Unslain fro thee, which ay us lifely herteth,

With books of his ornat enditing

That is to all this land enlumining.

Akenside's eulogy, correctly descriptive, is thus entitled :

INSCRIPTION

For a Statue of Chaucer at Woodstock.

Such was old Chaucer: such the placid mien
Of him who first with harmony informed
The language of our fathers. Here he dwelt
For many a cheerful day; these ancient walls
Have often heard him, while his legends blithe
He sang, of love or knighthood, or the wiles
Of homely life: thro' each estate and age
The fashions and the follies of the world
With cunning hand pourtraying. Though, perchance,
From Blenheim's towers, O stranger, thou art come
Glowing with Churchill's trophies; yet in vain
Dost thou applaud them, if thy breast be cold
To him, this other hero; who, in times
Dark and untaught, began with charming verse
To tame the rudeness of his native land.

SUSANNA MARIA CIBBER.

the stage

FORMED for the tragic scene, to grace
With rival excellence of grief and rage;
Mistress of each soft art, with matchless ski!!
To turn and wind the passions as she will;
To melt the heart with sympathetic woe,
Awake the sigh, and teach the tear to flow;
To put on frenzy's wild distracted glare,
And freeze the soul with horror and despair;
With just desert enrolled in endless fame,
Conscious of worth superior CIBBER came.

ALTHOUGH the existence of an English drama can be traced back to an age so remote as that of the Norman conquest; yet it is curious to observe, that for a considerable time no female characters were introduced into our plays, and that even up to the period of the Restoration, such parts were filled by men.-Every reader has heard of the manager who excused a delay in the performance to Charles the II. because the Queen was not shaved. It is to be observed, however, that this exclusion of women from the stage down to so recent a date, was confined to tragedy, and was, in all probability, occasioned by the very indifferent education which the sex was even then in the habit of receiving. For at the very time it was necessary for her tragic majesty to get shorn, the comic muse was admirably supported by a long list of congenial actresses: among Killigrew's patent company established in Drury Lane, we find the names of Mrs. Corey, Mrs. Marshall,

Mrs. Knap, Mrs. Boutel, and the good-natured Nel Gwynn; and among the Duke of York's company, settled in Lincoln's Inn Fields, were Mrs. Saunderson, afterwards Mrs. Betterton, Mrs. Long, Mrs. Gibbs, and Mrs. Davies, the rival partner of her sovereign's love with Nel Gwynn. In the generation of performers immediately succeeding to these, Miss Saunderson, afterwards married to Booth, and Mrs. Mountford, who was at one time his mistress, have been particularly distinguished; but the heroines of tragedy obtained no equal representative until the celebrated Mrs. Oldfield, and Mrs. Porter, made their first appearance in Drury Lane. The vacancies left by the death of the former, and premature debility of the latter, were soon and powerfully supplied by the happy subject of this sketch, and the ingenious Mrs. Pritchard, who will be found entitled to more particular notice in the proper order of these pages.

The motto prefixed to this article comprises all that is warm and admirable in the ample eulogy passed by Churchill in the Rosciad upon Susanna Maria Cibber. She was the daughter of an upholsterer in Covent Garden, who had the honour of being taken for a prototype of Addison's character of the Politician, in Nos. 155 and 160 of the Guardian; and was born about the year 1716. Her brother was the highly-gifted composer Dr. Arne, and, like him, she evinced even in her earliest days a strong talent for music. Possessing a good voice, she received all the benefits of his instruction, and in due time made her appearance, as an opera singer, on the stage of the little theatre in the Haymarket. Her tones were sweet, her manner graceful, and her action and elocution peculiarly judicious; she therefore met with a very favourable reception, and soon ranked amongst the most conspicuous members of the company.

