The daily dispatch. [volume] (Richmond [Va.]) 1850-1884, 1872-09-19

-HKR Fmsr AFpEaE Harriet b.
Stowe made her az 5at at spfi1gheld, Mass,
thenight be ttei 4th Instant, itffhe charac-
rtsf Of pusiic Pie 6Fffsaa be that
city describing II, says - l.t;.gs
The audience iast.eretlifig twas large fiIiing
the floor and the first gallery Of The opera.
House. the; price of the tickets and the ma
ture Of the performance excluding the, cElss
that usually Gil the ampbit Its cliaruc-
ter was peculiar. There were large Numbers
Of staid citizens who are rareIy seen there,
and the bellies and sehooi-fnaarns of tie city
were about equally represented. It was one
Of the best audiences chat ever turned cat,
representing the Intelligent OF nh classes OF
society-rather undemoustTatire and cold,
but at heart fond of the authorcss who was
to entertain them. At S O'Clock Mrs. Stowe.
after sitting a few moments in the plrquef,
came upon the stage and took her seat at the
table. She was dressed in black silk, with a
garniture of white lace putis, entirely be-
coming to her fine matron'y face, which wore
the color of health and happiness. Her
brown, wavy hair il scarcely rusted with
aye. and manifold rtirls ripple over tiny
waterfall behfnd. Her bite eyes lose none
Of theif mild fire and humanity, even through
the pince-nes: Altogether, Mrs. Stowe, at
the age of fifty-eight; bears such IN air
of health and of tenaciously- active life that
all her friends will hail her appearance
with joy. from the mere delight Of seeing
her, even IL She brought nothing else for Ell
tertainment. She stood to read, perhaps
from choice, but She could not sit without
being hid from half the audience by the
lamp, which was one of the student STYLE
She read first from the Oldtown stories Of
Sam lawson and read the whole of the
selections from that work without stopping.
Her thin voice Is well fitted to enact the
Yankee sharpness of utterince. Her descriIN
ton of "Parson Carry's" troubles and
"Huldy' triumph was truthful to her own
conception Of course, and, happily, 10 the
public idea of the. characters also. Her de-
lineation of the gossips &" Widow Piperage'
and Mis- Deaken Blodgett" was perfect to
the life, and highly enjoyable. "Sam Law
son" was also we'll rendered. We noticed
that she pronounced the word "well !"
"wal," and it Is so written in the book.
This Is, we believe, 4 word of the writers
rather than of the speakers of Yankee. The
Yankee word is q liquid WI when spoken
quickly, or fiat wa-a-a-l, with the q as in
hat, when prolonged. This question, how
ever, leads into a field where Mrs. Stowe
would have us at her mercy. The Oldtown
sketches took ttree-quarters of an hour.
After sitting three or four minutes Mrs.
Stowe resumed, this time with Il" Uncle Toms
Cahin' in her haud and commenced with
Black Sans stratagem. The dramatic in
terest of the story md tile spirit of the rem
dering held the audience closely, notwith-
standing the muggy air upon damp; warm
night. The negro dialect was not always
rendered with II distinctncss that made it in
telligent to northern cars but, in spite of
the occasional loss of sentence or phrase, no
one failed to follow and enjoy the rapidly
shifting phases of the characters as delineated
to the ear. At the end Of one hour and
twenty minutes Mrs. Stowe closed her book,
amid applause, with the words of one of the
practical listeners to Sans political hifalutiu,
Children, git off to bed" AS she left the
stage she spoke of an intermission, but her
agent in Il moment announced that the READ
ing had closed. 1t seems that it was her ill.,
tention to close with the death of Uncle Tom
but, seeing she had read almost an hour and
a half she feared to tre<pass longer on the
audience .....