[Footnote A: Women gambled as passionately as did the men in the early part of the eighteenth century. Ashton quotes the following from the "Gaming Lady": "She's a profuse lady, tho' of a miserly temper, whose covetous disposition is the very cause of her extravagancy; for the desire of success wheedles her ladyship to play, and the incident charges and disappointments that attend it make her as expensive to her husband as his coach and six horses. When an unfortunate night has happen'd to empty her cabinet, she has many shifts to replenish her pockets. Her jewels are carry'd privately into Lombard street, and fortune is to be tempted the next night with another sum, borrowed of my lady's goldsmith at the extortion of a pawnbroker; and if that fails, then she sells off her wardrobe, to the great grief of her maids; stretches her credit amongst those she deals with, or makes her waiting woman dive into the bottom of her trunk, and lug out her green net purse full of old Jacobuses, in hopes to recover her losses by a turn of fortune, that she may conceal her bad luck from the knowledge of her husband."]

"Lady T. And a husband must give eminent proof of his sense that thinks their powder puffs dangerous!

"Lord T. Their being fools, madam, is not always the husband's security; or, if it were, fortune sometimes gives them advantages might make a thinking woman tremble.

"Lady T. What do you mean?

"Lord T. That women sometimes lose more than they are able to pay; and, if a creditor be a little pressing, the lady may be reduced to try if, instead of gold, the gentleman will accept of a trinket.

"Lady T. My lord, you grow scurrilous; you'll make me hate you. I'll have you to know I keep company with the politest people in town, and the assemblies I frequent are full of such.

"Lord T. So are the churches—now and then.

"Lady T. My friends frequent them, too, as well as the assemblies.

"Lord T. Yes; and would do it oftener if a groom of the chambers there were allowed to furnish cards to the company.

"Lady T. I see what you drive at all this while. You would lay an imputation on my fame to cover your own avarice! I might take any pleasures, I find, that were not expensive.

"Lord T. Have a care, madam; don't let me think you only value your chastity to make me reproachable for not indulging you in everything else that's vicious. I, madam, have a reputation, too, to guard that's dear to me as yours. The follies of an ungoverned wife may make the wisest man uneasy; but 'tis his own fault if ever they make him contemptible.

"Lady T. My lord, you make a woman mad!

"Lord T. You'd make a man a fool.

"Lady T. If heaven has made you otherwise, that won't be in my power.

"Lord T. Whatever may be in your inclination, madam, I'll prevent you making me a beggar, at least.

"Lady T. A beggar! Croesus, I'm out of patience. I won't come home till four to-morrow morning.

"Lord T. That may be, madam; but I'll order the doors to be locked at twelve.

"Lady T. Then I won't come home till to-morrow night.

"Lord T. Then, madam, you shall never come home again." [Exit Lord Townley.

* * * * *

In the end, of course, Lady Townley is converted to the pleasures of domesticity, and ends the comedy by saying:

"So visible the bliss, so plain the way, How was it possible my sense could stray? But now, a convert to this truth I come, That married happiness is never found from home."

Perhaps when Oldfield delivered these virtuous lines, she thought to herself that happiness, even of the unmarried kind, was never very far away from home. But she forgot sentiment when she came back to give the breezy epilogue:

"Methinks I hear some powder'd critics say Damn it, this wife reform'd has spoil'd the play! The coxcombs should have drawn her more in fashion, Have gratify'd her softer inclination, Have tipt her a gallant, and clinch'd the provocation. But there our bard stops short: for 'twere uncivil T'have made a modern belle all o'er a devil! He hop'd in honor of the sex, the age Would bear one mended woman—on the stage."

Continuing, after diverse moral reflections, Nance made this appeal to her hearers:

"You, you then, ladies, whose unquestion'd lives Give you the foremost fame of happy wives, Protect, for its attempt, this helpless play; Nor leave it to the vulgar taste a prey; Appear the frequent champion of its cause, Direct the crowd, and give yourselves applause."

"Zounds, madam," cries a beau who is ogling a woman of quality in a stage box, "they say Anne Oldfield will never see forty-two again, but I'll warrant you, madam, she looks not a day older than yourself." And the woman of quality, who is over forty, bows at the compliment, as well she may. Bellchambers records that Lady Townley was universally regarded as Oldfield's ne plus ultra in acting. "She slided so gracefully into the foibles, and displayed so humorously the excesses, of a fine woman too sensible of her charms, too confident in her strength, and led away by her pleasures, that no succeeding Lady Townley arrived at her many distinguished excellencies in the character."[A] And the writer goes on to say that "by being a welcome and constant visitor to families of distinction, Mrs. Oldfield acquired a graceful carriage in representing women of high rank, and expressed their sentiments in a manner so easy, natural, and flowing, that they appeared to be of her own genuine utterance." Pray, sir, what is there so remarkable about that? Had not Anne as gentle blood as that which coursed through the veins of many a lady of rank?

[Footnote A: The Lady Townleys of later years included Mrs. Spranger Barry and the imposing Mistress Yates.]

But the triumphs of the first Lady Townley were fast drawing to a close; the curtain would soon be rung down for ever upon that radiant face, with its angelic smile and dancing eyes, and the stage, whether Drury Lane or mother earth would see her no more. Ill health began to follow in her once careless path, and there were times when the duties of acting seemed almost unbearable. Yet she was a brave woman, and kept a merry front to the audience, although she was obliged, on occasions, to turn away from the house, that it might not see the tears of pain flowing down her cheek. Here was a combination of comedy and tragedy, with a vengeance!

Still Nance went on, delighting the town as of yore, and putting into her last original role, that of Sophonisba, a fire which breathed not of sickness nor failing powers. At last there came a day when she played her final part, and left Drury Lane only to be driven tenderly home to her death-bed. Think of the pathos of this last performance, this giving up of all that was most alluring in life, and let none of us poor moderns presume to analyse the heart-broken woman's feelings as she said good-bye to the dear old theatre. Anne worshipped art, and the public, in turn, worshipped her; she had acted her many parts, laughed, cried, sinned, and waxed exceeding happy—and now she was to be cast out into the darkness. Must she not have shivered when she entered her house in Lower Grosvenor Street for the last time? Poor lovable creature! There could be for her now neither lights, nor laughter, nor applause; all would be gloom and weariness to the end.

During the weeks which followed, the invalid received the untiring attentions of Mistress Saunders, who once upon a time played bouncing chambermaids, but who had, for ten years past, acted as a feminine valet de chambre and general factotum for Mrs. Oldfield. And if ever she played well, 'twas in thus ministering to the dying wants of one who in health had been ever helpful and generous. Pope, who hated the great comedienne in his petty, spiteful way, has immortalised the intimacy of mistress and handmaiden in these lines:

"'Odious! in woolen? 'twould a saint provoke!' Were the last words that poor Narcissa spoke. 'No, let a charming Chintz and Brussels lace Wrap my cold limbs and shade my lifeless face; One would not sure be frightful when one's dead, And, Betty, give this cheek a little red.'"[A]

[Footnote A: Pope's Moral Essays.]

