The production of theatrical novelty is not to be expected
during the week or two immediately preceding the Christmas holidays ; the various managers being too much absorbed in the preparation of that serious work the Christmas Pantomime to bestow much thought on such mere trifles as tragedies, comedies, farces, and melodrames. By the spirit of benevo- lence, however, somewhat of life is infused into dramatic circles. A party of gentlemen, who usually figure as amateurs, have organized two benefits, one for the sake of Mrs. Macnamara, a superannuated actress of what the French would call the duSgnes; the other on behalf of the family of Mademoiselle Julie, the young artist who lately died in consequence of the accident at the Plymouth Theatre. The first of these is to take place at the Haymarket on Tuesday next; the second at the St. James's Theatre on Friday. Worthy of record, perhaps, is the fact, that the " Wizard of the North " reached his hundredth night on Tuesday last, and celebrated the event by a display of gas in front of the Lyceum, and an address de- livered on the stage, in which he made the first official announcement of be coming management of Covent Garden.
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