Original.

"OUR ACTORS."

THE LATE MRS. HILSON.

"Men's due deserts each reader may recite,
For men of men do make a goodly show;
But women's works do seldom come to light;
No mortal man their quiet worth can know,
If writer's don't a little time bestow
The worthy acts of women to repeat,
Whose due deserts, though silent, yet be great."
Mirror for Magistrates, 1559.

THE real objections against the stage as an occupation, especially for females, do not appear to us so well understood as they might be. We doubt whether, in proportion to the numbers employed, there is more of the particular description of impurity for which this pursuit is by many held in special horror, to be found among theatrical persons, than among classes who make higher pretensions, but are more adroit at concealments. Indeed, the ever stirring appetite of performers for noisy popular applause, is very apt to withdraw them from other engrossing allurements. Out of this, however, grows one peril, against which it would be well for such

artists to be guarded; and for this same peril the very persons by whom they are unjustly decried on the grounds to which we have alluded, are themselves in a great degree responsible. The personal homage and the pecuniary rewards given in various shapes to suc

cessful actors, are so entirely disproportioned to the real estimation in which their displays are honestly held even by the bestowers, that the recipients must be philosophers indeed who can ever see themselves as they are, or as they are actually considered out of the little world which hails them with so much idolatry. Every thing around them specially ministers to weaknesses from which even much higher education and stronger self-control than often falls to the lot of actors, has failed to prove a shield; and when, under these temptations, individuals appear who are neither selfish nor vain, and who are more than imperfectly alive to the true charities and the legitimate objects of existence, surely such, even though connected with the stage, deserve more praise than those equally exemplary, who have only breathed an atmosphere of salutary example and of perceptions always rightly governed, always calm

and rational.

We revert to the memory of MRS. HILSON, the subject of our present notice, with sincere pleasure, because we deem these last to have been her peculiar distinctions; she inherited them from her parents, she was sustained in them by her husband; she preserved them to her grave, over which they now rise to fling a pure and an enviable light of which the false fire of idolatry for excellence merely theatrical is utterly incapable.

The mother of MRS. HILSON is recollected with great favor by all who remember the earlier stars of the American stage. Her name was JOHNSON; and she and her husband, both, for some years ranked highly in the various theatres of Yorkshire, England; MR. JOHNSoN himself having appeared some seasons previous at the Haymarket in London. When MR. HODGKINSON sought actors on the other side of the Atlantic for his

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"Old American Company," in the year 1797, he considered himself very fortunate in securing the services of a couple possessing so much reputation in their provincial circuit, that Covent Garden and Drury-lane seemed likely to contend for them with New-York and Philadel phia. And his anticipations were correct, for in our country their popularity increased so rapidly that it soon brought them to the great goal of histrionic ambition. MRS. JOHNSON, with the reputation of "the American Farren," was engaged at Covent Garden in the season of 1798, and on the 28th of September, she made her appearance at that theatre in Lady Townly. If inferences may be drawn from a knowledge of the usual indications of the course of policy in London theatres, we should say that the managers had determined to give MRS. JOHNSON a support, in which they were not sustained by the public. For this it may not be diffiThe luminaries of the stage

cult to find a solution.

were then in all their glory: the high mettled racers had not left the course, and it was hard to triumph. The criticisms on MRS. JOHNSON, though favorable, were in a strain somewhat apologetic. "She is much above the middle stature," says one, "but her height, while gives a commanding appearance to her person, and, we think, rather femininely interesting than strongis not incompatible with grace; her face is handsome, ly expressive; her action is not inelegant, but it wants freedom and variety; her voice is happily suited to either department of the drama; her intonation is full and musical; she has a sort of lisp but it does not mate

rially affect her articulation; she speaks with a degree attain: indeed, good sense is the characteristic of her of judgment and precision which few women are able to performance. In every point of view she is to be consirequires so much from the actress, that it is seldom we dered with respect." "But the part of Lady Townly sent COUNTESS of DERBY looked, spoke and felt it. see a finished performance of the character. The preShe had herself mingled in the walks of fashion, and perhaps was a more perfect mistress of the graces and accomplishments of high life, than the majority of females, who fluttered within the circle of the drawingroom. To be inferior to such a woman, can be no degradation to MRS. JOHNSON; nor must we think lightly of her talents, because they were surpassed in Lady Townly, by the transcendent abilities of MISS FARren. Elegance is the charm which should preside over every scene of this character: the gay rattle of her conversation; her resolute resistance of her husband's authority; her teasing provocations; her lively raillery of Lady Grace, and her ' antediluvian notions,' must be all under the control of this prevailing quality. This it is that makes it so difficult in performance; many can play it with spirit, but few with elegance. MRS. JOHNSON'S appearance and manner are highly favorable to the undertaking; but though no novice upon the stage, she is one of those ladies, who, from a native diffidence of her own powers, shrinks from the approbation which is meant to cheer her; she comes modestly and respectfully before the public, and seems more solicitous that the audience should discover her merit, than she appears forward to disclose it. This amiable timidity prevented her from giving that sprightly effect to some of the passages, which the author intended; there was a lack of

