The Sun.
London, England, 1864-10-24 00:00:00

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as Mr Glaisher's ballooning. It is difficult to see why
experiments on the Banting system should not be
arranged by the same illustrious society, and their ex-
penses defrayed from the same source. Bantingizing is
surely as dangerous as ballooning; for a thorough-going
Beating exposes' his life for the good of his fellow-crea-
tures as bravely as the most intrepid aeronaut. Perhaps

the most serious obstecle is the difficulty of finding a num-
ber of individuals willing to yield themselves up as sub-
jects for the experience of science. There is only one Mr
Glaisher, and there are, probably, not many Bantings. If
Mr Banting had been, indeed, a denizen of Russia in the
days of Peter the Great, or of Prussia in the times of Fre-
derick, there would have been no delay. His system
would have been tried immediately upon the fattest and
most desperate criminals. For a free country the plan
would prove, perhaps, a failure. That the State should
Baud ag.ze a gaol-bird against his will would be as odious
to all enlightened citizens as flogging in the army is to
those metropolitan members whose seat is contested hotly.
It might, indeed, be possible to advertise for living models
whose duty was to be to regulate their diet with precision,
and to take observations of their personal declension with
accurate nicety. But it is to be feared that science would
suffer by enlisting under her sacred banner an army of cold-
blooded mercenaries. They would treat Mr Banting as
Sancho Panza treated Don Quixote in the matter of the
stripes which were to disenchant Dulcinea, and which,
when Don Quixote's back was turned, his squire laid vigor-
ously on to the neighbouring tree. To try Mr Banting's
system thoroughly, enthusiasts and not mercenaries are
wanted, only that enthusiasts in the cause of abstinence are
not so easily discovered.

TILE "SATURDAY REVIEW'S" TRIBUTE TO MISS HELEN
FAUCIT.—There is something in the present aspect of Drury
Lane Theatre that makes us feel as though we had glided,
to the extent of some 20 years or more, up the stream of
lime, and were again witnessing the efforts of Mr Macready
to establish the high poetical drama in one of its ancient
abodes, whence it had been driven by opera, ballet, and
spectacle. The master-spirit is indeed not present ; but the
managers who now hold his place, though their names do
not sound so loud in the trumpet of fame, adopt the prin-
ciples which he has bequeathed to them, and find their
reward therein. The notion that Drury Lane is not merely
a big edifice, fit for everything save the purpose for which
it was built—that it may still possibly become the capital
of the English theatrical world, especially now that the
link between Covent Garden and the non-lyrical drama
seems to be severed for ever—is again astir, and is regarded
as at least plausible, whereas, if started ten years ago, it
would have been looked upon as the dream of an unprac-
tical enthusiast. And much of the plausibility of this
notion is to be sought in the earnest and consistent
manner in which Messrs. Falconer and Chatterton go to
work. They cannot indeed collect such a company as was
presented by Mr Macready when he opened Drury Lane in
the season of 1841-2, or by Madame Vestris when she
opened Covent Garden shortly afterwards; for death and
old age have deprived us of many established grandees of
the profession who were then in full vigour, while several
have been dispersed in consequence of the modern system
of theatrical free trade, which, whatever may be its advan-
tages in other respects, is certainly adverse to the formation
of strong companies. But even in this direction they have
done their best. Mr Phelps, indubitably the actor of the
highest standing now to be found available for legitimate
purposes, is at the head of their force, and around his name
are grouped a circle of others belonging to trained and
respected owners. Granted the present condition of the
stage, and required the levy of a tragic troop, we do not
think that the problem could have been better solved than
it has been by Messrs Falconer and Chatterton. To
their earnest spirit witness is also borne by the manner in
which their pieces are produced, or, as technical writers
say, " put upon the stage." They have recourse to grand
spectacles on occasion, and sometimes awaken the uncom-
fortable doubt whether the accessory is intended to add
efficiency to the play, or the play is revived for the sake of
the accessory, but they usually adhere to an unobtrusive
and perfectly satisfactory mode of decoration which takes a
middle place between shabbiness and pageant. When a
manager does nothing for a play whatever beyond illustrat-
ing it with the first picture that his scene-room yields and
the bundle of clothes that comes readiest to hand in his
wardrobe, we may be sure that his austere simplicity pro-
ceeds—not from a belief that dramatic purity, unaided
and unadorned, is all-sufficient for his purpose—but, on
the contrary, from a conviction that the taste for Shaks-
peare, which has tempted him to revive ono of the ordinary
plays is too doubtful, or at any rate too transient, to be
worth a large investment even of time and trouble. Ever
since the opening of the theatre this season, the specta-
tors must have been struck with the excellence of
scenery the existence of which is hot even hinted at in the
bills. These btlong to the old stores of the establishment,
and have been renovated under the superintendence
of Mr W. Beverley, by whom the scenic department is di-
rected. The first part of "Henry IV„" which was the
spectacle-piece of last year ; the second part of the same
play, which is a curiosity in central London, and has acquired
celebrity through the Justice Shallow of Mr Phelps; and
the well-known " Othello," with the same gentleman as the
Moor, have been played here to crowded houses. Mr.
Carlyle looked upon Dr. Johnson with admiring wonder,
as a man who could actually pray in the age of Voltaire.
Othello, chiefly sustained by a popular tragedian who is
neither returning after a long absence, nor bidding a fare-
well, nor talking broken English, but nevertheless draws
f Imogene,
acted—savem° for
sceneg en
o pre'r speech that has a traditional celebrity with a u
throngs in an age of " sensation" and burlesque, is a pheno-
menon equally worthy of marvel. But the crowning event
of the season is the reappearance of Miss Helen Faucit on
the boards where she was once considered the least dis•
pensable of artists. Through the addition of this gifted
lady, the company, hitherto satisfactory, becomes really
strong, and from Monday last dates a renewed claim of
popularity
iTaho cahparlastyctewrhsihche selected was
wnaost
beentt
ahi an
t s o
no it S nry Lane.eaer'
Ydmlb e, e s
Wells. and perhaps some of the
remoter suburbs—for upwards of twenty years, which con-
the multitude, and which to uncultivated persons who never
read their Shakspere, is scarcely known by name. On her
first entrance she seemed a living record of another order
of things—a record be it observed, on which time had left
no trace, for she looked as young, as graceiul, and as
buoyant, as when she first acted the character under
the management of Mr. Macready. She was at once
greeted with deafening applause, but still we watched with
interest to ascertain whether acting of such ethereal refine-
ment as hers could be thoroughly appreciated by a modern
audience of a very mixed kind, and in whom the organ of
veneration has been but slightly cultivated. Of late years,
applause, when not gained by an appeal to the risible facul-
ties of mankind, has generally been elicited by a strong re-
production of every-day reality, with those details of the
truthfulness of which everyone can judge. Moreover,
although now rising into prominence, Drury-lane has not
of late been a fashionable theatre, and she question arose
whether the occupants of its pit wculd be thoroughly alive
to that exquisite ideality which characterizes Miss Faucit's
impersonations, especially when the part acted was one of
the most ideal kind. The lovely passage—
I would have broke mine eye-strings ; craoked them, but
To look upon him; till the diminution
Of space had pointed him sharp as my needle;
Nay, followed him till he had melted from
The smallness of a gnat to air—

