OUR CONSERVATORY. * DRAB MORALITY.—It is really a very diffi-, cult thing for a Quaker to be consistent with his own principles; and even the most rigid are often found swallowing them wholesale. For instance, the vain adorning of the person with dress, jewellery, and gold. He considers it a sin to indulge in those things, and yet in his shop he sells them. He makes his money by providing for the sins of his fellow Christians. He deems it a right thing to wear a broad brim to his hat, but he has no scruple about making and selling hats of a fashionable form for his fellow Christians to wear. He would not be so wicked as to dress his servant up in livery, with a gold band, &c., but in the way of business he will do it for another. If the peculiarities' are essential to the salvation of a Quaker, are they not also essential for all Christians? Can it be that 'Friends' sell and deal in those forbidden things, because they think the people of the world' have no chance of salvation at all, and that, therefore, it signifies but little what they indulge in, so that Friends profit by it? * Soon after becoming a housekeeper, I was called on by the tithe collector. Friends annually sum up the amount of all they have lost by this suffering, as they call it; and I was then under the idea that our noble testimony against an hireling ministry was an essential part of all true Christianity, and that our refusal to pay the unholy tax was an acceptable martyrdom in a small way. I had heard much preaching on the subject, and very much self-laudation on the faithfulness of the Society generally, indeed universally, to this our testimony, which so widely separated us from the hirelings of all other creeds. The two men who called on me, for the purpose of collecting the disputed impost, were exceedingly gentle and polite. They saw at a glance that I was an ignoramus, and kindly volunteered to inform me how other Quakers managed; for I had told them that my profession would not allow me to pay tithes, and that if they insisted on forcibly taking away my property, though I would not resist, still I would look on it as actual robbery.-"Did you ever pay tithes, ma'am?" said one of the men.-"Never," I replied.-"Well then, said he, "you are a stranger here, I see; and I'll just tell you how the Bristol Quakers manage, for I'm going about among them for twenty years past, and I am always glad to accommodate them and meet their scruples. The sum you must pay is one guinea; so I will call here tomorrow, at eleven o'clock in the morning, and you just leave on the side-board there some articles of plate-your tea-pot will do very well, or spoons, or whatever you like-then I come and take it away. You don't give it, and so your conscience is clear. You will then return to your Meeting-people, that your tea-pot, worth He ten guineas, was distrained for tithe; and as soon after as you like, you can go to Mr. Jones, the silversmith, and tell him how you lost your tea-pot, and are obliged to buy a new one. will condole with you; and after showing you a variety of new ones to select from, he will hand you your own identical article, and say he can sell you that cheap-say one guinea. You pay your guinea, and get your own safe back again, cleaner and brighter than ever; and, if you like, you can purchase some other little trifling article; for Mr. Jones is a very accommodating man." I was really shocked at the cool proposal of so nefarious and unprincipled a transaction, and indignantly rejected it; declaring, at the same time, my firm belief, that no Quaker would be guilty of so undignified and false an act. The man smiled, and said, "Aye, that is the way they all go on at first; but ma'am, it is a great deal the easiest and best plan in the end;" and then he gave me the names of very many, my own acquaintances, who regularly once a year, as he jocularly said, "allowed Mr. Jones to clean their plate. There is old Mr. R." said he, "has a fine massive silver tea-pot. It is always laid out ready for me; I always give notice before I go; and now, twenty times I have carried it off, and got it brightened for him. He values it at twenty pounds, and his tithe is only one pound ten. And there is young Mr. R. He likes me to get his spoons done for him. He gives so many dinners, he likes to have them bright and new-looking." Seeing me still very incredulous, he said, "Well, ma'am, I won't call on you for a week, to give you time to think about the matter." During that week I went to old Mr. R.'s, and told his daughter that tithes had been demanded of me, but that I had not paid them, and was expecting another visit from the collector. "Oh! yes," said she, "this is just the time they go