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agitated by a wonderful succession of triumphs, conspiracies, jealousy, revels, love, perfidy, declamation, and bloodshed. In some scenes the royal hero rises above the highest flight of humanity, in others he sinks to the degradation of a drunken Helot. There is a strong infusion of this extravagant spirit still prevalent among the successors of Lee; and it still has charms for audiences that prefer show to sentiment, who would despise the Alexander of Racine, because his greatness does not consist in Oriental pomp, or the rant of declamation, but in the true sublime of imperial virtue. Each poet has represented Alexander struggling in the toils of love. In the French tragedy he is entangled in a tender passion for Cleophile. We admire Lee's portrait, for the brilliancy of its colouring the freedom of its outline, and the glow of expression that pervades it; but Racine, though wanting in the copiousness and fire of Lee, enlists our admiration by his pathetic and moving tenderness-his poetic and elevated sentiments, and striking individuality of character.

Racine presents to us Cleophile so enthusiastically attached to Alexander, that her sole happiness is centred in his fondness-his smile seems the very sun of her sphere of existence. This princess prevails on her brother, Taxilus, an Indian potentate, to form an alliance with her lover. To this connection, so fatal to his country, he is stimulated by a passion stronger than affection for his sister jealousy forces him to the adoption of the measure, as his ancient ally, Porus, is his rival in his pretensions to the heart and hand of the beautiful Axiana, whose generous and independent spirit co-operating with her aversion to Alexander, had induced her to promise her hand and kingdom to that prince who should prove himself the most devoted to the cause of his country. But such are the allurements of Cleophile, and such the confidence of Taxilus in the valour and unvarying fortunes of the Macedonian king, that he entertains the ambitious hope of receiving Axiana from the hand of the victorious monarch, after the conquest of her kingdom. PORUS, swayed by love of country and abhorrence of subjection, continues faithful to the Indian confederacy, and unchangeable in his devotion to the Bactrian princess, with whose army, in conjunction with his own, he ventures an engagement with the conqueror of Persia, and is overthrown, after fighting with heroic bravery, and endangering the life of Alexander in single combat. In the confusion and hurry of pursuit that succeeds the battle, Porus is supposed to be slain. But the heroic prince, by an unexpected turn of fortune, finds means to escape to the camp of Taxilus, his now triumphant enemy and rival. The soldiers of Taxilus, to whom the exalted character of Porus, had always been an object of the most profound veneration, recognize their old victorious leader, with tears of joy; and, by a sudden impulse, a large body of them declare themselves his protectors. His rival, burning with jealousy, vengeance, and hope, flies to the camp to suppress the tumult; and in the moment when he is again sure of victory, he falls, mortally wounded, by the hand of the gallant Porus.

His mourning sister, affecting the greatest anguish, and confident of her influence with her imperial lover, and eager to appease the manes of her brother, solicits, with all that moving power which beauty in tears can exercise over the feelings of man, the death of Porus.

Policy and love unite in persuading the Macedonian monarch to comply with her wishes. He knows that by giving Porus his liberty and life, he affords a scope to the formidable confederacy of all the Indian princes against him, which his marriage with Axiana would surely marshal in hostile array. Alexander dreads the magnanimous spirit of this princess as much as he does the genius and valour of Porus. He knows, that at least, by detaining him in perpetual captivity, he would frustrate all her patriotic schemes.

Yet, though solicited by love, admonished by policy, and impelled even by a regard for his own safety, he resolves, in one of his "fits of virtue," to avert the danger, not by the executioner's sword, nor the galling chain, but by a godlike act of mercy and forgiveness-by raising the inveterate foe to the rank of

a confidential friend. The unconquerable spirit of the valiant and noble minded Porus is supported through every scene, while Alexander is represented struggling with contending passions, and a warfare of revenge, love, and glory. The French dramatists seem to delight in the exhibition of exalted virtue. This is particularly observable in their Comédie larmoyant, as it is called; but in their Tragedy it is seen in rather a stronger light, where they delineate the human character in a more dignified point of view. In this species of composition, the complication of interests is generally deeper, and the calls upon the moral feelings more pressing.

ORIGINAL PATCH-WORK.

PERSONIFICATIONS IN POETRY.-HOPE, the last consolation of the wretched-the oasis that is ever green in the desert of misery-that benignant affection, which according to the heathen my thology was the gift of Heaven, to compensate for the numerous ills sent on the human race, has not often been represented by the Poets under a material form.

