Every one felt that the
lofty patriotism and heroic virtues of the old Roman would find a fit
representative in Lamar. I remember, in our rehearsals, how completely
his identity would be lost in that of Brutus. He seemed to enter into
all the feelings and the motives which prompted the great soul of the
Roman to slay his friend for his country's good. Time has left but one
or two who participated in the play. The grave has closed over Lamar,
as over the others. Those who remain will remember the bearing of their
companion, on that occasion, as extraordinary--the struggle between
inclination and duty--the pathos with which he delivered his speech to
the people after the assassination, but especially his bearing and
manner in the reply to Cassius' proposition to swear the
conspirators--the expansion of his person to all its proportions, as if
his soul was about to burst from his body, as he uttered:
"No, not an oath."
And again, when the burning indignation burst from him at the
supposition of the necessity of an oath to bind honorable men:
"Swear priests, and cowards, and men cautelous,
Old, feeble, carious, and such suffering souls
That welcome wrongs, unto bad causes.
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