about. They seized a valuable silver tea-pot from us last week. My father values it at twenty guineas, and the demand in money is only about thirty shillings; but it is a noble testimony we are called on to bear; and I trust our faithfulness will yet be the means of opening the eyes of professing Christians to the nature of a pure, free, gospel ministry. I trust, my young Friend, thou wilt be faithful." She spoke so seriously that I hesitated to say what I intended about Jones's shop, lest the idea that I for a moment could think her or her father capable of such a deed might offend. I then called on young Mrs. R., and mentioned the same thing to her. "They did, indeed," said she, "take our spoons; but my William has managed some way or other to get them back. I can't tell how he manages; but I suppose they are ashamed of taking so much over their demand, and so return them. At any rate, they are sent back beautifully polished; and not only that, but a handsome sugar spoon, with WRITING AND ACTING.-You must know that the people who write shrewdly are often the most easy to impose upon, or have been so. I almost suspect, without however having looked into the matter, that Rochefoucault was a tender lover, a warm friend, and in general a dupe (happy for him!) to the impulses and affections which he would have us imagine he saw through, and had mastered. The simple write shrewdly, but do not describe what they do. And the hard and worldly would be too wise in their generation to write about what they practise, even if they perceived it, which they seldom do, lacking delicacy of imagination.-Companions of my Solitude. So sisters two Are parted now, Quitting the home where both drew breath; To the Prince of Life, HINTS TO FINDERS OF ANTIQUARIAN RELICS.- - Most antiquarian objects are covered with rust-articles of gold alone remain unchanged. Silver usually assumes a blackish tinge. Bronze and copper in peat bogs exhibit a red or blackish tint; while in the earth they become green. Iron is always very much corroded, except in peat bogs. Lead also is oxidized, amber becomes like resin; and glass looks like mother-of-pearl by lying in the earth. Bones become black or brown in bogs, where they are always best preserved. Antiquities should never be cleaned, as they are thereby almost always injured. Still more should the finders be careful not to break them, which ignorant people often do in their eagerness to see if they are gold.-Transactions of the Kilkenny Archaeolo-Once "all the blue bonnets were over the border," gical Society. IMPROMPTU. THE CALECHE. - On seeing young ladies discard the parasol for caleche bonnet covers : An age of reverses and times of disorder, sonnets; Now all the blue borders are over the bonnets. LITERATURE. THE GIRLHOOD OF SHAKSPERE'S HEROINES. By Mary Cowden Clarke. (Smith and Son: Simpkin, Marshall, and Co.)-"Isabella the Votaress," "Ophelia the Rose of Elsinore," and "Katharina and Bianca, the Shrew and the Demure," comprise the recent numbers of this remarkable series, justifying the high expectations which the earlier ones called forth, and proving not only that Mrs. Cowden Clarke is the great Shakspere student of the day, but that she has all the natural original qualities which are requisite to the romance writer. These three tales display more invention, more study of character, and more intricacy of plot than will be found in half-a-dozen novels of average success. We are glad too to see in how brave and womanly a spirit our authoress touches upon all womanly questions; and in "Isabella the Votaress" she finds fit occasion to glance at the darkest of them. Oh, if but a few women of fair fame and deserved repute, holding the strong sceptre of Influence, could be made to think deeply on this subject, and not turn the ear from painful cries, or the mind's eye from tragic contemplation, what Christian work would they find to be done! The "Rose of Elsinore" is among the most subtle of Mrs. Cowden Clarke's powerful delineations, as every careful student of Hamlet will readily allow; while in the "Shrew and the Demure" we have, under the guise of a lively story, more suggestive truths struck out apropos of female education than are generally to be found in a professed treatise on the subject. We subjoin a few extracts descriptive of the school discipline and convent life of the highspirited, warm-hearted Katherina, whose faults are fostered into those of the "Shrew" by mismanagement. Her violence of temperament was smothered; but it was not extinct. Radical cure of a bad passion is not effected by such means. Subjection is not conviction. Fear may induce the show of submission; but through reasoning affection alone, is