composer should not follow the Italian recitative too servilely, but make use of many gentle deviations from it, in compliance with his own native language. He may copy out of it all the lulling softness and dying falls (as Shakespeare calls them), but should still remember that he ought to accommodate himself to an English audience; and by humouring the tone of our voices in ordinary conversation, have the same regard to the accent of his own language as those persons had to theirs whom he professes to imitate. It is observed, that several of the singing birds of our own country learn to sweeten their voices, and mellow the harshness of their notes, by practising under those that come from warmer climates. In the same manner I would allow the Italian opera to lend our English music as much as may grace and soften it, but never entirely to annihilate and destroy it. Let the infusion be as strong as you please, but still let the subjectmatter of it be English.

A composer should fit his music to the genius of the people, and consider, that the delicacy of hearing and taste of harmony has been formed upon those sounds which every country abounds with: In short, that music is of a relative nature; and what is harmony to one ear, may be dissonance to another.

The same observations which I have made upon the recitative part of music, may be applied to all our songs and airs in general.

Signior Baptiste Lully acted like a man of sense in this particular. He found the French music extremely defective, and very often barbarous: however, knowing the genius of the people, the humour of their language, and the prejudiced ears he had to deal with, he did not pretend to extirpate the French music, and plant the Italian in its stead; but only to cultivate and civilize it with innumerable graces and me

dulations which he borrowed from the Italian. By this means the French music is now perfect in its kind; and when you say it is not so good as the Italian, you only mean that it does not please you so well; for there is not a Frenchman who would not wonder to hear you give the Italian such a preference. The music of the French is indeed very properly adapted to their pronunciation and accent, as their whole opera wonderfully favours the genius of such a gay and airy people. The chorus in which that opera abounds, gives the parterre frequent opportunities of joining in concert with the stage. This inclination of the audience to sing along with the actor, so prevails with them, that I have sometimes known the performer on the stage do no more in a celebrated song, than the clerk of a Parish church, who serves only to raise the psalm, and is afterwards drowned in the music of the congregation. Every actor that comes on the stage is a beau. The queens and heroines are so painted, that they appear as ruddy and cherry-cheeked as milkmaids. The shepherds are all embroidered, and acquit themselves in a ball better. than our English dancing-masters. I have seen a couple of rivals appear in red stockings; and Alpheus, instead of having his head covered with sedge and bulrushes, making love in a fair full-bottowed periwig and a plume of feathers, but with a voice so full of shakes and quavers, that I should have thought the murmurs of a country brook the much more agreeable music.

I remember the last opera I saw in that merry na-tion, was the Rape of Prosperine, where Pluto, to make the more tempting figure, puts himself in a French equipage, and brings Ascalaphus along with him as his valet de chambre. This is what we call folly and impertinence; but what the French look upon as gay and polite.

I shall add no more to what I have here offered, than that music, architecture, and painting, as well as poetry and oratory, are to deduce their laws and rules from the general sense and taste of mankind, and not from the principles of those arts themselves; or, in other words, the taste is not to conform to the art, but the art to the taste. Music is not designed to please only chromatic ears, but all that are capable of distinguishing harsh from disagreeable notes. A man of an ordinary ear is a judge whether a passion is expressed in proper sounds, and whether the melody of those sounds be more or less pleasing.

C.

No. SO.

WEDNESDAY, April 4.

BY STEELE.

Si, Mimnermus uti sensit, sine amore jocisque,
Vil est jucundum : vivas in amore jocisque.

HOR. Ep. 6. 1. 1. v. 65.

If nothing, as Mimnermus strives to prove,
Can e'er be pleasant without wanton love;

Then live in wanton love, thy sports pursue. CREECH.

ONE common calamity makes men extremely af

fect each other, though they differ in every other particular. The passion of love is the most general concern among men; and I am glad to hear by the last advices from Oxford, that there are a set of sighers in that university, who have erected themselves into a society in honor of that tender passion. These gentlemen are of that sort of inamoratos, who are not so much lost to common sense, but that they understand the folly they are guilty of; and for that reason have

separated themselves from all other company, because they will enjoy the pleasure of talking incoherently, without being ridiculous to any but each other. When a man comes into the club, he is not obliged to make any introduction to his discourse, but at once, as he is seating himself in his chair, speaks in the thread of his own thoughts, She gave me a very obliging 'glance; she never looked so well in her life as this ' evening;' or the like reflection, without regard to any other member of the society; for in this assembly they do not meet to talk to each other, but every man claims the full liberty of talking to himself. Instead of snuff-boxes and canes, which are usual helps to discourse with other young fellows, these have each some piece of riband, a broken fan, or an old girdle, which they play with, while they talk of the fair person remembered by each respective token. According to the representation of the matter from my letters, the company appear like so many players rehearsing behind the scenes; one is sighing and lamenting his destiny in beseeching terms, another declaring he will break his chain, and another in dumbshow striving to express his passion by his gesture. It is very ordinary, in the assembly, for one of a sudden to rise and make a discourse concerning his passion in general, and describe the temper of his mind in such a manner as that the whole company shall join in the description, and feel the force of it. In this case if any man has declared the violence of his flame in more pathetic terms, he is made president for that night, out of respect to his superior passion.

We had some years ago in this town a set of people who met and dressed like lovers, and were distinguished by the name of the fringe-glove club; but they were persons of such moderate intellects, even before they were impaired by their passion, that their irregulariVol. I.

N

ties could not furnish sufficient variety of folly to afford daily new impertinences; by which means that institution dropped. These fellows could express their passion in nothing but their dress; but the Oxonians are fantastical, now they are lovers, in proportion to their learning and understanding before they became such. The thoughts of the ancient poets on this agreeable frenzy are translated in honour of some modern beauty; and Chloris is won to-day by the same compliment that was made to Lesbia a thousand years ago. But as far as I can learn, the patron of the club is the renowned Don Quixote. The adventures of that gentle knight are frequently mentioned in the society, under the colour of laughing at the passion and themselves but at the same time, though they are sensible of the extravagancies of that unhappy warrior, they do not observe, that to turn all the reading of the best and wisest writings into rhapsodies of love is a frenzy no less diverting than that of the forsaid accomplished Spaniard. A gentleman, who, I hope, will continue his correspondence, is lately admitted into the fraternity, and sent me the following letter :—

Since I find you take notice of clubs, I beg leave 'to give you an account of one in Oxford, which you have no where mentioned, and perhaps never heard ' of. We distinguish ourselves by the title of the A'morous Club, are all votaries of Cupid, and admirers

of the fair sex. The reason that we are so little 'known in the world, is the secrecy which we are obliged to live under in the university. Our consti'tution runs counter to that of the place wherein we

live; for in love there are no doctors, and we all 'profess so high passion, that we admit of no graduates in it. Our presidentship is bestowed according 'to the dignity of passion; our number is unlimited;