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+*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 77394 ***
+
+
+
+
+Transcriber’s Note: Italic text is enclosed in
+_underscores_. Small capital text has been changed to all
+capital. Additional notes will be found near the end of this
+eBook.
+
+
+
+
+                             THE
+                           DRURIAD:
+                              OR
+                          STRICTURES
+                            ON THE
+                     PRINCIPAL PERFORMERS
+                              OF
+                     Drury-Lane Theatre:
+                     _A SATIRICAL POEM:_
+             WITH NOTES CRITICAL AND EXPLANATORY.
+
+                     ═══════════════════
+
+ “_Cuncti adsint, meritæque expectent præmia palmæ:_
+
+                       * * * * * * * *
+
+ “_Tros Tyriusque mihi nullo discrimine habetur._”----VIRG.
+
+                     ═══════════════════
+
+  “My lord, I will use them according to their deserts.”--
+
+  “Godsbodikins, man, better! Use every man after his
+  desert, and who shall escape whipping?--Use them after
+  your own honour and dignity: the less they deserve, the
+  more merit is in your bounty.”----SHAKESPEAR.
+
+                     ═══════════════════
+
+                          _LONDON_:
+
+     PRINTED FOR W. J. AND J. RICHARDSON, UNDER THE ROYAL
+                          EXCHANGE.
+                            ─────
+                            1798.
+
+  ═════════════════════════════════════════════════════════
+
+
+
+
+                        ADVERTISEMENT.
+
+                         ────────────
+
+
+I Cannot think the subject of the following Poem ill chosen,
+whatever faults there may be in the manner of its execution.
+As some kingdoms are found to be influenced by the good or
+bad qualities of the sovereign, so the theatres of this
+country may be considered as instruments by which virtue or
+vice may be equally propagated: they are universally
+frequented; for, who is so high as not to honour them with
+an occasional visit, and who is so low as not to deem
+himself an expert judge of theatrical merit? That this merit
+is on the wane, I fear, cannot be denied; and I think one of
+the causes may be traced to that laxity of morals which
+pervades all ranks of people. The time was when a vicious or
+foolish character, among his brethren behind the curtain,
+would have been more dreaded, by an actor of genius, than
+the hisses of the multitude before it. “Fuit ista quondam in
+hac republica virtus, ut viri fortes acrioribus suppliciis
+civem perniciosum quàm acerbessimum hostem coercerent.”
+Cicero.
+
+If it be allowed that an actor cannot do complete justice to
+his part unless he feel all the energy which the character
+is supposed to feel; or if, in other words, moral sensations
+and the glow of conscious virtue enhance the player’s
+powers; surely those powers must be impaired, if not totally
+annihilated, by debauchery and habitual intoxication; an
+observation not totally useless to those who, however they
+may slight virtue for virtue’s sake, will yet adhere to her
+when, like a modern heiress, she brings an ample fortune to
+increase her attractions.
+
+I have only to declare that I commit this Poem to the press
+blinded by no partiality and influenced by no unworthy
+motives; that my pages are stained with no private scandal,
+and that, whatever may be the fate of the Poem, I shall
+never blush at an undertaking which has for its object the
+praise of the meritorious and the ridicule of the
+undeserving.
+
+  ═════════════════════════════════════════════════════════
+
+
+
+
+                             THE
+                         DRURIAD, &c.
+
+                         ────────────
+
+
+                           AUTHOR.
+
+  Let loftier poets tune their martial lays,
+  And sing the patriot’s or the hero’s praise;
+  For casual fare, like hackney-coachmen, ply,
+  Blame where they can, and, where they cannot,--lie:
+  Each Pasquin now may lash his empty brother,
+  Or, like thin spiders, prey upon each other:
+  Snug in my shell, I shun their watchful fury,
+  Laugh at them all, and sing the praise of Drury;
+  My careless Muse now hovers round her walls,
+  And lifts her dome yet higher than St. Paul’s.
+
+                           FRIEND.
+
+  A wretched simile! of Eastern hue,
+  ’Tis neither gaudy, elegant, or new;
+  Would you be all that ere poor bard desir’d,
+  Be read by parsons, by the fair admir’d,
+  To love and Laura tune th’enervate lyre,
+  Let hot-press’d paper[1] glow with am’rous fire;
+  Ambrosial flow’rs[2] twine round your mood and tense,
+  And labour’d nothings take the place of sense.
+
+                           AUTHOR.
+
+  I’m all alive! Muse, plume your tow’ring wings,
+  Hush’d be the winds when charming Florio sings.
+
+                           FRIEND.
+
+  The fragrant morn--
+
+                           AUTHOR.
