likely to remain so; Turkey is downright bankrupt; while the credit of the South American Catholic countries is at a provokingly low ebb. Religion undoubtedly has a = very important though an indirect influence upon human business affairs. It promotes - commercial as well as social morality where its influence makes itself vigorously felt; - and even the practical economist will not refuse to admit that commercial morality is the soundest basis of commercial prosperity. The pope is shrewd enough to avail himself - of an appeal to self-interest to induce schismatics to return to the true fold and the faithful to cleave to their faith; but the French pilgrims, were they not the soberest and most unreasoning of devotees, must have laughed gently to themselves when told that the reason why gold napoleons are - plenty in France may be found in the penny contributions to the Holy Father, and the journeys made by the devout to the shrines ☐ of Paray and Lourdes. FL THE book-reviewer of the London Spectator, in noticing Mr. Southworth's "Four Thousand Miles of African Travel," is perplexed at the oddly-compounded name of Mr. Gouverneur Morris, Jr., of New York, apparently thinking that Gouverneur has some sort of gubernatorial significance. Mr. Julian Hawthorne writes to the Spectator to set the reviewer right: explaining that Gouverneur is --a frequently-recurring family name in New York. But Mr. Hawthorne might have gone ✓ a little farther, and reminded the Spectator reviewer that the name of a man so well known in American history as Gouverneur Morris -who figured in our Continental Congress, who was our agent in England during the Revolution, who was afterward our embassalor to France, and later a United States Sen was to extract from this mass of literature just such facts as seemed likely to prove useful in enabling the public to reach some which press for solution, or at least to understand their principles; and Professor Jevons may have the satisfaction of feeling that, if he has not closed the debate on the Bank Charter Act, or on "intrinsic" and "representative" value, he has made it easier than ever before for the wayfaring man to comprehend the real function of money, and the conditions with which it must comply. And, after all, money is like monogamy: its explanation is to be sought not in metaphysics but in history. Gold and silver have come to be universally accepted as the best circulating medium, not by a process of reasoning or an evolution of consciousness, but by the long experience of the race, extending over thousands of years, and embracing a trial of skins, corn, oxen, leather, wampum, cowries, copper, bronze, iron, and lead, that they most nearly meet the essential requisites of money. tween it and the harp in mechanical principle | conclusion upon the many currency questions itor, who was actively concerned in many | author defines it, "a descriptive essay on political movements ought to be known to in educated Englishman. It is true that eduated and other Englishmen are prone to lisdain all knowledge of what they call our ocal celebrities; but limitations in these matters quite as often arise from the stubornness and ignorance of the outside world s from any necessary boundary to the indiidual's fame. WHO invented the pianoforte? The lorentines, having caught the centennial in✔ection, propose to commemorate, next year, he one-hundredth anniversary of the death fa certain Cristofori, for whom they deand the honor of having given to the world he most elaborate and perfect of musical intruments. But Cristofori's claim is not of he clearest, and is very earnestly disputed. The fact probably is, that to no single inrentor do we owe the piano. It gradually the past and present monetary systems of * Money and the Mechanism of Exchange. By Professor Jevons begins with an amusing story of a French singer who gave a concert in the Society Islands with the understanding that she was to receive a third part of the receipts. When counted, her share was found to consist of three pigs, twenty-three turkeys, forty-four chickens, five thousand cocoa-nuts, besides considerable quantities of bananas, lemons, and oranges, which would have been a very fair return if it could have been converted into cash. Unfortunately, pieces of money were scarce in the Society Islands, and as mademoiselle could not consume any considerable portion of the receipts herself, it became necessary in the mean time to feed the pigs and poultry with the fruit. Homely as this anecdote is, there could hardly be a better illustration at once of the conditions of barter (the primary form of exchange), and of the usefulness of a standard currency; and from this initial point we are led step by step through the early history of money, the substitution of the metals for other materials, the various systems of metallic money, the "battle of the standards," and the growing