The Othello was very powerfully supported by the Iago of a gentleman well known in Calcutta as an excellent amateur actor. His conception of the part of Iago was strong and true, and his execution as firm and spirited as could be desired. He appeared to have no misgivings on the stage, but to have thoroughly conquered all doubts in the closet. Perhaps the character was made now and then a little too glaringly villainous. The appellation of honest Iago sounded oddly, when applied to a man sneaking into the room with a slow cautious gait, and a sinister expression of blended fear and malice. It interfered with our respect for Othello, who began to look too much like a gull. This was precisely Young's mistake in the same part. He wore too black a brow-the blackness should have appeared in his deeds and not in his looks, when he was in the presence of those against whose peace he was plotting, and before whom he had a certain

relaxed when the sudden burst of animation as suddenly subsides. They are then as much too low as they were before too high. Anxious and desperate timidity always misses the mark. It is better for a debutant to be less ambitious of occasional displays until he has felt his way. In the first instance he should aim rather at an uniform propriety than at fine starts and striking passages; because even if he occasionally succeeds in some measure in a solitary and hard-studied point, the contrast with his general tameness only the more conspicuously betrays his labour, and shows that he has no genuine or continuous feeling of his part. All illusion is then destroyed, his identity is no longer involved in his assumed character, and the audience recognize only the imperfect actor. It is safer, therefore, to be a little too cold or tame in the emphatic passages than to make them start out abruptly from the timid restraint of the general performance, for nothing can be more strikingly unnatural and ineffective than inequalities of this nature. The finest delivery of a single highly impassioned burst, would be ridiculous in a man who throughout the rest of his performance should exhibit a personification of awkward apathy. He would remind us of an automaton just wound up and put into temporary motion. If an actor were to do little more than walk through his part with entire self-possession, he would not so glaringly betray his unfitness as by these ridiculous out-breaks. We have an actress on the Chowringhee Boards who never by any chance falls into these inconsistencies. I allude to Mrs. Leach. She gives the finest and fullest expression to emphatic passages, and yet her humblest by-play has an air of entire truth and reality. She never drops her arms, stands still, and stares at the audience. As long as she is on the stage she feels that she has a part to perform, and she always performs it well.

character to support. There is an anecdote in some theatrical publication of the performance of Cooke in this character. It is said that a man in the gallery exclaimed what a villain! and called for his expulsion. Did we not remember that the audience have a knowledge of circumstances of which Othello is ignorant, we should pronounce an effect of this nature to be no compliment to, but rather a condemnation of the actor. Iago is a general deceiver. It is wrong to put a Cain-mark upon his forehead. It must have been, an ever-present consciousness of this truth that caused Kean to err on the other side, by making him too gay. It should never be forgotten in theatrical critiques, that in all representations on the stage the audience are in one sense of the phrase behind the scenes. They are mere lookers-on, and see all the secret springs and movements. They have a key to each character. As Iago proceeds in his demoniacal work, his villainy is so palpable to the audience that they are apt to be betrayed into a very unreasonable surprise that it is not equally evident to the whole of the Dramatis Personæ.

It has been thought that the character of Iago is in some degree unnatural, inasmuch as there is not a sufficient motive for his atrocious conduct. Perhaps this objection is not entirely unfounded. Hazlitt pronounces it more nice than wise. That writer was a profound and subtle critic, when he could bring himself to be quite impartial. He was at other times either a fierce hater or an equally fierce admirer. With respect to his Shakespearian creed, he was a thorough bigot, and seemed to think the poet as infallible as the Pope. But the sun of that mighty genius, glorious as it is, has far more spots upon its disk than many luminaries of lesser magnitude and brightness. Few great poets could so little justify an unqualified admiration. I am far from maintaining that the character of Iago is actually or altogether unnatural; but I think that even Shakespeare himself had some misgivings on this score, and had

anticipated the very objection which Hazlitt combats. It was on this account, perhaps, that he has made Iago express a suspicion that both the Moor and Cassio had dishonored him as a husband. The thing seems improbable in itself, and is so awkwardly introduced and has so little effect, that it looks very like an afterthought or interpolation. It is forgotten as soon as mentioned. The desire of obtaining Cassio's place, and of revenging himself on the Moor for his selection of that officer in preference to himself, does not seem a sufficient motive for his fiendish Machiavelism. Besides, it seems unlikely that such a cautious and clear-minded observer of human nature as Iago should not have reflected, that to succeed in proving Desdemona faithless would be to make Othello fancy himself

"A fixéd figure for the hand of scorn

To point his slowly moving finger at—”

and to deprive him of that precious charm in which he had "garnered up his heart,"

"Where either he must live, or bear no life."

