The Press.
London, England, 1855-09-01 00:00:00

SEPT. 1, 1855.

trayed by the same pen that recorded the
sorrows of " Jane Eyre." We could express
many errors in detail in the above picture.
"That masquerade of passion" is a fatal slip in
trying to intensify a description, and " the
" glimmering apprehension" at once recalls the
admired passage in CollyCibber on Betterton :
" Pity it is that the charms of acting cannot,
" like those of painting or poetry, be their own
" record; that the animated graces of the
" player can live no longer than the instant
" breath and motion which paint them, or at
" best can but faintly glimmer through the
" memory of a few surviving spectators r

Thus we see that the Shepherd, like all other
characters, has his weak points, and that under
a cloud of Scotticisms, mingled with vehement
English, he can occasionally show the contor-
tions of false vigour. But his Gaelic pathos
is pure and genuine, and our Laureate might
get some hints on the art of composing with
manly pathos. There is nothing puling or
sickly in the following description of the sad
work done by au accomplished hypocrite:—

Shepherd: Then to see him sittin a the time beside the
verra bonniest bit lassie in a' the pairty ! lean in his great,
broad, yellow, sweaty cheeks, within an inch of her inno-
cent carnations ! Sweet simple girl—she thinks him the
holiest o' men, and is blind and deaf to his brutalities. 0
save the lintwhite frae the houlat's nest ! But the puir
bonny boardin-school lassie has Biller—a hantle 0' siller—
thousands o' poun's, aiblins five or sax—and in twit-three
years ye see her welkin by her lane, wi' a girlish face, but
white and sorrowful, leadin a todilliu bairn in her hand, and
anither visible aneath her breast, nae husband near her, to
gie her his arm in that condition—nae decent servant lass
to help her wi' the wean—but quite her lane, no very weel
dressed, and careless, careless, speaking to mane she
meets, and saunterin wi' a sair heart down the unfre-
quented lanes, and awa into a field to sit down on the
ditch-side weepin, while her wee boy is chasing the butter-
flies among the flowers.
The manner in which sense and reflection are
mingled with the poetical passages is peculiar
to the "Noctes." But on a severe criticism
we discern some of the want of due dramatic
shadings and individual sustainment of cha-
racter. Occasionally Tickler is just as poetic
and picturesque as the Shepherd. Thus
Tickler describes the Falls of the Clyde in a
way that tantalises us with the idea of a cool,
fresh atmosphere :

North : The Fall of Foyers is terrible—a deep abyss
savage root-work, hideous groans, ghost-like vapours, and
a rumble as if from eternity.
Tickler : The Falls of the Clyde are majestic. Over Corra
Linn the river rolls exultingly ; and, recovering itself from
that headlong plunge, after some troubled struggles among
the shattered cliffs, away it floats in stately pomp, dallying
with the noble banks, and subsiding into a deep bright
foaming current. Then what woods and groves crowning
the noble rocks ! How cheerful laughs the cottage pea.
tered by the spray ! and how vivid the verdure on each
ivied ruin 1 The cooing of the cushats is a solemn accom-
paniment to the cataract, and aloft in heaven the choughs
reply to that voice of the Forest.

Dash that passage with a few Scotticisms, and
you have the Shepherd. But these and similar
errors are the faults of affluence of mind. In
the same passage, after North declares that
nature is all in all, and art stark nought,
Tickler rejoins :

Tickler : Yet softly. Who planted those trees by that
river side ?—Art. Who pruned them p—Art. Who gave
room to their giant arms to span that roaring chasm ?
Art. Who reared yon edifice on the cliff?—Art. Who
flung that stately arch from rock to rock, under which the
martins twitter over the unfeared cataract ?—Art Who
darkened that long line of precipice with dreadful or glo-
rious associations?—Art, polity, law, war, outrage, and
history, writing her hieroglyphics with fire on the scarred
visage of those natural battlements. Is that a hermit's
cell? Art scooped it out of the living stone. is that an
oratory ? Art smoothed the floor for the knee of the peni-
tent. Are the bones of the holy slumbering in that ce-
metery? Art changed the hollow rock into a tomb, and
when the dead saint was laid into the sepulchre, Art
joined its music with the torrent's roar, and the mingled
anthem rose to the stars which Art had numbered and
sprinkled into stations met the firmament of Heaven.
What then would Bowles be at, and why more last words
to Roscoe? Who made his ink, his pens, and his paper?—
Art. Who published his books?—Art. Who criticised
them ?—Art. Who would fain have damned them ?—The
Art of the Edinburgh Review. And who has been their
salvation?—The Art of Blackwood'e Magazine.

The last sentence is a capital stroke, and is
highly characteristic of the " rattling " way in
which the " Noctes " mingled the serious and
the droll.

Scattered through the convivial colloquies
are a variety of dicta on the contemporary
reputations of the time, delivered in a tone
between jest and earnest. Vast pretensions
are humorously assailed in a coarse style of