The Sun.
London, England, 1842-02-08 00:00:00

SIR R. PEEL.

SUN OFFICE,- Four o' Clock
(COPY.)

Crown and Anchor, Strand, Feb. 7.
SIR,—As Chairman of a preliminary meeting
of Deputies from Associations and Religious Con-
gregations front various parts of the kingdom, I
am directed to request that you will favour the
Deputation with an interview on the subject of the
Repeal of the Corn-laws, if at all consistent with
your convenience, previous to the announcement
of the intentions of the Government in Parlia-
ment, on Wednesday next.

I have the honour to be, Sir, yours,

JOHN BROOKS.
The Right Hon. Sir R. Peel, Bart., &e.:

Whitehall, Feb. 8, 1842.

SIR,—I am directed by Sir Robert Peel to
acknowledge the receipt of your note of Feb. 7,
requesting, on behalf of a Deputation from
Associations and Religious Congregations
from various parts of the kingdom, an inter-
view with Sir Robert Peel, on the subject
of the Repeal of the Corn and Provision-laws,
previous to the announcement of the intentions
of the Government on Wednesday next.
Sir Robert Peel desires me to express his
regret, that it is not in his power, on account
of the pre-engagements into which he has
entered, to make the appointment which you
desire. I am, Sir, your obedient servant,

W. H. STEPHENSON.

John Brooks, Esq.

COVENT GARDEN THEATRE.

A new comedy entitled the Irish Heiress, was pro-
duced last night at this theatre. It is from the pen of
M. Bourcicault, whose lively play of London Assur-
ance was, it may be remembered, deservedly success-
ful last season, notwithstanding that it was too much an
echo of our earlier comic writers. In the present pro-
duction there is much less of the imitative. The author
trusts more to his own resources; and though he ex-
hibits no characters nor incidents marked by decided
originality, yet he is not constantly reminding us, as in
his London Assurance, of Congreve, Cibber, and
more especially of Sheridan. The plot of his comedy
is complex, but its leading features are as
follow :—Sir William Stanmore (Mr. G. Van-
denhoff) is a fashionable young roue, who
is anxious to rid himself of an incumbrance, in the
shape of a young lady whom he has seduced, as he
imagines, by a counterfeit marriage. With this view,
he applies to his French valet, Lenoir (Wigan), whom
he prevails on to escort the deserted girl to India, and
there make her his wife. Having so far arranged his
plans, he pays insidious court to Miss Merrion, whom
he knows to be a rich Irish heiress ; but not being
by any means confident of the success of his suit,
as she has already evinced a penchant for Percy Ardent
(Charles Mathews), he strives hard to get up a quar-
rel between her and her lover, which may have
the effect of estranging them from each other, In order
to accomplish these ends, he purposely sets by the ears
Lord Daventry (William Farren), at whose house the
Irish heiress is residing, and his young wife, by leading
each into the belief that the other is faithless—that his
Lordship, for instance, is carrying on an intrigue with
the young Irish girl, and that her Ladyship is at-
tached to Percy Ardent. Out of these mistakes and
fancies arises the chief fun 'of the comedy. Lord
Daventry is jealous—his wife, ditto. A separation is
talked of, and the articles are about, to be signed : when
the lawyer, Supple (Cooper), who is to sign them,
makes the startling discovery that the girl whom Sir
William Stanmore has seduced is his own daughter.
Of course, the outraged father insists on reparation be-
ing made to his child, when he makes a second more
welcome discovery than the first—that as the marriage
between the parties had been solemnised in Scotland, it
is valid, however imagined to be otherwise. Sir William,
thus foiled, finds that he has no resource left but
to be honest, so makes all due reparation to
the various parties whom he has offended, by
agreeing to marry Supple's daughter, and confessing the
intrigues by which he had produced a temporary aliena-
tion between Lord Daventry and his wife. Percy Ar-
dent, who has been Sir William's tool throughout the
affair, marries the " wild Irish girl ;" and a Mrs. Coin-
fort (Mrs. Orger)—who plays a very unintelligible part
in the intrigues—espouses a certain Major Fuss (Har-
ley), whose business throughout the comedy appears to
be to twirl his fingers, and fidget about the stage as if
he had got St. Vitus's dance. The above is as cor-
rect an analysis of the plot as we can give ; but we
honestly confess that there are portions of it which
completely perplexed us. Tested, indeed, by his con-
structive faculty, Mr. Boureicault must be pronounced
sadly deficient as a comic dramatist; but his smartness—
his fancy—his power of ready repartee—his cordiality, of
true Irish growth—and, above all, the fine play of his ani-
mal spirits,—these are the qualificationswhich he possesses
in an eminent degree ; and in these are to be found the
true secrets of his success. Whether right or wrong, he
seldom fails to carry the audience along with him, who
laugh, not at him, but with him. His language is uni-
formly neat and perspicuous, sometimes even approach-
ing to elegance ; and when it is sentimental, it has the
rare merit of being so without an effort. As re-
gards the characters, Lord Daventry bears a slight
resemblance to Sir Peter Teazle ; and there is a
little of her Ladyship
in his young wife ; but the
imi-
tation is by no means servile. Mrs. Comfort, like most
of her class, is a mere fashionable nonentity, and Major
Fuss has his prototype in Marp
lot. The most original
character is decidedly' that of the Irish girl, which Ma-
dame Vestris sustained with great taste and spirit. Her
brogue was full of racy humour, soft and oily; and her
mingled vivacity and deep tenderness equally charac-
teristic. Farren played the part of an elderly Benedick
to perfection. His drunken scene was admirable,
though too much spun out ; and he had the
shrewdness net to forget the gentleman in his
cups. A few passages of serious import he de-
livered with a grace and propriety that show how
strongly he entered into the spirit of the character as-
signed him by the author. It is seldom that art and
nature play so adroitly into each others' hands—each
assisting, not encumbering the other's movements—as
in the performance of this very superior actor. Mrs.
Orger played an insignificant part with consummate
ease and self-possession, and mentioned the fact of
her having -" paid five hundred pounds to lodge
her poor dear departed husband in the family vault,
which was a great relief to her feelings," with exceeding
unction. Her matrimonial reminiscences, indeed, were rich
throughout. We have spoken of Mr. Bourcicault's viva-
city and archness of dialogue. We will subjoin a few
instances. Percy Ardent, having talked of going to a
fashionable party in a cab, his companion replies,
o What, go there with a surreptitious straw bear-
ing King's evidence against' yoa ' your. "strap ?"
Again Lord Daventry, remonstrating .with his wife for
her objecting to his dress, and more particularly to his
" vulgar indulgency of cloth" in his coat, and adding
that he should not seem too fond of her in public, he
replies, "Is connubial affection, then, contraband, and to
be seized at Hyde Park-corner as illegal import ?"
Miss Merrion, speaking of the admirable qualities of an
Irish horse, thus sums up her eulogiums :—" To get
itsupon
are is
on impracticable ; to keep your seat
when t,isitopossible.„
We close our
hasty and imperfect notice, by saying
you back
that the comedy is
one which. when curtailed—for
it greatly needs curtail-
ment—is likely to have a run, notwithstanding its im-
probabilities, which, fortunatelyt_ are not of a very glaring
character. The author has
shall ih f e true Comic spirit, and
greatly we be mistaken he do not, ere long, over-
top all contemporary writers in this department of litera-
ture.
The scenery was throughout admirable, and the
d with great applause.
piece receive

