the original Jeannette at the Théâtre-Lyrique-and Siguor Ronconi. The "revivals" include Beethoven's Fidelio, for Mdlle. Csillag and Signor Tamberlik; Meyerbeer's Prophéte, with Mdlle. Csillag as Fides, Signor Tamberlik as Jean of Leyden, and ("peraunter") Madame Miolan-Carvalho as Bertha; and Cimarosa's Matrimonio Segreto. There is a report that M. Félicien David's Herculaneum will be given; but respecting this we can state nothing definitively beyond the fact that M. David has arrived in London. Upon the revival of the Prophète the management is determined to expend all the means at its disposal. If, as is probable, the magnificence of former days is revived, Meyerbeer's grand lyric drama will be the most brilliant feature of the season. The cast of the Matrimonio Segreto includes Mesdames Miolan-Carvalho, Penco, and Nantier-Didiée, Signors Ronconi, Gardoni, and Graziani. The ladies are well placed, and from Sig. Ronconi's Geronimo, great things may be expected.

Four grand concerts are announced-one, "at least," to take place in the New Floral Hall. At the second concert, Glück's Orfeo will be performed, with costumes, scenery, and decorations.

About the ballet nothing is stated, beyond the fact that Mdlle. Zina Richard, the deserved favourite of the last two seasons, is engaged as principal danseuse.

"The full orchestra and chorus of the Royal Italian Opera," and Mr. Costa, as "director of the music, composer, and conductor"-these are items which speak for themselves. Mr. Augustus Harris is again stage-manager, and Messrs. Grieve and Telbin, the bond fide scene-painters of the Royal Italian Opera, are associated with Mr. William Beverley, who is also scenic artist at Her Majesty's Theatre. Mr. Smithson is chorus-master; Sig Maggioni, poet; Mr. Godfrey, leader of the military band; M. Nadaud, leader of the ballet; and M. Desplaces, maître-de-ballet.

One important consideration arising from an examination of the programmes of both operas, is the decline of the vocal art in Italy. How else account for the fact that in both houses the chief parts are filled by foreign singers, At Her Majesty's Theatre, the prima donna assoluta, Mdlle. Titiens, is a German; while two others-Madame Marie Cabel and Mdlle. Brunetti (Brunet) are French. At the Royal Italian Opera, Malle. Csillag is a German, while Mesdames Miolan-Carvalho and Nantier-Didiée are French. At Her At Her Majesty's Theatre, Signor Everardi (M. Everard), Signor Vialetti (M. Vialette) and M. Gassier, are French. At the Royal Italian Opera, M. Faure and Signor Tagliafico are French, while M. Zelger is a Belgian. Furthermore, one theatre opens with a Russian, and the other with a French opera. While Art rejoices over the disruption of a monopoly which threatened to arrest her progress, Italy weeps that her lyric temple should be invaded by the foreigner.

GETTING up early last Tuesday morning, and walking into the room, which, because it was equally destitute of books and writing materials, was called his study, Pantagruel was not a little amazed to find both Panurge and Epistemon deeply immersed in thought. The former was gravely turning over a battered terrestrial globe, which with two chairs and a

"May I be eternally," began Pantagruel, in his usual strong manner, when he was checked by a solemn "Hush!" uttered by both the philosophers,

"Odi profanum vulgus, et arceo," said Panurge. "Favete linguis," continued Epistemon.

"Out upon ye, for a couple of accursed rebels!" bellowed Pantagruel, though he was well-nigh choked with rage. "How dare ye apply to me the term 'profanum vulgus?" Think you I am the company of the theatre, all rolled into a one person, like the forty enchantresses of whom I read in Mr. Dickens's admirable periodical. It is not with my tongue, but with my foot I will discourse, if I am thus contumaciously treated!"

"Why, look ye, Master mine," said Panurge, "I meant not to offend thee. In fact my mind was so absorbed that I took thee for the Field Lane Ragged School-"

[At this juncture, Epistemon, thinking that the ensuing dialogue might disturb his meditations, took out the brass pin that fastened together the front of his shirt, pinned his paper against the wall, and clapping a hand on each ear so as to impede the entrance of sound, stared at the writing in such ridiculous fashion that Pantagruel, in spite of his choler, burst out into a roar of laughter, so loud, that all the singingbirds in St. Andrew's-street quaked with terror in their little green cages.]

"Look ye, Master," said Panurge, "A manager of great wisdom and experience hath been likening his theatre to a ship."