At this time the performances at the Haymarket were represented by a body of revolted actors from Drury Lane, under the direction of Theophilus, the profligate son of Colley Cibber, the comedian. Theophilus had scarcely been left one year a widower with two infant daughters, when he offered his hand to Miss Arne, with a sentimental declaration, that her amiable manners and virtuous disposition made her irresistible. A marriage was the reward of the compliment: it took place in 1734; but it is most likely that the advantages to be derived from her promising

talents were the principal motives for a match, which unfortunately was neither characterized by tenderness or virtue. Be this as it may, Mrs. Cibber was immediately encouraged by her father-in-law, to abandon the part of a vocalist, and attempt the more arduous walk of tragedy. The discernment was correct, and the result most prosperous. After being ably tutored for the change, both by her father-in-law and the author, she came before the public, in 1736, as Zara in Aaron Hill's tragedy of the same name, and succeeded at a first effort. Repeated efforts attracted increased applause, and she was speedily elevated into the rank of one of the first serious actresses that had ever graced the English stage. But the reputation thus acquired by her public conduct was ere long doomed to forfeiture, by a casualty in her private life. Her husband's extravagance forced him to fly from his creditors into Francé, and during his absence she contracted an intimacy with a young gentleman of fortune, respecting which, scandal hastened to speak with so loud a voice, that Theophilus returned from his voluntary exile, and in 1738 claimed the satisfaction due to injured honour in a court of justice. He laid his damages at 50007. but a case of connivance, or rather of direct instrumentality, upon his side, was made out against him, which it would seem the jury must have believed, for they returned a verdict for no more than 107.

An immediate separation took place between the parties, and the husband and wife lived no more together. He was thrown into the King's Bench Prison, and after his liberation became so odious to the public as not to be tolerated on the stage; so that he dragged on a miserable existence of poverty and perplexity, until the year 1758; when, taking a voyage to Ireland for the purpose of assisting Sheridan in an opposition theatre at Dublin, the ship was wrecked, and every passenger drowned. She 'remained in prudent seclusion until the notoriety of the affair subsided, and her criminality became merged in his greater infamy. She then obtained an engagement at Drury Lane, and for a series of twenty years filled a station of almost unrivalled excellence. Her sphere was parallel with that of Garrick: she personated the heroines of his heroes, and was considered peculiarly qualified to illustrate the style of acting for which he was admired. In other

respects she moved with equal happiness of effect, either as the gentle Celia, the indignant Hermione, the natural Juliet, or the disappointed Alicia. Davies, who was a qualified critic, gives an elaborate description of her person and powers in his Life of Garrick. From him, accordingly, we learn that her greatest merit lay in that simplicity which needed no ornament, and in that sensibility which despised all art. There was in her figure little or no elegance, in her face only a small share of beauty; but nature had given her such symmetry of form, and fine expression of feature, that she preserved every appearance of youth long after she had attained middle life. The melody of her powerful as the animation of her countenance. tenderness her eyes looked as if they swam in tears; in rage and despair they appeared to dart flashes of fire. In spite of the mediocrity of her figure, she maintained a dignity in her action and a grace in her step; and, thus overcoming every disadvantage, was esteemed almost inimitable in her profession.

voice was as In grief and

in

It is still more grateful to have to add, that under these circumstances of popular fortune, Mrs. Cibber conducted herself with a propriety which, in a great degree, atoned for the connexion already mentioned. In maturer years she succeeded in obtaining a friendship from many persons not only of high rank, but of exemplary life. Her aptitude for conversation was quick and shining; and she always possessed an air of natural modesty which made her a most engaging companion. It was in this condition that she began to feel the encroachments of that disorder which terminated her life; and its severity reluctantly compelled her to diminish the frequency of her public appearances. Still, however, she availed herself of every interval of health to preserve her reputation undiminished, and even made it her favourite exertion to enlarge her pretensions by taking some part in comedy. To this labour she was, in all probability, incited by the ease with which both Garrick and her rival, Mrs. Pritchard, alternately assumed both the sock and buskin; but she was, by no means, equally successful; and Churchill, whose praise of her abilities in tragedy heads this article, is comparatively as severe upon her efforts in comedy, which he unhesitatingly ascribes to mistaken vanity, and ill-directed emulation.