are very much relieved at the disappearance of the ghost. We
don't like those dark scenes in pantomimes.

After the usual business, that Ophelia should be turned into
Columbine was to be expected; but I confess I was a little
shocked when Hamlet's mother became Pantaloon, and was instantly
knocked down by Clown Claudius. Grimaldi is getting a little old
now, but for real humour there are few clowns like him. Mr
Shuter, as the gravedigger, was chaste and comic, as he always
is, and the scene-painters surpassed themselves.

"Harlequin Conqueror and the Field of Hastings," at the other
house, is very pleasant too. The irascible William is acted with
great vigour by Snoxall, and the battle of Hastings is a good
piece of burlesque. Some trifling liberties are taken with
history, but what liberties will not the merry genius of
pantomime permit himself? At the battle of Hastings, William is
on the point of being defeated by the Sussex volunteers, very
elegantly led by the always pretty Miss Waddy (as Haco
Sharpshooter), when a shot from the Normans kills Harold. The
Fairy Edith hereupon comes forward, and finds his body, which
straightway leaps up a live harlequin, whilst the Conqueror makes
an excellent clown, and the Archbishop of Bayeux a diverting
pantaloon, &c. &c. &c.

Perhaps these are not the pantomimes we really saw; but one
description will do as well as another. The plots, you see, are
a little intricate and difficult to understand in pantomimes;
and I may have mixed up one with another. That I was at the
theatre on Boxing-night is certain -- but the pit was so full