is want of sense." The plot is double, and equally ill-supported in both its branches. A lady of fashion (who was made as little disgusting as the part would permit by Miss Greville) makes overtures of love to a nobleman (Lord Clamourcourt, Mr. Foote), by publishing an account of a supposed intrigue between herself and him in the newspapers. The device is new, at least. The same nobleman is himself made jealous of his wife by the assumption of her brother's name (Neville) by a coxcomb of his acquaintance, by the circumstance of a letter directed to the real Neville having been received by the pretended one, and by the blunders which follow from it. The whole development of the plot is carried on by letters, and there is hardly a scene towards the conclusion, in which a footman does not come in, as the bearer of some alarming piece of intelligence. Lord Clamourcourt, just as he is sitting down to dinner with his wife, receives a letter from his mistress; he hurries away, and his Lady having no appetite left, orders the dinner back. Lord Clamourcourt is no sooner arrived at the place of assignation than he receives an anonymous letter, informing him that Neville is at his house, and he flies back on the wings of jealousy, as he had come on those of love. All this is very artificial and improbable. Quod sic mihi ostendis incredulus odi.2

We were a good deal disappointed in this play, as from the commencement we had augured very favourably of it. There was not much attempt to draw out the particular abilities of the actors; and the little that there was, did not succeed. Mathews, who is in general exceedingly amusing, did not appear at all to advantage. The author did not seem to understand what use to make of him. He was an automaton

2

66

1 EARL OF ROSCOMMON, Essay on Translated Verse, line 114. 'Quodcunque ostendis mihi sic incredulus odi." HOR., Ars Poet., 188.

"Things so incredible would shock the sight.”

W. DUNCOMBE.

put into his hands, of which he did not know how to turn the pegs. He is shoved on, and then shoved off the stage to no purpose, as if his exit or his entrance made the jest. One person twirls him round by the flap of his coat, and another jerks him back again by the tail of his periwig. He is first a stupid servant, and is next metamorphosed, without taking his degrees, into an ignorant doctor. He changes his dress, but the same person remains. He has nothing to do but to run about like a dog to fetch and carry, or to fidget over the stage like the dolls that dance (to please the children) to the barrelorgans in the street. For our own parts, we had rather see Punch and the puppet-show.

THE KING'S PROXY.

[Lyceum] August 27, 1815.

A NEW Opera was brought out at the Lyceum, last week, called The King's Proxy; or Judge for Yourself. If we were to judge for ourselves, we should conceive that Mr. Arnold must have dreamt this opera. It might be called the Manager's Opera. It is just what might be supposed to occur to him, nodding and half asleep in his arm-chair after dinner, having fatigued himself all the morning with ransacking the refuse of the theatre for the last ten years. In this dozing state, it seems that from the wretched fragments strewed on the floor, the essence of four hundred rejected pieces flew up and took possession of his brain, with all that is threadbare in plot, lifeless in wit, and sickly in sentiment. Plato,2 in one of his immortal dialogues, supposes a man to be shut up in a cave with his back to the light, so that he

1 By S. J. Arnold, composed by T. S. Cooke; produced August 19. 2 The Republic, vii.

sees nothing but the shadows of men passing and repassing on the wall of his prison. The manager of the Lyceum Theatre appears to be much in the same situation. He does not get a single glimpse of life or nature, but as he has seen it represented on his own boards, or conned it over in his manuscripts. The apparitions of gilded sceptres, painted groves and castles, wandering damsels, cruel fathers, and tender lovers, float in incessant confusion before him. His characters are the shadows of a shade; but he keeps a very exact inventory of his scenery and dresses, and can always command the orchestra.