genuine compliance obtained. Tyranny but inculcates the meanness of hypocrisy-the expediency of apparent yielding. Love only can truly subjugate a haughty spirit. Through love alone and its divine teachings are evil feelings to be eradicated, and virtuous emotions implanted in their stead. There was just now another chance for this little girl to have been redeemed from her defect of disposition; but like the former one, its influence was lost to her. In the chapel belonging to the convent, there hung a picture of the marriage of St. Catherine. It represented the virgin saint kneeling at the feet of the infant Saviour. By her side was the symbol of her martyrdom, the torturing wheel; but her face shone with holy fervour, hope, and extacy, as she bent to receive the ring of espousal from the hand of the sacred Babe, who leaned from his mother's lap to place it upon her finger. First, Katharina | came to regard this picture with curiosity, as being that of her patron saint; then she came to admire it for its great beauty, and the glories of its painting; then she loved to linger near it, and gaze upon it, for the sake of the benign expression upon the maternal smile of the Babe, and for the sake of the happiness she countenance, for the sake of the radiant sweetness in the felt in watching the look of hope, of joy, of heavenly aspiration on the face of the virgin-saint, her namesake. It seemed a comfort, a delight, to let her eyes rest upon so much of tranquil, unearthly gladness as shone there. She felt the turbulent sensations that usually agitated her soul, lulled and soothed, and set at rest, by looking upon this picture. She felt better, as well as happier, while she gazed; and she would often linger behind her companions, when they left the chapel, that she might stay and enjoy the delicious frame of mind into which the contemlike one entranced, forgetful of time; the nuns, her plation of this picture threw her. She would sit schoolfellows, her daily vexations, her petulances, grievances, ill-humours, all and everything, faded from her view; she beheld nothing but the picture felt nothing but the beatitude it inspired. One evening, after vespers, when her schoolfellows had all retired, she remained thus absorbed, and was sitting in her usual trance of delighted contemplation, opposite the picture, when one of the nuns, who had missed her, returned to the chapel in quest of her. "So, you are here, my dear child," said the nun, in the confidential whisper peculiar to her vocation; "neither sister Fidelia, nor sister Brigida, nor sister Lucia, could imagine where you were; and they want you in the school-room; and they sent me to seek you, and to tell you that--" tharina, to whom the whispered chatter of the nun "I wish you wouldn't hiss so," interrupted Ka "And what have you to say?" said Katharina. “Why, I told you before, only you're so pettish you never give yourself time to listen to what's said. They want you in the school-room for evening lessous. "Pshaw! lessons! I was studying better here. I wish they wouldn't disturb me.' Studying? you mean praying, I suppose; chapel isn't the place to study in. Ah, I see! you were preying to your patron saint, blessed Santa Katharina. Only you should kneel to her, and not sit lounging there in your chair, when you pray.” "I wasn't praying," replied she. "What were you doing here, then, child?" "I told you, studying. I was studying that glorious face, to get it by heart. It does me good; and I should like to have it always with me.' "What do you mean, child? Studying a saints face getting it by heart? What bold, heathenish this penance serve to cleanse you of your past sin, ideas! But it's of a picce with your sitting, when and inspire you with better and more fitting you ought to be kneeling before the blessed pic-thoughts for the time. Pax vobiscum, et benedicite, ture." my child!" "It is a blessed picture; but I feel its blessedness better when I'm sitting than when I'm kneeling. My knees get stiff and cramped, and the pain distracts me from the sensation I have of the bless ing of looking upon that face-upon all the faces, for they are all beautiful and blessed." "What a strange way you have of talking, child! Somehow, you shock me with your odd manner of expressing yourself." Katharina did not reply; she was again lost in rapturous contemplation of the picture. 