p. 135

36.
painter of that name at London and Mr Hugh
Reinagle was his eldest son. The latter was af-
terwards long known to the American public
as a most finished scene-painter and drawing-
master. The well-known facetious and eccen-
tric artist Thomas Reinagle was also a son of
Manager Reinagle by a second marriage.

It is undeniable that Mr. Wignell in the nice
selection of his company presented great dra-
matic strength as well as operatic excellenece.
His policy in the beginning of his operations it
would seem was to rely on and to push the latter
entertainments to the neglect of the former al-
though he possessed great ability in tragedy and
comedy. We venture to say that if he had si-
multaneously presented his various approved
attractions--or in other words alternately re-
presented tragedy comedy and opera--his trea-
sury would have been benefited. The country
at that period had not made any advances in
the more scientific music of the lyric style
however au fait in judgment our audience was
in the regular drama. Music of an elevated
character to be properly appreciated must have
adequate judges which only old and refined
nations can furnish in sufficient numbers to sup-
port so expensive an institution as an opera.
Mr. Wood our worthy ex-manager said that he
saw the opera of "Robin Hood" finely played
and sung by this first company to forty dollars--
a result which most obviously explains itself.

CHAPTER XX.
The Chesnut street theatre company in 1794--Sketches of its
members--Fennell--His melancholy fate--The beggar's
petition--A salt speculation--Harwood--Mrs. Oldmixon
--Sir John Oldmixon--A market gardener--Taste of the
English for rural pursuits illustrated bt an anecdote of
Vincent de Camp &c.

We will proceed with our sketches of the
members of the first Chesnut street theatre
company in 1794 treating of them indiscrimi-
nately without reference to grade of talent or age.

Mr. James Fennell was a native of London.
This gentleman was highly educated. He
passed through the University of Cambridge
with honors and entered as a student of law at
the temple but very soon flew on eagle's wings
from Blackstone and Coke to Shakspere. In
1787 he made his debut at Edinburgh under
the assumed name of Cambray in the charac-
ters of Othello and Jaffer in which attempts he
succeeded extremely well. Fennell seemed to
have a predilection for the sooty-colored heroes
or rather his subsequent fame was apparently
identified with Othello and Zanga. His appear-
ance was unquestionably very fine in the cha-
racter of a Moor. His face and figure when
thus made up seemed forcibly expressive and
aided those bursts of passion so characteristic
of the Veneitian general and Zanga. A tower-
ing form and marked features like those of
Fennell's were pre-requisites that could not fail
other things being equal to render the actor
popular in the public mind. But like the la-
mented Conway the height of Fennell was too
excessive to permit him to move and bend with
gracefulness. Both those actors were in stature
about six feet two or three inches. After the
essay of the debutant in Scotland Mr F return-
ed to London and still under his cognomen of
Cambray playyed with some success but not

sufficiently so to secure a permanent London
engagement which was the sheet-anchor of the
provincial actor's hopes--the very acme of his
highest aspiration. Our hero therefore re-
traced his steps to Edinburgh and acted there
again with flattering success. Whilst in that
city he unfortunately became involved in a pro-
fessional quarrel with a favorite actor. We
believe the dispute was about some parts.
Fennell was driven from the Edinburgh stage
by the audience and became thereby worried
and perplexed in a law-suit. Finally he re-
turned again to London and played for some
time at Covent Garden. Thence he repaired to
Paris where as My Lord Anglais he assumed
a leading position in the beau monde. He kept
his hotel in greatsplendor of style at the ex-
pense of those who were duped by his false ap-
pearances and insinuating address. At one
time he was idolized in Philadelphia especially
by the literary youth whose fathers counte-
nanced such patronage in their sons superin-
duced doubtless by the scholastic acquire-
ments and brilliant talents which unfortunate-
ly Fennell much abused. I well remember a
great division of public opinion in regard to the
relative merits of Fennell and Cooper. The
literati generally approved the former. But
Cooper gradually rose above him till he soon
outshone all competitors on our boards.--
I am free to say that I never could see that ex-
cellence for him as an actor. I however speak
with this qualification of opinion that my judg-
ment was yet unschooled while Mr. Fennell was
becoming passe from circumstances more than
from positive age ; so that to be truly impartial
in my record I must write with due reserve.
Fennell's Glenalvon was said by excellent judges
to have been a very natural and powerful per-
formance. Mr. Dunlap who seems to have been
not at all disposed towards Mr. Fennell
gives a most decided preference to him in that
part over the personation of the same charac-
ter by Mr. John Palmer of London celebrity.
Cooper's Young Norval Hopkinson's Old Nor-
val Fennell's Glenalvon Tyler's Lord Randolph
and Mrs. Whitlock's Lady Randolph constituted
a cast at the Park Theatre New York some
years since which was deemed not in any way
inferior to that of the London theatres if we
except the all-absorbing unapproachable ex-
cellence of the Siddons as the lady.

