The Sun.
London, England, 1842-03-03 00:00:00

COVENT GARDEN THEATRE.
Milton's. masque of Comus, which was represented for
the first time after it had been written at Lucile/1
Castle, in 1643, before John, Duke of Bridgwater, then
President of Wales, was revived at this theatre last
night. Considering how little this composition of Milton
approximates even to the ordinary run of masques,
which during the times of the Tudors chiefly were
noticeable for their coarse drolleries, it was to be feared
that lofty sentiment, such as embodied in Comus and the
statuesque character of its heroine, would be but )11*
adapted for dramatic effect, and as the spectacle Was
composed of the triple combinations of performallf,e'
music, and scenery, we shall'consccutively notice oleo;
Mrs. Walter Lacy enacted the Lady, but her study"
the character does not appear to us absolutely cOllO-
- with the poet's conception. The idea of a solemn
and stately personage, whose form, no less than whose
words, are characterised by the most majestic severity,
whose countenance should bear the very sign and im-
press of the " innuba Pallas"—the unwedded and chft:6,te
daughter of Wisdom, and 'h
whose tongue was armed "
the august reprimands of virtue—this was the just init.
gination of the Bard. But Mrs. Lacy, renouncing we,
philosophic dignity of the vestal, invested her entire part
with passion and ejaculation, a posture into which Mt'
ton's Lady never falls. Even the " sacred flame of ye;
hemence " is not kindled in her, but only hinted as
prospectively in the original. Mr. Harrison's C°llllle
was, for the most part, commendable, but. in the 'ln
temptation-scene, his delivery of the passage
" What need of vermeil-tinctured lips for thal,--
Love-darting eyes, or tresses like the
was not true. As the son of the Wine-god, that bal
his genealogy, he should have thrown rich ferrt
into his lineaments, and, as born of Circe the Siren, tm
most voluptuous of the wooer's tones into his utterance'
Among the groupings in the first scene was one singalarie'r
elegant of the firs; Bacchante (Madame Vestris). Au°t'h"-1
picturesque tabiwu also, was in the leaping forwards, 35
from the far-hills, of four cymbal-dancers, whose evt, 1
„tig
tions of limb were masterly. Leffler, was a gorge
personification of "laughter, holding skies'
His his si".l
His " suiting the action to the word' "—his rotunditihe
form and voice, and the heartiness and capacity of t ,
last, conveyed themselves so effectually to the chora
that surrounded him, that it appeared as if fifty vcsist
!
bands were about to be burst o, and the latchets of
many shces split asunder. The ordeal which tl'a
Lady is obliged to undergo while seated in the charmed
chair would have been tedious, but' for 'the truly wagli,"'
ficent scenery, and constructive devices which then e',,
adaptation has introduced, though the " winter-scene
needs seriously to be yet curtailed. The first seen,;;
conjured up by the arch-enchanter Comus, to act upon
her senses, is a Corinthian hall, with flower-wreathed
pillars and arches : this bland scene of beauty failing
subdue her nerves to acquiescence, the chilling asPecitt':
of a northern clime are summoned around her,
and icy precipices, with glistening stalactites depencling.!
these being still as vain in effect, a charming pree‘
tive, with the side-scenes consisting of golden trell.7
and forming a sumptuous hall, constitute the enchano
ment that encircles her, when rescued by her tva
brothers. But these, exquisite as they were, fciet,
themselves surpassed in a water-scene, at the out
consisting of a fall of diaphanous water, iwtliie
a shrine or fabric of gold above it ; and -0
subsequent scene in which Miss Rainforth,
the Severn-nymph Sabrina, rises in her convolute sIL.
of jasper, under a fountain formed of five tiers of
_wc;:
mond falls, and glittering with the extreme of brilliolltri.
But of these • scenic displays, the crowning
umph was the last, representative of the sbl
opened, and, round within round, the battalld,
of the virtuous, who with their golden shl.e
and white-robed companies ascend step by step into 19
nity : a lovelier piece of scene-painting than this,
make bold to say, cannot be produced. The Lady's rat,
drigal to "Echo," in which that impalpable being
nished a counterpart to the song.as warbled, was tecil°;,
and little more than unmeaning. With regard Cr
Mme, dress, and decoration, nothing could be snore COlli
plete or better appointed ; and the general action se,
dances have in them many features of grace and s)111111,,,
trical arrangement. The music of the three mastr,t,
Handel, Purcell, and Arne—appeared chiefly in
mentary snatches and disjointed portions, to ails: s
the purpose of adaptation to the poem, so thik4,
continued portion of either was not expected. tba
Harrison and Madame Vestris appeared after ,
curtain had dropped, and the announcement of its repict
tition for further nights by the former, was coraill
received by the audience. Considered in every releeoo;
Comus is one of those intellectual treats, which, Irles
its abstract and refined order, will find its chief favoqt'
among higher and more recherche minds.

