sarily precludes the other, or that we are fated to produce no more fine statues and paintings, no more monumental temples and palaces, because we now have, at lower prices than were paid in ancient times for inferior articles, beautiful carpets, and fabrics of silk, wool, and cotton, furniture, porcelain, and glass, in which the thought of the artist and the craft of the artisan are so admirably blend dead; it is throwing out wider and deeper roots, and will bear richer fruits in the garden of the future, enriched by the mingled detritus of by-gone ages, than it has ever borne in the primitive formations of the past. at an immeasurable distance; these muslins and gauzes, finer than gossamer, yet covered with exquisite traceries in gold and silver thread, fabrics that seem too etherially light to be worn by others than the ladies of Titania's court; these silks and satins, and damasks of admirable texture, and of richest dyes; these magnificent garments, stiff gold embroidery, with precious stones and with tinsel whose glancing hues produce an effect quite as bril-ed that they seem to be identical. Art is not liant as that of the jewels; how strangely they contrast, these splendid things intended for the few, with the coarseness of the fabrics destined for the ordinary use of the many. Compare these magnificent housings and accoutrements, these saddles of velvet, stiff with gold, these reins, and swords and daggers, full of pearls and jewels, with those clumsy implements of labor, and those uncouth, heavy utensils of domestic life. Compare the elaborate workmanship of screens, cabinets, vases, lamps, and tables, with the primitive candles and suspicious-looking soaps; the magnificence of carriages and palanquins, luxuriously cushioned, and hung with velvet and gold, in which lazy, bloated grandees are lounging, laden with jewels and finery, with the naked, emaciated bearers, human brutes that replace beasts of burden, and contrast, unfavorably, with average European horses! In European industry, on the contrary, an ascentional, out-reaching movement is every where visible. Beauty remains no longer in scornful isolation, divorced from use, but descending into the domain of every-day existence, incorporates her divine essence in all the forms of common life, pervading the lowliest spheres, raising and ennobling the humblest details, by her purifying and vivifying presence. This tendency, visible in the industry of all European nations, is still more clearly evident in the manufactures of France and England, whose productions, standing at the head of all others, constitute the highest expression of the industrial spirit of the age. Here the hardest and heaviest materials, wood, iron, and stone, become plastic under the workman's hand, assuming the most brilliant polish, the lightest and most elegant forms; grates, fire-irons, and kitchen-ranges, rival, in lustre and beauty, the attractions of diamonds, goldsmiths' work, and flowers. The admirable construction of machinery shares in the enthusiasm excited by the beautiful fabrics woven by their tireless fingers; and the "Golden Marriage" of use and beauty is every where celebrated under varying forms. One of the most interesting features of the present exhibition, the one which constitutes its distinguishing character, is, undoubtedly, its universality, and the interest which it excites among all nations, and all classes. And it was time that the results of human activity in its various departments, should thus be gathered together from the four corners of the globe, for the world is cut up into so many small fractions, and each fraction lives so much within the limits of its own narrow circle, ignoring, for the most part, all that is going on outside of it, that it is in the highest degree desirable that people should begin to see something of what their neighbors are doing. It is time that nations met elsewhere than on the field of battle, and measured their strength and dignity by some more rational standard than the relative force of their cannon; time also that the various classes of society, so widely separated by the artificial divisions of caste and fortune, should look, at length, into each other's face and recognize the band of a common nature and of common needs; that the world's, as yet, unhonored workers, beholding the glorious fruits of their prolific energy, should perceive the sublimity of their mission and take fresh heart and fresh hope; that the rich should learn, from the grand results of labor, to appreciate more justly its nobleness and worth. That the exhibition of 1851, successful as it is evidently destined to be, should fully realize this most desirable end, is hardly to be expected; but that it will do much toward creating a better understanding between classes and countries, and thus pave the way for the bringing in of a future era of universal helpfulness and good-will, may be very confidently predicted. STELLA. FRENCH FEUILLETONISTES UPON