Who does not remember the light music of "Peg of Limavaddy" in "The Irish Sketch Book"? Riding from Coleraine (Famed for lovely Kitty) Came a Cockney bound Unto Derry city; Weary was his soul, Shivering and sad, he Bumped along the road Leads to Limavaddy." In striking contrast with this may be placed the lines, "Abd-el-Kader at Toulon"; they seem to give us a glimpse of what Thackeray might have done in heroic poetry. Methinks the text is never stale, Of Folly, Fortune, Glory, Ruin." "The Ballads of Policeman X." have long been famous. They appeared in the pages of Funch, with which journal Thackeray was associated during the earlier part of his literary career. They are truly humorous, and though somewhat unequal, yet show throughout that vigor of thought, and facility of expression, for which their author became afterward remarkable. "The Wofle New Ballad of Jane Roney and Mary Brown" is inimitable; but perhaps the most popular is "Jacob 'No more, thou lithe and long winged hawk, of desert life Omnium's Hoss." Thackeray's humor often. for thee; No more across the sultry sands shalt thou go swooping free; Blunt idle talons, idle beak, with spurning of thy chain, Shatter against thy cage the wing thou ne'er may'st spread again." Again, "The May Day Ode" on the Great Exhibition of 1851, contains some fine passages. The following verses may have been premature at the time, but they have some title to be considered prophetic : "Look yonder where the engines toil; These Englands's arms of conquest are, And spans the seas." The teaching of Thackeray's poetry is well summed up in that grand ode "Vanitas Vanita tum," which is said to have been written in a lady's album, containing the autographs of kings, princes, poets, diplomatists, musicians, statesmen, artists, and men of letters of all nations, between a page by Jules Janin and a poem by the Turkish Ambassador. It is not a dirge, withering up energy, and paralyzing effort; it is written in a healthy, if regretful tone, and there is nothing in it which leads one to despond, although it has been objected to upon that ground. It is doubtful if "truer words were ever spoke by ancient or by modern sage." enough disguises indignation as well as pathos, and, "though he rarely uttered a word, either with his pen or with his mouth, in which there was not an intention to reach our sense of humor, he never was only funny." Thackeray's place among the writers of vers de société, nay, perhaps among the poets of his time, will be decided in years to come. His present reputation as the greatest novelist of his time is still an almost insuperable bar to any recognition being given to the poetical value of his scattered verses. Who could support both reputations? In all examples which occur to us we find that the one gives place to the other; but Thackeray may be the exception which proves the rule. Mr. Frederick Locker, in his "London Lyrics," says: "Light lyrical verse should be short, elegant, refined, and fanciful, not seldom distinguished by chastened sentiment, and often playful, and it should have one uniform and simple design. The tone should not be pitched high, and the language should be idiomatic, the rhythm crisp and sparkling, the rhyme frequent and never forced, while the entire poem should be marked by tasteful moderation, high finish, and completeness, for however trivial the subject matter may be, indeed rather in proportion to its triviality, subordination to the rules of composition, and perfection of execution, should be strictly enforced. piece cannot be expected to exhibit all these characteristics, but the qualities of brevity and buoyancy are essential.” Each We may accept these conditions as the true test of excellence, and applying this text to the poetry of Thackeray, we can arrive at some definite conclusion as to its intrinsic worth. FURNITURE AND FURNISHING. WE Americans, who, until within the past few years, have been cursed by conventionalism in our architecture, are at a greater disadvantage than any other people in the world, when we seek to unravel the Eleusinian mysteries of interior decoration. The unfortunate people of feudal times, whose barren households comprised only such furniture as was easily movable and could be taken on long journeys, were scarcely more restricted than we, when once we set our face resolutely against all parvenu principles in art, and accept the fundamental æsthetic proposition, which is harmony. It is not that we are devoid of all adequate appreciation of fine architectural effects-of all ear for "frozen music," as Madame de Stael quaintly calls it; but it is because this faculty has been so lately developed that only a fortunate few reap the practical advantage of it. I do not think that any one who has thought seriously on the subject, and has watched with kindling eyes the descent of the divine afflatus of art into this country, will venture to date the birth of the late revolution in our architectural and decorative effects-which we may call the "American Renaissance" -anterior to the opening of our Centennial Exposition. It was then that the capable but crude American was first fired with the ambition to attain excellence in art, and to surround himself BY ELEANOR MOORE HIESTAND. awaking of the Sleeping Beauty by the kiss of Prince Progress after a century of enchantment; and that will-o'-the-wisp we call taste, once aroused, speedily claimed its prerogatives. Hundreds of beautiful houses are planned and constructed from year to year,-houses which happily are not unfortunate exponents, like their predecessors, of a dozen false ideas of art, nor the amalgamation of a score of effete styles. Yet it is barely a decade since, among the most highly esteemed plans of our best domestic architects, there was to be found many a nondescript structure whose body perhaps illustrated the angular beauty of the Queen Anne style, but whose wings were capped with Gothic gables looming up under the shadow of a Tudor tower and overhanging a cinquecento window. Ten chances to one there was a Greek portico somewhere, whose Doric pillars were adorned with capitals after the Moresque! Lately a decorous order has stepped out of this chaos of ideas, and our architectural progeny give promise of attaining to that correct beauty which is only to be found where harmony and symmetry prevail. Interiors have, of course, undergone a like metamorphosis. The happy mistress of a house built in this new era MIDDERIGH of American art is not distracted by the impossibility of reconciling the marring elements of color and form. She has a certain amount of effectively-disposed space, and so many I.