The Sun.
London, England, 1847-12-23 00:00:00

r man" found his way to his native place, and gaining
access to the works of the famous clock, though blind,
cut some important wire and effectually destroyed
it. But this revenge cost him dear ; he had destroyed
his cherished chef d'oeuvre, he did not long survive it,
and the legend adds that his spirit was often seen
.wandering in the neighbourhood of the ruined time-
piece, wringing his hands andlamenting its destruction.
Of the poetical contributions to the "Keepsake," the
first is by Barry Cornwall, a translation from the
German, ."
The Awakener in the Desert." The
versification of this piece is sufficiently melodious,
but the subject (the reminiscences of a "mummied
thing") necessarily reminds us of Horace Smith's
inimitable "Address to a Mummy," and, conse-
quently, the " Awakener in the Desert," being
greatly inferior, obtains little of our admiration.
Among the other poems are some verses by Lord J.
Manners, being the disconsolate farewell of a despair-
ing lover ; some spirited stanzas upon " Slavery, by
Lady E. S. Wortley ; and some sweet lines on " The
Destiny of the Poet," by Mrs. Abdy. Anna
Savage has contributed a beautiful poem
upon the "Bourse," concluding with the
mournful moral that the wealth of worlds
" cannot purchase one lost hour again." There are
only two pieces from the fair editress, one, upon the
"Palace of the Luxembourg," is on the text " Uneasy
lies the head which wears a crown ;" the other upon
the " Gallery of Diana at Fontainebleau," is a brief
allusion to the strange incidents connected with a
palace built by Henry the Great, for his " fair Ga-
brielle," where afterwards " Monaldeschi's blood
crimsoned the floor," and where, in latter days,
" Fortune's favourite son" resided in the hour of
calamity. With this reminiscence the verses thus
conclude—

What bitter pangs were his, as now revealed—
Ingratitude stood forth, all unabashed,
And friends were few. His guards, whom oft he led
To glory, corquered now by grief, shed tears,

As theyreceived his earnest, fond farewell,
Whom, as a god, they worshipped in their hearts."
Of the beautiful engravings with which this volume
is adorned the most beautiful is the frontispiece—
a portrait of Jenny Lind, by J. W. Wright. Por-
traits of Jenny Lind are common enough, they are
to be met with in all directions ; indeed we are told
in a note to a poem addressed to the fair singer by
Miss Power, which appears in the " Keepsake,' that
,shortly after her arrival in England Jenny Lind,
chancing to enter .a poor cottage near Burnham
Beeches, was surprised and amused to find a portrait
of herself " the cherished ornament of the humble
abode." Nevertheless, numerous as these likenesses
may be, and critically correct as many of them doubt-
lessly are, after seeing the original on the stage, we
are invariably disappointed by them all. They may
give a tolerable representation of the features, but
they have not the expression which delighted us in
the original. They are not Jenny Lind. How-
ever,. this portrait, which forms the frontispiece to
the "Keepsake," differs in this respect from
its predecessors, it gives us not only the
features, but the charming expression which
animates them, an expression of mingled sweetness
and simplicity. The fair singer is here represented
as in the last act of the Somnambula when for-
getting a sad reality, she is dreaming of happiness
and love ; her countenance fully expresses the tender
and joyous sentiments, which are then supposed to
occupy the heart of Amina. Her whole appearance
is most interesting, and the artist has effectually
pourtrayed _ _

" The mind, the music, breathing from her face."
The pencil of J. Allom, and the graver of C. Mor-
tram, have contributed some admirable views of the
" Bourse," the " Staircase of the Palace of the Lux-
embourg," and the " Gallery of Diana at Fontaine-
bleau," and " Phoebe," by E. H. Weigall, is as
beautiful and natural a delineation of the dreaming
"Little Hop-Picker" as is Mrs. S. C. Hall's pen and ink
portraiture of the same.

THE BOOK Off'' BEAUTY; or, REGAL
GALLERY.

