BERKELEY

LIBRARY
UNIVERSITY OF

CALIFORNIA

THE TRAGEDIAN
AN ESSAY ON

THE HISTRIONIC GENIUS

OF

JUNTOS BEUTUS BOOTH.

THOMAS

R.

GOULD.

NEW YORK:
PUBLISHED BY KURD AND HOUGHTON.
1868.

Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1868, by

THOMAS R. GOULD,
In the Clerk
s Office

of the District Court for the District of Massa

chusetts.

LOAN STACK

RIVERSIDE, CAMBRIDGE:

STEREOTYPED AND PRINTED BT

H. 0.

HOUGHTON AND COMPANY.

M Ac

To

EDWIN BOOTH,
WHOSE RARE GOOD GIFTS HAVE ALREADY WON FOR THE UNDIVIDED ADMIRATION AND RESPECT OF
HIS COUNTRYMEN,
HEVI

OF HIS ILLUSTRIOUS FATHER, ARE AFFECTIONATELY

INSCRIBED,

BY THE AUTHOR.

716

PUBLISHER S NOTE.
THE
the

admirable photograph which

faces

title-page, was taken by H. G. Smith from a marble bust of Mr. Booth, sculptured

by the author of this volume.

CONTENTS.
PAGE

RICHARD

III

37 49

HAMLET
SHYLOCK
IAGO

73
81 92 118
.
.

OTHELLO

MACBETH
LEAR
CASSIUS

134
151

SIR GILES

OVERREACH

153 158

LUKE
SIR

EDWARD MORTIMER

160
166

BRUTUS

PESCARA

172
175

REUBEN GLENROT
OCTAVIAN

176
.
.
.
.

BERTRAM
PIERRE

177

179
.

THE STRANGER THE TRAGEDIAN AN INCIDENT

180
181

182 184
188

DIALOGUE

THE TRAGEDIAN

THE TRAGEDIAN.

DECEMBER,

1852.

days ago a private letter from New Orleans assured us, that the great actor of

TEN

the

Golden had arrived from the Land," was then playing an engagement in that city, and appeared in remarkably good
"

age

health.

which Swiftly following this intelligence us hope soon again to have sight gave of the Proteus of Shakespearean character
"

"

"

the

coming from the sea," and hear once more strange inward music of his voice came last week, with spleen of speed," the telegram that he had died on the passage to
"

Cincinnati.

Our
sonal

first

feeling

was the pang of a per

friendship,

came the thought

Then suddenly parted. that a great artist, the

had passed

greatest in his sphere in our day,

THE TRAGEDIAN.
finally, vivid

away; and
tions,

images and emo

won from

character

that wide range of tragic in which he so truthfully lived,

in

came crowding into our memory. JUNIUS BRUTUS BOOTH was born
don,
the

Lon

May

1, 1796.

don stage

at

appeared on the Lon the age of twenty, but has run

He

greater part of his dramatic career in He was of short stature, but this country.

and action were types of manli His face was cast originally ness and power. in the antique Roman mould ; and even many
his presence

years after the

spoiled
its

untoward accident

which
on one

classic outline, it presented,

occasion,

when we were

sitting

by

his side,

a singular resemblance to the portraits of Michael Angelo.

No
those

who have

language can do more than recall, to seen him in his most vital

his look

moods, the terrible and beautiful meaning of and gesture ; or the charm of his

massive

and resonant voice. For voice, and every fibre of his wonderful gesture, organization, were subordinated to a genius, which laid hold of and expressed, with
absolute
sincerity, the
;

radical elements
to its

of

character

and gave play

minor mani-

THE TRAGEDIAN.
festations,

with the spontaneous freedom and of nature. variety well remember how, in former times,

We

we hungered and
his personations.

thirsted, in the intervals of

his absence, after the intellectual

beauty of

His great popularity, which time, accident, and eccentric habits seldom availed to di minish, seemed owing mainly to those fire
blasts of a volcanic energy, that

power of

instant
sion,

and tremendous concentration of pas which was one constituent of his genius. Yet it was curious to observe a crowded and tumultuous pit, with its new comers strug in the coigne of vantage gling for some
"

"

doorways, noisily careless of the sorrows of King Henry, but hushed in a moment,
"

Still

as night,

Or summer
as the grand, but

noontide

air,"

subdued and self-commun

s

ing intonations of Richard

fell

opening soliloquy

upon In the cumulative and energetic evolution of character, which forms the basis of his fame, the subtler traits of Mr. Booth s delin eations were often overlooked but, to our thinking, it was this marvelous delicacy
;

their ears.

8
especially
it was."

TEE TRAGEDIAN.
which made his acting the feast It was this rare power which ena
"

bled

him

to follow the lead of

imagination, in its
its

airiest flights,

Shakespeare s most secret windings and and found him the sole

our time, worthy to present in living form the characters of Hamlet, lago, Othello, and Lear.
artist of

Thus much have we

in the

felt impelled to say, of the hour,- in grateful memory hurry

of one from
light

whom we
;

have drawn deep de

while

and instruction

we

reserve, to

sftme future day, an ampler notice, worthy, we trust, in some measure, of his exalted

representative genius.

1868.

AN
The
lines

actor

nature of his
sculptor

art, visionary
s

posthumous fame and

thought
lives

is,

by the
him, in
;

traditional.

after

and masses of imperishable marble the sorcery of painter s in simulated forms and on his canvas and from the impish color
"
"

figures

of the composer
at
"

score, a cunning

hand may

any time evoke

soul of
harmony."

The hidden

But when a great actor passes away, nothing remains excepting grand and delicate images, which in silent hours crowd the memory of
those

who have

which
in the

finds a fainter

seen him, and the report of and still receding echo

not.

minds of those who have

this view, in grateful testimony to the rare delight his personations have afforded ;

In

and in the hope of giving body to the vision, and language to the common sentiment of his appreciators, we proceed to record our im pressions of Mr. Booth s genius for dramatic
impersonation.

10

THE TRAGEDIAN.

And

here

we

feel

we cannot advance one

steady step without first considering, and haply disposing of, Charles Lamb s thought
ful essay

On the Tragedies of Shakespeare, considered in their fitness for stage repre in which he evinces the most sentation";
"

penetrating

sentiment
s

of

the

quality

of

Shakespeare genius, and denies with equal emphasis, but less discretion, the power of the

The sophistry of his stage to reproduce it. argument, as we apprehend it, lies in his ap
plying to

Shakespeare

dramas the

most

subtle imaginative tests, and thereupon as suming the entire absence of the imaginative

faculty in the representation of those dramas

on the

Let us review his theory cannot be represented, it Shakespeare

stage.

for

if

is

idle

to assign the quality of genius to any actor. Lamb tells us that, as he was taking a

turn in Westminster Abbey, he was struck by an affected figure of Garrick, the player, under writ by some fustian lines about the
equality

Garrick and need we affirm our Scarcely Shakespeare sympathy with Lamb s condemnation of their false thoughts and nonsense." They con
of

genius between

"

tain sufficient provocation to set off the ec-

THE TRAGEDIAN.

centric genius of Elia at a smart pace in the opposite direction.

can follow him in his lucid exposition of the inadequacy of the stage to represent supernatural scenery ; and the consequent
failure of all attempts to

We

reproduce the fairy

s Dream,"

creations of

"

A Midsummer Night

and
their

"

The

Tempest."

These require

for

due appreciation, an imagination sub tilized by quiet, and airily abstracted from
the presence of material objects.

But when he proceeds

stage
single

to distinguish the

as

equally incapable
characters, in

human
by

of embodying which the imagi

;

nation plays a conspicuous part

or

who

are

possessed
let,

supernatural emotions, as

Ham

Macbeth, Lear, then we part company

with the ingenious essayist.

of their adequate

The

possibility

man

is

representation by living involved in the fact of their creation

within the sphere of humanity.

No

doubt,

Lamb

sensitive spirit, devel

oped and nourished in the morning light and dew and fragrance of the English classics,

was often shocked by pretenders to the much-abused and misjudged fine art of acting Even that swarmed the London theatres.

12

THE TRAGEDIAN.

Edmund Kean, no pretender, but an original and genuine artist, may have swelled the
current of this feeling. Hazlitt cherished a passionate admiration for Kean ; but he was a jealous lover, and

Kean dis frequently chastised his favorite. him in Lear. The critic quotes appointed
the passage,
"

heavens,

you do love old men, if your sweet sway Hallow obedience, if yourselves are old, Make it your cause; send down, and take my Art not ashamed to look upon this beard?
If

part!

Regan, wilt thou take her by the

"

hand?"

and adds, One would think there are tones and looks and gestures answerable to these words, to thrill and harrow up the thoughts, to appall the guilty and make mad the free or that might create a soul under the ribs of
i
:

death
It
is

But we

did not see or hear them.

s

not enough that Lear

retorts,
"What

crosses

and per
and

plexities are expressed by single

strokes."

Lamb

have looks

tones to do with that sublime identification of

his age with that of the heavens themselves, when, in his reproaches to them, for conniving

at the injustice of his children, he reminds ? them that they themselves are old
"

THE TRAGEDIAN.

13

Lamb
the

word

enforces his abstract point by italicizing "heavens." But the attentive

reader of the play will see that Lear, the grand old pagan king, uses this word inter
the gods were changeably with "gods" if the heavens are not. persons

The respective printed articles in which these opposing views occur, are the evident outcome of a foregone conversation.
.

We

can fancy Hazlitt coming, on a Wednesday evening, hot from the theatre, into that con
gress of wits and good fellows then assembled at Lamb s lodgings ; uttering and controvert

ing opinion, with fierce and fitful eloquence ; then disappearing, in order to write one of
those papers on

Kean
from

performances, which
"

was

to lighten

dull world

his firefly page, on the of London, in the Chronicle

"

of the following day.

Lamb might have

added, and with equal

pertinency, to his question about looks and tones, what have words to do with that

sublime identification
signs.

Words

are arbitrary

Tone

is

their living spirit.

Tone

is

the direct utterance of the

heart and

the

We hold with Hazlitt. We imagination. have heard tones equal to the expression of

14

THE TRAGEDIAN.

the grandest words of Shakespeare. ring in the chambers of memory.

We

They
have

seen faces, one face, at least, capable of pre senting the very look of Lear, as he stood with his lifted face, blanched and wasted by

accumulated and unutterable

grief, his soul

looking through blue eyes, beyond the storm, towards the blue heavens, the abode of those
"

kind gods
for the

"

into

whose awful
transfigured.

likeness he

was

moment

We
we
its

judge of the capability of an art, had no better guide, by its best examples, not

average product : as in painting we take, not a tavern sign, being a portrait of the pro
prietor

but rather Raphael s picture in the Dresden Gallery of that Divine Child whose
;

name

is

Wonderful.
supposes that an actor must

Lamb
"

be

thinking only and always of his own appear On what compulsion must he ? tell ance. us
that."

A genuine actor,
as

it is

true, delights
;

in his

own product

an

artist

but

why

same time, the inspi may ration of his author, even to the point of selfBrooding study, and a mas forgetfulness ?
he not
feel, at the

tery over the business of his profession, may be the very means of his emancipation, and

THE TRAGEDIAN.

15

contribute to give free play to his genius ; even as the habit of virtue deepens the foun
tains of spontaneous goodness. Compare for a moment the histrionic with

and see what delight of liberty If the dull and the former may command. silent clay can be so manipulated by the hand
a
sister, art,

of genius as to insphere and express the rar est beauty of woman, as in that Neapolitan
colossal

Psyche, pure, proud, visionary ; or rise to the grandeur of the Phidian Jupiter,
big imagination glows in that lip why may not the actor, whose clay is a living organism of fearful and wonderful forces,
("how
!
")

make

an instant vehicle of the most glow He is statue, and picture, ing inspiration. and poem, and music, and informs them all
it

with
his

life

and motion, through the charm of

s

magnetic presence.
article is

Lamb
Let the
be
"

closet student exalt, if

a special literary plea. he will, the

pleasure of abstract reverie.

that robust

We hold

it

to

womanish and weak," compared with and intellectual delight, which a sense of distinctness comes with the
" "

great actor is capable of imparting to creations of human character whose form is genuine,

16

THE TRAGEDIAN.

and which can bear light and sound and mo The charm of Shakespeare s dramas is not a witch s spell, that an uttered word may
tion.

break.

like line of

Certain purists of to-day are following a argument with Lamb, in their

graduation of the relative dignity of the arts. Their formula might be stated thus that is
:

the finest art which employs the most imma terial vehicle. But so long as the beauty of
the world depends on the law of gravitation, we dare maintain, that the finest art is that

which the by the most

in

solidest material is
spiritual thought.

permeated This is the

true
"

Bridal of the earth and

sky."

Not with

his usual vision of the

germs and

processes of genius did Lamb write, that an actor is an imitator of the signs and turns of
passion.
sensible

actor of the understanding, a actor, indeed, always takes this

;

An

an imaginative actor, never. One takes the words of the text (always premis

method

ing that he
empirical the
character.

not a poor copy of some precedent), reasons upon, and

is

infers

meaning, and

so

extracts

the

The

result of this

method, how-

THE TRAGEDIAN.

17

is

ever carefully and comprehensively employed, at best but an abstract induction, having

something of the aspect of reality, but auto matic, and without the breath of life.

The

other looks, for example, into one of

s

Shakespeare

great
;

creations, as if passing
is filled

into a real presence

by

its

spirit

listens to its

and atmosphered language as to a

living voice ; is brought into intimate rela tions with the springs of its being ; and conceives it in unity by the power of a

brooding and recreative imagination. And unto this power, because it cometh
"

not with

observation,"

but transcends the

understanding

it is vital and life; and elevates acting from a mimetic giving, into an imaginative art, subordinating the

because

comparative intellect to
justified laws,

its

higher and

self-

we

feel

a considerate and

bound to give, with responsible decision, the

of genius. is too often do profaned. not intend either to cumber or distract the

sacred

name

This word

We

reader
will

mind with a new

definition.

But

it

be found equally true of the representa

they find

tive, as of the originating arts, that

their highest expression with swiftness, ease,

18
and joy.

THE TRAGEDIAN.

With

swiftness

for repose itself,

a live quiet, a quality so profound in art and so misappreciated, sits at the farthest remove

from dullness, and necessitates a quick con Living" tinuity of harmonious conditions.
"

and
ease

"

"

quick
;

for,

when

are English synonyms. the high powers of the

With
mind

come by

invitation or spontaneous consent,

and combine and converge towards one com

mon
and

end, the beautiful in art, their grandest

their gravest
is

work

is

play.

The glow

of

this play

the very element of joy. If in addition to the power we have indi

cated, but dare not define,

an actor be gifted

with an organization instantly responsive to

monitions, the conduit of its influence, and the varying form of its strong possession, or
its its

subtle

and

shifting inspiration,

we

call

him

by the noble name of artist. That Mr. Booth was a man of genius in the vital conception, and a consummate artist in the varied expression of dramatic, and es
pecially of Shakespearean character, amply to illustrate, by a review of his

we hope
more

important personations, defined and refreshed by memoranda made at the time of their
occurrence, during many years, for private reference and delight.

THE TRAGEDIAN.

19

In person Mr. Booth was short, spare and muscular with a head and face pf antique a neck and beauty dark -hair blue eyes
; ; ; ;

chest of ample but symmetrical

mould a
;

step

and movement
face
is

elastic, assured, kingly.

was

pale, with that healthy pallor

His which

one sign of a magnetic brain.

this brief, close-knit, imperial figure,

Throughout Nature

forces

had planted or diffused her most vital organic and made it the capable servant of the commanding mind that descended into
;

and possessed

The
found

it in every fibre. condensation of his temperament airy

fullest expression in his voice.

Sound

and capacious lungs, a vascular and fibrous throat, clearness and amplitude in the inte rior mouth and nasal passages, formed its
physical basis. truth of those

Words are weak, but the we shall employ, in an en

felt

deavor to suggest that voice, will be

multitudes

by by its living tones. Deep, massive, resonant, manystringed, changeful, vast in volume, of mar

who have been

thrilled

velous flexibility and range ; delivering with ease, and power of instant and total inter

change, trumpet-tones, bell-tones, tones like sound of many waters," like the muffled the
"

and confluent

"

roar of bleak-grown

pines."

20

THE TRAGEDIAN.
But no
analogies in art or nature, and espe its organic structure
conditions, could reveal the inner

cially

no indication of
its

and physical
secret of

charm.

This charm lay in the

mind, of which his voice was the organ: a 4t most miraculous organ," under the sway of
a thoroughly informing mind. The chest voice became a fountain of passion and emo tion. The head register gave the clear,
"

silver, icy,

keen, awakening tones

"

of the

pure intellect. And as the imagination stands, with its beautiful and comforting face, between
heart and brain, and marries

them with a

benediction, giving glow to the thoughts, and form to the emotions, so there arose in this
intuitive actor a third

element of voice, hard

the imaginative,
single

to define, but of a fusing, blending, Kindling

quality,

which we
the
full

may name
in

which appeared now

some

word,

now with

diapason of tones in some

memorable sentence, and which distinguished him as an incomparable speaker of the Eng lish tongue. That voice was guided by a method which defied the set rules of elocution. It transcended music. It brought airs from heaven and blasts from hell." It struggled and smothered in the pent fires of passion, or
"

THE TRAGEDIAN.

21

darted from them as in tongues of flame. the earthquake voice of victory." It was
"

It was,

break.

on occasion, full of tears and heart Free as a fountain, it took the form
;

and and pressure of the conduit thought known parallel in voice of expressive beyond man, it suggested more than it expressed. But his voice was marked by one signifi There It had no mirth. cant limitation. were tones of light, but none of levity. No
laughter, but that terrific laughter in Shylock, which seemed torn from his malignant heart
at the
is

announcement of Antonio

s losses.

It

have true Mr. Booth played in farce. seen him repeatedly as Jerry Sneak, in
Foote
s

We

farce of the

"

Mayor
"

of Garratt

"

and as Geoffry Muffincap, in

Actors."

But
our

his acting in this kind

Amateurs and was

alive.

never

to

taste.

It

was not fun

His farce was simply the negation of his tragedy. In it he took the one step from the
sublime.
smile, the pleasantry
social intercourse,

The sunny blue eye, the genial we found so winning in

stage.

never appeared upon the His genius, and the voice it swayed,

as he was,

were dedicated to tragedy. Child of nature though consummated by art, he

22

THE TRAGEDIAN.

disdained no resource which might minister

to the legitimate effects of tragedy. it be said that, as Phidias blended the lion may

And

into the god, in the face of his Jupiter, so

Booth
lion s

lifted the lion s voice,

"

the prowling

Here

I am,

"

into the

human

scale,

and with judicious reserve and translated meaning bade it "roar and thunder in the
index
"

Such

of the stormier passions. a man, so minded and so organized,

we

will not say justifies,

he

necessitates the
is

The moral stage. the inevitable fact.

existed,
to the

argument

absorbed in

If the theatre had not

it,

he would have created

according

Divine order, in which the soul invents

the circumstance.

Without

it,

there would

have been no

field for the

exercise of his

peculiar powers. In him grand passions found play through the imagination, not only harm less, but fruitful and beautiful as art. Nay, it

would seem

as if the nature of this

man

lay,

a distinct personality, embryonic very mind of Shakespeare, whose grander charac ters awaited, as the centuries rolled by, their
destined and completed representative. he came, in the fullness of time, to give
living form,

in the

And
them

and

vital

motion, and transcend-

THE TRAGEDIAN.
ant speech, and

23

personal unity, and ever-

endeared remembrance.

We
actors.

must regard him as the greatest of all Two names alone in the history of
Garrick

the stage, might dispute his supremacy

David Garrick and Edmund Kean.

is

a tradition.

The

record of his histrionic

power is meagre. He seems to have been hampered by conventionalism, enacting Mac beth in a tie-wig and knee-breeches. His look is praised and the power of his voice is
;

by declamatory passages. No sat isfactory analysis of his method has reached us. The anecdote that Dr. Johnson was overwhelmed by the pathos of his perform
illustrated

ance in Lear, is the most noteworthy cir cumstance of his life upon the stage. But Garrick played Tate s perversion, not Shake
speare
s

drama

and Johnson

morbid sensi

bility is

well known.

Garrick was of French descent, and he seems to have inherited the vivacity, the point,
the versatility, of the Gallic branch of the
Celtic race. He was playwright, player, dancer, and a facile writer of epilogues and He adapted, that is, altered for epigrams.

the stage, Cymbeline,

Winter

Tale, Kath-

24
erine
"

THE TRAGEDIAN.
and Petruchio.
Dr. Johnson said that

his death eclipsed the

He
far

gayety of nations." was best in comedy, and his comic parts outnumber the tragic. From all sources

of

knowledge on the
s

subject, not omitting

"Life

Fitzgerald

fascinating
in

of

Garrick,"

con recently published clude that his tragic acting, although a rare entertainment, did not touch the deepest
springs of feeling
;

London, we must

that

it

was rather a
s

skill

than an inspiration.

The inadequacy
ries,

of Johnson
all his

commenta

stamps him, with

as

sense,

singularly

deficient

vigorous English in the very

which made Shakespeare the great and which, whether in actor or critic, must be employed in interpret we mean the quality of im ing his pages
quality
est of all dramatists,

And we are without all evidence agination. that the player went beyond the critic. That
Garrick did not play up to the height of Shakespeare, is finally evident from the fact
that Shakespeare himself
till

was not truly known

Coleridge discovered him. Then Schlegel and other German thinkers (if indeed they did not .precede Coleridge),

a later day.

caught his

light,

THE TRAGEDIAN.
"

25

The light that never was on sea or lana, The consecration and the poet s dream,"
it

and reflected

About

this

back upon the English mind. time Booth appeared, at the age

of twenty, at Covent Garden Theatre, Lon don. At another theatre, another actor of
original force
full

and

fiery

temperament,

in the

maturity of his power and fame, the des pot of the stage, jealous of all rivalry, was enacting Shakespeare to the wonder and
admiration of the city; while such
Coleridge, and
Hazlitt,

men

as

win, sat attentive in

and Lamb, and God the pit. This actor was

Edmund Kean.
"

Two

stars

sphere."

