his excellence in female characters, that ladies of fashion used to quarrel as to who should take him in their carriages, and drive him round the park, in his stage clothes, after the play was over;* nor George Powell, who killed himself with drinking, when he might have lived and beaten all competitors; nor the facetious Will Bullock, and still more facetious Will Penkethman. Much we should have rejoiced to see Wilks, who was so kind to poor Farquhar's daughters, bequeathed to him as a legacy by his dying friend, and reputed to be the truest representative of the fine gentleman that the stage could boast. His dress was followed as the rule of fashion, and his manners copied as the criterion of elegance. A portrait of Sandford, too, would have been very acceptable. He, the Spagnoletto of the stage, the stock assassin and conspirator, whose features were never suflered to relax from the scowl of hatred, and who became unpopular, and was often hissed, as an involuntary tribute to his excellence in depicting villainy. Tony Aston describes Sandford as diminutive and mean in figure, round-shouldered, meagre-faced, spindle-shanked, splay-footed, with a sour countenance, and long, lean arms, all which rendered him a proper person to discharge lago, Foresight, or Malignii. He acted strongly with his features, wherein the diabolical passions were powerfully expressed. No wonder that the manager confined him exclusively to the line of villains, of which King Charles proclaimed him to be the best in the world. The Tatler (No. 134) says- "When poor Sandford was on the stage, I have seen him groaning upon a wheel, stuck with daggers, impaled alive, calling his executioners, with a dying voice, cruel dogs and monsters; and all this to gratify his judicious spectators, who were wonderfully pleased with seeing a man in torment so exquisitely acted."

-

Has any one ever seen a portrait of the noted buffoon and comic actor Joe Haines, commonly called Count Haines? equally remarkable for his wit and wickedness, in either of which he rivalled Rochester himself. He was educated by subscription at Queen's College, Oxford, and ought to have known better; but the spirit of pro

fligacy was strong within him, and overpowered the influence of learning. His excellence on the stage was produced by natural humour and impa dence, skilfully blended. Once he spoke an epilogue in the habit of a horse officer, mounted on an ass, a piece of extravagance imitated in more recent days by Liston, as Lord Griz

The

zle. Haines was a professed joker, both verbal and practical; but his mode of life was such as to bring dis credit on any calling. More stories are told of his wild tricks, than would suffice to fill several volumes. The fol lowing, which rests on the authority of Astou, may be selected as a specimen➡ "One morning Joe was seized by a couple of bailiffs, in an action for a debt of £20, as the Bishop of Ely was passing by in his coach. Quoth Joe to the bailiffs, Gentlemen, here's my cousin, the Bishop of Ely, going into his house; let me but speak to him, and he'll pay the debt and charges.' bailiffs thought they might venture that, as they were within three or four yards of him. So up goes Joe to the coach, pulling off his hat, and got close to it. The Bishop ordered the coach to stop; whilst Joe (close to his ear) said softly, My lord, here are two poor men who have such great scruples of conscience that I fear they'll hang themselves.' Very well,' said the Bishop; so calling to the bailiffs, he said, You two men, come to me tomorrow morning, and I'll satisfy you.' The men bowed, and went awar. Joe, hugging himself with his fallacious device, also went his way. In the morning the bailiffs, expecting the debt and charges, repaired to the Bishop's; when, being introduced, 'Well," said the Bishop, what are your scruples of conscience?' 'Scruples!' said the bailiffs we have no scruples. We are bailiffs, my lord, who yester day arrested your cousin, Joe Haines, for £20. Your lordship promised to satisfy us to-day; and we hope your lordship will be as good as your word. The worthy Bishop, reflecting that his honour and name would be exposed, if he complied not, paid the debt and charges."

6

Let us now take a look at the Hogarths, which are seven in number, beginning with the "leviathan "—Quin.

He has precisely the laughing, juicy eye suited to Falstaff; the burly, important look adapted to Sir John Brute; and the sensual expression of the gourmand who could revel in the fleshpots of Egypt. We know not whether he is best remembered as an actor, an epicure, or an utterer of facetiæ; but many jokes have been fathered on him, to which he has no claim. His ponderous, mechanical style, gave way before the brilliant vivacity of Garrick, who fairly acted him down, when they appeared together, and established the supremacy of what was then the new school, although the disciples of Garrick would now in turn be considered stiff and old-fashioned. Quin's ancestors were of an ancient Irish family. His grandfather, Mark Quin, had been Lord Mayor of Dublin in 1676; but he himself was born in London. His last appearance on the stage was at Covent Garden, in 1753, when he performed Falstaff, for his friend Ry. an's benefit. Until Garrick rose, he held the first place in public opinion; and his natural surliness of temper was not improved by being "pushed from his stool" before he was disposed to abdicate. He lived many years in Bath, in the best society, and is buried in the Abbey Church, with a very elegant epitaph from the pen of his successful rival. Like many of his theatrical brethren, Quin was generous and kind-hearted. He left by will £1000 to Thompson, and the same sum to Ryan, and told both, if they wanted money, they had better draw it at once, and save his executors trouble. In those days, actors fought duels as readily as noblemen. was twice out; once with Theophilus Cibber, who wounded and disarmed him, under the Piazza in Covent Garden; and a second time, when he was more unfortunate, as he killed a brother performer, Bowen, in a quarrel, which was decided at the Pope's Head Tavern, in Cornhill. Bowen before he died declared that all was fair, and forgave his antagonist. Quin was found guilty of manslaughter only, and soon returned to his usual avocation. He was constitutionally pugnacious; for on another occasion he came to fisty-cuffs with Aaron Hill, for an article in a periodical paper called The Prompter, in which his qualifications as an actor had been rather freely commented on. Quin's most popular characters were Falstaff, Sir John Brute, the Duke,

