always wished to see them adopt, and which can alone fix victory in their ranks.

In the second place, a royalist ministry fixes limits to certain ambitions, and destroys many chimeras. Elections made in virtue of a monarchical law, under a monarchical ministry, promise to be monarchical; and, with these elections, an increasing royalist majority puts an end to hopes that had long been nourished. But a party which feels that in a few months it may have lost its influence, will, of course, make a last effort while it is still in the field. In this desperate position any weapon will do; the liberties of the charte are invoked on account of the pestilence at Barcelona; Bayonne is another Coblentz, and the sanitory cordon an army; a measure of precaution, publicly discussed in the face of the sun, is a secret measure against Spain !

Another reason, , which seems to have made the discontented lose all patience, is, that some changes which have taken place in the police system, greatly to the advantage of the people, have begun to unhinge and take down that frightful machine which the French inherited from the Revolution. This indeed, may for a time impede the march of the administration, but still they have done it; and certain it is, that the old links are broken, and that there is now reason to hope for a police set in motion by monarchical machinery.

In fine, the masses of the nation remain incorruptible. Some ridiculous conspiracies, fomented by irritable passions and irremediable regrets, may still find a few dupes, but when once they descend to the people and the soldiers, they find nothing but fidelity. The general conspiracy, going on in Europe, and especially in France, which was to burst forth at the moment of a supposed rupture between Russia and Turkey, is an abortion. The prolongation of peace, and the formation of a royalist ministry, made it dart out partially and prematurely in France; but it is no sooner known than it is no longer to be found. Those, therefore, who are so little instructed by the past, as still to think without horror on political commotions, have no hope for the future; and the fate which seems to threaten Spain will hardly induce the French

to think of running again round the bloody circle of their former follies. The Revolution is dead in France; certain principles, which cannot restore it to life, may perhaps agitate it for a time in the grave; like that electrical power, which cannot raise the dead, but by the help of which one may give frightful convulsions to a corpse.

The ministry remained firm in the midst of this storm; and in a few days more this legislative fever will be succeeded by profound repose. The vehement discourses and desperate declamations that were poured forth in the Chamber do not belong to the times we live in, and they recall recollections one cannot think of without horror. If they were addressed to those without, it was very vain; for they affect nobody; and their effect is over with the debate which excited them. What will be the result of all this violence and agitation? The abolition of the censorship, and a much greater degree of freedom of the press.

The ministry, by this single act, has merited the thanks of all those who are sincerely attached to the constitutional liberties of their country, and who consider those liberties as a pledge of the public tranquillity. In less than six weeks, this new administration, the object of so much distrust and of so many sarcasms, has acquired a strength which superficial minds did not expect, but which, however, it was not difficult to foresee. A ministry formed according to one of the two great opinions in France-a ministry which began its career by abolishing the last law of exception to the charte, immediately placed itself in its natural political order; and all natural order is durable: yielding to the impulse of new institutions, instead of thwarting them, its power is increased by all the power of those institutions themselves. The consequence of this true position was quick and perceptible. The public funds rose rapidly; a striking inajority declared itself; and the liberty of the press, which was to set every thing in a flame, and destroy every thing, with which it was impossible to govern, took place without being perceived, as soon as the ministers shewed themselves courageous enough to submit their acts and their persons to the scrutiny of public opinion.

and the first use she makes of it is to deliver Aladdin.

The work met with the most brilliant success, and nothing could be more magnificent than the decorations and costumes, which are said to have cost 150,000 francs, about 6000 guineas. The spectators of the grand opera never witnessed, I believe, a more superb and elegant spectacle. The most remarkable pieces of scenery were three palaces; that of Aladdin, in the third act, the bronze palace of Timorken in the fifth act, and, lastly, the palace of light, at the extremity of which was a moving sun. I must not forget to mention, that the new lustre, on this occasion, was lighted with hydrogen gas, which had a most brilliant effect.

Two interesting and pretty voluminous notices have lately been published on an antique statue in the Museum of the Louvre, which is called Venus Victorieuse. This statue, of Parian marble, was discovered in the Greek island of Milo, in 1820, was transported to Paris the year following, and presented to the King by the Marquis de la Riviere, French ambassador at the Ottoman court.

The author of these two notices, M. Quatremere de Quincy, of the Academy of Inscriptions and Belles Lettres, and the Comte de Clarac, Conservator of the Museum of Antiques, are not of the same opinion respecting the composition, and the primitive destination of the statue. Such discrepancies, you know, are not uncommon, even among the most renowned antiquaries. However, these two learned gentlemen are unanimous in thinking that this work, notwithstanding the damage it has experienced, is really a production of the golden age of the fine arts in Greece, and all the connoisseurs who have seen it agree with them. In fact, among all the fine statues of this kind, which time has allowed to reach us, there is perhaps none worthy to be compared to this, if not for the fineness, the purity, and the correctness of the forms, at least for the grandeur of the style, the fulness of the naked parts, and, above all, for the beauty of the execution, which, every where ample and mellow, is at the same time disengaged from those useless details, that individual imitation, which the sentiment of ideal beauty always rejects.

