University of Virginia Library

BEHIND THE CURTAIN.

Editor's room, toward midnight — Enter the brigadier,
as the printers go down stairs — The day over, and
the shop shut up under — A pen (too tired to be
wiped) drying in peace on the editor's table — Newsboys
done (thank God!) — Brigadier collapsed into
a chair.

Brig. — Oh, mi-boy! To think of the trouble of
“getting along,” and the very small place in which
we sleep, when we get there! I wonder whether a
man would be much behind the time at his own funeral
if he stopped working! I'm tired, Willis! I'll
send my ticket for the afterpiece, and “go home,” as
the Moravians say.

“We.” — You forget! Editors are on the “free
list” in the theatre of life, and “not entitled to a
check.”

Brig. — Talk plain to me, my dear boy, and save
your heliotropes for the paper! The work I have
done this week! Is it you that say somewhere,
“there's no poetry in a steamboat?” Think of the
blessed cry of “stop her!”

“We.” — And so you are fairly fagged, my “martial
Pyrrhus!”

Brig. — Fagged and dispirited! Moving the printing
office — getting all the advertisements set up in
new type — little indispensable nothings plaguing my
life out — new arrangements in every corner, and the
daily paper going on besides —

“We.” — I don't wonder you're dead!

Brig. — That is the least of my trouble, I was going
to say — (though, to be sure, what we have done this
last week, changing office, and renewing type, without
stopping the daily, is very much like shoeing
your horse without slacking his trot) — but the “benefit,”
my dear boy, the benefit.

“We.” — So long since you have had any money to
lend — is that what you mean? You are afraid you
have lost the art of making yourself out poorer
than the man who comes to borrow. Why, my poor
general!

Brig. — Doesn't it strike you as a dreadful mortification,
my dear Willis?

“We.” — The whole business?

Brig. — The whole business.

“We.” — Inasmuch as for genius to be rich, after
being poor, would make a god of the man so enriched
(by the intensity of his enjoyment, and his natural
inoculation against catching the canker from his
money) — it is wisely ordained by Providence that we
shall not receive it in sums larger than $3, city bill,
without mental agony. We should else be in heaven

before our time, my dear general — purgatory omitted!

Brig. — But isn't your pride wounded for me, my
dear boy?

“We.” — As Cassio says (who, by the way, loved
general Othello very much as I do you),

I have no tear to shed on the subject. I have
thought it all over, and would have stood in your
place and received the painful thousands myself, if I
had thought it more than you could bear — but let me
tell you how I look at it.

Brig. — Do, mi-boy, and don't joke more than you
can help!

“We.” — Editors are the pump-handles of charity,
always helping people to water, and never thought to
be thirsty themselves!

Brig. — You funny Willis! — so we are!

“We.” — You, particularly, have not only been
bolted to the public cistern for every benefit of the
last twenty years, the fag and worky of every possible
charitable committee, but your paper has been called
upon (and that people think nothing of) to blow wind
into the sail of every scheme of benevolence, every
device for the good of individuals or the public. People
see your face on every printed note that comes to
them. You are the other-folks-beggar of the town.
When you die —

Brig. — No painful allusions now, mi-boy!

“We.” — I was only going to say, my dear general,
that they will wish they had unmuzzled the ox that
trod out the corn!

Brig.(swallowing something apparently). But I have
had so many misgivings about this benefit concert, my
dear Willis!

“We.” — The pump-handle changing places with
the pail! Well — it will be a shower-bath at first, but
you'll be full when it's over!

Brig. — There you go again!

“We.” — I was letting that simile trickle off my
lips while I fished up, from my practical under-current,
another good reason for your benefit. Suffer
me to be tedious a moment!

Brig. — Be so, mi-boy — be so! I love you best
when you're tedious!

“We.” — Well, then! Political economy differs
from the common estimates of things, by taking into
consideration not only their apparent value at the
time of sale, but what it has cost, directly or indirectly,
to attain that value. Do you understand me?

Brig. — No.

“We.” — For example, then! — a leg of mountain
mutton may weigh no more than a leg of lowland
mutton — but as the fibre of the meat is finer from being
fed on highland grass, it is reasonable to estimate
it by something besides its weight — i. e., the shepherd's
risk of losing it by wild beasts, and the trouble
of driving it up and down the mountain.

Brig. — True.

“We.” — Thus, a lawyer charges you fifty dollars
for an opinion which it takes him but ten minutes to
dictate to his clerk. A savage would laugh at the
price, and offer to talk twice the time for half the
money — but a civilized man pays it, allowing for the
education, study, and talent, which it cost to give the
opinion value.

Brig. — True again. Now for our “mutton.”

“We.” — You and I, my dear general, are brain-mongers
— which is an exceedingly ticklish trade. We
start with our goods in supposition, like the capital
of a western bank — locked up in a safe, that is to say
(the skull), to which the “teller” alone has the key.
We are never sure, in point of fact, that the specie is
there, and we are likely at any moment to be “broke”
by the critics “making a run upon the bank.”

Brig. — Now that's what I call clear! —

“We.” — Don't interrupt me! The risks of success
in literature, the outlay for education, the delay
in turning it to profit, the endurance of the gauntlets
of criticism, and the rarity of the gift of genius from
God, should be added to the usually fragile shop in
which its wares are embarked for vending. The poet,
by constitution least able to endure rude usage, is the
common target of coarseness and malice. Here and
there, to be sure, a man is born, like me — with brains
enough, but more liver than brains — and such men
sell thoughts as they would potatoes, and don't break
their hearts if customers find specks in them; but the
literary profession, generally, is of another make, and
“political economy” should compensale proportionally.
They do it for clergymen! What clergyman
feels it an indignity to be sent abroad by subscription,
if his health fails? He considers that he is inadequately
paid unless his parish take the risks of his
health! And you! — besides the reason you have,
wholly apart from our joint business, for needing this
benefit — here you are, after passing your life in serving
people, with a pair of eyes you can scarce sign
your name by, and a prospect of a most purblind view
of the City Hall when they make you mayor.