These ante-mortem directions had no further reality than the imagination of the poet; but it is easy to believe that the woman who had set the fashions for the town these many years would have enough of the feminine instinct left, though Death waited without, to plan a becoming funeral garb. Woollen, forsooth! It was a beastly law which required that all the dead should be buried in that material, and Nance shuddered when she thought of it.[A]

[Footnote A: The dead were then buried in woolen, which was rendered compulsory by the Acts 30 Car. II. c. 3 and 36 ejusdem c. i. The first act was entitled "an Act for the lessening the importation of linnen from beyond the seas, and the encouragement of the woolen and paper manufactures of the kingdome." It prescribed that the curate of every parish, shall keep a register to be provided at the charge of the parish, wherein to enter all burials and affidavits of persons being buried in woolen; the affidavit to be taken by any justice of the peace, mayor, or such like chief officer in the parish where the body was interred.... It imposed a fine of five pounds for every infringement, one half to go to the informer, and the other half to the poor of the parish. This Act was only repealed by 54 Geo. III. c. 108, or in the year 1815. The material used was flannel, and such interments are frequently mentioned in the literature of the time.—ASHTON.]

Soon there were no more thoughts of dress, no more plaintive shudders at the iniquity of the woollen act. The eyes whose kindly light had illumined the dull soul of many a playgoer, closed for ever on the 23rd of October, 1730, and the incomparable Oldfield was no more. Surely old Sol did not shine on London that day; surely he must have mourned behind the leaden English sky for one of his fairest daughters, that child of sunshine who brightened the world by her presence, and made her exit, as she did her entrance, with a smile.

After the breath had left Anne's still lovely body, Mistress Saunders dressed her in a "Brussels lace head-dress, a Holland shift, with tucker and double ruffles of the same lace, and a pair of new kid gloves." It was, no doubt, the costume which the actress had commanded, and handsome she must have looked, as many an admirer took one last glimpse of the remains prior to the interment in Westminster Abbey. All that was mortal of Oldfield lay in state in the Jerusalem Chamber,[A] and then there followed an elaborate funeral, at which were present a host of great men, and the two sons of the deceased, Mr. Maynwaring and young Churchill. Were these sons less grieved when they found that their mother had left them the major part of her fortune?

[Footnote A: The solemn lying in state of an English actress in the Jerusalem Chamber, the sorrow of the public over their lost favourite, and the regret of friends in noble, or humble, but virtuous homes, where Mrs. Oldfield had been ever welcome, contrast strongly with the French sentiment towards French players. It has been already said, that as long as Clairon exercised the power, when she advanced to the footlights, to make the (then standing) pit recoil several feet, by the mere magic of her eyes, the pit, who enjoyed the terror as a luxury, flung crowns to her, and wept at the thought of losing her; but Clairon infirm was Clairon forgotten, and to a decaying actor or actress a French audience is the most merciless in the world. The brightest and best of them, as with us, died in the service of the public. Monfleury, Mondory, and Bricourt died of apoplexy, brought on by excess of zeal. Moliere, who fell in harness, was buried with less ceremony than some favourite dog. The charming Lecouvreur, that Oldfield of the French stage, whose beauty and intellect were the double charm which rendered theatrical France ecstatic, was hurriedly interred within a saw-pit. Bishops might be exceedingly interested in, and unepiscopally generous to living actresses of wit and beauty, but the prelates smote them with a "Maranatha!" and an "Avaunt ye!" when dead.—DR. DORAN.]

Later on Savage was inspired to write that famous poem of his, unsigned though it appeared, on the virtues of the departed:

"Oldfield's no more! and can the Muse forbear O'er Oldfield's grave to shed a grateful tear? Shall she, the Glory of the British Stage, Pride of her sex, and wonder of the age; Shall she, who, living, charm'd th' admiring throng, Die undistinguish'd, and not claim a song? No; feeble as it is, I'll boldly raise My willing voice, to celebrate her praise, And with her name immortalise my lays. Had but my Muse her art to touch the soul, Charm ev'ry sense, and ev'ry pow'r control, I'd paint her as she was—the form divine, Where ev'ry lovely grace united shine; A mein majestic, as the wife of Jove; An air as winning as the Queen of Love: In ev'ry feature rival charms should rise, And Cupid hold his empire in her eyes. A soul, with ev'ry elegance refin'd, By nature, and the converse of mankind: Wit, which could strike assuming folly dead; And sense, which temper'd ev'ry thing she said; Judgment, which ev'ry little fault could spy; But candour, which would pass a thousand by: Such finish'd breeding, so polite a taste, Her fancy always for the fashion pass'd; Whilst every social virtue fir'd her breast To help the needy, succour the distrest; A friend to all in misery she stood, And her chief pride was plac'd in doing good. But now, my Muse, the arduous task engage, And shew the charming figure on the stage; Describe her look, her action, voice and mein, The gay coquette, soft maid, or haughty Queen. So bright she shone, in ev'ry different part, She gain'd despotic empire o'er the heart; Knew how each various motion to control, Sooth ev'ry passion, and subdue the soul: As she, o'er gay, or sorrowful appears, She claims our mirth, or triumphs in our tears. When Cleopatra's form she chose to wear We saw the monarch's mein, the beauty's air; Charmed with the sight, her cause we all approve, And, like her lover, give up all for love: Anthony's fate, instead of Caesar's choose, And wish for her we had a world to lose. But now the gay delightful scene is o'er, And that sweet form must glad our world no more; Relentless death has stop'd the tuneful tongue, And clos'd those eyes, for all, but death, too strong, Blasted that face where ev'ry beauty bloom'd, And to Eternal Rest the graceful Mover doom'd."

In writing which Savage almost justified his existence.



APPENDIX

THEATRICAL CLAPTRAP

(What Addison has to say about it in the "Spectator")

No. 44. FRIDAY, APRIL 20, 1711.

"Tu quid ego, et populus mecum desideret, audi." HOR. ARS POET. ver. 153.

"Now hear what ev'ry auditor expects." ROSCOMMON.