-CLOCK IN ROCAILLE STYLE. with those manifold artistic creations in which he found a new and subtle delight. It was the 2.--CARVED CHAIR, SEVENTEENTH CENTURY (FRONT). portion of an American house more than another in which it is difficult to preserve a pleasing ensemble, that part is the much neglected and abused hall. There appears to have been an unauthorized opinion prevalent among our architects that vestibules and corridors were necessary conveniences, but not entitled to any special con sideration. In many of our houses the halls appear to have been pieced out of the odds and ends of space left over after the general plan had been completed. Accordingly, they twist and turn from right to left, like the blocks in an ingenious bit of patch work, utterly destroying their potentialities. I wonder if many people remember the New Jersey State Building at the Centennial Exhibition? There was a hall, my country women! -of homely finish and simple ornature, but in proportions most imposing. It was a hall with an open fire-place and a hard-wood wainscot, the like of which would be an honor to any American house. The pigmy forms of our domestic furniture have annihilated all possibilities of deep-vaulted ceilings and lofty corridors. It is only by a lucky chance that an American gathers unto himself a suit of armor, a lance, and a battle-axe or so, to grace his hall-way, and such furniture as alone could support the fabulous frame of the barbarous Goth, or could withstand the usage of men like Prince Dagobert, is too rare to be found straying in transatlantic countries. The furniture at our command is no larger than need be. It is emphatically too small to submit with impunity to the belittling contrast of a room with lofty ceiling. So we put aside with a sigh the possibilities of splendor couched in groined arches and lacunars, while we content ourselves with the two advantages of space to be found in a broad latitude and a long perspective. have described above, and still more of us are condemned to residence in a brick and mortar monstrosity of eminent gentility, but with abso- It is an artistic impossibility to render a narrow lutely no style. This, then, is the palpable occasion hall attractive; and what could be more coveted for my remark that we Americans are at a disad- by a hospitable spirit than an entrance whose vantage when we turn our attention to decorative beauty should be a snare to the feet of the too infreeffects. quent visitor? My finest conception of a hall It has often occurred to me that if there is one premises a great square room with paneled walls, a polished floor, and a high wainscot. I would have a terminal window, too, tall and wide, with a roomy seat, and a sliding curtain of warm, rich coloring. But such halls are rarely met with in America, and that house is indeed fortunate which can boast of a corridor with fifteen feet of latitude. If you possess such a one, consecrate to it your highest energies; it is worthy of the noblest conceptions of art. Let every bit of furniture that seeks to gain entrance to it be made to pronounce the shibboleth of art-harmony. The hall, like every other room in the house, should be sacred to some particular "style." The autocrats of household art insist that though the inviolable decrees of harmony may not require us to furnish our whole house in the Elizabethan, the Gothic, the Queen Anne, or the Renaissance, they are inflexible in their requirements that no two of these styles be placed in immediate juxtaposition. If you are a victim of Renaissance madness, as so many of us are, and determine to adopt its pseudo classic principles in furnishing your hall, place a rigid embargo on every decoration that smacks of another spirit. Let us have none of the PreRaphaelite, no Byzantine, no "Eastlake," an' you love me! For my part, if I were furnishing a hall to my fancy, I should choose some less elaborate style than that whose pristine splendor immortalized the Renaissance. But whatever may be the type you prefer, see to it the casings of the doors and windows, the wainscot and the wall form a harmonious background. The walls are naturally the least troublesome feature, for in these days of artistic paper-hangings and free-hand frescos there is hardly any effect that is not at our command. I have often wondered what could be at the bottom of the idea which many people entertain that pictures, or any mural ornament, are out of place in a corridor. Should not a hall be something more than a domestic highway? Could it not be a comfortable, habitable place where one could sit down and wait for a friend without experiencing any of the depressing effects of solitary attendance in, the drawing-room or parlor? And why should it not be beautified? Custom at the present day confines its furniture to a hatrack, a mirror, and two chairs. Such a thing as a table or a tête-à-tête is tabooed. This regulation is alike arbitrary and unreasonable. We will not submit to it. We will bring in by the back way an old clock and a cabinet, a tripod and a halfmoon table. The Rocaille and its ally, the Rococo style of ornament, are alike popular for hall furniture. The former, which took its name from the French 524 Rocaille. We furnish a striking example of this A seven- Of course a hall must have chairs. There is a delicate hint to the thoughtless in the circumstance that these chairs are never cushioned. The hall is not intended for lengthy conference or indiscriminate lounging. It is a place of dignity and decorum. The conventional hall chairs are devoid of arms, and have almost, or quite, perpendicular ness the representations At the end of every unexceptionable hall there must be an ante-roomsquare, octagonal, or round, as fancy may dictate, but an ante-room beyond a doubt. I can conceive of a taste to which it would not be inacceptable to utilize in this ante-room, during a "cold spell," such a stove as we have represented in Fig. 4. But commend me to an open fire-place for beauty. Stoves, however, have been metamorphosed and ornamented until they occupy no mean place in decorative art, as our representation of a Rococo stove in brilliantly-colored Majolica gives evidence. One might almost venture to introduce into the ante-room a complete furniture of this time, without violating the principle of harmony before enunciated, even though one's hall were adorned 4.--ROCOCO STOVE IN MAJOLICA. backs. They are more elaborately carved, perhaps, than the chairs of most other apartments, as wit |