Brig. — Mi-boy! oh!

“We.” — There's but one pair of well-endorsed eyes
between us, and suppose somebody leaves me money
enough to unharness me from this omnibus, and turn
me out to grass at Glenmary! What will become of
you?

Brig. — Heaven indissolubly Siamese us, my dear
boy!

“We.” — And I have not even named, yet, the ostensible
ground for this concert — the songs you have
loaded the women's lips with, and never received
even a kiss for your trouble!

Brig. — What a fellow you are for reasons, Willis!

“We.” — My dear friend, I am going to state all
this to the committee for your benefit! By the way
— did you ever hear of Ismenias, the D'Orsay of ancient
Corinth?

Brig. — Never.

“We.” — Ismenias commissioned a friend to buy a
jewel for him. The friend succeeded in purchasing
it at a sum below its value. “Fool!” said Ismenias,
“you have disgraced the gem!” Did you suppose,
general, that I was going to give the public the pleasure
of paying you this tribute without taxing their
admiration as well as their pockets! No! (Hear
him!) No! I trust every woman who has sung, or
heard sung, a song of yours, will be there to wave a
handkerchief for you! I hope every man who loves
literature, and has a corner in his heart for the poet
who has pleased him, will be there to applaud you!
I hope David Hale will give us gas enough to see
you on the platform. I hope — God bless me, twelve
o'clock!

Operatic Party. — As our readers are aware, a
private sparkle from the stars of an operatic constellation,
is one of the luxuries rated as princely in Europe
— a proper fitness in the other circumstances of the
entertainment requiring a spaciousness of saloons and
a magnificence of menu which only the very wealthiest
have to offer. The private dwelling-houses of
this city, till within a few years, have been much too
small for the introduction of this advanced phase of
pleasure. Last night, however, a sumptuous residence,
that might compare to advantage with any interior
in Europe, was thrown open, and its “wilderness
of beauty” delighted with private performances
by the operatic company now in such admirable combination.

As being the head of a new chapter of national
refinement, it would, perhaps, be posthumously
worth while to depict the scene — not only as to its
sumptuary splendors and costumes, but with a description
of the “beauty that bewitched the light” —
but however posterity might thank us for such an inky
Arethusa, we have too much to do with what is above
ground, just now, to bury charms for the future.

Madame Pico remarked, before the commencement
of the performance, that it was almost as trying for
singers used to a theatre to adapt the voice, impromptu,
to a saloon, as for an amateur to calculate, at once,
the volume of voice necessary to fill a theatre. The
first two or three pieces were, notwithstanding this
judicious apprehension, a little too loud. Signor
Valtellina must have the credit of having been the
first to reduce the “fill of the empyrean” to the capacity
of a saloon, and, after the measure was taken,
the music was exquisitely enjoyable. After tea
(served in an adjoining apartment at the close of the
first part) the artists assumed, to a charm, the necessary
abandon, and the singing between tea and supper
was, to our ear, faultless. The pianist only, M.
Etienne seemed lacking in the magnetism to quicken
the movement with the acceleration of Pico's climax,
and we wished a younger or more sympathetic hand
in the accompaniment; but this charming cantatrice
has too infallible an ear to outrun the instrument, and
the effect was sufficiently enchanting. She and Signorina
Borghese were rapturously encored, and a
laughing terzetto between Borghese, Sanquirico, and
Perozzi, was called for, a second time, with boundless
delight and enthusiam.

We had never before seen Madame Pico off the
stage. Care has left no foot-print on the threshold
of the gate of music, and her mouth is infantine in
texture and expression; but her eyes have that indefinable
look which betrays

Her person shows to more advantage in a drawing-room
than on the stage, and her manners, like those of
all gifted Italians, are of a natural sculpture beyond
the need of artificial chiseling. Borghese, too, has
charming manners, and we were pleased with the cordial
accueil given to the prima-donnas by the ladies
of the party. Altogether, the absolute good taste of
the entertainment, and the unusually choice mixture
of elements, social, sumptuous, and professional, made
the evening one of high enchantment.

Opera Singers. — At the benefit of Mademoiselle
Borghese, lately, the centre of the ceiling suddenly
gave birth (at the close of the first act) to a shower of
billets-doux, which, being immediately followed by the
descent of the drop-scene, representing Jupiter feeling
the pulse of Juno, was understood by the audience
“as well as could be expected.” The delivery was
rather a relief to the feeling of the house, for the
crowd and pressure had been very uncomfortable,
and some critical event was needed to relieve the endurance.

We have been pleased at the example, set by the
good authority of the party of Monday evening, of
giving a cordial, social welcome to distinguished musical
strangers. America profits by having two nations
marching immediately before her in civilization —
each unwilling to imitate the other, but both open to
study, by us, with no impediment as to our selection
of points for imitation or rejection. The French and
English are wholly at variance on the point we have
just alluded to — the social position given to celebrated
musicians. In the high circles of France, when a
party is given at which the operatic singers perform a
concert, the reception for the musicians consults only
their personal comfort. — Chairs are placed for them,
which they rarely leave to mix with the party, and
their supper is always separate from that of the guests.

