scope, they cry, proves this. An unjaundiced human eye proves quite another thing. See if it does not.

"In the last week of the month of October, of last (1846) year, a young relative of mine, making drawings of the church and seat of the Earl of Gainsborough, at Exton, Rutlandshire, sent me a fly that had alighted on his paper as he was sketching out of doors. He wanted to know the name of it. When the fly arrived some boyish anglers were with me, and I told them to find amongst my artificial flies any one that they thought resembled the natural one in shape and colour. Without more than necessary delay, and at the first guess, they picked out the right imitation. I then told them to look for the same fly in Alfred Ronald's Fly-fisher's Entomology.' They did so; found the drawing and the imitation, and pronounced the natural fly the gold-eyed gauze wing.' They were right; and if boyish eyes looking through- nature's microscope were right, think fish would be wrong?

you

"Now this fly, of which I am speaking, has a green body, with a slight yellow cast in it, four transparent, shovel-pointed, reticulated wings, lying flat over the body, the two under wings being shorter than the upper, and these latter longer than the body of the fly. The head and eyes appear brightly burnished. You have seen an imitation cigar with its burning end deceive the most knowing connoisseur. You have seen a glass filled with simulated brandy and water, invitingly undulating, as it was offered to a most accomplished judge, and taken by him unconscious, until no smell or taste told him of the deception. You have seen man deceived by imitations, with his fine eye for shape and colour; and yet the philosophers tell you fish cannot be so deceived.

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I have told you the colour and the shape of the fly I have just mentioned. I'll now tell you how it is to be imitated. Mr. Ronalds says the following is the way: Body, very pale yellowish green floss silk, tied on with silk thread of the same colour; wings and legs, the palest blue dun hackle that can be procured.' In this imitation the body only is correct; the legs partly so, but the wings are wrong. The fly should not be dressed with hackle-wings, but with wings long and lying flat. They should be made of the fibres of the wing feather of a young starling, or of any light dun feather, stained very slightly green.

"Strange as it may appear, the somewhat imperfect imitation of Mr. Ronald's will be taken by fish in the autumn months, especially by grayling. The reason it will be so taken is that the colour of the body is right, and it is of more importance that the body should be a good imitation than that the wings should be. But if the fly is imitated in my way with flat transparent wings, a bright brown head of two or three laps of silk, it will be a better imitation and a better killer.

"The eyes of birds are, I believe, pretty good. At any rate they can see at an immense distance. The philosophers will perhaps allow that the eyes of the feathered tribes are as difficult to be deceived as those of the finny tribes. I should say more so, because their eyes are sharpened by something very like an intelligent brain placed close by them. Well, birds are continually deceived by the artificial fly of the angler. Swallows, martins, swifts, goldfinches, have darted at artificial flies as the wind blew them about on the line, and have hooked themselves and been taken. It was only last year that a dunghill cock seized an artificial May-fly, attached to an angler's rod resting outside

an inn at Buxton, and was caught. If birds take these imitations of water-flies, not being their natural or best food, how can it be argued that fish will not take them?

"The philosophers say, attempts at imitation are of no avail, for salmon and some of the salmonidæ rise eagerly at artificial flies that resemble nothing living on earth, in air, or water. That is true, and as yet unaccountable. But dress those gaudy salmon flies, or lake trout flies, as small as you like, and the common trout and grayling will not rise at them; neither will dace, chub, or roach; and yet they will rise freely at imitations of river-flies, caterpillars, house-flies, and flies that are bred upon trees, amongst gravel, sand, and plants. I say they will rise at these imitations, and rise at them only, with very few exceptions, when the natural fly is on the water or in season.

"Will the philosophers answer this question? How is it that neither trout nor grayling will during the spring, autumn, or winter months risc at an imitation of the May-fly, their especial favourite during a part of May and June? If trout, or grayling, or chub, would prefer nondescripts to the imitations of flies on the water, no more attractive nondescript could be presented to them than the imitation of the handsome May-fly. But they never take it, except during the 'drake season,' or a little before or a little after it. In that season, viz., when the Mayfly (ephemera vulgata) or green-drake is out upon the waters, fish will prefer an imitation of it to an imitation of any other fly, except indeed at mornings or evenings, when other natural flies are out, and the Mayfly is not. I will here grant, and doing so will strengthen my argument, that it is impossible to imitate well the delicate and beautiful May-fly. Still, fish will sooner take the bad imitation, I may say the worst imitation of it, than the best of any other fly not in season.

