Text: C. F. Briggs (?), Literary, Broadway Journal (New York), April 5, 1845, vol. 1, no. 14, p. ??

[page 216:]

MR. HUDSON, THE NEW LECTURER ON SHAKSPEARE.

WE present our readers with a sketch of this popular lecturer, as he appears in the desk, while delivering his unique remarks on the Shaks-pearian age. We have already awarded to Mr. Hudson the claim of a Genius. His peculiarities are very striking, and his manner provincial in the extremest degree. He might have served Mr. Halliburtou as a model for Sam Slick, and if he should ever repeat his lectures in England, we have no doubt that he would be taken for the onginal of that happy creation. He is a yankee of the Yankees, and would, as such, create a sensation in London. It is just the place for him to make his fortune in, and if he is the real yankee that we take him for, he will certainly repeat his lectures in that city. We cut from an exchange paper a brief account of his career, from which it will be seen that he is the maker of his own fortunes. It is said, or rather he says it himself, that he delivered eleven lectures in Cincinnati, and seven in Boston, before be got a full audience. He has succeeded wherever he has made an attempt to gain an audience, and we have no doubt that success will still follow him. He is one of those who compel it.

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“In youth Mr. Hudson was sent to learn the blacksmith's trade, at which he labored till the age of eighteen. The individual with whom he passed these important years of his life entirely neglected his education and afforded him scarcely the means of comfort. Uuder such circumstances, the young apprentice was transferred from the shop of the blacksmith to that of a coachinaker, to which occupation he applied himself diligently four years more — three years as apprentice and one as a journeyman.

“Up to this time, the advantages which he enjoyed for improving his intellectual capacities were very slight, and by no means satisfactory to one who had even an ordinary degree of mental gifts. Ile had for some time felt the want of an education, and at length resolved to obtain it; preparing himself for a collegiate career, he entered the University in Middlebury, Vt., adjoining his native town, and graduated there in 1840.

“After his graduation, Mr. H. went to the South to engage as a teacher. lie spent one year in Kentucky and subsequently two years in Huntsville, Alabama; and while occupied in this little retired town, he wrote for his own gratification, and for the purpose of occupying an ever restless mind, his lectures oo Sbakspeare. At first they wore read before a few persons in Huntsville, some of whom were discriminating enough to appreciate their beauties, and induce Mr. H. to try his fortunes as a bona fide lecturer. Thinking to compass his desire of discharging his college debts sooner by this course than by continuing as a teacher, he went to Mobile during the winter of 1833-4, and delivered his Shakspearian discourses before an audience sufficiently large to defray his expenses. He now felt encouraged to visit a larger city; and be accordingly went to Cincinnati, where he gave two courses with much the same success as at the South.

“He was now urged by some gentlemen of Boston, whom he met in Cincinnati, to make a visit to the ‘Athens of America.’ He followed their advice, and his success has surpassed even his most sanguine expectation, while it has afforded him the means, to a considerable extent, of liquidating his pecuniary engagements.

“At the commencement of his college life, Mr. Hudson says, be finally resolved to make just as much of himself as possible;’ and his subsequent course shows that thus far be has not lost sight of his determination. He is now preparing for one of the learned professions, and intends only to continue his lectures until he shall have procured the means of defraying his old arrears, and of prosecuting his future studies.”