Down by the hamlet's hawthorn-scented way,
Where round the cot's romantic glade are seen
The blossomed bean-field, and the sloping green;
Leans o'er its humble gate, and thinks the while,
'Oh that for me some home like this would smile!'
Some hamlet shade, to yield my sickly form
Health in the breeze, and shelter in the storm;
There should my hand no stinted boon assign
To wretched hearts, with sorrow such as mine!'

What a forcible illustration of the sentiment conveyed in these touching lines, is the remark with which the good Abbé closes one of his cabinet pictures: "The only tears of unmingled bitterness, are those that fall on no one's bosom, and that no one wipes away.'

JACK SHEPPARD: A ROMANCE. By W. HARRISON AINSWORTH, Esq. In two volumes, pp. 436. Philadelphia: LEA AND BLANCHARD.

We believe it is ROBERT SOUTHEY, who relates, in some one of his matter-full books, that he once saw, on a populous borough-road in England, a full sized figure of FAME, erect, tiptoe, in the act of springing to take flight and soar aloft, her neck extended, her hand raised, the trumpet at her lips, and her cheeks inflated, as if about to send forth a blast which was to be heard even as far away as London. The image was placed, if we remember rightly, above a shop-board which announced that Mr. Somebody fitted up water-closets upon a new and improved principle! We have been reminded of this ambitious artizan, while reading the English publisher's puffs of 'Jack Sheppard,' which have been repeated ad nauseam in the London journals, within the last three or four months. We were satisfied, from a perusal of the numbers as they appeared, that Mr. AINSWORTH's fame, so far as 'Jack Sheppard' was concerned, was of a peculiar kind, and vastly resembled infamy. The brilliant success of Mr. DICKENS, in his incidental but matchless pictures of metropolitan degradation and crime, undoubtedly prompted our author to attempt the feeble imitation before us; but instead of employing these themes as final accessories to a good purpose, Mr. AINSWORTH adopts them as the very staple of a work, whose lessons are of the worst description. Its only merit, in fact -- and even this has been greatly overrated is a certain degree of power in descriptions of nature and character. But there is nothing in 'Jack Sheppard' which can be said to approach the faintest of Boz's limnings in this kind, in 'Oliver Twist,' and elsewhere. We endorse, unreservedly, the verdict of a London contemporary, (and the respectable portion of the English press are with him,) upon the character and inculcations of this badly-conceived and worse executed work: 'Jack Sheppard' was a 'celebrated' house and prison breaker of the last century, and the history of his life is the history of the vulgar and disgusting atrocities incidental to his 'gentle craft.' To relieve the tedium of an endless repetition of adventures, where each reflects its brother, and to raise the work above the level of a dry extract from the Newgate Calendar, and the newspapers of the day, the hero is involved in a melo-dramatic story of motiveless crime, and impossible folly, connected with personages of high degree; and an attempt is made to invest Sheppard with good qualities, which are incompatible with his character and position. But the sacrifice of probability and of moral propriety is vain. We never escape from the staple: crime is the one source of every interesting situation; and if we cannot exactly say that horse-pistols are the sources of horse-laughs, we may safely assert, that the only proofs the dramatis persona exhibit of possessing brains, is the constant liability under which they live, and move, and have their being, of having them knocked or blown out.' In the elaboration of a work of this description, little is required beyond mere technical authorship. The invention and excitement are furnished to the author's hand. The characters, actions, thoughts, and expressions, dictated beforehand, are all of the lowest and the most monotonous kind. And yet the author of such a book as this has been favorably compared with DICKENS! Absurdity can no farther go.

EDITORS' TABLE.

MURDER ONE OF THE FINE ARTS.-'Every man,' says that quaint old worthy, NASH, 'can thresh corn out of full sheaves, and fetch water out of the sea: but out of dry stubble to make an after harvest, and a plentiful crop without sowing, that is the right trick of a workman.' And thus in sooth thought we, while perusing a very elaborate article, in the last number of BLACKWOOD, upon 'Murder, considered as one of the Fine Arts. 'Who but a true artist, with a heart well ossified, would ever have thought of giving such a turn to such a theme? How many periodical writers have passed a great portion of their literary lives in the pursuit of subjects under difficulties, without ever thinking of the 'fine art' of murder; of shedding a mild lustre over homicide; of indicating, in a tasteful manner, those refined acquirements, by which a man may be put in the way of being hanged? Yet here is one, who comes forward in the character of a connoisseur, or dilettante, in murder; to show that one murder is better or worse than another, in point of good taste; to set forth the little differences and shades of merit; and to record the proceedings of a club and a dinner with which he is connected, and at which he presided, both tending to the same little object, the diffusion of a just taste in the matter under consideration; a taste, the cultivation of which is to be enhanced by bounties on well-conducted homicides, with a scale of draw-back, in case of any defect or flaw! The writer sets out by declaring, that it is a well-known thing, among all his friends, that he never committed a murder in his life; and that, with the exception of a solitary member of the club, who pretended to say that he once caught him making too free with his throat, on a club night, after every body else had retired, the charge of murder had never been brought against him; and even this he attributes to the asperities and soreness which would naturally be engendered between two amateurs. He claims to be a very particular man, in every thing relating to murder; aiming only at the golden mean, and sometimes, he fears, carrying his delicacy too far; his infirmity being too much milkiness of heart: 'in fact,' says he, 'I am too soft-too soft; I'm for virtue, goodness, and all that sort of thing.' He cites an instance, to show to what an extremity he carries his self-denying 'virtue.' He has a hopeful nephew, of whom he thus speaks:

