is strongly to be regretted that this new lung of the city were not so odious as to depreciate the value of town-lots; for in that case we might hope for the support and approval of such objectors as the Journal of Commerce.

Fortunately, however, the scheme has wise promoters-men, who seeing into the future of our population, have the sagacity and good sense to urge this provision for health, for comfort, and for all the ends of city civilization. When a man opposes a particular public interest by suggesting another and more feasible course of securing it, we respect his scruples, and are willing to listen to his reason; but when he condemns as extravagant and needless a measure which the whole civilized world recognizes as an imperative necessity for such a city as ours, we have not even a respect for his weakness.

It has been objected to us as a nationand the World's Fair confirms the accusation that our artisans are lacking in artistic taste, and chiefly because they have few forms of beauty around them for study, and because the prevailing fever of utility has driven from our minds all sense of the elegant. And now when it is proposed to open a grand school for the free study of nature, for a full development of the laws of health, and for encouraging a love of the truest and purest beauty,-the matter is decried as extravagant and needless.

It may be that our economists and partisans, and holders of down-town property, may prevent this accession to our city pride and city growth; if so, we can hardly wish them joy of a triumph which finds its forces in the short-sighted policy of the hour, and which an advancing and improved age will be very sure to reverse.

possible to foresee; nor, indeed, are we disposed to venture any decided opinion. If we were to take up a defence of the new style, we might lose caste with the matrons, and have all the stout women against us; and if we were to hazard an approval of the long dresses, we might be subject to the attack of some virago in short clothes.

The editor of the Albion seems to be as cautious as ourselves; at any rate our lady readers shall judge of his position, by his paragraph:—

"The new costume for the ladies is talked of and written of, just as though it were regularly ordained by the voice of lecturers and the pen of editors; whilst not only are the wearers exceedingly rare aves, but it may be safely asserted that a new mode cannot be brought about amongst the gentle votaries of fashion by any such means. In proof of this, may be adduced the total failure of the late attempt to bring about some improvement in male costume, for which it was thought that the World's Fair would have been an excellent opportunity. The utmost that can be done is to write down, and talk down, and laugh down a custom which is manifestly inconvenient, and repulsive to all ideas of propriety. We therefore have no hesitation in denouncing the present length of ladies' walking dresses. Dirt and delicacy cannot foot it together: but the evil may be remedied without any violent changes; and it is to be hoped that the good sense of the ladies themselves will take the many hints already offered them. If not, we shall be compelled to say that they need a Punch or a Charivari at their heels. Those witty satirists might fairly be invoked."

The great Fair still holds fair possession of the world's thought, and, through a thousand channels of letter and illustration, the details of its wonders and events come to our ear and to our eye. The access of visitors with the diminished price had not been for the first week so great as was expected; still, however, the throng was undiminished; and with the cheap trains which were advertised for the month of June, the Palace will without doubt overflow.

Mr. GREELEY, of the Tribune newspaper, continues his letters to that paper; and we must say little as we like many of the social vagaries of that gentleman—that he has tempered his observations thus far with a discretion and a sagacity that makes his letters not only eminently readable, but in a

"The Guild of Literature and Art' will have already been heard of in America. It is an undertaking of several fortunate authors and their friends to make some provision for their unsuccessful brethrenfor those who have the bad luck to be born before their time, as well as those who would apparently have done better by declining to be born at all. The world overflows with writers who would fain transmute their thoughts into bread and, lacking the opportunity, have a slim chance for any bread at all, even the coarsest. No other class has less worldly wisdom, less practical thrift; no other suffers more keenly from 'the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune,' than unlucky authors. If any thing can be done to mitigate the severity of their fate, and especially if their more favored brethren can do it, there ought to be but one opinion as to its propriety.

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And yet I fear the issue of this project. The world is scourged by legions of drones and adventurers who have taken to Literature as in another age they would have taken to the highway-to procure an easy livelihood. They write because they are too lazy to work, or because they would scorn to live on the meagre product of manual toil. Of Genius, they have mainly the eccentricities that is to say, a strong addiction to late hours, hot suppers, and a profusion of gin and water, though they are not particular about the water. What Authorship needs above all things is purification from this Falstaff's regiment, who should be taught some branch of honest industry and obliged to earn their living by it. So far, therefore, am I from regretting that every one who wishes cannot rush into print, and joining in the general execration of publishers for their insensibility to unacknowledged merit, that I wish no man could have his book printed until he had earned the cost thereof by bona fide labor, and that no one could live by Authorship until after he had practically demonstrated both his ability and willingness to earn his living, in a different way. I greatly fear the proposed Guild,' even under the wisest regulations, will do as much harm as good, by aggravating the

prevalent tendency toward Authorship by thousands who never asked whether the world is likely to profit by their lucubrations, but only whether they may hope to profit by them. If the 'Guild' should tend to increase the aspirants to the honors and rewards of Authorship, it will incite more misery than it is likely to overcome.

"However, this is an attempt to mend the fortunes of unlucky British Authors, and as we Americans habitually steal the productions of British Authorship, and deliberately refuse them that protection to which all producers are justly entitled, I feel myself fairly indebted to the class, by the amount of my reading of their works to which copyright in America is denied. I meant to have attended the first dramatic entertainment given at Devonshire House in aid of this enterprise, but I did not apply for a ticket (price £5) till too late; so I took care to be in season for next time-that is, on Tuesday evening-of this week.

