The system of calling on the principal performers after the play or opera, and half smothering them with bouquets, is a recent importation from the Continent, and has become so prevalent that it has ceased to be a compliment, and looks more like a mockery. Not unfrequently the call originates with Edmund Kean was a great favorite of half-a-dozen boys in the gallery, for the mere Mrs. Garrick, the widow of the celebrated fun of the thing. I once saw at the end actor. Whenever it was desirable that a of the Gamester, Mrs. Beverley, Beverley, new performer at Drury Lane should make Stukely, and Lewson, successively called out a hit, the committee used to bring the venerand dismissed with the usual gratulations.able old lady out to her private box, to say

he reminded her of David. She said so, and this went the round of the papers accordingly. In the case of Kean, she spoke honestly. He did remind her of her husband, and was nearer to him, by many degrees, than any actor she had ever seen, although both agreed he could not play Abel Drugger.* Once in conversation he complained to her that the papers made terrible mistakes as to his conceptions of character, readings, points, and other peculiarities. "These people," said he, "don't understand their business; they give me credit where I make no effort to deserve it, and they pass over the passages

on which I have bestowed the utmost care

and attention. They think because my style is new and appears natural, that I don't study, and talk about the sudden impulse of genius. There is no such thing as impulsive acting; all is studied beforehand. A man may act better or worse on a particular night from particular circumstances, but the conception is the same. I have done all these things a thousand times in country theatres, and perhaps better, before I was recognized as a great London actor, and have been loudly applauded; but the sound never reached as far as London." You should write your own criticisms," replied the old lady; "David always did so.”

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Garrick was a master of his art, and he never showed that mastery with more skill than in adopting this sound conservative practice. In 1807, a small volume was published by Leigh Hunt, called "Critical Essays," being a collection of theatrical articles which had appeared in the Examiner, and other London papers. Many of these are very well written, and the series may be referred to as a fair specimen of this class of composition. Hazlitt's notices, written when he was reporting for the London papers, have also been collected into a volume, entitled "A View of the English Stage," and have acquired considerable rep utation, but they are inferior to Hunt's both in sound judgment and impartiality. They abound in smart severities and ad captandum periods. But the book is valuable as a stage record, and contains accounts of

* Kean acted Abel Drugger for his benefit, which drew the following laconic note from Mrs. Garrick : "Dear Sir, you cannot play Abel Drugger. Yours, Eva Garrick;" to which he replied,-"Dear Madam, I know it. Yours, Edmund Kean."

the first appearances of Miss O'Neill, Miss Foote, Miss Stephens, Kean, and Macready, and of the last performances of Mrs. Siddons and John Kemble. In these pages there will be found a vast amount of prejudice. Hazlitt underrates Miss O'Neill, billingsgates Conway, allows Young scarcely any merit, and absolutely deifies Kean. Yet we have often heard him appealed to as the best theatrical critic of his day. Let us quote an extract or two to show why we differ from this:

"The best thing we remember in Coleridge's tragedy of Remorse, and which gave the greatest satisfaction to the audience, was that part in which Mr. was precipitated into a deep pit, from which, by the elaborate description which the poet had given of it, it was plainly impossible he should ever is to be puffed off, rise again. If Mr.

and stuck at the head of his profession at this unmerciful rate, it would almost induce us to wish Mr. Coleridge would write an other tragedy, to dispose of him in the same way as his predecessor."

Speaking of one of the most elegant and classical actors of the day, recognized by the public as such, he says:—

"Mr.

ought never to condescend to play comedy, nor aspire to play tragedy. Sentimental pantomime is his forte." Again :

Mr. is brought forward as a downright, common madman, just broke loose from a madhouse at Richmond, and is going with a club to dash out the brains of his daughter and her infant. The infant is no other than a large wooden doll: it fell on the floor the other evening without receiving any hurt, at which the audience laughed."

Mr. seemed to be rehearsing Don Felix, with an eye to Macduff, or some facemaking character."

"Mr. both speaks and sings as if he had a lozenge or a slice of marmalade in his mouth. If he could go to America and leave his voice behind him, it would be a great benefit-to the parent country."