66 Suddenly she said: I have found why the face of the Madonna so delights me. It is just such a kind, gentle, good face as my Aunt Antonia's. It is very like her. It never struck me till this moment; but it is very like her." The nun started; again crossed herself; and exclaimed:" Santissima Madre! What are you saying? It absolutely horrifies me to hear you attach such mundane notions to the picture of our blessed lady. Come, let us leave the chapel. If I hear any more such profanity, I shall have to report you to the Superior." She turned, and beheld the Lady Abbess, standing close at her elbow, with arms folded, and person drawn up to its full height. Confused thoughts of flinging herself against the reverend mother, of upsetting her, and tumbling her headlong down the flight of steps-even a keen sense of the pleasure it would be, to see one so dignified and imperturbable, bundling helplessly over-flashed wildly through the brain of the child; but a second glance at the face and figure of the Superior, sufficed to show even her impetuosity the folly of any such attempt. The shrewd glassy eye, all the more stern for the cold smile with which it gleamed through the quivering half-closed lids; the compressed lips, the set teetli, the folded arms, the firm erect mien, all told the utter futility of hoping to move-either physically or morally-such a woman. She stood thus for some moments, transfixing her with those sharp, slantwise glances, until she seemed satisfied with their effect, and knew that they had gained her the mastery. Then she said, in her even voico:-"I have heard something of this. And so you do not like to be stared at, Katharina Minola? Then you should learn to comport yourself a little less singularly, my child. We will take order that it shall be so. You shall learn to pray before a holy picture, as other people do, not study it; and then perhaps when you affect no singularity, your companions will not be disposed to wonder at you, or stare at you; you will be spared that, my child, if it affront you. I am willing to spare the feelings of all my flock as much as may be, and I expect, in return, that they will not offend me by affecting singularity, which I hold to be a sinful and dangerous vanity." "I don't affect-I hate affectation-I--" stammered Katharina. "Be silent, my child, while I speak," interrupted the Lady Abbess. "In order that you may obtain an insight into your error, and learn to regard that picture in its proper light, I desire you will repeat a thirty days' prayer, together with the seven penitential psalms, upon your knees, morning and evening, fasting, in front of that sacred picture; and may Their brains had remained stunted, while their bodies grew; their characters had been permitted to remain undeveloped; their ideas had been cramped and compressed into shell-baskets and rice-paper boxes; their thoughts had been pinned down to pincushions; their intellects had been put under glass cases with artificial flowers-dwarfed and confined beneath glass lids with waxen effigies, and gilt fillagree; they had never been suffered to entertain an opinion on a subject less flimsy than floss silk, catgut, or gauze; to speculate upon higher subjects than paste, wire, and gum; or to exercise their invention upon things of graver weight than feathers of greater moment than spangles, foil, and tinsel. In all, save increased dexterity of finger, they were veriest babies still. * * * * * The same rivalry went on between the two convents year after year. The school conducted by the Ladies of the Holy Petticoat maintained its preeminence as a fashionable seminary; while that under the superintendence of the Sisters of Humility was still cited for its strict discipline, its propriety, and its excellent system. Many particulars of this system became known to the rival school, by the secession of one of the young-lady boarders, who coaxed her guardian into letting her come over to the milder and more modish establishment. She was received with delight by her new schoolfellows. Her acquisition was matter of triumph. Her stories of the community she had left were devoured with avidity. She was urged, encouraged, courted, to relate every petty minutia concerning it. They dwelt, with the pertinacious interest of little minds, upon the most insignificant details; and seemed never weary of hearing and canvassing the most trivial circumstances. The appetite for gossip, induced by paucity of food of a higher kind, is as craving as it is irrational. It increases in proportion as it is gratified. It seems absolutely insatiate. No amount of gossip suffices your gossip-lover. No amount of the aliment-frothy in itself, to be surewill produce repletion. A true gossip-lover will gorge it with hungry eagerness-with an evergaping maw, that only such fictitious appetites know. The appetite for gossip is a morbid taste, one of those unwholesome, unnatural relishes-such as the fancy for crunching slate-pencil, green gooseberries, cabbage-stump, and raw turnips-very