tempting shops, full of elegant inutilities, or what the French call "bétises." The classical figures in Biscuit de Sèvres, a better material than the Parian porcelain, dwell pleasantly on the memory, some with robes just fringed with gold. Statuettes are the most elegant ornaments of a drawing room; more elegant because they might be done without. A friend of mine who was going to be married, let his friends know generally that he would dispense with the ordinary presents, for certain articles of plate and useful things in general he must get, whether they were given him or not; but that he would feel obliged to them for any little work of art, which, his means being limited, his conscience would not let him buy. Works of art, small or great, have this advantage over many other possessions, they are hard to steal, because they have a traceable individuality when complete; and when reduced to their bare materials, they are comparatively worthless; broken up or melted up, they become mere rubbish. I pity the man who, supposing his object was not to turn it into money, would rather possess the Koh-i-Noor than a gem of Raphael, both on account of his own bad taste, and his want of consideration for those who are open to temptation. We go up the Rue Vivienne, and turning into those pretty lateral passages where the busts of artists are exposed for sale, with numberless amusing prints, we get to the Boulevard, and pass into the Passage Jouffroy. What is our object? Nothing more or less than dinner, and well have we earned it today. The French have satirically remarked, "Il y a une chose que les Anglais font tous les jours, et qu'ils font toujours mal;" and accordingly, when an Englishman comes to Paris, he thinks himself much injured if he gets a bad dinner. And yet even there bad dinners are to be had, in spite of the "Physiologie du Gout," and "BrillatSavarin." In fact, the difficulty of getting a dinner at Paris, to the uninitiated, is very great. The "carte" is put into the hand of the stranger, and he nervously orders, not the most savoury, but the most translatable dishes, while the criticising "garçon" is standing over him, and observing his mistakes, if not in the combination,

at least in the succession of his "plats." There is one place where this difficulty is removed, the stranger's gastronomy being taken into affectionate leadingstrings. It is the "Dîner de Paris," in the Passage Jouffroy. There is a new dinner every day-the dinner of the day. The bill of fare appears on the board outside. If you like it, or think you do, or choose to speculate, you pay for your ticket and go in. It struck me that that paying for the ticket gave a certain artistic complexion to the whole affair; it was like paying at the door of a theatre, concertroom, or exhibition, and it removed that slight anxiety during the agreeable ceremony as to the amount of the bill, which may have a certain effect, though infinitesimal, on digestion. It was a very good dinner, the cost, including wine, being three francs and a half. There was a multitude of diners, though only one dinner, which, like the fairy shilling in the Irish story, was renewed as fast as consumed. Some amusement was created by the conduct of two Englishmen, each having a will of his own, though they came into the room together; one insisting on taking a table in the corner, the other in the middle of the room, and each being seated by himself for some time in the place he had chosen, and beckoning the other over, till the stronger will prevailed, and the gentleman in the middle went to the corner. On comparing notes, they found that the cause of the obstinacy of the one was, that he liked to dine in quiet; while that of the other was, that he liked conversation at dinner, and there were two gentlemen at the middle table. Be it as it may, it amused the French, and it struck us that, somehow or other, the French would not have done so. When they are in company, one seems instinctively to take the lead, and the others to follow. After dinner, we go to the Opéra Comique, which of all the "spectacles" is perhaps the most thoroughly national,-that is to say, best suited to the higher taste of the nation; for to see the French middle and lower classes at home, you must go to the Palais Royal and Porte St Martin. The performances at the Opéra Comique are chiefly mixtures of dialogue and song; airiness and gaiety

being the characteristics of the musical part, which is alike removed from the dreamy sentimentality of the German, and the rich luxurious satisfaction of the Italian school.

The first piece that we heard has passed away from the mind, leaving a residue of agreeable sensation, connected with the warbling of a female singer, Miolan. The second piece has impressed itself more vividly. It is a classical subject, called "Galathée." It is made out of the well-known story of Pygmalion, summed up in a few words, in a simile by Schiller, in his "Ideals "

"As with ardent supplication
Wooed Pygmalion the stone,
Till the chisel's cold creation

A glowing, conscious nymph had grown;
So, with young zeal overflowing,

Clave my heart to Nature's charms,
Till I felt her breathing, glowing,

Wound within my poet-arms."

