elegance of Terence, and our comedy seemed to be perfected. But a new species of comedy has since been imported from France; in which, as often happens in the great drama of the world, ludicrous and interesting cir cumstances are blended, and scenes of humour interchanged with those of sentiment Kelly's False Delicacy, and Cumberland's West-Indian, are precious pieces in this new taste. Besides its connection with manners and literature, the stage has an intimate alliance with painting and music. Of this alliance the English stage has not failed to take advantage, or that which is derived from machinery and architecture. Our whole scenery is per haps superior to that of any theatre in ancient or mod. ern times, and also our theatrical wardrobe, as our dresses certainly are better adapted to the characters which the actors represent. The costume is presented more perfectly on ours than on any other stage1o. The effect of our landscapes and sea-pieces, by the power of perspective, and extrinsic help of illumination and obscurity, is equal if not superior to that of nature; and these enchanting scenes, in conjunction with music and dancing, give to the mute drama an illusive charm, a deception that is altogether necromantic.-A word here of dancing. The art of dancing has of late been carried to great perfection among us, as well as among our neighbours on the continent; so as not only to keep time to music in graceful motion, but to be at the same time expressive of a series of action, and a fluctuation of passion. As human beings, however, endowed with the distinguishing faculty of speech, let us not set too high a value upon this light-heeled corporeal language, which it is possible to teach even so rude an animal as a bear; and in which, as far as it is mimetic of hunting or war, its two favourite subjects, an American savage is infinitely 10. This beautiful propriety, which gives so much truth to good acting, we owe chiefly to the classical taste and enlightened understanding of Garrick. more more perfect than Slingsby, Vestris, or Heinel. Theatrical music deserves more attention. Music formed an essential part of the dramatic entertainments of the ancients. In those of the moderns, and especially in ours, it was long only an occasional auxiliary. Our first successful musical piece, the celebrated Beggar's Opera of Gay, is said to have been written in ridicule of the Italian opera; though I am fully persuaded the author foresaw the pleasure the comic opera would afford to an English audience, independent of that circumstance, and only called in the contrast of character, in order to procure a more ready reception to his new drama. If burlesque had been his chief object, he would have made Macheath and all his gang warble Italian airs. Gay, on the contrary, adapted the words of his songs. to native tunes. These tunes had all been heard by most of the audience in early life, when the mind was free from care; in the scenes of rural innocence, or the walks of gay frolic, when the youthful heart beat high with ambitious hope, or reposed in the luxury of infan tine passion; while reason was lost in dreams of ineffable delight, and fancy was fed with illusions of unchangeable love. Every tune recalled some agreeable feeling, or former happy state of mind. The effect of the music was accordingly altogether magical; and it would have been still greater, if the airs had been sung by persons whom the audience could have loved or respected. But as this was not the case, the Beggar's opera, in consequence of its musical enchantment, had a very immoral tendency. It served to dignify the character of a highwayman, and to familiarise, and even to reconcile the mind to such flagitious scenes as ought ever to be held in distant abhorrence; the nocturnal orgies of robbers, whores, and thieves: their levity in the cells of Newgate, and their indifference at the prospect of ignominiously paying the debt of justice on Tyburn-tree! -Nor was this all. The author, by putting into the mouths of such wretches not only the tunes, but a parody upon the words of some of our most admired love-songs, threw threw a stronger ridicule upon genuine passion and virtuous tenderness than upon the Italian opera. Notwithstanding the great success of this musical piece, we had no other comic opera of any merit for many years. The singularity of the subject, and the continued applause paid to the Beggar's Opera, deterred imitation and precluded rivalry. In the meantime the famous Handel, who had quarrelled with the proprietors of the opera-house, brought on the English stage a new species of musical drama, to which he gave the name of Oratorio, and in which he exerted all his powers of combining harmony, to the delight and astonishment of the whole musical world. But the Oratorio, which has already lost its hold of the public taste, has so many radical defects, as a theatrical entertainment, as must forever prevent it from being in general request. It has fable and dialogue, but neither action, scenery, nor characteristical dresses. Dr. Arne, sensible of the imperfections of the Oratorio