mon appearance, having the short, stout frame, which predicted the death he died. He never could comprehend business, even of the simplest nature, and at times confiding as a child, he was at others suspicious past all conception, Joined one day by a friend, in his hotel at Lyons, he was found in a state of great agitation, exclaiming he would marry directly, and his motive for a sudden resolution, not at all compatible with his ideas of freedom, was, that he had been robbed, that a wife would make a list and take care of his linen. His friend asked "what he had lost?" but this he did not know he missed nothing-his portmanteau felt lighter; the imaginary difference of weight was to him convincing, and as nothing farther could be found to prove the theft, so all arguments failed to show it had not been committed. Driving away all melancholy ideas, he fled the society of men of his own standing, frequenting that of the young, who often laughed at him, since his manner and conversation agreed so ill with his age and appearance. In his publications he was careless beyond belief.

The

first part of the "Abbesse de Castro" printed, his publisher sent for the conclusion;-it was lost, and what was worse, forgotten. Beyle wrote it a second time; when it was before the public, finding the other, which seemed to his sorrow the best. His volumes are crowded with typographical mistakes, since, fearing the sound of his feigned name, perhaps, lest a hiss should mingle with it, he escaped from proof-sheets and printers to distant hiding-places. He averred that he made use of these imaginary signatures to put at fault the police of Europe; persuaded that it was always on his track, and seeing spies everywhere. One of the despairs of his life arose from his belief that some rival in a lady's favour had made him, in 1820, pass for a secret agent of France. He had some real friends, who clung to him through life-but they were few. He did not resist a jest or a sarcasm, and they fell away before them. He wrote his life, year by year, with suppositious names and false dates of place and time; the journal of 1805 (never published) contains a circumstantial detail of his love for Madame D--; the commence

He

"To console himself for the misfortune of selling his horses, May, 1814, Monsieur Darlincourt wrote the life of Haydn, Mozart, and Metastasio. was really present at Haydn's funeral at Vienna, in 1809-he went with Monsieur Denon. This first work is imitated in part from an Italian biography of Haydn, and was translated into English.

In 1817, Monsieur Darlincourt published two volumes of the History of Painting in Italy,' which had no success, and cost him four thousand franes at Didot's. At this time, Monsieur Darlincourt did not even know the advantages of camaraderie,' he would have held them in horror. A friend inserted in the 'Debats' an article in praise of the History of Painting in Italy;' the next day the same newspaper retracted it. The two volumes were the fruit of three years' study; the Picturesque History of Florence' was written in Florence; that of Rome' in Rome, and so elsewhere.

"In 1817, Monsieur Darlincourt published 'Rome,' 'Naples,' and 'Florence;' the manuscript had been written for his friends, and with no idea of printing. It was successful; and the History of Painting,' copied and recopied seventeen times, was read by nobody.

"In 1822, Monsieur Darlincourt, still a stranger to intrigue, had great trouble in finding a bookseller who would charge himself gratuitously with the manuscript of l'Amour.' This bookseller said to him, at the end of the month-' Your book, sir, is like the psalms of Monsieur de Pompignan, of which it was said"Sacred they are, for no one touches them."

"In 1830, Rouge et Noir,' and some articles in the reviews, with signatures dictated by prudence; a notice on Lord Byron in the work of Madame Belloc."

The contradiction in the "Debats" we understand to have been inserted by Beyle himself-the unsold edition of "l'Amour" went as ballast in a vessel to America. Beyle's distaste to his own country is no where more strongly marked than in these volumes, "De l'Amour," which, treating of many subjects beside, contain some of his best as well as his feeblest pages. The process of falling in love he chooses, most originally, to compare to the flinging a dead branch into the depths of the mines of Saltzbourg; in the course of some time you may draw it forth so covered with crystallizations that the primitive bough cannot be recognised. In this manner the image of lady or gentleman lodged in the brain becomes invested with all manner of sparkling perfections, belonging not to itself, but its dwelling-place. He goes on to consider gravely this natural phenomenon, which he denominates crystallization. He denies to France the existence of love as a passion, as he has elsewhere denied her genius, conceding more kindness and talent, generally diffused, than elsewhere. From among his serious or witty pages we extract a part of his judgment pronounced on his countrymen. That he knew them well, they will not deny; he has treated them severely. His view of them is that of a face in a magnifying mirror, where the defects which really exist are made so prominent as to become unnatural, and the charm which neutralizes them disappears in their shadow.

