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During the sixteenth century, at the appearance of Palestina's works, the Italians certainly gave instructions in counterpoint to all the rest of Europe. Gafforis of Lodi shone eminent, and opened a school of music in his native town, whence he formed many excellent scholars. In the year 1501 he wrote a work which, though difficult, became absolutely requisite for the understanding the ancient authors. Two dialogues on music, by Dentice, a Neapolitan gentleman, were published at Rome, in 1553. Their subject turns on musical proportions, and on the modes of the ancients. It appears by this dialogue, that vocal performers were not then accompanied by a band, but each sang to his own instrument. The author says, "There are very few musicians who sing to their instruments that have entirely satisfied me; as they have almost all some defect of intonation, utterance, accompaniment, execution of divisions, or manner of diminishing and swelling the voice occasionally; in which particulars both art and nature must conspire to render a performer perfect."

It may be seen by this conversation that much art and refinement were expected from vocal performers besides the mere singing in time and tune: and that the cultivation of music in Naples was exquisite, and held in the highest estimation. During the sixteenth century the musical theorists of Italy employed themselves in subtle divisions of the scale; this mania also extended itself to practical musicians, who were desirous of astonishing the world by their superior skill and science: the inquiry was vain, and only served to impede the progress of modern music. In 1555, Vincentino published a work at Rome with the following title, Ancient Music reduced to Modern Practice, to which he added an account of a newly invented instrument for the most perfect performance of music, with many musical secrets.

The change in musical modes has continued to our time, and will, no doubt, continue. For, as Dr. Burney remarks, "Melody being a child of fancy and imagination, will submit to no theory, or laws of reason or philosophy; and, therefore, like love, will always continue in childhood."

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It seems that the records of the Pontifical chapel were destroyed at the burning of Rome, in 1527, by the army of the Emperor Charles V. which has caused much confusion in the entry of the composers and singers' names, till the time of Palestina. Among them we find not only Netherlandders but Spaniards.

We are informed by Tassoni, that James the First, King of Scotland, was not only a composer of sacred music, but that he was the inventor of a new species of plaintive melody, different from all others; in which it is said he was imitated by the Prince of Venosa, who embellished music with many admirable inventions. Our present great theorists, and best writers on music, declare themselves, however, incapable of discovering the least similarity between the Caledonian airs and the madrigals of the Prince of Venosa, who was perpetually straining at original expression and modulation; his panegyrists, perhaps, were more dazzled by his rank than his merit.

The Lombard school furnishes an ample list of eminent musicians, whose composi tions are still extant. Father Costanzo Porta was the author of eighteen different works for the church; he died in 1601. In his faculty he very much resembled our English composer Tallis, and flourished at the same time, in the reign of Henry VIII. His style is rather artificial and elaborate.

The oldest melodies to Italian words are preserved at Florence: they consist of a collection of sacred songs: for the performance of which a society subsisted so late as 1789, and may still subsist; and which society was formed in 1310.

The Carnival songs were sung through the streets of Florence in the time of Lorenzo the Magnificent. At that gay and happy period the organist of the Duomo, at Florence, stood high in the Prince's favour, and was beloved by all his fellow citizens. His name was Antonio Squarcialuppi; and in the year 1770, his monument was seen in the cathedral of Florence, erected by his fellow citizens to his memory. The illustrious Tuscan, Lorenzo il Magnifico, is said to have died in the act of playing on the lute, in 1494.

(To be continued.)

HISTORICAL AND SELECT ANECDOTES.

ANECDOTE OF BONAPARTE.

WHEN General Bonaparte took Berlin, nothing would satisfy him but he must sleep in the royal palace; and such was the height of his vanity that nothing would content him but the royal nuptial bed itself! Even his Mamaluke was placed on another royal couch, in the room adjoining to his; which was the same the Emperor Alexander occupied when he visited Berlin. The French General and his associates stript the palace of all the best paintings, and the very throne, in the audience room, could not escape the cupidity of this magnanimous conqueror; it was entirely stripped of the gold and silver ornaments with which it was richly decorated.

ANECDOTE OF THE PRESENT KING OF
PRUSSIA.

THE Great Frederic was one day writing at his table, when his Majesty, the present King of Prussia, then about three years of age, was playing at ball in Frederic's apartment; the ball accidentally fell upon the old King's inkstand, and upset it. Frederic was angry with the little Prince, and ordered him to Coventry in a corner of the room; the Prince refused to submit, and when asked why he did not obey? he replied, "The descendant of Frederic will never consent to be punished for such a trifle."

