NINE YEARS OF AN ACTOR'S LIFE. 115 



We gazed together upon Passion's scroll, 



Whose words are writ in fire, while every line 



Reflected burning lustre on my soul ; 



Yet cold and calm, as starlight, beamed on thine. 



My love for thee could live, although the tide 

 Of time brought change and sorrow in its way ; 



It could exist unaltered, though 'twere tried 

 By pain's excess by desolation's sway. 



Yet thine how soon has faded, withered : Why ? 



Will one, of more devoted feeling, show 

 A deeper love a kinder sympathy 



More singleness of heart than mine ? Ah no. 



Yet though another on thy gentle breast 

 May find the fondness which is lost to me 



And with thy young heart's gentleness be blest 

 I cannot curse him, while I think on thee. 



In radiant vision in consoling dream 



Thine image will beguile the long, lone night, 



And, though a spirit visitor, may seem 

 More than the shadow of our past delight. 



LEON. 

 Devonshire Place. 



NINE YEARS OF AN ACTOR'S LIFE, 



BY ROBERT DYER I 



Longman, London; Nettleton, Plymouth. Svo. pp. 241. 



THE author states that a love of declamation was 

 one of his earliest tendencies, and that whilst yet a lit- 

 tle boy he made extemporaneous speeches about blood 

 and death and his heart ; always finishing by stabbing 

 himself with a butcher's steel to the great admiration 

 of his fellow playmates : this early love of the histronic 

 art induced him, on leaving school to become a mem- 

 ber of an amateur company, a circumstance which we 

 will allow him to detail in his own words, especially as 

 it is accompanied by some remarks on private theatri- 



