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of which swept in multitudinous forms around his carriage. The magnificent march in "Oberon," it may here be related, also owed its existence to a still more singular apparition. Weber was accustomed, when performances took place at the "Linkesches Bad," to walk out after dinner and take his coffee there in the garden by the Elbe. One day a heavy rain had come on during the walk, to the capellmeister's infinite disgust. He was unusually silent and morose. When he reached the garden, all the guests had been driven away by the rain, and the waiters had heaped the chairs and tables one upon another, with their legs sprawling in the air. The capellmeister stood for a time, with his hands folded behind him, gazing at the grotesque grouping of these distracted-looking objects. All on a sudden he called to young Roth, the clarionette-player, who had been the companion of his walk. "Look there!" he said; "does not "that look exactly like a great triumphal march? Donnerwetter! "What chords there are for the trumpets! I can use that! I can use that!" He had just then been asked to compose a march for Gehe's tragedy of "Henry the Fourth." Immediately on reaching home, after the theatre, Weber wrote down his singular inspiration, at first only for brass instruments. It was afterwards turned to account, and arranged for the orchestra in "Oberon." (Vol. ii. pp. 81-4.)

But, in spite of all these contradictory workings of the world without and the world within, in Weber's musical creations, there was a harmony in his productions, a thorough and intimate individuality, which never can be mistaken. He was himself in all he produced; and, in this respect, Weber the boy may be found to have been throughout the father of Weber the man. But there was one of the characteristics of his nature, not derived from without, the influence of which was far more powerful than all: this was his spirit of order, which, conspicuous in the management of his affairs in daily life, was more conspicuous still in the direction of his genius. Its assistance in the exercise of his greatest faculties, its use in maturing his powers, were constantly apparent. It was this innate quality, probably, which led, by constant application, to his possession of a singular faculty not known to be enjoyed, to so great a degree at all events, by any other composer. All Weber's composition, in his maturer years, was carried on in his brain. Not only were ideas conceived, and melodies inspired to be treasured up by an almost marvellous power of memory in his mind; but harmonies were wrought out, and all instrumental effects, even to the most delicate shadings of accompaniment, were arranged on imaginary scores of mental music paper, so as to be written down, when fully complete, with a perfection which required no subsequent alteration, and in a neat hand which rivalled the most exquisite copper-plate.

Among the many instances of Weber's wonderful faculty of memory, his son has recorded a remarkable incident which occurred when he was exercising his functions as Capellmeister in the Dresden theatre.

'One night the "Zauberflöte" was to be given. The performance was about to begin, when it was found that, by some mistake, the conductor's score was not upon his desk. The musicians were all in a state of terror. The Court might enter at any moment; and it was well known that, in the eyes of the punctual Friedrich August, it would have been an unpardonable transgression, had not the opera commenced at the very moment. This terror reached the public. Caroline saw the empty desk, and trembled in her seat. Weber entered the orchestra, was made aware of the terrible disaster, but smiled on the band to the surprise of all, and quietly despatched a messenger for the missing score. The Court entered-the desk was still empty-Weber gave a glance at his pale frightened wife to reassure her, raised his baton, and conducted the whole first act of the opera with his usual fire, and without a fault-out of his head; amusing himself, at the same time, by pretending to turn over the pages of the score in pantomimic action, at the due places. Mozart's opera had grown to be a portion of his own flesh and blood. The fact was known; and from many members of the royal family Weber received the most flattering acknowledgments of this wonderful proof of his heart's memory.' (Vol. ii. pp. 194, 195.)

For his geniality and joyousness of disposition Weber was eminently conspicuous during the greater part of his life; he was even celebrated for the incessant flashes of wit and humour which sparkled in his conversation; and, although sadly changed in temper when his fatal illness was perpetually tormenting his body and rendering his mind, naturally prone to exaggerated susceptibilities, more assailable by the annoyances and mortifications continually heaped upon him, his kindheartedness, affectionate disposition, and placability, when one kind word was addressed him by an enemy, remained with him to the last. In earlier years, and even at intervals to the hour of his death, he was as childlike in manner and fancy as was Mozart-as even Handel was at times in spite of his irritable and passionate temper-as Beethoven could be when the dark cloud was swept away by some unusual genial current of thought—as Mendelssohn always was. Latterly a love of gain, the utter absence of which had been so remarkable in the youth and the man when struggling against penury and precarious fortune, became a strong feature in his character. For this last weakness the great artist is touchingly excused by his son. This abnormal state of mind, urges M. de Weber, was only superinduced by the strong and

natural desire of the husband and father to provide as bountifully as possible for his family, when he felt that the hand of death was surely on him.

