an actor's privacy, no order achieve the open sesamé! of his street door, when once closed upon the generous public. There is no free admission for the liberal patrons of the actor but within the walls of the theatre, whence they may pursue him to the utmost limits of open space; but once within his own domestic fence, he is invisible to outward ken.

How, then, are the habits and casualties of an actor's private life to be ascertained? how is the "laudable curiosity" of the world to be satisfied? It is notorious that such individuals are peculiarly jealous of undue personal notice; the more eminent, the more popular an actor is in his professional career, the more reserved and impenetrable to the

general" when once ensconced behind the arras of domestic privacy. The performer who lives in the full glare of the public eye three parts of his life will be found most tenacious of his right to dispose of the fourth without observation, interruption, or publicity; hence it follows, that those who admire the humour of a comedian on the stage little reck what may be his humour elsewhere. The merry droll of farce is probably a very dull fellow in the drama of domestic life; and the man who has made his audience roar with laughter under the reiterated strokes of his comicality may soon after make his children roar with agony under the repeated lashes of his cane; the tender and impassioned lover may be found to be a terribly passionate husband; the submissive wife, a brawling virago; the miser in the scene, a very spendthrift out of it (and vice versú): in short, as no true estimate of the man can be formed from an acquaintance with the actor, it naturally and reasonably becomes a question of some concern, what he really is when his "lendings" are "off," and he returns unto himself: and an inquiry ensues as to how he comports himself with his family and friends; how he eats, drinks, sleeps, walks, talks, when he has no part to play; whether he is what by outward show he appears-namely, a thing of flesh and blood, with appetites, passions, amusements, griefs, and gratifications, in common with his fellow-men; and whether, like them, he is possessed of organs, dimensions, senses, affec

tions; fed with the same food; hurt with the same weapons; subject to the same diseases; healed by the same means; warmed and cooled by the same winter and summer;" or whether he is in fact a thing" of shreds and patches;" a soulless being formed and set apart for the mere purpose of amusement to dull humanity; to be laughed at in a comical garb ; stared at in a gorgeous one; encored in a good song, hissed in a bad one; dismissed from his toil with plaudits or neglect to remain, like other coldblooded animals, torpid, until again drawn forth and warmed into action and the fitful fulfilment of his destiny. The speculation is, indeed, at once delicate and interesting, touching the real nature, feelings, and faculties of actors out of the scene of their histrionic excellence; and it is no mean boast in the writer of these remarks that he has crossed the very threshold which has divided the "curious" from their insight to the private natures and pursuits of public performers; and, having passed the Rubicon, plunged into the very heart of their mystery, he now offers up to his constant readers the conclusion to which his personal observations have brought him-namely, that actors, however they may seem in public, are merely human beings! endowed with the same tastes and faculties as others boast, subject to the like frailties, capable of the same virtues, and liable, alas! to the same errors, and mutations, and all the numerous humours, accidents, and sorrows that mortality is heir to; and, even as "Punch has feelings," so have actors, although they are often treated as if they had none. In fine, gentle reader-theatrical reader!-if you will peruse the following instances, you will find that these, the "abstract and brief chronicles of the time," are, as we ourselves are,-creatures but of time and circumstance, governed by the same casualties, moved by the same weaknesses, open to the same mistakes, instigated by the same temptations, liable to the same-but hold! - something too much of this. We find that we have been edging ourselves into your presence somewhat in the fashion of a pedlar, who brings himself and his pack into your room sideways. In further imitation of his mode of "doing business," we shall

to his bed until proper advice could be had. This tenderness, however, so far from assuaging the agitation of the afflicted man, served only to exasperate his misery, and, apparently, his temper. He struggled, in the greatest excitement, again and again, to render his words intelligible, and after repeated efforts, at length partially succeeded; but his success only conveyed to his hearer additional sorrow and alarm, for, from the nature of the communication so imperfectly made, Mr. Bannister felt now convinced that poor Mr. Heath's intellects were too surely impaired by the shock which his constitution had undergone, and that he no longer knew what he said or did. Under this strengthened conviction of his unhappy friend's dangerous state, Bannister became more and more impatient for the arrival of the medical gentleman, and, in the interim, he again resorted to the soothing system, which, however, produced no better effect upon the unfortunate man than the former attempt to calm him. So far, indeed, from any salutary result, sympathy seemed further to excite him; and finding all oral attempts fail in their object, poor Mr. Heath stamped about the room like a madman; and finally, in the fury of his despair, he seized Mr. Bannister (who was just making his retreat from the supposed maniac in excessive terror) stoutly by the arm, and holding his own head close to the light, he opened wide "the doors of his face," and disclosed to his astonished friend two level rows of gums guiltless of ivory, and apparently long since relieved from all natural responsibilities! In plain terms, Mr. Heath's mouth resembled that of a new-born infant-with this difference, he had evidently cut his teeth. Bannister was appalled, and stood gazing like Macbeth when the murdered Banquo appears before him with his gaping wounds; and he might naturally have exclaimed, in imitation of the guilty thane—

