ing appealed to for their opinion, pronouncing his head to be quite the proper thing, he gradually recovered his good humour; and, by the time they were summoned to the dinner-table, all parties were in a state of complacency towards each other.

They found, in the dining-room, Charles and Mr. Hunter, with very orderly faces, and also Mr. Danvers, Matilda's very civil friend the last time she visited at Mr. Hunter's. This gentleman covered his satirical propensities so dexterously, that a very rigid observer of human nature might have passed him over as possessing, in reality, all the simplicity and good-nature he endeavoured to assume. It was without the slightest degree of alarm, therefore, that the dramatis persona, who were not, individually or collectively, very acute people, observed him of their party. They all returned his cordial shake of the hand with great glee, and began to relate to him, with the utmost naïveté, the different doubts, hopes, and fears, with which the undertaking had been accompanied.

CHAPTER XI.

THE whole of the conversation, both at and after dinner, turned, as might have been expected, upon nothing but the business of the evening. Mr. Hunter gave all the encouragement possible to the performers, by making libations to their success, in which Michael Cassio so freely joined, that Mr. Danvers observed to Matilda, he probably designed to anticipate the intentions of Iago, and make himself ready intoxicated to his hands.

"Or possibly," he continued, (and such, indeed, was the fact)" he feels, as the hour advances, that like Bob Acres, his courage is oozing out at his fin gers' ends, and he takes this method of screwing it to the sticking place.””

As it was expected that the play would take up rather more time than usual in the representation, it was decided that it should commence precisely at seven o'clock.

vate theatre in

Accordingly, at that hour, such of the party as composed only the audience, proceeded to the priStreet. Here they found the greater part of the spectators assembled, to the number of about a hundred and fifty; the performers, desirous of sparing themselves the dishonour of exhibiting to empty benches, having invited their

friends, and their friends' friends in every direction -to come and have a laugh at their expense. Such were not, perhaps, the precise words of the invitation; but, by the arch smile which accompanied the greeting of the visitors, the watching amongst each other for some word or look, as a signal that restraint might be laid aside and the flood-gates of ridicule safely unlocked, it was easy to perceive that the ma. lice of human nature anticipated to itself a fund of

amusement.

Matilda having neither husband, brother, nor cousin, who was going to make a simpleton of himself, had as lawful a right to laugh as any body there; and, it being a faculty which she had lately had but small opportunity of indulging, she did not quite recoil from the possibility of having it a little excited.

But as to prepare one's-self to laugh or to cry, is generally the prelude to disappointment-matter for mirth, or melancholy, or any thing else, never coming when it is expected-it appeared as if the audience had been rather premature in their hopes of fun, when the first act passed over with a mawkish mediocrity insufferable to behold.

The minor characters of the play were supported by some gentlemen who were kept for the “ heavy business" at the great public theatres; and who, bad as they were in their own proper places, happened unfortunately, on the present occasion, to be the best of the party; and, by their acting, considerably overshadowed those more important personages, Othello, Iago, and Michael Cassio.

VOL. II.-L

A very pretty affected Desdemona, laughing rather more visibly than was quite proper, and treating her Lord Othello with the most ineffable disdain, and a magnificent looking Emilia, also from a public theatre, completed the dramatic corps.

In the second act affairs took a turn, and Michael Cassio, who was now something more than tipsy, began to want the aid of the prompter.

He had raved pretty well, and told with violence enough to deafen any body, how that

"Tempests themselves, high seas, and howling winds,
The gutter'd rocks, and congregated sands,

Traitors ensteep'd to clog the guiltless keel,

As having sense of beauty, do omit

Their mortal natures, letting go safely by

The divine Desdemona ;"

and had greeted that fair one with a hearty shake of the hand, and a

Having fired off which piece of eloquence, he had said his all, and had nothing further to advance when it most behoved him to speak. Twice had Desdemona inquired,

"What tidings can you tell me of my Lord ?" ́

and twice had the valiant Cassio looked to the prompter for intelligence, but in vain ; not being on the same side, he could but indistinctly hear him; so, as the case was desperate, he thought any an

swer was better than none, and ventured simply to reply,

"He's well!"

The prompter's hasty suggestion,

"Not yet arriv❜d, nor know I aught,”—

was now very audible, as well as the ill suppressed laughter of Miss Arabella Hunter, between whom and Mr. Danvers, Matilda occupied a seat.

Before them, to her great alarm, sat divers cousins and sisters, headed by the mother of Michael Cassio; all of whom, at every titter of Miss Arabella's, turned round and looked upon her and Matilda with most appalling countenances; though the latter, in her great consideration for the feelings of every person, as soon as she understood their consanguinity to the unfortunate and most ridiculous Cassio, would not move a muscle of her face in derision of him, however strongly excited to it.

That personage, still in the dark as to the prompter's words, began to lose all patience, and hastily walking over to his side, he inquired with much irritation, "What is it then?" This movement excited a general laugh in the audience, which the angry glances of his kindred, and the charitable applause and bravos of a few of the spectators, could hardly quell.

Cassio, however stood his ground pretty well; and soon being relieved by the dialogue between. tween Iago and Desdemona, his blunder passed off without much interruption to the business.