tion, affects the floor of the large lunar crater Plato (called by Hevelius the greater Black Lake), is now rejected, because the supposed change has been shown to be a mere effect of contrast. The apparent change is of this nature: -As the sun first begins to rise above the floor of the crater-or, in other words, as the light of the filling moon gradually flows over the crater-the floor appears bright, getting brighter and brighter as the sun rises higher and higher, up to a certain point. But afterwards the floor darkens, becoming darkest towards lunar mid-day. Lastly, as the lunar afternoon progresses, the floor of Plato gets gradually lighter again. The midday darkening was attributed to some process of vegetation or else to chemical changes. It has no real existence, however, but is due simply to the effect of contrast with the great brightness of the crater-wall all around, which is formed of some very white substance, and looks peculiarly bright and lustrous at the time of lunar mid-day, so that contrasted with it the floor looks peculiarly dark. On the other hand, during the morning and evening hours, the black shadow of the crater-wall is thrown across the floor, which by contrast looks brighter than it really is. This explanation has indeed been denied very confidently by some who formerly advocated the theory that lunar vegetation causes the darkening of the floor; but there can be no doubt of its justice, for no one (not prejudiced in favor of a theory) who has tested the matter experimentally, eliminating the effects of contrast, has failed to find that there is no real darkening of the floor of Plato.

It seems as certain as any matter not admitting of actual demonstration can be that the moon is, to all intents and purposes, dead. Her frame is indeed still undergoing processes of material change, but these afford no more evidence of real planetary life than the changes affecting a dead body are signs of still lingering vitality. Again, it seems certain that the processes through which the moon has passed in her progress towards planetary death, must be passed through in turn by all the members of the solar system, and finally by the sun himself. Every one of these orbs is constantly radiating its heat into space, not

indeed to be actually lost, but still in such sort as to reduce all to the same dead level of temperature, whereas vitality depends on differences of temperature. Every orb in space, then, is tending steadily onwards towards cosmical death. And, so far as our power of understanding or even of conceiving the universe is concerned, it seems as though this tendency of every individual body in the universe towards death involved the tendency towards death of the universe itself. It may indeed be said that since the universe is of necessity infinite, whereas we are finite, we cannot reason in this way from what we can understand, or conceive, to conclusions respecting the universe, which we cannot even conceive, far less understand. Still it must be admitted that, so far as our reasoning powers can be relied upon at all, the inference, from what we know, appears a just one, that the life of the universe will have practically departed when the largest and therefore longestlived of all the orbs peopling space has passed on to the stage of cosmical death. So far as we know, there is but one way of escape from this seemingly demonstrated, but in reality incredible, conclusion. May it not be that as men have erred in former times in regarding the earth as the centre of the universe, as they have erred in regarding this period of time through which the earth is now passing as though it were central in all time, so possibly they may have erred in regarding the universe we live in, and can alone comprehend, as though it were the only universe? May there not be a higher order of universe than ours, to which ours bears some such relation as the ether of space bears to the matter of our universe? and may there not, above that higher order, be higher and higher orders of universe, absolutely without limit? And, in like manner, may not the ether of space, of which we know only indirectly though very certainly, be the material substance of a universe next below ours,* while below that are lower and lower orders of universe absolutely without limit? And, as the seemingly

* The work called the Unseen Universe presents a portion of the evidence to this effect, but unfortunately the style of that work is not sufficiently lucid to bring its reasoning within the range of the general non-scientific reader.

wasted energies of our universe are poured into the universe next below ours, may it not well be that our universe receives the supplies of energy wasted (in seeming) from the universe next in order above it? So that, instead of the absolute beginning and the absolute end which we had seemed to recognise, there may be in reality but a continual interchange between the various orders of universe constituting the true universe, these orders being infinite in number even as each one of them is infinite in extent. We find ourselves lost, no doubt, in the contemplation of these multiplied infinities; but we are equally lost in the contemplation of the unquestioned infinities of space and time amidst which our little lives are cast, while the mystery of infinite waste, which seems so inscrutable when we consider the universe as we know it, finds a possible interpretation when we admit the existence of other orders of universe than the

Thus

order to which our lives belong. should we find a new argument for the teaching of the poet who has saidLet knowledge grow from more to more, But more of reverence in us dwell, That, mind and soul according well, May make our music as before, But vaster;

who said-
a new significance in the vision of him

See all things with each other blending,
Each to all its being lending,
All on each in turn depending;
Heavenly ministers descending,
And again to heaven uptending,
Floating, mingling, interweaving,
Each from each, while each is giving
Rising, sinking, and receiving-
On to each, and each relieving
Each-the pails of gold; the living
Current through the air is heaving;
Breathing blessings see them bending,
Balanced worlds from change defending,
While everywhere diffus'd is harmony unend-
ing.
Cornhill Magazine.

