LOUISA, Viscountess Beresford, is the youngest daughter of the late Most Rev. William Beresford, Archbishop of Tuam, Baron Decies: her ladyship was married, first, to Thomas Hope, Esq., of Deepdene, in the county of Surrey, and, secondly, to the present Viscount Beresford.

The ancient family of Beresford, formerly written Bereford, of which her ladyship is a scion, flourished for ages in the counties of Stafford, Warwick, and Leicester.

JOHN DE BERESFORD was seized of the manor of Beresford, in the parish of Alstonfield, in the county of Stafford, in 1087: from him lineally descended,

JOHN BERESFORD, who lived in the reign of Edward IV., and married Elizabeth, daughter of William Basset, of Blore: he was succeeded in his manor of Beresford by his eldest son: his second son,

THOMAS BERESFORD, was seated at Newton, otherwise Newton-Grange, and Bentley, in the county of Derby, in the reigns of Henry VI. and Edward IV. To the former of these princes he did good service in the French wars, and, says tradition, mustered at Chesterfield a troop of horse consisting alone of himself, his sons, and their servants. He was interred in the church of Fenny-Bentley, where a fine alabaster monument was erected to his memory. He married Agnes, daughter and heir of Robert Hassal, Esq., of Arcluyd, in Cheshire, by whom he had sixteen sons and five daughters: his seventh son,

HUMPHREY BERESFORD, Esq. of Newton-Grange, married Margery, daughter of Edmond Bardesly, Esq., and was succeeded by his eldest surviving son,

GEORGE BERESFORD, Esq., Steward of the town of Nottingham. This gentlemen married Ellen, daughter of Thomas Greene, Esq. of Sussex, and was succeeded by his elder son,

MICHAEL BERESFORD, Esq. of Ottford, and the Squirres in Kent, an officer of the court of Wards. This gentleman, who was living in 1574, married Rose, daughter of John Knivett, Esq.: his third son,

TRISTRAM BERESFORD, Esq., went over to Ireland in the reign of James I., as Manager of the Corporation of Londoners, called the Society of the New Plantation, in Ulster. He settled at Coleraine, in the county of Londonderry, and was succeeded by his elder son,

SIR TRISTRAM BERESFORD, who was Member of Parliament for the county of Londonderry in 1661, and was created a Baronet by Charles II., 24 March, 1664. By his first wife, Anne, eldest daughter of John Rowley, Esq. of Castle-Roe, in the county of Derry, he had, with other issue, a son, and successor at his decease, 15 Jan., 1673,

SIR RANDLE BERESFORD, the second Baronet, who was Member for Coleraine in the first Parliament after the Restora tion: he married, in July, 1662, Catharine, younger daughter of Francis, Viscount Valentia, and, dying in 1681, was succeeded by his eldest surviving son,

SIR TRISTRAM BERESFORD, the third Baronet, who headed a regiment of foot against King James, and was attainted by that Monarch's Parliament, in 1689. He married, in Feb., 1687, Nichola - Sophia, daughter and co-heir of Hugh, Baron

Glenawly, and, dying 16th June, 1701, was succeeded by his only son,

SIR MARCUS BERESFORD, the fourth Baronet, who married Catherine Poer, Baroness Le Poer, daughter and heiress of James, third Earl of Tyrone. By this connection the representation of the ancient family of De La Poer was vested in the house of Beresford. The De la Poers sprung from Sir Roger Le Poer, Knt., who came to Ireland with Strongbow, and accompanied the invader in his expedition to recover the kingdom of Leinster for Dermot Mac Murrough, and also assisted John de Courcy in the reduction of Ulster. The lineal descendant of Sir Roger Nicholas le Poer had summons to Parliament as Baron le Poer 23rd Nov. 1375: from him, through a long and proud line of influential nobles, derived Richard, Baron Le Poer, who was advanced, 9th Oct., 1673, to the Viscounty of Decies, and the Earldom of Tyrone: his grandson, James, the third Earl, married Anne, eldest daughter and co-heiress of Andrew Richards, Esq. of Dangan Spidoge, in the county of Kilkenny, by whom he left, at his decease, 19th Aug., 1704, an only daughter and heiress, the Lady Catherine Poer, the wife of Sir Marcus Beresford. The original barony, by writ of Le Poer, descended on this daughter of the last Earl of Tyrone, while the Earldom of Tyrone and all the other honors expired with the father. Sir Marcus Beresford therefore, in consequence of his alliance, was raised to the Peerage of Ireland, 4th Nov., 1720, as Baron Beresford of Beresford, in the county of Cavan, and Viscount Tyrone, and was created Earl of Tyrone 18th July, 1746. His lordship died 4th April, 1763, leaving, with other issue, George de la Poer, his successor, and third son,

