Star.
London, England, 1829-10-08 00:00:00

improbable but this anecdote may have already found its
way to England ; but it will bear telling twice, as an il-
lustration of passing occurrences and the system gene-
rally. I had almost forgotten to add, that the deceased
Princess, to mark her sense of Don MIG VEL'S merits,
left him a large Mack diamond, no bad emblem of per-
fidy and treason, it must be confessed !
I ought not to conclude a sketch which is calculated to
afford but a very imperfect notion of the wretchedness
to which this country is reduced, without stating as a
fact, that there are serious thoughts, (for what can be too
extravagant and preposterous for such fanatics?) of esta-
blishing the Inquisition, a direct violation of existing
treaties, by the bye, in a modified form; and I have
heard, from persons acquainted with the subject, that a
number of Jesuits have already arrived here, to pave the
way for the intended ecclesiastical discipline and re'gime.

THE DRAMA.
In an article of the Morning Chronicle of yes-
terday, signed VERAX, the writer, after asserting that
dramatic talent was never more abundant amongst us
than at the present time, proceeds to ascribe the decline
of the English drama " to the prevalence of puritanical
nations—the fastidiousness of the taste of the day—the
weakness of Clergymen who dare not attend the theatres—
and the coxcombicality of our fashionable and aristocrat;'
exclusives, who refuse to sit nay where with the body of
the people."
To his first assertion we reply that Ii h:.l x, Yo N 6 ,
and KEm ate, are no proofs of our b...ing superior—or
even equal in dramatic talent—to our pretleepssors.
KEAN has been, as it were, proscribed from the London
Stage. His merits, to the extent they have been ex-
alted, have long been questioned ; and his rerecra,s in
the melo-dramatic character he is wont to give the
genuine tragedy, is adduced as an argument in
proof of our degeneracy of taste. Be this ns
it may, report represents his genius in decay,
and soon to be eclipsed for ever. YOUNG, at the apex
of his glory, was secondary indeed to the last of the Clas-
sic School in tragedy, namely, JoIIN K ENi hiLc : histri •
onic talent is not more immortal than the body : with tare
wasting vigour of the latter the spirit mast decay—and
YoUNG—the ghost of what he was—offe...s but a shadow
for the substance. Cll.l tuts KEM aria:, never more than
a respectable actor, has long waxed into those years when
gentlemen wear wigs and spectacles ; and although the
stage is the region of illusion, it is expecting too much
of human imagination in us, with the most ductile
fancy, to transform the wrinkled face of age into the
smoothy brow of youth ; and to admit the labrur;iig
of asthma—the querulousness of the veteran lungs—enc.,
stiffness of Ihnb and expiring eye of a set of grandfathers,
holding jealous and tenacious possession of the stage
even to the last—to be the attril rites of Hamlets,
Romeos, Rangers, Charles Surfaces, &c. Lifros
is an agreeable buffoon, holding the same dra-
matic rank as Print tEn in Paris; who, although
a public favorite, irresistibly risible, is yet con-
fined to a Minor Theatre, as incapable of that
chastity and identification with his author which
mark the true comedian. KEztrs is not greater
than ODDRY ; and like him, he owes his gn•atest
triumph to a silly face and manner, together wAr a
diMinutive stature—stale subject for punster's to crack
jokes upon. FtRREN comes nearer to the truth;
but his unchanging manner, voice, and peculiar per-
son, deny him the Protean facility of assuming, with
distinct particularities, that variety of character which
genius has delineated with so many shades through-
out the vast range of Comedy. MaTiltwl, to a
misfortune of person, has had the weakness and bad
taste to misapply his ability to the vicious walk of mere
mimicry. Had he dedicated one half of his time to the
study of the English dramatists, which he has directed to
men, and carried but a portion of his observations on the
latter into the legitimate drama, he might have been the
first comedian living. Madame VESTRIs is indubitably
the best comic actress on the stage ; but she is of the
French school, and in France, there are many of superior
calibre. Here, in tragedy, we have long possessed no
female of transcendant capacity ; and Hope, for the pre-
sent, is confined to the young star of Covent-Garden.
VERAX challenges us to name a period when the
English stage was more fertile in talent than at present.
We presume the days of GARRICK might be cited in
contradiction of his too hasty assertions. There were a
Macklin, Mossop, Quin, Quick, and others of th
times, whom we hope, for the reputation of the British
Drama, were superior to the mediocrity of the time

being.
With a SIDDONS, KEMBLE, and COOKE, We had
YOUNG and ELLISTON, in their youth—JORDAN ,
DUNCAN, BANNISTER, MUNDEN, EMERY, and more
not yet replaced. As to the musical department of our
theatre, we are still inferior to all Europe. Our school
of music is yet unformed ; and the Opera has no regular
house assigned to it, by which it in vats struggles to
escape from present obscurity and degradation.
However, admitting or not, the justice of our opinions,
permit us to ask, if English theatrical talent is still
equal to all we suppose it to have been—why the
national Theatre, deserted by the distinguished of
society is fallen to neglect and ruin ? We must tell
Vents, that puritanical repugnance averse to its en-
couragement, the objections of clergymen to assist at the
Drama, and the abandonment of English plays through
" coxcombicahty," in the " ezclusives," is an effect and
not a cause. No,— Yera,r—it is owing to theatrical
monopoly.—the mismanagement of people who abuse the
stage by their cupidity ; it is that dramatic writers are
lightly treated by these mere speculators on the public
pocket, that a selfish, capriciuns and arbitrary judgment is
passed by these histrions on iiramatic compositions, inso-
much as no respectable writer will choose to humiliate him-
sea' before them—it is because old men stick upon the stage
as immortal stars to the exclusion of fresh caadidates—
paid salaries which tempt them to arrogance and neg-
lect of assiduity—it is because tragedy, comedy, opera,
farce, melo-drama, pantomime, and concert are all played
on the same stage, by which neither are closely cultivated :
it is because the inferior actors are most detestable, des-
titute of hope, and badly paid ; and it is because, Oh Vertu !
that there is a brothel attached to every London theatre,
called a Saloon—to the disgrace of society and the in-
famy of our national theatre—from which Clergymen and
Coxcombicality" choose to be exclusive.
St at

Extract of a commercial letter from Rio Janeiro, 30th
July :—`• From the further improvement in the exchange,
produce has met with a decline in proportion ; and as the
new crops of coffee comes more abundantly into market,
we think the prices must go much lower. The stock of
sugar, hides, and horns, is lighter, and quotations nomi-
nal. Exchange on 'London, '27."
The Guernsey paper received this morning states that.
the revenue tables of the present quarter will, it is said,
present a cheering increase ; that the amounts mule up
to the close of last week, exhibits, above the correspond-
ing period of last year, an increase of nearly 501.
Bermuda Papers to the 12th August have been re-
ceived, but are void of intelligence.