s a spectacle. The French literal translation
of the grand old tragedy seemed at once stilted and bald, and yet I
perceived and felt through it the power of the ancient solemn Greek
spell; and though strange and puppet-like in its outward form, I was
impressed by its stern and tragic simplicity. It is, however, merely an
archaeological curiosity, chiefly interesting as a reproduction of the
times to which it belongs. To modern spectators, unless they are poets
or antiquarians, I should think it must be dull, and so I find it is
considered, in spite of Mendelssohn's fine music, which, indeed, is so
well allied in spirit to the old tragedy, that to most listeners I dare
say it has something of the dreamy dreariness of the drama itself.

Mrs. Jameson was with me, and it was chiefly on her account that I did
not give way to my impulse to leave the theatre.

Good-bye. God bless you, my dear.

Ever yours,
FANNY.

[The foregoing letter refers to my having declined to read the
"Antigone" at Buckingham Palace, under the following circumstances.
My father was desired to do so, but his very serious deafness made
his reading anything to which there was an occasional accompaniment
of music difficult to him, and he excused himself; at the same time,
unfortunately for me, he suggested that I should be applied to to
read the play. Accordingly, I received a message upon the subject,
but was obliged to decline the honor of reading at the Palace, for
reasons which had not occurred to my father when he answered for my
accepting the task he had been unable to undertake. I had never yet
read at all in public, and to make my first experiment of my powers
before the queen, and under circumstances calculated to increase my
natural nervousness and embarrassment, seemed hardly respectful to
her, and almost impossible to me.

Then, for my first attempt of the kind, to select a play accompanied
by Mendelssohn's music, of which I had not heard one bar since the
shock of his death, was to incur the almost certain risk of breaking
down in an uncontrollable paroxysm of distress, and perhaps being
unable to finish my performance.

What I endured at the St. James's Theatre, on the occasion I have
spoken of in this letter, confirms me in my conviction that I
couldn't h