It

is

keep not their motion in one from the purpose of this essay

to detail the circumstances of the

war which

The players. of the reader may find satisfaction curiosity by looking into any authentic record of the
followed, between the
rival

English stage. What we briefly to note the respective

onic

have

to

do,

is,

forms of
;

histri

power

in

Kean and Booth

to trace

forms to their true sources in bodily and mental constitution, and to assign the
these
superiority to

whom

There was a

rightfully belongs. striking resemblance between

it

26

THE TRAGEDIAN.

these two actors, in height and figure. In there was a partial sim temperament, also,
ilarity

both being distinguished by passion

and by daring to displace the habits of the stage, by the action prescriptive and the tones of nature. To the English
ate energy,

mind, observant of externals, and thrice-sod

den
that

in its regard for precedent, this super

likeness, coupled with the mere fact Booth was the younger and later prod uct, seems to have suggested that he formed his style upon the acting of Kean. Nothing could be farther from the truth. We pro
ficial

pose to state the points of difference between them, condensed from the widest range of
the most unimpeachable testimony. In Booth, the passionate energy,
to both,

common

was sustained and expanded by a certain ethereal quality, wanting in Kean. Kean was alert Booth, airy. Kean was black-eyed, like the children of Southern Europe. Booth had the blue eyes of the
;

North,
"

Whence those arts and races sprung Which light, and lift, and sway the world."

confined intensity of temperament in HazKean, limited the range of his voice.

The

THE TRAGEDIAN.
litt
"

27

the eye of an speaks of him as having and the voice of a raven ; and else eagle,
"

where, while justly lauding the

"

fire,

the na

ture, the genius of his favorite, confesses to inharmonious voice." The voice obeys his

the emotion which dominates and employs it, and the pathos of Kean s utterance, partic
ularly
in

certain passages of Othello, has

"

probably never been surpassed. In that admirable paper on the

of
Kean,"

Acting

written

by Mr. Dana (himself a

poet and imaginative critic of a high and del icate order of genius ; and which brief record

has gone far to continue the visionary and

vanishing fame of the actor), he says, the Ha in pronunciation of the single word
"

"

Othello,
first

when

the
in his

feeling

of jealousy

is

awakened
the
s

throat was a cave of magical whis But, whether owing or not to the national catarrh, which afflicts the majority
pers.

away Kean

listener

"

heart, seemed on its wild

to carry
swell."

of Englishmen, and the influence of which upon the pronunciation of their native tongue

by some absurd Americans, his was equally deficient in the ringing head tones, and in that resonant bass, not
is

imitated

voice

28

THE TRAGEDIAN,
which Booth used
effect.

guttural, but far deeper,

with such masculine and memorable

voice a pe a mannerism, in which the liquids culiarity, and n had no place, but which consisted
s
I

We

find accordingly in

Kean

in a prolongation of the liquids

"

and

r.

Farewell-l-1 the pl-1-lumdd

trrroop."

The most
lence,

cordial tribute to

Kean

excel

was given us by one who, by the law of retaliation, was under the least obligation to render it, namely, by Mr. Booth himself.
Similar magnanimity Kean never would have shown. But Mr. Booth, throughout a

changeful career, marked by

human

infirm

ity, and running sometimes on the giddy verge of madness, was always a gentleman as well as a scholar while it must be owned that Kean, great as were his histrionic claims, was neither the one nor the other. There existed however a distinction, more
;

radical than temperament, or education, or manners, which separated these two actors, and lay in the very core of the mental life

of each. Look at the portraits of Kean. All concur (even that one with the Kemble eye brow, which Kean had not) in giving him a brain wide at the base, pinched at the tern-

THE TRAGEDIAN.
pies
;

29

winged and balanced brain of Booth. Correspond in ingly, all records and all reports agree,

in

marked

contrast with the

Kean s performances as fearfully intense, inevitable, aiming to express char acter by single strokes of overwhelming en
representing
ergy, or heart-broken pathos ; and leaving between the strokes wide intervals of dull
ness.

Coleridge said that to see

like

him
the

"

act,

was

reading Shakespeare by

flashes of light
little

ning."

John Kemble
earnest."

"

said,

fellow

is terribly in

All records agree

"

all

but one.

England,"

History of Macaulay, in his in one of those brief and brilliant

episodes which beguile the progress of the story, traces the pedigree of Kean to the

Marquis of Halifax

through

how many

escapades of illegitimacy he does not confess. He says, the Marquis was the progenitor
of
"

that

Edmund Kean, who,

in our

own

time, transformed himself so marvelously into Shylock, lago, and Othello." If this be
true,

no higher praise could be awarded

actor.

to

any
idge,

If this be true, then the

por

traits,

and Kernble, and Hazlitt, and Coler and a multitude of contemporary ob

servers

now

living, are all at fault.

30

THE TRAGEDIAN.

think it will require something more than the dazzling dogmatism of the English
historian, to sustain his position.

We

We

think,

not that

Kean transformed himself

and Othello
those
:

into

Shy-

lock, lago,

but that the actor

respectively that he took

transformed
into

characters
that
is,

Edmund Kean

just those words, and lines, and points, and passages, in the character he was to repre
sent, which he found suited to his genius, and gave them with electric force. His method was limitary. It was analytic and

passionate
lectual

not, in the highest sense, intel

and imaginative.
"

Our final authority is Hazlitt, who has given, in his work on the English Stage," by far the most thorough exposition of
Kean

He
"

s powers. Hazlitt learnt him by heart. delved him to the root, and let in on his

merits and defects the

insolent

irradiating and the of a searching criticism. He light" says, with fine hyperbole, that to see Kean at his best/ in Othello, was one of the con
"

solations of the

human mind

"

yet

is

con

strained to admit, even in his notice of this

play, that
"

Kean lacked

imagination."

Now

this

power Booth possessed of a sub-

THE TRAGEDIAN.
tile

31

and in magnificent measure. It weird expressiveness to his voice. It atmosphered his most terrific performances
kind,
lent

with beauty.
best,

Booth took up Kean at his and carried him further. Booth was

Kean, plus the higher imagination. Kean was the intense individual Booth, the type To see Booth in in the intense individual. like reading Shake his best mood was not speare by flashes of lightning," in which a
;
"

blinding glare alternates with the fearful sus pense of darkness ; but rather like reading

him by the sunlight of a summer

light

day, a

deep shadows, gives play to glorious harmonies of color, and shows all
casts

which

objects in vivid

life

and true

relation.
left

The recorded

impression

by Kean on

the minds of his reporters and biographers, is of a mighty grasp and overwhelming ener

gy

in partial scenes

while Booth

is

remem

bered for his sustained and all-related con

ception of character, intensely realized, it is true, but chiefly marked by those ideal traits,

which not only charmed the listener, but ac companied the scholar to his study, and shed a light on the subtlest and the profoundest
page of Shakespeare.

The imaginative power

32

THE TRAGEDIAN.

was so opulent in Booth, that he multiplied himself into the scene, and abolished the
dullness of the other players. Filled with of the supernatural himself, he the conception

shook the superflux to them." In Hamlet, he made the tread and exit of the heaviest
" "

ghost,"

airier

by
old

his presence

and in Macbeth, transformed and action, the three fantastic

women

into ministers of fate.

In according to Booth the gift of supreme histrionic power, we do not imply that his
performances were faultless
;

for the faultless

performer lingly admit that he

is

simply the correct.

We

wil

may

have been matched

in all second

by

others,

and haply surpassed

ary qualities, excepting voice, which illumi nate the stage ; he holding, beyond rivalry,
the single controlling quality of a penetrating,
kindling, shaping imagination.
light its

Genius can

own

fire

and

it is

the peculiar prop

late,

erty of histrionic genius to cherish, manipu and apply the flame. Yet in the finest
is

results of all art there

something indepen
the
this

dent of the

will.

Mr. Booth was perhaps

all great actors.

most unequal of

And

inequality was more sadly manifest towards His excellence the latter part of his career.

THE TRAGEDIAN.
was, however, throughout his
life,

33
so incal

culable and surprising, that one of his very

greatest

Shakespearean performances took

in Boston.
spirits,

place in the year 1850, during his last en

gagement

Health, animal

that vigor

which

comes from just

intervals of repose, clearness

of voice in our trying climate, and general freshness of the physical man, may all con spire to serve the exacting hour, and yet the

spontaneous
vein."

actor not find himself

"i

the

The

on which he

transforming imaginative power relies to identify himself with

the dramatic character,

may

be either slug

gish or asleep. ,The whence that wind of the spirit, who

and whither of knoweth ? So

Mr. Booth,

to the

casual attendant on his

performances, often failed to sustain his great reputation. Only to those who, like our

had waited on them through remuner ating years, did the full depth and refinement, the glow and sway of mind he showed,
selves,

entirely appear.

Many a

time,

when

passion

and imagination were comparatively wanting, have we admired the subtle intellect of his and were v on such occasions, interpretations
;

content to follow his

lifted

and guiding torch,

31

THE TRAGEDIAN.

along the spar-gemmed labyrinths of Shake

speare
s

Our

more intricate meanings. course of remark has drifted us into

that cloud which

hung over and

in

partially

obscured his fame, and which,

good

men

minds, affixed a blot on his personal character. mean what has been called, with needless

We

exaggeration, his habit of intoxication.

"

We

omitwould gladly avoid this subject, but tance is no quittance/ and we proceed to
set the

charge in

its

true light.

During the
his
life,

forty years, save one, which bounded dramatic career, Mr. Booth s habit of

both on his farm and on the stage, was exemHis reverence for the plarily temperate.
sacredness of
stition.
all
life

amounted

to a super

He

abstained for

many

years

on

principle
*

from the use of animal food.

An

extravagant and erring spirit," allied to madness, would sometimes take possession of
him, and hurry him away from the theatre at the moment the performance was to begin ; and to this cause, and not to intoxication,
should be attributed the not infrequent dis appointment of the audience. Still it must

be confessed, with grief and baser charge was often true.

pity,

that the
resort to

THE TRAGEDIAN.
stimulants
is

35

ever-present temptation

Booth

and Mr. spontaneous method, sometimes an

the
actor
:

special bane to an actor of

irresistible

was
it

to

him a

The histrionic art temptation. Not to speak cultus, a religion.

sacrifice to the
"

profanely, he offered himself a perpetual god of terror and of beauty ;

he staked soul and body on the action both," and the exhaustion sometimes attendant upon his performance of the fiery rite, was relieved by means questionable, pitiful, pardonable. The accident by which his nose was broken,
spoiling forever his noble profile, threatened for a time the more serious disaster of a per

manent injury
his recovery

to his voice.

Immediately on

he began
first

to play.

To

those

performances, recalled the perfect features and the resonant tones of former years, the sight and sound were

who, during these

indeed

pitiful.

ly perceptible. vocal infirmity, he spoke with all the old mastery of motive, and let the result take
itself. By this persistent method, in than two years after the accident, his voice had completely recovered its original

The head tones were scarce But instead of humoring this

care of

less

scope, variety, and

power

as

we can

attest

36

THE TRAGEDIAN.
close, solicitous,

and comparative observa added to the autumnal ripeness of his physical and mental powers, we owe the undiminished zest and

by

tion.

To

this

restoration,

life

of his impersonations.

the
"

pass on to examples, in the hope that reader will bring to our record that which alone can productive imagination
"

We

render
fire

fruitful the

endeavor to rekindle the

of eye and action, to give form to air, to bring a voice out of the silent past, and to

conjure up before
presence.

him a kingly and

inspiring

RICHARD

III.

do not quarrel with Colley Gibber, and playwright of the time of Garplayer rick, because he saw fit, for the convenience
of the stage, to compose, out of several his torical plays of Shakespeare, in which the

WE

same characters occur, one

ard the
his
Third."

entitled

"

Rich
for

But we do blame him

audacious excision of the living limbs, his more audacious interpolations in the text,

and

his senseless

changes in the character

of that Richard, third of the name, whom Shakespeare delineated. He has obliterated
those
lights

of

human

feeling,

which the

great master touched in, and which alone redeem Richard from the condition of vulgar
villainy,

into

which Gibber

plunges him.

The buoyant, aspiring soul of the usurper, finding expression in such language as this
But I was born so high, aiery buildeth in the cedar s top And dallies with the wind, and scorns the
"

Our

sun,"

does nowhere appear.

38

THE TRAGEDIAN.
In Shakespeare, the villainy
is

incidental

to the ambition

and is besides relieved by and vast and ready variety genius, energy,
;

of intellectual resources.
sion,

In Gibber

ver

villainy
;

is

the substance of the char

it sits

acter

the very element in which

and

revels.

In Shakespeare, when multiplying dangers and ghostly visitation have com bined to open in Richard s soul the access
"

and passage
"

to

remorse,"
:

occurs this remark

able utterance
There

is

And

if I

no creature loves me, die no soul will pity me

"

the character, below

ness.

Gibber wantonly hardens the depravity of its all-sufficient wicked

The

interpolated

scene

with

Lady

Anne, whom
cious

Richard had widowed, cajoled,

is

married, and resolved to slay,

simply atro

and inhuman.

the play, such as it is, shining with Shakespeare s genius, blotted by Gibber s
folly,

But

less

has always held the stage our purpose to complain of

s

and

it

is

its

defects,

than to show Mr. Booth

masterly imper
is

sonation of the leading part. He fied with it in the public mind.

identi

His per

formance of

it

was

certain, at

any period of

RICHARD
his life, to

III.

39

crowd the
excluded

theatre.
all

And

in truth,

opportunity for the of the finer traits of his genius, yet display the energy, subtlety, variety, he brought to

although

it

its

representation

voice,

and

look,

and
s

the sustained vigor of action, to the last

justified the popular approval.

In Mr. Booth
not the crimes

pulse was most apparent

it

conception the main im the ambition, and ; caused. There was a certain
at

a sombre and surrounding underlying his most brilliant action and giving place at last to a preternatural energy, and fiery ex

slow

movement

the opening

settled purpose,

pedition, only

when

the object, the crown,

attained, and all the resources of his fertile brain were drawn on and combined,
in the effort to retain the regal power he had usurped. With head bent in thought, arms folded, and slow long step, longer it would seem

was

than the height of his figure might warrant, yet perfectly natural to him, and so that his

emerged first into view, Booth appeared upon the scene, enveloped and ab
lifted

foot

sorbed in the character of Richard.

If tumultuous plaudits extorted from

him

40

THE TRAGEDIAN.

a momentary recognition of the audience, it was done with no suspension of the look and
action of the character.
tion

That look and ac

were profoundly
u

self-involved.

He

de

livered the soliloquy beginning

Now

is

the winter of our

discontent,"

in

tone, varied

an inward many-stringed resonance of by outbursts of passionate vehe

"

mence, when descanting on his own de and reaching through murderous formity,"
intent after the glorious diadem. like a man thinking aloud, not as

He
if

spoke

reciting

from memory. Indeed, to speak with strict He possessed ness, he never re-cited at all. himself of the character, and its language, and then uttered it from inspiration, and according to the emergency of the scene and
the situation.

Memory,

the prime need of

his greatest dan a danger lurking always in repetitions ger ; of performance, but one into which our actor

an

actor, speedily

becomes

seldom
"

if

ever

fell.

He

carried distinctness

of articulation to
ocean,"

in this

an extreme, pronouncing soliloquy, as a word of three

syllables.

In the sequent scene where Gloster hav ing killed King Henry, exclaims with bitter scorn

RICHARD
u

I1L

41

What

Will the aspiring blood of Lancaster

I

Sink in the ground?

thought

it

would have mounted!

"

he

lifts his sword, and his eye following, catches sight of blood upon the blade, in a manner like the very truth of nature. He

adds
"

See How my sword weeps for the poor king s O may such purple tears be always shed,
!
!

death

By

those

who wish

the downfall of our

house."

What grim humor was

"

in that cold,

self-

poised recollection, contained in the words Indeed, tis true, that Henry told me
of,"

Henry lying then warm but dead by his hand, and alone with him in the kingly bed
chamber
!

Mr. Booth s performances was a necessity of his genius. His acting was a congeries of causes, coordinated with the main cause, the conception of the char acter. Kean s manner of acting, on the con trary, was a series of disconnected brilliant
Originality in
effects.

Gloster

wooing scene with Lady

of Kean, repre

Anne is a case in point. The best character portrait

sents

him on one knee,

"

smiling,

and saying
up
me."

Take up the sword

"

again, or take

Hazlitt says,

The whole scene was an

ad-

42

THE TRAGEDIAN.
vil

mirable exhibition of smooth and smiling

lainy."

Booth made no

such

exhibition.

He

did not kneel gracefully.

The

question
;

with him was not, how is courtship done but how would Gloster do it. Nothing

would be more

woman

as

likely to charm so weak a Anne, than the repentance Lady

and humility of
of Richard. the soldier
flattery
"

so powerful a nature as that in

You may relish him more

lover."

than in the

Personal

was thrown

as the substance of the dish

in as a spice, and not he offered her.

Surprise was blent with joy at his hoped-for

victory, in the glance he darted up from his abasement at her feet, when Lady Anne

drops the sword.

Surprise which finds vent

in words, as soon as he finds himself alone.

"

Was Was
I ll

ever ever

woman in this humor wooed? woman in this humor toon f

but
I will not

have her

keep her

long."

soliloquy was given with that massive, vivid, and varied intonation, which

The whole

might express the tumult of feelings awak ened by his almost incredible success. How
fine the

sudden

halt, in that

repeated descant

on

his

own

deformity, and airy change of

tone, in the passage beginning

RICHARD
"

111.

48

My
I

dukedom

to a beggarly denier

do mistake

my

person

all this

while."

Nothing could exceed the picturesque beauty

of his action, as he
lines
u Shine out fair sun,
till

delivered
I salute

the

closing

my glass,
pass."

That

maj- see

my ehadow
at
his

as I

supposed shadow seem to see the shadow as we write) (we he looked with lingering step, and, with pauses between the words, annihilated the
looked
;

He

down

sing-song of the double ending

"

That

may

see

my shadow

as

pass."

The flexible grasp with which Mr. Booth laid hold of and personated the elements of
a character, permitted certain minor varia tions, both in by-play and intonation, in dif
ferent performances of the same part, with out injuring, but rather heightening, the This freshened the interest general effect.
in

successive exhibitions, and gave scope oftentimes to rare and vanishing delicacies of thought and feeling. An instance occurred
in the scene

between Gloster and the young prince Edward, sometimes given thus
:

Gloster (aside).
live
long,"

"

So wise, so young (they

say), do ne er

44

THE TRAGEDIAN.

as if musing complacently on the proverb, yet scarcely harboring the purpose of making it true. And again thus
:
"

So wise,

so

young, they

say,

do ne er live

long."

as if the proverb was but the cloak of his full blown intent to u remove the prince.
"

From this point he developed the character with ever-increasing animation and momen tum. His change of manner when seated
on the throne was marked and majestic, and
in fine

contrast with the wily, plotting ap proaches to it. Buckingham, the agent of
his elevation, stands at

once and forever in

Booth s tone the shadow of his kingly will. and action acquired a combined solidity and
celerity,

which continued, with brief but fear

ful interruptions in the latter scenes, to the

end of the play.

We
his

may

here note an apparent error in

manner of replying to Buckingham s urgent and reiterated demand for the prom
ised earldom.
"

He

says
me.
I

Thou

troublest

m not V

the

vein,"

in

a tone of fretful anger.

The

passage

would seem rather to require a tone of cool and kingly slight. Shakespeare amplifies the retort, and has this line, left out in Gib
ber
s

version

RICHARD
"

III.

45
to-day."

am

not in the giving vein

In the scene where Richard pleads with Queen Elizabeth for her daughter s hand, and
says
"

When this warlike arm shall have chastised The audacious rebel, hot-brained Buckingham, Bound with triumphant garlands will I come,
And
lead your daughter to a conqueror s
bed,"

cannot express the splendor of his man ner better than by saying, that it suggested the majestic march, the mighty music, and the flower-like play of color of a Roman tri

we

umph. words

Lord Stanley
:

enters

with

these

Richmond
Richard.
seas on
"

him

"

is on the seas." There let him sink" (plummet), "and be the the lift, advance, and fall of one huge ( like

whelming wave),

"white-livered

runagate"

(between

set

teeth, like hissing foam).

In this dialogue with Stanley, Booth re stored a passage from Shakespeare, not in Gibber s play, but essential to the character
of Richard, who, fighting to maintain his throne, seems really to feel himself "the

Lord

anointed."

In

reply to

Stanley

suggestion that

Richmond came
Is the

to claim the

crown, Richard bursts forth

"

Is the chair
"

empty ?

sword unswayed ?

Is the

king dead?

46

THE TRAGEDIAN.

The solid, smiting questions, the momen tary pause between, as rendered by Booth, can never be forgotten by those who heard
them.
in that
"

The

questions continue and culminate

memorable passage
i the North, they should serve their sovereign
i

What do they

When

the

West?

"

The

last line

was delivered

in

one continuous
in

tone of

commanding resonance,

which the
current

words were dropped

like stones in the

of his speech. In the concluding scenes of this play he seemed, when in his best mood, to be filled

with

"

strange

fire."

He

showed

infinite

vigilance of mind, relentless mastery of will. The tent scene, in which Richard starts out

of his remorseful dream, was one of terrific grandeur, and never failed of producing an After he had mastered the electrical effect.

harrowing thoughts born of his dream, his utterance of the words

"

Richard

himself again,"

constituted a brief but pointed study of char

acter.

A distinguished tragedian, now living

and performing, and therefore here unnamed, could find no better gesture for Richard s
self-recovery than to strike a fencing attitude.

RICHARD

III.

47
inclusive,

But Booth

stood

still,

and with one

unanalysable motion of the hand, took limbs, body, heart, and brain, in its subtle and com manding sweep, while he delivered the pas
sage

expressing his

inward

victory

with

inward voice
"As

if a man were author And knew no other kin

!

of himself
"

In

the
is
"

following scene,

when
s
head."

Stanley

defection

announced, Richard exclaims

Off with his son George

At

that

moment

his ear catches the

sound of

distant music,

and

his

whole manner instantly

leaning on the air with

changes.

He

listens,

keen looks and parted lips, and an expression of eager and confident expectation.
"

Norfolk.

My

lord, the foe s already past the

let

marsh;
die."

After the battle

young Stanley

Richard

"

Why,

after be

it then."

He said this in a tone of the lightest and most careless readiness, still listening then resumed his energy of manner in the brief and stirring appeal to his soldiers, as he led
;

them

into the fight.

last
;

In the

desperately fought on the

scene he fought with Richmond when wounded and overthrown,

ground.

Finally, gathering

48

THE TRAGEDIAN.

himself up with one mighty effort, he plunged headlong at his cool antagonist, was disarmed, and felled to the earth. Gibber has put in
to the

mouth of the dying Richard, some wretched and inhuman stuff, which, to the credit of Mr. Booth be it said, we could never
distinctly

hear from his

"

lips.

It

sounded

only

like

The cloudy groan Of dying thunder on the distant wind."

HAMLET.
THE
character of

Hamlet has been, ever

since the time of Shakespeare, the delight and the puzzle of scholars. The portrayal of it

has been equally the ambition and the failure

of actors.

The

scholar finds the

drama emi

nently a tragedy of thought, and is apt to refine into abstraction the personality of the
actor, depending in his art on and speech, usually fails to sound presence

hero.