M. de Weber ascribes the indifference and the slights which so frequently fell to the artist's share in the world to his father's mean and insignificant appearance; it is a point which he presses frequently on his reader, more especially when writing of the want of all regard to him on the part of the English aristocracy. No doubt there was nothing imposing in the small, narrow-shouldered, thin, spare frame, with a limping gait occasioned by some early injury. The composer himself was accustomed to turn his own appearance into ridicule when he put on the hideous uniform of Saxon Court etiquette, and to declare that he was fit only for a wax-figure show. But he certainly must have derived some great charm of manner and expression from nature. He was evidently regarded in early life with more than complacency by the softer sex. He had a fine expressive head, although too large and too long to be in proportion with his slight stature, and somewhat encumbered by too marked and powerful a nose; his eyes were full of deep meaning, by turns benevolent, animated, and flashing, even through the disfigurement of his spectacles; his smile had the power of winning all hearts. When he appeared in England, it is true, long and wearing illness had bowed his form and crushed his genial spirit. But it is to his morbid susceptibility, mixed with a certain degree of shyness and reserve, rather than to his frail uncomely form, that his want of success in society must be attributed. A man of greater vigour of character and intellect would have found in the inconceivable popularity which some of his works enjoyed at that time amongst all classes of the people of England, an ample compensation for the imaginary slights which may have afflicted him in May-Fair.

With such elements of romance as those which the life of Carl Maria von Weber affords, it has been impossible for his biographer, in spite of all his efforts not to be zu nouvellistisch,' to prevent the interest of his book from being in a great measure that produced by a work of fiction, and we are indebted to Mr. Palgrave Simpson for an English translation and reconstruction of these volumes, which are in more respects than one an improvement on the original.

AKT. V.-1. Frost and Fire. Natural Engines, Tool-marks,
and Chips, with Sketches taken at Home and Abroad, by a
Traveller. By J. F. CAMPBELL.
Two volumes, 8vo.

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Edinburgh: 1865.

6

2. Ice Caves of France and Switzerland, a Narrative of Subterranean Exploration. By the Rev. G. F. BROWNE, M.A., Fellow and Assistant Tutor of St. Catherine's College, Cambridge; Member of the Alpine Club. London: 1865. T is an ungracious task to criticise a book that has on the whole given us so much pleasure as Frost and Fire:' the author's hobby-horses are so handsome in their careless vivacity, as they canter about the easy green fields of science, bound with astonishing leaps over moderate difficulties, and shy with a lissom swerve at familiar sign-posts, it seems unreasonable to have them led up for examination, to estimate their soundness and real worth, by the rules that apply to common horseflesh. But old experience teaches wariness. Imperfect sight is a very frequent cause of shying among hobby-horses and horses in general; high jumps over low hurdles show a miscalculation of difficulties, due to inexperience in the hunting-field; and unsoundness in the legs is a cogent reason for avoiding a steady-going trot on the hard highway. We must be careful lest we unguardedly put our faith in a noble-looking steed, with a flowing mane and tail, and wonderful action, who is capable of a great deal but who, nevertheless, is not sufficiently sound to carry us over the heavy stage for which he is about to be harnessed.

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There are two methods of treating topics such as those that form the subject of Frost and Fire.' One is the scientific method, the other is the popular. They are almost the antipodes of one another. The author who writes a really scientific treatise confines himself to phraseology that is rigorously exact, and handles his subject with a firm and comprehensive avoids uncertainties of expression to the utmost of his power: and he shows an abhorrence of doubtful, dark corners of thought. He states clearly what he knows, and he draws with a firm line the boundary where his knowledge ends and the obscure and the unknown begins. The model scientific writer endeavours to be concise without baldness. He trusts that his readers will be sufficiently intelligent and studious, to succeed in realising to their imaginations the ideas which he has justly, though unrhetorically, set forth.

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But the writer of a so-called 'popular' treatise on science works on quite another principle. He is as careless of precision as he is regardless of thoroughness and comprehensiveness. He endeavours at one and the same time to convey new ideas, and to stimulate a torpid curiosity in his reader. He tries to do so by selecting portions of old and familiar modes of thought, expressing them rhetorically and arranging them in new combinations. He therefore deals copiously in metaphors that are partially applicable, and in allegories that have to be strained in order to be understood. His method of treatment is approximative and confused, not clear and rigorous: it is partial, not comprehensive. However ingeniously or poetically the author of a merely popular book, on any branch of science, may acquit himself, the result is necessarily imperfect; for ideas that are really new are not to be extracted, ready made, from old ones. 'Frost and Fire,' notwithstanding its great and substantial merits, on which it will shortly be our pleasure to enlarge, is in its treatment a popular book; and is therefore crammed full of the faults that necessarily attach themselves to this style of writing. It is impossible to read the work without constant fret and vexation, that it should be so inadequate to its pretensions as a whole, and yet so excellent in many of its parts. It is literally a Kosmos in design, treating of primeval forces, from their application to molten planets and the constitution of the sun, down to the latest geological changes on our earth. Beginning and ending with Kosmic theories of questionable value, the middle of it is occupied with the author's careful geological observations in north-western Europe and America. He shows that it is probable an Arctic current from the Northpolar seas swept, in ancient days, right over an almost wholly submerged Scandinavia and Britain, carrying fleets of icebergs, that scored the now elevated lands into their present configuration. This part of the work leaves little to be desired except condensation. We have also greatly to commend the author's experiments to illustrate the action of geological forces on a miniature scale, though it will be seen that we limit the professed range of their application, before we can consent to adopt them as substitutes for theory and calculation.

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Frost and Fire' is by no means a book to be skimmed or lightly dealt with. It consists of two thick volumes, with plenty of matter in them. They require steady reading, more than once, before the limits of the author's meaning can be apprehended; and it is hard work to read them, for the style is quaint and the course of argument exceedingly circuitous. The reader has to travel through all the Kosmic matter to

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