The Sun. — 1866-10-05 (London, England)

HER MAJESTY.  BALMORAL, Wednesday.  The Queen, Princess Louise, and Prince Arthur, attended by the Marchioness of Ely and LieutenantGeneral the Hon. Charles Grey, drove to the Spital of Glenshee on Monday, and rode on ponies over the bill to Kindrogan, from whence the royal party drove to Dunkeld.  11cr Majesty remains at Dunkeld on a visit to the Dowager Duchess of Athole.  The Drama in the Provinces.  It has become the custom, within the last few years, to try, in some provincal towns, plays which have been afterwards produced in London, but their trials have been confined to such houses as Glasgow, Liverpool, and Manchester. Bradford may now be added to the list, as a new play, entitled " The Man and the Shadow," has been produced at the Alexandra Theatre, which has met with extraordinary success. The play, says the Bradford papers, is as original as any of Shakspere's. The plot alone is founded upon a German play by Carl von Holtei, and the author, Mr. W. G. Wills, has greatly added to the already high reputation which his admirable novels, such as " David Chantrey," the " Wife's Evidence," and others have long earned for them. Arthur Bruce, the hero, is a poet of original genius, who has not yet acquired that stamp which we call " a name," and without which the solid success which money represents, is not to be attained. In that position he is advised by most of his friends to abandon what they consider an unprofitable taste, and to apply himself to the prosaic drudgery by which very mediocre minds may yet earn a living. Poverty compels him to follow their advice, but his mind, deprived of its natural food, poetry, gives way under the enforced burden of prose to which it is degraded. His Pegasus, yoked to an ox, breaks down under the uncongenial toil. Domestic troubles and an unfortunate passion for a lady who had excited his gratitude, by a heartfelt recognition of his genius, complete the ruin of a noble intellect ; and when for his mad conduct he is expelled from his employer's house, he disappears under circumstances which lead to the supposition that he has committed suicide. Twenty years after his supposed death, his works having become famous, a statue is erected to his memory in the public park of his native town, and here we have a situation invented entirely by Mr. Wills, which is not only completely novel and original, but unsurpassed for dramatic effect. While the supposed dead poet's friends unveil and inaugurate his statue, the poet himself, now a mad beggar, appears, and is hustled by the crowd at the foot of his own statue ; he is protected from violence by his own son. His old friend and townspeople sing a song of his, which he himself had sung in the first act. The melody and words strike a chord in the old man's disordered brain, and bring back his senses. He takes up the song himself, but breaks down through excitement, and his identity with the original of the statue is established. His friends crowd round him, and welcome his return to life, but the joy has been too much for him. His heart is broken, and he dies on the day of his triumph. Mr. Hermann Vezin, for whom this play has been written, and who has already, by his performance of Shakspere's heroes in the metropolis, placed himself in the foremost rank of living actors, advances his reputation by his rendering of this original part.  An excellent map with Metropolitan Railway and its branches vividly defined in scarlet has just been published. It will be found very useful for reference.