The Sun.
London, England, 1863-09-21 00:00:00

PAPER

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Funeral of the late Count Alfred
-
Count Alfred de Vigny was buried (pal 6144
morning. He was born in 1799. Tk9.ur-'*-
the chosen profession of his family, anct,
at the age of 16, entered the Red iSloti
Louis XVIII., just in time to quit France witia
on Napoleon's return from Elba. In the follow ing•
year he exchanged into the infantry. He accooa.•
panied the Duke d'Angoulenie on his military pro,.
inenade in Spain and left the service, a captain, in..
1823. Of his work, chiefly poetical, probably the,
best known to English readers is his hiatorical ro-
mance of " Cinq Mars," a work of great interest and
merit, which appeared in 1826, went through four
editions in three years—at that time an almost un-
precedented success iu France—and which the
Debats, in a rather high-flown eulogium, bays f.B
perhaps the choicest gem of modern romance. lle
published a translation of" Othello," performed at
the TbearreFrancpis in 1829, and two other plays,
"La Marechale d'Ancre" and " Chatterton." His
death Was preceded by a very long end painful ill-
ness. " For many years," say the Debats,
"Alfred de Vigny had published nothing. He shw327
amassed fragments, poetical materials, murmuring alwa)'s,
like Andre Ch6uier,

I Rien n'est fait aujourdhui, tout sera fait domain.,
The morrow has come and his artist hands are cold in the
tomb. But in the mystery of private life, under the inspi-
ration of the only Muses who have dictated to him his
work of honour and of pity, he accomplished other works,
the best, which only his most intimate friends had oppor-
tunity of admiring. Eight months ago, from his bed of
agony, he presided at the funeral of Madame de Vigny, his
valetudinarian companion, for whom during 20 years he had
been the most indetatigable, the most exquisite sister of
charity on whom angels ever smiled. Absorbed in these
pious cares, entrenched in his poetical solitude, isolated from
coteries noble and proud, he died as a poet, without a stain
on his ermine robe. The moment has not come to revert to
the beautiful works which will immortalize his name. But
he was large of heart and good. It is soothing to say that,
before all else, while we still are weeping his loss. r ranee
has lost one of her purest glories."

SMOKING ON RAILWAYS.

The Saturday Review pleasantly enough.
argues thus, that a system should be
adopted—as, in fact, on a few lines, it has
been for some time past—of attaching smoking
carriages in the rear of all trains, to which
smoking rooms at the stations might reasonably be
added. A. small fee might be charged, if thought
worth while. Thousands would gladly pay it ; and.
the company would soon realise enough to defray
all the fines levied on them for casualties by juries
in the excursion season. Morals would be purer,
the carriages less reeky, the risk of fire less,
the public more comfortable, the servants
relieved of an invidious charge, the company
enriched. Under the existing system there is a
constant call for dodging, shifting, ,s tipping," and
equivocating, and there is desultory smoke ever
flitting about, and the stale aroma, which even to a
votary of tobacco is a nuisance, sticking in the
cushions. Wherever the practice which we suggest
has been adopted, no ill effect whatever has been
known to follow from its nse. But we will take the
prejudices of mutually antagonistic sections of the
community, and show that such a change as wo
propose would best meet the views of those who
condemn and those who defend smoking.