+
+                     Nay, now your pow’r I doubt,
+  Each worthless sonnet--
+
+                           FRIEND.
+
+                         Prithee hear me out.
+  The fragrant morn her rosy blushes spreads,
+  And o’er the land a dewy influence sheds,
+  Scarce has the sun emerg’d from ocean’s tide,
+  His beams yet sleeping on yon mountain’s side,
+  All nature wakes, life breathes in ev’ry gale,
+  The insect-tribe spread forth the mimic sail,
+  Aërial songsters chaunt the vocal lay,
+  Sport on the wing, and hail returning day.
+
+                           AUTHOR.
+
+  Siste, viator! let me set you right,
+  ’Tis not the day! I hail returning night:
+  Through lamp and link-boys take my devious way,
+  Streets, carts, and “Bill, your honour!” to the play.
+  There point my quill, “shoot folly as it flies,
+  And catch the living manners as they rise.”[3]
+  Sooner shall Gallia cease her hostile fury,
+  Sooner shall mighty George frequent old Drury,
+  In modern bosoms virtuous ardour burn,
+  Or loan-contractors zealous patriots turn,
+  Than I forego the critic’s choicest food,
+  To lash the worthless and to praise the good.
+
+                           FRIEND.
+
+  But who art thou who thus presum’st to wield
+  The weighty arms of Churchill in the field?
+
+                           AUTHOR.
+
+  In life’s low vale, I mean not to aspire
+  To Churchill’s honours and poetic fire,
+  But merely to divert an idle hour,
+  Of Drury’s host to ascertain the pow’r;
+  And, with a candid, not ill-judging, spirit,
+  Award their different degrees of merit.
+
+                           FRIEND.
+
+  But why alone on Drury “wag your tongue?”[4]
+  Why Covent-Garden’s actors leave unsung?
+
+                           AUTHOR.
+
+  Know, with buffoons I cannot condescend
+  My page to tarnish and my time to spend:
+  Crawford, in age, though not in wisdom, grey,
+  Attempts in vain th’allotted part to play;
+  Though Abington spreads out her wrinkled arms,
+  The Widow Belmour now has lost her charms.
+  O tasteless age, in folly how mature,
+  Such mad perversion tamely to endure;
+  Haste, venerable pair, and leave the stage,
+  For “beads and prayer-books are the toys of age.”
+
+     A royal edict issues from the throne,
+  O! say what brilliant spectacle is shewn?
+  What constellation sheds its brilliant ray?
+  Quick is the Georgium Sidus of the play!
+  By Reynolds taught,[5] see Lewis frisk and climb,
+  And Follett’s carrots[6] grace the pantomime.
+
+                           FRIEND.
+
+  If Covent-Garden’s virtues are unknown,
+  Adopt the reigning mode, and praise your own;
+  Warton, in Pope, presents us nothing new,
+  Pert Boswell brings all Johnson to our view,
+  In quarto see the man of star and ribbon
+  Sedately usher in the works of Gibbon;
+  Erskine, self-fancy’d scourger of the throne,
+  Now pleads his client’s cause, and now his own.
+  Holman plays Hotspur: Shakespear, with a groan,
+  Sees Percy, and scarce knows him for his own!
+  Think you for foreign benefit they strive?
+  Shakespear is dead, but Holman is alive;[7]
+  Self prompts the player, self fills the tedious page,
+  Alike or in the closet or the stage.
+
+                           AUTHOR.
+
+  Enough of this! proceed we to our song,
+  Attend my lays, and tell me where I’m wrong;
+  Hither, my muse, thy wand’ring flight restrain,
+  Perch on my quill, and sing of Drury-Lane.
+
+     Siddons,[8] great mistress of each magic art,
+  To raise contending passions in the heart,
+  When wretched Shore, depress’d with grief and pain,
+  Calls upon death, her last resource, in vain;
+  Or when, unaw’d by conscience or by fear,
+  Macbeth drives on her impious mad career,
+  When horrid dreams at length her guilt reveal,
+  And on her hand she shews the bloody seal;
+  When poor Cordelia, after wars alarms,
+  Expires with anguish in her father’s arms;
+  In Beverley’s distress and piercing moans;
+  In Isabella’s shrieks and dying groans;
+  O Siddons! thou alone the soul can’st thrill,
+  And melt us down, like Circe, to thy will.
+
+     When Shakespear bids contending passions wage,
+  Love, hatred, jealousy, remorse, and rage,
+  Or paints the madness of the noble Dane;
+  Or fell ambition of the Highland thane;
+  Or Richard urges on his blood-stain’d course,
+  And madly cries “My kingdom for a horse!”