The upper part of the statue is entirely naked down to the waist, all the rest below is covered with an elegant drapery. The two arms have been almost entirely destroyed, so that what remains of them is only sufficient to shew that the figure had a very prominent attitude. But what was its motion or action? The authors of the two notices have each their system, which they support by ingenious hypotheses, and reasons that appear wellfounded; nevertheless, notwithstanding all their conjectures, there is nothing on this point but doubt and uncertainty. But as it is evident that there would have been a want of equilibrium between the different parts of the statue, if it had not had a resting point, which it seems to be seeking for, we may come to the conclusion, that it was not originally destined to figure alone on a pedestal. This is the opinion of Mr Quatremere de Quincy, who presumes, and even thinks he can affirm, that it belonged to a group of two figures, and was thus in relation with the god of war, and was soothing his savage temper. He cites, in support of his opinion, two or three antique groups representing the same subject with a remarkable conformity.

The Comte de Clarac is not altogether of the same way of thinking; having ascertained that the drapery of the statue is as much finished on the side where the second statue is supposed to have been, he concludes that both were insulated. The two statues, according to him, were not contiguous, but at a certain distance from each other, perhaps opposite. The sup posed statue, says M. de Clarac, may have been Mars, Paris, Adonis, or one of the two goddesses over whom Venus has just obtained a victory.

After all, this question, which is difficult to resolve, is not the most important object. The essential point for the satisfaction of amateurs, and for the progress of the art of sculpture, is the acquisition of a masterpiece, the superiority of which cannot be denied, not only over that crowd of antiques collected with so much care, and transported at such expence, the chief merit of which is often nothing but their antiquity, but over the very small number of choice pieces, worthy of being held forth as models of taste and execution.

Besides the arms of the Venus of Milo, which are wanting, some other parts are more or less injured; but all the rest is as well preserved as could be expected, after twenty centuries of ravages and vicissitudes. It is to be hoped, indeed, that this rare production may be scrupulously preserved in the state of degradation in which it has been transmitted to us, and that no rash hand will attempt to restore what time has destroyed. Not that the French are without able statuaries, but I should scarcely think any of them would have the pretention to continue or finish a work of Praxiteles, if, to be sure, this piece may really be attributed to that celebrated sculptor, or to one of his school, as the two ingenious antiquaries above mentioned presume.

The Venus of Milo was exhibited for some time in the Musée des Antiques in the Louvre, near the Diana of Ephesus. It has since been transported to the upper story, and placed in the round hall which precedes the Gallery of Apollo; but the public are not admitted there at present, as some decorations are going on which will soon be finished."

Numerous pamphlets and literary essays, both in prose and verse, have been published respecting Bonaparte since his death; but none of them, perhaps, are worthy of much notice, except an Ode or lyrical poem on the death of Napoleon by Lebrun, author of the tragedies of Ulysses and Marie Stuart. Educated at the Prytarée francais, by the benevolence of Bonaparte, this author has interrupted the course of his silent studies, to celebrate his benefactor, and to throw a garland on his tomb.

Incapable of disturbing the tranquillity of any individual, and very far from wishing to offend any thing that is now respected in France, the author of this Ode has thought it right to reveal to the public his impressions and involuntary impulses on receiving the intelligence of the unexpected death of Bonaparte.

Madame la Marquise de Montpezat, who died here lately, was a native of Provence, and endowed with all the vivacity and sensibility which is observable in the natives of that southern region. She was an authoress, but never put her name to her works; and was well acquainted with Tacitus and Horace, who were her favourite authors. The

following anecdotes will give you some idea of her imagination and feeling. She had a friend for whom she had the greatest esteem, but who lived a great way from her. For many years she wrote him a letter every day; at length she had the misfortune to lose him, but notwithstanding, she continued to write to him every day, for two or three years, as if he had been alive. A friend remonstrating with her on this strange proceeding, she said: Il y a des morts qui nous entendent mieux que beaucoup de ces étres qui se croient vivans. There are deceased persons who understand us much better than many of those beings who think themselves alive. This lady was implicated in the conspiracy of Pichegru, and was put into prison. Hearing some beggars one day asking for charity under her window, she immediately looked for some money for them, but found she had none. She directly began to strip off almost all her clothes, and thrust them through the bars of her window, saying to those who were with her, "We must give something to these poor people, they are in want of every thing, and we want nothing but liberty."

The joyous Carnival, which lasted this year only fifteen days, has passed off very quietly with all its masquerades, its harlequins and scaramouches, its masked balls of twelve hours, as they are called, which last all night, and the grand annual procession of the Fat Ox, with all its motley accompaniments of buffoonery, which is the glory of Paris, and the pride and joy of the Boulevards for three whole days together. A grand improvement was made in the procession of the Fat Ox this year for the first time. Formerly, the child who represents Cupid used to sit in a chair on the back of the ox; but this year the ox was led first covered with a fine pall, and Cupid sat in a canopied throne, fixed on a triumphal car, in which there were other smiling loves like himself. This arrangement is much more comfortable for the child, and is an additional embellishment to the parade and pomp of the procession. Some persons pretend that there were not so many masks as usual; that masquerades are going out of fashion, &c. &c., but I look upon this as only a touch of party spirit, to make us believe that the people are unhappy and discontented.-I am, &c.