There is no intention shown, of treating them like
equals. In England, on the contrary, the operatic
company are the pets of society. Pasta, Catalani,
Persiani, Grisi, and the male singers, Lablache,
Rubini, Ivanhoff, and others, were free of all exclusion
on the score of rank, and “dined and têted”
familiarly like noble strangers from other countries.
We have seen the duke of Wellington holding the
gloves of Grisi, while she pulled to pieces a bunch of
grapes at the supper table of Devonshire house; and
we have a collection of autographs of public singers
(two of which we published the other day), addressed
to persons of high rank, and expressed in terms of
the most confessed feeling of ease as to relative position.

We repeat that we rejoice in the power to select
footsteps to follow in civilization (from those of two
nations gone on before), and we take pride, that, in
this latest instance, we have copied the more liberal
and kindly-hearted usage. These children of a passionate
clime are not justly measured by our severe
standards; and we should receive them like airs from
a southern sky, without cooling them first by a chymical
analysis. They are, commonly, ornaments to
society — joyous, genial, free from the “finikin” superfineries
of some of those inclined to abase them — and
the difference of the pleasure they give, when their hearts
are in it, is offset enough for any sacrifice made in excusing
the “low breeding” of their genius!

Borghese, whose benefit came off so triumphantly
last night, is a woman of very superior mind, of manners
faultlessly distinguished, and (essential praise to
a woman) a model of toilet-ability. She is, besides, a
remarkable actress, and a very accomplished musician.
This is a pretty good description of an agreeable acquaintance;
and, if we were to sketch Madame Pico,
it would be in terms still more warmly eulogistic.
We leave to the ladies who throw bouquets to Sanquirico,
to laud the men of the opera, and wind up
this essay of political economy, by drawing an instructive
example, of the effect of what we preach, from
the manufacture of a prima-donna into a queen and
goddess, in the days of venerable antiquity.

“Among the female performers of antiquity, Lamia
is certainly the most celebrated; how much her fame
may have been aided by her beauty we can not determine.
She was everywhere received with honor, and
according to Plutarch, equally admired for her wit,
beauty, and musical performance. She was a native
of Athens, but travelled into Egypt to hear the celebrated
flute-players of that country. During her residence
at the court of Alexandria, Ptolemy Soter was
defeated in a naval engagement by Demetrius, and all
his wives and domestics fell into the hands of the
conqueror. Lamia was among the number; but
Demetrius was so attracted by her beauty and skill,
that he raised her to the highest rank, and from her
solicitations, conferred such benefits on the Athenians,
that they gave him divine honors and dedicated a temple
to `Venus Lamia.”'

Madame Pico's Benefit. — We should be happy
if Europe would inform us why this remarkable cantatrice
comes to us “new as a tooth-pick,” as to fame,
and whether (the same lack of previous trumpeting
having given us a surprise in Malibran), we are to
have the credit also of the eccalobeion of Pico! Even
without the “deep-sea plummet” of her contralto
(which certainly does touch bottom for which most

voices lack fathoms of line) she has a compass as a
mezzo soprano, which would alone serve for remarkable
success in her profession. She is a most correct
musician too — (the only false note we have heard
from her, having been occasioned by her striking her
chest too violently while singing defiance to Valtellina)
— and, withal, a most gifted and charming woman,
every way formed to be an idol for the public. We
have written a great deal about Madame Pico, and,
her benefit being the last occasion we shall find, to do
more than chronicle her movements, we shall send
this quill to our friend Kendall of the Picayune (as
the Highlanders send the lighted brand), enveloped
in a stanza addressed by an Italian poet to Lady
Coventry: —
We leave the rest to the Picayune's prophetic divination.

Adieu, Pico, l'in-cantatrice! A clear throat and a
plethoric pocket to you!

Madame Arnoult's Concert. — It looked very
queer (and a little wicked withal) to see opera-glasses
and ladies with their heads uncovered, in the pews of
the Tabernacle; and we are not sure that our “way
we should go” did not twitch us for a “departure,”
when we found ourselves applauding with kid gloves
in the neighborhood of the altar! We were applauding
Pico; and the next thought that came to us was,
a regret that such voices should not be consecrated to
church choirs; for (granting the opera to be a profane
amusement, as is thought by the worshippers at the
Tabernacle), “it is a pity,” as a celebrated divine once
said, “that the devil should have all the good music.”
And, apropos — was not this capital remark — (attributed,
we believe, to Wesley) — suggested by one, recorded
of the pope Gregory of the fifth century? Britain
at that time was, to Rome, what Africa is now to us
— a savage country they brought slaves from; and
the introduction of Christianity into that heathen land
is said to have been prompted by the pope's admiration
of the beauty of two or three young John Bulls
who were for sale in the market-place of Rome. On
inquiring of the merchant if they were Christians,
and being informed they were pagans, he exclaimed,
“Alas, what a pity that the author of darkness should
be in possession of men of such fair countenances!” He
commissioned Pelagius forthwith to send missionaries
to the handsome British pagans, and hence the church
of England — probably the only church, the members
of which owe their salvation to their personal beauty!
(Pardon this historical digression, dear readers!)

Madame Arnoult took New York by surprise —
she is so much better a singer than was supposed.
With less effort, and in a smaller room than the nave
of the Tabernacle, she would, however, appear to much
more advantage. Her voice, to our ear, lacked fledging,
or lining, or something to make it warmer or
more downy — but it is a clear and most cultivable
soprano, and she manages it with wonderful skill for a
beginner at public singing. We predict great popularity
for her. Madame Pico sang, with her, the
duet from Semiramide, and it was enough to steep
even the pulpit cushion in a this world's trance of
music.