+  Kemble,[9] in scenes like these, can nobly soar,
+  And make e’en Garrick’s loss be felt no more.
+
+     Next Jordan[10] comes, Thalia’s fav’rite child,
+  And charms with naïveté and humour wild;
+  Miss Peggy, Prissy Tomboy, or Miss Prue,
+  Oh! who can play so charmingly, so true?
+  But, in the name of ev’ry thing that’s strange,
+  Why suffer her in Farren’s walk to range?
+  Why call her Lady Teazle, Lady Belle?
+  Still it is Jordan finely dress’d--as Nell.
+  Farren had reach’d the summit of renown,
+  And who like her shall charm the partial town?
+  Ah! who shall now portray the modish wife,
+  When will another Farren spring to life!
+  But Lady Teazle, Lady Townly too,
+  Bisarre, and Estifania,--all adieu!
+
+     Decamp[11] approaches! born to tread the stage,
+  At once the pride and pleasure of the age;
+  Whether in tragic stole or comic vest,
+  In each her pow’rs superior are confess’d;
+  And when she warbles Ariel’s plaintive airs,
+  ’Tis like the music of the tuneful spheres;
+  In ev’ry scene new beauties stand confess’d,
+  And the last character is still the best.
+  But, oh! what pen with equal skill can trace
+  Th’expressive passions varying in her face?
+  A face uniting elegance and ease,
+  Prompt to delight, and emulous to please,
+  Still changing as the vary’d passions move,
+  And sure in all to fix esteem and love.
+  Ye erring critics! will ye still deplore
+  That wit is fled and genius is no more?
+  That modern acting no more boasts the art
+  “To raise the genius and to mend the heart?”
+  Attend submissive to the voice of truth,
+  For, see, array’d in all the pride of youth,
+  Unconscious of her own pre-eminence,
+  In graceful action, and in native sense,
+  Decamp approaches! Envy hides her head,
+  And foul Detraction sinks among the dead!
+  Each charm’d spectator instant homage pays,
+  And all is lost in universal praise.
+
+     The tragic Muse, by various evils cross’d,
+  Some future day, shall mourn her Siddons lost!
+  Yet one remains, and critics must confess,
+  Powell shall serve to make that loss the less;
+  Expressive beauties mantle in her face;
+  Yet is her gaudy action void of grace.
+  But, when she paints Almeria’s tender woes,
+  Each sympathetic heart with pity glows;
+  Nay more, would she discard the tricks of art,
+  The outspread arms, shrill voice, and measur’d start;
+  Would she converse in nature’s artless strain,
+  Nor deign to walk in imitation’s train;
+  Her native pow’rs would fairest fame engage,
+  And a new Siddons might adorn the stage.
+
+     Old Churchill spoke in terms of warmest praise
+  Of Pope, the lively, in her youthful days:
+  Though sixty summers o’er her head have flown,
+  Thalia claims this fav’rite for her own:
+  In Alscrip, Malaprop, and Mistress Page,
+  She stands without a rival on the stage;
+  And of her lasting charms, so wide the scope,
+  All the domestic virtues shine in Pope!
+
+     Palmer’s rough tones no sympathy impart,
+  Yet the man walks majestic through his part;
+  His voice, his action, and his person, good,
+  His author always clearly understood;
+  Firm as the Trojan chief, of form divine,
+  Whose mother-goddess made his temples shine;
+  ’Twas his, (but not in our degen’rate days,)
+  ’Twas his to mix the myrtle with the bays;
+  Through five long acts alert and gay to dance,
+  And realize the fictions of romance.
+  But now, alas! those fairy scenes are fled,
+  The myrtle, and the bays, both droop the head!
+  In modern scenes solicitous to please,
+  He acts the gentleman with studious ease;
+  And in some parts I see both sense and spirit,
+  In Stukely and Iago sterling merit,
+  With genuine Nature strive:--one part remains
+  To crown his merit and reward his pains.
+  See Packer, whom his dress in vain disguises,
+  Seems half-seas over ere the curtain rises;
+  Tott’ring beneath the weight of plumes and age,
+  He speaks _memento mori_ to the stage.[12]
+  Haste, Palmer! haste! disrobe the royal knave,
+  Assert your claims, and Drury’s credit save;
+  Study the part, make Claudius all your own,
+  And drive the driv’ller from the Danish throne.
+
+     Old King,[13] with ev’ry requisite to please,
+  Strong sense, dry humour, wit, and comic ease,
+  Unrivall’d reigns, on Drury’s classic boards,
+  In crusty crabbed sires and testy lords.
