Who resist the most touching appeals made for diamonds
By their wives and their daughters, and leave them for days
Unsupplied with new jewelry, fans or bouquets,

Even laugh at their miseries whenever they have a chance,
And deride their demands as useless extravagance;

One case of a bride was brought to my view,

Too sad for belief, but, alas! 't was too true,
Whose husband refused, as savage as Charon,

To permit her to take more than ten trunks to Sharon.
The consequence was, that when she got there,

At the end of three weeks she had nothing to wear;
And when she proposed to finish the season
At Newport, the monster refused, out and out,
For his infamous conduct alleging no reason,
Except that the waters were good for his gout;
Such treatment as this was too shocking, of course,
And proceedings are now going on for divorce.

But why harrow the feelings by lifting the curtain
From these scenes of woe? Enough, it is certain,
Has here been disclosed to stir up the pity

Of every benevolent heart in the city,

And spur up Humanity into a canter

To rush and relieve these sad cases instanter.

Won't somebody, moved by this touching description,
Come forward to-morrow and head a subscription?
Won't some kind philanthropist, seeing that aid is
So needed at once by these indigent ladies,
Take charge of the matter? Or won't Peter Cooper
The corner-stone lay of some new splendid super-
Structure, like that which to-day links his name
In the Union unending of Honor and Fame,
And found a new charity just for the care

Of these unhappy women with nothing to wear,

Which, in view of the cash which would daily be claimed,

The Laying-out Hospital well might be named?
Won't Stewart, or some of our dry-goods importers,

Take a contract for clothing our wives and our daughters?
Or, to furnish the cash to supply these distresses,

And life's pathway strew with shawls, collars and dresses,

Ere the want of them makes it much rougher and thornier, Won't some one discover a new California?

O ladies, dear ladies, the next sunny day,
Please trundle your hoops just out of Broadway,
From its whirl and its bustle, its fashion and pride,
And the temples of Trade which tower on each side,
To the alleys and lanes, where Misfortune and Guilt
Their children have gathered, their city have built;
Where Hunger and Vice, like twin beasts of prey,

Have hunted their victims to gloom and despair;
Raise the rich, dainty dress, and the fine broidered skirt,
Pick your delicate way through the dampness and dirt.

Grope through the dark dens, climb the rickety stair
To the garret, where wretches, the young and the old,
Half starved and half naked, lie crouched from the cold;
See those skeleton limbs, those frost-bitten feet,
All bleeding and bruised by the stones of the street;
Hear the sharp cry of childhood, the deep groans that swell
From the poor dying creature who writhes on the floor;
Hear the curses that sound like the echoes of Hell,

As you sicken and shudder and fly from the door; Then home to your wardrobes, and say, if you dareSpoiled children of fashion-you've nothing to wear!

And O, if perchance there should be a sphere
Where all is made right which so puzzles us here,
Where the glare and the glitter and tinsel of Time
Fade and die in the light of that region sublime,
Where the soul, disenchanted of flesh and of sense,
Unscreened by its trappings and shows and pretence,
Must be clothed for the life and the service above,
With purity, truth, faith, meekness and love,
O daughters of Earth! foolish virgins, beware!
Lest in that upper realm you have nothing to wear !

1857.

ILLUSTRATED NEWSPAPERS.

BY JOHN PHOENIX.