Armlets. — We have observed that there is a late
fashionable promotion of the jewels of the arm to the
more lovely round above the elbow, where, it must
be confessed, a bracelet sits much more enviably imbedded.
We rather think this renewal of the fashion
of armlets is a clean jump from the rape of Helen to
1845, for the latest mention we can find of it is in the
account of the Trojan nymphs, who laid aside their
armlets to dance in the choirs on Mount Ida. It
takes an arm, plump and not too plump, to wear this
clasp with a grace, but where the arm is really beautiful,
no ornament could be more fitly and captivatingly
located. We were very much struck with the effect
upon the dazzling arm on which we lately noticed it.

Views of Morris's Concert. — There are few
buttons on the motley coat of human dependance, to
which the button-hole is not serviceably correspondent
— the button (conferring the favor) commonly drawing
the same garment closer by aid of the button-hole
(receiving the favor). There is one very striking instance
however, of constant services unreciprocated, in
what editors do for singers and actors. Our attention
has been called to this by a series of paragraphs —
(part silly, part malicious) — expressing surprise that
Ole Bull and others, who had never been in any way
benefited by Gen. Morris, should have been asked to
contribute their services gratuitously to his benefit
concert.

It is needful, of course, in a newspaper, to make
some mention and some critical estimate of all public
performers. It may be done favorably or unfavorably;
and there is a way of being abundantly paid for
either. “Black mail” is willingly paid where commendation
is sold in shambles, but the editor is better
paid, still, if, with skilful roasting and dissection of
the faults of public performers, he cruelly enriches
his paper (like a paté de foie gras with the liver of the
goose roasted alive), and so sends it, palatably spiced,
to the uninquiring appetite of the public. He who
has a hair of his head left undamned, to creep with
shame at the “black mail” sale of his approbation —
and he who has common human kindness to prevent
his murdering the hopes of strangers to make his
paper readable — both these are of classes that go unpaid,
and commonly unthanked, for services most
essential to others, and forbearance most costly to
themselves.

The editor's business is to make his paper readable.
The most difficult task he has to do is to be readably
good-natured. The easiest writing in the world is
criticism amusingly severe. If any one doubts, for
example, that with the same pains we have taken,
glowingly to interpret between Ole Bull and the public,
we could have ridiculed him into a comparative
failure — sending a laugh before him through the
country that would have armed every listener with an
impenetrable incredulity — if any one doubts our power
to have done this, as easily as we have ushered him
into hearts we made ready for a believing reception
of his music, he does not know either the press or the
public — neither the arbitrary license of the press, nor
the public's weak memory for everything but ridicule.
Where Ole Bull now stands, the press is comparatively
powerless. He is stamped with success. But,
when he stood on the threshold of this country's favor
— a musician, whose peculiarities at first seemed tricks,
and whom few heard for the first time with a confident
appreciation — if, then, ridicule had met him, boldly
and unsparingly, even though this one paper had alone
opened the cry, he would have had us to thank, we
believe, for the tide turned back on which he now rides
triumphantly onward. Certain as it is that we could
not, all alone, have made his present good fortune, it
is quite as certain that we could, all alone, have marred
it — and that, too, to the profitable spicing of our somewhat
praise-ridden columns. We need not stop to

tell the reader that we are describing the fiend Siamesed
to Liberty — an Irresponsible Press which can not
be chained without chaining Liberty too — but we wish
to show that there is some merit in not harnessing
this fiend to our own slow vehicle of fortune. There
never was an opportunity so ready as Ole Bull's advent
for amusing ridicule — but we were the first, or
among the first, to call for faith in him, and aid in his
appreciation. We did it from love of the man and
belief in his genius, and would as soon have been
marked on the brow with a hot iron as bargain for a
syllable of it. But — the unforeseen opportunity presenting
itself, when, apparently, he might return our
paper's service by a favor to our associate — he was
invited without scruple to do so. Suppose he had
played ten minutes on the violin for the benefit of the
proprietor of a paper devoted, for a year, invariably to
his interests? Would it have been the “act of charity”
for which a paragraphist says that “Ole Bull was
unreasonably called upon?” The high-spirited Norwegian
placed his regret, that he could not be here to
comply, upon no such footing.

While we are calling things by their real names,
we may as well change the label of another matter —
the motive of the benefit to Gen. Morris. As the
public know, our estimable associate, by twenty years
of literary labor, amassed a moderate fortune, which,
in the disasters of an era of bankruptcy, he suddenly
lost. A part of his property was invested in the
beautiful country-seat of Undercliff on the Hudson —
the residence of his family for several years. His
friends — with a provident hope, looking beyond the
clouds that enveloped him — fastened, to the transfer
of this lovely spot, a condition by which he might,
if able, repurchase it at a certain time, and at its then
reduced valuation. He has since been suffered to
tenant it for a trifling rent. He has improved it, embellished
it, increased its value. His children have
grown up in it. But, meantime, the limit came around
— (now only a short time off) — when the purchase
must be made or the home lost. His old friends came
to inquire into the probable result of their forethought
for him. We need not give the particulars of our
business — General Morris was partly prepared to redeem
the property. The lack was a sum that might
be covered by a benefit concert — so suggested by one
of the parties. It was urged upon him and declined.
He was told that Beranger had three subscriptions
(one of twenty thousand dollars) — that Campbell
had several — that Scott's children were relieved of
his debts by a posthumous subscription of two hundred
thousand dollars — and that private subscriptions
for literary men were of common occurrence in
England.

The public know the sequel. He refused, till the
concert was agreed upon by his friends without him.
The Italians, whom our paper had more especially
served, sprang, generously and with acclamation, to
reciprocate our constant advocacy of their company's
attraction. The musicians resident here were all
friends of General Morris, for he alone, more than all
other men in New York taken together, had served the
dramatic and musical profession. They, too, joyously
sprang to the chance of benefiting him. Never
was service more eagerly rendered than that by the
performers last night at the Tabernacle — never came
good purpose before the public, so lamely and disparagingly
construed.

