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had fought bravely; his triumphant exclamation when he learns that he had fallen like a hero-"I'm satisfied!" and

"Thanks to the gods! my boy has done his duty;"

and his pathetic injunction

"Porcius, when I am dead, be sure you place
His urn near mine :-"

were wonderful specimens of the actor's genius. The far-famed soliloquy in the fifth act was delivered with a solemnity and power worthy of those heaven-inspired lines. Sir Thomas Lawrence has produced a picture of amazing beauty and expression, of Mr. Kemble in this scene. If it has not all the poetic feeling of his Hamlet, it is a more correct representation of the actor :

"Tis wondrous like,

But that art cannot counterfeit what nature
Could make but once."

How different is the statue of Kemble, by Flaxman, in Westminster Abbey; in which little of his countenance, and none of his dignity, are preserved. It is a complete failure as regards verisimitude and equally unworthy of the actor and the sculptor.

DG.

CATO.-Flesh-coloured dress-black Roman sanda's -white Roman tunic-white kerseymere toga, edged with scarlet.

LUCIUS.-Blue Roman toga and tunic-breastplate -flesh coloured legs, and black sandals.

PORCIUS.-Roman breastplate and lambrakins-scarlet mantle-flesh-coloured legs-black sandals-helmet. SEMPRONIUS.-Blue Roman toga-flesh-coloured legs, and red sandals.

MARCIUS.-Ibid, with gray sandals.
DECIUS.-Ibid, with brass helmet,

JUBA.-Scarlet satin jacket-tiger-skin mantle-rich bracelets and coronet-flesh legs, and red sandals. SYPHAX.-Black jacket-tiger-skin mantle — rich breastplate scarlet sash-blue trousers- bow and arrows- -buskins.

JUNIUS.-Gray Roman dress.
TITUS.-Ibid, with helmet.

SENATORS.-Roman togas-tunics-flesh-coloured legs, and black sandals.

FASCES, ROMAN GUARDS.-Roman dresses. NUMIDIAN GUARDS.-Turkish robes - white vests and trousers - yellow boots-turbans - cimeters and spears.

LUCIA.-White muslin dress, with white Roman drapery tiara of pearls, and black bracelets.

MARCIA.-White muslin dress

bracelets.

drapery - black

Cast of the Characters at Covent Garden Theatre, 1824.

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ORIGINAL PROLOGUE TO CATO,

WRITTEN BY MR. POPE, AND SPOKEN BY MR. WILKS.

To wake the soul by tender strokes of art,
To raise the genius, and to mend the heart,
To make mankind in conscious virtue bold,
Live o'er each scene, and be what they behold:
For this the tragic muse first trod the stage,
Commanding tears to stream through every age;
Tyrants no more their savage nature kept,
And foes to virtue wonder'd how they wept.
Our author shuns by vulgar springs to move
The hero's glory, or the virgin's love;
In pitying love we but our weakness show,
And wild ambition well deserves its woe.
Here tears shall flow from a more gen'rous cause,
Such tears as patriots shed for dying laws:
.He bids your breasts with ancient ardour rise,
And calls forth Roman drops from British eyes.
Virtue confess'd in human shape he draws,
What Plato thought, and god-like Cato was :
No common object to your sight displays,
But what with pleasure Heav'n itself surveys;
A brave man struggling in the storms of fate,
And greatly falling with a falling state!
While Cato gives his little Senate laws,
What bosom beats not in his country's cause?
Who sees him act, but envies ev'ry deed?

Who hears him groan, and does not wish to bleed?
Ev'n when proud Cæsar 'midst triumphal cars,
The spoils of nations, and the pomp of wars,
Ignobly vain, and impotently great,

Shew'd Rome her Cato's figure drawn in state,
As her dead father's rever'nd image past,
The pomp was darken'd, and the day o'ercast,
The triumph ceas'd-tears gush'd from ev'ry eye,
The world's great victor pass'd unheeded by ;
Her last good man dejected Rome ador'd
And honor'd Cæsar's less than Cato's sword.

viii

Britons attend! Be worth like this approv'd, And shew you have the virtue to be mov'd. With honest scorn the first fam'd Cato view'd Rome learning arts from Greece, whom she subdued: Our scene precariously subsists too long On French translation and Italian song. Dare to have sense yourself; assert the stage, Be justly warm'd with your own native rage, Such Plays alone should please a British ear, As Cato's self had not disdain'd to hear.

САТО.

ACT I.

SCENE 1.-A Hall in the Palace.

Enter PORCIUS and MARCUS, R.

Por. The dawn is overcast, the morning lowers,
And heavily in clouds brings on the day,
The great, the important day, big with the fate
Of Cato and of Rome. (c.) Our father's death
Would fill up all the guilt of civil war,

And close the scene of blood. Already Cæsar
Has ravag'd more than half the globe, and sees
Mankind grown thin by his destructive sword:
Should he go further, numbers would be wanting
To form new battles, and support his crimes.
Ye gods, what havock does ambition make
Among your works!

Mar. (L. c.) Thy steady temper, Porcius,
Can look on guilt, rebellion, fraud, and Cæsar,
In the calm lights of mild philosophy:
I'm tortur'd, even to madness, when I think
On the proud victor: every time he's named,
Pharsalia rises to my view; I see

The insulting tyrant prancing o'er the field

Strow'd with Rome's citizens, and drench'd in slaugh

ter.

O, Porcius, is there not some chosen curse,
Some hidden thunder in the stores of heaven,
Red with uncommon wrath, to blast the man
Who owes his greatness to his country's ruin!

Por. Believe me, Marcus, 'tis an impious greatness,
And mix'd with too much horror to be envied.
How does the lustre of our father's actions,
Through the dark cloud of ills that cover him,
Break out, and burn with more triumphant brightness!

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