m »w/J» *^-* *.3^'i2fe ^ J LIBRA rr UNIV-R3ITY O CALIFO 'NA SAN DIEGO \ J REJECTED ADDRESSES Rejected Addresses OR THE NEW THEATRUM TOETARUM " Fired that the HOUSE reject hira !— 'Sdeath, I'll print it, And shame the Fools ! " POPE. LONDON GEORGE ROUTLEDGE AND SONS Broadway, Ludgate Hill GLASGOW AND NEW YORK 1888 PREFACE.* /^N the 14th of August 18 12, the following advertisement appeared in most of the daily papers : — '■'' Rebuilding of Driiry Lane Theatre, "The Committee are desirous of promoting a free and fair competition for an Address to be spoken upon the opening of the Theatre, which will take place on the loth of October next. They have, therefore, thought fit to announce to the public, that they will be glad to receive any such compositions, addressed to their Secretary, at the Treasury-office in Drury Lane, on or before the loth of Sep- * To the first Edition, published in October 1812. VI PREFACE. tember, sealed up, with a distinguishing word, number, or motto, on the cover, corresponding with the inscription on a separate sealed paper, containing the name of the author, which will not be opened unless containing the name of the successful candidate." Upon the propriety of this plan, men's minds were, as they usually are upon matters of moment, much divided. Some thought it a fair promise of the future intention of the Com- mittee to abolish that phalanx of authors who usurp the stage, to the exclusion of a large assortment of dramatic talent blushing unseen in the background ; while others contended that the scheme would prevent men of real eminence from descending into an amphitheatre in which all Grub Street (that is to say, all London and Westminster) would be arrayed against them. The event has proved both parties to be in a degree right, and in a degree wrong. One hundred and twelve addresses have been sent in, each sealed and signed and PREFACE. VII mottoed, '' as per order," some written by men of great, some by men of little, and some by men of no talent. Many of the public prints have censured the taste of the Committee, in thus contracting for addresses as they would for nails — by the gross ; but it is surprising that none should have censured their temerity. One hundred and eleven of the addresses must, of course, be unsuccessful : to each of the authors, thus infallibly classed with the genus i7'ritabile^ it would be very hard to deny six staunch friends, who consider his the best of all possible ad- dresses, and whose tongues will be as ready to laud him as to hiss his adversary. These, with the potent aid of the Bard himself, make seven foes per address ; and thus will be created seven hundred and seventy-seven im- placable auditors, prepared to condemn the strains of Apollo himself — a band of adversaries which no prudent manager would think of exasperating. Vlll PREFACE. But, leaving the Committee to encounter the responsibihty they have incurred, the pubhc have at least to thank them for ascertaining and establishing one point, which might other- wise have admitted of controversy. When it is considered that many amateur writers have been discouraged from becoming competitors, and that few, if any, of the professional authors can afford to write for nothing, and, of course, have not been candidates for the honorary prize at Drury Lane, we may confidently pronounce that, as far as regards mwtber, the present is undoubtedly the Augustan age of English poetry. Whether or not this distinction will be extended to the qualify of its productions, must be decided at the tribunal of posterity ; though the natural anxiety of our authors on this score ought to be considerably diminished when they reflect how few will, in all probability, be had up for judgment. It is not necessary for the Editor to mention the manner in which he became possessed of PREFACE. IX this "fair sample of the present state of poetry in Great Britain." It was his first intention to publish the whole ; but a little reflection con- vinced him that, by so doing, he might depress the good, without elevating the bad. He has therefore culled what had the appearance of flowers, from what possessed the reality of weeds, and is extremely sorry that, in so doing, he has diminished his collection to twenty-one. Those which he has rejected may possibly make their appearance in a separate volume, or they may be admitted as volunteers in the files of some of the newspapers : or, at all events, they are sure of being received among the awkward squad of the Magazines. In general, they bear a close resemblance to each other — thirty of them contain extravagant compliments to the immortal Wellington and the indefatig- able Whitbread ; and, as the last-mentioned gentleman is said to dislike praise in the exact proportion in which he deserves it, these laudatory writers have probably been only A 2 X PREFACE. building a wall against which they might run their own heads. The Editor here begs leave to advance a few words in behalf of that useful and much- abused bird the Phoenix ; and in so doing, he is biassed by no partiality, as he assures the reader he not only never saw one, but {i7iirabile diciu !) never caged one, in a simile, in the whole course of his life. Not less than sixty- nine of the competitors have invoked the aid of this native of Arabia ; but as, from their manner of using him after they had caught him, he does not by any means appear to have been a native of Arabia Felix, the Editor has left the proprietors to treat with Mr. Polito, and refused to receive this vara avis, or black swan, into the present collection. One exception occurs, in which the admirable treatment of this feathered incombustible entitles the author to great praise — that Address has been preserved, and in the ensuing pages takes the lead, to which its dignity entitles it. PREFACE. XI Perhaps the reason why several of the sub- joined productions of the Mus^ Londinenses have failed of selection, may be discovered in their being penned in a metre unusual upon occasions of this sort, and in their not being written with that attention to stage effect, the want of which, like want of manners in the concerns of life, is more prejudicial than a deficiency of talent. There is an art of writ- ing for the Theatre, technically called touch and go, which is indispensable when we con- sider the small quantum of patience which so motley an assemblage as a London audience can be expected to afford. All the contri- butors have been very exact in sending their initials and mottoes. Those belonging to the present collection have been carefully pre- served, and each has been affixed to its re- spective poem. The letters that accompanied the Addresses having been honourably de- stroyed unopened, it is impossible to state the real authors with any certainty ; but the Xll PREFACE. ingenious reader, after comparing the initials with the motto, and both with the poem, may form his own conclusions. The Editor does not anticipate any disap- probation from thus giving publicity to a small portion of the REJECTED Addresses ; for unless he is widely mistaken in assigning the respective authors, the fame of each individual is established on much too firm a basis to be shaken by so trifling and evanescent a pubhca- tion as the present : "... neque ego illi detrahere ausim Haerentem capiti multa cum laude coronam. Of the numerous pieces already sent to the Committee for performance, he has only availed himself of three vocal travesties, which he has selected, not for their merit, but simply for their brevity. Above one hundred spec- tacles, melodramas, operas, and pantomimes, have been transmitted, besides the two first acts of one legitimate comedy. Some of these evince considerable smartness of manual dialogue, and several brilliant repartees of chairs, tables, and other inanimate wits ; but the authors seem to have forgotten that in the new Drury Lane the audience can hear as well as see. Of late our theatres have been so constructed that John Bull has been compelled to have very long ears, or none at all ; to keep them dangling about his skull like discarded servants, while his eyes were gazing at piebalds and elephants, or else to stretch them out to an asinine length to catch the congenial sound of braying trumpets. An auricular revolution is, we trust, about to take place ; and as many people have been much puzzled to define the meaning of the new era, of which we have heard so much, we venture to pronounce that, as far as regards Drury Lane Theatre, the new era means the reign of ears. If the past affords any pledge for the future, we may confidently expect from the Committee of that House everything that can be accom- plished by the union of taste and assiduity. THE REJECTED ADDRESSES. nPHE rebuilding of the theatre at Drury Lane, after its late destruction by fire, was managed by a certain committee, to whom also was confided, amongst other minor and mechanical arrangements, the care of procur- ing an occasional prologue. The committee, if it was wisely selected for its other duties, could not, we may well suppose, be greatly qualified for this ; and, accordingly, with due modesty, and In the true spirit of tradesmen, they advertised for the best poetical address, to be sealed and delivered within a certain number of days, folded and directed in a given form; in short, like the tender for a pubHc contract. THE REJECTED ADDRESSES. XV '• The result has been just what we should have expected from so auspicious a beginning, in every respect but two : one is, that, to our great astonishment, three - and - forty persons were found to contend for this prize ; and the other, that amongst these are to be found two or three persons who appear to have some share of taste and genius. "The three -and- forty addresses, however, properly folded, sealed, marked, and directed, reached the committee. We can easily imagine the modest dismay with which they viewed their increasing hoards ; they began to think that it would have been easier and safer to trust to the reputation and taste of Mr. Scott or Mr. Southey, Mr. Campbell or Mr. Rogers, than to have pledged themselves to the task of making a choice and selection in a matter of which, what little they knew, was worse than nothing. The builders of the lofty pile were totally at a loss to know how to dis- pose of the builders of the lofty rhyme : the XVI PREFACE. latter all spoke different languages, and all, to the former, equally unintelligible. The com- mittee were alike confounded with the number of addresses and their own debates. No such confusion of tongues had accompanied any erection since the building of Babel ; nor could matters have been set to rights (unless by a miracle), if the convenient, though not very candid plan of rejecting all the addresses had not occurred, as a ' mezzotermine,' in which the whole committee might safely agree ; and the addresses were rejected accordingly. We do not think that they deserved, in true poetical justice, a better fate : not one was excellent, two or three only were tolerable, and the rest so execrable, that we wonder this committee of taste did not agree upon one of them. But as the several bards were induced to expend their precious time and more precious paper, by the implied engagement on the part of the com- mittee that the best bidder should have the contract, we think they have a right to protest REJECTED ADDRESSES. Xvii against the injustice of this wholesale rejection. It was about as fair as it would be in Messrs. Bish and Carter, after they had disposed of all their lottery tickets, to acquaint the holders that there should be no drawing, but that they intended to transfer the ^20,000 prize to an acquaintance of their own. The committee, we readily admit, made an absurd engagement ; but surely they were bound to keep it. " In the dilemma to which that learned body was reduced by the rejection of all the biddings, they put themselves under the care of Lord Byron, who prescribed in their case a composi- tion which bears the honour of his name." — From the Quarterly Review. PREFACE TO THE EIGHTEENTH EDITION.* T N the present publishing era, when books are like the multitudinous waves of the advancing sea, some of which make no im- pression whatever upon the sand, while the superficial traces left by others are destined to be perpetually obliterated by their successors, almost as soon as they are found, the authors of the " Rejected Addresses " may well feel flat- tered, after a lapse of twenty years, and the sale of seventeen large editions, in receiving * i2mo. , 1833. The first published by Mr. Murray. The "Preface" was written by Horace Smith; the " Notes " to the Poems by James Smith, PREFACE. XIX an application to write a Preface to a new and more handsome impression. In diminution, however, of any overweening vanity which they might be disposed to indulge on this occasion, they cannot but admit the truth of the remark made by a particularly candid and good-natured friend, who kindly reminded them, that if their little work has hitherto floated upon the stream of time, while so many others of much greater weight and value have sunk to rise no more, it has been solely indebted for its buoyancy to that specific levity which enables feathers, straws, and similar trifles, to defer their sub- mersion, until they have become thoroughly saturated with waters of oblivion, when they quickly meet the fate which they had long before merited. Our ingenuous and ingenious friend further- more observed, that the demolition of Drury Lane Theatre by fire, its reconstruction under the auspices of the celebrated Mr. Whitbread, the reward offered by the committee for an XX PREFACE. opening address, and the public recitation of a poem composed expressly for the occasion by Lord Byron, one of the most popular writers of the age, formed an extraordinary concurrence of circumstances which could not fail to insure the success of the " Rejected Addresses," while it has subsequently served to fix them in the memor}^ of the public, so far at least as a poor immortality of twenty years can be said to have effected that object. In fact, continued our impartial and affectionate monitor, your little work owes its present obscure existence entirely to the accidents that have surrounded and embalmed it, — even as flies, and other worthless insects, may long survive their natural date of extinction, if they chance to be preserved in amber, or any similar substance, " The things, we know, are neither rich nor rare — But wonder how the devil they got there ! " With the natural affection of parents for the offspring of their own brains, we ventured to PREFACE. XXI hint that some portion of our success might perhaps be attributable to the manner in which the different imitations were executed ; but our worthy friend protested that his sincere regard for us, as well as for the cause of truth, compelled him to reject our claim, and to pronounce that, when once the idea had been conceived, all the rest followed as a matter of course, and might have been executed by any other hands not less felicitously than by our own. Willingly leaving this matter to the decision of the public, since we cannot be umpires in our own cause, we proceed to detail such circumstances attending the writing and pub- lication of our little work, as may literally meet the wishes of the present proprietor of the copyright, who has applied to us for a gossiping Preface. Were we disposed to be grave and didactic, which is as foreign to our mood as it was twenty years ago, we might draw the attention of the reader, in a fine XXll PREFACE. sententious paragraph, to the trifles upon which the fate of empires, as well as a four- and-sixpenny volume of parodies, occasionally hangs in trembling balance. No sooner was the idea of our work conceived, than it was about to be abandoned in embryo, from the apprehension that we had no time to mature and bring it forth, as it was indispensable that it should be written, printed, and pub- lished by the opening of Drury Lane Theatre, which would only allow us an interval of six weeks, and we had both of us other avocations that precluded us from the full command of even that limited period. Encouraged, however, by the conviction that the thought was a good one, and by the hope of making a lucky hit, we set to work con amore, our very hurry not improbably enabling us to strike out at a heat what we might have failed to produce so well, had we possessed time enough to hammer it into more careful and elaborate form. PREFACE. XXlll Our first difficulty, that of selection, was by no means a light one. Some of our most eminent poets, such, for instance, as Rogers and Campbell, presented so much beauty, harmony, and proportion in their writings, both as to style and sentiment, that if we had attempted to caricature them, nobody would have recognised the likeness ; and if we had endeavoured to give a servile copy of their manner, it would only have amounted, at best, to a tame and unamusing portrait, which it was not our object to present. Although fully aware that their names would, in the theatrical phrase, have con- ferred great strength upon our