First, let us take the extremest possible view—
that of the eminently ascetic Dean, whose example
of temperance shows itself in his drink, but does not
extend to his language, and who, under the paternal
rule of James I. and VI., would certainly have risen
to be an archbishop. The Very Rev. Dr. Counter-
blast might say :—" Tobacco is a gorging fiend, let
us do what we can to intercept his ravages by pre-
venting contagion between smokers and the un-
tainted residue of the public. By all means let therm
not ride in the same carriage, lest the doom which,
sooner or later,is thesmcker's portion fall upon inno-
cent and guilty alike. The man who would light a.
pipe would pick a pocket ; but the Legislature will
and exclude smokers from the
not take my advice,
benefit of railway travelling, let the latter at least
feel the ban of social excommunication, and be
treated even as negroes are in the Northern States
—thrust forth, as an unclean offscouring of
humanity, into a vehicle by themselves."
We next proceed to consider the views of an old-
fashioned gentleman of the grand Georgian era,
who has taken " Prince's mixture" these 50 Tears,
but held the ignited weed in polite abhorrence. Ho
will recount his acute sufferings when, there being
family affairs of importance to be settled, he took a
place in the mail train, and was kept from sleep all
night by the fumes of a lively party of subalterns
in the next apartment, who regularly opened firo
as soon us the train was in motion, and had their
whiff over before it reached the station, evading his
detection, and defying his threats. He woke next
morning from hurried slumber in an hotel, and
found his peruke—fangh! not all the perfumes of
the Georgian era were able to overcome the per-
tinacious odour of the weed. Following the tra-
ditions of the same golden age, he sent a challenge
to the whole party, but discovered that one of the
subs was his own nephew, and wrote at once to get
him cashiered. He could not obtain that favour, but

struck him out of his will, and also brought an
action to compel the railway company to deodorize
their own cushions and his perukes. ‘, Why," he
concludes, " not have a dickey' behind every train
to receive these riotous young savages, and enable
a gentleman—the few who are left now-a-days--
to breathe freely during his journey, and feel pre-
sentable on getting out ? "
On the other hand, our smoke-consuming lieu-
tenant thinks it " a shame a fellow can't have a
weed without all this botheration. Always smokes,
except when there is danger of being rude to a lady,
or, since his uncle had cut him, of a forty-shilling
fine. The present regulation leads to a great waste
of matches, by which many holes are burnt in a
fellow's coats and wraps. Had paid the fine once,
and must have paid it many times over in tipping
the guard. Remembers that night in the mail train.
Nunkey' was great fun, and wanted to fight the
whole lot of them, but has cut him dead ever since,
and where is the money for his captaincy to come
from now ? Knows a stunning line, where the por-
ters always whisper, Do you want to smoke, sir ?'
at least, to others, never to him—to him they bring
a cigar as a thing of course. Capital good weeds
they are, too! Is aware that it is forbidden to give
money to the servants. Lots of things are forbidden,
in the army and out of it, but no one makes himself
unhappy about them. Should he object to a smok-
ing carriage ? Of course not. It would be the very
thing for keeping one out of the way of uncles and
other aged or dyspeptic humbugs, who were the
victims of the prejudices of a bygone age. If there
had been a smoking carriage, lie shouldn't have been
cut off with a shilling."
Another, a steady-going old smoker, " dislikes
the discomfort of feeling that a man mustn't do what
he can't do without; hates the risk of being bothered
by police, and badgered by old ladies. Doesn't
want to annoy other people, that would effectually
prevent his enjoyment. Likes a pipe above all
things, but dislikes asking a lady if she has no ob-
jection. In the chilly weather, especially, tobacco
is indispensable to the well-being of the human
frame, and after the wretched comestibles which the
so-called refreshment' rooms furnish, some real re-
fresher is, in his opinion, necessary. Why should
people of opposite tastes bo forced into familiarity
and made unneighbourly, when a simple arrange-
ment might preclude any such necessity ? Tobacco
rightly applied conduces always to mutual good-
humour. Why should a man waiting, for a train an
hour and a half have his pipe put out ? Thinks
that the smoking room at the station is as necessary
ae a smoking carriage in the train ; and believes the
companies might make a deuced good thing of it,
if they would only open their eyes, and leek that
way." We will not add to the argument, by any
less original comments. The public must judge
whether the allegations of these various malcon-
tents are genuine or fictitious.

MR. KINGLAKE'S "Invasion of tho Crirmrt," the
fourth edition of which has just appeared, has
already eFread over the continent. Tauchnitz, at Leipzig,
has not onlypublished a German translation of the work, but
likewise a cheap English Continental edition in four small
volumes. A French translation, which will mcst likely
create more ill-blood, and be read more than any other one on
the other side of the Channel, will, it is stated, be brought
cut in Brussels in the come of the next month,