"Mrs. never appeared to us any and at present she is very much out of tune." thing but an ordinary musical instrument,

Mr. makes his face up into a bad joke, and flings it right into the teeth of the spectators."

"Mr. acts as if he was moved by wires. He is a very lively automaton." "Mr. T, as Sir Oliver Surface, wore a great coat with yellow buttons."

"Mr. F, in Trip, had a large bouquet. And why should we refuse to do justice to who was dressed in black." Mr. Cis no favorite of ours; he is

"Mr.

always the same Mr., who shows his teeth, and rolls his eyes, and looks like a jackdaw just caught in a snare."

Mr.'s Prospero was good for nothing, and, consequently, was indescribably bad. Mr. had nothing of Caliban but his gaberdine, which did not become him."

Mr. C-topped the part of Comus with his usual felicity, and seemed almost as if the genius of a May-pole had inspired a human form. He is said to make a very handsome Comus; so he would make a very handsome Caliban, and the common sense of the transformation would be the same.'

Of Mr. C's Romeo we cannot speak with patience. He bestrides the stage like a Colossus, throws his arms into the air like the sails of a windmill, and his motion is as unwieldy as that of a young elephant. Quere, why does he not marry?”

Now all these smart and sarcastic nothings are very easily written, very well calculated to amuse a breakfast-table, and elicit the exclamations of Capital! how good! d-d keen! &c., &c., &c., but we beg leave respectfully to suggest they are not-criticism!

Perhaps the best sentence in Hazlitt's book is this:

"Mr. Kemble has been compared lately (in the Times) to the ruin of a magnificent temple, in which the divinity still resides. This is not the case. The temple is unimpaired, but the divinity is sometimes from home."

ceros.

the throne, to the lowest subordinate who says, "the coach is waiting," on the stage. "Tis the rough brake which virtue must go through," and is to be endured with becoming philosophy. Any one who writhes under it, should get rid as soon as possible, and how he may, of his sensitive feelings, and encase himself in the hide of a rhinoIt is certainly not pleasant to think that the reputation which it has taken a quarter of a century to establish, may be "snuffed out by an article," and possibly an incompetent one, in a quarter of an hour. But the patient must console himself by reflecting, that mighty men have, ere now, been extinguished by trifling agencies. King Pyrrhus was slain by an old woman, who threw a tile on his head; Lord Anson, who sailed round the world, caught his death by tumbling into a brook; and the great Duke of Marlborough died of sixpence.

The actor of thirty years' standing is often criticised, and perhaps condemned, by the scribbling tyro of three months' experience. John Kemble wrote out the part of Hamlet thirty times, and each time discovered something new which had escaped him before. During his last season, he said, "Now that I am retiring, I am only beginning thoroughly to understand my art." After Mrs. Siddons had left the stage, a friend calling on her one morning, found her in her garden musing over a book. What are you reading," said the visitor. "You will hardly guess," replied Melpomene. "I am reading over Lady Macbeth, and I am amazed to discover some new points in the character, In truth, to act is difficult, but to write which I never found out while acting it." what is called a criticism on acting, is wonderfully easy.

Here is certainly not a bad specimen of the multum in parvo. One of the best remarks, in this line, we ever read, was by a critic in a London paper (not Hazlitt) on a debutant in Richard the Third, who was too good to be hissed, but not good enough to be applauded. The writer said, we never before thoroughly understood honest Dog berry when he exclaims, most tolerable and not to be endured.'" Before quitting Hazlitt, we must point out the following observations to the attention of all those who think the scenery and appointments the great indispensables of a play, and in which all the merit is supposed to lie, as ADVENTURES OF A POLISH VETERAN. the wisdom in the judge's wig:

"One of the scenes (in the Duke of Milan) a view of the court-house, was most beautiful. Indeed the splendor of the scenery and dresses frequently took away from the effect of Mr. Kean's countenance."

