timid whiting makes its debut upon our tables. Normandy gathers in its vintage by threshing the trees, and the apple, that unlimited Proteus, begins to embellish our desserts."

In his dedication to the intestines, that the author designates as his "illustrious brethren," he congratulates them on their happy indifference to the revolutions of empires, since, although a thousand constitutions may perish, they will always belong to the party which dines. Smitten, as he proceeds, with a patriotic and gastronomic enthusiasm, he eloquently exclaims :

"May the more solid glory of the table succeed to the vaingloriousness of arms! May all parties become reconciled, glass in hand, and deposit their animosities upon the sideboard, the altar of Comus! May your example, in short, give birth to a new kind of emulation in the assembly of which you form the most honourable portion, converting it, if we may thus speak, into a vast stomach, and changing the chamber of deliberation into an immense dining-room, wherein the present eloquent and useless discussions may be succeeded by jovial conversation, bacchanalian songs, the tinkling of glasses, and that sweet and gastronomic fraternity, which knows no other rivalry than that of the stomach, no other distinctions than those of the appetite, and which may finally propagate throughout Europe this salutary maxim-that there is nothing true in the world but the kitchen, nothing really useful but mastication."

The next chapter, which is perhaps the most profound and argumentative in the whole work, has for its subject" The accordance between epicurism and the representative system;" and is discussed with an acumen which renders it doubtful whether the author be more distinguished for the clearness of his head or the delicacy of his palate. It has been generally thought, he observes, that we pronounce the highest praise of the representative system when we say that it is founded upon opinion; but we should much better appreciate the nature of things by maintaining that, if this be the best possible mode of government, it is because it is founded upon the eternal basis of epicurism; and he most earnestly intreats that he may be acquitted of all attempts at pleasantry in advocating this doctrine. It will be difficult to find any law, any public act, any important measure which has not had a dinner for its basis.

"The road along which a law travels from its origin and successive formation up to the time of its promulgation, is (so to speak) watered with Champagne, bordered with Strasburg pies, and turkeys stuffed with truffles; and in fairly considering the influence which these delicious viands have exercised over every stage of the bill, we arrive at the inevitable conclusion that they are, in fact, the first, the most eloquent, and almost the sole legislators. Every thing is, has been, or is to be epicurean in a constitutional

state."

This dictum our author follows up by a variety of ingenious illustrations, and in our opinion completely establishes his point. Nor are we less disposed to admit his position, that in this age of clubs and good cheer, no aspirant to literary celebrity can hope to succeed, unless he have propitiated his bookseller, and ingratiated himself with the public, by being enrolled a member of some dining association.

"Read the history of representative government," says M. Perigord, in conclusion," and tell me whether there was ever an insurrection without a dinner, or a dry conspiracy: not to feast one's accomplices has been always

deemed the height of imprudence; fidelity wavers when the gullet is dry. If, finally, I may compare the state to a great car, I should say that the kitchen artist is its driver, and epicurism the shafts."

From a minute and most interesting account of the author's personal habits we shall only extract his notions upon the subject of dinner when he is quite alone, which will be found rational and moderate.

"To eat things hot is a principle of gastronomy as well as of health. I am always served dish by dish. In general I consider myself to have dined badly when I have not had a substantial dish of meat, one of fish, one of game, one of poultry, and, above all, a ragout with truffles. These different sorts of viands are as necessary to a dinner as the three unities to a tragedy. They form the minimum of a dinner for one person. Rien ne doit deranger l'honnête homme qui dine.' My door is so inflexibly shut at this period that the king himself would not be admitted. This meal seldom lasts more than three or four hours when I am alone, six hours when I receive company.”

It might have been expected that so vigorous and resolute a feeder at this hour, would be rather ethereal and cameleonish at breakfast; but, on the contrary, we find him a zealous advocate for a substantial dejeuner à la fourchette. With a somewhat indecorous energy he exclaims :

"As it is in the very nature of mankind to abuse the best things, they have even dared to attack the noble and philanthropic institution of the dejeuner à la fourchette. Horrible blasphemies have been uttered upon this subject by melancholy stomachs, cacochymical doctors, and literati without conscience, who pretend that solid nourishment paralyses the imagination, clogs the senses, offuscates the intellect. A man who has substantially breakfasted is worth two drinkers of tea and coffee. He has more shrewdness, activity, energy; his perceptions have greater clearness and audacity; and many a speculator, whom a single operation at the Stock Exchange has enriched, has only owed his fortune to his boldness, and his boldness to his breakfast."