In making up our mind to allow the public to be
intimate with us, we expect now and then to expose
the lining of our gaberdine. We conform to the exigences
of the latitude we live in — but upon dishabille explanations,
we hope for dishabille constructions. What
we have written here, between five o'clock, A. M., and
breakfast (wholly without the knowledge of General
Morris), goes to press with the ink undried, and we
have no security against errors but that of writing as
we would talk to our confessor. If the time should
ever arise when really good intentions may be trusted
to stand, in public opinion: —

we may cease to explain “why our stocking is ungartered.”
Meantime, we expect to die.

The Opera Bereavement. — What is to become
of this widower of a town when it has lost its fairly-espoused
Pico, we must leave to the survivor's obituary
to record. We may as well have our ears boxed and
stowed away! — Their vocation is as good as gone!
No more Pico? Faith, it will go hard for the first
week or two! But — by the way — as those “lost from
us” are invariably supposed to be crowned in the next
place they go to, and as, of course, Pico will be
crowned in the presence of St. Charles and the brunet
angels of New Orleans, we must take upon ourselves,
as her New York “gold stick in waiting,” to summon
one at least, of her liege subjects to his duty. (We
happen, fortunately, to possess an autograph of
George the Fourth, signed to the necessary formula.)

Star returning to its Meridian. — Pico has
changed her mind! Jubilate! She has declined to
go to New Orleans with the Borgheses, and will remain
here to be the nucleus for a new operatic crystalization.
We beg New York and Boston to shake
hands in felicitation! And now that it is settled (as
we understand it was, yesterday, by a decisive letter
to Signor Borghese), let us splinter a ray or two of
light upon the diamond that has so wisely refused resetting.
New Orleans is a French city, with a French
opera; and Mademoiselle Borghese is a French woman,
with lost laurels to win back from the Italian
Pico. This new arena, little likely to have been an
impartial one, is a great way off, the journey dangerous
and tedious, and, to go there, Madame Pico must
abruptly leave a wave of fortune, which she is now
riding “at the flood,” and give up three admiring cities
for one that might be dubious! A new opera-house
is about to be built here, of which she will be the first
predominant star; her concerts, in the meantime, in
the different cities, will profitably employ her; and,
as to the company, there is a substitute lying perdu
for Borghese, and a tenor might soon be found to replace
Perozzi. Out of these facts, the public can
pick the good reasons Madame Pico has for abandoning
her journey to New Orleans. Let us do our best
to show her that she has not made a mistake in preferring
us

Taking the White Veil. — The Undine of the
Bowling-green (Miss Undine W — g, if named after

the gentleman to whose liberality she owes her existence)
was shown last evening, with her radiant beauty
enveloped in glittering white, to the assembled
friends of the author of her being. To alight from
the poetry of the matter: — Mr. W — g invited, yesterday,
a party of his friends to see an illumination of the
superb fountain with which he has embellished that
part of the city. The rocky structure through which
it leaps, is completely encrusted with ice, and it looked
like — like more things than we have room to mention.
The colored light covered the fountain first
with a suffused blush of the tenderest pink, and this
deepened to crimson, and the glow upon ice and water
was really superb beyond any effect of the kind we
have ever witnessed. It made even a Dry Dock omnibus
(which chanced to be passing at the moment),
look rosily picturesque and fairy-like. The black sky
overhead; the delicate tracery of the naked branches
of the trees; the enclosure of architecture with lights
in the windows (which seemed completely to shut it
in like the court of an illuminated palace), were all
striking additions to the effect. We would inquire,
by the way, whether this couleur de rose could not be
adapted to the brightening of the ice with which the
fountains of the mind are sometimes crusted over.
Phlogistic chymists will please explain.

Improvements on the American Language. —
The making an improvement in one's mother's property
is, of course, a praiseworthy filial service, and we
find that we have succeeded in enriching our “mother
language” by successfully breaking, to new and valuable
service, a pair of almost useless and refractory
terminations. “-Dom” and “-tricity” may now be
hitched by a single hyphen to any popular word, name,
or phrase, and, without the cumbrous harness of a
periphrasis, may turn it out in the full equipage of a
collective noun! Our first experiment in this economy
of parts of speech was the describing a charming
class of society by the single word Japonica-dom.
This musical substantive could hardly be displaced by
a shorter sentence than “the class up town who usually
wear in their hair the expensive exotic commonly
called a japonica.” The second experiment was the
word Pico-tricity — a condensation of “the power,
brilliancy, and electric effect of the singing of Madame
Rosina Pico.” We see by the papers that these
expediting inventions (for which we liberally refrained
from taking out a patent) are freely used already by
our brother administrators of the mother language,
and we have only respectfully to suggest a proper
economy and fitness in their application.

Early-hours-dom. — We scarcely need explain, we
presume, that we have undertaken the wholesome
mission of giving interest, as far as in us lies, to the
more refined occupancy of that portion of the day comprised
between twilight and go-to-bed time — becoming,
so to speak, the apostle of fashionable early-hours-dom.
Of course we are entirely too practical to dream
of “reforming out,” by mere force of argument, the
four-hours' unprofitable yawn and the night's restitution-less
robbery of sleep. Every one knows that the
reasons for the late hours of European fashion are
wholly wanting in this country — but every one consents
to follow the fashion without the reasons. The only
way to diminish the attraction of late amusements
is to anticipate them by more attractive early amusements.
It will be remembered that we commenced
our vigorous support of the opera with this view of
the use of it. It was a well-put though unsuspected
blow to the habit of late hours, for many gave up par
ties they would otherwise have gone to, from having
been sufficiently amused at the opera; and others
found out, practically, that to dress and go to the opera
from seven till ten, gave all the relaxation they required,
and their natural night's sleep into the bargain!
It is with this ultimate view of making a fashionable
Kate

giving us a substitute that shall make late hours more
easily dispensed with — that we look upon the plan of
this new opera-house as a national benefit. If built
luxuriously, lavishly lighted, made to serve all the purposes
of a sumptuous festal saloon, and give exquisite
music besides, it will be a preferable resort to a ball-room;
and we believe that it is only from the lack of
a preferable resort in evening dress, that late parties
are any way endurable. Early parties on the off
nights of the opera, would soon follow, we think — the
habit of early hours of gayety, once relished — and so
would creep out this servile and senseless imitation of
foreign fashion.