The

the depth of the character, to pluck out the heart of its mystery, and so gives its varied
incident,
action,

succession
effects.

dialogue, soliloquy, in a of incoherent, perhaps brilliant,

In Mr. Booth s conception, Hamlet was a character, not of melancholy, but of a pre

dominant
choly.

sensibility,

which included melan

the invisible world,

Not

of madness, but of one who,

ties to

bound by strange
mastery of

found his large discourse of reason and his

will distracted
4

between opposing

50
duties.

THE TRAGEDIAN.
In Hamlet,
filial

love
s

amounted
in

to a

passion.

And

his father

spirit,

arms,

manded him,
to

appeared visibly to him, and audibly com in terms of solemn adjuration,

a man.

commit a deed abhorrent to his feelings as Booth s Hamlet was intensely per sonal. His brain was
"

The quick

forge

and working-house of thought.

His heart was full of purpose, as of affection. His indecision was the result of circumstances, not a defect of will. But this positive and
personal
life

was

so

atmosphered by beauty,

so steeped in melancholy, so spiritualized by supernatural emotion, that it seemed to us,

in all essential qualities, the

very Hamlet of

Shakespeare.

That phase of this many-sided creation to which he gave least effect, was the princeliness. That pensive grace and high breeding which many regard as Hamlet s permanent
condition, ruffled only passion, illuminated by

by passing gusts of
fitful

lights of philoso

phy and fancy, and crazed by ghostly visita found in him an indifferent interpre tion,
ter.
"

too severely exercised thoughts beyond the reaches of his soul

He seemed

by
to

"

HAMLET.
;

51

mind the graces of the court and his manner was seldom gentle, but rather swift as medi Hamlet was Booth s favorite part. tation." Among unnumbered representations, we select for special comment one which took
"

place at the Howard Athenaeum, in Boston, on that very winter s night when the steamer Atlantic was lost upon Long Island Sound, in

a furious snow-storm
"

brave vessel
noble creatures in her,
all to

Which had no doubt some

Dashed
pieces."

Owing
small.

to

the weather the attendance

was

This circumstance aided the illusion

if

of the opening scene, as

tators

the scattered spec

at

were accidentally present, and looking the chilled and lonely sentinels, pacing the

ramparts of Elsinore castle. But the audi ence was fit though few. An eminent Shake spearean scholar* sat with us, and a knot of
literary friends.
It was a noteworthy fact, however it might be accounted for, that Mr. Booth seemed to play better to a thin house.

appeared on the stage with his features marred, with his natural hair turned irongray, and with no special help from costume,
or scenery, or the other actors.

He

But never

52
did the soul
clearly with

THE TRAGEDIAN.
of

Hamlet

shine

forth

more

its

own

peculiar,

fitful,

far-reach

and supernatural light. not merely sad, but stricken in grief, at the sudden and mysterious death of
ing, saddened,

He was

his father.

He

is

picion of his uncle.

stung by instinctive sus He is shamed and out

s

raged by his mother

marriage. uncle father
"
"

hasty and incestuous

He
"

sobs audibly. addresses him

cousin Hamlet, and

When
my
son,"

his

But now

my

he answers
"

aside, in bitter

murmur
less

little

more than

kin,

and

than

kind."

To his mother s vague generalization about the commonness of death, he answers with
restrained respect
"

Ay, madam,

it is

common."

But when she urges a question of cold com

plaint,

he vindicates the profound sincerity of his grief, in that fine speech beginning
"

Seems,

madam!

nay,

it

is."

We pause upon this passage, for in the search

ing and thoughtful emphasis he gave to its delivery, Mr. Booth struck the key-note of

Hamlet

character,

the

depth

of

which

HAMLET.
neither
action

53

nor language, however elo

quent or effective, could ever fully reveal. He had that within which passeth show."
"

Hamlet
"

is left

alone,

and instantly unbur

would

dens his heart in the soliloquy beginning

0, that this
too, too solid flesh
melt."

Did Shakespeare intend the speech uttered aloud, or only mused upon ?

to

be

The

question becomes pertinent, in view of Lamb s objection to the stage representation of the
play, where he speaks of Hamlet s "lightthink and-noise-abhorring ruminations." the terse vigor of the language would find a

We

tongue.

It did find

an eloquent tongue in

our actor.

The

jostle of thoughts, the

all

im

patient leaps of emotion,

crowding for

utterance, found meet expression in his rapid

and changeful delivery.

"

Frailty, thy

name

is woman,"

as if

no other name were needed.

"

Married with mine uncle (pause),

"

My

father s brother

(in low

and

slighting tones),

then without pause

"

But no more
Hercules
."

like

my father

Than

I to

The

following scene

is

chiefly remarkable

54

TEE TRAGEDIAN.

for the report to Hamlet of the appearance of the ghost. How fit that this disclosure should be made by Horatio, whose gracious,
limited,

and

firm-seated

nature
to

becomes,
the
fever,

from

this

moment,

coolness

and counterpoise to the perturbation of his princely friend, even to the closing scene of the play, when Hamlet lies dead in his arms The spiritual tone Booth imparted to this
!

scene, weighted as it is by specific questions as to the time and aspect of the apparition, raised the listener at once into

and answers,

the rare atmosphere of

Hamlet

being, and
:

culminated in this remarkable soliloquy

"

My father s spirit
I

in

doubt some foul play

then
sit still,

arms ! All is not well would the night were come

;

Till

my

soul: foul deeds will rise,

Though

all

the earth o

erwhelm them,
"

to

men

eyes."

Booth uttered the words,

rise,"

Foul deeds

will

as with the voice of Fate.

"

Then came

the

mighty parenthesis, Though all the earth o erwhelm them," which he gave with

a sweeping gesture, as if taking the solid earth, and lifting it as a wave of the sea is
lifted,

and

letting

it

fall.

He

then raised a

warning hand, with significant motion, before his face, and with changed voice, couching

HAMLET.

55

strength of emphasis on a lower range of tones, resumed the suspended meaning

"

to

men

eyes."

In the platform scene, his adjuration of the Spirit reached a climax of feeling in the

word "father," into which he threw the agony of his grief, and the contending hope and fear born of this strange visitation.
After a momentary pause, the figure remain
ing silent,

Hamlet recommences, and

:
"

delivers

without pause the following

Royal Dane^ 0, answer

me."

In

all
"

editions of the play, there

is

a colon
this

after

Royal

Dane."

Booth overruled

pause, with a more subtle perception of the meaning of the passage than has been shown

by any commentator.
of the sudden apparition passes rapidly off; and Hamlet soon finds himself in strange and calm accord with the
first

The

effect

silent

but beckoning

visitor.
:

To

the dissua

sion of his friends

"

he says

Why, what
[

should be the fear?

do not set
for

my life
soul,

at a pin s fee,
it

And

my

what can

do

to that,
"

Being a thing immortal

as itself ?

Booth

manner here

is

hard to analyze.

It

56

THE TRAGEDIAN.
suffice to say, that

may

both tone and action

scaled the heights of spiritual thought. He seemed to have digested in his soul the very bitterness of death, to have passed beyond,

and

to

tality.

speak as one conscious of his immor In fine contrast came the passionate

outbreak
"

My fate
lion s

cries out

And makes
As hardy

each petty artery in

this

body

as the

Nemean

nerve."

We

know

nated with Mr. Booth or not

not whether the action origi but in the

:

scene following the terrible revelation of the

Spirit,

when

his friends
to

find him,

and he

swears them secrecy, Hamlet holds up the hilt of his sword, the cross, and not the
blade,
for

the

imposition

of

their

hands.

have seen, both in picture and on the stage, the hands of Horatio and Marcellus
laid
"

We

along the blade.

disposition,"

In

this

scene,
so

the

antic

which has

puzzled

In Booth s actor, begins to play. this was partly a reaction from conception,
critic

and

the pressure of supernatural emotion ; and Its fitful light partly assumed as a disguise.

seemed native to the genius of our actor. It gave variety and unexpectedness in look, and

HAMLET.
tone,

57

throughout the play. It shone above the melancholy, like phospho rescence on a midnight sea, with most inten
action,

and

sifying

effect.

The

scenes with P^lonius,

;

where Hamlet plays upon him the scenes with his school-fellows, in which he shows he cannot be played upon and the scenes with
;

the players, are instances in point.

Ghost (beneath).

Hamlet.

Swear. There are more

things in heaven and earth,

Horatio, Than are dreamt of in your philosophy: 1

A light scorn in
light

the last word

and

his

hand

passed his forehead,

with a gesture equally

and evanescent. Perhaps the most brilliant example of that unexpectedness which is genius in an actor, as if he indeed were the character assumed as if the thoughts were developed from
;

within, and the language occurred to him, might be found in the passage beginning
"

have of

late (but

wherefore I

know

not) lost

all

my

mirth."

the words, This most excellent canopy, the air, look you, this brave o erhanging
"
"

At

(he omitted the word

"

"

firmament,"

as in the

folio),

this majestical roof fretted

with golden

58
fire,"

THE TRAGEDIAN.
his voice,

sombre and husky

in the

preceding lines, suddenly darted upward like light ; seemed to penetrate the sky ; to run
to search out and ; back the remotest echoes of heaven. give The speaker was for the moment forgot,
all
"

over the firmament

Hidden

In the light of thought."

that plays the king shall be wel was uttered with eager emphasis, a momentary betrayal by Hamlet of his inner thought which however he masks immedi ately, by a running and cheery commentary on the other players. Hamlet has received,
"

He

come,"

seen through, talked with, and dismissed his school-mates ; puzzled Polonius by subtle reaches of wit ; welcomed the players with a

and princely grace bined freedom and aptitude

volatile
"

shown a com
in
all

this sur
"

whiff face-play of mind, this of thought, over the deep sea

spirit,

and wind
of his

sad

most wonderful in Shakespeare, and reproduced by Booth as in a mirror until he finds himself alone, when he reveals his
;

latent purpose in that soliloquy in

lines occur
:

which the

HAMLET.
I ll have these players Play something like the murder of my father Before mine uncle."
"

59

and closing with

"

The play
ll

Wherein

s the thing catch the conscience of the

king."

Our Shakespearean scholar found fault with an emphasis, after the act was done. he said he ; Booth emphasized catch,
"

"

"

should have emphasized

so.
life

The
to the

actor

Not method gave spontaneous

conscience.
"

whole passage. He really empha sized both words, and all in due relation. The Third Act opened. The play went The atmosphere of Hamlet, with whose on.
very being Booth was for the time consubstantiated, enveloped also the listening scholar, and gradually nourished him out of
his

meagre mood of verbal

criticism.

And

work, that we heard him uttering unconscious groans for sympathy, as the catastrophe drew near and that foreboding illness, "here about
to that degree did the influence

found expression in tender trust mournful,

the
heart,"
:
"

tones of

If

it

be now,
:

tis

not to come.
is all.

If
be."

it

be not now, yet

it

will

come

the readiness

Let

60

THE TRAGEDIAN.

Hamlet repeatedly revolves

suicide.
"

We
life

the problem of have seen that he does not

set his

at

a pin

fee

"

but his con

science, the very strength of his moral na ture, which withholds his hand from attempt

ing his own life, also makes him fear to take that of the king. The beginning of the meditation To be, or not to be was ut
"
"

tered in a voice like the mystic

river running attentive ear :
"

murmur

of a

under ground, and required an That undiscovered country

"

"

from bourn no traveller returns whose given with accelerated and vibrating intensity, the
(in a
"

manner unimaginably remote)

last

stroke of emphasis coming suprisingly on the word. It shocked the elocutionist, but

delighted the Shakespearean scholar. The soliloquy was marked by a curious

reading, thus
"

For who would bear the whips and scorns of time,

When

he himself might his quietus

full stop.

make."

Here he made a

Then, as

if

be

ginning a new sentence, and without pause in the delivery of it, he went on
"

With a bare bodkin who would

fardels bear, etc.

On

being called to account for this odd read-

HAMLET.
.1

61
"

ing,

he affirmed, that

"

bodkin

was a

local

term, in some parts of England, padded yoke, worn over the shoulders for the sup and that a port of burdens on either side
for a
;
"

bare bodkin

and
all

was a yoke without the pad, The meaning as therefore galling.

"

signed, has,

we

believe, escaped the notice of

lexicographers.

On

meditation done

his suddenly discovering Ophelia with what tremulous ten

derness did he say

"

Nymph,

in

thy orisons

Be

all

my

sins remembered."

In the acting play, Hamlet

:

is

made

to catch

a glimpse of the king and his minister at the discovery being intended to ac espial

count for his

harshness

towards Ophelia.

We
The

find

no warrant
s

for this in Shakespeare.

Hamlet knows, it is true, by manner, that she is acting a part Ophelia under instructions. But we think every one
intuitive

of his speeches to her

nature

by

his

endeavor to

is justified by his own assumed madness or by his wipe away both from his own
;
"

mind and
that

hers,

all trivial

fond

records,"
"

so
all

the

commandment
"

of the Spirit

alone

may

live

62
"

THE TRAGEDIAN.
Within the book and volume of
his brain
"

and

all

without supposing him

to

be aware of

other listeners.

In spite of the set purpose, his deep love bursts forth in jets of passionate tenderness. He It did so in Mr. Booth s rendering. with wildness rather than severity. spoke

He

was

in constant action
;

striding across

passing out, still speaking, and beginning the next speech before he re en seem now to hear his voice ring tered.

the stage

We

ing, out of view, the phrase

"

have heard of your paintings

too, well enough."

Only when imploring her

did he

to

go

to a

nunnery

then, approaching her tenderly, he threw into those oft-repeated words to a nunnery, go," the whole force
;
"

pause in

action

of his fervent affection.

Mr. Macready played Hamlet in Boston, and Cambridge crowded the boxes yes, and applauded too, as that sensible but unim
of aginative actor gave his studied version

Hamlet
Hamlet

idleness.
"

(to Horatio).

They

are

coming

to the play

must be idle: Get you a place."

Macready seemed unaccountably

to

have

HAMLET.
"

63
"

changed natures with Osric the waterfly for he danced before the foot-lights, flirting a This white handkerchief above his head
;
!

was that

"famed

performer" to
"

whom Em

erson refers,

heard, gedian, was that in

when he says All I then and all I now remember, of the tra
:

which the tragedian had no part; simply, Hamlet s question to the

ghost
1

What may

this

mean,
complete
steel

That thou, dead

corse, again in

Revisit st thus the glimpses of the

moon?
s.

Booth
tires

idleness

was Hamlet

He

re

up the

appears like
that enters

stage, passes from view, and re a shadow is lost in the company

;

him next

play. at Ophelia s feet, at once

to witness the

We

find

Mercury
airily

and Nemesis, the lover s wit playing above the avenging purpose.

(We may

here mention that in the year

1831, Mr. Booth

Charles

became
in

the

temporary

manager of a theatre
on
this occasion,

Kean enacted Hamlet.

Mr. Mr. Booth, assumed the part of LuBaltimore.

"

cianus, called in the play-bills,

actor,"
"

the second

whose whole

office it is to
drugs
fit,

say

Thoughts black, hands

apt,

and time agreeing;

;

Confederate season, else no creature seeing

64

THE TRAGEDIAN.

Thou mixture rank, of midnight weeds collected, With Hecate s ban thrice blasted, thrice infected

Thy natural magic and dire property, On wholesome life usurp immediately."

In Booth

delivery of these

fearful lines,

each

word

dropped

poison.

The

weird

music of

his voice

and the stealthy yet de

this brief

cisive action,

made

scene the

mem

orable event of the night.) The king does blench Upon the talk of
"

the poisoning
fire."

"

he

rises

"

frighted with false

The
his

play within the

is

play abruptly

ends.
first

Hamlet

left alone.

To him come,
then
the

traitor

school-fellows;

meddling Polonius, envoys of the king and

queen.

In two

lines of the short soliloquy

which

follows, the tragedian indicated, by a master stroke of intonation and expression, the span

and sweep of Hamlet

nature

the restrain
to

ing force of will, acting as counterpoise the momentum of his feelings.

"

Soft;

now

to

my mother.
;

heart, lose not thy nature

let

not ever
bosom."

The

soul of

Nero enter

this firm

The thought
denly
to

of

Nero

crime seemed sud

fill

occur to him, to

him with hor-

HAMLET.
ror,

65
"

word Nero a sur of gesture and emphasis. prising repulsion These lines were a fit prologue to the
and
to lend to the
"

great scene of the play, in the Third Act, the interview with his mother. The strong the earnest pleading, the impas current,
sioned
conscience,
life,

the

noble

purpose,

the

intense personal

made manifest by Mr.

might serve as a study
"

Booth
this
"

in this scene,

for those,

abstract

who, impressed by a single trait in and brief chronicle of civ

this
full

ilized

man
be

Hamlet

weakly conclude

him

to

choly born
"

of weakness, and of a melan of weakness. His melancholy

my father
sit

was born of his strength.

Mother, you have

much

offended."

"

Come, come, and

you down; you

shall not

budge;
"

You go not, till I set you up a glass Where you shall see the iw-most part

of

you!

He had

already said
"

I will speak
"

daggers to
"

her."

That word
the matter.

inmost

touched the core of

of
it,

The sound

greatly pro

was like a search of steel. After he had killed Poing probe lonius, mistaking him for the king, he gave separately each word of the line
first syllable,

longed on the

66
"

THE TRAGEDIAN.
Thou wretched,
rash, intruding fool, farewell
"

with ascending emphasis, in tones of mingled grief and anger, and as if dashed
all

and

with tears.

What exalted passion is in the continuing In the comparison of portion of this scene the portraits, what dramatic action, thought,
!

imagery, language
belongs to

We

Shakespeare. ing towards him, where he sits, in the glory and beatitude of his own peculiar heaven. All we claim for Mr. Booth, all that can fcje
the

We

know this tribute make it, look

claimed for any actor, is, that he shall, by power of imaginative sympathy, pass

himself,

and draw us after, into the strong of Shakespeare s thought ; shall re current mould and rekindle to our attentive senses,
individuality

the

of

his

unmatched char
his father

acters.

Looking on the picture of

says
"

he

Where

every god, did seem to set his

seal."

was "This your husband" (kissing the picture and in a voice that sheathed affection for his father, in reprobation for
his mother).
"Look

you now what

follows"

(with startling

change of manner)

HAMLET.
"

67

Here

is-s-s your husband, like a mildewed ear Blasting his wholesome brother
"

The words of this phrase were shaken and eddied over by one continuing flood of tone ; in obedience to a passionate method, most expressive and quite peculiar to our actor.
At
the opportune

moment, when the heat

of his indignation finds expression thus

"

A murderer and a villain

of the empire

A cutpurse
over Booth
devotion.

and the

rule,"

the ghost appears.

s

to pass features an instant baptism of All anger vanished. The out-

There seemed

reaching and imploring look in his full blue eyes, arching the inner angles of the brows,

gave the face a tender exaltation, as he be gan that strange colloquy between Hamlet, his guilty mother, and his father s spirit, with the words
"

What would your

"

gracious figure?

During the presence of the ghost,

until

just before its exit at the opposite door, Booth stood rooted to the spot from which
first saw it ; stood with steady gaze, out stretched hands, and such pathetic reverence of voice and action, that, though we looked

he

68

TEE TRAGEDIAN.
in a

and listened then

yet the
"

memory
"

of

mood above weeping, it surprises us, as we

tears."

write,
Ghost.

unto the brink of

Speak
lady?"

to her,

Hamlet."
"

Ham.
Queen.

(Still looking at the ghost.)

How

is it

with you,

"

Ham.

"

Whereon do you look ? On him, on him" (as if

"

the question

were idle;

as if she must see the figure also).

In the oft-quoted passage

"

Assume a

virtue

if

you have

it

not,"

Booth paused
"

after

u
virtue,"

then uttered

the words, if you have it not," as if a spring of love gushed in his heart, and he caught at a hope, that she might have re

pented already. In the grave-yard scene, after he has matched wit with the clown, and given
another example of that blended airiness and melancholy which seemed the very form of

Shakespeare

thought, the

funeral proces

sion of Ophelia enters.

Hamlet
"

(to

Horatio).

That
"

is

Laertes,

A very noble youth:

mark

uttered with perfect simplicity and generous high breeding. Perhaps in qualification of an
opinion heretofore expressed, the princeliness

EAMLET.
came out more strongly
tes says
"A

69 Mr. Booth
s

in

de

lineation of these later scenes.

When
sister
be,"

Laer

ministering angel shall

my

Hamlet, according
exclamation
"

to the

text, utters

the

What!

the fair Ophelia!

"

No

syllable of this phrase could be

heard.

Only a wild, inarticulate cry escaped him ; and he muffled his face in his cloak. He
seemed
to

have gone behind Shakespeare

s

language, into Shakespeare

thought. Following this fine touch of feeling and character, came what seems to us a wholly
:
"

unauthorized reading
What
is

he whose grief Bears such an emphasis V whose phrase of sorrow Conjures the wandering stars, and bids them stand Like wonder-wounded hearers ? This is I,

Hamlet the

Dane."

So Shakespeare but Booth made a after the word stand then said
;
"
"

full stop

"

Look

wonder-wounded

hearers, this

is

I,"

etc.

The

scene, however, was grandly carried to The storm of mingled grief and completion.

love for the dead Ophelia

of anger breaking through respect, for Laertes, could never

;

70

THE TRAGEDIAN.

have had a more characteristic representa

tion.

Hamlet consents
Laertes, but
is

of

evil.

We
:

wager with by a presentiment had heard Mr. Booth give the

to play the

possessed

passage thus
"

It is

but foolery, but

(slight

would, perhaps

it is such a kind of gain-giving as pause, then in lower tone), trouble a

woman,

"

meaning,

it

man, yet I
said
"

feel it

ought not to trouble me, a does." On this occasion he

As would,
"

perhaps, trouble (slight pause) a

woman,"

meaning,

but shall not trouble

me."

How

fine the sentiment,

delicate the appre that could dictate these distinctions. hension,

how

The wavering
latter reading
;

balance inclines toward the

for to Horatio s friendly dis
"Not

suasion,

a whit

Hamlet immediately rejoins we defy augury there is a

;

special

providence in the

Choate

"

said,
"

exquisitely
finer

Rufus have seen him act Hamlet and again, in comparing Kean
fall
sparrow."

of a

and Booth, he
touches."

"

said,

This

man (Booth)

has

The last scene was full of grace and dra matic truth, in the fencing match with Laer-

HAMLET.
tes,

71

and

in its

accumulation of tragical results.

Well might Fortinbras, coming in peaceful march from recent victory, exclaim
"

0, proud Death

What

feast is

toward in thine eternal

at a shot,
"

cell,

That thou so many princes, So bloodily hast struck?

of the play, but

to

Dullness no doubt in us, in early readings we confess our indebtedness

Mr. Booth, for the true meaning of a line in Hamlet s last speech. After he has wrested the poisoned cup from Horatio s hand, he
says
"

If

thou didst ever hold

me

in

thy heart,
breath in pain,

Absent thee from

felicity awhile,

And in this harsh world draw thy To tell my story."

