-1825.] 
pause, and attitude, and studied transitions 
of the voice ;—than the trick and tact of 
the stage, and an observance even of the 
realities of nature. There is required a 
quick and electric susceptibility that is al- 
most of the nature of delirium—a fine 
frenzy that realizes illusion; that annil:i- 
lates, as it were, the actor—extinguishes 
the consciousness of his own identity, and 
transmutes him into the character the 
poet has created. It will not do for 
him to be thinking “ how am I to do this 
thing?” or ‘‘ how I have done it?” He 
must be, in perception, himself a poet, of 
whom his author is the inspiring god: or, 
at least, the poet’s intellectual mirror, in- 
stinctively reflecting whatever the poetic 
mind presents. In short, to make the 
genuine actor, there must be something 
more than acting. Our players forget all 
this :—or, rather, they reject it, or are in- 
capable of comprehending it. They have 
other maxims, drawn from other schools. 
One thinks he plays Shakspeare because 
he is skilled ‘ in the bookish theorick,”’ is 
mathematical in the still-life outline of im- 
passioned attitude, and studies his parts, as 
he studied his arithmetic at school. Ano- 
ther thinks he can embody the passions of 
this profound adept in the mysteries and 
possibilities of Nature, because he has 
scanned her every-day workmanship with 
an observant eye; and, mistaking her 
journey-work for her mastery, and her 
familiar coloquies for her inspirations, he 
proses the feelings and conceptions of 
his author, as he proses his language; 
and makes Hamlet a moping metho- 
dist, and Macbeth a highland drover. A 
third trusts to the suggestions of an un- 
tutored energy, fostered at a porter-house 
club: holds elevation of mind, the refine- 
ments of taste, and intellectual cultivation, 
unnecessary auxiliaries to histrionic genius ; 
records his lucky hits (which he calls his 
study), and repeats them till they become 
common-places ;—till what began in vigour, 
ends in mechanism ; and, instead of an ar- 
tist drawing for ever fresh inspirations from 
the inexhaustible varieties of nature, he 
dwindles into a mere copyist of his own 
crude conceptions, and repeats himself in 
every scene. 
But we have run into dissertation where 
we intended only a fugitive notice; and we 
must pass over, for the present, both the 
Shylock and the Richard of Mr. Kean: each 
of which he has performed more than once. 
: COVENT GARDEN 
Tas favoured us even with less novelty 
than the rival house ; or, rather, has given 
us no novelty at all, It lias exhibited, how- 
ever, more variety. A Woman never Vered, 
Much Ado about Nothing, Henry IV., 
Native Land, Clari, Charles II., The School 
Sor Scandal, Der Freischiitz, only four times, 
The Belle’s Stratagem, The Inconstant, and 
A Rowland for an Oliver, form a striking 
contrast to the almost monotonous succes- 
Theatrical Review; and Music. 
167 
sion of the other house. Of these, the first 
presents us with Miss Chester in all her 
beauty and happiest fascinations ; C. Kemble 
in one of his happiest veins, and Miss Lacy, 
with much more of the power and discrimi- 
nation ef an actress than we had witnessed 
in any preceding character. In the second, 
if we have not all that we look for in Bea- 
trice and Benedick, we have more than, at 
present, any but C. Kemble and Miss Ches- 
ter could give us. In the third, we have 
all that labour, correct conception, and ju- 
dicious study can do for Sir John Falstaff, 
where nature has withheld the physical at- 
tributes. of the character. Of the School 
for Scandal, we will only say that, unfortu- 
nately for the present race of actors, we 
remember Smith, and Palmer, and Kiug, 
and Parsons, amd Dodd, and Yates, and 
Baddely, and Miss Farren, and Miss 
Pope, &c. &c., and that we shall be, in- 
deed, astonished if we should ever see any 
one of the dramatis persone of this comedy 
performed again as they respectively per- 
formed them. ‘The day is past, we fear, 
when even the manners of the age could 
‘furnish materials for such acting of these 
manners-painting characters. They were 
localities of the times, and with the times 
expired. 
In The Inconstant, however, we have Mr. 
Kemble in all his glory: not only distanc- 
ing all contemporary competition, but all 
that memory can look back’ upon. His 
Young Mirabel is, indeed, a wonderful piece 
of acting; approaching perfection in every 
trait and every scene ; and, what is most sur- 
prising, in that very scene which approaches 
nearest to tragedy, he is eyen most excel- 
lent. How astonishing, that the actor who 
can so embody, and adopt with such truth 
and force of nature, the emotions of the 
scene of impending murder, in this comedy 
whenever he puts on the buskin should Jose 
sight of verisimilitude, and exhibit nothing 
but the elaboration of art !—that his decla- 
mation should become stilted, his pathos la- 
chrymous, and his more feryid passion voci- 
feration ! Is it that he also lacks the imagi- 
native faculty, which can pass the ordinary 
limits of nature without losing sight of her 
laws and principles, and consequently with- 
out becoming unnatural? Yet how near to 
all this is the very scene in question! The 
play itself, indeed, is a wild imagination ; 
or at least an extravagance of fancy: it 
certainly is not nature: not genuine co- 
medy. It is the origina model, one would 
think, of those five act farces of our day— 
those compounds of the romantic and the 
familiar, of tragedy and caricature, by which 
the name ef comedy is usurped. But, O, 
how wide the difference between the parent 
and the degenerate progeny! If here -be 
extravagance, there is no fatuity; if there 
be humour too broad for legitimate comedy, 
there is none of the buffoonery of the booth. 
But the striking feature at this house 
has been the reception of Miss Foote, on 
her 
