would have been followed with a sort of reverence. But a writer of humour would have discovered elements of burlesque in the legend. He would have considered what the female nature is in all times and ages, and how, assuming the change of the statue into a living person to have taken place, the ordinary weaknesses and caprices of the woman would have broken out. From this basis might be then conveyed a sly doubt as to the genuineness of the metamorphosis itself. In short, this would be the same "note" as is struck in the "Belle Hélène," where the old pagan priest of the temple is heard asking "if the man had sent home the thunderbolt." Nor must it be forgotten, as Mr. Gilbert owns in his preface, that this airy tone of the piece is well sustained by the actors of the Haymarket, who exhibit a treatment and handling of the characters as airy. A popular German comic opera, curiously enough on the same subject, was given at another theatre, and the actors and actresses interpreted the piece after quite a different fashion-viz., according to the rules and traditions of common English burlesque-that is, by endeavouring to "get fun" out of each character, according to the gifts of the interpreter, without regard to the sense of the piece. There is "the art critic," who, but for the announcement in the bill, might be a funny Roman out of a pantomime. A French actor wholly independent of the words of his part would have had a comic seriousness, and would have enriched the character by gestures and by-play and personal bearing. So, too, with Galatea, who suggests nothing pagan, nothing poetical, nothing that evinces the situation of a being suddenly changed from a statue into a living person. The impression therefore left is something singularly dull and prosaic. The only risk that Mr. Gilbert runs is that he may become a little monotonous by keeping too closely to a particular class of subject. "The Princess," "Thespis," "The Palace of Truth,” and "Pygmalion" are sufficiently in the same key. Not that he has given too much of that music, but enough; with more he will grow tame, and find his powers cramped through repetition. Let him, for instance, try something out of the Roman history. Or better still, let him treat some popular child's story after the fashion that "Blue Beard" was arranged for Offenbach's opera—that is, a grave reduction of the absurdities to real life, giving as it were the real shape out of which the legend had grown. One of Mr. Gilbert's happiest efforts was "The Sensation Novel," written for the "chamber" audience of Mr. and Mrs. German Reed, where he seemed to have given freer range to his fancy. Nothing more playful or more carefully or spiritedly written can be conceived, and there is no reason why such a piece should not be transferred to the broader scene of a regular theatre. It is just such a piece as MM. Halévy and Meilhac might have written, only with bolder touches. His "Ages Ago" was also singularly pretty, and full of that mixture of sentiment and humour which is such an advantage for both. Indeed, generally Mr. Gilbert might be bolder and firmer in his strokes; and in striving to be careful he runs the risk of becoming trifling in his excellent attempts to be refined. But on the whole the English stage is vastly indebted to him, far more than to the late Mr. Robertson, to whom he is infinitely superior, alike in conception, fancy, power, and workmanship. In truth, when we look to those who guide public opinion, those who ought to discriminate and point out what is true humour, we get really bewildered. Who shall blame the public for going astray when they are so misled? The other day an intelligent and capable critic in a leading journal, while criticising Mr. Wilkie Collins's new story, "Poor Miss Finch," pronounced that there was "humour" and "fun" in the following passages:-"I" (Madame Pratolungo) "sat down with my legs anyhow, like a man. . . . .. Did I cry? A word in your ear, and let it go no farther. I swore." "The fun would have been better had the last word been more realistic. But it is good fun as fun goes." Heaven preserve us from such funny persons! and it is to be hoped that very little fun of the kind is "going." "So, too, is the fun," goes on the critic, "got out of Herr Grosse, who opines that when Gott made the womens he was sorry afterwards for the poor mens, and he made tobaccos to comfort them. And in addition to this sense of fun," &c. There is a class who would be amused by this sort of thing, which we may venture to say Mr. Collins never intended to be quoted as "fun," but merely as illustrative of character. But the mind of the writer who could see humour and find pleasure in such expressions is a fairly representative one, and stands for those meagrely endowed theatre-goers who would roar when the clown stole a ham or when the comic man emerged with his face covered with flour. The truth is innumerable plays are written on this plan for educing mirth, and whose idea of "fun" is very much the same as the other critic's. superintendent of police, who told the