Page:Sketches of representative women of New England.djvu/75

56 of us like best to think of her. Here she is a radiant figure. Presence, manner, voice, all contribute to an impression that is sometimes wonderful.

She is sometimes spoken of as a public reader, why I know not, for she never reads. She carefully memorizes her selections, and this all the way from a lyric of Whittier to a drama of Shakespeare. Thus steeping her mind in them, she can not only interpret them, but incarnate them. Their humor, piety, passion, pathos, smile and aspire and glow and weep in her. She is extremely fond of Browning, has studied him widely and deeply, and in her public recitations done not a little to extend his influence. It seems a daring thing to carry Browning to a popular audience, but she has done this repeatedly with superb success. She has great power of personation, through which the successful presentation of an elaborate drama has been with her a frequent achievement. Browning's "Blot in the 'Scutcheon" she has rendered to audiences of three thousand, which she enthralled. I once heard her render "The Merchant of Venice," in herself a whole troupe of dramatic stars. Every feature of the rendering charmed me; but the feature that especially impressed me was the facility with which she transformed herself into the likeness of her various characters. That Antonio should come before us was not surprising, for he opens the play, and the personation of one character is achievement with which we are familiar; but Salarino and Solanio and Bassanio and Gratiano were as distinctly there. In the flow of the dialogue so many men could not have preserved the individuality of these characters more successfully. Afterward, in a group of those who had been present, it was interesting to hear them give judgment as to her better part: it occurred to no one to specify her poorer. To me her more successful personation seemed her Shylock. If there be moral advantage in seeing in vice its own deformity, we received a useful lesson that evening. But there was her Portia, and some were sure that her higher achievement was the personation of her. Others saw the finer stroke in some aspect of her recital of the billing and cooing of Lorenzo and Jessica. Through all, however, it was a discussion of excellences: she had given us nothing else for discussion.

From a mass of press notices of her work I learn that her more recent recitals have been the "Blot in the 'Scutcheon," before mentioned, and Stephen Phillips's "Paolo and Francesca." From their great variety of character, their delicate shadings of sentiment, their pathos, triumph, tragedy, for one person to present these dramas even passably well would require talent of a high order. Yet these notices are one and all testimonials, not of fair achievement, but of proud success. They come from diverse sources, but there is no difference in the general judgment; and they impart to my mind the suspicion that in these later efforts she has beaten her best hitherto. While, however, there is no difference in the general judgment, there is a difference in the point of emphasis. Prevailingly they witness to the general and popular effect. One or two write, as artists, of the manner, personation, intonation. Neither order of representation can be adequate: for any just account of her, both are absolutely needful. While our friend has studied her art broadly and deeply, its spirit has become life within her. Hence, when she deals with a public assembly, there is no suggestion of artifice. All seems as natural as her most quiet parlor conversation. Nothing is for effect, nothing is exaggerated. Rant, by which like artists of a lower order seek to prosper, and unhappily often do, is far, far from her. There is such harmony of detail with detail, and all so related to the grand meaning of the whole as to make it a scene of life that is offered you. In other words, her art is obscured by its own perfection.

All who know Mrs. Humphrey-Smith talk of her voice, its richness of tone, its range, its flexibility. Its carrying power is a striking feature. An audience of three thousand in a hall of the best acoustic construction will test the powers of a good speaker; yet Mrs. Humphrey-Smith has recited with ease and success to six thousand people out of doors. This suggests a feature of her voice that has interested me. it is precisely the voice I used to hear in that country school-house. In the utterance of the stormiest dramatic passion any schoolmate