The Sun.
London, England, 1844-06-03 00:00:00

AINS WORTH'S MAGAZINE.

In the present chapters of the editor's romance of
" St. James's," we find the plot progressing at a very
rapid rate. Abigail Hill is married to Masham, the
Queen's equerry, and the next incident of moment,
we suppose, will be the overthrow of the influence of
the imperious Duchess of Marlborough, and her dis-
tinguished partner, the great Whig Duke. There
are one or two humorous scenes introduced in the
course of the chapters before us, but they are not
very successful ; Mr. Ainsworth should avoid humour,
for he has not a particle of it in his composition. His
forte is description, and ingenious, skilfully-executed
melodramatic incident. The "New Generation" is
a panegyrical review of Mr. D'lsraeli's new tale of
" Coniugsby"—iitcomparably the ablest production of
the season. "Night Noises and Phantoms" is the
production of Mr. Charles 011ier, and the object of
the essay—a highly laudable one—is to endeavour to
account for many of those mysterious nocturnal
sounds which so often terrify unreflecting people, and
rouse all the dormant superstitious feeling within
them. "A Jar of Honey from Mount Hybla" con-
sists of a series of critical observations on Greek pas•
toral poetry, to which no essayist of the day is
better qualified to do justice than Mr, Leigh Hunt.
He quotes, we perceive, with deserved approbation, a
beautiful passage from Moachus's elegy on the death
translates with elegance and scrupulous
of Bion, with which we have long been familiar, and
which he
ac3uracy. "John Manesty, the Liverpool Merchant,"
is unusually interesting this month, and evinces none
of that langour and heaviness which characterised
earliersfo
rhe following i(u
t chapters.lO:
i' dextracetrsreswpeilcllinngo
doubt;some o fthe
thank us
Kean' which we give from%lietill
ston Papers" On a certain eyeraug, shoaly after his memorable
debut at Drury.lane, Kean, accompanied
faithful ally, Jack Hughes, dropped
b y his old and
in,e or ratherir
dropped up (by way of catachresis ate QfikY,s,
etage, the cider-room, in He nrietta.street, Covent• premier
Ensconced in a snug corm or the apartment, the two
friends were enjoying their nip,' and as the conversa-
tion of the Toora 'Was a right of common, they felt them,-
spikes no trespassers in nipping the pasturage alv., As
it generally happens, in places of this ltiAd, there is one
certain personage who usurps the tead on all topics—
one who would teach Ifni-Ili:Alt the art of war • so was
the case at this p.e.;;;od, at Offley's. This individual was
a Mr. Waiison, or Wason, a red-headed wholesale tc,i)ge-
conist, and a charlatan warranted town %adv.' I3ut
Watson was a man who might have caNe4Junius Brutus
himself a pretender, for Watson was really a fool. At
the court of Offi,,y,:hnciever, he had obtained .1-
_ Cordon
bleu, a4ii had a cionsiderable tail ``
, there was not
a wag in it.
who knew the movements of the town far
wetter
than the Morning Post, had already enlightened
,
t his auditory on the intrigues of Lady Douglas, kg the

once.

a -
\-‘s,
;--- •
case of the Princess, when he led the eonverSattott,..Daij—c-=,--,,,j
unnaturally, to the subject of the new actor 044t.„.6):::.•
lane.
" It is true enough," said be, stirring up the flam 4.
forest which grew upon his ' Dr. Drury brought
him to town. He talked with me on the subjcet—in
fact, we went together into Dor.s..etshire to see bin; act.
I shall never forget lienn's gratitude when we proposed
his appearance at Drury-lane.'
" Here Kean thrust himself forward like a ferret,
gazing at the speaker in perfect wonderment ; and the
blood-red knight' proceeded—
"' I saw him today in Cecil-street—he is in the very
ecstacy of triumph—and well be may: A nice child his
son ; but I am afraid my friend has something yet ty
learn.'
" How?—what is that?' demanded the whole tail at

4tift'iN
7 ' /

" Why, he thrashes his wire,' replied the oracle, with
the aspect of a red Indian; ' and he who raises his hand
on a woman, except in an act of kininess, it were base
flattery to call a coward.'