LON- THE They who imagine that art has died out of the world, and sigh for the chisel of Praxite- HE leading Parisian journals have corresles, the pencil of Apelles, and the glorious con- pondents in London during the Great Exceptions of the masters of the middles ages, hibition, and as the corps of Parisian feuilletowould do well to visit the Crystal Palace, and nistes comprises much of the richest and racontrast the rudeness which shaped all the rest talent of the great French metropolis, elements of ordinary life in former periods, there is a piquancy and brilliance in these dawith the elegance and beauty which the sim- guerreotypes of London life and the impres plest objects of common use are beginning to sions of English character, which is very enassume. Not, however, that the one neces-tertaining. No traveller who remembers din ing at any of the recherché cafés upon the Boulevards with a Frenchman, and chatting with him of England and London, can forget the cold chill that curled through the Parisian's conversation, as if he were a Pole, gossipping of Siberia, or the glances of intense satisfaction and pride which he cast upon the lively and lovely groups in the street, inly thanking God that he was not born a child of perfide Albion. portion of his last letter, as a specimen of what an intelligent man of letters feels on visiting us for the first time, and before he becomes well acquainted with us: "At home you may have the dignity and nobleness of the Cid-you may be another Talma: but pass the Channel-show yourself to the English, and in spite of yourself you will become as comic as Arnal. Arnal! do I say? why, he would not make them laugh so much as you do; and they would consider our inimitable comedians Levassor and Hoffmann as serious personages. Do not be angry, then, or cry with Alceste, "One of the principal causes of surprise to me in walking along the streets of London, has been to see myself all at once become a curious animal. I did not think that I had any of the qualities necessary for such a thing, being neither humpbacked nor club-footed, neither a giant nor But these gentlemen talk not alone of the a dwarf. Thus, then, on the day of my arrival I Exhibition, but of the "town" in general. mations and laughter of the crowd on seeing me, went along Regent Street, and heard the exclaTheir articles wear the air of the journals of I examined myself from head to foot, to ascertain heroic adventurers who have penetrated into the cause of the unhoped-for success which I obbarbarous lands. They are clearly home-sick, tained in England. I even felt all up my back, these sybarites. We extract the following thinking that perhaps some facetious boy might from a translation in the London Literary have transformed me into a walking placard. Gazette, prefaced with a few editorial remarks. There was nothing, however; but I had moustaSpeaking of the variety of their topics the re-chios and a foreign air! A foreign air! That is viewer says: "Thus the great Jules Janin, in one of the little miseries on which you do not the Journal des Débats, notwithstanding the count, O simple and inexperienced travellers! interest of portions of his article, some of which have been translated into our journals, makes the infamy of French republicans, and his own fervent love and devotedness to the royal family of Orleans, the burden of his lucubrations. M. Blanqui, the historian of political economy, and translator of Adam Smith, faithful as becomes an economist to his idée fixe, bewails in the Presse the folly of France in rejecting the doctrines of free trade, and clamors loudly for an immediate reform of French tariffs. M. Jules de Prémary fills column after column in the Patrie with descriptions of English manners, customs, and peculiarities; and yet he admits that he knows nothing of our language, and has only resided amongst us for a few days. Parisian littérateurs pride themselves on being men of imagination, poets, penseurs fantasistes; and it is clear that it would be as reasonable to chain an eagle to a dog-cart, as to expect them to deal with a plain, practical, matter-of-fact thing in the methodical business-like way of the English journalist. Of these, the lines of Miss Fanny Fudge are strikingly true: "Vain. critics, vain All your efforts to saddle wit's fire with a chain !! But though our worthy confrères of the Pa- broad-brimmed hat. Par la sambleu! Messieurs, je ne croyais pas être Si plaisant que je suis !' They would only laugh the more. In this respect the English are wanting in good taste and indulgence. Their astonishment is silly and their mockery puerile. The sight of a pair of moustachios makes them roar with laughter, and they are in an ecstasy of fun at the sight of a rather much bored to seize such occasions for amusing A people must be very themselves. However, all the travers, like all the qualities of the English, arise from the national spirit carried to exaggeration. They consider themselves the beau ideal of human kind. Their stiffness of bearing, their pale faces, their hair, their whiskers cut into the shape of mutton chops, the excessive height of their shirt collars, and the inelegant cut of their coats-all that makes them as proud as Trafalgar and Waterloo. 