Untilled Field of Literature in New York.
— The one country we have lived in, without loving
a native, is the country that, on the whole, gave us
the most to admire — France. We embroidered a
year and a half of our memory with the grace and wit
of the world's capital of taste, and we have left a heart
(travellers' pattern) in every other country between
Twenty-second street and the Black sea; but, that
we do not even suspect the color of a French heartache
we solemnly vow — and marvel. We admire the
French quite enough, however (perhaps there lies the
philosophy of it!) to leave no fuel for sentiment to
mourn over as wastage, and now — (apropos des bottes)
— why have we no vehicle for French wit in New
York — no battery for the friction and sparkle of French
electricity? How can the French live without a
“Charivari?” Twenty thousand French inhabitants
and no savor in the town, as if the gods had “dined
below stairs!” Ten thousand French women (probably),
and either no celebrity, of wit or beauty, among
them, or no needful newspaper-cloud in which the
thunder and lightning of such pervading electricities
could be collected!

We wonder whether the “Courrier des Etats Unis”
(the Anchises French paper which we read, as the
pious æneas carried his father on his back, to have
something to cherish, out of the city left behind —
something French, that is to say) — we wonder whether,
on their alternate days, the editors of that sober
tri-weekly paper could not give us something spiced
à la Parisienne — and whether such a vehicle, for the
French wit that must be here, benumbed or hidden,
would not be a profitable speculation! The “Courrier”
is the best of useful and grave papers, and entirely
fulfils its destiny, but it is small pleasure to the
ten thousand people in New York, who relish French
literature, to re-peruse the matter of the daily papers,
rechauffé in a foreign language. If the lack of Parisian
material, here, were an apparent objection, what a
delightful luxury it would be to have a paper made up,
at first, entirely, with the condensed essence of the
gay papers of Paris? A feature of New York charivari-ty
might be gradually worked in — but, meantime,
a well-selected bouquet of the prodigal wit and fun of
the capital (made comprehensible by a correspondence
kept up with Paris, which should explain allusions,
etc.) would be, we should really suppose, most
attractive to the better classes of our society, and, to
the French of New Orleans and other more remote
cities, an indispensable luxury.

There is a natural homeopathy for everything French
in this city — much stronger than for the same things

a l'Anglaise. We would wish, too, that the barrier
of a different language were gradually broken down,
so that some of the delightful peculiarities of Paris
might ooze into our city manners through a conduit
of periodical literature. Heigho! — to think of the
brilliant intellectual lamps blazing like noonday in
France, while, with the material for the same brightness
about us, we sit by the glimmer of fire-light!
Oh, Jules Janin! “American in Paris!” — come over
with your prodigal brain and be a Parisian in America!
Ordain yourself as a missionary of wit, and Janin-ify
a continent by a year's exile beyond the Boulevards!
You'll laugh at us when you return, but
streams chafe the channels they refresh, and we will
take you with your murmur!

It would hardly be inferred — but we really sat
down to write the following paragraph, and not the
foregoing one: —

The Prima-donnas at Fault. — The “Courrier
des Etats Unis” has now and then an ebullition of national
spirituality, in the shape of a half column of
theatrical gossip, and we have had on our table, for
several days, a cut-out paragraph, very well hit off,
touching one or two of the town's pleasure-makers.
The editor is, of course, behind the curtain, as the
natural centre of the foreign circle of New York, and
he writes with knowledge. He gives as a fact that
Borghese cleared $550 by her benefit, but he disparages
the performance of that evening, and hauls the
ladies seriously over the coals for having exhausted
themselves at a private party the night before! He
detects an anachronism in Semiramide, and calls Pico
to account for appearing before the queen (as Arsace)
with his mother's crown on, when the good lady had
as yet only promised it to him! The first thing in the
succeeding duet, says the “Courrier,” should have
been a remark from Semiramide (who has promised
him the crown as a lover, not knowing it is her son)
to this effect: “Vous étes un peu pressé, mon bel
amoureux!” ou bien, “De quel droit portez-vous
cette couronne, que je n'ai fait que vous offrir?” The
crown given him by the high-priest, out of the paternal
box, was, of course, only symbolic, as the queen
was still on the throne.

Korponay's Fall, from a Faux Pas. — Another
matter touched in the same paragraph is the nonrising
of the new ballet-star promised for that evening.
The leader of the constellation chanced to be taken
ill (below the horizon) at Philadelphia, but the Courrier
states that the illness was owing to a fall, from a
faux pas, and that the faux pas was an engagement
by the tumbler (Korponay) to go to Philadelphia
once a week for twenty-four dollars, when his expenses,
wife and all, were twenty-six! The Courrier does
not state, what we think highly probable, that Korponay's
blood has come through too many generations
of gentlemen to be good at a dancing-master's bargains.

