the most poignant satirists and profound critics of the age. He has for the last twenty years devoted his time and talents, in conjunction with Schlegel, to the study, translation, and illustration of Shakspeare. The combination of these two minds has done perhaps what no single mind could have effected in developing, elucidating, and clothing in a new language the creations of that mighty and inspired being.

It is to be hoped that some translator will rise up among us to do justice in return to Tieck. No one tells a fairy tale like him: the earnest simplicity of style and manner is so exquisite that he always gives the idea of one whose hair was on end at his own wonders, who was entangled by the spell of his own enchantments. A few of these lighter productions (his Volksmärchen, or popular Tales,) have been rendered into our language; but those of his works which have given him the highest estimation among his own countrymen still remain a sealed fountain to English readers.*

"Tieck," says Carlyle, "is a poet born as well as made.-He is no mere observist and compiler, rendering back to us, with additions or subtractions, the beauty which existing things have of them

It was with some trepidation I found myself in the presence of this extraordinary man. Notwithstanding his profound knowledge of our language, he rarely speaks English, and, like Alfieri, he will not speak French. I addressed him in English, and he spoke to me in German. The conversation in my first visit fell very naturally upon Shakspeare, for I had been looking over his admirable new translation of Macbeth, which he had just completed. Macbeth led us to the English theatre and English acting-to Mrs. Siddons and the Kembles, and the actual character and state of our stage.

selves presented to him; but a true Maker, to whom the actual and external is but the excitement for ideal creations, representing and ennobling its effects. His feeling or knowledge, his love or scorn, his gay humour or solemn earnestness; all the riches of his inward world are pervaded and mastered by the living energy of the soul which possesses them, and their finer essence is wafted to us in his poetry, like Arabian odours, on the wings of the wind. But this may be said of all true poets; and each is distinguished from all, by his individual characteristics. Among Tieck's, one of the most remarkable is his combination of so many gifts, in such full and simple harmony. His ridicule does not obstruct his adoration; his gay southern fancy lives in union with a northern heart; with the moods of a longing and impassioned spirit, he seems deeply conversant; and a still imagination, in the highest sense of that word, reigns over all his poetic world."

While he spoke I could not help looking at his head, which is wonderfully fine; the noble breadth and amplitude of his brow, and his quiet, but penetrating eye, with an expression of latent humour hovering round his lips, formed altoge ther a striking physiognomy. The numerous prints and portraits of Tieck which are scattered over Germany are very defective as resemblances. They have a heavy look; they give the weight and power of his head, but nothing of the finesse which lurks in the lower part of his face.* His manner is courteous, and his voice particularly sweet and winning. He is apparently fond of the society of women; or the women are fond of his society, for in the evening his room is gene- . rally crowded with fair worshippers. Yet Tieck, like Goëthe, is accused of entertaining some unworthy sentiments with regard to the sex; and is also said, like Goëthe, not to have upheld us in his writings, as the true philosopher, to say nothing of the true poet, ought to have done. It

* Since this was written, a likeness of Tieck has been published by M. Weigt, of Leipsig, from the celebrated portrait painted by M. Vogel; the resemblance is as perfect as anything I ever saw in art: full of life and power.

is a fact upon which I shall take an opportunity of enlarging, that almost all the greatest men that have lived in the world, whether poets, philosophers, artists, or statesmen, have derived their mental and physical organization, more from the mother's than the father's side; and the same is true, unhappily, of those who have been in an extraordinary degree perverted. And does not this lead us to some awful considerations on the importance of the moral and physical well-being of women, and their present condition in society, as a branch of legislation and politics, which must ere long be modified? Let our lords and masters reflect, that if an extensive influence for good or for evil be not denied to us, an influence commencing not only with, but before the birth of their children, it is time that the manifold mischiefs and miseries lurking in the bosom of society, and of which woman is at once the wretched instrument and more wretched victim, be looked to. Sometimes I am induced to think that Tieck is misinterpreted or libelled by those who pretend to take the tone from his writings and opinions: it is evident that he delights in being surrounded by a crowd of admiring wo

men, therefore he must in his heart honour and reverence us as being morally equal with man, -for who could suspect the great Tieck of that paltry coxcombry which can be gratified by the adulation of inferior beings?

Tieck's extraordinary talent for reading aloud is much and deservedly celebrated: he gives dramatic readings two or three times a week when his health and his avocations allow this exertion; the company assemble at six, and it is advisable to be punctual to the moment; soon afterwards tea is served: he begins to read at seven precisely, when the doors are closed against all intrusion whatever, and he reads through a whole play without pause, rest, omission, or interruption. Thus I heard him read Julius Cæsar and the Midsummer Night's Dream (in the German translation by himself and Schlegel), and, except Mrs. Siddons, I never heard anything comparable as dramatic reading. His voice is rich, and capable of great variety of modulation. I observed that the humorous and declamatory passages were rather better than the pathetic and tender passages: he was quite at home among the elves and