66 In our theatres we laugh at them as they laugh at us, and on that score we are quits. But in our great towns they are much better and more seriously received than we Frenchmen are in England. "At Paris now-a-days nobody laughs at an Englishman; but at London every body laughs at a Frenchman. We do not make this remark from any feeling of ill-will; in fact, we think that to cause a smile on the thin and pinched-up lips of old England is not a small triumph for our beards and moustachios. After all, too, the astonishment which the Englishman manifests at the sight of a newly disembarked Frenchman (an astonishment which appears singular when we call to mind the frequent communications between the two netions), is less inexplicable than may be thought. Geographically speaking, France and England touch each other-morally, they are at an immeasurable distance. Nothing is done at Calais as at Dover, nothing at London as at Paris. There is as much difference between the two ra ces as between white and black. In France, the Englishman conforms willingly to our customs, and quickly adopts our manner of acting; but in England we are like a stain on a harmonious picture. 66 666 "No,' said he, with a smile. “What, then, has this professor in a red coat come for?' "He is the master of grace." "What! that grenadier, who is as long as the column in Trafalgar-square?' "Yes, or rather he is the walking master. "I looked out of the window, and saw the three young ladies drawn up and immovable as soldiers, and presently they began to march to the step of the grenadier. They formed a charming platoon, and trod the military step with a precision worthy of admiration. I asked for an explanation of such a strange thing. 666 Our fashion of sauntering along the streets, smiling at the pretty girls we meet, looking at the shops, or stopping to chat with a friend, fills the English with stupefaction. They always walk straight before them like mad dogs. In conversation there is the same difference. In England it is always solemn. Left alone after dinner, the men adopt a subject of conversation, which never varies during all the rest of the evening. Each one is allowed to develop his argument without interruption. Perhaps he is not understood, but he is listened to. When he has ended, it becomes the turn of another, who is heard with the same respect. The thing resembles a quiet sitting of the Parliament. But in France, conversation is a veritable mélée-it is the contrary excess. A subject is left and taken up twenty times, amidst joyous and unforeseen interruptions. We throw words at each other's heads without doing ourselves any harm; smart sallies break forth, and bon mots roll under the table. In short, the Englishman reflects before speaking; the Frenchman speaks first and reflects afterwards-if he has time. The Frenchman converses, the Englishman talks: and it is the same with respect to pleasure. Place a Frenchman, who feels ennui, by the side of an Englishman who amuses himself, and it will be the former who will have the gay-in truth inexhaustible. Indeed I defy the most est air. From love, the Englishman only demands its brutal joys; whereas the Frenchman pays court to a woman. The Englishman, at table, drinks to repletion; the Frenchman never exceeds intoxication. "A difference equally striking exists between the females of the two countries. I do not now speak of the beauty of the type of the one, or the elegance and good taste of the others; but I will notice one or two great contrasts. In France, a young girl is reserved, is timid, and as it were hidden under the shade of the family but the married woman has every liberty, and many husbands can tell you that she does not always use it with extreme moderation! In England, you are surprised at the confident bearing of young girls, and the chaste reserve of married women. The former not only willingly listen to gallant compliments, but even excite them; whilst the latter, by the simple propriety of their bearing, impose on the boldest. The boldness of young girls in England was explained to me by the great emigration of young men-in other words, by the scarcity of husbands. The French girl who wants a husband is ordinarily rather disdainful; the English girl is by no means difficult. "A Frenchwoman walks negligently leaning on our arm, and we regulate our steps by the timidity and uncertainty of hers: the Englishwoman walks with the head erect, and takes large strides like a soldier charging. An accident made me acquainted with the secret of the strange way of walking which Englishwomen have. I was lately on a visit to the family of a merchant, whose three daughters are receiving a costly edu cation. The French master, the