majo rollicking style of acting were quite spirited enough, even for that very spirited part.  Formes was indeed under the impression that he himself was the Figaro Figarorum, the incarnate half-Spanish ideal of that wonderful barbaresque conception; but then, the Formes Figaro was ’developed from the depths of his subjective moral consciousness,’ whereas the Figaro of a Southern European is the thing itself—­like Charles Mathews playing the part of Charles Mathews, or like the Greek comedian’s imitation of a pig’s voice, by pinching a veritable pork-let, which he bore concealed within his mantle.

Perhaps no character is so little appreciated by Anglo-Saxon audiences as this of Figaro.  To them he is little more than a buffoon.  To Southern Europe, he is the bold, prompt, shrewd, popular ideal, suiting himself by craft to every superior, regarding all things with a shoulder-shrugging, quizzical philosophy; a democratic Mephistopheles; a lurking devil, equalizing himself, and the people with him, by wit and insolence, with nobility itself.  Among the Latin races, as in the East, such Figaros often rise, like Oliver le Daim, to power, and the people understand it.

Fast-Day, in Boston, was operatically feted with ’the light and melodious Martha,’ by that arch-thief of melodies, Flotow.  Would not—­considering the day in question—­I Puritani have been more appropriate for ‘a day of fasting and prayer’?  It has already been discovered (by the sagacious Ullman, we believe) that the Huguenots was appropriate to sacred concerts.  A friend suggests that Masaniello for high mass, and Don Giovanni for St. John’s day would be a great advance in these dramatic unities.

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We are indebted to a new contributor for the following sketch: 

We are all familiar with Hayden’s dinner-party, and the Comptroller of Stamps, and Charles Lamb’s ’Diddle diddle dumpling,’ and ’Allow me to look at the gentleman’s phrenological development.’  I am always reminded by it of a circumstance which occurred between the Rocky and Alleghany mountains.  A certain witty professor of a certain Western college, had been invited to deliver a poem before the Phi Beta Society of Athens—­not the capital of Greece, nor the Athens of America, but a sort of no-town, without even the advantages of an established groggery, or mutual admiration society.  The poet, not having attained that celebrity which is incompatible with keeping one’s word with small towns, small lyceums, and small profits, and the roads not being stopped up, in short, ’Providence permitting, and nothing happening to prevent,’ the poet made his appearance at the proper hour, like any ordinary mortal, and acquitted himself with such rhythmical eloquence, such keen, silvery humor, as brought the house down, and himself vice versa.

The audience having dispersed in a state