to be caricatured on their own ground, and to appear as if inviting the public to discover and laugh at their defects and peculiarities. The green-room in a body remonstrated with the manager. Sparks declared that his reputation as an actor and peace of mind as a man were injured permanently. Dame Clive told Wilkinson to his teeth that he was an insolent cub and deserved a good horsewhipping. "Not," said she, "but that I can and do take off, myself; but then it is only the Mingottis and a set of Italian squalling devils, who come over to England from their own beggarly country to get our bread from us; and I say curse them all for a parcel of Italian b§.” Garrick, to keep the peace behind the scenes, ordered Wilkinson to desist; but thus he raised the audience on his back, who imperatively demanded the imitations, and a serious riot ensued. Garrick then submitted, and by way of a salve to the enraged performers, added a sort of permission to Wilkinson to include himself if he could. Wilkinson took him at his word, and to his utter confusion produced roars of applause. All parties now saw that it was useless to continue opposition and the imitations, in due course, died a natural death with the conclusion of the engagement.

In the summer of 1761, Richard Bentley-the son of the great scholastic critic, Master of Trinity College, Cambridge, and Archdeacon of Ely, called "slashing" Bentley by Pope produced a comedy at Drury-lane, entitled, "The Wishes; or, Harlequin's Mouth opened." Harlequin by O'Brien. The other characters by Foote, Baddeley, Davis, Weston, Miss Haughton, Miss Elliot, and Miss Ambrose. "The Wishes" was a witty but eccentric drama, on the model of the Italian comedy, in which Harlequin, Pantaloon, Pierrot (or Clown), Mezzetino, and Columbine are introduced as speaking characters. Many portions exhibited just satire and solid sense, with ample evidences of the author's learning and critical judgment. But there was a lack of incident, which forms the essence of

acting comedy. This deficiency, joined to the extravagance and oddity of a set of characters which English audiences had been accustomed to see as mute mimics only, rendered the piece caviare to the million, and seems to justify the coldness with which it was received. The plot is simply this-Isabella, the heroine, obtains from Manto, a fairy, the accomplishment of three wishes, on this proviso, that if she three times recalls what she has desired, she shall lose all her power. She first wishes that her lover, Harlequin, could speak; she next wishes for riches; and lastly, that Harlequin, who has been taking some liberties with her, should be hanged, which is immediately complied with. She then unwishes her last wish, as she had already unwished her two former ones.

After being privately circulated in manuscript, admired and applauded by the readers, this comedy was privately rehearsed at Lord Melcombe's villa, afterwards Brandenburgh House, by the performers who were to act it. This gave rise, as a matter of course, to a report that the noble lord had some hand in the paternity. It was even hinted that a still greater personage, meaning the young king, George the Third, was also a contributor. Be that as it may, it is certain that the former interested himself very warmly in its production, and the royal favour extended itself to the avowed author in a very handsome present, in consequence of which he resigned the profits of his third night (inconsiderable they proved), to the advantage of the performers. The prologue and epilogue were written by Cumberland, Bentley's nephew.

The comedy came out on the 27th of July, 1761. Notwithstanding the lateness of the season, it had been so much the topic of conversation in the beau monde that it drew all the wit and fashion in town to its first representation, when it narrowly escaped birth-strangling. The brilliancy of the dialogue, and the reiterated strokes of point and repartee, kept the audience in good-humour with the leading acts,

the titled inamorata, and within a fortnight married another more to his liking, from his own line of life. Lord Ilchester pardoned O'Brien on condition of his leaving the stage, with which he readily complied, and then went into honourable exile in America, where he enjoyed a good post until the colonies won their independence. He returned to England after that event, and settled down into the lucrative sinecure of Receiver-General of the County of Dorset, where he lived in great clover and repute to a very advanced age. A leading object with him in after-life was to "sink the player," and to bury in oblivion those years of his existence which are the most worthy of being remembered. They were actively and creditably employed, and he added lustre to a highly intellectual calling, which prejudice has unjustly decried and lax practitioners have unnecessarily debased.