drawing master, and the music master had each given his lesson, when I saw a sergeant of the grenadiers of the We in England,' said my host, 'understand better the duty of women than you Frenchmen do. We cannot regulate our manner of walking on that of a being subjected to us. Our dignity forbids it. It is the woman's duty to follow us. Consequently she must walk as we do,—we can't walk as she does.' 666 ‘Ma foi !' said I, ‘I must admit that in progress you are decidedly our masters. In France the law, it is true, commands the wife to follow her husband; but it does not, I confess, say that she must do so at the rate of a quick march! "The contrasts between the two countries are patient observer to find any point of resemblance between them. In France, houses are gay in appearance; in London, with the exception of some streets in the centre, such as Regent-street or Oxford-street, they are as dark and dismal as prisons. Our windows open from the left to the right; windows in England open from top to bot tom. At Paris, to ring or knock too loud is vulgar and ill-bred; at London, if you don't execute a tattoo with the knocker or a symphony with the bell, you are considered a poor wretch, and are left an hour at the door. Our hack cabs take their stand on one side of the street; in England they occupy the middle. Our coachmen get up in front of their vehicles; in England they go be hind. In Paris, Englishmen are charming; at home they are-Englishmen. One thing astonishes me greatly-that the English don't walk on their hands, since we walk on our feet.” But the French gentlemen do not have it all their own way. The London Leader at tacks them pleasantly in a similar spirit, yet it is always tinged, upon both sides, with a shade of caustic feeling: "Jules Janin, who has fallen in love with our fog and kindliness announces to all France the joyful news that there will be no Waterloo banquet this June: the flag of France floating over the Crystal Palace suggests to the Duke that the banquet would be a breach of hospitality, be Janin believes that report; or at least prints it, which is to give journalistic credence to it. We are sorry to think how "cruelly” France will be disappointed; and we are amused at the excessive pre-occupation of Frenchmen with this said battle of Water cause it would recall such "cruel souvenirs!" loo. It is the ineradicable belief of every Schalken advanced towards the door. It opened Frenchman that we in England are in a per- before he reached it, and Rose rushed into the petual self-swagger about Waterloo. We are room. She looked wild, fierce, and haggard with prodigal of the word upon omnibus, shop, terror and exhaustion; but her dress surprised street, and road, because we wish to humble them as much even as her unexpected appearance. It consisted of a kind of white woollen wrapper, France at every corner. Waterloo-house is made close about the neck, and descending to the an insult! Waterloo-bridge a defiance! Wellington boots an outrage! Every step you soiled. The poor creature had hardly entered the very ground. It was much deranged and travel take you trample on the national pride of chamber when she fell senseless on the floor. France, for with "insular arrogance" you walk With some difficulty they succeeded in reviving in boots named of Wellington or of Blucher! her; and on recovering her senses she instantly We are intoxicated with our success at hav- exclaimed, in a tone of terror rather than mere iming beaten the French-never having drubbed patience, Wine! wine!-quickly, or I'm lost!" them before, from the times of Cressy, Poic- "Astonished, and almost scared, at the strange tiers, and Agincourt, down to the Peninsular agitation in which the call was made, they at once Campaign! This one success of Waterloo-administered to her wishes, and she drank some (which, after all, was not a success, as France wine with a haste and eagerness which surprised clearly gained the battle, only she quitted the them. She had hardly swallowed it, when she field in disgust!) we cannot forget; we exclaimed, with the same urgency, 'Food, for God's cherish it, we riot in it; we blazon the name sake; food at once, or I perish !' everywhere to flatter our national pride and humiliate the foreigner. And, curious enough, the foreigner is humiliated! He turns his head away as he passes Waterloo-house; he declines crossing Waterloo-bridge, or crosses it in a passion; and even his national dread of rain cannot induce him to ride in a Waterloo omnibus. Of all the many profound misconceptions of English society current in France, none, we venture to say, is more completely baseless than the belief in the English feeling about Waterloo. Though it would be impossible to persuade a Frenchman that omnibus proprietors, hotel keepers, and builders were guilty of no national swagger in using the offending word " Waterloo." SCHALKEN THE PAINTER.