attempted to inspire his countrymen with a taste for the serious opera. With this view, he set to excellent music, and brought upon the English stage, a translation of the Artaxerxes of Metastasio; which was received with the most enthusiastic applause, and is still a favourite performance. Yet, extraordinary as it may seem, we have no other serious opera that is so much as tolerated. Musical tragedy is happily little suited to the general taste of an English audience, which requires a more masculine composition. Our musical comedy has made greater progress. It hath been much refined and improved, by the exclusion of profligate manners, and by judiciously intermixing scenes of sentiment with those of humour; as in Love in a Village, the Duenna, and some other pieces of a similar kind, which have deservedly met with a favourable reception. Even these, however, appear to be losing ground. Many of our comic operas are already transformed into after-pieces, and as such they will always please. Since the charm of novelty has ceased, the good sense of the people of England seems still to require a standard comedy or tragedy, as their principal theatrical dish:-and music has other walks to occupy. The grand concerts in the capital, and in every considerable town in the kingdom, afford ample scope to native composers; whilst the opera-house, or Italian theatre, calls forth all the talents of foreign masters, as well as all the powers of execution, both vocal and instrumental, by the most liberal rewards, for the entertainment of the nobility and gentry. The advances of the other arts, considered as elegant, in England, during the present century, opens a wide field for investigation, at which I can only glance. Nor am I required to enter deeply into it by my subject; a general view of improvement being the sole purpose of this letter. The improvements in manufactures and the mechanical arts, I have already carried forward by anticipation, in tracing the progress of commerce11; though perhaps I have not been sufficiently particular in some articles, such as the great perfection to which the printing of linnen and cotton cloths has been carried, so as to surpass in beauty those of India; or of paper for the lining of rooms, which has been taught to imitate velvet and sattin, and even to rival tapestry. Nor ought I to omit the taste and fancy displayed in the paterns of our figured silks; or in our carpets, which vie with those of Persia in fabric, equal them in lustre, and exceed them in harmony of colours. Our sepulchral monuments, at the close of the last century, were mere masonry, and executed in a very bad taste. The excellent carvings of Gibbons in wood excepted, we had properly no sculpture. Kneller, our only painter of any eminence, was a foreigner, and employed himself chiefly on portraits. Rysbrach, Scheemaker, and Roubiliac, who have since adorned Westminster-Abbey with many sculptured monuments worthy of ancient Greece, also were foreigners. We were more fortunate in native architects. 11. Part ii. Let xxvi. Inigo Inigo Jones found a successor not unworthy of himself, in sir Christopher Wren, rendered immortal by the plan of St. Paul's and of St. Stephen's Walbroke ; exclu. sive of his other great designs-of that of Greenwich hospital or the additions to the palace of Hampton court. Wren was succeeded by the classical lord Burlington, a liberal patron of the arts, and no contemptible professor, and by the ponderous but inventive Kent; whose plan of Holkham, the seat of the earl of Leicester in Norfolk, and his temple of Venus in Stowe Gardens, if he had designed nothing else, would entitle him to a distinguished rank among modern architects. But Kent has been greatly surpassed, in architecture, by sir William Chambers, Wyat, Adam, and others, who have adorned the capital and every part of the kingdom with edifices in the purest taste of antiquity: who have united elegance with conveniency, and lightness with solidity. Nor should Milne be forgot, to whom we are indebted for Blackfriar's-bridge, a work to which antiquity can offer no parallel12. We have at present native statuaries of considerable merit. But Bacon and Nollikens have yet produced noring equal to the Hercules of Rysbrach; Scheemaker's Shakspeare, or the Handel and Newton of Roubiliac 3. 12. Westminster bridge, not perhaps less noble, though surely less ele. gant, was executed after the plan of a Frenchman. 13. Of these celebrated statues, the most excellent is the Hercules, Compiled from various parts of the body and limbs (which the sculptor supposed to be most truly formed) of seven or eight of the strongest and best made men in England, chiefly champions in the amphitheatre for bruising, under the protection of the late duke of Cumberland. The Newton of Roubiliac has also great merit; but Mr. H. Walpole thinks the "air is a little too pert for so grave a man." But Mr. Scott, a man of taste and genius, is of a very different opinion. "Behold! (a prism within his hands) "Absorb'd in thought great Newton stands, "His serious gait and musing mien." ODE TO SCULPTURE. Hogarth, |