Among the several artifices which are put in practice by the poets to fill the minds of an audience with terror, the first place is due to thunder and lightning, which are often made use of at the descending of a god, or the rising of a ghost, at the vanishing of a devil, or at the death of a tyrant. I have known a bell introduced into several tragedies with good effect; and have seen the whole assembly in a very great alarm all the while it has been ringing. But there is nothing which delights and terrifies our English theatre so much as a ghost, especially when he appears in a bloody shirt. A spectre has very often saved a play, though he has done nothing but stalked across the stage, or rose through a cleft of it, and sunk again without speaking one word. There may be a proper season for these several terrors; and when they only come in as aids and assistances to the poet, they are not only to be excused, but to be applauded. Thus the sounding of the clock in "Venice Preserved" makes the hearts of the whole audience quake, and conveys a stronger terror to the mind than it is possible for words to do. The appearance of the ghost in "Hamlet" is a masterpiece in its kind, and wrought up with all the circumstances that can create either attention or horror. The mind of the reader is wonderfully prepared for his reception by the discourses that precede it. His dumb behaviour at his first entrance strikes the imagination very strongly; but every time he enters he is still more terrifying. Who can read the speech with which young Hamlet accosts him without trembling?

"Hor. Look, my Lord, it comes!

"Ham. Angels and ministers of grace defend us! Be thou a spirit of health, or goblin damn'd; Bring with thee airs from heav'n, or blasts from hell; Be thy events wicked or charitable; Thou com'st in such a questionable shape That I will speak to thee. I'll call thee Hamlet, King, Father, Royal Dane. Oh I answer me. Let me not burst in ignorance; but tell Why thy canoniz'd bones, hearsed in death, Have burst their cerements? Why the sepulchre, Wherein we saw thee quietly inurn'd, Hath op'd his ponderous and marble jaws To cast thee up again? What may this mean? That thou dead corse again in complete steel Revisit'st thus the glimpses of the moon, Making night hideous?"

I do not therefore find fault with the artifices above mentioned, when they are introduced with skill and accompanied by proportionable sentiments and expressions in the writings.

For the moving of pity our principal machine is the handkerchief; and indeed in our common tragedies we should not know very often that the persons are in distress by anything they say, if they did not from time to time apply their handkerchiefs to their eyes. Far be it from me to think of banishing this instrument of sorrow from the stage; I know a tragedy could not subsist without it: all that I would contend for is to keep it from being misapplied. In a word, I would have the actor's tongue sympathise with his eyes.

A disconsolate mother, with a child in her hand, has frequently drawn compassion from the audience, and has therefore gained a place in several tragedies. A modern writer, that observed how this had took in other plays, being resolved to double the distress, and melt his audience twice as much as those before him had done, brought a princess upon the stage with a little boy in one hand and a girl in the other. This too had a very good effect. A third poet being resolved to outwrite all his predecessors, a few years ago introduced three children with great success: and, as I am informed, a young gentleman, who is fully determined to break the most obdurate hearts, has a tragedy by him where the first person that appears upon the stage is an afflicted widow in her mourning weeds, with half a dozen fatherless children attending her, like those that usually hang about the figure of Charity. Thus several incidents that are beautiful in a good writer become ridiculous by falling into the hands of a bad one.

But among all our methods of moving pity or terror, there is none so absurd and barbarous, and which more exposes us to the contempt and ridicule of our neighbours, than that dreadful butchering of one another, which is very frequent upon the English stage. To delight in seeing men stabbed, poisoned, racked, or impaled is certainly the sign of a cruel temper; and as this is often practised before the British audience, several French critics, who think these are grateful spectacles to us, take occasion from them to represent us as a people who delight in blood. It is indeed very odd to see our stage strewed with carcasses in the last scenes of a tragedy; and to observe in the wardrobe of the playhouse several daggers, poniards, wheels, bowls for poison, and many other instruments of death. Murders and executions are always transacted behind the scenes in the French theatre, which in general is very agreeable to the manners of a polite and civilised people; but as there are no exceptions to this rule on the French stage, it leads them into absurdities almost as ridiculous as that which falls under our present censure. I remember in the famous play of Corneille, written upon the subject of the Horatii and Curiatii, the fierce young hero, who had overcome the Curiatii one after another (instead of being congratulated by his sister for his victory, being upbraided by her for having slain her lover), in the height of his passion and resentment kills her. If anything could extenuate so brutal an action, it would be the doing of it on a sudden, before the sentiments of nature, reason, or manhood could take place in him. However, to avoid public bloodshed, as soon as his passion is wrought to its height, he follows his sister the whole length of the stage, and forbears killing her till they are both withdrawn behind the scenes. I must confess, had he murdered her before the audience, the indecency might have been greater; but as it is, it appears very unnatural, and looks like killing in cold blood. To give my opinion upon this case, the fact ought not to have been represented, but to have been told if there was any occasion for it.

It may not be unacceptable to the reader to see how Sophocles has conducted a tragedy under the like delicate circumstance. Orestes was in the same condition with Hamlet in Shakespeare, his mother having murdered his father and taken possession of his kingdom in conspiracy with her adulterer. That young prince, therefore, being determined to revenge his father's death upon those who filled his throne, conveys himself by a beautiful stratagem into his mother's apartment, with a resolution to kill her. But because such a spectacle would have been too shocking to the audience, this dreadful resolution is executed behind the scenes. The mother is heard calling to her son for mercy, and the son answering her that she showed no mercy to his father; after which she shrieks out that she is wounded, and by what follows we find that she is slain. I do not remember that in any of our plays there are speeches made behind the scenes, though there are other instances of this nature to be met with in those of the ancients: and I believe my reader will agree with me that there is something infinitely more affecting in this dreadful dialogue between the mother and her son behind the scenes than could have been in anything transacted before the audience. Orestes immediately after meets the usurper at the entrance of his palace; and by a very happy thought of the poet avoids killing him before the audience, by telling him that he should live some time in his present bitterness of soul before he would despatch him, and by ordering him to retire into that part of the palace where he had slain his father, whose murder he would revenge in the very same place where it was committed. By this means the poet observes that decency, which Horace afterwards established as a rule, of forbearing to commit parricides or unnatural murders before the audience.

"Nec pueros coram populo Medea trucidet," ARS POET. ver. 185.

"Let not Medea draw her murd'ring knife, And spill her children's blood upon the stage." ROSCOMMON.

The French have therefore refined too much upon Horace's rule, who never designed to banish all kinds of death from the stage; but only such as had too much horror in them, and which would have a better effect upon the audience when transacted behind the scenes. I would therefore recommend to my countrymen the practice of the ancient poets, who were very sparing of their public executions, and rather chose to perform them behind the scenes, if it could be done with as great an effect upon the audience. At the same time, I must observe, that though the devoted persons of the tragedy were seldom slain before the audience, which has generally something ridiculous in it, their bodies were often produced after their death, which has always in it something melancholy or terrifying; so that the killing on the stage does not seem to have been avoided only as an indecency, but also as an improbability.