'He is horribly ambitious, and thinks himself a man of cultivated taste in most branches of murder, whereas, in fact, he has not one idea on the subject, but such as he has stolen from me. This is so well known, that the Club has twice blackballed him, though every indulgence was shown to him as my relative. People came to me and said: 'Now really, President, we would do much to serve a relative of yours. But still, what can be said? You know yourself that he'll disgrace us. If we were to elect him, why, the next thing we should hear of, would be some vile butcherly murder, by way of justifying our choice. And what sort of a concern would it be? You know, as well as we do, that it would be a disgraceful affair, more worthy of the shambles than of an artist's attelier. He would fall upon some great big man, some huge farmer returning drunk from a fair. There would be plenty of blood,and that he would expect us to take in lieu of taste, finish, scenical grouping. Then, again, how would he tool? Why, most probably with a cleaver and a couple of paving stones: so that the whole coup d'ail would remind you rather of some hideous ogre, or Cyclops, than of the delicate operator of the nineteenth century.'

"This picture,' he adds, 'was drawn with the hand of truth; that I could not but allow; and as to personal feelings in the matter, I dismissed them from the first!' Although delicately situated, he is determined that no consideration shall induce him to flinch from his duty. Accordingly, next morning, he opens the matter to his nephew. 'You seem to me,' says he,' to have taken an erroneous view of life and its duties. Pushed on by

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ambition, you are dreaming rather of what it might be glorious to attempt, than what it would be possible for you to accomplish. Believe me, it is not necessary to a man's respectability that he should commit a murder. Many a man has passed through life most respectably, without attempting any species of homicide- good, bad, or indifferent. We cannot all be brilliant men in this life: and it is for your interest to be contented rather with a humble station, well filled, than to shock every body with failures, the more conspicuous by contrast with the ostentation of their promises. And thus he 'saves a near relation from making a fool of himself, by attempting what was as much beyond his capacity, as an epic poem!' But another case still more forcibly illustrates his virtue:

'A man came to me as a candidate for the place of my servant, just then vacant. He had the reputation of having dabbled a little in our art; some said not without merit. What startled me, however, was, that he supposed this art to be part of his regular duties in my service. Now that was a thing I would not allow; so I said at once, Richard, you misunderstand my character. If a man will and must practise this difficult (and allow me to add, dangerous) branch of art; if he has an overruling genius for it, why, he might as well pursue his studies while living in my service as in another's. And also, I may observe, that it can do no harm either to himself or to the subject on whom he operates, that he should be guided by men of more taste than himself. Genius may do much, but long study of the art must always entitle a man to offer advice. So far I will go; general principles I will suggest. But, as to any particular case, once for all I will have nothing to do with it. Never tell me of any special work of art you are meditating; I set my face against it in toto. For if once a man indulges himself in murder, very soon he comes to think little of robbing; and from robbing he comes next to drinking and Sabbath-breaking, and from that to incivility and procrastination. Once begin upon this downward path, you never know where you are to stop. Many a man has dated his ruin from some murder or other, that perhaps he thought little of at the time.'

