be thrown away by the coming child, as soon as the child is come. And so miracles of linen caps and socks, long-coats and short-coats, ruffles and bibs, and a myriad things by us, a bachelor, unnamable as inconceivable, having been brought together at last, are arrayed and exhibited to a curious world. And dukes and dignitaries, bronzed soldiers, and republican citizens, throng to see the show, and to extol the grandeur of the imperial mind which permitted or commanded it! And all this takes place in Paris, the capital of civilization! The wretched, frivolous Frenchmen! Of course there were no Americans who followed in this wake of a cradle, to do homage to a baby's cap? You and we, reader, had we been in Paris, would have stood proudly aloof from these imbecile servilities. Nor should we have countenanced, by our presence, that ball in honor of the greatest American, from which literature was excluded to make way for lackeydom! Not in such festivities do our hearts delight, but rather in such genial overflow of cordial good feeling as one witnesses at great dinners, where the lively and the learned meet to honor the arts. So the lively and the learned met, and dined, and smiled in behalf of the Dramatic Fund, but the other day, in this our good city. The bar, that hath ever loved the stage, was not wanting there, but, warmed with cheer and champagne, uttered much eloquence and not a little sense. Specially commendable, in this particular, was the speech of our esteemed Judge Daly, who dwelt largely and luminously upon our beloved Shakespeare, vindicating, well and wisely, the immortal bard, from the imputations of those who, knowing that he had "small Latin and less Greek," have assumed that he was, therefore, as one of the ignorant. Although one of our own contributors came under the Judge's condemnation, we own that we rejoiced and were glad to find so much learning and so much feeling devoted to the explanation and justification of that life of which the world knows less than of the career of any other of its greatest men, yet which has borne the richest and most immortal fruits of all.

Do our friends, the painters, begin to fancy that we have forgotten them in our walks about this teeming city-world of ours? A sad mistake, if they do so-yet what can we say of them? The Academy

exhibition is always creditable to the vitality of art amongst us, in this respect, at least, that it proves how pertinaciously our painters persevere with their studies, in the face of public indifference the most disheartening. Year after year, the best efforts of our best men are thrust away, almost out of sight, in small, inaccessible rooms; the current of life in the city drifts heedlessly by them; the critics growl more than they praise, and when a few connoisseurs have bought a few of the really good works, and the warm weather empties the town, the gilded frames are taken down, and, for a year, hardly a sign is given that we possess an artist in the land. A painter of the first rank hardly receives as much recognition among us as we give to a novelist or a poet, decidedly his inferior.

Yet our people are not indifferent to art. You cannot hang a good picture in a Broadway shop window without attracting a crowd, renewed each hour. Why does not some one of our millionaires immortalize himself by building a gallery of the fine arts, to be to us what the Luxembourg is to Paris? This year's Academy exhibition, imperfect as it is, suffices to show what promise the American pencil gives.

We do not speak mainly of the landscapes; for, though our most distinguished living artists are landscapists, we cannot consider landscape-painting the richest department of the art. Notwithstanding the examples of Nebuchadnezzar and Wordsworth, we do not believe man to be a ruminating animal. Not that we disrespect either the Assyrian king or the English poet. Wordsworth was a true poet as Claude was a true painter, but we hold the Avon dearer than Rydal, and the name of Urbino is more musical of meaning to us than that of Lorraine.

So we sit but a little while before this grand opening of mountain scenery, in which Mr. Kensett has missed the foreground, to seize the dim, delicious vistas of the distant blue; nor does Mr. Church detain us, though his pencil, dipped in light, brings back to us the tropic morning purpling over palms, and mountain ridge, and broad red-roofed Spanish towns; and we glance, but for a moment, over Mr. Cropsey's shoulder, at the glorious sunset flooding Pæstum's temples left alone, forever, with the roses and the sea; glance

but for a moment, yet long enough to wish the thoughtful artist a happy voyage back again to those divine shores, and a pencil ever more and more faithful to reproduce their beauty. Had we more time, this sunset poem, by Casilear. would tempt us, it is so full of the true feeling, so accurate in drawing, so warm in color; nor should we slight these graceful, genuine studies which prefigure distinction for the names of Coleman and Shattuck.

But it is by other pictures of another promise that our eyes and minds are chiefly charmed; by these small sketches into which Darley has thrown the fire of a true imagination, controlled by a master's knowledge, sketches where every line has a meaning, and the spirit of a poet interprets, with equal force, the temper of the patriot Yankee, and the passions of the unfettered savage; or by these fine canvases of William Hunt. In works like these we recognize a future for painting. Realism in art has been pushed to its last term in our day, and we have been summoned to surrender our old-fashioned faith, that it was the artist's highest function to add a new creation to the world. It is true, the student, who reproduces with fidelity and feeling what he sees, adds his way of seeing it to our experiences, and in so far exerts the faculty of creation, which is the prerogative of genius. But is it not a higher function which he discharges when he finds within himself a vision of beauty never seen on land or sea," and by his shaping spirit of imagination guides his skillful pencil or his skillful pen to give that vision permanence, and a place on earth? Do you suppose Shakespeare formed Portia or Desdemona, Othello or Falstaff, Lear or Hamlet, in Fleet street, or at the Mermaid Tavern, or in the pit of the Globe Theatre? Life gave him a thousand hints, but each character he drew, came new-coined, individual from his glorious brain. As with poets, so with painters-the age of realism is but the dawn of the greater age of imagination; Giotto is the morning-star who precedes Raphael. And the men to whom we must look for the future of art in our own day, are the men who give us signs of a revival of the imagination.

