fle a leisure sentence or two with, and then to be
dismissed, and she to be the Great Lady still. She touched the
imperious fantastic humour of the character with nicety. Her fine
spacious person filled the scene.

The part of Malvolio has in my judgment been so often misunderstood,
and the _general merits_ of the actor, who then played it, so unduly
appreciated, that I shall hope for pardon, if I am a little prolix
upon these points.

Of all the actors who flourished in my time--a melancholy phrase
if taken aright, reader--Bensley had most of the swell of soul,
was greatest in the delivery of heroic conceptions, the emotions
consequent upon the presentment of a great idea to the fancy. He had
the true poetical enthusiasm--the rarest faculty among players. None
that I remember possessed even a portion of that fine madness which he
threw out in Hotspur's famous rant about glory, or the transports of
the Venetian incendiary at the vision of the fired city. His voice had
the dissonance, and at times the inspiriting effect of the trumpet.
His gait was uncouth and stiff, but no way embarrassed by affectation;
and the thorough-bred gentleman was uppermost in every movement. He
seized the moment of passion with the greatest truth; like a faithful
clock, never striking before the time; never anticipating or leading
you to anticipate. He was totally destitute of trick and artifice. He
seemed come upon the stage to do the poet's message simply, and he
did it with as genuine fidelity as the nuncios in Homer deliver the
errands of the gods. He let the passion or the sentiment do its own
work without prop or bolstering. He would have scorned to mountebank
it; and betrayed none of that _cleverness_ which is the bane of
serious acting. For this reason, his Iago was the only endurable one
which I remember to have seen. No spectator from his action could
divine more of his artifice than Othello was supposed to do. His
confessions in soliloquy alone put you in possession of the mystery.
There were no by-intimations to make the audience fancy their own
discernment so much greater than that of the Moor--who commonly stands
like a great helpless mark set up for mine Ancient, and a quantity of
barren spectators, to shoot their bolts at. The Iago of Bensley did
not go to work so grossly. There was a triumphant tone about the
character, natural to a general consciousness of power; but none of
that petty vanity which chuckles and cannot conta