"Nec pueros coram populo Medea trucidet: Aut humana palam coquat exta nefarius Atreus; Aut in avem Progne vertatur, Cadmus in anguem. Quodcunque ostendis mihi sic, incredulus odi." HOR. ARS. POET. ver. 185.

"Medea must not draw her murd'ring knife, Nor Atreus there his horrid feast prepare; Cadmus and Progne's metamorphoses (She to a swallow turn'd, he to a snake); And whatsoever contradicts my sense, I hate to see, and never can believe." ROSCOMMON.

I have now gone through the several dramatic inventions which are made use of by the ignorant poets to supply the place of tragedy, and by the skilful to improve it; some of which I could wish entirely rejected, and the rest to be used with caution. It would be an endless task to consider comedy in the same light, and to mention the innumerable shifts that small wits put in practice to raise a laugh. Bullock in a short coat, and Norris in a long one, seldom failed of this effect.[A] In ordinary comedies a broad and a narrow brimmed hat are different characters. Sometimes the wit of a scene lies in a shoulder-belt, and sometimes in a pair of whiskers. A lover running about the stage, with his head peeping out of a barrel, was thought a very good jest in King Charles the Second's time, and invented by one of the first wits of the age.[B] But because ridicule is not so delicate as compassion, and because the objects that make us laugh are infinitely more numerous than those that make us weep, there is a much greater latitude for comic than tragic artifices, and by consequence a much greater indulgence to be allowed them.

[Footnote A: Addison's comment about these two favourite comedians shows that then, as now, eccentricity in dress formed a popular species of stage humour.]

[Footnote B: Sir George Etherege, in his comedy of "The Comical Revenge, or Love in a Tub."]



COMIC EPILOGUES

(From the "Spectator")

No. 338. FRIDAY, MARCH 28, 1712.

"Nil fuit unquam Sic dispar sibi." HOR. SAT. III. 1-1-18.

"Made up of nought but inconsistencies."

I find the tragedy of the "Distressed Mother" is published to-day. The author of the prologue,[A] I suppose pleads an old excuse I have read somewhere, of "being dull with design;" and the gentleman who writ the epilogue[B] has, to my knowledge, so much of greater moment to value himself upon, that he will easily forgive me for publishing the exceptions made against gaiety at the end of serious entertainments in the following letter: I should be more unwilling to pardon him, than anybody, a practice which cannot have any ill consequence, but from the abilities of the person who is guilty of it.

[Footnote A: Steele.]

[Footnote B: Addison credited Budgell with the epilogue.]

"MR. SPECTATOR,—I had the happiness the other night of sitting very near you, and your worthy friend Sir Roger, at the acting of the new tragedy, which you have in a late paper or two so justly recommended. I was highly pleased with the advantageous situation fortune had given me in placing me so near two gentlemen, from one of which I was sure to hear such reflections on the several incidents of the play as pure nature suggested; and from the other, such as flowed from the exactest art and judgment; though I must confess that my curiosity led me so much to observe the knight's reflections that I was not so well at leisure to improve myself by yours. Nature, I found, played her part in the knight pretty well, till at the last concluding lines she entirely forsook him. You must know, Sir, that it is always my custom, when I have been well entertained at a new tragedy, to make my retreat before the facetious epilogue enters; not but that those pieces are often very well writ, but having paid down my half-crown, and made a fair purchase of as much of the pleasing melancholy as the poet's art can afford me, or my own nature admit of, I am willing to carry some of it home with me; and cannot endure to be at once tricked out of all, though by the wittiest dexterity in the world. However, I kept my seat the other night, in hopes of finding my own sentiments of this matter favoured by your friend's; when, to my great surprise, I found the knight, entering with equal pleasure into both parts, and as much satisfied with Mrs. Oldfield's gaiety, as he had been before with Andromache's greatness. Whether this were no more than an effect of the knight's peculiar humanity, pleased to find at last, that, after all the tragical doings, everything was safe and well, I do not know. But for my own part, I must confess I was so dissatisfied, that I was sorry the poet had saved Andromache, and could heartily have wished that he had left her stone-dead upon the stage. For you cannot imagine, Mr. Spectator, the mischief she was reserved to do me. I found my soul, during the action, gradually worked up to the highest pitch; and felt the exalted passion which all generous minds conceive at the sight of virtue in distress. The impression, believe me, Sir, was so strong upon me, that I am persuaded, if I had been let alone in it, I could at an extremity have ventured to defend yourself and Sir Roger against half a score of the fiercest Mohocks; but the ludicrous epilogue in the close extinguished all my ardour, and made me look upon all such noble achievements as downright silly and romantic. What the rest of the audience felt, I cannot so well tell. For myself I must declare, that at the end of the play I found my soul uniform, and all of a piece; but at the end of the epilogue, it was so jumbled together and divided between jest and earnest, that, if you will forgive me an extravagant fancy, I will here set it down. I could not but fancy, if my soul had at that moment quitted my body, and descended to the poetical shades in the posture it was then in, what a strange figure it would have made among them. They would not have known what to have made of my motley spectre, half comic and half tragic, all over resembling a ridiculous face, that, at the same time, laughs on one side, and cries on the other. The only defence, I think, I have ever heard made for this, as it seems to me the most unnatural tack of the comic tail to the tragic head, is this, that the minds of the audience must be refreshed, and gentlemen and ladies not sent away to their own homes with too dismal and melancholy thoughts about them: for who knows the consequence of this? We are much obliged indeed to poets for the great tenderness they express for the safety of our persons, and heartily thank them for it. But if that be all, pray, good Sir, assure them, that we are none of us like to come to any great harm; and that, let them do their best, we shall, in all probability, live out the length of our days, and frequent the theatres more than ever. What makes me more desirous to have some reformation of this matter is, because of an ill consequence or two attending it: for a great many of our church musicians being related to the theatre, they have, in imitation of these epilogues, introduced in their farewell voluntaries, a sort of music quite foreign to the design of church-services, to the great prejudice of well-disposed people. Those fingering gentlemen should be informed, that they ought to suit their airs to the place and business; and that the musician is obliged to keep to the text as much as the preacher. For want of this, I have found by experience a great deal of mischief. For when the preacher has often, with great piety, and art enough, handled his subject, and the judicious clerk has with the utmost diligence called out two staves proper to the discourse, and I have found in myself, and in the rest of the pew, good thoughts and dispositions, they have been all in a moment dissipated by a merry jig from the organ loft. One knows not what further ill effects the epilogues I have been speaking of may in time produce: but this I am credibly informed of, that Paul Lorrain[A] has resolved upon a very sudden reformation in his tragical dramas; and that, at the next monthly performance, he designs, instead of a penitential psalm, to dismiss his audience with an excellent new ballad of his own composing. Pray, Sir, do what you can to put a stop to these growing evils, and you will very much oblige your humble servant,

"PHYSIBULUS."

