the late patriotic Serjeant Glynn, he took the lead in the court of Common Pleas. Mr. Grofe had the happiness of uniting what very few attain, the talent of a special pleader with a confiderable portion of eloquence.

In 1787, without the intervention of great friends, powerful alliances, or parliamentary intereft, he was raised to a feat in the court of King's Bench, of which he is now the third judge and foon after this promotion his majesty conferred the honour of knighthood upon him.

In his judicial capacity, he has conducted himself so as to avoid reflection or reproach; and this, in the prefent times, evinces no fmall degree of integrity. Being entirely unconnected with political parties, he cannot reasonably hope to fucceed to the Chief Jufticeship of either of the courts, and therefore has no other object in view-but to difpense justice with credit to himself and advantage to the public; for he is now arrived at what to him may be looked on as the ne plus ultra of his profeffion.

P.

MR. KEMBLE

IS brother to the celebrated actress, Mrs. Siddons, and the eldest fon of Mr. Roger Kemble, who was many years manager of an itinerant company of comedians.

When a boy, Mr. K. ufed to appear on his father's ftage in fuch characters as fuited his age, but was not by him defigned for a theatrical life. The Kemble family are catholic, and the old gentleman placed his fon John at a Roman catholic, academy in Staffordshire; whence he was sent to the English college at Douay, in order to be qualified for the church.

While there, he was equally noted for the ftrength of his memory, and admired for his happy mode of delivery.

But being at length tired of the college trammels, he for fook his ftudies, and returned to England, before the age of twenty, without his father's confent. Having landed at Briftol, he walked to Gloucefter, where hearing that the company was at Brecknock, he proceeded thither, but met with a cool reception; his father, indeed, actually refused to relieve him; but the actors generously affifted him with money, by way of fubfcription, to which his father, according to a report, which we truft is unfounded, was with difficulty perfuaded to add a guinea!

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On this, he returned to Gloucestershire with his pittance, and joined Chamberlin's company, with whom he made his firft effay on the ftage of a small town in that county. His profits from this were fcanty and his diftress great, which fometimes involved him in rather ludicrous fituati

ons.

Kemble's chief fault feemed to be an unaccountable negligence, but he was ftill looked on as a rifing actor. In hopes of procuring more profit and reputation than his prefent fituation afforded him, he joined with the manager of Cheltenhom theatre, in order to give a miscellaneous entertainment. Young Kemble was to lecture, and his partner to entertain the company with flight-of-hand tricks! Kemble obtained great credit by his eloquence, but neither of them gained much money; and we have only to lament, that fuch men fhould have been reduced fo low by the frowns of the fickle goddess.

After this, our theatrical hero joined a company at Worcefter, where he remained until his fifter introduced him to Mr. Younger; from which time he gradually improved, until he obtained a high degree of eminence in his profeffion.

About this period he produced " Belifarius," a tragedy, and a poem called "The Palace of Mercy."

From Younger's company he was introduced to that of Mr. Wilkinson, at York; who being appointed manager at Edinburgh, took him along with him; there he was well received, and delivered a lecture on oratory, which gained him reputation as a man of letters.

Mr. Kemble played, in Dublin in 1782, at Smock-alley theatre, and succeeded admirably, particularly in Jephson's "Count of Narbonne." His fifter foon after procured him an engagement at Drury-lane theatre.

His first appearance in the metropolis was in Hamlet, and but few first appearances in London have given greater fatisfaction. His folemn demeanor and style of acting are admirably fuited to the character. He has often repeated it, but always in an improved ftate; and his Hamlet is now, perhaps, as finished a portrait as any on the stage. Since that period he has performed a great variety of tragic characters, always refpectably, and fometimes with acknowledged excellence.

His perfon, action, and deportment, joined to a distinct and claffical utterance, fit him particularly for a tragedian. The pathetic complaints of Jaffier are, however, delivered with torpor, nor is his voice equal to the burfts of rage in Richard, or Macbeth. In the lover he is alfo defective; but in the defpair of Beverly, the jealousy of Othello, and the inquietude of royal John, he is peculiarly fuccessful. His great fault is the always aiming at being original, in which he frequently fails; but yet in those attempts he fometimes ftrikes out new beauties. On the whole, he is one of the firft performers of the prefent day.

4

Mr. Kemble has produced a farce called the " Projects," and has altered Bickerstaff's comedy of " 'Tis Well it's no Worfe", into a farce called the "Pannel," as well as

Louvet's

Louver's "Lodoifka;" he has also fitted the old play of «Love in many Masks" for the modern stage.

On Mr. King's quitting the management of Drury-lane, Mr. Kemble was appointed his fucceffor; but it is certain the house under his control was not very fuccessful: this, however, may be attributed partly to want of taste in the town, and partly to want of countenance in a certain quarter; for he affuredly poffeffes the talents requifite to judge of new pieces, and a fufficient knowlege of the stage to get up fuch as are old in the best manner.

Mr. Kemble married the widow of the late Mr. Brereton. It is laid that the daughter of a deceased minifter of state was strongly attached to him, which coming to the father's ears he prudently offered a fortune of 3000/, on condition he would marry, immediately, any lady he liked. He accordingly caft his eyes on Mrs. Brereton, and thus fecured to himself a confiderable acceffion of fortune, and a most excellent wife.

MISS SEWARD,

THIS lady, fo well known, and so much respected in the literary world, is the only daughter of the reverend Mr. Seward, rector of Eyam, in Derbyshire; prebendary and canon-refidentiary of Litchfield,

Being an author himself, he was fond of giving his daugh ter a tafte for letters, particularly poetry; and at the early age of three years the could repeat the L'Allegro of Milton; and at nine fhe could recite the three first books of Paradife Loft with spirit and propriety. About the fame age the converted several of the pfalms into English verse.

Bu

But her mother not approving this turn for poetry, perfuaded her to relinquifh her literary purfuits; fhe ftill, however, indulged now and then in her beloved occupation, and facrificed by ftealth to the mufes..

A friend of the family happening to doubt whether the poems fhewn as her's had not received fome paternal affiftance, he called one evening when he knew her father was absent, and requested the young lady to favour him with a few lines on any subject, adding "Let me write a stanza, " and you finish it," he accordingly indited one, and left her: on the fucceeding morning fhe prefented him with fome verses, which convinced him of her merit and his own injustice.

On the death of an only and beloved fifter, which happened a few years after, fhe wrote an Elegy as fhe was fitting in the garden. Other poems flowed rapidly from her pen; and becoming acquainted with the late Lady Miller, of Bath-Easton, she was a frequent and fuccefsful candidate for the prize bestowed at that villa.

Her first regular publication was a beautiful Elegy on the death of Captain Cook, which, with an "Ode to the Sun" (a Bath-Easton prize poem), were published in quarto (1780). In the course of the next year, the composed a "Monody" on her friend Major André. These two productions induced Dr. Darwin to fay, that fhe was the inventress of "epic elegy." Since that period, fhe has written "A Poem to the "Louifa," a poetical novel; an Ode on "Gen. Elliot's return from Gibraltar;" and "Llangollen Vale."

Memory of Lady Miller;"

Mifs Seward has alfo diftinguished herself as a tranflator, for fhe has clothed one of the most elegant of the Latin poets in an English drefs, having presented the public with a new verfion of feveral of the Odes of Horace. They have been thought fomewhat too diffufe, but are allowed to exhibit proofs of a claffiçal taste and fine imagination.

EARL