vidual life a tinge of piquant interest, because it is one denotement of the temperament of genius.

The poets of the world pour themselves through all subjects by the use of their own words. In what manner they are affected by the forces of nature its influences of gentleness and peace or its vast pageants of beauty and terror - those words denote; and also those words indicate the action, upon their responsive spirits, of the passions that agitate the human heart. The actors, on the other hand, assuming to be the interpreters of the poets, must pour themselves through all subjects by the use of their own personality. They are to be estimated accordingly by whatever the competent observer is able to perceive of the nature and the faculties they reveal under the stress of emotion, whether tragic or comic. Perhaps it is not possiblemind being limited in its function-for any person to form a full, true, and definite summary of another human creature. To view a dramatic performance with a consciousness of the necessity of forming a judicial opinion of it is often to see one's own thought about it rather than the thing itself. Yet, when all allowance

is made for difficulty of theme and for infirmity of judgment, the observer of Ada Rehan may surely conclude that she has a rich, tender, and sparkling nature, in which the dream-like quality of sentiment and the discursive faculty of imagination, intimately blended with deep, broad, and accurate perceptions of the actual, and with a fund of keen and sagacious sense, are reinforced with strong individuality and with affluent and extraordinary vital force. Ada Rehan has followed no traditions. She went to the stage not because of vanity but because of spontaneous impulse; and for the expression of every part that she has played she has gone to nature and not to precept and precedent. The stamp of her personality is upon everything that she has done; yet the thinker who looks back upon her numerous and various impersonations is astonished at their diversity. The romance, the misery, and the fortitude of Kate Verity, the impetuous passion of Katharine, the brilliant raillery of Hippolyta, the enchanting womanhood of Rosalind — how clear-cut, how distinct, how absolutely dramatic was each one of those personifications! and yet how completely characteristic each one was of this individual

actress! Our works of art may be subject to the application of our knowledge and skill, but we ourselves are under the dominance of laws which operate out of the inaccessible and indefinable depths of the spirit. Alongside of most players of this period Ada Rehan is a prodigy of original force. Her influence, accordingly, has been felt more than it has been understood, and, being elusive and strange, has prompted wide differences of opinion. The sense that she diffuses of a simple, unselfish, patient nature, and of impulsive tenderness of heart, however, cannot have been missed by anybody with eyes to see. And she crowns all by speaking the English language with a beauty that has seldom been equalled.

XVIII.

TENNYSON'S COMEDY OF THE FORESTERS.

"BESIDES, the King's name is a tower

of strength." Thousands of people all over the world honour, and ought to honour, every word that falls from the pen of Alfred Tennyson. He is a very great man. No poet since the best time of Byron has written the English language so wellthat is to say, with such affluent splendour of imagination; such passionate vigour; such nobility of thought; such tenderness of pathos; such pervasive grace, and so much of that distinctive variety, flexibility, and copious and felicitous amplitude which are the characteristics of an original style. No poet of the last fifty years has done so much to stimulate endurance in the human soul and to clarify spiritual vision in the human mind. It does not signify that now, at more than fourscore, his hand sometimes trembles a little on the harpstrings, and his touch falters, and his

music dies away. It is still the same harp and the same hand. This fanciful, kindly, visionary, drifting, and altogether romantic comedy of Robin Hood is not to be tried by the standard that its author reared when he wrote Ulysses and Tithonus and The Passing of Arthur that imperial, unapproachable standard that no other poet has satisfied.

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'Cold upon the dead volcano sleeps the gleam of dying day."

But though the passion be subdued and the splendour faded, the deep current of feeling flows on and the strong and tender voice can still touch the heart and charm the ear. That tide of emotion and that tone of melody blend in this play and make it beautiful. The passion is no longer that of Enone and Lucretius and Guinevere and Locksley Hall and Maud and The Vision of Sin. The thought is no longer that of In Memoriam, with its solemn majesty and infinite pathos. The music is no longer that of The May Queen and the Talking Oak and Idle Tears. But why should these be expected? He who struck those notes strikes now another; and as we listen our wonder grows, and cannot help but grow, that a