Print collector's quarterly (4.1914)

which was most picturesquely sordid. The play had
been acted, we believe, and “forgotten, when a very
clever actor, M. Frederic Lemaitre, took upon himself
the performance of the character of Robert Macaire,
and looked, spoke, and acted it to such admirable per-
fection, that the whole town rung witli applauses of
the performance, and the caricaturists delighted to
copy his singulär figure and eostume. M. Robert Ma-
caire appears in a most picturesque green coat, with a
variety of rents and patches, a pair of crimson pan-
taloons ornamented in the same way, enormous
whiskers and ringlets, an enormous stock and shirt-
frill, as dirty and ragged as stock and shirt-frill can
be, the relic of a hat very gaily cocked over one eye,
and a patch to take away somewhat from the bright-
ness of the other—these are the principal pieces of his
eostume—a snuff-box like a creaking warming-pan, a
handkerchief hanging together by a miracle, and a
switch of about the thickness of a man’s thigh, formed
the Ornaments of this exquisite personage. He is a
compound of Fielding’s “Blueskin” and Goldsmith’s
“Beau Tibbs.” He has the dirt and dandyism of the
one, with the ferocity of the other: sometimes he is
made to swindle, but where he can get a Shilling more,
M. Macaire will murder without scruple: he performs
one and the other act (or any in the scale between
them) with a similar bland imperturbability, and ac-
companies his actions with such philosophical remarks
as may be expected from a person of his talents, his
energies, his amiable life and character.
Bertrand is the simple recipient of Macaire’s jokes,
and makes vicarious atonement for his crimes, acting,
in fact, the part which pantaloon performs in the pan-

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