"The play (as before) was 'Not so Bad as We Seem, or Many Sides to a Character,' written expressly in aid of the 'Guild' by Bulwer, and performed at the town mansion of the Duke of Devonshire, one of the most wealthy and popular of the British nobility, On the former evening the Queen and Royal Family attended, with some scores of the nobility; this time there was a sprinkling of Duchesses, &c., but Commoners largely preponderated, and the hour of commencing was changed from 9 to 74 P. M. The apartment devoted to the performance is a very fine one, and the whole mansion, though commonplace enough in its exterior, is fitted up with a wealth of carving, gilding, sculp ture, &c, which can hardly be imagined. The scenes were painted expressly in aid of the 'Guild,' and admirably done. The Duke's private band played before and between the acts, and nothing had been spared on his part to render the entertainment a pleasant one. Every seat was filled, and at $10 each and no expenses out. A handsome sum must have been realized in aid of the benevolent enterprise.

The male performers, as is well understood, are all Literary amateurs; the ladies alone being actresses by profession. Charles Dickens had the principal character-that of a profligate though sound-hearted young Lord-and he played it very fairly. But stateliness sits ill upon him, and incomparably his best scene was one wherein he appears in disguise as a bookseller tempting the virtue of a poverty-stricken author. Douglas Jerrold was for the nonce a young Mr. Softhead, and seemed quite at home in the character. It was better played than Dickens's. The residue were indifferently good-or rather, indifferently bad-and on the whole the performance was indebted for its main interest to the personal character

"After a brief interval for refreshments, liberally proffered, a comic after-piece, Mr. Nightingale's Diary,' was given with far greater spirit. Dickens personated the principal character-or rather, the four or five principal characters-for the life of the piece is sustained by his appearance successively as a lawyer, a servant, a vigorous and active gentleman relieved of his distempers by water-cure, a feeble in valid, &c., &c. It is long since I saw much acting of any account, but this seemed to me perfect; and I am sure the raw material of a capital comedian was put to a better use when Charles Dickens took to authorship. The other characters were fairly presented, and the play heartily enjoyed throughout."

And now, having rounded our gossip into a talk of books, we shall quote as an offset to the above, the remarks of Mr. THACKERAY, the author of Pendennis, at the anniversary dinner of the Royal Literary Fund.

"The toast of Mr. Thackeray and the Novelists' being proposed, that gentleman, in returning thanks, said- As there were a number of foreign gentlemen present, and the question of literature had been brought on the tapis, there was a certain error commonly indulged in which ought to be protested against by himself and by men of his profession. He wished to inform those gentlemen that the literary men of England were not the most unfortunate, the most degraded, the most seedy people which was generally supposed. He did not believe in literary men being obliged to resort to ignoble artifices in order to get places at the tables of the great, and to enter into society upon sufferance; he did not believe in patrons, except such as those before him, who were glad to see an honest man, and to shake him by the hand, as he had been shaken by the hand by them. Therefore, he proposed that, from this day forth the oppressed literary man should disappear from amongst us. The times were altered. the days of Queen Elizabeth there were laws against caricatures and lampoons, visiting offenders with maining and hanging; but if that were the state of things now, what would be the condition of his august friend and patron, Mr. Punch? (Cheers and laugh. ter.) Where would be his hands, and neck, and bowels-for the offenders were sometimes disembowelled too? The fact was, the literary men of the present day did not want patrons, they wanted friends; but against their fancied degradation he strongly protested and utterly denied. They did not want to be pitied any more; and as for pity being employed on the novelists of the pres

In

question. On the contrary, the public had confidence in their opinions, and looked to them as leaders on other than literary matters. Take in the first place the great novelist, the great head of a great party, in a great assembly of this country. When he first offered himself as a candidate, he was asked on what interest he stood, and he said he stood on his head; and no one could doubt the great merit and genius of Mr. Disraeli. Another eminent novelist addressed letters to John Bull, from his ancestral hall; and a third was even at that moment employed, heart and hand, he might better say, heart and voice, in a cause of charity. (Alluding to Mr. Charles Dickens engaged in rehearsal of the new play by Sir E. B. L. Bulwer.) Of course it was impossible for authors to settle the mere price by which the works of those who amused the public were to be paid. Signor Twankadilla, or Madame Taglifipas, by their chests or toes, might earn as much in a night as a literary man could by weeks of hard labor. They could not help the difference of payment, and sometimes it was impossible to prevent distress. Thank God, in his own case, he had felt that necessity for assistance; and because he had found friends who had help ed him at those moments of distress, he felt deeply interested in the aims of a society which had for its object the helping brethren at hours of similar misfortune."""

The last work of Mr. HAWTHORNE has met with rich and deserved success in England, and has been issued by Mr. BOHN, for one shilling and sixpence a copy. Athenæum commends it highly.

The

A revision of the late decision in reference to copyright is earnestly prayed for by many of the booksellers in London, and there is reason to think that the decision of Lord Campbell may go up to the House of Lords.

Punch has become latterly particularly severe on American topics, and has pointed his jokes, with portraits—from the

life.

Among new American issues, arethe Heir of Wast- Wayland, by MARY HOWITT;-England in 1850, by LAMARTINE;Wayside Flowers, by Mrs. ST. LEON LOND;Memoirs of Wordsworth, by C. WORDSWORTH ;-Caleb Field;-a new edition of Fresh Gleanings;—Bulwer's New Play;— The Wife's Sister, by Mrs. HUBBACK;— new edition of Colton's Ship and Shore, (called Land and Sea);-Para, or Scenes in the Amazon, by T. F. WARREN.