With Mrs. Oldfield the picture was far different.  She could not make of Thomson’s tragedy a success, yet she played Sophonisba (one of the last parts in which she was ever seen) with a grandeur of effect that well earned the undying gratitude of the author.[A] In after years her old admirers were wont to thrill with pleasure as they recalled the passionate intensity she gave to that much-quoted line,

  “Not one base word of Carthage, for thy soul,”

as she stood glaring at the astonished Massinissa.

[Footnote A:  Mrs. Oldfield, in the character of Sophonisba, has excelled what, even in the fondness of an author, I could either wish or imagine.  The grace, dignity, and happy variety of her action have been universally applauded, and are truly admirable.—­Thomson.]

Among those who saw Sophonisba was Chetwood, whose “General History of the Stage” gives us many a charming glimpse of dead and gone actors.  Dead and gone?  Nay, rather let it be said that they still live in the ever fresh and graphic pages of contemporary critics, and thus refute the gentle pessimism of Mr. Henley when he asks so gracefully: 

  “Where are the passions they essayed,
  And where the tears they made to flow? 
  Where the wild humours they portrayed
  For laughing worlds to see and know? 
  Othello’s wrath and Juliet’s woe? 
  Sir Peter’s whims and Timon’s gall? 
  And Millamant and Romeo? 
  Into the night go one and all.”

“I was too young,” says Chetwood, “to view her first dawn on the stage, but yet had the infinite satisfaction of her meridian lustre, a glow of charms not to be beheld but with a trembling eye! which held her influence till set in night.”

Of Nance’s tendency to escape tragic plays the same writer tells us:  “When ‘Mithridates’ was revived, it was with much difficulty she was prevail’d upon to take the part; but she perform’d it to the utmost length of perfection, and, after that, she seem’d much better reconcil’d to tragedy.  What a majestical dignity in Cleopatra! and, indeed, in every part that required it:  Such a finish’d figure on the stage, was never yet seen.  In ‘Calista, the Fair Penitent,’ she was inimitable, in the third act, with Horatio, when she tears the letter with

  “’To atoms, thus! 
  Thus let me tear the vile detested falsehood,
  The wicked lying evidence of shame!’

“Her excellent clear voice of passion, with manner and action suiting, us’d to make me shrink with awe, and seem’d to put her monitor Horatio into a mousehole.  I almost gave him up for a troublesome puppy; and though Mr. Booth play’d the part of Lothario, I could hardly lug him up to the importance of triumphing over such a finish’d piece of perfection, that seemed to be too much dignified to lose her virtue.”

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