----“Next I’d place Felicia Hemans, second in the race; I wonder the Reviews, who make such stir Oft about rubbish, never mention her. They might have said, I think, from mere good breeding-- Mistress Felicia’s works are worth the reading.” “Mrs Hemans,” adds the critical satirist in a note, “is a lady, (a young lady, I believe,) of very considerable merit. Her imagination is vigorous, her language copious and elegant, her information extensive. I have no means of ascertaining the extent of her fame, but she certainly deserves well of the republic of letters.” The worthy bishop has lived to read “The Records of Woman;” and, we have no doubt, rejoices to know that the aspirant of 1819 has now taken her place among British classics.] TALES AND HISTORIC SCENES. THE ABENCERRAGE. [The events with which the following tale is interwoven are related in the _Historia de las Guerras Civiles de Granada_. They occurred in the reign of Abo Abdeli, or Abdali, the last Moorish king of that city, called by the Spaniards El Rey Chico. The conquest of Granada, by Ferdinand and Isabella, is said by some historians to have been greatly facilitated by the Abencerrages, whose defection was the result of the repeated injuries they had received from the king, at the instigation of the Zegris. One of the most beautiful halls of the Alhambra is pointed out as the scene where so many of the former celebrated tribe were massacred; and it still retains their name, being called the “Sala de los Abencerrages.” Many of the most interesting old Spanish ballads relate to the events of this chivalrous and romantic period.] “Le Maure ne se venge pas parce que sa colère dure encore, mais parce que la vengeance seule peut écarter de sa tête le poids d’infamie dont il est accablé.--Il se venge, parce qu’à ses yeux il n’y a qu’une âme basse qui puisse pardonner les affronts; et il nourrit sa rancune, parce que s’il la sentoit s’éteindre, il croiroit avec elle avoir perdu une vertu.” Sismondi. Lonely and still are now thy marble halls, Thou fair Alhambra! there the feast is o’er; And with the murmur of thy fountain-falls Blend the wild tones of minstrelsy no more. Hush’d are the voices that in years gone by Have mourn’d, exulted, menaced, through thy towers; Within thy pillar’d courts the grass waves high, And all uncultured bloom thy fairy bowers. Unheeded there the flowering myrtle blows, Through tall arcades unmark’d the sunbeam smiles, And many a tint of soften’d brilliance throws O’er fretted walls and shining peristyles. And well might Fancy deem thy fabrics lone, So vast, so silent, and so wildly fair, Some charm’d abode of beings all unknown, Powerful and viewless, children of the air.