The Press.
London, England, 1856-08-02 00:00:00

PERIODICAL LITERATURE.

Blackwood opens this month with an admirable
essay on Macaulay. The idea, rather suggested than
expressed, that Macaulay does for history what
Mr. Charles Kean does for Shakespeare, is extremely
felicitous. The story of " The A thelings "is continued
with great spirit; it is a thoroughly natural tale. "A
Visit to Selborne," and "Seaside Studies," are espe-
cially agreeable subjects during such weather as the
present. "Tickler among the 'Thieves" is humorous,
but scarcely equal to last June's " Tickler."
Aytoun's " Bothwell," and the " Sketcher" papers, are
the two literary reviews of the number, and " India
under Lord Dalhousie," the politico-historical one.
Fraser this month has a great and agreeable
variety of articles. We are glad to see the com-
mencement of a new tale, by the author of "John
Halifax," entitled "The Double House." "A I'eep
into the Principalities " is sensible and impartial.
" Life at the Water Cure" is an amusing and, we
imagine, useful article, setting forth all the pecu-
liarities of that healing course, and commenting
sagaciously on Mr. Lane's enthusiastic description.
"The Opera Season of 1856," " Life and Manners in
Persia," and " A Midsummer Day with the Poets,"
are the principal remaining articles.

The Dublin has an excellent list of articles—
eleven out of fourteen being purely literary ones.
The " Story of the Darragh " grows interesting.
" 'I he Progress of the British Navy," " Cyprus,"
" French Versions of Shakespeare," and " Gossip on
Fortune," will perhaps be the most generally ac-
ceptable—the second and third mentioned especially.

'O

The " Gossip on Fortune," however, is a most able
and attractive essay of a kind we see too seldom.
" Modern English Latin Verse " is a sketch of the
progress of Latin poetry in this country from the
time of Buchanan to the present day. The review
of " Montgomery's Life" is a well.written critique,
giving us most of the interesting circumstances of
the poet's career. The poetical pieces by Mr.
Frank Davis and Mr. Mortimer Collins are all
meritorious, though we hope the latter gentleman
does not intend to desert rythm, as he has done in
the serenade of " Troilus." " Reformatory and
Industrial Schools" and "Popular Education" are
both valuable articles.

Bentley this month gives us an interesting instal-
ment of " The Spendthrift," the best which has yet
appeared. The review of "The Attache in Madrid"
is a well-arranged article, with some lively extracts ;
and the memoirs of Charles Young, the actor, is a
pleasing and laudable contribution. Monkshood
writes this month on Coleridge. " Mary Goring" is
one of the regular Bentley stories—short, pregnant,
and amusing.
The Eclectic Review contains an excellent article
upon " Low Life in London," a forcible review of the
Austrian Concordat, and rather a silly one of
" Lamartine's Characters." The article on " Modern
Painters " seems well written and moderate.

PUBLICATIONS RECEIVED.--JULY 31.

BOOKS.

Kars, and Our Captivity in Russia. Colonel Atwell Lake.

The Happy Cottager.
Drafts fur Acceptance.

The Deserted Infe.

Bothwell. A Poem.
Essays, Critical and Imaginative.
The Austrian Dungeons in Daly.

Bentley
Newby
Routledge

C. H. Clarke

Blackwoods
Ditto
Rontledge

Ferny Counties. Lovell Ree-Ve
The Life and Adventures of James P. Beekwourth.
Sampson Low and Son

TEXT OF SHAKESPEARE.
TO THE EDITOR OF " THE PRESS."
Sir,—ln the third act of Henry VIII., sc. 2, we
find the following speech of Wolsey :
I do profess
That for your highness' good I ever laboured
More than mine own : Mal am have and will be--
(Though all the world should crack their duty to you
And throw it from their soul: though perils did
Abound as thick as thought could make them, and
Appear in forms more horrid)--yet my duty,
As doth a rock against the chiding flood,
Should the approach of this wild river break,
And stand unshaken yours.
With regard to the incomprehensible words in
italics, commentators have uniformly adopted one or
other of two courses. They have either held the
passage to be corrupt without offering any emenda-
tion, or supposed the sentence to be unfinished,
without perceiving that no possible addition could
have made sense of the words as they stand. Mr.
Collier's corrector is silent. I venture to make a
slight alteration, perfectly obvious, and, as I would
fain believe, uerfectly satisfactory both in meaning
and metre :
I do profess
That for your highness' good I ever laboured
More than mine own, that am your slave and will be,
Though all &c.

I profess, says Wolsey, that I labour more for your
good than for my cwn, since I ever have es-
teemed and ever shall esteem myself a slave whof.e
work belongs to you, my master, and not to myself ;
the duty I thus owe you shall never be denied, even
though all else should fail you.
There is no reason that the parenthesis should
continue to interrupt the sense of the passage.—l
aro, yours obediently,

B. BICKLEY ROGERS.

Wadham College.

TO THE EDITOR OF " THE PRESS."

Sir,—ln The Merry Wives of Windsor, Mr. Collier's
MS. corrector, probably incited thereto by his own
appreciation of creature comforts, proposes a change
in the text which is truly laughable. Minn host of
the Garter, urging Dr. Coins in his pursuit of Anne
Page, tells him :
I will bring thee where Mistress Anne Page is, at &farm-
house feasting, and thou shalt woo her. Cried game,
said I well ?—Act ii. 6c. 3.