bill, w^e were reluctantly compelled to forego them, and to confine ourselves to writers whose style and habit of thought, being more marked and pecu- liar, was more capable of exaggeration and distortion. To avoid politics and personality, to imitate the turn of mind, as well as the phraseology of our originals, and, at all events. XXIV PREFACE. to raise a harmless laugh, were our main objects : in the attainment of which united aims, we were sometimes hurried into extra- vagance, by attaching much more importance to the last than to the two first. In no instance were we thus betrayed into a greater injustice than in the case of Mr. Wordsworth — the touching sentiment, profound wisdom, and copious harmony of whose loftier writings we left unnoticed, in the desire of burlesquing them ; while we pounced upon his popular ballads, and exerted ourselves to push their simphcity into puerility and silliness. With pride and pleasure do we now claim to be ranked among the most ardent admirers of this true poet ; and if he himself could see the state of his works, which are ever at our right hand, he would, perhaps, receive the manifest evidences they exhibit of constant reference, and delighted re-perusal, as some sort of amende honorable for the unfairness of which we were guilty, when we were less conversant PREFACE. XXV with the higher inspirations of his muse. To Mr. Coleridge, and others of our originals, we must also do a tardy act of justice, by declar- ing that our burlesque of their peculiarities has never blinded us to those beauties and talents which are beyond the reach of all ridicule. One of us had written a genuine Address for the occasion, which was sent to the com- mittee, and shared the fate it merited, in being rejected. To swell the bulk, or rather to diminish the tenuity of our little work, we added it to the Imitations ; and prefixing the initials of S. T. P. for the purpose of puzzling the critics, were not a little amused, in the sequel, by the many guesses and conjectures into which we had ensnared some of our readers. We could even enjoy the mysticism, qualified as it was by the poor compliment, that our carefully written Address exhibited no " very prominent trait of absurdity," when we saw it thus noticed in the Edinburgh XXVI PREFACE. Review for November 1 8 1 2. "An Address by S. T. P. we can make nothing of; and pro- fessing our ignorance of the author designated by these letters, we can only add, that the Address, though a little affected, and not very full of meaning, has no very prominent trait of absurdity, that we can detect ; and might have been adopted and spoken, so far as we can perceive, without any hazard of ridicule. In our simplicity we consider it as a very decent, mellifluous, occasional prologue; and do not understand how it has found its way into its present company." Urged forward by hurry, and trusting to chance, two very bad coadjutors in any enter- prise, we at length congratulated ourselves on having completed our task in time to have it printed and published by the opening of the theatre. But alas ! our difficulties, so far from being surmounted, seemed only to be beginning. Strangers to the arcana of the bookseller's trade, and unacquainted with their almost PREFACE. XXVli invincible objection to single volumes of low price, especially when tendered by writers who have acquired no previous name, we little anti- cipated that they would refuse to publish our " Rejected Addresses," even although we asked nothing for the copyright. Such, however, proved to be the case. Our manuscript was perused and returned to us by several of the most eminent publishers. Well do we re- member betaking ourselves to one of the craft in Bond Street, whom we found in a back parlour, with his gouty leg propped upon a cushion, in spite of which warning he diluted his luncheon with frequent glasses of Madeira. " What have you already written ? " was his first question, an interrogatory to which we had been subjected in almost every instance. '• Nothing by which we can be known." " Then I am afraid to undertake the publication." We presumed timidly to suggest that every writer must have a beginning, and that to refuse to publish for him until he had acquired XXVlll PREFACE. a name, was to imitate the sapient mother who cautioned her son against going into the water until he could swim. "An old joke — a regular Joe ! " exclaimed our companion, tossing off another bumper. " Still older than Joe Miller," was our reply ; " for, if we mistake not, it is the very first anecdote in the facetiae of Hierocles." "Ha, sirs!'' resumed the bibliopolist, "you are learned, are you ? So, soh ! — Well, leave your manuscript with me ; I will look it over to-night, and give you an answer to-morrow." Punctual as the clock we presented ourselves at his door on the following morning, when our papers were returned to us with the observation — " These trifles are really not deficient in smartness ; they are well, vastly well for beginners ; but they will never do — never. They would not pay for advertising, and without it I should not sell fifty copies." This was discouraging enough. If the most experienced publishers feared to be out of pocket by the work, it was manifest, a fortiori^ PREFACE. XXIX that its writers ran a risk of being still more heavy losers, should they undertake the publi- cation on their own account. We had no objection to raise a laugh at the expense of others ; but to do it at our own cost, uncertain as we were to what extent we might be in- volved, had never entered into our contempla- tion. In this dilemma, our "Addresses," now in every sense rejected, might probably have never seen the Hght, had not some good angel whispered us to betake ourselves to Mr. John Miller, a dramatic publisher, then residing in Bow Street, Covent Garden. No sooner had this gentleman looked over our manuscript, than he immediately offered to take upon himself all the risk of publication, and to give us half the profits, should there be any ; a liberal proposition, with which we gladly closed. So rapid and decided was its success, at which none were more unfeignedly astonished than its authors, that Mr. Miller advised us to collect some " Imitations of Horace," which had XXX PREFACE. appeared anonymously in the Monthly Mirror^ offering to publish them upon the same terms. We did so accordingly ; and as new editions of the " Rejected Addresses " were called for in quick succession, we were shortly enabled to sell our half copyright in the two works to Mr. Miller, for one thousand pounds ! ! We have entered into this unimportant detail, not to gratify any vanity of our own, but to encourage such literary beginners as may be placed in similar circumstances ; as well as to impress upon publishers the propriety of giving more con- sideration to the possible merit of the works submitted to them, than to the mere magic of a name. To the credit of the genus irritabile be it recorded, that not one of those whom we had parodied or burlesqued ever betrayed the least soreness on the occasion, or refused to join in the laugh that we had occasioned. With most of them we subsequently formed acquaintance- ship ; while some honoured us with an intimacy PREFACE. XXXI which Still continues, where it has not been severed by the rude hand of Death. Alas ! it is painful to reflect, that of the twelve writers whom we presumed to imitate five are now no more ; the list of the deceased being unhappily swelled by the most illustrious of all, the clariun et venerabile nome7i of Sir Walter Scott ! From that distinguished writer, whose transcendent talents were only to be equalled by his virtues and his amiability, we received favours and notice, both public and private, which it will be difficult to forget, because we had not the smallest claim upon his kindness. " I certainly must have written this myself ! " said that fine- tempered man to one of the authors, pointing to the description of the Fire, "although I forget upon what occasion," Lydia White, a literary lady who was prone to feed the lions of the day, invited one of us to dinner ; but, recollecting afterwards that William Spencer formed one of the party, wrote to the latter to put him off; telling him that a man was to be XXXll PREFACE. at her table whom he " would not like to meet." " Pray who is this whom I should not like to meet ?" inquired the poet. " Oh ! " answered the lady, '' one of those men who have made that shameful attack upon you ! " " The very man upon earth I should like to know ! " rejoined the lively and careless bard. The two individuals accordingly met, and have continued fast friends ever since. Lord Byron, too, wrote thus to Mr. Murray from Italy — " Tell him I forgive him, were he twenty times over our satirist." It may not be amiss to notice, in this place, one criticism of a Leicestershire clergyman, which may be pronounced unique : " I do not see why they should have been rejected," observed the matter-of-fact annotator ; " I think some of them very good ! " Upon the whole, few have been the instances, in the acrimonious history of literature, where a mali- cious pleasantry like the '' Rejected Addresses " — which the parties ridiculed might well con- PREFACE, XXXUl sider more annoying than a direct satire — instead of being met by querulous bitterness or petulant retaliation, has procured for its authors the acquaintance, or conciliated the good-will, of those whom they had the most audaciously burlesqued. In commenting on a work, however trifling, which has survived the lapse of twenty years, an author may almost claim the privileged garrulity of age ; yet even in a professedly gossiping Preface, we begin to fear that we are exceeding our commission, and abusing the patience of the reader. If we are doing so, we might urge extenuating circumstances, which will explain, though they may not ex- cuse, our dififuseness. To one of us the totally unexpected success of this little work proved an important event, since it mainly decided him, some years afterwards, to embark in that literary career which the continued favour of the novel-reading world has rendered both pleasant and profitable to him. This is the (34) B XXXIV PREFACE. first, as it will probably be the last, occasion upon which we shall ever intrude ourselves personally on the public notice ; and we trust that our now doing so will stand excused by the reasons we have adduced. London, March 1833. CONTENTS. I. Loyal Effusion. By JV. T. F. . II. The Baby's Debut. By William JVordsivorth III. An Address luithout a Phoenix. By S. T. P. IV. Cui Bono ? By Lord Byron V. Hampshire Farmer's Address. By William Cobbeit VI. The Living Lustres. By Thomas Moore VII. The Rebuilding. By Robert Sou they . YIU. Drury's Dirge. By Laura Matilda IX. A Tale of Drury Lane. By Sir Walter Scott X. Johnson'' s Ghost ..... XI. The Beautiful Incendiary. By the Hon William Robert Spencer XII. Fire and Ale. By Matthew Gregory Lewis XIII. Playhouse Musings. By S. T. Coleridge XIV. Drury Lane Hustings .... PAGE 59 47 )7 63 79 91 99 117 125 139 151 161 XXXVl CONTENTS. PAGE XV. Architectural Atoms. By Dr. B. . .185 XVI. Theatrical Alarm-Bell. By Editor of the ■ " Morning Post " . . . . ,201 XVII. The Theatre. By the Rev. George Crabbe . 21 t XVIII. Macbeth Travestie. By Moinus Medlar . 229 XIX. Stranger Travestie . By Ditto . . -233 XX. George Bar mv ell Travestie. By Ditto . 257 XXI. Punch's Apotheosis. By Theodore Hook . 245 LOYAL EFFUSION, I. LOYAL EFFUSION. BY W. T. F.* " Quicquid dicunt, laudo : id nirsum si negant, Laudo id quoque. — Terenxe, T TAIL, glorious edifice, stupendous work 1 God bless the Regent and the Duke of York ! Ye Muses ! by whose aid I cried down Fox, Grant me in Drury Lane a private box, * William Thomas Fitzgerald.— The annotator's first personal knowledge of this gentleman was at Harry Greville's Pic-Nic Theatre, in Tottenham Street, where he personated Zanga in a wig too small for his head. The second time of seeing him was at the table of old Lord Dudley, who familiarly called him Fitz, but forgot 39 40 REJECTED ADDRESSES. Where I may loll, cry Bravo ! and profess The boundless powers of England's glorious press ; While Afric's sons exclaim, from shore to shore, " Quashee ma boo ! " — the slave-trade is no more ! In fair Arabia (happy once, now stony. Since ruined by that arch apostate Bony), to name him in his will. The Earl's son (recently deceased), however, hberally supplied the omission by a donation of five thousand pounds. The third and last time of encountering him was at an anniversary dinner of the Literary Fund, at the Freemasons' Tavern. Both parties, as two of the stewards, met their brethren in a small room about half-an-hour before dinner. The lampooner, out of delicacy, kept aloof from the poet. The latter, however, made up to him, when the following dialogue took place : Fitzgerald (with good humour). " Mr. I mean to recite after dinner." Mr. . ' ' Do you ? " Fitzgerald. " Yes : you'll have more of ' God bless the Regent and the Duke of York ! ' " The whole of this imitation, after a lapse of twenty years, appears to the Authors too personal and sarcastic ; LOYAL EFFUSION. 4 1 A Phoenix late was caught : the Arab host Long ponder'd — part would boil it, part would roast ; But while they ponder, up the pot-lid flies, Fledged, beak'd, and claw'd, alive they see him rise To heaven, and caw defiance in the skies. So Drury, first in roasting flames consumed, Then by old renters to hot water doom'd. but they may shelter themselves under a very broad mantle : ' ' Let hoarse Fitzgerald bawl His creaking couplets in a tavern-hall." — Byron. Fitzgerald actually sent in an address to the committee on the 31st of August, 1812. It was published among the other "Genuine Rejected Addresses," in one volume, in that year. The following is an extract : — " The troubled shade of Garrick, hovering near, Dropt on the burning pile a pitying tear." What a pity that, like Sterne's Recording Angel, it did not succeed in blotting the fire out for ever 1 That faiHng, why not adopt Gulliver's remedy? B 2 42 REJECTED ADDRESSES. By Wyatt's trowel patted, plump and sleek, Soars without wings, and caws without a beak. Gallia's stern despot shall in vain advance From Paris, the metropolis of France ; By this day month the monster shall not gain A foot of land in Portugal or Spain. See Wellington in Salamanca's field Forces his favourite general to yield, Breaks through his lines, and leaves his boasted Marmont Expiring on the plain without his arm on ; Madrid he enters at the cannon's mouth, And then the villages still further south. Base Buonaparte, fill'd with deadly ire, Sets, one by one, our playhouses on fire. Some years ago he pounced with deadly glee on The Opera House, then burnt down the Pantheon ; Nay, still unsated, in a coat of flames, Next at Milll:)ank he cross'd the river Thames; LOYAL EFFUSION. 43 Thy hatch, O Halfpenny ! '^ pass'd in a trice, Boil'd some black pitch, and burnt down Asiley's twice ; Then buzzing on through ether with a vile hum, Turn'd to the left hand, fronting the Asylum, And burnt the Royal Circus in a hurry — ('Twas call'd the Circus then, but now the Surrey). Who burnt (confound his soul!) the houses twain Of Covent Garden and of Drury Lane ? Who, while the British squadron lay off Cork (God bless the Regent and the Duke of York !) With a foul earthquake ravaged the Caraccas, And raised the price of dry goods and tobaccos : * In plain English, the Halfpenny-hatch, then a foot- way through fields ; but now, as the same bards sing elsewhere — " St, George's Fields are fields no more, The trowel supersedes the plough ; Swamps, huge and inundate of yore, Are changed to civic villas now." 44 REJECTHD ADDRESSES. Who makes the quartern loaf and Luddites rise? Who fills the butchers' shops with large blue flies ? Who thought in flames St. James's court to pinch .'' Who burnt the wardrobe of poor Lady Pinch ? — Why he, who, forging for this isle a yoke, Reminds me of a line I lately spoke, '•' The tree of freedom is the British oak." Bless every man possess'd of aught to give ; Long may Long Tylney Wellesley Long Pole live ; God bless the Army, bless their coats of scarlet, God bless the Navy, bless the Princess Char- lotte ; God bless the guards, though worsted Gallia scoff", God bless their pig- tails, though they're now cut off; And, oh ! in Downing Street should Old Nick revel, England's prime minister, then bless the devil ! THE BABY'S DEBUT. II. THE BABY'S DEBUT. BY WILLIAM WORDSWORTH. " Thy lisping prattle and thy mincing gait, All thy false mimic fooleries I hate ; For thou art Folly's counterfeit, and she Who is right foolish hath the better plea ; Nature's true Idiot I prefer to thee." —Cumberland. \_Spoke7i ill the character of Naiicy Lake, a girl eight years of age, who is drawn upon the stage in a child'' s chaise by Sanmel Hughes, her tmcle's porter.l M Y brother Jack was nine in May,"^ And I was eight on New-year's-day ; * Jack and Nancy, as it was afterwards remarked to the Authors, are here made to come into the world at 47 48 REJECTED ADDRESSES. So in Kate Wilson's shop Papa (he's my papa and Jack's) Bought me, last week, a doll of wax, And brother Jack a top. Jack's in the pouts, and this it is, — He thinks mine came to more than his ; So to my drawer he goes. Takes out the doll, and, O my stars ! He pokes her head between the bars, And melts off half her nose ! periods not sufficiently remote. The writers were then bachelors. One of them, unfortunately, still continues so, as he has thus recorded in his niece's album : " Should I seek Hymen's tie. As a poet I die — Ye Benedicks, mourn my distresses ! For what little fame Is annexed to my name Is derived from Rejected Addresses^ The blunder, notwithstanding, remains unrectified. The reader of poetry is always dissatisfied with emen- dations : they sound discordantly upon the ear, like a modern song, by Bishop or Braham, introduced in " Love in a Village. " THE BABY S DEBUT. 