"
It was soon evident they would not, or rather that they could not stand
it. But it was not alone his new reading in what regarded the person of
Hamlet, that excited astonishment. Mr. Stubbs had so many other new
readings, that before he got to the end of his first speech, beginning
with, "Seems, madam! nay, it is," they were satisfied of what was to
follow. When, however, Mr. Stubbs stood alone upon the stage, in the full
perfection of his figure, and concentrated upon himself the undivided
attention of the house--when he gathered up his face into an
indescribable aspect of woe--but, above all, when, placing his two hands
upon his little round belly, he exclaimed, while looking sorrowfully at
it,
"Oh, that this too, too solid flesh would melt,
(Pat, went the right hand,)
Thaw, and resolve itself into a dew,"
(Pat, went the left hand,)
the effect was irresistible. One roar of laughter shook the theatre, from
the back row of the shilling gallery to the first row of the pit, mingled
with cries of _bravo! bravo! go on, my little fellow--you shall have fair
play--silence--bravo! silence!_--Stubbs, meanwhile, looked as if he were
really wondering what they were all laughing at; and when at length
silence was partially restored, he continued his soliloquy. His delivery
of the lines,
"Fye on't oh fye! 'tis an unweeded garden
That grown to seed: things rank and gross in nature," &c.
was one of his new readings--for holding up his finger, and looking
towards the audience with a severe expression of countenance, it appeared
as though he were chiding their ill manners in laughing at him, when he
said, "Fye on't--oh, fye!"
He was allowed to proceed, however, with such interruptions only as his
own original conceptions of the part provoked from time to time; or when
any thing he had to say was obviously susceptible of an application to
himself.
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