Unfortunately, she ventured out driving soon afterwards, the day was cold, and a chill seemed to have developed the erysipelas internally. On the 31st May she was seized with sickness and ague, and in the course of the evening both her legs were attacked with erysipelas inflammation. This increased during the night, and was accompanied by much fever. In the course of the following day there was a consultation of doctors. They pronounced the case hopeless, mortification supervened, and about nine on the morning of the 8th June she expired, after a week of acute suffering. On the 15th June she was buried in the New Ground of Paddington Church, followed to the grave by her brother Charles Kemble, two sons of Henry Siddons, and many others. Alas! of her own immediate family few were left, and her eldest son was in India. In the procession were eleven mourning coaches, with the performers of the Theatre Royal Drury Lane and Covent Garden. When the burial service had been read, a young woman, Campbell tells us, knelt down beside the coffin with demonstrations of the wildest grief. She came veiled, and her name was never discovered. Why go into the items of the will Mrs. Siddons left, and the articles she assigned to her heirs? To us she has bequeathed the memory of one of the greatest dramatic artists that ever graced our stage, and of one of the noblest of the long list of noble women enrolled in the annals of our country. Time goes on whirling away all memories in its relentless rush. A new generation is ever ready to depreciate the enthusiasms of their grandfathers, and ours is incredulous when told of the powers of a Garrick or a Siddons. It was with a feeling of pain that, while standing the other day by the great actress’s grave where it lies lonely and untended in Paddington churchyard, we heard that our cousins across the Atlantic set more store on the memory of Sarah Siddons than we do. Miss Mary Anderson, the custodian told us, whenever she is in London, comes up on Sunday afternoons, with parties of her countrymen, to lay fresh flowers on the grave, and has undertaken, at her own expense, to execute all necessary repairs to the railings and tombstone. Let us, before it is too late, anticipate this high-minded and generous offer. FOOTNOTES [1] It was the same Lady Lucan who was said once to have asked the actress: “Pray, Madam, when you are to prepare yourself in a character, what is your _primary object_ of attention, the _superstructure_, as it may be called, or the ‘foundation’ of the part?” [2] Mrs. Piozzi, who, after Mr. Thrale’s death, had married again, much to the disgust of the Johnsonian band. [3] On the first night of the O. P. riots, we are told the actress wore a costume fashioned after the bridal suit of the unfortunate Queen of Scots, and was a perfect blaze with the jewels in the stomacher of the dress, as well as upon her hair and around her neck. London: Printed by W. H. Allen & Co., 13 Waterloo Place. S.W.