"You may command me," replied the young lord, folding his arms, and throwing himself into an attitude of listless attention," I shall listen with all the patience you may require-I have been so much accustomed to exercise that very domestic virtue of late, that-" "I will, nevertheless, be brief," said Sir Robert; "I will not affect to misunderstand your meaning; it were a poor and pitiful affectation-to-morrow I leave you-I go to my place in Ireland-would I had gone at once after I welcomed you home; it would have saved me your friendship, and my own peace of mind-but regrets are now unavailing. I have already taken leave of Miss Ashtonville and her parents; and I have at least the consolation of knowing, that-" "You have sacrificed your own feelings, and those of Ada, to an irritable and ungrateful friend," cried Baltimore, as, ardent in every impulse, he sprang towards the baronet. Drewnorth, I blush ever to have doubted you-but from this hour-" 66 "I am satisfied, Frank," said Sir Robert, as he returned the embrace; "all I ask is, that we may part in friend ship, as we have ever done." No, Drewnorth!" cried the excited young man. "I will not be outdone in generosity; you shall not leave us tomorrow; it is now your turn to listen ;I have been an irritable, an unreasonable fool; I have felt bitterly towards you, without remembering that Ada's affections are in her own gift-do not interrupt me-I believe them to be yours:to affirm that I am unhurt by this belief, were to be insincere;-despite a thousand prejudices, I have learned to love Miss Ashtonville-fondly love her;-but her hand, if she has otherwise disposed of her heart, were a poor boon;-I have just made this discovery;-I should feel a pang in resigning her, did she indeed honour me with her preference; but if I find it otherwise, I owe it to myself, to withdraw at once my claim to her hand-and I will do so-tomorrow shall decide.-" "Are you indeed rash enough to—” "I am reasonable enough, Drewnorth, for that is a better word, to learn the truth; and from to-morrow never to see Ada again until she is Lady drewnorth; and I can look on her simply with the regard due to the wife of my friend; or to assent to your immediate departure, should her decision determine you to persist in your original resolution-do not endeavour to dissuade me from my purpose:-I am an only son:-I will not be thwarted-I cannot brook contradiction; you have already had proof of this; and now, good night." They parted; and at an early hour on the ensuing day, Lord Baltimore reached Ashtonville. Ada was alone in the library, and he entered unannounced; she was as pale as marble, and her fine hair hung negligently round her face; she looked languid, and her whole appearance bespoke a sleepless night. She did not remark the entrance of Baltimore, for she was leaning listlessly against the mantel, abstractedly strewing the leaves of a china rose on the fire, and watching them, as they successively shrivelled with the heat and disappeared. "Miss Ashtonville," said the intruder, in a low voice. Ada started, and looked round. "Do I intrude?" resumed Baltimore. "I have yet to learn the possibility of your doing so," said the lady, extending her hand; "I am then forgiven, my lord?” You have robbed me of a question, Miss Ashtonville, we will neither of us repeat it I am an early guest-I came to-to announce that is, not to announce, for I believe that he has already mentioned to you his intended departure' "You allude to Sir Robert Drewnorth," said the lady, calmly. "I do," replied her companion; "are you aware of the reason of this sudden determination." "He did not advance one," said Ada, and her face glowed. "He held it unnecessary," pursued Baltimore, with increased seriousness; "needed there words to tell Miss Ashtonville that he loved her? surely notthere is a feeling inherent in every female "Sir Robert!" exclaimed Ada, with a malignant start, "is it kind, is it generous, my lord, to select such a subject for raillery? my situation was already sufficiently distressing. I had hoped that my conduct would have secured me from the imputation of impropriety; but I never dreaded the breath of ridicule, at least from the son of Lord Mountmorris." She spoke with difficulty, and the tears of wounded feeling fell on her pale cheek. "Miss Ashtonville-Ada!" cried Baltimore, "in striving to spare you I have, I fear, wounded alike your delicacy and your pride. I too am proud-the very dread of uniting myself to a reluctant bride, dear as she might be to me—Oh ! you know not, you cannot guess what the purpose of this interview has cost me "Baltimore!" murmured Ada, and she turned on him eyes radiant with blended beauty and affection, "surely, surely, you came not here to spare me!" "Ada! my own Ada!" whispered the