Striving against the poison at

work

in his
lifts

own
his

frame, he begs Horatio to live, and hand toward that heaven whither he

felt

his noble friend

"

would go, saying

felicity
awhile."

Absent thee from

We have taken more copious notes of Booth s Hamlet than of any other character assumed by him. But in reviewing the mis
cellany, something of Antony s impatience at the prolixity of his messenger from Rome,

prompts us to exclaim

"

Grrates

me :

the

72

THE TRAGEDIAN.
"

what marvelous and the personal We venture no opinion. But various life ? the total impression left by Mr. Booth s per sonation, at the time of its occurrence, and which still abides, was that of a spiritual melancholy, at once acute and profound.
!

sum

What

is

the

sum

of

Hamlet

unity of that

This quality colored his tenderest feeling

and

his airiest fancy as well as his

graver

purpose.

You

felt

its

presence even

when

he was

off the stage.

As

the Claude mirror

defines, refines,

Booth
let s

and tones the landscape, so impersonation lent a saddened and

mysterious charm to the vast world of

Ham

thought and observation.

SHYLOCK.

THE Hebrew blood, which, from some re mote ancestor, mingled in the current of his and was evidently traceable in his life
;

features

and haply determined the family

name (Booth from Beth, Hebrew

for house, nest for birds), did also undoubtedly in or fluence Mr. Booth s conception of the char

acter of Shylock. He made it the representative Hebrew: He the type of a race, old as the world.

drew the character

eur,

and
it

filled it

in lines of simple grand with fiery energy. In his

;

hands,

by intense pride of race as if there centered in

people

was marked by pride of intellect by a reserved force, him the might of a

;

whom

neither time, nor scorn, nor

political oppression

could subdue

and which
to our

has at successive periods, even

down

own

day, drawn the

its

attention of

mankind

towards
power.

frequent examples of intellectual His pronunciation of the words

74
"

THE TRAGEDIAN.
This Jacob from our holy

Abraham

was,"

carried the
tiquity,

mind back

into the remotest

an
for

and begat an involuntary respect

of

the speaker. The intense realism

Edmund Kean

made Shylock merely

a malignant usurer ; and so represented, to our thinking, rather Gratiano s idea of the Jew, than Shakes

But Kean, after making the audipeare s. ance hate him, did, by one of his sudden
turns of power, and by the pathos of his voice, in the passage beginning
Nay, take my life and an entire revulsion of feeling in the produce listener, so that pity took the place of ex
"

all,"

ecration.

Booth, on the contrary, whether for better

or worse, the

made usury
employment

the
;

Jew

accidental

or enforced
is

and avarice, which

natural

rather a graft on the original stock.

ally of such employment, his nature than a part of

He

disdained

all

appeal

He gave to the compassion of his judges. the passage quoted only as a softened ex
pression of that inexorable logic, which in other scenes, yields a certain dignity to the character, and wins our reluctant regard.

SEYLOCK.

75

ginning

Geo. Frederick Cooke, in the passage be Hath not a Jew eyes ? when he
"

"

came
it

to the

word

"

affections,"

so

informed
it

feeling, so contrasted the context, that it remains as the

with

human

with

marked

point

of his

performance.

But

if

Kean

abject appeal for the

means

Shylock was utterly

of living, when ruined, be doubtful ;

Cooke s turning the Jew out of the current of his reasoning wrath, when he had wealth and power, and was rejoicing in the pros
pect of revenge,
his

in order to complain of

wounded

affections,

seems

at best

but a

tempting error of conception.

tions

Booth, on the

contrary, gave no prominence to his affec but did, as we believe Shakespeare ;

intended, evenly include them in that in ventory of the qualities and conditions of

man, on which Shylock based respected as a man.

his character in

his claim to

be
of

Shylock develops the strongest

the very
first

traits

scene.

Ob

serve the cautious self-satisfaction with which

he holds and
power, Antonio.

plies the reins of monetary in his interview with Bassanio and

Yet the Hebrew stands back of

and above the usurer. Antonio

He

says,

musing on

7t>

TIIE
"

TRAGEDIAN.

If I

I will feed fat the ancient

He

can catch him once upon the hip, grudge I bear him. hates our sacred nation."

Again
"

What

are there

masques ?

Lock up

my

doors

....

Hear you me, Jessica

Let not the sound of shallow foppery, enter

My

sober

house."

Perhaps the grandest performance of Shylock ever given by Mr. Booth, or any other, was on the third of September, 1850, during his last engagement before going to Califor
nia.

He

was

in perfect physical condition.

still

His voice was

omed

resonance, which told

capable of that unfathin the settled

revengeful purpose of the part.

eral conception

The gen

was

as

we have

indicated.

Salanio and opened. Salarino are conversing of Antonio s losses. Shylock enters, having just found out Jes
sica s
theft, and heard of her elopement. You knew, none so well as should say, But no word of my daughter s flight." you,

The Third Act

He

"

could

molten by passion, before

volcanic

His voice seemed could be shaped into words, and so leaped from his lips, a
distinguish.
it

we

eruption

of

inarticulate

speech.

SHYLOCK.
This as he was coming
in.

77

When

fairly

on

the scene, the fire retreats inward.

He

im

mediately proves himself an overmatch for the lighter wit of the two Venetian gallants.

them makes a feeble rally, then they and receive without further par his tremendous questioning. ley The fiery scorn he threw into the words
of

One

stand

silent,

"

A bankrupt

a prodigal

that used to
to
call

come

so

smug upon

the mart.

...
bond."

He was wont

me

usurer.

Let him look to his

And he strode down the stage to the farthest corner, the white fire of his anger writhing
in his face, animating his tread, and flying out in his wild but determinate gesture.
Salarino.
his flesh:
"

Why I am
s

sure

if

he

forfeit,

thou wilt not take

what

that good for?

"

"

Shylock (turning suddenly).

To

bait fish

withal."

We

have heard Mr. Booth,

this

in

one of his

tamer moods, say

holding a fishing-rod. with a gesture inexpressibly violent and rapid, he seemed to be tearing the flesh, and

with a gesture as if But on this occasion,

throwing it into the sea. The whole of the next speech rode on a

mighty

tide

of passion, gathering, acceler

ating, rushing

due on, but broken sometimes

78

THE TRAGEDIAN.
fearful pauses

by
the

smiting blows of

of thought, followed by logic, like the hush before

thunder-stroke.

How

those

questions
irresisti

came, winged and edged with

!

scorn, solid as

the substance of thought, fiery and ble as the motion of passion

Nor can we tell from what depth of vigor arose the grand and various expression of the next scene, directly after, on the en trance of Tubal. Let the reader review the
text.
"

....
"

No
I

ill

No

luck stirring but what lights o tears but o my shedding."

I

my

shoulders.

thank God,

thank

God."

Good news. Ha! ha! ha!" Thou slickest a dagger in me

I

"

am

glad of it. I ll torture him. I am glad of would not have given it for a wilderness of monkeys."
it."

I will

have the heart of him

if

he

forfeit."

Go, Tubal, and meet

me

at our

Synagogue, at our Syna

gogue,

Tubal."

All given with glowing passion, and fine

artistic

changes.
act,

In the fourth

Booth enters the court

room, calm, his tumult of passion condensed into a settled purpose ; and with a kind of
dignity, if unrelenting hate like his can bear

that quality. From the audience, he listens to the Duke, then quietly begins
:

SHYLOCK.
"

79
;

And by
If

have possessed your Grace of what I purpose our holy Sabbath have I sworn To have the due and forfeit of my bond
:

you deny

it,

let

the danger light

Upon your

charter,

and your

city s

freedom."

The last two lines were given with an outreach ing and arching motion of the arm and hand, palm downward, like the stoop of a bird of prey.

We

feel the pressure of the intense

pas

sionate purpose,

below the

logic, in his short

colloquies with Bassanio

as the Doctor, enters,

and Gratanio, and in

till

his longer speeches to the court

Portia,

and speaks of mercy

quality
;

and the law.

as

Against her plea for mercy,

twice-blessed
itself,

against

the

Shylock
religion

sets his face like

flint

but as his

moved him,

at the mention of the

name

of God,

his breast,

Booth folded his arms upon and bowed his head in reverence.

"

My

deeds upon

my head

"

As Christ was mercy, Shylock. been floating in Shakespeare s mind that other fearful imprecation, His
exclaims
there

may have

"

blood be on us and on our

children."

The

dark effluence of the same

the language of the Jew.

spirit

appears in
:

Booth gave the

saying

words with

solid force, as after, in

80
"

THE TRAGEDIAN.
An
oath,
I

an oath,

have an oath

in

heaven

Shall

lay perjury upon

for
Venice,"

my

soul?

No, not

he stood a type of the religion of the law.

The
is

crisis

finds his

of the play arrives. Shylock a two-edged sword, and "justice

"

suffering

from the unexpected stroke of

:

it.

Foiled of the penalty he craves, he says

"

I take this offer then:

pay the bond

#0,"

thrice,

And

let

the Christian

uttered between set teeth, and with repeated still holding to the last, gesture of repulsion
:

his pride of faith as the his cruel

dominant element of

mind.

IAGO.

AN
That a

actor

man

is the only innocent hypocrite. of Mr. Booth s probity and gen

so insphered the erosity of soul, should have to make it one of his character of lago as

is

most admirable and popular representations, a case in point. lago seems not so much

a debauched intelligence as an intelligence which had been the devil s own from the
beginning,
that kind

It pain. intellectual activity, without moral principle or human feeling.

Yet his diabolism was not of which delights primarily in others consisted rather in an unresting

He
am

is

a constitutional

In audacious contrast to
that I
am,"

lago

He brags of it. Him who said, I I am not what I says,

liar.
"

"

am."

Danger and crime are necessary

to

give scope to the action of his fertile brain.

He
in

is

human

the embodiment of spiritual wickedness character. And we must resort

to this

paradox, in order to make him

human

that he seeks for motives, which are in them-

82

THE TRAGEDIAN.

selves criminal, in order to justify the pro ceeding of his spontaneous malignity. He is

the parent of
literary art.
is

many a villain in more recent The Mephistopheles of Goethe

of his family, at the least a cousin-german.

But Goethe slights his fiend into heaven, and gives him preternatural power to work mis
chief on the earth:

while lago

successes

(which are only postponed failures) are the mere product of his busy brain, and his

plumed-up
not by

will.

He

"

works by

wit,

and gay

witchcraft."

Hazlitt says that

Kean made lago

a careless,

"

light-hearted monster;

cordial,

comfortable

villain."

another version.
nine
swift
;

Booth gave quite His conception was satur

but the expression of

and

brilliant.

He

it was strangely showed the dense

force, the stealth, the velvet-footed grace of

the panther ; the subtlety, the fascination, the rapid stroke of the fanged serpent. There

was

less variation

in his performances,
this part,

one

from the other, of

character.

than he exhibited

in the portrayal of

any other Shakespearean Whatever difference did exist,

lay in the greater or less intensity of the rep resentation.

IAGO.

83

On

the loth of September, 1847, as

we

most vividly remember, he was possessed by He came on the his most splendid devil.
stage, clear as spirit, and the voice he used was that most sweet and audible, deep-re

volving bass.

He

"

talked far above sing

His delivery of the text was a master ing." It had all the of colloquial style. piece turns, the tones of nature, the unex abrupt

and the occasional persuasive which belong to the best conversation. force, In the first scene, having quieted Roderigo s complaints, he breaks out with
pectedness,
"

Call up her father;

Rouse him
delight,

(that

it,

Othello),

make

after him, poison his

Proclaim him in the streets

And

incense her kinsmen, though he in a fertile climate dwell, Plague him with flies though that his joy be joy, Yet throw such changes of vexation on t,
; :

As

it

may

lose

some

color."

Observe the rapid alternation of subject in these lines, and the chasing up of mis
chievous suggestion they contain.
Roderigo.
logo.

Here

is

her father

house

ll

call

aloud.

Do with like timorous accent and dire yell, As when (by night and negligence) the fire
Is spied in

populous

cities.

There was no heat

in this passage.

Booth

84
uttered

THE TRAGEDIAN.

it with a devilish unconcern, as if with the fancy of terror and dismay, pleased and playing meanwhile with his sword-hilt,

or pulling at his gauntlets.

He

then strikes

house, and speak the key-hole, sounds the reso ing through

on the door of Brabantio

"

nant alarm,

What,
felt

ho, Brabantio

"

Yet
"

in

play saying this, The duplicity, ing with some inward bait." the double nature, the devil in him, was
subtly manifest.
in the darkness,

we

that his

mind was

After Roderigo has made himself known and while Brabantio, from
is

the window,
ities,

uttering his peevish personal

why
"

cannot some actor

at intervals, in

who

represents
interrupt

the

silly gentleman,"

make him
"

the old

man

order to get a
Sir, sir,
sir,"

hearing, instead of repeating

all

invariably done upon the and which indeed is in the text so stage? set down.
at once, as
is

in the mood of complaint, us note the ludicrous error, usually com mitted by actors, in lago s next speech
let
:
"

While we are

Zounds,
if

sir,

you are one of those that

you."

will not serve

God,

the devil bid

In which they bring

down

the

emphasis

IAGO.

85
motive
!

plump on
Booth
that

"devil,"

as if the highest
s

for serving

God, were the devil

"

bidding

said

that will not serve Grod, if the

devil bid

you,"

giving the plain

meaning,

the

devil

bidding was no argument

against serving God. In the first scene, lago enters, lying to In the second he enters, lying to Roderigo.

In the third, he is Othello about Roderigo. the trial of Othello s a silent attendant during
in

But no one who saw Mr. Booth marriage. any of these scenes, either speaking or
could escape
the impression
of the

silent,

presence of a malign and potent intellect. The second act opens in Cyprus. Desdemona is waiting and anxious for the arrival
of Othello.
"

She says
;

am

not merry but

I

do beguile
"

The thing

seeming otherwise. Come, how would st thou praise me?

am by

In lago

reply, with his invented rhymes,

art,

Booth showed that nature in was one felicity of his genius.

He

which was a

poet caught in the very act of invention ; with just those pauses, abstractions, flashes, and occasional career of speech, when a line
or two

came out

entire

which

befit

the

86

THE TRAGEDIAN.

The ambition
his

of

many

actors

is

to

make

the sound an echo to the sense.

Booth used

grand voice, not as echo, but as inter His imagination was so penetrative, that he did not stop at the imagery, but
preter.

voiced the thought or emotion imaged. In simple passages, however, where the ring, or
or buzz, or plunge, or clang, or suspiration, of the words, is identical with their

hum,

meaning, as was the case in the early days of human speech, nothing could exceed the
sphered beauty of that tongue s utterance. An example occurred in lago, on the night

know

exclaims in question. his trumpet."

He

"

The Moor
the
;

word, gave with the very sound of the instrument and tossed it from his lips with the careless

He

grace

of an accomplished musician. sound startled from his dull mood one

The
critic
lis

in the audience,

and kept him an

alert

tener for the remainder of the play. In the that concludes this self-betraying soliloquy
scene, occur the lines
"

Now

do love her too

Not out

of absolute lust (though peradventure I stand accountant for as great a sin

").

The

gratuitous fiendishness contained in this

IAGO.

87

parenthesis, Booth illustrated, by looking up to heaven with, defiant forehead and gesture,

and with a cold and mocking

smile.

lago has fooled Roderigo to the top of his too drunk, and bent ; made Cassio drunk
vulgarly
so,

rel follows,

a quar most actors make him the town rises, and Othello ap

pears, lago is called on for explanation, and finds himself in just those circumstances

which give a stinging relish to the motion How he stood, still, but with of his mind.
a quick spirit in every fibre, between the roused Othello and the drunken Cassio, vig ilant, vital, ready for the unknown emer

gency, and with an invention whose play

was

"

"

He

easy as lying reached the acme of hypocrisy in the

!

passage beginning
I

Touch me not so near: had rather have this tongue cut from
"

my mouth
"

Than

it

should do offense to Michael Cassio

When
"

left

alone with Cassio, lago says

honest

As

am an

man

thought you had received some

bodily

wound."

The simpler meaning is conveyed, by the usual emphasis on But this em bodily."
"

phasis

would

oppose

bodily

to

spiritual

88

THE TRAGEDIAN.
faith in the latter.
"

wounds, and lago has no

Booth, with fine penetration, said, I thought you had received some "bodily wound" em
phasizing both words, as if there were no other wounds to suffer from. And we find
__

him

directly after

"

blowing

reputation,"

the

loss of

which Cassio so deplores,

fertility

like a

bub

ble, into thin air.

With what amazing

of evil re
:

source has Shakespeare invested lago and what subtlety of adaptation did Booth ex
hibit in those soliloquies,
"

wherein he

"

plumes

up

his will

and

in the varied play of fac

ulty he brings to bear on the other charac dare not attempt ters of the drama
!

We

to analyze his look, tone, manner, the undefinable efflux of wickedness, under the guise

of friendship,

by which,

in

the Third Act,

he obtains the mastery over Othello s mind. One or two points may bear specific mention. Finding the suspicion he has awakened in
the Moor, applies

alone to
it,

Cassio, leaving
:

Desdemona yet
"

clear of

lago says

Good name
Is the

dear in man and woman immediate jewel of their souls."

my lord
"

and woman by a before and after, and completing the pause

Isolating

the

words

"

IAGO.
isolation

89
in

an altered, clear, low tone, he aims directly at Othello s heart, and plants in it the first surmise of
his wife s infidelity. His addresses to

by uttering them

Othello had a fearful symmetry of falsehood. He lied so like truth, that had we been in Othello s place, we felt he would have deceived us too. His soliloquies, and those looks and slight
gestures aside, alone revealed his true char
acter.

Between

his

assumed friendship, and

these tokens of self-betrayal, he passed with incredible rapidity of transition ; and did it

with a keen

relish,

an intense gust of iniquity.

Yet was the odiousness of lago s nature lightened and carried off by the grace and force of Booth s representation. For, dis
guise it as we may, the love of natural to man, that we take an
delight in the exhibition in a play. good or evil

power is so unmeasured of power, whether

for

of a just-imported leopard, that

The eyeballs we saw in our

youth, dilating and glancing with a green malignant light, shine still with all the old
fascination
;

and glow

in

memory by some
write of Booth
s

occult

association, as

we

chastened Shakespeare by deliv lago. as in one continuous line, ering,

He

90
"

THE TRAGEDIAN.
It is a

common

thing to have a foolish

wife."

He

gave
"

Burn

like the

Dangerous conceits mines of sulphur,"

.

with a voice like a writhing inward flame. Wherever Shakespeare raised one of his
characters above
it

its

habitual level,

by plum

with the splendor of his own imagi ing nation, Booth instinctively took wing with
him,; ,and the
"

manner

in

which he gave

Not poppy nor mandragora

the drowsy syrups of the world Shall ever medicine thee to that sweet sleep Which thou ow dst yesterday,"
all

Nor

was, as if a boding angel, in tones of profoundest music, banished all the agents of repose, and created the doom he pronounced.

In the night scene, where Roderigo en counters Cassio, on the very night when the deeper tragedy of the play is consummated, lago appears with a light and a drawn sword.

The

light shone

on Booth

pale

and

fiendish

face, as,

with a sword-stroke into Roderigo s wounded body, he delivers himself of this

stroke of devilish wit
"

Kill

men

the

dark!"

1AGO.
It will be

91
instigated

remembered that he had murder of Cassio. Roderigo

to the

In the

last scene, as

lago stands a defeated

culprit, his hideous crimes exposed, Othello

saying,
"

If that thou be st a devil I cannot kill

thee,"

runs

at

and

stabs

him.

Booth

replied,

staunching the wound, and mastering the anguish of it, and with a look of steady
hatred and defiance,
"

I bleed, sir,

but
"

not

kitted."

As

he would say, cannot kill me. I am a

if

You

are right,

you

devil."

OTHELLO.
DURING
a certain

week

in the

autumn

of

1847, there came

to us a special revelation of

On Tuesday, September 14th, Mr. Booth enacted Othello. On Wednesday, 15th, lago that lago we and on Thursday, have just briefly noticed
the scope of the histrionic art.
16th,

Othello

again.

The

entireness

of

transition in so short a span ; the complete ness of identification in characters so essen

filled us with a wonder that But a great actor is the only human being who is voluntarily and happily beside himself, with power of complete self-

tially diverse,
still

abides.

recovery, and readiness for a fresh transfor mation.

Booth

lago was so well

known

to us

his

figure rose so surely in our imagination as we read the play, that we heard, not without

some misgiving, the announcement of Mr. Booth as Othello, the first time for many
"

years."

We

confess to a fear, lest, in his

look, or trait, or tone of

performance, some

OTHELLO.
the deep-revolving subtle villainy of his
familiar

93

more

part might appear, to despoil the frank and noble presence of the Moor. But
scarcely too much to say, that the two characters did not lie more clearly asunder
it is

in

the
s

mind of Shakespeare, than

representation.

in

Mr.

Booth

Othello was a Christian graft upon a wild He was a Mauritanian Arabian stock.

The Eastern origin of his race ; his prince. birth in Africa ; his military life ; his Venetian
had part in building up a charac ter, compact of strength, fervency, simplicity, and honor. Accordingly, Booth s persona tion was marked, especially in the earlier
culture
;

all

portion of the play, by an oriental largeness and calm. Even when his frame of nature
is

wrenched from

its

fixed place,

by lago

preternatural enginery, there is a continual recoil and reinstatement of the Moor s solid
virtue
;

so that

he never loses our respect, at

the same time that he moves our sympathies beyond any other male character in Shake
speare. might sum up Mr. Booth s characterization in one word magnanimity. In this mood of mind he enters on the

We

scene, lago following.

If the reader could

94
imagine Booth
Othello,

THE TRAGEDIAN.
s

lago played against his

the illusion
!

how would

own we hope to
tries to

create in

him be heightened

lago

incense Othello against Roderigo, the soi-disant rival. Othello answers

"

Moor

"Tis

better

as

it

is."

with a gravity, a weighty last three words, which a reproof, and was intended to dis conveyed miss the subject. lago returns to the charge :
this

Booth gave

distinctness

on the

Nay, but he prated, spoke such scurvy and provoking terms Against your honor ;
"

And

"

home

thrust, but finding

it

without

effect,

his speech veers

and power

for

upon Brabantio, his place Then comes from injury.

"

Othello the noble reply, beginning

Let him do his
I fetch

spite.

my

life

and being

From men

May
As

of royal siege; and my demerits speak unbonneted to as proud a fortune

this that I

have

reached,"

given with peculiar intonation, and rising em phasis, imparting a fine accent to the meaning,
did not add to the dignity of a Moorish prince to become the son-in-law of a Vene tian senator.
that
it

OTHELLO.
"

95
.