THERE is a striking resemblance between the genius and characters of Cooke and Edmund Kean. Both were gifted with splendid talents that through their own vices became a curse rather than a blessing to their possessors; their style of acting was similar; most of their triumphs were secured in the same parts; both destroyed health and fortune, lost the respect of the world, and sank into utter degradation through dissipated habits; and both commonly committed acts of extravagant eccentricity, to put it in the mildest form, that it is difficult to ascribe to sane men.

Cooke's parentage and place of birth. are both doubtful; he has been claimed as an Irishman and a Scotchman, but, according to his own statement on his death-bed, he was born in Westminster in 1756, and soon afterwards removed to Berwick, where he was brought up. He was in the habit of boasting that his father was an army captain, but it is more probable that he was a sergeant. At all events, his mother was left a widow, in very straightened circumstances, while he was quite a child..

The Edinburgh theatrical company coming to Berwick for a short season ap

pears to have decided George Frederick's destiny. He was taken to see The Provoked Husband,' and from that time he says, in a 'Chronicle' which was found after his death among his papers, plays and playing were never absent from his thoughts. By-and-by he formed an amateur company of boys of his own age. Their theatre was a deserted barn, their scenery a motley patchwork of mat and paper, and their costumes such finery as they could borrow. they could borrow. He was at this time only thirteen years old; his mother was dead, and he was then under the protection of two aunts, who apprenticed him to a printer.

Three years after their first visit the Edinburgh actors paid a second to the town. Fain would young Cooke have attended every performance; but his funds would not permit, and many were the schemes he devised for a surreptitious entrance. One of these, told by himself, is extremely ludicrous. One night he slipped through the stage door before the keeper was posted, or any of the employés about, and groping his way behind the scenes sought for a place where he might remain concealed until the curtain rose, when he hoped to be

able to ensconce himself in some obscure spot unobserved and get a glimpse of the performance. In a remote corner he found a very large barrel-nothing could be better for his purpose. Dropping himself into it he found at the bottom two twenty-four pound cannon-balls, about which, however, he did not trouble himself. Little did he imagine that he had taken refuge within the machine by which the Theatre Royal, Berwick, produced its stage thunder. But so it was. Just as the last bars of the overture were being played, the property man tied a piece of carpet over the top of the barrel, without perceiving in the dark its living occupant, raised it in his arms, no doubt wondering at its extra weight. and carried it to the side scenes. The play was Macbeth,' which opens with thunder and lightning. As the curtain. bell sounded away he sent the machine rolling. Horribly frightened, and pounded by the cannon-balls, Cooke roared out lustily, and fighting to release himself, sent the barrel on to the stage, burst off the carpet head, and rolled out in front of the audience, scattering the three witches right and left.

Cooke's account of his early years is not sufficiently trustworthy to be quoted. It appears, however, he did not long remain in the printer's office, that he went to sea, and afterwards spent some time in London, where he saw Macklin and Garrick in several of their finest parts. At twenty we find him making his professional début in a strolling company in the large room of a public-house at Brentford, as Dumont, in Rowe's 'Jane Shore.' For two years he strolled about the towns of the south coast, Hastings, Rye and others; and in 1778 appeared for a benefit at the Haymarket as Castalio in Otway's 'Orphan.' The next year he played several other parts in the same theatre, but without attracting any attention. Back to strolling again in the midland counties, until he appeared at Manchester in 1784 as Philotas in Murphy's Grecian Daughter,' in which, although a poor part, he made a most favorable impression; Lancaster and Liverpool followed, and in 1786 he played Baldwin to Mrs. Siddon's Isabella in Southerne's tragedy, at York. Again the years roll on, and we still find him a provincial actor in petty towns, for that

epithet was equally applicable both to Manchester and Liverpool, at least in a theatrical point of view, in those days. During most of these years he kept a diary, a strange record of various and desultory reading-upon which he wrote remarks that indicate a shrewd though but half cultivated intellect―of hard professonal labor, of sad dissipation and attendant repentance, but yet no record of such miserable struggles as those of poor Kean.

