-AMONG the many devices for social entertainment, such as charade parties, amateur theatricals, etc., tableaux parties have in the last two seasons grown to be a very common and popular means of parlor amusement. We have It is a little singular that four of the most distinguish-auditor where an unusual degree of excellence and spirit was been present upon several such affairs, and recently was an ed novelists of England at the present time (if we except Bulwer), are named Charles Charles Dickens, Charles Reade, Charles Kingsley, and Charles Lever.

Entertainments of this kind, which require art, taste, and | family to supply the trousseau. We, who know so little of dramatic feeling, are an agreeable variety to the orthodox courts, are at a loss about the matter. dancing party-and as some of our readers may desire a few hints as to the mode of getting them up, we subjoin a brief direction or two:

In parlors which communicate by folding doors, use one room for the auditors, the other for the tableaux. Stretch a piece of thin gauze between the rooms. Line the tableaux-room with some dark stuff-black muslin or the like. Some erect a platform-but it is not necessary. Concentrate a very brilliant light upon the tableaux room, and arrange the light in the auditorial room so that it can be turned nearly out during the representation. Dresses, with little tact, can be manufactured at home. These are all the preparations that are necessary. Some dramatic feeling, and sense of the picturesque, will be requisite for any great degree of success. Well-known scenes in familiar plays or poems, afford good subjects, but where a complete story can be represented by a succession of pictures, the interest and pleasure is enhanced. Humorous incidents can be introduced very happily.

A Yankee girl, now, takes her bridal garments and outfit from the old homestead, and proudly disdains all aid in these matters from the masculine side of the contract. But then, New England is not Old England, to say nothing of Berlin, and, of course, all this is right, and according to the strictest court usage, or our haughty neighbors across the water would never permit a satin slipper, or a yard of lace to come within fifty miles of Victoria's charming daughter.

Now, considering these hard times, when weddings and funerals are so expensive, that nothing but millionaires can afford to marry or die-we should like to have this royal fashion introduced here. It would save anxious mammas a world of trouble, and let our young men down pleasantly from politics to satins, velvets and wreaths of white roses. By all means, this is a fashion worth transplanting.

-It is very gratifying to see that Shakspearean revivals, at our theatres, properly put forward, are almost always successful. The senior Wallack has been giving us such revivals,

way of scenery, quite superior to anything we have had since Kean's King John. He opened in Hamlet, and played it six nights to full houses. It was very beautifully put upon the stage. The last scene of the first act, was as fine a scenic

- Ar the fair, last month, notwithstanding large induce-marked with unusual care in appointments and cast, and in the ments were offered to induce ladies to exhibit on horseback, only one female made her appearance, and that one under an assumed name. We are glad to see that the sex is getting ashamed of these unfeminine exhibitions, at least in the neighborhood of the metropolis, and we trust that this shrink-effort as we can recall. The respective parts of the play ing from the gross notoriety of a race-course, will spread into the rural districts. If we are to have female jockeys, the thing will soon run into fast horses, and females driving four in hand, till, in the end, America may yet have female gamesters expert as those of Badin, or Aix la Chapelle, or lady pugilists practising in the ring, à la Tom Hyer.

Let us have no more of these unlady-like exhibitions. Die Vernon certainly was a charming romp, and Lady Gay Spanker something of a character, but neither of them we fancy, were intended to set young ladies crazy to exhibit their skill and pretty faces to the miscellaneous rabble of a race-course Imagine a woman having her baby christened out of the plate won by herself at a riding-match, or a man of sense falling in love with a young girl, as she dashes by him in the ring, pell-mell against a rival, with her foot in the stirrup and her whip in the air.

Thank heaven, ladies in this vicinity prefer to take their equestrian exercises after a more approved fashion.

were carefully rendered. Mr. Wallack never has been as successful in Shakspearean parts, as in others of a more melo-dramatic and showy character. He made his Hamlet much as might have been expected. It was declamatory, strongly marked, statuesque, picturesque, scholarly read; and he looked the part a great deal better than we have any right to expect from a man considerably over sixty. But it was not philosophical, nor contemplative; there was very little of the melancholy, the "river of the eye," the sad, softness which we look for in the meditative prince.

Mr. Wallack's Benedick is one of the most popular and successful of his renditions. Of course, he could not play an engagement without it; and, upon this occasion, its production was enhanced in interest by the debut of a young lady of high social rank in this city, who appeared as Hero. It was a successful first appearance. There was, of course, agitation, tremor, and a very evident fluttering-but there were, nevertheless, decided indications of talent. We heard the lady read previously to an assembly of friends and cri

— AND SO, the princess royal is on the highway to matri- tics. She has beauty, cultivation, intelligence, the breeding mony, and a German husband.

The bridal arrangements are going on with spirit at Berlin, and attract so much attention that hundreds are actually going from London to witness them. "There are six rooms filled with silks, satins, ribands, velvet, costly laces, artificial flowers, exquisite embroideries in gold and silver, bonnets, caps, gowns, gloves, body and table linen, diamonds and jewelry, shawls, mantles, and toilet requirements of every description, color, and material. Thirty persons have been engaged several months on the embroidery, and one hundred and twenty needle-women have worked on the different articles."

