The British Press; or, Morning Literary Advertiser.
London, England, 1825-10-22 00:00:00

COVENT-GARDEN THE.4TRE.

The managers of the;i=aeatres have begun with
feeling the liaise of the public, and resorted to a variety or
trifling expedients, to ascertain the direction of the popular
taste, as we throw up straws to find which way the wind
blows. Several new performers have made their appear_
ance, but none of them produced a strong or perrnamee
sensation, and almost every species of dramatic entertain-
ment has been tried, as yet without any particular success.
Freiechatz and Faustus (Mr. Elliston's pair ofa,ectacte,)
were again brought out, but we apprehend hey dis.
closed no pfensing prospect to the lessee or his represents,
r..es, who have not been able to see their too!, throng!,
thent so clearly as formerly. Melo-Brame, which them%
best in the Christmas holidays, conjointly with the pan.
before
rtaln ; n
ii
a time
thaw, e'
lialscioamnireireaigtlaipntitcoY.: that should always be played
after 1 " this breathing world"
the frost. It has been held,
that comedy may be ventured on *hen the wind is
north-east, and in hard weather, but, in order to
succeed, the wit must bemore brilliant, and the humour
warmer than of late, or the audience atands a good chance
to die of cold, and the piece to perish by indifference.
Opera should he reserved for an open ',MOH atitl the pre.
valence of " gentle air', which give delight and hUrt not,"
but, on the contrary, come over the charmed sense
" Like the sweet South, upon a bed of fIOS
edt
" Staling and giving perfume,"
as Shaksftare has it.
When we observed the announcement of I.illa,a new
operatic drama, with the music adapted by B. Livius, a
composer of some mark and likelihood, we apprehended
the management had provided us an entertainment of the
description last adverted to. It turns out we were wrong,
and the opera proves to be a melo-draine. We shall not
harass our readers with the analysis of a plot, alike
empty and intricate, and which, sooth to say, we do not
pretend very perfectly to understand. It is enough that
the piece is of the true melodramatic school, and moreover,
as we shrewdly suspect, of French extractlm. Thaw is
an abundance of fainting both of men and women, and
firing of pistols and houses. Add in this a dance of lei.
lagers, an involuntary jump of the villain Mal tin Brand,
from a precipice some 20 or 30 feet high, a hymn of pea.
sante to the rising sun, and a chorus of thunder to the
falling rain, and you have a very pretty idea of the whole.
The sentiments are as unnatural as the situations, which is
much. One Master Brenhold (Fawcett). a Silesian farmer,
has lost a couple of boys through the agency of some
Frenchmen, and he preserves the life of Victor St. Phan
(l'owcr), a French officer, who has no connexion with
the act, and for what purpose, think you gentle reader?
—simply, and in one word, in order that he may enjoy the
satisfaction of murdering him ! But he does not. However,
with this charitable intent, Brenhold had brought the
Frenchman home to his own house, and kept him there
long enough for his daughter to fall in lore with him.
Lilla (Miss Paton) and Victor St. Phar get great friends,
and finally man and wife. The farmer goes mad, and
throws himself over a precipice, and every hotly concludes
him dead, but he is not. He encounters his daughter and
her husband, and fires a pistol coolly in the fact of the lat-
ter, who, by another lucky accident, escapes harmless.
Seeing this, Brenhold, who appears to have discharged
his pistol and his choler together, shakes bands
with them both very cordially, and the piece con-
eludes. These are a few of the incident.. The reader
will judge of their probability. Previous, however,
to the above desirable denouement, Martin Brand (Con-
nor), who hat been perpetrating all manner of diabolical
villauies, is scut to his account after a new and summary
fashion, to which we have already alluded: Victor and he
appear fighting on a bridge—Martin appears to receive a
mortal stab, and falls behind a bush, whence Victor picks
up an effigy of his enemy, very accurately made, and hurls
it down an immense yawning gulf. The leap bests the fly.
ing American hollow. This trick was loudly applauded
by the galleries. Some of the a'tdienee thinking—good
easy souls—it was Mr. Connor himself who had encoun-
tered the perilous fall, were alarmed ; but to the stern
sense of poetical justice of the majority, the merited rem.
Nation was highly satisfactory ;so much so, that there were
cries of " Encore!" from individuals who appeared de-
sirous, like Alexander—