Avaunt, and quit my sight!
Thy gums are toothless;

Thou hast no mastication in those jaws
Which thou dost gape with.
Hence, horrible vacuum—
n-hence!

The truth now broke ludicrously upon the percipient, who, with a

serio-comic expression of condolence upon his friend's embarrassment, was, in spite of his good-nature, inwardly amused by this enforced revelation of a long-guarded secret; and finding it impossible to repress his risibility, he ran once more downstairs in order to have his laugh fairly out, and to countermand the summons to the physician, as well as to make some inquiry about the alleged robbery of Mr. Heath's teeth, which the owner gravely averred to have been taken from him-stolen while he was asleep! The landlord and waiters, almost turned to stone by this account, and the extraordinary accusation annexed to it, accompanied Mr. Bannister back to the chamber wherein the poor destitute gentleman was still diligently seeking for his lost dominos, in which search all present now assisted; nor was it abandoned until every crevice and corner of the room, every place possible and impossible, had been examined with

out success.

Mr. Heath again muttered his conviction that somebody had robbed him of his teeth. By the aid of pencil and paper now supplied, he clearly explained to the anxious group that, previously to his getting into bed the preceding night, he had, after locking the bed-room door, carefully deposited his bran-new set of masticators in the right-hand pocket of his coat, not only for security, but concealment, till the morning; when taking up the coat from the chair near his bedside, whereon he had laid it, he missed his teeth: they had, in fact, been extracted-taken away! What made this account incredible to all present was, that Mr. Heath had confessedly locked the room-door before he shed his teeth, and no one could by any means have entered the apartment until after he had missed them the next morning. It was altogether extraordinary-inconceivable! Nevertheless, the main fact could not be gainsaid: "the gentleman's teeth" were nowhere to be found! The “Establishment" at this period of the case cast simultaneously a furtive glance at "the gentleman's" friend; but Bannister was too much absorbed by the strange event to be aware of the half suspicions that all naturally felt, Mr. Heath included, that he might have something to do with

the alleged abstraction. But no one ventured to breathe their imperfect thoughts; the landlord, indeed, timidly suggested that "it was possible that the gentleman had left his teeth behind him in London, or perhaps dropped them upon the road." But Mr. Heath pettishly repelled the idea; and Mr. Bannister very emphatically bore witness that his friend's teeth were certainly in his mouth during supper-time, and to the best of his belief when they wished each other good night.

Strange and inexplicable as such a theft appeared, it could no longer be doubted. Somebody must have drawn Mr. Heath's teeth while he slept; an operation which might be supposed would baffle the skill and dexterity of Cartwright himself to perform without the concurrence of the owner. At this period of the case the servants of the hotel loudly reasserted their innocence of the alleged abstraction, and became openmouthed to be searched,-a process promptly entered upon by the landlord, who immediately seizing upon the head-waiter, drew from his pocket a tortuous instrument, at first supposed a tooth-drawer, but which proved to be a corkscrew. This, and the indispensable napkin of his calling, was all the property found on the person of either waiter, except a silver-toothpick, left over-night upon the supper-table, and which was now respectfully handed to Mr. Heath, but claimed by Mr. Bannister as his exclusive right. The delicate investigation ended, Mr. Heath admitted that there was not a peg on which to hang further suspicion of the parties examined; and the friends looked at each other, as if asking what was next to be done. Neither could tell; and the bereft gentleman threw himself upon the bed, mumbling his despair in accents at once ludicrous and pitiable.

Mr. Bannister, now that the nature and extent of his friend's disaster were explained, became once more eager to prosecute the original aim of their journey; and he ventured to propose to Mr. Heath to proceed at once to Paris, in spite of his teeth, which he suggested might easily be replaced on their arrival in that city. But to

this proceeding Mr. Heath gave a prompt and decisive negative-naturally enough averse (as his pencil said) to continue, during so long a journey by sea and land, without the power and means of talking or eating. He had, in fact, set his heart upon his first French dinner at Calais; and though Bannister very considerately assured him that genuine French cookery required little or no mastication, and that without any such effort he would relish and enjoy it perfectly, Mr. Heath persisted that it was quite impossible that any dish could prove toothsome to a man in his condition; and declared a fixed conviction, that until he again found his teeth he could not stir a peg.

