PROLOGUES AND EPILOGUES

PROLOGUE TO ABBEY'S EDITION OF

"SHE STOOPS TO CONQUER "

IN the year Seventeen Hundred and Seventy

and Three,

When the GEORGES were ruling o'er Britain the free, There was played a new play, on a new-fashioned plan,

By the GOLDSMITH who brought out the GoodNatur'd Man.

New-fashioned, in truth-for this play, it appears, Dealt largely in laughter, and nothing in tears, While the type of those days, as the learnèd will

tell ye,

Was the CUMBERLAND whine or the whimper of KELLY.

So the Critics pooh-poohed, and the Actresses

pouted,

And the Public were cold, and the Manager doubted;

But the Author had friends, and they all went to see it.

Shall we join them in fancy? You answer, So be it!

Imagine yourself then, good Sir, in a wig,

Either grizzle or bob-never mind, you look big. You've a sword at your side, in your shoes there are buckles,

And the folds of fine linen flap over your knuckles.

You have come with light heart, and with eyes that are brighter,

From a pint of red Port, and a steak at the Mitre ; You have strolled from the Bar and the purlieus

of Fleet,

And you turn from the Strand into Catherine Street;

Thence climb to the law-loving summits of Bow, Till you stand at the Portal all play-goers know. See, here are the 'prentice lads laughing and pushing,

And here are the seamstresses shrinking and blushing,

And here are the urchins who, just as to-day, Sir, Buzz at you like flies with their "Bill o' the Play, Sir ?"

Yet you take one, no less, and you squeeze by the Chairs,

With their freights of fine ladies, and mount up the stairs;

So issue at last on the House in its pride,
And pack yourself snug in a box at the side.

Here awhile let us pause to take breath as we sit,
Surveying the humours and pranks of the Pit,—
With its Babel of chatterers buzzing and humming,
With its impudent orange-girls going and coming,
With its endless surprises of face and of feature,
All grinning as one in a gust of good-nature.
Then we turn to the Boxes where TRIP in his lace
Is aping his master, and keeping his place.
Do but note how the Puppy flings back with a yawn,
Like a Duke at the least, or a Bishop in lawn!

Then sniffs at his bouquet, whips round with a smirk,

And ogles the ladies at large-like a Turk.

But the music comes in, and the blanks are all filling,

And TRIP must trip up to the seats at a shilling; And spite of the mourning that most of us wear The House takes a gay and a holiday air;

For the fair sex are clever at turning the tables, And seem to catch coquetry even in sables. Moreover, your mourning has ribbons and stars, And is sprinkled about with the red coats of Mars.

Look, look, there is WILKES! You may tell by the squint;

But he grows every day more and more like the print

(Ah! HOGARTH could draw!); and behind at the back

HUGH KELLY, who looks all the blacker in black. That is CUMBERLAND next, and the prim-looking person

In the corner, I take it, is Ossian MACPHERSON. And rolling and blinking, here, too, with the rest, Comes sturdy old JOHNSON, dressed out in his

best;

How he shakes his old noddle!

crown,

I'll wager a

Whatever the law is, he's laying it down!

Beside him is REYNOLDS, who's deaf; and the

hale

Fresh, farmer-like fellow, I fancy, is THRALE.