+
+     See Charles,[14] a brother of the Kemble race,
+  With youthful figure and expressive face,
+  In ardent Malcolm admiration draws,
+  And claims in luckless Barnwell loud applause;
+  He, urging onward in the path of fame,
+  The native honours of his house to claim,
+  Shall gain the steep ascent, by Siddons led,
+  While wreaths of living laurel grace his head.
+
+     Wroughton’s[15] a useful player and a just,
+  And faithful to his manageric trust,
+  In some few characters, to give his due,
+  He acts with feeling and with judgement too.
+  What pity then to see the man presume
+  To torture and burlesque poor Captain Plume!
+  “And never was a story of more woe,”
+  Than Wroughton croaking love-sick Romeo.
+
+     With shaggy wig, stiff knees, and lengthen’d stride,
+  Pedantic tone, and arms expanded wide,
+  Unmeaning emphasis, theatric roar,
+  ’Tis an automaton, or Barrymore![16]
+  Dramatic Proteus! who, strange to tell!
+  Plays ev’ry thing by turns, and nothing well!
+  Long has he stood, nor chang’d his first degree,
+  Fix’d at the freezing point of apathy;
+  And much I fear, that time, which, join’d with sense,
+  Exalts true genius into excellence,
+  Will ne’er promote the man, whose sole renown
+  Heads a banditti or assaults a town.
+
+     Suett comes next:--alas! and “Woe is me!
+  “T’have seen what I have seen, see what I see!”
+  In some low scenes of Colman’s motley stuff,[17]
+  Suett is sometimes laughable enough;
+  But genuine humour, comic wit, and grace,
+  Are chang’d by him to mum’ry and grimace.
+  Poor Foresight, skill’d in astrologic lore,
+  When Parsons died, you fell to rise no more!
+  For ever clos’d, Burgoyne, is thy chaste page,
+  And Gripe and Moneytrap must quit the stage.
+
+     With figure neat, and pretty lifeless face,
+  Goodall, alas! appears of stoic race!
+  Nor joy, nor grief, affect her lifeless frame,
+  Inanimate and gentle, mild and tame:
+  Yet, would she call expression to her aid,
+  Speak up, and cry, with Kecksey, “Who’s afraid?”[18]
+  Her Rosalind would charm, and, in her cause,
+  All Drury’s dome might ring with loud applause.
+
+     When Bannister in Walter’s part appears,
+  Who can deny the tributary tears?
+  And, of his real merits, not to baulk ye,
+  He’s excellent in Gubbins, Scrub, and Gawkey:
+  But when, forgetting nature, form, and make,
+  He tries t’assume the gentleman and rake;
+  Or when in Tom with lively Lewis vies;
+  Heav’ns! how disgusting to our ears and eyes!
+  Yet few comedians, of the present age,
+  Appear so well, acquainted with the stage;
+  And, spite of ev’ry fault, the truth to own,
+  He has the art of pleasing all the town.
+
+     When Shakespear’s magic Tempest awes the soul,
+  When light’nings dart, waves dash, and thunders roll;
+  Let beauteous Miller, diffident and fair,
+  Assume Miranda’s wild angelic air:
+  Pale with affright, she bends beneath the storm,
+  While the rude winds unveil her lovely form;
+  “Poor souls! they perish!” cries the maid distress’d,
+  “Poor souls! they perish!” echoes ev’ry breast.
+
+     Dowton, in Cumberland’s romantic Jew,
+  Portrays with feeling what the author drew;
+  In Scrub, or grave-digger, might gain renown:
+  Why are the corners of his mouth drawn down?
+  When merit fails, and nature’s sober grace,
+  Buffoonery but ill supplies their place.
+
+     Packer aspires to Denmark’s regal chair,
+  “O Hamlet! what a falling off was there!”
+  Palmer’s the king for Gertrude’s bridal feast,
+  And Packer,--he should play the churlish priest.
+
+     When vulgar Heidelberg assumes her airs,
+  Deaf to her brother’s threats, her niece’s tears,
+  Wallcott comes forth, with squabby shape and mien,
+  Equal to Mesdames Hopkins, Webb, and Green.
+
+     O popular applause! how short thy date!
+  Crouch sinks beneath the hand of time and fate!
+  Hard is the task the slight remains to trace
+  Of what was Phillips’ elegance and grace.
+
+     Old Bannister, in tones of deepest bass,
+  In Caliban displays his ugly face;
+  And critics must allow, upon the whole,
+  Some share of merit to his Mother Cole;
+  Then let him pass, the social bowl allow,
+  Applauded once, we well may suffer now.
+
+     With lisping voice, and action full of bustle,
+  In Fribble shines the Margate hero Russell;
+  In Sparkish decent, and in Surface mean,[19]
+  The worst Sir Lucius that the stage has seen!
