THE BALLET.
AFTER La Sonnambula comes Masaniello, that most stirring and pie. turesque of ballets ; revived with becoming splendour. Its animated groupings, enlivened by choral and scenic accessories, and the strolls interest of the pantomimic action, make the absence of the asild displays by first-rate artists little felt. In ordinary cases, a pa seal or a pas de deux is the only relief to the tedium of the ballet. ia this, it is almost felt as an impertinence, because it arrests the progreee of the story. CooLoses personation of Masaniello (for it deserves this epithet) is one of the most perfect exhibitions of silent acting on the stage. ffia
pantomime is equally intelligible and unostentatious : he does not, m
ordinary artists do, appear like one labouring to supply Jie want of words by redundant and often merely conventional gesticulation; he seems a man mutely suffering, reflecting, and acting, who betrays unconsciously the emotions that successively influence him. The last scene—where the rash adventurer, giddy with the whirl of excite-
ment, and distracted with contending feeling, goes mad—is painfully
affecting. Mademoiselle C. FORSTER, as Fenella, evinces sem.
bility and energy ; but her gestiloquence wants that graceful flow and
just emphasis necessary to the perfection of mute declamation; and she does not display any of the saltatory graces that are often found to atone for the imperfection of pantomime. BERTRAND and VENA.
FRA ably support theY two secondary leaders of the revolt. Mademoi- selle BELLON danced a pas de deux with COUSTOU, prettily enough, but not so brilliantly as to attract particular attention ; nor did she come up to her male partner, COUSTOU, whose power and elasticity of
limb are conspicuous. We must protest, however, against the intro. duction of pirouettes and the monotonous exercises of French dancing
into a popular rejoicing at Naples : the dances should be exclusively national—and, moreover, less negligently performed than the one in the market. place. Masaniello, as now represented, is a very acceptable substitute for the absence of a premiere danseuse ; TVA DUVERNAY in immediate prospect, the ELSLEX8 in the distance, and Taoism— whose "feet, like Hope's, are last in heaven "—in posse.
The house has been "swept and garnished," and the metallic green of the box-fronts agreeably exchanged for an ochre yellow, that her. monizes with and sets off the meagre gold ornaments.
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