Colley might make a delightful fop, but the playing of dandies could hardly lead one up very gracefully to the handling of Cato.
Next came the suggestion that John Mills[A] should try the character, but fortunately he displayed no more enthusiasm for it than did Cibber.

Cato was too old a person for him to act, he said, and so declined to have anything to do with the elderly hero.

Afterwards he was cast for the less important role of Sempronius, which proved in every way a better disposition of affairs, for Mills was a plodder rather than a genius.

He belonged to the order of actors to whom, in the present day, we apply the charitable word of painstaking, an adjective which shows very plainly the nature of the man, while it likewise allows the critic to escape the charge of unkindness.

We all know the painstaking player, and always cheerfully acknowledge his virtues, but who shall blame us if, after giving him the benefit of his earnestness, we yawn and creep out into the lobby while he holds the stage?
[Footnote A: Mills was considered one of the most useful actors that ever served in a theatre, but, though invested by the patronage of Wilks with many parts of the highest order, he had no pretensions to quit the secondary line in which he ought to have been placed .-- BELLCHAMBERS.] That Mills sometimes inspired this feeling of boredom may be imagined from the way in which his performance of Macbeth was once received.