The representation of Tom Taylor's drama, The Ticket-of-leave-Man by Willacd's Wanderers and members of the A.D.C., ab the Lyceum 'Theatre on Monday night was, in all respects, a complete success. 'Phe house was full'in all parts and the audience testified their approval of the performers' efforts by frequent rounds of hearty applause. The piece is not altogether now to Shanghai; it was first played hero some thirteen' or fourteen years ago and has, we believe, been revived once or twice since that time. The editor of Ben of the Time classes it amongst the most successful earlier comedies of its author, and in this opinion most playgoers will probably concur. If we remember rightly, it made its appearance on the London boards at a time when Dion Boucicault wud playwrights of that stamp were pandering to a taste for morbid wsationalism which had been called forth such dramas as the Colleen Ban, Peep O'Day, etc., ete., and although suine of the then leading professionals wore included in the caste—Mr. Neville and Miss Kate Terry if we mistake not being amongst the number—it did not meet. with very great success, The incidents are of the simplest kind; but some of the characters are so ably drawn by the author that it requires no mean theatrical abilities to present them. The plot turus on the misadventures of a young Lancashire lad who suddenly finds himself the possessor of a considerable fortune and who accordingly is bent on seeing life and he does seo it with a vengeance. Having unwittingly allowed himself to become the tool of a pair of sharpers he is sentenced to penal servitude on a charge of uttering counterfeit notes, Befure his period has expired he returns on a ticket-of-leave to find the world strangely altered, as far as he is concerned. The tenth of the proverb, fucius des census aver ni, sed revol care gradu, de., is impressed on him with terrible emphasis. He gains employment one day only to lose it the next, for gaol-birds must be shunned. But as usual when things are at their worst they sometimes mend; so it proved with Bob Brierly and when the curtain finally descended, with lights half turned down and soft music, his star was once more in the ascendant.' The drama is a long one and to many probably appeared rather heavy; it was, however, well put upon the boards, the acting was excellent, the scenery far above the average and the delineation of character, as will presently be seen, very effective. The following was the case Robert Brierly (a Lancashire Lad) Mr, P. W. Willard, Tames Dalton (alias Dow:
ney, alias The Tiger)... Mfr. C. Kyre. Hawkshaw (a Detective)..dlr. P, P. Congo, Afr. Knight,
Me. Gibson (a Bill-broker)Mr. Titus Oates Sam Willoughby. -Afiss C. Carlton The Public Band, under the direction of Signor Vela composed the orchestra and played a selection of operatic and dance music prior to the rise of the curtain and between the acts, The incidental music, always an important adjunct to the proper representation of a drama, was given on the piano-forte by Mr. Thong? Te was singularly appropriate and well chosen and added greatly to the effect of the more pathetic scones. The scenery and effects were mostly uew. The Bellevue Gardens in the first Act was well arranged, as also was the Bill-broker's office in the third, But the palm must be awarded to the Churchyard night scene in the last Act. This was not only well painted, but the stage business enacted in it was gone through with splendid effect. Nothing could have been more real and lifo-like than the encounter between the thieves and detectives and the ultimate capture of the former by the latter, Had the represonta~ tive of Hawkshaw been "to the manner born" he could not have floored his man or have adjusted the ''darbies" mora scientifically. But it is time we came to the characters. speak of the ladies first; but for the sake of Phe rule of place aus dames prompts us to
regularity, and on the principle of the first being last and the last first, we will take the dramatic persona in the order in which they are given above. Robert Brierly, the hero of the drama found a most able representative in Mr. Willard. Had he lived in Lancashire all his life he could not have caught the true ring of the dialect more correctly than he assumed it on Monday night. Nor is this all; the gradual development of character was perfect, from the first scone in which We see him as a young mau, not naturally badly inclined, but whose head has been turned by his sudden accession to fortune, through the varying incidents of his unwitting commission of the crime, his return from Portland, his employment in, and dismissal from, the bill-broker's office, his being hunted down from place to place, his partial surrender to temptation in a moment of desperation, and his ultimate triumph and vindication, In pour-traying all this Mr. Willard was most effective. Hitherto he has been regarded as a successful low or burlesque comedian; but on Monday night he proved himself to be possessed of far higher powers and to excel in what must always be a singularly difficult branch of his profession. James Dalton was very ably sustained by Ir. C. Eyre. It is one of those thankless reles that seldom or never elicit much applause from an audience, however well they may be played. Dalton is a sample of those accomplished scoundrels who assume so many aliases as to out-do even Proteus himself, In the first act he appears asa species of farmer or cattle drover; in the third as a bill-broker and commission agent, and in the last as a gentleman of no particular occupation. Beneath all three his true character as a an wnscrupulous villain has to be dimly secon by the audience who, of course, as lookers-on, are supposed to see most of the game. All this requires a great deal of versatility and careful by-play on the part of the actor, and it is only fair to Mr. Eyre to say that he accomplished his task most creditably. We have already indirectly
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