"A murmur of applause followed this dramatic scrap,
when Kean, having quickly passed from a f,Tret into a
tiger, was only withheld by the grir.e of I Inghes froal
springing on the carotty tobacconist. The dealer in
Virginia still went on:—' fhis was his,' said he, care-
lessly, as he pulled from his poeket a little chaed snuff-
box,—‘ this was Kean';—a slight token of his obiigatiorz
to me, as he was pleased to say. I carry it for his sake:
" 1)o you, by the gods!' exclaimed Kean, and darting
from his corner, he grasped the sight token from the
table, and hurled it through the window glass into the
street.

" Consternation seized the tobacconist, as though Cubi
itself had been suddenly swallowed by the sea; but up
rose his tail, like a water-spout, threatening annihilation
to the undaunted little actor, who stood with his arms
folded, like a stone terminus on a parapet. lam
Edmund Kean!' exclaimed he, grinding his teeth.
Slanderer! for the first time behold him! lam the
Kean!'

" The whole West Indies seemed now In a state of in-
surrection. The company rushed in a body towards the
sturdy tragedian, and verily believing him to be an im-
postor, notwithstanding the humiliation of the wholesale
dealer, assailed him with violence, and finally expelled
him the house. Little Hughes came in for his share of
the bounty, and with a shoe less than he entered' the
apartment, accompanied his friend, to finish the evening,
and consult future proceedings, at No. 21, Cecil street?'

HOOD'S MAGAZINE,
We are sorry to learn from a notice affixed to this
number, that the editor, Mr. Hood, has lately had a
severe attack of hemorrhage from the lungs, " brought
on by the wearing excitement of ceaseless and exces-
sive literary toil.' The writer of the notice, how-
ever, adds that "he is now gradually recovering
strength, and there is every reason to expect that he
will be able, in the next number, to give the promised
new chapter and illustrations of his novel, which are
at present of necessity deferred." The author of the
admirable " Song of a Shirt"—a poem that has
touched the hearts of thousands—is a man whom the
literary world can ill afford to lose, and we do most
sincerely hope that he will be shortly restored to
health, and delight and instruct his readers for many
a year to come, with his sprightly fancies and subtle
sketches of character, few of which but exhibit the
germs of shrewd, and sometimes even deep thought.
The " Laboratory" is a quaint poem by Robert
Browning. There are some impressive ideas scat-
tered carelessly through it, but the subject-matter is
not rendered sufficiently obvious to the generality of'
readers—a fault of frequent occurrence in this gen-
tleman's writings, who conceive, with far more force,
skill, and distinctness, than he executes. "An Inci-
dent at Pisa" we should. have guessed to have been
the composition of Mr. Monckton Milnes, even with-
out his --,ss"1111/nre, for it betrays all that peculiar man-
he owes to a careful study of the works
d vt.trords,,vorth. The "Nice Young Man" is a
slight, sketchy story, whose redeeming features are
its liveliness and good nature. " Recollections of
Gideon Shaddoe" is a passable collection of ghost
stones, which should, however, have bean kept for
the long winter evenings, when the co'.d, and glom,
and blighting fogs of the season tend greatly to
assist the effect of such wild, mysterious narratives.
We quote one of the best of them :

