BARRETT.
BARRETT.
ing ill the Chambers street theatre. Mr. Burton,
who had jiist oiiened a new liouse. afterwards called
"Winter Garden theatre, was pleased with Barrett's
acting and engaged him to play minor parts in
the new theatre. In the season of 1S62-'G3, he
had risen to the part of leading man, snpi>orting
Eihvin Booth, Mary Provost, Mrs. D. P. Bowers,
and others. In 186-4 he went south with Lewis
Bilker, and undertook the management of the old
Varieties theatre in New Orleans, La. There he
played for the first time such parts as Hamlet
and Richelieu, and Eliot Grey in Lester Wallack's
'• Rosedale." He made his first trip abroad in
IsiiT, returning in the latter part of that year, and
afterward taking a sea journey to California.
In February, 18G9, he played Hamlet in Maguire's
opera house in San Francisco. While in that city
he undertook, in connection with John McCul-
lough, the maimgement of the new California
theatre, retaining his interest for nearly two
years. He returned to New York in the summer
of 1870 and played Cassius at Niblo's tlieatre, with
E. L. Davenport as Brutus, and Walter Mont-
gomery as Marc Antony. The following winter
he played %vith Edwin Booth at Bootli's theatre,
acting Laertes, Othello and DeMauprat to Booth's
Hamlet, lago, and Richelieu, and also appearing
as Leontes in "Winter's Tale." In June, 1871,
he first acted James Harebell in "The Man of
Airhe " at Booth's, and in December assumed the
management of the new Varieties theatre in New
Orleans, La., remaining in New York to act Cas-
sius in Edwin Booth's revival of "Julius Csesar."
He went to New Orleans in March, 1872, and
played with great success in many roles, among
them Hamlet, Richelieu, Shylock, Richard III..
Cassius, Raphael in " The Marble Heart," Alfred
Evelyn in " Money," Dazzle in " London Assur-
ance," Manuel in "The Romance for a Poor
Young ^lan," Harebell, Romeo, and King Lear.
Returning to Booth's in 1875 he added to his rep-
ertoire "Daniel Druce, Blacksmith," by W. R.
Gilbert, Mr. Barrett taking the title roll. In 1877
he went to Cincinnati, O., playing "A Counter
feit Presentment," and in 1878 played " Yorick's
Love" in Cleveland, both Mr. Howell's plays. In
1881 he went to Chicago, and in 1883 to Phila-
delphia, attracting large and enthusiastic audi-
encos. He played in the Lyceum theatre, London,
in the spring of 1884, and in the fall of the same
year again ajjpeared in New York city, having
two new plays — " A Blot on the 'Scutcheon," by
Robert Browning, and "The King's Pleasure,"
by Theodore de Banville. In the fall of 1886 he
became the manager of Edwin liooth's tours, and
in 1887-'88 and 1888-'89 played with that actor
in "Julius C;esar," "Othello," "Hamlet," and
other plays. He made four tours of Euro])e, but
was receive<l with some coldness by English
a udiences. The best critics hesitated to call Mr.
Barrett great, or called him great with some
reservations. His art was acijuired rather than
original, and acquired only by the most assid-
uous labor of an earnest and highly intellectual
man. His appearance on the stage cannot better
be described than by the words of AVilliam
Winter, written shortly after Barrett's death:
" His coming was always a signal to arouse the
mind. His mental vitality impressed even un-
sympathetic beholders with a sense of fiery
thought struggling in its fetters of mortality and
almost shattering and consmiiing the frail temple
of its human life. His stately head, silvered with
graying liair, his dark eyes deeply sunken and
glowing with intense light, his thin visage, i)allid
with study and pain, his form of grace, and voice
of sonorous eloquence and solemn music (in com-
pass, variety and sweetness, one of the few great
voices of the current dramatic generation), his
tremendous earnestness, his superb bearing, and
his invariable authority and distinction, all those
attributes united to announce a ruler and leader
in the reahn of intellect. " Lawrence Barrett was
said to be essentially the student and scholar of
the theatre, and it is undeniable that he was a
man of unusual intellectual power. But the
chief characteristic of his nature was his un-
swerving adherence to what he believed to be
right. A biographer said of him, " He never spoke
a false word or knowingly harmed a hiiman being
in all his life." He was a prominent member of
the Players' club in New York, the author of
" Edwin Forrest " (1881), and " Charlotte Cush-
man " (1889). He died in New York city, March
20, 1891.
BARRETT, William E., representative, was born at Melrose, Mass., Dec. 29, 1858. He was graduated from Dartmouth college in 1880, and became assistant editor on the Messenger, St. Albans, Vt., where he remained for two years. In 1882 he connected himself with the Boston Daily Advertiser, and was sent to Washington as regular correspondent for that paper. In 1886 Mr. Barrett left Washington to take the position of president of the Advertiser newspaper com- pany, publishers of the Advertiser and Evening Record. He was elected a representative to the Massachusetts legislature in 1887, '88, "89, '90, "91, '93; became speaker of the house in 1889, and was re-elected every year to 1893 without opposition. In 1891 he was the Republican nominee for gov- ernor. He was elected a representative to the 54th U. S. Congress on the Republican ticket, and made himself conspicuous by his attitude on the Venezuelan matter, and by his efforts for the impeachment of Mr. Bayard, United States ambassador to Great Britain. He was re-elected to the 55th Congress in 1896.
