a merry peal, 'Specially Miss Peg's was (As the glass of ale Trickling down my legs was) That the joyful sound Of that ringing laughter Echoed in my ears Many a long day after.

'Such a silver peal! In the meadows listening. You who've heard the bells Ringing to a christening; You who ever heard Caradori pretty, Smiling like an angel Singing 'Giovinetti,' Fancy Peggy's laugh, Sweet and clear and cheerful, At my pantaloons With half-a-pint of beer full!'

We repeat, the 'Irish Sketch-Book' is a _capital_ work, and cannot fail of very general popularity. The author possesses a delicate appreciation of the beautiful, as well as a lively perception of the ridiculous; a felicitous combination of faculties, since the union of fine taste and strong humor seldom takes place in the same individual.