development of representative money, such as under-weight coins, promissory-notes, bank-notes, checks, bills of exchange, and the various other "credit documents" by which, in modern commerce, the use of actual money is dispensed with. Much attention is given to technical matters relating to coinage, such as alloys, the size and wear of coins, the methods of counting them, and the best plan to prevent counterfeiting. In treating of the materials of coins the professor cites the tradition that Lycurgus obliged the Lacedæmonians to use iron money, in order that its weight might be a check upon overmuch trading, and remarks that, if this rule were adopted at the present day, a penny (English money) would weigh about a pound, and a ton of iron would represent a five-pound note. On the other hand, gold and silver are very awkward for small currency. A silver penny weighs seven and Of the "Lyrics," several are deformed by | Harper & Brothers. a half grains, and a gold one would weigh only half a grain. The octagonal quarterdollar tokens, circulated in California, weigh less than four grains each, and are so thin that they can almost be blown away. The suitability of gold and silver for the higher values has, however, been recognized everywhere; and the only open question in coinage is as to the best material for fractional currency. Bronze is better than copper, and the alloy of one part of nickel with three of copper that has been adopted for the onecent pieces of the United States, the smaller coins of Belgium, and the ten and five pfennig pieces of the new German coinage, would be excellent but for the variableness of the price of nickel. If steel could be prevented from rusting, it would be one of the best possible materials; but Professor Jevons thinks it likely that some new and entirely satis factory material for fractional money will shortly be found-perhaps an alloy of manganese. Naturally, the largest space is devoted to the English monetary system and to English experience, but the facts marshaled are of universal application. A good deal of attention, moreover, is given to the problem of international coinage-the adoption of which, the author thinks, would be the most important step in the path of progress that the race could take, except the adoption of an international language. Professor Jevons thinks that the decimal system will, in the end, prevail, if only from the hold which it has taken on the world; but he candidly admits its defects, and shows that the duodecimal system is in various ways more simple and convenient. As to the steps necessary to secure an international money, he thinks the most important that could be taken now would be the assimilation of the American dollar to the French five-franc piece-a change which would involve a reduction of less than two grains in the amount of gold which the dollar contains. "There is little doubt," he says, "that the adhesion of the American Government to the proposals of the Congress of 1863 would give the holding turn to the metric system of weights, measures, and moneys. It is quite likely that it might render the dollar the future universal unit. The fact that the dollar is already the monetary unit of many parts of the world, gives it large odds. In becoming assimilated to the French écu, American gold would be capable of circulation in Europe, or wherever the French napoleon has hitherto been accepted." In studying a language we begin with the grammar before we attempt to write or read; and there is much to be learned about money before entering upon those abstruse questions which barely admit of decided answers. Professor Jevons's work furnishes an elementary grammar of the subject; and if it could have a circulation proportionate to its merits, that murky atmosphere of ignorance in which visionary financial schemes are enabled to flourish would soon be cleared. Ir is plain, from the "Home Pastorals, Ballads, and Lyrics" (Boston: J. R. Osgood & Co.), that Mr. Bayard Taylor, as a poet, considers himself at issue with his fellows; and the tone of most of the poems is alternately one of remonstrance and defiance. Like the singer of the "Earthly Paradise," he was "born out of his due time;" but he is not, as Morris is, content to dwell apart in a world created and peopled by his own art, but frets under the restraints and limitations of unsympathetic and uncongenial surroundings. The "burden of the day" is heavy upon him because he will not shape himself after the patterns that are wrought "in our common mills of thought; " and his only consolation comes from the hope that, if he wins in his attempt to throw off the burden, those who imposed the restrictions will awaken and thank him because he defied. Now, in a case of this kind, there is always a question whether it is the time or the poet that is out of joint; and it is certainly odd to encounter such a complaint coming from