49 Quite cross, a bit of string I beg, And tie it to his peg-top's peg. And bang, with might and main, Its head against the parlour door : Off flies the head, and hits the floor, And breaks a window-pane. This made him cry with rage and spite : Well, let him cry, it serves him right. A pretty thing, forsooth ! If he's to melt, all scalding hot, Half my doll's nose, and I am not To draw his peg-top's tooth ! Aunt Hannah heard the window break, And cried, " O naughty Nancy Lake, Thus to distress your aunt : No Drury Lane for you to-day ! " And while papa said, " Pooh, she may ! " Mamma said, "No, she shan't ! " Well, after many a sad reproach, They got into a hackney coach, 50 REJECTED ADDRESSES, And trotted down the street. I saw them go : one horse was bhnd, The tails of both hung down behind, Their shoes were on their feet. The chaise in which poor brother Bill Used to be drawn to Pentonville, Stood in the lumber-room : I wiped the dust from off the top, While Molly mopp'd it with a mop, And brushed it with a broom. My uncle's porter, Samuel Hughes, Came in at six to black the shoes, (I always talk to Sam :) So what does he, but takes and drags Me in the chaise along the flags, And leaves me where I am. My father's walls are made of brick, But not so tall and not so thick THE BABY S DEBUT. 5 I As these ; and, goodness me ; My father's beams are made of wood, But never, never half so good As those that now I see. What a large floor ! 'tis like a town ! The carpet, when they lay it down. Won't hide it, I'll be bound. And there's a row of lamps ! — my eye ! How they do blaze I I wonder why They keep them on the ground ? At first I caught hold of the wing. And kept away ; but Mr. Thing- um bob, the prompter man, Gave with his hand my chaise a shove, And said, " Go on, my pretty love ; Speak to 'em, little Nan. " You've only got to curtsey, whisp- er, hold your chin up, laugh, and lisp. 52 REJECTED ADDRESSES. And then you're sure to take : I've know the day when brats, not quite Thirteen, got tifty pounds a night ; * Then why not Nancy Lake ? " But while Fm speaking, where's papa ? And where's my aunt ? and where's mamma ? Where's Jack ? Oh, there they sit ! They smile, they nod ; I'll go my ways, And order round poor Billy's chaise, To join them in the pit. And now, good gentlefolks, I go To join mamma, and see the show ; * This alludes to the Young Betty mania. The writer was in the stage-box at the height of this young gentle- man's popularity. One of the other occupants offered, in a loud voice, to prove that young Betty did not under- stand Shakespeare. "Silence!" was the cry; but lie still proceeded. " Turn him out 1 " was the next ejacu- lation. He still vociferated "He does not understand Shakespeare ; " and was consequently shouldered into the lobby. " I'll prove it to you," said the critic to the doorkeeper. " Prove what, sir?" " That he does not understand Shakespeare." This was Moliere's house- maid with a vengeance ! THE BABYS DEBUT. 53 So, bidding you adieu, I curtsey, like a pretty miss, And if you'll blow to me a kiss, 111 blow a kiss to you. [B/ows a h'sSf and exit. m AN ADDRESS WITHOUT A PHCENIX. III. AN ADDRESS WITHOUT A PHOENIX. BY S. T. P. " This was looked for at your hand, and this was balked."— ^F/^a/ Yot^ Will. w HAT stately vision mocks my waking sense ? Hence, dear delusion, sweet enchantment, hence ! Ha ! is it real ? — can my doubts be vain ? It is, it is, and Drury lives again ! Around each grateful veteran attends. Eager to rush and gratulate his friends. 58 REJECTED ADDRESSES. Friends whose kind looks, retrace with proud dehght, Endear the past, and make the future bright : Yes, generous patrons, your returning smile Blesses our toils, and consecrates our pile. When last we met, Fate's unrelenting hand Already grasped the devastating brand ; Slow crept the silent flame, ensnared its prize. Then burst resistless to the astonished skies. The glowing walls, disrobed of scenic pride, In trembling conflict stemmed the burning tide, Till crackling, blazing, rocking to its fall, Down rushed the thundering roof, and buried all! Where late the sister Muses sweetly sung. And raptured thousands on their music hung. Where W^it and Wisdom shone, by Beauty graced. Sat lonely Silence, empress of the waste ; AN ADDRESS WITHOUT A PHOIXIX. 59 And still had reigned — but he, whose voice can raise More magic wonders than Amphion's lays, Bade jarring bands with friendly zeal engage To rear the prostrate glories of the stage. Up leaped Muses at the potent spell, And Drury's genius saw his temple swell : Worthy, we hope, the British Drama's cause, Worthy of British arts, a.nd jour applause. Guided by you, our earnest aims presume To renovate the Drama with the dome ; The scenes of Shakespeare and our bards of old. With due observance splendidly unfold. Yet raise and foster with parental hand The living talent of our native land. Oh ! may we still, to sense and nature true. Delight the many, nor offend the few. Though varying tastes our changeful Drama claim, Still be its moral tendency the same, 60 REJECTED ADDRESSES. To win by precept, by example warn, To brand the front of Vice with pointed scorn, And Virtue's smiling brows with votive wreaths adorn. CUI BONO? IV. CUI BONO? BY LORD BYRON s ATED with home, of wife, of children tired, The restless soul is driven abroad to roam ; "^ Sated abroad, all seen, yet nought admired, The restless soul is driven to ramble home ; * This would seem to show that poet and prophet are synonymous, the noble bard having afterwards re- turned to England, and again quitted it, under domestic circumstances painfully notorious. His good-humoured forgiveness of the Authors has already been alluded to in the preface. Nothing of this illustrious poet, however 64 REJECTED ADDRESSES. Sated with both, beneath new Drury's dome The fiend Ennui awhile consents to pine, There growls, and curses, like a deadly Gnome, Scorning to view fantastic Columbine, A'iewing with scorn and hate the nonsense of the Nine. trivial, can be otherwise than interesting. "We knew him well." At Mr. Murray's dinner-table the annotator met him and Sir. John Malcolm. Lord Byron talked of intending to travel in Persia. "What must I do when I set off? " said he to Sir John. " Cut off your buttons ! " "My buttons! what, these metal ones?" "Yes; the Persians are in the main very honest fellows ; but if you go thus bedizened, you will infallibly be murdered for your buttons ! " At a dinner at Monk Lewis's chambers in the Albany, Lord Byron expressed to the writer his determination not to go there again, adding, "I never will dine with a middle-aged man who fills up his table with young ensigns, and has looking-glass panels to his book-cases." Lord Byron, when one of the Drury Lane Committee of Management, challenged the writer to sing alternately (like the swains in Virgil) the praises of Mrs. Mardyn, the actress, who, by-the-bye, was hissed off the stage for an imputed intimacy of which she was quite innocent. The contest ran as follows : GUI BOKO? 6$ II. Ye reckless dupes, who hither wend your way To gaze on puppets in a painted dome, Pursuing pastimes ghttering to betray. Like falling stars in life's eternal gloom. What seek ye here ? Joy's evanescent bloom ? " Wake, muse of fire, your ardent lyre, Pour forth your amorous ditty, But first profound, in duty bound, Applaud the new committee ; Their scenic art from Thespis' cart All jaded nags discarding, To London drove this queen of love, Enchanting Mrs. Mardyn. Though tides of love around her rove, I fear she'll choose Pactolus— In that bright surge bards ne'er immerge, So I must e'en swim solus. ' Out, out, alas ! ' ill-fated gas, That shin'st round Covent Garden, Thy ray how flat, compared with that From eye of Mrs. Mardyn ! " And so on. The reader has, no doubt, already dis- covered "which is the justice, and which is the thief." Lord Byron at that time wore a very narrow cravat (34) C 66 REJECTED ADDRESSES. Woe's me ! the brightest wreaths she ever gave Are but as flowers that decorate a tomb. ]\Ian's heart, the mournful urn o'er which they wave, Is sacred to despair, its pedestal the grave. of white sarsnet, with the shirt-collar falling over it ; a black coat and waistcoat, and very broad white trousers, to hide his lame foot. These were of Russia duck in the morning and jean in the evening. His watch-chain had a number of small gold seals appended to it, and was looped up to a button of his waistcoat. His face was void of colour ; he wore no whiskers. His eyes were grey, fringed with long black lashes ; and his air was imposing, but rather supercilious. He undervalued David Hume : denying his claim to genius on account •of his bulk, and calling him, from the heroic epistle, " The fattest hog in Epicurus sty.'* One of this extraordinary man's allegations was, that "fat is an oily dropsy. ' To stave off its visitation, he frequently chewed tobacco in lieu of dinner, alleging that it absorbed the gastric juice of the stomach and pre- vented hunger. " Pass your hand down my side,'' said his lordship to the writer ; "can you count my ribs?" "Every one of them." "I am delighted to hear you say so, I called last week on Lady ; ' Ah, Lord Byron,' said she, ' how fat you grow ! ' But you know GUI BONO? 67 III. Has life so little store of real woes, That here ye wend to taste fictitious grief? Or is it that from truth such anguish flows, Ye court the lying drama for relief ? Lady is fond of saying spiteful things ! " Let this gossip be summed up with the words of Lord Chester- field, in his character of Bolingbroke : " Upon the whole, on a survey of this extraordinary character, what can we say, but ' Alas, poor human nature ! ' " His favourite Pope's description of man is applicable to Byron individually : — " Chaos of thought and passion all confused, Still by himself abused or disabused ; Created part to rise and part to fall, Great lord of all things, yet a slave to all ; Sole judge of truth, in endless error hurled — The glory, jest, and riddle of the world." The writer never heard him allude to his deformed foot except upon one occasion, when, entering the green- room of Drury Lane, he found Lord Byron alone, the younger Byrne and Miss Smith the dancer having just left him, after an angry conference about a pas seul. " Had you been here a minute sooner," said Lord B., ' ' you would have heard a question about dancing referred to me ; — me ! (looking mournfully downward) whom fate from my birth has prohibited from taking a single step." 68 REJECTED ADDRESSES. Long shall ye find the pang, the respite brief: Or if one tolerable page appears In folly's volume, 'tis the actor's leaf, Who dries his own by drawing others' tears, And, raising present mirth, makes glad his future years. IV. Albeit, how like young Betty doth he flee ! Light as the mote that danceth in the beam, He liveth only in man's present e'e ; His Hfe a flash, his memory a dream, Oblivious down he drops in Lethe's stream. Yet what are they, the learned and the great ? Awhile of longer wonderment the theme ! Who shall presume to prophesy their date, Where nought is certain, save the uncertainty of fate ? GUI BONO? 69 V. This goodly pile, upheaved by Wyatt's toil, Perchance than Holland's edifice "^ more fleet. Again red Lemnos' artisan may spoil ; The fire-alarm and midnight drum may beat, And all bestrewed ysmoking at your feet ! * " Holland's edifice." The late theatre was built by Holland the architect. The writer visited it on the night of its opening. The performances were " Macbeth " and the "Virgin Unmasked." Between the play and the farce, an excellent epilogue, written by George Colman, was excellently spoken by Miss Farren. It referred to the iron curtain which was, in the event of fire, to be let down between the stage and the audience, and which accordingly descended, by way of experiment, leaving Miss Farren between the lamps and the curtain. The fair speaker informed the audience, that should the fire break out on the stage (where it usually originates), it would thus be kept from the spectators ; adding, with great solemnity — " No ! we assure our generous benefactors 'Twill only burn the scenery and the actors ! " A tank of water was afterwards exhibited, in the course of the epilogue, in which a wherry was rowed by a real live man, the band playing— ' ' And did you not hear of a jolly young waterman ? " Miss Farren reciting — 70 REJECTED ADDRESSES. Startye? perchance Death's angelmay be sent, Ere from the flaming temple ye retreat ; And ye who met, on revel idlesse bent. May find, in pleasure's fane, your grave and monument. " Sit still, there's nothing in it, We'll undertake to drown you in a single minute," " O vain thought ! " as Othello says. Notwithstanding the boast in the epilogue — " Blow, wind — come, rack, in ages yet unborn, Our castle's strength shall laugh a siege to scorn " — the theatre fell a victim to the flames within fifteen years from the prognostic ! These preparations against fire always presuppose presence of mind and promptness in those who are to put them into action. They remind one of the dialogue, in Morton's "Speed the Plough," between Sir Abel Handy and his son Bob : *' Boi. Zounds, the castle's on fire ! Sir A. Yes. Bob. Where's your patent liquid for extinguishing fire? Sir A. It is not fixed. Bob. Then where's your patent fire-escape ? Sir A. It is not fixed. Bob. You are never at a loss ? Sir A, Never. Bob. Then what do you mean to do ? Sir A. I don't know." GUI BONO"? 71 VI. Your debts mount high — ye plunge in deeper waste ; The tradesman duns — no warning voice ye hear ! The plaintiff sues — to public shows ye haste ; The bailiff threats — ye feel no idle fear. Who can arrest your prodigal career ? Who can keep down the levity of youth ? What sound can startle age's stubborn ear ? Who can redeem from wretchedness and ruth Men true to falsehood's voice, false to the voice of truth ? VII. To thee, blest saint ! who doffed thy skin to make The Smithfield rabble leap from theirs with joy, We dedicate the pile — arise ! awake ! — Knock down the Muses, wit and sense destroy, 72 REJECTED ADDRESSES. Clear our new stage from reason's dull alloy, Charm hobbling age, and tickle capering youth With cleaver, marrow-bone, and Tunbridge toy; While, vibrating in unbelieving tooth,"^ Harps twang in Drury's walls, and make her boards a booth. VIII. For what is Hamlet, but a hare in March ? And what is Brutus, but a croaking owl 1 And what is Rolla ? Cupid steeped in starch, Orlando's helmet in Augustin's cowl. Shakespeare, how true thine adage, "fair is foul ! » To him whose soul is with fruition fraught, The song of Braham is an Irish howl, * A rather obscure mode of expression for /^wj'-harp ; which some etymologists allege, by the way, to be a corruption oi Jaws -hax^. No connection, therefore, with King David. GUI BONO? 73 Thinking is but an idle waste of thought, And nought is everything, and everything is nought. IX. Sons of Parnassus ! whom I view above, Not laurel-crown'd, but clad in rusty black ; Not spurring Pegasus through Tempe's grove, But pacing Grub Street on a jaded hack ; What reams of foolscap, while your brains ye rack, Ye mar to make again ! for sure, ere long, Condemned to tread the bard's time-sanction'd track, Ye all shall join the bailiff-haunted throng, And reproduce, in rags, the rags ye blot in son.sr. X. So fares the follower in the Muses' train ; He toils to starve, and only lives in death c 2 74 REJECTED ADDRESSES. We slight him, till our patronage is vain, Then round his skeleton a garland wreathe, And o'er his bones an empty requiem breathe — Oh ! with what tragic horror would he start, (Could he be conjured from the grave beneath) To find the stage again a Thespian cart, And elephants and colts down-trampling Shake- speare's art. XI. Hence, pedant Nature ! with thy Grecian rules ! Centaurs (not fabulous) those rules efface ; Back, sister Muses, to your native schools ; Here booted grooms usurp Apollo's place, Hoofs shame the boards that Garrick used to grace, The play of limbs succeeds the play of wit, Man yields the drama to the Hou'yn'm race. GUI BONO i 75 His prompter spurs, his licenser the bit, The stage a stable-yard, a jockey-club the pit. XII. Is it for these ye rear this proud abode ? Is it for these your superstition seeks To build a temple worthy of a god. To laud a monkey, or to worship leeks ! Then be the stage, to recompense your freaks, A motley chaos, jumbling age and ranks, Where Punch, the lignum-vitae Roscius, squeaks, And Wisdom weeps and Folly plays his pranks, And moody Madness laughs and hugs the chain he clanks. HAMPSHIRE FARMER'S ADDRESS. HAMPSHIRE FARMER'S ADDRESS. BY WILLIAM COBBETT. TO THE SECRETARY OF THE MANAGING COM- MITTEE OF DRURY LANE PLAYHOUSE. OIR, — To the gewgaw fetters of rhyme (invented by the monks to enslave the people) I have a rooted objection. I have therefore written an address for your Theatre in plain, homespun, yeoman's prose ; in the doing whereof I hope I am swayed by nothing but an independent wish to open the eyes of this gulled people, to prevent a repetition of 79 80 REJECTED ADDRESSES. the dramatic bamboozling they have hitherto laboured under. If you like what I have done, and mean to make use of it, I don't want any such aristocratic reward as a piece of plate with two griffins sprawling upon it, or a dog and a jackass fighting for a ha'p'worth of gilt gingerbread^ or any such Bartholomew Fair nonsense. All I ask is that the door- keepers of your playhouse may take all the sets of my Register now on hand, and fo7'ce everybody who enters your doors to buy one, giving afterwards a debtor and creditor account of what they have received, post-paid, and in due course remitting me the money and unsold Registers, carriage-paid. I am, &c. W. C. HAMPSHIRE FARMERS ADDRESS. 