general question of examining how far a drama can be legitimately applied to the solution of a psychological problem, but assuredly neither the subject of Lucretia Borgia, nor the manner in which it is treated, are calculated to inspire us with any favourable impressions of the author's artistic skill.

A heroine polluted by incest, murder, adultery, encircled by an atmosphere of depravity, to whom crime is as necessary as food, retains the feelings of a mother: it is possible, for the tigress loves her cubs; but is scarcely within the limits of credibility, that the object of her affection should be the offspring of incestuous intercourse, the living witness of the most revolting crime in nature; and it is utterly impossible that her affection should be of that holy and pure nature which alone is worthy of poetry. We might have endured the moral anomalies of Victor Hugo's earlier plays; it is possible that the bandit Hernani may have preserved the chivalrous feelings of a Spanish noble, and that the courtesan Marion de l'Orme may be capable of pure love; but it is utterly impossible that Lucretia Borgia should have room in her polluted soul for any feeling that could interest humanity. It was a flagrant error to make such a moral monster the heroine of a drama. What would be said of the sculptor that sought his models in the charnel or the lazar house, that wrought representations of revolting decay, or still more revolting deformity, to shew that there was some single minute feature in the human frame which resisted the disgusting effects of death or pestilence? But Hugo has gone beyond this: never was there in life or in death any thing more shocking, more horrifying, and more sickening than his portraiture of Lucretia Borgia; and the attempt to relieve the picture by traits of maternal love merely superadds incredulity to disgust. Yet it was received with applause on the very stage whence Hernani and Marion de l' Orme had been hissed and hooted such is the influence of perseverance in producing the toleration of splendid error.

Victor Hugo has told us the secret of the peculiarities of Lucretia Borgia; it is simply the development of an idea of his own consciousness-maternal love in a vicious bosom-the characters have derived nothing from history but their baptism, and

he demands that they should be tried, not by the conventional standard of any stage of society, but by the general laws of human nature. The demand is unfair; but even if we yield to it, what law of nature would justify maternal love redeeming not one vice, but every crime which the tongue can speak or the mind conceive?

We have not room to enter into any analysis of Angelo, the tyrant of Padua; it is, in fact, a mere revival of Hernani and Marion de l'Orme; there are a scoundrel and a courtesan, each with a single virtue, pictures undoubtedly from the dark room and imperfect glass, creatures of Hugo's imagination, whose archetypes could not be found in the world of reality. But our old acquaintance, Bloody Queen Mary, must not be dismissed so summarily; she is made the heroine of a drama, or rather she is made the form in which the author developes one of the most whimsical ideas of his consciousness. The psychological discovery which the drama was formed to propound, is contained in the following speech of Lemon Renard :

"My Lord Chandos, when a woman is our ruler, caprice is our ruler. Politics are regulated, not by calculation, but chance. We are no longer able to count upon any thing. To-morrow will not be a logical inference from to-day. Affairs of state cease to be a game of chess, and become a game of cards.”

Now while we deny that this aphorism can be received either as an absolute or general truth, we assert, that if the entire annals of history were searched for a refutation, no more striking instance could be found than Mary Tudor. She was not capricious, but as steady a bigot as ever the church of Rome produced, and as inflexible a despot as either her father or sister. The politics of her reign might have been calculated on from the outset with more certainty than Finlayson's long annuities. The politicians of her day could count upon every thing. The to-morrow of her time might be read in the yesterday; and the affairs of state were only a game of cards, because the chief player could sauter la coupe and hold all the honours.

This drama is, indeed, Victor Hugo's most flagrant sin against historical verity; his partisans tell us that he had a right to baptize his own idea, but we say that by such baptism he did by implication "promise

and vow certain things in its name," and that the neglect of the conditions is ruinous to the child.

It would be worse than idle to criticise the historic verisimilitude of a drama, in which there is not an incident that would have occurred in the reign of any of the Tudors, nor indeed at any time in England. It is equally at variance with abstract human nature. Marie Tudor and Jane are impossible characters; their love and their jealousy are not the passions as we see them in real life, and the hero Fabiani is to the full as much out of nature as Triboulet. We need not pursue the analysis farther; he who has read one of Victor Hugo's plays can understand the plan of all; his system is to represent one pure passion struggling with and overcoming the depravity of all the rest; it is the Corsair or Giaour broken into crums; he exaggerates the purity, he exaggerates the depravity; he views both in his

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dark room and through his distorted ́ dium, he will not correct his false impressions by his own experience or that of others-he neither mixes with the world nor reads history; hence his representations are distorted phantasmagoria, objects of wonder, of horror, even of admiration, but not of sympathy. And hence their fate may be predicted, they will be stared at, applauded, and forgotten.

