GARRICK'S HOUSE,

AT HAMPTON.

THE residence of Mr. Garrick will ever be considered as one of the classic objects on the banks of the Thames, and received all its decorations from him. The house is elegant and commodious, was fitted up in the best taste of the time, and its elevation towards the water is from a design of Mr. Adams. The home garden is laid out with great judgment, and communicates, by a subterraneous passage, with the beautiful bank that presents itself to the Thames, where the temple of Shakespeare appears to decorate the scene.

It was the peculiar merit and good fortune of Garrick to rescue the English stage from bombast, rant, and grimace. His acting was founded on the immutable dictates of nature; who, in forming him for his profession, had lavished her graces with the most unsparing bounty. His expressive features were the versatile mirror of every passion of the soul: he could not only suddenly, but progressively, change them from the highest dignity, with all the intermediate varieties of passion and character, down to the unmeaning gaze of idiotcy; while his eye appeared to possess a magical influence, which could awe with its terrors, alarm with its fury, fascinate with its gaiety, and almost torture with its tears! Churchill says-

"If strong expression, and strange powers which lie
Within the magic circle of the eye,

If feelings, which few hearts like his can know,
And which no face, so well as his, can show."

His voice was sweet, harmonious, and clear, and comprehended every modulation of sound. His person altogether was well formed for the active bustle of the stage: in his first essay at Ipswich he performed Harlequin, and in his very last performance, which was in the character of Don Felix, in the Wonder, at the advanced age of sixty, he

had all the gaiety of youth. When these extraordinary powers were aided by his superior taste, it is not surprising that he should have at once burst forth the phenomenon of the dramatic world. Indeed, in a very short time after his appearance at the theatre in Goodman's-fields, his attraction was so powerful, that the whole west end of the town was emptied, as it were, every evening of his performance, and that unfrequented suburb was crowded with the coaches of the nobility and gentry; the other theatres being altogether neglected.

George II. was so deeply impressed with his Richard, that he did not believe he could be an honest man: and his brother Peter, having sent a letter to him by a grocer of Litchfield, who, coming to town late, and going to the theatre, where he saw Garrick perform Abel Drugger, was so disgusted that he would not visit him; and when questioned on the subject of his incivility by Mr. Peter Garrick, he said:" I saw enough of him on the stage. He may be rich, but by, though he is your brother, Mr. Garrick, he is one of the shabbiest, meannest, and most pitiful hounds I ever saw."

A gentleman in Goodman's-field, while playing with his only child at an upper window, had the misfortune to let it fall from thence on a stone pavement, where it expired before his eyes. The wretched parent having lost his senses, in consequence of this sad event, Garrick frequently visited him, and from this genuine source took his idea of the mad scene in Lear. When, in action only, he gave a representation of this horrid affliction to a private party abroad, Mademoiselle Clairon, the celebrated French actress, was so enchanted with this exhibition of his extraordinary powers, that, as it were by an irresistible impulse, she clasped him in her arms. There are some persons now living, who could bear testimony to his unparalleled powers in this dire picture of human misfortune, which he sometimes, but very rarely, exhibited, and then only to a select company of friends.

It is a disadvantage peculiar to the art of acting, that

GARRICK'S HOUSE.

its professors cannot bring their talents into comparison with others of distant ages.

"The actor only shrinks from time's award;
Feeble tradition is his mem'ry's guard;

By whose faint breath his merits must abide,
Unvouch'd by proof, to substance unallied !"

However, in the present instance, we have the testimony of Pope, who had seen Booth, Wilkes, Cibber, and Betterton, and gave Garrick the most unqualified preference: and there are those now living, whose judgment is beyond all challenge, who are fully qualified to make the comparison between him and all who have succeeded him to the present hour, and who with one voice exclaim that they never did see his like, and are without the hopes of again enjoying such a supreme gratification.

That he made a complete reformation in the art, is proved by what Quin said after seeing his Richard, "that if the young fellow was right, he and the rest of the players had been all wrong."

Mr. Lacy having obtained the sole patent of Drury-lane theatre, offered him a moiety, with a view of making the remainder more valuable to himself; Garrick accordingly purchased it for £8000, and thus laid the foundation of his fortune.

The situation of a manager is among those which is least to be envied disappointed authors and actors are con stantly loading him with abuse, as the great obstacle to the attainment of their wishes; but, besides these considerations, his splendid talents and fortune exposed him, more particularly, to the envy and malevolence of his contemporaries; and it is to these causes we must attribute the deluge of unmerited calumny, so freely lavished upon him by some writers. He might be guided by prejudice, on some occasions, but his rejec tion of Douglas was a decision of his judgment; and subsequent experience has proved, that managers cannot always form an opinion as to what will, at all times, suit the public