Mr. Taylor. We had always supposed that his poetry took much of its interest, as it certainly takes much of its popularity, from its falling in with the time-from its drawing its inspiration, its subjects, and its sentiments, from the prevailing tastes and feelings of his audience. How else account for the considerable measure of success which he has achieved? And surely Mr. Taylor has no reason to be dissatisfied with the reception accorded his work both by the critics and the public. It seems to us, in truth, that the time has been peculiarly propitious to Mr. Taylor's muse. In a period of lofty dramatic or intensely lyrical poetry-a period favorable to spontaneous, natural singing-he could hardly have hoped to gain a hearing; whereas, now, few American poets are more certain of a wide and admiring audience. The present collection contains most of the miscellaneous poetry which Mr. Taylor has written since 1864. The first group is entitled "Home Pastorals," and contains five pieces: a proem, an epilogue, and three longer poems entitled, respectively, “May - Time," "August," and "November." These are for the most part descriptive, as pastoral poetry should be, and are written in flowing, leisure. ly hexameters, a difficult measure, which Mr. Taylor manages extremely well. The tone is pitched very low, and there is little attempt at pictorial embellishment; occasionally, however, we come upon a felicitous bit like the following, descriptive of November's advent: "Silent are now the flute of spring and the clarion of summer, As they had never been blown: the wail of a dull Miserere Heavily sweeps the woods, and, stifled, dies in the valleys." The second group, entitled "Ballads," comprises six pieces, all of which are goodinteresting in subject and spirited in style. "John Reed" is a peculiarly impressive picture of a life unblessed by love, and slowly withering to the root; and "The Old Pennsylvania Farmer" is a striking and lifelike portrait. The instinctive conservatism of old age has seldom been more accurately and amusingly depicted. "Napoleon at Gotha" is a spirited rendering of a well-known historic incident. the fretfulness of which we spoke at the beginning of our notice, and in others the topic is too subtile to find truly lyrical expression. The skill in versification is, perhaps, their most noticeable feature; though "The Two Homes," "The Sleeper," and "Run Wild," are both pleasing and musical. All of these are too long to quote; so we select, instead, the following stanza from "Summer Night" -a good example of the author's easy command of rhythm and rhyme: "ADAGIO. "Something came with the falling dusk, breast. Shy Spirit of Love, awake, awake! All things feel thee, And all reveal thee: The night was given for thy sweet sake. Toil slinks aside, and leaves to thee the land; The heart beats warmer for the idle hand; The timid tongue unlearns its wrong, And every life, like flowers whose scent is dumb Oh, each so lost in all, who may resist The plea of lips unkissed, Though kissed a thousand times, kiss not again!" Mr. Taylor's muse seems to need the spur of a great occasion, and the "Odes" undoubtedly present the finest poetry in the volume. "The Gettysburg Ode," in particular, is a very noble poem, and will take a place but little below Lowell's "Commemoration Ode," in the patriotic song of the nation. The fine "Ode to Goethe," read at the memorial dinner, was reproduced at the time in the columns of the JOURNAL, and the echo of its exalted straius can hardly have faded as yet from the minds of our readers. It was a happy thought on the part of Miss Johnson to adopt the Catskill Mountains as the locale of her fairy stories; * for the necromancy of Washington Irving has already rendered them enchanted ground, and nothing is too marvelous for belief concerning the region which Rip Van Winkle has consecrated to mythology. Her fairies, it is true, are not of the familiar goblin brood, and their ancestry could easily be traced back to Robin Goodfellow and his merry elfs; but we can readily believe that previous writers have overlooked part of the popula tion of our wonder-land, and Nip, and Puff, and Rapp, and Laurel Queen, and the rest, will find a cheerful welcome to the Catskill Valhalla. The plan of Miss Johnson's book is like that of the Arabian Nights-a cluster of stories within a story, the wildest flights of the imagination being linked to the homely incidents of every-day life and facts familiar to us all. A little boy, named Job, left alone in a cottage on the mountains while his grand father went to the village for provisions, is snowed in on Christmas-eve by an unexpected snow-storm; and, as he hovered close to the fire in his solitude, the great clock in the * The Catskill Fairies. By Virginia W. Johnson. Illustrated by Alfred Fredericks. New York: corner, and the murmuring shell on the las have no cyclopædia or biographical