Ladies and Gentlemen, on these grounds, and
backed by the recommendation of three hundred artists in favour of
the Benevolent Fund, I beg to propose its prosperity as a toast for
your adoption.
SPEECH: THE FAREWELL READING. ST. JAMES'S HALL, MARCH 15, 1870.
[With the "Christmas Carol" and "The Trial from Pickwick," Mr.
Charles Dickens brought to a brilliant close the memorable series
of public readings which have for sixteen years proved to audiences
unexampled in numbers, the source of the highest intellectual
enjoyment. Every portion of available space in the building was,
of course, last night occupied some time before the appointed hour;
but could the St. James's Hall have been specially enlarged for the
occasion to the dimensions of Salisbury Plain, it is doubtful
whether sufficient room would even then have been provided for all
anxious to seize the last chance of hearing the distinguished
novelist give his own interpretation of the characters called into
existence by his own creative pen. As if determined to convince
his auditors that, whatever reason had influenced his
determination, physical exhaustion was not amongst them, Mr.
Dickens never read with greater spirit and energy. His voice to
the last retained its distinctive clearness, and the transitions of
tone, as each personage in the story, conjured up by a word, rose
vividly before the eye, seemed to be more marvellous than ever.
Pages:
248
249
250
251
252
253
254
255
256
257
258
259
260
261
262
263
264
265
266
267
268
269
270
271
272