The same improvement that we noticed in "The
Keepsake" is visible in this " Book of Beauty" for
1848, which, besides its accustomed and very honour-
able employment as the mirror of beauty, lays claim
to the, we were about to say, higher office of illus-
trator of history. As usual, it presents us with a
group of lovely faces, and, as usual, they are not
fanciful but actual portraits, with this difference—
they are taken, not from the present but from the
past. Consequently each portrait is not, as heretofore,
only interesting to the favoured few acquainted with
its fair prototype, but is, or should be, attractive to
the great multitude who are supposed to
have a certain knowledge of its original,
for each of the twelve fair ladies here re-
presented, "the likeness of a kingly crown had
on," each of these fair ladies was a queen of England.
This " regal gallery," as it is termed, appears at an
appropriate time, when the sovereignty of Queen
Victoria, and the writings of Miss Strickland, have
rendered the royal ladies of England a subject of
general interest. This volume contains the portraits
of only twelve out of the long list of English Queens,
and in order, doubtless, to avoid the appearance of
being too historical, great care has been taken, in the
arrangement of the volume, to place the pictures
without any regard to date—thus the Queens of
Henry VIII. take precedence of the Consort of
Richard 1., and the wife of Richard 11. comes long
after the queen of Charles I. Hence, we -presume,
that each lady is to be considered per se, and her life
regarded as matter of biography, rather than of history,
notwithstanding the judicious remark of Miss Tout-
min, in her life of Queen Caroline, in this volume,
that an: isolated historical character is like " a pro-
file cut in paper, without shadow or background, or
artistic accessories." Taking the royal ladies, then,
not as we find them in history, but in the "Book of
Beauty," we must begin with Anne Boleyn, whose
portrait by H. O'Neil forms the frontispiece, and
whose memoir, by Lady Blessington, is the first article
of the volume. This commencement is, we think,
somewhat injudicious, not that the picture in itself is
unfit to he a frontispiece—on the contrary, it is a
most beautiful likeness of a most beautiful counte-
nance, and as an engraving, is worthy of all
praise—yet surely the regal gallery of Eng-
land can boast of some more admirable Queen
than Anne Boleyn. Next follows Jane Seymour,
and then Catherine Parr. Thus, out of a list of only
twelve Queens, a very undue share is, to our think-
ing, given to the Consorts of Henry VIII. Their
memoirs by Lady Blessington are all interesting,
and their portraits worthy of a Book of Beauty.
Then we meet with Berengaria and Elizabeth Wood-
ville, who lived in very different yet equally perilous
times. The one shared with her husband in the
chivalrous wars of the Crusades—the other mourned
over the terrible battles of the Roses. Next follows
the stately Caroline, wife to George 11. The
memoir of this right queenly lady is, as we have
Queen-Consort, she possessed more real power than
al :free aodf ycsaariodl,i
nwe'riist tae by
nn i
ntel‘rleissstinUgamstiulidayT;cluthimouigh. only
many a reigning sovereign yet, (and in this respect, her
conduct is well worthy of admiration, and, if we
am
(la yu e ve
ne n: us
hr
ee
et to
esracyj s it, of of i
gr
e ma
ti t
iant imitation
na leseo ) al
though
as
hus-
band, she was zealous in the performance of her
duty as a wife, yielding him submission due, and
this not from motives of policy, not . even, it has been
said, from affection, but from .a strong sense of duty.
It is related that when, the King desired her to walk
with him ; when, from ill health, too weak for the
exertion, she frequently would plunge her feet in
cold water before setting out, in order to
gain temporary_ strength. Whether or not the
King knew of this is not said, but in either
case, as Miss Toulmin justly observes, " Whether
one thinks of a man who could for his own
gratification permit such risk and suffering to be
incurred by a wife, of whom he said, I never yet
saw the woman who was worthy to buckle her shoe
or the resolution with which she concealed the
sacrifice, the alternative is equally amazing." After
Eleanor of Provence, comes the portrait and memoir
of Matilda of Scotland, Queen of Henry I. This
portrait is one of the most attractive in the book;
the Queen appears in an attitude of humility, car-
rying a basket, but her air is dignified, and the ex-
pression of her countenance most pleasing, according
well with the interesting character here given of her by
Dinah Mulock, and according well with what we
should anticipate from her parentage—the daughter
of Malcolm Canmore and Margaret the Saint ; and
with her own surname of " Good Queen Maud."
Philippa of Hainhault, equally good as a wife
and as a queen, presents in many respects a striking
contrast to the gentle Matilda, whom she succeeds.
Henrietta Maria, Eleanor of Castile, and Isabella de
Valois complete this " regal gallery?' In the me-
moir of Eleanor strong dpubts are cast upon the
veracity of the anecdote of Eleanor sucking the
poison from her husband's wound, but " where igno-
rance is bliss, 'tis folly to be wise," and we feel no
gratitude towards those who endeavour to shake our
belief in the pleasing incidents, few and far between
which illumine the otherwise somewhat gloomy
chronicles of the past.

It is understood that tile unrestricted control of
the money order deportment of the Post•offie through-
out thc kingdom has been placed in the hands of Mr.
lowland hill by the Postmaster General, with a view
to its improvement and extension... No step could have
been adopted in connexion with this branch of the Go-
vernment service more calculated to afford satisfaction
to the public, while at the same time it furnishes a good
precedent—and in England a most rare one—in allow-
ing freedom of action to a reformer, master of his sub-
jrct, instead of permitting his plans to be marred by
official pedants, and then complaining of delays or of
imperfections.

INTERNATIONAL COPYRIGHT.—In conformity with
the treaty lately concluded between Prussia and Eng-
land relative to copyright, two editions of the German
translation of Bulwer's "Lucretia " have been seized-at
ar..d the publishers prosecuted.