The sigh of beauty steals and steals in vain,
Nor yet to sadness sacred, nor to thee !—
That fails to kindle, when the muse's wand
In well-imagined anguish veils a form
True to the softest lineaments of grace-
Bright as the fairy forms of shadowy mien,
Celestial, that on sailing pinions watch
O'er sleeping innocence, or guard unseen
The parted spirit to its native sky.

The harp that hung (so sings the fabling muse)
Unconscious through the dreary hours of gloom,
In tones melifluous hail'd th' approach of dawn;
And on the startled silence of the waste
Shed wild mysterious music. So the bard
Thou bidd'st awake, transported by thy charms,
That break upon him like the dawn of day,
Unveils their elegance. The graceful brow
Of conscious majesty; the tender tear,
And all the soft enchantment of thy powers,
To virtue sacred, he allots to fame.
And oh believe his artless song, with life
Thy mem'ry will not perish, for the sighs
Of visionary sorrow, that have own'd
The melting magic of thy powers, await
Their sweet remembrance when those powers have slept;
And beauty, as she treads the moonlight turf
Moist with the tear of memory shall sigh
"Such were the tears her BELVIDERA drew!"

the gaieté du cœur, the flow of spirits which never once forsakes the giddy votary of fashion, till shame, contempt and disgrace unite, to display the horrors of her situation. The vivacity of Lady Townly should have no boundary, for her follies are in some measure the consequence of her gentle and playful disposition; otherwise nothing could preserve her from the detestation of the audience. MRS. JOHNSON was very successful in the last scene, which she played with great delicacy and feeling." MRS. JOHNSON does not appear to have repeated Lady Townly, and her next performance, October 5, 1798, as Sylvia in the Recruiting Officer, is spoken of as in the "first scenes agreeably arch and animated," but failing when she assumed the male attire, in the effrontery required to keep pace with the grossness of the other characters. This partial deficiency through "not being sufficiently divested of mauvaise honte," is no slight praise to MRS. JOHNSON as a woman. On the 11th of October, 1798 she was brought out as the original Agatha in Lovers' Vows; an appropriation of her by the management, indicative, after her earlier attempts, of no remarkably brilliant impression upon the audience in a higher range of character; for Agatha has little else to do than to be half-starved and entirely dis- In 1808 the property of the Park theatre changed consolate. MRS. JOHNSON, however, was praised as hands. It was purchased by the present proprietors, having been of "no inconsiderable advantage to the with reference to a new management; and MR. and piece," which was triumphantly successful, and has been MRS. JOHNSON had been already induced by other one of the stock favorites ever since, of all stages where professional prospects which derived new interest English is professed to be spoken. After this, we only from their ruling desire of every advantage for hear of her as performing Lady Macbeth on the 15th of their young daughter's education, once more to seek December 1798, with a débutant in the Scotch Usurper their native land. They remained in England until -MRS. SIDDONS then being at the zenith of her re- 1818. The progress of Miss JOHNSON in all her acnown; notwithstanding which, the critics say, " MRS. quirements and her surpassing success in music, gave JOHNSON increased the favorable opinion which the pub-evidence that neither attention nor expense had ever lic had before entertained of her abilities:—a little more been wanting to second the pre-dispositions of her natu dignity and fire was, perhaps, wanting, in a few in-ral taste and genius. Perhaps MRS. JOHNSON may have stances; but when we recollect what the character is, again appeared in London during this visit. Miss and by whom we have been in the habit of seeing it per- JOHNSON, at a very early age, if we are not much misformed, we are really surprised there should have been taken, made a début at Drury-lane in the Child of Naso little to censure and so much to commend." ture, and possibly performed some other part. In the course of that time we heard her in private upon the

also composed music; and we remember a very delightful specimen of her early powers in that way, which she herself sang with great spirit and expression.

