The Sun.
London, England, 1863-06-30 00:00:00

MADE. RISTORI AS LADY MACBETH.

Whilst we have a young Frenchwoman present-
ing Juliet, with a perfection which we believe has
never been equalled on our stage—we have an
Italian who embodies Lady Macbeth in a manner
that has not been witnessed since the days of Mrs.
Siddons. Shakespeare's two greatest feminine con-
ceptions are placed before us, side by side, and
with a like unrivalled excellence by the genius of
two foreigners. This Is a fact, which is certain
tainly anything but flattering to our national pride
—and which has only one offset to offer us in the
extended fame of our national poet, of which it
affords at the same time so eminent a proof. Shake-
spear has at length established his sway over the
entire heart of Europe, and now supplies as potent
an impulse to the gifts and sympathies of France
and Italy as forty years ago he was known to do t..)
those of Germany. It is some consolation,
therefore, if we have ceased to interpret him
ourselves, that our land should have supplied
the highest inspiration to the artistic spirit of
our cotemporaries.

Madame Ristori's wholly unrivalled impersona-
tion of Lady Macbeth has lost none of the charac-
teristics which stamped its first performance with
such magnificent distinctions—whilst, in common
with her other efforts, it exhibits that increase of a
reflective quality that gives a clearer view of pur-
pose, in union with the utmost sense of power. All
the masculine nature of the woman—the resolute
ambition and the invincible will, which contrast
so strikingly with the kindlier and juster spirit of
her husband—Madame Ristori puts before us with no
abatement of their old grandeur—whilst she enforces
them in innumerable passages, with a stern severity
of thought that serves to explain the source of her
cruelty, if it cannot suffice to excuse it. She con-
veys the notion of a woman who has so intensely
contemplated evil ends, that she has succeeded in
reasoning herself into the belief of their expedience,
if not justice, and who by this process has so corn-
letely put in abeyattce human sympathies, that she
has ceased for a time to be a moral agent, and only
exists as the instrument of a hideous and merciless
delirium. Her moral sense has been so suspended by
a sheer acticn of the intellect, that she herself
becomes as much a victim to her lower nature as
does Macbeth. such a prostration of soul and con-
science, if it prepares for the direst crimes, provides
equally for the expiation of a proportionate remorse
on their fulfilment. The revulsion from a wholly
benumbed to an ordinarily active moral conscious-
ness, however gradual and undemonstrative, could
scarcely fail to attain a force that would balance in
its poignancy, its previous insensibility. Excess
would replace excess till the equilibrium was estab-
listed either in penitence or death. This is evi-
dently the view of Madame Ristori, which,
developed by consun mate skill, renders her
sleep•-walking scene one of the profoundest
interpretations which Shakespear has received
in our remembrance. Instead of gliding
in with the usual sad composure that we are accus-
tomed to—the calm if solemn punishment of a soul
that can no longer rest, Madame Ristori totters
before us as a being withered up with torture--har-
rowed by remorse as by a palsy—who awoke to a
sense of her crime, expiates it with the same in-
tensity with which it had been committed. Her's
is no mere pallid grief of face, no gentle rubbing of
the damned spot by which she hopes to re-
move it; her features are pinched and con-
vulsed with the sense of her exceeding sin, and
her hand desperately endeavours to free its fellow
from the evidence. This is a view which we be-
lieve to be as artistically just as in all ethical re-
spects it is incomparably impressive. Never was
the lesson of an unbridled will and a criminal am
bition made so striking in our knowledge as in this
masterly performance.
We can only express our regret that the nature
of her arrangements prevents the repetition of this
character with that of the Medea and the Elizabeth,
since we are quite sure their superior excellence would
more than counterbalance the attraction that is sup-
posed to lie in the mere novelty of many others. Corn-
ing to us only for so brief a period, it seems the more
necessary she should be seen the most in that which
is most excellent, that the deeper sense may be left
behind her of all that distinguishes her so widely
from the best of her contemporaries. It only remains
for us to say that her performance of Lady Macbeth
attracted the same appreciative audience, and
elicited the same delighted testimonies which have
attended her other efforts. Her sleep-walking
scene especially rousing the most marked amount
of enthusiasm—and, saving a slight tendency to ex-
cess in the prominent scenes, we must add she was
ably supported by the Macbeth of Signor Pezzans.

THE EASTERN FISHERIES.—The mackerel and
herring fisheries have made little progress during the last
few days, At Great Yarmouth mackereLiavebeen quoted
2os, to 285., and hentage 12e, 6d. per 120 fish,

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