But O'Brien, though he would fain have sponged out all memorials of his having been an actor, had no dislike to the reputation of a dramatic author. On the 8th of December, 1772, he brought out a comedy called "The

Duel," at Drury-lane, and on the same evening a farce entitled "Cross Purposes," at Covent Garden. This arrangement is unique in theatrical diplomacy. It was scarcely to be expected that both would succeed, or both fail. The plan looks very like what is understood on the turf as a "hedge." The result resembled what frequently occurs at races-the favourite lost. The comedy, good in itself, and admirably acted by Barry, King, Reddish, Brereton, Moody, Weston, Mrs. Barry, Mrs. Hopkins, and Miss Younge, failed and was not repeated. The farce, with less pretensions, though not without genuine humour and applicable satire, met with more than average success. It was revived at Drury-lane, in 1789, at Covent Garden in 1790, and at Bath so recently as 1821. The comedy is taken from Le Philosophe sans le savoir of Sedaine; the farce from Les Frois Frères Rivaux of La Font. Both are printed, and a perusal satisfies the reader that O'Brien must have been a much better actor than dramatist, reversing the cases of Sheridan Knowles and the unapproachable name of Shakespeare.

THE writer whom we now introduce to our readers is worthy of the distinction, by reason of the wit and humour which he possesses, the agreeable and easy style of his writing, his stock of real experience, acquired by active intercourse with the world, and the union of poetry with the prose of modern existence. If he had never been compelled to exert his energies in order to surmount the ills and inconveniences of poverty, we might, perhaps, have received nothing better from him than mere romances or idyls. But circumstances acquainted him thoroughly with the stern laws of human life; and his works, in consequence, deal with the strictly probable, around which, however, he throws as much poetry and romance as they can bear, and yet retain their real and truthful character.

In commencing a story he has a clear idea of its drift and outline, and with this consciousness, he permits

himself to make sundry excursions in its progress; never, however, permitting the reader's attention to wander far from the main route, but recalling it at the moment when there is danger of straying too far away by some by-path. He would break away into the enchanted regions where imagination holds sovereign sway, but that his eyes are too open to the commonplace, and disagreeable, and tiresome adjuncts of every-day life, and his sense of truth and reality checks his flight; and, much against his will, apparently, he keeps to the dusty and well-used highway, from which we can never wander far with impunity, and to which we are obliged to make speedy returns, if we wish to arrive with any comfort at our journey's end.

Thus his tales and sketches are chiefly occupied with ordinary occurrences, to which his genius imparts freshness, and colour, and interest.

"Far from wrapping himself in useless reverie," says Mons. Ottavi, "he walks into the market-place; visits country districts, obscured by the smoke of manufactories; makes a voyage in a steamboat; attends an auction after the decease of the master of the house; keeps his ears on the strain for all news for all reports of the day-for ridiculous incidents and prosperous vices. He consoles all the sorrows, and washes the wounds of our existing society. And then, when all this chaos, all this tumult, and all this disturbance which we are making every moment, has entered his head, he melts it at the fire of his imagination and his soul, and there issues from the discordant elements a metal pure and sonorous. He pursues unity of design through a most bewildering variety.'

Léon Gozlan is a Marseillais, as well as Mery, Louis Reybaud, Eugene Guinot, Amedée Achard, and other bronze-faced and hot-blooded men of letters; and is at present about fiftyseven years of age. His father, a merchant of some standing, intending him for maritime business, sent him at the proper age to a school where the languages spoken on the shores of the Mediterranean were said to be effectively taught. Having received prizes in the Arabic and Greek classes, his father invited a Turkish and a Greek captain to dinner, in order to hear Léon converse with them. After the removal of the soup, the Greek captain asked the young student, in modern Greek, if he had a good appetite; and as he did not give an immediate answer, the Turkish captain inquired, in good Arabic, if he would like to come with him to Constantinople. Poor Léon looked from one to the other, with an air of comic distress about his eyes and open mouth, when his father cried out to him, "Ah, you young scamp! is this the way you have learned Greek and Arabic ?" 'But, papa, it is ancient Greek they teach in college. Many of the modern Greek words are different, and, besides, they don't pronounce them here as they do at Athens." "Well, that may be, but what about the Arabic?" My professor never quitted France; and I suppose he has not taught me the true pronunciation.' Begone, you jackanapes! your teacher is no better than a knave; and as for you,

you must go without your dinner." So poor Léon was put on bread and water the day he was crowned in the college.

He was afterwards sent to a teacher who put more conscience in his instructions; and about the year 1824, he commenced his seafaring experiences, and was left at Gibraltar by a Mexican captain, who had engaged him for a voyage to China. He then joined some cruisers, whose enterprises were confined to the African coast, as far south as Senegal. He saw business in the slave line executed, but is generally supposed to have kept his own hands undefiled by the abominable traffic. He and a comrade were once in danger of death from a group of natives, who, not satisfied with taking their ammunition, would have had their lives into the bargain.