Spencer has two representations of Hope. One is that of a virgin clad in blue, chiefly distinguished by the anchor on which she leans. This is the established symbol by which Hope is delineated in painting; and may be interpreted as referring to that property of the "Heaven-born Goddess," by which it enables the soul to resist all the storms of adversity; and preserve it from the shipwreck of despair. As usually pictured, however, it is liable to objections. A great anchor is an awkward thing for a delicate female to carry about with her; nor is it at all an appropriate instrument for a young lady to rest upon. She ought to bear it as a miniature ornament suspended from her girdle. Spencer's other portraiture of this benign divinity is defined with more fancy and feminine elegance in the following stanza

With him [Fear] went Hope in rank a handsome maid,

Of cheerful look, and lovely to behold;

In silken samite she was light array'd,

And her fair locks were woven up in gold :-
She always smil'd and in her hand did hold

An holy water sprinkler, dipt in dew."

Spencer, very properly, in our opinion, instances this emblem of the aspergoire, or sprinkler, as one of those which are censurable for want of sufficient perspicuity and distinctness. It is not by any means perfectly obvious; but we think still it is not void of propriety; for Hope may justly be represented as shedding that divine influence on the verdure of the mind, which like sun and shower to the opening rose, gives it vigour and bloom, under the nipping blasts of misfortune.

If we recollect correctly, Shakspeare gives no persorification of Hope. In the Two Gentlemen of Verona he pictures it a " Lover's staff;" and in Richard II, he speaks of Hope as if she were of the masculine gender.

-He is a flatterer,

A parasite, a keeper beach of death," &c. Milton's exhibition, in Comus, of Hope is attractive and graceful, but scarcely distinguished from the other kind affections of humanity :

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Thou hovering angel girt with golden wings.' Yet the epithet hovering has peculiar force in denoting the close and unremitting guardianship of this celestial attendant.

Collins, in his Passions, though he seems to dwell with peculiar pleasure on the music of Hope, has failed in hitting off a graphic portrait of that Divinity, whose soothing attention is only withdrawn when death seals our eyes. Cowley has two pieces, highly wrought, in his florid style, for and against Hope, in which every line displays a new image, or figure of comparison, that is just stated, and then relinquished. Some of these are picturesque, but are too slight, impalpable, and transient, for a distinct personification.

Truth was represented by Apelles as a majestic, and modest female, plainly attired

but her countenance shining with the light of beauty and innocence. Addison, in his ingenious allegory of "True and false wit," adheres to the simple manner of painting. He chiefly distinguishes the Goddess of Truth by the “bright radiance cffused from a pretty face," lit with the smiles of innocence; which seemed to purify and sublimate the atmosphere she inhaled.

The same idea is improved, and expressed with more force and brilliancy by Mason, in his tragedy of Elfrida.

“So Truth proclaims, I hear the sacred sound,

Burst from the centre of her burning throne

Where aye she sits with star-wreath'd lustre crown'd;

A bright sun clasps her adamantine zɔne."

Ben Jonson, in one of his masques, presents us with a vivid and striking portraiture of Truth.

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Upon her head she wears a crown of stars,

Through which her orient hair waves to her waist,

By which believing mortals hold her fast,

And in those golden cords are carried even

Till with her breath she blows them up to heav'n.—

She wears a robe enchas'd with eagles' eyes

To signify her sight in mysteries;

Upon each shoulder sits a milk white dove,

And at her feet do wily serpents move;—

Her spacious arms do reach from east to west,

And you may see her heart shine thro' her breast:

Her right hand hol is a sun with burning rays:

Her left a curious bunch of golden keys,

With which Heaven's gate she locketh, and displays

A crystal mirror hanging at her breast,

By which men's consciences are rack'd," &c.

There are several more lines of this description; but enough has been quoted to give an example of that expeditious accumulation of emblems, by which a figure is rather overwhelmed than illustrated. [In our next we shall delineate Truth and Liberty.1

BEAUTY-Has been defined, by an ancient painter, to be "a symmetry of limbs, accompanied by goodness of colour." It was this principle that governed the magic pencil of Apelles, when he delineated the "sea-born goddess," so lovely and inimitable in the blaze of personal charms-so full of attraction, grace, and the enchantment of fascination! It was this plastic principle that fired the genius of Lysippus, when he performed such a sublime miracle of art in creating the beatified beauties' illumination of perfection and celestial character, that breathe their charms over the Apollo Belvidere.

