and he redoubles in bitterness.  The speech that follows, given with tragic cynicism in every word, is a dirge, not so much for her as for himself.  From that time forth there is nothing human left in him, only ’the fiend of Scotland,’ Macduff’s ‘hell-hound,’ whom, with a stern glee, we see baited like a bear and hunted down like a wolf.  He is inspired and set above fate by a demoniacal energy, a lust of wounds and slaughter.  Even after he meets Macduff his courage does not fail; but when he hears the Thane was not born of woman, all virtue goes out of him; and though he speaks sounding words of defiance, the last combat is little better than a suicide.

The whole performance is, as I said, so full of gusto and a headlong unity; the personality of Macbeth is so sharp and powerful; and within these somewhat narrow limits there is so much play and saliency that, so far as concerns Salvini himself, a third great success seems indubitable.  Unfortunately, however, a great actor cannot fill more than a very small fraction of the boards; and though Banquo’s ghost will probably be more seasonable in his future apparitions, there are some more inherent difficulties in the piece.  The company at large did not distinguish themselves.  Macduff, to the huge delight of the gallery, out-Macduff’d the average ranter.  The lady who filled the principal female part has done better on other occasions, but I fear she has not metal for what she tried last week.  Not to succeed in the sleep-walking scene is to make a memorable failure.  As it was given, it succeeded in being wrong in art without being true to nature.

And there is yet another difficulty, happily easy to reform, which somewhat interfered with the success of the performance.  At the end of the incantation scene the Italian translator has made Macbeth fall insensible upon the stage.  This is a change of questionable propriety from a psychological point of view; while in point of view of effect it leaves the stage for some moments empty of all business.  To remedy this, a bevy of green ballet-girls came forth and pointed their toes about the prostrate king.  A dance of High Church curates, or a hornpipe by Mr. T. P. Cooke, would not be more out of the key; though the gravity of a Scots audience was not to be overcome, and they merely expressed their disapprobation by a round of moderate hisses, a similar irruption of Christmas fairies would most likely convulse a London theatre from pit to gallery with inextinguishable laughter.  It is, I am told, the Italian tradition; but it is one more honoured in the breach than the observance.  With the total disappearance of these damsels, with a stronger Lady Macbeth, and, if possible, with some compression of those scenes in which Salvini does not appear, and the spectator is left at the mercy of Macduffs and Duncans, the play would go twice as well, and we should be better able to follow and enjoy an admirable work of dramatic art.