Mr. Arnold may be safely placed at the head of a very prevailing class of poets. He writes with the fewest ideas possible; his meaning is more nicely balanced between sense and nonsense, than that of any of his competitors; he succeeds from the perfect insignificance of his pretensions, and fails to offend through downright imbecility. The story of the present piece (built on the well-known tradition of the Saxon King1 who was deceived by one of his courtiers in the choice of his wife), afforded ample scope for striking situation and effect; but Mr. Arnold has perfectly neutralized all interest in it. In this he was successfully seconded by those able associates, Mr. and Mrs. T. Cooke,' Mr. Pyne, Mr. Wallack, by the sturdy pathos of Fawcett, and Miss Poole's elegant dishabille. One proof of talent the author has shown, we allow-and that is, he has contrived to make Miss Kelly disagreeable in the part of Editha. The only

1 Holinshed relates that King Edgar [c. 974] heard of the great beauty of Alfred [Elfrida] the daughter of Horger, Duke of Cornwall or Devonshire, and sent Earl Ethelwold to see her. He fell in love with her, treacherously reported that she was not beautiful enough to marry the king, and married her himself. When Edgar saw the lady he admired her so much that he "contrived Ethelwold's death, and married his wife."-Book vi, chap. xxiv.

2 Mr. T. Cooke was Athelwold; Mrs. T. Cooke, Genilda; Mr. Pyne, Edred; Mr. Wallack, King Edgar; Mr. Fawcett, Earl of Devon; and Miss Poole, Elfrida.

good thing in the play was a dance by Miss Luppino1 and Miss C. Bristow.

[Haymarket Theatre.

"A new musical farce, called A Chip of the Old Block; or The Village Festival, . . ."

This account is from The Chronicle. It is much too favourable. The piece is one of the most wretched we have seen. A statute fair would be more entertaining. The political claptraps were so barefaced as to be hissed. Mathews" sung a song with that kind of humour and effect of which our readers will easily form an idea.]

THE MAID AND THE MAGPYE.

[Lyceum] September 3, 1815.

A PIECE has been brought out at the Lyceum, called The Maid and the Magpye,* translated from the French, and said to be founded on a true story of a girl having been condemned for a theft, which was discovered after her death to have been committed by a magpie. The catastrophe is here altered. The play itself is a very delightful little piece. It unites a great deal of lightness and gaiety with an equal degree of interest. The dialogue is kept up with spirit, and the story never flags. The incidents, though numerous, and

1 Miss Luppino made her first appearance at Covent Garden, March 27, 1815, in Zembuca.

The Maid and the Magpye; or, Which is the Thief? by S. J. Arnold-from La Pie Voleuse, by MM. Caigniez et d'Aubigny-was produced at the Lyceum, August 28, 1815. Another version, called The Magpie; or, The Maid of Palaiseau, was brought out at Drury Lane on September 12. Miss Kelly and Messrs. Knight, Penley (the Jailor), and Oxberry took the same parts in both versions.

complicated with a number of minute circumstances, are very clearly and artfully connected together. The spirit of the French stage is manifest through the whole performance, as well as its superiority to the general run of our present dramatic productions. The superiority of our old comedy to the French (if we make the single exception of Molière) is to be traced to the greater variety and originality of our national characters. The French, however, have the advantage of us in playing with the common-place surface of comedy, in the harlequinade of surprises and escapes, in the easy gaiety of the dialogue, and in the delineation of character, neither insipid nor overcharged.

The whole piece was excellently cast. Miss Kelly was the life of it.' Oxberry made a very good Jew. Mrs. Harlowe was an excellent representative of the busy, bustling, scolding housewife; and Mr. Gattie played the Justice of the Peace with good emphasis and discretion. The humour of this last actor, if not exceedingly powerful, is always natural and easy. Knight did not make so much of his part as he usually does.

2

THE HYPOCRITE.

Drury Lane, September 17, 1815.

2

THE Tartuffe, the original of The Hypocrite, is a play that we do not very well understand. Still less do we understand The Hypocrite, which is taken from it. In the former, the glaring improbability of the plot, the absurdity of a man's imposing on the credulity of another in spite of the evidence of his senses, and without any proof of the sincerity of a

1 Miss Kelly was Annette; Oxberry, Isaac; Mrs. Harlowe, Julienne (Mrs. Gerard); Gattie, the Justice of the Village; and Knight, Blaisot. 2 Tartuffe; ou, l'Imposteur, by Molière, 1667.

3 The Hypocrite, by Isaac Bickerstaffe, played at Drury Lane September 12, 1815.