It was not by a mere cursory acquaintance Mrs. Jordan could be known:—confidence alone could develope her qualities, and I believe few of them escaped my observation. I have seen her in the busy bustling exercise of her profession:—I have seen her in the tranquil lap of ease, of luxury, and of magnificence;—in a theatre, surrounded by a crowd of adulating dramatists—and when surrounded by a numerous, interesting, and beloved offspring. I have seen her happy:—I have seen her miserable: and I could not help participating in all her feelings.
At the point of time when I first saw Mrs. Jordan, she could not be much more I think than sixteen or seventeen years of age; and had made her début as Miss Francis, at the Dublin Theatre. It is worthy of observation, that her early appearances in Dublin were not in any of those characters (save one) wherein she afterward so eminently excelled; though such as, being more girlish, were better suited to her spirits and age. I was at that time, of course, somewhat less competent than now to form a judgment; yet could not then but observe, that in these parts she was perfect even on her first appearance: she had no art to study;—Nature was her sole instructress. Youthful, joyous, animated, and droll, her laugh arose from her heart, her tear started ingenuously from her feeling. Her countenance was all expression, without being all beauty:—her form, then light and elastic—her flexible limbs—the juvenile graces of her every movement impressed themselves, as I perceived, deeply upon those who attended even her earliest performances.
Her expressive features and eloquent action at all periods harmonised blandly with each other—not by skill, but by intellectual sympathy: when her figure was adapted to the part she assumed, she had only to speak the words of an author to become the very person he delineated. Her voice was clear and distinct, modulating itself with natural and winning ease; and when exerted in song, its gentle flute-like melody formed the most captivating contrast to the convulsed and thundering bravura. She was throughout the untutored child of Nature: she sang without effort, and generally without the accompaniment of instruments; and whoever heard her Dead of the Night, and her Sweet Bird, either in public or private, if they had any soul, must have surrendered at discretion.
In playful genteel comic characters, such as Belinda, &c., she was excellent: but in the formal, dignified, high-bred parts of comedy, her superiority was not so decided:—her line, indeed, was distinctly marked out; within its extent she stood altogether unrivalled—nay, unapproached.
At the commencement of Mrs. Jordan’s theatrical career she had difficulties to encounter which nothing but superiority of talent could so suddenly have surmounted. Both of the Dublin theatres were filled with performers of high popular reputation, and thus every important part in her line of acting was ably preoccupied. The talent of the female performers, matured by experience and disciplined by practice, must yet have yielded to the fascinating powers of her natural genius, had it been suffered fairly to expand. But the jealousy which never fails to pervade all professions was powerfully excited to restrain the development of her mimic powers; and it was reserved for English audiences to give full play and credit to that extraordinary comic genius, which soon raised her to the highest pitch, at once of popular and critical estimation.
Mrs. Daly (formerly Miss Barsanti) and Mrs. Leyster were foremost among the successful occupants of those buoyant characters to which Miss Francis was peculiarly adapted:—others had long filled the remaining parts to which she aspired, and thus scarcely one was left open to engage her talents.
Mr. Daly, about this time, resorted to a singular species of theatrical entertainment, by the novelty whereof he proposed to rival his competitors of Smock-Alley; namely, that of reversing characters, the men performing the female, and the females the male parts in comedy and opera. The opera of “The Governess” was played in this way for several nights, the part of Lopez by Miss Francis. In this singular and unimportant character the versatility of her talent rendered the piece attractive, and the season concluded with a strong anticipation of her future celebrity.
The company then proceeded to perform in the provinces, and at Waterford occurred the first grave incident in the life of Mrs. Jordan. Lieutenant Charles Doyne, of the third regiment of heavy horse (Green’s), was then quartered in that city; and, struck with the naïveté and almost irresistible attractions of the young performer, his heart yielded, and he became seriously and honourably attached to her. Lieutenant Doyne was not handsome, rather the reverse, but he was a gentleman and a worthy man. He had been my friend and companion some years at the university; I therefore knew him intimately, and he entrusted me with his passion. (Miss Francis’s mother was then alive, and sedulously attended her.) Wild and thoughtless myself, I told him, if he could win the young lady, to marry her; adding, that no doubt Fortune must smile, whether she chose or not, on so disinterested a union; he being no beauty himself, and having no chance of getting a moneyed wife by his attractions, as young ladies seldom fall in love with the unsophisticated goodness of a lover: an ordinary picture without either frame or gilding is seldom seen in a fashionable drawing-room.
Her mother, however, was of a different opinion; and as she had no fortune but her talent, the exercise of which was to be relinquished with the name of Francis, it became matter of serious consideration whence they were to draw their support—with the probability too of a family! Here was a real enigma. His commission was altogether inadequate, and his private fortune small.—This, in short, was insurmountable. Mrs. Francis, also anticipating the future celebrity of her child, and unwilling to extinguish in obscurity all chance of fame and fortune by means of the profession she had adopted, worked upon her daughter to decline the proposal. The treaty accordingly ended, and Lieut. Doyne appeared to me for a time almost inconsolable. Miss Francis I did not see afterward; she accompanied her mother, soon after, to England, and soon commenced her ascent toward the pinnacle of fame. Lieut. Doyne lately died collector of the Queen’s County. His esteem for Mrs. Jordan was never obliterated.
Mr. Owenson, the father of Lady Morgan, was at that time highly celebrated in the line of Irish characters, and never did an actor exist so perfectly calculated, in my opinion, to personify that singular class of people. Considerably above six feet in height;—remarkably handsome and brave-looking,—vigorous and well-shaped,—he was not vulgar enough to disgust, nor was he genteel enough to be out of character: never did I see any actor so entirely identify himself with the peculiarities of those Irish parts he assumed. In the higher class of Irish characters (old officers, &c.) he looked well, but did not exhibit sufficient formal dignity; and in the lowest, his humour was scarcely quaint and original enough; but in what might be termed the “middle class of Paddies,” no man ever combined the look and the manner with such felicity as Owenson. Scientific singing was not an Irish quality; and he sang well enough.—I have heard Mr. Jack Johnstone warble so sweetly and so very skilfully, and act some parts so very like a man of education, that I almost forgot the nation he was mimicking: that was not the case with Owenson; he acted as if he had not received too much schooling, and sang like a man whom nobody had instructed. He was, like most of his profession, careless of his concerns, and grew old without growing rich. His last friend was old Fontaine, a very celebrated French dancing-master, many years domiciliated and highly esteemed in Dublin. He aided Owenson and his family whilst he had means to do so, and they both died nearly at the same time—instances of talent and improvidence.