For know, lago,

But that

I love

the gentle Desdemona,"

with wealth of tenderness, and sad, as

high feeling
vibration
is,

all

and
"

in tones that

seemed the

of his

that speech Mr. of the character.

dear heart-strings." In Booth struck the key note

picturesque and effective are the The whole night scenes of this great play of the First Act, with its large variety of
!

How

place

Fifth, with

and persons, and the whole of the much of the Second and Fourth

Acts, pass in the night.

for peace
It
is

and

love.

It is the

Night is the season house of grief.

with
followers,

the cloak of crime.

Brabantio

(entering

torches, and weapons) exclaims

"

Down

with him, thief

"

(They draw on both

with
"

sides.)

lago strikes in
am

You, Roderigo, come

sir,

for

you."

Perhaps he intended to pick off that gentle man, whose purse he had already drained, even as he does later in the play. Perhaps in encountering him he only meant to pre
serve him, in

order to pluck him cleaner.

yb

TEE TRAGEDIAN.
speculate on the motives and conduct of
s

We
are

Shakespeare

characters,

living persons.

And
living,

as if they were with reason ; for they

not only

but

immortal.

lago

He has no sympathy plainly expects a fight. with that romance of honor, which governs
Othello
s

conduct.

He

can have no knowl

edge of

it.

But

so disengaged

from

all

pur

pose or permission of quarrel is the Moor, that he playfully and nobly says
"

Keep up your bright swords,

for the

dew

will rust

them."

Then turning to Desdemona s father, who has just called him he adds, in a thief," manner of mingled reproof and deference
"
"

Good

signior, you shall

more command with years

Than with your

weapon."

But

into the utterance of the last line, there

crept a keen, low-toned, cool disdain. old father insists on Othello s arrest,

The
and

heaps gross accusations on him.

Then came

from Booth
"

The

flash

and outbreak of a

fiery

mind,"

in the

words
"

Both

ou of

my

Hold your hands inclining and the

!

rest;

Were it my

cue to fight,
"

should have

known

it

Without a prompter

OTHELLO.
the

97

concluding words quietly addressed to

the disappointed lago.

Charles

Lamb
To
it

said that

he was quite un

able to measure the value of

"

Hamlet
Othello

s so

liloquy,

be or not to

be,"

because he
s

had heard

so often recited.
is

ad

dress to the Senate

almost equally hack

neyed. But Mr. Booth so cleansed it from the scurf of custom ; gave it with such dig
nity,

directness,
to hear
all

seemed

it

delicacy, fervor, that we then for the first time.

To

genius

doors fly open.

s

He
;

took us
see

into old Brabantio

house, and

made us

the very progress of his courtship and the gentle lady, the house affairs dispatched, sit
ting a
"

charmed
father loved

listener to his recital.

Her
Still

me

(gesture of dissent from the father)

Oft invited

me

questioned
I

me

the story of

my

life,

From year
That

to year, the battles, sieges, fortunes,

have passed. I ran it through, even from my boyish days, To the very moment that he bade me tell

it."

These circumstances were proof of

the dramatic truth of Booth
felt
s

love, in

the estimate of the frank-minded Moor.

delivery
foe,"

In

we

the presence of the

"insolent

whom

he was

"sold

to

slavery,"

by and the joy

98
of his
listens
"

THE TRAGEDIAN.
redemption thence." with greedy ear
"

"

Desdemona

"

Which I observing, Took once a pliant hour, and found good means

"

glancing at the father

"To

draw from her a prayer of earnest heart, That I would all my pilgrimage dilate, Whereof by parcels she had something heard, But not intentively."

In these words and in the following lines, where he quotes Desdemona, we seem to hear her speaking through him, with all her
innocent finesse, and full-hearted tenderness. Twas pitiful," as if concluding then with
"

and with rising in wondrous The Twas flection pitiful. was made to the Senate, and not to address
fresh access of feeling,
"

the audience.

We

can only add, in the lan

guage of the Duke

"I

think this tale would win

my

daughter

too."

The
that in

reader has undoubtedly remarked, making the comparison of excellence

in actors,

we excluded

all

literatures beside

the English, and all nations who did not speak the English tongue. And simply be cause of the unquestioned supremacy of

Shakespeare.
lations,

The French and Italian trans and the actors who perform in them,

OTHELLO,

99

may

be passed by without comment.

affinity of

The

Germans, by

language and race,

may put in a better claim. The name of Devrient, has a vague high fame, in the Ger man Shakespeare, as well as in the drama of
his

native

land.

Travelled

scholars

have

years, brought back report of the unmatched excellence of Mr. Bogumil

also, for

many

Dawison, as a representative of Shakespear ean character and the cultivated audiences of New York and Boston have recently en
;

joyed the rare pleasure of seeing him play Othello in German, to Mr. Edwin Booth s

lago

in English.

watched his performance with eager It was full of beauties, and strik ingly original and natural, in action and by He dismissed Cassio as if he loved play.
interest.

We

him.
as if

He lay on a couch in his own chamber, no one were looking at him. He hung
last scene,

over his dead wife, in the

cries

uttering

whose simple pathos touched the heart. His voice is sweet and flute-like, but of little His facial ex compass, or variety of tone. was intense and vivid, though with pression sameness and his gestures were indetermi Yet he made one exit, in nate and heaving.
;

100

THE TRAGEDIAN.

Act, in which, by abrupt and repeated looking back, and by pauses, glances, and play of feature, he expressed
in a

the great Third

the contending emotions of Othello s mind, manner that Roscius might have envied,

at the height of Shake introduced the long first scene of speare. the Fourth Act, always omitted on the Eng

and which aimed well

He

lish

and American stage

but which

is

so

necessary to that continuity and accumulation of evidence, which overbears Othello s mind,

and hurries on the catastrophe and for this we thank him heartily. He carried natural His affection for Desdeness to an excess.

mona was very

fulsome.

manifest

perhaps a

little

It lacked

dignity,

and that

reti

cence which belongs to calm, firm natures, whose flame of love is contained, intense,

and steady.

He

translated the character,

as well as the language, into

German.

These remarks
in that scene

we

apply to his expression, have reached, in our pres

will

the scene of ent consideration of the play Othello and Desdemona meeting at Cyprus.

The words
and
first
"

"

"

"

content,"
"

calm,"

comfort,"

content

again, appear in the

Moor
"

speeches.

He

calls

her

his

soul s

OTHELLO.

101

joy."

So

that he

feels

chaste, so deep-hearted is his love, an ex a willingness to die,

to

perience only possible

the most

serene

and imaginative mood.

Booth.
"

We

return to Mr.

If it

were now to die

for I fear

Twere now to be most happy;

hath her content so absolute, That not another comfort like to this,

My soul

Succeeds in

unknown

fate."

The calm

intensity, the purified

and exalted

passion, the sad, prophetic, far-off music he infused into this passage, can never be for

gotten.

shall recall it, once, in the course of this analysis. On that scene of confusion so skillfully

We

engineered by lago,

with Cassio drunk, and the town alarmed, Montano wounded, Othello appears, roused with indignation.

The

tropic blood,

till

now

veins, begins to stir. not as if he loved him

He
;

sleeping in his dismissed Cassio,

if,

or rather as

loving

him, he loved discipline and honor more. have had the initial touches of this

We

man

We

s vast capacity for imaginative emotion. are prepared for the grand Third Act, exhibiting the second distinct phase of Othel

lo s nature,

yet without losing his noble in-

102
dividuality.

THE TRAGEDIAN.

We

have hitherto seen him as

the Christian soldier. the barbaric prince.

ice.

The

He now appears as Africa supplants Ven mighty passions, nourished by the

sun,

where he was born, and which lay slum

bering within, imparting, so long as they were kept subdued, a lion-like strength to
his character, are here set loose,

and lashed

into a fearful storm,

by

the devil-agency of

lago.

we

In order to save a repetition of names, shall speak, for the time, of Othello and
as

Booth

one person.

They were

one, to

our apprehension. note the noble con fidence of Othello towards Cassio, whom he I do believe sees parting from his wife.
"

We

twas

he."

ture, to

So opposite was Othello by na the selfish and self-generated passion

of jealousy, that it required the repeated subtle probe of lago s wit before even Cassio

could be brought under suspicion.

Othello.
"

yes,

and went between us very

oft,"

given with a hearty and happy remembrance of Cassio s friendship. And not till lago
has,

by covert

and

brought Othello,
agonized question,

who
"

halting insinuations, lived by truth, to the

dost thou

What

mean ?

"

OTHELLO.

103

does

does he dare to implicate Desdemona. He it then only by suggestion, and in the

"

and woman," pushing that general words card like an ingenious juggler. Othello takes it, and finds it inscribed with characters of
dismay. The fiend follows up his advantage, and wrings from the heart of his victim, in the words tones that for ex O, misery of inward desolation we have never pression
"

"

heard equaled. Yet in the next long speech, we find his shaken manhood partially recovering its
poise
:
"

Thinkest thou

d make a

life

of jealousy?

"

The blended modesty and

ner, in the phrase
"

self-respect of

man

Nor from mine own weak merits The smallest fear or doubt of her
For she had eyes

will I

draw

revolt:

and
"

chose

me."

The word

"

revolt

was one of those strokes

of genius in tone, of which he furnished such numberless examples. It came with access of emphasis, as if he felt, for an instant, how dreadful a thing her revolt might be, then dismisses the thought at once. It was that
subtle touch of lago
"

s,

in the phrase
you,"

She did deceive her father marrying

104

THE TRAGEDIAN.
for

put forth as a basis

Othello calls
for,

those

"

"

proofs

which took the ground

little

from under him.

"

lago.
Othello.

I see, this
"

hath a

dashed your

spirits."

Not a jot.

Not a

jot,"

in a tone, playing
filled

on the surface of a mind,

with suppressed agony.

:
"

And

again,

soon after
till

No, not much

moved,"

his o erfraught heart burst into the

"

words
"

do not think but Desdemona

honest

meaning, of and given with a ges the fore ture strangely original and fine of the lifted hand pointed vertically to finger
"Fear

not

my

government,"

course,

my

self-control,

the top of the head.

"

If I

do prove her haggard,

etc.."

matched the airy sweep of the to prey at fortune," the words, imagery ; a darting and dispersed ges accompanied by
in a voice that
"

ture.
"

Desdemona comes

If she
I
ll

be

false,

0, then heaven mocks

it."

itself!

not believe

The

sight of his wife

dispels

suspicion, as

daybreak a hideous dream. ness remains.

But the weari

OTHELLO.
"

105
little."

Your napkin

is

too

The handkerchief Desdemona to the

invited the
is
"

He goes with drops. dinner, to which he has

generous islanders." The scene occupied by Emilia in finding the fatal nap

kin,

and lago, in snatching

it.

it,

and plotting

mischief with

Othello has said

make me jealous, feeds well, loves company, Is free of speech sings, plays, and dances well Where virtue is these are more virtifous."
"

Tis not to
is fair,

To say my

wife

But
begun
the

already, to Othello s mind, lago has And to turn that virtue into pitch.

we may imagine

the guileless hospitality of

gentle lady to her guests, maddening her husband, so that he abruptly leaves them, and reenters on the scene to lago, with the

exclamation
"

Ha, ha!

false to

me?

to

me ?

"

He

seeks a wretched refuge in the surmise

:
"

of ignorance
I

had been happy, Pioneers and all

"

if

the general camp,

the voice of desperation as he heaps up the

hyperbole
So

"

Had

tasted her sweet body,

known."

had nothing

106

THE TRAGEDIAN.
self- wounding,

But the

scorpion

mood

is

of

change of mano in a style large, oriental, he came down ner, the stage ; and looking towards the listeners,
brief duration.
entire

With

but never at them, he poured the

full

volume
"

of his voice, not loud but deep, into the fare well." The melancholy grandeur of the lines,

however
soul.

uttered, finds

its

way
"

into

every
his

In the mere word

farewell,"

great heart seemed to burst as in one vast The phrase, the tranquil continuing sigh.
"

mind,"

clear

brain-tones,

immediately succeeding, came in with a certain involved

suggestiveness of meaning almost impossible

to define, but as if the tranquil flown. The whole passage, with
sive

mind had
its

succes

images of glorious war, filing and dis appearing before his mind s eye, employed some of the grandest elements of voice, sub

dued

to retrospective
"

and mournful cadences.

s
gone."

Othello s occupation

And
eyes

he stood with a look in

the

his large blue

bronzed
as
s

face
if

lending
all

them a
scene, of the

strange

sadness

happiness had
this

gone

after.

Kean

manner, in

was very

different.

At

the

close

"farewell,"

he raised both hands, clasped

OTHELLO.

107

them, and so brought them down upon his head, with a most effective gesture of des
pair.

But the
is

action seems to us like trans

forming Othello into

It

Edmund Kean.

the setting of the "farewell," the like grand pause in the passion of the play the ominous pause of the maelstrom, at the

turning of the tide sway over the mind.

which gives

it

such

The

passion

returns

with redoubled power, to the evident sur prise, and almost to the discomfiture of lago,

whom

Othello seizes by the throat,

demand

The ing ocular proof of his wife s infidelity. villain can make only short protests. Words
can but faintly indicate the
"

terrific

and cum

ulative energy of the passage, beginning

If thou dost slander her,

and torture me,

Never pray more;

"

marked
clearness,

as

it was equally by intellectual heat of passion, and imaginative

realization.

The

fit
;

passes,

and leaves him and

in a whirl of doubt

but of doubt pressing

towards

resolution,

demanding

proof,

lago

is

ready with his master stroke, the

"

Strong circumstance
"

Which

leads directly to the door of truth

the handkerchief.

108

THE TRAGEDIAN.
Such a handkerchief was your wife s) did I to-day
"

(I

am

sure

it

See Cassio wipe his beard

with."

When

Mr. Booth played lago, he

did, in

saying this, while pretending to lay his hand on his heart, to enforce asseveration, tuck

away more

securely in his doubtlet, the very

handkerchief, which, with fiendish purpose, he intended Cassio should wipe his beard
with.

Now
Othello

appears the third distinct phase of The history nature, the oriental.

of that handkerchief arises in the mind of the Moor, and with it the dim and dominat ing superstitions of the East, the birthplace
of his race.

He
"

exclaims
do
I see
tis

Now

true

"

The passion of the Third Act is so intense and varying, the drain on the physical power
of the actor, especially his voice,
is

so enor

mous

that eight lines, beginning

"

Like to the Pontic

sea,"

have been cut out of the representation. Edmund Kean never gave them. Mr. Booth omitted them on his first performance but
;

at the urgent solicitation of personal friends,

OTHELLO.
restored

109
Their utter

them on the second.

ance overpaid expectation.

headlong speed and vast

They came with momentum. The

images and names of those eastern seas, he endowed with a peculiar freshness and sur
"

"

prise.

Hellespont dashed on rocks.

"

sounded

like a torrent

Till that

a capable and wide revenge

up,"

Swallow them

gave the sound, and figured the very action of engulfing waves.
of the river Rhone, as they leave the lake of Geneva, are singularly pure.

The waters

The turbid Arve empties into the Rhone ; and, side by side, without mingling, flow the two distinct currents in the same channel.
Even
so

was

it

with Othello

mind.

The

current of his pure and inextinguishable love, runs side by side, without mingling, with the
his heart

flow of foul and bloody thoughts poured into by lago. He blows his love to

heaven

in

one pathetic breath.

its

He

invokes

his love to

throne to

crown and hearted yield up hate. His bosom swells tyrannous

"

He fraught of aspic s tongues." from the scene, in order to provide passes

with
its
"

Some

swift

means of death,

For the

fair

devil."

110

THE TRAGEDIAN.
in

But when he comes,

is

the

very next
all
s

scene, into the angel presence of his wife,

changed. with a grave tenderness.

clear itory tones, ring
"

He

takes

Desdemona

hand

His paternal, mon and sad in our memory.

is

This hand
felt

moist,

my

lady."

no age, nor known no sorrow." This argues fruitfulness, and liberal heart: Othello. Hot, hot, and moist. This hand of yours requires
Desdemona.
" "

It

yet has

A sequester from liberty,

This
the
line

fasting

and

prayer."

Hebrew

and the following, remind one of poetry, which consisted of a

varied repetition of the thought, in mated

lines,

but without rhyme.

"

He

goes on
"

Much

castigation, exercise devout;

and he held up the innocent hand between

his two, in

momentary but fervent

attitude

of prayer. Then, still holding her hand in one of his, and pointing with the other, and

looking keenly but without unkindness into

her palm, he adds, with heightening and ring ing accent

:
"

For here s a young and sweating That commonly rebels."

devil here,

These three words

in

changed tone, and with

the voice sustained at the close, and given in such a manner that the attentive listener

supplemented

the

"

meaning

and

fear

OTHELLO.

Ill

must do
tion
"

so in

your

performance.
For here

On
s

case." So, at the first the second, a fine varia

a young and sweating

devil

here,"

then a with the same searching intensity doubt seems to rise in his mind, and kindly
;

he gives her the benefit of it in saying

"

That commonly

(slight pause)

rebels"

history of the handkerchief, contain the only touch of the supernatural in this ing domestic tragedy, was told with a fine orien
tal fanaticism.
"

The

She was a charmer, and could almost read The thoughts of people."

Eye, gesture, voice, conspired

very impress of divination.
"

to give

the

And

bid me,

when

my

fate

would have

me

wive."

His look reached upward,

as

a Chaldean

might, towards those stars which influence

human
"

destiny.

Make

it

a darling, like your precious

eye."

The priceless, unreplaceable preciousness of the handkerchief, was condensed in the word
"darling,"

with a keen, fond, defended in

tonation.

112
Desdemona.
"

TEE TRAGEDIAN.
Is it possible ?
"

"

Othello (instantly).

Tis true.
in the

There
world

magic in the

web

of

it.

sibyl, that

had numbered

The sun

to

make two hundred

In her prophetic fury

compasses, sewed the work."

The whole passage came with a frenzy of spontaneous narration ; and with gesture full of subtle intimations, not mimicries, for turning, swift as a swallow in flight, example,
from the inspiration of the ing of the work.
"

sibyl, to the

sew

Fetch

it;

let

me

see

it,"

as with a desperate certainty that

it

could

not be found or brought. It argued a certain badness of nature in

Emilia,
science
for which only her wakened con and her willing death at the end of

the play might fully atone, that she could bear to stand by and hear this relation, wit
ness

Othello
little

astonished grief, and and yet withhold the angry exit, word that would have set all right.

her mistress
s

The

omission of the

first

scene

of the

Fourth Act, was a serious always be presented. In

proofs thicken.

fault.
it

It should

the simulated

The wild

alternation. .of love

with jealous madness in Othello

that pa-

OTHELLO.
renthesis of contemplation,
his
"

113

where he
"

refers

instructed na shadowing passion to and not to lago s report and so ture," makes the very emotion he suffers under
"

the an occult proof of his wife s guilt bloody thoughts which clot into single, ter his trance are all of the rible words

and ex and can employ the very highest pression, Moreover, that scene genius of any actor. the auditor for the following, and prepares accounts for Othello s direct and cruel ac
closest texture of dramatic situation

cusations.

The

turbid current has mingled

to

with the pure.

We

come now
It

the

last

scene

the

was full of fate. Mr. bed-chamber. Booth entered with an eastern lamp lighted in one hand, and a drawn scimitar in the other. The oriental subjective mood had
obtained
"

full

"

posed

proofs

The sup possession of him. had sunk into his mind, and
This
is

resolved themselves into a fearful unity of

thought and purpose. in a later speech

:
"

fully

shown

For to deny each article with oath, Cannot remove or choke the strong conception That I do groan withal. Thou art to die."

114

THE TRAGEDIAN.
again
is

And
there

Being done (i. e., resolved on) no pause (m deed).

"

"

The

movement, the

expression of contained energy in his large, low-toned, vibrant ru

mination of his voice, sounding like thought overheard, filled the scene with an atmos

phere at once oppressive and fascinating.

"

know

not where

is

that

Promethean

heat,"

as if the adjective had just occurred to him and accompanied by a wandering and ques

tioning gesture. feel a certain

We

shame

items for

comment from

in picking out scenes of profound

view

or exalted passion, like this one we have in and especially as the excellence of ;

Mr. Booth s acting could not be measured by the number of good points he made, but by the entireness of identification. Yet we find no help for it. Observe the eastern
imagery employed
throughout
"

this

scene.

The moon
moon

"

chaste
"

stars

the

"

error
"

of

the

"

;
"

the Arabian the

"

trees

"

the base

Indian
;

;
"

huge eclipse of sun and and that big imagination of the

One
entire

world as
"

and

perfect

chrysolite."

OTHELLO.

115
:

The deed
"

is

done.

Emilia enters
s foul

good
Othello.

my lord,
"

yonder

murder

done."

"What, now?"

Emilia.
Othello.

But now,
It is the

my

lord."

very error of the moon She comes more near the earth than she was wont,
"

And makes men

mad."

His gesture seemed to figure the faith of the Chaldean, and to bring the moon more near.
"

"

Roderigo killed
killed
"

"

(with wonder).
the

And

Cassio
throat).
"

(glutting

words in his

O,

were damned beneath

I

all

depth in

hell,

But that

did proceed, upon just grounds,

To

this extremity."

He

uttered that

first

tremendous

line

with

burning intensity.
thought, and put
"

Milton has borrowed the

into the

it

mouth

of Satan
etc.

And

in the lowest depth,

a lower

deep,"

After the truth

of his

out, and under the spell grand presence, and in the tragic con
is

tinuity of the scene, his speech over his dead

wife seemed the ultimate reach of blended

grief

and love and wild remorseful passion

of which the
"

human

voice

is

capable.
"

Wash me

in steep-down gulfs of liquid fire

Othello has

wounded
:

lago, but not killed

him.

He

says

116
"

THE TRAGEDIAN.
I

am

not sorry neither: I d have thee

live ;

For in

my sense,

tis

happiness to

die."

We
Act

now

recall that passage

"

in the

Second

If it

Twere now

to be

were now to die most happy."

fullness of his joy

Then, the expression came from the absolute ; now, the same word tells of the last bitterness of his grief and self-con demnation
:
"

The wheel has come

full

circle."

From this moment his own death is assured. At the summons, Bring him away," and
"

as

he

is

beginning his final speech Soft you; a word or two before you

go,"

he takes a silken robe, and carelessly throws it over his shoulder ; then reaches for his tur ban, possessing himself of a dagger he had
concealed therein.
"

Then must you speak

Of one

that loved, not wisely, but too well,

Of one whose hand, Like the base Indian, threw a pearl away Richer than all his tribe."

