e curtain into his comedy, it produced a harsh and
dissonant effect. He was out of keeping with the rest of the _Personae
Dramatis_. There was as little link between him and them as betwixt
himself and the audience. He was a third estate, dry, repulsive, and
unsocial to all. Individually considered, his execution was masterly.
But comedy is not this unbending thing; for this reason, that the same
degree of credibility is not required of it as to serious scenes. The
degrees of credibility demanded to the two things may be illustrated
by the different sort of truth which we expect when a man tells us a
mournful or a merry story. If we suspect the former of falsehood in
any one tittle, we reject it altogether. Our tears refuse to flow at a
suspected imposition. But the teller of a mirthful tale has latitude
allowed him. We are content with less than absolute truth. 'Tis the
same with dramatic illusion. We confess we love in comedy to see an
audience naturalised behind the scenes, taken in into the interest
of the drama, welcomed as by-standers however. There is something
ungracious in a comic actor holding himself aloof from all
participation or concern with those who are come to be diverted by
him. Macbeth must see the dagger, and no ear but his own be told of
it; but an old fool in farce may think he _sees something_, and by
conscious words and looks express it, as plainly as he can speak, to
pit, box, and gallery. When an impertinent in tragedy, an Osric, for
instance, breaks in upon the serious passions of the scene, we approve
of the contempt with which he is treated. But when the pleasant
impertinent of comedy, in a piece purely meant to give delight, and
raise mirth out of whimsical perplexities, worries the studious man
with taking up his leisure, or making his house his home, the same
sort of contempt expressed (however _natural_) would destroy the
balance of delight in the spectators. To make the intrusion comic,
the actor who plays the annoyed man must a little desert nature; he
must, in short, be thinking of the audience, and express only so much
dissatisfaction and peevishness as is consistent with the pleasure of
comedy. In other words, his perplexity must seem half put on. If he
repel the intruder with the sober set face of a man in earnest, and
more especially if he deliver his expostulations in a tone which in
the world must necessarily provoke a duel; his real-life manner will
destroy the whimsical and pur