"A very good simile too," replied Pantagruel, still chuckling at the appearance of Epistemon; "Horace did the same with respect to the Roman State:

"O navis, referent in mare te novi

Fluctus? O quid agis? Fortiter occupa Portum.” "Nay, Master," cried Panurge, "the manager in question says he is in port already."

"Nonne vides ut Nudum remigio latus," proceeded Pantagruel, with beautiful complacency, mightily delighted with his own power of quotation.

"Totally inapplicable," shouted Panurge, "there's a very fair crew,-why, there's Miss Louise Keeley, and Mrs. Young, and Mrs. Weston, and Mr. George Melville, and Mr. Saker, and Mr. Frank Matthews,-and they all pull very well together."

But Pantagruel would go on :

"Et malus celeri saucius Africo."

But Pantagruel went on :

"Non di, quos iterum pressa voces malo." "I tell you the pantomime was the best in London, and

the gods were delighted!" screamed Panurge, whose loyalty had become as small as the audience of the Strand Theatre prior to the reign of Miss Swanborough.

But with the most idiotic of smiles, Pantagruel proceeded :

"Quamvis Pontica pinus."

"By all the devils!" shouted Panurge, "Horace is now taking you to the Royal English Opera, to which I make no reference! Hold your tongue, and be to you." This treasonable exclamation brought Pantagruel to a sudden stop, but his countenance was so awful that the Polish refugee, who lived over the and saw him through way, the window, took him for the ghost of the wicked king Popiel, who, as we all know, was devoured by mice, like Archbishop Hatto. However, Panurge, glad to attain a pause at any price, said with wondrous fortitude :

"The manager, who likened his theatre to a ship, said that he had taken it into the speculative waters of the Theatrical Ocean. Now I'm looking at this globe to find where those waters are situated, perfectly satisfied that the ocean in question is not the Pacific."

But Pantagruel, who had been bottling up his wrath, now went off like Vesuvius or ginger-beer, and poured the whole force of his colossal lungs into the single monosyllable "THERE!" accompanied by a blow of his right fist on the globe, which made a big hole just about the middle of the Atlantic. Into this hole did he with his left hand cram the paralysed Panurge, and immediately afterwards kicked the globe through the window. Over many streets and neighbourhoods did it pass, while little boys below saluted it on its journey with cries of "Ah-bah-loon !" till at last it fell into the garden of the Royal Grecian, where Mr. George Conquest, who not only writes the pieces for the establishment, but is an exceedingly clever gymnast, instantly performed upon it a feat well known in amphitheatrical

circles.

Panurge having been thus satisfactorily removed, Pantagruel strode up to Epistemon's paper, which was pinned against the wall, and to his own infinite disgust read as follows:

"Although many works on this subject have been already presented to the public, it has not yet been treated in a manner so as at once to satisfy the general reader and the earnest student. To supply a deficiency so utterly unaccountable, the present work was undertaken, and will, it is hoped, thoroughly answer the purpose of everybody. While the universal intellect has been thus sedulously, and, it is hoped, conscientiously consulted, pains have been taken to please the universal eye by a typography, which, it is hoped, will be found unexceptionable. Moreover, it is hoped--"

"It is hoped, it is hoped, it is hoped," said Pantagruel, forcibly removing Epistemon's hands from his ears, and thus compelling him to hear. "What hopeful stuff is this that is involved in such a wilderness of platitudes? Truly it would be a pleasure to enter Dante's Hell, where no hope is allowed to enter, when hope finds such dreary modes of expression. Campbell, besides writing the Lochiel, which Miss Amy Sedgwick reads with such surpassing eloquence at the Haymarket Theatre, likewise composed a poem called the 'Pleasures of Hope.' Now this essay, or letter, or oration, or whatever in the Devil's name thou stylest it, should be named the 'Pains of Hope.' And pray what is the all-important subject which the blockhead is about to treat?"

"The blockhead, who is myself," said Epistemon, "has not the slightest notion. Only having heard the directress of the Lyceum Theatre declare that her past season was the preface of a book not yet commenced, I drew up that document that I might learn what such a preface was like."