Is not our young Parisian one of these men? See his "Marguerite"-a simple

composition, thoughtfully studied, disagreeably couturesque in the conventional character of the sky and the backgrounds, but full of feeling-that girl, plucking to pieces the sybil-flower in her hand, is a poetic shape, and you will remember her as if you had met her walking in among the "bearded barley."

Or look at the "Fortune-Teller." Might not Scott have imagined that keen, dark face portentous in every line? And how full of vague awe are the features of the child-how painfully earnest those of the mother! For the force of this group, where shall we find a rival? Shall we call upon Mr. Ehninger, whose picture of the "Sword" reminds you of a sonnet by Milton; whose "Gamblers," if a trifle melo-dramatic in treatment, is Byronic in intensity of expression? Or if, while seeking imagination, you desire its happier exercise, why should you not pause awhile before these works of Mr. Johnson, whose name you do not know, but in whose "Card Players" and "Savoyard" you recognize the spirit and the patient power of a true artist. Call them German if you must, but admit the sincerity of the feeling, the skill of the design, the softened harmony of the coloring. Is it not worth while to encourage men who can and will paint as these men do?

Or do you prefer the style of that vast portrait of a governor going down stairs with his hat in his hand, which is as much like a work of art as Dr. Johnson's famous doggrel was like a ballad? If you do, you deserve to be married to that conscious young lady yonder in turquoise green, and to have the portraits of your children painted after the manner of that chalk-legged infant astraddle of a red chair. But you will not invite so dark a fate. You will agree with us in hoping less and less from the art which mere vanity nourishes, more and more from the art which respects itself, creates in the passion of creation, and waits quietly to receive the meed of honor and of wealth, which shall one day be accorded, even in our material moneymaking America. We are not so very bad, all things considered; at least, not so very much worse than our neighbors. How long is it since Haydon cut his throat in London, and David Scott died of despair in Edinburgh, and Leopold Robert blew out his brains in Venice?

the approach of strangers of a different race and color, and with whose name is associated everything that is terrible.

We were all on the alert, expecting an attack every moment, as we went up with the flood-tide, which runs in the Pegu like a mill-race. Soon we began to hear the native war-gongs beating in every direction; and the distant cry of warriors giving the alarm-a guttural, monotonous hoo-hoo-was bayed on every side.

This lugubrious warning was more like the baying of countless dogs than any other civilized noise, and we knew that its object was to gather a force to intercept us, or, at all events, to strengthen the defense of the town of Pegu. Occa sionally, however, we passed a Karien village where the inhabitants were friendly. Only women, and children, and old men were left in these places, and they saluted us joyfully with shouts and waving of white cloths, dancing and running down to the river bank in crowds, pointing up the stream, and hurrying us on to the town, which they hoped we would take. The higher up we got, the louder grew the alarm; the gongs became as innumerable as the voices of runners and scouts carrying on the warning, and the whole produced a melancholy harmony, now like the sighing of the wind, now like the dying away of thunder.

All this time we were exposed to the intensest heat of a tropical sun, a heat such as is experienced nowhere but in Burmah; for, whatever may be the indications of the thermometer, heat is not felt in any other spot on earth as it is in the low, flat lands along the delta of the Irawaddy. Thermometrically it may not be so great, but Burmese heat has a peculiarly depressing effect; it makes you faint; it seems to steam and stew your head, and you find yourself bending under it as under a great and growing weight. We had no awnings over the boats, and most of us were dressed in thick cloth uniform. I wore a heavy cloth navy cap-the regulation cap of the Company—an undress blue cloth frock-coat, trowsers of the same material, and, in a belt at my waist, a sword and a pair of heavy ship's pistols. Very soon after the sun rose I had begun to experience the wilting influence of his rays, and, as he mounted higher and higher, rapidly acquiring strength, I was fast becoming

sick. At first I was seized with a slight fit of vomiting; then my mind became confused. For a moment I would forget where I was, but only for a moment; the next I would recover my recollection. I had a sense of dried peas with hot water poured upon them, swelling in my skull; I became violently excited, raved, said I don't know what to the men around me, seized one, thinking he was about to attack me--and then fell over on my face in the bottom of the boat-coup de soleil !