dic- ries" are sure to delight. The book is beautifully printed and bound, and Mr. Fredericks's illustrations are * fully as pleasing as the text. If the modern taste for art has extended to fairy-land, - Queen Puff will surely appoint him courtartist. T THE second volume of the new edition of Hawthorne's works (Boston: J. R. Osgood & Co.) contains "The House of the Seven Gables," one of the most fascinating romances ever written. We have already spoken of the exquisite style in which this edition is published, but each additional volume affords a new pleasure to the eye. Nothing could ex THE witty Charles Monselet-one of the men who know best how to say nothing quite agreeably-has just brought out in Paris his "Années de Gaité," a book certified to be full of fun and of good spirits. It is a collection of fanciful stories, in which, notwithstanding all that is fanciful, Parisian existence is sketched from the life; not serious Parisian life, indeed, but such as we see on the Boulevard and in the Bois. Certain of the morsels which compose it contain ideas which would do well on the stage. The Débats cites onea little story, "The Sorrows of a Borrower"in which one gentleman constitutes himself guardian of another, who on the morrow is to lend him a few hundred pounds, and the wouldbe borrower goes so far as to fight a duel with some one who had cause of quarrel with the lender, lest the lender himself should, by THE combination of sound scientific instruction with an exciting and plausible story is not an easy one, and we cannot say that Mr. Trowbridge has been entirely successful in his attempt to make it in "The Young Surveyor" (Boston: J. R. Osgood & Co.). There is plenty of instruction in it, no doubt, lucidly and ingeniously put, and the story is highly interesting; but the two are mingled without being mixed, and we are ifraid most boys will skip the explanations | death, be incapacitated from lending. of Jack's surveying achievements in their agerness to reach his encounters with old Peakslow, his adventures with Radcliff, and is gradual reformation of the Betterson Joys. They cannot read even these portions of the story, however, without acquiring at east a modicum of useful knowledge; and THE London Athenæum is pleased to commend Miss Alcott's "Eight Cousins" highly. It says that Miss Alcott's stories are thoroughly healthy and full of racy fun and humor, and ends its criticism as follows: "Although there are seven boy cousins, one or two of whom are quite men in their own eyes, and he tone of the book, which, after all, is the ❘ although there is a lovely, fascinating little nost important point, is thoroughly wholeome and invigorating. Sensible boys will ave little reason to complain as long as they ave the opportunity, now and then, to add uch a book to their collection of wellhumbed literary treasures. There are many illustrations in the volme, and most of them are good, but the arst's vignette of "Lord Betterson" is an bsurdly inappropriate travesty of Mr. Trowridge's portrait of that backwoods "aristo cat." MR. JOHNSON concludes his "Little Clascs" with a volume of "Authors," containrg biographical sketches of all the authors presented in the series. As there are more an a hundred and fifty of these, the sketchare necessarily very brief, and little is atmpted in the way of criticism. Addison Oserves in the opening paper of the Spectar that "a reader seldom peruses a book ith pleasure till he knows whether the writof it be a black or a fair man, of a mild choleric disposition, married or a bacher, with other particulars of the like nature Dat conduce very much to the right underanding of an author;" and it is to the rnishing of such particulars, with others a chronological and bibliographical charter, that Mr. Johnson chiefly addresses mself. The sketches are fairly good of eir kind, and will prove serviceable to such girl, who grows up to be a charming young 'Clarescit urendo.' It does not brighten as it burns. It seeks to run through the gamut of the universe, but it has not yet discovered a concord. It is a perfect Chinese concert of sounds. Shelley is its most pronounced type, and by far its greatest ornament; and ninetenths of Shelley's poetry is a diseased wail and a shapeless cry that does not reach the gods, and does not benefit man." THE Saturday Review characterizes the literature of spiritualism very plainly and pointedly. It says: "The chief thing that must strike any rational mind on taking up the literature of what is called 'spiritism' is its intense and irredeemable dreariness. Weary, flat, stale, and unprofitable as the courses of this world may have been pronounced, none but the veriest lunatic would think to better himself by flying to one the course of which is likely to be such as the mediums have to tell us of. Any thing more stupid than the doings, more vapid than the talk, more pointless than the