[Footnote A: At that time ordinary of Newgate; and who, in his accounts of the convicts executed at Tyburn, generally represented them as true penitents, and dying very well.]



No. 341. TUESDAY, APRIL 1, 1712.

"—Revocate animos, maestumque timorem Mittite—" VIRG. AEN.I. 206.

"Resume your courage, and dismiss your care." DRYDEN.

Having, to oblige my correspondent Physibulus, printed his letter last Friday, in relation to the new epilogue, he cannot take it amiss, if I now publish another, which I have just received from a gentleman who does not agree with him in his sentiments upon that matter.

"Sir,—I am amazed to find an epilogue attacked in your last Friday's paper, which has been so generally applauded by the town, and received such honours as were never before given to any in an English theatre.

"The audience would not permit Mrs. Oldfield to go off the stage the first night till she had repeated it twice; the second night the noise of ancora was as loud as before, and she was again obliged to speak it twice; the third night it was called for a second time; and, in short, contrary to all other epilogues, which are dropped after the third representation of the play, this has already been repeated nine times.

"I must own I am the more surprised to find this censure, in opposition to the whole town, in a paper which has hitherto been famous for the candour of its criticisms.

"I can by no means allow your melancholy correspondent, that the new epilogue is unnatural, because it is gay. If I had a mind to be learned, I could tell him that the prologue and epilogue were real parts of the ancient tragedy; but every one knows, that on the British stage, they are distinct performances by themselves, pieces entirely detached from the play, and no way essential to it.

"The moment the play ends, Mrs. Oldfield is no more Andromache, but Mrs. Oldfield; and though the poet had left Andromache stone-dead upon the stage, as your ingenious correspondent phrases it, Mrs. Oldfield might still have spoke a merry epilogue. We have an instance of this in a tragedy where there is not only a death, but a martyrdom.[A] St. Catherine was there personated by Nell Gwyn; she lies stone-dead upon the stage, but, upon those gentlemen's offering to remove her body, whose business it is to carry off the slain in our English tragedies, she breaks out into that abrupt beginning of what was a very ludicrous, but at the same time thought a very good epilogue:—

"'Hold: are you mad? you damn'd confounded dog! I am to rise and speak the epilogue.'

[Footnote A: "Tyrannic Love; or, the Royal Martyr." By Dryden.]

"This diverting manner was always practised by Mr. Dryden, who, if he was not the best writer of tragedies in his time, was allowed by every one to have the happiest turn for a prologue or an epilogue. The epilogues to 'Cleomenes,' 'Don Sebastian,' the 'Duke of Guise,' 'Aurengezebe,' and 'Love Triumphant,' are all precedents of this nature.

"I might further justify this practice by that excellent epilogue which was spoken, a few years since, after the tragedy of 'Phaedra and Hippolitus;'[A] with a great many others, in which the authors have endeavoured to make the audience merry. If they have not all succeeded so well as the writer of this, they have however shown that it was not for want of good will.

[Footnote A: By Edmund Neal.]

"I must further observe, that the gaiety of it may be still the more proper, as it is at the end of a French play; since every one knows that nation, who are generally esteemed to have as polite a taste as any in Europe, always close their tragic entertainments with what they call a petite piece, which is purposely designed to raise mirth, and send away the audience well pleased. The same person who has supported the chief character in the tragedy, very often plays the principal part in the petite piece; so that I have myself seen, at Paris, Orestes and Lubin acted the same night by the same man.

"Tragi-comedy, indeed, you have yourself, in a former speculation, found fault with very justly, because it breaks the tide of the passions, while they are yet flowing; but this is nothing at all to the present case, where they have already had their full course.

"As the new epilogue is written conformably to the practice of our best poets, so it is not such an one, which, as the Duke of Buckingham says in his 'Rehearsal,' might serve for any other play; but wholly rises out of the occurrences of the piece it was composed for.

"The only reason your mournful correspondent gives against this facetious epilogue, as he calls it, is, that he has a mind to go home melancholy. I wish the gentleman may not be more grave than wise. For my own part, I must confess, I think it very sufficient to have the anguish of a fictitious piece remain upon me while it is representing; but I love to be sent home to bed in a good humour. If Physibulus is however resolved to be inconsolable, and not to have his tears dried up, he need only continue his old custom, and when he has had his half-crown's worth of sorrow, slink out before the epilogue begins.

"It is pleasant enough to hear this tragical genius complaining of the great mischief Andromache had done him. What was that? Why, she made him laugh. The poor gentleman's sufferings put me in mind of Harlequin's case, who was tickled to death. He tells us soon after, through a small mistake of sorrow for rage, that during the whole action he was so very sorry, that he thinks he could have attacked half a score of the fiercest Mohawks in the excess of his grief. I cannot but look upon it as a happy accident, that a man who is so bloody-minded in his affliction, was diverted from this fit of outrageous melancholy. The valour of this gentleman in his distress brings to one's memory the Knight of the Sorrowful Countenance, who lays about him at such an unmerciful rate in an old romance. I shall readily grant him that his soul, as he himself says, would have made a very ridiculous figure, had it quitted the body and descended to the poetical shades in such an encounter.

"As to his conceit of tacking a tragic head with a comic tail, in order to refresh the audience, it is such a piece of jargon, that I don't know what to make of it.

"The elegant writer makes a very sudden transition from the playhouse to the church, and from thence to the gallows.

"As for what relates to the church, he is of opinion that these epilogues have given occasion to those merry jigs from the organ-loft, which have dissipated those good thoughts and dispositions he has found in himself, and the rest of the pew, upon the singing of two staves culled out by the judicious and diligent clerk.

"He fetches his next thought from Tyburn; and seems very apprehensive lest there should happen any innovations in the tragedies of his friend Paul Lorrain.

"In the mean time, Sir, this gloomy writer, who is so mightily scandalised at a gay epilogue after a serious play, speaking of the fate of those unhappy wretches who are condemned to suffer an ignominious death by the justice of our laws, endeavours to make the reader merry on so improper an occasion by those poor burlesque expressions of tragical dramas and monthly performances.—I am, Sir, with great respect, your most obedient, most humble servant,

"PHILOMEDES."



ON DRAMATIC CRITICS

(Addison in the "Spectator")

No. 592. FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 10, 1714.

"—Studium sine divite veni." HOR. ARS POET. 409.

"Art without a vein." ROSCOMMON.

