how he might like to hear that his nephew had gone upon the stage. The Paragon Royal had scarcely a grander sound than the Stepney Star. Critics might be hostile; for all literary people, she heard, were unjust; and, at all events, I was to appear as Julian Gray till my position was fairly assured, and I could announce myself as the Shakspeare and Garrick of modern times. I smiled at all these cautions; I smiled at the hostility of the critics; I frowned at the possibility of a failure; I started when I heard her allusion to my uncle; in fact, I found that I was a regular playactor, and that I went through the gamut of stamps and facemakings exactly like Messrs Martingdale and Fitz-Edward. Miss Claribel laughed. "You rehearse very well," she said, "even when you are not repeating your part. You have immense command of feature, as much, I should say, as Grimaldi; but then he never attempted the tragic." "I don't quite understand your meaning, Miss Claribel," I said, looking as dignified as Coriolanus when he banished the Romans. "Do you mean that I grimace too much?" "Certainly, if you grimace at all. There is no surer sign of a man being a mere actor, than a reliance on scorning lips and upturned eyebrows. It is not natural. The words and passion must force their own way from the heart, and make their mark on the countenance at the moment of the burst. When you see a man throw himself back with his arms stretched out, his one leg forward, his mouth gaping, and his eyes ready to fall out of his head, in expectation of a ghost or some other dreadful sight, he is a mere conventional figure of fright, with no terror or apprehension whatever within. He should wait for the apparition; he should show the pit the first glimpse he gets of it; through his eyes they should see the undefined horror grow into consistency; and without the palpable presence either of the murdered Banquo or of Hamlet's father, they should feel a graveyard air about them, and see the dreadful shadow take shape and form. This is not produced by starts and grins." "Then, in heaven's name! how is it produced?" "By feeling it, by seeing it, by believing it." "I feel it, see it, believe it, and my eyebrows ascend, my mouth opens, my arms stretch out."