+
+     O mortals! vain and wayward, ever prone
+  To vilify all merit but your own;
+  Deaf to reproof, to public sarcasms blind,
+  Ye quit the proper sphere by fate assign’d:
+  Each stripling risks some daring enterprize,
+  And, giant-like, would rush into the skies.
+
+     The youth, whose pow’rs are neither good nor bad,
+  In humble merit’s sober mantle clad;
+  Whose mighty task extends to “Good, my liege!”
+  Secure or in a chorus or a siege;
+  Whose modest tongue, unknown to wisdom’s lore,
+  Speaks what his author wrote, and speaks no more;
+  Who marks the present hour, recalls the past,
+  And makes each night a critic on the last;
+  Him shall applauses greet where numbers pour,
+  Wentworth or Davis, Webb or Phillimore.
+  But, when I see some forward youngster stalk,
+  Smit with the rage of tragedy and talk,
+  O’erleap each fence of modesty and fear,
+  And boldly mount to Shakespear’s radiant sphere,
+  Indignant, then, I spurn compassion’s call;
+  Contempt and laughter wait upon his fall:
+  The hapless elf lies humbled in the dust,
+  While scoffing crowds confess the sentence just.
+
+     But, hark! a plaintive voice amid the gale,
+  In numbers sweet, breathes out a tender tale;
+  Sure ’tis some minstrel of the fairy band,
+  ’Tis more than mortal!--No, ’tis little Bland.
+
+     With voice mellifluous, though somewhat weak,
+  And often husky, view the warbler Leak.
+  On Margaretta’s simple artless lays
+  She builds a monument of lasting praise;
+  And, oh! ’twould melt the sternest heart to pity
+  To hear her sing her “lowly plaintive ditty.”
+
+     See Biggs, a candidate for London fame,
+  In Drury’s annals now records her name:
+  Dauntless she enters on the classic ground,
+  With universal praise and plaudits crown’d.
+
+     Aikin, with feeling and good sense endu’d,
+  Can act the parent prudent, firm, and good;
+  The British merchant, gen’rous, open, just;
+  And the old steward, faithful to his trust.
+
+     Patient and simple, Drury’s weakest tool,
+  With too much folly e’en to play the fool;
+  With awkward form, and vague quiescent face,
+  Wretched buffoonery, and low grimace;
+  Lo! Wathen tumbles in, by folly led,
+  And quick compulsive gravity of head.
+  Alas, alas! poor shifting weather-cock!
+  Why didst thou change the halberd for the sock?
+  Thy lagging purse and wit could ill afford
+  The festive joys of Wargrave and her lord!
+  Small bounds divide the idler and the player;
+  The soldier turns an actor in despair.
+  See lovely Rose, whom circling crowds adore,
+  Ne’er felt for Bullock half the shame before.[20]
+  Heav’ns, what a contrast! View the motley feast;
+  ’Tis Pan and Venus, beauty and the beast.
+  Not Farquhar’s wit could force thy friends to stay,
+  Though Dibdin’s song ek’d out the murder’d play.
+  While shows like these can Britain’s care engage,
+  I spurn such folly, and renounce the stage;
+  Calm and remote, neglect the passing scene,
+  Nor quit my roof for Wathen and the spleen.
+
+     Who has not oft beguil’d his ev’ning hours,
+  Charm’d with the melody of Kelly’s pow’rs?
+  Aided by him, still Arne enchants the town,
+  And Kelly adds new gems to Handel’s crown.
+  Oft have we heard, well pleas’d, yet mourn’d the while,
+  His tones melodious, but his action vile:
+  Our eyes must weep at what our ears rejoice;
+  So spare the man, in pity to his voice!
+
+     Bob Palmer can a drunken story tell,
+  His Jeremy and Trip are passing well;
+  But, for the airy fops of Farquhar’s age,
+  When will another Dodd adorn the stage?
+
+     For Hollingsworth we have not far to look,[21]
+  What is the part he plays?--Oh! Jacob Cook!
+
+     Badd’ley, thy loss must Drury still deplore,
+  Thy Moses set the audience in a roar:
+  Now Wewitzer the usurer assumes,
+  And struts a magpie in the peacock’s plumes.
+
+     In Mellon’s face what gay good humour lies,
+  How archly roll her sparkling gipsy eyes!
+  And when their fire she darts in Lydia Languish,
+  O lovely nymph! I cry, assuage my anguish!
+
+     Sedgwick, in Woodley, stands to public view,
+  Or the brave captain of a smuggling crew:
+  And Dignum’s voice harmonious, soft, and clear,
+  Though far from pow’rful, charms the list’ning ear.
