As might have been expected, a very good audience assembled on Tlursday evening to witness the first amateur performance of the season, We have been passing through a time of deadly dulness for some weeks past 1 and wretchedness generally go hand-and, and while the weather was too for outside recreations, it was too and close for the proper enjoyment of ix door pleasures. Now, however, the chill, bright, healthy period of autumn has fairly set in, and the amusements proper to the time of year have been suitably inaugurated by the opening of the Lyceum for the winter season.
Both pieces selected for the performance of Thursday night have been given in Shanghai before. The wisdom of this step may certainly be called in question. It is, we think, only safe to repeat plays familiar toa Shanghai audience when the management is able to put them on the stage with 'a very much stronger cast than on the first, occasion; and we fear that, in public opinion, the management had not that excuse on Thursday. But, to review the performance in detail. The farce of the 'Two Bonnycastles' went off extremely well, as indeed it could scarcely fail to do with such excellent supporters as Messrs. Super, Oates, and Mumm. If it were not invidious to single out one for special pra where all were good, we should be inclined to give the palm to Mr. Super, "His make, up was perhaps rather too farcical: but his play was admirable, and had a most inspiriting influence upon both his fellow-actors and the andicnee. Mr. Oates as Smuggins fully sustained a deservedly high reputation, and looked his part as well as he represented it—which is saying a great deal. Mr. Jules Mumm has much' improved since we had last the pleasure of seeing him, and is one of the most useful members of the company. His by-play is quiet and natural, he is never ata loss what to do with his hands, he makes perhaps even more points than the author intended, and is always distinctly heard. Miss Crook, the representative of the buxom Mrs, Bonnycastle, was excellently made up, and played the pact with spirit while Miss Godesh and Miss Nye, who, we are told, appear for the first time, give nood promise for the future, Altogether the farce went off very well indeed, and the curtain fell amid a tempest of applause.
'The Porter's Kuot,' which was the piece of the evening, was, to begin with, an_ unfortunate selection. It is a poorly: written thing at be: Everything is left to the actors, who must often curse the author in their hearts for making them do such foolish things and say euch foolish words. A playwright who can deliberately condem a man to advance to the footlights, address his siancée by saying:—I have no secret, except that, dearest Alice! I love you"—and then leave him there, to get out of his absurd position as best he may, with the vapid sentence unsupported by any rejoinder—onght to be made to play the part himself; we can conceive ho sharper punishment. After admiring Mr. Super in the farce, we were compelled to pity him in the drama. The part ho had to play was in every respect a most ungrateful one. Gussy Burr is stick, and it would require a Conway or a Harcourt not to appear like a stick too, in playing him. Me. Knight was more fortunate, His role gave him an_excollent opportunity of displaying his undoubted talents, and it is not too much to say that ho took full advantage of it. His make-up was excelent, and the only hole, we can pick in his performance is that his'accent was rather too refined for the character he represented, Next, perhaps, to Mr. Knight, we are inclined to place Mr. Wrongman, who played the part of Smoothly Smirk, He was capitally dressed, and though he over-acted alittle the audience wore thankful to him for doing something, at any rate, to relieve the flatness which, by the time he appeared, was beginning to steal over the performance. Mr. Ginger's reading of Captain Oakum was ood, though a little conventional; and Mr. Jules Mumm wasa most characteristic Scatter. With regard to the ladies—who were. very tastefully dressod,—our task la a little dificult. Miss St. George left little to be desired in the part of Alice, and struggled manfully with the difficulties so profusely strewn in her path by the author. Her by-play, too, was good; a little more vivacity might have been an improvement, but there was more to praise than to blame in her efforts. Miss Herbert had still greater obstacles to encounter. There is nothing reprehensible in the inability of a yourly man to look, walk, and speak like an old countrywoman, especially when the words that are put into his mouth are so peculiarly feeble as those assigned to Mrs. Burr. Her make-up, too, was decidedly tuo young, Otherwise she did her best witha rather unsuitable part, and no one can do more. The depressing influences of the piece itself could scarcely but be felt by the actors, who, on the 1g of the curtain up on the second act, found them-res playing very empty house. Even the splendid instrumentation of the band of the 7 is, appreciated and applauded as it was, proved inadequate to counteract the duluess of the play. We can only hope that on the next occasion
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.