STEPHEN MASSETT AT THE ODD FELLOWS' HALL.

Evening Post, Volume XVI, Issue 79, 16 March 1878, Page 2

STEPHEN MASSETT AT THE ODD FELLOWS' HALL.

There was a large and fashionable audience at the Odd Fellows' Hall last night, when Mr. Stephen Massett made his first bow to a Wellington public. Whether in pathos or humor, his manner is perfectly natural, his voice sympathetic, and his delivery that of a pastmaster in the art of elocution. Commencing with "The Beggar and His Dog," Mr. Massett •it once ingratiated himself with his audience. His second recitation — " The Dame with the Camelias " — was to our mind the gem of the evening, in its realistic power and depth of feeling. " Betsy and I are out" — a touching piece, iv which an old American farmer is supposed to be giving instructions to a lawyer to draw up a deed ot separation, after he has lived over twenty years with his wife, left a sad impression on the audience, which was only relieved by the sequel—" How Betsy and I made it up." That most touching scene from the pen of Dickens, the death of Poor Jo, preceded an intensely laughable sketch, representing a French woman with an imperfect knowledge of Euglish, and an Englishman with au impediment in his speech trying to do the love scene in " The Lady of Lyons." In the first part of the entertainment Mr. Massett sung several ballads of his own composition. That of " Sunset " was encored. His imitation of Madame Anna Bishop in " Home, Sweet Home" was capital, and received a vociferous encore. The second part was almost entirely devoted to mimicry. Representations of tho different styles of Artemus Ward, Mark Twain, Charles Dickens, Kean, Thackeray, and Charles Clark succeeded each other with great rapidity. Mr. Massett has the happy knack of seizing upon some peculiarity of the speaker, and he presents it with such exactitude that an instantaneous recognition is certain. Life on board a White Star steamer, with the inevitable concert, gave Mr. Massett an excellent sketch ; and h,is illustration of a bass, tenor, and soprano in comic opera displayed to its fuHest extent the wonderful capabilities of his. voice, *' The Charge of the Ljght Brigade," delivered by special request, brought the entertainment to a close, _______^_________