There's a wedding for you. Six rooms full of exquisite finery, and all for a pretty little girl of sixteen. But how does it happen that all these preparations are at Berlin and not in London? Is it royal etiquette for the husband's

of a lady, the enthusiasm of an artist, and willingness to study hard. Moreover, she starts in the right direction. She goes on the stage, and talks as Christian men and women talk, with a very wholesome abhorrence of stagy stalking, and conventional mouthing. We submit if this last recommendation ought not of itself make her welcome to all sensible people.

This little theatre, now under Mr. Stewart, sustains the reputation it attained when exclusively under the control of Mr. Wallack. Laura Keene's soon opens, and so the Broadway-then comes the tug of war. But we have faith in Mr. Stewart. We do not believe that he will be found behind his rivals in any essential requisite ; and nowhere can such a company be gathered together, as nightly holds forth at this theatre. But, will Mr. Stewart give us some new plays?

-Bothwell: a Poem. By W. Edmondstoune Aytoun. | century. Lieutenant Burton is the only "infidel" with the Professor Aytoun is the editor (or reputed editor) of Black- exception of Burckhardt, who has penetrated to the shrine wood. The critical articles which have appeared in that periodical have been attributed to him. He has always been a severe satirist of what he calls the "Spasmodic School" of poetry. He never conceded to Alexander Smith the poetical rank claimed for him. He burlesqued his poem, and was mercilessly severe upon him and all of his school. Of course, the appearance of Bothwell is an excellent opportunity for a little tit for tat. The Titan, an Edinburgh monthly, in the interest of Alexander, charges in full tilt against it. "A poem should certainly contain poetry; here we have found none," says the Titan; and elsewhere: "We should not have known it was a poem, if the author had not so informed us on the title page;" further on: "The music seldom rises beyond the most ordinary common metre ever droned through the nose of a Ranter." These are only a few of the stones which the Titan hurls at the professor. Others of the critics take up the bludgeon in the same way -and still others range by the side of the poet, and defend him lustily. It is a very pretty battle as it stands.

of Mohammedanism; and, inasmuch as severe sickness prevented Burckhardt from observing minutely all the mysteries of the jealously guarded cities, this work is almost an exploration into an unknown field. Lieutenant Burton's journey was singular and romantic. A long residence in India, features somewhat Eastern in their character, and a thorough acquaintance with various Persian and Arabian dialects, fitted him of all others for the dangerous task. Disguised as a travelling Dervish, he performed the journey safely-the difficulties of which can scarcely be appreciated, even by his reader. Discovery would have been his destruction. He required to be perpetually on his guard, and punctiliously to observe the thousand rites and observances of the true Mohammedan; observances and ceremonies so intricate and various, as to be with difficulty learned and comprehended even by those to the "manner born." The relation of the journey is clear, graphic, and agreeable; and the insight it affords into the inner temple of Mohammedanism, complete and satisfactory. The American edition contains an introduction by Bayard Taylor. (G. P. Putnam & Co.)

-Daisy's Necklace: and What Came of It, by T. B. Aldrich, is not worthy the genius of the author. Mr. Ald

Our own impression of Bothwell is highly favorable. It is of the Scott and "Marmion" school-a brilliant poem, with no affectation, no mannerism-with passages of terse, graphic, picturesque reality, fluent and simple in style, and, as a whole, in its completeness, perfect unity, and sus-rich is a fine poet. Some of his pieces which travel about tained dramatic power, really fascinating. The poem is in the form of a monologue. Bothwell in his dungeon in the fortress of Malmoe, pours forth his story-that strange, wild, turbulent story, which so outdoes romance or invention. The narrative is so contrived as to include all the most salient events in the career of Mary, but siding always with that unhappy queen. We recommend its perusal to our readers. Some may refuse its claims as a poem-none can deny its profound interest as a splendid historical chronicle. (Ticknor & Fields.)

among the newspapers, evince exquisite fancy, great delicacy, and remarkable felicity of touch. The fame he is sure to acquire as a poet, will make him ashamed of this volume before he is many years older. It is not without its good things; it has some sharp satire and pleasant humor-but, as a whole, it is simply foolish. The plot is extravagant and forced. Its best scenes remind the reader of others already known to fiction. It has no reality, no earnestness. People won't sympathize with characters when the author plays his antics behind them, and lets his readers into the secret that he don't believe in them himself. Mr. Aldrich says he was A Pilgrimage to El Medinah and Meccah, by Lieute- tempted by the seductive argument of a cheque. Don't let nant Burton, of the English army, is one of the most remark-him yield again. His fame is of too much promise to be able and interesting books of travel published during the trifled with. (Derby & Jackson.)

OUR FASHION DEPARTMENT.