whole life which goes on in the so-called world of spirits, it is not in the power of man to conceive. No wonder that the heroes in the Elysian Fields had rather, as they told Telemachus, serve as the veriest bondsmen in the world of daylight and the earth than reign over the shades, if the unearthly abode of the blessed corresponded in the slightest degree with the melancholy blank which seems to make up 'mediumistic' existence at its best. Universal and unmitigated imbecility certainly seems to be the state to which what are put forward as the 'higher class of spirits' are one and all reduced. As for the lower orders, the wickedness of their old Adam finds vent in pranks and mystifications too childishly inane to be accused of serious mischief. We never heard, at least, of any thing worse than pulling unbelievers' beards in the dark, or hitting them over the head with a banjo." A NEW drama in London, by Messrs. Palgrave Simpson and Herman Merivale, entitled "All for Her," must be of a rather composite order, according to the Athenæum. The central figure, it tells us, is taken, by permission and with acknowledgment, from Dickens; the sacrifice, which forms the main interest, recalls the "Esmond" of Thackeray; the treatment of the subject is in the manner of the elder Dumas; and the hero, remade, or at least redressed, seems at the outset compounded of equal portions of Don Cæsar de Bazan and Le Neveu du Rameau. These approximations, however, which can scarcely, except in one instance, be called resemblances, scarcely detract from the originality of a work which is nobly planned and fairly executed. There is freshness of motive enough to set against any amount of unconscious imitation, and the interest begotten during the progress of the story is equally novel and powerful. A WRITER in Temple Bar assails the poetry of the present era in a very truculent if not discriminating fashion. He says: "If we rid ourselves of a certain glamour which its usually high coloring sheds around its performances, and of a certain amount of unhealthy sympathy with it which a contemporary can hardly resist, we shall find that, substantially, the poetry of the Romantic School, the poetry which essentially breathes the air and expresses the feelings of the nineteenth century, is thin, hazy, unsubstantial, deficient in good sense as well as in definiteness, wanting in sobriety and measured judgment, too fine by half in its dress, morbid, unsatisfactory, and inadequate. It does not satisfy. It excites; at least it excites us. But whether it will excite a future generation is another question. It is ornate, excessive in adornment, outrageous in expression, forced, odd, quaint, spasmodic, and | The very air of Italy seems blowing through sometimes positively epileptic. It is wanting in backbone, or rather indulges in those painful explosions and contortions which accompany certain forms of spinal disease. It is very glowing, but it gives no light. It dazzles, but does not illuminate. It cannot be said of it, as Cicero says of the true orator, DR. ELZE, in his new book on Shakespeare, may be said to have added something to the probability of Shakespeare's having visited Italy. It is indeed difficult to believe that the poet never himself saw those fair blue skies, beneath which so many of his creations move as beneath their native and proper canopy. many of his scenes. And does any non-Italian work transport us into the bright, starclear South like the last act of "The Merchant of Venice?" "M. C.," in the London Pictorial Worldasserted to be Mortimer Collins-declares Jo aquin Miller, Artemus Ward, and Julian Hawthorne-American writers who went to London to use their pens to be not only not "firstclass men," but that "Tupper is equal to all three of them"!!! S The Arts. IX pictures, by Gérôme, Alma - Tadema, Meissonier, Zamacoïs, Vibert, and Jules Breton, have been on exhibition at Goupil's. These pictures were painted some ten or twelve years ago, and are very interesting examples of the work of artists some of whom did not then by any means enjoy the world-wide reputation they have since justly acquired. It is instructive to look at their work and see in some the half-formed manner that has since developed completely, and in others to note the change of aim that has crept into the purpose of the painter. In neither of these early works is there the same freedom of handling or precision of color which now marks the works of the same artists; and the change in these respects is an encouraging indication for all younger students that improvement constantly goes on where painters earnestly work with the hands and think out difficulties with the imagination. The painting by Alma-Tadema is called "Teaching Young Gauls the Manly Arts," and represents two handsome boys (young princes eight or ten years old) in a stately apartment, surrounded by officers of the court, including