" A venerable manor-house in the west of England,
with its terraced walks, noble hollies, and quaint yew
hedges, had sunk into the usual condition of such ancienu
places, and had become a farm-house of the better class.
The former possessors had been of elevated rank, and
the last of their descendants, a widow lady of title, had
retired there, still retaining the remains of loveliness,
with a handsome nephew in the prime of manly beauty,.
about the middle of last century. They lived in-strict
privacy, were never seen out of the grounds, and never
received any visitors, with one exception. At the ex-
piration of every three months an old. fashioned coach
rolled up the avenue shaietl by the sun-proof elms,
stopped at the entrance, and out stepped a
man of advanced age, dressed in a dark-
brown suit, with a plain cocked hat and grey
stockings. In about ten minutes he again made
his appearance, entered the carriage, which rolled down
the avenue, and was seen no more till the next quarter
of a year had passed away. This had gone on for seine
time, and afforded subject for comment to all the 'country
round. The neighbours shook their heads, and whis-
pered light tales of the dame ; but all attempts to pene-
trate the cloud that shrouded their history failed.
" One fine August evening, six weeks at least before
its appearance was due, according to its usual periods of
arrival, the light of the harvest moon shone on the well-
known coach till it was lost to view under the melancholy
boughs of the avenue trees. Some reapers, on their way
home, saw it return, and, as it passed out of the avenue
gates, beheld, sitting by the side of the old gentleman,
the handsome nephew, pale and motionless as a corpse.
The same night a carriage and four drove furiously up
to the house, and, at the end of the week, a hearse and
six received at midnight a coffin covered with black
velvet, and went—none of the neighbours knew where.
The place was shut up for years, and had only beetrs
lately fitted up for the reception of a new tenant—a sub-
stantial man who had bought the land about the house
and farmed it himself—at the commencement of the pre-
sent century.
"In its desolate state, it was haunted of course ; and.
' the wicked lady,' as she was called, had often been seers
gliding in the moonlight about the terraces by those wino
had been hardy enough to take a short cut across the
grounds in their way home from the village club.
"The two sons of the new tenant were young men
just at the end of their teens. They had heard all the
ghost stories connected with the place, and laughed at
them. They had also heard strange noises, especially
from one particular chamber, in which the lady had
died, and the door of which had not been unlocked for
years, and had satisfied themselves that they had traced
some of the sounds to a colony of jackdaw's that had es-
tablished themselves in the unused chimneys with which
the spacious old house—a world too wide for the present
occupants—abounded.
" These two brothers lay upon a grassy heatisand
enjoying the noon of a lovely day outside one of the
garden walls. They were shaded from the Plan by the
overhanging laburnums and guelder-roses, which, tired
of their confinement within, had, truant-like, broken
bounds to mingle their blossoMs with the wild flowers
on the field-side of the half-ruined wall. The young
men listened to the humming in the air, and lazily
watched the tremulous haze that rose from the ridge's
of the fallow which lay parallel to them.
" Lying thus, with half-shut eyes, they saw upon the
ridges before them the figure of a e.ziy dressed in the
costume of the middle of the eighteenth century. They
both started up together, and advanced rapidly to the
form, which receded Nvithout appearing to move a limb
across the furrows, with its face still towards them as
they had first seen it, till it reached the closed gate,
through the bars of which it seemed to pass as the
brothers arrived at the barrier—and then was lost to
their view. Beyond was a bare common, where no per-
son could have been hid; and the only beings in sight
besides themselves were a party of gnats dancing in the
sun, and the swallows that ever and anon cut a lanes_
through them, leaving the survivors to continue their
dance." •

