I found in Edwin Forrest a man who must always live in the history of the stage as the first great original American actor. This place is secured to him by his nativity, the variety, independence, vigor, and impressiveness of his impersonations, the important parts with which he was so long exclusively identified, the extent and duration of his popularity, and the imposing results of his success. Other distinguished actors who have had a brilliant reputation in this country have been immigrants or visitors here, as Cooke, Cooper, Conway, Kean, Booth; or have been eminent only in some special part, as Marble, Hackett, Setchell, Jefferson; or have enjoyed but a local celebrity, as Burton, Warren, and others. But Forrest, home-born on our soil, intensely national in every nerve, is indissolubly connected with the early history of the American drama by a career of conspicuous eminence, illustrated in a score of the greatest characters, and reaching through fifty years. During this prolonged period his massive physique, his powerful personality, his electrifying energy, his uncompromising honesty and frankness, his wealth, the controversies that raged around him, the unhappy publicity of his domestic misfortune, and other circumstances of various kinds, combined, by means of the newspapers, pamphlets, pictures, statuettes, caricatures, to make him a familiar presence in every part of the country. Therefore, whatever differences there may have been in the critical estimates of the rank of his particular presentments or of his general style of acting, it is impossible to deny him his historic place as the first great representative American actor. He likewise _deserves_ this place, as will hereafter be recognized, by his pronounced originality as the founder of a school of acting--the American School--which combined, in a manner without any prominent precedent, the romantic and the classic style, the physical fire and energy of the melodramatic school with the repose and elaborate painting of the artistic school. It cannot be fairly thought that the great place and fame of Forrest are accidental. Such achievements as he compassed are not adventitious products of luck or caprice, but are the general measure of worth and fitness. Otherwise, why did they not happen as well to others among the hundreds of competitors who contended with him at every step for the same prizes, but were all left behind in the open race? If mere brawniness, strutting, rant, purchased favor, and clap-trap could command such an immense and sustained triumph, why did they not yield it in other cases, since there were not at any time wanting numerous and accomplished professors of these arts? A wide, solid, and permanent reputation, such as crowned the career of Forrest, is obtained only by substantial merit of some kind. The price paid is commensurate with the value received.