Lucian, who was an accomplished judge of the subject, bestows high encomiums on Homer, for comparing Menelaus' naked arms to ivory, gently dyed in purple; as such, according to his opinion, should be the colour of the whole body. Ausonius, the celebrated Roman poet, who loved so ardently and enthusiastically the charming and beautiful daughter of the Emperor Valentinian, the graceful and incomparable Bissula, thus addresses a painter, whom he employed to draw her portrait.-" Go then, happy artist! and confound red roses with dew-washed lilies, and whatever reflection the air takes from them, let that be the colour of her face, of enchanting smiles." Petrarch, in his vivid and glowing description of the charming loveliness of Laura, represented the voluptuous rose and blanched lily blooming on her cheeks; and that, when she smiled, her breath exhaled perfumes as sweet and balmy as the odour of the peach-blossom, displaying, at the same time, ivory teeth of the finest enamel, resembling a brilliant row of pearls set in orbs of pure coral. The impassioned Byron thought that beauty never appeared so attractive and winning, as when bathed, like April flowers, in the "dewy tears" of melancholy sadness. But the fairest and finest features, even if arranged by the graceful hand of Nature, in the most harmonious symmetry, and heightened by the most blooming complexion, must be animated with a glowing expression of sensibility before they can strike the passions, elicit the sparks power of of sympathy, or enchain the admiration of love. To invest beauty with the

conquest, it is necessary, as Lord Byron, the sublimest of pocts-the most feeling of lovers, observed, that there should be

"Heart on the lips, and soul within the eyes."

Among the most peculiar blandishments and attractive graces of a beautiful face, the dimple has always borne away the palm of pre-eminence, and the reason is evident; dimples illuminate the countenance with the light of smiles, which reflects, as a mirror, the sensibility of the soul, the emotions of the passions, and the sweetness of temper which connect beauty with sentiment, and express a powerful and winning charm, that is not the property or characteristic of any other particular set of features, but may be, and is, perhaps, possible to all.

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A ROMAN DANDY.-Seneca hurls the bolts of ridicule at the race of dandies that disgusted Rome with their frippery and foppery in his age. "The men," says he, even exceed the effeminacy of the other sex, in adorning their persons. The coloured cloth they wear is light, and meretricious, and that they have a wanton, mincing pace, and seem not to walk, but to creep. They curl their hair like women; they speak with a low and affected voice, and gird themselves with corsets, to make their waists taper, and assume all the delicacy of body which belongs to the other sex. How they chafe when the hair-dresser is negligent, or betrays by his actions that he is dressing and trimming a man. They are more solicitous for their whiskers than for their health, and prefer being fine to being manly." One would imagine that a New-York Dandy had read Seneca, and formed his habits from his description.

A ROMAN BELLE.—It may amuse some of our readers to know what were the dress and ornaments of Roman ladies eighteen hundred years ago.

Silk, immensely dear, was much worn in the age of Seneca. "The dress of our women," says the philosopher, "cannot be called clothing, as it neither hides their bodies, nor modesty; as it is so transparent and closely fitted, that it serves to discover every part." Manlius Titus, the historian, informs us "that the head, neck, and hands, were decked with precious stones; and the ladies' snowy feet shone with chains of gold."

"I have seen," says Pliny, "Lollia Paulina, wife of the Emperor Caligula, dressed, not in her best manner, with rows of emeralds and pearls totally covering her head and neck; bracelets on her wrists; rings on her fingers; while her ears glittered with jewels. On their feet the women of quality wore precious stones, and their slippers were radiant with pearls. They painted their faces and eye-brows."-" Their looking-glasses," Ovid tells us, were as high as their heads, which were framed with gold and silver, and ornamented with brilliants." He says "that the ladies had numberless little boxes, which graced their toilets, filled with paints, perfumes, and ointments, emitting such a fragrant scent as fumigated their apartments with the mot pleasing odours. They often changed the colour of their hair by lotion."

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TO DISCOVER THE SECRETS OF A WOMAN'S HEART.-Pliny the elder mentions, in the 32nd book, chapter the fifth, of his Natural history, that by the following application, the secrets which are hid in the deepest recesses of a woman's heart, may be revealed. "Democritus," says he, "let the tongue of a living frog be extracted, without permitting a particle of its flesh to adhere to it; then throw it into water; after a short time take it out, and lay it on the breast of a woman asleep, exactly on the spot where the palpitation of the heart is perceptible; whatever questions you shall then propose to her she will answer truly." What an easy and admirable method to reflect the feelings of woman, and exhibit to our view the beauty of sincerity, and the defor mity of hypocrisy! This is the talisman that can tear off the mask of affectation from the cunning prude, unlock the real thoughts of the coy coquet, and "excuse the blush and pour out all the heart" of the love-smitten maiden. By this means a man may dive into "secrets worth knowing." If we were to resort to the puffing system of the soi-disant inventors of "panaceas," and, like the quacks, get the signatures of half a dozen of doting old woman, attesting the efficacy of our nostrum, we might, in process of time make a fortune of it; but we present it gratuitously to the readers of the IRISH SHIELD, and the only reward we ask for publishing so inestimable a discovery, which curbed the vagaries of the Roman ladies nearly two thousand years ago, is the patronage of old bachelors, and dreaming old maids; as it furnishes the first with the clew of prying into "mysterious secrets," and the latter with an infallible armour of caution, to baffle every Paul Pry that may "drop in," when they are asleep. VOL. I.-24

