DEATH OF MRS. GEORGE DARRELL.

Globe, Volume XXII, Issue 1831, 5 January 1880, Page 3

DEATH OF MRS. GEORGE DARRELL.

There are yen? few of our readers but will aee with regret'in this morning’s telegrams the announcement of the death of Mrs Geo. Darrell. This favorite actress has for some years past been in delicate health, and the fatal result of her last illness has not been altogether unexpected. To give anything like a faithful memoir of Mrs Darrell would be to write a history of the colonial stage of which, for upwards of twenty years she was one of the brightest ornaments. The deceased lady may bo said to have been cradled in the theatrical profession, her father, Mr Cathcart, being for many years a leading actor in the principal theatres of England and Scotland, and an oc o asional member of the companies at Drury Lane and Sadlers’ Wells, in London. When she was little more than a girl the writer saw Fanny Oathcart (Mrs Darrell’s maiden name) perform Pauline in the “Lady of Lyons,” for her father’s benefit in the old Adelphi Theatre, in Obristain street, Liverpool, Mr Cathcart sustaining the character of Colonel Damas, and Ur James Cathcart, Mrs Darrell’s brother, Claude. This was over twenty-eight years ago. Not very long after, Miss Cathcart was induced by the wellknown Australian manager, Mr George Coppin, to visit Victoria as juvenile tragedienne, to support the late G. V. Brooke, Robert Heir, the deceased lady’s first husband, and a most excellent actor and genial man, being a leading member of the company. The career of Mrs Darrell thus brilliantly commenced in the old Olympic Theatre, in Lonsdale street, better known to its habitues as the “Iron Pot,” has scarcely received a check up to the termination of her life. As Mrs Robert Heir she visited the whole of the colonies, and her name was a household word not only in Melbourne, but in Sydney, Adelaide, Hobart Town, and of late years in every city in New -Zealand. Independently of her great engagements, in which she appeared in conjunction with Brooke, Montgomery, Barry Sullivan, James Anderson, Charles Dillon, and indeed almost every great actor that visited the colonies, she was an immense favorite on all ttie diggings and inland towns of the Australian continent, and thousands will read of her death with feelings cf sorrow and regret. In her early Australian career Mrs Darrell had to compete for public favor with Mrs Charles Young (Mrs Hermann Vczin), and at a later day with Miss Cleveland, Miss Ellen Mortyn, and Miss Adelaide Bowring, but the hold she obtained from the first on the affection and admiration of colonial playgoers, not only by her fine histrionic talent, and exquisite taste, combined with her amiable disposition and winning manner, she retained until the end, and it will be very long botore the memory of the deceased actress is forgotten, or her reputation eclipsed by a rival. Mrs Darrell visited New Zealand for the first time about 1867, her then husband, Mr Heir, dying on the passage from Melbourne to the Bluff. After performing in Dunedin, Christchurch, and Wellington she ■went to Auckland where in partnership with Mr John Bennett she opened the theatre Royal in Grahumstown, and played n most brilliant engagement, and twelve months later there acted with Mr Henry Talbot, the English tragedian. In Grahamstown the deceased lady became united to Mr George Darrell, who was a member of the company, and the union was a most happy one. Her subsequent career is well known. Belonging to what is very frequently and sneeringly termed the “old school” of acting as distinguished from the “ modern and flippant ” one, Mrs Darrell was almost alone in her particular speciality as a Shakespearian actress. Her elocution was almost perfect, indeed, bat for a little too measured style in her delivery, she was only a little inferior to Mrs Charles Keane, and Miss Cleveland and Miss Browering were the only actresses who approached her. A grand appearance, a handsome face, a powerful yet musical voice, and an innate dignity in her deportment, were the gifts nature had given her, and to these she herself added_ sound judgment, cultivated taste, and feminine refinement. Combined they made her what she was, the favorite actress par excellence of Australia, and her name will only be forgotten when her great coadjutor, G. V. Brooke, ceases to be remembered. Those who only remember her in the later days of her life, when bravely struggling against a mortal complaint, can hardly realise her greatness as an actress in her palmy days. Mrs Darrell’s best characters were: Lady Macbeth, Hermoine, “Winter’s Tale”; Volumuia, “ Ooriolanus ” ; Rosa'ind, “As You Like It”; Beatrice, “Much Ado About Nothing" ; Leah, and Lady Isabel, “ East Lynne.” Mrs Darrell leaves a very large circle of friends, private and professional, to mourn her demise. With regard to her fellow-artistes, male and female, there will be but one feeling of wide and heartfelt regret, at the loss of one who was endeared to them, not only by long years of artistic association, but by the sterling qualities that make up a truly good woman.