"The tone of good society is, to treat all serious interests with irony. For a Frenchman to be seen admiring, that is to say, inferior, not only to what he admires (that might pass), but also to his neighbour, if that neighbour should choose to sneer, is a situation against nature. A Frenchman believes himself the most unhappy of men, and ridiculous besides, if obliged to pass his time alone. Where is passion without solitude? An impassioned man thinks only of himself, a vain one only of others, the neighbour is all in all to him. It is easy to understand what effect habits of mind (which, to speak truth, are losing strength daily), but will

cling to the French at least a century more, must exercise on the passions. I think I see a man throwing himself out of the window, and trying all the while to arrange a graceful posture wherewithal to arrive on the pavement. The happiness of Italy, as also to a certain degree that of England and Germany, consists in following the inspiration of the moment: in France, a man asks himself, What idea will my neighbour form of my happiness?' That caused by feeling cannot be an object of vanity, because invisible; and therefore France is the country of the world in which there are fewest love matches.'

Farther on we find an essay on female education as it exists in France; with most of the opinions we cannot but coincide. Deploring ignorance, he deprecates authorship in women. We may think with him, chiefly because the time of a women who has a family may be spent far better. Those who depreciate women, and would prove their inferiority by that of their productions in art or science, may, perhaps forget, besides the disadvantages of their youth, how much talent may go to a far more important work, and how many men of merit may have been made, or confirmed such, by the early bent given to the mind by a clever mother.

66

"By the education now given," says Beyle, we leave idle their best faculties, those which would produce most happiness to them and to ourselves. It should be remembered, that in case of the husband's death, they are called on to govern a young family, and give their male children (the young tyrants of the future) that first training which forms the character and teaches to seek happiness, by such a route, rather than by such another-a settled thing at four or five. If the change I would require demands several centuries, it is because by an unhappy fatality, all first experiments necessarily contradict the truth. Enlighten a young girl's mind, form her character, give her, in short, a good education in the true sense of the word, sooner or later, feeling her superiority over other women, she becomes a pedant, that is to say, the most disagreeable of beings. There are none of you who would not prefer a servant to a learned wife. Plant a young tree in the midst of a close forest, its neighbours, depriving it of air and sun, its leaves will be sickly and pale-it will take an ungraceful form which is not

that of nature; the whole forest must be planted at once. Where is the woman proud of knowing how to read? For two thousand years pedants have repeated to us that women have livelier wit, and men more solidity of judgment; that women have more delicacy of idea, and men more power of attention. A Paris citizen walking in the gardens of Versailles likewise concluded from all he saw that trees grew shorn.

"A woman of thirty, in France, has not the acquired knowledge of a boy of fifteen, nor a woman of fifty the practical sense of a man of five and twenty. It is said that if women read with pleasure the ten or twelve good volumes which come out yearly in Europe they will abandon the care of their children. It is as though we feared by planting trees on the sea shore to impede the motion of the waves. During the last four hundred years the same objection has been made to all kinds of education; and not only now, in 1820, is a Parisian woman more virtuous than she was in 1720, the time of the Regent and the system of Law, but the daughter of the richest 'fermier general' of that time received an education inferior to that of the humblest lawyer of our day. Are household affairs less cared for? Certainly not, since poverty, illness, shame, instinct, force to their fulfilment. We might as well say of an officer, becoming too agreeable, that he will soon not know how to ride, forgetting he will break his arm the first time he takes that liberty. The acquisition of ideas produces on both sexes the same good and evil effects-vanity will never be wanting even in a complete absence of all that justifies it. See the inhabitants of a little town. The half witted, led on by the revolution, which changes every thing in France, have confessed within twenty years that women may do something, but that they should choose occupations fitted to their sex, such as, rearing flowers, forming a herbal, or hatching canary birds-what are called innocent pleasures. Could we seriously require that Madame Roland or Mistress Hutchinson should spend their time in rearing a rose tree? You say, Women would be the rivals of men, not their companions.' Not till you have suppressed love by an edict. The desire of pleasing will for ever place modesty, delicacy, all feminine graces beyond the reach of education. It is as though you feared to teach nightingales not to sing in spring time. The grace of women does not belong to their ignorance. See the worthy spouses of your village citizens, or the wives of rich English shopkeepers. 'A woman VOL. XXII-No. 130.