He

uttered the
"

indeed

pearl "as if it were the immediate jewel of his soul,"

"

word

his wife,

with a lingering fullness and tender ness of emphasis, and with a gesture as if, in

OTHELLO.
the act of throwing from him.
it

117
his

away, he cast

own

life

If the excellence of a performance may be judged by its effect on the audience, this one

had transcendant merit.

attention of a

Let the hushed

company unusually numerous

let

the silent tears of strong men, carried by the imaginative stress of the scene beyond the reaches of their critical

and refined

bear witness. For ourself, we went no more to the play during that engage ment but walked about as in a voluntary
culture
;

dream, not caring to dispel by attendance on even his other performances, the pathetic
illusion

he had created.

MACBETH.
AMONG
those undefined influences which

stream from the greater dramas of Shake speare may be numbered the climate of the
play; and
servation,
this,
tells

while often eluding the ob surely upon the feeling of the

tropical heat,

reader.
chill

From

mists of Scotland.

we pass to the From the alternate

from im languor and fierceness of passion agination which rides upon the current of the

and revels in gorgeous color and in and sensuous forms, we pass to that higher imagination, which allies itself to the
blood,
rich
intellectual and, spiritual nature
;

in a

word,

from the atmosphere of Othello mosphere of Macbeth.

to the at

The

ductile flame of

Mr. Booth

histrionic

genius passed into this northern

Othello.

form with

even greater readiness and radiance than into

The

supernatural element in

Mac
in its
is

beth

is

more pervading and various

working than in Hamlet.

The

character

more

closely knit

the action

more peremp-

MACBETH.

119

in the

In his ambition, and tory and progressive. of satisfying it, there are points ways
of likeness to Richard.

But Richard moved

without
is

toward
dread,"

design while Macbeth

;

his

"

remorse or

a victim to both

these conditions

not from a lack of courage,

his thoughts into objects.

but by virtue of a morbid excess of imagina

tion,

which projects
is

So dominant
sisters

this quality, that the

weird

themselves seem

like

the

outward

They appear shapes of his guilty purposes. first upon the scene, then vanish, then reap
pear, as
if

they were the influences of his

as the heralds of his approach.
filled this part.

mind as well Mr. Booth

gracious

We

had seen

performances,

and

heard musical

readings of the text by other actors. They Booth was possessed reported the character.

by it. A captain in the service of his king, and returning from successful fight, in com pany with Banquo, he is met upon a blasted
heath by the three witches.
ural

The

grandeur, and

significant brevity,

preternat of

their greeting, are usually lost

And

this,

we

contend,

is

upon the stage. owing quite as much

to the incapacity of imagination

on the part of the performer of Macbeth, as to the fan-

120
tastical,

THE TRAGEDIAN.
half-comic aspect of the
three old

women.

While they were speaking, Mr.

>

Booth betrayed his strong inward agitation and when they vanished (that is, clattered
off the stage),

the

air,

he looked at them, then into with a quick and wonder-struck tran

volatilized their substance,

sition,

which

and

abolished their defect.

We
And

must

illustrate this

scene by a

com

parison.
The earth hath bubbles, as the water has, Whither are they vanished ? Macbeth. "Into the air; and what seemed corporal melted As breath into the wind."
"

Banquo.

these are of them.

"

Mr. Vandenhoff, the elder, a gentleman whose readings from Shakespeare and other poets delighted large audiences in this coun try some twenty years since, had a voice sin We saw him gularly sweet and sonorous. act Macbeth, or rather heard him read the for his action was always secondary. part His delivery of the passage quoted, was a
;

marvel of descriptive intonation. body and form to the impalpable

could almost see his breath in
it.

He
air.

gave

You

But he did Booth did. With not give the vanishing. a sudden upward look, and with a sudden

MACBETH.

121

springing tone, not musical, but like the whiz into of a shaft from a cross-bow, he gave
"

the

air"

No.

Could he dally with the image ? Voice, look, action, conveyed the instant
:

And the conclusion thought, the vanishing. of the sentence came in the same style
"

And what seemed

"

corporal

(looking at his
"

own

body),

"

Melted as breath into the wind

(short

i),

with wonder.

with a succession of emphasis, swift, and filled To assign the method of vari
:

ous actors, we might say Vandenhoff played the imagery Macready, the analysis ; Kean, the passion of the scene Booth, the charac
; ;

ter,

which not only includes the other methods, but supplies an element wanting in them.

The speech beginning

"

Two

truths are

told,"

pression,

drew upon that well-spring of imaginative ex which lay deep in Booth s nature, and which Macbeth gave scope for, in a more condensed and terrific way, than any other
character.
"

The
was

effect of the

"

supernatural

soliciting

to kindle this quality into its

highest life. heard or read

No

voice that

we have

ever

of, could convey like his, the unbodied beauty or terror of supernatural

122
emotions.

THE TRAGEDIAN.

The music
in his ears.

of

the

"imperial

saw the throne in vision, but between him and it were dark horrible imaginings." ness, fearful guilt, and

theme

"

was

He

"

"My

thought, whose murder

tone

and gesture

that

is but fantastical (with yet figured a hovering and vanishing

shape),

Shakes so
Is

my

single state of

man

(with vibrant intensity),

that function

smothered in surmise, and nothing

is
not."

is

But what

This phrase was uttered in one continuous tone of involved resonance, and in such a manner as to make the listener feel that the
thronging shapes of Macbeth
objective realities. In that terrific invocation
to the
"

s roused and had displaced the world of guilty imagination

by Lady Macbeth

Spirits

That tend on mortal

thoughts,"

she says,
"

Stop up the access and passage to remorse That no compunctious visitings of nature Shake my fell purpose, nor keep peace ( ?) between
;

The

effect

and

it."

All the editions, including Hudson

for the profound value of
in
its

s,

which
is,

commentary,

our judgment, by far the best

preserve

this reading.

But

it

would seem that Shake-

MACBETH.
speare

123
"

wrote
"

"

pace,"

not

peace."
"

He
are

personifies
to

nature,"
"

whose
"

"

visitings

on keep pace" imagined the murder, between the effect," guard,

like a sentinel

and

"

it,"

the

fell

purpose

sundering them,

the very thing

Lady Macbeth deprecated.

her
returning

She
with

welcomes
"

husband
!

Great Glamis, worthy Cawdor Greater than both by the all-hail hereafter!
"

But

his

mind

is

bewildered,

and

his

will

weakened, by images of terror his ambition has conjured up. His uncertain and post
poning mood, found
fit

manner

of

Mr. Booth

interpretation in the delivery of the few

;

words that conclude

soliloquy, beginning
"

this scene

and in the

If

twere done

when

tis

done,"

that

Note the crowd and jostle of inconsequent thoughts, in words that defy punctuation. His mind flies at a tangent, from the need of despatch in the horrid deed he contemplates, to the hope
full

mood found

utterance.

of success

then to fears of the

life

to

come,

followed by fears of retribution in the life Mr. Booth did not play the that now is.

trumpet stop of
"

his voice, in the phrase

trumpet-tongued,"

Will plead like angels,

124

THE TRAGEDIAN.

but gave us rather to feel the gracious nature

of Duncan, and
"

The deep damnation

of his taking

off."

But
wife,

at length,
is

through the agency of

his

he

resolved,

purpose of regicide. from which he goes to kill the king, appears before him, the dagger of the mind. The the look, the evasion of the object, pause,

and strained up to the In the dark chamber

which

still

haunted

his vision,

and would not

pass, as expressed

by

Booth, bettered nature.

At

length came the words

"

7s this

a dagger that

I see before

me,"

low-toned, scarce audible, with a prolonged emphasis on the first word, and in that man

ner as

if

thinking aloud without auditors,

which marked all his soliloquies. The whole It speech was given in volumed whispers. was filled with fearful shadows. It made one
hold his breath in dreadful expectation, as the
actor passed silently
"

With Tarquin

ravishing

strides,"

towards the king s chamber. What an awful grandeur

with
its

is in this play ; dense thought, rapid action, sub

stantive

imagination, and mystery of iniq-

MACBETH.
uity ! Even Lady Macbeth, as she was, sometimes thinks in images

125
ambitious realist
;

as

when, and which we are disposed

indirection,
grooms."
"

in the appalling scene

now
to

opening, describe by
"

she

speaks

of

the

surfeited

I have drugged their possets That Death and Nature do contend about them, Whether they live or
die."

In the progress of the scene, her cruel hard

ness returns, and stands out strong against the overwhelming imaginative remorse of

her husband.

He

not only

"

void air with his

own

phantoms,"

peoples the but fills it

with strange voices.

"

Methought I heard a voice cry, Sleep no more Macbeth does murder sleep the innocent sleep,
!
;

Balm

of hurt minds.

"

What wealth of meaning in these words And what assuaging fullness of comfort,
!

Booth infused into that

"

little

word,

"

balm

"

Hurt

minds,"

given in anguished brain"

tones.

Goethe pregnantly

said,

The power

of

art lies, not in reporting, but in conveying invoke the aid of your impressions."

We

that power, in our endeavor to convey the

126
actor
s

THE TRAGEDIAN.
manner,
the culminating speech Lady Macbeth has gone to
in

of this scene.

gild the faces of the grooms with Duncan s Left alone, Macbeth hears a knock blood.

ing at the gate.

"

Whence

is

that knocking?

with me, when every noise appals me ? What hands are here? Ha! they pluck out mine eyes! Will all great Neptune s ocean wash this blood

How is t

Clean from

my hand?

"

Looking on his hands with starting eyes, and a knotted horror in his features and wiping one hand with the other from him, with intensest loathing. The words came, like the weary dash on reef rocks, and as over sunken wrecks and drowned men, of
;

the despairing sea.

No this The multitudinous
"

my hand will
one
red."

rather

seas incarnardine,

Making

the green

launched the mysterious power of his voice, like the sudden rising of a mighty wind from some unknown source, over those
multitudinous seas," and they swelled and congregated dim and vast before the eye of the mind. Then came the amazing word,
" "

He

incarnardine,"

the stroke of a sword, and, as

each syllable ringing like it were, mak"

MA CBETH.

127

one red." The whole pas ing the green sage was of unparalleled grandeur ; and in

conveyed the impression of an infinite and unavailing remorse. During the alarm at the discovery of the murder of the king, Macbeth goes to Dun
tone, look, action,

can

chamber and returns, saying

u

Had
I

but died an hour before this chance

lived a blessed
time,"

had

etc.

While delivering this speech, and the follow ing one, wherein he justifies himself for the added murder of the grooms, an intelligent
reporter for the press happened to enter the he exclaimed. theatre. That s not good
"

"

"

What

the matter with

Booth to-night

"

Nothing was the matter, except that the actor had reached the height of the histri
onic art, and was speaking Macbeth s false sentiments with pretended feeling. He de livered the forced imagery, in the affected

manner

common
crown.

of a hired mourner, hired by enemy of man," and paid

"

the

Hazlitt says of Kean s Macbeth, that he was deficient in the poetry of the character;
"
"

and that he did not look like a man who had encountered the Weird Sisters." How
"

128
then,

THE TRAGEDIAN.

ask, could he play the part at For, unless we are made to feel that the actor is possessed by visions of the mind, all?
startled by voices in the air, waylaid, and drawn on to his confusion, by those
"

we may

Secret, black,
it

and midnight

hags,"

becomes of little account that he

did,

gives, as

one heart-rending picture of re morse, after the commission of a murder. This might be done, without representing

Kean

Macbeth.

Booth s performance, on the contrary, was constituted by imagination, kindled and Macswayed by supernatural agencies.
beth
the
s

action

is

intervals

are

a succession of crimes, but filled with thoughtful

show the native affinity of the imaginative faculty with what is best in man. A fine example occurs in these
lines
:
"

The truth speech. these musings, into

and beauty that

slide

Duncan

is

in his grave

After

life s fitful

Treason has

fever, he sleeps well. done his worst: nor steel,

nor poison,

Malice domestic, foreign levy, nothing, Can touch him further."

The mood was

the thoughts
it

profoundly retrospective, but generates were uttered with

MACBETH.
spontaneous
"

129
"

life.
"

The

"

fitful

fever,"

trea

son,"

steel,"

poison,"

and the other ene

mies of

life,

came

as fresh thoughts, not as

remembered words. The passage was be gun, and closed, and rounded in with tones
of mournful music.

In the banquet scene, Banquo personated

his

own ghost, by appearing in bodily form, and pointing to his wounds. This rank ex pedient might have been toned into art, by means of costume, obscured lights, and espe

cially by a judicious wonder in the faces and manner of the guests, at the outbreak of Mac-

beth

not see.

supernatural fear of an object they do prefer, however, the visionary

We

Banquo, the pure creation of the usurper wicked conscience

"

That coineth goblins

swift as frenzy

thoughts."

Mr. Booth had to do with the bodily pres ence, and it must be confessed he spirit
ualized
it His passion of blended strangely. terror and fury, made the object a horrible and left it so, as it disappeared. shadow,"
"
"

And overcome

us, like

Can such things be a summer s cloud,

"

Without our special wonder?

What

is

the meaning of these lines ?

The

130
cool
"

THE TRAGEDIAN.
commentator says nothing, or
s

replies

Pass over us without wonder, as a casual

cloud
passes
unregarded."

summer
the

But

aglow or chilled with the pas sion of the scene, gave quite another ver The summer s cloud was to him a sion.
actor,
" "

huge shadow, suddenly scaling the heavens, charged with lightning, and filling the specta He used overcome in the tor with fear.
"

"

sense proximate to

"

overwhelm," or

"

stoop

The speech is made in answer to upon." his wife, who has left the feast and come to his rescue. The vanished ghost still has him
in

possession,

and he turns
"

to his

guests,

with
You make me
strange,

Even

to the disposition that I owe,

When, now I think you can behold such sights, And keep the natural ruby of your cheeks,

When mine

are blanched with

fear,"

and

filling the speech with an intense and varied fury of wonder. The same power of imagination that con

jured up the

"

unreal

mockery,"

played also

in the subtile shades of

meaning he infused
blood."

into the passage, beginning

"It

will

have

This was uttered

as soliloquy, his wife sitting

MACBETH.
silent by.

131

The

first

phrase came in a reso

nant murmur,
fate.

like

an assent to a decree of

Then,
"

in livelier tone
;

blood will have blood They say Stones have been known to move, and trees to speak;

"

given as vivid conceptions, not as recalled In the concluding phrase of impressions.

this

speech
"

The

secret st
"

man

of

blood,"

came with so profound secret st the word and quiet an intonation, that we feared the. emphasis it manifestly requires, must be lost. But beneath the lowest depth of his voice,
"

there might at any time open a lower deep ; and here, after a momentary pause, the close

caught distinctly from some unfathomed source the syllabled rumination Man of
listener
"

blood."

Among

those passages of solemn beauty,

their place side

which find or make

by

side

with the warlike speech of the later scenes, that one following the death of the queen was
the most significant. Macbeth is left alone in the world. which had seemed to Life,

him
a
"

before that event of

little

value,

becomes

walking

shadow."

The

sense of vague

132
desolation

THE TRAGEDIAN.

which the actor conveyed in this and in the whole speech to which it phrase, belongs, can bear no closer comment
:
"

What

he,

That

-was not

born of woman ? such a one

none."

Am I

to fear, or
"

The word
flighj;

fear

"

was uttered

in

an upward
a scorn of
in

of sound, and carried with

it

fear.
"

similar

example occurred

Lear

Through

tattered clothes small vices do

appear."

His voice flashed the appearance. Yet no one could on such examples found a rule of elocution. There is no rule for sympathy ; none for imaginative art.
"

bear a charmed
of

life

which must not yield

"

To one

woman

born."

The word
two, as
it is

"

charmed

was not broken

in

usually pronounced, but uttered

in one prolonged, resonant, confident syllable. So close was Mr. Booth s identification of

character that
fest, in

its

transpirations

were mani

minor and unconsidered ways. We may instance as contrasted examples the dif ferent modes of fighting and dying, in Rich
ard and in Macbeth.
externally similar.

The circumstances

are

In each play a brave and guilty king dies in single combat, either with

MACBETH.

133

the rightful heir to the throne, or his repre sentative, after suffering a supernatural and

But how different is prophetic visitation. In Rich the soul of the respective scenes.
ard, the vision of the night has passed like a In the battle forgotten dream.
"

A thousand hearts
is still

are swelling in his

bosom."

His kingdom

at stake.

The hope

of

victory lives in the fast embrace of his enor mous and tenacious will, and never leaves

him till the last blow is struck. Booth as Richard, seemed

"

Accordingly,

Treble sinewed, hearted, breathed,

maliciously,"

And

fought

while in Macbeth, he flung out voice and action, with the desperate abandonment of a

brave soldier, consciously meeting a preter

natural doom.

LEAR.

WHAT audacity of genius, or what igno rance of the greatness of the task could have induced Mr. Booth, at the age of twentythree, to study and represent the character
His suc of Lear, we need not now inquire. cess in the personation is a fact of dramatic Hazlitt says, under date of April, history.

1820

"

We

with great pleasure.

have seen Mr. Booth s Lear Mr. Kean s is a greater

But pleasure to come (so we anticipate)." the critic has left it on record, that these
"

expectations Were very considerably disap

"

pointed

and he goes on in

his

brilliant

way, through several pages, descanting on the grandeur of the character, and marking in scene after scene, the deficiency and
"

desultoriness of the interest excited

"

by Mr.

performance of it. This sounds like implicit testimony from an unwilling witness
s

Kean

to the superiority of
rate, it sets the

Booth

Lear.

At any

absurd question of imitation

a question

first

put by prejudice, and since

LEAR.
repeated by dullness

135
entirely at rest ; as first in order of

Booth

performance came

time, took place

his powers.

when he was very young,

in the full maturity of

and when Kean was

Indeed, as the public mind was preoccupied by Booth s admired personation, there was

danger that Kean himself, when he came to play the part, might be regarded as the imi
tator.

And

this consideration led

him

into

perverse readings, which are duly scored by

The critic, however, Hazlitt s caustic pen. could not dismiss his favorite without giving
Booth one disparaging touch,
"

in the follow

In a subsequent part Mr. ing sentence Kean did not give to the reply of Lear
:

Ay, every inch a king

the same vehemence and emphasis that Mr.

Booth

in the text,

and in this he was justified for, it is an exclamation of indignant and he irony, not of conscious superiority immediately adds with deep disdain, to prove
did,
; ;

the nothingness of his pretensions

When

do

stare, see

how

the subject quakes.

"

From this we appeal to

sentence, judicially pronounced, the judgment of the thoughtful

136
reader.

THE TRAGEDIAN.

Lear has just entered on the scene, and with fantastically dressed with flowers
;

the exclamation
"

No, they cannot touch

I

me

for

coming

am

the king

himself."

No

irony here, but downright mad earnest. Directly after, in reply to Gloster s question
Is
t

not the king

?"

the sense of outraged majesty, which, com plicated with filial ingratitude, was the very occasion of his madness, comes back on him
in

full

tide

of consciousness, as

he ex

claims
"

Ay, every inch a king

"

Hazlitt infers the irony from the line

follows
"

which

When

do

stare, see

how

the subject

quakes."

To
"

sustain his
"

subject
spect.

view there should be some present who pays the king no re

is

There

none.

The
filled

only other oc
his blind

cupants of the scene are

father,

Edgar and

who
Edgar.
Gloster.

stand by

with grief and

reverence.
"

O, thou side-piercing sight

"

"

0,

let

me

kiss that

hand

"

Lear

is

talking to the shadows of his distem-

LEAR.

137
realities to

pered fancy, which become He goes on I pardon that man s

"

him.

life,"

etc.

In the year 1835, fifteen years after these

first

was our privilege, in early youth, to see Mr. Booth enact Lear, at the National Theatre in Bos ton. We saw him then for the first time.
performances in London,
it

The

blue eye

profile,

the white beard the nose in keen as the curve of a falchion the
;
;

ringing utterance of the names, Regan," the close-pent-up passion, striv Goneril ;
"
"

"

ing for expression

the kingly energy ; the affecting recognition of Cordelia in the last act made a deep impression on our boyish
;

mind.

We

did not see Lear.

closet study of the great poet, coupled with the reading of Charles Lamb s refined and ingenious strictures on the capacity of

saw and heard all this, but we We were not old enough.

the stage, conspired to prevent our attend ance on a representation of either Hamlet or

Lear, during the lapse of

many

years.

The

grandeur and subtlety of Mr. Booth s per formance in other characters, however, led us one night to dare his Hamlet. We found
the atmosphere of the play-house not stifling

138

THE TRAGEDIAN.

to the imagination, provided there was genius on the stage. Lamb s fantastic theory van

ished.

The
s

illumination which accompanied

filled

Booth

Hamlet,

us with eagerness to

witness his Lear.

hold the just representation of this character to be the sublime of the actor s art.

We

There be players that we have seen play, and heard others praise, and that highly," who, whether developed among us, or arriv ing from over sea with their budget of literary
"

credentials, did little else in Lear, but show us the choler or the querulousness of an old

king, abused and abandoned of his children. They yielded to the temptation of rendering the stormier passages with melodramatic fury,

and the milder ones with the peevish feeble ness of age. Mr. Kean seems to have over done the part in both these respects. But
overdoing, on the stage, is usually the result of under-thinking. And if there be one char
acter in Shakespeare which requires in an actor fullness of thought, delicacy and subtlety of apprehension, and beyond these, the im
aginative and identifying power, character of Lear.
it

is

the

Mr. Macready gave us a

scholastic per-

LEAR.
formance, which
pleasure.
It

139

we

witnessed with a certain

the efforts of

was marred by the cold pre

all

meditation which marked

It did not move that educated gentleman. Marvelous as was the imitation of the us.

signs of passion,

we

felt

the absence of the

He was the intellectual show pulse of life. man of the character, not the character itself.
never got inside. Conception is a bless not vouchsafed to actors of his school. ing With Mr. Booth the case was different.

He

We

expected that he would retouch and re

vivify the

dim old pagan

figure,
filled

and we were
the
hitherto

not disappointed.
niche.

He

of mind, rising empty colossal and unexpected out of age and desti tution ; the frenzy of outraged feeling in this

The grandeur

child-changed father, passing upward from a poignant sense of his own suffering, and en
larging
to

a sublime
;

abuses of the world

contemplation of the the gradual untying of

"

that u knot intrinsicate

faculties in strength

which bound up

his

the pathos
kingliness

and sanity ; the anguish ; and, through all, the essential in a word, the interior life of

Lear, came forth and shone in the focal light of Mr. Booth s representation.

140
In the
first

THE TRAGEDIAN.
scene

we

note the choleric and

;

impatient majesty of the old king who yet, out of his deeper love, parleys with Cordelia; hears her cool answers ; controls his rising
passion,
till

he casts her
"

at length it bursts all bounds, off in the speech beginning

truth then be thy
dower."

and

Thy

This, and the banishment of Kent, who takes her part, employed the most sonorous ele ments of Mr. Booth s voice, shaken and

weighted as with age, yet betraying latent physical vigor, and choked in passages by the
force of contending emotions. hold the to be necessary to the identity show of vigor

We

of this character, enabling Lear to bear the

stress and strain on both body and mind, to which he is afterwards destined ; and respond ing to the wonder expressed in a later scene,

when he
his

is

turned out in the storm, that

"

Life

and wits
all."

at once

Had

not concluded

When
filial

Goneril, putting aside the mask of piety, first assumes the governess, Mr.
as with a blow.