-A GHOST WE STORY. E take the following from a volume of ghost stories, with illustrations by Phiz, which has lately been published in London. One Minheer Vanderhausen, through the means of a certain persuasive eloquence, backed by money, becomes the husband of Rose, the niece of Gerard Douw, and with whom Schalken, the celebrated painter's pupil, was in love. Vanderhausen and his wife set out ostensibly for Rotterdam, but receiving no communication from either for a long time, Gerard resolves upon a journey to the city. No such individual as Vanderhausen is known there, and the fate of the poor wife is told as follows: "One evening, the painter and his pupil were sitting by the fire, having accomplished a comfortable meal, and had yielded to the silent and delicious melancholy of digestion, when their ruminations were disturbed by a loud sound at the street door, as if occasioned by some person rushing and scrambling vehemently against it. A domestic had run without delay to ascertain the cause of the disturbance, and they heard him twice or thrice interrogate the applicant for admission, but without eliciting any other answer but a sustained reiteration of the sounds. They heard him then open the hall-door, and immediately there followed a light and rapid tread upon the staircase. the table, and Schalken immediately began to cut "A large fragment of a roast joint was upon some; but he was anticipated; for no sooner did she see it than she caught it, a more than mortal image of famine, and with her hands, and even with her teeth, she tore off the flesh, and swallowed it. When the paroxysm of hunger had been a little appeased, she was on a sudden overcome with shame; or it may have been that other more agitating thoughts overpowered and scared her, for she began to weep bitterly, and to wring her hands. "Oh! send for a minister of God!' said she; 'I am not safe till he comes; send for him speedily.' "Gerard Douw dispatched a messenger instantly, and prevailed on his niece to allow him to surrender his bedchamber to her use. He also persuaded her to retire there at once to rest: her consent was extorted upon the condition that they would not leave her for a moment. 666 'Oh, that the holy man were here!' she said; he can deliver me: the dead and the living can never be one; God has forbidden it.' "With these mysterious words she surrendered herself to their guidance, and they proceeded to the chamber which Gerard Douw had assigned to her use. Do not, do not leave me for a moment!' she said; 'I am lost for ever if you do.' through a spacious apartment, which they were "Gerard Douw's chamber was approached now about to enter. He and Schalken each carried a candle, so that a sufficiency of light was cast upon all surrounding objects. They were now entering the large chamber, which, as I have said, communicated with Douw's apartment, when Rose suddenly stopped, and, in a whisper which thrilled them both with horror, she said, 'O God! he is here! he is here! See, see! there he goes!' "She pointed towards the door of the inner room, and Schalken thought he saw a shadowy and ill-defined form gliding into that apartment. He drew his sword, and raising the candle so as to throw its light with increased distinctness upon the objects in the room, he entered the chamber into which the shadow had glided. No figure was there-nothing but the furniture which belonged to the room; and yet he could not be deceived as to the fact that something had moved before them into the chamber. A sickening dread came upon him, and the cold perspiration broke out in heavy drops upon his forehead; nor was he more composed when he heard the increased urgency and agony of entreaty with which Rose implored them not to leave her for a moment. "I saw him,' said she, 'he's here. I cannot be deceived; I know him; he's by me; he is with me; he's in the room. Then, for God's sake, as you would save me, do not stir from beside me.' "They at length prevailed upon her to lie down upon the bed, where she continued to urge them to stay by her. She frequently uttered incoherent sentences, repeating again and again, 'The dead and the living cannot be one; God has forbidden it: and then again, Rest to the wakeful-sleep to the sleep-walkers.' These and such mysterious and broken sentences she continued to utter until the clergyman arrived. Gerard Douw began to fear, naturally enough, that terror or ill-treatment had unsettled the poor girl's intellect; and he half suspected, from the suddenness of her appearance, the unseasonableness of the hour, and, above all, from the wildness and terror of her manner, that she had made her escape from some place of confinement for lunatics, and was in imminent fear of pursuit. He resolved to summon medical advice as soon as the mind of his niece had been in some measure set at rest by the offices of the clergyman whose attendance she had so earnestly desired; and until this object had been attained, he did not venture to put any questions to her which might possibly, by reviving painful or horrible recollections, increase