"Sir John Dalrymple by express permission, nay, under the sanction of His present Majesty, has published a Collection of Letters:" one of these letters from Charles the Second to Henrietta, Duchess of Orleans, is "exceptionable in point of delicacy;" and therefore His present Majesty gave his express permission, nay his very sanction to Sir John Dalrymple to publish this very particular and individual Letter!! To what miserable expedients are those driven who undertake to defend what is indefensible!

To some of the points of accusation against Sir N. it might have been as well had he not given himself the trouble of making a serious reply-to the pleasantry of the Quarterly Review, for instance, in comparing him for incapacity and self importance to "P. P. clerk of this Parish," whose "Memoirs " furnish so much ludicrous entertainment in the works of Pope; and to the charges of plagiarism from the pages of the Annual Register and Daily Advertiser. If, as he assures us,

"Neither the praise nor the censure of his adversaries can operate beyond the moment; that their weapons are not the arrows of Teucer, but the imbecile and harmless darts of Priam, Telum imbelle, sine ictu,” why tire his readers with the gleanings of their fretful pages? Why imitate the knight of La Mancha, in assailing every windmill that an accidental blast may put in motion?

The conclusion is just and good.

"However great or numerous, as I admit, may be the defects of my work, it is characterized in every page, by Loyalty to the Sovereign, Detestation of French principles, Abhorrence of Bonaparte and all his fallen Jacobin gang, Attachment to the crown, and Reverence for the British Constitution."

ART. XXI. Steps to Sense Verses, or a set of English Exercises to be rendered into Latin Hexameters and Pentameters, for the use of Schools. London: Law and Whittaker, 1815, pp. 60.

THE Composition of Latin verses is considered by scholars as indispensably necessary to a correct taste. The practice itself is, in most cases, most excellent; but the abuse of it has been strenuously combated, and severely reprobated, as existing in a very mischievous degree in our greater seminaries.

The advantages resulting from versification, especially in preparing pupils for understanding and relishing the beauties of the classics, are often inestimable. And it is to facilitate the acquisition of this branch of knowledge that the present little per

formance has appeared. Select passages from the Latin poets are translated into the plainest and most literal English, that the pupil may render them into the language from which they are taken; as for example :

"Averse to studies, nor devoted to any muse,

The loiterer spends the long day in manifold art;

In the fresh morning, he takes the cold of the dewy field,

And the seventh hour is passed in the slow walk.

In the eighth, he seeks the grateful quet of the well-known tavern,
And in the ninth, he wanders to the placid waters of Isis."

By means of such an arrangement of words as this, ample assistance is afforded to the mere beginner; a due exercise is at the same time given to the mind, and when the task is finished, the pupil has the advantage of comparing his own performance with the words of the original, On looking into this little volume, we saw another advantage attending the selection. The examples are chosen from authors whose works the pupil cannot easily procure had he a desire to do so.

The usual method in schools is, for the master to select and translate more difficult passages for such of his pupils as are the most advanced. But this practice is attended with inconveniences; to obviate which, the present series of exercises selected, as already hinted, from authors, some of them but little read in schools, is offered to the public.

ART. XXII. Short Greek Exercises on an improved plan, contain ing the most useful rules in Syntax; being a concise Introduction to the writing of Greek. By the REV. J. PICQUOT. London: Law and Whittaker. 1815. pp. 108.

"AWARE," says the compiler of this useful little work, "that memory should be cultivated, but not overcharged; and that the shortest formulæ are best suited to the natural indolence of the youthful mind, many have attempted to condense the most elaborate and extensive treatises into a series of short and simple axioms. These elementary works may be considered as forming a new era in the annals of education; for at no period could there be found so many, and such easy methods of instruction, and never have the most abstruse subjects been rendered at once so familiar and instructive. Works framed on this plan have been eagerly adopted both by public and private instructors; and it is this success which has induced the compiler of the present work to attempt, for an useful and elegant language, what had been accomplished with so much success for the

sciences, and to offer to the public what he had intended for his private use. The compiler has ventured upon the task of rendering the study of the Greek language at once more easy and more agreeable to the student, by presenting him with short and simple rules of Syntax, illustrated by appropriate examples, and accompanied by exercises, framed on the simple and much approved plan of those found in Levizac's French Grammar."

The use of Latin Exercises has long been familiar in every school; but it was not until our own times that exercises on the Greek language came to be generally used. If, however, the surest method of perfecting a pupil in the study of Latin Syntax, be to furnish him with a series of exercises on the rules which he commits to memory, thus imprinting them more strongly on his mind by uniting practice with theorycertainly the same method must be equally eligible with respect to the Greek syntax.

