The Sun.
London, England, 1850-01-22 00:00:00

THACKERAI'S CHRISIMAS BOOR.

REBECCA AND ROWE (VA : a Romance upon
Romance. By Mr. Michael Angelo Titmarsh.
Neither burlesques nor travesties are much to our
liking—and hence it is possible that we have failtd
to recognise the real excellence of the last effusion of
the indefatigable and fastidious Titmarsh—now, to
the joy of his friends, a valetudinarian. What has
always appeared to us to be the principal merit of Mr.
Thackeray as a writer of light literature is that keen
perception of the ludicrous, as evidenced in modern
society, which he has betrayed most conspicuously
in his compositions in Fraser as Yellowplush, and in
Punch as the Fat Contributor, in his Snob papers,
and in his more pretentious serials, such as " Penden-
ta" Whenever he has adventured out of this, his
peculiar province, as a novelist, he has ever, to our
thinking, proved the least successful; and having said
thus much, it is almost superfluous to add, that in our
.pinion his present" Romance upon Romance" is very
far iudeed from ranking among his masterpieces For
ourselves, the mere notion of witnessing a travestie
of Macbeth or of Romeo and Juliet—Juliet being
disguised in red shoes and a pinafore, while Romeo is
nabited in the costume of a " gent," with Joinville tie
and paletot complete—is matter of heart-ache and
chagrin. Therefore it is that site shrink with disrelish
from a book that might otherwise possibly be provo-
ative of amusement—wherein is contained a frivo-
lous travestie of " Ivanhoe," perhaps the noblest his-
torical romance of the greatest master in that branch
of our literature where Wilfred of Ivanhoe
is described as clad in a wig and spectacles,
while Rebecca is doomed to devour dog-biscuits in
A back kitchen; Richard Doyle has in some measure
redeemed the book from " forfeiting our malevolence
for ever" by 4 exceedingly humorous coloured
engravings?: Even the little wood-cut decorating the
centre of the ortitabental cover is capital for its ab-
surdity—represimting " Master Motley" with palette
and brush, painieng the lily. Richard Coeur de Lion,
in the frontispice, dancing the polka in the most
approved fashion of the most snobbish of the casinos,
.s also eminently ridiculous—the Jullien of the age of
chivalry being of course conspicuous in the orchestra.
As a sort of vignette for the title-page, we hale
Wamba as Clown, Isaac of York as pantaloon,
Wilfred of Ivanhoe as Harlequin, and Rebecca as
Columbine—a disposition of characters in the
burlesque not inappropriate at Christmas, the season
of pantomimes. Richard warbling one of his real
original ballads to Berengaria is the subject for
another tableau ; but the best of all the illustrations
fur grotesque extravagance is that representing the
storming of the castle of Chalus by the English
Sovereign. The laughable character of the whole
sketch is infinitely delightful, and evades all our
attempts at description. Several other droll embel-
lishments from the hand of the same gifted carica-
turist are scattered through the subsequent chapters.
Among the best portions of the letter-press are the
rhythmical effusions, of which we transcribe the fol.
lowing as a fair specimen :
COMMANDERS OF THE FAITHFUL.
The Pope he is a happy man,
His palace is the Vatican:
And there he sits and drains his can,
The Pore he is a happy mar.
I of ten say when I'm at home,
I'd like to be the Pope of Rome.
And then there's Sultan Sala3in,
That Turkish Solder, full of sin;
Ile has a hundred wiles at least
By which his pleasure is increased;
I've often wished (I hope no sin),
That I were Sultan Saladin.
But no, the Pops no wife may choose,
And so I would not wear his shoes;
No wine may drink the proud Paynim,
And so I'd rather not be him;
My wife, my wine, I love, I hope.
And would be neither Turk nor Pope.
In concluding our notice of " Rebecca and
Rowena," we would congratulate the admirers of
Mr. Thackeray on his happy restoration to health ;
and, yielding to him first our felicitations on that
head, bid him good speed in his after labours, and all
success to his " Pendennis."