"The artificial May-fly is not a killing bait except under peculiar circumstances, and when thrown upon the water amongst the real flies, fish will generally prefer the latter. Use any other artificial fly, as unlike the May-fly as possible, and you will prove the theory of the philosophers to be erroneous, for fish will not rise at these un-like flies at all. They will rise, however, at a bad imitation, particularly under circumstances that tend to improve that imitation. When the weather is gloomy and windy during the drake season,' and the deep waters are ruffled, and few natural May-flies are out, imitations of them will kill well. I account for it thus. During such weather the imperfections of the artificial fly are, to a great measure, hidden. The water is disturbed and not very clear, the splash caused by the falling line and large imitation flies is not very great, and the appearance of the artificial fly then is like that of a natural one either drowned or drowning, or struggling against the effects of gusty weather. On a fine clear day, in pools at least, the artificial May-fly will not succeed; and still less any of the philosophers' outlandish flies, because of the impossibility of imitating the motions of the natural May-fly, observed plainly and constantly by the fish through the clear and tranquil water sending up myriads of the beautiful real insect. When it first comes to the surface of the water it has to shake off the case that confines its wings, to dry them, to gain a little strength in the new atmosphere it breathes, before it can fly away to enjoy a few hours' existence. Whilst making these incipient preparations for ephemeral enjoyment, it is seen by the fish, and fre

quently checked at the outset of its career. The fly-maker cannot imitate these acts of the fly, so apparent to fish in sunny weather, and hence the little success attending the artificial green drake at such a time.

"The above famous fly, so common in the rivers of the midland, the western, and the southern counties of England, is not so common in the north, is rare and even unknown in many of the best rivers of Scotland, Ireland, and Wales. It would be in vain to fish with it there, which proves again that the common trout, at any rate, will not rise at nondescript things, which instinct informs them bear no resemblance to their natural food. Gnats and midges are to be found every where throughout the kingdom, especially in summer, and hence the different sorts of dun artificials, intended to be imitations of those insects, are good general flies in every part of the empire. Artificial palmers, which are imitations of caterpillars of different sizes and colours, are common to the rivers of the British isles, and are therefore good baits, perhaps the best general ones, except in those months when the living caterpillar does not exist."

SELECT WRITINGS OF ROBERT CHAMBERS: Vol. 1.-Essays: Chambers, Edinburgh.-The mere fact of finding short occasional papers collected into a volume does, or at any rate ought to, imply a certain degree of excellence. This, with Mr. Chambers' work, wants no guarantee, there being few, indeed, who have not at some time or other had a taste of what here is given in so abundant a supply. Perhaps the greatest feature in these essays is the almost invariably trifling matters they are built on like the French cook who made his four courses out of a pair of old boots, we verily believe Mr. Chambers would "find good" in the same apparently barren material. Amusing, instructive, and more popular yet, they cannot fail to be, from the lasting power and truth with which they are written; the quiet humour stealing on one like that of poor Goldsmith, and the 'cute observation of the middle classes forcibly reminding one of Franklin..

NEW MUSIC.

THE PASTORAL WEEK: Six vocal quartettes, for two trebles, tenor, and bass, with a condensed piano-forte score: the words by John Major, Esq., editor of "Walton and Cotton illustrated;" the music composed and dedicated to Cipriani Potter, Esq., by John Stenson Major. Addison and Hodson, Regent-street. It is an agreeable surprise in these days of maudlin mediocrity and frivolous common-place to meet with a composer of sterling music. The standard of English composition is reduced so low that many musicians are enabled to "pass muster" who, if subjected to the test of talent, and proved by the touchstone of genius, would at once sink into insignificance. There are, however, some few gems which, although not the produce of Golconda, sparkle and shine like dew-drops on the grassy glades of the valley-beautiful, albeit evanescent-reflecting the rays of solar brilliancy, although not formed to reflect them for more than an hour. Stars

of the seventh magnitude, they yet pierce through the darkness. Minor oracles of the mysteries of science, they are still apt to inform and instruct mankind.

This young composer, Mr. J. S. Major, has here given such striking proofs of his scientific skill and cultivated ideas that we have been unwittingly betrayed into a somewhat lengthy exordium. Our excuse to the reader is this:-Mr. Major deserves more than a mere transient notice. He must not be treated like the damned ones in Dante's "Inferno:"

"Non ragionam di lul, ma guarda e passa;"

for his works merit a minute analysis, as giving evidences of talent of which very few can boast. Time and space preclude this analysis on our own part; all that the critic can do is to take a cursory survey of the "Pastoral Week," and refer his readers to the work itself for further information. The six quartetts before us appear to have been written, or, at all events, conceived during the delights of a honeymoon excursion. We think we can trace that sober love which is akin to melancholy in the exquisite No. 5, "Regret," to which we unhesitatingly point as the best of the series. We should have preferred the minor mode, but Mr. Major has chosen the key of G major. The interrupted cadence in E minor, and the chord of the subdominant in the fifth bar-the modulation into C major, and D minor (instead of D major)and the fine though recondite harmonies taken upon a pedal bass, are highly effective. The melody is pathos itself.

