concert, ball, or other assemblage of articulately-speaking beings, during their residence in this country, "That Lady Amelia Sorrel shall never venture to read in a wicked, improper, and never-to-be-sufficiently-condemned book, which is in most libraries, neatly bound and lettered, and called Hume's History of England,' "That Miss Laura Fitz Eustace shall never again open the gilt-edged leaves of the Lalla Rookh' which we ourselves presented to her in pure love and red morocco, until she shall have given up dancing, and entered upon a certain age,'— “That all reviewers and revilers whose names are not here specified, shall remember constantly that Knight's Quarterly Magazine' is under the protection and patronage of Lady Mary Vernon; that it is dangerous to trifle with reputations or play with edged tools ;—that Marmaduke Villars can split a bullet upon a penknife's blade at twelve paces; and that Vyvyan Joyeuse can indite a lampoon upon any distributor of defamation at a minute's warning. "Given at this our Castle of Vernon, "Sept. 1st, 1823. (Signed) "PEREGRINE COURTENAY, "Secretary.' ON QUADRILLES. I HAVE resolved never again to dance;-and yet this is a cruel resolution at two-and, thirty. For ten years I have been a happy member of our social assemblies in the pleasant town of M- My subscription will be saved; but how shall I fill up the tedious winter months without the recollections of the past, and the anticipations of the coming ball? Delightful companions of the full moonblooming evenings of defiance to hail and frost-ye are gone, and my solitary hearth must be my solace. I shall never forget the night when the seeds of your destruction were first sown. Louisa W. had to call, and I was her delighted partner. The eager hands were clapped, the dis cordant strings were screwing up into tune, and we were debating with the venerable leader of our country band the relative merits of "the Honey-Moon" and "Speed the Plough." With the most correct taste, Louisa had decided for " right and left," a preference to " la poussette," we were ready. At that instant a handsome officer of dragoons-the coxcombadvanced to Louisa, and in the most humble tone-the puppyventured to recommend a quadrille. Louisa's eyes consulted mine, and I boldly consulted the leader. I knew the range of his acquirements, and I was safe;-we went down with "the Honey Moon;" but the evil was rooted. Within a fortnight there was a special meeting of the subscribers to our assembly-room to discuss an important question. It was convened at the particular desire of a lady of fashion, who had become a temporary resident amongst us. I knew there was mischief brooding, and, as I was petulant, I staid away. Poor Kit the master of our band, and his faithful followers, were dismissed after thirty years' duteous service; and four fiddlers, from Paine's I think they said, came from London by the coach-fine-powdered fellows in silk stockings-but no more to compare with Kit's crew for strength and untiring execution than a jew's-harp to a hand organ. But they were wonderfully applauded; and Louisa, seeing that I would not sanction them, recommended me to take lessons. I would as soon have learned to speak High Dutch. They have now gone on for two years with their Quadrilles -but I have done with them. I hate their curtsies and their bows their skipping in and their skipping out-their endless labyrinths-their barbarous nomenclature. 66 Departed visions of the dear country dances of my boyhood, to what foreign land are ye fled? Even the shopkeepers of M-, who meet every Christmas at the Hoop and Griffin to a ball and supper" have banished you. Are ye gone to thrust out waltzes from Germany, or fandangos from Spain-are ye departed to unnationalize other feet, like the detestable quadrilles have corrupted ours? Ah no-ye have not the subtlety of your hateful rival-like your unhappy countrymen, ye must give place to the cuckoo tribe, who drive you from your nests. It is only twenty years since I learned to dance-ay, sirs, under a pupil of the celebrated Vestris-and my knowledge has become obsolete. To outlive one's old friends is the most painful feeling in earth's pilgrimage-and I have done this before I am grown grey. "The Jolly Young Waterman," and Money Musk," and the "Devil among the Tailors," and 66 1 "Drops of Brandy," and "Off She Goes," and "Mother Casey," and "Molly put the Kettle on," and "Lady Montgomery," are with the things before the flood-and "I will weep for them.” But I will never abandon my early faith for "La Poule," or "L'Eté," or- Psha! I hate myself for knowing even these execrable names. I will practise,even with my own chairs, up the middle and down again, swing corners, hands four, and right and left," till the gout overtakes me-but I will never prostitute myself to "dos-à-dos, chassée en avant, balancer, tourner les dames, or chaine-An-glaise,”—no, not if I could secure myself an exemption from crutches till my eightieth winter. I have too much patriotism in my blood. 66 I am satisfied that my hatred to quadrilles is not a vain caprice, but is founded upon moral and philosophical principles. There is nothing kind, genial, manly, womanly, cheerful, ebullient, in the quadrille. It is a formal and impertinent piece of personal display, from beginning to end. It is cold, repulsive, artificial; it requires practice and skill-it is altogether an affair of the feet and not of the heart. It is unsuited to our climate and our habits;—it is for a people who would corrupt the unconstrained intercourse of our English dance into a matter of intrigue. But our country dance was made expressly for, if not by, our character. It requires no skill but what a good ear and good humour may supply; it breaks down the usual cold intercourse of the sexes into an unpresuming and regulated familiarity; it calls forth all the thousand graces of innocent hearts and unclouded spirits; it creates an interchange of individual sentiments, in the midst of the most cordial sociality. No maiden ever went away less innocent in her freest thoughts from a country dance, though her fingers had once or twice replied to a scarcely perceptible pressure from those of her handsome partner. But the balancing and footing of the quadrillethe display of personal advantages upon the most approved system of studied grace—it is altogether an unnatural and constrained affair-and when the simplicity of the heart is fled, its innocence is knocking very hard to be let out. A ball supplies the most exquisite pleasure to youthful and unsophisticated minds-and let such enjoy it, in the freshness and vivacity of their national dance. Quadrilles were made for prudes of forty and martinets of fifty. But I may live to see a re-action-Quadrilles have descended to the kitchen;and so Sir Roger de Coverley may again find his true place in the drawing-room. R. M. III. The gorgeous ranks of flaming cherubim, Forms dear to me on Earth-that many a voice May 5.-My dear Nicholas, your verses about the tomb of Napoleon will never do. Do you seriously believe that the Emperor had a file of grenadiers daily at the Thuileries, to be shot, at halfafter-twelve, for his imperial entertainment? Is it an article of your creed that he commonly dined upon stewed bombs and pickled musket-balls? And have you any authority for asserting that he amused himself in his captivity by applying thumbscrews to Marshal Bertrand, and pulling Madame Montholon's hair? And why do you exult so vehemently because such a man has nothing over his dust but a shrub and a flat stone? Are you really so anxious upon the subject of posthumous accommodation, that you would give half-a-crown for a bust, or five shillings for a pyramid? As an admirer of mine said but indifferently in Greek, and as I say very prettily in English, Give me a low and humble mound ;- Where echo shall make music round, And while one natural rivulet Shall wander on its way, and sing And she I loved shall often glide, To whisper near that tomb and tide And shed one tear in that still grove,→ May 7.-Tristram Merton, I have a strong curiosity to know who Rosamond is. But you will not tell me; and, after all, as far as your verses are concerned, the surname is nowise german to the matter. As poor Sheridan said, it is too formal to be registered in Love's Calendar. Oh Rosamond! how sweet it were, on some fine summer dawn, When flowers and heaps of new-mown grass perfume the morning breeze, And look along the spreading vale to the ocean far away; And oh! how passing sweet it were, through the long sunny day, And when the winds, on winter nights, in fitful cadence blow, Tristram, I hope "Rosamond" and your "Fair Girl of And the kiss which sealed it |