8 1 IN THE CHARACTER OF ' A HAMPSHIRE FARMER. ..." Rabida qui concitus ira Implevit pariter ternis latratibus auras, Et sparsit virides spumis albentibus agros." — OviD. Most thinking People, — When persons address an audience from the stage, it is usual, either in words or gestute, to say, *' Ladies and Gentlemen, your servant." If I were base enough, mean enough, paltry enough, and brute beast enough, to follow that fashion, I should tell two hes in a breath. In the first place, you are not Ladies and Gentle- tnen, but I hope something better, that is to say, honest men and women ; and in the next place, if you were ever so much ladies, and ever so much gentlemen, I am not, nor ever will be, your humble servant. You see me here, most thinking people, by mere chance. I have not been within the doors of a play- 82 REJECTED ADDRESSES. house before for these ten years ; nor, till that abominable custom of taking money at the doors is discontinued, will I ever sanction a theatre with my presence. The stage-door is the only gate oi freedom in the whole edifice, and through that I made my way from Bag- shaw's "^ in Br)'-dges Street, to accost you. Look about you. Are you not all comfort- able ? Nay, never slink, mun ; speak out, if you are dissatisfied, and tell me so before I leave town. You are now (thanks to Mr. WhitbreacT) got into a large, comfortable house. Not into a gimcrack palace ; not into a Solomoii^s temple ; not into a frost-work of Brobdignag filigree ', but into a plain, honest, homely, industrious, wholesome, brown brick playJiouse. You have been strugglmg for independence and elbow-room these three years ; and who gave it you ? Who helped you out of Lilliput ? Who routed you from * Bagshaw. At that time the publisher of Cobbett's Register. HAMPSHIRE farmer's ADDRESS. 83 a rat-hole, five inches by four, to perch you in a palace ? Again and again I answer, Mr. Whitbread. You might have sweltered in that place with the Greek name * till doomsday, and neither Lord Castlerecigh, Mr. Cajinzjig, no, nor the Marquess Wellesley, would have turned a trowel to help you out ! Remember that. Never forget that. Read it to your children, and to your children's children ! And now, most thinking people^ cast your eyes over my head to what the builder (I beg his pardon, the architect) calls the prosceniian. No motto, no slang, no popish Latin, to keep the people in the dark. No vehiti zji specuhcm. Nothing in the dead languages, properly so called, for they ought to die, ay, and be dam?ted to boot ! The Covent Garden manager tried that, and a pretty business he made of it ! When a man says veluti in speculum^ he is called a * The old Lyceum Theatre, pulled down by Mr. Arnold. That since destroyed by fire was erected on its site. 84 REJECTED ADDRESSES. man of letters. Vety well, and is not a man who cries O. P. a man of letters too ? You ran your O. P. against his veliiti in speculujn^ and pray which beat ? I prophesied that, though I never told anybody. I take it for granted that every intelligent man, woman, and child, to whom I address myself, has stood severally and respectively in Little Russell Street, and cast their, his, her, and its eyes on the outside of this building before they paid their money to view the inside. Look at the brick- work, English Audience ! Look at the brick- work ! All plain and smooth like a Quakers' meeting. None of your Egyptian pyramids, to entomb subscribers' capital. No overgrown colonnades of stone, like an alder- man's gouty legs in white cotton stockings, fit only to use as rammers for paving Tottenham Court Road. This house is neither after the model of a temple in Athens, no, nor a temple in Moorfields^ but it is built to act English plays in ; and, provided you have good scenery. HAMPSHIRE farmer's ADDRESS. 8) dresses, and decorations, I daresay you wouldn't break your hearts if the outside were as plain as the pikestaff I used to carry when I was a sergeant. Apropos^ as the French valets say, who cut their masters' throats * — apropos^ a word about dresses. You must, many of you, have seen what I have read a description of, Kemble and Mrs. Siddons in Macbeth, with more gold and silver plastered on their doublets than would have kept an honest family in butcher's meat and flannel from year's end to year's end ! I am informed (now mind, I do not vouch for the fact), but I am informed that all such extravagant idleness is to be done away with here. Lady Macbeth is to have a plain quilted petticoat, a cotton gown, and a mob cap (as the court parasites call it ; — it will be well for them, if, one of these days, they don't wear a mob cap — I mean a white cap, with a 7nob to look at them) ; and Macbeth * An allusion to a murder then recently committed on Barnes Terrace. 86 REJECTED ADDRESSES. is to appear in an honest yeoman's drab coat and a pair of black calamanco breeches. Not 5e 38urninc» As Chaos, which, by heavenly doom, Had slept in everlasting gloom., Started with terror and surprise When light first flash'd upon her eyes — 128 REJECTED ADDRESSES. So London's sons in nightcap woke, In bed-gown woke her dames ; For shouts were heard 'mid fire and smoke, And twice ten hundred voices spoke— "The playhouse is in flames ! " And, lo ! where Catherine Street extends, A fiery tail its lustre lends To every window-pane ; Blushes each spout in Martlet Court, And Barbican, moth-eaten fort. And Covent Garden kennels sport, A bright ensanguined drain ; Meux's new Brewhouse shows the light, Rowland Hill's Chapel, and the height Where Patent Shot they sell ; The Tennis Court, so fair and tall. Partakes the ray, with Surgeons' Hall, The Ticket-Porters' House of Call, Old Bedlam, close by London Wall,'^ * Old Bedlam, at that time, stood " close by London Wall." It was built after the model of the Tuileries, which is said to have given the French king great offence. A TALE OF DRURY LAKE. 1 29 Wright's shrimp and oyster shop withal, And Richardson's Hotel. Nor these alone, but far and wide, Across red Thames's gleaming tide, To distant fields, the blaze was borne, And daisy white and hoary thorn In borrow'd lustre seem'd to sham The rose or red sweet Wil li-am. To those who on the hills around Beheld the flames from Drury's molind. As from a lofty altar rise. It seem'd that nations did conspire To offer to the god of fire Some vast stupendous sacrifice ! The summon'd firemen woke at call, And hied them to their stations all : In front of it Moorfields extended, with broad gravel walks crossing each other at right angles. These the writer well recollects ; and Rivaz, an underwriter at IJoyd's, has told him that he remembered when the merchants of London would parade these walks on a summer evening with their wives and daughters. But now, as a punning brother bard sings, " Moorfields are fields no more." (34) E 130 REJECTED ADDRESSES. Starting from short and broken snooze, Each sought his pond'rous hobnail'd shoes, But first his worsted hosen plied, Plush breeches next, in crimson dyed. His nether bulk embraced ; Then jacket thick, of red or blue, Whose massy shoulder gave to view The badge of each respective crew. In tin or copper traced. The engines thunder'd through the street. Fire-hook, pipe, bucket, all complete, And torches glared, and clattering feet Along the pavement paced. And one, the leader of the band. From Charing Cross along the Strand, Like stag by beagles hunted hard, Ran till he stopp'd at Vin'gar Yard. The burning badge his shoulder bore, The belt and oil-skin hat he wore, The cane he had, his men to bang, Show'd foreman of the British gang — His name was Higginbottom. Now A TALE OF DRURY LANE. I3I 'Tis meet that I should tell you how The others came in view : The Hand-in- Hand the race begun, Then came the Phoenix and the Sun, Th' Exchange, where old insurers run, The Eagle, where the new ; With these came Rumford, Bumford, Cole, Robins from Hockley in the Hole, Lawson and Dawson, cheek by jowl, Crump from St. Giles's Pound : Whitford and Mitford join'd the train, Huggins and Muggins from Chick Lane, And Clutterbuck, who got a sprain Before the plug was found. Hobson and Jobson did not sleep, But ah ! no trophy could they reap, For both were in the Donjon Keep Of Bridewell's gloomy mound ! E'en Higginbottom now was posed, For sadder scene was ne'er disclosed ; Without, within, in hideous show, 152 REJECTED ADDRESSES. Devouring flames resistless glow, And blazing rafters downward go, And never halloo " Heads below ! " Nor notice give at all. The firemen terrified are slow To bid the pumping torrent flow. For fear the roof should fall. Back, Robins, back ! Crump, stand aloof ! Whitford, keep near the walls ! Huggins, regard your own behoof, For, lo ! the blazing rocking roof Down, down, in thunder falls ! An awful pause succeeds the stroke, And o'er the ruins volumed smoke, Rolling around its pitchy shroud, Conceal'd them from th' astonish'd crowd. At length the mist awhile was clear'd. When, lo ! amid the wreck uprear'd, Gradual a moving head appear'd. And Eagle firemen knew 'Twas Joseph Muggins, name revered, The foreman of their crew. A TALE OF DRURY LANE. I 33 Loud shouted all in signs of woe, " A Muggins ! to the rescue, ho ! " And pour'd the hissing tide : Meanwhile the Muggins fought amain, And strove and struggled all in vain, For, rallying but to fall again, He totter'd, sunk, and died ! Did none attempt, before he fell, To succour one they loved so well ? Yes, Higginbottom did aspire (His fireman's soul was all on fire), His brother chief to save ; But ah ! his reckless generous ire Served but to share his grave ! 'Mid blazing beams and scalding streams, Through fire and smoke he dauntless broke, Where Muggins broke before. But sulph'ry stench and boiling drench Destroying sight o'erwhelm'd him quite, He sunk to rise no more. Still o'er his head, while Fate he braved, 134 REJECTED ADDRESSES. His whizzing water-pipe he waved ; " Whitford and Mitford, ply your pumps, You, Clutterbuck, come, stir your stumps, Why are you in such doleful dumps ? A fireman, and afraid of bumps ! — What are they fear'd on ? fools ! 'od rot 'em ! " Were the last words of Higginbottom. Peace to his soul ! new prospects bloom, And toil rebuilds what fires consume ! Eat we and drink we, be our ditty, "Joy to the managing committee !" Eat we and drink we, join to rum Roast beef and pudding of the plum ; Forth from thy nook, John Horner, come, With bread of ginger brown thy thumb, For this is Drury's gay day : Roll, roll thy hoop, and twirl thy tops, And buy, to glad thy smiling chops, Crisp parliament with lollypops, And fingers of the Lady. A TALE OF DRURY LANE. 1 35 Didst mark, how toil'd the busy train, From morn to eve, till Drury Lane Leap'd like a roebuck from the plain ? Ropes rose and sunk, and rose again, And nimble workmen trod ; To realise bold Wyatt's plan Rush'd many a howling Irishman ; Loud clatter'd many a porter-can, And many a ragamuffin clan With trowel and with hod. Drury revives ! her rounded pate Is blue, is heavenly blue with slate ; She " wings the midway air " elate, As magpie, crow, or chough : White paint her modish visage smears, Yellow and pointed are her ears, No pendant portico appears Dangling beneath, for Whitbread's shears * Have cut the bauble off. * Whitbread's shears. An economical experiment of that gentleman. The present portico, towards Brydges 136 REJECTED ADDRESSES. Yes, she exalts her stately head ; And, but that solid bulk outspread, Opposed you on your onward tread, And posts and pillars warranted That all was true that Wyatt said, You might have deem'd her walls so thick Were not composed of stone or brick. But all a phantom, all a trick, Of brain disturb'd and fancy sick. So high she soars, so vast, so quick ! Street, was afterwards erected under the lesseeship of EUiston, whose portrait in the Exhibition was thus noticed in \he Examiner: "Portrait of the great lessee, in his favourite character of Mr. EUiston. JOHNSON'S GHOST. E 2 X. JOHNSON'S GHOST, [^Ghost of Dr. Johnson 7'zses from trap-door P. S., and Ghost of ^OS^'E'LL. f'om trap- door O. P. The latter bows respectfully to the House, and obsequiously to the Doctor's Ghost, and retires^ Doctor's Ghost loquitur. nPHAT which was organised by the moral ability of one has been executed by the physical efforts of many, and Drury Lane Theatre is now complete. Of that part behind the curtain, which has not yet been destined to glow beneath the brush of the varnisher, or vibrate to the hammer of the carpenter, little is thought by the public, and 139 I40 REJECTED ADDRESSES. little need be said by the committee. Truth, however, is not to be sacrificed for the accom- modation of either ; and he who should pro- nounce that our edifice has received its final embellishment would be disseminating false- hood without incurring favour, and risking the disgrace of detection without participating the advantage of success. Professions lavishly effused and parsimo- niously verified are alike inconsistent with the precepts of innate rectitude and the practice of external policy : let it not then be conjectured, that because we are unassuming, we are im- becile ; that forbearance is any indication of despondency, or humility of demerit. He that is the most assured of success will make the fewest appeals to favour, and where nothing is claimed that is undue, nothing that is due will be withheld. A swelling opening is too often succeeded by an insignificant conclusion. Parturient mountains have ere now produced muscipular abortions ; and the auditor who JOHNSONS GHOST. T4I compares incipient grandeur with final vul- garity is reminded of the pious hawkers of Constantinople, who solemnly perambulate her streets, exclaiming, "In the name of the Pro- phet — figs ! " Of many who think themselves wise, and of some who are thought wise by others, the exertions are directed to the revival of moul- dering and obscure dramas ; to endeavours to exalt that which is now rare only because it was always worthless, and whose deterioration, while it condemned it to living obscurity, by a strange obliquity of moral perception, con- stitutes its title to posthumous renown. To embody the flying colours of folly, to arrest evanescence, to give to bubbles the globular consistency as well as form, to exhibit on the stage the piebald denizen of the stable, and the half-reasoning parent of combs, to display the brisk locomotion of Columbine, or the tortuous attitudinising of Punch ; — these are the occupations of others, whose ambition, 142 REJECTED ADDRESSES. limited to the applause of unintellectual fatuity, is too innocuous for the application of satire, and too humble for the incitement of jealousy. Our refectory will be found to contain every species of fruit, from the cooling nectarine and luscious peach to the puny pippin and the noxious nut. There Indolence may repose, and Inebriety revel ; and the spruce apprentice, rushing in at second account, may there chatter with impunity : debarred, by a barrier of brick and mortar, from marring that scenic interest in others, which nature and education have disciualified him from comprehending himself Permanent stage-doors we have none. That which is permanent cannot be removed, for, if removed, it soon ceases to be permanent. What stationary absurdity can vie with that ligneous barricado, which, decorated with frappant and tintinnabulant appendages, now serves as the entrance of the lowly cottage, and now as the exit of a lady's bed-chamber ; at one time, insinuating plastic Harlequin into Johnson's ghost. 