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179.
appalling point of the part thrilled and star-
tled the audience to gushing ecstacies. Much
as this point has elicited admiration we have
ever deemed it a mere melo-dramatic trick of
German extraction and improved upon by the
English actors inthe minor theatres of London---
a trick of the practiced actor's metier that no
legitimate performer would indulge in. The
shaking of every fibre of the frame the ghast-
ly look produced from a white leadish compo-
sition placed in the palm of a gauntlet glove
and the turning of the eyes upward until the
orbs see the eye-brows all produce a very
peculiar abd shuddering aspect; but all are
easily effected by practice the metaphysics
of the romantic drama. Nobody understood
those adjuncts to popular acting better than
Booth. He used them against his judgment.
His truly great and pure excellencies did not
require such low and imitative arts. His clas-
sical mind his genius and very generalpow-
ers were above all this vulgar address. His suc-
cess in Virginia (as he played afterwards at Pe-
tersburg and Norfolk) put money in his purse
and helped Gilfert's treasury in the same ratio.
But still this Virginia fame and furore did not
reach the North and East as his appearance
here and at New York in 1822 and '23 amply
proved. Here and at New York and Boston
they said that he was an imitator of Kean. We
shall treat of that hereafter.

Junius Brutus Booth made his first bow to
a Philadelphia audience with very poor pros-
pects of success. Nobody knew anything
about him nor did anybody seem to care for
him. His reception was extremely lukewarm.
The house was poor ; the applause was poorer.
A few saw merit ; the verdict of his jury was
"No go !"

He was announced for Sir Edward Mortimer
in the "Iron Chest" on Wednesday 19th there
being no play on Tuesday. Wilford was per-
formed by H. Wallack ; Helen Mrs. Darley ;
Blanch Mrs Tatnall. The piece was cast to
the full strength of the company. The farce
was "The Citizen." Young Philpot Wemyss ;
Maria Mrs. Tatnall. Mrs. Entwisle was a
much superior Maria. This ridiculous attempt
at starring on the part of Mrs. Tatnall shelved
Mrs. Entwisle for better than one-third of the
season. She was the real star in the parts as-
sumed by the latter lady. Are not such ar-
rangements nonsense.

The house on the second appearance of Booth
was not good yet he unfolded merits that made
some talk the next day.

On Friday February 21st he played his great
character Sir Giles Overreach in "A New Way
to Pay Old Debts." This he played with his
usual excellence winning from those who were
present "golden opinions" and the most en-
thusiastic applause. But he failed to draw
houses---a most unpardonable sin in any star.
After these three performances Booth was sus-
pended with the following brief announce-
ment : "Due notice will be given of Mr. Booth's
fourth appearance." He did not re-appear until
April 2d and then as King Lear. On succeed-
ing nights he performed Reuben Glenroy Octa-
vian and Orestes in "The Distressed Mother"
in which Mrs. Duff made her first appearance

for six years as Hermion. At Booth's benefit
he played Jerry Sneak in the farce of "The
Mayor of Garratt."

As this celebrated actor afterwards filled a
great space in our theatrical annals an ex-
tended sketch of his life will be appropriate.