The new Danseuse. — A third topic of this same
pregnant paragraph is the contention between two
dancing-masters, Charruaud and Mons. Korponay, for
the honor of having given the finishing grace to the
“light fantastic toe” of Miss Brooks, the new wonder.
Monsieur Charruaud (Frenchman-like) declares
that she is not only his pupil, but by no means the best
of his pupils! Monsieur Korponay simply advertises
her as his; and the star, and the star's mamma, confess
to her Korponay-tivity. But —

What blood does the public think is running in the
veins of this same “fantastic toe?” — James Brooks —
the “Florio,” who, ten years ago, was the poetical
passion of this country — was the father of this dancing
girl! What would that sensitive poet have written
(prophetically) on the first appearance of his daughter
in a pas seul!

Longfellow's Waif. — A friend, who is a very fine
critic, gave us, not long since, a review of this delightful
new book. Perfectly sure that anything from that
source was a treasure for our paper, we looked up
from a half-read proof to run our eye hastily over it,
and gave it to the printer — not, however, without
mentally differing from the writer as to the drift of
the last sentence, as follows: —

“We conclude our notes on the `Waif' with the
observation that, although full of beauties, it is infected
with a moral taint — or is this a mere freak of
our own fancy? We shall be pleased if it be so — but
there does appear, in this exquisite little volume, a
very careful avoidance of all American poets who may
be supposed especially to interfere with the claims of
Mr. Longfellow. These men Mr Longfellow can
continuously imitate (is that the word?) and yet never
even incidentally commend.”

Notwithstanding the haste with which it passed
through our attention (for we did not see it in proof), the
question of admission was submitted to a principle in
our mind; and, in admitting it, we did by Longfellow as
we would have him do by us. It was a literary charge,
by a pen that never records an opinion without some
supposed good reason, and only injurious to Longfellow
(to our belief) while circulating, un-replied-to,
in conversation-dom. In the second while we reasoned
upon it, we went to Cambridge and saw the poet's
face, frank and scholar-like, glowing among the busts
and pictures in his beautiful library, and (with, perhaps
a little mischief in remembering how we have
always been the football and he the nosegay of our contemporaries)
we returned to our printing-office arguing
thus: Our critical friend believes this, though we do
not; Longfellow is asleep on velvet; it will do him
good to rouse him; his friends will come out and
fight his battle; the charge (which to us would be a
comparative pat on the back) will be openly disproved,
and the acquittal of course leaves his fame brighter
than before — the injurious whisper in conversation-dom
killed into the bargain!

That day's Mirror commenced its

We expected the return mails from Boston to bring
us a calmly indignant “Daily Advertiser,” a coquettishly
reproachful “Transcript,” a paternally severe
“Courier,” and an Olympically-denunciatory “Atlas.”
A week has elapsed, and we are still expecting. Thunder
is sometimes “out to pasture.” But, meantime,
a friend who thinks it the driver's lookout if stones
are thrown at a hackney-coach, but interferes when it
is a private carriage — (has loved us these ten years,
that is to say, and never objected to our being a target,
but thinks a fling at Longfellow is a very different
matter) — this friend writes us a letter. He thinks as
we do, exactly, and we shall, perhaps, disarm the
above-named body-guard of the accused poet by quoting
the summing-up of his defence: —

“It has been asked, perhaps, why Lowell was neglected
in this collection? Might it not as well be
asked why Bryant, Dana, and Halleck, were neglected?
The answer is obvious to any one who candidly

considers the character of the collection. It professed
to be, according to the proem, from the humbler poets;
and it was intended to embrace pieces that were anonymous,
or which were not easily accessible to the general
reader — the waifs and estrays of literature. To
put anything of Lowell's, for example, into a collection
of waifs, would be a peculiar liberty with pieces
which are all collected and christened.”

It can easily be seen how Longfellow, and his
friends for him, should have a very different estimate
from ourself as to the value of an eruption, in print, of
the secret humors of appreciation. The transient
disfiguring of the skin seems to us better than disease
concealed to aggravation. But, apart from the intrinsic
policy of bringing all accusations to the light,
where they can be encountered, we think that the peculiar
temper of the country requires it. Our national
character is utterly destitute of veneration.
There is a hostility to all privileges, except property
in money — to all hedges about honors — to all reserves
of character and reputation — to all accumulations of
value not bankable. There is but one field considered
fairly open — money-making. Fame-making, character-making,
position-making, power-making, are privileged
arenas in which the “republican many” have
no share.

The distrust with which all distinction, except
wealth, is regarded, makes a whispered doubt more
dangerous to reputation than a confessed defect. The
dislike to inheritors of anything — birthrights of anything
— family names or individual genius — metamorphoses
the first suspicion greedily into a belief. A
clearing-up of a disparaging doubt about a man is a
public disappointment. “That fellow is all right
again, hang him!” is the mental ejaculation of ninety-nine
in a hundred of the readers of a good defence or
a justification.

P. S. We are not recording this view of things by
way of assuming to be, ourself, above this every-day
level of the public mind — too superfine to be a part
of such a public. Not a bit of it. We can not afford
superfinery of any kind. We are trying to make a
living by being foremost in riding on a coming turn of
the tide in these matters. The country is at the lowest
ebb of democracy consistent with its intelligence.
The taste for refinements, for distinctions, for aristocratic
entrenchments, is moving with the additional
momentum of a recoil. We minister to this, in the
way of business, as the milliner makes a crown-shaped
head-dress for Mrs. President Tyler. It has its penalty,
but that was reckoned at starting. We knew,
of course, that we could not sell fashionable opinions
at our counter without being assailed as assuming to
be the representative of fashion[1] — just as if we could
not even name a tribute of libertinism to virtue without
being sillily called a libertine by the Courier,
Commercial, and Express. However, there is some
hope, by dint of lifetime fault-culture, that, in the sod
over a man's grave, there will be no slander-seed left
to flower posthumously undetected.