a

WILLIAM BERESFORD, who having entered into Holy Orders, was successively Bishop of Dromore, Bishop of Ossory, and Archbishop of Tuam. His Grace married, 12th June, 1763, Elizabeth, second daughter

of John Fitz Gibbon, Esq., and sister of John, Earl of Clare, Lord Chancellor of Ireland, by whom he had surviving issue,

JOHN, present Baron Decies.
George, in Holy Orders, married
Susan, third daughter of Hamilton
Georges, Esq. of Kilbrew, in the
county of Meath, and has issue.
William, in Holy Orders, married
Anne, daughter of Charles, late
Earl of Tankerville, and died in
1830, leaving issue.
Catherine-Eleanor, married to the
Rev. William Armstrong.
Araminta-Anne, married to the Very
Rev. Arthur John Preston D.D.,
Dean of Limerick, and died 26th
September, 1816.

Harriet, married to Thomas-Birming-
ham-Daly-Henry Sewel, Esq., who
claimed the barony of Athenry.
Frances, married to Colonel Bur-

rowes.

LOUISA.

The Archbishop was created a Peer of Ireland 21st December, 1812, by the title borne by his ancestors, of LORD DECIES: his Grace died 6th September, 1819, and was succeeded by his eldest son,

JOHN, present LORD DECIES.

The youngest daughter of the Archbishop, LOUISA, the lady whose portrait forms this month's illustration, was married on the 29th Nov., 1832, to WILLIAM CARR BERESFORD, VISCOUNT Beresford, in the Peerage of England, and Duke of Elvas, in that of Portugal, a General Officer in the British Army, and one of the heroes of the Peninsula. Her Ladyship was previously married, in 1806, to Thomas Hope, Esq. of Deepdene, the celebrated author of Anastasius, who died the 2nd Feb., 1831, leaving issue by her,

Henry-Thomas Hope, Esq. of Deep-
dene.

Adrian-John Hope, a Captain in the
4th Dragoon Guards.
Alexander-James-Beresford Hope.

PERHAPS no productions of the human mind have exhausted so much criticism as the plays of Shakspeare; and however some modern disciples of Aristarchus may have detracted from the merits of these immortal writings, yet the whole of them may be said to concur in the general opinion that, with all their imperfections, these dramas are still the greatest of their kind, keeping every work of a similar class, both ancient and modern, at a vast and unapproachable distance. The most extraordinary character of these masterly compositions is, that in each of them, with perhaps two or three exceptions, there is a positive plenitude of genius, which circulates, with an influence frequently more subtle than obvious, through the whole frame and contexture of the piece, so as to escape particular detection; the reader's sense-for it is an almost unconscious perception-of the presiding power constantly pouring upon his mind in a flood of absorbing conviction, and carrying him imperceptibly to the conclusion, that the noblest fruits of the human intellect have been displayed before him in the page of that unrivalled man, to whom all the mysteries of humanity were unfolded, and the treasures of human nature unlocked; who drew from those stores as he thought fit, and enhanced the riches there ready to his hand by amalgamating them after his own productive fancy, and impressing upon them the assay marks of his mighty mind.

The immortal productions of our author's hand are not structures in which your attention is engrossed by splendid blocks of marble squared and polished with prodigious labour and consummate art, exquisite tracery, or beautiful gilding :-you look at nothing in detail, but at the stupendous whole. You contemplate the broad masses and mighty dimensions, the towering strength and massive proportions, the picturesque outline and indestructible solidity of the temple. You observe no petty beauties, no puny embellishments, to arrest attention and provoke applause; but the imagination is filled with the glorious creation of the master hand, and lapses into silent reverence, because it is VOL. X.-NO. VI.-JUNE, 1837.

too full and intense for the tongue's utterance; the common language of commendation being inadequate to express the profound admiration by which the enraptured mind is engrossed.