Mr. Collier observes, " The difficulty has been how
to make any sense out of cried game," and he ap-
proves of the alteration made by the old corrector of
this expression to "curds and cream," as "the most
ordinary objects of feasting at farmhouses at that
time." In the first sketch of this play by Shakespeare
published in 1602, theretore twenty-one years before
the " first folio," entitled, " A most pleasaunt and ex-
cellent conceited comedie of Syr John Falstaff.? and
the !tterrie Wives of Windsor, iScc.," we find the pas-
sage thus given

,f

740

Ile bring thee

Where Mistris An Page is a feasting at a farm•house,
And thou shalt wear hir, cried game : sed I wel bully.
It will be seen, therefore, that the only change made
by the poet himself in the finished play was from
" wear hir " to " woo her," omitting the favorite word
of the host, "bully," but retaining "cried game ;"
and though, as Mr. Halliwell states, the phrase •is
obscure, yet, as it seems to have been originally
written and afterwards retained by Shakespeare, it
looks like rashness to alter it even for the old cor-
rector's suggestion, who was perhaps thinking of
Perdita, "the queen of curds awl cream," Winter's
Tale.

In this delightful play there is a word which re-
quires a better explanation than the critics har•e yet
given. Falstaff says .

I do mean to make love to Ford's wife ; I spy enter•
tainment in her; she discourses, she carves, she gives the
leer of invitation.—Act i. se. 3.

Mr. Collier considers " carves" to be a misprint for
craves," but the former word occurs in the first
sketch of the play, and may therefore be assumed to
be the poet's word. We find the expression in Love's
Labour Lost. Biron, speaking of the " honey-
tongued " Boyet, .

. The ape of form, monsieur the nice,
thus describes the chamberlain of the Princess of
France

This gallant pins the wenches on his sleeve,
Had he been Adam, he had tempted Eve ;
He can carve too and lisp.—Act v. sc. 2.
We can hardly supposo that the verb to carve, in
either of these instances, refers to helping at table,
as suggested by some critics, for Alice Ford was only
a guest at Page's dinner, where it is not very likely
that she would carve the " hot venison pasty ;" and
the application of the word to Boyet would imply
eDme peculiarity of speech or action of which we have
lost the true meaning. We have still in use aparallel
word often tound in Shakespeare, " to mince," deno-
ting an affectation in gait or language, and evidently
derived from the table :—" Mincing steps."—Mer-
chant of Venice. "A minced man."—Troilus and
Cressida. "She minces virtue."—King Lear. "Hold
up your head and mince."—Merry Wives of Windsor,
duo.

GEORGE RUSSELL FRENCH.

USit.

HER MAJESTY'S THEATRE.

DONIZETTI'S comic opera Don Pasquale was com-
posed expressly for Grisi, Mario, Tamburini, and
Lablache, whose admirable acting as well as singing
rendered the ensemble one of the most perfect spe-
cimens of vivacious vocalisation ever heard on the
lyric stage. In 1848 the cast at Her Majesty's
Theatre was Mme. Tadolini, Labocetts, Belletti, and
Lablache. Subsequently, Mme. Sontag was the
Norina, and in 1852 Mme. de Lagrange undertook
the part, supported by Calzolari, Ferrauti, and La-
blache. At the Royal Italian Opera Grisi, Mario,
Ronconi, and Lablache, gave unusual attraction to
this lively work. Labiache is now hors de combat, it
is feared, for ever. He has been confined to his
house in Paris the entire season with dropsical
symptoms, and has been unable to appear at the
Lyceum this year. His only possible successor in
Don Pasquale would be Ronconi, but the music
must be transposed to suit his voice. Rossi, wbo
enacted the ancient bachelor to Mlle. Piccolomini's
Norina, Belletti's Dr. Malatesta, and Calzolari's Er
nesti, is a good and conscientious artist; but his
position was most difficult following Lablache,
whose grotesque Pasquale is so fresh in the recollec-
tion. The disposition of the dramatis persona,
indeed, taken individually, on the present occasion,
will not stand comparison for a moment with former
representations ; but, on the whole, all the artists
being Italians, the composition itself being quite
familiar to them, and the acting being con amore,
the interpretation of the opera was one of the best
aid closest of the season. Mlle. Piccolomini de•
pitted the assumed bashfulness of the fiery widow
very amusingly—in the storms of the scold she was
less successful her fun was too transparent.
Belletti carried off the honours of the singing. He
delivered the romanza, "Bella siccome un angelo,"
with remarkable taste and animation. The noble
quatrain " E rismasto," was steadily given ; this piece
alone would stamp Donizetti as a dramatic musician
of the first order. The dramatic performance of
Mlle. Wagner came to a close last Monday with Tan
credi, and she has left town for Berlin, without
having had the opportunity of really displaying her
unquestionably great powers in a German opera.
The subscription season terminates this evening
with La Traviata, and three extra nights at reduced
prices, next week, will bring Mr. Lumley's short
campaign to an end.

ROYAL ITALIAN OPERA.
THESE have been three performances this week—
Lucrezia Borgia, last Monday night; Rossini's Bar-