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then have a very tight, compact little company, and crowded houses in the dog-days.

The new after-piece of Two Words,' at the English Opera, is a delightful little piece. It is a scene with robbers and midnight murder in it; and all such scenes are delightful to the reader or spectator. We can conceive nothing better managed than the plot of this. The spell-bound silence and dumb-show of Rose, the servant girl at the house in the forest, to which the benighted travellers come, has an inimitable effect; and to make it complete, it is played by Miss Kelly. The signals conveyed by the music of a lone flute in such a place, and at such a time, thrill through the ear, and almost suspend the breath. Mr. Short did not spoil the interest excited by the story, and both Mr. Wilkinson and Mrs. Grove did justice to the parts of the terrified servant, and the mischievous old house-keeper, who is a dexterous accomplice in the dreadful scene. The fault of the piece is, that the interest necessarily falls off in the second act, which makes it rather tiresome, though the second appearance of Miss Kelly in it, as the ward of Bartley at his great castle, is very ingeniously contrived, and occasions some droll perplexities to her lover, Don whose life

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she has just saved from the hands of the assassins, only escaping from their vengeance herself by the arrival of her valorous guardian and a party of his soldiers. On the whole, this is the best novelty that has been brought out during the season at the English Opera, and we wish it every possible success.

[Haymarket.]

Mr. Terry last week had for his benefit The Surrender of Calais. He played the part of Eustace de St. Pierre in it

Two Words; or, The Silent not Dumb, attributed to S. J. Arnold, was produced September 2. Miss Kelly was Rose; Mrs. Grove, the Hostess; T. Short, Valbelle (the lover); Wilkinson, La Fleur; and Bartley, Sir Hildebrand de Guy.

2 By G. Colman the younger, revived August 27.

with judgment and energy, but without a pleasing effect. When Mr. Terry plays these tragic characters,

"The line too labours, and the thoughts move slow."

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He sticks in tragedy like a man in the mud; or, to borrow a higher figure from a learned critic, "he resembles a person walking on stilts in a morass.' "2 We shall always be glad to lift him out of it into the common path of unpretending comedy: there he succeeds, and is himself. The Surrender of Calais is as interesting as a tragedy can be without poetry in it. It has considerable pathos, though of a kind which borders on the shocking too much. It requires accomplished actors to carry it off; but it was not, in the present instance, very heroically cast. The Haymarket Theatre inclines more to comedy than to tragedy; and there are several scenes in this tragedy (for such it really is till it is over), which, "not to be hated," should be seen at the greatest possible distance that the stage allows. One advantage, at least, of our overgrown theatres is, that they throw the most distressing objects into a milder historical perspective.

3

THE WONDER.

Covent-Garden, September 15, 1816.

The Wonder3 is one of our good old English comedies, which holds a happy medium between grossness and refine

1 POPE, Essay on Criticism, 1. 371, where it runs "the words move slow."

2 A. W. Schlegel says this of Dryden; see his Dramatic Art, p. 479, Bohn's edition.

3 The Wonder; A Woman Keeps a Secret, by Mrs. Centlivre, was given September 13.

ment. The plot is rich in intrigue, and the dialogue in double entendre, which however is so light and careless, as only to occasion a succession of agreeable alarms to the ears of delicacy. This genuine comedy, which is quite as pleasant to read as to see (for we have made the experiment within these few days, to our entire satisfaction) was written by an Englishwoman, before the sentimental, ultra-Jacobinical German School, of which a short and amusing account has been lately given in The Courier,' had spoiled us with their mawkish platonics and maudlin metaphysics. The soul is here with extreme simplicity considered as a mere accessary to the senses in love, and the conversation of bodies preferred to that of minds as much more entertaining. We do not subscribe our names to this opinion, but it is Mrs. Centlivre's, and we do not choose to contradict a lady. The plot is admirably calculated for stage-effect, and kept up with prodigious ingenuity and vivacity to the end. The spectator is just beginning to be tired with the variety of stratagems that follow and perplex one another, when the whole difficulty is happily unravelled in the last scene. The dove-tailing of the incidents and situations (so that one unexpected surprise gives place to another, and the success of the plot is prevented by the unluckiest accident in the world happening in the very nick of time) supplies the place of any great force of character or sentiment. The time for the entrance of each person on the stage is the moment when they are least wanted, and when their arrival makes either themselves or somebody else look as foolish as possible. The Busy Body shows the same talent for invention and coupd'œil for theatrical effect, and the laughableness of both comedies depends on a brilliant series of mis-timed exits and entrances. The Wonder is not, however, without a moral;

