birthright of an English lady. Mary of garded as a series of confessions, of which Berlichingen would do no discredit to the that work was the supplement. Nor is it bed-chamber of our Queen. unworthy of note, that he has represented We cannot trace in her much of the cha- the aberrations of conduct, both of Weislinracter of Friederike, and if she was, as gen and of Clavigo, as the result of the inGoethe says, in his mind when he drew the fluence of more resolute characters, by character of Maria, he must have portrayed whose consistent wickedness they were in a rather what she might have become, than measure held in subjection, whereas there what she was when he knew her. We sus- is no indication of anything analogous havpect that the resemblance between the cha- ing existed in his own case: a proof, it racters and conduct of the lovers-between would seem, that he considered the self-sugWeislingen and himself-is considerably gested heartlessness of his own conduct as nearer. Maria has less vivacity than Frie- incapable of being clothed with interest derike—there is more of a gentle reserve in even in a drama. her presence, and tender affection, rather Before we quit the gallery of Goethe's than passionate fondness, is the character of beauties, there is one other face to which we her love. cannot refrain from calling the attention of The conversation between her and her our readers. It is that of a simple, lovelittle nephew Karl, is one of the most skil- sick girl, of one whom Goethe himself has ful things of the kind with which we are spoken of as one of nature's maidens, and acquainted-her part is so perfectly that of on whom Schiller has also pronounced a a woman-his so thoroughly that of a child. very eloquent panegyric. We allude, as The scene, however, in which she finds her many will divine, to the Clärchen in Egfaithless lover, Weislingen, on his death-bed, mont. She belongs rather to the class of poisoned by the hand of his mistress, the which we formerly spoke than to that of haughty and heartless Adelheid, when she which Maria Von Berlichingen may be concomes to beg for her brother's life, is the sidered as the type; and we should not have perfection of pathos. reverted to the subject of Goethe's childlike In the Maria of Clavigo the resemblance female characters, had it not been partly to Friederike is more apparent, though to from the feeling that we had unjustly overus, at all events, she is a much less interest-looked her when formerly treating of them, ing character than the sister of the iron- and partly from the circumstance of Egmont handed Gotz. She is a lively, passionate, belonging as a composition altogether to the French girl, with something more of ten- time of Goethe's maturity. We are quite derness, and a good deal more of constancy, of Schiller's mind with reference to the drathan usually belong to the vivacious daugh-matic error which is involved in the cirters of Gaul. In her lover, Clavigo, we cumstance of her appearance at all; and have also much more both of the character we regard it, moreover, as a singular and and conduct of Goethe than in Weislingen. lamentable proof of Goethe's perverted moral He is represented as an accomplished scho- taste, that he considered a parting scene belar, and elegant man of the world, whose tween a fictitious Egmont and his mistress, better feelings, though never extinguished, more likely to enlist the sympathies of his were continually proving too weak for the readers, than one such as must actually selfishness with which they had to contend. have taken place, between an affectionate In his desertion of Marie de Beaumarchais, husband and a loving wife. Poetical license he is actuated by precisely the same motives, is one thing, and poetical slander is another; which induced Goethe to abandon Friede- and if poor Egmont, with all his faults, left rike, the very yulgar ones, viz. of feeling at the last an unblemished moral character, that his social position was now in some de- we see no reason why he should in this regree superior to hers, and the hope of mak- spect be needlessly misrepresented. ing a better match. This double confession Whether Schiller was entitled to cast the of a single act (in Gotz and Clavigo) is re- first stone at Goethe in behalf of good taste, markable as an illustration of that tendency at all events, will perhaps seem a question which seems to exist in all minds, even the to those who remember the parting scene strongest, to confess in some way or another between Leicester and Mary Stuart in his whatever they themselves feel that they own drama. But leaving the vexed queshave done amiss; and it is a proof of what tion as to whether poor Clärchen ought or Goethe himself says somewhere in his Auto- ought not to have been where she is, there biography, that his whole works may be re- are few of our readers, we believe, who will not hail her as a beautiful creation wherever The translation which we have given, we she may be, and some of them, perhaps, present to our young lady readers, as only will thank us for the little glance which we one degree better than the very miserable shall give them of her, as she walks to and fro in her mother's humble abode in Brus sels, waiting for her lord. "CLARA AND HER MOTHER ALONE. Mother. "Such a love as Brackenburg's I have never seen; I thought such things were to be found only in the histories of the saints.