lover, as he twined his arm round her, and pressed his lip softly to her pale cheek, which grew crimson at the pres sure, "will you be mine indeed, without one remembrance of the hateful contract?" "Self-tormenting sceptic?" said Ada, tenderly, "you will make me a convert to your own doubts." "And are you really mine?" cried Baltimore, as he drew her yet closer to his heart, and she hid her blushing face on his shoulder, "mine! and mine only!" Not quite, young sir," said Mr. Ashtonville, coming forward, "as an old, and it may be indulgent friend to the lady, I still venture some claimshe is not yet yours-but, may Heaven bless you, my children!" and Mr. Ashtonville spoke with such solemnity, that Ada and her lover instinctively sank upon their knees before him: "may you be blest alike in yourselves, and in each other-may the autumn of your days be as calm as the spring is glorious; and when at length the winter of existence comes, may the blight never wither up your spirits, but fall on hearts prepared and chastened for the change! You are now young, but Time creeps on stealthily, and remember, that although when his path is over roses, you remark not his footfall, he is neverthe less unravelling the skein of life, and that he will one day suffer the end of it to escape him. And now, enough of this-we are all too much excited-we must not forget that we are all mere common mortals, moving in a common world, and that our debt to that world must be paid; therefore, when Lord Baltimore has finished the arduous task of wiping away your tears, Ada, and that you have ceased renewing the necessity of his labours, you will find me with your mother." S.S. SONG OF THE FAIRY KING. LET every flow'r yield up its fay, For the moon rides high, and we must away; Titania has shook off her soft repose, Where she slept in the breast of the damask rose, MRS. SIDDONS. "Denn schnell und spurlos geht des mimen kunst, THIS incomparable woman has departed from us, and in a very few years, they who remember what she was in the So nimmt er Schiller. Prolog. Walleinstein. full blaze of her greatness, will be-what she herself is. Then her name, like that of Garrick, or Betterton, or Cibber, The following is offered as a loose paraphrase, rather than an exact translation of the above passage; preserving the ideas without attempting to transfuse the poetical beauty: "Brief and trackless is the actor's art VOL. II. 'Tis wonderful! yet leaves no trace behind. To be the image of what it was. "Severe and toilsome is THE ART; fleeting The reward. Posterity weaves no wreath In the present-therefore should the moment He should build a living monument of will alone survive; no other memorial, no other record (save the inadequate language of her panegyrists, inadequate for every thing except to tell that such a person lived), will remain of one whose power over the hearts of thousands immeasurably surpassed all who were contemporary with her: even her own great and inimitable brother, John Kemble. So melancholy is the truth conveyed in the beautiful language of the German bard, which we have quoted above, the "magic of the scene with the scene itself expires!" Poets, painters, sculptors, orators-the children of fame in every path of human excellence, leave behind them something indicative of that for which they were renowned; something by which after ages can judge why they were famous in their own. But the actor lives alone in the eyes and ears of his own generation; nay, almost in the moment only that he is heard and seen; for though the impression he makes be strong, it is incommunicable, and hardly susceptible of being re-produced when memory would fain recal it. Who, indeed, can describe-so as to make another feel-the look, or tone, or gesture, which thrilled through his own frame as he gazed or listened? Or who can thrill again by the mere recollection of them, as he did when he owned their influence on the scene? It is there alone the actor Gives my breast a thousand pains, A despicable attempt, by the most despicable journal in the country, as far as principle of any kind is concerned (we mean The Times), was made to fling contempt upon the profession of an actor, the day after the death of Mrs. Siddons, because some one had suggested the idea of a public funeral in Westminster Abbey. Garrick had a public funeral; and wherein was Mrs. Siddons inferior to Garrick? But The Times has a sort of vampire-like delight in feeding upon insults to the dead. No sooner does the grave close over monarch, prince, or statesman, than it riots in mean slanders upon them. It was so with George III. It was so with George IV. It will be so with William IV. It was so with the Duke of York. It was so with the Marquis of Londonderry. It would be difficult to account for this