I look upon the playhouse as a world within itself. They have lately furnished the middle region of it with a new set of meteors, in order to give the sublime to many modern tragedies. I was there last winter at the first rehearsal of the new thunder,[A] which is much more deep and sonorous than any hitherto made use of. They have a Salmonus behind the scenes who plays it off with great success. Their lightnings are made to flash more briskly than heretofore; their clouds are also better furbelowed, and more voluminous; not to mention a violent storm locked up in a great chest, that is designed for the "Tempest." They are also provided with above a dozen showers of snow, which, as I am informed, are the plays of many unsuccessful poets artificially cut and shredded for that use. Mr. Rymer's "Edgar" is to fall in snow, at the next acting of "King Lear," in order to heighten, or rather to alleviate, the distress of that unfortunate prince; and to serve by way of decoration to a piece which that great critic has written against.

[Footnote A: Mr. Dennis's new and approved method of making thunder. Dennis had contrived this thunder for the advantage of his tragedy of "Appius and Virginia"; the players highly approved of it, and it is the same that is used at the present day. Notwithstanding the effect of this thunder, however, the play was coldy received, and laid aside. Some nights after, Dennis being in the pit at the representation of "Macbeth," and hearing the thunder made use of, arose from his seat in a violent passion, exclaiming with an oath, that that was his thunder. "See (said he) how these rascals use me: they will not let my play run, and yet they steal my thunder."—"Notes on the Spectator."]

I do not indeed wonder that the actors should be such professed enemies to those among our nation who are commonly known by the name of critics, since it is a rule among these gentlemen to fall upon a play, not because it is ill written, but because it takes. Several of them lay it down as a maxim, that whatever dramatic performance has a long run, must of necessity be good for nothing; as though the first precept in poetry were "not to please." Whether this rule holds good or not, I shall leave to the determination of those who are better judges than myself; if it does, I am sure it tends very much to the honour of those gentlemen who have established it; few of their pieces having been disgraced by a run of three days, and most of them being so exquisitely written, that the town would never give them more than one night's hearing.

I have great esteem for a true critic, such as Aristotle and Longinus among the Greeks; Horace and Quintilian among the Romans; Boileau and Dacier among the French. But it is our misfortune, that some, who set up for professed critics among us, are so stupid, that they do not know how to put ten words together with elegance or common propriety; and withal so illiterate, that they have no taste of the learned languages, and therefore criticise upon old authors only at second hand. They judge of them by what others have written, and not by any notions they have of the authors themselves. The words unity, action, sentiment and diction, pronounced with an air of authority, give them a figure among unlearned readers, who are apt to believe they are very deep because they are unintelligible. The ancient critics are full of the praises of their contemporaries; they discover beauties which escaped the observation of the vulgar, and very often find out reasons for palliating and excusing such little slips and oversights as were committed in the writings of eminent authors. On the contrary, most of the smatterers in criticism, who appear among us, make it their business to vilify and depreciate every new production that gains applause, to descry imaginary blemishes, and to prove, by farfetched arguments, that what pass for beauties in any celebrated piece are faults and errors. In short, the writings of these critics, compared with those of the ancients, are like the works of the sophists compared with those of the old philosophers.

Envy and cavil are the natural fruits of laziness and ignorance; which was probably the reason that in the heathen mythology Momus is said to be the son of Nox and Somnus, of darkness and sleep. Idle men, who have not been at the pains to accomplish or distinguish themselves, are very apt to detract from others; as ignorant men are very subject to decry those beauties in a celebrated work which they have not eyes to discover. Many of our sons of Momus, who dignify themselves by the name of critics, are the genuine descendants of these two illustrious ancestors. They are often led into these numerous absurdities in which they daily instruct the people, by not considering that, first, there is sometimes a greater judgment shown in deviating from the rules of art than in adhering to them; and, secondly, that there is more beauty in the works of a great genius, who is ignorant of all the rules of art, than in the works of a little genius, who not only knows but scrupulously observes them.

First, we may often take notice of men who are perfectly acquainted with all the rules of good writing, and notwithstanding choose to depart from them on extraordinary occasions. I could give instances out of all the tragic writers of antiquity who have shown their judgment in this particular; and purposely receded from an established rule of the drama, when it has made way for a much higher beauty than the observation of such a rule would have been. Those who have surveyed the noblest pieces of architecture and statuary, both ancient and modern, know very well that there are frequent deviations from art in the works of the greatest masters, which have produced a much nobler effect than a more accurate and exact way of proceeding could have done. This often arises from what the Italians call the gusto grande in these arts, which is what we call the sublime in writing.

In the next place, our critics do not seem sensible that there is more beauty in the works of a great genius, who is ignorant of the rules of art, than in those of a little genius who knows and observes them. It is of those men of genius that Terrence speaks in opposition to the little artificial cavillers of his time:

"Quorum aemulari expotat negligentiam Potius quam istorum obscuram diligentiam." AND. PROL. 20.

"Whose negligence he would rather imitate, than these men's obscure diligence."

A critic may have the same consolation in the ill success of his play as Dr. South tells us a physician has at the death of a patient, that he was killed secundum artem. Our inimitable Shakespeare is a stumbling-block to the whole tribe of these rigid critics. Who would not rather read one of his plays, where there is not a single rule of the stage observed, than any production of a modern critic where there is not one of them violated![A] Shakespeare was indeed born with all the seeds of poetry, and may be compared to the stone in Pyrrhus's ring, which, as Pliny tells us, had the figure of Apollo and the nine Muses in the veins of it, produced by the spontaneous hand of Nature without any help from art.

[Footnote A: With all his fondness for classic models, Addison breaks away from conventionality of form in this essay, and pays his tribute to the genius of Shakespeare. But critical Joe could never forget the bard's so-called "faults" of construction.]



THEATRICAL PROPERTY

(Steele in "The Tatler," No. 42)

It is now twelve of the clock at noon, and no mail come in; therefore I am not without hopes that the town will allow me the liberty which my brother news-writers take in giving them what may be for information in another kind, and indulge me in doing an act of friendship, by publishing the following account of goods and moveables.

This is to give notice, that a magnificent palace, with great variety of gardens, statues, and water works, may be bought cheap in Drury-lane; where there are likewise several castles, to be disposed of, very delightfully situated; as also groves, woods, forests, fountains, and country-seats, with very pleasant prospects on all sides of them; being the moveables of Christopher Rich, Esquire,[A] who is breaking up house-keeping, and has many curious pieces of furniture to dispose of, which may be seen between the hours of six and ten in the evening.

[Footnote A: This essay was written (July, 1709) at the time that Drury Lane was closed, by order of the Lord Chamberlain.]

THE INVENTORY.

Spirits of right Nantz brandy, for lambent flames and apparitions.

Three bottles and a half of lightning.