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should never make herself talked of.' I reply again, where is one cited because she can read? and what prevents them from concealing the study which makes their habitual occupation, and each day furnishes them with a reasonable ratio of happiness? There is none without labour; and perhaps fifty thousand women in France are dispensed from all labour by their fortunes. The true sphere for a woman is a sick chamber.' Do you reckon on obtaining from Divine Goodness a multiplication of diseases that our women may be occupied? You would make a woman an author.' Exactly as you propose that your daughter should be an opera singer when she takes music lessons. If a woman writes it should be some work to be published after her death; to publish under fifty, is to place her happiness on the most terrible of lotteries; if she have a lover, she will commence by losing him. The present female education, being the greatest absurdity of modern Europe, a woman rises in value according as she is wanting in it. In the two sexes the fate of old age depends on the employment of youth; this is earlier felt by women. How is one of forty-five received in society? Judged severely, and beneath her merit; flattered at twentyabandoned at forty. Where is the man happy enough to be able to communicate his thoughts as they rise to the woman with whom he passes his life? He finds a kind heart which shares his griefs; but he is always obliged to put his ideas in small change if he means to be understood, and it would be ridiculous to expect reasonable advice from an understanding which, to seize objects, must have them subjected to such a regimen. She, who according to received ideas is most perfect, leaves her partner isolated in the dangers of life, and soon risks to weary him. One of the highest prerogatives of talent is, that it brings honour to old age. As to women, poor things, as soon as they have lost the brilliancy of youth, their sole and mournful happiness lies in their power of deceiving themselves as to the place they fill in society. The remains of youthful accomplishments are merely ludicrous; it would be happy for them to die at fifty. I would give to young girls, as far as possible, the same education as to boys. I would have them learn Latin, history, and mathematics, the knowledge of plants useful for food or cure, logic, and moral sciences. The more sense acquired, the more it becomes obvious that justice is the only road to felicity. Genius is a power, but still more is it a flambeau to light to the great art of being happy."

2 E

In all Beyle's works he reproduces his theory of happiness, the same idea recurring to contrast France, where men are happy and unhappy only through vanity, therefore inapt for the fine arts, and incapable of enthusiasm, with a country where vanity is excluded by passion. We do not agree with him in admiring energy for its own sake; it needs an admirable cause, or it tends to excesses, as in the misruled and unenlightened land where the only uncommon violence seems to be suicide. We confess, notwithstanding Beyle's epigrams, that when he asserts that we may find during an evening passed in a Paris drawing-room, two or three new ideas, but not one absorbing passion, and exactly the reverse in Italy, we think the advantage on the side of France. We see him inclined to excuse a bad government, because "more favourable to this very energy than the wiser rule of England and France;" in short, he will pardon any thing on the plea of its being an introduction to the fine arts, "which live," he says, " on the passions." He seems to forget that ill effects, working on the mass, and the stimulus on the few, it would be unsafe to form or avoid a legislation on the chance of reproducing Benvenuto Cellini or Salvator Rosa.

Ere we lay down the volumes "De l'Amour," we may extract from them a circumstance of which Beyle was witness during his soldier-life. It will serve to show how little charm he found in his theory when he saw it put in practice.

"In Piedmont (he writes) I became the involuntary witness of a fact nearly similar, but at the time I was ignorant of the details which afterwards came to my knowledge. I was sent with five and twenty dragoons to the woods which skirt the Sesia, to put a stop to some smuggling practices carried on there. Arriving at nightfall in this wild and deserted place, I perceived among the trees, what I believed to be the ruins of a chateau, but approaching, I saw to my surprise that it was inhabited. I found there a nobleman, its owner, a man about forty years old, who was six feet high, and had a sinister expression of countenance. He yielded me two rooms, murmuring at the necessity. I was fond of music, and used to practise there with my marechal des logis. Several days had passed ere we discovered that our

host kept guard over a woman, whom in jest we called Camilla, little suspecting the terrible truth. She died in six weeks. A melancholy curiosity led me to see her in her coffin. I paid a monk who watched by her corpse, and at midnight, under pretext of sprinkling it with holy water, he conducted me into the chapel. I found one of those superb heads which are beautiful even in death. The nose was finely formed, and the contour of countenance had something noble and tender which I shall never forget. I quitted the fatal place; but five years after, a detachment of my regiment accompanying the emperor to his coronation as king of Italy, the whole story was told to me. The jealous husband, Count

had found one

morning, suspended above his wife's bed, an English watch belonging to a young man who lived in the little town they then inhabited. That same day he removed her to the ruined house in the midst of the woods of Sesia. He never pronounced a word in her presence, but in answer to her prayers held forth coldly and silently the little watch which he always wore. He passed in this manner nearly three years alone with her. She died at last of despair, in the very flower of her age. Her husband attempted to stab the owner of the watch-missed him, and went to Genoa-embarked there, and was never heard of again. His heirs divided his property."