A YEAR or two since a weekly paper was started in London, called the Illustrated News. It was filled with tolerably executed wood-cuts, representing scenes of popular interest, and though perhaps better calculated for the nursery than the reading-room, it took very well in England, where few can read, but all can understand pictures, and soon attained an immense circulation. As when the inimitable London Punch attained its world-wide celebrity, supported by such writers as Thackeray, Jerrold and Hood, would-be funny men on this side of the Atlantic attempted absurd imitations-the "Yankee Doodle," the "John Donkey," etc.-which, as a matter of course, proved miserable failures; so did the success of this Illustrated affair inspire our money-loving publishers with hopes of dollars, and soon appeared from Boston, New York and other places, Pictorial and Illustrated Newspapers, teeming with execrable and silly effusions, and filled with the most fearful woodengravings, "got up regardless of expense," or anything else; the contemplation of which was enough to make an artist tear his hair and rend his garments. A Yankee named Gleason, of Boston, published the first, we believe, calling it "Gleason's Pictorial (it should have been Gleason's Pickpocket) and DrawingRoom Companion." In this he presented to his unhappy subscribers, views of his house in the country, and his garden, and, for aught we know, of "his ox and his ass, and the stranger within his gates." A detestable invention for transferring Daguerreotypes to plates for engraving, having come into notice about. this time, was eagerly seized upon by Gleason for farther embellishing his catchpenny publication, duplicates and uncalled-for pictures were easily obtained, and many a man has gazed in horror-stricken astonishment on the likeness of a respected friend, as a "Portrait of Monroe Edwards," or that of his deceased grandmother, in the character of "One of the Signers of the Declaration of Independence." They love pictures in Yankeedom; every tin peddler has one on his wagon, and an itin

erant lecturer can always obtain an audience by sticking up a likeness of some unhappy female, with her ribs laid open in an impossible manner, for public inspection, or a hairless gentleman with the surface of his head laid out in eligible lots, duly marked and numbered. The factory girls of Lowell, the professors of Harvard, all bought the Pictorial. (Professor Webster was reading one when Dr. Parkman called on him on the morning of the murder.) Gleason's speculation was crowned with success, and he bought himself a new cooking-stove and erected an out-building on his estate, with both of which he favored the public in a new wood-cut immediately.

Inspired by his success, old Feejee-Mermaid-Tom-ThumbWoolly-Horse-Joyce-Heth-Barnum forthwith got out another Illustrated Weekly, with pictures far more extensive, letter-press still sillier, and engravings more miserable, if possible, than Yankee Gleason's. And then we were bored and buffeted by having incredible likenesses of Santa Anna, Queen Victoria and poor old Webster thrust beneath our nose, to that degree that we wished the respected originals had never existed, or that the art of wood-engraving had perished with that of painting on glass.

It was, therefore, with the most intense delight that we saw a notice the other day of the failure and stoppage of Barnum's Illustrated News; we rejoiced thereat greatly, and we hope that it will never be revived, and that Gleason will also fail as soon as he conveniently can, and that his trashy Pictorial will perish with it.

It must not be supposed from the tenor of these remarks that we are opposed to the publication of a properly conducted and creditably executed Illustrated paper. "On the contrary, quite the reverse." We are passionately fond of art ourselves, and we believe that nothing can have a stronger tendency to refinement in society, than presenting to the public chaste and elaborate engravings, copies of works of high artistic merit, accompanied by graphic and well-written essays. It was for the purpose of introducing a paper containing these features to our appreciative community, that we have made these introductory remarks, and for the purpose of challenging comparison, and defying competition, that we have criticised so severely the imbecile and ephemeral productions mentioned above. At a vast expenditure of money, time and labor, and after the most incredible and unheard-of exertion on our part, individually, we are at

length able to present to the public an Illustrated publication of unprecedented merit, containing engravings of exceeding costliness and rare beauty of design, got up on an expensive scale, which never has been attempted before, in this or any other country.

We furnish our readers this week with the first number, merely premising that the immense expense attending its issue will require a corresponding liberality of patronage on the part of the public, to cause it to be continued.

PHENIX'S PICTORIAL,

And Second Story Front Room Companion.

VOL. I.]

[No. I.

Portrait of His Royal Highness Prince Albert.-Prince Albert, the son of a gentleman named Coburg, is the husband of Queen Victoria of England, and the father of many of her children. He is the inventor of the celebrated "Albert hat," which has been lately introduced with great effect in the U. S. Army. The Prince is of German extraction, his father being a Dutchman and his mother a Duchess.

Mansion of John Phoenix, Esq., San Diego, California.