Booth seemed stunned

"

Then
"

partially recovering, he put those fearful ques Are you our daughter ? Does tions
"

LEAR.

141

any here know

tell

me ? Who is it that can me who I am? and the rest in a manner

"

"

"

as if freighted with the possibility of madness.

of mind, the terrible suspicion just waking in him that he has dispossessed himself irrevocably, the bursts of anger
"

The agony

Degenerate bastard

I ll

not trouble thee ;

"

the selfish regret

"

Woe

that too late repents

"

the affectionate regret

"

0, most small fault,

How

ugly didst thou in Cordelia

show;

"

the imperious impatience towards Albany; the desperation, as he strikes his head
"

0, Lear, Lear, Lear,

Beat at

this gate, that let thy folly in,

"

And

thy dear judgment out;

those manifold flaws and starts,

into a

all

crowded

few lines, and a few moments, were ren dered as they were conceived, with wonder

ful variety

and

truth.

Even
fine

in this whirl

and kingly the of his reply to Albany, who dis courtesy claims all knowledge of what had moved him, in the words
his passion,
"

wind of

how

It

may be

so,

my

lord."

142

THE TRAGEDIAN.

(So again at the end of the play, in a scene unhappily omitted by Mr. Booth, Lear speaks
to

Albany
"

Pray you, undo

this button.

Thank you,

"

sir;

the phrase receiving an exquisite accent of courtesy, from the infinite pathos of the sit
uation.)

the imprecation on Goneril. This it the curse." customary word roughens the sense of it unnecessarily.
It
is

Then comes

to call

"

It is in substance a

may

be childless

but

pagan prayer, that she if she must teem,"

"
"

that her child

"

may

be a
to her;

Thwart disnatured torment

suffer the
is

that she

may
The
an
"

same kind and quality

of anguish which she

father.

now

inflicting

on her
is
"

principle of the prayer

"

"

an

in Jehovah eye." Putting eye stead of Nature," a Jew might have uttered Mr. Booth began it as a solemn adjuration it. The indig to the unseen power of Nature.
for

nant bitterness in the terms of imprecation, seemed as if it was converted out of sweetest

images of what a child should be, that lay in the core of his fatherly heart. This double
action of his mind, in the

agony which

it

in-

LEAR.

143

volved, swayed and shook his kneeling figure and lent his voice a wild vibration that drew The heart involuntary sympathy and awe. followed him as he arose and ran out with extended arms. Lear reenters, and in the

course of his speech to Goneril, in a similar vein of feeling, but with that change sug gested by the lines
"

That these hot

tears which break from Should make thee worth them

"

me

perforce,

Mr. Booth produced one of those large which distinguished his personations.
"

effects

Thou

shall find

That I I have

ll

resume the shape which thou dost think

forever."

cast off

Into the word

"

resume,"

he cast the whole

energy of his royal will, with a volumed,

His very prolonged, and ringing intonation. seemed to dilate with majesty. figure

There

is

a scene, omitted on the stage, at

the end of this First Act, which rivals in pathos that omitted scene in Othello, which

we commented on
It consists of

in our notice of that part.

a brief dialogue between Lear and the Fool. The Fool s talk, matter and
"

impertinency partly responded to whose few musing and asides," by Lear,

mixed," is
"

144

THE TRAGEDIAN.

broken exclamations, touch the core of the plot, and point to the tragic consummation. Let the reader ponder this scene, if he would
pass into the presence of the character. In the opening scene with Regan, in the

Second Act, all the unexpressed tenderness which the old king had felt for his best-loved child Cordelia, seemed to pass by a kind of
vicarious deflection
fatherly hope.
glad to see your highness." I know what reason I think you are I have to think so; if thou should not be glad,
"

upon Regan, now

his only

Regan.
Lear.

am

"

Regan,

from thy mother s tomb, Beloved Regan, Thy sister s naught. 0, Regan, she hath tied Sharp-toothed unkindness like a vulture, here
I

would divorce

me

Sepulchring an adultress.

can scarce speak to

thee."

When
says

coldly advised to return to Goneril he

"

Ask

her

forgiveness

"

Then, with mock humility

"

Dear daughter,
still

I confess that I

am

old,"

etc.

And, when
from
tion
his

pressed to return, he rises

knees with the tremendous exclama

"

Never, Regan She hath abated me of half my train Looked black upon me struck me with her tongue,
:

LEAR.
Most
serpent-like,

145
:

upon the very heart

All the stored vengeances of heaven On her ingrateful top."

fall

In these passages, and in the recurrence to

his desperate
"

hope

in

Regan

Thy

tender hefted nature shall not give . . Thee o er to harshness

Thou
The
offices of nature,

better

know

st

bond of childhood,"

etc.

Mr. Booth sounded the various stops of grief, of parental love, of irony, of indignation, of baffled but clinging hope, which filled inter
changeably, or inhabited together in discord, the heart of Lear, until Goneril enters.
art of Shakespeare, in her upon the scene, that the two bringing unnatural daughters may vie with each other
in impious speech, so that Lear, heart-struck, if not heart-broken, is torn and cast loose at
last

The transcendant

from

all ties

of earth, and stands appeal

:

ing to the
"

heavens

You see me here, you As full of grief as

gods, a poor old man,

age."

The

responsive art of our actor, who, touched

with noble anger, filled with grief and un shed tears, crowned with majesty yet with
out
its

lendings

visiting

upon those
10

abjured all roofs, unnatural hags

"

after
"

the

146

THE TRAGEDIAN.
his
!

overwhelming energy of
rushes out into the storm

wrath, as he
s
is

The

final test of

an actor

worthiness to
his

delineate this sublime figure,

"

power

to

catch and reproduce the insanity of Lear. Hazlitt says Mr. Kean s performance, when the king s intellects begin to fail him,
:

and are

at last quite disordered,

was curious

and quaint, rather than impressive or natural. He driveled and looked vacant, and moved his lips so as not to be heard, and did nothing, and appeared at times as if he would quite The spectator was big with forget himself.
expectation
of

means employed

seeing some extraordinary but the general result did ;

not correspond to the waste of preparation." Dana takes a directly opposite view. He
for one
is a study himself acquainted with the workings of an insane mind. And it is hardly less true that the acting of Kean

says

"It

has been said that Lear

who would make

was an embodying of these workings. There was a childish feeble gladness in the eye, and
a half-piteous smile about the mouth, at times, which one could scarce look upon without
tears."

If this be true, the

remains, did

Kean

question still the insanity of represent

LEAR.

147

Lear

The

phases
differ as

and modes of mental

widely in different per derangement as do the operations of the healthful sons,

mind.

A generalized

would hardly

suffice for the character

expression of insanity we are

considering ; but this, it would seem, was the sum of Kean s achievement.

The madness
mind
;

of Lear was not a chaos of

it

neither was
It

a declension towards

The im was exalted, although diverted from agination the truth of things and presented, at times, a grandeur of thought and speech, which has
imbecility.

was an aberration.

no

parallel in dramatic literature.

left intact,

The
its

rea

soning power was

fusion reigned
ercise.

even when con

ex

among

the subjects of

think the text of Shakespeare, mused upon, will bear out this inter deeply It is certain that the view might pretation.

We

have been deduced from Mr. Booth

terization.

charac

In the storm scenes, where Lear,

with a Greek vigor of imagination, personifies the elements, addressing them as substantial beings, and with a majesty of self-exaltation,
yet dashed with madness,
"

calls

them
"

Servile ministers

That have with two pernicious daughters

148

THE TRAGEDIAN.

leagued against him, the acting of Booth was

indescribably grand.

What Lamb

calls

"

the

contemptible machinery of the storm," was It was the tempest in Lear s forgotten. mind, that Mr. Booth made us conscious of,

and

this

range of his personation reached the

topmost height of the actor s art. His mind played over the minor crazed nimble stroke of quick passages, with the cross lightning." There was no weakness or
"

vacancy in any word or

act.

Instead of
eye,"

"

childish feeble gladness in the

we saw

only the blue light of a speculative madness

ened

and shining in his eyes. His sharp looks, and his keen crazy questioning of Edgar, whom yet he treated with a kind of
shifting

fraternal tenderness

airy of his brain,

"

manner, when

the visioning eye and dealing with the creations

;

Arraign her

first,

tis Goneril,"

and
"

Then

let

them anatomize Regan

see

what breeds about

her

heart"

if

these things did not

because

make us weep, it was touched a depth below the they

source of tears.

In order to avoid a vain repetition of terms,

LEAR.

149

we touch

of the lightly the pathos

chamber

scene which follows the arrival of Cordelia. His return to soundness of mind, in the ap

peasing presence of* his one true daughter, was as subtle, tender, and graduated, as the

departure had been violent and

willful. Never, mouth, have we heard a more pathetic utterance, than he gave to the line

even from

his

"

If

you have poison

for

me

I will drink

it."

Not only was

heart.

it filled with music, but with the remorseful humility of a bruised heroic

Our

notes on Booth

Lear must here

close

abruptly.

The

last scene, the great

scene for

sounding the inmost depths of human feeling, not only in this play, but in all dramatic
literature,

Lear. It does not lessen our chagrin to that Garrick played at an earlier date,

Booth played Tate s add and Kean at a later, in that diversion on Shake speare s grandest drama, which leaves out the indispensable Fool, and puts in the superflu

was

left out.

ous

folly.

We
Lear

have no

fault to

find with

Booth

so far as

he followed Shakespeare.

We

sat at his feet.

But

his

performance was a

150

THE TRAGEDIAN.

It might be compared magnificent fragment. of Hercules, which Angelo so to that torso

reverently

through

its

and which conveyed knotted and swayed outlines, the

studied,

suggestion of a grief

we may

guess

at,

but

which, in

its

fullness,

must remain forever

unexpressed.

CASSIUS.
IN earlier years Mr. Booth assumed many minor characters of Shakespeare, which he afterwards surrendered, as Richard II., Hot There may spur, King John, Posthumous.
still

be found in London a print of him in the

Cassius was the last part

latter character.

played it in Boston, with Mr. Forrest as Brutus, about the year 183T.
so

surrendered.

He

Cassius was a
restless spirit,

Roman, whose
splenetic
Italian,

and

to

the

modern
this
"

subtle mind, humor, allied him and showed some

points of likeness to lago.

But when we

name

Italian

fiend,"

the generous and

constant

between Brutus and friendship Cassius must of course be put from view.

The

noble head, the mobile features, the spare figure of .Booth gave him a singular
for the part.

external fitness
in

Perhaps no
of

his, tran passage any performance scended in colloquial style the well-known street scene with Brutus. His description of

152

THE TRAGEDIAN.

swimming in the Tiber raw and gusty day and of Caesar s sickness when he was in Spain," were Booth s vivid por especially noteworthy.
on that
" "

himself and Cassar

"

traiture

recreated the event.

of Brutus
;

He

touched

the

leaned, but without un due familiarity, upon his shoulder. In the

"

arm

line
His coward
lips

did from their color

fly,"

Cassius, by a subtle reversion of the common the color fled from his lips," implies phrase, a sarcasm on Cagsar s quality as a soldier.
"

Booth

illustrated the
if

meaning by a momen

tary gesture, as

carrying a standard.

The

movement was
sarcasm,
action,

but

as giving edge to the pointed to a redundancy of

fine,

which sometimes appeared in this actor s personations ; marking the ex great cess in him, however, of those high histrionic powers, keen feeling and shaping imagination. His Cassius was signalized by one action of characteristic excellence and originality. After Caesar had been encompassed and stabbed by the conspirators, and lay extended on the floor of the Senate-house, Booth strode right across the dead body, and out of
the scene, in silent and disdainful triumph.

SIR GILES

OVERREACH.

OUT
down

to

of Shakespeare, through Massinger, the lowest quarry to which his

to Payne, Colman, Otway, even to Sheil and Maturin, the path of our actor was a track of light and, against the mass of dramatic dullness it some

genius deigned to stoop

times met,
"

Stuck

fiery off

indeed."

His
play,

"

"A

Sir Giles Overreach," in Massinger s to pay Old Debts,"

New Way
memory

stands in our

singular solid force.

dle towards
artist s

We

as a representation of propose to relimn

some of the bolder strokes, and hold a can some of the finer touches of this
work.

When

he speaks of having,

as servants to his daughter

"

Margaret
decayed,"

The

ladies of errant knights

he adds,
"

There having ever been

More than a
Between

feud, a strange antipathy us and true gentry,"

Booth infused

into those

two

italicized

words

154
the
rich

THE TRAGEDIAN.
aspiring

and implacable hatred of the and overbearing commoner. His ges

It

ture, like his speech, escaped the confinement

was the natural language of or the complement imaginative passion

of rules.
"

In the scene of fine perceptions. extern Marrall to work the where Sir Giles urges
"

ruin of Wellborn, and says

"

Persuade him that

"

tis

better steal than

"

beg,"

he gave the word

"

steal

with the fingers

of his right hand downward, and as in act of than beg," palm up, as in act of taking
:

solicitation

and both movements with rapid

tries

ease.

The scene with Margaret, where he

to induce her to receive, or if

need

be, catch,

the attentions of
piece.
"

Lord Lovel, was a master

You

ll

If you are my true daughter, venture alone with one man, though he came
Semele."

Like Jupiter to

Margaret protests
"

If to

obey you
"

I forget

my

honor,

He must and
Sir Giles.

will forsake

me."

How

Forsake thee

Do

wear a sword for fashion; or is this arm Shrunk up or withered ? Does there live a man, Of that large list I have encountered with,
1

Can truly say, I e Not purchased by

er

gave inch of ground,

his blood, that did oppose

me?

"

SIR GILES OVERREACH.

155
with
shall

These

lines

were so

full

and
s art,

bristling

shining points of the actor

that

we

attempt an analysis of Mr. Booth s victori He uttered ous method of rendering them. with a shriek of astonish forsake thee
"

"

ment.
"

Do

wear a sword

for fashion?

"

beginning low, and as on a rising wave of

passion, the last

word blown
its

disdainful, like

the foam from

In saying it, he the scabbard with his left hand, and clutched
crest.

struck the sword-hilt with his right.

Or is this arm Shrunk up or withered?
" "

He

grasped his outstretched right arm with

the fingers of the left hand, and gave the phrase in throated and roughened tones of The words of the continuing lines scorn.

were
solid
"

"

rammed with
"

life,"

and

full

of the

temper of Sir Giles, down to the word when his voice dropped suddenly blood ; to its subterranean chamber, and he uttered
"

that did oppose me," in a cool the phrase of tone, which seemed to assure the depth

doom
is

of

all

antagonists.

Wellborn, cheated and hated of Sir Giles, presented to him by Lady Allworth, with

156
the remark,
"

THE TRAGEDIAN.
If I

The manner

in

am welcome, bid him which Booth stood, with

so."

his

back turned, betraying an inward strife by subtle motions of head, hands, and features, until, mastering repugnance by policy, he turned suddenly with affected heartiness, and grasped the youth s hand, saying, My
" "

s question if he is not moved the imprecations of those he has by wronged, Sir Giles replies
"

nephew To Lord Lovel

!

was a

most

felicitous

touch.

When

foaming billows
;

split

Yes, as rocks are themselves against

Their flinty ribs or as the moon is moved When wolves, with hunger pined, howl at her

brightness."

The change
words
"

to the silver clearness of the

of voice from the howling pack moon, in the

brightness,"

at her

made

the listener

feel the
ity.

assumption of unapproachable seren The whole speech was a magnificent

example of self-assertion, and suggested how grandly Mr. Booth could have enacted Coriolanus. We do not know that he ever did this character but one night in personate when the mood was on, he took Cincinnati, down a volume of Shakespeare, and read the
;

whole play aloud

to his

son Edwin.
sight of objects

Lamb

argument that the

SIR GILES OVERREACH.

dispels the imagination of them,
is

157
disproved

by notable examples.

Does not the imagina

tion rather deal with sensible objects, accord Fuseli, the ing to its own exalting laws ?

painter, said that after reading most characteristic translation of

went out

into the street,

Chapman s Homer, he and the men he

met, seemed to him to be ten feet high! Father Hennepin, the first white man who ever
wild

looked

upon
"

the

Falls

of

Niagara,
least six

makes,

in his quaint
"

and simple record, the

are
at

surmise,

that they

hundred

feet high ! he bore truer testimony to the spirit of the scene, than does

And

the scientific tourist,

who

takes the altitude

of the

When Booth, on a certain occasion, as Sir Giles, chal lenged Lord Lovel, and ran (not shuffled) out, but finding he was not followed, came
cliff in

English

feet.

directly back, stood just within the scene, and uttered these words in his deepest voice,
"

Are you

pale?"

he took

his stature
to dilate

from the mind

his figure

seemed
his will,

with the vast expansion of

to overstate in physical

and actually

dimension, the bulky

and brawny Scotchman

who

played Lord Lovel.

LUKE.
IN Massinger
the
s

play entitled the

"

City

Madam," adapted for the

name

of

"

Riches,"

modern stage under Mr. Booth played the

is

part of Luke.
"

The

plot

simple.

Luke, a

ruined prodigal, is obliged to accept, in order to keep base life afoot," the situation of
servant to his brother
s

wife, the City

Madam.
s

His conduct

in this capacity is so

exemplary
its

that his brother, believing in the prodigal

reformation, yet willing to test

feigns death, leaving

reality,

Luke

all

his

immense

wealth.
his

The

former mistress, and

servant turns tyrant, maltreats is reveling at a feast

in solitary luxury,

from the dead.

John appears, as Luke, though struck at first with terror, soon comprehends the situation, and dashes from the scene in a rage.
Sir

when

The
vant
s

sight of our actor, a short

livery, carrying a

man

in ser

number of band-boxes

and bundles, and scolded by madam for his But the tardiness, at first provoked a smile. manner of gentle reverence, and the intellec-

LUKE.
tual intonation with

159

which he delivered the

following speech, soon changed the feeling of

the auditor
"

am your creature, madam, And if I have in aught offended,

I

humbly ask your pardon. But as I was obliged to bring

These from the Tower, these from the old Exchange, And these from Westminster, I could not come

Much

sooner."

Coming from the room filled with riches which he has unexpectedly inherited, he
says
"

am

sublimed, I walk on air!

"

not with that epicurism of elocution which the words invite, but with the roughened
voice of a
selfish joy.

man who

could not contain his

He
of
it,

kind of Satanic grace.

gives

presided at his solitary banquet with a When, in the midst

to rage,

terror at the appearance of his brother

way
"

and he dashes past him

The world
wide enough

with the words

Bar not

my way

is

For thee and

me,"

he sounded the grand organ stop of his voice, with that easy power, which at once startled

and charmed the audience.

SIR

EDWARD MORTIMER.

seeing Booth, at the of twenty, play lago, was so struck with age his excellence that he wrote the young tra

WILLIAM GODWIN, on

gedian
praise.

letter,

filled
s

with

discriminating
"

From Godwin
"

novel called

Caleb

Williams,"

the

"

Colman dramatized the play called Iron Chest and Mr. Booth s por
;

trayal

of the principal character,

we have

always regarded as one of his most effective use the adjective with personations.

We

deliberate intent.

Effective

it

was beyond

measure, and above praise. Indeed, if it had been our actor s purpose to combine in one
representation all the daring, and difficult, and terrific feats, in look, voice, action, of which his supple frame was capable, he could not have selected a better field for the ex
hibition than this play affords. that ever saw Mr. Booth as Sir

Who

Ed
just

ward Mortimer, can forget

the

his utterance of
ton,"

name

"

Adam, Adam Winter

before the scene draws, and

discloses

him

S1H

EDWARD MORTIMER.
?

161
from

seated at his library table

It carried

the invisible speaker the whole tragedy, in its muffled, yet resonant and boding cry.

The opening

soliloquy of Sir

Edward, a sen

sitive, generous, honorable man, but stained with the guilt of a secret murder, was filled

with melancholy beauty.

"

He

invokes

That mind of man

Which

lifts

us to the stars, Avhich carries us

er the swollen waters of the

air."

angry deep,

As swallows skim the

his picturing voice, the look of the chafed and billowy sea very then, by a fine ethereal transition, the motion

Booth gave, with

of a bird in

air.
is,
"

passion of this play once quaintly expressed it,

The

as the actor

jump
Sir

all

the

time."

on the tight scene in which Every

bril

Edward appears has a pyrotechnic The interest centres, not in liancy.

the

evolution of character, but in the presenta These tion of special scenes and situations.

were given with wonderful resource of voice and look, and equal vividness and variety of
action.

Witness for instance the

first

scene

with the secretary, Wilford, penetrate his master s secret,

who

seeks to

162
"

THE TRAGEDIAN.
Sirrah What am I about? Oh, Honor! Honor! Thy pile should be so uniform, displace One atom of thee, and the slightest breath Of a rude peasant makes thine owner tremble
!

For his whole building

"

The

this speech,

rapid changes in voice and manner, in and the original intonation of the

concluding phrase, at once reckless and sus tained, and as if the building were about

were marked by Mr. and inimitable method. unique No actor we have ever seen seemed to have such control over the vital and invol untary functions. He would tremble from
tumbling into ruin,

Booth

head

to foot, or tremble in one outstretched

arm

to the finger tips, while holding it in the as in the last firm grasp of the other hand

scene of this play, where he says

"

Curse on

my

flesh to tremble

so."

The veins of his corded and magnificent neck would swell, and the whole throat and face become suffused with crimson in a moment, in the crisis of passion, to be succeeded on

To the ebb of feeling by an ashy paleness. throw the blood into the face is a compara
sim tively easy feat for a sanguine man by the breath ; but for a man of pale ply holding

SIR

EDWARD MORTIMER.

163

complexion to speak passionate and thrilling words pending the suffusion, is quite another
thing. O

On

the other hand

it

must be ob-

served that no amount of merely physical exertion, or exercise of voice, could bring
color into that pale, proud, intellectual face. This was abundantly shown in Shylock, in

Lear, in Hamlet, where the passion was in tense, but where the face continued clear and
pale.

To

return to Sir Edward.

In the

terrible

scene in the library, when he proposes the oath of secrecy to Wilford, and
"

Waxing

desperate with

imagination,"

reenacts the

murder he has confessed

"

in the

threat to Wilford
Dare
to

make

The

slightest

And

the

awake my fears, gaunt criminal naked and stake-tied,

to

movement

Left on the heath to blister in the sun

Till lingering

Compared

to thee, shall to the

death shall end his agony, seem more enviable

Than cherubs

damned!

"

the accents of which, even to the last rever berant word, ring startlingly clear in our

memory
his face, or

in all this scene

no color mantled

mingled

in the manifest

working

of his features.

