women sad and silent, like so many Dalai Lamas, wrapped up in the contemplation of their own grandeur and finery, or perhaps chattering like magpies, to make amends for a week's silence at home; while the whole conversation runs upon parish business or scandal, marriages or commitments," excellent discourses" or bad conduct, Miss A's lovers and Mr. B's lawsuits, hares, partridges, and illegitimate little ones, the overweening pretensions of this upstart to a seat on the grand jury, or the confidence of that would-be-lady, in assuming precedence in the ball-room. Bad and detestable as this is for a country gentlemanhimself "a native, and to the manner born,”—the case is ten times worse, for the casual inmate of a country-house, to whom all these interesting particulars are wholly unintelligible; and who, perhaps, escaping from the wearisomeness of artificial life in a great city, wishes to enjoy nature, undisturbed, and in quiet. Country society is, at best, ever on stilts; and formality, morgue, and ostentation are the current coin which passes among rival landholders; but when a Londoner, one not possessed of the dirty acres, ventures among them, he will soon be taught that a fund-holder, or a capitalist, is held as nothing by the lords of the soil, who measure virtue, talent, and respectability with the land-surveyor's chain, and in their whole deportment and intercourse with the world, seem eternally to cry, like the French king, "L'état c'est nous." 66 'Je l'ai toujours dit," says J. J. Rousseau, "et senti, que la veritable jouissance ne se décrit pas ;" and I never felt the truth of the axiom more than now, when I would describe the joys of " Not at home." Who is there that has not experienced the delight of hearing a threatening intruder depart unsatisfied from the door, while, with loosely-slippered feet toasting on the fender, he has himself continued, uninterrupted, the thread of a well-written novel? Not longer ago than last week I was brought all the way out of Ireland, where I was in close communion with poor Mary Grace, the heroine of the powerfully written "Tales of the O'Hara family," because my stupid servant chose to admit the most notorious professor of boring in the whole town, against whom I had given the strictest positive general orders. But I was even with the rascal, and sent him about his business the next morning. Oh! it is so provoking when one has made up one's mind to enjoyment, and arranged every thing for spending an evening comfortably, to have the little scheme of domestic happiness overthrown by any villainous intruder, who is determined "to bestow all his tediousness upon you." I say nothing of the convenience of" Not at home" to tradesmen with unsettled accounts, or to borrowing friends, whose importunities for assistance are too well founded to admit of a vivâ voce refusal. Every collegian who has "sported oak," is aware of this pleasure. But no one can be acquainted with the full value of "Not at home," who has not heard it from the lips of the fair object of his preference, when on entering her boudoir, she impresses it on her servant, with the emphatic addition of—" to whoever calls." What a long string of delightful conclusions flow from the enchanting premises! What a flattering innuendo in favour of the privileged guest, for whom all the world is excluded! It is not merely the seccatore, the obliging gentleman, who, like Madame du Deffand's Englishman, "always spends the evening where he dines," that is denied, but "whoever calls," including wits, beaux, worth, genius, kindred, all that is most desirable in society, most intimate in friendship ;-lucky dog! "Not at home" is likewise a very necessary contenance interposed between visitor and visitee in those numerous calls of etiquette, which, while they are perfectly essential to the "maintenance of social order and civilized society," are yet insufferable taxes on time and patience. In order to reap a few dinners, it is necessary for a diner-out to sow an infinity of tickets; and if such visits were really paid in kind, and not in a pasteboard currency, a poor bachelor would run a sad risk of being starved for want of leisure to overtake his invitations and qualify for their repetition. What between visits on introduction, visits after balls, friendly calls, and "vísites de digestion," a man might pass his whole life in the vocative case, were it not for the friendly intervention of" Not at home." But the matter would be still worse with the ladies, and their punctilious lists of six or eight hundred "particular friends," not one of whom would even recognize them in a ball-room, or exchange a salute from a carriage-window, if the due annual visit had not been paid. Like the service of a writ, the putting in of a refreshing ticket is an essential preliminary to bringing the parties to a hearing; without this protocol there is no re-establishing the "accustomed relations of amity between the high contracting allies" at the commencement of a season; and two square inches of pasteboard, more or less, make all the difference between the most intimate liaison and perfect strangeness. In a case so weighty as this, nothing is so unpardonable as that carelessness and inattention with which an étourdie will sometimes suffer herself to be at home, when she should not. On this point indeed every one who possesses a knowledge of the art of living in decent society, will take care to be guarded, by hiring only such servants as have an instinctive tact, refined by long and habitual exercise, to enable them, without specific orders, to divine who ought, or ought not to be admitted; and when their lady is, or is not, at home. The want of this talent often leads to an abuse which cannot be sufficiently deprecated. When a blockhead of a porter has not the skill to distinguish between a counterfeit and the true thing; or, after examining his man from head to foot, is as much at a loss to know what to do with him, as a naturalist with an ornithorhyncus, he coolly answers his "Is your lady at home?" with “I'll see, sir;" and away he trots to declare the visitor's name and appearance, and take orders accordingly. Now this is abominable! Much better is it, in all cases of doubt, to give a bold "No" at once, than thus to return with a negative, which cullibility itself could not credit, and which the most egregious vanity cannot fail to construe, as it really is, into a personal denial. I say nothing of the impropriety of leaving a gentleman waiting in the hall while this errand is doing, and of letting him hear the loud whisper of "Oh, no, by no means to him," and the shutting the drawing-room door, which preceded his dismissal. The thing itself is in bad taste, and shows such an ignorance of the customs of society, as fully justifies a dead cut.