"If ever author," says Mr. Pope, "deserved the name of original, it was Shakspeare. Homer himself drew not his art so immediately from the fountains of Nature; it proceeded through Egyptian strainers and channels, and came to him not without some tincture of the learning, or some cast of the models, of those before him. The poetry of Shakspeare was inspiration indeed: he is not so much an imitator as an instrument of nature, and it is not so just to say that he speaks from her, as that she speaks through him." This is the praise of a poet who could appreciate the beauties of a far greater, and has recorded his opinion in words that can never die.

In briefly commenting upon some of the more prominent qualities of Shakspeare's plays, we shall first notice the general structure of his dramas. These, in spite of the fastidious objections of certain critics, who denounce the violation of those unities, maintained by the Greek tragedians, as dramatic heresies, are for the most part constructed with great skill and with a singular adaptation to the characters and events. Every action is either an illustration or a commentary of something to succeed, or that has preceded it; and even the most trifling episode is so indispensable to the perfect development of the plot, to the proper tinting of the characters, or the appropriate disposition of the groups, that it could not be withdrawn without depriving the whole of a certain portion of vitality which would in a degree cripple it, or at least reduce its masculine vigour, precisely in proportion to the quantity of spirit draughted from it in the portion curtailed. Let us take the play of Hamlet for an example, in which perhaps, upon the whole, Shakspeare's infraction of the dramatic canons are as strikingly manifest as in any.

To our mind nothing can exceed the masterly skill in every particular exhibited in this tragedy. It opens with a brief but

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earnest dialogue between Horatio and two officers of the watch, respecting some supernatural appearance, by which expectation is vividly kindled, and glows with a lively fervour. The author plunges at once into the subject of his story without preface, and raises the interest of the spectator to the highest pitch. The events follow consequentially in rapid but just order, until the whole cause of the subsequent actions is developed in a gradual series of exciting and appropriate incidents, each heightening the interest as it proceeds. There is no halting for the displays of stately elocution, or to show the accomplishments of authorship; and even the preternatural is so originally constructive, so essentially blended with the natural, and so accordant with the superstitions of all times, that we cease to be shocked at the violation of physical possibility, but bring it, if not precisely to a level with our belief, at least within the far boundary-line of the probable, though not of the true.

The plot gradually rises in interest as it advances the villany of the king, and the obligation imposed upon Hamlet to revenge his father's murder, are placed in such skilful juxtaposition, that, however the mind may revolt from the contemplation of deliberate homicide, it seems to look for it, in the present case, at the hands of Hamlet, as an act of justifiable retaliation. Our natural repugnances at the destruction of human life are eliminated by the claims of judicial retribution, and we demand as it were in our own mind the consummation of the judgment of nature.

The peculiar character of the hero aids and protracts the process of the plot in a manner as consummate as it is original. The lights and shadows of human emotion flit before us in an almost endless variety of intangible forms, so apparently palpable and identic with our sympathies, that we seem to see our own hearts reflected in the object so exquisitely realised by the poet. As the events proceed, the irresolution of the hero, his shrinking sensibility, the almost convulsive struggles of a mind anxious to avenge its own and parent's wrongs; his desperate resolutions swamped in the flood of his morbid and prevailing sensibilities; vindicating to himself the judicial propriety of revenge, and steeping his subtle intellect in that logic of social retaliation which justifies to itself the extreme of physical punishment, yet shrinking, at the same moment, from the manual

infliction; philosophising with a cool and temperate exactness upon determinations which he dares not execute; acting by impulse, but deliberating with a just and calculating precision; practically weak, but theoretically strong;-all these remarkable variations of character- nay, his minutest moral infirmities so singularly evolved from the contingent movements of the plot, give it an interest and a reality which rivets the attention while it enlists our deepest sympathies. Every thing goes on progressively to the end, and when interrupted it is only to strengthen the finely woven tissue of dexterous combinations which terminates in the catastrophe.

There is nothing in this drama, if we except mere passages, which could be omitted with advantage. The whole is unique in its kind, composed indeed, in some particulars, of heterogeneous elements, but brought into such original and harmonious combination as to leave an irresistible impression upon the reader, that this play is one of the most perfect works of art which the mighty resources of literature, under the influence of genius, have supplied. The scene in which Hamlet holds dialogue with the grave -digger, though, upon a superficial view, it may appear extraneous to the plot, is nevertheless an accessory which we could not miss without losing one of those contingent aids which, in the works of this great master, often more strongly contribute by indirect appliance to sustain in complete concordancy the frame-work of the structure, with all its splendours of columnar grandeur, together with its gorgeous appendages of pinnacles and towers, than any direct and mechanical contrivance, where the art is perceptible, and the necessity of its application obvious. How beautifully does it throw out the features of Hamlet's character, which had been before only partially seen through the brief flashes of his hasty impulses, or faintly reflected during the rapid transitions of passion, where the strong markings of his mind were rather left to be inferred than positively indicated. How naturally the acute but covert wisdom-the rugged and stern, the homely but just, philosophy of the witty gravedigger elicits the moving reflections of the prince, and draws out those beautiful sympathies, the subtler elements of subdued but lofty emotion, of which his heart, in spite of the vexations that have seared it, appears to be so strongly susceptible. It

