r handsomely,
and still carried the usual applause along with him, we directly
conceived that there would be just ground for thinking it not entirely
the result of prejudice, nor by any means undeserved.

At his entrance he seemed a little intimidated, as if he were dubious of
his reception; nor could he for some minutes devest himself of that
feeling, though he was received with the most flattering welcome;--this
transient perturbation gave a very pleasing effect to his first words;
and when he said, "My name is Norval," he uttered it with a pause which
seemed to be the effect of the modest diffidence natural to such a
character upon being introduced into a higher presence than he had ever
before approached. Had this been the effect of art it would have been
fine--perhaps it was--but we thought it was accidental.

The utter impossibility of a beardless boy of sixteen or seventeen
years, at all assimilating to the character of a warrior and mighty
slayer of men, is of itself an insuperable obstacle to the complete
_personification_ of certain characters by a young gentleman of the age
and stature of Master Payne. He might speak them with strict
propriety--he might act them with feeling and spirit; but had he the
general genius of Garrick--the energies of Mossop--the beauty of Barry,
the elocution of Sheridan, and the art of Kemble, he could not with the
feminine face and voice, and the unfinished person inseparable from such
tender years, _personate_ them: nor so long as he is seen or heard can
the perception of his nonage be excluded, or he be thought to represent
that character, to the formation of which, not gristle, nor fair, round
soft lineaments, but huge bone and muscle, well-knit joints, knotty
limbs, and the hard face of Mars are necessary. If we find, as we do in
many great works of criticism, objections made to the performance of
several characters by actors of high renown merely for their deficiency
in personal appearance--if the externals of Mr. Garrick are stated by
his warmest panegyrists as unfitting him for characters of dignity or
heroism, even to his exclusion from Faulconbridge, Hotspur, &c. and if
we find that the greatest admirers of Barry considered the harmony and
softness of his features, as reducing his Macbeth, Pierre, &c. to poor
lukewarm efforts, how can it be expected that a boy, just started from
childhood, should present a true picture of a warrior or a philosopher?
We premise this for t