UNITED STATES.
At the New England Society's Dinner, Mr. Webster made a most felicitous allusion to the Mayflower, à propos to a confectionary model of that vessel which graced the table: "There was," said he, "in ancient times a ship which carried Jason in his voyage for the acquisition of the Golden Fleece; there was a ship at the battle of Actium which made Augustus Cæsar master of the world; there have been famous ships which bore to victory a Drake, a Howe, a Nelson; there are ships which have carried our own Hull, Decatur, and Stewart in triumph. But what are they all, as to their chances of remembrance among men, to that little bark Mayflower? That Mayflower was and is a flower of perpetual blossom. It can stand the sultry blasts of Summer, resist the furious tempests of Autumn, and remain untouched by the gales and the frosts of Winter. It can defy all climates and all times; it will spread its petals over the whole world, and exhale a living odor and fragrance to the last syllable of recorded time!"
Mr. Stephenson, of Charlestown, has lately completed a statue of great merit both in conception and execution. It represents a North American Indian who has just received a mortal wound from an arrow; he has fallen forward upon his right knee, the left leg being thrown out in advance. The right hand which has drawn the arrow from the wound, rests upon the ground, the arm with its little remaining strength preventing the entire fall of the body. The statue is wrought from a block of marble from a quarry just opened in Vermont, which is pronounced not inferior to the famous quarries of Carrara.
The literalism of the Panorama has lately been invaded by an effort toward the Ideal. Pilgrim's Progress has been made the subject of an extensive work of this kind by two young artists of New York, Messrs. May and Kyle. They have met with great and well deserved success. Their work embodies the spirit of Bunyan, and presents all the scenes of any interest in his famous dream. The seizing of the popular preference for panoramas for the purpose of converting it from a wondering curiosity at the reproduction of actual scenes, to the admiring interest awakened by an imaginative subject, was a happy instance of tact too rarely found in artists; and the eagerness with which the public welcomed the change is another evidence of the general advancement in taste to which we have before alluded.
W.S. Mount, the only artist among us who can delineate "God's image carved in ebony," or mahogany, has just finished a picture in his happiest style. It represents a genuine sable Long-Islander, whom a "lucky throw" of the coppers has made the owner of a fat goose. He holds his prize in his hands, his dusky face radiant with joy as he snuffs up in imagination the fragrant odors to come. The details of the picture—the rough coat, the gay worsted comforter and cap, disposed with that native tendency to dandyism, which forms so conspicuous an element of the negro character, are admirably painted. The effect, like that of every true work of art, and unlike that of the vulgar and brutal caricatures of the negro which abound, is genial and humanizing. The picture is in possession of Messrs. Goupil and Company, 239 Broadway, by whom it will soon be sent to Paris, to be lithographed in a style uniform with the "Power of Music," and "Music is Contagious," of the same artist. This house will soon publish engravings from one of Woodville's characteristic pictures, "Politics in an Oyster House," and from Sebron's two admirable views of Niagara Falls.
W.H. Powell is in Paris, at work on his large picture for the Capitol at Washington. He has recently finished "The Burial of Fernando de Soto in the Mississippi," of which a fine print, executed in Paris by Lemoine, has been published. The committing of the body of the grand old enthusiast to the turbid current of the Father of Waters, of which he was the discoverer, is a splendid subject, and is treated by Powell in a manner full of deep poetic feeling.
Prof. Hart, of Philadelphia, one of our most elegant belle-lettre scholars, is preparing a volume of "The Female Prose Writers of America." It is to form a royal octavo of five hundred pages, elegantly printed, with numerous portraits, executed in London, in the best style of line and stipple engraving. We are authorized to state that the Editor will be happy to receive from authors and their friends materials for the biographical and critical notices.
Mrs. Hale's "Female Biography," from which we furnished some extracts in our last Number, is nearly ready for publication. It will form a large octavo of about eight hundred pages, containing numerous authentic portraits.
Mr. G.P. Putnam announces as in preparation for speedy publication a series of Manuals for popular reference, designed to compress into a compact form a comprehensive and accurate view of the subjects of general history, science, literature, biography, and the useful arts. They are to be prepared by authors of undoubted qualifications, on the basis of Maunder's and other recent compilations; and to be published in a style uniform with the "World's Progress." The office of a compiler and classifier in literature assumes a new importance, and has new claims upon the gratitude of the student, in these days when the life of a man is too short for him to make himself acquainted, from the original sources, with any one branch of knowledge. The same publisher also announces a "Life of Washington," by Washington Irving; "The Monuments of Central and Western America," by Francis L. Hawks, D.D.; a "Commentary on Ecclesiastes," by Moses Stuart; and new works by Dr. Mayo, Author of "Kaloolah," by J. Fennimore Cooper, Hon. E.G. Squier, and the Author of "Rural Hours."
The Opera has not had the success of last season, in spite of the addition of Signorina Parodi to the company of last year. Parodi is admitted to have a remarkably fine voice, and to be not without dramatic talent, although prone to exaggeration, but she is not generally thought equal to the claims set up for her, and, what is of more importance, she does not fill the house so well at two dollars and a half as was expected. Toward the end of her first series of performances at New York she drew quite large audiences, and made many admirers among persons of acknowledged taste.