ly a
fine actress, and the high position which she now deservedly occupies
amongst her sister artists, we are inclined to think, has been gained
perhaps less through her personal attractions than by the sterling
characteristics of her art. Each of her scenes bears the stamp of
intelligence of an uncommon order, and perhaps not the least remarkable
feature in her portraiture of Galatea is that her effects, one and all,
are produced without a suspicion of straining. Those who were present in
the crowded theater last night, and saw the actress in the _role_--said to
be her finest--had, we are sure, no room to qualify the high reputation
which preceded the impersonation."

CHAPTER IX.

MARY ANDERSON AS AN ACTRESS.

The author approaches this, his concluding chapter, with some degree of
diffidence. Though he has in the foregoing pages essayed something like a
portrait of a very distinguished artist, he is not by profession a
dramatic critic. He does not belong to that noble band at whose nod the
actor is usually supposed to tremble. He is not a "first-nighter," who, by
the light of the midnight oil, dips his mighty pen in the ink which is to
seal on to-morrow's broad-sheet, as he proudly imagines, the professional
fate of the artists who are submitted for his censure or his praise. Not
that he is by any means an implicit believer in the verdict of the
professional critic. An actor who succeeds, should often fail according to
the recognized canons of dramatic criticism, and the reverse. That the
beautiful harmony of nature and the eternal fitness of things dramatic are
not always preserved, is due to that _profanum vulgus_ which sometimes
reverses the decisions of those dramatic divinities who sit enthroned,
like the twelve Caesars, in the sacred temple of criticism, as the inspired
representatives of the press.

Those who have been at the trouble to read the various and conflicting
notices of the chief London journals upon Mary Anderson's
performances--for those of the great provincial towns she visited present
a singular unanimity in her favor--must have found it difficult, if not
impossible, to decide either on her merits as an artist, or on the true
place to be assigned to her in the temple of the drama. The veriest
misogynist among critics was compelled, in spite of himself, to confess to
the charm of her strange beauty. Hers, as all agreed, was the loveliest
face and the most graceful figure which had appear