Quin

in Measure for Measure, Brutus, and Cato, in which last many thought he even excelled Booth, the original representative. Churchill, in the "Rosciad," while awarding him considerable praise as a manly, nervous elocutionist, who topped what he calls "the labour'd artifice of speech," condemns him as a monotonous declaimer, without flexibility, feeling, variety, or power of individualizing character. According to this trenchant satirist, he was always the same :

"In Brute he shone unequalled: all agree
Garrick's not half so great a brute as he.
When Cato's labour'd scenes are brought to view,
With equal praise the actor labour'd too.
In fancied scenes, as in life's real plan,
He could not, for a moment, sink the man.
In whate'er cast his character was laid,
Self still, like oil, upon the surface play'd.
Nature, in spite of all his skill, crept in:
Horatio, Dorax, Falstaff,-still 'twas Quin."

The individual thus described may be a good and sound actor, but can show no pretensions to the name of a great comprehensive master of his art. Judgment and physical power are attributes far inferior to the divine inspiration of genius. Quin was a bad dresser, and his carelessness in this particular was not improved by the outrè costume then worn on the stage. At the age of sixty, he performed Chamont, in the Orphan, in a long, grizly, half-powdered wig, hanging low down on each side of his breast, and down the back; a heavy scarlet coat and waistcoat, trimmed with broad gold lace, black velvet breeches, black silk neckcloth, black rolled stockings; a pair of square-toed shoes, with an old-fashioned pair of stone buckles; a pair of stiff, high-topped, white gloves, and a broad old scolloped hat. Were the youthful Chamont to appear in such a dress now, the tragedy would cause more laughter than tears. who have read Cumberland's delightful autobiography, will remember his lively description of the first appearance of Quin and Garrick together, as Horatio and Lothario, in the Fair Penitent; an entire century appeared to roll away in a moment, between the heavy, measured exit of the one, and the bounding, elastic entrance of the other!

All

We should have mentioned Barton Booth before Quin, in the regular succession of theatrical dynasties, but his portrait has only this moment caught our eye. We must insert him in a parenthesis, although his merit, as the legitimate successor of Betterton, demands a longer notice. He was near

ly related to the Earls of Warrington, and educated at Westminster, under the matchless pedagogue, Dr. Busby. He was unquestionably the greatest tragedian of the early stage, next to Betterton; but forced to retire, from ill health, in his forty-sixth year. To the last hour he hoped to recover, and was endeavouring to improve himself in the art he longed to resume. A few days before his death he said, "The longest life was too short for the almost endless study of an actor." Booth, in addition to his histrionic talents, was a very pretty poet, of which good evidence may be seen in his translations and imitations of Horace, and in the well-known song of "Sweet are the charms of her I love," which may be reckoned a masterpiece in its kind. He invested the greater part of his fortune in building three streets in Westminster-viz., Cowley-street, Bartonstreet, and Booth-street. In the first, he perpetuated the memory of Cowley, whom he looked upon as the greatest of English poets; and in the two latter, the name of himself and family.

The old lady now before us, honour. ed by the pencil of Hogarth, is Mrs. Pitt, who was forty years at Covent Garden, and played the Nurse to six generations of Juliets. She would, perhaps, wonder at her own immortality, if she was aware of it. And here, close by, is John Rich, the ignorant pa tentee, but accomplished harlequin, whose stage name was Lun. The first English pantomime was brought out by him, at Lincoln's Inn-fields, in 1717, called Harlequin Sorcerer. He was a mighty master in his own peculiar walk, but had a sovereign contempt for Shakspeare and legitimacy. When the houses at Covent Garden were crowded to overflowing, to witness the joint efforts of Garrick and Quin, Rich would look through the hole in the green curtain, in utter mortification, and exclaim derisively to the audience (but not loud enough to be heard), "So, you are there again, are you? Much good may it do you." We have him again in another room, in his generic panoply of Harlequin.

