The Sun.
London, England, 1845-01-03 00:00:00

COVENT-GAR: LEN THEATRE.

A bold, and to a certain extent, a successful expe-
riment was made last night at this theatre, in the
production of the Antigone of Sophocles—the last of
three tragedies connected v. ith the history of (Edipus
which the august genius of the Greek dramatist has
familiarised to every clatsieal scholar. When we
first read the announcement of this play we were not
:without serious apprehensions that it would prove an
arrant failure, for we did not deem it at all probable
-that an English audience, habituated to the rapid,
irregular action, and continual stir of Shakspeare's
tragedies, with the fierce and tumultuous passions de-
veloped in their progress, would sympathise with the
slow and stately march of a Greek play wherein
the feelings of the human heart are roused
but not probed to the quick ; and where
more is said than done, the character of
the piece being narrative rather than dramatic. But
we have been agreeably disappointed. The Antigone,
on the whole, has been successful, but its success has
tot been so much owing to the interest taken by
the audience in the conduct of the plot, whose severe
simplicity and somewhat languid progress are ill-
adapted to the melodramatic taste of the day, as
to the music of Bartholdy, which is full of expres-
sion, varying in happy accordance with the sentiments
enunciated by the dramatist. It is a striking proof of
the undying character of true genius, to see a play
which, upwards of two thousand years ago, delighted
an Athenian audience received with applause by an
English one, the majority of whom can know nothing
of the incomparable grace and majesty of its style,
and can be effected only by the truth and earnestness
of the feelings it depicts. The Antigone of Sophocles
is remarkable for the strict unity of its action, for the
absence of all irrelevant characters and incidents, and

more especially for the pure and lofty moral it incul-
cates, and which is never for an instant lost sight of.
The aim of the dramatist is obvious throughout. It
it to show the remorse that waits on injustice :—in a
Word, to illustrate the wholesome truth which Shak-
aPeare has so well expressed. that
"The great gods are just ; and of our pleasant vices
Make instruments to scourge us."
The plot may be summed up in a few words. On the
death of Eteocles and Polynices, sons of CEdipus, who
fell in battle by each other's hand, Creon, their nearest
tnale relative, ascends the throne of Thebes, and forbids

the rites of sepulture to the body of Polynices.
Antigone, animated by piety and sisterly
affection, nobly braves the despot's command,
lout being detected in the attempt to inter her
brother, she is condemned to be buried alive in
the cavern of a rock. Soon after she has been
conveyed thither, Tiresias, the soothsayer—so well
known in Greek fable--enrers into Creon's presence,
And by solemnly predicting the evils that will flow
from the tyrant's unjust decree, induces him to bury
;Polynices, and issue an order for the release of
Antigone. But the order is issued too late.
Antigone has already strangled herself, and her
lover, Ilmmon, Creon's son, commits suicide in the
agony of his grief for her fate. His mother, also,
distracted by this double loss, destroys herself, and
the tragedy concludes with the unavailing self-re-
Iproaches of the King, and the exhibition of his intense
?emorse. The chorus, who, as in all Greek dramas,
takes a conspicuous share in the conduct of the plot, is
composed of the nobles and councillors of Thebes,
Who are supposed to be assembled before the palace
in order to hear the decree which has so promptly
proved fatal to Creon. Nothing can well be simper
than this plot, or less complex than the emotions
sought to be conveyed by • the dramatist. The in-
terest of the piece is confined exclusively to Anti-
gone, and rises and falls as she appears and disappears
from the scene. Her character is conceived in a
noble spirit, in which there is loftiness without
exaggeration; and the execution is not less mas-
terly. The glowing, majestic, heartfelt sentiments
put into her mouth, are just such as might be ex-
rected from a nature of her heroic stamp ; but which,
oweeer essentially elevated it may be in its
imbued
ding
wtiothne ofa
thought and feeling, is yet
keen sense of the more
homely, familiar, and domestic affections. Like the
Alcestes of Euripides --one of the most delightful
female portraits ever drawn by the magic pen of
genius—Antigone merits the highest praise for the
completeness and harmony of the conception. The
touches are carefully laid on one by one, and the
course of emotion proceeds in exact accordance with
—what philosopher Square would call—" the fitness
of things." In reverting once again to the plot, we
cannot forbear from commenting on the exquisite
skill with w hich the spirited hymn to Bacchus is
introduced. This has evidently been done with a
"iiew to relieve the more tragic portions
of the play, and so give variety to its other-
Iris* somewhat monotonous character. fhe chorus
sing the hymn—and a noble piece of music it is—
lander the impression that Antigone will be released
411 d all er.d happily; but the catastrophe has already
bean wrought, and the tragic tone of the subsequent
lePnPs acquires tenFolci ferce from the brief gleam of
eherrfumess by which the, here- been preceded. Of
the per Formers, all played their parts creditably, and
'one or two with sups rtor feehig and judgment. Mr.
Vllntlenhuti, as Creon, declainied with etilphanis and
- propriety though o:casionally his manner was
4ornewhat too cold and formal and Miss
Vandenhoff exhibited more feeling as Antigone,
than in any character in which she has yet appeared
" the stage. The numerous choruses were admi-
1141Y managed, and every possible effect was given
4.6 the delightful music or Bartholdy. The hazardous
'lPeriment of the performance of a Greek play having
Itt)vv.• been made, and with comparative success, we
Ire not without hopes that it will, ere long, he re-
peated. There is more of incident, variety, and
Thriskness of action in the CEdipu3 Tyrannus than in
the -Antigone of Sophocles; and, judging from last
ihighe3 performance, we cannot but think that the
6104ing scenes of the Coloneus, when the unseen
voice of Destiny is heard summonieg Edipus
11.ladgment in the gloomy depths of the grove con-
eerated to the Furies, would—if aided by im-
ressive and appropriate music such as Bartholdy
hag shown himself capable of composing
Produce a very striking effect. It is highly
'creditable to the taste of an ,eiglish audience that
they paid the most marked attention throughout the
tntire performance of Antigone. One or two of its
more impassioned sentiments—the genuine utterances
of humanity as it existed two thousand years ago,
sod Will exist through all time—were received with
loud
aPPlause ; and at the fall of the curtain Mr.
audenhoff and his daughter were called on to re-
ethe the Congratulations of the audience.

