Successful as Elizabeth Barry was in parts which she had studied under her preceptor, Lord Rochester, she cannot be said to have established herself as the greatest actress of her time till the year 1680. Up to this period she appeared in few characters suited to her abilities. In tragedies, she enacted the confidants to the great theatrical queens, Mrs. Lee and Mrs. Betterton; in comedies, the rattling, reckless, and audacious women, at whose sallies the pit roared approbation, and the box ladies were not much startled. But, in the year just named, Otway produced his tragedy of "The Orphan, or the Unhappy Marriage," in which Mrs. Barry was the Monimia to the Castalio of Betterton. On the same night the part of the Page was charmingly played by a future great actress, Mrs. Bracegirdle, then not six years old. In Monimia, Mrs. Barry exercised some of those attributes which she possessed above all actresses Cibber had ever seen, and which those who had not seen her were unable to conceive. "In characters of greatness," says Cibber, in his _Apology_, "she had a presence of elevated dignity; her mien and motion superb, and gracefully majestic; her voice full, clear, and strong, so that no violence of passion could be too much for her; and when distress or tenderness possessed her, she subsided into the most affecting melody and softness." From the position which she took by acting Monimia, Mrs. Barry was never shaken by any rival, however eminent. Her industry was as indefatigable as that of Betterton. During the thirty-seven years she was on the stage, beginning at Dorset Gardens, in 1673, and ending at the Haymarket, in 1710, she originated one hundred and twelve characters! Monimia was the nineteenth of the characters of which she was the original representative; the first of those which mark the "stations" of her glory. In 1682, she added another leaf to the chaplet of her own and Otway's renown, by her performance of Belvidera. In the softer passions of this part she manifested herself the "mistress of tears," and night after night the town flocked to weep at her bidding, and to enjoy the luxury of woe. The triumph endured for years. Her Monimia and Belvidera were not even put aside by her Cassandra, in the "Cleomenes" of Dryden, first acted at the Theatre Royal, in 1692. "Mrs. Barry," says the author, "always excellent, has, in this tragedy, excelled herself, and gained a reputation, beyond any woman whom I have ever seen on the theatre." The praise is not unduly applied; for Mrs. Barry could give expression to the rant of Dryden, and even to that of Lee, without ever verging towards bombast. "In scenes of anger, defiance, or resentment," writes Cibber, "while she was impetuous and terrible, she poured out the sentiment with an enchanting harmony." Anthony Aston describes her in tragedy as "solemn and august;" and she, perhaps, was never more so than in Isabella, the heroine of the tragic drama rather than tragedy, by Southerne, "The Fatal