tisraNnfoDuitChTctihVat it has new been proved
E.--We learn from
n the mender-in-Chief there,
after a full examination all the four Quartermasters that
steered her Majesty's ship
compass e mile
an
ee on the 26th ult., that the
cause of her late accident was
.trror of three points in the
oo
sr
iCrCi
vAo
er
ISryeEs t lin Oo
tnFbdee nsTat k It
ai
stEf
aPe otVoi i
0.
compass—as these men, togetherrw.i h the Second Master, have
fVindictiv
ith the intention
all declared that the course steeer ebdewas W. N. W. by compass,
agreeably to the Captain's d
or Nabint about three points free
after she weighed from off the Light vessel (which then
of anchoring in St. Helen's until the weather cleared,
bore W. by S. by
whereas she found herself, to the astonishment of the
Captain and Second Master, close to the Dean Elbow
Buoy, by which she must have made a N. W. by N. course
only, instead of a W.N.W.course, and there was not any
tide at that time, it being slack water ,and during the 15 to
20 minutes that she was under canvas she was going full five
knots. Thus it is evident that nothing but the error in the
compass could have led the Vindictive into danger ; and even
then, when the Buoy of the Dean Sand was discovered close
to her, she would have got clear of it by lulling to the wind,
had not the wind at that instant shifted from S. by W. to
West, in a squall, which compelled her to anchor in six
fathoms, about a cable's length from the buoy. We further
off the shoal through
find, that the Vindictive got her own re-
sources alone, not having received any aid from the shore or
from our ships; and that nothing but her setting her courses
and slipping her cables as she did, at high water, though still
blowing a gale of wind, could possibly have saved the ship.—
Naval and Military Gazette.
We understand the visit of her Majesty and
Prince Albert to Brighton will be expressly for the benefit of
change of air for the Princess Royal, who has been so far in-
disposed as to render this rather inconvenient removal of the
Court, fora short periods absolutely necessary. His Royal
Highness Prince Aibert has never yes seen Brighton.