Hogarth the fourth is the incomparable Kitty Clive, as the Fine Lady in Lethe. In broad comic characters she has never been equalled; but, like many others, mistook her line, and was always squabbling with Garrick because he would not indulge her, or per

mit an inimitable Flora to be ex changed for a bad Violante. The great delight of her life was to bully Roscius into submission, in which she some times succeeded. Such was her bad taste, that in the trial scene of the Merchant of Venice, wherein she was suffered to travesty Portia, she turned the whole into burlesque by a mimicry of some well-known lawyer. A modern audience is often accused of having degenerated in taste; but most assuredly they would not endure, for a moment, such an outrageous perversion of the author's intent. Kitty, after her retirement, lived many years in a snug cottage at Twickenham, and in comfortable independence. She was a great favourite of Horace Walpole, and a constant visitor at Strawberry Hill, where, from her undaunted manner, ready repartee, and freedom of speech, she became the nightly terror, the bête noire of all the gossiping, cheating, tea-table tabbies, who formed the staple of his select coterie. She produced four dramatic pieces, all of which are long forgotten. The second picture of Mrs. Clive, said to be by Verelst, is a mistake-Verelst died the year before she was born. The two next portraits by Hogarth, are Christopher Bullock, who died young, in the high road to excellence; and John Hippesley, who began as a candle-snuffer, and, on the death of Penkethman, succeeded to all his characters, and more than half his reputation. Hippesley's Drunken Man" obtained much celebrity. His face was distorted by an accidental burn in his youth, which some said was his chief recommendation. One day he mentioned to Quin, that he had thoughts of bringing his son on the stage, and he hoped he would resemble his father. "In that case," replied the cynic, "you had better begin by burning him.

66

And now, look on the three Peg Woffingtons, by Wilson, Mercier, and Hogarth the last incomparably the best and most fascinating. There she is, reclining on a couch, "dallying and dangerous," as Charles Lamb observed thirty years ago, when he first saw the painting. She has a book in one hand, and a miniature in the other. What is the subject of her studies, and whose features is she contemplating? Do not gaze too long, lest you become fascinated. We can

not promise you the fortune of Pygmalion, or that Venus will a second time re-animate her own rival. No wonder she captivated Garrick, in the heyday of his success, and in the pride of her own loveliness. She had but one drawback an inharmonious voice; her face and figure were faultless. She was, perhaps, altogether the most beautiful woman that ever appeared upon the stage; and her animation and overpowering vivacity were never equalled, except by Dorothea Jordan. She sometimes courted Melpomene, but in that walk she only reminded the audience painfully of her superior devotion to the sister muse. Alas! she was frail as the most yielding of the sisterhood, in spite of the chivalrous efforts of our friend, Charles Reade, to purify her fame in his agreeable drama, and still more attractive novel. But her heart was in the right place: she supported her mother with every comfort; built and endowed a number of almshouses at Teddington, in Middlesex; and although cut off in the prime of life, lived long enough to repent sincerely of all her early indiscretions. Christian charity may readily echo the sentiment of the gallant bishop, who, being accidently a witness to her benevolence, and captivated by her graces, exclaimed involuntarily, "Woman, may thy sins be forgiven thee!" Garrick intended to marry her, poured forth his adoration in the song of "Lovely Peggy;" and went so far as to place a ring on her finger before witnesses. But he pulled up in time -detected her in an infidelity-found that he could do better, and united himself to Mademoiselle Violetti, a celebrated dancer, also distinguished by her beauty and accomplishments, with whom he lived in uninterrupted harmony to the end of his days, and from whom he was never separated for four-and-twenty hours, after holy Church had incorporated two in one. There she is opposite to you, at the end of the room, between the windows, painted by Cipriani, in her decline, and looking very sedate and matronly, although she never knew the feelings of a mother. No matter whether she was Lord Burlington's daughter or not, he gave her a good fortune, and bestowed her on an excellent husband.

She survived David forty-three years, and died in 1822, at the extraordinary age of 105. He left her a magnificent fortune, but she never married again. Perhaps she thought as old Sarah of Marlborough did, that the heart which had once belonged to a great man should never be given away a second time.