apt to grow upon ill-regulated school-girls; and almost sure to be engendered by frivolous instruction, a teaching of handiworks rather than of ideasinsufficient mental culture. Give a girl silly things to do and to think of-occupy her fingers, and leave her mind unsupplied-and the natural conse quence is, inanity, with its almost universal concomitant, an inordinate love of gossip. is AMUSEMENTS OF THE HER MAJESTY'S THEATRE. ΜΟΝΤΗ. and Stranger," which has afforded Miss Louisa On the 5th ultimo the Queen's state visit took place, Her Majesty having commanded Thalberg's new opera Florinda for the occasion. The magnificence of the royal box, the enthusiasm with which our beloved sovereign was received, and the grace with which she responded to these cordial greetings, have been so widely proclaimed that we will not repeat the story. Florinda; or, the Moors in Spain," is founded on the well-known story of Count Julian and "On the eve of the jubilee of a Suabian village his Daughter; and M. Thalberg was fortunate Mayor (Mr. Lambert), his long absent son Herrin selecting so romantic a theme-none the mann (Mr. Donald King) coines home from the worse for his purpose for being well known-wars in disguise, intending to increase the joy of the for the subject of his opera. Our space forbids us to enter on minute details, but we may observe that he has established his claim to rank as a composer of second-rate eminence at lowest. Supported as it has been by the singing and acting of Cruvelli, Lablache, Sims Reeves, and Calzolari, the opera may be considered to have been quite successful. Numerous extra nights have been given at this theatre, and a corps of Spanish dancers, who have lately created quite a sensation in Paris, have attracted some curiosity; Masaniello," "Le Nozze di Figaro," and other established favourites have been given, and Alboni-the queen of the contralti-and the vocalist of all but universal power, has made her re-entrée in the "Cenerentola," singing, if it were possible, with richer voice and finer taste than ever. 66 ROYAL ITALIAN OPERA. Her Majesty has also visited the Royal Italian Opera in state, selecting Mozart's exquisite opera, "Il Flauto Magico" for performance. It is strange that music so excellent, and in its detached airs so well known and appreciated, should be so rarely produced in its complete form. Yet the "Flauto Magico" afforded another triumph to the Covent Garden management, and what a combination of talent did it command! Madame Viardot, Grisi, Mademoiselle Zerr, and Mario, Ronconi, and Formes. "Le Prophète" has also been repeated, with Viardot and Mario as great in it as ever; and the "Huguenots" and "Norma" have afforded Grisi her accustomed ovations, and been produced with all the completeness for which Covent Garden is remarkable. The new grand opera of "Sappho," by the new French composer, M. Gournod, is, as we write, announced to be in rehearsal. HAYMARKET. revel by a surprise. On that same evening, how- When the evening bells are chiming.' In all these the effect and the character are equal to the intrinsic beauty of the music. Then, for more dramatic pieces, we may cite the duct betwixt the which is full of life and animation-the second tertwo women-the capital terzet, O how wilt thou,' zett, as true a piece of comic scolding and cajolery rivals under Lisbeth's window, with the droning cry of the village German watchman, employed in caricature to interrupt the serenade. More adroitly managed and hearty fun in music than this scene presents does not exist in opera. The least, no less than the longest, of the above pieces is finished with the solicitude of a true and ripe artist; and we have specified enough, it will be owned, to make the fortune of a three-not a one-act drama. The work is lightly scored; but with grace, variety, and p'quancy." as ever Cimarosa wrote-and the scene betwixt the OLYMPIC. Mr. Webster has been indefatigable in pro- Miss Helen Faucit has been acting here for a viding the town with theatrical amusement. few nights, appearing, among others, in her Not only has he lately re-introduced the Ame- favourite characters Pauline (of which she was rican actor, Hackett-who has been playing with the original) and Juliet. How it is that she has his clever compatriot, Mr. Davenport, in the not a permanent engagement in London we do "Merry Wives of Windsor," but we have had not understand; these occasional performances a laughable original farce, entitled "Grimshaw, only serving to remind us how completely she Bradshaw, and Bagshaw;" and last not least, a is unrivalled-how distinctly she must be proone-act operetta of Mendelssohn, entitled "Sonnounced the first of our tragic actresses. |