London, who, when dismissing him with a modest recompense for past services, made it an understood condition that he was not to set up in business in his neighbourhood. Thomas, having made some progress in his darling art, and finding his purse nearly empty, turned his face once more to London, and began to ply his former trade. Having delivered as many bags of his commodity as served to meet his daily wants, he would proceed to explore among old bookshops and stands for rare old pieces of music and rare old books on science and literature.

At night, dulcet sounds would be heard by his neighbours proceeding from the long low room on a level with the street, in one end of which were piled his sable goods, and in the other was laid out his kitchen and dormitory, innocent of a partition. One day, making a call on Christopher Bateman, a book and music seller, he enlarged his acquaintance in a strange enough fashion.

The Duke of Devonshire and my Lords Oxford, Pembroke, Sunderland, and Winchelsea, being book-hunters of no mean order, generally employed Saturday, a dies non in the Parliament house, in their literary courses among shops and stalls. One day, having assembled at the shop mentioned above, they were not a little surprised to see a person of middle size, and of a frank and intelligent countenance, lay his black bag carefully in a corner, and inquire in a modest but unembarrassed manner about a certain volume of old music. One nobleman entered into conversation with him, another nobleman joined in the discourse, and soon it became a general conference, all being surprised at the poor, small-coalman possessing such a fine taste for the art, so much literary information, and being at the same time so modest and so little disconcerted by the notice taken of him.

That day the noble company dined at the Mourning Bush, making Thomas Britton their guest, and thenceforward till the day of his

death, he enjoyed, with little intermission, the society of the titled and learned at weekly re-unions, held for the purpose of treating the members to the rare standard melodies of former composers.

Having spent the greater part of the day on his ordinary rounds, bag on shoulder, he would pass the long evening treating his ears to such sweet sounds as could be drawn from his Viol de Gamba. † While thus solacing his ears with the melodies of Jenkins, Simson, Corelli, and Purcell, he attracted the notice of a neighbour of his, a foreigner, who was diligently throwing away his time and money in alchemical experiments. This professor was the French doctor, Garencières, who, losing his office of physician to the French Embassy, took to the search of the Philosopher's Stone to 1aise his sinking state. During the intimacy of the oddly matched pair, Britton, who was ingenious in inore than one line, constructed for his friend a portable laboratory, which attracted the notice of many scientific men in London. The visionary Frenchman demoralized the Briton to some extent, for he joined him in his chase after the visionary substance. However, there was not much mischief done. A French gentleman who was much interested in the small laboratory, took Tom with him for a while to France to construct such another article for him, and handsomely rewarded him for his services. The alchemist died soon after, and Britton, being no longer under the evil influence of alchymy, contentedly resumed his rounds by day, and his musical treats by night.

He had some money on his return from France, and with it he treated himself to a more commodious residence. His kitchen, dormitory, and coal-store still occupied the groundfloor, but over this was a long, low room, so low indeed that the head of a very tall man would graze the ceiling. It was approached in the Scotch fashion by an outer staircase, bearing a striking resemblance to a better sort of ladder, and up this steep climbed

ladies and gentlemen once a week, hid the poverty of floor and walls with their rich dresses, and enjoyed the best music procurable at the time. The concerts of the day seem to have held out but little inducement to people of good taste, if we can form a correct judgment from the announcement of one which took place, Feb. 4th, 1674 :—

"This day, at the tavern of the Fleece, near St. James's Palace, at two o'clock, and every day of the week except Sunday, a rare Concert for four MARINE TRUMPETS, an instrument unknown in England up to the present day. Price of places—the best, a shilling, the others threepence each."

The marine trumpet had no tube, nor was it made of brass; it was simply a large guitar, possessing one chord only. It would require a remote ancestor of Paganini to extract enthralling sounds from such an instrument.

In 1678 Britton commenced his series of concerts; and delicate ladies and foppish gentlemen were content to brave the dangers of the narrow outside stair, and the prying and offensive gaze, and sometimes the rough jokes of the mob, for the privilege of sitting within the walls of the long, shabbily-furnished room, and listening to the best music of the day.

But poor Britton's modesty, singlemindedness, or industry, could not save him from evil tongues. There must be some untold, unknown, and disloyal motive for these assemblies of the great at the house of a smallcoal man; he was once in league with the magician Garencières, he must be a Jesuit or an Atheist, he and his visitors should be looked to. In fact, the position became untenable, to use a vulgar expression, and the result was, that a convenient salon was taken, and a club organised, each member paying ten shillings per

annum.

