Then followed his career of unexampled success and prosperity continually marred and at last ruined by the dissipated habits to which this giant among tragic actors allowed himself to become the unhappy victim--habits that wrecked his home and well-nigh ruined his reputation. Between 1814 and 1827 his earnings had amounted to £200,000, and yet when he died in 1833 everything he left behind him, all his presents and mementos, had to be sent to the hammer to pay his debts. The 25th March 1833 (here is my second picture) saw the end of his stage career. For the first and only time Edmund the father and Charles the son (who had been sent to Eton, but who had taken to the stage as most of the sons of true actors will) stood upon the London boards together, the one playing Othello, the other Iago. The event caused great excitement among playgoers, and the house was crammed to suffocation. But Edmund Kean went through his part "dying as he went," until he came to the "Farewell,"--and the strangely appropriate words--"Othello's occupation's gone." Then he gasped for breath, and, falling upon his son's shoulder, moaned, "I am dying, speak to them for me." Within a few months the restless spirit of Edmund Kean was at peace in the quiet churchyard at Richmond. The third picture has been limned by Dr. Westland Marston, and shows a sad little episode in the declining years of Charles Kean, a man who, devoid of the genius of his erring father, had ever attempted to promote the highest interests of his calling, and to do good in the world. "In the autumn of 1866," says my vivid word painter, "I chanced to be at Scarborough. The evening before leaving, when passing by one of the hotels--I think the Prince of Wales's--there appeared, framed in one of the windows, a worn, pallid face, with a look of deep melancholy abstraction. 'Charles Kean!' I exclaimed to myself, and prepared to retrace my way and call. But, having heard already that he had been seriously unwell while playing a round of provincial engagements, I thought it better not to disturb him or to bring home to him a grave impression as to his health, even by a card of enquiry. In little more than a year after this his death took place. It occurred in January 1868, when he had reached his fifty-seventh year.... His friends who are still amongst us will cherish the recollection of a high-principled gentleman, warm in his attachments, generous in extending to others the appreciation he coveted for himself, and gifted with a charm of simple candour that made even his weaknesses endearing." [Illustration: TOWER COTTAGE, WINCHELSEA. _Ellen Terry's country home._ [_To face page 48._ ] It is to be feared that in the theatrical career on which he started with so much energy and confidence Charles Kean met with lack of appreciation and much disappointment.