revolting propensity, if we did not know that malignity and cowardice are twin vices; and that a blow struck at the dead provokes no danger. With regard to public honours bestowed upon the memory of a Garrick or a Siddons, where is their impropriety? Their great talents obtained for them, while living, the most flattering distinctions from those with whom it is deemed an honour to associate. Why, then, should their talents be denied the celebration of posthumous honours? Why should they be considered un worthy of that tribute when dead, which they gathered so abundantly when alive? It is no new homage; no testimonial created for the occasion: it is merely a final demonstration of respect at the grave; even as the sorrow of relatives is but that love and affection clothed in tears, which once were dressed in smiles and gladness. We, who are lovers of Shakspeare, not "on this side," but to, idolatry, can never hope to see again Queen Katharine, Queen Constance, Lady Macbeth, Hermione, Isabella (in Measure for Measure), Volumnia, and Desdemona, personated as Shakspeare drew them, unless nature should present us with another Siddons, which is what we do not expect. It was one of the highest mental luxuries of which we have any recollection, to hear that extraordinary woman deliver the language of Shakspeare; and many a time, in order that we might enjoy this luxury, without any admixture of "baser matter" by the other senses, have we closed our eyes to the scene, to revel in the enjoyment of her matchless elocution, and the deep full tone of her harmonious voice, undulating upon the ear like the most perfect melody, while every sentence as it fell from her lips was fraught with the meaning of the inspired bard; so unlike the parrot recitation and mouthing inanity of those whose minds, if they have any, are divorced from their tongues, and who do Shakspeare by memory. Mrs. Siddons stood at his shrine; and when she spoke, seemed full of the god whose priestess she was. She had a majesty of form, too, and what we would almost call a sublimity of countenance, when lighted up by the loftier passions, added to a graceful dignity of action, such as, probably, were never combined, in the same de gree, in any other actress. There were no drawbacks in her; no allowances to be made for defects, in stature, voice, or lineaments: she realized all that poet or painter would have feigned as the representative of queenly grandeur and tragic solemnity. It was one of the peculiar qualities of Mrs. Siddons's histrionic genius (a quality which also belonged to her Q. Kath. Lord Cardinal To you I speak. brother, though hardly in so eminent a degree), that while she spread her conceptions, as it were, over a whole character, and made it her own, she imparted to single sentences, half lines, and sometimes to a word only, such a thrilling, such a concentrated force of passionate meaning, that they fell upon the audience like an electrical shock. Her "Is he alive?" in Lady Randolph; her "Farewell-remember twelve !" in Belvidera; her "Give me the dagger!" in Lady Macbeth; and her " Keep your own counsel and begone!" to Stukely, in the Gamester, are a few instances which it is sufficient to recal to those who have heard her; while to those who have not, no description can convey any idea of her manner. The same may be said of the following, in the trial scene, in Henry VIII: Cardinal Wolsey. Your pleasure, madam. I am about to weep; but, thinking that We are a queen-(or long have dream'd so)-certain " I'll turn to sparks of fire. Wol. Be patient yet. Q. Kath. I will, when you are humble; nay, before, Induced by potent circumstances, that You are mine enemy; and make my challenge, The words in italics, and more especially those in small capitals-"You SHALL NOT BE MY JUDGE!"-were delivered by her with such a swelling grandeur of voice, and look, and attitude-with such measureless contempt for, and defiance of, him whom she knew to be her secret enemy, that surely if the unhappy queen herself, full of her wrongs, had so spoken, and so looked, even her tyrant husband and iniquitous judge must have shrunk down abashed and foregone their base design. This character, by the by, as we learn from her conversation with Dr. Johnson, recorded by Boswell, was her favourite one; and truly the representation of it has died with her. It was, from first to last, a gem; an exquisite gem! How fine was her transient burst of impatient pride, suddenly overborne by grief, in the following, as she was departing the court Card, Campeius. She's going away. Kath. What need you note it? pray you keep your way; When you are call'd return. Now the Lord help! They vex me past my patience! Pray you pass on: I will not tarry; no, nor ever more Upon this business, my appearance make |