143 a butcher's shop, and, at anotlxir, yawning, as a flood-gate, to precipitate the Cyprians of St. Giles's into the embraces of Macheath, To elude this glaring absurdity, to give to each respective mansion the door which the car- penter would doubtless have given, we vary our portal with the varying scene, passing from deal to mahogany, and from mahogany to oak, as the opposite claims of cottage, palace, or castle, may appear to require. Amid the general hum of gratulation which flatters us in front, it is fit that some regard should be paid to the murmurs of despondence that assail us in the rear. They, as I have elsewhere expressed it, '- who live to please," should not have their own pleasures entirely overlooked. The children of Thespis are general in their censures of the architect, in having placed the locality of exit at such a distance from the oily irradiators which now dazzle the eyes of him who addresses you. I am, cries the Queen of Terrors, robbed of my 144 REJECTED ADDRESSES. fair proportions. When the king-killing Thane hints to the breathless auditory the murders he means to perpetrate in the castle of Macduff, " ere his purpose cool," so vast is the interval he has to travel before he can escape from the stage, that his purpose has even time to freeze. Your condition, cries the Muse of Smiles, is hard, but it is cygnet's down in comparison with mine. The peerless peer of capers and congees * has laid it down as a rule, that the best good thing uttered by the morning visitor should conduct him rapidly to the doorway, last impressions vying in durability with first. But when, on this boarded elongation, it falls to my lot to say a good thing, to ejaculate " keep moving," or to chant. " hie hoc horum getiitivo^^ many are the moments that must elapse ere I can hide myself from public vision in the recesses of O. P. or P. S. * The celebrated Lord Chesterfield, whose Letters tohis Son, according to Dr. Johnson, inculcate "the manners of a dancing-master and the morals of a ," iS:c. Johnson's ghost. 145 To objections like these, captiously urged and querulously maintained, it is time that equity should conclusively reply. Deviation from scenic propriety has only to vituperate itself for the consequences it generates. Let the actor consider the line of exit as that line beyond which he should not soar in quest of spurious applause : let him reflect, that in pro- portion as he advances to the lamps, he recedes from nature ; that the truncheon of Hotspur acquires no additional charm from encounter- ing the cheek of beauty in the stage-box, and that the bravura of Madame may produce effect, although the throat of her who warbles it should not overhang the orchestra. The Jove of the modern critical Olympus, Lord Mayor of the theatric sky,"^ has, ex cathedra^ asserted * Lord Mayor of the theatric sky. This alludes to Leigh Hunt, who, in the Examiner at this time, kept the actors in hot water. Dr. Johnson's argument is, like many of his other arguments, specious, but untenable ; that which it defends has since been abandoned as impracticable. Mr. Whitbread contended that the actor 146 REJECTED ADDRESSES. that a natural actor looks upon the audience part of the theatre as the third side of the chamber he inhabits. Surely, of the third wall thus fancifully erected, our actors should, by ridicule or reason, be withheld from knocking their heads against the stucco. Time forcibly reminds me, that all things which have a limit must be brought to a conclusion. Let me, ere that conclusion ar- rives, recall to your recollection that the pillars which rise on either side of me, blooming in virid antiquity, like two massy evergreens, had yet slumbered in their native quarry, but for was like a portrait in a picture, and accordingly placed the green curtain in a gilded frame remote from the foot- lights ; alleging that no performer should mar the illu- sion by stepping out of the frame. Dowton was the first actor who, like Manfred's ancestor in the "Castle of Otranto,'' took the liberty of abandoning the canon. " Don't tell me of frames and pictures," ejaculated the testy comedian ; " if I can't be heard by the audience in the frame, I'll walk out of it ! '' The proscenium has since been new modelled, and the actors thereby brought nearer to the audience. JOHNSON S GHOST. I47 the ardent exertions of the individual who called them into life : to his never-slumbering talents you are indebted for whatever pleasure this haunt of the Muses is calculated to afford. If, in defiance of chaotic malevolence, the destroyer of the temple of Diana yet survives in the name of Erostratus, surely we may confidently predict that the rebuilder of the temple of Apollo will stand recorded to distant posterity in that of — Samuel Whitbread, ^ THE BEAUTIFUL INCENDIARY. XI. THE BEAUTIFUL INCENDIARY. BY THE HON. WILLIAM ROBERT SPENCER. Formosam resonare doces Amaryllida sylvas," — Virgil. [Scene draws, and discovers a Lady asleep on a couch. '\ Enter Philander. PHILANDER. O OBRIETY, cease to be sober.* Cease, Labour, to dig and to delve ; All hail to this tenth of October, One thousand eight hundred and twelve ! * Sobriety, &c. The good humour of the poet upon occasion of this parody has been noticed in the preface. 151 152 REJECTED ADDRESSES. Ah ! whom do my peepers remark ? 'Tis Hebe with Jupiter's jug ; Oh no, "tis the pride of the Park, Fair Lady EHzabeth Mugg. II Why, beautiful nymph, do you close The curtain that fringes your eye ? Why veil in the clouds of repose The sun that should brighten our sky ? " It's all very well for once," said he afterwards, in comic confidence, at his villa at Petersham, "but don't do it again. I had been almost forgotten when you revived me ; and now all the newspapers and reviews ring with 'this fashionable, trashy author.'" The sand and "filings of glass," mentioned in the last stanza, are referable to the well-known verses of the poet apologising to a lady for having paid an unconscionably long morning visit ; and where, alluding to Time, he says, All his sands are diamond sparks, That glitter as they pass.'' Few men in society have more "gladdened life " than this poet. He now resides in Paris, and may thence make the grand tour without an interpreter — speaking, as he does, French, Italian, and German, as fluently as English. THE BEAUTIFUL INCENDIARY. I 53 Perhaps jealous Venus has oiled Your hair with some opiate drug, Not choosing her charms should be foiled By Lady Elizabeth Mugg. III. But ah 1 why awaken the blaze Those bright burning-glasses contain, Whose lens with concentrated rays Proved fatal to old Drur>' Lane ? 'Twas all accidental, they cry, — Away with the flimsy humbug ! 'Twas fired by a flash from the eye Of Lady Elizabeth Mugg. IV. Thy glance can in us raise a flame. Then why should old Drury be free ? Our doom and its doom are the same, Both subject to beauty's decree. 54 REJECTED ADDRESSES. No candles the workmen consumed, When deep in the ruins they dug ; Thy flash still their progress illumed, Sweet Lady Elizabeth Mugg. V. Thy face a rich fireplace displays : The mantelpiece marble — thy brows ; Thine eyes are the bright beaming blaze ; Thy bib, which no trespass allows, The fender's tall barrier marks ; Thy tippet's the fire-quelling rug, Which serves to extinguish the sparks Of Lady Elizabeth Mugg, VI. The Countess a lily appears. Whose tresses the pearl-drops emboss ; The Marchioness, blooming in years, A rose-bud enveloped in moss ; THE BEAUTIFUL INCENDIA. 1$$ But thou art the sweet passion-flower, For who would not slavery hug, To pass but one exquisite hour In the arms of Elizabeth Mugg? VII. When at court, or some Dowager's rout, Her diamond aigrette meets our view, She looks like a glow-worm dressed out, Or tulips bespangled with dew. Her two lips denied to man's suit, Are shared with her favourite Pug ; What lord would not change with the brute, To live with Elizabeth Mugg ? VIII. Could the stage be a large vis-a-vis. Reserved for the polished and great. Where each happy lover might see The nymph he adores tete-k-tete ; 136 REJECTED ADDRESSES. No longer I'd gaze on the ground, And the load of despondency lug, For I'd book myself all the year round, To ride with the sweet Lady Mugg. IX. Yes, she in herself is a host, And if she were here all alone, Our house might nocturnally boast A bumper of fashion and ton. Again should it burst in a blaze, In vain would they ply Congreve's plug,* For nought could extinguish the rays From the glance of divine Lady Mugg. * Congreve's plug. The late Sir William Congreve had made a model of Drury Lane Theatre, to which was affixed an engine that, in event of fire, was made to play from the stage into every box in the house. The writer, accompanied by Theodore Hook, went to see the model at Sir William's house in Cecil Street. "Now I'll duck Whitbread ! " said Hook, seizing the water-pipe whilst he spoke, and sending a torrent of water into the brewer's box. THE BEAUTIFUL INCENDIARY. I $7 O could I as Harlequin frisk, And thou be my Columbine fair, My wand should with one magic whisk Transport us to Hanover Square : St. George's should lend us its shrine, The parson his shoulders might shrug, But a license should force him to join My hand in the hand of my Mugg. XI. Court-plaster the weapons should tip, By Cupid shot down from above, Which, cut into spots for thy lip. Should still barb the arrows of love. The God who from others flies quick. With us should be slow as a slug ; As close as a leech he should stick To me and Elizabeth Mugg. 158 REJECTED ADDRESSES. XII. For Time would, with us, 'stead of sand, Put filings of steel in his glass, To dry up the blots of his hand, And spangle life's page as they pass. Since all flesh is grass ere 'tis hay,* O may I in clover live snug, And when old Time mows me away, Be stacked with defunct Lady Mugg ! * See BjTon, afterwards, in " Don Juan : " — " For flesh is grass, which Time mows down to hay." Rut as Johnson says of Dryden, "His known wealth was so great, he might borrow without any impeachment of his credit." % FIRE AND ALE. XII. FIRE AND ALE. BY MAITHEW GREGORY LEWIS.* " Omnia transformat sese in miracula rerum." — Virgil, A/f Y palate is parched with Pierian thirst, Away to Parnassus I'm beckoned ; List, warriors and dames, while my lay is rehearsed, 1 sing of the singe of Miss Drur}^ the first. And the birth of Miss Drury the second. * Matthew Gregory Lewis, commonly called Monk Lewis, from his once popular romance of that name. He was a good-hearted man, and, like too many of that fraternity, a disagreeable one — verbose, disputa- tious, and paradoxical. His "Monk" and "Castle Spectre" elevated him into fame; and he continued to (34) 161 K 1 62 REJECTED ADDRESSES. The Fire King, one day, rather amorous felt ; He mounted his hot copper filly ; His breeches and boots were of tin, and the belt Was made of cast iron, for fear it should melt With the heat of the copper colt's belly. -'Sure never was skin half so scalding as his ! When an infant 'twas equally horrid ; write ghost-stories till, following as he did in the wake of Mrs. Radcliffe, he quite overstocked the market. Lewis visited his estates in Jamaica, and came back perfectly negro-bitten. He promulgated a new code of laws in the island, for the government of his sable sub- jects : one may serve for a specimen : ' ' Any slave who commits murder shall have his head shaved, and be con- fined three days and nights in a dark room." Upon occasion of printing these parodies, Monk Lewis said to Lady H., " Many of them are very fair, but mine is not at all like ; they have made me write burlesque, which I never do." "You don't know your own talent,' answered the lady. Lewis aptly described himself, as to externals, in the verses affixed to his " Monk,' as having " A graceless form and dwarfish stature." FIRE AND ALE. 1 63 For the water, when he was baptized, gave a fizz, And bubbled and simmerd and started off, whizz ! As soon as it sprinkled his forehead. Oh ! then there was glitter and fire in each eye, For two living coals were the symbols ; He had, moreover, large grey eyes, thick features, and an inexpressive countenance. In talking, he had a dis- agreeable habit of drawing the forefinger of his right hand across his right eyelid. He affected, in conversa- tion, a sort of dandified, drawling tone ; young Harlowe, the artist, did the same. A foreigner who had but a sh'ght knowledge of the English language might have concluded, from their cadences, that they were little better than fools— "just a born goose," as Terry the actor used to say. Lewis died on his passage home- ward from Jamaica, owing to a dose of James's powders injudiciously administered by "his own mere motion." He wrote various plays, with variovis success: he had admirable notion of dramatic construction, but the good- ness of his scenes and incidents were marred by the badness of his dialogue. 164 REJECTED ADDRESSES. His teeth were calcined, and his tongue was so dry, It rattled against them, as though you should try To play the piano in thimbles. From his nostrils a lava sulphureous flows, Which scorches wherever it lingers ; A snivelling fellow he's call'd by his foes, For he can't raise his paw up to blow his red nose, For fear it should blister his fingers. His wig is of flames curling over his head, Well powder'd with white smoking ashes ; He drinks gunpowder tea, melted sugar of lead, Cream of tartar, and dines on hot spice ginger- bread, Wliich black from the oven he gnashes. Each fire-nymph his kiss from her countenance shields, 'Twould soon set her cheekbone a frying ; FIRE AND ALE. 1 65 He spit in the Tenter-ground near Spital- fields, And the hole that it burnt, and the chalk that it yields, Make a capital lime-kiln for drying. When he open'd his mouth, out there issued a blast (Nota bene, I do not mean swearing). But the noise that it made, and the heat that it cast, I've heard it from those who have seen it, sur- pass'd A shot manufactory flaring. He blazed, and he blazed, as he gallop'd to snatch His bride, Httle dreaming of danger; His whip was a torch, and his spur was a match, And over the horse's left eye was a patch. To keep it from burning the manger. l66 REJECTED ADDRESSES. And who is the housemaid he means to enthral In his cinder-producing alhance ? 'Tis Drury Lane Playhouse, so wide, and so tall. Who, like other combustible ladies, must fall, If she cannot set sparks at defiance. On his warming-pan kneepan he clattering roll'd, And the housemaid his hand would have taken, But his hand, like his passion, was too hot to hold. And she soon let it go, but her new ring of gold All melted, like butter or bacon ! Oh ! then she look'd sour, and indeed well she might, For Vinegar Yard was before her ; But, spite of her shrieks, the ignipotent knight, Enrobing the maid in a flame of gas light. To the skies in a sky-rocket bore her. FIRE AND ALE. 167 Look ! look ! 'tis the Ale King, so stately and starch, Whose votaries scorn to be sober ; He pops from his vat, like a cedar or larch ; Brown-stout is his doublet, he hops in his march, And froths at the mouth in October. His spear is a spigot, his shield is a bung ; He taps where the housemaid no more is^ When lo ! at his magical bidding, upsprung A second Miss Drury, tall, tidy, and young. And sported in loco sororis. Back, lurid in air, for a second regale, The Cinder King, hot with desire, To Brydges Street hied ; but the Monarch of Ale, With uplifted spigot, and faucet, and pail, Thus chided the Monarch of Fire : " Vile tyrant, beware of the ferment I brew ; I rule the roast here, dash the wig o' me \ 1 68 REJECTED ADDRESSES. If, spite of your marriage with Old Drury, you Come here with your tinderbox, courting the New, ril have you indicted for bigamy ! " PLAYHOUSE MUSINGS. F ? XIII. PLAYHOUSE MUSINGS. BY S. T. COLERIDGE. " Ille velut fidis arcana sodalibus olim Credebat libris ; neque si male cesserat, usquam Decurrens alio, neque si bene." — Horace. IV , T Y pensive Public, wherefore look you sad ? I had a grandmother, she kept a donkey To carry to the mart her crockery- ware, And when that donkey lobk'd me in the face, His face was sad ! and you are sad, my Public ! Joy should be yours : this tenth day of October Again assembles us in Drury Lane. Long wept my eye to see the timber planks That hid our ruins ; many a day I cried. 172 REJECTED ADDRESSES. Ah me ! I fear they never will rebuild it ! Till on one eve, one joyful Monday eve, As along Charles Street I prepared to walk, Just at the corner, by the pastrycook's, I heard a trowel tick against a brick. I look'd me up, and straight a parapet Uprose at least seven inches o'er the planks. Joy to thee, Drury ! to myself I said : He of Blackfriars' Road,* who hymned thy downfall In loud Hosannahs, and who prophesied That flames, like those from prostrate Solyma, Would scorch the hand that ventured to rebuild thee. Has proved a lying prophet. From that hour, As leisure offer'd, close to Mr. Spring's Box-office door, I've stood and eyed the builders. They had a plan to render less their labours ; Workmen in olden times would mount a ladder * "lie of f31ackfnars' Road," viz., the late Rev. Rowland Hill, who is said to have preached a sermon congratulating his congregation on the catastrophe. PLAYHOUSE MUSINGS. I75 With hodded heads, but these stretched forth a pole From the wall's pinnacle, they placed a pullcy Athwart the pole, a rope athwart the pulley ; To this a basket dangled ; mortar and bricks Thus freighted, swung securely to the top. And in the empty basket workmen twain Precipitate, unhurt, accosted earth. Oh ! 