The programme at the Lyceum has been at last varied
by the produc- tion of The King's Musketeers, a dramatized version of M. Dumas's well- known noveL It is scarcely necessary to state that the action takes place in the time of the Duke of Buckingham's embassy to the Court of Louis XIII, and chiefly relates to the difficulty in which Anne of Austria involved herself by giving her jewels to the gallant Englishman. Its chief interest from a theatrical point of view arises from the fact that Mr. Dillon proves the versatility of his talent, by admirably acting a light, careless, goodnatured Gascon, whose fortune is his sword, and who desires no other felicity than a frequent opportunity of using it. In this joyous part he displays the same natural spontaneity as in delineating the misery of Belphegor. Altogether, he seems to have hit on the sound principle, that the object of histrionic art is not to make a series of "points," but to realize an entire conception, and let the details be the logical result of the general view. In the accessories of scenery and costume Mr. Dillon shows due respect to the "spirit of the age."
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