ipal characters, and we contrived to speak the words, and even sing
the songs, so much to our own satisfaction, that we thought we might
aspire to the honor of a hearing from our elders and betters. So we
produced our play before my father and mother and some of their friends,
who had good right (whatever their inclination might have been) to be
critical, for among them were Mr. and Mrs. Liston (the Amoroso and
Coquetinda of the real stage), Mr. and Mrs. Mathews, and Charles Young,
all intimate friends of my parents, whose children were our playmates,
and coadjutors in our performance.

For Charles Matthews I have always retained a kindly regard for auld
lang syne's sake, though I hardly ever met him after he went on the
stage. He was well educated, and extremely clever and accomplished, and
I could not help regretting that his various acquirements and many
advantages for the career of an architect, for which his father destined
him, should be thrown away; though it was quite evident that he followed
not only the strong bent of his inclination, but the instinct of the
dramatic genius which he inherited from his eccentric and most original
father, when he adopted the profession of the stage, where, in his own
day, he has been unrivaled in the sparkling vivacity of his performance
of a whole range of parts in which nobody has approached the finish,
refinement, and spirit of his acting. Moreover, his whole demeanor,
carriage, and manner were so essentially those of a gentleman, that the
broadest farce never betrayed him into either coarseness or vulgarity;
and the comedy he acted, though often the lightest of the light, was
never anything in its graceful propriety but high comedy. No member of
the French theatre was ever at once a more finished and a more
delightfully amusing and _natural_ actor.

Liston's son went into the army when he grew up, and I lost sight of
him.

With the Rev. Julian Young, son of my dear old friend Charles Young, I
always remained upon the most friendly terms, meeting him with cordial
pleasure whenever my repeated returns to England brought us together,
and allowed us to renew the amicable relations that always subsisted
between us.

I remember another family friend of ours at this time, a worthy old
merchant of the name of Mitchell, who was my brother John's godfather,
and to whose sombre, handsome city house I was taken once or twice to
dinner. He was at one time very rich, but lost all his