But when

old Winterton

164
comes
fixing
in,

THE TRAGEDIAN.
and Sir Edward turns
glance,
to Wilford,

him with magnetic

"

and utters

the parting admonition

I shall

be angiy,
careless,"

Be very angry

if I

find

you

the reiterated word, given in prolonged and kindling tones, carried also a flush of feeling
visibly into his face.

where he
"

seizes Wilford,
I will crush thee
!

In a former scene, and cries out

Slave

That no

vile particle of

pulverize thy frame, prying nature

I will

May
O, agony
!

ha ha ha
! !
"

not

harm

thee, boy,

and rushes from the scene, the gust of anger gathers and spends itself without change of color ; but the sudden revulsion of feeling
that takes place with the
"

words
thee,
boy,"

I will

not

harm

crimsons his face and neck with burning shame. His ghastly pallor in the death
scene shall conclude this episode on color.

In a word, he commanded
potic ease.

his

own

pulses, as

well as the pulses of his auditors, with des

John Howard Payne,

cism on Booth
the
"

in a published criti

manual eloquence

Mortimer, speaks happily of he exhibited. The

"

SIR JED

WARD MORTIMER.

165

beauty of this hand-play, shone throughout the drama, above the terror of the represen tation. The indescribable motion of both

hands towards those heart-wounds

"

Too tender

e en for tenderness to touch;

"

the creeping, trembling play of his pale, thin fingers over his maddening brain ; and his

when describing the assassination, may serve as examples. melancholy interest attaches to this part,
action

in

view of the

fact that

acter in which

it was the last char Mr. Booth ever appeared.

BRUTUS.
MB. BOOTH was never
the literary fashion.

He came unheralded, and without letters. He was obliged to introduce himself to the
manager of the Richmond
occasion of his
try.
first

theatre, on
in this

the

He came
s

to

performance Boston and appeared in

"

coun

Colman
"

play called the

Mountaineers,"
"

Octavian by Mr. Booth

to a

moderate

house.
the

But the fire took, and the next day town was ablaze with interest in the new

an interest that scarcely flagged tragedian the following thirty years. during It was the native whim of this monarch of
to mix with tragedy, to go about incognito the people ; to play at second-rate theatres. The reward he got, beside that richest and
;

ever sure reward which the artist enjoys in the excellence of his work, was a fullness and heartiness of popular appreciation which our
actor felt

was

infinitely better

than the cool

He avoided the listless approval of scholars. and fashionable audiences, with the blue blood

BRUTUS.

167

sleeping in their veins, and who go to the He turned with joy theatre for idle pastime.
to crowded audiences of the people with the red blood leaping in their arteries, who went
to the theatre to see the play,

and him in

it

and

whom

he melted by the pathos, or raised

or

by the grandeur,

charmed by the beauty

of his impersonations. If the exclusive, of nice culture, excluded himself from these im
personations, on account of the place in which they shone, or the company who enjoyed their light, then the loss was irreparably his.

The
little
"

Eagle,"
"

current of our remark brings us to the a theatre in Boston, about as

"

large as the

theatre in London in Globe which Shakespeare had a share, and in which Shakespeare played. Good society shunned

the

"

Globe."

There

is

no evidence that

Lord Bacon
"

Large-browed

Verulam,"

ever set foot in

it.

When

Shakespeare

company played before the Queen, it was at The the palace, and not at the play-house.
was not fashionable. Neither was A few gray heads, whose "Eagle." hearts continued warm a few critical brains ;
"

Globe

"

the

168

TEE TRAGEDIAN.

a few enthusiastic youths ; and the remainder of the little cockpit was filled up by that

crowd which the seething

nightfall

city spills after

into
in

its

places
nutshell,

of

amusement.

Bounded

that

Hamlet became
"

king of the infinite spaces of thought ; Rich ard found ample room and verge enough for his vast ambition and there took place
"

the most intense and memorable representa tion of John Howard Payne s tragedy of Brutus, or the

Roman

Father.
rich material for his
literature.

The playwright found

work
in history

and in

Junius

Brutus, a supposed fool, but hiding his wit through policy, hears from Sextus Tarquin
his confession of the

ravishment of Lucretia

and breaks out upon him in a speech of fiery Throwing aside the mask of indignation. folly, Brutus incites his countrymen to re venge, and to the extirpation of the Tarquins. He is clothed with civil and military power, and vanquishes the enemy. But his own
son, fighting

on the side of Tarquin,

is

taken

Here centres the chief and closing prisoner. interest of the play, in the struggle between the duty of the magistrate, and the feelings
of the father.

In

this struggle the

Roman

BRUTUS.

169

triumphs, and Brutus condemns his son to The play has supernatural scenes, death. which are failures but those scenes which
;

turn on the domestic affections, display un usual power. believe the tragedy was

We

It is cer written expressly for Mr. Booth. tain that the author was an intimate and ad

miring personal friend of the actor.

Booth enters running, and is called by some other character on the scene to minister The rounded back, the to his amusement.
blank face, the restless, aimless motion of the Moved by hands, enacted folly to the life.
his evil genius, Tarquin reports for pastime to Brutus, the details of his crime, beginning

with the remark that he will

fill

the fool with

wonder.
"

Brutus replies
say nothing that would

You can

make me

wonder."

Before the
his looks
"

last word he made a slight pause, grew keen, he uttered the word

w onder
r

"

with an ominous and penetrating

s

accent, then leaned to listen.

During Tarquin
straightened.
son, and on

recital,

kindled with a strange blue light.

Booth s eyes His back

He
fire

stood,

with indignation

crowned with rea and thus

;

170

THE TRAGEDIAN.

transformed as into a strong avenging angel (Tarquin s story done), he hurled upon him

an anathema, the agony of which should

"

last

millions of

years."

Never
fibre

shall

we

of his frame

forget that speech. Every seemed to contribute to

swell the energy of his voice. elements of his voice

"

And

all

the

Constringed in

mass,"

burst upon the astonished and terrified offen

der.

Nor can we

forget

Booth

pale

and

nor the lightning of his glance, nor the unexpected, but most dramatic move
terrible face,

ment which supplemented the

speech.

While

speaking he stood still, towering above his victim; but after the words "millions of
years,"

he began to stride down the stage. The power which had animated his voice was
;

transferred to his action

and he

literally
it

stage, treading versely to the extreme corner, as if

occupied the
pass over

little

trans

he would

then turning abruptly, he strode up again to the other ex treme, a fearful play of look and feature, betraying meanwhile a silent, inward, grow

among

the audience

ing,

and tremendous

resolution.

BRUTUS.

171

next find him in the public square, addressing the citizens, over the body of

We

There was no elocution in this was rough in voice, half choked speech. with feeling. The manner was at the farthest remove from that of an opera singer, listening
Lucretia.
It

to

his

own

musical grief.

But

his

tones

seemed the outcry of a torn and bleeding heart, and in them a noble anger strove with and finally overmastered the softer emo
tions.

no passage in any of his, either in or out of Shake performance speare, exhibited a greater intensity of dra matic conception, or a more thorough accord
It
is

safe to affirm that

of utterance and action than did the closing The Roman costume left scene of this play.

There might be and sub movements of head and feature, now tler quivering and writhing with emotion, now To watch this fixed in immovable resolve. varied movement would have satisfied the
head, neck, and arms bare. seen swift changes of color
;

swifter

deaf.

To

listen to the

accompanying tones,

often inarticulate heart-cries,

wrung thence

by the passion of the hour, would have given mental vision to the blind.

PESCARA.
SHIEL, in his play of the "Apostate," wrote the part of Pescara for Booth. Booth
responded,
Shiel: that
defective

by creating the
is,

character
its

for

he poured into
his

ugly and

mould
life.

own

abounding

To

splendid faculty and speak the interior truth,

think both parties might have been bet ter employed, Shiel in writing, Booth in de
for a more desperate example of inhuman depravity than this Pescara, could

we

lineating

scarcely be hunted out of literature. If it be said lago is more fiendish

we

answer,
is

let

him be

so.

The

difference of the

two characters is a difference of kind. lago an intellectual experiment on the part of

a capable young

man

of twenty-eight, to see

how
life,

successfully he can play the game of

He is full leaving God entirely out. of subtlety, and many parts of his speeches, as set forth by the unmatched art of Shake
speare, might, when viewed apart from his Pescharacter, shine in ethical discourse.

PESCARA.
cara,

173
an uninteresting

villain,

passions in turgid rhetoric ; and holding the attention only by a cruel force of will, exercised in his office
as

on the contrary, ventilating bad

is

governor of Granada.
Probably, there worked through the dull

brain of the author, and out into his dark and cruel Spaniard, some dim reminiscence
of Shakespeare s Certainly, in the
"

super-subtle

Venetian."

personation

of Pescara,
spirit

Booth drew

off

some of that

which

filled his lago, adulterated it with Shiel, and offered it with great acceptance to the rank

palate of a popular audience

"

Darkening his power

to lend base subjects

light."

Yet the flashing and magnetic eye ; the crisp, resonant, and changeful tones ; the natural attitudes of easy power ; the lithe strength in action, always characteristic of Booth,
lent their
also,

wonted charm to this performance and made even Pescara yield a transi

tory delight. Two sets of characters figure in the play ; Moors and Christians. Pescara is one of the
Christians.

matic.
rival, is

entrance is highly dra a Moor, and his successful Hemeya, saying to Florinda
first

His

174
"

THE TRAGEDIAN.
Who now
shall part us ?
"

"I,"

action,

Booth s replies Pescara, entering. as he stepped upon the scene, had

first

something of the measured force of his

entrance in Richard, and something of the stealthy tread of his lago ; while the word he
uttered, gave voice in one little syllable to the whole malign personality of the char
acter.

In a

later scene,

he was accustomed to

recount a dream or vision, in a manner des

perately vivid.
excellence,
told
in
this

A
in

Florinda,

lady of much histrionic our hearing, how, as scene, she involuntarily

shrank from his touch, possessed by his fero

cious aspect and resounding voice. with that conscious and tactile

But

he,

delicacy,
filled

which never

left

him, even

when most

with the inspiration of his art, in a few lowtoned words reassured her, and proceeded without a moment s pause, to possess with
his vision the

imagination

of his auditors.
sat at the centre

The calm
"

directing

mind

of his wildest passion, like

The whirlwind
s

heart of peace."

REUBEN GLENROY.
LET
and
us touch a few other characters with

a slight pencil.
Country,"
is

In Colman

"

play,

Town
by

Reuben,
old

accompanied

Cosey,

seeking his lost love in the labyrinths

of London.

The kind

man makes some

casual remark, at which the lover winces.

"

Cosey.

I
"

beg pardon
Bringing

for bringing her to

your
"

mind."

Reuben.

her

to

my mind ?

Booth gave the

"

first

word with a

pathetic

ringing clearness, paused slightly before and and closed the sentence, in a after her,"

manner very low,

quisitely

and quick ; most ex conveying the plain meaning, that

clear,

she was always in his mind.

OCTAVIAN.
OCTAVIAN, in the Mountaineers," is a rag ged and melancholy Spaniard, of high birth and breeding, who finds his love, Floranthe, after long and wretched separation, and under
"

extraordinary circumstances.

The deep joy

of this discovery

was de

picted by Mr. Booth with a tender fullness of expression most winning to the popular also recall one unique gesture. heart.

We

locked the fingers of his raised hand within the fingers of Floranthe, while speak a subtle and beautiful diversion on ing,
that dangerous thing, the stage embrace. Booth rarely yielded even to the most

He

vociferous call to appear before the curtain.

On one occasion, however, in Octavian, at the close of the play, he came towards the footlights as the curtain was descending, let
it fall

behind him, was

to the

still

atmosphered by
the
character,
silently with

the

melancholy beauty

of

bowed
drew.

audience, and

BERTRAM.
CLERGYMEN
witness the
"

"

are seldom good playwrights Zanga of Dr. Young, the Cat;

"

"

The old feud between of Mr. Croly. the pulpit and the stage makes it difficult for any combatant to fight, either for love, or
aline

fame, or hire,

The

didactic

successfully on both sides. and the dramatic methods of

lie

presenting truth,
poles native
:

respectively at opposite
is

by temperament or mental constitution towards either one or the other method, but
never towards both.
for the

and

an author

determined

view furnish what excuse it may Reverend J. Maturin, who wrote the wretched tragedy of Bertram." The play is and that is a little worse than the Apostate," Morbid passion, adul highly unnecessary.

Let

this

"

"

tery, ress ;

murder, suicide, mark its criminal prog and it is choked by a throng of incon gruous and unnatural incidents.
as the play is, Booth descended occa his sionally to its level, and by the touch of
12

Bad

178

THE TRAGEDIAN.

histrionic genius, stirred its corruption into

a transient phosphorescent brilliancy. To Bertram, as to Pescara, he contributed him

self;

and
art,

in the

enjoyment of
happily

his

consum

mate

we sometimes
is

lost sight of

the author.

Bertram
borne in on

men

picked up from a wreck and s shoulders, as one drowned.

In his slow recovery of consciousness, Mr. Booth took the spectator with him. One could almost feel the partial flow and quick ebb of the vital current ; and the intermit
tent thrill of
life

to his extremities.

He
soil,"

de

livered such passages as

"

No dews

from Heaven

fall

on

this blighted

and
"

have offended Heaven,

will not

mock

it,"

with
grace.

melancholy, undeserved,

Byronic
play

We

find nothing else in this

worthy

to illustrate

our subject.

PIERRE.
MR. BOOTH
of
"

Pierre, in

Otway

tragedy

Venice

Preserved,"

was distinguished by

one salient passage of extraordinary energy and clearness. He is urging his fellow con
spirators
to
fire

the

city

of Venice.

He

stood with his back to the audience, appeal ing with fierce eloquence to each one of his

companions

in turn.

Well do we remember

his transport at the vision of

"

The Adriatic

in her robes of

flame."

performance of this part that we took place at the Howard Atheneum recall, After the in Boston, about the year 1847. we met a gentleman, ripe in years and play,

The

last

culture,

who had known Mr. Booth through

out his career, and who said he had never seen him exhibit more beauty or clearness of voice and gesture, than on this occasion.

The remark
"

acquires value, in view of the blown surmise," that the actor s voice, if

not his general histrionic power, had become impaired by the accident to his face.

THE STRANGER.
OF
Kotzebue
s

play, entitled

"

The Stran
gesture

ger, or Misanthropy and Repentance," only the piquant tone and this remains
:

with which he said

"When

they see

me

with

my runaway wife

upon

my

arm."

this play, so weak and so un of representation, the question natu worthy rally arises, why did not Mr. Booth enact

In considering

Timon? We suppose the managers might have answered. We can only regret that he did not add this mighty figure to his Shake spearean gallery. We can only fancy the large and hospitable style he might have lent
to the beginning of the play ; his scorn when the tide of prosperity

impetuous
is

turning,

isolated majesty of mien and voice, becoming the sullen grandeur of the closing scenes.

and the

THE TRAGEDIAN.
inclusive, if not the

IN the exercise of the most effective and most exalted of the fine arts, the art of acting, Mr. Booth s method was
"

Unremovably coupled
"

to

nature."

The

term

theatrical,"

invidiously

used,

could never be justly applied to him. Nature was the deep source of his power and she imparted her own perpetual freshness to his
;

personations.

We
tire

more than we
as the poise

of her.

could not tire of him, any His art was, in a

;

high sense, as natural as the bend of Niagara

and

drift

of

summer

clouds

the
;

or play of lightning ; the play of children as the sea, storm-tossed, sunlit, moonlit, or

brooded in mysterious calm

and

his

art

awakened
emotions.

in

the

observer

corresponding

AN

INCIDENT.

GARRICK, in addition to his other gifts, was an admirable dancer. Kean danced he also
;

sang exquisitely, employing a faculty not un common with rough-speaking men. Booth
could neither dance nor sing. The single comic song with which he enlivened his per
jingle, scorning

was simply a grotesque melody, and depending for its success on odd turns of expression, verbal and vocal. We recall a true incident, show
in farce,

formance

ing his characteristic admiration of a talent he did not possess.

After a splendid success in tragedy, he stood at the wing (as at other times, on going behind the scenes, we have seen him stand),

with folded arms, in the dress of the charac

ter

he had just personated, and listening in tently to an excellent singer, then before the audience. Unable to congratulate him at the
time,

Booth sought and found the

actors.

later in the night, at a refreshment

room

singer, in

company with other

Booth entered

AN

INCIDENT.

183

the room, silently stretched himself at full took one of the length upon the sanded floor, singer
s

feet,

held

it

so a

placed it upon his own neck, few moments, then, rose and de

parted without word.

A DIALOGUE.
A hotel chamber, dimly lighted. Time SCENE. summer evening. Mr. Booth discovered sitting at an open window, smoking. A glazed cap, and a round
about formed a part of his dress, giving him the appear ance of a Middy Ashore." Enter Guest. Inter
"

change of

salutations

and

courtesies.

G-uest. I

ning.

saw your Sir Giles last eve How do you manage to carry the
"

"

scene so smoothly, with such weak support ? Actor. By close attention to the business
of the stage.
G-uest.

But you seemed

to lose yourself in

your impersonation.
Actor. Else
ter ?
G-uest.

how

could I identify charac

And

can you keep up these two

of thought at the
after the
is

diverse

processes

same

time?
Actor. Nothing easier

machin

ery

is

oiled.
"A

In one view, that

it.

a strange
are
al]

play,

New Way to pay Old Debts,"

They

not one honest person in

A DIALOGUE.
rogues from beginning to end
virtue, rogues in vice.
foibles of the
lines,
;
;

185
rogues for

good by making the good counterplot against the villains. Did you see how near they came
to letting Shakespeare s birthplace slip into I once the hands of a Yankee speculator ?

Shakespeare drew the but he never blurred the

saw, on the 23d of April, the whole way from London to Stratford lined with flowers, in

honor of the poet.

every vestige of him.
G-uest

They should
the
of
title

preserve

(Murmurs
"Vestiges

of a book then

popular).

Creation."

Actor (Catching the allusion, instantly re joins). Yes, he was the god of the histrionic art in England. Can you tell me whether

Howard Payne be

still

mot G-uest. I cannot. upon him, made by some London critics, who cut up his tragedy of Brutus. The author was indiscreet enough to retort through the
"

living ? But I recall a bon

"

press.
"

Whereupon
The
labor

the critics rejoined,

Payne."

we

delight in, physics

and turned the laugh on him.

did

Mr. Booth, ever read in public ? you The Actor. Reading is emasculate acting. drama should never be so treated. (Then

186

THE TRAGEDIAN.

added, smiling) I did attempt it once. I read the ** Ancient Mariner at the Chatham
"

Street Theatre in

New York. But

the read

The boys were cracking ing was a failure. nuts and calling out to each other, Hi
"

"

hi

all

over the house.

Guest. I fear your audience was of similar quality to those sailors, who are said to have

bought up the
regard
to the

first

edition of the

poem, out of

disgusted

But they soon became with the purchase. They couldn t

name.
"

fathom the meaning. I would I had been and heard your reading, even with there,"
the
"

accompaniment. Actor (whiff, whiff, in silence).

!

Hi

hi

"

Guest.

How

vivid the imagery,

how
flew;

allur

ing the measure of that remarkable poem.

"

The fair breeze blew, the white foam The furrow followed
free."

Actor (continuing the verse).

"

We were the first that ever burst,

Into that silent sea
!"

Guest (Listens patiently, but hears no Ancient Mariner that night. more of the
"
"

The

actor was

"

not

the vein

").

Actor.

The

me

greatly.

reports about Rachel interest She has become famous since

A DIALOGUE.

187

my

Europe. The French style, in the antiquated tragedy of Racine, is closer to nature than ours.
last visit to

even

Guest. Is she a Jewess ?

Actor. Juive

Francaise

purity of accent).
first

By

(with exquisite the way, this is the

Jewish month (September). Guest takes leave.

Actor.

Come down
bit.

with

me

to
in

supper;

come, take a
stairs).

going

(on the

Come now, you d

better take a bit.

Guest declines, bids good-night, and sees the actor pass across the hall, and out of sight, with his natural and kingly stride.

THE TRAGEDIAN.
His knowledge and accent of the French He played tongue were simply perfect.
Orest
at
in

Racine

"

tragedy,

Andromaque,"

French Theatre in New Orleans, repeatedly, and in a manner to rouse the

the
wildest enthusiasm.

Frenchmen of

that city

speak of him to

this day, as

a secorxd Talma.

MEETING on one
the late Governor

occasion, at the house of

select

Andrew, a

company

of gentlemen and ladies, the talk turned on the stage and the drama, and was varied by imitations running up into the region of

Shakespearean

criticism.

The Reverend Mr.

Clarke, present, related an adven ture he had with Mr. Booth in Louisville.

who was

was the germ of an excellent which has since appeared in the At paper, lantic Monthly. At the close of the inter view therein described, and which appears so
His
recital

THE TRAGEDIAN.
full

189

of histrionic, eccentric, and psychological interest, the player told the preacher that he

had

theist,

on him as a Unitarian, a monohimself being a Jew. Whether the latter statement referred to race or religion,
called
is left

little

uncertain.

Nothing can be surer, however, than that Mr. Booth s mind was deeply exercised by
religious problems
"

ings

of futurity

by obstinate question and human destiny. The

"

chance companions of his convivial hours, or even the thrilled auditor and spectator of his
matchless
little

impersonations, could have had conception of this, his private and ha

bitual

mood.
passed into
all religions

He

with a certain

humility and humanity, and, we may add, with a certain Shakespearean impartiality.

Among
was

as familiar with the

Jews, he was counted a Jew. He Koran as with the

Scriptures,

Hebrew
times,

and would name a

child

of his after a wife of Mahomet.

At

other

and in sympathy with his favorite poet, Shelley, he delighted to lose himself in the

mysticism of the faiths of India.

THE TRAGEDIAN.
IN recording our impressions of him, who, power of identification be the actor s su preme gift, was perhaps the greatest of all actors, we have lived over again hours of rare
if

aesthetic delight.
this happiness

indulge the hope that has been in some measure

over.

We

communicated
len
Its
is

to the reader.
is

But the play

;

The

curtain has fal

is

the actor vanished.

His voice
air.

hushed.

wild bell has died upon the

His eye

quenched.
"

No more
Fill its blue

shall the quick

im

agination of Shakespeare,
urn with
fire."

That organization,
fibrous, delicate, has

so

elastic,

firm,

dense,
dust.

become a pinch of

Yet remains the

out of the
"

indestructible

hope, that,

Abysmal deeps

of

personality,"

how, when, or under what aspect, who can himself shall arise immortal and tell?
sacred
still

to

the beneficent

ministry of

beauty.

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o

BY

CIRCULATION OUT.

DEC

^tr

LD21

A-40m -8/75
(S7737L)

General Library University of California

Berkeley