OLYMPIC THEATRE.
b The Outcast, a drama written purposely for Mr.
pay again performed at this theatre on Wed-
-13,4Y, when that gentleman resumed Hs original part
o' 11 alter Graysdale, and Mrs. W. West sustained
Walter Graysdale,
of the heroine. The piece consists of
a strange medley of scenes and circumstances, among
Iffbich may he enumerated a harvest home, a gang of
th34ic4l"B, a shipwreck, an incendiary conflagration,
• R child rescued from the flames, and other incidents
"by flood and field." The plot is less skilfully con-
th tructed than it might have been, and in particular at
e
fro end of the first act, when the child is preserved
rn the flames. This would have formed a more
stpropriate close to the piece. The drama affords
leope for the display of Mr. Rayner's peculiar forte
arla Powerful talents, and most ably he acquitted him-
-8,4f in both the whirlwind of passion and the subdued
pathos
by which some of the scenes were distin-
Kuished. It is fair to state that he acted with all the
ti.rce and freshness of his earlier days. The audience
l v,re extremely liberal in their plaudits. Mrs. W.
eAt laboured hard and successfully to make the
tilnoA of an indifferent part. The house was well at-
tended.

A movement is now being- made at Ipswich for
• the appointment of a chaplain to instruct the labourers
on the Eastern Union ltuAlway. We wish the parties
all success. The good 4fects of a similar arrangement
are now seen on the works progressing in the neigh-
bourhood of Cambridge. We should like to see all con-
tractors following the example of Messrs. Grissell and
Peto in the instance referred to. They contribute most
liberally towards the religious instruction of the la-
bourers, and without any restriction as to creed.—Rail-
-waY Record.
Record.
FREE CHURCH COLLEGE.—Lord Jeffrey has
addressed the following letter to the editor of the Scuts-
7"""Sir,---Myattention having been called (for the,
last
time this morning) to a statement in your paper of
ho s: Wednesday, with reference to a report of my having
"'le
n ,
one of the munificent cntributors ru the projected
fie of the Free Church, I am bound to disclaim the
!Pedit of any such splendid liberality, and to state that I
nave not subscribed anything to that undertaking. It
',lll be obliging in you, therefore, to mention the fact in
Zoe next publication. I am, Sir, 8.e., F. JLPYRZY...-.-
14) UOrappliee, Dm 17.

MAGAZINES-(CON TINUED.)
DUBLIN UNIVERSITY MAGAZINE.

