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diseased V You now hear no more of her chiding * and reproaches No ; all her thoughts are now directed to divert hia from those sorriest fancies , by turning them to the approaching banquet , in exhorting him to conciliate the goodwill and good thoug ht * of h * e guests , b y receiving them with a disengaged air , and cordial , bright , and jovial demeanour . Yes ; smotnering her sufferings in the deepest recesses of her own wretched bosom , we cannot but perceive that she devptes herself entirely to the effort of supporting him .
4 Let it be here recollected , as some palliation of her former very different deportment , she bad , probably , from childhood commanded all around her with a high hand ; had uninterruptedly , perhaps , in that splendid station , enjoyed all that wealth , all that nature had to bestow ; that she had , possibly , no directors , no controllers , and that in womanhood her fascinated lord had never once opposed her inclinations . But
now her new-born relentings , under the rod of chastisement , prpmpt her to make palpable efforts in order to support the spirits of her weaker , and , I must say , more selfish husband . Yes ; in gratitude for his unbounded affection , and in commiseration of his sufferings , she suppresses the anguish of her heart , even while that anguish is precipitating her into the grave , which at this moment is yawning to receive her . '—
Vol . ii . p . 21—25 . From much theatrical record and criticism , all of which is pleasant reading , though the latter be not always convincing logic , we can only make room for a description of the death-scene of Queen Catharine in Henry the Eighth . It is part of a critique
which Mr . Campbell conjectures to have been written by the late Mr . Terry . It bears the mark of a stage-artist , and shows by implication what variety of observation and of power , what nicety of touch as it were ,, is required for the personation of a character , the outline of which is so much more simple than that of many
dramatic heroines : — * There is one feature of her delineation of the sickness unto death which struck us as a remarkable indication of the superiority of her observations of nature , wd her skill in the representation . Instead of that motionless languor , and monotonous imbecility of action and countenance , with which the common-place stage-pictures of sickness are given , Mrs . Siddons , with a curious perception of truth and nature peculiarly her own , displayed , through her feeble and falling frame , and death-stricken expression of features , that morbid fretfulness of look , that restless desire of changing place and position , which frequently attends our last decay . With impatient solicitude she sought relief from the
irritability of illness by the often shifting her situation in her chair ; having the pillows on which she reposed her head every now and then removed and adjusted ; bending forward , and sustaining herself , while speaking , by the pressure of her hands upon her knees ; and playing , during discourse , amongst her drapery with restless and uneasy finger * ' and all this with such delicacy and such effect combined , as gave a most beautiful as well as most affecting portraiture of nature fast approaching
to its exit . * To select passages from this scene for particular admiration would be idle , where tne whole so strongly callt for the revived attention of u *
Untitled Article
646 CtmpMl ' s Lift & # *< Stidd * n $ .
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Aug. 2, 1834, page 546, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2636/page/16/
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