Page:The lives of the poets of Great Britain and Ireland to the time of Dean Swift - Volume 4.djvu/190

180 ; he had a grave countenance, a good perſon, an air of dignity, a melodious voice, and a very manly action. He ſpoke juſtly, his cadence was grateful to the ear, and his pronunciation was ſcholaſtically correct and proper. He ſo far inſinuated himſelf into the favour of Engliſh gentlemen in Ireland, and found his reputation growing to ſo great a heighth, that he returned home in 1701, to make a trial of his talents on the Britiſh ſtage. He accordingly applied to lord Fitzharding, of the bedchamber to Prince George of Denmark, and was by him recommended to Mr. Betterton, who took him under his care, and gave him all the aſſiſtance in his power, of which Mr. Booth greatly profited.

Never were a tutor and pupil better met; the one was capable of giving the beſt inſtructions in his own performance, and the other had a promptneſs of conception, a violent propenſity, and a great genius. The firſt part Booth performed in London was Maximus in Valentinian, a play of Beaumont and Fletcher’s originally, but altered, and brought upon the ſtage by the earl of Rocheſter. The reception he met with exceeded his warmeſt hopes, and the favour of the town had a happy effect upon him, in inſpiring him with a proper degree of confidence without vanity. The Ambitious Step-mother, a tragedy written by Mr. Rowe, in which that author has thrown out more fire, and heat of poetry, than in any other of his plays, was about this time introduced upon the ſtage; the part of Artaban was aſſigned to Booth, in which he raiſed his character to ſuch a heighth, as to be reckoned only ſecond to his great maſter.

In the year 1704 he married Miſs Barkham, daughter to Sir William Barkham of Norfolk, bart. who lived with him ſix years, and died without iſſue. In