+
+     For walking gentlemen, and trailing lords,
+  Grac’d with becoming paucity of words;
+  Or, for the bleeding captain in Macbeth,
+  Who talks of honour, murder, scars, and death;
+  Or of conspirators to make a cluster;
+  Holland and Caulfield here may well pass muster.
+
+     Maddocks and Phillimore, ye brilliant pair!
+  Let Banquo’s bloody murder be your care:
+  While Trueman cries, aghast, in fearful mood,
+  “Methought, my lord, I saw a moving wood!”
+
+     Let black-ey’d Heard, and Stuart tattling fast,
+  Of vixen chambermaids divide the cast:
+  And Tidswell tall, with Booth, the ancient crone,
+  Lead in the queen, or stand behind the throne.
+
+                           FRIEND.
+
+     Enough! enough! now let the curtain fall,
+  Here cease your song, and bid good night to all.
+
+                           AUTHOR.
+
+     The Muse now rests, her purpos’d labours o’er,
+  Safe from her toil, and landed on the shore:
+  Each actor view’d in Fancy’s magic glass,
+  Walks o’er her page like royal Banquo’s race.
+  Oh! would kind Fate, like his, her offspring bless,
+  Exalt with favour, and with smiles caress,
+  Her moral page should circling crowds delight,
+  And added vigour aid her tow’ring flight.
+
+     Genius of Shakespear, from thy heav’nly sphere,
+  Look down with pity on thy vot’ries here:
+  See pantomimic jargon, ev’ry season,
+  Usurp the place of common sense and reason.
+  Some rising poet, O great Bard! inspire,
+  With one bright spark of thy immortal fire,
+  Reclaim the taste of this degen’rate age,
+  And reign once more triumphant o’er the stage.
+
+    ──────────────────────────────────────────────────────
+
+  [1] See this absurd and pernicious custom well ridiculed
+  in “The Pursuits of Literature.” A work which strongly and
+  properly reprobates the practice of those, whose learning,
+  “like a rich armour worn in heat of day,” only serves to
+  encumber the wearer. It is not our business to criticize
+  the temper or motives of the author of that elaborate
+  performance. He may possibly, to use the words of a modern
+  poet, be “shrouded in a mist of moral spleen;” or he may
+  be influenced by the purest intentions. The work is of
+  extensive utility; and, as such, is entitled to our
+  thanks.
+
+  [2] Such is the _celestial_ phrase of Henry James Pye,
+  Esq. “O’er June’s ambrosial flow’rs.”--This gentleman in
+  his ardent devotion to the Muses seems totally to have
+  forgotten the Graces; else, why the pompous repetition of
+  the same turgid compound epithets that encumber without
+  adorning his odes? We acknowledge that Poet Laureates are
+  placed in a dangerous situation; like the pictures hung up
+  in the Forum, they are exposed to the indiscriminate
+  criticism of the multitude. Cibber, smarting under the
+  lash of Pope, says “a lick at the Laureate” has ever been
+  the fashion. I am sorry to observe, that the present bard
+  cannot claim an exemption. I would recommend to his
+  observation the following lines of Pope, speaking of
+  Blackmore:
+
+   What, like Sir Richard, rumbling rough and hoarse,
+   With arms, and George, and Brunswick, crowd the verse;
+   Burst, with tremendous din, your ears asunder,
+   With gun, drum, trumpet, blunderbuss, and thunder.
+
+  [3] Pope.
+
+  [4] Hamlet.
+
+  [5] By Reynolds taught.--The speaking pantomimes of this
+  gentleman, called by courtesy comedies, are at present
+  generally known; but, as in all probability they will be
+  soon forgotten, it was thought necessary to mention them
+  here.
+
+  [6] As posterity may be puzzled to understand the meaning
+  of these words, know, all men, by these presents, that the
+  joke consists in Mr. Follett, the clown, coming forward
+  and sitting down in the front of the stage, with a basket
+  containing three or four immense carrots; which, assisted
+  by some intro-susceptive power in the vegetable, he has
+  the appearance of devouring whole, to the great delight of
+  the British audience.
+
+   Indocti stolidique et depugnare parati
+   Si discordet eques, media inter carmina poscunt
+   Aut _ursum_, aut _pugiles_; hic nam plebecula gaudet.
+   Verum equitis quoque jam migravit ab _aure_ voluptas
+   Omnis ad _incertos oculos_, et gaudia vana.
+
+  [7] _Holman._--This is one of those actors who should
+  receive a hint to pay more attention to their author and
+  less to themselves. Cibber wrote as well as acted for the
+  stage, and succeeded: Holman has written too; but, “haud
+  passibus æquis!”