HOW TO GET PRAISE IN TO

NAVY.
The judgment of the Court-martial on Oth
Nicolas, of the Vindictive, contains lessons NIT'
will not be thiown away on the navy.
cuing
It appears that an officer is not to blame for ge-,ng
his ship under weigh on a lee shore, and in a ri-lier
gale, under sail which would not keep her lin „
command in so possible or probable an event as 13„ri'.
pened, the wind's heading in a squall. This iS "na
garly called chancing it, in which there is nothiloder
censurable. Had the wind held, the ship
courses, would have reached her anchorage ; buter
the wind headed, and the ship could not stay unu_
courses, she had no resource but to let go her ancho
which did not save her from striking. t
Had the gale continued from the south, she moot
have been lost, and probably all her crew with her ;
as one chance put her in jeopardy under sail with will°
she could not stay, so another released her. ti
Next, an officer is not to blame for steer
ly
course bringing him to the edge of a shoal, eSpeCi-
in so unknown and unmarked a sea as that bete
the Nab and St. Helen's Roads, where the sighty,ie
such a thing as a buoy is as strange as a pine-aPV
on Salisbury plain. The Captain, as usual ni..ch
such cases, laid the blame to the compasses,' .
would not traverse; the compasses, poor dumb thing:,
could not defend themselves, and retaliate that the
Cth
tam could not traverse a distance short of a league-NIT' c,
out two great faults ; but the Court honourably' 3
quitted both the compasses and the Captain.
" The Court cannot decide with precision on the cast eci
which led to the disaster. They appear to had e
mainly on some error in the supposed position of the s 6th
when at anchor off the Nab, on the morning of the F,de
of January last, and in the course intended to be
good whilst under weigh, but it is not proved hY:
lion
deuce, that there was any material error or della
in the compasses." se4
The Court was thus of opinion that the comr;
were right, and the course wrong ; but it 50;
t
tha
thing censurable in mistaking the position • '3', the
13 ',I
ship in that unknown sea within half a league of
Nab, or in shaping a wrong course in a kin"
voyage of discovery thence to St. Helen's Roads. %.
The amazement of the ship's company at the 1111e,..,t
pected phenomenon of the buoy on the lee bow In
indeed have been most deadly and unaffected. le
Nobody and nothing having been to blame, not eisty
those common causes of such catastrophes, the fti'd.o
less compasses; her Majesty's ship the Vindictie
handsomely thumping on the shoal, and in this bl 9
less jeopardy her, Captain gains more credit for
conduct than the ship lose's from her bottom. liyd
Should any other officer happen to be in the
pro
circumstances to those in which Captain Nicolas 03
placed, he will do all that Captain Nicolas did, fi of
nothing but what he did, and with the full sanetilip
the Court-martial just held, he will run his „5,,ee,
ashore. After the example and sanction now g..!'e
no officer will venture to set his top-sails in the
predicament.—Examiner.