ELOCUTION.Virgil was a most fascinating reader; his accent was sweet with the melody of its measured cadences and impressive euphony. He recited his own verses with such an enticing sweetness and enchanting grace, that Julius Montanus, a poet, who had often heard him, used to say that “he could steal Virgil's verses, if he could steal his voice, expression and gesture;" for the same verses that sounded so rapturously when the author read them, were far from having the charms of excellence when pronounced by the month of another. Hooke, the celebrated author of Roman History, took occasion to read some passages of his work for Onslow, the speaker of the English House of Commons, in 1764, (who piqued himself too upon his emphatic reading) and begged him to give his candid opinion of the work. The Speaker answered, as if in a passion, "that he could not tell what to think of it, as it might be nonsense, for aught he knew, because his manner of speaking had bewitched him.”

Mrs. Oldfield, the far-famed tragic actress, used to say, "that the best school she had ever known, was on hearing Rowe read her part in his tragedies." Isaac Hawkins Browne, the author of the " Pipe of Tobacco," declared that he never felt the charms of Milton, until he heard old Sheridan pronounce his exordium."

Boisrobert, famous in his day as a story-teller, and who had so happy a talent this way as to become the favourite of Cardinal Richelieu, when his friends advised him to publish his tales, assured them that they would find nothing of that engaging agreeableness on paper, that he had the happy skill to spread over his living chat, "and that his reading was only a mere cheat upon their ears."

Such a siren is Pronunciation, united with the tone, the expression, and the gesture of an accomplished reader. Of Goldsmith and Thompson it was said, that “ they wrote like angels, but read like parrots."

THE VICAR OF BRAY.-Any man that, now-a-days, deserts his early principles and political friends, and enlists himself under the banners of his former enemies, is said to act like the Vicar of Bray, who had the vicarage of Bray, in Berks, which he retained from the reign of Henry VIII. until his death, in the reign of Elizabeth, by changing his religion three times. On being reproached as a turn-coat, he calmly replied "that he kept to his principle, that of living and dying Vicar of Bray.

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OLIVER GOLDSMITH.-The author of the Traveller discovered, at a very early age, germs of that genius which afterwards grew to be the most majestic oak in the forest of English poetry. The following instance of his precocious rhyming, though omitted by his biographers, is handed down by the traditionary legends of Elphin, the place of his birth. During the Christmas holidays of 1737, a large company of young people were assembled one evening at his uncle's, and Oliver, then but nine years of age, was required to dance a hornpipe, while one of his schoolfellows played at the same time on the fiddle. Being but newly recovered from the small-pox, by which he was much disfigured, and his figure being short and thick, the musician (very archly, as he supposed) compared him to Esop dancing;—and still harping on this idea, which he conceived to be very happy and apposite, the laugh was suddenly turned against him by Oliver's stopping short in the dance, with this pungent retort

Our herald had proclaimed this saying

See Esop dancing, and his monkey playing."

This smart reply decided his fortune, for his uncle was so pleased with it that he determined to send him to the University of Dublin.

A HISTORIAN. Some one in conversation with St. Pierre, the celebrated author of the Studies of Nature, observed that a just, impartial historian, should be without a country and without any religion, if such things were possible. "Say rather," said the literary patriot, "without passion and without a pension."

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THE VOICE.-There is nothing can give such pomp and dignity to tragic declamation, as a fine musical voice. "The voice," says Madame de Stael, "is the organ of the soul; and it has more power upon the mind than the most exquisite beauty;" yet how little care do we take to cultivate the excellence of this material organ, which gives such charms to poetry and eloquence.

JUSTICE. There is no virtue which can adorn a monarch more exalted than justice: it is the source of liberty and happiness; and the government in whose principles its balmy emanations do not commingle, is vicious and despotic. According to the opi

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