IN presenting our readers with a fashion department, which it is our intention to give each month, we obey a popular demand rather than our own tastes, which, we must confess, would confine these things to works devoted exclusively to the toilet. But our readers want the fashions, and so long as we have the power, our readers shall have exactly what they want.

In order to make the department perfect, we have engaged our designs from Frank Leslie, whose corps of engravers are picked from the best artists of the country, and whose Gazette of the Fashions is confessedly the most complete authority in the world for every department of the toilet. Every engraving that he supplies to us, is taken from the

original garment, selected by the editor of the New Monthly from the ware-rooms in which it is invented, and, in order to render our selections still more reliable, the authority for each article will always be found in direct connection with its illustration.

Having been the editor of "Leslie's Gazette" for several years, we are, from assured experience, enabled to select those authorities best adapted to the wants of our lady readers, and, if we must have fashion plates, they shall be fresh from the most approved establishments, and the best which art can produce in the original article of costume, the letter-press, and the engravings. The season has been so bland, and the leaf fall has so pro

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tracted itself so pleasantly into the cold months, that we can scarcely speak of winter fashions as a thing that exists, except in the near future. But we have a brilliant foreshadowing of what is to come in fancy straws en. riched with velvet, and brilliant with chinelle, jet, and gorgeous autumn flowers. Dresses are still deeply flounced, and the basquines are getting deeper and deeper, till we anticipate them ending in the double jupe of olden times, looped up from a skirt of some other color; a pretty costume, which we should not regret to see introduced. Meantime, we have seen some very lovely out - door toilets, which we will content ourselves with describing, till the season for opera and ball-dresses arrives.

One suited for the carriagedrive consists of silk in broad stripes, alternately white and violet. The violet stripes, which are of a beautiful bright tint, are watered, and the white stripes are figured with large bouquets of pink daisies with

each side.

coat is blue watered poplin; the waist is made high in the neck, with an open front, ornamented by lapelles of black velvet, terminating in a polka at the back; in front the velvet extends down the entire length of the skirt in a graduated piece. The edges of the lapelles, and polka, are decorated by a succession of blue plush balls, suspended by silken cords. The bias skirt is half a yard in length. A border of black velvet, two inches wide, surrounds the edge. The flowing sleeves are ornamented by a turn-up cuff of black velvet, forming a point on the top, and underneath the arm (each point) is confined by a blue plush ball. The under-skirt is of fine linen, the bosom formed of a double frill of needlework, arranged on a band of insertion; the neck is finished with a round collar, edged with a needle-work frill. The sleeves are full, and gathered into a cuff of insertion, terminated by a needle-work frill. A heavy blue cord and tassels encircle the waist. The pants are of black velvet, descending

No. 2 is a superb bridal bonnet, so, vapory, diversified, and charming as to render it almost indescribable. The foundation is white satin, covered with puffed tulle, and banded with light feather trimming, woven on a piping of white satin. A delicate feather trimming, arranged in the form of leaves, bands the front

foliage. The skirt of this dress has no trimming. The a little below the knee. Three small gilt buttons adorn corsage, which is made high, and with a basque, is trimmed with a revers pelerine of black lace, round at the back, and meeting in a point in front of the waist. At the edge of the basque, there is a row of black lace, six or seven inches deep, headed with passementerie of an open pattern, and about an inch in width. The sleeves are composed of one large puff of silk and a frill of lace, the latter surmounted by a the curtain, which row of passemen- is composed of terie. The under- lace, edged an sleeves are of inch deep with a Venetian point in slight puffing of silk covered with

2

two large puffs,

and descends over

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HEAD-DRESS, from Genin's, 518 Broadway.

No. 1 is a costume for a little boy. The material of the white hyacinths on the right side. On the left are clusters

of white moss rose-buds and forget-me-nots. of white ribbon, edged with satin.

Broad strings medium-sized collar, round in the back and pointed in front, forms a finish to the neck: the front is closed with plain satin buttons, and ornamented by a heavy cord and round tassels of twisted brown silk.

No. 3 is a superb style of head-dress. It is arranged on a spring foundation of black lace. On the right are two full loops and streamers of broad blue ribbon, brocaded with a No. 5 is a talma of royal ermine, or, to use its proper. rich pattern of flowers, veined with silver and mingled with name, a Siberian ermine, the most beautiful of all furs for a profusion of silver flowers falling among the loops. The the opera. The one we illustrate is truly magnificent. Its left side is adorned by full clusters of white ostrich plumes. snowy purity is enhanced by its black pendants, surrounded No. 4 is a mantilla of mink fur, which is especially adapted by a faint golden tinge; at the back, it is nearly a yard in to the promenade, where dark furs are always the most de- depth, the fronts corresponding in length, and forming slight sirable. It is quite large and the form is beautiful. It is points; the neck is finished with a medium-sized collar of slightly rounded in the back, and descends considerably the same form, fastened to the garment by a heavy silken below the line of the waist; the fronts descend in long cord, terminated by rich flat tassels of white silk; the lining square tabs of glossy fur, made from the choicest skins; a is of glossy white silk, quilted in a border of flowers.