It opens by the appearance of a lazy young slave asleep on a couch. He gets up, rubs his eyes, stretches, yawns, and falls asleep again; at last, repeating the same process, sits up and sings a very good song, descriptive of the charms of doing nothing, and having nothing to do. The actor is Mocker, too stout and thick-set a man for the character, giving it too much of the "fat boy appearance, and failing to give an idea of the beautiful, lazy, domestic pet, intended by the character of Ganymede. Pygmalion is evidently an easy-going master, a classical St Clare, and his slaves take great liberties with him, especially now that he is absorbed in the contemplation of his beautiful statue, which is kept behind a curtain, and occasionally exhibited as a special favour. His prayers to Aphrodite, uttered in very good music, at last prevail, and on an occasion, when the curtain is drawn, to his delight and surprise the statue has become a living nymph, well represented by Mdlle. Ugalde. Delighted with the present of the gods, he hastens to ascertain her wants, and the first is a very homely one," J'ai faim." Of course, Pygmalion must do everything for himself, so off he goes to market with a basket on his arm. While he is away, his new acquisition makes acquaintance with Ganymede, paying

very artless compliments to his youth and good looks, and also with another friend of his master's, one Midas, who comes on the stage all over rings, pins, and chains, like a Jewish broker. This is a rather ungallant satire on woman, represented by Galathée in her most unsophisticated state. She flatters Midas into giving her, one after another, all his articles of jewellery, then tells him he is an ugly old fellow, and that he may go out the way he came in. At this crisis Pygmalion appears. Midas hides under the tablecloth, and Ganymede, looking very demure, stands ready to wait at table. Pygmalion takes out bread and fruit and wine, and sits down with Galathée to discuss it socially. The bread and fruit disappear without comment, but the wine, as new to her as life, excites the nymph's unbounded admiration. All the accompaniments of the feast are eminently classical, with the exception of the tablecloth, which is much like a piece of bedroom carpet. Ganymede, in obedience to the musical solicitations of the nymph, fills glass after glass for her, or rather patera after patera, while she gradually lapses more and more into the posture of a Bacchante, or, in plain termsmust we say?-becomes more and more unmistakably intoxicated; till at last Pygmalion, who has been getting more and more serious in proportion as she gets more and more fuddled, stops the hand of Ganymede. The consequence is, that the "patera" is thrown at his head, and the nymph jumps up in a fury, upsetting the table and Midas, who is under it, and driving Pygmalion off the stage. When he comes back, he finds that his ci-devant statue has run away with the "fat boy." Tired of his bargain, he prays to Aphrodite again, and Galathée, to his infinite satisfaction, resumes her place on the marble pedestal, a statute as before. whole piece is well sustained in all the parts of its simple plot, and both the acting and the singing of Mdlle. Ugalde leave nothing to be desired. We are seated behind the orchestra in the stalls, always the best place for foreigners who wish to catch the words of a drama, although no doubt something of the illusion is lost by

The

the neighbourhood of the stage, and the side-peeps behind the scenes.

The next morning-it is one of the first days of January-we are waiting in a most well-behaved crowd at the gate of the Carrousel, to see the Emperor come out: we wait a long time, but no Emperor; we are out of patience, but we do not go away, for we think that every next minute he must come. At last we see a movement in the crowd at a distance, and hear a murmur of disappointment in that near us, and we find that he has passed out the other way, and has gained the Champs Elysées. We want to see him and the Empress, as we have seen neither of them before. Our last visit to Paris was just after the coup d'état, and then we shared the common feeling against him, which we have since seen great reason to modify. So we walk up the Champs Elysées, a walk on a bright winter's day, with a clear sun and a frost just sufficient to give piquancy to the air, particularly pleasant. All the world are there, great and little, and we pass with peculiar satisfaction the many groups of prettily-dressed happy children in the gardens of the Tuileries. We meet several acquaintances as naturally as if we met them in Hyde Park; we are shown several French and English notabilities-amongst others, the tall figure of the author of " Vanity Fair." We pass a fine building to the left, intended for the Exhibition, for which all the preparations are making in the teeth of the war, as if the Czar and his audacious pretensions had never been heard of. But then the French are always prepared for war, and take these matters easily. We are in the Bois de Boulogne, where improvement has been proceeding on every side at a rapid pace. The little unmeaning trees have been cleared away in some places into vistas and savannahs, and the ground sown with grass, all done with perfect taste. We come to the banks of the lakes, which extend as far as the eye can reach, with graceful curves, and in one place form waterfalls among rocks artificially placed there, but which look perfectly natural, as if they had stood there for ages. The Emperor comes and passes on horseback, but where is the Empress? Her carriage moves along at

a slow pace, empty. We observe people on the side-walk respectfully making room, and the gentlemen doffing their hats. She is coming on foot with some other ladies. She returns our salutation with a gracious bow, and we have a full view of her as she passes, looking not so much like a queen or an empress, as one of nature's most lovely ladies, who would have been the same had she appeared in a cottage porch or the reception-room of a palace. She is evidently a being above being affected by her station, except as somewhat of a burden, and we cannot help applying, as she walks, the lines of the Latin poet :Pomponit factim, subsequiturque decor." "Illam quicquid agit, quoque vestigia pressit,

Long life to her, for she is said to be good as she is beautiful-truly said, for, if expression is to be believed, never did we see an expression more abundant in goodness. Let her come over to see the Queen-I hope she will not be frightened, for I think she will hear such a British cheer as foreign potentate has seldom been greeted with before.

