Booth's conjecture. On lifting the cloth the
actor started from the chair with a genuine expression on his features
of that terror which he was used so marvelously to simulate as Richard
III. in the midnight tent-scene or as Macbeth when the ghost of Banquo
usurped his seat at table.
In the pretty willow-woven basket lay the head of Booth's old pensioner,
which head the old pensioner had bequeathed in due legal form to the
tragedian, begging him henceforth to adopt it as one of the necessary
stage properties in the fifth act of Mr. Shakespeare's tragedy of
"Hamlet." "Take it away, you black imp!" thundered the actor to the
equally aghast negro boy, whose curiosity had happily not prompted him
to investigate the dark nature of his burden.
Shortly afterward, however, the horse-stealer's residuary legatee,
recovering from the first shock of his surprise, fell into the grim
humor of the situation, and proceeded to carry out to the letter the
testator's whimsical request. Thus it was that the skull came to secure
an engagement to play the role of poor Yorick in J.
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