-(Brackenburg was an honorable suitor for Clara's hand.) Clärchen (walking up and down through the room, humming a song between her lips), "Happy alone Is the spirit that loves." Mother. "He knows of thy intercourse with Egmont, and I believe if you would show him a little kindness, he would marry you yet.” Clärchen (sings), "Joyful And sorrowful, one which they will find in their musicbooks. The original, however, with the beautiful music of Beethoven, we recommend to their serious consideration; and we think it might, without prejudice, be adopted as a substitute for "Woodman, spare that tree," or, "Ye marble Halls," or, Beautiful Venice," or, indeed, for most others of the lays of modern England with which they are at present in the habit of lulling their papas to slumber. Did our limits permit, we would gladly linger in the society of the beautiful daughters of Goethe's brain, and the names of many of them, we are sure, would require only to be mentioned, in order to rekindle the enthusiasm with which our readers must have once regarded them. The majestic form of Iphigenie would rise up afresh, with its statue-like beauty, and the childish tenderness of the melancholy Mignon would again claim a tear. In the gay and profligate Philline we should still take pleasure, in spite of our disapproval, and the two Leonoras would once more divide our admiration and our love. But we must hasten away from the enchanted circle, and we shall detain our readers only with a very few observations on the characteristic differences between the female characters of Goethe and those of our own great dramatist. is a powerful song. I have sung full-grown chil-heroic, so to speak, than those of Shakspeare. Goethe's females are less dignified, less dren to sleep with it before now." And fearing, Is the spirit that loves." Mother. "Leave off that ranting, child." It Mother. Thou hast nothing in thy head but They are truer to nature, not in the higher that love of thine. Would that thou couldst sense of what nature might and would prothink of something else. Brackenburg might duce in given circumstances, but in the place you in an honorable condition, I tell you. lower sense of what she usually does proHe may still make thee happy." Clärchen. "He ?" Mother. "O yes! a time will come! You children cannot look before you, and will not listen to our experience. Youth and love all come to an end, and a time may come when you will thank God for a roof to cover you." duce, and what we see around us in the ordinary intercourse of the world. They are one degree further removed fromthe antique, in that they are less the embodiments of abstract passion, and approach nearer to the complexity of ordinary nature. Nor have Clärchen. (Shudders, is silent, and then ex- they the power of Shakspeare's females. claims), "Mother, let that time come as death Tenderness and sweetness are their chief will come! To think of it beforehand is horrible. characteristics. There is not one of them, And, when it comes! When we must-then so far as we know, who could support the we shall bear ourselves as we may. Egmont ! to renounce you! (in tears.) No! it is impossi-passion even of Juliet, or in whose nature ble-impossible." such a passion, if represented, would not be felt to be an incongruity. How different is Clärchen's little song, in this scene, short the part which Portia plays from that which though it is, is one of the most powerful of Goethe has assigned, or could with propriety Goethe's lyric compositions. It is, indeed, have assigned, to any of his female characas she calls it, "ein kräftig Lied." As an ters! In female characterization, as in outpouring of the emotions of a passionate every other department of dramatic comand loving heart, we know not its equal. position, we hold religiously to the opinion that no poet, ancient or modern, has ever regarded must have effected, to some extent, equalled Shakspeare, and we are disposed a change on the natural characters of those to place the female characters of Goethe, to whom it belonged. Chiefly, however, she both poetically and morally, on a lower was different to him; for she was raised to level than his. Still, they are as they a height, and surrounded by an atmosphere, should be. The ages for heroic conception which allowed his imagination free scope to are gone gone, so far as we can see, be- gild her at will, and he has drawn her, of yond recall; and the epic, we fear, is not course, as he conceived her. The relations the only form of poetic composition which which subsisted between the different classes is unsuited to our time. In Shakspeare's of the community, and the feelings with days the middle age still lingered with a which they mutually regarded each other, sunset glow, and its grandeur was blended were then altogether different from what in his imagination, with the bright soft tints they now are. The sharp and rigid distincof the coming time. He stood, as it were, tions which then marked the different steps upon a height, between the day which had on the social ladder were unquestionably been and the day which was to be, and his favorable to feelings of mutual respect. eye descried the dawn, whilst the rays of The affectation of contempt with which the the evening still gilded the west. Even the high and the low now regard each other, and majestic shadows of the Roman grandeur the ridiculous light in which they contrive may be supposed to have stretched to him; to exhibit their respective characteristics, is for it was the cloud which had sunk down the result of a jealousy on the one hand, and upon it which was rising on all sides when of an envy on the other, which could have Shakspeare was born. It was the same found no place where rivalry was excluded with the great painters of Italy; and in by the very constitution of the society in their works we see much of the majesty of which men lived. Where encroachment classic art-not copied, but still remaining was not dreaded, mutual respect and kindly in spirit-united to the picturesque luxuri- feeling naturally