priests in long, yellow robes, and their mother, a royal woman, who sits somewhat apart attended by her maids. From the composed, self-reliant faces of the young boys, and their level brows and solid features, we should have taken them for the Asiatics or Egyptians Alma-Tadema has since so often represented, were it not for their fair skins and yellow hair. One boy has just flung his little weapon, resembling a small battle-axe, at a target at the end of the room, where it sticks in the wall close to the bull's-eye. This child is now standing still as a statue, while his brother takes his turn at the sport. While Alma-Tadema did not paintso well when this picture was made as he now does, there may be seen in it the same love of composed and statuesque forms and groupings that now marks his pictures; but experience has taught him that Greek or Egyptian types are more in consonance with the lofty composure he loves than those which are less beautiful in line and more nervous in action. It is very interesting to trace technically in this picture the indications of an instinct for color which has more recently unfolded in the strange, subtile lights and shades which dominate his paintings, and now show masses of rich hues put upon the canvas so evenly and with such unerring precision. In the picture of the young Gauls we perceive that Alma-Tadema loved color when he made the massed forms of yellow drapery hanging from the shoulders of the priests; but it was color he had not learned to manage well, and the edges of it are uncertain and dirty, while the shadows do not repeat the hue which shows in the light. This artist has lost somewhat his love of carefully-anatomized drawing in the last ten years, even if he ever had it, which we much doubt, for examples are extremely rare of painters with so positive an instinct for tones of color and the æsthetic sphere of their subjects as Alma-Tadema is possessed of, who care much for the unimaginative and realistic development of particulars. It is said of Corot that he gives the sentiment of a landscape. As truly may we apply this thought to Alma-Tadema that he gives the sentiment of an historical period or the genius of a race-the sentiment as he conceives it, which may or may not be the true conception and Mr. Ruskin thinks it is not - but it is at any rate a very definite and positive one. Meissonier now depicts; for in those days Meissonier evidently cared very much for his subjects, and, as he did not know so well how to make them good, he threw more of his own thought into them than he now does, when long habit has taught him to the breadth of a hair what sized pencil to use for the exquisite veining of a hand, and the precise shade of blue with which to mark the shadows about the eyelids, or the sunk thinness of the temples. Of old these minutiæ were much less precise and more coarse than now, but still they were positive enough to indicate whither the genius of the artist tended. The other pictures are less significant than the two we have described. Jules BreWhen Alma-Tadema painted his two ton has always apparently had the same habyoung Gauls he was somewhat in the position its of color, and his group of women in the of a student, and his own individuality was gray twilight show the same innocent type less developed than now, in consequence of French peasantry as in his pictures of toof which we see more clearly here than in day. In this painting of "The Day's Work any picture we remember by him, that he over," a woman pure as a nun, and as strongly studied hard when he painted the stalwart built as a horse, sits nursing a large, healthy legs and carefully-articulated knees of his infant, while another child, vigorous and young barbarians. They are very minutely brawny, is stretched out on a hay-cock beside delineated, and attract the eye more particuits mother. Two or three more women are larly than any other point in the picture. ❘ grouped about, simply painted and well But now, from all his late paintings, we made, and in the distance their frame cotknow he does not care for this department | tage appears through the gloaming in the of a picture, which Gérôme, on the other hand, has most potently in his thought; his mind has run toward statuesque composition clothed with strange and harmonious tones of color. Disraeli, in "Contarini Fleming," describes the growth of a poet's mind, but no biography of an artist so representative and individual as Alma-Tadema can so well show the progress of his thoughts and his skill as pictures made by him at different stages. Meissonier's little painting has great value from somewhat the same cause as the one by damp evening haze. This painting is quite a large one, but we do not recollect to have seen a picture by Breton that contained so many figures in it, and these figures too are grouped to make a pleasant composi❘tion, each of them being as thoroughly