No. 1-" Returning Spring," in A major, 6-8 time, is a gay and glad. some ebullition of May-day mirth. The repetition of the chord of the dominant of the relative minor, in the 9th bar, stimulates the ear to expectation. This harmony is resolved upon a chord of the 6-4. We are then led by the chord of D major (with the 6th), an inversion of the dominant 7th in B minor, and the chord of B minor itself, to a pause on the dominant of the original key.

No. 6-"The Contemplative Angler," in A minor and major, is treated at some length. We like it less than the others; but it is diversified by a very agreeable modulation into the relative major, previous to the alteration of the signature. Few changes are more pleasing to the ear than this temporary introduction of the relative major in a minor key, although the general practice of composers is to commence with the tonic minor instead of with the relative. Spohr's symphony in F, the overture to Don Juan, and B. Romberg's divine overture in D, may be adduced as instances of the case in point.

"The Nightingale," No. 4, in A, and "The Lover's Holiday," No. 3, in G, are on a par with the rest, both as regards fecundity of idea and arrangement of harmony.

No. 2, in D major, is entitled "The Invitation." The harmonization is artistically constructed by a series of progressions which lead by dominant chords, from the relative minor to a pause in A (the dominant) major. Mr. Major appears fearful of anything like monotony, and he is a master of the art of modulation; but his quartetts will require the aid of the best vocal performers.

We have left ourselves little space to speak of our friend Mr. John Major's very pretty pastoral poetry-naturally, from him, of a Waltonian tendency. He has co-operated with his son, the musician, most successfully. Altogether, these quartetts reflect the greatest credit both upon the composer and the writer. As regards the former, we bid him advance and prosper in the career of which the outset is so highly promising. To our readers, and the musical public generally, we can safely and conscientiously recommend a visit to the music-warehouse of Messrs. Addison and Hodson. We like not either to praise or to condemn, without affording an opportunity for the confirmation of our decision,

PUBLIC AMUSEMENTS OF THE METROPOLIS.

'Mid sounds and sights like these long years have passed."-BYRON.

In all directions preparations are being made for Easter-tide. As in former seasons, there will be abundance of sights to be seen: no mean quantity of sound to be heard, from the regions of the Haymarket to the confines of Greenwich; and doubtless there will be no lack of spectators and listeners. The notes of the nightingales at the Operas, both old and new, will not fail to attract; neither will the "sweet voices" of the industrious "walk up! walk up!"-gentlemen, at the Cockney Carnival, be exerted in vain.

The greatest novelty undoubtedly will be the opening of COVENT GARDEN ROYAL ITALIAN OPERA. There can be no second opinion entertained of the exertions of those engaged in the extensive alterations and decorations of this house. Their skill and taste have been remarkably well displayed. The result of these labours is that the interior of this temple of the lyrical drama, besides being considerably enlarged, presents a coup-d'oeil of a highly pleasing character. Rossini's opera of "Semiramide" is selected for the opening; the caste including Grisi, Tamburini, and Mdlle. Alboni, a débutante. If a proper system of management be pursued, there can be no doubt of success. Whether that course be taken by the directors will be tested anon.

THE OLD ITALIAN OPERA-such, we opine, must it be intituled, now that there are two houses devoted to Italian Operas-has been well attended, considering the early state of the season. It is an evidence of good management on the part of Mr. Lumley determining not to follow the olden practice of deferring all novelties until after Easter. Thus stepping out of the beaten track he has brought forward a ballet which bids fair to have a long run--a circumstance not at all surprising when the principal agents are the feet. "Thea; ou La Fée aux Fleurs" has afforded Mademoiselle Rosati an opportunity of dis playing her choregraphic abilities to an extent hitherto denied her, Some of her steps are perfectly surprising, and fail not to inspire her numerous spectators with no ordinary delight. Marie Taglioni in a pas seul is highly pleasing. The general appointments, and the mise en scene, are not to be surpassed.

At DRURY LANE Shakspeare is to be seen-outside, and Mr. Hughes' stud-inside. Nuture appears to have moulded her child Bunn expressly for this age of steam. His ideas appear to be concentrated in the notion that to "get on" you must be continually "puffing." The last "heavy blow" from the managerial trumpet announces the day of the arrival of Mr. Hughes' troop of horses, camels, drivers, &c. The exact minute that the train conveying all these accessories to the forthcoming pageant at Drury Lane will reach the terminus is foretold with an accuracy not to be surpassed-supposing the prophecy to be fulfilled. And then the public is further informed how the calvacade will set out from Euston Square, and the route to be observed is graphically described. Enlightenment is also afforded as to the extensive stables