gives the reader an interest in the hero, which else had been overborne by the more affecting position of Laertes, who shortly after appears as chief mourner at the grave of a sister, who had evidently fallen a sacrifice to the imputed unkindness of Hamlet. How admirably does it prepare the mind for what is to follow, and it must be held as a proof of Shakspeare's unrivalled perception of the exactest proportions of the true and proper in his delineations of Nature, that nowhere in this dialogue between the clown and Hamlet does the wit of the former in the least detract from the solemnity of the scene, but rather adds to it by that direct contrast of particulars which imparts equal strength to the contrasted objects, as beauty and deformity, when placed in immediate relief together, are mutually enhanced by the juxtaposition. No one laughs at the sharp retorts and loose gibes of the philosophic sexton. The grave deductions to which they so pointedly lead are only the more rapidly conveyed to the mind, and the more fixedly implanted there by the unusual but impressive medium through which it receives them. They are, moreover, an admirable set off to the sterner philosophy of Hamlet, which seems to receive an impetus from the racy but exuberant wit of his menial interlocutor.

This scene is a splendid indication of the transcendant, though occult powers, if I may so say, with which our immortal dramatist was endowed.

If we look at this play with a view to ascertain how far it is a triumph of wit, we shall find that in this particular it is unrivalled, except by those equally eminent productions of the same pen. Its variety is prodigious, whether we consider its plot, characters, language, or the incidents upon which the former is dependant, and the skill with which all its complex elements are combined and harmonized is equal to its variety. The incidents are not only exceedingly numerous, but all surprisingly concur to realize the aim of the play, and impart to it a commanding power of interest, as the numberless veins of the human body minister to the vitality of the trunk, not only communicating beauty to its mechanism, but health and vigour to its whole frame. The diversity of these incidents, occasionally relieved by comic dialogue strictly germane both to the agents and to the action out of which it arises, is never confused nor out of place.

They follow in rapid succession, evolving new and appropriate aspects of character, as if the store-house of material from which this marvellous drama was produced was inexhaustible. The equivocal hallucinations of Hamlet, the capricious fatuity and blended good sense of Polonius, the positive madness of Ophelia, are beautiful gradations of light and shadow in the vast atmosphere of mind, only produced by Shakspeare. They rise like northern lights, which gild with their radiant fires the distant circumference, upon the horizon of his vast and excursive intellect, irradiating with new glories all the objects which reflect their splendours.

The introduction of the ghost, being not inconsistent with popular belief, is managed with equal adroitness and effect. The supernatural action has such an air of probable and circumstantial reality, that we seem to feel it to be both natural and true. It helps to bring out the character of Hamlet as well as to disclose the secret only known to himself and to the king, and which otherwise, except by the confession of the latter, could not have been revealed. And what is remarkable, the traits of the once living prototype are distinctly but indirectly marked in the ghost, not by any positive notation of identity, but by mere casual expressions arising adventitiously out of the matter which the spirit of a murdered sovereign and parent quits its cold prison-house, the grave, to disclose. In spite of the solemnity with which the idea of supernatural agency is associated, the terror is in a degree neutralized by the pathos, the lingering of human recollections, the subsiding echoes, as it were, of human sympathies, which seem to invest the dim outline of what had once the presence of a king, with a halo of bright but evanescent hues arising, like a pure mist spangled by the morning sunbeam, from the inexhaustible fountain of human emotions.

The catastrophe is said by Dr. Johnson not to be very happily produced; "the change of weapons," says he, "is rather an expedient of necessity than a stroke of art. A scheme might easily be found to kill Hamlet with the dagger and Laertes with the bowl." But the fastidious critic seems to have kept his mind from the obvious fact, that according to his plan of destruction there would have been an abandonment of poetical justice; the important moral which is now to be drawn from the