became the connecting ance of the Middle Ages, and the clear con- links between the different classes of men, ception and perfect technique of modern instead of ridicule and unbelief being, as times. Goethe, again, is the poet of an al- with us, the principles which jumble all together new civilization-of a social con- ranks together. No "Punch " No "Punch" appeared dition, the result, no doubt, of those elements then on the Saturday mornings, to hold up of change and of progression which were at to the laughter of the land, the royal banquet work in the days of Shakspeare and of Ra- of the previous night. If there had, what phael, but still differing in its developed glorious matter he would have found in the state most essentially from what it was in doings of our gracious lady, Elizabeth. No the period of its formation. His poetry is "leader" had then even mooted the opinion the only kind of poetry which was possible, that royalty was a pageant kept up merely as original and indigenous poetry, in an age for the convenience of the community, and in which clearness, precision, and reality for preserving the symmetrical appearance have taken the place of the magnificent and of the Constitution. Shakspeare did not the ideal; and it is thus a legitimate conse- labor, as we do, and as Goethe did, under quence of the condition out of which they the disadvantages which, according to Louis arose, that his women should be as we find XIV., beset the valets of the great; and, them-mere (6 comfit-makers' wives," ," and consequently, there were some men, and "Sunday citizens," when placed side by women too, who did continue to be heroes side with those of Shakspeare. They are to him. real women, however-perfectly simple, and The merit of Goethe on the other hand is, free from mawkish artificiality-perfectly that he read the newspapers all his days, graceful, but at the same time divested of all and that he was a poet notwithstanding. the dignity which is derived from position, Nay, that he has proved to us, that while and with which the circumstances of the men and women feel, love, and suffer, the time permitted Shakspeare to invest his poet's occupation will remain. He might characters. A queen or princess in Shak- have imitated Shakspeare and the older speare's days, and to Shakspeare, was a very poets if he had chosen, as he has imitated different person from what she is in our days, the Greeks in Iphigenie; but if he had, he and to us. Partly, she was different in her- would not have been as he is the poet of self; for it cannot be doubted that the almost the nineteenth century. The true province sacred reverence with which rank was then of the poet, and this Goethe knew, is to em family, her early education differs as much as can well be imagined from the convent education of France, or the showy and too often superficial instruction which falls to the lot of the English maiden. She is not educated for show, nor regarded as an ornament, and the consequence is that she is rarely either showy or ornamental. body in their greatest purity and their greatest strength, the sentiments and feelings of his age. He is and must be the aesthetic expression of his time. Even the poets of France, the least original of all to whom the name has ever been conceded-were so to a certain extent against their will; and their tiresome imitations of the antique are a standing monument of the want of healthy Of this species of woman we have a comand original life, which then characterized plete exemplification in the Charlotte of their country. The same observations ap- Werther's Leiden, who, notwithstanding the ply with equal force to the other depart- violence of the passion which she excites, is ments of the fine arts, and it requires no all along represented as a plain, simple, unprophet to foretell, that if ever we should pretending housewife. Her lover is evidenthave a true school of painting or sculpturely a fine gentlemen, and an intellectual fop in Europe again, it will bear to that which besides of the very first water; but we see sprang up in Italy at the close of the Mid- nothing of the accomplished miss or of the dle Ages, the same relation which the poetry fine lady about Charlotte. She is a woman of Goethe does to the poetry of Shakspeare. simply, and the charm which attaches to So much for one, and perhaps the chief her is altogether apart from conventional cause of the difference, which we perceive feeling. In this respect, as in many others, between Goethe and Shakspeare's female Goethe's women often remind us of the fecharacters; but there is another which no males who figure in the dialogues of Erasdoubt had its influence, and which we ought mus. When we read of these as puellæ, not to pass over unnoticed. It is the dif- feminæ, uxores, matrone, or under whatever ference of feeling, with regard to the female other title they may appear, we think of sex, prevalent in the two countries to which them simply as well developed specimens of the poets respectively belonged. In Ger- female humanity, but without the slightest many a woman is a being to be loved and reference to their position in the world. cherished, but not to be reverenced and Poverty does not weigh upon them, nor does adored, as she was in England in Shak- wealth puff them up. They are neither exspeare's time, and still is to some extent. alted by the deference of others, nor deThe sphere of her activity is consequently pressed by the absence of self-respect. They. more limited, she is a less prominent person- are not learned; for although their converage in the eyes of the world, and less im-sation is reported in Latin, they are supportant in her own, and hence the homeli-posed to have spoken in the vulgar