2

1 A series of letters on "The Drama-Bertram" appeared in The Courier of August 29, September 7, 9, 10, and 11. The second letter is here referred to.

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it exhibits a rare example of a woman keeping a secret, for the sake of a female friend, which she is under every temptation to break, and her resolution and fidelity are, after a number of mortifying accidents and fears, happily rewarded by the triumph both of her friendship and her love. The situation of Violante is more prominent than her character; or, at least, the character is more moral than entertaining. She is a young lady of great goodness of heart and firmness of principle, but who neither displays any great superiority of wit in extricating herself from the difficulties in which her regard for the safety of her friend involves her, nor of spirit in repelling the insinuations to which her reputation is exposed in the eyes of her lover. She submits to her situation with firmness of purpose, and conscious reliance on her own innocence.

Miss Boyle,' the young lady who appeared in this character on Friday, showed herself not incompetent to its successful delineation. Her figure is tall, and her face, though her features are small, is pretty and expressive. Her articulation (for a first appearance) was remarkably distinct, and her voice is full and sweet. It is, however, rather sentimental than comic. She rounds her words too much, nor do they come "trippingly from the tongue." It is sufficient if the dialogue of genteel comedy comes with light-fluttering grace and gay animation from the lips; it should not come labouring up all the way from the heart. This young lady's general demeanour is easy and unaffected; and when she has overcome her timidity, we have no doubt she will give considerable spirit and dignity to the more serious scenes of the story. Her smile has much archness and expression; and we hope, from the promise of taste and talent which she gave through her whole performance, that she will prove an acquisition to the stage, in a line of comedy in which we are at present absolutely deficient. She was very favourably

1 Miss Henrietta Cecil Boyle married Professor John Thelwall May 15, 1817, and died in 1863.

received throughout [and is to repeat the part on Friday next].

We do not think the play in general was well got up. Charles Kemble seemed to be rehearsing Don Felix with an eye to Macduff, or some face-making tragic character. He was only excellent in the drunken scene. Mrs. Gibbs1 at one time fairly took wing across the stage, and played the chamber-maid with too little restraint from vulgar decorums. Mr. Abbott never acts ill, but he does not answer to our idea of Colonel Briton. Emery's Gibby was sturdy enough, and seemed to prove what he himself says, that "a Scotchman is not ashamed to show his face any where."2

THE DISTRESSED MOTHER.

3

[Covent Garden] September 22, 1816.

A MR. MACREADY 3 appeared at Covent-Garden Theatre on Monday and Friday, in the character of Orestes, in The Distressed Mother, a bad play for the display of his powers, in which, however, he succeeded in making a decidedly favourable impression upon the audience. His voice is powerful in the highest degree, and at the same time possesses great harmony and modulation. His face is not equally calculated for the stage. He declaims better than any body we have lately heard. He is accused of being violent, and of wanting pathos. Neither of these objections is true. His manner of delivering the first speeches in this play was admirable, and the want of increasing interest

1 Mrs. Gibbs was Flora.

2 "There ne'er was a Scotsman yet that shamed to show his face."The Wonder, v, i.

3 William Charles Macready (1793-1873), whose London début is here recorded, made his farewell as Macbeth February 26, 1851.

4 By Ambrose Philips, revived September 16.

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