During the present visit of MR. and MRS. JOHNSON to England, their daughter, ELEANOR AUGUSTA, was born,harp and the piano; her execution was brilliant. She in 1800. They returned to New-York in 1802, and remained here till 1806; in the course of which time, MR. JOHNSON had become associated with MR. TYLER, another actor of great respectability, in the management of the Park theatre. MRS. JOHNSON rose into higher favor than ever; and her reception in the best private circles proved that as a woman she sustained an elevation quite equal to that which as an actress we find recognized in her by the tributes of the day both critical and poetical. One of these latter, by a native bard, who died at an early age, is now in our possession; and the reader will be gratified to see it here preserved, as much on account of its own rare merit, as from its connection with the subject of our sketch. It was prompt ed by MRS. JOHNSON's personation of Belvidera, at the Park theatre, in 1806:

Daughter of passion and of tears! thee all
That fancy muses in her saddest vigils,
Thee the poet hails! With fluttering pulse,
With eye still moist, and sorrow-troubled touch,
He wakes the lyre. Oh, ever may it wake
To virtue, tenderness and truth like thine!
For ever silent be that string, o'er which

In 1818, we find the family of MR. and MRS. JOHNson again settled in New-York, and MISS ELEANOR AUGUSTA, their daughter, after a triumphant début at the Park, enjoying high professional reputation and thorough personal respect. In 1826 she became the wife of a distinguished comic actor; a gentleman whose real name was HILL, but who called himself HILSON, in consequence of some objections on the part of his highly respectable family in England to the mingling of their name with the affairs of the stage. It would have been impossible to have found a couple better suited to each other. MR. HILSON, in addition to his first rate talent as a comedian, was well educated, attached, accomplished. He was an enthusiast in the fine arts; was possessed of a precious private gallery of ancient paintings, and himself wielded a pencil, especially in landscape sketching, which few artists in this or any other country, could outrival. He sought his associations among the intellectual and refined, and was distin

guished for a generous flow of good feeling, which makes || have them now in England. Those that I possess are all who enjoyed his acquaintance remember him with at any time entirely at your service, to be appropriated affection. The only frailty he has been charged with, as you propose; I will freely lend them for the purpose; sprang from those very social qualities which endeared my husband would have rejoiced in the opportunity of him to his friends; his convivial accomplishments lured || thus promoting your object. But I would not part with him into a fondness for that sort of society, which, even any one of them for the world! Why, they are all of when the highest of its order, can scarcely be courted scenery in which we have delighted together; views, with impunity by the hardiest constitutions. That of every scrap of which brings back some endearing reMR. HILSON was such as to render a milder climate collection; I was never from his side when he made than ours at New-York desirable. After the death of these sketches:-Could I part with them? I would both the parents of MRS. HILSON, she went to the not part with them if I were starving! Were our child south with her husband. But the gay companionship ever to be in want, I might; but never for any wants of of those who loved the laugh he was so skilled in rais- my own. They speak to me so touchingly of my dear, ing, soon wrought consequences upon the health of his dear husband that I could never allow them to go from body, from which the health of his mind and heart esca- me. They say to me more than words can." ped; neither of which are usually so fortunate as to pass through such perils unscathed. He died suddenly at Louisville, Kentucky, in 1835, deeply and deservedly lamented.

MRS. HILSON came to New-York and performed here until her death. Those who saw how well she assumed gaiety, (for she appeared the most frequently in joyous characters) could have little dreamed of" the grief within which passeth show." Persons who have ever been behind the curtain in these matters, are well aware how often performers upon the stage are compelled to seek in the excitement of the very smiles they kindle, a refuge from their secret cares! To such as see them with this

The unwavering attachment of his wife, even down to the latest moment of her widowed existence, involves the best eulogium upon MR. HILSON's qualities; for she was a woman of too much good sense to have been won lightly. To a gentleman who saw her at New Orleans not long after she had lost her husband, "I am delight-consciousness, the counterfeited mirth wears the aspect ed," exclaimed she, "to meet you; for my dear husband always spoke of you so kindly, that had I no previous acquaintance with you myself, I should take pleasure in the recognition upon his account. Indeed, sometimes it seems to me as though I could neither think nor feel, excepting in association with his memory, and to what- || ever has been liked by him, I turn with eagerness and confidence and find in it a sort of consolation. My whole soul," continued she, "is wrapped up in the recollection of that man; and I only live now for his child. I shall devote myself to the education of our darling babe in such a manner as my husband would have been most proud of. I cannot tell you how I feel at the very thought of acting upon the stage with this anguish at my heart. But my child's interest requires it, and I believe it is better for my own mind that I should have occupation which may force me away from myself. I have been urged to return to New-York. In the family of MR. SIMPSON I shall find sympathising friendship and in his theatre employment which will be shaped in reference to the state of my feelings-morbid, perhaps, and requiring to be humored. There is a home always open to me with my husband's relations in England; but I should be a stranger there and should feel like a mere pensioner. New-York is my country and Mr. Simpson's family seems to me like my own.'