an

At length, in 1794, he was engaged for Dublin, and after eighteen years of probation appeared for the first time before an audience worthy of those great talents which were already fully developed. But alas, so convivial a city as the Irish capital was a bad home for one of Cooke's habits; and although his success as an actor was great, his dissipation, which there became worse than ever, ruined his prospects. Dunlap, in his life of Cooke, published in 1813, and Mathews, in his Memoirs,' relate anecdote of this period which well illustrates his outrageous conduct. Mathews, then a very young man, was a member of the same company, and lived in the same house with him. One night, having played Mordecai to Cooke's Sir Archy Macsarcasm in Macklin's 'Love à la Mode,' much to the latter's satisfaction, he was invited to sup and share a jug of whisky punch in the tragedian's room. The young novice delightedly accepted the invitation, thinking himself much honored, and failed not to pour forth those laudations upon his host's talents which were so grateful to George Frederick's ears. One jug of punch was quickly emptied and a second filled, and Cooke began to praise his guest in a patronising way. You are young," he said, "and want some one to advise and guide you. Take my word for it, there is nothing like industry and sobriety. In our profession, dissipation is the bane of youth, villainous company, low company, leads them from study," &c. Holding forth thus, the jugs of punch continued to disappear with ever increasing rapidity. Mathews rose to leave, but was pushed back into his seat again. "You shan't stir; we'll have one more cruiskeen lawn, my dear fellow, and then you shall go to bed," said the tragedian, now growing very drunk. "You

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don't know me. The world don't know me. Many an hour that they suppose I've wasted in drinking, I have devoted to the study of my profession; the passions and all their variations; their nice and imperceptible gradations. You shall see me delineate the passions of the human mind, by facial expressions." The power of the whisky, however, acting in direct opposition to the will on his strong and flexible features produced contortions and distortions of which he was insensible. Mathews, a little hazy himself from the potent liquor, half alarmed, and yet with difficulty repressing his laughter at these extraordinary grimaces, sat staring at him, endeavoring to understand these delineations, and wishing himself out of the room. After each horrible face, Cooke demanded with an air of intense self-approval, "Well, sir, and what is that?" It's very fine, sir," answered Mathews, without the remotest conception of what he should say. "Yes, but what is it?" "Well-a-oh, yesanger?" "You're a blockhead," roared the tragedian; "the whisky has muddled your brains. It's fear-fear, sir." Then followed more contortions and more questions, but Mathews never guessed right. "Now, sir," said the angry delineator at last, "I will show you something you cannot possibly mistake." And he made a hideous face, compounded of Satanic malignancy and the leering of a drunken satyr. What's that, sir?" "That? oh, revenge!" Dolt, idiot! despite o'erwhelm thee," burst forth Cooke furiously; "it is love!" This was too much, and forgetful of consequences, Mathews fell back in his chair and roared with laughter. What, sir! Do you laugh? Am I not George Frederick Cooke? born to command a thousand slaves like thee!" Mathews immediately apologised, averring that the punch had stupefied him. This nollified his host's indignation, and finding the jug empty he called out for his landlady to refill it. But he had faithfully promised the previous one should be the last, and Mrs. Burns intended to keep him to his word. "Sure, Mr. Cooke," she answered from below, "I am gone to bed, and you can't have any more to-night." Indeed, but I will," he replied. Mathews tried to get away, but was again thrust into his chair,

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while Cooke reiterated his demand for more punch. But Mrs. Burns remained obdurate. Cooke took up the jug and smashed it upon the floor over her head. "Do you hear that, Mrs. Burns?" "Yes, I do, Mr. Cooke." Then smash went the chairs, the fire-irons, the table and between each the question "Do you hear that, Mrs. Burns?" "Indeed, but I do, and you'll be sorry for it to-morrow.' Up went the window, and out, one after another, went the fragments of the broken furniture into the street. Mathews, believing he was in company with a madman, and now thoroughly frightened, endeavored to make a bolt, but was seized and dragged back. Finding him struggle violently, Cooke threw up the window and shouted, " Watch, watch!" A watchman attracted by the uproar was already beneath. "I give this man in charge," roared Cooke; he has committed murder." "What do you mean?" cried the alarmed youth. "Yes, to my certain knowledge he has this night committed an atrocious, cold-blooded murder. He has most barbarously murdered an inoffensive Jew gentleman named Mordecai; I charge him with it in the name of Macklin, the author of 'Love à la Mode.'" Here Mathews, by a desperate effort, wrenched himself away and fled, Cooke hurling after him the candle and candlestick.

