* Of an actor so extensively popular, let us indulge a few
reminiscenees. We remember his first entrée upon the boards
of old Covent Garden, in Jacob Gawky; but his present
amplitude of face and rotundity of person were then wanting
to heighten the picture; and flesh, like wine, does wonders.
His voice, too, has Avaxed more fat and unctuous; and
broader (like his figure) has grown his fun. The stage
became possessed of a new character, such as humourist had
never before conceived, or player played—Mr. Liston!—The
town roared with laughter; actors split their sides at his
deepening gravity; caricaturists, in despair, cast off
invention, and trusted solely to his unique lineaments; our
signs bore aloft his physiognomical wonders; and walking-
sticks, tobacco-stoppers, snuff-boxes, owned the queer
impeachment.
Liston! the Knight of the comieal countenance, where Momus
sits enthroned in every dimple, crying aloof to the sons of
care and melancholy! He is the very individual oddity
described in the epigram—
“Here, Hermes” says Jove, who with nectar was mellow,
“Go, fetch me some clay, I will make an odd fellow.”
And forth sprang Liston, a figure of fun! Not for the
amusement of gods, but of men!
To Suett Ave owe our first impression of drollery, but his
glimmering spark was soon extinct. The sun of Liston has
been before us from its rising to its setting. We hailed its
grotesque ascension, basked in its-broad meridian, and now
(when time has somewhat sobered down its comet-like
eccentricities) sorrowfully contemplate its going down.
Liston's last season! and the cruel old boy looks so
provokingly hale and comical! What years of future laughter
are in his face, scored over with quips and cranks! drawn up
in farcical festoons! furrowed with fun!
Liston's last season!—Why should he retire? Are not the
times sad enough?—How will the world wag, wanting its
merriest one?
To this the satirical nosed gentleman nodded assent.
“With fifteen new readings to electrify the diurnal critics of Petticoat Alley and Blow-bladder Lane!”
Mr. Bubangrub guaranteed for the brethren. One new reading he would take the liberty of suggesting to Mr. Bigstick. John Kemble had entirely mistaken Shakspere's meaning. “Birnam Wood” comes not to “Dunsinane” a town; but to “Dunce inane” Macbeth! who was blockhead enough to put his trust in the witches. The great Tragedian danced with ecstasy at this “palpable hit,” and promised pipes and purl for the critical party after the performance.
“Egg-hot,” said he, “is not my ordinary tipple; but on this occasion (pardon egotism!) I will be an egg-hot-ist! And now, to the Queen's Arms for a supper, and then to Somnus's for a snooze!”
With a patronising air he conducted us down the ladder. To Uncle Timothy he said a few words in private, and our ears deceived us, if “gratitude” was not among the number.
We fancied that the jovial spirit of the good Prior, on a three days' furlough from Elysium, hovered over the holiday scene; and that a shadowy black robe and cowl, half concealing his portly figure and ruddy features, flitted in the moonlight, and disappeared under the antique low-arched door that leads to his mausoleum! *
* Each of the monks that kneel beside the effigy of Rahere
has a Bible before him, open at the fifty-first chapter of
Isaiah. The third verse is peculiarly applicable to his holy
work. And as it was the Star that guided him to convert an
unhealthy marsh, “dunge and fenny” on the only dry part of
which was erected “the gallows of thieves,” into a temple
and a “garden of the Lord so it was his divine assurance
that he would live to see, in his own case, the prophecy
fulfilled; and hear the “voice of melody” echo through the
sacred walls his piety had raised.
“The Lord shall comfort Zion: he will comfort all her waste
places; and he will make her wilderness like Eden, and her
desert like the garden of the Lord; joy and gladness shall
be found therein, thanksgiving, and the voice of melody.”
“Dreams are the children of an idle brain.” Yet ours was a busy one through the live-long night. The grotesque scene acted itself over again, with those fantastical additions that belong to “Death's counterfeit.” Legions of Anthropophagi; giants o'ertopping Pelion and Ossa; hideous abortions; grinning nondescripts; the miniature, mischievous court of Queen Mab, and the fiddling, dancing troop of Tam O'Shanter passed before us in every variety of unearthly combination. Clouds of incense arose, and the vision, growing dim, gradually melted away,—a low, solemn chant leaving its dying notes upon the ear.
Let gratitude's chorus arise,