Pantagruel was about to reply, when the musical snuffbox, which he carried in his pocket, and into which he had slipped the fourth "Carmen" of Catullus, warbled forth thus:

The skiff, my friends, which here you see,
Says-Once the fleetest craft was she;
To pass her all the rest would fail,
Whether they moved by oar or sail;
The dang'rous Adriatic shore,
She swears she knew in days of yore,
The Cyclades, the noble Rhodes,
And Thrace, that land of wild abodes;
Oft she has seen, too, the Propontis,
The angry Euxine too, whereon, 'tis
Said, she a leafy forest stood,
Before she ventured on the flood,
Perch'd on the tall Cytorus, whence
Her rustling leaves with eloquence
Whisper'd; these facts she says are known
To you, Amastris, and her own
Cytorus, on whose box-grown tip
She grew, her oars about to dip
In frantic waves; likewise to carry
Her lord, however winds might vary,
In perfect safety; ne'er she paid
A vow in raging tempests made;
For safe her voyages would be,
When coming from the furthest sea.
But all these glories now are past,
The skiff compell'd to rest at last,
Devotes herself, releas'd from bother,

To Castor and to Castor's brother.

Epistemon, who was very sharp with his criticism, contrived As Pantagruel was very touchy on the subject of his box to slip out of the room before the above was finished, and descending into the street, paused before the window of a the announcement of a rat-hunt that was about to take place neighbouring bird-fancier, when he read with intense interest at Westminster.

DID not a Greek sage say that no one was to be accounted happy until the manner of his death was known? Heaven knows that poor, Jullien was not happy either towards the close of his life or in his last illness, which was terrible indeed, and since his decease his memory has received one of the greatest slights that could possibly have been offered to it. He has not been vilified and calumniated in any direct manner by a declared enemy, because no one could have accused Jullien of a dishonest or dishonourable action. This is what has happened to him; he has been sneered at by a journalist. However, he is no longer of this world, and nil nisi malum is what the perpetrator of the sneer might be expected to say of the dead. "Jullien," we are told," was an adventurer," which he decidedly was not, because an adventurer is always changing his occupation, whereas Jullien was never anything but a musician. "He began life, unless we are mistaken, at sea." The sneerer is again mistaken; he did not begin life at sea, but as a musician in a military band. "Thence," says the writer-no, let us be exact, he says "from thence""by what steps we know not, but obviously not those of a sound musical education, he stumbled into the place of a dance-conductor." Jullien was for years a pupil of

Halévy.

"He made himself famous here, not so much by his dance-tunes," &c. : why, his " Bridal" and "Olga" waltzes were the most successful pieces of dance-music ever produced in England.

The next charge is still more extraordinary. Jullien is accused of having had "dim and romantic notions of art," and of having, at his Promenade Concerts, "sprinkled the tawdry performances necessary to attract the million with selections from the classical composers." In other words, he undertook the management of promenade concerts, when such entertainments were usually composed of the most frivolous and worthless music, and entirely changed their character, by devoting one-half of each evening to the works of the great masters. This, we are told, was "charlatanry"-in which case we can only say that we wish there was more charlatanry (or charlatanism, as we usually call it) in the world, and especially in the world of music.

What can be the meaning of these aspersions on the character of one who was a good, charitable man, and an honourable, conscientious artist? We are assured by the same critic, that when Jullien founded his English Opera, having engaged such a company as was never gathered together before on the English stage, he gave "princely commissions-to be executed in years to come." This passage causes us to reflect, and reminds us of something we read a few days since in Thackeray's admirable novel, now in course of publication in the Cornhill Magazine. You have remarked, says the wise man, that when one man hates another, the real reason is never assigned. "You say, "The conduct of such a man to his grandmother, his behaviour in selling that horse to Benson, his manner of brushing his hair down the middle'- -or what you will-'makes him so offensive to me that I cannot endure him.' His verses, therefore, are mediocre; his speeches in Parliament are utter failures; his practice at the Bar is dwindling every year, his powers (always small) are utterly leaving him, and he is repeating his confounded jokes until they quite nauseate." Or, if he be a musician (and dead), he was a charlatan--never received a musical education-and was, if the truth is to be told, not a musician at all but a-sailor.

And all this because Jullien gave "princely commissions," and was not able to "execute" them ("act up to them" would be better, because it is the person receiving the commission who is expected to execute it)! Merely because he had undertaken to produce a certain version of and was unable, from the force of circumstances, to bring it out.