Junius Brutus Booth was born at St. Pan-
cras near London on the first of May 1796.
He was the son of an attorney in good prac-
tice who intended him for the same profession
and directed with infinite care his education to
that end. After passing through the routine
of the grammar school and the usual prepara-
tory studies of a college preparation he was
placed at Eton where his vigorous and quick
powers in the acquisition of languages were
soon developed. His genius for the mathema-
tics was very apparent---his predilections for
natural philosophy or the more abstruse sci-
ences were less evinced. Booth remained at
this institution for some time pursuing his stu-
dies ; but his restless and eccentric nature
would fitfully break forth. We believe that
he did not stay to graduate with the honors of
his Alma Mater---those crowning laurels that
at least make proud the boast of the classical
scholar. If genius be denied the pupil by
Dame Nature yet he may plume himself upon
his foster-mother's learning. Booth's literary
attainments were various and extensive. He
was a most accomplished linguist speaking
French like a native (having played Orestes
in that language.) In the Spanish Italian
German and the Flemish dialects he conversed
with fluency. He read the best masters of the
classics with ease and translated with facility
---acquirements so rarely combined with vigor-
ous original thoughts quick perceptions florid
and vivid imagination and ready analyzing
qualities embraced a wealth of mind fortified
by liberal culture which was calculated to
shed not only honor on his profession but
upon mankind generally. It is a mortifying
subject of regret that such a mind should
have been doomed to aberrations from its most
sacred duties and social obligations. Booth
occasionally yield to hallucinatios that not
only destroyed his dignity his talent but
with them the protectorate of his domestic
temple---the earthly paradise of man the sem-
blance of his state hereafter. These exalted
attribute have seldom been reverted to by his
many friends ; but we have heard some of the
best men of our land in the impulses of their
admiration for his genius bewall the painful
results of his mental disease. Booth had de-
voted much attention to the fine arts. In the
premliminary studies of sculpture and painting
he had accomplished more than amateur pro-
ficiency : still the ruling spirit of the drama
predominated in his nature. He wooed and
won Melpomene for his bride and but retained
her sisters for his handmaids. He arose with
all her majesty and set almost too early in her
mourning weeds. Like DeSoto the discoverer
of the mighty Mississippi , Booth nearly found
a grave beneathed his las after a few days ill-
ness on its turbid waves Nov 20th, 1852 at-

tended in his state-room on the steamer J. W.
Chenoworth only by a stranger (whose name
is unkonown) and his son Edwin both of whom
in his last hours of life devoted their entire
energies and love to his wants on the lonely
"Father of Waters." While on his way home
from California it pleased an all-wise Provi-
dence to summon hence his immortal part.
The hollow rumbling of red "Mississippi's
flood" alone sang his mournful requiem while
the silent sorrow of the stranger and the be-
reaved love of his son offered up their heart-
felt prayers. The curtain fell for the last time
in melancholy folds upon the lone tragedian
as his spirit fled hence over the drear waste of
waters while the Muses wept. May we not
hope that the messenger of death bore his re-
mains to that rest prepared for all "in the
bosom of his Father and his God !" May we
not further say in consonance with the moral
poet's lines---

"No longer seek his merits to disclose
Nor draw his frailties from their dread abode !"

Booth in crossing the Isthmus had been
seized with a violent dysentery had been
been conquered at New Orleans ; but his son
Edwin said that he had drank the river water
which bad the effect of renewing the disease
upon his system with all its fatal virulence.

Booth's irrepressible desire for the Thespian
vocation caused him to desert all other con-
templated pursuits. Thus impressed he made
his first essays in the English provincial thea-
tres and of course became an itinerant for
one or two years. He subsequently accom-
panied Mr. Penley to the Netherlands. Penley
had been on the stage from his infancy. In
1815 he took his first step from a provincial
theatre to Drury Lane making his debut there
as Norval in "Douglas." This gentleman
was best known for a fine figure and finer
teeth. Here his biographers seem to halt---
we suppose in admiration.

At Brussels Booth acquired popularity it
would seem in his happy illustration of the
unhappy Megrim in the farce of the "Blue
Devils" the idiosyncratic peculiarities of which
character were not incompatible with our his-
trion's nature. He often without any ap-
parent cause was himself the Megrim of real
life. Booth as a man and an actor filled
during a perturbed existence no ordinary
space in the theatrical or social sphere ; and
from his first landing on our shores in 1821 to
his death 1852 "he was the observed of all
observers." Nor do we know a public man
who has been more privately and profession-
ally abused and eulogized. He has been de-
famed as a drunkard as a knave a fool a
monomaniac as a humbug actor and a vile
imitator of Kean ; also as a slovenly dresser.
To this last charge he should certainly have
pleaded guilty. He was derided upon account
of his low stature bow legs &c. &c. Others
again would assert that he had no superior as
a tragedian and that he far surpassed Kean or
Forrest. He was certainly no mean man. He
served at least to fill up scandal's measure
furnishing food if not for powder at least for
new topices of talk and affording to jealous
rivals food for comment and derision with
some grains of pity for his drunken freaks.

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