He returned to Marseilles rather poorer than when he left it, and obtained a professorship in the college. A penchant for literature brought him to Paris in 1828, with a manuscript collection of poems, but he could not find a publisher; and, not being able to support himself by his own works, he turned the works of others to account, by taking office as bookseller's assistant. After some time Mery took him in hand, and procured him admission on the staff of the Incorruptible. He afterwards contributed to the Figaro, the Vert Vert, the Corsaire, and other small journals.

When he was about being engaged for the Figaro, Nestor Roqueplan, then editor, thus accosted him: "You are from a land of talent: I am sure you will bring wit and vigour with you. But remember, no one joins us unless provided with a good hatred to something or somebody. If you have no hate of your own, you must borrow one." Gozlan, from his very admission, showed the most decided aptitude for fierce and witty attack. Thoroughly ignorant of fear, he terrified every enemy, and, "instead of an eye for an eye, he generally exacted an eye for a hair."

Sometimes he contented himself with inflicting only a trifling punishment. A spiteful fellow taking occasion to say that he had followed the profession of a pirate, and had even killed his captain; Léon answered, "This gentleman is right enough; but he has stopped short of the full enor

mity. I not only killed the captain, but I ate him into the bargain.'

Gozlan never heartily sympathized with the extreme section of the republicans. A mob of this party once invested the office of the paper to which he was attached for the time, but he and the other working members of the establishment, seizing on all the available arms within their reach, charged the crowd, and put them to ignominious flight. Not content with his success as a satirist, he took to writing novels, romances, and plays, in all which he was successful. His first dramatic piece-"The Right Hand and the Left," being submitted to the ministerial censors, their sharpeyed police sent a copy to London, and the Times decided that the English nation was most shamefully treated by the author. Guizot suspended the performance, and not till large pieces of offensive matter were cut away would he allow a new rehearsal. John Bull, continuing to take offence, a new arrest was made, and not till about a cantel, the third of the whole drama, was cut away, were the public allowed to decide on its merits. All this did not tend to put the Ancien Corsaire in good-humour with Les perfides Anglais.

At the representation of one of his plays, in which he ridiculed some aristocratical pretensions, a claqueur was killed, an old man dragged by the hair over the benches and severely beaten, and fifty persons more or less injured--a sample of the former amenities of the drama among our polite neighbours.

King Louis Philippe was so incensed against Gozlan for his obstinate efforts to destroy the entente cordiale between France and England (this was about 1842), that he most carefully passed over his name in the lists of those presented for decoration by the Cross of the Legion of Honour. Mme. de Girardin (née Delphine Gay) whose soirees were assiduously attended by Gozlan, seized on the Minister Salvandy one day, and infused such enthusiasm into his heart and brain that he repaired at once to the King's

Cabinet, and made his request in due form. "Impossible," was the answer; "M. Gozlan is my enemy." "I was not aware of that, sire," replied the intrepid author of "Alonzo." " 'Henceforward I shall get my list of nominations inspected by the Minister of Police."

However, Gozlan was decorated in the year 1846. As he was awaiting his audience in the antechamber, Roger Beauvoir walked in. "What are you doing there?" said he to Gozlan. "My dear fellow," answered the witty romancer, "I am performing the stations of the Cross."*

However small was the love of Gozlan for the citizen King, he and many other men of the pen had little welcome for the Revolution of 1848, which, for a time, seriously damaged literary speculations. At a reunion of Mme. de Girardin's cotery, being asked what he intended to do with himself, he announced his intention to commence as grocer at the sign of the "Used-up Pen."

In 1849, having providentially survived a visitation of the cholera, he made a tour to recover his strength. Passing through Brussels, he beheld, in a bookseller's window, a richly coloured portrait of himself, in which golden locks and carmine-tinted cheeks presented the jet-black__hair_and bronzed skin of the native Marseillais. In other respects the portrait was true enough. He walked into the shop. "Pray, sir, whose portrait is that in the window ?" Leon Gozlan's, Monsieur." He took off his broad-brimmed hat. 'Look at me, sir; I am Leon Gozlan. I cannot prevent you from pirating my works, but at least leave me my black hair!"

Laurent Jean, one of his intimate friends, was so tired of perpetually hearing "Live the Republic!" that he nearly fell ill of his longing to hear this long life wished for some other person or thing. He thus accosted Gozlan on his departure :—“ Oh, happy mortal!-going to a country where a man may give scope to his enthusiasm. I beg of you to cry out for me, when you are in that Elysium,