Mr. Brandram's recitation of Hamlet at Willis's Rooms, on Thursday,
was in every way a fine performance. Pro- bably neither the part of Polonius nor that of Osric has ever been better or so well given on the stage. With regard to Polonius, he struck just the right mean between the concep- tion of him which dwells on his pompousness and vanity, and that which dwells on the shrewdness of his worldly wisdom. And the delicacy and tenderness of Mr. Brandram's Ophelia was still more marvellous. In Hamlet himself the soliloquies —at least, the meditative soliloquies—were made quite too much of set speeches, though the soliloquies in which Hamlet expresses his impatience of his own halting and irresolute purpose were given with a force and fire, and yet a thorough naturalness, greater than we have ever seen on the stage. Mr. Irving renders the argument with himself—the argument of reverie—better than Mr. Brandram, Mr. Brandram the passion of self-scorn better than Mr. Irving.
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