" Twice to sky the slain."
The plunge was not repeated. Notwithstanding, we advise
Mr. Courtenev to look to his laurels.
We have left ourselves neither room nor inclination to
criticise the performers. Indeed it would be unjust to
them to do so : the materials given them by the author
afforded scanty room for exertion. Suffice it to say, Messrs.
Fawcett, Keeley, Connor, and Power, made the best
of four very indifferent characters, and Misses Love and
Paton sung two or three songs sweetly, and with their ac•
customed effect.

The piece passed off ffith little applause, and that it was
permitted to do so, without much disapprobation, may be
attributed to that which constituted its only merit in our
eyes—its shortness. Ilowever, tediousness is quite con-
sistent with brevity, such as is possessed by this produc-
tion ; and short ill it is, we venture to predict its run will
be Amer There is some tolerably pretty music, and one
very pretty 'et n^.

MR. RAYNER THE COMEFIAN.ThiS distinguished
actor, we understand, was among the losers at the last
Doncaster races. Betting and playing during the week,
was, of course, the order of the night as well as the day;
and Mr. Rayner deeming the latter not out of his line, en-
gaged one evening with a company of spirited performers
in one of the theatres, where boxes were in much request
by noted persons. The character he sustained in the piece,
which was Fortune's Frolic, ob!!ged him to take out his
pocket-book soon after he commenced playing, and rt.:tracer
a small portion of its contents to the gentleman filling the
opposite part. The interest of the scene speedily increased,
laud it again came to Mt. Rayner's turn to draw. But, as
ill luck would have it, he found that the necessary attri-
bute of his dress for that purpose had vanished under the
magic influence of some of the propertymen of the corps.
Such an important and unexpected deficiency immediately
turned the tables, and introduced a general search of the
wardrobes of the company. None of the dramatis per-
sona had left the stage from the moment of Mr. Bayiwr's
entre, save a celebrated actor, wboappeared man innkeeper
on the London road, and with whom it would have been
out of character to have performed in a suspected line of
business. Among the other members of the Green-room,
however, no vestige of the stray property could be found,
hut upon one was discovered a " flash note." This had
nearly occasioned a striking situation—the bustle of the
Piece thickened, and the scene terminated by a watchman
entering and leading off the doubtful gentleman to a Ma-
gistrate's. The next Act discovered the two characters
violently struggling in the street, from whence the scene
suddenly changed to a watchhouse, when the curtain dropt,
never since to rise upon the fate of Mr. Rayner's pocket-
book. Such is the story related by our " Reporter."—
Leels Intelligeneer.
CH•NOE RINGING.—OH Thursday, the 13th instant,
the Society of Eastern Scholars rang a true and conipl!'/e
peal of Grandsire Triples, at Lewisham, Kent, comilisill.g
5,040 changes. The performers were all carpenters, their
names are as follow :—George Stone, treble, John Pen!.
2nd, Thomas Sprulea, 3d, James Blacklock, 4th, .T
Herbert, sth, Richanl Jupp, 6tb, John Bray, 7th, and
John Earle, tenor. It was conducted by Mr. W. Herbert,
and the compass and striking of the bells were allowed by
amateurs of the science to be excellent. The peal being
rang by men all of one trade is, perhaps, unexampled in
the annals of ringing. It was performed in three hours
exactly.
The News or Litemtvre and Faqhinn, or Journal
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men of Parliament-8. The Dmmies in London, No. 8. A!!:T.
ireaking-2. 31arriage in Acient and Modern Times—iO. 11
and Welshmen— Moseley -me Mosel-me Lyrics. No. 5, the Belle
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