The village of Servieres, in the Puy-de-Dornfi',Air
on the 7th instant, visited by an awful avalanche, sv.ir„, etv
from the mountains above it to the extent of more tote
yards in breadth. Of 210 sheep, the united flocks of t'i oeli
habitants, which were returning home for the niflbt,', is!!
12 escaped alive. The shepherd was beaten dower
the valley, but, fortunately, was not so overwhelmsll,loisr"
snow as to prevent him from extricating himself. Fou,r r Isei
were buried several yards deep; but the inhabitants, eni
fering almost all the horrors of death, were, by the,: if
exertions of their neighbours, and the people from °WI°
rounding villages, released from what they expected I,"°,f tY
their tombs. After three days' successive labour, 1120/
sheep remained undiscovered. Ot
11005914

APPELLATE JURISDICTION OF THE
Loans.—By arrangements that have been made between tbt
Chancellor, and Lords Brougham, Cottenham, and CO h,
W 011 '',
appeals now waiting for hearing before the House of 1.01. e
°„ t tb
much expedited. The Lord Chancellor has arranged t°
House to hear causes four days in one week, Monday' fscPl
Thursday, and Friday ; and two days in the next week•-..1.,„,--u
and Friday. The ex-Chancellors Cottenham, Brougn":01,111;
Campbell, have agreed to attend four days in each weel4....L.;'ceil"
be enabled to hear appeals on the two days that the Loirlur"pesih,
is absent. Thus, four days in every week being allotted t°l4C°'
those interested in the causes will have not only the adeetto
four Learned Judges to adjudicate upon their causes, but '-
tain more speedy hearing than has hitherto been the case. vrofitg
EXPLOSION AT MESSRS. CURTIS AND CO.'S 1),,,g°„ tbS
Mum—Scarcely had the excitement occasioned througu`;ooe°
neighbourhood of Hounslow by the late melancholy oce°lo4oo
began to subside, before we have to 'announce two other e_sl)
on the works of Messrs. Curtis and Harvey, which hype'
ever, most providentially been unattended by fatal coni9:000
The first took place in the afternoon ofSaturday last, b;"u"ce„ti
minutes to three o'clock, in a powder- Saroom near to the 'OO,
the previous explosion. Two men named John Irish, novice
years of age, and Wm. Fox, about the same age, in the tole se
Messrs. Curtis and Co., were sent in to sweep it 'up,and Wh 'hat tbil
gaged, from tome cause at present unexplained, eicePte"by OB
neglected first to damp the floor, the loose powder expinael"„d ddb
force of which the windows of the building were broken °;ijorlY
men injured. The second explosion tcok place on Monday of the
Ing, about half.past eight o'clock, when the inhabitante_ed
country round, for a radius of four or five miles, "were show.
a loud report, which on inquiry was found to haveoccurred 4st' ijeti,
wo: ks belonging to the same firm, situated at Hatton, tlf. gee°
font, about four miles from Hounslow, by which the roof& 00
charged mill was, it is stated, blown eff, but without all P •
being killed or injured.
UP"
ATMOSPHERIC PRESSURE ENGINE.-The O
nais has the following:—" M. Lewinsky, a Pole bybirtloo,
naturalised in France, will in a few days make trial of an
d'in bsi
pheric pressure-engine, in a small boat which Admiral ,Baud
placed at his command. We have before us a certificate V. 0.01.
tain Durbac, of the port of Marseilles, affirming that hf•
sky in the course of last year made a trial of his engine' vi pie
of wood, in a fiat.bottomed boat, which he was therebY 3 y, at
take out of the port of Marseilles, and reach the fourth DI tb.
the rate of between three and four knots an hour, alth°4 ••11
xPerl°,e4
sea was very boisterous. He had previously made an orac•-..
at Rome, in the presence of numerous spectators; thie,sebele
the notice of the Eng ish consular agents, and indufie" *Looo°'
communicate an account of it to their Government. The„,i, hid
the Admiralty in consequence wrote to M. Lewinsky,
.°.
to bring his invention to England, promising him every Pet's' 0, hi'
and encouragement ; but M. Lewinsky, wishing to Prreosri°l
the "
discovery to his adopted country, declined accepting
offer."