THE TWO HIGHLANDERS.

THERE are now, or at least were a few years ago, living at the village of Three Rivers, Canada, two venerable Highlanders, who fought in the opposite armies at the battle of Culloden, which terminated the Scotch rebellion of 1745-6. Their names are Sinclair and Macdonald. The latter fought under the banners of the Pretender, and on the final defeat of the unfortunate Charles Edward, escaped from Scotland, and ultimately settled in Canada. Sinclair fought in the regiment called the Fraser Highlanders, attached to the royal forces. This corps formed a part of Wolfe's army, which invaded Canada, and on the peace of 1763, he left the regiment and settled at

Three Rivers. Both of them were private soldiers at home; but in Canada they acquired handsome properties by hard and honest industry, and their children have intermarried with the most wealthy and respectable inhabitants of the province. They are hospitable to all strangers, especially to the Scotch, but will not call them by any other name than North Britons, as having been born since the Union with England, which they deplore as the extinction of their nation. They also live on the best terms, and never meet without a hearty shake of the hand, but daily jeer each other, the one on the signal defeat of the rebels at Culloden, and the other on his friend's abandonment of their legitimate Prince, to serve the recreants. It is remarkable that Macdonald, the soldier of Stuart, dresses in the English fashion of last century, and that Sinclair, the soldier of Cumberland, most religiously adheres to the costume of a Highland laird of the seventeenth century. They are each about one hundred years of age, and are very fine specimens of the hard features and athletic forms of the Highlanders at the days of other years. Sinclair, especially, with his decorated bonnet and ample plaid, seated at the door of his neat and hospitable mansion, quaffing the Indian leaf, is an object of peculiar interest to every person who visits the beautiful village of the Three Rivers; and when they depart this life, there will be a blank in its society that no addition can fill to equal advantage.

ANECDOTE OF GENERAL IRETON.

THE famous General Ireton, who took so active a part in the persecution and death of King Charles I. was unquestionably the most artful, dark, and deliberate man of all the republicans, by whom he was revered as a soldier, a statesman, and a saint; when he died, his body was laid in state in Somerset-House. was hung in black, and an escutcheon was placed over the gate of this palace, with this motto:-Dulce est pro patria mori; which a wag thus Englished-" It is good for his country that he is dead."

The room

ANECDOTE OF KING CHARLES I. AND
LORD FALKLAND.

KING Charles I. being at Oxford during the civil wars, went one day to visit the public library. Among other books he was shewn a very beautiful impression of Virgil. Lord Falkland, who waited on his Majesty, thinking to amuse him, proposed his consulting the Sortes Virgiliana | on his fortune. It is well known our ancestors were much addicted to this sort of superstition. The King smiled, and opened the book, and the first passage that occurred was this" Et bello audacis," &c. Eneid, lib. iv. Which runs in English thus: "That, conquered by a warlike people, driven from his states, separated from his sou Ascanius, he should be forced to go and beg foreign succour, that he should see his associates massacred before his eyes; that, after making a shameful peace, he should neither enjoy his kingdom nor his life; that he should meet with an untimely death; and that his body should for ever be deprived of a sepulchre."-The King shewed much uneasiness at this prediction, and Falkland perceiving it, was in a hurry to consult himself the lot, in hopes of hitting upon some passage that did not relate to his situation, aud might divert his Majesty's thoughts to other objects.

Opening the book himself, he found the regrets of Evander for the untimely death of his son:"Nou hæc, O Pallas, dederas," &c. Eneid, lib. xii.-" O Pallas, thou didst promise not to expose thyself imprudently to the danger of war. Is it thus thou hast kept thy promise? Well did I know how much the passion of its glory in its birth animates a young man, and how far the pleasure of signalizing himself in a first battle may hurry him. Lamentable essay! Fatal inition in the science of arms! Alas! all the Gods have been deaf to my solicitations."-Lord Falkland was Secretary of State, was present at the first battle of Newberry, and vigorously charging the rebel cavalry, was killed at the age of thirty-four."

ANECDOTE OF FREDERIC PRINCE OF

WALES, FATHER OF GEORGE III.