Popularity of Madame Pico. — During the past
week we received a letter from a serious writer (a lady),
confessing to her own great delight in Madame Pico,
but wishing us to impress upon our religious readers,
by arguments more at length, the sacredness of good
music, even by an operatic singer. We remember a
passage in Burnet's Records, which shows that even
these operatic singers, if enlisted to sing in the choirs
of churches, would become the special subjects of
prayer. “Also ye shall pray for them that find any
light in this church, or give any behests, book, bell,
chalice or vestment, surplices, water-cloth or towel,
lands, rents, lamp or light, or other aid or service,
whereby God's worship is better served, sustained and
maintained in reading and SINGING.” It has long been
our opinion that to heighten the character of church
music would be aiding and giving interest and consequence
to religious service, and the inviting of professed
singers to the choirs, for the sabbaths they pass
in the city, would make them particularly (according
to Burnet) special subjects of prayer.

The four-feet precipice between the carriage wheel
and the side walk, and the back slope to the range of
racing omnibuses and drunken sleigh-riders, prevent
ladies from embarking in carriages at present, and this
is one thing that reconciles us to the opera people's
having chosen to

Madame Pico has found a rich oasis in Boston appreciation,
and we trust the snow will have melted away
before the Tabernacle so that it will not be an inaccessible
desert when she returns. Her concert there will
be like a dawn after a month's night of music.

Two or three new Fashions in France. — In a
French pamphlet handed in to our office a few days
ago, purporting to be Monsieur Grousset's justification
for having been shot down in Broadway by Monsieur
Emeric, Mr. Grousset describes a previous affair with
the same gentleman, lately, in France. On that occasion,
he states, Mr. Emeric went to the field attended
by nine persons, one of whom was a lady!

We find, also, by a private letter from a friend in
Paris, that the now common FEMALE practice of SMOKING
CIGARS is considered (by connoisseurs in knowing-dom)
as a most engaging addition to the attractions
of some particular styles of beauty! “The play of the
mouth upon the cigar, the reddening of the lips by the
irritation of the tobacco, and the insouciant air, altogether,
which it gives to the smoker, adds to the
peculiar quality of a dashing and coquettish woman, as
much as it would detract from that of a retiring and
timid one.” The eyes (he adds) gleam with a peculiar
softness, through the smoke. Our correspondent had
just returned from a call on a charming American
lady, whom he found with a cigar in her rosy mouth!

Wellington boots have been sported during the
late bad weather for walking, by some of the fashionable
ladies of Paris. They are made of patent leather,
reaching to the knee, with a small tassel in front (at
least so exhibited in shop-windows) and the leg of the
boot rounded and shaped in firm leather, like the
fashion of boots twenty years ago. The high heel
(keeping the sole of the foot from the wet pavement),
is “raved about,” in Paris — the ladies wondering how
such a sensible thing as a heel should have been so
long disused by the sex most in need of its protection.
The relief of the ankles from contact with the cold or
wet edge of the dress in wet weather is dwelt upon in
the description, as is also the increased beauty of the
foot from the heightening of the arch of the instep by
the high heel.

Fashions for country belles. — The following
appeal to our gallantry pulls very hard: —

We have omitted the bulk of Miss Kate's letter,
giving rather too long an account of two or three expensive
disasters from being misguided by magazines
as to the fashions — but it is easily to be seen that it is
a matter that concerns outlay which “comes home to
business and bosom.” We shall take it into consideration.
Our present impression is, that we shall
set apart half a column, weekly, bi-weekly, or tri-weekly,
devoted to “the fashions by an eye-witness.”
This, however, immediately suggests a dilemma:
There are two schools of taste among the ladies!
Some women dress for men's eyes, and this style is
both striking and economical. Other women (most
women indeed), dress for ladies' approval only, and
this style is studiously expensive, sacrifices becomingness
to novelty, and is altogether beyond male appreciation.
— Which style should we shape our report for?

Canadian Gossip. — The chief of the Scotch clan,
McNab, has lately emigrated to Canada with a hundred
clansman. On arriving at Toronto, he called on
his newly illustrious namesake, Sir Allan, and left his
card as “The McNab.” Sir Allan returned his visit,
leaving as his card, “The other McNab.” The unusual
relish of this accidental bit of fun, has elevated
the definite article into a kind of provincial title, and,
in common conversation, the leading individual of a
family name is regularly the-ified. Among the officers
at Montreal there was lately a son of the late celebrated
“Jack Mytton,” the most game-y sportsman
in England. Meeting Sir Allan McNab at a mess-dinner,
young Mytton sent wine to him with the message:
“The Mytton” would be happy to take wine
with “The Other McNab.” We should not wonder
of this funny use of the definite article became the
germ of the first American title. The Tyler! The
Mrs. Tyler!

This same young Mytton, by the way, inherited his
father's adventurous temper, and though the first
favorite of Montreal society, he alone, of all the officers,
could find no lady willing to sleigh-ride with him.
They openly declared their fear of his pranks of driving.
One fine day, however, when all the town was on runners,
Mytton was seen with a dashing turn-out, and a
lady deeply veiled, sitting beside him, to whose comfort
he was continually ministering, and to whom he
was talking with the most merry glee. It was, to all
appearance, a charming and charmed auditor, at least.
The next day, there was great inquiry as to who was
driving with Mr. Mytton. The mystery was not
solved for a week. It came out at last, that in a
certain milliner's shop in Montreal had stood a wooden
“lay figure” for the exhibition of caps and articles
of dress. The despairing youth had bought this, had
it expensively and fashionably dressed, and still keeps
it at his lodgings (under the name of “Ma'm'selle.
Pis-Aller”) for his companion in sleigh-riding!