her agitation. The clergyman soon arrived; a man of ascetic countenance and venerable age-one whom Gerard Douw respected much, forasmuch as he was a veteran polemic, though one perhaps more dreaded as a combatant, than beloved as a Christian-of pure morality, subtile brain, and frozen heart. He entered the chamber which communicated with that in which Rose reclined; and immediately on his arrival she requested him to pray for her, as for one who lay in the hands of Satan, and who could hope for deliverance only from heaven. That you may distinctly understand all the circumstances of the event which I am going to describe, it is necessary to state the relative position of the parties who were engaged in it. The old clergyman and Schalken were in the anteroom of which I have already spoken; Rose lay in the inner chamber, the door of which was open; and by the side of the bed, at her urgent desire, stood her guardian; a candle burned in the bedchamber, and three were lighted in the outer apartment. The old man now cleared his voice, as if about to commence; but before he had time to begin, a sudden gust of air blew out the candle which served to illuminate the room in which the poor girl lay, and she with hurried alarm exclaimed, 'Godfrey, bring in another candle; the darkness is unsafe." “Gerard Douw, forgetting for the moment her repeated injunctions, in the immediate impulse, stepped from the bedchamber into the other, in order to supply what she desired. "O God! do not go dear uncle,' shrieked the unhappy girl; and at the same time she sprang from the bed and darted after him, in order by her grasp to detain him. But the warning came too late; for scarcely had he passed the threshold, and hardly had his niece had time to utter the startling exclamation, when the door which divided the two rooms closed violently after him, as if swung to by a strong blast of wind. Schalken and he both rushed to the door, but their united and desperate efforts could not avail so much as to shake it. Shriek after shriek burst from the inner chamber, with all the piercing loudness of despairing terror. Schalken and Douw strained every nerve to force open the door; but all in vain. There was no sound of struggling from within, but the screams seemed to increase in loudness, and at the same time they heard the bolts of the latticed window withdrawn, and the window itself grated upon the sill as if thrown open. One last shriek, so long, and piercing, and agonized, as to be scarcely human, swelled from the room, and suddenly there followed a death-like silence. A light step was heard crossing the floor, as if from the bed to the window, and almost at the same instant the door gave way, and yielding to the pressure of the external applicants, they were nearly precipitated into the room. It was empty. The window was open, and Schalken sprang to a chair, and gazed out upon the street and canal below. There was no one there; but he saw, or thought he saw, the waters of the broad canal beneath settling ring after ring, in heavy circles, as if a moment before disturbed by the submersion of some ponderous body." SKETCHES OF LIFE IN SWEDEN. Impro visatore is one of the most beautiful and intrinsically truthful of the myriad beautiful books upon Italian life, has published a new work, Pictures of Sweden. It is very genial summer reading, consisting of detached sketches of Swedish life and scenery, with interludes of poetic reverie. The London journals complain that it is not sufficiently well translated, but we quote the following characteristic passages in which the same weird child-likeness of feeling which his readers will recall, is expressed in the peculiar, subdued strain of northern sentimentalism, which is more the complexion, than the substance of his style. Here is the preInde to the book: "It is a delightful spring: the birds warble, but you do not understand their song? Well, hear it in a free translation. "Get on my back,' says the stork, our green island's sacred bird, ‘and I will carry thee over the Sound. Sweden also has fresh and fragrant beech woods, green meadows and corn-fields. In Scania, with the flowering apple-trees behind the peasant's house, you will think that you are still in Denmark.' "Fly with me,' says the swallow; 'I fly over Holland's mountain ridge, where the beech trees cease to grow; I fly further towards the north than the stork. You shall see the vegetable mould pass over into rocky ground; see snug, neat towns, old churches and mansions, where all is good and comfortable, where the family stand in a circle around the table and say grace at meals, where the least of the children says a prayer, and, morning and evening, sings a psalm. I have heard it, I have seen it, when little, from my nest under the eaves.' "Come with me! come with me!' screams the restless sea-gull, and flies in an expecting circle. 'Come with me to the Skjärgaards, where rocky isles by thousands, with fir and pine, lie like flower |