SECOND THOUGHTS.
A LITTLE piece at the Haymarket, under this title, is said, in the bills of that theatre, to be received with enthusiastic applause, and to be therefore repeated every evening. The repetition we believe —the enthusiasm of empty boxes is an equivocal mark of approba- tion. Nevertheless, the acting of FARREN and MTS. GLOVER de- serves a better fate than to waste its sweetness upon the desert air of Mr. MORRIS'S thin houses.
The hero of Second Thoughts is a certain antique bachelor----,- short, snappish, eccentric, and remarkable for the suddenness of his proceedings : he is called Mr. Sadden, and is personated by FARREN. Mr. Sudden is always recurring to his "second thoughts ;" and prides himself on their soundness, though the whole of his disasters turn upon his rashness. Finding him- self puzzled in the management of an obstinate ward, he re,- sorts to the singular expedient of marrying a designing widow, Mrs. Trapper, in order to procure some one in his- house whose authority might be influential in the control of the 'young lady. His "second thoughts" melt have taught him that it was easier to manage one lady than two. However, he is only saved from the sacrifice at the altar, by hearing a rumour that Mrs. Trapper had poisoned her first husband in a glass of sangaree, in America, the country. she had lately left. The pro- posal t f Mr. Sudden had been rapid and rash; he had backed it by a promise in writing; but now, horrified at the idea of a premature death, he breaks in upon his intended, her daugh- ters, and her workwomen, all busy in preparing the wedding gar- ments and declares WI; with as little ceremony as he had declared on. A dreadful scene of violence ensues on tile part of Mrs. Trapper, excellently filled out by Mrs. GLOVER, and only ter- minated by Mr. Sudden, in his distress and confusion, plumping down on a chair containing Mrs. Trapper's matrimonial chapeau. Damages to the amount of 2,0001. follow, not on the score of the ruined bonnet, but of the disappointed feelings of the unhappy widow. Sadden is, however, too much a. man of impulse to pay money : on "second thoughts," he pockets his draft, and re- solves to leave the country : a judge's warrant, by play-law, stops his progress: he is arrested, and in the act of going to gaol, when accident turns up Mrs. Trapper's first husband,—who had not died, but only run away. Sudden is released,--overjoyed, and in such exceeding good humour, that he pairs and patronizes all the young couples about him ; glorying all the time in the " second thoughts," to which he. is certainly but little indebted. The part of Sudden is admirably and uniformly sustained, and with less than ordinary exaggeration. Some scenes were me- morable: they were each in conjunction with the formidable Mrs. Trapper,—as if FARREN'S flint only struck a light to Mrs. Geo- VER'S steel. The manner in which that excellent actress received the announcement of the breaking off of the match—her violence first, then the idea flashing across her mind that it was a hoax or a joke—her sudden softening, and ultimately her most tremen- dous threatening of the law, when she saw that Sudden was firm and serious—all this was most inimitably done. Similar praise is to be given to her desperate rage with Jabber (HARLEY), whom she justly suspects of double-dealing; her indignant accusation against him, of having picked up and read a letter she had dropped; and her ultimately dragging him before the parties she suspected he had been paltering with. There are also seve- ral superexcellent scenes with her daughters, which play as some of Mrs. GORE'S scenes read—and that is high praise. FARREN conceived his part to the life : he is a selfish, troublesome, ugly, old bore, who is tolerated for the sake of his wealth, and who con- ceives that all the world ought to play the Jacquey to him and his "second thoughts ;" and, while he is in point of fact wearying out the very soul of every person dependent upon him, imagines his authority is vanishing, and that all neglect him. He is a choleric grumbler—an apparent inconsistency, but a real nuisance. FAR- BEN'S costume is always good, but in this piece has genius in it. His appearance and his effect in the part are not inferior to his John Jones.
The author has the merit of giving birth to a sprightly little piece, which affords some good opportunities to two excellent artists • in other hands, it would be nothing. In places, the dialogue is pointed: there are a few "good things," but generally the composition is not much above the farce par. There is a new actress here, a Miss TURPIN, who bids fair to be an acquisition. We saw her play Am/data, in the Young Quaker, in a very agreeable style. She took pains ; and we cannot say that of most of the company,—which has generally an excessively half-pay manner about it.
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