ppealed to the courts to remove the
skeleton which was hidden in his closet. With the proceedings of that
trial, which resulted in divorce, alimony, and separation, this memoir
has nothing to do.

[Illustration: Forrest as Metamora.]

Edwin Forrest, leaving the court-room a defeated man, was instantly
raised to a popularity with the masses beyond anything even he had
before experienced. He began an engagement soon after at the Broadway
Theatre, opening as Damon. The house was crowded to suffocation. The
engagement of sixty nights was unparalleled in the history of the
American drama for length and profit. But despite the flattering
applause of the multitude, life never again had for him the smiling
aspect it had so often worn before. The applause which filled his
ears, the wealth which flowed in upon him could not improve that
temper which had never been amiable, and all the hard stories of his
life belong to this period.

On September 20, 1852, he reappeared at the Broadway Theatre, New
York. In February, 1853, "Macbeth" was produced in grand style, with
new scenery and appointments. The tragedy was played on twenty
consecutive nights, then by far the longest run of any Shakespearean
play in America. The cast was very strong. It included Conway, Duff,
Davenport, Pope, Davidge, Barry, and Madame Ponisi.

On September 17, 1860, after an absence of nearly four years, Edwin
Forrest appeared again on the stage. He was engaged by James Nixon,
and began his contract of one hundred nights at Niblo's Garden, New
York, in the character of Hamlet. The long retirement only increased
the curious interest which centred round his historic name. Upon his
opening night the seats were sold at auction. His success in
Philadelphia rivalled that of New York. In Boston the vast auditorium
of the grandest theatre in America was found too small to contain the
crowds he drew.

Severe attacks of gout were beginning to tell upon that herculean
form, sapping and undermining it; and in 1865, while playing Damon at
the Holiday Street Theatre, in Baltimore, the weather being very cold
and the theatre open to draughts, he was seized with a sudden illness,
which was followed by very serious results. Suffering the most intense
agony, he was able to get to the end of the part; but when his robes
were laid aside and physicians summoned, it was found to his horror
that he had suffered a partial paralysis of the sciatic nerve. In an
instant the stur