the words of learnéd length and thundering sound.' In the stage directions, we are told: Ghost of Dr. JOHNSON rises from trapdoor, on one side, and Ghost of BosWELL from trap-door on the other. The latter bows respectfully to the house, and obsequiously to the Doctor's Ghost, and retires.' Literary Leviathan, loquitur :

'THAT which was organized by the moral ability of one, has been executed by the physical effort of many, and DRURY LANE THEATRE is now complete. Of that part behind the curtain, which has not yet been destined to glow beneath the brush of the varnisher, or vibrate to the hammer of the carpenter, little is thought by the public, and little need be said by the committee. Truth, however, is not to be sacrificed for the accommodation of either; and he who should pronounce that our edifice has received its final embellishment, would be disseminating falsehood without incurring favor, and risking the disgrace of detection without participating the advantage of success.

'Professions lavishly effused and parsimoniously verified are alike inconsistent with the precepts of innate rectitude and the practice of external policy: let it not then be conjectured, that because we are unassuming, we are imbecile; that forbearance is any indication of despondency, or humility of demerit. He that is the most assured of success, will make the fewest appeals to favor; and where nothing is claimed that is undue, nothing that is due will be withheld. A swelling opening is too often succeeded by an insignificant conclusion. Partrurient mountains have ere now produced muscipular abortions; and the auditor who compares incipient grandeur with final vulgarity, is reminded of the pious hawkers of Constantinople, who solemnly perambute her streets, exclaiming, 'In the name of the Prophet-figs!'

'Of many who think themselves wise, and of some who are thought wise by others, the exertions are directed to the revival of mouldering and obscure dramas; to endeavors to exalt that which is now rare, only because it was always worthless, and whose deterioration, while it condemned it to living obscurity, by a strange obliquity of moral perception, constitutes its title to posthumous renown. To embody the flying colors of folly; to arrest evanescence; to give to bubbles the globular consistency as well as form; to exhibit on the stage the pyebald denizen of the stable, and the half-reasoning parent of combs; to display the brisk locomotion of Columbine, or the tortuous attitudenizing of Punch; these are the occupations of others, whose ambition, limited to the applause of unintellectual fatuity, is too innocuous for the application of satire, and too humble for the incitement of jealousy.

Our refectory will be found to contain every species of fruit, from the cooling nectarine and luscious peach, to the puny pippin and the noxious nut. There Indolence may repose, and Inebriety revel; and the spruce apprentice, rushing in at second account, may there chatter with impunity, debarred by a barrier of brick and mortar from marring that scenic interest in others, which nature and education have disqualified him from comprehending himself. That which is permanent

'Permanent stage doors we have none.

cannot be removed, for if removed, it soon ceases to be permanent. What stationary absurdity can vie with that ligneous barricado, which decorated with frappant and tintinabulant appendages, now serves as the entrance of the lowly cottage, and now as the exit of a lady's bed-chamber; at one time insinuating plastic Harlequin into a butcher's shop, and at another, yawning as a flood-gate to precipitate the Cyprians of St. Giles' into the embraces of Macheath. To elude this glaring absurdity; to give to each respective mansion the door which the carpenter would doubtless have given; we vary our portal with the varying scene, passing from deal to mahogany, and from mahogany to oak, as the opposite claims of cottage, palace, or castle, may appear to require.'

IN submitting the address of CRABBE, we must ask the attention of his familiar reader to the 'syllabus' or 'argument' which precedes the text. Certainly, it is not less admirable in its 'keeping,' than the main article itself, which is the perfection of imitation. It runs as follows: Interior of a Theatre described; Pit gradually fills. The Check-taker. Pit full. The orchestra tuned. One fiddler rather dilatory. Is reproved - and repents. Evolutions of a play-bill; its final settlement on the spikes. The gods taken to task-and why. Holywell-street, St. Pancras. Emanuel Jennings binds his son Apprentice. Not in London and why. Episode of the Hat.' But to the poetry :

"Tis sweet to view from half past five to six,
Our long wax-candles, with short cotton wicks,
Touch'd by the lamp-lighter's Promethean art,
Start into light, and make the lighter start;
To see red Phoebus through the gallery pane
Tinge with his beam the beams of Drury-Lane,
While gradual parties fill our widen'd pit,
And gape, and gaze, and wonder, ere they sit.