One shower of snow in the whitest French paper.

Two showers of a browner sort.

A sea, consisting of a dozen large waves; the tenth bigger than ordinary, and a little damaged.

A dozen and a half of clouds, trimmed with black, and well conditioned.

A rainbow, a little faded.

A set of clouds after the French mode, streaked with lightning and furbelowed.

A new moon, something decayed.

A pint of the finest Spanish wash, being all that is left of two hogsheads sent over last winter.

A coach very finely gilt, and little used, with a pair of dragons, to be sold cheap.

A setting-sun, a pennyworth.

An imperial mantle, made for Cyrus the Great, and worn by Julius Caesar, Bajazet, King Harry the Eighth, and Signor Valentini.

A basket-hilted sword, very convenient to carry milk in.

Roxana's night-gown.

Othello's handkerchief.

The imperial robes of Xerxes, never worn but once.

A wild boar killed by Mrs. Tofts[A] and Dioclesian.

[Footnote A: A favourite singer of the day.]

A serpent to sting Cleopatra.

A mustard-bowl to make thunder with.

Another of a bigger sort, by Mr. D——'s[A] directions, little used.

[Footnote A: John Dennis, the critic.]

Six elbow-chairs, very expert in country dances, with six flower-pots for their partners.

The whiskers of a Turkish Pasha.

The complexion of a murderer in a band-box; consisting of a large piece of burnt cork, and a coal-black peruke.

A suit of clothes for a ghost, viz., a bloody shirt, a doublet curiously pinked, and a coat with three great eyelet-holes upon the breast.

A bale of red Spanish wool.

Modern plots, commonly known by the name of trapdoors, ladders of ropes, vizard-masques, and tables with broad carpets over them.

Three oak-cudgels, with one of crab-tree; all bought for the use of Mr. Pinkethman.[A]

[Footnote A: The comedian.]

Materials for dancing; as masques, castanets, and a ladder of ten rounds.

Aurengezebe's scymitar, made by Will Brown in Piccadilly.

A plume of feathers, never used but by Oedipus and the Earl of Essex.

There are also swords, halbards, sheep-hooks, cardinals' hats, turbans, drums, gallipots, a gibbet, a cradle, a rack, a cart-wheel, an altar, an helmet, a back-piece, a breast-plate, a bell, a tub, and a jointed baby.



ACTORS AND AUDIENCE.

(From Cibber's "Apology")

Among our many necessary reformations, what not a little preserved to us the regard of our auditors was the decency of our clear stage, from whence we had now for many years shut out those idle gentlemen who seemed more delighted to be pretty objects themselves than capable of any pleasure from the play; who took their daily stands where they might best elbow the actor, and come in for their share of the auditor's attention. In many a laboured scene of the wannest humour and of the most affecting passion I have seen the best actors disconcerted, while these buzzing muscatos have been fluttering round their eyes and ears. How was it possible an actor, so embarrassed, should keep his impatience from entering into that different temper which his personated character might require him to be master of?

Future actors may perhaps wish I would set this grievance in a stronger light; and, to say the truth, where auditors are ill-bred, it cannot well be expected that actors should be polite. Let me therefore show how far an artist in any science is apt to be hurt by any sort of inattention to his performance.

While the famous Corelli,[A] at Rome, was playing some musical composition of his own to a select company in the private apartment of his patron-Cardinal, he observed, in the heighth of his harmony, his Eminence was engaging in a detached conversation, upon which he suddenly stopt short and gently laid down his instrument. The Cardinal, surprised at the unexpected cessation, asked him if a string was broke? To which Corelli, in an honest conscience of what was due to his musick, reply'd, "No, Sir, I was only afraid I enterrupted business." His Eminence, who knew that a genius could never shew itself to advantage where it had not its regards, took this reproof in good part, and broke off his conversation to hear the whole concerto played over again.

[Footnote A: Arcangelo Corelli, the "father of modern instrumental music."]

Another story will let us see what effect a mistaken offence of this kind had upon the French theatre, which was told me by a gentleman of the long robe, then at Paris, and who was himself the innocent author of it. At the tragedy of "Zaire," while the celebrated Mademoiselle Gossin[A] was delivering a soliloquy, this gentleman was seized with a sudden fit of coughing, which gave the actress some surprise and interruption; and his fit increasing, she was forced to stand silent so long that it drew the eyes of the uneasy audience upon him, when a French gentleman, leaning forward to him, asked him, If this actress had given him any particular offence, that he took so publick an occasion to resent it? The English gentleman, in the utmost surprise, assured him, So far from it, that he was a particular admirer of her performance; that his malady was his real misfortune, and if he apprehended any return of it, he would rather quit his seat than disoblige either the actress or the audience.

[Footnote A: Jeanne, Catherine Gossin, of the Comedie Francaise.]

This publick decency in their theatre I have myself seen carried so far that a gentleman in their second Loge, or middle-gallery, being observed to sit forward himself while a lady sate behind him, a loud number of voices called out to him from the pit, "Place a la Dame! Place a la Dame!" When the person so offending, either not apprehending the meaning of the clamour, or possibly being some John Trott who feared no man alive, the noise was continued for several minutes; nor were the actors, though ready on the stage, suffered to begin the play till this unbred person was laughed out of his seat, and had placed the lady before him.

Whether this politeness observed at plays may be owing to their clime, their complexion, or their government, is of no great consequence; but if it is to be acquired, methinks it is a pity our accomplished countrymen, who every year import so much of this nation's gawdy garniture, should not, in this long course of our commerce with them, have brought over a little of their theatrical good-breeding too.



INDEX

Abington, Mrs. Actors and audience, Colley Cibber on Addison, Joseph his "Cato" Anne, Queen Anne's reign, Life in Queen Ashbury, Joseph Ashton's "Reign of Queen Anne" Aston, Tony Attorneys of Queen Anne's day

Baggs, Zachary Baker of Dublin Barry, Spranger, Mrs. Spranger Barry, Mrs. Elizabeth Bartholomew Fair Bath life "Beaux' Stratagem," Farquhar's Bellchambers, Edmund Bertie, Miss Dye Betterton, Thomas Blackmore, Dr. (Sir Richard) Boileau Bolingbroke, Lord Booth, Barton Mrs. Barton see also Santlow Boswell, James Bowman, an actor Bracegirdle, Anne Bradshaw, Mrs. Brett, Colonel Miss Anne Broschi, Carlo (Farinelli) Budgell, Eustace Bullock, an actor Burney, Dr. "Busiris," Young's

