nt at a very handsome salary for her father; her own of course
was liberal--when one considers how long Mrs. Siddons had appeared upon
the stage before she got a firm footing on the London boards, one cannot
but be astonished at the rise of this lady at one leap from the
threshold to the top of her profession. It is worthy of observation that
the real children of nature generally burst at once upon the view in
excellence approaching to perfection; while the mere artists of the
stage lag behind, labouring for years, before they attain the summit of
their ambition; when their consummate art and their skill in concealing
that art (ars celare artem) if they have it, entitles them at last to
the highest praise. Mrs. Bellamy was one of those children of nature.
Before she appeared, Quin decidedly gave judgment against her: yet the
first night she performed he was so struck with her excellence, that,
impatient to wipe away his injustice by a candid confession he
emphatically exclaimed, "My child, the spirit is in thee." Garrick it is
said never surpassed his first night's performance: and the Othello of
Barry's first appearance, and the Zanga of Mossop's never were equalled
by any other actors, nor were ever surpassed even by themselves.

Such was the impression made by this phenomenon, even before she left
the country for London, that the presses teemed with tributes to her
extraordinary merit, in verse and prose. Learning poured forth it praise
in deep and erudite criticism--Poetry lavished its sparkling encomium in
sonnets, songs, odes, and congratulatory addresses, while the light
retainers to literature filled the magazines and daily prints with
anecdotes, paragraphs, bon-mots, and epigrams. In a word, there was for
sometime no reading a newspaper, or opening a periodical publication
without seeing some production or other addressed to Miss Brunton. From
the number which appeared the following is deservedly selected, for the
elegance of its Latin and the beauty of its thoughts:

AD BRUNTONAM.

E GRANTA EXITURAM.

Nostri praesidium et decus thartri;
O tu, Melpomene severioris
Certe filia! quam decere formae
Donavit Cytherea; quam Minerva
Duxit per dubiae vias juventae,
Per plausus populi periculosus;--
Nec lapsam--precor, O nec in futuram
Lapsuram. Satis at Cam[oe]na dignis
Quae te commemoret modis? Acerbos
Seu praeferre Monimiae dolores,
Frater cum vetitos (nefas!) ruebat
In fratris th