We have looked over this little volume with some attention, and have reason to think that the compiler has fully accomplished the object he had in view. All the world is acquainted with the exercises of Huntingford, Neilson, &c. but, independently of their high price, the examples in them are not always strictly and exclusively adapted to the rules they are intended to exemplify. So rigorous has the present compiler been in rejecting every thing that did not seem to the purpose, that it may be objected by some, that the exercises are too short. They are short certainly; but they are long enough to imprint the rules on the mind of the pupil, who, if one be not enough, can, by an indulgent master, be treated with two or three. When these exercises are exhausted, he will be prepared to attempt some of a higher order-not rigorously. adapted to particular rules.

We are happy to observe that the moral improvement of the pupil has not been neglected in the choice of the examples. Mr. Picquot informs us, that they have mostly been selected from the works of the two authors, who are allowed to have written with the greatest purity, elegance, and simplicity: viz. Isocrates, and Xenophon. On the whole, we are not aware that any collection uniting so many advantages as this does, has yet been laid before the public.

A

THE DRAMA.

preceding number contained some reflections on the ancient Drama; and a few remarks on the modern may not be unacceptable in this number.

The proprietors of the London winter theatres have their agents on the Continent, to furnish them with the dramatic novelties which the French and other theatres produce. Is there then such a miserable dearth of British genius, as to render this expedient necessary? If not necessary, the caterers (i. e. the managers) insult their guests by setting before them unsubstantial foreign dishes-remarkable for nothing but their garnish.

It is notorious that, in this country, not genius, but encouragement is wanting-that British authors could well supply the British stage, if managers could but lay aside their prejudices. Having imbibed somewhat of the selfish principle of Colley Cibber, they sometimes return a manuscript unperused, in order to "crush the singing birds ;" and accept only of such pieces as are written expressly for the performers-though the same performers frequently appear in pieces (particularly that novel species called Melo-drames) which were never intended for the English stage. Thus curbed, neglected and supplanted, our play-wrights are rendered, in appearance at least, inferior to foreign dramatists, which must hurt the feelings of all who are enemies to partiality. and innovation.

Every nation boasts of some peculiarities, which are more or less conspicuous in its literary productions. "Hamlet," on the Parisian boards, is rendered a truly ludicrous play-sans ghost, sans grave-diggers, sans almost every thing characteristic; and no doubt to many Frenchmen, this favorite tragedy appears equally ridiculous in its English dress. Indeed some of our best dramas could not, on account of their peculiarities, be successfully transferred to foreign stages; and how is it to be supposed that Parisian trifles can always be rendered fit for an English theatre?

A few years ago German pieces were imported by us, to the exclusion of native merit, and became so much the rage that some of our eminent dramatists condescended to dress them for representation. It will however be allowed that Mr. Sheridan derived more credit from his popular comedy of the "School for Scandal," than from his alteration of " Pizarro;" and that Mrs. Inchbald stamped her fame by " Every One has his Fault," and not by Lovers' Vows." A translator cannot be styled an author any more than a compiler can be deemed a composer. German gravity, it appears, is now succeeded by French levity, of which

the proprietors of Drury Lane and Covent Garden theatres have given ample proof. These winter theatres having closed in the dog-days, REOPENED in weather equally as hot, allowing the short interval of only about seven weeks for the summer houses; and threatening (by their annual encroachments) the total annihilation of the Haymarket theatre-long the field of genuine wit and humor.

The first novelty produced at Drury Lane, was—a 2 Mag. pie-imported from France! Unfortunately for the proprietors this Magpie had prated on the Lyceum boards during the previous short season of the English Opera, so that the novelty of the thing was anticipated! The emulation of the managers consisting, in a great measure, in bringing forward these Parisian novelties in the grandest style, the Magpie appeared again on Covent Garden stage. Thus we have had three Magpies, though only one piece, which is not, indeed, an abso lute death-blow to native genius, but certainly a mortal affront to it. Would not John Bull have been better pleased with three real novelties, two of them the product of his own country? There would have been no harm in one Magpie, in order to show him the summary proceedings of Gallic jurisprudence; and especially after being so liberally treated with dogs, horses, and elephants.

The proprietors acted well in not raising the price of admission to the pit, since they had resolved on bringing forward second-hand entertainments. It is not true that they are obliged to have recourse to expensive decorations, in order to insure full houses. Ever since the days of Rich, Covent Garden has been noted for Pantomimes and grand processions; but that house has always been crowded, when pieces of sterling merit, and not mere pageantry, have been represented. Macklin's Comedy of the "Man of the World," which is formed on the model of the ancient drama, the scene never varying throughout the five acts---has brought, at least, as much money to the theatre as "Timour the Tartar."

It is to be hoped that the new Committee of Drury Lane theatre will endeavour to raise the British stage to its pristine consequence; as its present deterioration has evidently proceeded from the want of good management, not of native genius, For some time past, show has been substituted for sense: and dialogue (formerly the soul of English Comedy) neglected for the sake of unmeaning meagre bustle, the chief ingredient of the French drama. The motto which Foote chose for his theatre--Quid rides? De te fabula narratur, would be preposterous if applied to a London audience gazing on the representation of foreign manners.