He must have known that he could not have long continued an agreeable object to Othello's eye. "The first bringer of unwelcome news hath but a losing office." It must be remembered, however, that Iago did not himself see his own way with perfect clearness and precision. His plans were at first confused and undefined, and the course of events became more fearful than he had expected. Crime after crime entailed the necessity of deeper and deeper guilt, and he became himself involved in a hideous labyrinth of his own creating. The total destruction of his victims was at first as little contemplated as his own. Had a pause in his horrible career been consistent with his own safety and success, there is no reason to suppose that he would have desired so dreadful a consummation of his revenge.

Othello is perhaps the most thoroughly dramatic of all Shakespeare's Plays, and is certainly one of the very noblest productions

of his genius. In none of the works of this matchless writer is there a more powerful display of human passion; in none of them is the heart more entirely laid open. It is not, however, in every respect his best performance. I cannot help saying a word or two in this place (however awkwardly introduced) respecting a play of a very opposite character. I allude to that of Hamlet, a production which seems to have been an especial favourite with the author himself, if we may judge from his careful revision of it, and the internal evidence it affords of great care and study.

The elements of passion in Othello are more simple, and are more easily painted and more readily comprehended and sympathized with than the ethereal movements of Hamlet's mind.

Hamlet is a purely intellectual character. His actions and even his feelings have little interest, but as they indicate the metaphysical movements of his spirit. Never was there a being clothed in the attributes of humanity more nearly allied to a superior nature. He is in the world, but not of it; and all the apparent inconsistencies of his conduct seem but the necessary consequence of a being of a purely spiritual nature endeavouring to act in an element which is altogether strange and uncongenial to him. When he gets into the busy world, he is quite out of his sphere. He very naturally exclaims,

"The time is out of joint

O cursed spite that ever I was born to set it right."

He is a mere thinker. He thinks when he ought to act. His qualities are not duly balanced. He is a child in action.

It might be thought by a superficial critic that he has a better head than heart. It has been said that his treatment of Ophelia is not merely rude and harsh, but absolutely brutal, and the cool way in which he plans the death of his two school-fellows, shows that he is quite devoid of any natural tenderness of disposition. That in fact he is lacadaisical, cowardly, and cold-hearted; a truly unmanly character; and that he sinks into utter insignificance when

contrasted with the generous Moor who "loved not wisely, but When Othello is about to kill Desdemona, he gives her

too well."

time to prepare herself for the awful change.

“Othello.—I would not kill thy unprepared spirit;

No,-heaven forefend! I would not kill thy soul.
Desdemona.-Talk you of killing?

Oth.-Ay, I do.

Des.-Then heaven

Have mercy on me!

Oth.-Amen with all my heart!”

There will at first appear much in favor of Othello and against Hamlet, if we compare the above passage with the dreadful soliloquy of the latter when he beholds his uncle at his prayers. He is half tempted to kill him at that moment, but reflecting that a man is never better prepared for death than in the hour of prayer, in the purging of his soul, when he is fit and seasoned for his passage," he exclaims.

Up, sword; and know thou a more horrid hent;
When he is drunk, asleep, or in his rage ;

Or in the incestuous pleasures of his bed :
At gaming, swearing, or about some act,
That has no relish of salvation in't:

Then trip him, that his heels may kick at heaven;

And that his soul may be as damned and black,

As hell, whereto he goes."

Dr. Johnson observes that this speech in the mouth of a character intended to be a virtuous one, is too horrible to be read or uttered. Monk Mason, Steevens and Malone all comment on it in a similar spirit of indignation.

That so many commentators should have failed to enter thoroughly into the character of Hamlet, is no argument against the skill and truth with which it is delineated. We must very carefully refer to human nature, before we can judge with accuracy and precision of Shakespeare's imitations. We are not to look upon Hamlet as a perfect character. We must leave it to such a writer as