'twas a goodly sound, to hear the people Who watch'd the work express their various thoughts ! While some believed it never would be finish'd, Some, on the contrary, believed it would. I've heard our front that faces Drury Lane Much criticised ; they say 'tis vulgar brickwork, A mimic manufactory of floor-cloth. One of the morning papers wish'd that front Cemented like the front in Brydges Street ; As it now looks, they call it Wyatt's Mermaid, A handiome woman with a fish's tail. 174 REJECTED ADDRESSES. White is the steeple of St. Bride's in Fleet Street ! The Albion (as its name denotes) is white ; Morgan and Saunders' shop for chairs and tables Gleams like a snow-ball in the setting sun White is Whitehall. But not St. Bride's in Fleet Street, The Spotless Albion, Morgan, no, nor Saunders, Nor white Whitehall, is white as Drury's face. Oh, Mr. Whitbread ! * fie upon you, sir ! I think you should have built a colonnade ; When tender Beauty, looking for her coach. Protrudes her gloveless hand, perceives the shower, And draws the tippet closer round her throat, Perchance her coach stands half a dozen off, And, ere she mounts the step, the oozing mud * "Oh, Mr. Whitbread!" Sir William Grant, then Master of the Rolls, repeated this passage aloud at a Lord Mayor's dinner, to the no small astonishment of the writer, who happened to sit within ear-shot. PLAYHOUSE MUSINGS. I75 Soaks through her pale kid shpper. On the morrow, She coughs at breakfast, and her gruff papa Cries, '• There you go ! this comes of play- houses ! " To build no portico is penny wise : Heaven grant it prove not in the end pound foolish ! Hail to thee, Drury ! Queen of Theatres ! What is the Regency in Tottenham Street, The Royal Amphitheatre of Arts, Astley's Olympic, or the Sans Pareil, Compared with thee ? Yet when I view tliee push'd Back from the narrow street that christened thee, I know not why they call thee Drury Lane. Amid the freaks that modern fashion sanc- tions. It grieves me much to see live animals Brought on the stage. Grimaldi has his rabbit, Laurent his cat, and Bradbury his pig ; lyo REJECTED ADDRESSES. Fie on such tricks ! Johnson, the machinist Of former Drury, imitated hfe Quite to the life. The Elephant in Blue Beard, Stuff'd by his hand, wound round his lithe proboscis, As spruce as he who roar'd in Padmanaba.* Nought born on earth should die. On hackney stands I reverence the coachman who cries " Gee," And spares the lash. When I behold a spider Prey on a fly, a magpie on a worm, Or view a butcher with horn-handled knife Slaughter a tender lamb as dead as mutton, Indeed, indeed, I'm very, very sick ! \Exit hastily. * " Padmanaba," viz. , in a pantomime called " Harle- quin in Padmanaba." This elephant, some years after- wards, was exhibited over E.xeter 'Change, where, the reader will remember, it was found necessary to destroy the poor animal by discharges of musketry. When he made his entrance in the pantomime above mentioned, Johnson, the machinist of the rival house, exclaimed, " I should be very sorry if I could not make a better elephant than that ! " Johnson was right : we go to the theatre to be pleased with the skill of the imitator, and not to lr»ok at the real it v. DRURY LANE HUSTINGS. XIV. DRURY LANE HUSTINGS, a ifSeto H^alfpennr ISallati. BY A PIC-NIC POET. " This is the very age of promise : to promise is most courtly and fashionable. Performance is a kind of will or testament, which argues a great sickness in his judg- ment that makes it."— TiMON of Athens. [ 7!:? he stnig by Mr. Johnstone in the character Cf LOONEY M'TWOLTER.] A /T R, JACK, your address, says the Prompter ^ ^ to me, So I gave him my card — no, that a'nt it, says he ; 'Tis your public address. Oh ! says I, never fear, If address you are bother'd for, only look here. \Puts on hat affectedly. Tol de rol lol, &c. 179 I So REJECTED ADDRESSES. 11. With Drury's for sartin we'll never have done, We've built up another, and yet there's but one ; The old one was best, yet I'd say, if I durst, The new one is better — the last is the first. Tol de rol, &c. III. These pillars are call'd by a Frenchified word, A something that's jumbled of antique and verd ; The boxes may show us some verdant antiques, Some old harridans who beplaster their cheeks. Tol de rol, &c. IV. Only look how high Tragedy, Comedy, stick. Lest their rivals, the horses, should give them a kick ! If you will not descend when our authors beseech ye, You'll stop there for life, for I'm sure they can't reach ye. Tol de rol, &c. DRURY LANE HUSTINGS. l8l V. Each one-shilling god within reach of a nod is, And plain are the charms of each gallery goddess — You, Brandy faced Moll, don't be looking askew. When I talk'd of a goddess I didn't mean you. Tol de rol, &c. VI. Our stage is so prettily fashion'd for viewing, The whole house can see what the whole house is doing : 'Tis just like the Hustings, we kick up a bother ; But saying's one thing, and doing's another, Tol de rol, &c. VII. We've many new houses, and some of them rum ones, But the newest of all is the new House of Commons ; 1 82 REJECTED ADDRESSES. 'Tis a rickety sort of a bantling, I'm told, It will die of old age when it's seven years old. Tol de rol, &c. VIII. As I don't know on whom the election will fall, I move in return for returning them all ; But for fear Mr, Speaker my meaning should miss, The house that I wish em to sit in is this. Tol de rol, &c. IX. Let us cheer our great Commoner, but for whose aid We all should have gone with short commons to bed ; And since he has saved all the fat from the fire, I move that the house be call'd Whitbread's Entire. Tol de rol, &c. ARCHITECTURAL ATOMS. XV. ARCHITECTURAL ATOMS. TRANSLATED BY DR. B. " Lege, Dick, Lege ! " — Joseph Andrews. \^To be recited by the Translator's Son.'\ A WAY, fond dupes ! who, smit with sacred lore, Mosaic dreams in Genesis explore, Doat with Copernicus, or darkling stray With Newton, Ptolemy, or Tycho Brahe ! To you I sing not, for I sing of truth, Primeval systems, and creation's youth ; Such as of old, with magic wisdom fraught, Inspired LUCRETIUS to the Latians taught. I sing how casual bricks, in airy climb, Encounter'd casual cow-hair, casual lime ; ,85 l86 REJECTED ADDRESSES. How rafterSj borne through wondering clouds elate, Kiss'd in their slope blue elemental slate, Clasp'd solid beams in chance-directed fury, And gave to birth our renovated Drury. Thee, son of Jove ! whose sceptre was con- fess'd, Where fair ^olia springs from Tethys' breast ; Thence on Olympus, mid celestials placed, God of the Winds, and Ether's boundless waste — Thee I invoke ! Oh. puj'my bold design, Prompt the bright thought, and swell th' har- monious line ; Uphold my pinions, and my verse inspire With W^insor's * patent gas, or wind of fire, * " Winsor's patent gas " — at that time in its infancy. The first place illumined by it was the Carlton House side of Pall Mall ; the second, Bishopsgate Street. The writer attended a lecture given by the inventor : the charge of admittance was three shillings, but, as the inventor was about to apply to Parliament, members of both houses were admitted gratis. The writer and ARCHITECTURAL ATOMS. 1 87 In whose pure blaze thy embryo form enroird, The dark enlightens, and enchafes the cold But, while I court thy gifts, be mine to shun The deprecated prize Ulysses won ; Who, sailing homeward from thy breezy shore, The prison'd winds in skins of parchment bore. Speeds the fleet bark till o'er the billowy green The azure heights of Ithaca are seen ; But while with favouring gales her way she wins. His curious comrades ope the mystic skins ; When, lo ! the rescued winds, with boisterous sweep, Roar to the clouds and lash the rocking deep ; a fellow -jester assumed the parts of senators at a short notice. "Members of Parliament!" was their impor- tant ejaculation at the door of entrance. " What places, gentlemen ? " " Old Sarum and Bridgewater. " ' ' Walk in, gentlemen." Luckily, the real Simon Pures did not attend. This Pall Mall illumination was further noticed in " Horace in London : " — " And Winsor lights, with flame of gas, Home, to Kinsr's Place, his mother." 1 88 REJECTED ADDRESSES. Heaves the smote vessel in the howling blast, Splits the stretch'd sail, and cracks the tottering mast. Launch'd on a plank, the buoyant hero rides, Where ebon Afric stems the sable tides, While his duck'd comrades o'er the ocean fly, And sleep not in the whole skins they untie. So, when to raise the wind some lawyer tries. Mysterious skins of parchment meet our eyes ; On speeds the smiling suit — " Pleas of our Lord The King " shine sable on the wide record ! Nods the prunella'd bar, attorneys smile, And siren jurors flatter to beguile ; Till stript — nonsuited — he is doom'd to toss In legal shipwreck and redeemless loss ! Lucky, if, like Ulysses, he can keep His head above the waters of the deep. yEolian monarch ! Emperor of Pufls ! We modern sailors dread not thy rebuffs ; ARCHITECTURAL ATOMS. 1 89 See to thy golden shore promiscuous come Quacks for the lame, the blind, the deaf, the dumb ; Fools are their bankers — a prolific line, And every mortal malady's a mine. Each sly Sangrado, with his poisonous pill. Flies to the printer's devil with his bill, Whose Midas touch can gild his ass's ears. And load a knave with folly's rich arrears. And lo ! a second miracle is thine, For sloe-juice water stands transformed to wine. Where Day and Martin's patent blacking loll'd. Burst from the vase Pactolian streams of gold ; Laugh the sly wizards, glorying in their stealth. Quit the black art, and loll in lazy wealth. See Britain's Algerines, the lottery fry Win annual tribute by the annual lie ! Aided by thee — but whither do I stray ? — Court, city, borough, own thy sovereign sway ; An age of puffs an age of gold succeeds. And windy bubbles are the spawn it breeds. 190 REJECTED ADDRESSES. If such thy power, hear the Muse's prayer 1 Swell thy loud lun^s and wave thy winj^sof air ; Spread, vie\vles5 :^iant, all thy arms of mist Like windmill-sails to brini; the poet .i^'rist ; As erst thy roarin;^ son, with eddying; ^'ale, Whirl'd Oritiiyia from her nati^'C vale — So, while Lucretian wonders I rehearse, Augusta's sons shall patronise iny verse. I sing of Atoms, who>e creative brain, With eddying impulse, built new Drury Lane ; Not to the labours of subservient man, To no young Wyatt appertains the plan — We mortals stalk, like horses in a mill, Impassive media of atomic will ; Ve stare ! then Truth's broad talisman discern — Tis demonstration speaks — attend, and learn 1 From floating elements in chaos hurl'd, Self-form'd of atoms, sprang the infant world : No great First Cause inspired the happy plot, lUit all was matter — and no matter what. MU.Ill IIA. I L uAi. AiOMS. I9I Aloiiis, attracted by some law occult, Settling in spheres, the k^o^c ^^'^s the result ; Tare child of Chance, which still directs the ball, As rotatory atoms rise or fall. In ether launch'd, the peopled bubble floats, A mass of particles and contluent motes, So nicely poised, that if one atom flings Its weight away, aloft the planet springs, And wings its course through realms of bound- less space, outstripping comets in eccentric race. Add but one atom more, it sinks outright 1 )own to the realms of Tartarus and night. What waters melt or scorching tires consume. In different forms their being re-assume : Hence can no change arise, except in name. For weight and substance ever are the same. Thus with the tlames that from old Druiy ri>e, Its elements primeval sought the skies; 19- REJF.CTFD ADDRESSES There pendulous to wait the happy hour When new attractions should restore their power : So, in tliis procrcant theatre elate, Echoes unljorn their future life await ; Here embr>'o sounds in ether lie conccal'd, Like words in Northern atmosphere congeal'd. Here many a f(Ltus laugh and half-encore Clin<;s to the roof, or creeps along the floor ; liy pufis concipienl some in ether flit, And soar in bravos from the thundering pit ; Some forth on ticket nights * from tradesmen break, To mar the actor they design to make ; • " Tickcl-nighls." This phmse is proKibly unintel- ligible to the unlhealrical portion of the conimuniijr, which may now be said to Ik? all the world except the actors. Tickcl-nighls arc those whcn-on the inferior actors club for a tenefii : each disiributes as many tickets of admission as he is able among his friends. A moiley assemblage is the consequence ; and as each actor is encouraged by his own set. who are not in general play-going people, the applause comes (as Chesterfield says of Pope's atlempis at wit), "generally unseasonably, and loo often unsucrcssfully." ARCHrnCTURAI ATOMS. I95 While some this mortal life abortive miss, Criislid by a groan, or strangled l)y a hiss. So, when " Dog's-meat " re echoes through the streets, Kiish sympathetic dogs from their retreats, lieam with bright blaze their supplicating eyes, Sink llicir hind-legs, ascend their joyful ciies ; Ka« h, will! with hope, and maddening to prevail, I'oinis the pleased ear, and wags the expectant tail. Ve fallen bricks ! in Drury's fire calcined, .Since doom'd to slumber, couch'd upon the wind, Sweet was the hour, when, tempted by your f; caks. Congenial troweU smooth'd your yellow cheeks. Float dulcet serenades upon the ear, Bends every atom from its ruddy sphere. Twinkles each eye, and, peeping from its veil, Mark^ in the adver-e crowd its destined male. 194 REJECTED ADDRESSES. Tlic oblonp beauties clap their hands of grit. And brick-du.^t titterings on the brcc/es flit ; Then do^ni ihey rush in amator)' race, Their dusty bridegrooms eager to embrace. Some choose old lovers, some decide for new, lint each, when fix'd, is to her station true. 1 hus various bricks are made, as tastes invite - riic red. the grey, liie dingy, or the white. i'erhaps some halfl>al;r(i :n\cr. fr.in',^ ;iti.i free, To alien beauty Ijcnds the lawless knee, Hut of unhaliow'd fascinations sick, Soon quits his Cyprian for his married brick : The Dido atom calls and scolds in vain. No crisp .ICncas soothes the widow's pain. So in Cheapside, what time Aurora peeps, A mingled noise of dustmen, milk, and sweeps. Falls on the housemaid's ear : amazed she stands, Then opes the door with cindcr-sabled hands, ARailTECTURAL ATOMS. 1 93 And " Matches "' calls. Ihc dustman, bubbled flat, Thinks 'lis for him, and doffs his fan-tail'd hat ; The milkman, whom her second cries assail. With sudden sink unyokes the clinking pail ; Now louder i;rown, by turns she screams and weeps — .•Mas ! her screaming only brings the sweeps. .Sweeps but put out — she wants to raise a rlame, And calls for matches, but 'tis still the same. Atoms and housemaids ! mark the moral true — If once ye go astray, no match for you ! As atoms in one mass united mix, .So bricks attraction feel for kindred bricks ; Some in the cellar view, perchance, on hi-h, I-air chimney chums on beds of mortar lie ; Knamour'd of the sympathetic clod. Leaps the red bridegroom to the labourer's hod: And up the ladder bears the workman, taught To think he bears the bricks — mistaken thought ! ,196 REJECTED ADDRESSES. A proof behold : if near the top they find The nymphs or broken-corner'd or unkind, Hack to the base, " resuhing with a bound," They bear their bleeding carriers to the ground I So legends tell along the lofty hill Paced the twin heroes, gallant Jack and Jill ; On trudged the Gemini to reach the rail That shields the well's top from the expectant pail, When, ah ; Jack falls ; and, rolling in the rear, Jill feels the attraction of his kindred sphere ; Head over heels begins his toppling track, Throws sympathetic somersets with Jack, And at the mountain's base bobs plump against him, whack ! Ye living atoms, who unconscious sit, Jumbled by chance in gallery, box, and pit. For you no Peter opes the fabled door, No churhsh Charon plies the shadowy oar ; ARCHITECTURAL ATOMS. 1 97 Breathe but a space, and Boreas' casual sweep Shall bear your scatter'd corses o'er the deep, To gorge the greedy elements, and mix With water, marl, and clay, and stones, and sticks ; While, charged with fancied souls, sticks, stones, and clay. Shall take your seats, and hiss or clap the play. O happy age ! when convert Christians read No sacred writings but the Pagan creed — O happy age ! when, spurning Newton's dreams, Our poets* sons recite Lucretian themes, Abjure the idle systems of their youth, And turn again to atoms and to truth ; — O happier still ! when England's dauntless dames. Awed by no chaste alarms, no latent shames, The bard's fourth book unblushingly peruse. And learn the rampant lessons of the stews ! 