The members of the club bore the whole expense of the establishment, admission to enjoy the entertainment being by free tickets. The worthy founder presided at the harpsichord, and was as blessed as one of Homer's gods, surrounded by beauty and talent, and his whole being immersed in the flood of harmony pouring from the breaths and fingers of such performers

as Bannister, Needler, Hughes (author of the "Siege of Damascus") Hart, Shuttleworth, Pepusch, young Dubourg, and the great Handel! Among the visitors were to be seen Lords Bolingbroke, Burlington, Chandos (Musical Mecenases), Pope, Addison, and other wits and men of genius. Of course, these lights of the Augustan age of England did not (as we have seen living, empty-headed, fashionable people do) begin to chatter with each other as soon as the concert commenced. Those whose nerves were not tremblingly alive to the influence of sweet sounds, and would not wound the susceptibilities of the performers by inattention, stayed away; at least we hope they did.

In the height of his enjoyment and his reputation, Britton never neglected his business as dealer in coal and coke. He lived independent and respected till 1714, and might have enjoyed life much longer, but for a mischievous thought that entered the mind of a Middlesex magistrate, who, to make sport of the simple and unaffected Britton, brought in a ventriloquist one day, having first instructed him what to do. During the performance of a charming piece, the poor man at the harpsichord heard these awful words, apparently in the tones of his dead friend, the Alchymist, and proceeding from below the floor-"Fall on your knees, Thomas Britton ; your hour is come-say a prayer, you are on the point of death." The unsuspecting victim did as he was desired, certain that the warning came from beyond the tomb. He fell prostrate, began to pray in the agony of the expected death, and in vain did the afflicted contrivers of the trick endeavour to undeceive him; the shock had been too great, the mischief was done: he died two days afterwards. May every lover of practical jokes who learns this circumstance now for the first time, lay it to heart, and restrain his stupid and mischievous propensities.

Poor Britton left a good and loving wife to bewail his loss. Among his property, which was sold by auction for her behoof, were many rare books, and numerous volumes of music, engraved or written by his own hands. There was a large collection of musical instruments, and the catalogues of the sale, which lasted three days, are now among the desiderata of the

curious. It is to be hoped that there was a respectable amount realized by the auction.

During Britton's lifetime, the Society of Ancient Music was founded, his own exertions having probably given the first impulse. Folk in the lower ranks of life, blessed or cursed, as it might be, with tastes unsuited to their sphere, were unwisely treated in many instances by the great of the last and the preceding century. They would take these low-born musicians, poets, and romancers, admit them to their drawingrooms, and send out invitations to large parties to admire the poses and the growlings of these lions of lowly estate, pat them on the backs, and liberally subscribe to their slender volume of poems or other literary efforts. Alas! how sordid and squalid did everything in their native villages and native homes seem afterwards to these poor victims when they recalled the rich saloons in which they lately sat, and how boorish and ungraceful was the demeanor of sweetheart or relative when the refined grace and amiable manners of Lady Amelia or Lady Sophia were remembered. If extreme wretchedness of mind or loss of reason ensued, was it out of the common order of things? The lords and ladies of our times are more considerate, and in reality much more kind to the poor patients bitten by the demons of poetry or romance. They not only afford them no countenance, but get out of their way whenever a possible meeting is to be apprehended. If a green-grocer, at the instigation of the poetic demon, writes or prints "Flights of Fancy,"

or

“Poetic Trifles," or "Youthful Musings," his erewhile crowded stall becomes a desert; his aristocratic patrons cross over the way to his unlettered rival in business, whose soul is not above greens or turnips. A poetic ploughman will be sent about his business, and scarcely get his discharge from his disgusted employer. This is as it should be. Poetry (including romance), painting, music, and their gifts. are all refined luxuries, and by right belong to those favoured individuals who can afford to indulge in them.

Jacques-François-Elie - Fromental Halevy, from whose funeral orations

we have made some extracts, was born 27th May, 1799. His parents were of the Jewish faith, and were known by the name of Levi. His musical tastes must have been early developed, for we find him receiving lessons at the Conservatoire in 1809. He obtained the chief prize for musical composition in 1819, and was commissioned in 1820 to set the De Profundis (Hebrew words) to music for the funeral obsequies of the Duc de Berri. He was afterwards sent into Italy to pursue his studies at the expense of the Government. After more than one unsuccessful effort to bring himself before the public by the production of musical pieces, his Artisan was performed in 1827 at the Feydeau, but with little success. However, he had better fortune next year with The King and the Ferryman, an occasional piece produced on the festival of Charles X.