We have next a portrait of an Ultradelicate, who belonged to the club; a person of a gloomy, misanthropical disposition, who denounced all modern murders as vicious abortions, belonging to no authentic school of art. Tasteful murder was his pet, his hobbyhorse. He snarled at the finest performances of our own age, as deficient in manner, place, and time. He gradually grew more and more fierce and truculent; and at length, went about muttering and growling continually. 'Wherever you met him, he was soliloquising, and saying, 'Despicable pretender! - without grouping without two ideas upon handling without' And there you lost him!' He considered the French Revolution as having been the great cause of degeneration in murder. 'Very soon, Sir,' he used to say, 'men will have lost the art of killing poultry: the very rudiments of the art will have perished!' 'Even dogs are not what they were, Sir they should be. I remember in my grandfather's time that some dogs had an idea of not what murder. I have known a mastiff lie in ambush for a rival, Sir, and murder him with pleasing circumstances of good taste. Yes, Sir, I knew a tom-cat that was an assassin. But now And then, the subject growing too painful, he would dash his hand to his forehead, and depart abruptly, in a homeward direction. But soon after, a London morning paper records a murder, 'the most superb of the century, by many degrees,' which had occurred in the heart of the metropolis:

He had received the account by express, despatched by a correspondent in town, who watched the progress of art on his behalf, with a general commission to send off a special express, at whatever cost, in the event of any estimable works appearing; how much more upon occasion of a ne plus ultra in art! The express arrived in the night time; he was then gone to bed. He had been muttering and grumbling for hours, but of course he was called up. He knocked over the porter on his road to the reading-room; he seized every man's hand as he passed him; wrung it almost frantically, and kept ejaculating, 'Why, now, here's something like a murder! - this is the real thing! this is genuine! this is what you can approve, can recommend to a friend: this says every man on reflection-this is the thing that ought to be!' Then, looking at particular friends, he said, 'Why, Jack, how are you? Why, Tom, how are you? Bless me, you look ten years younger than when I last saw you! No, Sir,' I replied, it is you who look ten years younger.' should n't wonder if I did; such works are enough to make us all young!' 'Do I?' well I

Now to the million, such a character would seem to have a 'smack of Tartarus, and the souls in bale;' but we defy any one to peruse the article in question, without imbibing the idea that he was a sort of BRUMMELL among his fellows of the club; one who is made unhappy by a doubt whether, after all, a nice taste is not rather a curse than a blessing, since for that very reason one is pleased with fewer things!

At the dinner, among other ancient 'artists' who are rapturously toasted, are the Jewish Sciarii, a band of murderers, who, during the early years of the emperor Nero, prosecuted their studies in the art in a very novel manner; 'tooling' with small scymeters, and operating upon a priest officiating in the temple at mid-day, ‘as beautifully as if they had him alone, on a moonless night, in a dark lane.' Those early and eminent artists, the Assyrian assassins, in the period of the Crusaders, are not forgotten; and the mode of tooling by the Greek and Latin fathers is highly commended. A striking statement in reference to the earliest work of antediluvian art, is submitted by one of the members; namely, that the quarrel of Cain with Abel, was about a young woman, and that, by various accounts, Cain had tooled with his teeth, instead of the jaw-bone of an ass, 'which latter is the tooling adopted by most painters.' This, however, is on the authority of an ancient operose commentary on Genesis, by a Roman Catholic, and is considered of questionable authenticity. 'It is pleasing to the mind of sensibility,' says our connoisseur, 'to know, that as science expanded, sounder views were adopted touching the quality of Cain's tooling;' one author contending for a pitch-fork, Saint CHRYSOSTOM for a sword, IRENEUS for a scythe, and PRUDENTIUS for a hedging-knife. In prefacing the toast, 'Our Irish friends, and a speedy revolution in their mode of tooling, as well as every thing else connected with the art,' the mover takes occasion to observe:

'Gentlemen, I'll tell you the plain truth. Every day of the year we take up a paper, we read the opening of a murder. We say, this is good this is charming- this is excellent! But, behold you! scarcely have we read a little farther, before the word Tipperary or Ballina-something, betrays the Irish manufacture. Instantly we loathe it: we call to the waiter; we say, Waiter, take away this paper; send it out of the house; it is absolutely offensive to all just taste.' I appeal to every man whether, on finding a murder (otherwise perhaps promising enough,) to be Irish, he does not feel himself as much insulted as when Madeira being ordered, he finds it to be Cape; or when, taking up what he believes to be a mushroom, it turns out what children call a toad-stool. Tithes, politics, or something wrong in principle, vitiate every Irish murder. Gentlemen, this must be reformed, or Ireland will not be a land to live in; at least, if we do live there, we must import all our murders, that's clear!'

