Star.
London, England, 1829-11-16 00:00:00

THE DUEL.

How did that duel end at Staines?
They fired three shots a piece, they say,
But—aiming at each other's brains—.
The balls met rothing in their way.
PETER SCHLE3IIH4

THE THEATRES.

DRURY LANR—" WILD OATS.."
Few,' if any, of our modern dramatists, have enjoyed
such pleasurable celebrity as the natural drollery and cc-
centric humour of O'KEE:E•i: acquired for him ; and, of
his numerous productions, not one has more essenti•►liy
contributed to the maintenance of that cherished illusion,

which was to him " precious as Fame itself," than the
vivacious whimsicalities of " Wild Outs, or the Strolling
Gentleman." •
The veteran has worn his histrionic honours so meekly,
and endured with such cheerful resignation, and calm sub-
missiveness, that severe privation which left him
0. D.rk, dark, dark amid the blaze of anon,"
that it were an ungenerous and ungracious task to dis-
turb that soothing complacency which sheds the light
of other days" around him in the gloom of age, by dis-
cussing the pretensions of his plays to the rank of legiti- .
mate comedy, or determining their merits by an invidious
comparison. He wrote at a time when• the supremacy of
the actor exacted tribute from the talent of the author, in
every department of the Drsinici* when the very " pur-
pose of acting" was so perverted, that the stage, instead
of " holding the mirror up to Nature," reflected but the
peculiarities of the performer; and characters were shaped,
like costumes, to the figure and the fancy of the wearer.
To such an excess was this arrogant assumptioncarried—
an assumption, we lament to say, that has not yet lost its
baneful influence upon the favoured and fortunate disciples of
Thespis—that nothing but the personal consideration and
intellectual power of the dramatist could resist its domi-
nation; and circumstanced as O'KEEFE was, he had no
alternative between implicit compliance with their hu-
mours, or the abandonment of his favourite pursuit ; and
it is no slight evidence of his skill, that under such diffi-
culties—" cabin'd, cribbed, confined," as his own im-
pulses were, he should have produced entertainments
which were not only successful in the hands of the per-
formers to whose capabilities they were expressly suited,
but have retained their hold upon the popular feeling,
through every change of representatives, and every caprice
•of public taste, up to the present hour. We know not,
in the. extensive range of Dramatic Biography, a more
affecting incident—as regards the sensations of an author
in the hour of probation—than " the blind old man" has
himself so faithfully presented to us in his entertaining
and interesting " Reminiscences" where he discloses
the breathless anxiety with which, in dark and mute
suspence, be awaited the decision of the public upon one
of his favourite productions, and describes the joy with
which its foetus •cfieered and consoled him under his
affliction. Such joy he might again have felt—without
the painful anxiety—could he have witnessed the en-
thusiasm with which,.on the fall of the curtain on Satur-
day evening, the audience demanded the repetition of
"* Wild Oats :"—the applause was reiterated, and the
pit rose, as one body, to pay the tribute of respect to the
memory of an old favourite—of admiration to the great
talents of the performers by whom the Comedy was so
excellently sustained. It has been the fate of " the
Strolling Gentleman" to survive almost all .his original
associates, and certainly all but one of his adequate re-
presentatives : and when we look back to the days when
RICHARD JONES-DOW "the bold Thunder" of the
Stage, first attained distinction as

a Handy, 8110114,t0n, or Rover,"

—some five or sic and twenty years ago Heaven save
the mark l—and behold him with all the freshness and
volatility of spirit which then rendered his performance
so entertaining—with all the buoyancy—the whim—the
gaiety of early life, chastened but not subdued : we
own that the only "Rover" of the present day—

" has 'shed In skUl,
Moth moss than he has lost In Ere."—

The bluff and absolute Sir George Thunder htts so little
in common with the exquisite refinements of Lord Ogleby,

and the self-torturing fantasies of Er Peter Tea
characters which FA RREN has made so exclusively hie
own, as to wear—" without co-rival all their dignity,"—
that his successful assumption of " Old Abrawang" is
an excellence of no ordinary kind. LISTON'S Ephraim
Smooth—gravely ludicrous, and ludicrously grave—is
as unique as any of his performances, and irresistibly
comical. HARLEY imparted not only rustic simplicity,
but genuine feeling to Sim ; and his defence of his
father from the anticipated resentment of Rover, elicited
the applioe' which it so well deserved. It were but
niggard praise to say that WA LLACK acquitted himself
admirably of an arduous duty in the personification of
John Dory, when in point of fact, he not merely sue-
'ceeded in reconciling us to the appearance of the gallant
and graceful hero of tragedy, in the habiliments of the
rugged tar—but enhanced, by his quaint humour, and
involuntary bursts of honest passion, the general effect of
the play. Miss Mon DAUNT looked the Lady Amaranth
excellently, and supported the quiet mirth of the fair
Quaker with a demure and imperturbable pleasantry. We
.can conceive few efforts of dramatic skill more arduous
than the perusal of an eloquent passage on the stage,
which requires the aid of declamation to give it
full effect, an& yet the reader cannot attempt to
impart to it that passionate declamation Ur aid of ac-
tion, which the orator prmounced to be the eiienc3 ari
the grace of eloquence ;—in such an effort Miss MOR-.
DAUNT was successful—aye, triumphantly successful—
and gave such effect to the celebrated passage of
" Mercy," that we are satisfied her excellence is yet but
imperfectly developed, and that the chaplet of her fame
must be wreathed from the ever-blooming flowers of our
SIIA K ESP EA RE'S Parnassian Paradise. As a contrast to
the placid and tranquil Lady Amaranth, Mrs. Oncrea's
Jenny Gammon was very delightful.—The acting
throughout was untitled to the highest commendation,
and merited the spontaneous. burst of approbation with
which the repetition of the play was called for.

• The pupils of the Royal Academy of Music are about
to give a series of representations of Italian Operas.
Those performances will be given in the Grand Concert-
room of the King's Theatre, which has recently been
fitted up with appropriate scenery and decorations for the
purpose. The orchestra, as heretofore, will be composed
entirely of the pupils of the Academy, under the direction
of Mr. C. POTTER.
. The American Minister visited the Earl of ABERDEEN
yesterday afternoon at the, Foreign Office.
Sir Chains and Lady Ogle have returned in good health
from the Canadas.

The Demerara Papers are void of the least interest.
From the Papers of Prince Edwards Island.
" There are at present forty sail of vessels in Mira-
michi for the purpose of loading with timber, the price of
which was very high.