Volume 5 / Book 8 — Noctes Amicæ.

There are being born into this great city a vast number of young people—enough babies indeed, every day, to make a great noise in the world sometime, if every one should turn out to be a Demosthenes or Cicero, an Alexander, a Cæsar, or a Napoleon. But though every dame may think her own the prettiest child alive, it seems to us not altogether agreeable to good taste for her to anticipate the judgment of the future in naming it after that celebrity that he or she is destined to rival or eclipse. In seriousness, the habit which prevails so generally of bestowing illustrious names in baptism, is ridiculous and disgraceful, and is continually productive of misfortunes to the victims, if they happen to be possessed of parts to elevate them from a vulgar condition. In the south they manage these things better; the Cæsars, Hannibals, Napoleons, Le Grands, Rexes, &c., are all to be found in the negro yards; but almost every public occasion in the north, affords an instance by which a "man of the people," hearing his name called in an assembly, or seeing it printed in a journal, is compelled to feel shame for the weakness of his parents, by which he is burthened with a name that belittles the greatest actions of which he is capable.

In illustration of the passport system, a good story is told of the recent arrest of a Turk on the frontier of the Herzegowina. For some time past, the Turkish Government has allowed its authorities to wring something out of the people by means of passports and the devices thereunto belonging, but it chances that a great many persons in power can neither read nor write, and therefore a shrewd fellow may palm any species of official-looking paper he thinks proper as his regular pass on the officials; thus it was that a Turk who had travelled some time in peace with a document of imposing appearance, which he had picked up in the streets at Constantinople, at last found one who could read it, and it was discovered to be one of Jean Maria Farina's Eau de Cologne labels!

A Mayor of the department of the Haute-Saône, France, has had the following decision placarded on the church door:—

"Whereas, at all times, there have been disorders, and always will be; and whereas, at all times, there have been laws to repress them, and always will be; and whereas magistrates are appointed to have them properly executed, I ask, ought we, or ought we not, to do our duty? If we do our duty, we are calumniated. Well, then, taking these things into consideration, I declare that if that horde of good-for-nothings who are in the habit of frequenting the churchyard during Divine service, shall continue to do so, they will have to come into collision with me."

M. Michaud, of the French Academy, is pleased to express literary malice against those whom he loves and esteems the most. A political man came one day to confide a secret to him, and recommended to him the strictest discretion. "Do not be uneasy," replied M. Michaud, "your secret shall be well kept; I will hide it in the complete works of my friend Lacretelle." We think we know of an American author whose "various writings" would serve the same purpose.

In the last International we mentioned the death of the well-known ballad composer Alexander Lee. Some painfully interesting circumstances of his last days have since appeared in the journals:

"About a week before his death, he called on a friend and brother pianist, Thirlwall, stated his extreme destitution, and asked that a concert might be got up for his relief. This was done, generously and promptly. The concert was advertised, Lee and Thirlwall to preside at the piano. The other performances were to be by Mr. Thirlwall's four daughters, and by half a dozen other friends and pupils of Lee, who had offered their gratuitous services. On the day of the proposed concert, he for whose benefit it was to be given, died. It was thought best to perform the concert, however, and to devote the proceeds to paying the proper honors to his memory. They did so, but most of those who tried their voices were too much affected to sing, and the performance was at last brought to an abrupt termination by one of his pupils, who burst into a passion of tears while endeavoring to sing The Spirit of Good, an air by the departed master."

Stories of the sagacity of elephants are endless; here are two which imply complicated processes of thought:

"Another elephant that was exhibited in London was made to go through a variety of tricks, and among them that of picking up a sixpence with its trunk; but on one occasion the coin rolled near a wall beyond its reach. As the animal was still ordered to get it, it paused for a moment as if for consideration, and then, stretching forth its trunk to its greatest extent, blew with such force on the money that it was driven against the wall, and was brought within reach by the recoil. An officer in the Bengal army had a very fine and favorite elephant, which was supplied daily in his presence with a certain allowance of food, but being compelled to absent himself on a journey, the keeper of the beast diminished the ration of food, and the animal became daily thinner and weaker. When its master returned, the elephant exhibited the greatest signs of pleasure; the feeding time came, and the keeper laid before it the former full allowance of food, which it divided into two parts, consuming one immediately, and leaving the other untouched. The officer, knowing the sagacity of his favorite, saw immediately the fraud that had been practised, and made the man confess his crime."