THE following circumstance, not so generally known as many actions of the distinguished personage of whom it is told are,

is said to have furnished the author of a sentimental comedy with the situation in which he has placed two persons of the drama. During the late reign, when the Prince of Wales held his court at Kew, a young lady of the name of Malyn was des. perately in love with the heir apparent: and she took such pains to make him know it, that it would have been impossible it should have escaped him. She walked the gardens early and late, constantly crossed him in his perambulations; and once, on seeing him alone in one of those little excursions on the banks of the river, she fell down as if in a fit, which being perceived by the Prince, he ran to her, raised her up, and inquired the reason of her disorder. After a flood of tears, she was open, or weak enough, to disclose the affection she had conceived for his Highness; and as her person was attractive, she did not hesitate to confess a compliance with every wish that the royal youth might expect from such a declaration. After a modest salute, he begged her to return home to her friends, consoling her in the best manner his imagination could suggest; and promised the next morning to send her his thoughts on the matter, and a plan for her conduct in future. He was as good as his word; for a messenger was sent the next day with the following note:-" Your beauty of person and frankness of temper have charmed me: so fair an outside cannot but cherish the chastest ideas; the regard of an amiable woman cannot but prove agreeable to the most exalted stations. The situation of us both require we should nip in the bud those rising passions which can have their end only in disgrace. Au honourable connection is impossible; and I could never think of contributing to injure one whose only fault is her being too lovely." It is added of the Prince, that he immediately left Richmoud, and for two months avoided the place. The captivated female soon forgot her hopeless passion and was afterwards married to a Captain of foot.

ANECDOTE OF A DUTCH POSTILLION.

GEORGE II. in one of his trips to Hano ver, was passing through Holland; and not having his own horses with him, he had his carriage drawn by post-horses: one of

the postboys, of the true Dutch make, suf-,, ed the Dutchman thought a King of Great Britain a much less consequential person. than a magistrate of Amsterdam, made George burst into a fit of laughter, and he suffered his driver to go his own pace, without giving him any further trouble.

FRENCH GRATITUDE.

fered his horses to go at a very gentle pace, while with his flint and steel he was striking fire to light his pipe. The King, who wished to get to his journey's end as expeditiously as possible, called out to the fellow to drive faster. The Dutchman, without deigning even to look back at his Majesty, just laid his whip across the off horse, A wine merchant, residing in the Domand continued to smoke his pipe. The Platz, at Saltzburg, infected with revolu King, out of all patience at the phlegm of tionary principles, and wishing to ingra the driver, called out in a great passion to tiate himself into favour with the French, him, and threatened to caue him if he did gave them a hearty welcome, and on their not drive faster: upon this the postillion, arrival presented them with several hogstaking his pipe from his mouth, and very heads of wine, for which he would receive deliberately striking it upon his thumb nail no recompence. This act of liberality was to get out the dust, turned to the King, appreciated as it deserved. When the and with all the sangfroid imaginable said, enemy were compelled to quit the town, "I am going at a very good pace; and I they returned the kindness of the wine could not drive your Majesty faster if you merchant by staving several hogsheads of was even the Burgomaster of Amsterdum.” wine and overflowing the streets with their This curious insinuation, that plainly shew-contents!

SKETCHES OF PUBLIC CHARACTERS.

JOHN HOWARD, THE PHILANTHROPIST. Ir ever a model of benevolence appeared in a form all human, it was in that of Mr. Howard. The history of his life is full of variety. His was not a theoretic benevolence, confined to the contemplations of his own mind, or to the sanctuary of his own family. Attached, as he was, with all the fervour of his fiue nature to the dearer charities of home, he still had a bosom large enough for all mankind. He felt for their miseries, and, as far as his single exertions could go, he laboured to relieve them. He visited them in prisons, in hospitals, in cottages, at home and abroad. No personal inconvenience, no pecuniary expence, no pursuit of business or of pleasure had power to retard him in his singular career. He traversed many countries, and in all left proofs of his godlike mind. Distinctions of language, of faith, and of manners, were to his view no grounds of peculiar sympathy or aversion. None were aliens to his mind who wore the human form. The world was his country: and wherever calamity bowed down his fellow creature, he loved to be near him, to cousole him, and, if possible, to rescue him. The meNo. 117.-Vol. XVIII.