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The disgrace attending the notoriety of this transaction, drove him on to further mad intemperance; the stage was abandoned, and, in a fit of drunkenness and despair, he enlisted as a private in a regiment destined for the West Indies. Fortunately for him, however, sickness prevented him embarking. Yet he remained in the army until 1796. In that year, Maxwell, the manager of the Portsmouth theatre, being in Southampton was accosted by a soldier, in whom he recognised Cooke. He asked him for assistance to purchase his discharge; with the aid of the managers of the Manchester theatre, this was accomplished. Maxwell heard no more of the truant for some weeks. One day a boy came to the Portsmouth theatre, and accosted him with, "A poor sick man who has been a soldier, sir, is now at my mother's, and wishes to see you before he dies." He went to a low public-house, and there found Cooke in a state of the most

return.

In 1797 he reappeared at Dublin, and spoke the address on the occasion of the opening of the new Theatre Royal in Crow Street. During the engagement he played for the first time with John Kemble, who came to star. One night while he was waiting at the side scene for his cue to go on, Kemble came up and said: "Mr. Cooke, you distressed me exceedingly in my last scene, I could scarcely get on. You did not give me more than one cue; you were very imperfect." "Sir, I was perfect," replied Cooke. "Excuse me, sir, you were not.' "I was, sir." "You were not." tell you what I'll not have your faults fathered upon me. And d- me, black Jack (Kemble's nickname), if I don't make you tremble in your pumps one of these days yet."

"I'll

At length the opening came, and in the year 1800, Cooke, then in the forty-fifth year of his age, was engaged for Covent Garden, for three years, at six, seven, and eight pounds a week; there he appeared on the 31st of October, as Richard the Third. Never," he says, was a reception more flattering, nor did ever I receive more encouraging, indulgent, and warm approbation than on that night, both through the play and at the conclusion. Mr. Kemble did me the honor of making one of the audience."

"His superiority over all other" (Richards), says his biographer, Mr. Dunlap, "in the dissimulation, the crafty hypocrisy, and the bitter sarcasm of the character, is acknowledged by every writer who has criticised his acting. . . . . His triumph in this character was so complete, that after a struggle Mr. Kemble resigned it altogether to him."

During the season he played the part twenty-three times. twenty-three times. A German writer quoted by Dunlap, gives the following contrasted picture of Cooke:

His

"Cook does not possess the elegant figure of Kemble; but his countenance beams with great expression. The most prominent features in the physiognomy of Cooke, are a long and somewhat hooked nose, of uncommon breadth between the eyes, which are with prominent lids and flexible brows; fiery, dark, and at times terribly expressive, lofty and broad forehead, and the muscles around the mouth pointedly marked. countenance is certainly not so dignified as Kemble's, but its expression of passion, parstronger. His voice, though sharp, is powerticularly the worst passions of our nature, is ful, and of great compass, a pre-eminence which he posesses by nature over Kemble, and of which he skilfully avails himself. His Kemble, but they are just, appropriate, and attitudes are far less picturesque than those of natural."

His second character was Shylock :

"Those who were present at Mr. Cooke's boards, say that in the great scene of the third first exhibition of Shylock upon the London act he was greeted with shouts of applause. The savage exultation of his laugh when the full amount of his enemy's loss is stated, were frightfully impressive."

Strange, that a few years afterwards Kean, who, as I have before remarked, so strongly resembled him, should have won his first two triumphs in the same parts, with only the order reversed. Cooke's third character was Sir Archy Macsarcasm, his fourth Iago, which added another to his list of successes. Macbeth followed, but here he was much inferior to Kemble; yet he played it four nights to crowded houses. Kitely, in which he had seen Garrick, and remembered him, was his next part, and was deemed the most perfect of all he had yet performed.

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Sir Giles Overreach was another tri