Fennell's vicissitudes were many and heart-
rending. If therefore I was not old enough to
form ideas of his pristine acting I afterwards
saw with pain his poverty-stricken situation
and how step by step he descended to the grave.
In those bitter days of his fitful life he re-
ceived the sympathy and the shelter of a poor
widow's roof in whose benevolent arms he re-
signed his dying breath. Many of our con-
temporaries must have read the affecting story
of James Fennell's humble solicitation at the
door of the kind-hearted Mrs. Brown to forgive
him and once again to give shelter to his house-
less head. Mrs. Brown lived in Union street
where Fennel had lived. She had been
obliged by his course of conduct and ungra-

cious feeling towards her to forbid him her
house wherein her charitable heart had fos-
tered and nursed his fast-decaying physical
powers when by the world forgotten. "No
friends complaint no kind domestic tear :"--
all gone naught saved but the widow's mite !
that angel gift to man was there. One bleak
and penniless he knocked at her door and
begged her for mercy's sake to give him a
night's lodging from "the pitiless storm." This
kind woman had been so often deceived by
his appeals and promises that she felt con-
strained to refuse his request which she did
rather angrily from the second-story window
where she was at the time retiring to rest.
He then (the picture of thebroken-hearted and
demented King Lear) in a most pathetic and
melting tone "which went direct to my heart"
(as Mrs. Brown said) "recited the 'Beggar's
Petition' to me :

"'Pity the sorrows of a poor old man
Whose trembling limbs have born him to your door
Whose days are dwindled to the shortest span;
Oh give reflief and Heav'n will bless your store.'"

This had the desired effect ; she felt the poe-
try--the heart-melting power of delivery. She
hurriedly interrupted the rest of the stanzas with
which he was proceeding placed him in a warm
bed ministering every comfort that she could
command to relieve and to restore his bodily
and mental afflictions. He did not long survive
this last melancholy scene. Mrs. Fennell was
yet living and a fine woman but her heart was
broken by her many misfortunes ; she survived
him some few years and died also under the
asylum of Mrs. Bron's roof. A son and daugh-
ter yet survive. This account I had from Mrs.
Brown who was an English woman and whom I
helped to carry to her last resting-place.

Mr. Fennell had lived in Philadelphia in the
most luxurious style. He had revelled in every
luxury that he could imagine. He was flatter-
ed by the great "applauded to the very echo
that should applaud again" on and off the
stage until the manis of extravagance ended
where necessarily it must in all such cases in
abject poverty without a chance of redemption
or opportunity of flight. Oh ! how lamentable
was his fate ; to abuse powers so adequate to
elevate him to the highest histrionic honors or
to command his entrance into the most refined
and educated society of our land. Surely such
men owe a responsibility when so gifted to the
world and its institutions. Their very elevated
public position demands a moral conduct a
suitable use of their talents a conservative
course of life as a living example as a light in
the world's progress by which her wayward
children may choose the proper path. Fen-
nell's absurd salt speculations to give them no
harsher term involved him in inextricable dif-
ficulties. Mr. Dunlap in his remarks upon this
matter we think deals too severely with the
poor actor's frailties. He says : "After a series
of acts which if an honorable and liberal pro-
fession could be disgraced it--after all
the obloquy and misery inseparable from a
career of fraud--after sporting with the credu-