A delegation of those disgusting creatures of the feminine or neuter gender, who hold conventions for the discussion of "Women's Rights," obtruded into the presence of the wife of Kossuth, just before the Hungarian left England, with an address, which, in addition to expressions of sympathy, contained an intimation that a statement of opinions was desired respecting their efforts to achieve the "freedom of their sex." The lady replied that she thanked them for their attentions, and that, with respect to her views on the emancipation of woman, she had in earlier years confined herself to the circle of her domestic duties, and had never been tempted to look beyond it; that latterly the overwhelming course of events had left her, as might be well supposed, still less leisure for any speculations of this kind; it would, moreover (such was the conclusion of her little speech), be forgiven in her, the wife of Kossuth—a man whom the general voice, not more than her own heart, pronounced distinguished—if she submitted herself entirely to his guidance, and never thought of emancipation! Probably this admirable answer has saved her the annoyance of receiving any such visitors in this country.

We find the following in the Gazette des Tribunaux:

"In 1814, Lord W—— was colonel of an English regiment, and joined the allied army which invaded France. Shortly before his departure from Dover, where he was in garrison, the Colonel married a rich heiress, but he left her with her family whilst he went to encounter the risk of combats. The campaign of France being terminated, nothing further was heard of the colonel; it was known, however, that his regiment had been almost entirely destroyed in a combat with the French in the south of France, but his death not having been regularly proved, some law proceedings took place between the different members of his family respecting property to a very large amount. These proceedings, which are not yet terminated, will, no doubt, receive a solution from the following singular circumstances:—Some time ago an old soldier, M. R——, residing in the environs of Marseilles, came to Paris on family affairs, and took up his residence in a hotel in the quarter of the Chaussée d' Antin. Having run short of money, he begged the hotel-keeper, M. D——, to advance him 100f., and as a guarantee he left him provisionally a superb gold watch, ornamented with diamonds, and on the back of which was the miniature of a lady, with the initials 'E. W——.' M. R—— told the hotel-keeper that in a combat in 1814, in the south of France, he had wounded and taken prisoner an English colonel; that the colonel dying almost immediately after of his wounds, his watch had remained in his hands. He recommended M. D——to take particular care of the watch, and he went away, some days ago, announcing that he would soon send by the messageries the sum lent, and demand restitution of the watch. Two days back there was such a numerous gathering of travellers in the hotel of M. D——, that he was obliged to give up his own room to an Englishman. On seeing the watch hanging over the chimney the Englishman uttered a cry of surprise, and examined it closely. From the miniature on the back, and the replies of the hotel keeper to his questions, he recognized it as the property of his brother, Colonel W——. With an obstinacy peculiarly English, the Englishman would not give up the watch, and offered to pay 100,000f. for it if required; for it was, with the testimony of R——, the proof of the decease of his brother, and the termination of the law proceedings, which had been pending thirty years; but in the absence of the proprietor of the watch, the hotel-keeper could not dispose of it. To satisfy, however, the obstinacy of the Englishman he called in the commissary of police, who consented to take it as a deposit. The same day the Englishman set out for Marseilles to seek for Mr. R——."

The London Spectator has the following just observations on a scandalous exhibition in the theatres:

"There is a certain degree of elevation, especially in the course of human events, which foretells a speedy downfall. Tyrannies, before their decline, become more and more abominable; and probably the last tyrant is the one who deems his position most secure and his impunity best established. We are forced to this reflection by a burlesque on Auber's Enfant Prodigue, brought out this week at the Olympic. Here we have the most affecting story of sin and repentance, derived moreover from the lips of One whom almost every inhabitant of this island esteems as sacred, made the peg whereon to hang the ordinary jokes which we hear usque ad nauseam, every Christmas and Easter. There must be an overweening confidence in the safety of burlesque to make such an experiment possible. We are by no means anxious to assume the Puritanical tone, or to lay down the doctrine that certain subjects are to be excluded from any department of art. The most sacred themes are worked into oratorio-books, and the most straitlaced portion of the community applauds their combination with music. But when a subject is in itself solemn, let it be solemnly treated. Opinions may be divided as to whether the story of the Prodigal Son can with propriety be represented in the form of serious opera or spectacle, but that it is an improper theme for burlesque there cannot be the shadow of a doubt. Our dramatic authors have too long been in the habit of trying to raise a laugh about every thing, and we have too long been inundated with a species of drama in which the chief wit is anachronism and the chief wisdom a Cockney familiarity with the disreputable works of the Metropolis. We trust that the début of the Prodigal Son at Vauxhall and the Casinos is that crisis of a disease which precedes a return to health, and that henceforth we shall hear less about Haroun Alraschid's views of the polka, and Julius Cæesar's estimate of cider cellars and cigars. As for the Olympic burlesque itself, it is by no means void of humor; nor is it unsuccessful. We only stigmatize it as the perfection of a bad genus."

Some time ago when a comic opera founded on the history of Joseph was produced in England the people refused to hear it.