Under the title of "The White Lace Bonnet" we
find a plemant prose tale in the present Number of
this Magazine, one of the scenes in which is laid on
the Birmingham Railway. The principal incident
refers to the mishaps of a young man who has been
inveigled into matrimony by an artful woman whom
he accidentally encountered on board a Margate
steamer, and who shortly after her marriage con,
leased to the fortunate husband of her choice, that
"she had been twice married before, and had heavy
misgivings that her two spouses were still living!"
In the notices of the "Leading State Trials in Ire-
land" there is afi affecting account of the trial of one
Jackson, which tiok place in Dublin towards the
close of the last century, but was put an abrupt stop
to by the prisoner's death, which occurred while he
was in court listening to the proceedings against him.
l'he " Crescent and the Cross" is a review of a book

of travels in the East, which has lately made its ap-
pearance. From an amusing and somewhat whim-
sical essay on the " Nightmare," we quote the follow-
ing passage :
" Now, there is nothing elevated about indigestion: it
is neither saintly nor, in its unsaintliness, is it sublime.
In general, it comes from eating too much, which is not
a proceeding of a seraphic tendenly, nor the first step of
a movement heavenwards. And these affections of the
epigastric regions are ordinarily the fruit of indigestion,
wherefore the "sleep-waking" state into which they cast
us—namely, that sleep of the outward and waking of
the inward man—reveals to the eye of the latter a base
neighbourhood. The nightmare does not come up into
our sphere, but we spiritually descend into his. He is
there already, while we are gorging ourselves, but we
are not aware of him until the outward senses be sealed
in torpor, and the inward world opens in its dim horror
on the troubled eye of the soul.
" We have met with people who believe that the
beasts characterised by the Mosaic law as unclean are
not so in a mere ceremonial sense, but in one that has
its foundation in nature ; in fact, that such beasts are in
a special wise liable to demoniacal possession. The cat
is a long-recognised minister of the darker powers.
Dogs and horses see ghosts, which, as we shall presently
see, implies a capability of being possessed, and is, in
fact, the next thing to it. Wnat is more horrible than
to come into ' magnetic rapport' with a dog, through in-
fusion of the saliva of the latter into your blood? For
the saliva is a great medium of magnetic influences, a
conductor of psychic agency, wherefore, also, the moods
of the soul have a marked operation on its physical
qualities, making it a vehicle of sanatory virtue, or a
deadly poison. Armstrong affirms that the bite of
negroes, when enraged, produces obstinate ulcers and
hydrophobia. Gaubius tells of a soldier who, being bit
in the arm by a woman whom he had bitterly angered,
died in convulsions; as also of a rung Italian, who in a
paroxysm of anger, bit himself in the finger, and forth-
with became rabid, and died. And Sauvage has re-
corded the case of a young maiden, who, by sheer inten-
sity of ireful emotion, without any bite at all, of herself
or another, man or beast, was thrown into a state exactly
resembling canine madness. Even the mere sight of a
person in hydrophobia" has engendered the same affec-
tion in persons of susceptible temperament. Mease
relates such a case, wherein the sufferer was a priest. A
student of Wittenberg became hydrophobious, after he
had seen, with heartfelt sympathy, a violent paroxysm
of rabies with which a young maiden, already nigh in
the last agonies, was seized. He was indeed restored,
but for years laboured under a great weakness and un-
certainty of the voice, as well as a painful dread of
speaking in public. Themison experienced something
of the same kind after attending a. friend in hydrophobia,
and seeing him die. An inward paralysing terror took
possession of him as often as he recalled to his memory
the vivid picture of the suffering he had witnessed.
Peter Frank, having merely touched with his fingers a
person dying of hydrophobia, wag, through the power
of imagination, presently atf,..eted with symptoms of the
dise,:se ; and a young physician, mentioned in the
Journal Genoa de Medecine, 1824, became rabid
through a similar operation of phantasy, after the dis-
section of a child which had died of the bite of a mad
dog. The like unhappy fate had a woman, through
attending the death-bed of her husband under similar
circurnstafices."

THE BANKERS" MAGAZINE AND JOUR-
NAL OF THE MONEY MARKET. No. X.

This able periodh al continues to prefer fresh darns
on the attention aad confidence of the commercial
world, by the general soundness of its opinions on all
monetary questions, and the careful accuracy with
which the data are collected that it brings to bear in
support of those opinions. The first paper in the pre-
sent Number, entitled " Effects of the Stamp Act on
Banking," is an able exposition of the positively, or
the possibly, injurious and unfair operation of the Act,
under four especial heads, of " Banking Licenses,"
" Letters of Credit," " Cheques," and " Deposit Re-
ceipts." Some " Notes on Recent Bank Failures"
give a lucid illustration of the specific causes which
must have led to the catastrophe of the " Yorkshire
Agricultural and Commercial Banking Company."
Other articles, such as " Summary of the Arguments
for and against Restriction of Bank Issues," " Present
State of the Insolvency Laws," " The Law of
Cheques," Sze., are much to be commended for the
amount of practical and valuable information they
concentrate. The money and banking statistics com-
prised in papers relative to the savings' banks and
joint-stock banks, are cleverly arranged. We hs:;,
no doubt that this Magazine will find a Viso in the
counting-house of every mercantllc or banking con-
cern in the metropolis and 'cne country, the dealings
of which habitually connect it with the money
market.