Some conversation passed concerning a sale of MR. HILSON's collection of pictures, then in progress at New Orleans. Mention was made of certain sketches from his own pencil which were exhibited among them, and a desire expressed by the traveller to secure some of them, with a view to their being used as illustrations of a tour through that part of the United States:

"They will not be sold," observed MRS. HILSON. "He made, perhaps, a collection better suited for the purpose you mention, than any ever yet formed in this country. His sketches were rapid but full of character. I believe there were at least six hundred, taken in all parts of the United States, sent to his relations, who

of " moody madness laughing wild amid severest woe;"
and cases are on record in which an incidental applica-
tion of the mimic scene, under such attempts to "min-
ister to the mind diseased," has wrenched forth even to
the view of those before unaware of it, with appalling
vividness, the secret of the hidden sorrow. This occur-
red once with a celebrated performer in England, who,
after the loss of his wife and favorite son, at the ques-
tion asked him in the course of his personated charac-
ter-" Why did you not keep your children? They
might have amused you in many a dreary hour?"-drop-
ped dead upon the stage. We ourselves have witnessed
a self-betrayal of a similar, though less awful, nature,
and in a much humbler sphere. An Esquimaux chief
and his wife had been exhibiting some of their national
customs in Paris. The female was young; and beauti-
fully formed and featured. After gallantly dashing
round and round the long hall, in her dog-drawn bark
sledge, to display the Esquimaux style of gliding over
the snows, she disappeared. During her absence some
one asked, "What is become of the young chief, her
husband?” Have you not heard? He is dead.
died suddenly. These Esquimaux widows have their
husbands' remains embalmed and encased in a particu-
lar manner and will not part with them; it is a super-
stition of their love. The French police make no
allowance for the romance of passion: they require the
burial of a dead body within six-and-thirty hours of the
decease. The gens-d'armes have been here. An hour
or two ago they claimed the young chief's body. Tears
and entreaties and struggles were of no use. They
forced it from the poor girl. She is now all alone in a
strange land." The Esquimaux widow had now return-
ed to the room. She was arrayed in her bridal dress.
She began the bridal dance. Suddenly she stopped.
She stood for a moment, glanced wildly around, burst
into an agony of weeping, and darted from the room.
The audience understood the feeling. A dead silence
followed and all departed, one by one, slowly and not a

66

He

few with moistened eyes. By numbers, as they went out, money was placed on the table of the heart-broken widow, thus compelled to exhibit herself for a livelihood and in a foreign country, bereft even of the consolation of honoring in her own way the memory of him she loved.

If a rude native of the most cheerless of regions could feel thus under such circumstances, how heavily must they press upon affections equally intense, blended with fine talent and cultivated intellect? From this, to say nothing of the stronger case we quoted before it, we can judge what MRS. HILSON might, occasionally, have endured. But it is believed that the kindness of her new

Original.
THEATRICALS.

in the personations of Mrs. Keeley, will ever

PARK THEATRE.-We have nothing of an extraordinary nature to chronicle this month. Mr. and Mrs. Keeley have concluded their farewell engagement and departed for their own native England. Although the success attending their late brief and final sojourn was not of that flattering and distinguished nature that their acting so richly merited, still the warm feeling expressed by the few who are enabled to visit theatres in these perplexing times, must have strongly convinced them, that their exertions were as highly and deservedly appreciated as heretofore, and that only the complete stagnation of every branch of business could have operated so injuriously to their pecuniary interests. The quiet, quaint humor and the irresistible richness which characterize the acting Mr. Keeley; home, and the claims of her darling daughter and the and the depth, pathos, feeling and natural simplic developed natural soothings of time, had begun to take the bitter-pleasure. In the wide range of the drama, there is not, perhaps, ness and the poignancy from her affliction; and, per- || another female capable of giving herself up so entirely to the haps, she was already as cheerful as she would ever have character she is enacting as this lady;-hence the interest been, when she became a victim to the scarlet fever, which her acting ever inspires. then prevailing in our city, and on the 2d. of April last, (1837) she expired, in the 37th year of her age. person so carefully brought up and so exemplary through life as MRS. HILSON had been, must, ere she quitted the world, upon which she had long ceased to look with pleasure, have found her perceptions improved by her bereavement. The sudden wreck of her most cherished earthly dependence for happiness, could only have left her the more accessible to that better reliance which cannot disappoint. She was borne to the grave from the house of MR. SIMPSON, regretted by all who had known her, and attended by the most distinguished persons in our literary and theatrical circles.