In these days of nocturnal dinners we certainly opine that a certain solidity of breakfast is "haud omninò spernendus ;" and at a time when every body is a jobber, or candidate for sudden wealth from stocks or mines, pearl fisheries, or South Sea bubbles, our author could scarcely have advanced a more winning argument in favour of the dejeuner à la fourchette than that with which we concluded our last extract. He would be delighted to learn the progress we are making in England when a single entertainment of this sort, given last autumn by a wealthy dame at Kentish Town, is said to have cost little less than five thousand pounds.

The next chapter of the work is a learned Treatise upon Dinner; but as the gastronomic M. de Perigord himself characterises this meal as by far the most important of the daily drama of Epicurism, we cannot discuss it at the close of an article, and therefore respectfully invite our readers to dine with us on the first of next month.

THE PARTING SONG.*

A YOUTH went forth to exile, from a home
Such as to early thought gives images,

The longest treasured, and most oft recall'd,
And brightest kept, of Love. A nountain-home,
Which, with the murmur of the rocking pines,
And sounding waters, first in childhood's heart
Wakes the deep sense of Nature unto joy,
And half unconscious prayer. A Grecian home,
With the transparence of blue skies o'erhung,
And, through the dimness of its olive shades,
Catching the flash of fountains, and the gleam
Of shining pillars from the Fanes of old.

-And this was what he left!-Yet many leave
Far more:-the glistening eye that first from theirs
Call'd out the soul's bright smile; the gentle hand,
Which through the sunshine led forth infant steps
To where the violets lay; the tender voice,
That earliest taught them what deep melody
Lives in Affection's tones.-He left not these.
-Happy are they that weep fresh tears to part
With all a mother's love!-a bitterer grief
Was his-to part unloved!—of her unloved
That should have breathed upon his heart, like Spring
Fostering its young faint flowers.

-Yet had he friends,
And they went forth to cheer him on his way
Unto the parting spot ;-and she too went,
That mother, tearless for her youngest-born!

The parting spot was reach'd :—a lone deep glen,
Holy, perchance, of yore, for Cave and Fount
Were there, and plaintive Echoes; and above,
The silence of the blue, clear, upper heaven,
Hung round the crags of Pindus, where they wore
Their crowning snows.-Upon a rock he sprung,
The unbeloved one, for his home to gaze,
Through the wild laurels, back. But then a light
Broke on the stern proud sadness of his eye,
A sudden quivering light, and from his lips
A burst of passionate song

"Farewell, farewell!

I hear thee, O thou rushing stream! thou 'rt from my native dell,
Thou 'rt bearing thence a mournful sound, a murmur of Farewell!
And fare thee well-flow on, my stream !-flow on, thou bright and free!
I do but dream that in thy voice one tone laments for me.
But I have been a thing unloved, from childhood's loving years,
And therefore turns my soul to thee-for thou hast known my tears!
The mountains, and the caves, and thou, my secret tears have known;
The woods can tell where he hath wept, that ever wept alone!

"I see thee once again, my home!-thou 'rt there amidst thy vines,
And clear upon thy gleaming roof the light of summer shines.
It is a joyous hour when Eve breathes whispering through thy groves,
The hour that brings the son from toil, the hour the mother loves!

For the tale on which this piece is founded, as well as for some interesting particulars respecting the extempore parting songs, or songs of expatriation, of the Modern Greeks, see Fauriel's Chansons Populaires de la Grèce Moderne, p. 30. 32,

33.

The hour the mother loves!-for me beloved it hath not been,
Yet ever in its purple smile thou smil'st, a blessed scene!

A scene whose beauty o'er my soul through distant years will come;
Yet what but as the Dead to thee shall I be then, my home?
"Not as the Dead !-no, not the Dead!-we speak of them, we keep
Their names, like light that must not fade, within our bosoms deep!
We hallow ev'n the lyre they touch'd, we love the lay they sung,
e pass with softer step the place they fill'd, our band among!
But I depart like sounds, like dews, like aught that leaves on earth
No trace of sorrow or delight, no memory of its birth!