'At first, while vacant seats give choice and ease,
Distant or near, they settle where they please;
But when the multitude contracts the span,
And seats are rare, they settle where they can.

'Now the full benches, to late comers, doom
No room for standing, miscall'd standing room.

'Hark! the check-taker moody silence breaks,
And bawling 'Pit full,' gives the check he takes;
Yet onward still, the gathering numbers cram,
Contending crowders shout the frequent damn,
And all is bustle, squeeze, row, jabbering, and jam.

'See to their desks Apollo's sons repair;

Swift rides the rosin o'er the horse's hair;

In unison their various tones to tune,

Murmurs the hautboy, growls the hoarse bassoon;

In soft vibration sighs the whispering lute,

Tang goes the harpsichord, too-too the flute,

Brays the loud trumpet, squeaks the fiddle sharp,

Winds the French-horn, and twangs the tingling harp;
Till, like great Jove, the leader, figuring in,
Attunes to order the chaotic dín.

Now all seems hush'd- but no, one fiddle will
Give, half-ashamed, a tiny flourish still;
Foil'd in his crash, the leader of the clan
Reproves with frowns the dilatory man;
Then on his candlestick thrice taps his bow,
Nods a new signal, and away they go.

'Perchance, while pit and gallery cry, 'Hats off,'
And awed Consumption checks his chided cough,
Some giggling daughter of the Queen of Love
Drops, reft of pin, her play-bill from above;
Like Icarus, while laughing galleries clap,
Soars, ducks, and dives in air the printed scrap;
But, wiser far than he, combustion fears,
And, as it flies, eludes the chandeliers;
Till sinking gradual, with repeated twirl,
It settles, curling, on a fiddler's curl:

Who from his powder'd pate the intruder strikes,
And, for mere malice, sticks it on the spikes.

'Say, why these Babel strains from Babel tongues?
Who's that calls 'Silence!' with such leathern lungs!

He, who, in quest of quiet, silence!' hoots,

Is apt to make the hubbub he imputes.'

After describing a motley group of play-goers, among whom are:

"The lottery cormorant, the auction-shark,

The full-priced master, and the half-price clerk;

Boys who long linger at the gallery door,

With pence twice five, they want but twopence more,

Till some Samaritan the twopence spares,

And sends them jumping up the gallery stairs;'

He passes to the 'episode of the hat :'

'John Richard William Alexander Dwyer
Was footman to Justinian Stubbs Esquire ;
But when John Dwyer listed in the Blues,
Emanuel Jennings polish'd Stubbs' shoes.
Emanuel Jennings brought his youngest boy
Up as a corn-cutter, a safe employ;

In Holywell Street St. Pancras he was bred,
(At number twenty-seven, it is said,)
Facing the pump, and near the Granby's Head:
He would have bound him to some shop in town,
But with a premium he could not come down;
Pat was the urchin's name, a red-hair'd youth,
Fonder of purl and skittle-grounds than truth.

'Silence, ye gods! to keep your tongues in awe,
The muse shall tell an accident she saw.

'Pat Jennings in the upper gallery sat,
But, leaning forward, Jennings lost his hat;
Down from the gallery the beaver flew,
And spurn'd the one to settle in the two.

How shall he act? Pay at the gallery door

Two shillings for what cost, when new, but four?

Or till half-price, to save his shilling, wait,

And gain his hat again at half-past eight?

Now, while his fears anticipate a thief,

John Mullins whispers, 'Take my handkerchief:'

Thank you,' cries Pat, 'but one won't make a line;'

'Take mine,' cried Wilson, and cried Stokes, 'take mine.'

A motley cable soon Pat Jennings ties,

Where Spitalfields with real India vies.

Like Iris' bow, down darts the painted hue,
Starr'd, striped, and spotted, yellow, red, and blue,
Old calico, torn silk, and muslin new.

George Green below, with palpitating hand,
Loops the last 'kerchief to the beaver's band,
Upsoars the prize; the youth, with joy unfeigned,
Regain'd the felt, and felt what he regained,
While to the applauding galleries grateful Pat
Made a low bow, and touch'd the ransom'd hat.'

It would be doing injustice to Mr. CRABBE, to omit the preface of apologies' which accompanied his communication. He says:

A few words of explanation may be deemed necessary on my part, to avert invidious misrepresentation. The animadversion I have thought it right to make on the noise created by tuning the orchestra, will, I hope, give no lasting remorse to any of the gentlemen employed in the band. It is to be desired that they would keep their instruments ready tuned, and strike off at once. This would be an accommodation to many well-meaning persons who frequent the theatre, who not being blest with the ear of St. Cecilia, mistake the tuning for the overture, and think the latter concluded before it is begun.