The influence of the theatre cannot be revived; Victor Hugo in his efforts to restore stage dynasty, has inflicted upon it an irreparable injury, by removing it to a greater distance from reality, and thus depriving it of sympathetic interest. He has mistaken the true nature of fiction, which is the more perfect when it is the more true; but he has evinced powers that would command success if he opened the shutters of the dark room and substituted plain glass for the imperfect convex lens.

I HAD been angling on the Nannywater, and, after a good morning's sport, determined to turn in and have breakfast at my friend Tim Casey's,-who at that time was landlord of the "Golden Shamrock," near BlackAbbey. I had two motives for doing so :— first, because the hostess-Mistress Nancy -was justly considered the best hand in the country at dressing rashers and eggs; and next, because I wished to select one of a litter of fine Newfoundland puppies which Tim's celebrated "Mermaid" had just produced.

While breakfast was preparing, Tim and I walked into the yard, and paid a visit to the manger where the whelps lay comfortably nestling their noses and resting their chins upon each other's flanks, in a state of somnolency. Having made my selection, we returned to the little parlour, and there found the tea, coffee, et cætera,as exquisite as a keen appetite could desire-Nancy with her best cap, and best smiles, officiating in person at the tea-board.

As the moralist says, "All human happiness is fleeting;" and as I say, "breakfast itself must have an end!" The important business being over, and its equipage removed, Tim went off about his out-door ocVOL. X.-NO. IV.-APRIL, 1837.

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cupations, and Nancy to attend to her duties in the bar-where a continual bustle, clanking of pewter pots, and loud talk, gave undeniable evidence that the house was well to do." For my own part, having lighted my cigar, I took up the "Dublin Observer," and stretching out my legs upon the sofaor rather settle-determined to "take mine ease in mine inn."

Before ten minutes however had elapsed, I was interrupted by a stentorian voice exclaiming,-"Blood-an-agers! Missus Casey, darlint, how is every bit of you? but, by gorra! it's yourself that's looking elegant, so I needn't be after axing."

""Tis Dennis O'Daisy," said I, “for a guinea to a turnip,—I know his voice." So getting up, I rang the bell, and summoned our hero into the parlour.

Dennis was a boy, (at least so he called himself,) about thirty years of age, six feet two inches in altitude, with a proportionable breadth of shoulder and strength of limb. In his attire, he was invariably, (if I may be allowed to apply the language of Horace,) simplex munditiis. He wore strong shoes, blue cotton stockings, short leathern breeches, and a coarse grey coat-or rather jacket,— with very brief skirts. A low-crowned hat,

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perfectly devoid of all nap, and slightly placed aside, upon an immense mop of curly, black hair, surmounted his person, and (with the addition of a shirt,) completed his costume ;-for, (except on Sundays,) he generally dispensed with the use of either waistcoat or cravat, "not," as he declared, "in the regard of the saving, but becaze he felt aisier athout them." On the Sabbath, however, he sported either a "plover's-eye," or a shamrock green,"

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"tied round his nate neck,"

and a cotton vest, cut from a piece of cloth, originally intended for a bed-curtain, and having portrayed on it, in glowing colours, the spirit-stirring device of a Fox-chase!

About the design in this last-mentioned work of art. I shall at present say nothing;

but I think the artist rather laid himself open to the strictures of criticism, as far as the execution was concerned. It evinced a startling contempt for perspective; and indeed a boldness-I had almost said carelessness of colouring, which went far to convince me that the "Ball's-Bridge" cotton factory has not been able, (no matter what the connoisseurs may say about home manufacture,) to equal the yet celebrated loomwork to which old Gilles Gobelin has given his name. I shall not press my readers, however, to adopt this opinion, as after all perhaps it may be the result of early prejudice on my part.

At so-hoing a hare, snaring a rabbit, drawing a trout-stream, or robbing a rookery, Dennis was without a rival. He was also the best wrestler in the Three Parishes, and had unconquerable courage, "barring by night;" for Dennis, like many of his country's peasantry, was ludicrously superstitious, and has been known to run with breathless speed from an old white goat, who, in his anxiety to reach a tuft of ivy, had set his fore feet against the churchyard wall, and happened to peep over it just as Dennis chanced to be reluctantly passing, at the hour of gloaming,

Shadows the soul of Dennis could appal!

Ghosts and Ben-shees he trembled at the very name of; but the FARIES were his grand subject of alarm. When mention of "The Good People" was made, he either became silent altogether, or talked mysteriously, and with as much guardedness as though he firmly believed that Queen Mab herself was within ear-shot of the conversation. Often had he been jeered at for this ridicu

lous timidity, by his less credulous companions at the alehouse; and as often had he exclaimed in reply,-" Blood-an'-agers! isn't it enough that I'm not afeard to face a man, or a mad bull, or, by Jabers! a rhinoros, or any other frightful Christhian, but yous must expect me to go for to stand aginst the Divil himself? Well, wait awhile! maybe the Good People may talk to some of yous yet!"

