in his “History of the Stage,” 1749, writes:  “The composition for blackening the face are (sic) ivory-black and pomatum; which is with some pains cleaned with fresh butter.”  The information is given in reference to a performance of Othello by the great actor Barton Booth.  It was hot weather, and his complexion in the later scenes of the play had been so disturbed, that he had assumed “the appearance of a chimney-sweeper.”  The audience, however, were so impressed by the art of his acting, that they disregarded this mischance, or applauded him the more on account of it.  On the repetition of the play he wore a crape mask, “with an opening proper for the mouth, and shaped in form for the nose.”  But in the first scene one part of the mask slipped so that he looked “like a magpie.”  Thereupon he was compelled to resort again to lamp-black.  The early Othellos, it may be noted, were of a jet-black hue, such as we now find on the faces of Christy Minstrels; the Moors of later times have been content to paint themselves a dark olive or light mahogany colour.  But a liability to soil all they touch has always been the misfortune of Othellos.  There was great laughter in the theatre one night when Stephen Kemble, playing Othello for the first time with Miss Satchell as Desdemona, kissed her before smothering her, and left an ugly patch of soot upon her cheek.  However, as Miss Satchell subsequently became Mrs. Stephen Kemble, it was held that sufficient amends had been made to her for the soiling she had undergone.

Another misadventure, in regard to the complexion of Shakespeare’s Moor, has been related of an esteemed actor, for many years past attached to the Haymarket Theatre.  While but a tyro in his profession, he had undertaken to appear as Othello, for one night only, at the Gravesend Theatre.  But, not being acquainted with the accustomed method of blackening his skin, and being too nervous and timid to make inquiry on the subject, he applied to his face a burnt cork, simply.  At the conclusion of the performance, on seeking to resume his natural hue, by the ordinary process of washing in soap and water, he found, to his great dismay, that the skin of his face was peeling off rather than the colour disappearing!  The cork had been too hot by a great deal, and had injured his cuticle considerably.  With the utmost haste, although announced to play Hamlet on the following evening, the actor—­who then styled himself Mr. Hulsingham, a name he forthwith abandoned—­hired a post-chaise and eloped from Gravesend.

Making-up is in requisition when the performer desires to look either younger or older than he or she really is.  It is, of course, with the first-named portion of the art that actresses are chiefly concerned, although the beautiful Mrs. Woffington, accepting the character of Veturia in Thomson’s “Coriolanus,” did not hesitate to assume the aspect of age, and to paint lines and wrinkles upon her fair face.  But she was a great artist, and her loveliness was