+
+             Scribimus indocti doctique.--HOR.
+
+  [8] The great and unrivalled talents of this lady in
+  tragedy are such as would justly subject us to the
+  imputation of vanity and folly, were we to attempt to
+  enumerate them. With such a distinguished favourite of
+  Melpomene before our eyes, it is painful to think that
+  tragedy should be in this nation overlooked and neglected,
+  as is evinced by the cold manner in which the productions
+  of our best dramatic writers are received upon the stage,
+  though aided by the magic powers of her, who carries us
+  into whatever regions the fiction of the poet places in
+  our view.
+
+   Irritat, mulcet, falsis terroribus implet,
+   Ut magus; et modo me Thebis modo ponit Athenis.--HOR.
+
+  Let not poets any longer arrogate immortality to their
+  works, when we see the productions of Dryden, Otway,
+  Southern, and even Shakespear himself, placed upon the
+  shelf: And for what? To please the taste of a public,
+  vitiated by the unseemly trash, issuing from the pen of
+  O’Keefe, Reynolds, Morton, &c. &c.
+
+     Whose happy arts attention can command
+     When fancy flags, and sense is at a stand.--POPE.
+
+  [9] We think it sufficient to observe of this gentleman,
+  (whose talents as an actor are too well known to require
+  commendation here,) that his Coriolanus and Macbeth are
+  noble instances of his powers, and that he has brought
+  Hamlet to the achme of perfection.
+
+  [10] Who, that has witnessed the admiral efforts of Mrs.
+  Jordan in low comedy, does not regret to see her attempt
+  such parts as Lady Teazle and Estifania? After these
+  extraordinary undertakings, we shall soon expect to see
+  Mr. Bannister, jun. in Richard III. and Mr. Suett in
+  Beverley or Macbeth. As Mrs. Amlet says in the
+  Confederacy, “We are all for appearing above what we are,
+  and that is what ruins every body.”
+
+  [11] The satirist, averse to exhibiting scenes of folly,
+  fixes with delight on beauty and excellence: as the
+  traveller, weary of the uniformity of a dusky heath,
+  wanders with joy over fertile plains and enamelled
+  meadows. Seldom have we received more various and rational
+  pleasure than from the truly excellent performances of
+  Miss Decamp. With a face well adapted to express the
+  sentiments of the soul, an elegant and graceful person,
+  appropriate action, and a knowledge of her author’s
+  meaning, which good understanding alone can give, this
+  young lady bids fair to obtain general and unrivalled
+  approbation. But, as the human mind, however variously
+  gifted by nature, has still some single object in which it
+  is peculiarly fated to figure, some cast of character
+  which is exclusively its province, we would strongly
+  recommend it to this young lady to study Mrs. Jordan’s
+  comic characters, without meaning to preclude her from
+  those occasional variations, which no one can undergo with
+  more justice and versatility than herself.
+
+        “Reddere personæ scit convenientia cuique.”
+
+  [12] It is surprising that the Manager should remain
+  ignorant of the most important part of his office, namely,
+  an appropriate distribution of parts. Packer, some thirty
+  years ago, might have been a tolerable actor; but surely
+  he has had time to “strut and fret his hour upon the
+  stage,” and should now be “heard no more.” The character
+  of the Danish usurper, in his hands, is deprived of all
+  its interest, by losing that crafty, yet daring, villany
+  which Shakespear intended to portray. The fine soliloquy,
+  “O my offence is rank!” &c. is entirely omitted, in pity,
+  we suppose, to this old man’s infirmities: but, it is time
+  to inform Mr. Packer, that, when he attempts parts like
+  these, “O my offence is rank!” would be no improper
+  exclamation.
+
+  [13] In the veteran King we see an actor of sterling
+  excellence and merit. He possesses real humour
+  unadulterated with buffoonery; a most rare quality in the
+  present state of the stage! But “Vitæ summa brevis, spem
+  nos vetat inchoare longam.” Mr. King’s infirmities are now
+  growing fast upon him;
+
+         --------------------“His way of life
+         Is fallen into the sear, the yellow leaf!”
+
+  And it is with infinite regret that we look forward to the
+  time when he shall retire from that stage, of which he has
+  so long been a distinguished ornament.
+
+  [14] Mr. Charles Kemble’s powers are daily expanding into
+  excellence; and we look forward with pleasure to the
+  future eminence of this young actor.
+
+       Yet shall he mount, and keep his distant way,
+       Beyond the limits of a vulgar fate.--GRAY.
