every day life, which brought the stage boards into streets, and
dining-parlours, and kept up the play when the play was ended.--"I
like Wrench," a friend was saying to him one day, "because he is the
same natural, easy creature, _on_ the stage, that he is _off_." "My
case exactly," retorted Elliston--with a charming forgetfulness,
that the converse of a proposition does not always lead to the same
conclusion--"I am the same person _off_ the stage that I am _on_." The
inference, at first sight, seems identical; but examine it a little,
and it confesses only, that the one performer was never, and the other
always, _acting_.

And in truth this was the charm of Elliston's private deportment.
You had a spirited performance always going on before your eyes,
with nothing to pay. As where a monarch takes up his casual abode for
a night, the poorest hovel which he honours by his sleeping in it,
becomes _ipso facto_ for that time a palace; so where-ever Elliston
walked, sate, or stood still, there was the theatre. He carried about
with him his pit, boxes, and galleries, and set up his portable
playhouse at corners of streets, and in the market-places. Upon
flintiest pavements he trod the boards still; and if his theme chanced
to be passionate, the green baize carpet of tragedy spontaneously rose
beneath his feet. Now this was hearty, and showed a love for his art.
So Apelles _always_ painted--in thought. So G.D. _always_ poetises.
I hate a lukewarm artist. I have known actors--and some of them of
Elliston's own stamp--who shall have agreeably been amusing you in
the part of a rake or a coxcomb, through the two or three hours of
their dramatic existence; but no sooner does the curtain fall with
its leaden clatter, but a spirit of lead seems to seize on all their
faculties. They emerge sour, morose persons, intolerable to their
families, servants, &c. Another shall have been expanding your heart
with generous deeds and sentiments, till it even beats with yearnings
of universal sympathy; you absolutely long to go home, and do some
good action. The play seems tedious, till you can get fairly out of
the house, and realise your laudable intentions. At length the final
bell rings, and this cordial representative of all that is amiable
in human breasts steps forth--a miser. Elliston was more of a piece.
Did he _play_ Ranger? and did Ranger fill the general bosom of the
town with satisfaction? why should _he_ not be Ranger, and diffuse