She Stoops to Conquer;
Or, The Mistakes of a Night.
Enter Mr Woodward, dressed in black, and holding a
Handkerchief to his Eyes.
Excuse me, sirs, I pray-I can't yet speak-
I'm crying now-and have been all the week!
'Tis not alone this mourning suit, good masters;
I've that within-for which there are no plasters!
Pray would you know the reason why I'm crying?
The Comic muse, long sick, is now a-dying!
And if she goes, my tears will never stop;
For as a player, I can't squeeze out one drop:
I am undone, that's all-shall lose
my bread-
I'd rather, but that's nothing-lose my head.
When the sweet maid is laid upon the bier,
Shuter and I shall be chief mourners here.
To her a mawkish drab of spurious breed,
Who deals in sentimentals will succeed!
Poor Ned and I are dead to all intents,
We can as soon speak Greek as sentiments !
Both nervous grown, to keep our spirits up,
We now and then take down a hearty cup.
What shall we do?—If Comedy forsake us!
They'll turn us out, and no one else will take us,
But why can't I be moral ?-Let me try-
My heart thus pressing-fix'd my face and eye-
With a sententious look, that nothing means
(Faces are blocks, in sentimental scenes),
Thus I begin-All is not gold that glitters,
Pleasure seems sweet, but proves a glass of bitters.
When ignorance enters, folly is at hand;
Learning is better far than house and land.
Let not your virtue trip, who trips may stumble,
And virtue is not virtue, if she tumble.
I give it up-morals won't do for me; To make you laugh I must play tragedy. One hope remains-hearing the maid was ill, A doctor comes this night to show his skill. To cheer her heart, and give your muscles motion, He in five draughts prepar'd, presents a potion: A kind of magic charm-for be assur'd,
will swallow it, the maid is cur'd. But desperate the Doctor, and her case is, If you reject the dose, and make wry faces!
This truth he boasts, will boast it while he lives,
No poisonous drugs are mix'd in what he gives;
Should he succeed, you'll give him his degree;
If not, within he will receive no fee!
The college you, must his pretentions back,
Pronounce him regular, or dub him quack.
SCENE.-A Chamber in an old-fashioned House.
Enter Mrs Hardcastle and Mr Hardcastle.
Mrs Hard. I vow, Mr Hardcastle, you're very
particular. Is there a creature in the whole
country, but ourselves, that does not take a
trip to town now and then, to rub off the rust
a little? There's the two Miss Hoggs, and
our neighbour, Mrs Grigsby, go to take a
month's polishing every winter.
Hard. Ay, and bring back vanity and affectation to
last them the whole year.
London cannot keep its own fools at home. ΙΟ
In my time, the follies of the town crept
slowly among us, but now they travel faster
than a stage-coach. Its fopperies come down,
not only as inside passengers, but in the very
basket.
Mrs Hard. Ay, your times were fine times, indeed;
you have been telling us of them for many a
long year. Here we live in an old rumbling
mansion, that looks for all the world like an
inn, but that we never see company. Our
best visitors are old Mrs Oddfish, the curate's
wife, and little Cripplegate, the lame dancing-
master: And all our entertainment your old
stories of Prince Eugene and the Duke of
Marlborough. I hate such old-fashioned
Hard. And I love it. I love everything that's old old friends, old times, old manners, old books, old wine; and, I believe, Dorothy [taking her hand], you'll own I have been 30 pretty fond of an old wife.
Mrs Hard. Lord, Mr Hardcastle, you're for ever at your Dorothys and your old wives. You
may be a Darby, but I'll be no Joan, I pro
I'm not so old as you'd make me,
by more than one good year.
twenty, and make money of that.
Hard. Let me see; twenty added to twenty, makes
just fifty and seven !
Mrs Hard. It's false, Mr Hardcastle: I was
but twenty when I was brought to bed of
Tony, that I had by Mr Lumpkin, my first
husband; and he's not come to years of dis-
cretion yet.
Hard. Nor ever will, I dare answer for him. Ay,
you have taught him finely!
Mrs Hard. No matter, Tony Lumpkin has a good
fortune. My son is not to live by his learning.
I don't think a boy wants much learning to
spend fifteen hundred a year.
Hard. Learning, quotha! A mere composition of 50 tricks and mischief!
Mrs Hard. Humour, my dear: nothing but humour.
Come, Mr Hardcastle, you must allow the boy
Hard. I'd sooner allow him a horse-pond! If burning the footmen's shoes, frightening the maids, and worrying the kittens, be humour,
|