+
+  [15] The power of managers to obtrude themselves upon the
+  public in what characters they please must often be
+  abused, by laying them open to the attacks of vanity;
+  while, from their high situation in the theatre, we
+  presume the real truth is not likely to offend their ears.
+  The humorous author of the Connoisseur hints at a reverend
+  bishop, who kept his chaplains in a state of such extreme
+  servility, that it was their custom to ask him at the
+  conclusion of every deal at whist what his lordship would
+  please to have for trumps? Mr. Wroughton may not perhaps
+  be so highly pampered as the above-mentioned bishop, but
+  it was thought necessary to enlarge upon the frequent
+  absurdity of his conduct, that future managers may profit
+  by his evil example.
+
+ “Bonum est fugienda aspicere alieno in malo.”--PUBL. SYR.
+
+  [16] Barrymore is one of those personages, to make use of
+  Pope’s words, “Who never changed his principles or
+  wig.”--As his action and voice are uniform, so is his wig;
+  as his gigantic method of uttering trivial sentiments is
+  uniform, so is his wig: pity the wig is not a better one!
+
+  [17] The dramatic productions of Mr. Colman have a real
+  claim to the title of motley. As a proof of this
+  assertion, we beg leave to refer our readers to the
+  Mountaineers and the Iron Chest, in both of which plays
+  are lines not unworthy of a Congreve or a Rowe; but these
+  are debased most miserably by others, which are beneath
+  the notice of criticism. Upon the whole, it appears, that
+  the genius of this gentleman is happily adapted to the
+  size of his theatre:
+
+       Humano capiti cervicem pictor equinam
+       Jungere si velit, et varias inducere plumas
+       Undique collatis membris; aut turpitur atrum
+       Desinat in piscem mulier fermosa superne
+       Spectatum admissi risum teneatis, amici?--HOR.
+
+  It may be worth inquiry, why the public should permit the
+  performance of the Iron Chest at the Haymarket, after the
+  decided sentence pronounced upon it at Drury-Lane; as it
+  must be obvious to the most ignorant spectator, that the
+  play was cast with much greater force at the
+  last-mentioned theatre; for, while we respect the talents
+  of Mr. Elliston, we hold it something like blasphemy to
+  place him in competition with Mr. Kemble, the first
+  tragedian of the age; and how must the broad farcical
+  humour of Fawcett suffer in comparison with the acting of
+  the late excellent Dodd! Perhaps it may be urged, that
+  Fawcett stood next to Dodd in the personification of such
+  characters as Adam Winterton: if so, it must certainly be,
+  as Virgil expresses it, “Proximus, sed longo intervallo.”
+
+  [18] We wish that Mrs. Goodall would avail herself of our
+  friendly hints; she might certainly become an actress of
+  some merit: at present she gives us an idea of a
+  well-constructed automaton.
+
+  [19] Strange that so few actors can play the
+  gentleman!--As to Mr. Russell,--but it would be a waste of
+  time to expatiate on his demerits. All our astonishment is
+  to think that he should _attempt_ such characters as
+  Charles Surface; especially as the excellence of Smith is
+  still fresh in the minds of the public.
+
+       ----------Quid enim contendat hirundo
+       Cycnis?                               LUCRET.
+
+  [20] The part of Bullock was performed, by Mr. Wathen, not
+  for the public benefit, but his own. The good nature of a
+  British audience was never better exemplified than in the
+  above instance.--Surely there never was such an age of
+  toleration!--Dibdin’s song of the _Waggoner_ was also sung
+  by our hero, to exhibit his talents in another point of
+  view. To say the execution was intolerable is far from
+  sufficient, and yet we have neither time nor patience to
+  say more.--All was hushed! for, at least half the audience
+  was asleep.
+
+       Somno positi sub nocte silenti
+       Lenibant curas et corda oblita laborum.--VIRG.
+
+  [21] We are astonished to see this man figuring away in
+  such characters as the Baron of Oakland, Mr. Hardy, and
+  Sir Francis Wronghead.--When will managers learn their
+  duty to the public? and when distinguish between
+  unaffected humour and unnatural buffoonery?--To
+  Hollingsworth we may apply the lines of Peter Pindar:
+
+           “Of acting I have seen enough,
+           “Most vile, most execrable, stuff;
+         “But none so bad as thine, I vow to God!”
+
+
+                           THE END.
+
+
+
+
+                     Transcriber’s Notes
+
+
+New original cover art included with this eBook is granted
+to the public domain.
+
+The original text used the long s. This has been changed
+to the regular s.
+
+The footnotes have been renumbered and moved to the end of
+the book.
+
+A few obvious typographical errors have been silently
+corrected. Archaic and irregular spellings have been
+retained.
+*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 77394 ***