How long I remained insensible I have never known; but my first consciousness was of lying over the side of the boat, with a sailor dipping up water in his hat and pouring it over my head. My clothes were open, my dress loosened as much as possible, and saturated with water. I recognized some of the officers, particularly an assistant-surgeon of the 18th Royal Irish, my intimate friend, and was more or less conscious, from that time, that I was in a remote spot, and on a dangerous expedition, although I did not recollect the nature of the enterprise nor even the name of the country. In recognizing the officers, I could not recall their connection with the events then recurring. I heard the beating of the tomtoms along the land; I heard the same multitudinous hoo-hooing, Baying, wailing, and it filled me with irrepressible horror at times, while at others it excited me to madness. By degrees I became more quiet, and, as soon as it was safe to do so, I was removed from the cutter to a large Burmese rice-boat, housed over with mats and capable of containing from a hundred to a hundred and fifty persons. This floating house had windows and doors, and had been fitted up with hospital traps of every sort-a complete surgeon's and apothecary's outfit. Here I was laid upon a litter-dhoolee, as it is called in India - stripped, and water poured on me as before, by the bucketful, especially over my head and breast. The dhoolee was stretched in the middle of the boat, between the doors and windows. Occasionally, I relapsed into insensibility, but under the medical treatment, which was vigorous and pertinacious, I recovered sufficiently, every now and then, to recognize the faces and voices of the two medical officers who had kindly remained in charge of me, as well as the dhoolee-bearers-half-naked Hin

doos, who belonged to the hospital department and a cabin-boy of the frigate Fox, a handsome, spirited little fellow of fourteen or thereabouts, who had been permitted to accompany us for the purpose of witnessing an action. I had scarcely recovered my consciousness sufficiently to understand where I was and what had happened, when a message arrived from Capt. Tarletongreat-grandson, by-the-by, of the troublesome Tarleton of our Revolutionary war, and a dashing leader--commanding these medical officers to join immediately their respective detachments, and to leave me in the best care they could provide. Accordingly, they asked me whether they could safely leave me alone, relying upon my sense and experience to do that for myself which there would be no one to do for me in their absence. I urged them to go.

Shortly after they left-it seemed to me not more than half an hour-the little boy, of whom I have spoken, approached the side of the dhoolee, and, while bathing me with a sponge, giving me water to drink, and changing the mustard-poultices, told me where we 'were. He said this hospital-boat had been moored on the side opposite the town, under a high bank, where there were only jungle and the ruins of a burnt village, a few hundred yards off. He assured me that I had no cause for alarm; that we were perfectly safe; that the officers had explained to him that the boat had been moored there for safety, because there were no Burmese on that side, and that, in a very short time, they would rejoin us. My excitement was thus partially allayed, and I became comparatively calm; still, that horrible banging of gongs, mingled with the rattling of musketry-for our troops were then storming the place-and the occasional discharge of the twelvepounders we had brought up in our boats, were, at times, frightful in their effect upon me, and it was with great difficulty that I could master the impulse to leap into the water and hurry toward the sceno of action. All these sounds seemed to go through and through my head. The effect of the coup de soleil on my sense of hearing was, to intensify it beyond endurance. If one of those guns had been fired close by my ear, it could scarcely have produced an effect more shocking than it did at the dis

tance of more than a mile. How long the engagement lasted, it is, of course, impossible for me, under circumstances of such confusion and even delirium, to remember; but presently there was a pause: not a gong was to be heard; that dismal slogan was no longer to be caught; the artillery and musketry were still; all was perfect silence. The

dhoolee-bearers were squatting around on their haunches, and one or two of them had lighted hubble-bubbles. The boy went to the door, and, presently returning, whispered to me, seeming anxious to communicate something important; but, in my condition then, I could not understand him, and

hardly gave him my attention. Then there was a stir among the Coolies-a quick expression of alarm; they laid down their hubble-bubbles, and went to the windows on the side next the bank. Immediately they rushed back in great confusion and terror, shouting, "Burmee, Burmee man; Sahib, Sahib, Burmee man!" The boy again went to the door, and, after reconnoitering, returned and informed me that a large force of Burmese were gathering on the bank over the boat; and, as he spoke, I could hear their shouts. They had come from below, probably, to assist their friends, but had taken such care to keep at a safe distance from our men, that they had blundered upon this boat in its exposed and helpless situation. There was hardly an appreciable interval between the announcement of their presence and the discharge of their muskets. The roof of the boat was quickly perforated in every direction, and bullets whistled about the bed; they struck the timbers over my head, and by my side, and, more than once, struck the bed itself. With a scream of terror, the dhoolee-bearers leapt into the water, and then I was alone with the boy. For a minute or two, there was a pause in the firing, the attention of the Burmese being distracted by the panic of the Hindoos; but it was immediately resumed, this time directed upon the swimming Coolies.

Now, remember that I was stark naked, intensely excited (except at blessed moments of insensibility), in a high state of cerebral exaltation, reckless of danger, possessed by a sort of devil resembling mania a potu in all its phenomena. The little boy, now my