drawn and as expressive as if it formed the centre of interest in the picture. Zamacois seems to us to have changed less than either of the artists named, and, though his pictures have less color than in some of his works of a later day, the lady mixing drink for an old brown monk, in her handsome Alma-Tadema. In Meissonier's case, how-dress and with her two gorgeous male com ever, the motive ever appears to have been to depict, with the most minute realism, each quality in any object from a man to his shoestring, and to render with absolute fidelity every particular line and shade of color that went to its composition. An analytic, not a synthetic, painter, it is not the general sentiment of a scene or a condition of life that saturates his intelligence, but the brilliant panions, might have been found in one of his paintings of last year. FREDERICK A. BRIDGMAN'S Salon picture, entitled "The Nubian Fortune-Teller-Interior of a Harem," is now on exhibition in Brooklyn. The scene represents a Moorish interior or apartment, with a lofty, bracketed ceiling, and side-walls richly colored and or sparkle of a multiplicity of facts. This pict-namented with arabesque-work. The sides ure was painted several years ago, and since it was executed the same change and technical progress may be observed in it as in that of the "Young Gauls" by Alma-Tadema. Then as now, Meissonier evidently considered it a duty to use no more canvas than was absolutely necessary for the expression of his ideas, and so we see here a small cabinet picture with a man in it, as minute and as detailed as in the painter's works of last year. But in the nicety with which these details are rendered, time and practice have made a great improvement. In the picture at Goupil's there is the evidence of a freshness of feeling, which has since died out of work that has become somewhat hackneyed, though now more thorough than ever. This fresh interest is shown in the vivacity of the expression of the man's face-an expression of the room are furnished with luxuriant divans, and the centre of the tessellated pavement is sunken, where a small fountain plays. On the right, a tawny Arab reclines upon a divan, and his favorite wife is seated on a rug at his feet, and has her arm thrown lowingly around a little child. At the right hand of this group a dark-skinned Nubian woman is seated on the pavement, and is apparently telling the fortunes of those around her in pantomime as well as in words. Behind this weird figure of the Nubian woman there are scattered figures, some of which are standing and others reclining upon the divans and upon the pavement. The background is in the form of a deep alcove. It has a large, latticed window, in shadow, which scarcely affects the soft light in the recess. The strongest light in the apartment more positive and perhaps exaggerated than | is concentrated on the foreground group, and the effect is very striking, not only in connection with the figures, but also with the - delicate tracery shown upon the walls. Just behind the Arab the wall is of a deep-blue tone, and its color is emphasized by a warm brown tint introduced on the right, where there are a number of niches holding vases and other household ornaments. Upon the cornices of the doors and windows, and resting on brackets, are numerous objects of the potter's art; and other evidences of a some- what rude and uncultivated art-taste are also apparent in the apartment. There is a great variety of colors and textures shown in the costumes, and the arrangement is harmonious. The drawing is excellent. The interest of the picture is concentrated in the foreground group. This concentration of interest around the Nubian woman is one of the most artistic features in the composition; it is not disturbed by the brilliancy of the wall-colors, the enervated figures of the women in the background, or the gorgeous accessories of costume and rich architectural detail. At first sight, such is the repose of the scene, one fails to comprehend its extraordinary beauty. This feeling, however, is soon dispelled, and the picture at once as ten to be sung mezza voce, to use the hybrid Despite these defects, Wachtel is a mar- serts its force and power as a lasting expres-sciously associates with the tenor voice some sion of the beautiful, and as such we have no doubt it will be accepted by lovers of art. MAURICE F. H. DE HAAS is at present engaged upon a large canvas representing the clearing away of a storm at West Hampton, on the ocean-shore of Long Island. There is a brig stranded in the breakers; and a pile of merchandise on the beach, covered with canvas, indicates that the crew, aided by --wreckers, have been engaged in taking out her cargo. There is a large number of figires forming scattered groups on the beach, Find the brig's deck is yet held by the crew. The sky is covered with drifting stormlouds, and the