They go to the Forum, where Appius is seated on the tribunal, supported by the lictors and an armed troop. The acting of Forrest in the trial-scene that followed was as genuine and moving, set in as bold relief, as anything the American theatre has known. Who that saw him can ever forget the imperial front with which, bearing Virginia on his arm, he advanced before the judgment-seat,—the firm step, the indomitable face, the parental love that seemed to throw a thousand invisible tendrils around his child to hold her up! The tableau caused a silence that was absolute, and was maintained so long that the suspense had begun to be painful, when the kingly voice of Virginius broke the spell:
"Does no one speak? I am defendant here!
Is silence my opponent? Fit opponent
To plead a cause too foul for speech! What brow
Shameless, gives front to this most valiant cause,
That tries its prowess 'gainst the honor of
A girl, yet lacks the wit to know that they
Who cast off shame should likewise cast off fear!"
The strong, lucid, cutting tones in which these words were spoken went vibrating into the breasts of the listeners, and thrilled them with sympathetic echoes. The perjured witness was summoned by the recreant judge. And the next passage of the play had a moral meaning deep enough, and was represented with a truth and power grand enough, to turn the stage for the time being into a pulpit and make the world tremble at its preaching.
"Virginius. And are you the man