“Ay, Sir Joshua,” cried my father, “but like Moliere’s physician, nous avons changé tout cela!”
“Very true, Dr. Burney,” replied the Knight; “but I remember the time—and so, I dare say, do you—when it was thought a slight, if not a sneer, to speak any thing of a lady’s performance: it was only in mockery to talk of painting like a lady; singing like a lady; playing like a lady—”
“But now,” interrupted Mr. Burke, warmly, “to talk of writing like a lady, is the greatest compliment that need be wished for by a man!”
Would you believe it, my daddy—every body now, himself and my father excepted, turned about, Sir Joshua leading the way—to make a little playful bow to—can you ever guess to whom?—vol. ii. pp. 236, 237.
We do not complain that this was originally confided to an old, a fraternal friend, in all the warm glow of surprise, raised pride, and gratified feelings; but we do think that a lapse of fifty years should have somewhat tempered that glow, if it did not even suggest something like a question whether all these hyperbolical compliments, bestowed at last upon a production of no higher class than a novel, could be quite sincere. But enough on this subject; we have been led further into it than we at first intended, and abandon it with much more satisfaction than we took it up.
[To be continued.]
ANCIENT CONCERTS.
WHATEVER hopes we might have been led to entertain, at the commencement of the last season, from the change of circumstances which had occurred, by which a nobleman of great musical reputation became a director, and a gentlemen of no mean acquirements was appointed conductor of these concerts; we must confess, that, as the season advanced, these hopes, like the girdle of the Lady of Avenel, gradually diminished, and at the termination of the series, we had nearly abandoned the expectation of their further continuance. We are, however, in this respect agreeably disappointed; we say agreeably, because from early associations and long-confirmed habits, we are disposed to cling to the wreck, whilst ‘a plank of the vessel’ remains. With all its faults, both of omission and commission, its ‘short-comings and mis-doings,’ the Ancient Concert is endeared to us by a thousand interesting reminiscences: it was an assemblage of the great and mighty of the land, and ‘king’s daughters were among her honourable women.’ Even at this distant period, we cannot recall to mind the exquisite strains of a Banti, a Mara, a Billington, a Bartleman, &c., without sensations that thrill through our very frame.
FIRST CONCERT OF ANCIENT MUSIC,
Under the Direction of his Royal Highness the Duke of Cumberland, Wednesday, March 6, 1833.
ACT I.