en
lines in the commencement of the play, in which Edgar follows Cordelia
across the stage with the following pathetic stuff:

"Cordelia, royal fair, turn yet once more,
And ere successful Burgundy receive
The tribute of thy beauties from the king."--

It is too sickening: I cannot go on. Cordelia the amiable and sensible
Cordelia, in love with such a whining milk-and-water fool as this! It
need not be mentioned, that of course they have several unaccountable
interviews, and at the conclusion of the play, Cordelia, all overjoyed
at the restoration of her father, marries Edgar!

The last remarkable corruption is in the introduction of a curious piece
of stage-machinery, ycleped a confidant, who, loving her mistress more
than herself, like a good servant, accompanies her through wind and
rain, and every other stage-horror, in a dark night, on a wild-goose
chase, without any adequate or apparent object. This confidant is like
every other stage-confidant.

How such a wretched jumble of inconsistencies, absurdity, and
insipidity, can have been suffered ever to be performed, is a subject at
once of wonder and regret. It is surprising, that Garrick never remedied
the evil; a man, who had an ardent veneration for Shakspeare, and by his
acting and management went some way towards doing him justice. It is
rather inconsistent, that he could suffer this play to be performed
instead of Shakspeare's, and yet in one of his prologues make the
following assertion:

"'Tis my chief wish, my joy, my only plan,
To lose no drop of that immortal man."

_Prologue to Catherine and Petruchio._

These lines too are quoted by Mr. Kemble, and prefixed as a motto to his
alteration of one of Shakspeare's plays. Is Mr. Kemble not aware, how
many drops of Shakspeare are lost, and how much false wine obtruded in
their place, in this metamorphosis? It would be an endless task to point
out all the beautiful and sublime passages omitted by Tate: but to point
out all the absurdities he has introduced, would be more endless. As Mr.
Kemble professes, however, such a wish, I will just remind him, before I
conclude, of what perhaps he has forgotten, that the present
stage-representation of Shakspeare is a disgrace to his memory; that
many of his best plays are never performed; that those which are
performed are exhibited in so mangled a state, as to be totally unlike
Shakspeare; and that not one of his dramas is now exhibited pu