The sun goes down, and closes an evening of peculiar beauty. There is a purple flush over the lake, and the Bois, and the thin smoke of Paris, and we turn back well contented with our walk, to see in the evening the representation at the Gaîté which we promised ourselves yesterday. A piece of Frederic Soulie's, "La Closerie des Genêts," has been commanded for the evening, the expected coming of the imperial pair having exorcised "les Cinq cent diables." The Emperor and Empress are punctual to the minute, and occupy the corners in their box, while behind them stand three gentlemen-in-waiting, whose patience we thought must have been well tested by a play which lasted from half-past seven to past midnight. The length of theatrical representations is a great objection to them both in England and France, turning what would be a rational and intellectual recreation too often into a sort of dissipation, only to be occasionally indulged in without the sacrifice of time which might be better employed. We have often been struck by a remark of the author of Friends in Council, that almost everything is

too long, and that almost everybody to whom you give an inch of your short life will take an ell of it; that society, in fact, is a general buttonholder. And all this takes place in spite of the good old maxim, that too much of a good thing is good for nothing. A very hard case, indeed, is a long sermon, for although you may not be in the position of Dugald Dalgetty, to whom eighteenthly, nineteenthly, twentiethly, and to conclude, might at any moment have brought the conclusion of his career, yet there a man, without your leave, has you at his mercy if he is merely dull, there is no great harm done, and, as the good Herbert says, he preaches patience. But he may be preaching doctrine you detest; you cannot escape him, for if you run out you are thought unmannerly, and you cannot answer him without the offence of "chiding and brawling," as if there must be two persons to do it. But the hardest case of all is, when a pleasure will not have done with you when you have done with it-when mine host, an oldfashioned fellow, will not let you rise from the wine and join the ladies, but keeps you listening to his old barrack stories or college stories, as the case may be, till the carriage-wheels begin to come to the door, and you, if a youngster, endure the torments of Tantalus all the time, for snatches of polyglot song come through the drawing-room door, when the footman goes in or comes out with the tea-tray, and you might be turning the leaves over, and putting in a few notes in English prose-no, not quite prose. It is very hard, too, to be kept too long at a concert or theatre: it is true, you may go out at any time, but then you will perhaps lose the best piece or the best part of the piece; and you have paid your money, and will have your money's worth; so the after-dinner repose is sacrificed to the beginning, and the first hours of sleep to the end. It seems to us that it is an outrage to art to make its service a dissipation. It is true that the Athenians, that nation of artists, sat out three tragedies and a satiric drama at a time; but then they considered it a religious service, and they were in the open air, breathing all the time, not carbonic acid gas, but the PawórаTov

allépa of their own resplendent climate. They manage these matters better, not in France, but in Germany. There the general custom is to have one play at a time, beginning at seven, and ending at nine. The price is moderate, for you pay according to the length of the representation. It is better taste to keep the impression of the tragedy or comedy distinct, than that they should be confused in your dreams, as they are sure to be if you witness incongruities the same evening. The theatre becomes a rational and intellectual recreation, like looking at a few good pictures as compared with a bewildering dance through endless galleries of them.

One reason, Irenæus, that I dwell on this point is, that I am one of those who wish to rehabilitate the theatre amongst us; I wish the time to come when children will be taken to it for mental benefit, as they are now taken to see wizards and wild-beast shows. Puritanism has kept up the prejudice against the theatre with us, which has died out in reference to the other fine arts, which it equally "tabooed" at first, and which its extreme development, Quakcrism, as you know, still taboos. The playwrights of the Restoration, instead of trying to mend this prejudice by respectability, justified it by assuming the loosest tone, and doing all they could to degrade the art. The prejudice is not yet dead, though the general tone of plays now acted is good, and the characters of actors are in many cases irreproachable. All honour to William Macready for his half-successful attempts to assert the dignity of the stage; all honour to Jenny Lind, whose very presence seemed to shed an atmosphere of goodness and purity through the Italian Opera House, so that men about town confessed that she had moved them to tears, and stirred up memories of better things, to which they had been strangers for many a long day. The drama, like the other fine arts, has no distinctive moral character of its own, though it may become a most powerful instrument for good or for evil, as it is used or abused. It is precisely the same with fiction; certain it is that nothing is more strongly moving to human nature; and to ignore such agencies argues want of