7AIT'S MAGALL

In his digest of the politics of the month, Tait re-
marks, in reference to the late astounding Ministerial
majority on the Ten Hours' Bill—" the question
remains for the present
a unsettledhdaoelnsl
tortawhennandgne
hollowness
hseevanene
ara
insincerity
invniccgetriniotony
iothernafth immediate
ppublicu bl
ime en.
mind resultToh of the
thanthsue
suspi-
cious conversions and the shameless reconversions
that have taken place on the Fawcthor?, Question,b. I will
y, of Parliament,'
not be easily forgotten. The
as oeasusiness s aa
discreditable to the character, and
stphereeent
tayouftgholoa:teietr
aylel
years,
sb.; damaging to
anything. we. have
This opinion, we believe, is held
the thinking, dispassionate por-
tion of the community ; and the startling circum-
stances attending the majority in question—the mo-
tives which induced it, and the free and easy manner
in which it was brought about, will certainly not be
forgotten at the next election. " Bon Gaultier and his.
Friend" is a familiar conversational article, modelled on
the " Noctes" of Blackwood, but possessing a very
moderate share of the vigour, eloquenCe, and humour
that charactised those admirable dialogues. There is,
however, some quaint, sprightly poetry scattered
through the paper ; and the remarks of "Young
Scotland," one of the speakers, are occasionally pointed
and happy in their sarcasm. Mrs. Gore's ' Wheeli
of Fortune " is abruptly brought to a close this month.
Beau
Brute-
meltof
the
The tale is by no means one of her most felicitous
efforts ; but even Homer sometimes nods, why not
then the authoress of some twenty or oorfeli thirty
lolfigtelin n et
daoytice of Captain Jesse's is
a n novels
i uk
cleverest' '
re-
cently published memoirs of this autocrat of fashion,
whose will, for nearly twenty years, was the law of
the West-end, and to veriose undisputed aupremacg
even that " finest gentleman in Europe," the Prince
Regent, succumbed. From an article entitled ek St
Andrew's," we quote an amusing sketch of that out-
of-Abe-may and wisophisticated city :
~ When, we last visited St. Andre-,,5,
some twelve
yhat it 112,1eam ago, it n§ a peculiarity of flip'6 -is, '
distinguished city,
t. .
ho stage-coach co •
• . anication with the rest
of the world. W:e have hea. d a rumour that this is now
amended ; nay,, were somewhat startled the other day,
\
by hehulding 'ne venerable name of the Archiepiscopate,
printed in flaring red letters. assooiated with some vul-
gar announcement about four inside, and fares moderate.
This occurred last summer. We know not whether the
1 ' qtergisipg cowpony' have had courage .keep up

the communication between the world we live in and

these unknown regions. Moreover, we have heard, on
good authority, that a certain adventurous steam-boat,

containing a pleasure party from Dundee, did actually
bring-to at the pier of St. Andrews, much to the sur-
prise of the denizens, who, theretofore, had no more
practical knowledge of " smoke ships with chariot
wheels," than the Chinese ; but whether this attempt
has been repeated, our authority saith not. At all
events, however, it is elear, that the adventurous spirit
of modern discovery, bids fair to reopen the communi-
cation between St. Andrews and the civilised world.
Our pilgrimages to St. Andrews have been winter
excursions. The natural scenery around it is naught ;
and it is at that season that it receives its most charac-
teristic class of inhabitants—the remnant of those who
linger about its venerable university. In the summer
season we are told that sundry red-faced, quick-walking
Dundee citizens, with first-rate appetites, squat their fine
families along the borders of the links, for the benefit of
sea-bathing, and the fine bracing air. To find St. An-
drews with such occupants, is as incongruous as the ren-
counter of the French traveller, who, when he had pene-
trated to a distant, and, as he believed, hitherto unknown
temple on the Indus, found a party of English ladies, with
pink parasols, pic-nicking at the gateway. In winter,
these migratory birds are gone, and the city is left in the
peaceful possession of its native rookery. Looking
through the vista of a long and wide street, you will see,
perhaps, no other human being than a professor, in his
Geneva gown, stalking along with measured step, and
with a countenance on which you find deeply impressed
tile fact how very difficult it would be to beat into the
head behind it any notion which is not fully a hundred
years old. Perhaps the scene is a little more lively—five
or six red specks are seen advancing in the distance, and
as their bulk enlarges in the retina of the eye, you per-
ceive that they are so many students in their scarlet
cloaks, each with his Collectanea or his Euclid under his
arm, and looking,' as Fox said of Thurlow, wiser
than any mortal man actually is.' A staid sedateness,
as of Sleepy-hollow, marks their walks, and shows the
influence of the place—the power of the genius loci in
subduing to its solemn tone the natural buoyancy of
youth. What a new world there is to open on their
spirits when they are removed from among the lumber
of old tottering opinions, and set down in the busy whirl
of modern useful active existence !"