enthusiasm to which he was cheerfully
prepared to sacrifice the interests of the theatre,
Kemble had recourse to every expedient prior
to, and on the night of representation, in order
to crush the play. He arranged with a
number of devoted adherents who were
carefully posted in the house, to give himself the
signal for the uproar. The signal agreed upon
was the line which happened to occur in one
of his own speeches—

"And when this solemn mockery is o'er,"

which line he took care to deliver in a
sufficiently pointed manner, and with a
tremendous result. Never had such an uproar,
and such derisive laughter and hooting, been
heard within the walls of that most respectable
theatre. Waiting with great patience
until he could again obtain a hearing, Kemble
came forward, and reiterated the line " with
an expression," as Mr. Ireland tells us, " the
most pointedly sarcastic and acrimonious it
is possible to conceive."

The demonstration upon this assumed all
the indignity of a " row; " and it was kept
up with such effect that not one syllable more
of the play was intelligible. The line occurs
towards the close of the second scene of
Act V.—being the last scene but one of the
drama—prior to which no hostility had been
manifested. Indeed, so decided was the
applause that many—even of the performers
—were confident of success. This was
notwithstanding that Kemble had given several
parts in the play not only to the most
incompetent, but to the most absurd actors he could
find. He had also placed Dignum purposely
in a subordinate part, wherein, speaking of
the sound of trumpets, he had to say "Let
them bellow on," " which words were uttered
with such a nasal and tin-kettle twang that
no muscles save those of adamant could have
resisted."

Malone's " Investigation," which was a final
blow to the pretensions of the play, was not
long in making its appearance. After this,
Mr. Chalmers published, first his " Apology
for the Believers," and then a " Supplemental
Apology," wherein, says Mr. Ireland, " though
advocating the untenable side of the question,
he displayed a far greater depth of antiquarian
research and scholastic reasoning than his
opponent; in short there is scarcely one
position laid down by Malone that is not most
satisfactorily refuted by Chalmers."

Ireland adds that this warfare affected him
only in so far as it caused suffering to his
father, who was even himself accused of
having fabricated the papers, and this, he
avows, was his sole reason for satisfying " the
world" on the subject. The play of Henry
the Second was another Shakspearian
attempt by the same author; but it deceived
few, and attracted generally but little
attention. Mr. Ireland has since made his
appearance as the author of a novel called
"Rizzio." He had previously taken up his
residence in Paris, where Napoleon showed
him favour and attention. In England he was
never forgiven by the distinguished critics,
among whom was Boswell, whom he had
deceived. He returned eventually, however, to
his native country, and died in London not
many years ago.

The name of Allan Cunningham, in
association with this class of literary ingenuity,
brings us down to something like our own
times. It was in the summer of 1809, that
Mr. Cromek, by profession an engraver, visited
Dumfries, in company with Stothard the
painter, for the purpose of collecting materials
and drawings for a new edition of the works of
Burns. He took with him a letter of introduction
to a young stonemason of literary tastes—
ambitious, ardent, and obscure. Their talk was
all about Burns, the old Border ballads, and
the Jacobite songs of the Fifteen and the
Forty-five. Cromek slighted some of Allan's
poems, which it may be supposed the young
bard did not fail to read to him, and sighed
after the old minstrelsy. " The
disappointed poet " (says Mr. Peter Cunningham
in the interesting introduction to his father's
songs) ..." changed the conversation,
and talked about the old songs and
fragments of songs still to be picked up among
the peasantry of Nithsdale." Cromek was
immediately seized with the notion of a
collection; " the idea of a volume of imitations
passed upon Cromek as genuine remains
flashed across the poet's mind in a moment,
and he undertook at once to put down what
he knew, and to set about collecting all that
could be picked' up in Nithsdale and Galloway."
Cromek was delighted with the idea;
the " Collection," with appropriate notes and
illustrations, in due time appeared, and was
pronounced by competent authorities to
breathe the genuine Jacobite spirit which it
was impossible to mistake. Professor Wilson
was the first to detect the " Jacobite spirit"
as not being exactly " proof," and mercilessly
exposed the deception in Blackwood—with
due respect, however, for the original powers
of the poet.

The last successful, and perhaps most
pardonable of literary forgeries, came forth under
the title of Maria Schweidler, the Amber
Witch. The story, (which is supposed to be
told by one Abraham Schweidler, Lutheran
Pastor at Coserow, during the early part of
the Thirty Years' War) appeared at Berlin in
1843, " edited " by Doctor Meinhold. At that
time a school of criticism, of which Dr. Strauss
was the head, gave great offence to faithful
and pious people, by an assumption of critical
infallibility so nice as to discriminate, even in
the Gospels, between what is true and what
the critics were pleased to say is false. Dr.
Meinhold determined to play the Infallibles
a trick. He wrote the Amber  Witch, and
pretended that it had been brought to him by
his sexton; who had found it in a niche in the
church, where it had lain for centuries among