MRS. S1DDONS.—This great actress expired on Wednesday, at her resi-
dence in Upper Baker Street. She had been for some time past in a
dangerous state, and on Saturday she was given over by her medical at- tendants. She rallied a little on Sunday. On Tuesday she again sunk ; dewing the night her speedily approaching dissolution was painfully ob- vious ; at nine o'clock in the morning of Wednesday, the anticipated event took place.
Sarah Kemble, afterwards Mrs. Siddons, was the eldest daughter of Mager Kemble, and of Sarah Ward, daughter of John Ward, a come-
'Ban of respectable talents. The father of Mrs. Siddons was an actor,
and the head of a strolling company. At the time of Sarah's birth, the 14th of July, 1755, he was performing at Brecknock in Wales; and was lodged in a public-house, which bore the somewhat vulgar sign of the Shoulder of Mutton. The stage at that time, even more than at present, was chiefly indebted for a succession of occupants to the families of actors. Acting, seventy or eighty years ago, was not the lucrative
profession that with not It few it now is. Roger Kemble's children were all players. Sarah came out when a mere child, at the benefit of her father ; when she recited the fable of the boys and the frogs, with applause, to an audience wh,ich, according to Holcroft, was by no means disposed to receive with acceptance every infant spouter that claimed its notice. From that period to her fifteenth year, she continued to act in her father's company in such parts as suited her age. About this time idae caught the heart of Mr. Siddons, one of her father's coadjutors ; a person of no small value to the company, "for he could do any thing from Hamlet to Harlequin," but who did not at first, notwithstanding is high claims, succeed in securing the approbation of Mr. and Mrs. Kemble. It was probably the uncertainty of a stroller's life, which Mr. 'Ketable well knew from experience, that made him anxious to discourage this attachment ; he does not seem to have been influenced by any am- bitions views. Sarah was removed from the stage, and placed in the amble station of waiting-maid to a Mrs. Greathead, of Guy's Cliff, near Warwick. She remained " under the protection" of this lady, as Emden expresses it, for some two years ; when the affection of the young people continuing undiminished, they were at length, with the sufferance of all parties, allowed to follow the bent of their inclinations. .111rs. Siddons is described, at that period, as possessing a person of surpassing beauty ; which those who have beheld her matronly shams will readily believe. In 1775, while performing with her husband at Cheltenham, Mrs. Siddons was seen by the notorious Bate Dudley, who recommended her warmly to Garrick; and on the 29th December of that year, she made at Drury Lane, in the character of Portia, her first courtesy to a London audience. Tom sing played Shylock on the occasion, and Infamy Davies Nerissa. Mrs. Siddons afterwards appeared as Mrs. Strickland in the Suspicious Hug- hand, and as Lady Anne in Richard the Third. She did not succeed, arid received no engagement. Garrick has been inconsiderately blamed sla being blind to the great actress's merits. He was not ; Mrs. Siddons *eclat that period no peculiar merits to exhibit. She herself used to say, that she perfectly felt the parts assigned her, and how they ought to be ooted, but she could not express her feelings. She was not one of those in whom nature seems to render art superfluous ; she was, like her bro- ther John, formed by long and earnest study—by years devoted to a profession where, as in most professions, careful and sedulous attention is 9ehlom thrown away, though, without the dives vena, it cannot look for ends splendid success as crowned the efforts of these two eminent per- sons. Mrs. Siddons's principal engagement during her seven years' rus- tication previous to her second appearance in the metropolis, was at Ilath. It may be observed, that she did not feel or affect any of that fastidiousness which certain small deer in our times have indulged in. During her stay in the country, she is stated to have played in Hamlet with great applause. Her reputation had been slowly but gradually rising; and in 1782, on the 10th of October, she again stood foiward as a can- didate for the applause of the capital. She was received with unbounded approbation, nor did the kindness of the public ever after forsake her. Is is right to add, that by no impropriety in private, or carelessness in public life, did she ever for a moment put the continuance of it in hazard. Her excellence as an actress was only equalled by her respecta- Nita- as a woman. It is a strong proof of the attractiveness of Mrs. Siidons's acting, at a period when the race of play.goers were infinitely better skilled and snore rigid judges than they are now, that she played libe feeble part of Isabella twenty-two times during the first season of her realm to Drury Lane. As she became known, she of course became fashionable; and liberally received the patronage of the wealthy and the greet, after she had proved that she could do without it. In the recess, the visited Ireland and Scotland ; and her tour was a succession of triumphs, in which Plutus bore the train of Victory. In 1804, Mrs. Siddons fe*appeared in the two characters which she made so absolutely her own, &wall the subsequent personation& have been received by the public as faint and imperfectcopies of her sterling originals—we mean Constance and Ls* Macbeth. In 1801, she transferred her services to Covent Garden, in add& theatre her brother John had become a shareholder. In 1812, after boring stood.alone and unapproached at the head of the higher drama for thirty long years, she bid the stage a public farewell. The occasion was dirs. tinguished by a circumstance which some of our readers may perhaps re- member: The play was Maeeth; and at the termination of the dream scene, when " the well-graced actress" had quitted the stage, the audience rese as one man, and demanded that the piece should close. This farewell was not, however, a final one. In 1813, Mrs. Siddous played for the Theatrical Fund, and also for her brother Charles's bene- fit. In 1;18, she again appeared for her brother's benefit. In the same year—on tie 8th of June— for the gratification of the Princess Char- lotte (who could not, however, attend), she once snore, and for the last time, eons:on:A to act her great part of Lady Macbeth.
Mrs. Siddims bad four children—two daughters and two sons, three of whom as wall as her husband she survived. Her youngest daughter died in l7n8, the victim of ilbrequited affection's. The eldest daugh- ter died in 1803, only a year after Mrs. Siddons had lost her husband. Ber eldest son, Henry, who was for several years lessee of tho Edinburgh theatre, died there about fifteen years ago. He married Miss Murray, a lady of great talent as an actress, as well as of great respectaiiiiity. She held the lease of the theatre in conjunction with her brother until lately, when she retired from Public life. Mrs. Siddons's heirs, according to report, are her nephew, Mr. Horace Twiss, and her nephews and nieces the children of Mr. Charles Kemble. Her wealth is understood to be considerable.
Mrs. Siddons was the last of the great school of English actors. The angel visit of Miss O'Neil, and the bright flashes of genius exhibited by Miss Fanny Kemble, we cannot help looking on as the fitful sparks sent up by the expiring ashes of a fire which no future race will see rekindled. We have outlived the age of dramatic illusion ; the enchantment of the scene no longer attracts us. Time world has grown too serious—perhaps too dull—to care for such light amusements; or rather, it cares for them as amusements only_our fathers studied them as a business. - Children and young people will still crowd the theatres,— for even in an age of the severest -philosophy, boyS and girls are not born philosophers; but bearded men, and mothers of families, will look elsewhere for more solid and less transient enjoyment than the world's mimic is capable of • We alluded to this fatal passion in our notice of the Life of Sir Thomas Law- rence, SreerATes, N. I3, p. 545.
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