effect of the wind can almost be heard, so realistic is the treatment, as it - ways the vessel's spars and whistles through the rigging. The force of the wind is also hown on the water, and, as the huge rollers break, it catches the white-caps, and sends he foam swirling in showers over the strandid vessel and landward. In the drawing of thing inconsistent with masculine vigor. But, shown in the great duet in the last act of "The Huguenots." Here the genius of the singer comes out unmistakably. In listening to Herr Wachtel as an interpreter of music, one irresistibly recurs to that class of art-associations growing out of the thought of Gluck, Weber, Beethoven, and Wagner, as composers of music. There is nothing feminine, soft, and luxuriant, in the moral atmosphere of such art, but every thing that is sturdy and invigorating. It breathes of the mountain and pine-forest, not of the plain and orange-grove. Surely, to belong to this fellowship in music is loftier and better than to be merely rounded, and moulded, and polished, in accordance with the fastidious requirements of musical dilettanteism, which sometimes threatens to eat like a dry-rot into all that is truest and most inspiring in music. For our part, the pleasure to be derived from this kind of excellence seems far more worthy of preference than that growing out of mere finish of method and liquid sweetness of voice. Wachtel the actor has the merits of Wachtel the singer. There are fire, freedom, and breadth, in his dramatic manner; he fills the stage by his mingled dignity and passion. The union of power in singing and acting is It gives Wachtel a stamp as an artist which even his great defects can hardly tarnish, and establishes him as one of the most remarkable musical artists of the age. rare. THE last British Quarterly Review has a very sweeping criticism of Mr. Holman Hunt's "Shadow of Death." It denounces the figure of Christ as simply imbecile, expressing neither energy of body nor of mind: "The lower limbs are muscular, and yet the pose and movement are so feeble and devoid of will as to suggest paralysis. The slender arms are not in action, but are spreading heedlessly in space, without intention or control. The face is equally devoid of energy, intelligence, and human sympathy. Never were mental weakness and the absolute deficiency of moral power more ably shown. Fallen humanity could have little hope from such a delicate and dainty personage. The forty days and forty nights of wandering in the wilderness, and the effective power of will and limb experienced by the money-changers, are entirely inconsistent with this feeble presence. This, then, is not the Christ. The eyes of all would never have been fastened on an aspect such as this. Here is no possibility of any Saviour of the world. No one would put his trust in such a paragon of imbecility. The whole figure is the very opposite of the historic Christ. The Saviour could have been no pretty weakling; but, as a man destined to sorrow, he would be firm of countenance, with majesty, and power, and gentleness, united in his aspect. His eyes would not be soft and weak, and full of selfcomplacency, but bright, beaming with active sympathy for human nature, and capable of insight into power as well as into weakness. His mouth and lips, 'taught by the wisdom of his heart, would be finely moulded for the ceptionally pleased with a rendering of the utterance of 'gracious words' or of most bitter scorn. His frame and constitution must "De' Quella Pira" in "Trovatore," which he have been exceptionally strong, and his arms sings an octave above the written score; but muscular, for he was known as an efficient the cultured lover of high art will take even workman, not a make-believe." Severe as more delight in the magnificent dash and huthis criticism is, it seems to us scarcely bemor of "The Whip-Song" in "The Postilyond the facts. The picture seemed to us to illustrate nothing more than its utter failure to he wave-forms and the doomed brig there is ) down the whole depth of the Covent Garden HERR WACHTEL has scarcely awakened ess interest in his present visit to New York man he did on his first appearance in this ountry, but his qualities as a singer are prob stage in London, pealing it forth with a sustained trumpet-force. Rubini, a great tenor of the last generation, not only emulated the feat, but sang four notes higher so artistically that the most delicate ear could not tell where the head-production of voice was substituted for that from the chest. But Wachtel's compass is not his greatest claim upon our admiration, for the ut de poitrine rather captivates the mass than the cultivated listener. His style has so much dignity, breadth, and force throughout, that, if necessary, we could dispense with an ad cap bly now measured with more discrimina-tandum power. The ordinary ear may be ex on and accuracy. Wachtel has indisputa- |