The Life of Rossini," which was, as Beyle wrote, his only work at once favourably received in good society, had beside its merit as musical criticism, that of being an exceedingly amusing biography. It was written when Rossini's fame was at the highest, and deserved confidence, as Beyle says in his preface, because its author had inhabited, eight or ten years, the towns where Rossini's operas were composed and played. Besides, he knew him personally. With his usual sneer at his countrymen, he adds, that the book had been written for England, but a school for music he saw near the Place Beauveau had given its author the audacity to publish in France. As in his volumes "De l'Amour" he had denied it to his countrymen, so in these he asserts their incapacity to feel music, still from the same causes. says that one only class in France, as if to console national dignity, has remained so motionless that it may proudly decline the fatal weathercock which crowns many heads-the public of the opera! We read with pleasure

He

his History of Music in Italy, the comparison admirably drawn between Cimarosa, Mozart, and Rossini-deploring however the love of paradox which makes him find resemblance between the productions of Mozart and Raphael, Rossini and Voltaire, afterwards of Rossini and Walter Scott.

Beyle explains the musical superiority of Italy. The following remarks are amusingly interspersed with his judgment of England and France.

"In France the painter and the musician find the place of all the passions filled by the fear of being wanting in propriety, or by the project of issuing forth a happy calembourg. In England pride and religion present themselves as foes to the fine arts. The passions in the upper classes are kept down by the suffering timidity, which is but one of the forms of pride, and are extinguished elsewhere by the horrible necessity of consecrating fifteen hours of each day to some close and severe toil, on pain of wanting bread and dying in the street. In Italy the child is nursed to music-not exactly that of Malbrook. Beneath a burning sky, a pitiless tyranny, joy or despair are more naturally expressed by song than in a letter. Conversation turns only on music-men dare have an opinion, and express it warmly and frankly, only on music. They read and write but one thing-satirical sonnets in the dialect of their province, against the governor of the town; and the governor at the first opportunity sends to prison all the poets of the place. This is true to the letter. I could write fifty names, if prudence permitted me. To recite the burlesque sonnet which ridicules the governor or the sovereign, is much less dangerous than to discuss a political principle or a trait of history. The abbé, who holds the office of spy, being of the drollest ignorance, if he repeat to the head of the police-generally a clever man, and a renegade from the liberal party-any piece of reasoning which can stand alone, and has an appearance of common sense, it is evident to the police that the spy is not guilty of calumny. The prefet sends for you, and says gravely-You declare war against my master's govern ment, they fish ideas in what you say.' To recite the satirical sonnet in fashion is, on the contrary, a sin of which all may be guilty, or any be accused calumniously it does not pass the known powers of the spy.'

The avoidance of what may by possibility be considered an allusion is

amusingly shown in the following anec dote :

"I was, some years since (in 1816), in one of the largest towns in Lombardy, where some rich amateurs had got up a theatre with all possible luxury, and purposed to celebrate the arrival of the Princess Beatrice of Este, mother-inlaw to the Emperor Francis. They had composed a new opera in her honour, words and music, this being the greatest compliment which can be offered in Italy. The poet arranged for the purpose Goldoni's comedy of Torquato Tasso. The very eve of the performance, the princess's chamberlain came to signify to the distinguished citizens who held it an honour to sing before her, that it would be disrespectful to mention in the presence of a princess of the house of Este the name of Tasso, a man who had ill-conducted himself towards her illustrious family. No one was surprised, and Lope de Vega's name replaced that of Tasso."

Successful from his outset, Rossini was favoured by circumstances as well as genius. Mozart, little known, was less appreciated; Paisiello was still living, but grown old and long since silent. The death of Cimarosa, the Venetian favourite (the consequence of his imprisonment in 1801) left the field open to him.

Born at Pesaro, on the gulf of Venice, his father was a poor third-class player on the French horn, of those who frequent fairs to gain a livelihood. His mother had been a beauty, and was a passable seconda donna. They went from company to company, and from town to town, the husband performing in the orchestra, the wife on the stage. They were very poor; but at Pesaro, the little town on the seashore, they lived cheaply, and were neither sad nor anxious concerning the future. At seven years old, little Joachino already earned a few Pauls by singing in the churches, and was caressed for his beauty. At ten he was chosen to conduct an orchestra at Bologna for the performance of Haydn's Creation and Four Seasons. When his parents had no engagement they returned to inhabit their poor little house at Pesaro. Joachino was patronized by some kind amateur, who sent him to Venice, where success at once attended him. At this time he was only sixteen. His early operas, says Beyle, have the defects of his