LEILA; or the Siege of Granada. Part I. By
Sir Edward Bulwer Lytton.
A republication of one of the earlier fictions of the
most versatile and indefatigable author of our genera-
tion is hero commenced Published in monthly in-
stalments, and embellished with the original en-
gravings, copied from drawings by eminent artists,
such for example as Stephanoff, Kenny Meadows, &e.,
under the efficient superintendence of the late Charles
Heath, the whole will form, on completion, a volume
of no small attraction and of no meagre interest.
Leila herself, the heroine of the story, her
Hebrew father, otherwise known as the magician,
her lover Muza, the Moorish King Boabdil, his
beautiful mistress Amine, together with the
great Spanish sovereigns Ferdinand and Isabella, and
a multitude of minor actors, such as the decrepit slave
Ximen—people the gorgeous chambers of the Al-
hambra, and the lovely scenery surrounding Granada,
and constituting the peculiar charm of Andalusia--
apartments and landscapes delineated in such brilliant
and matchless colours by the pen that has since
written the epic of " Arthur," the romance of " Ha-
rold," the comedy of Money, and the family picture
of " The Caxtons. , No one whose mind is thoroughly
imbued with an affection for English literature can
fail to derive satisfaction from retraversing the earlier
steps of Sir Bulwer Lytton, now that his genius has
become more fully developed, and his reputation more
widely extended—the study of that extension and
development is one which, to ourselves, is fraught
with a singular fascination.

OUR RAMBLES BY THE DOVE.
ADDRESSED TO C. C., IN AMERICA.
'Tis well to proudly tell me of the glories of the West,
Of the stream with rapid torrent and the lake with heaving
breast,
Of the mountain and the prairie, of the forest and the bluff,
Savannah spot so fragrant and the jungle dell so rough.
I know that there are wonders in your own gigantic land,
The gorgeous and the beautiful, the startling and the grand,
I know the cataracts are bold, the fields of maize are wide,
I know the pines are thick enough to let the lightnings hide;
But glad I am to hear thee say with warm and clinging
love,
Thou thickest of Old England and eur rambles by the
" Dove."

Prize as thou wilt the banks that keep the clear broad ri-
vers in,
Where panthers drink and light canoes bear on the tawny
skin,
Be speaking fondly as thou may'st of hills that climb around,
And boast of wild-flowers that bedeck the trackless •" hunt-
ing ground ;"
Magnolias are exquisite and humming-birds are choice,
And " whip-poor-will" may charm thee with his melancholy
voice ;
But canst thou quite despise the thrush that whistled on the
thorn,
And those " forget-me-nots " that wore the jewels of the
morn,
Canst thou shut out the green below and cloudless blue
above,
That led us still, still onwards in our rambles by the
" Dove?"

Oh, no, indeed ! I know thy land will never chase away
The happiness we found in mine on that long, sunny day;
I know thy great White Mountains cannot dim the winding
steep,
That lured us dreamily along to gain the "Lover's Leap."
Do you remember how we sat, and tried to find a word
That would express the plashing gush of water that we
heard ;
And bow we watched the alders bend, as peacefully and
light
As though an angel's wing had passed and touched them in
its flight,
And how we said that Eastern clime held no Arcadian Grove
Of more romance and sweetness than the valley of the
" Dove."

We were familiar with the place, we had been there before,
But somehow on this August day we worshipp'd it the more,
And every crag of old grey rock and every wave-washed stone
Seemed touched with richer colouring, and breathed a softer
tone.
That tiny river, how it crept beneath the leafy shade,
Where golden perch and silver dace in glancing frolic played,
And how it dashed in foaming haste adown the mossy wall,
Where granite fragments broke the flow, and made a
waterfall,
And how we stood with silent joy with hearts brim-full of
love,
And saw the great Creator gliding onward with the " Dove.'
Oh! do not let the mighty, scenes that meet thy vision now
Shut out ..Thorpe Cloud' that standeth like a frown on
Beauty's brow,
Oh
! do not let the noble trees that spring upon
Prompt thee to spurn the bramble arms thatu ty sod,
huggedh us aS
we
many things to win thy loudest praise,
But
ld England's woods and dales yet steal upon thy
tbroeds;eeing
Thou wilt
oi lt
gaze.
Think of our merry travels on this narrow island earth,
And own that t\ e have often found rare spots of Eden
nbirth
And when amid the vast and fair thy native footsteps rove,
Call up our sunny rambles by the waters of the " Dove."
I breathed a prayer while straying there (God grant 'twas
not in vain),
It asked the boons of life and health to seek that place again—
It asked that those around me then might share the future
joy,
The hope was earnest, strong, and pure, God keep it from
alloy
Write on—and proudly tell me of the wonders of the West,
But glad I am that more than once thy spirit bath confessed
Affection for our daisied fields, green lanes, and babbling
brooks,
Our orchards and white cottages, and fairy-haunted nooks,
For I believe that thou wilt come with all thy olden love,
And let my prayer be answered by the waters of the " Dove.
lVeekly Dispatch. ELIZA COOK.

MADAME KOSSUTH.— INTe
...have much pleasure in
announcing that the wife of Kossuth has escaped from
Hungary, and had reached Belgrade on her way to joia
hot husband at Shumla.