In 1829 his Claris, an opera in five acts, met with public favour, Madame Malibran filling the chief part. After some other successes and failures, his great work, The Jewess, firmly established his reputation in 1835. It exhibited great elevation of style and superior talent. We subjoin the names and dates of some of his numerous pieces which followed The Jewess, and were favourably received :— -The Plague of Florence, 1838; The Queen of Cyprus, 1840; Charles VI., 1842; The Queen's Musketeers, 1846; The Vale of Andorre, 1848; and TheWandering Jew, 1855. We have counted eighteen other operas among his remains.

M. Halevy had the happy art of uniting charming melodies to striking dramatic situations. His concerted pieces, his choruses, and orchestral effects were always deeply studied, and for the most part highly successful. All his productions were the result of great care and study, and were distinguished by apparent ease and great breadth. In 1833 he obtained the office of Professor at the Conservatoire; he was named Member of the Academy in 1836, and Perpetual Secretary in 1854: his death occurred in 1861. The Corps Legislatif conferred a pension of 5,000 francs on his widow, herself a lady distinguished by her knowledge of the fine arts.

NOTWITHSTANDING the disagreeable nature of some of the subjects treated in the two volumes of this work, sometime published-subjects calculated to excite the displeasure and resentment of some high people and their literary supporters-the author feels satisfied with the reception of his revelations, taking everything into account. As the concluding volumes are replete with anecdotes (some of them slightly scandalous) concerning most of the popular and literary characters, who have figured since the beginning of the present century, they have been or will be read with avidity. The portions that relate to natural history, and discuss merely literary matters, are more to our individual taste, but we must be content to remain in a minority.

EXPERIENCES OF A SPORTSMAN AND NATURALIST.

Those who have read the first two volumes of the life and opinions, require not to be told of the author's passionate attachment to field sports. A propensity of this nature is not necessarily allied to cruelty, as every one knows. Still there are circumstances attending the chase which can scarcely be read by good dispositioned people with any degree of comfort. It is not an agreeable occupation that of seeking the life of any poor animal while anxiously exerting itself to preserve its young. So though somewhat excited by the account of some famous captures of otters within the precincts of the New Forest, we could not relish the following exploit :

"I once found a female otter on the Efford stream in the act of making a couch for her young. Old Palastine from the Grafton kennel found and disturbed her in the midst of it. At her we went for seven hours and a quarter with constant views, and during that time, on a stump overhanging the river, she miscarried and gave birth to two cubs born only a few days before their time (!). A hound found them, and when I took one in my hand it was scarcely cold. She beat us for want of light, and well she deserved to escape. (Would that he had thought so before the chase began!) The work that myself and my

keeper, James Dewie, did on that day in tearing up holts, at times up to the waist in water, and then having to go in our wet things a distance of six miles at dark, with tired hounds, was severer than I should saying what the view of an otter will prolike to undergo now, though there is no duce if I find another. The only effect it had was to give each of us a toothache on the following day." (They deserved that luxury.)

We prefer to watch our sportsman crawling through damp grass and heather to have a shot at a stag of ten, or else assuming the guise of those denizens of the New Forest of whom the animal are not distrustful. There is much of nature, and picturesqueness, and vigour in the descriptive parts of the work, and not a little of good feeling towards the working classes. It would require much trouble to convince us of the who was kind to the poor, and a badness of a nobleman's disposition favourite with the dumb animals of his household and estate. After a description of a wretched cold time, which we intend to read over again in the dog-days, we find himself and

kitchen of Mrs. Casey, cold, and 'seeming as if sugared for a Christmas present. ducting him to the little cold parlour, with the fire endeavouring to light,—

his retriever in the comfortable

Mrs. C. is about con

"No, my good Mrs. Casey,' said I. The kitchen chimney corner if you please. Bring me your little round table, a glass of hot dog's nose, and a toast in it, white with creamy froth as if in derision of the snow, and then I'll be thawed by the time Lord Malmesbury comes."

"Down then we sat, almost in the fire to enjoy our toast and ale. (The door is opened once or twice to his great discomfort.) 'Dash that door! there's the latch again.'

