The Sun.
London, England, 1855-01-16 00:00:00

DEATH OF MISS MITFORD.

After a long period of decline and helpless suffering,
cheerfully borne, the author of " Our Village -" died at
Swallowfield Cottage, near Reading, on Wednesday last
aged—as a memorandum furnished by herself Bona) years
ago assures us-66 years. She was born in 1769 at
Alresford, in Hampshire. Her mother wps an Ikeirese,
and the daughter of Dr. Russell, of Ashe, in Hampshiie
a man of scholarship and letters. Her father, belonging
to,the Mitfords of. Northumberland, was, as her own
"Reminiscences " have told us, a sanguine, cheerful and
speculative man, who tried physic, playedat whist, spent
every one's money, and something more, and madeevery
living creature about him love him, lend to him, and
forgive him. To this love and to his extravagance his
daughter's life was sa,crificed. EVery fortune that came in
hid way, includinga2o,oool. prize won in tlie lottery, was
waste,l, gaily and plausibly, by Dr. Mitford, and while yet
a gM, with all the impulses of a poetess, but with all the
re:lerve of an old fashioned gentlewoman strong within
her, his daughter was p'aced in the position of one who
ha 1 to " stave cif" want and sorrow from the parent to
whom she was devoted, by turning her choict• and pe-
culiar gifts to account in nuthorship. Educiated :a a
London boarding-:shoot—which seems to have had the
pecalicr gift of " bringing out" poetesses—Miss 3,lritfoid
first presented herself to the public in three volumes of
poetry—one a South S-a romance, after the fashion of
Scott. It was by clianc3 that she afterwards fell on
the veins of a country ii4e, scenery, and manners, oir the
one hand—and on the other, of high tragic pa- son
°don, which " Our Village" and her plays in verbs
severally represent. Ti:o story of these has been told
too. frequently and too minutely by herself in lets
publications which have passed through our lands
for it to be necessary to dwell more minutely on them
now, or to enumerate the works that made a labourer's
cottage with a duchess's " flower garden," three
miles of Reading, a place of pilgrimage to some of
the highest and most accomplished persons in Eu-
rope. But we must add, that Miss Mitford's works
did not represent all her gifts, produced as they
were under sharp pressure, and at moments when it
was fitter that the body of a delicate woman should have
been at rest, rather than that her fancy should have
been goaded into exertion. Her letters were charming ;
her c ,nversa,don was shrewd, racy, and elegant, full of
pertinence in its allusions, full of anecdote in its recol•
lections. She was a faithful and cheering friend to those
she loved. She bore up against the trials of a hard and
ill-understood life with a sweetness and vivacity such as
could have made strangers imagine that there was no-
thing to bear. She was well read in English and
French literature, Not long after her father's death,
her own health, which had been shaken by the dutiful
attendance on him Logan to fail ; and the illness which
carried her away 'was slow, painful, and dispiriting.
But her sweetness of temper and her brightness of mind
never failed her to tlae last, since only a few hours before
the news of her dece.sse reached her friends, they had
received from her greoting and tokens in her own hand-
writing—showing, no,, merely that the old kind heart
was sot soured by suiVoring, but that her sympathies
had not been contracte ti by narrow fortunes, age, and
pain. There are few of whom surviving friends will long
think so affectionately and so cheerfully as of Mary
Russell Mitford. Her a tune has an honoured place in
the library of healthy ani). real English literature.

ST. JAMES' 8 THEATRE.

Ihe success that attended the roduction of the I ntigon-
of Sophocles, with the music 0. imposed for it by Men
delssohn, at Covent Garden Th, has induced Mrs.
Seymour to bring before the put the Alcestis of Euri-
pides ; but with this difference--ii.l. the former all modern
stage decorations were discarded, in the latter the most
has been made of them. To add t. the effect selections
from the magnificent compositions o f Gluck are given,
and the direction of the music has t men confided to Sir
H. Bishop. The bill also informs us t the chorus has
been increased to sixty voices, and this orchestra consi-
derably strengthened, Mr. Spicer's ve,-sion of Alcestis
is cleverly put together, and contains 801 n e truly poetical
passages, in which the spirit of Euripid'e s is faithfully
though freely rendered. The faithful small heroic wife,
who devotes herself to death to save the of her hus-
band, presents a picture which must move 'very heart,
and its effect is increased by the beauty witlx which the
tale is told. The heroine was finely personate dby Miss
Vanden hoff, who felicitously combined the claissi c ideality
of the character with the warmth of real and iio,ttlal life.
The part of Admetus was well represented by .Mr. B.
Sullivan, and justice was done to the character ,f Her-
cules by that sterling actor, Stuart. Altogether. the ex-
periment must be said to have succeeded, although there
are portions to which we beg leave to take exe,,pt ion.
Attraction, without doubt, has been the point sou,ght
after ; but we think a ?LCW play, from the pen of Air.
Spicer, would have been of greater service to the =At'
agement. Vier° was considerable applause at the cloiw
of the play, and the principal performers, of course,•
were called for. We have frequently bad to compliment
the fair lessee upon her management behind the curtain;
Lit us hope she will look to it before it.

THE FRENCH LOAM—The subscriptions to the French
loan of 20,000,000 t. wore closed on Saturday, and are
supposed to reach nearly 80,000,0001.—a very remark-
ali, result, in the face of an actual deyosit of 10 per
cant. being required of every applicant' on the full
amount asked. As alio itiet:ts to sub-criners for sr a 1
totals are to, be made with,,ut dcdu3tion, the share ap--
porti,uted to the larger capitalists must he !united, and,
under these circumstances, the sun to be prrrnanently
drawn from England is li'cely to be small. Hence the
rate of exchange at Paris already shows an improve-
ine and it is believed that no further remittances of
gold were made yesterday.
Corr SLR AND EATING DOUSE KEEPERS' ASSOCIATION.
--Yost ;relay evening the JoOa half-yearly meeting of the
members of this society WhA Meld at the Freemasons'
Tavern, Great Queen-street. Mr. Yates, president of
the so.3iety, occupied the chair. Mr. Rogers read the
report of the committee, which stated that since the last
half-yearly meeting a sum of 2001. had been added to
the invested stock, making a total, including interest to
the 20th of November, to amount to 3,102/. 18s. Bd.,
the interest on which was not sufficient to cover the ex-
penf,es, as there was on the accounts of the years balance
of It7/.los. due to the treasury. This report was adopted,
if.. per month was voted to the children of a deceased
member, and the widow of another placed on the funds.
TILe procetaings then terminated,
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