tongue. ness of her manners, and the greater preponderance of the strictly domestic virtues. Every English man on first coming in contact with German women, is struck with the absence, even in the very highest classes, of what is vulgarly denominated "style." Their object is not to attract admiration, but to engage the affections-they appeal not to the eye, but to the heart, and hence there is in their manners for the most part, what in an Englishwoman would be an affectation of simplicity. An intelligent Englishman (Dr. Bisset Hawkins) writing about Germany some years ago, said that there was no other nation in the world, where the natural woman was so easily discoverable under the social crust, and the truth of the observation will be confirmed by all who have had an opportunity of forming an opinion from personal observation. The whole education of a German woman indeed tends to bring about this result. Trained from the first to domestic duties in the bosom of her VOL. XIV. No. I. 2 Neither are they ignorant; for on every subject on which the interlocutor addresses them, they are extremely intelligent and ready-witted. They are simply, as we said before, puellæ, feminæ, uxores, matrona, &c. with such a degree of wealth, of station, of learning, and of intelligence. as to render them normal specimens of the human being of the sex at the period of life, and otherwise in the circumstances in which they are represented. To some of our readers it may seem strange that Erasmus should be spoken of as a poet, and, stranger still, that he should be instanced as a successful delineator of female character. With ourselves, however, we confess that several of his women have long been especial favorites-the Maria, for instance, in the "Proci et Puella," the Catharina (Virgo Mooyauos), the Fabulla, and even the unfortunate Lucretia. The characterization is excellent; for although there is a great similarity observable in them all, they have each a distinct individual existence. In reading the dialogues, short though they be, we seem, as it were, to make their acquaintance, and to become familiar with their respective peculiarities. Catharina, for instance, is by far the most poetical; and indeed we know few things more beautiful than the quaint, half-sportive conversation between her and her lover, when they are first presented to us in the garden after the banquet. Eubulus. "Gaudeo tandem finitam esse cœ nam, ut liceat hac frui deambulatione, qua nihil amœnius." Cath. "Et me jam tædebat sessionis." Eu. "Quam vernat, quam arridet undique mundus! Hæc nimirum est illius adolescentia." Cath. "Sic est." Eu. "At cur tuum ver non æque arridet." Eu. "Quia subtristis es." Cath. "An videor alio vultu quam soleo." Cath. "Maxime." that of all the friends in whom she trusted, The Eu. "Vides hanc rosam, sub imminentem his murderess. The discussion too between noctem, foliis contractioribus ?" Cath. "Video, quid tum postea ?” Cath. "Bella collatio." Eutrapelus and Fabulla (the puer pera), in which she challenges him, "Dic quæ te causæ moveant, ut felicius existimes peper Eu. "Si mihi parum credis, in hoc fonticulo isse catulum, quam catellam," is ineffably contemplare teipsum," &c. So far, indeed, we have not much of Catharina, and she delivers her short responses with the coyness of one who expected to be wooed; but the manner in which her lover, who is perfectly up to his business, endeavors to arrive at her understanding and her heart, through the medium of her imagination, shows sufficiently the natural tendency of her mind. The whole scene breathes of the freshness of the garden; and we can picture to ourselves, without an effort, the two lovers walking over the close-shorn green, and listening to the gentle murmuring of the water, as it trickled into the fountain in which Catharina was to contemplate her beauty. We are strikingly reminded of the garden scene of Faust-and Catharina, in many respects, might pass for the sister of Gretchen. Her character is finely brought out as the dialogue proceeds, and her conscientious scruples about matrimony are shaken, though not overcome. In the dialogue which follows, and which is supposed to take place after she had made trial of the convent, we have a return to the feelings which naturally belong to a girl of her age; and Eubulus is rewarded for his former unsuccessful argumentation, by a declaration on the part of the young lady, droll in many parts. The whole of the dialogues indeed are sparkling with wit; and as they are generally carried on between a man and a woman, no inconsiderable part of it must necessarily fall to the share of the ladies. In this respect they differ altogether from Goethe's females, for in their mouths we seldom find anything that is witty, and indeed Goethe himself, was by no means so great a wit as Erasmus. DEATH OF WILLIAM THOM, THE INVERARY POET. Mr. Thom died at Dundee on the 28th ultimo. For some time past the poet had been in delicate and declining health. He has left behind him a widow and three children, the eldest of whom is only five years, and the youngest but a few months old. These are utterly destitute. We believe that intimations to the above effect either have been, or are immediately to be, despatched to Lord Jeffrey, Charles Dickens, and others; and that Messrs. Chalmers, Middleton, and Shaw, booksellers, are willing to receive donations on behalf of the widow and children. SCIENTIFIC EXPEDITION.-The King of Prussia is about to send a scientific expedition into Negroland, in search of some vast and splendid ruins of an ancient city, which a Mahommedan traveller, whose work has been translated from the Turkish by Dr. Rosean, asserts that he discovered during his wanderings in Central Africa. |