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Why, Dennis, have you ever seen any of them same?"

"Have I! is that what you say? oh, no matter!-never you fear, I've seen more nor the best of yous has comed across yet; but not more, (plaze God!) nor some of you may meet before ye die."

By this evasiveness in his answers, Dennis, at last, went far to convince his auditors that he had seen something, and by long and habitually thus tacitly lying, in order not to remove their error from the minds of his catechumens, he finally began to believe with the fervour of a devotee even the wildest and most absurd of his own theories ;

Dark, tangled doctrines, dark as fraud can weave; Which simple votaries shall on trust receive, While craftier feign belief, till they believe!

In a word, as Dennis grew older, he every day became more amusingly superstitious.

Our hero at this time was land-stewart,

game-keeper, indeed factotum to Sir Valentine Burrows, who intended at the next general election to become a candidate to in Parliarepresent the county of D— ment. Now it so happened that his near neighbour, Lord Doublechin,had paramount thereof, was paid every courtesy and atteninterest in that quarter; and in consequence tion by the worthy and aspiring baronet.

When Dennis entered the room, I observed that he deposited in one corner of it a small sack which he had slung over his brawny shoulder, tied round the mouth with a leathern thong, and evidently containing some living animal.

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A bag-fox, I'll be sworn, Dennis!"

you know, Sir, looks mighty odd. Bagfox ?-bag-devil!-bad luck to me! your honour, if I don't think he forgets entirely the music of a pack of hounds, the darlints!" "Well, that does look rather odd, as you say, Dennis."

"Troth! and so it does, your honour; but God be wid ould times!-bag-fox!'faix! as I said afore, I wish it was!—it's myself that's fagged carrying the dirty little baste; and maybe, I'm not as dhry as if a fathom of Skerries' linen was after being dragged up my throat, and sure it's small blame to me, after walking, as I am, both hard and fast."

The concluding observation was intended as a pretty broad hint that Dennis expected me to "stand treat." Accordingly, I requested the mistress-who just entered at the convenient moment-to furnish my friend Dennis immediately with a pot of Guinness's best XX, mulled, and with a stick* in it.

While Dennis was discussing the contents of the first pot, he digressed from the Parliamentary subject, to give me a description of a very fine breed of pigs, which his master had been latterly cultivating extensively.

The first, however, not being found sufficient, I was obliged to trouble our hostess to bring forward a second pot, which Dennis received with a grin of increased glee, and chucked her under the chin as he drank her health;—" Here's to you, Missus Casey, acolleen! Ah, then, it's you that can mull drink-by gorra! it's beautiful entirely !— here's to you again, a-cushla; and your health, too, your honour."

"But touching the sack, Dennis," said I, "the sack, there, in the corner-what may it contain, pray y?"

"O blood-an-ounds, aye! sure it's about that I was just telling your honour. You

gentleman, (the brute!) with his damned grunting."

"Indeed, and I'll do that same for you, Denny O'Daisy; and it's good care that shall be taken of him," was the reply of the obliging landlady.

As soon as the pig and the mistress had vacated the parlour, Dennis continued—

"You must know, Sir, that the last time when ould Lord Doublechin dined with my master, he said there was nothing in the 'versal world that he was so fond of, as a fine little pig for dinner: and so, you see, as my master wants to curry favour with the Lord, aginst the 'lection—a—you see— a-that's it, Sir. You know, a nod's as good as a wink, Sir. Your health, Sir!" "I understand you. Your master wishes to make a present of the pig to his lordship, I suppose?"

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Purcisely! your honour. And more's the pity that my master, who's a dacent man, and a good Roman Catholic into the bargain, (God keep him so, I pray Jasis and the Blessed Mother!) should go for to send a pig to the same lord, or to any one of his creed, when it would be fitter for him to be after giving the likes to Father O'Tool, that's a rale riverind,-not that I wish hurt or harm to any body; at the same time, God forbid I should do such a dirty action !— only just, the divil a bit myself would care to taste of the same pig after he's roastedbecase, you see, I don't think he can be all right, after coming from one that bleeves this aways, to one that bleeves that aways. And, God between us and harm!" continued Dennis, beginning to speak in a whisper," more nor once, do you know, as I trudged along the road with him, I thought somehow, that he was beginning to grunt more like a Protestan nor a natural pig, already. Your health, Sir! But now isn't that mighty strange, Sir?"

I could not help smiling at Dennis's harmless - however inveterate-bigotry, and was about to admit the strangeness of the pig's vocal apostacy, when I was interrupted by the entrance of our landlord, who, after shaking hands with Dennis, and "bidding him the top of the morning," remarked, with a very roguish leer, that the little pig, intended as a present to "the Lord," was a remarkably fine one.

"Troth! and that same's a true thing for you to say, Mistur Casey," replied Dennis, “and sure enoug it's no wonder for him to be so, when I tell you, that it's my