In later times, much good acting has been entirely swamped by unnecessary pageantry. All public characters are lawful subjects for public criticism, from the sovereign on

From "The Tribune,"

WE translate for The Tribune from the Leipsic Grenzboten, the following thrilling and characteristic sketch of military life. Never before have we seen the utter hatred a Pole bears the Russian Emperor so powerfully illustrated.

ALTHOUGH the war with Denmark was a purely German affair, and hence allowed no foreign officer in the army, as a general rule, still a few Poles and Hungarians were re

His general deportment was marked by an astringent silence. Although he spoke the German language tolerably well, but with a foreign accent, he would never pronounce a word, unless necessary; nor had any one ever seen the slightest smile on his face at the jokes around the bivouac fire. For hours long he would sit brooding over the blaze of the watch-fire, so that if it had not been for the flash of his eye, which look

taken for a dead block of stone. Nor did he talk any more freely with his Polish comrades, when he happened to fall in with them. He drank no brandy, eat but little meat, and lived for the most part on beans, strong coffee, which he prepared for himself, and bread.

The soldiers, and even the officers, had a kind of dread of the gloomy corporal; and although they esteemed his admirable qualities as a soldier, they did not cotton to him very freely. For myself, I was strongly drawn toward the dark man, whose iron strength of character was expressed in his whole appearance, and I had often tried, without much success, to have a talk with him.

ceived as volunteers. There was an old two other Danish officers were shot by Pole, whom I knew as a non-commissioned him. infantry officer in the spring of 1850. He was a singular phenomenon, to be sure, exciting a lively interest as soon as I saw him. His appearance was not a little remarkable. His long, silver-gray beard and mustaches hung down from his thin, sharpfeatured face, from which flashed a pair of fiery blue eyes. The skin of his face, as bright and brown as leather, was dried up and wrinkled, showing that he had got his looks from many an exposure to the burned out upon the night, he might have been ing sun, and many a bivouac in storm and rain. A frightful scar extended from his forehead, with a dark red stripe over his nose to the corner of his mouth, dividing his face into two oblique parts. His forehead was high and broad. Only a few iron-gray locks straggled out from beneath his helmet. His figure seemed made entirely of muscles and sinews, dry, withered, yet at the same time vigorous and elastic. He limped a little with the left foot in consequence of a wound, and the middle finger was also wanting on the left hand. But his bearing was always erect and truly military, and how ever hot might be the July sun, he carried a full knapsack on a twelve hour's march, walking off with this heavy load as if he had been born with it on his back. His dress, in spite of dusty marches and rainy bivouacs, was always clean and tidy, and his arms as bright as if they had just come out of the shop. The picture of an old veteran of Napoleon's Imperial Guard was completed by the cross of the Legion of Honor and a Spanish order. As a soldier, he possessed a rare fidelity to duty, a thorough | knowledge of the service, and the most quiet courage. You could not but see that he had fought on many a bloody field. During the warm work at Idstedt he highly distinguished himself. He was as quiet in the midst of the enemy's fire as if he was not in the least disturbed by the whistling of the Danish bullets, or the dull growl of the cannon-balls. The men of his command asserted that they once heard him say he would never shoot a Danish soldier, unless obliged to do so, but would pick out only the offi cers." It is said among them that the general of the hostile army, Schleppegrell, was killed by his shot, and many eye-witnesses testify that on the retreat at Idstedt

One day the company in which he was a corporal had a pretty smart skirmish on the outposts with the Danes, in which they at last began to fire with some light field-pieces. As the enemy was retiring, a random shot was fired from a distance, and the ball took off both the corporal's legs below the knee. He fell bleeding to the ground with this terrible wound, and was taken off by his comrades senseless.

The next morning a soldier came to me with a request that I would go to the wounded man, who was lying in a neighboring farm-house, as he wished to speak to

me.

On the way, the surgeon of the battalion told me that the corporal would die within two hours. Although it was barely possible at first that he might have been saved by amputating both legs, he decidedly refused his consent, declaring that if the amputation were performed he would tear off the bandages. The proposal was accordingly given up, and mortification had already set in, which would cause his death in a few hours without pain.