But this supposition would be entirely erroneous.
The courtiers and citizens themselves were but dull company: it was
chiefly the acting that kept the audience on the benches and out of their
beds.
Without action or wit, what then renders the comedy endurable? It is this:
all the parts are individualities--they speak, each and every of them,
exactly such words, by which they give utterance to such thoughts, as are
characteristic of him or herself, each after his kind. In this respect the
"Court and City" presents as pure a delineation of manners as a play
without incident can do--a truer one, perhaps, than if it were studded
with brilliancies; for in private life neither the denizens of St.
James's, nor those of St. Botolph's, were ever celebrated for the
brilliancy of their wit. Nor are they at present; if we may judge from the
fact of Colonel Sibthorp being the representative of the one class, and
Sir Peter Laurie the oracle of the other.
This nice adaptation of the dialogue to the various characters, therefore,
offers scope for good acting, and gets it. Mr. Farren, in _Sir Paladin
Scruple_, affords what tradition and social history assure us is a perfect
portraiture of an old gentleman of the last century;--more than that, of a
singular, peculiar old gentleman.
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