The Sun.
London, England, 1845-05-05 00:00:00

FREE-TRADE BAZAAR.

Within the last five weeks Covent-garden Theatre
has undergone a complete metamorphosis, for the
purpose of preparing it for the proposed Free-trade
Bazaar, to be held there on the 12th instant. On
Saturday evening we were admitted to a private view
of the theatre, which was lighted up for the occasion,
and presented a very splendid appearance. The entire
audience part of the house, the stage, and the scene•
room beyond, have been converted into a vast Gothic
hall, two hundred feet in length. Standing at the
entrance in the centre of the dress boxes, the eye is
struck by the magnificent effect of the old wooden
roof, very similar to that of 'Westminster Hall, or
King John's Palace, at Eltham. The grand hall is
terminated by a screen, and
a lofty archway, in the
Tudor styl", through which is seen a richly stained
glass window, that lights a smaller hall beyond. The
general form of the hall is not unlike that of a
cathedral. Gothic arches, supported by clustering
pillars, run round the hall, and give it a very light
and picturesque effect. The stage portion of the
theatre forms what may be termed the transepts of
the edifice, in which are several alcoves, corresponding
in style with the other parts of the building, and each
lighted by a stained glass window. Two tables
extend the entire length of the hall, for the display
of the various articles to he exhibited in the bazaar.
A. number of transparent lamps give a cheerful
appearance to the same. But the most ingenious and
novel feature in this fairy palace is the mode in which
the light is equally diffused through the roof, which
is formed of transparent painted cloth. All the shields
and scrolls in the decorations bear the device and
cognizance of the League—a wheatsheaf, with the
mottos " Free Corn," and ~ Free Trade." The whole
arrangements do infinite credit to the taste and
ingenuity of Mr. Grieve, from whose designs, and
under whose superintendence, it has been executed.

JONATHAN SHARP ; OR, THE ADVENTURES OF A
KENTUCKIAN, WRITTEN BY HIMSELF.—After Colonel
Crocket and Sam Slick, we sadly wanted a new specimen
of an American literary hero, and Jonathan Sharp has
done wisely in presenting himself as an adventurer of a
different type to those with which we are already fami-
liar. Our Kentuckian has gone through a series of ad-
ventures of the most exciting character, in Cuba, in
Mexico, in Texas, among various tribes of Indians in the
neighbourhood of the States, as well as some of a less
startling nature in Europe, and has written his history
partly with the object of displaying to his countrymen
the deplorable state in which society exists among them,
and partly to make the European reader acquainted with
the true state of affairs in Texas, &e. His narrative is
worthy of De Foe. It is full of romance from beginning
to end. There is scarcely a chapter in the work that
would not have made the fortune of a modern novel-
list, for whether the author be exploring the haunts
of the Bu. cancers of the Havannah, wearing among
the trackless prairies of Texas, dwelling with the hospi-
table planters in Mexico, or making the acquaintance of
Mormons, Indians, or Yankee bravoes of the true bowie-
knife school, he renders his narrative so singularly inte-
resting, that the reader finds it impossible to lay it down
till he has gone through to the last page-
MEMOIRS OF PRINCE CHARLES STUART.—We are
requested to state, that Mr. Colburn, of Great Marl-
borough-street, has this day published " Memoirs of
Prince Charles Stuart, commonly called the Young Pre-
tender, with Notices of the Rebellion in 1745," by Charles
Louis Klose, Esq., in 2 vols., Bvo., with portrait. 245.
bound, which can now be had of all booksellers. Mr. Colburn
has also just published-2. Adventures in Georgia, C:r-
cassia, and Russia, by Lieut.-Col. G. Poulett Cameron,
C. 8., &c., 2 vols., 21s. bound. 3. Peninsular Sketches,
edited by W. 11. Maxwell, Esq., author of " Stories of
Waterloo," &c., 2 vols., 21s. bound. 4. A second edition
of The Crescent and the Cross, by Eliot Warburton,
Esq., 2 vols., with illustrations, 21s. bound. 5. The Duke
of Wellington's Maxims and Opinions' Bvo., 14s. bound.
6. Revelations of Spain in 1b45, by an English Resident,
2 vols., 21s. bound; and 7. Three Years in Constantinople;
or, Domestic Manners of the Turks, by Charles White,
Esq., 3 vols., with 34 illus'eations, 31s. 6d. bound.
Is is rumoured that a key to the characters in the
new novel of " Self," by the author of " Cecil," is pre-
paring for publication. The number of individuals al-
luded to, obviously portraits of living or lately deceased
persons, certainly entitles the work to that distinguished
honour, though it will cut short the pleasure now being
enjoyed by
various portraits exhibited in its pages—the brightest of
so many of finding nut the originals of the
which, however, according to the Athenerunz, are its
humorous ones. " When all is said and done," says the
same acute critic, " the reading world would be truly
ink, promised in the motto,
blind to its own interests were it to refuse to welcome
one of this worldly, clever, and entertaining family of
novels. Long live Cecil, then! and may the gall in his
hold bitterly out."
SPARLINGS.—These very delicate fish, which greatly
resemble the smelt in savour and appearance, have arrived in pro.
digioua shoals within the last ten days in all the estuaries of the
and performed in Self;
Hampshire coast, insomuch so that a gentleman at Redbridge
took with a single rod and line no less than twelve dozen and a
half of them in the course of one flood tide, in the early part of
the present week. These
migratory visitors are fiercely pur-
sued by the mackerel guard, several of which fish tl.e gentle.
man trailed and secured, they having ravenously chal.
lenged his balls, which consisted of the " rag-worm," and
which are dug from out the the salt.wster sands when the tide
bas receded.