A

Miss Melton and Mr. Latham are most excellent stock performers, but by no means "bright particular stars." Miss Melton's forte is doubtless, pert chambermaids; and Mr. Latham's peculiar talents, fr been long attached to the comp quire a word of commendation from us.

the appearance of Mrs. Wood and Mr. Templeton, in the opera

The regular campaign commences on the 21st of August with

of La Sonnambula, succeeded by Mr Forrest, Mr. Hill, Miss Ellen Tree, Miss Clifton, and a host of other bright luminaries, equal in celebrity to those we have emerated. Mr. Hughes,

formerly leader at Drury Lane, lave charge of the

orchestra. The stock company will assume an aspect differing from that of last season :-Mrs. Sharp, Miss Charlotte Cushman, Mrs. Chippendale, Mrs. Willis, and Mrs. Pritchard have been added, with an adequate number to fill un vacancies in the male sed by the dismissal of some and the expiration of the ae intention of the manager to ale parts hereafter filled, by persons capa

enge

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of speaking, at least loud enough to be heard, even if they should not be able to speak well, which we trust will not be the case, eir sex have the reputation of never using their tongues but to son purpose. One very great cause for complaint last season will be remedied in the approaching one: No impudent, swaggering supernumerary girls will be thrust into parts of which they are utterly incapable-nor be permitted, we hope, to disgust the audience with their tricks and giggling while on the stage.

The house, previous to its opening will be newly embellished and adorned with rich and superb devices, illustrative of historical and dramatic subjects. The interior of the classic walls of "Old Drury" will scarcely be recollected, such alterations and changes are to take place. Mr. Simpson is busy with maturing his arrangements, for which he spares no expense.

As an actress, we were very little acquainted w subject of our sketch; but in consequence of what we do remember about her, we have quoted largely from the criticisms upon her mother, MRS. JOHNSON; for in these the daughter's style seems perfectly described; even to its very lapses, which "leaned to virtue's side." But her qualities as a woman are those which are now the only ones of importance to her and to others; and it delights us to feel persuaded that they can be praised with entire sincerity and that they might be imitated in any circle, with advantage: domestic purity, perfect affection and devotedness as a wife, a mother and a friend, and a prevailing gentleness and delicacy of disposition, were her characteristics. It is with no slight gratification we have to add that her aspirations for her infant's happiness are not likely to be baffled. The friend of the mother, who long before had been the friend of the father, too-has become the daughter's friend. MR. SIMPSON, the manager of the Park theatre, (though we believe he has a family of his own to provide for,) has charged himself with the care of the child of MRS. HILSON. We should hope that the father's friends in England, would assist him in his generous purpose; but no assistance, even if accorded, can diminish the claim it has already given MR. SIMP1 to be; that all intrigues to get the theatre away from him SON, to the respect of all those who have a proper failed; and that the creditors of the concern have handsense of the imperishable distinction earned in such an somely admitted that so large a sharer in the consequences of exercise of the power emanating from prosperity in the times ought not to be subjected to a ruin which such indulmaking that power the instrument of enlightened gence as the very highest now-a-days are compelled to claim, benevolence and the means of proving the fidelity of may avert; consequently they have given time, and advanced money. We have no doubt but Mr. Dinneford may ere long be an attachment from the earliest period, to most merito-enabled to reap in peace the soil, which, with so much trouble rious parents, by sustaining their unportioned and their and loss he has, amid difficulty, ploughed and planted. homeless orphan.

There is a rumor in circulation that Madame Vestris has signed an engagement with Mr. Price, for two years, and will visit this country. We have the best authority, that of Mr. Simpson, for contradicting such rumor. If the lady was ever so inclined she could not venture upon taking so long a voyage. She suffers so much from sea sickness even in passing from Dover to Calais, that to cross the Atlantic might cost her her life.

W. W. S.

THE BOWERY.-The Bowery has gone through various fortunes since our last, and we intended to have spoken at large certain transactions behind the curtain. But we learn that MR. DINNEFORD has been protected in his interests, as he de

W. W. S.