inspector, who told the oldest officer in the force, who told the barber, that Gripps had only saved himself from a worse end. The lawyer, therefore, it will be seen, had few friends in Middleton. Even his chapel-going acquaintances were glad to be rid of him, because he had a mortgage on their house of prayer, out of which he made money and compelled friendship and "brotherly love." It was not a little surprising to discover after Magar's condemnation how many people in Middleton had "suspected" something for years past. It was a delicate matter to speak about, they all agreed; but many shrewd burgesses had wondered over their pipes how it was that Magar "got on in life so rapidly after Collinson's disappearance." Several people had had "their suspicions" about the young yeoman's visit to America. The postman said it was true he had left American letters at Magar's; but he had often turned them over and thought they had a doubtful appearance. The watchman who heard the noises at the mill had started up in his sleep, as his wife could bear witness, with that strange midnight screech ringing in his The man who paused a moment to listen on the fatal night had often thought "if there should have been some foul play at work," but had not dared to speak about it, or somehow had not thought to do so. The waiter at the inn where the three men met could have sworn there was "something queer going on," but how was he to know? ears. The town was divided about Jennings. One half of it would not believe that such a mild fellow as he could have really been concerned in killing his friend; while the other half had no faith in the sneaking, canting, pious manner which Jennings had always affected, and with which he covered his villainy, as Magar's was hidden beneath a cloak of assumed benevolence. There was no difference of opinion about the righteousness of the verdict against Magar. Only one person evinced any feeling about the matter. This was a wretched woman to whom he had promised marriage when he was a young man. She came from a town near Middleton, and demanded admission to his cell as a relative. “If I am not his wife I ought to have been," she said in a hoarse, broken voice to the governor of the gaol. "It is true," said Magar, "let her come in." Even Gripps and Magar had their mourners. When the jurymen went to view the lawyer's body, cold and wet and the body's own cold cheerless lonely house, they found ir sitting by the corpse, whining piteously, utterly forgetting and forgiving all the hard kicks it had received from its dead master's heavy boots. Gripps had his dog mourner; Magar in his last hours was solaced by a woman. Ruined, humiliated, disgraced as she had been by this hypocrite and murderer, the woman threw herself upon his neck, and sobbed as earnestly as if he had deserved her tenderness and affection. She never once thought of her wrongs; I am not prepared to say that she would not if she could have changed places with him, and died praying for his happiness. For she remembered when Magar had been kind to her; when he came to her father's house at nights, and they went out together in the fields. They had been lovers in the early days; but for a vile mischief-maker they would have been married in their innocency. Eventually Magar's own selfishness led to their living together without the rites of marriage. There were unhappily many local precedents for this kind of arrangement; how far it demoralised Magar, brutalised his nature, this setting law, morality, religion, and true love at defiance, it is hard to say; but I suspect he was a brute to begin with, and his love of money and vulgar ambition overthrew him at last. Soon after this woman left the gaol on that last day, the prisoner, who had wailed and cried and asserted his innocence in the most abject way, requested to be provided with writing materials. He was occupied until far into the night, preparing a full confession of his crime, which he placed in the hands of the chaplain, on condition that if he were reprieved it should be returned to him unsealed; and that if he were not, the packet should remain unopened until two years after the execution, when the contents were to be made public. The chaplain accepted this trust, and pledged himself, as a clergyman, to do his best to fulfil it to the letter. The prisoner paused occasionally to listen; but whenever he did so, one of the men who sat there watching him made a noise with his feet, or moved about: he was rather tender-hearted, this officer, despite his long experience, and did not wish the convict to hear what he heard, and what many people heard during that long night, when the weight of some dire event seemed to lie heavily upon the town, and the thud, thud of the carpenter's hammer sent a cold shiver through many a stalwart frame. An evening mist hung about the Dinsley County Prisons, and rain fell at intervals. The old church bells were chiming for evening service, which was held there twice during the week: but the sound of the bells seemed to die away in the fog, as if the one little breath |