to the novice, a guide is necessary, whether through the crowded columns
of a _restaurateur's_ complicated _carte_, or amidst the fair promises
held out by the two dozen playbills posted each morning at eleven
o'clock upon the walls and pillars of Paris. For want of it, many a
Johnny Newcome finds himself, after much bewilderment and painful
deliberation, masticating an unsatisfactory dinner or witnessing a
stupid play. We have often wondered that, amongst the multitude of Paris
guide books, not one was to be found containing minute instructions to
the stranger as to the dinners he should order, and the plays and actors
he should see; giving, in short, a series of bills of fare, culinary and
histrionic. This deficit has at last been supplied, at least as regards
things theatrical. A book has been published which should find a place
in the portmanteau of every Englishman starting for the French capital.
Partly a compilation from French works, and partly the result of the
author's own experience, it contains the general history of each of the
Paris theatres, biographical and critical sketches of the actors, lists
and anecdotes of the principal musicians and authors who compose and
write for the stage, and, finally, an enumeration of the best performers
at each theatre, and of the pieces in which they are seen to the
greatest advantage. We need say no more to demonstrate the utility of
the work to those going abroad. And by those remaining at home, its
lively pages will be found a mine of amusing anecdote and curious
information. Abounding in racy and pungent details, sometimes valuable
from their connexion with historical characters, and as illustrations of
the manners and morals of the times, the history of the French stage
might almost be indefinitely prolonged; and, amidst the multitude of
materials, it required some ingenuity to select, as Mr. Hervey has done,
those most suitable to the taste of the day, and to pack them into a
single volume.