Cadogan, Charles Sloane, 1st Earl Campbell, Thomas "Careless Husband," Cibber's Cat, Christopher Cat-calls "Cato," Addison's Centlivre, Mrs. her "Perplexed Lovers" Centlivre, Mr. Charles II., King Chener, Mons. Chetwood, W.R. "Christian Hero, The," Steele's Church and stage Church music and the theatre Churchill, General (Marlborough's nephew) Churchill, Colonel (Oldfield's son) Churchill, Sarah, Duchess of Marlborough Churchill, Mary, Countess of Cadogan Cibber, Caius Gabriel Cibber, Colley "Cibber, Apology for the Life of" Cibber, Theophilus Clive, Mrs. Coffee-houses of Addison's day Collier, William Colman's "Random Records" Congreve Corelli, Arcangelo Costumes, Stage Courthorpe's "Addison" Covent Garden Theatre Craggs, Mr. Secretary Crawley, the showman Critics, Addison on dramatic Crown, John Cuzzoni, Francesca

Davenant, Alexander Davies, T. Defoe, Daniel Delany, Mrs. Dennis, John, "Essay on the Operas" Diction of the eighteenth century "Distressed Mother, The," Philips' Dod, Benjamin Dogget, Thomas Doran, Dr. Dorset, Earl of Dorset, Garden Theatre Downes, the prompter Drama and the Restoration Dramatic critics (Addison) Dramatic writings, old and new Drury Lane Theatre Drury Lane, revolt of Betterton another exodus riot Drury Lane, Company Dryden "Duke of York's Company" D'Urfey's "Western Lass"

"Echoes of the Playhouse" Elrington, Thomas Epilogues, Comic (The Spectator) Estcourt, Dick Eugene, Prince Evans, John

"Fair Quaker of Deal," Shadwell's Farinelli Farquhar, Capt. George Faustina, Bordoni Hasse Fielding, Henry Fitzgerald, Percy Fontaine, Monsieur de la Foote, Samuel "Funeral, or Grief a la Mode, The," Steele's Funeral customs, old time

Gambling women Garrick, David Garth, Dr. Genest, P. George I., King Gildon, Charles, Gossin, Jeane Catherine Gregory, Mr. Griffith, Thomas Gwyne, Nell

Habits of society Halifax, Lord Haymarket Theatre, restricted to operas "Hearts, The King of," Maynwaring's Hendon, Heywoodhill Henley, Mr. Hertford, Countess of Hill, Aaron Horton, Mrs. Howard, Bronson Hoyt, Mr. Hughes, Mr. Hulet, Charles

Ibsen "Inconstant, The," Farquhar's Ingolsby, General Italian opera

"Jane Shore," Rowe's Jerusalem Chamber, Westminster Johnson, Dr. Samuel Johnstone, Drury Lane machinist Jones, Henry Arthur Jonson, Benjamin

Keen, Theophilus Killigrew, Charles "King's Company, The" Kit-Cat Club Knight, Mrs. Knipp, Mrs.

Lambro, Miss Lecouvreur, French actress Leigh, Francis Lincoln's Inn Field Theatre of 1695, re-opened "Lives of the Poets," Cibber's Lorrain, Rev. Paul Lowe, R.W.

Macclesfield, Anne, 1st Countess of Macklin "Make-up," Art of Marlborough, see Churchill Master of the Revels, office of Maynwaring, Arthur, Maynwaring, Mr. (Oldfield's son) "Milk White Flag, A," Mr. Hoyt's Mills, John Misson's, Henre, "Memoirs" Mist, Nathaniel Mist's Weekly Journal Mitford, M.R. Mitre Tavern Moliere Montagu, Captain Morley's "Notes on The Spectator" Mountford, Will Mountford, Mrs., see Verbruggen Mountford, Susan

Neal, Edmund, "Phaedra and Hippolitus" "Non-Juror, The," Cibber's Norris, an actor

Oldfield, Captain Oldfield, Mrs. Oldfield, Anne (Nance) birth meets Farquhar introduced to Vanbrugh, joins the stage Bath debut first stage triumph Cibber's "Careless Husband" her success deportment as Sylvia in Farquhar's "Recruiting Officer" leaves Drury Lane for the Haymarket supplants Mrs. Bracegirdle salary at the Haymarket —— and at Drury Lane as Andromache in "Distressed Mother" plays Marcia in "Cato" meets Alexander Pope tragic parts rivals produce a riot, her triumph as Jane Shore adheres to Drury Lane takes Sophonisba, praised by Thomson meridian lustre mistress of A. Maynwaring personal attractions accepts protection of Marlborough's nephew received at Court her natural children ancestress of Earls of Cadogan sympathy for Richard Savage intercedes for his life mourned by Savage contemporaries her equipage sweetness and common sense retains her bloom captivating as Lady Townley moved in polite circles ill-health, dies in Lower Grosvenor Street laid in State in the Jerusalem Chamber interred in Westminster Abbey Oldfield, Anne, elegy by Richard Savage Opera, Italian Operatic singers Oxford and the drama actors contribute to St. Mary's restoration fund

Page, Francis Pepy's Diary "Perplexed Lovers, The," Centlivre's Philips, Ambrose Players in Queen Anne's time Pope, Alexander Porter, Mistress Powell, George Prince George of Denmark Pritchard, Sir William "Provoked Husband, The," Vanbrugh and Cibber's

Radcliffe, Dr. "Recruiting Officer, The," Farquhar's Rich, Christopher Rich, John Rivers, Lord Rogers, Mrs. Rowe, Nicholas Russell Court Chapel Ryan, Lacy

Sandridge, Dean Santlow, Hester see also Booth, Mrs. Saunders, Mistress Savage, Richard Schlegel, Augustus Wm. "Scornful Lady, The" Shadwell, Thomas Sheridan, Richard Brinsley Side-shows "Sir Courtly Nice," Crown's "Sir Thomas Overbury," Savage's Skipworth, Sir Thomas Smith, an actor Spectator, The Stage armies Stanyan, T. Steele, Sir Richard Strolling players Swift, Dean Swiney, Owen

"Tamerlane," N. Rowe's "Tartuffe," Moliere's Theatre and church and playgoers Theatrical dress claptrap, Addison on property, Sir R. Steele on Theatricals began, Hour Thomas, Augustus Thomson's "Sophonisba" Thurmond, John Toasts Toasting glasses Tofts, Mrs. Tonson, Jacob Trumbull, Sir William

Vanbrugh, Sir John Verbruggen, Mrs. Voltaire Voss, Mrs.

Walker, an actor Walpole, Horace Walpole, Sir Robert Ward, Ned Wig, cost of a full-bottomed Wilks, Robert William III., King Williams, Joseph Woffington, Peg "Wonder, The," Mrs. Centlivre's Woollen shrouds

Yates, Mistress Young's, Dr., "Busiris"

THE END