These lines certainly were written without the slightest reference to the rivalry of Nature and Art-but they were written in the true spirit of poetry, and they represent the effect of withering grief on a lovely woman, as being that

Song and smile-beauty and melody,

And youth and happiness are gone from her,

and that her form is "chilled into a cold and joyless statue;"-that, in short, she has faded from a being, instinct with beautiful life, formed by Nature,-to motionless" shapen stone," chiselled by Art. May we not say, then, physically, as Godwin has said, morally, "It is better that man should be a living being than a stock or a stone"?

Has Art any thing so poetical as the desert-with its ocean-like extent-its columns of moving sand-its burning and death-bearing winds-and, more than all, its occasional green spots and gushing springs, rendered doubly beautiful and grateful by their contrast to all around? I believe there is no image more frequently made use of in poetry, especially by Lord Byron himself, than this very one of a fountain in the midst of the desert

As springs in deserts found seem sweet, all brackish though they be ;, So, midst the withered waste of life, those tears would flow to me.

How is it that caravans add poetry to the desert? It is not by the contrast between the littleness of man and the immensity of the wilds through which he journeys? -by his toil, his privations, his peril? We see him exposed to be swept from the face of the earth by the whirlwinds of sand, or to perish from drought in the desert; and we reflect how little he is, and how vast and awful is the wilderness around him. Which is it, then, which confers poetry-the caravan on the desert,

or the desert on the caravan? Each certainly heightens and adds to the interest of the other, but the desert would still be sublime, though man never crossed its surface, whilst the bales, and slaves, and camels of the merchants would lose all poetry, were they unconnected with the wildness and grandeur of the desert.

But there is one whole class, and that the highest class, of poetry, in which Nature is all-Art nothing.-I mean that of feeling and of passion. I think it will be conceded, that the highest of all poetry is that which portrays the workings of the human mind-the conflicts of the human heart.-And is not this all Nature? Is not the jealousy of Othello, Nature? Is not the love of Romeo, Nature? Are not the irresolute guilt and vacillating ambition of Macbeth-the relentness cruelty of Richard-the broken-hearted madness of Lear, Nature? Truly may we say with him-" Nature's above Art in that respect." I would willingly rest my quarrel upon this ground. Strike out from poetry all that relates to Man, and what have you left? "Twere endless to prove by citation that all poetry which does relate to man, is wholly derived from, and dependent upon, Nature-and has no connection with Art. To do this I might quote the better half of the poetry of the better half of poets-to do this I might quote nearly the whole of Shakspeare. You have only to take down from your shelf the first volume of Shakspeare that falls under your hand, to see how truly Nature was the wellspring from which the streams of his genius flowed. Hence is it that he still lives within the soul of all those to whom his language is known.-His contemporaries reared their structures on the shifting sands of Art, and the advancing tide of society has undermined them, and made them fall;—the rock of Nature was the

foundation on which Shakspeare built-it is immutable, and the glorious edifice stands unshaken, unshakeable, by ages.

In conclusion, I must guard against being supposed to deny the poetical susceptibility of many objects of Art. I fully admit that it exists, and that to a high degree, but not to the very highest. The master-pieces of Art are the highest manifestations of the human mind, but the master-pieces of Nature are manifestations of the Deity himself. I regard, in fine, Art to yield to Nature, insomuch as the noblest of the works of God are superior to the noblest of the works of man.

THE STRATFORD JUBILEE.

THERE are few things in which I regret what are commonly called "the good old times;" for I am intimately convinced, that what has been equally erroneously termed "the ignorant present time," is far better. It is strange, indeed, to look back and observe how every period furnishes jeremiades on the decay of talent, and the deterioration of "affairs in general”– and this even at eras to which we now revert (as our ancestors did to their predecessors) with applause, strangely contrasted with the vituperation of every thing existing. Maugre this, we have been going on improving more and more rapidly in every generation, as I believe would very speedily be admitted by any one who was put to live a twelvemonth in the days which he lauds so lavishly.

There is one thing, however, to which I do look back

with regret-namely, to the time (not above forty years ago) when there were said to be four estates in the realm-King, Lords, Commons, and Theatre. In my love of the drama, I am completely of the old school; and lament, therefore, bitterly, the decadence into which it has fallen. I have heard this attributed to many things; to the late hour of dining-to the inexplicable changes of fashion-and to divers other causes, which console me not at all, inasmuch as the effect is all I care for, and that is undeniable. Among the rest, many of the worthy assertors of progressive degeneracy have not failed to allege, that it arises from there being no actors now such as we used to have formerly-but to this I oppose at once as decided a negative as it is possible to make with regard to any thing so impalpable and traditionary as acting. With all due modesty, I beg to assert that I am peculiarly well qualified to speak on this point for I believe there are few better read in dramatic history than I am. From the time of Booth, Wilks, and Cibber, down to the production of the last new pantomime, there is scarcely a tragedy, comedy, opera, or farce, dead or living, saved or damned, with the merits and fate of which I am not acquainted;-there is scarcely an actor, actress, or singer, whom I do not know as well as their perishable art will suffer them to be known to posterity. Now, with all this learning, and having given to the subject all due consideration, I am of opinion, that (always with one exception) we have as effective a corps dramatique at this moment as ever existed at any one time. In talking of Betterton, Nokes, Booth, Quin, Garrick, Woodward, King,—Mrs. Bracegirdle, Mrs. Oldfield, Mrs. Pritchard, Mrs. Cibber, Mrs. Clive, we forget that we heap together what in truth

was but a succession of talent; for though the dawn of King was contemporary with the setting of Garrick, and his again with Quin, who, in turn, succeeded Booth, who succeeded Betterton,-yet the first name and the last flourished, in fact, at the distance of nearly a century from each other.

The one exception to which I have above alluded, is Garrick. I do believe that there was never any thing near him on the stage. It is not to his wonderful versatility that I especially allude-to his tragedy, comedy, and low comedy-his Lear, his Benedick, and his Drugger-but his powers of pantomime were such as I believe were never possessed, or at least displayed, by any other individual. The gift of being able to mould the countenance into the most real and living expression of an assumed passion, does appear to have been his to a degree far beyond any thing else on record. The wellknown story of his personating the mad father before a French company at Mlle. Clairon's, is strong proof of this. He used to say, that it was from witnessing the madness of that man that he learned to play Lear. This person was an acquaintance of Garrick's, and lived near Goodman's Fields. In playing with his infant child at an open window, he let it fall, and it was dashed to pieces. The shock was so great to the father, that from that moment he became mad-and his insanity used to display itself by his going to the window, fancying that he was playing with the child-then, after some time, dropping it—and again acting, because again suffering, the pangs which he felt at the real catastrophe. This Garrick often witnessed-and from these sources, he declared that he drew that representation of insanity in Lear, which was, it is said, more forcible, terrible, and true, than any similar delineation ever given on the