-But to return to the awkwardness of being improperly at home; there are thousands of dear friends who so perfectly understand each other, that, between being "at home" at night, and not being at home in the morning, they carry on a friendship through life, without ever meeting in private. Husbands in trade, or in professions, are peculiarly apt to be saddled with connexions which the wife cannot disavow, and will not bring into society with persons who are dangerous to cut and impossible to introduce; with these, however, all the decencies of life are fulfilled, "all parts absolved," when an annual card is dropped at their door, and an annual invitation sent to the omnium gatherum party, which gets rid of the "sweepings of the porter's book," (the metaphor is not the most elegant) at the close of the season. Friends upon this footing are scarcely known to each other by sight; or at most their faces are recognized with no very precise idea of the name to which they are appended. Judge, then, how distressing to all parties it must be when a blundering servant brings them to close action, and forces them into inquiries after family and connexions, of which they are utterly ignorant! Think of asking a re-married widow for the husband who has been buried these sixteen months, or making tender inquiries after Master Tommy's cough from a spinster of forty! But, if it be wrong to admit visitors under certain circumstances, it is a still greater breach of the peace not to take a denial, when it is given, to force the consigne, and insist upon "getting in." The impertinent familiarity of "I know your master will be at home to me," is a direct violation of the fundamental principles of visiting intercourse; and the Roman was quite right who insisted on being believed, on his own assertion, that he was "Not at home. For who ought to know better the necessities of the case? How can the intruder know what weak point in the family œconomy he may lay bare by his unseasonable marplotism? What téte-a-tête he may derange? What third person, whom it is awkward to meet, he may encounter in such undue efforts to gain admission? How can he tell that he will not run bolt against his own divorced wife, or the man who has thrown him out of parliament, or blackballed him at the club, the holder of his promissory note, the plaintiff in his crim. con. case, or the lady who has refused him? In self-defence such practices should be abandoned, and no friendship, no intimacy can justify them. As well might one tolerate the impertinent curiosity of the prying friend who pumps your servant to learn who dined with you yesterday, or what you have got for dinner, as overlook conduct at once so dangerous, so annoying, and so indicative of uncivilized vulgarity. Oh! Sirs, "reform it altogether."-There is indeed but one person who is allowed never to take a denial; and he is universally admitted to be so great a bore, that no one in his senses would think of imitating him. He'll knock at any door he pleases, whether in Grosvenor-square or St. Giles's, and like his friend the doctor, stops not to ask "Is your master at home?" but walks upstairs at once, to the discomfiture of every body in the room. With a fellow of this peremptory character, there is but one point of good manners to be observed, which is always to be ready to receive him with a good grace; neither weakly dreading his visit when he does not come, nor treating it, when he does, as a thing unexpected and unlooked for. Receive him with the firmness of the stoic, the gaiety of the epicurean, and the respect which is due to the Power in whose name he comes; for he was never known to retire from a bad reception, or to remit his claims, to tears, struggles, or supplications; and as for "Not at home," and leaving his card, show me the porter who would dare to propose it. M. MAZURIER, OR THE THEATRE'S THREE AGES. TIME was, a century ago When grossness ruled our wanton stage, When royalty and Maintenon, Jesuits, and prostitutes, and robbers, Then blazed with Congreve's wit the scene, Flash'd back each author's polish'd page, Shakspeare, and sense, and Garrick brought, The stage the truth of Nature taught, eye Revived the great of epochs old, And she whom none can since outvie In her own greatness standing lone, The tragic muse Antiquity Ne'er saw, but had been proud to own The mighty mistress of the spell That governs things invisible. These came, and pass'd, and left a name, Of what can now but point a story; Such is the sum of earth's best things; Thus melt away into the shade Beneath the rustling of Time's wings, The boards where Kemble lately fix'd With awe and stillness as of death- Pepper'd with fiends and sprites unholy, Guiltless of plot, a wild extortion From the mazed brain of drunken folly, Is hail'd with cries, and shouts, and smiles, By drunken galleries from St. Giles. And comedy unbless'd with wit, And tragedy that leads to laughter, And leaden farce that labours after, To rend the solid globe in shares ; Though Colman had a censor's hand in Chipping the blocks to shapes of piety, Giving hypocrisy variety. "Perversion could no farther go :" The world of man was deem'd worn out, The brute creation long ago They on the boards had put to rout. That will the part of beast sustain; Of France as in old time appears, |