We have here no less than twelve portraits of Garrick, in different characters. Little David was vain-the common weakness of genius, according to some philosophers. He never tired of sitting for his portrait, and cared not for trouble, while it increased his popularity. His versatile powers rendered him equally excellent in Tragedy and Comedy, and entitled him to the precedence which Churchill has accorded him in the "Rosciad." There may be many disputes as to who should come next, but his claim to stand first is universally admitted. Actors have exceeded him in individual parts. He failed utterly in Othello and Marplot, and never willingly assumed the Roman dress. But, as a whole must be judged by all its parts taken together, we may fairly place him above every professor of the histrionic art that any age or nation has produced. He repudiated measured declamation for easy, impassioned speaking; and when we remember the artificial impediments of the early classic stage, we become incredulous as to the great effects recorded of Polus, Roscius, and Paris. How could they possibly reflect nature through the pipe, the mask, and the exaggerated cothurnus; and, above all, how could the gentler sex be invested with interest, while its representatives were bearded men? The illusion is entirely dispelled, when we are told that the play cannot begin until the queen is shaved. Churchill's condensed eulogium on Garrick may bear repetition, although tolerably familiar :

:

"If manly sense, if nature link'd with art;
If thorough knowledge of the human heart;
If powers of acting, vast and unconfined;
If fewest faults with greatest beauties join'd;
If strong expression, and strange powers, which lie
Within the magic circle of the eye;

If feelings, which few hearts, like his, can know,
And which no face so well as his can show;
Deserve the preference-Garrick, take the chair,
Nor quit it, till those place an equal there."

We cannot say that we admire this

Zoffany, representing Garrick and Mrs. Pritchard in the murder scene of Macbeth. The positions of the figures are stiff and unnatural-that of Garrick ungraceful almost to impossibility. We know he was short, but here, although placed in advance, he looks like a dwarf attended by a vulgar giantess. We also recollect the lines of the poet we have just quoted from, wherein it is justly said—

"Before true merit all objections fly

Pritchard's genteel, and Garrick six feet high."

This picture reminds us of the defect, but conveys not the intense expression of high genius which supplies the remedy. Macbeth is dressed in a heavy blue coat, with scarlet waistcoat and breeches plastered with broad gold lace, very similar to the full costume of the Lord Mayor's state coachman, on inauguration day, with his hair hanging over his shoulders, and just loosened out of a trimly curled wig. Macklin was the first who introduced the tartan, while all the rest of the characters, including his brother general, Banquo, retained the court dresses of George the Second. Kemble arrayed the entire dramatis personæ in kilts, and made a good step in advance; but the correct point is reached at last in the magnificent revival, by Mr. C. Kean, at the Princess's Theatre.

Here is a much more agreeable picture by Hayman (one of the first members of the Royal Academy), in which we have the two great artists again as Ranger and Clarinda, in Dr. Hoadly's comedy of the Suspicious Husband. In this, the Garrick is light, airy, and elegant, as we have so often heard him described. Mrs. Pritchard is a fine portly looking dame, somewhat too substantial for the juvenile heroines of the comic muse; but her talent must have been of the highest order, for she conquered personal disadvantages, and her line embraced leading characters of the most opposite descriptions. She was as celebrated in Mrs. Oakly as in Lady Macbeth. Dr. Johnson says of her that she was coarse and uneducated; and her pronunciation of English so impure that she talked of her gownd. Her features were strong and impressive rather than pleasing, but her voice had great power and compass. Garrick told Wilkinson that, in scenes of passionate grief, she blubbered too much, and became indistinct with emo

tion. Mrs. Pritchard retired from the stage in 1768, and died, not long after, at Bath. Her last appearance was in Lady Macbeth. Garrick wrote her farewell address, which is a poor composition, much on a level with his own, delivered eight years later. The author of the epitaph on Quin might have produced something better than the following common-place rhymes :—

"The curtain dropt, my mimic life is past:
That scene of sleep and terror was my last-
I now appear myself-distress'd, dismayed,
More than in all the characters I've played:
In acted passion tears must seem to flow,

But I have that within which passeth show.

But worse lines than these will produce effect, if delivered with good emphasis and discretion.

Here is Garrick again as Jaffier, but this time accompanied by Mrs. Cibber as Belvidera. She was one of the most natural actresses that ever lived, so much so that it was impossible to imitate her. She had no salient points of peculiarity which could be caricatured. She was originally a singer, and sister to the great musical composer, Dr. Arne. Ophelia has never been so perfectly represented either before or since. Garrick dreaded ber quiet, determined manner, even more than the clamorous invectives of Clive and Woffington, when they squabbled for parts, as they were continually doing. A manager leads a sorry life with his rival queens. When

the news of Mrs. Cibber's death was brought to Garrick, he thus pronounced her eulogium "Then tragedy has expired with her! and yet she was the greatest female plague belonging to my house. I could very easily parry the threats and despise the coarse language of some of my other heroines; but whatever was Cibber's object, a new part or a new dress, she was always sure to carry her point, by the acuteness of her invention and the steadiness of her perseverance."

We are now standing opposite to the finest Zoffany in the collection, representing a scene from the Clandestine Marriage, with King as Lord Ogleby, Mrs. Baddely as Miss Fanny Sterling, and Baddely as Canton. Either as regards the likenesses or the details, this picture is admirable. Garrick originally intended to play Lord Ogleby himself, but resigned the part to King, who, under the instructions of his master, made it entirely