'One fiddle will

Give, half-ashamed, a tiny flourish still,'

was originally written one hautboy will;' but having providentially been informed, when this poem was upon the point of being sent off, that there is but one hautboy in the band, I averted the storm of popular and managerial indignation from the head of its blower; as it now stands 'one fiddle' among many, the faulty individual will, I hope, escape detection. The story of the flying play-bill is calculated to expose a practice much too common, of pinning play-bills to the cushions, insecurely, and frequently, I fear, not pinning them at all. If these lines save one play-bill only from the fate I have recorded, I shall not deem my labor ill employed. The concluding episode of Patrick Jennings, glances at the boorish fashion of wearing the hat in the one shilling gallery. Had Jennings thrust his between his feet at the commencement of the play, he might have leaned forward with impunity, and the catastrophe I relate would not have occurred. The line of handkerchiefs formed to enable him to recover his loss, is purposely so crossed in texture and materials, as to mislead the reader in respect to the real owner of any one of them. For, in the satirical view of life and manners which I occasionally present, my clerical profession has taught me how extremely improper it would be, by any allusion, however slight, to give any uneasiness, however trivial, to any individual, however foolish or wicked.'

WITH the subjoined choice bit of COLERIDGE, we close our quotations for Part One. It may be necessary to remind the reader, that the original bard once made overtures of intimacy to a jackass; but the babbling, jingling simplicity,' and the speculative philosophy,

upon trivial matters, need no explanation. The 'likeness' cannot fail of being recognised:

'My pensive Public, wherefore look you sad?
I had a grandmother, she kept a donkey
To carry to the mart her crockery ware;
And when that donkey look'd me in the face,
His face was sad! and you are sad, my Public!

'Joy should be yours: this tenth day of October
Again assembles us in Drury Lane.

Long wept my eye to see the timber planks
That hid our ruins: many a day I cried,
'Ah me! I fear they never will rebuild it!'
Till on one eve, one joyful Monday eve,
As along Charles-street I prepared to walk,
Just at the corner, by the pastry-cook's,
I heard a trowel tick against a brick!
I look'd me up, and strait a parapet
Uprose at least seven inches o'er the planks.
'From that hour,

As leisure offer'd, close to Mr Spring's
Box-office door, I've stood and eyed the builders.
They had a plan to render less their labors;
Workmen in elder times would mount a ladder
With hodded heads, but these stretch'd forth a pole
From the wall's pinnacle; they placed a pulley
Athwart the pole, a rope athwart the pulley;
To this a basket dangled; mortar and bricks
Thus freighted, swung securely to the top,
And in the empty basket workmen twain
Precipitate, unhurt, accosted earth.

Oh! 't was a goodly sound to hear the people

Who watch'd the work, express their various thoughts!

While some believed it never would be finished,

Some, on the contrary, believed it would.

'Oh Mr. Whitbread! fie upon you, Sir!

I think you should have built a colonnade;

When tender Beauty, looking for her coach,

Protrudes her gloveless hand, perceives the shower,
And draws the tippet closer round her throat,
Perchance her coach stands half a dozen off,
And, ere she mounts the step, the oozing mud
Soaks through her pale kid slipper. On the morrow,
She coughs at breakfast, and her gruff papa,

Cries, There you go! this comes of play-houses!'
To build no portico is penny wise:

Heaven grant it prove not in the end pound foolish !'

'Amid the freaks that modern fashion sanctions,

It grieves me much to see live animals

Brought on the stage.

'Nought born on earth should die. On hackney stands

I reverence the coachman who cries Gee!'

And spares the lash. When I behold a spider

Prey on a fly, a magpie on a worm,

Or view a butcher, with horn-handled knife,
Slaughter a tender lamb as dead as mutton,
Indeed, indeed, I'm very, very sick!'

The 'Baby's Début,' of WORDSWORTH, 'Drury's Dirge,' by LAURA MATILDA,' MOORE'S 'Living Lustres,' The Rebuilding,' by SOUTHEY,' and 'Fire and Ale,' by the horrid MONK LEWIS,' will form the subjects of another and concluding number.

C.