198 REJECTED ADDRESSES. All hail, Lucretius I renovated sage ! Unfold the modest mystics of thy page ; Return no more to thy sepulchral shelf, But live, kind bard — that I may live myself! " In one single point the parodist has failed — there is a certain Dr. Busby, whose supposed address is a translation called ' Architectural Atoms, intended to be recited by the translator's son.' Unluckily, however, for the wag who had prepared this fun, the genuine serious abs7(rdily of Dr. Busby and his son has cast all his humour into the shade. The doctor from the boxes, and the son from the stage, have actually endeavoured, it seems, to recite addresses, which they call mo7iologues and tinalogues ; and which, for extravagant folly, tumid meanness, and vulgar affectation, set all the powers of parody at utter defiance," — Quarterly Review. "Of 'Architectural Atoms,' translated by Dr. Busby, we can say very little more than that they appear to us to be far more capable of combining into good poetry than the few lines we were able to read of the learned doctor's genuine address in the newspapers. They might pass, indeed, for a very tolerable imitation of Darwin." — Jeffrey, Edinburgh Review. THEATRICAL ALARM- BELL. XVI. THEATRICAL ALARM- BELL. BY THE EDITOR OF THE ''MORNING POST."* " Bounce, Jupiter, bounce ! " — O'Hara. T ADIES AND GENTLEMEN,— As it is now the universally-admitted, and in- deed pretty-generally-siispected, aim of Mr. Whitbread and the infamous, bloodthirsty, and, in fact, illiberal faction to which he * This journal was, at the period in question, rather remarkable for the use of the figure called by the rhetoricians catachresis. The Bard of Avon may be quoted in justification of its adoption, when he writes of taking arms against a sea, and seeking a bubble in the 20T C 2 202 REJECTED ADDRi;SSES. belongs, to burn to the ground this free and happy Protestant city, and estabhsh himself in St. James's Palace, his fellow committee-men have thought it their duty to watch the principles of a theatre built under his auspices* The information they liave received from an undoubted authority — particularly from an old fruit-woman who has turned king's evidence, and whose name, for obvious reasons, we forbear to mention, though we have had it some weeks in our possession — has induced them to introduce various reforms — -not such reforms as the vile faction clamour for, meaning thereby revolution, but such reforms as are necessary to preserve the glorious constitution of the only free, happy, and prosperous country now left upon the face of the earth. From the valuable and authentic source above alluded to, mouth of a cannon. The Morning Post, in the year 1812, congratulated its readers upon having stripped off Cobbett's mask and discovered his cloven foot ; adding, that it was high time to give the hydra-head of Faction a rap on the knuckles ! THEATRICAL ALARM-BELL. 20 3 we have learnt that a sangumary plot has been formed by some united Irishmen, com- bined with a gang of Luddites, and a special committee sent over by the Pope at the instigation of the beastly Corsican fiend, for destroying all the loyal part of the audience on the anniversary of that deeply-to-be-abhorred- and-highly-to-be-blamed stratagem, the Gun- powder Plot, which falls this year on Thursday, the fifth of November. The whole is under the direction of a delegated committee of O. P.'s, whose treasonable exploits at Covent Garden you all recollect, and all of whom would have been hung from the chandeliers at that time, but for the mistaken lenity of Government. At a given signal a well-known O. P. was to cry out from the gallery, '* Nosey ] Music ! " whereupon all the O. P.'s were to produce from their inside pockets a long pair of shears, edged with felt, to prevent their making any noise, manufactured expressly by a wretch at Birmingham, one of Mr. Brougham's evidences, 204 REJECTED ADDRESSES. and now in custody. With these they were to cut off the heads of all the loyal N. P.'s in the house, without distinction of sex or age. At the signal, similarly given, of "Throw him over !'' which it now appears always alluded to the overthrow of our never-sufficiently-enough- to-be -deeply- and -universally- to-be - venerated constitution, all the heads of the N. P.'s were to be thrown at the fiddlers, to prevent their appearing in evidence, or perhaps as a false and illiberal insinuation that they have no heads of their own. All that we know of the further designs of these incendiaries is, that they are by-a-great-deal-too-much-too-horrible- to-be-mentioned. The Manager has acted with his usual promptitude on this trying occasion. He has contracted for 300 tons of gunpowder, which are at this moment placed in a small barrel under the pit ; and a descendant of Guy Faux, assisted by Col. Congreve, has undertaken to blow up the house, when necessary, in so novel and in- THEATRICAL ALARM-BELL. 20^ genious a manner, that every O. P. shall be anni- hilated, while not a whisker of the N. P.'s shall be singed. This strikingly displays the advan^ tages of loyalty and attachment to Government. Several other hints have been taken from the theatrical regulations of the not-a-bit-the-less- on-that- account- to-be - universally -execrated monster Buonaparte. A park of artillery, pro- vided with chain-shot, is to be stationed on the stage, and play upon the audience, in case of any indication of misplaced applause or popular discontent (which accounts for the large space between the curtain and the lamps) ; and the public will participate our satisfaction in learning that the indecorous custom of stand- ing up with the hat on is to be abolished, as the Bow Street ofiEicers are provided with daggers, and have orders to stab all such persons to the heart, and send their bodies to Surgeons' Hall. Gentlemen who cough are only to be slightly wounded. Fruit-women bawling '' Bill of the Play ! " are to be forthwith shot, for 206 REJECTED ADDRESSES. which purpose soldiers will be stationed in the slips, and ball cartridge is to be served out with the lemonade. If any of the spectators happen to sneeze or spit, they are to be trans- ported for life ; and any person who is so tall as to prevent another seeing, is to be dragged out and sent on board the tender, or, by an instrument to be taken out of the pocket of Procrustes, to be forthwith cut shorter, either at the head or foot, according as his own con- venience may dictate. Thus, ladies and gentlemen, have the com- mittee, through my medium, set forth the not-in-a-hurry-to-be-paralleled plan they have adopted for preserving order and decorum within the walls of their magnificent edifice. Nor have they, while attentive to their own concerns, by any means overlooked those of the cities of London and Westminster. Finding on enumeration, that they have with a with- two- hands -and -one- tongue - to - be - applauded liberality contracted for more gunpowder than THEATRICAL ALARM-BELL. 207 they want, they have parted with tlie surplus to the mattock-carrying and hustings-hammering high-bailiff of Westminster, who has, with his own shovel, dug a large hole in the front of the parish church of St. Paul, Covent Garden, that, upon the least symptom of ill-breeding in the mob at the general election, the whole of the market may be blown into the air. This, ladies and gentlemen, may at first make provisions rise^ but we pledge the credit of our theatre that they will soon fall again, and people be supplied, as usual, with vege- tables, in the in-general-strewed-with-cabbage- s talks- but - on - Saturday -night - lighted - up - with- lamps market of Covent Garden. I should expatiate more largely on the other advantages of the glorious constitution of these by-the-whole-of-Europe-envied realms, but I am called away to take an account of the ladies and other artificial flowers at a fashionable rout, of which a full and particular account will hereafter appear. For the present, my 208 REJECTED ADDRESSES. fashionable intelligence is scanty, on account of the opening of Drury Lane ; and the ladies and gentlemen who honour me will not be surprised to find nothing under my usual head ! ! THE THEATRE. XVII. THE THEATRE. BY THE REV. GEORGE CRABBE,* " Nil iatentatum nostri Liquere poetje, Nee minimum meruere decus, vestigia Grasca Ausi deserere, et celebrate doraestica facta." — HOR, A PREFACE OF APOLOGIES. T F the following poem should be fortunate enough to be selected for the opening- address, a few words of explanation may be deemed necessary, on my part, to avert invi- * The Rev. GEORGE Crabbf.. The writer's first interview with this poet, who may be designated Pope in worsted stockings, took place at William Spencers villa at Petersham, close to what that gentleman called his gold-fish pond, though it was scarcely three feet in diameter, throwing up a jet dean like a thread. The 212 REJECTED ADDRESSES. dious misrepresentation. The animadversion I have thought it right to make on the noise created by tuning the orchestra, will, I hope, give no lasting remorse to any of the gentle- men employed in the band. It is to be desired venerable bard, seizing both the hands of his satirist, exclaimed, with a good-humoured laugh, " Ah ! my old enemy, how do you do?" In the course of conversa- tion, he expressed great astonishment at his popularity in London; adding, "In my own village they think nothing of me." The subject happening to be the inroads of Time upon beauty, the writer quoted the following lines : — " Six years had pass'd, and forty ere the six. When Time began to play his usual tricks : My locks, once comely in a virgin's sight. Locks of pure brown, now felt th' encroaching white ; Gradual each day I liked my horses less. My dinner more — I learnt to play at chess." " That's very good ! " cried the bard ; " whose is it? " *' Your own." " Indeed ! hah! well, I had quite forgotten it." Was this affectation, or was it not? In sooth, he seemed to push simplicity to puerility. This imitation contained in manuscript the following lines, after describ- ing certain Sunday newspaper critics who were supposed to be present at a new play, and who were rather heated in their politics : — THE THLATRE. 215 that they would keep their instruments ready- tuned, and strike off at once. This would be an accommodation to many well-meaning per- sons who frequent the theatre, who, not being blest with the ear of St. Cecilia, mistake the " Hard is the task who edits — thankless job — A Sunday journal for the factious mob : With bitter paragraph and caustic jest, He gives to turbulence the day of rest ; Condemn'd, this week, rash rancour to instil. Or thrown aside, the next, for one who will : Alike undone or if he praise or rail (For this affects his safety, that his sale), He sinks at last, in luckless limbo set. If loud for libel, and if dumb for debt.' They were, however, never printed ; being, on reflec- tion, considered too serious for the occasion. Is it not a little extraordinary that Crabbe, who could write with such vigour, should descend to such lines as the following : — " Something had happen'd wrong about a bill Which was not drawn with true mercantile skill, So, to amend it, I was told to go And seek the firm of Clutterbuck & Co," Surely ' ' Emanuel Jennmgs, " compared with the above, rises to sublimity. 214 REJLCTLD ADDRESSES. tnnin^^ for the overture, and think the latter conckided before it is begun. " one fiddle will (jive, half-ashamed, a tiny flourish still," was originally written " one hautboy will ; " but, having providentally been informed, when this poem was on the point of being sent off, that there is but one hautboy in the band, I averted the storm of popular and managerial indignation from the head of its blower : as it now stands, " one tiddle " among many, the faulty individual will, I hope, escape detection. The story of the flying play-bill is calculated to expose a practice tnuch too common, of pinning play- bills to the cushions insecurely, and frequently, I fear, not pinning them at all. If these lines save one play-bill only from the fate I have recorded, I shall not deem my labour ill- employed. The concluding episode of Patrick Jennings glances at the boorish fashion of wearing the hat in the one-shilling gallery. THE THEATRE. 21) Had Jennings thrust his between his feet at the commencement of the play, he might have leaned forward with impunity, and the catas- trophe I relate would not have occurred. The line of handkerchiefs formed to enable him to recover his loss is purposely so crossed in texture and materials as to mislead the reader in respect to the real owner of any one of them. For in the statistical view of life and manners which I occasionally present, my clerical profession has taught me how extremely im- proper it would be by any allusion, however slight, to give any uneasiness, however trivial, to any individual, however foolish or wicked. G. C. THE THEATRE. Interior of a Theatre described. — Pit gradually fills. — The Check-taker.— Pit full.— The Orchestra tuned. — One fiddle rather dilatory. — Is reproved — and repents. — Evolutions of Play-bill. — Its final settle- ment on the Spikes. — The Gods taken to task— and why. — Motley Group of Play-goers. — Holywell Street, St. Pancras. — Emanuel Jennings binds his Son apprentice — not in London — and why. — Episode of the Hal. 'Tis sweet to view, from half-past five to six, Our long wax- candles, with short cotton wicks, Touch'd by the lampHghter's Promethean art. Start into light, and make the lighter start ; To see red Phoebus through the gallery-pane Tinge with his beam the beams of Drury Lane : While gradual parties fill our widenM pit, And gape, and gaze, and wonder, ere they sit. At first, while vacant seats give choice and ease. Distant or near, they settle where they please ; 217 2l8 KEJECTED ADDRESSES. But when the muhitude contracts the span, And seats are rare, they settle where they can. Now the full benches to late-comers doom No room for standing, miscall'd standing 7'oom. Hark ! the check-taker moody silence breaks, And bawling " Pit full ! " gives the check he takes ; Yet onward still the gathering numbers cram, Contending crowders shout the frequent damn. And all is bustle, squeeze, row, jabbering, and jam. See to their desks Apollo's sons repair — Swift rides the rosin o'er the horse's hair ! In unison their various tones to tune. Murmurs the hautboy, growls the hoarse bassoon ; In soft vibration sighs the whispering lute, Tang goes the harpsichord, too-too the flute, THE THEATilE. 219 Brays the loud trumpet, squeaks the fiddle sharp, Winds the French-horn, and twangs the tingling harp ; Till, like great Jove, the leader, figuring in, Attunes to order the chaotic din. Now all seems hush'd — but no, one fiddle will Give, half-ashamed, a tiny flourish still. Foil'd in his crash, the leader of the clan Reproves with frowns the dilatory man : Then on his candlestick thrice taps his bow. Nods a new signal, and away they go. Perchance, while pit and gallery cry, "Hats off!" And awed Consumption checks his chided cough, Some giggling daughter of the Queen of Love Drops, reft of pin, her play-bill from above : Like Icarus, while laughing galleries clap, Soars, ducks, and dives in air the printed scrap ; But, wiser far than he, combustion fears, And, as it flies, eludes the chandeliers ; 220 RhJECTED ADDRESSES. Till, sinking gradual, with repeated twirl, It settles, curling, on a fiddler's curl ; Who from his powder'd pate the intruder strikes. And, for mere malice, sticks it on the spikes. Say, why these Babel strains from Babel tongues 1 Who's that calls " Silence ! " with such leathern lungs ? He who, in quest of quiet, " Silence ! " hoots, Is apt to make the hubbub he imputes. What various swains our motky walls con- tain ! — P'ashion from Moorfields, honour from Chick Lane ; Bankers from Paper Buildings here resort. Bankrupts from Golden Square and Riches Court ; P'rom the Haymarket canting rogues in grain, Gulls from the Poultry, sots from W^ater Lane ; The lottery-cormorant, the auction- shark, The full-price master, and the half-price clerk ; THE THEATRE. 22 1 Boys who long linger at the gallery-door, With pence twice five — they want but twopence more ; Till some Samaritan the twopence spares. And sends them jumping up the gallery-stairs. Critics we boast who ne'er their malice balk. But talk their minds — we wish they'd mind their talk ; Big-worded bullies, who by quarrels live — Who give the lie, and tell the lie they give ; Jews from St. Mary Axe, for jobs so vvar>', That for old clothes they'd even axe St. Mary : And bucks with pockets empty as their pate. Lax in their gaiters, laxer in their gait ; Who oft, when we our house lock up, carouse With tippling tipstaves in a lock-up house. Yet here, as elsewhere, Chance can joy- bestow, Where scowling Fortune seem'd to threaten woe. 222 REJECTED ADDRESSES. John Richard William Alexander Dwyer Was footman to Justinian Stubbs, Esquire; But when John Dwyer listed in the blues, Emanuel Jennings polished Stubbs's shoes. Emanuel Jennings brought his youngest boy Up as corn-cutter — a safe employ ; In Holywell Street, St. Pancras, he was bred (At number twenty-seven, it is said). Facing the pump, and near the Granby's Head : He would have bound him to some shop in town, liut with a premium he could not come down, Pat was the urchin's name— a red-hair'd youth. Fonder of purl and skittle-grounds than truth. Silence, ye gods ! to keep your tongues in awe, The Muse shall tell an accident she saw. Pat Jennings in the upper gallery sat, But, leaning forward, Jennings lost his hat : Down from the galleiy the beaver flew And spurn'd the one to settle in the two. How shall he act ? Pay at the gallery-door Two shillings for what cost, when new, but four? THE THEATRE. 