Very Suspicious is the title of a slight piece produced
at the Lyceum ; in which a prying lady discovers that two persons are secretly married, having first based her suspicions on their indifference towards each other. There is something of satire in this notion ; and the piece being neatly written, and respectably acted by the minor stars of the house, passes muster exceedingly well. The performances of the German company this week have, we think, essentially contributed to fix the position of Herr Emil Devrient, if we would try him by the standard of our own stage. We do not believe that we have an actor who could give such effect to the character of Count Paul von Scharfeneck, in the Princess of Saxony's .Majorakerbe ; a young man, whose manners are spoiled by a bad education, but whose nature is supremely noble, and keenly sensitive to unkindness or injustice. He'rose before us as a new fresh reality ; the part allowing much more unity of detail than the declamatory personages of Schiller ; and he seemedjust the man whom we most desiderate for our histrionic community. What we greatly want is an artist who can give sufficient weight to the younger personages of tragedy and comedy—in a word, a first-rate light comedian, with tragic capabilities ; and such an artist Herr Devrient appears to be. His Hamlet, on the other hand, which he plays after Schlegel's admirable translation, does not, in our opinion, raise him to the level of our more emi- nent masters. There is a remarkable combination of elegance and energy, excellent declamation, and refinedjudgment ; but we have been accustomed to see Hamlet do so much more, that we cannot help feeling disappointed when effects are missed to which we have been accustomed during a play- going life. And while we praise the German company generally for the care and minuteness they bestow on the English tragedy, we do not see in them any possibility of rivalling such a performance as might be given by a picked body of London actors, even in the present degenerate days. The Ophelia of Mademoiselle Schafer, and the Gravedigger of Herr Birn- still, show that everything has yet to be learned as to the means of pro- ducing a sensation with those characters. The actors do not fail in what they attempt, but there is a world of resource which they leave altogether unattempted, and of which probably they have never heard. Herr Bim- still is an intelligent actor, as he showed by his representation of the po- litical busybody in Egmont ; and we are sure that if he saw the grave- digging scene sustained by Keeley and Harley, a new region would open to his eyes. He would be astonished to see how much can be made of words which now seem of comparatively small importance. The most perfectly-performed part in Hamlet was unquestionably Herr Limbach's Polonius ; in which the morality of the courtier was admirably preserved without senile buffoonery.
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