We should consider it proper to offer an apology for occupying so much of our space with a synopsis of this paper, but for the fact that a portion of our pages has ever been set apart for a consideration of the Fine Arts, 'in all their various branches,'

'JACOB JONES.' - Our able dramatic correspondent, who for five years has kept our readers advised of all theatrical matters appertaining to the PARK THEATRE, has turned his fine satirical powers to good account, in the present number, by burlesqueing, in a style peculiar to himself, the species of trashy, clap-trap drama, so much in vogue at the present day. Like a kindred mind, in these pages, three or four years ago, he has, in the history of JACOB JONES, and his dramatic abortion, 'aspired to hold a candle to superior worth;' to flash the gems of 'The Gladiator' full upon the public eye. Half the productions written for the modern stage are utterly contemptible, in a literary point of view. Setting aside the dramatic magnates, as KNOWLES, and a very few kindred spirits, of the better class, we can call to mind scarcely an exception to this remark. The words of half the operas and ballet-operas produced in this country, are bald and meagre, to the last extreme. 'La Bayadere,' with all its pleasant music, is ineffably stupid, in this regard.

FESTIVAL OF SAINT NICHOLAS. - Very pleasant was the late anniversary festival of this ancient patron saint of all the KNICKERBOCKERS. Were we to note, in detail, the hilarity and esprit du corps of the society; the numerous speeches and songs, or the thousand and one felicitous incitements to the merriment and good feeling which prevailed; they would appear comparatively flat upon paper, being abstracted from all the circumstances which set them off to such admirable advantage. It was a rare feast. Most sumptuous were the edibles and potables of the renowned CozzENS: the very tables 'groaned, being burthened.' And who that saw it, will ever forget the appearance of the worthy President, when, with the rosy reflection of his official badge in his plump, handsome face, and his head covered with the veritable cocked hat of old 'Hard Koppig Piet,' he rose, and with true Dutch deliberation, detailed the condition and doings of the Society, and rejoiced over the prospect of a new hall for its use, to be erected on the Bowling Green, with the aid of two hundred thousand guilders, to be raised in Europe, as is the manner of the time, on the credit of the Society! Then the happy, unpremeditated speeches of the Presidents of the other benevolent societies-the 'German,' the 'New-England,' (or 'Saint Jonathan!') the 'Saint Patricks,' and the Saint Andrews; not forgetting the High Dutch address from the venerable and reverend LongIsland member, so soft and flowing, and so perfectly intelligible-to every one who understood it! The sable attendants flitted about, in the quaint livery of the time of PETER STUYVESANT; bearing in the fragrant schnaps-brought direct from Holland, in long, curiously-shaped earthen jugs, by that indefatigable purveyor of all that is choice and rich in vinous and spiritual fluids, Gilbert DAVIS-and passing around the long pipes to each delighted guest. Yes, reader, it was a rich scene, when the pipes were lighted, and looking back through the gathering smoke of tobacco, and the mist of years, the famous Dutch worthies of the olden time were called up in long review. And these illusions were strengthened, ever and anon, by the passing remarks of the hour. Mr. DAVIS had but just returned from Holland, where he had secured the identical arm-chair of no less a personage than HENDRICK HUDSON; and there it stood before the Society. He told us, too, what a great people- beyond all conception on this side the water - the sons of Saint Nicholas are, in their mother country. They not only made the best schnaps in the known world, but they were making land, the finest pasture land in Christendom, with a perseverance known only to the Dutch, by pumping out the waters of the sea! They had just exhausted one sea, and were now engaged upon another, the 'Sea of Harlaem,' which is eleven miles long, and nine wide, containing twentyeight thousand acres of water, sixteen feet deep. There blows no 'ill wind' in Holland. A gale stands but a poor chance there. It is used up at once, by the thickly-planted wind-mills, which turn the machinery that is pumping out vast dyke-enclosed seas, Mr. DAVIS gave his hearers, also, some pleasant characteristics of our 'brethren across the water,' which agree marvellously with the records of our excellent progenitor, the renowned historian of New-Amsterdam. He said that if a traveller were to ask of a true Dutchman the distance from the Hague to Delft, he would reply, 'three pipes;' and from Delft to Rotterdam, 'four pipes.' 'Generally speaking,' said Mr. Davis, 'he comes out to a minute. Sometimes, however, it is true, his pipe will be a few seconds ahead: yet again he will beat his pipe, which is considered a great triumph of travel!' And thus, sparkling like his own exquisite 'Nuptial' or 'Duverzenay' champaigne, Mr. DAVIS went on; until it fell to the lot of a facile wit and spirited poet to succeed him, and make one of the most felicitous and natural speeches of the evening. After this, we tarried but to hear a melodious episode in the private history of

'Mynbeer VAN DUNK, who never was drunk,

Yet drank brandy and water gaily ;

Quenching his thirst with two quarts of the first,

To a pint of the latter, daily!"

And then, with a congenial son of Saint Nicholas, we sought our abode, in the 'sma' hours beyond the twelve,' happy in the recollection of an evening of unembittered enjoyment, which the adverse fates cannot annul.'