moirs of such a man have topics of interest, not merely for the people among whom he was born, but for every assemblage of society, who revere and would wish to imitate his illustrious virtues. The view of the character and public services of Mr. Howard, written by his friend Dr. Aikin, and published soon after his death, contains much authentic information. It is, however, if we may be allowed the metaphor, but a miniature of that great man, and the want of a full length portrait has long been lamented by the friends of Howard, and of humanity. That desideratum Mr. Baldwin Brown, of the Temple, has undertaken to supply. He has, with great labour, aud, we may add, with remarkable skill, compiled from various sources a large quarto volume, in which the early life of Mr. Howard, as far as it is known, the numerous benevolent occupations of his maturer years, and the retirement of his season of decline, are described in an ample and satisfactory manner. The author, in his preface, recounts the names of several respectable and learned persons who gave him new and useful materials for his undertaking, and expresses himself as particularly

I i

Thomas Raffles, of Liverpool, with whom the idea of the work originated. We have no reason, therefore, to doubt the authenticity of any part of these memoirs; and as the book may not possibly reach the hands of many of our readers, we are sure they will be gratified with some account of the volume.

indebted to his brother-in-law, the Rev.,, wholesale grocer in the city. But his father dying before his apprenticeship expired, his ill state of health, combined with a distaste for a line of life upon which he, no doubt, entered in compliance with a parent's wishes, rather than to gratify his own inclination, he gladly embraced the opportunity afforded by his coming of age, to make arrangements with his master for the purchase of the remainder of his time. By his father's will he was not to come into the possession of his fortune until he reached his twenty-fourth year, and then he became entitled to the sum of seven thousand pounds, in addition to the whole of his father's landed property, his plate, furniture, pictures, and the moiety of his books, be

the event of his attaining to the age prescribed for the full enjoyment of so ample an inheritance. His sister, who with himself constituted the whole of the testator's family, on reaching the same age, was to receive the sum of eight thousand pounds as her portion of his personal estate, together with the other moiety of his books, and nearly the whole of the jewels and wardrobe of her mother and her stepmother.

The time of Mr. Howard's birth, singular as it may seem, the author, with all his anxious research, was not able to ascertain precisely. From the best information, it appears that the philanthropist was born about the year 1727, at Clapton, in the parish of Hackney, the well known village adjoining to London. His father having amassed a considerable fortune in the busi-sides being named sole residuary legatee in ness of an upholsterer, which he carried ou in Long-lane, Smithfield, removed to Clapton, where he lived in retirement. The boy, soon after his birth, was sent to Cardington, near Bedford, to be nursed by a cottager there, who lived upon a small farm of his father's.. This farm was then the only property his father had in that village, but it afterwards became the favourite residence of Mr. Howard, when, by the increase of his patrimony, he was enabled to purchase in its neighbourhood. Mr. Howard's father was a dissenter, of Calvinistic principles, or rather an Independent, and of course he entrusted the education of his son to a tutor professing those religious opinions which he himself entertained, but of whose qualifications for || his office Mr. Howard, late in his afterlife, expressed no very high opinion. From the care of this tutor, whose academy was at Hertford, young Howard was removed (though it does not appear at what age) to a school of a superior description in London, which was under the directiondence and discretion, a considerable part of of Mr. John Eames. Amongst his fellow pupils there, was the late celebrated Dr. Price. The subject of these memoirs having been destined by his father for a commercial life, paid less attention to the Greek or Ro-house at Clapton, which the parsimony of man page than he did to arithmetic, and its late possessor had rendered necessary. hence it is easy to account for the incorrect- He went there for this purpose every other ness of style in his writings, and for his day; and a venerable old man, who had very superficial acquaintance with foreign been gardener to his father for many years, languages. After he left school, he was and who continued in that situation until the apprenticed to Mr. Newnham, grandfather son let the house, would, in the year 1790, to the late Alderman Newnham, a large when he had attained the age of ninety

The executors of this will were Mr. Laurence Channing, the husband of the testator's sister; Mr. Ive Whitbread, of Cardington, his first cousin; and Mr. Lewin Cholmley, a Blackwell-hall factor, who w was one of his most intimate friends, and also some distant relation to his first wife, the mother of the children whose persons and property were committed to the joint guardianship of these gentlemen, until they attained the age of twenty-one. But as the subject of these memoirs, even at an early period of his life, was remarkable for pru

the management of the estate to which he was the sole heir, was entrusted to his more immediate management, particularly the superintendence of those repairs in the

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