We

I go !-the echo of the rocks a thousand songs may swell,
When mine is a forgotten voice-woods, mountains, home, farewell !
"And farewell, mother!-I have borne in lonely silence long,
But now the current of my soul grows passionate and strong!
And I will speak, though but the winds that wander through the sky,
And but the dark, deep-rustling pines, and rolling streams reply !
Yes, I will speak!-within my breast whate'er hath seem'd to be,
There lay a hidden fount of love, that would have gush'd for thee!
Brightly it would have gush'd; but thou, my mother! thou hast thrown
Back on the forests and the wilds, what should have been thine own!
"Then fare thee well! I leave thee not in loneliness to pine,
Since thou hast sons of statelier mien and fairer brow than mine!
Forgive me that thou couldst not love !-it may be, that a tone
Yet, from my burning heart may pierce through thine, when I am gone!
And thou perchance may'st weep for him, on whom thou ne'er hast
smiled,

And the grave give his birthright back to thy neglected child!
-Might but my spirit then return, and midst its kindred dwell,

And quench its thirst with Love's free tears!—'tis all a dream-farewell!" "Farewell!”—the Echo died with that deep word,

Yet died not so the late repentant pang,

By the strain quicken'd in the mother's breast!
-There had pass'd many changes o'er her brow,
And cheek, and eye, but into one bright flood
Of tears, at last all melted; and she fell
On the glad bosom of her child, and cried
"Return, return, my son !"-the Echo caught
A lovelier sound than song, and woke again,
Answering-" Return, my son !"

F. H.

LIVING FRENCH POETS.-NO. IV.

Pierre Antoine Le Brun, &c.

It would be very difficult to select one from among the living French dramatic writers, to rank with those poets whom we have already noticed, were the choice to be influenced by considerations of mere poetical talent as confined to the stage. There is at this moment in France a number of authors whose powers are in full and constant display, and whose merits are so nicely balanced, as to make the choice of any in exclusion of the others an act of considerable injustice, were we not guided by reasons distinct from those which apply to several of M. Le Brun's successful contemporaries, and which will be developed as we go on.

National causes, which have been frequently explained, have at all

times turned the chief products of French poetry into theatrical channels. All the first-rate versifiers, with the exception of Boileau, La Fontaine, and one or two more, have founded their fame on playwriting, and have thus done serious injury to their drama, inasmuch as poetry, instead of passion, thereby became its chief ingredient; and great must be the merit of that poetry, let us think of it as we may, that could tame down into cool criticism, and satisfy with des beaux vers, the turbulent delight of the most theatrical nation in Europe. This point, although not proving much taste either in the people or the poets, seems generally misunderstood by English critics, when it is made a subject of exclusive reproach without any admission of praise; for it is clear that if the nation suffers itself to be dazzled by a minor dramatic merit, it at least must be considerable, to produce such an effect. After all that has been written in this country on the subject of French poetry, it would be vain to enter into an examination of it as opposed to our own or that of other nations. The merits of almost all things must certainly be judged by comparison. But among the exceptions is assuredly that poetry, the chief beauties of which avowedly lie in difficulties of construction, and to feel which a peculiar tact must be acquired, which the mass of foreigners never can possess. A few individuals of other countries may from long habit catch, as it were, this new sense, and be able to appreciate French versification, but in nine cases out of ten they would lose the relish for that of their own nation; and to judge of the former, in all its measured movements, by an ear familiar with the accented melody of English rhythm, would be, generally speaking, as impossible as to learn the science of fortification by the rules of musical composition. The feelings and habits which lead the two nations to their respective modes of poetical taste are utterly distinct, indefinable, and incapable of being blended together. It is therefore as useless, we conscientiously believe, to spend the breath of criticism on this subject, as it would be to turn the powers of chemistry to the vain attempt of forming a fusion between metals which are not susceptible of it by nature. We are not, however, to jump to a conclusion not warranted by the premises, and say that the boasted beauties of French poetry are merely imaginary, because we cannot comprehend them. We may, on the contrary, be certain that there is a charm, and a very powerful one, although for our particular parts we may not be conjurors enough to analyse it.

But, however dull our ears may be to the delicacies of the poetry, we may be fully capable of understanding the merits or demerits of the poet distinct from niceties of style. We can judge amply of his thoughts, his images, and touches of nature, although we may not seize upon the charms of their expression; and there is one defect of the standard dramatic writers of France too obvious for escape-that is, their constant effort to mingle the epic with the dramatic style, and by engrafting the pomp and declamation of the former upon the brevity and pith which are the soul of the latter, misplacing the one while overloading the other. That seems to be, after all, the most flagrant fault of French tragedy and French tragic writers. Their best poets, perceiving that the weakness of their versification was unable of itself to command the heart and lead the mind in epic productions, were forced