"The latch did lift, and more than once, with a timid and cautious sound. At last, after keeping me in suspense, the door opened just enough to admit a head in strong contrast to the surrounding hues. It was a queer looking black head, garnished with some grizzled wool. A feeble voice begged permission to come in for a warm.

"No;' was mine hostess's sharp and repellant reply, as she bustled towards the

door to push it to. 'This is no place now for the like of you,' alluding to my presence and the expected arrival of Lord Malmesbury.

"The poor Darkie thus rudely shut out,

crossed before the window beside the door, and a more wretched, half-clothed, whollystarved negro I never saw. A few rags only hung about him, leaving his head, and feet, and chest bare, and they had been nipped by the intense frost to an inflammatory blue and ferruginous brown.

"As he passed the window he threw upon the flickering casement ruddy with the fire a longing and imploring glance, and as he did so his eyes met mine. Jumping up, and opening the door, I called to him to return; he paused for an instant in indecision.

"Come here, my good fellow,' I cried; he obeyed. Pointing to a place near the fire I bade him be seated by my little table,

and then not more to the astonishment of the poor black than the hostess, I bade the latter dress up another pot of hot dog's nose the same as my own, and place it before the negro, with a plate of bread and cheese.

"The poor fellow's astonishment at being so comfortably entertained on the spot whence he had so lately been inhospitably expelled, was beyond description. It seemed as if words were denied him. However after rubbing his hands at the fire, he began at the viands before him, sipping his hot brew, and lifting his eyes to me every now and then with a timid look of the most heartfelt thanks.

"God forgive me for many a harsh word hastily spoken to a poor man! The food I thus bestowed on this negro was no atonement to them on my part. For I do not hesitate to say that I had as much pleasure in watching this houseless, lonely, wretched man eating heartily, and being kindly treated, as I afterwards had in the day's wild-fowl shooting. It cost me but little, indeed I had not much to give; but the shilling laid out gave me infinitely more happiness than the expenditure of many a five-pound note.”

One chapter is devoted to the many pets which succeeded each other in the affections of the author, from the robin-redbreast to the stag-hound, one, apparently the most cherished, being a cormorant !

Beset, as has been the career of our writer by family annoyances, he has sought and obtained many consolations in the study of the natural features of sequestered landscapes, the phenomena of the various seasons, and the habits of the animals, wild and tame, which came under his notice. He not only feels the beauties

and the consolations which the study of God's creatures impart to finely constituted minds, but is possessed of the power to communicate his mental enjoyment to his readers.

"How genial is the air of this lovely' spring, and verdant the re-awakened vegetation! Birds and buds in song and hue, all burst out together,—the band and banner of the summer host is seen and heard on wooded waste and wild; and I in my solitary life am spoken to by my feathered little friends, who had lingered round my cottage in frost and snow, and had come to my call and fed on such food as I could give them. While sitting at breakfast during winter and looking out on the frozen lawn and on my varied guests, I used to please myself with thinking that those I saw there silent and sad, would, when spring time came, rejoice me with their sweet songs, and recall my thoughts to boyhood's hours by the treasures shown me in their wondrous nests, no longer to be reft or broken. Here now while I write, by my open window sits my little friend, the hedge-sparrow in her russet garb, on four beautifully bright blue eggs. In a nook of an old ivied stump of a tree close by, nests the, to man, social robin, but to his tribe the most quarrelsome bird of all. There in those laurels are the nests of the thrush and blackbird, while up in the fork of the birch above sits the misletoe thrush, her screeching voice ready to proclaim the presence of a hawk, and to call me forth with the ever-protecting gun. As I wander in the kitchen-garden to inhale the perfume of the blossoms of the apple and cherry trees above my head, the grateful goldfinch gathers moss from the bark to make her nest, and the warbling lesser white-throat, by some erroneously called the willow-wren, sweetly sings his little song, while seeking insects so minute as scarcely to be traced by the human eye."

The lover of nature and of her dumb children is not without his troubles. Here we find our naturalist obliged to keep watch and ward over his young water-fowl and other weakly pets to guard their lives from snakes, stoats, adders, even squirrelsthose innocent looking little creatures! but the cares we are confident are more than counterbalanced by the enjoy

ments.

THE SMALL JOKES OF GREAT PEOPLE.

Our Naturalist, when he quits his pets wild and domestic for the society of beaux and wits, scarcely pleases us so well by his remarks or his reports of their witty sayings and bizarre doings. Nearly every one