22 3 Or till half-price, to save his shilling, wait, And gain his hat again at half-past eight ? Now, while his fears anticipate a thief, John Mullens whispers, "Take my handker- chief." " Thank you," cries Pat ; " but one won't make a line." " Take mine," cried Wilson ; and cried Stokes, "Take mine." A motley cable soon Pat Jennings ties. Where Spitalfields with real India vies. Like Iris' bow, down darts the painted clue, Starr'd, striped, and spotted, yellow, red, and blue, Old calico, torn silk, and muslin new. George Green below, with palpitating hand. Loops the last 'kerchief to the beaver's band — Upsoars the prize ! The youth with joy unfeign'd, Regain'd the felt, and felt what he regain'd ; While to the applauding galleries grateful Pat Made a low bow, and touch'd the ransom'd hat. TO THE MANAGING COMMITTEE OF THE NEW DRURY LANE THEATRE. (34) XVIII. XIX. XX. TO THE MANAGING COMMITTEE OF THE NEW DRURY LANE THEATRE. /"" ENTLEMEN— Happening to be wool- gathering at the foot of Mount Parnassus, I was suddenly seized with a violent travestie in the head. The first symptoms I felt were several triple rhymes floating about my brain, accompanied by a singing in my throat, which quickly communicated itself to the ears of every- body about me, and made me a burthen to my friends and a torment to Doctor Apollo ; three of whose favourite servants — that is to say. 228 REJECTED ADDRESSES. Macbeth, his butcher; Mrs. Haller, his cook ; and George Barnwell, his book-keeper — I way- laid in one of my fits of insanity, and mauled after a very frightful fashion. In this woeful crisis, I accidentally heard of your invaluable New Patent Hissing Pit, which cures every disorder incident to Grub Street. I send you enclosed a more detailed specimen of my case : if you could mould it into the shape of an address, to be said or sung on the first night of your performance, I have no doubt that I should feel the immediate eftects of your invaluable New Patent Hissing Pit, of which they tell mc one hiss is a dose. 1 am, Sic, MoMUS Medlar. Case No. I. MACBETH. {E?iter Macbeth in a red nightcap. Page following with a torch.'\ Go, boy, and thy good mistress tell (She knows that my purpose is cruel), I'd thank her to tingle her bell As soon as she's heated my gruel. Go, get thee to bed and repose — To sit up so late is a scandal ; But ere you have ta'en off your clothes, Be sure that you put out that candle. Ri fol de rol tol de rol lol. 229 230 REJECTED ADDRESSES. My Stars, in the air here's a knife ! — I'm sure it can not be a hum ; I'll catch at the handle, add's life ! And then I shall not cut my thumb. I've got him ! — no, at him again ! Come, come, I'm not fond of these jokes ; This must be some blade of the brain — Those witches are given to hoax. I've one in my pocket, I know, My wife left on purpose behind her ; She bought this of Teddy-high-ho, The poor Caledonian grinder, I see thee again ! o'er thy middle Large drops of red blood now are spill'd, Just as much as to say, diddle diddle, Good Duncan, pray come and be kill'd. It leads to his chamber, I swear ; I tremble and quake every joint — No dog at the scent of a hare Ever yet made a cleverer point. MACBETH. 231 Ah, no ! 'twas a dagger of straw — Give me blinkers, to save me from starting ; The knife that I thought that I saw Was nought but my eye, Betty Martin. Now o'er this terrestrial hive A life paralytic is spread ! For while the one half is alive, The other is sleepy and dead. King Duncan, in grand majesty. Has got my state-bed for a snooze ; I've lent him my slippers, so I May certainly stand in his shoes. Blow softly, ye murmuring gales ! Ye feet, rouse no echo in walking ! For though a dead man tells no tales. Dead walls are much given to talking. This knife shall be in at the death — I'll stick him, then off safely get ! Cries the world, this could not be Macbeth, For he'd ne'er stick at anything yet. 232 REJECTED ADDRESSES. Hark, hark ] 'tis the signal, by goles ! It sounds like a funeral knell ; Oh, hear it not, Duncan ! it tolls To call thee to heaven or hell. Or if you to heaven won't fly, But rather prefer Pluto's ether, Only wait a few years till I die. And we'll go to the devil together. Ri fol de rol, &c. ^ Case No. II. THE STRANGER. Who has e'er been at Drury must needs know the Stranger, A waihng old Methodist, gloomy and wan, A husband suspicious — his wife acted Ranger, She took to her heels, and left poor Hypocon. Her martial gallant swore that truth was a libel, That marriage was thraldom, elopement no sin : Quoth she, I remember the words of my Bible, My spouse is a Stranger, and I'll take him in. With my sentimentalibus lachrymse roar'em, And pathos and bathos delightful to see ; And chop and change ribs, a-la-mode Ger- man orum, And high diddle ho diddle, pop tweedle dee. 233 H 2 2 34 REJECTED ADDRESSES. To keep up her dignity no longer rich enough, Where was her plate ? — why, 'twas laid on the shelf; Her land fuller's earth, and her great riches kitchen-stuff — Dressing the dinner instead of herself No longer permitted in diamonds to sparkle, Now plain Mrs. Haller, of servants the dread. With a heart full of grief, and a pan full of charcoal, She lighted the company up to their bed. Incensed at her flight, her poor hubby in dudgeon Roam'd after his rib in a gig and a pout, Till, tired with his journey, the peevish curmudgeon Sat down and blubber'd just like a church- spout. One day, on a bench as dejected and sad he laid, Hearing a squash, he cried. Damn it, what's that ? THE STRANGER. 235 'Twas a child of the Count's, in whose service Hved Adelaide, Soused in the river, and squall'd like a cat. Having drawn his young excellence up to the bank, it Appear'd that himself was all dripping, I swear ; No wonder he soon became dry as a blanket, Exposed as he was to the Count's son and hei?'. Dear Sir, quoth the Count, in reward of your valour, To show that my gratitude is not mere talk, You shall eat a beefsteak with my cook, jNIrs. Haller, Cut from the rump with her own knife and fork. Behold, now the Count gave the Stranger a dinner. With gunpowder-tea, which you know brings a ball. And, thin as he was, that he might not grow thinner, He made of the Stranger no stranger at all. 236 RFJF.CTED ADDRESSES. At dinner fair Adelaide brou-ht up acliicken — A bird that she never had met with before ; But, seeini,^ liim, scream'd, and was carried off kicking, And he bang'd his nob 'gainst the opposite door. To finish my tale without roundaboutation, Young master and missee besieged their papa ; They sung a quartetto in grand blubbcration — The Stranger cried, Oh ! Mrs. Hallcr cried, Ah! Though pathos and sentiment largely are dealt in, I have no good moral to give in exchange ; For though she, as a cook, might be given to melting. The Stranger's behaviour was certainly strange. With this senlimentalibus lachryma? roar 'em, And pathos and bathos delightful to see, And chop and change ribs, a-la-mode Ger- man orum, And high diddle ho diddle, pop tweedle dee. Case No. III. GEORGE BARNWELL. George Barnwell stood at the shop-door, A customer hoping to find, sir ; His apron was hanging before, But the tail of his coat was behind, sir. A lady, so painted and smart. Cried, Sir, Pve exhausted my stock o' late ; I've got nothing left but a groat — Could you give me four penn'orth of chocolate ? Rum ti, &:c. Her face was rouged up to the eyes, Which made her look prouder and prouder ; His hair stood on end with surprise, And hers with pomatum and powder. iS RKJECTED ADDRESSES. The business was soon understood ; The lady, who wish'd to be more rich, Cries, Sweet sir, my name is Mihvood, And I lodge at the Gunner's in Shoreditch. Rum ti, Sec. Now nightly he stole out, good lack ! And into her lodging would pop, sir ; And often forgot to come back, Leaving master to shut up the shop, sir. Her beauty his wits did bereave — Determined to be quite the cmck O, He lounged at the Adam and Eve, And caird for his gin and tobacco. Rum ti, &c. And now — for the truth must be told, Though none of a 'prentice should speak ill — ■ He stole from the till all the gold. And ate the lump-sugar and treacle. In vain did his master exclaim, Dear George, don't engage with that Dragon; GEORGE BARNWELL. 239 She'll lead you to sorrow and shame, And leave you the devil a rag on Your Rum ti, &c. In vain he entreats and implores The weak and incurable ninny, So kicks him at last out of doors, And Georgy soon spends his last guinea. His uncle, whose generous purse Had often relieved him, as I know, Now finding him grow worse and worse, Refused to come down with the rhino. Rum ti, &c. Cried Milwood, whose cruel heart's core Was so flinty that nothing could shock it, If ye mean to come here any more, Pray come with more cash in your pocket : Make Nunky surrender his dibs, Rub his pate with a pair of lead towels. Or stick a knife into his ribs — I'll warrant he'll then show some bowels. Rum ti, Sec. 240 REJECTED ADDRESSES. A pistol he got from his love — 'Twas loaded with powder and bullet ; He trudged off to Camberwell ( irove, But wanted the courage to pull it. There's Xunky as fat as a hog, While I am as lean as a lizard ; Here's at you, yuu stingy old dog ! — And he whips a long knife in his gizzard. Rum ti, &.C All you who attend to my song, A terrible end of the farce shall see, If you join the inquisitive throng That follow'd poor George to the Marshalsea. If Mil wood were here, dash my wigs, Quoth he, I would pummel and lam her well ; Plad I stuck to my prunes and figs, I ne'er had stuck Nunky at Camberwell. Rum ti, &c. Their bodies were never cut down ; For granny relates with amazement. GEORGE BARNWELL. 24I A witch bore 'em over the town, And hung them on Thorowgood's casement. The neighbours, I've heard the folks say, The miracle noisily brag on ; And the shop is, to this very day, The sign of the George and the Dragon. Rum ti, Sec. PUNCH'S APOTHEOSIS. XXI. PUNCH'S APOTHEOSIS. BY THEODORE HOOK. *' Rhymes the rudders are of verses, With which, like ships, they steer their courses." — HUDIBRAS. [Scejte drarc'S, aiU discovers TUNCil on a throne, sur- rounded by Lear, T.ady Macbeth, Macbeth. Othello, George Barnwell, Ham lit, Ghost, Mache.vth, Juliet, Frl\R, Ai'OTHE- cary, Romeo, and Fal.staff.— Punch descends and a fdresses them in the follaiving RECITATIVE. A S manager of horses Mr. Merryman is, -^ So I with you am master of the cere- monies — 245 2 lb REJECTHD ADDRESSES. Tlicse grand rejoicings. Let mc sec, how name ye 'em ? — Oil, in Greek lingo 'tis E-pi-thalamium. Octobers tenth it is : toss up each hat to- day, And celebrate with sliouts our opening Satur- day ! On this great night "tis settled by our manager, That we. to please great Johnny Bull, should plan a jeer. Dance a bang-up theatrical cotillon. And i)ut on tuneful Pegasus a pillion ; That every soul, whether or not a cough he has, May kick like Harlequin, and sing like Orpheus. So come, ye pupils of Sir John Ciallini,* Spin up a teetotum like Angiolini : f That John and Mrs. Bull, from ale and tea- houses, May shout huzza for Punch's Apotheosis ! * Then Director of the Opera House. + At that time the chief d.incer at this establishment. PUNCH S APOTHEOSIS. 247 They dance and sing. Air—" Sure such a day."~'\Q's\ Thumb. LKAR. Dance, Regan I dance, with Cordelia and Goneril — Down the middle, up again, poussette, and cross ; Stop, Cordelia ! do not tread upon her heel, Regan feeds on coltsfoot, and kicks like a horse. See, she twists her mutton hsts like Molyneu.x or Beelzebub, And t'other's clack, who pats her back, is louder far than hell's hubbub. They tweak my nose, and round it goes — 1 fear they'll break the ridge of it, Or leave it all just like Vau-xhall, with only half the bridge of it.* * Vau.xhall Bridge then stood suspended in the middle of the Thames. 248 REJECTED ADDRESSES. OMNES. Ivound let us bound, for this is Punch's holy day, ('.lory to Tonifuolcry, huzza ! huzza ! LADV MArP.F.TH. / killed the k'uvj, : my husband is a hea\7 dunce ; He left the grooms unma>sarred, then massacred the stud. One loves long gloves ; for mittens, like king's evidence, Let truth with the fingers out, and won't hide blood. MACBF.TH. When spooncys on two knees implore tlio aid of sorcery. To suit their wicked purposes they quickly put the laws awr\- : PUNCH S APOTHEOSIS. 249 With Adam I in w ife may vie, for none could tell the use of her, Except to cheapen golden pippins hawk'd about by Lucifer.' OMNES. Round let us bound, for this is Punch's holy- day, Glory to Tomfoolery, huzza I huzza ! OTHELLO. Wife, come to life, forgive what your black lover did, Spit the feathers from your mouth, and munch roast beef; lago he may go and be toss'd in the coverlet That smother'd you, because you pawn'd my handkerchief. 250 RtJKCrtD ADDRESSES. GEORGE BARNWELU Why, ne;j;cr, so eager about your rib im- maculate ? Mihvood shows for hanging us they've got an ugly knack o' late ; If on beauty 'stead of duty but one peeper bent he sees, Satan waits with Dolly baits to hook in us apprentices. OMNKS. Round let us bound, for this is Punch's holy- day, Glory to Tomfoolery, huzza ! huzza! HAMI.KT. I'm Hamlet in camlet, my ap- and perihelia The moon can fix, which lunatics makes sharp or flat. PUNCH S AP0THE05IS. 2$I I Stuck by ill luck, enamourd of Ophelia, Old Polony like a sausage, and cxclaim'd, " Rat rat ! " GHOST. Let Gertrude sup the poison'd cup — no more I'll be an actor in Such sorry food, but drink home-brew'd of Whit- bread's manufacturing. ilACHEATH. ril Polly it, and folly it, and dance it quite the dandy O ; But as for tunes, 1 have but one, and that is Drops of Brandy O. OMNES. Round let us bound, for this is Punch's holy- day, Glory to Tomfoolery, huzza ! huzza ! 253 REJECTED ADDRESSES. I'm Juliet Capulct, who louk a cio.^c of helle- bore — A hell of a bore I found it to put on a palL FRIAR. And 1 am the friar, who so corpulent a Belly bore. APOTHECARY. .And that is why poor skinny I have none at all. ROMEO. I'm the rcbu:rcclion-m.\n, of bunca [)oUics amorous. FALSTAFF. I'm fagg'd to death, and out of brcalh, and am for quiet clamorous ; PUNCH S APOTHEOSIS. 253 !■ or thou^'h my pdunch is round and staunch, I ne'er begin to feel it ere I I'eel that I have no stomach left for entertain- ment military. OMNES. F\oi nd let us bound, for thi> is Punch's holy day, (ilory to Tomfoolery, huzza ! huzza ! [ Exeunt dancing. " ' Punch's Apotheosis,' by G. Colman, junior, is loo purely nonsensical to be extracted ; and l)Olh gives less pleasure to the reader and does less justice to the in- genious author in whose name it stands, than any other of the poetical imitations." — Edinburgh Rn.'im: " W'c have no conjectures to offer as to the anonymous author of this amusing little volume. He who is such a master of disguises may easily be supposed to havf Ijoen successful in concealing himself, and. with the power of assuming so many styles, is not likely to be detected by hi.s own. We should guess, however, that he had not written a great deal in his own character — that his natural style was neither very lofty nor very grave — and that he rather indulges a partiality for puns and verbal pleasantries. 254 REJECTED ADDRESSES. We marvel why he has shut out Campbell and Rotjrrs from his theatre of living poets, and confidently expect to have our curiosity in this and in all other particulars very speedily gratified, when the applause of the country shall induce him to take off his mask." — Edinburgh Review. THE END. • Al.LAKTYKF PRESS! EDINBURGH AND LONDON. ROUTLEDGH'S POCKET LIBRARY IX MONTHLY VOLUMES. " A series of beautiful little books, tastefully hound."— Times. " Bcauiifuily printed and tastefully bound."— 5tf/Kr<^aj' Revirw. " l")eservcs wariu praise for the taste shown in its productioa." -Athettteurn. •• Routledt'c's PERFECT Pocket Library."— /»««<:*. Bret Harte's Poems. Thackeray's Paris Sketch Book. Hood's Comic Poems. Dickens's Christmas Carol. Poems by Oliver Wendell Holmes. Washington Irvlng's Sketch Book. Macaulay's Lays of Ancient Rome. Goldsmith's Vicar of Wake- field. Hood's Serious Poems. Lord Lytton's Coming Race. The Bigflow Papers. Manon Lescaut. Longfellow's Song of Hia- watha. Sterne's Sentimental Jour- ney. Dickens's Chimes. Moore's Irish Melodies and Songs. Fifty Bab' Ballads. Poems by E. B. B^o^)ming^. Bret Harte's Luck of Roar- ing Camp. Poems by Edgar Allan Poe. Milton's Paradise Lost. Scott's Lady of the Lake. Campbell's Poetical Works. Lord Byron's W^erner. Book of Humour, Wit. and Wisdom. Longfellow's Hyperion. Dickens's Cricket on the Hearth. Gray's Poetical Works. Willis's Poetical Works. Thackeray's Cornhill to Grand Cairo. Mrs Stielley's Frankenstein. Tales from Pickwick. Artemus Ward— His Book. Rejected Addresses. // UC SOUTHERN REGIONAL LIBRARY FACILITY B 000 008 610 8 1