was, in her lips, one of the moat delicate expressions Of de-
voted tenderness, with the additional charm that it pre-
sented the situation merely described. The spectator might
believe, from Miss Faucit's manner, that she actually saw
the retiring Posthumus dwindling into air—nay, could
almost imagine that he himself beheld the gradual diminu-
tion. But that unconscious propriety of Imogen, that innate
virtue which guards her as a shield and enfolds her as a
garment, that purity of soul which speaks in her slightest
movements—would all this be thoroughly understood by
persons long accustomed to sympathise with no griefs
but such as might fall with most prosaio force to their own
share, and to see the most tragic situations subjected to a
burlesque treatment ? There is something so inimitably
picturesque in Miss Faucit's acting that one constantly
longs to see each successive attitude fixed in a photograph
and bound into a volume to form a psychological illustration
to the play. But would this excellence appeal to a public for
which, of all arts, sculpture has the slightest charm P
Abandoning the interrogative mood, we gladly record the
fact that Miss Faucit's Imogen was appreciated to the high•
est degree of enthusiasm. When once she had the audience
in her grasp, she held them firmly, and was listened to with
breathless attention. However admirable a performance
may be, some one salient point is always requisite to convert
quiet approbation into demonstrative sympathy. This point
in " Cymbeline" was the sudden indignation of Imogen
when lachimo's false reports of the infiielity of Post-
humus aro followed by an attempt on her honour. To some
minds the delicate doubts and sorrow by which the mind of
the peerless Imogen is harassed, and in the delineation of
which the subtlest emotions of the part are reproduced in
the most refined expressions or the actress—whose whole
fame, so to speak, is devoted to the task of realising one of
the coyest of ideate—might scarcely be intelligible; but the
outburst of virtuous rage was a " touch of nature " that
addressed all intellects alike, and the house reverberated
with an explosion of admira.ion. We aptly use an oft•
allowed commonplace when we say that the transformation
of the extremely gentle being into a heroine, striking terror
with glance, voice, and gesture, was electrical. The stand-
point of admiration having been attained, what a scene of
beauty was opened to the view I The refined artist to whom
the right of delivery of the least prominent word was a matter
of the highest importance, had that power of expressing the
strongest emotion without which a wide popularity is not
to be acquired, and it was felt that not only art, but nature,
was at the basis of her most subtle interpretations. We have
touched upon the picturesque character of Miss FAVfOet!'fi