Yes, they return-I'll linger yet a while On borders darling as my native home Kind Fancy, all my wayward thoughts beguile, Again I mingle in the social choir, The converse sage or jocund still goes round, Let others revel in their gorgeous halls, Let others prize the pomp of Europe's crimes, Mine be the boon of fond domestic joy, Ah, no! like fleeting phantom of the morn, LOCKHART MUIRHEAD.* THE PROVINCIAL ACTRESS. A SKETCH. Ir actresses have got any good parts about them they take care to put them to the best market: they deal them out upon the stage. In private life they are a set of heartless, frivolous creatures. Trities light as air are to them matters of great consequence, and their whole life is spent-that is, the portion of it which belongs to themselves-in backbiting one another, in making or patching up dresses, and in quarrelling with the manager. Your thorough-bred actress is a thorough-bred coquette. She Late Professor of Natural History in the University of Glasgow. encourages the soft glances-because perhaps she feels flattered by them of the puppy who lounges by the side-wings, as well as those of the "grim-faced loon" who pulls up the curtain. She looks round the pit, the boxes, and the gallery, but never rests her eyes long in one direction. She makes them play this circuit generally twenty times a-night; and no matter in what corner of the house you be seated, you cannot but feel flattered that the pretty one's eyes have rested on you no less than a score of times in the course of one single evening. To be sure you are in love with her. The actress at rehearsal generally inspires you with disgust: she attempts to be smart-ogles in your face-hums a tune at the pitch of her voice—and takes a swirl between the side-wings, as if in imitation of the French dancers; but in reality to show you that she can afford to wear clean stockings by day-light as well as by gaslight. She may also perhaps feel some secret vanity in showing you that she wears garters, and that they are of the reigning colour. Her silly frivolities seem boringly impertinent in day-light. You discover that her cheeks are rough; and that her face and neck seem as if they had not been washed for the last two weeks. You feel shocked at a dirty-faced woman's impertinence in thus aping the airs of a hoyden. She spends her mornings in bed, sighing for a husband, or glancing over her part for the evening. She is extremely fond of something nice to breakfast; but if she be engaged only for the waitingmaid or the old women parts, she can afford no greater luxury than a salt-herring. But if it be the proper season of them, she just fancies that she is picking a bit of trout, and her happiness is complete. It is only the tragedy queen who can muster up a plate of ham at breakfast.-Juliet rioting upon bacon! while Lady Capulet must be content Your poor provincial actress is very susceptible of flattery or censure. Praise her, no matter how grossly, and you are a "dear impudent rogue." Offer a slighting remark upon the arrangement of a curl, and you put her in the sullens for the evening. If she has got a pair of small feet, she wears the heel of one of her shoes down; and pretends that a great nasty fellow nearly crushed her little toe to pieces the other night, while embracing her upon the stage. You are hereupon bound to remark upon the smallness of her shoe, which she throws off and assures you is far too large for her. "Ah, dear me! my foot is so swelled to-night !-only feel it." She is a creature of art and affectation. If she is serious for a moment, you can easily discover that her gravity is selfish. A sister actress complains of illness, and her sympathy flows from her in torrents; but she turns her back, and hints to the first she meets, that all is not right with Miss Somebody-but mum, you know-I said nothing." The first time I ever was in a theatre, I fell violently in love with a lady whose name I now forget. These were the days when I used to jump from the window of the little room in which I slept, after the rest of the family had gone to bed, and run to the theatre. I was a first-gallery man in these days. Distance, and gas-light, and vermilion were the means of my enslavement. What a charming creature that was! Three years afterwards I got initiated behind the scenes, and found that she was a wrinkled old woman. In these days, when I was fool enough to dance about the sidewings, I received many an insult from the starvelings and the underlings of the establishment: but my day, I knew, was coming. I wrote a Tragedy-sent it up to old Drury, where it was highly successful! I was now "at home" behind the scenes,-the manager now recognized me,-he shook hands when he met me. To return to our provincial actress. She has a great veneration for an author. Every man who writes a farce or a melo-drama, she thinks must be a man of genius. She treasures up every little puff he pours into her ear, and she retails it to every one whom she can "hold by the button." If he tells her that she "played to-night extremely well-that the part seems her own"-she puts it on the list of her pet ones. After all, poor creature! her situation is not an enviable one. The applause she receives is but short-lived; it neither satiates her craving for flattery, nor yet fills her belly. All woman-kind look upon her as a something which belongs not to their sex. Fair ones who know not what it is to labour for their daily bread, turn up their noses at her, even while she is doing her utmost to please them. And we of the masculine gender, while praising her beauty or her apparent amiableness of manner, whine forth our-" pity that she is an actress." Perhaps her manager is severe to her, or perhaps he cannot pay her her salary when the treasury-day comes round. Perhaps she is not in love with her profession-but we might "perhaps" it through a dozen of pages. That man is a fool, who, not himself an actor, fancies that he is doing a wise thing in marrying a female from the stage. No wise rational merchant or manufacturer would think of taking unto his bosom one of those unsettled animals yclept Tinklers,-equally absurd would it be for him to marry an actress, however pretty, whose habits of life and every thing about her would go to derange his sober way of getting through the world. I am not aware that her ladyship drinks any thing stronger than lemonade "to bear her courage up;" unless it be a drop of brandy now and then-for the benefit of her stomach. In course of time she gets worse and worse in her profession. The town gets tired of her; and she enlists herself under the banner of some strolling manager. She leads his business for a time, and then "is heard of no more." It is only an old play-goer like myself that can run over the names of the hundred thousand actresses who have strutted and fretted their little hour upon a provincial stage. R. B. H. A SCOTTISH BALLAD. My heid is like to rend, Willie, It's vain to comfort me, Willie, Sair grief maun ha'e its will- I'm sittin' on your knee, Willie, Ay, press your han' upon my heart, Oh wae's me for the hour, Willie, Oh wae's me for the time, Willie, That our first tryst was set! Oh wae's me for the loanin' green That gart me luve thee sae! Oh! dinna min' my words, Willie, An' drie a warld's shame! Het tears are hailin' ower your cheek, I'm weary o' this warld, Willie, I canna live as I have lived, But fauld unto thy heart, Willie, The heart that still is thine; An' kiss ance mair the white, white cheek A stoun' gaes thro' my heid, Willie, Oh! haud me up, an' let me kiss Thy brow ere we twa pairt. Anither, an' anither yet! How fast my life-strings break! Fareweel! Fareweel! thro' yon kirk-yaird Step lichtly for my sake! The lavrock in the lift, Willie, That lilts far ower our heid- Abune the clay-cauld dead; Wi' dew-draps shimmerin' sheen, But oh! remember me, Willie, An' oh! think on the leal, leal heart, An' oh! think on the cauld, cauld mools That kiss the cheek, and kiss the chin, W. MOTHERWEI L. |