In the report of a concert given by Alex. Dreyschock, at Berlin, the Preussische Zeitung gives vent to its enthusiasm in the following magniloquent sentences:

"If the trio in C minor is one of the first written by Beethoven at the age of sixteen (?), how many first and last ones of his successors are such first ones? Look at the andante: with what gentle sorrow it gushes forth; and the master's joy, his first boon, his son whom the coy, sacred love of his soul, beautiful melancholy, gave him, and whom he, with a father's holy love, cradled in his arms. Look at the scherzo! how does the father's pensiveness, and the tearful gaze, wet with woe, of the mother, smile from out its eye! Wonderfully were both entwined, moving in the sounds of the three players, especially in those of the pianist, whose magic tones melted away again, yet possessing a gentle decision and stamp of their own, even in the smallest detail, so that the chains of trills (??) rolled over the keys, like dew-drops over the leaves of flowers; but like dew-drops which appeared to confirm the notion of the ancients, concerning the origin of pearls, namely, that sucked in by the mussels, they formed the costly gems! Under Dreyschock's fingers, the tones, breathed out, as it were, pos sessed such a purity and plastic roundness of sound, that anyone would

have fancied he was working the keys into the well-known microtechnical wonders of ivory; a Callicrates of the ear, who, as the other of the size of a pea fashioned to represent the four-horsed car of the enabled the eye to distinguish, by the aid of a glass, polished ivory balls sun-god, charmed similar piano-sounds of amazing perfection out of the keys, whose apparent smoothness resolved itself for the ear into the most astonishing musical toreutics. Then, again, the hammering hand which flew out and disappeared in a hazy cloud of the finest tonestruck mighty sources of harmony out of the depth of the instrument, diamonds. The piano appeared to have stormed into an organ, which, roaring in surging chorals, melted away into the gently lisping flute-work of the Saltarello' arpeggios, which sounded though ripped out of rocks with Neptune's trident, died off into extemporaneous variations on Heil dir im Siegerkranz' played with a piano, as sweet as the fragrance of night violets. Then we had the left hand, bnt hammered out with an iron touch, like that with which Qötz was accustomed to hammer out his iron Victoria-wreaths, and that upon the skull for which they were intended." Can the official press in Berlin find no saner musical reporter?

as

If the foregoing be a fair example of Teutonic criticism, the Berlin Punch deserves rating for flagrant neglect of duty. A more efficient system of literary police must be instituted, or the reputation long formed, and still loudly claimed, by the Germans as art-judges, will speedily merge into a theory of the past, or-in more familiar language— "go to pot."

MARRIAGE OF MADEMOISELLE VICTOIRE BALFE.-This favourite vocalist has just been united, at St. Petersburgh, to Sir John Fiennes T. Crampton, Bart., K.C.B., Her Majesty's Minister at the court of Russia. Sir John, who succeded as second baronet on the death of his father, the late Sir Philip Crampton, Bart., Surgeon-general to the forces in Ireland, in 1858, was formerly Minister Plenipotentiary to the United States, and is now in his fifty-third year, having been born in 1807.

ENGLISH OPERA, DRURY LANE.-The English Opera, under the direction of Dr. James Pech, which was to have appeared at the Princess's, has, we see, been transferred to the boards of Drury Lane, which opens on Monday, and for which, we understand, a good working company has been secured.

PHILHARMONIC SOCIETY.-At a meeting of directors, members, and associates, on Tuesday morning, in the Hanover-square Rooms, the following new compositions were tried :

Symphony, Perry; Symphony, Beaumar; Overture (Recollections of the Past), Stephens; Overture, Banister; Overture, Graves; and Overture (Don Quixote), Silas.

Each composer directed the performance of his own work, Professor Bennett, the Society's conductor, being in the orchestra as president of the meeting. A symphony in E flat, by Herr Kapellmeister Rietz (of Leipsic-Mendelssohn's pupil), was also to have been tried; but as the overtures of Mynheer Silas, Mr. C. E. Stephens, and Mr. Banister were played through twice, and many parts of the symphony of Mr. Beaumar (a very young and adventuresome composer), gone through more than once, there was no time left for the German work. The occasion was one of high interest, and will win many friends for the Philharmonic Society.

M. FELICIEN DAVID, the well-known French composer, has arrived in London.

ROYAL ACADEMY OF MUSIC.-The first concert this season for the exhibition of the students took place on Saturday, in the rooms of the Institution, Tenterden-street. The programme was made up of sacred music, with the exception of the instrumental pieces, as is customary in Lent, and the first part was devoted to Mozart's Requiem, evidently in memory of the departed Lord Westmoreland, the late President of the Academy.