Poor Bannister, finding that Heath would not bite at his proposition, now despaired of getting on board of the packet that day; and recollecting his own limited time, which allowed him little more than a week in Paris, he felt truly vexed, and, for him, very much out of temper at the provoking contretemps. Moodily seating himself on the edge of the bed, he slowly unfastened the woollen "comfortable" in which he had enveloped his throat for the voyage, and taking it off, thrust it pettishly into the depths of his coat's ample pocket, where some unwonted substance struck sharply against his knuckles, and upon which his fingers the next moment instinctively closed. A short pause ensued, during which might have been observed in Bannister's expressive countenance an indication of speculative surprise, which resolved itself into a grave though ludicrous suspicion that what he held in his hand might have connexion with his friend Heath's calamity— nay, that it might prove to be the i-dentical object so unaccountably missing; and slowly and cautiously dragging forth the complicated machinery, and darting at it a piercing look, compounded of curiosity and wonder at its construction, he timidly held it forth, with even childish embarrassment, while he asked, in his most deep and tragic tones (after one of his habitual Hems), with great naïveté, "Why, Heath, my good fellow, are these your teeth?" (as if, at that moment, they were likely to

prove any body's else!)-" If they are, I assure you, upon my honour, that I am not aware how I came by them; for, as you see, I've plenty of my own, and could have no motive, my good fellow, for depriving you of yours. I really beg your pardon;" at the same time presenting the teeth to his friend with the harlequin jerk of his hands so usual with him, and much in the fashion and smirk that he was wont to offer Fustian the the bill of Silvester Daggerwood, "whose benefit is fixed;" and, with another of his expressive "Hems" in conclusion, he awaited the result.

Without a moment's hesitation the precious fugitives were identified by their right owner, and eagerly snatched from his friend's hand; and Mr. Heath having with prompt dexterity "posted his ivory," he broke forth in most articulate thanksgiving for the recovery of those pearls of price; and every mouth but his own was closed, that had before been gaping with wonder and dismay at the strange affair. Another mystery now remained to be solved; and the question naturally arose, how it came to pass that Mr. Heath's teeth, which he had deposited within his own coat previously to his taking it off, came to be found in the pocket of Mr. Bannister's? Here was a perplexity which none could unravel. Mr. Heath was, however, too well pleased at the unexpected recovery of this vital portion of his animal economy to be over curious as to the manner of its loss; and though somewhat suspicious of his friend having played him a wag's trick, he good-humouredly hastened with him to the vessel, which they happily reached in time for sailing, and it was there reserved

for honest daylight to reveal what night's shadow had so concealed.

The simple fact was, that in the darkness and confusion of the morning's preparations, Mr. Bannister, who was a very absent man, in groping about the room, had unconsciously put on Mr. Heath's coat instead of his own; and Mr. Heath afterwards finding a coat in about the same position in which he had placed his over night, was equally unsuspicious of exchange. Both coats were of similar make, both had metal buttons, and the friends not differing materially in bulk, no thought of malappropriation crossed the mind of either.

In conclusion to this dark transaction, it is necessary to add that the coats, though both of blue cloth, differed by a shade; and the candle at the hotel throwing no light upon the difference, the parties most interested did not discern any variation of tint; and it was not till they confronted each other on the deck of the vessel, "when daylight peeped," that the friends detected the cause of their late embarrassment, they then appeared again in their true colours by resuming their original habits, which, from long and intimate association, were naturally so much alike in all respects.

It may be satisfactory to the reader to be told that these worthy friends and compatriots reached Calais in perfect safety and good spirits, notwithstanding a tedious passage, the wind being smack in their teeth the greater part of the voyage, a circumstance of much annoyance and vexation to every passenger on board, with the exception of Mr. Heath.

haps, than his time of life strictly warranted such distinction; but Bannister's line of acting, after his first few years of tragedy with which he commenced his theatrical career under the tuition and management of Garrick, was sprightly comedy and other youthful characters, of which he kept undisputed possession when youth no longer abided. It was, therefore, desirable that he should keep up as much as possible his juvenile reputa