EPILOGUE1

SPOKEN BY MRS. BULKLEY.?

As puffing quacks some caitiff wretch procure To swear the pill, or drop, has wrought a cure; Thus, on the stage, our play-wrights still depend For Epilogues and Prologues on some friend, Who knows each art of coaxing up the town, And makes full many a bitter pill go down. Conscious of this, our bard has gone about, And teased each rhyming friend to help him out. An Epilogue! things can't go on without it! It could not fail, would you but set about it. "Young man," cries one (a bard laid up in clover), “Alas, young man, my writing days are over;

Let boys play tricks, and kick the straw,3 not I; Your brother Doctor there, perhaps, may try."

4

1 Epilogue: The author, in expectation of an Epilogue from a friend at Oxford, deferred writing one himself till the very last hour. What is here offered, owes all its success to the graceful - GOLDSMITH. manner of the actress who spoke it.

2 Mrs. Bulkley: Originally Miss Wilford, was on the London stage from 1764 to 1789. She created the part of Miss Hardcastle in She Stoops to Conquer, and of Julia in The Rivals.

3 and kick the straw: Referring to the feats of a performer named Mattocks, who could kick a straw and balance it on his nose. See The Citizen of the World, Letter xxi, on the English Theatre.

• Doctor: The title of Doctor seems to have been somewnat more freely used in Goldsmith's time than at present. Johnso.. was called Doctor upon the LL. D. granted by Dublin University in 1765; however, he always preferred the plain Mister. Goldsmith was known as Doctor by common consent, though his only degree was M. B., and he did not use this on a title-page until March, 1763.

"What I, dear sir?" the Doctor interposes,
"What, plant my thistle, sir, among his roses!
No, no, I've other contests to maintain;

To-night I head our troops at Warwick-lane.1
Go, ask your manager."—" Who, me? Your pardon;
Those things are not our forte at Covent Garden."
Dur author's friends, thus placed at happy distance.
Give him good words indeed, but no assistance.
As some unhappy wight, at some new play,
At the pit-door stands elbowing a way,

While oft, with many a smile, and many a shrug,
He eyes the centre, where his friends sit snug,
His simpering friends with pleasure in their eyes,
Sink as he sinks, and as he rises rise:

He nods, they nod; he cringes, they grimace;
But not a soul will budge to give him place.
Since, then, unhelp'd, our bard must now conform
To "bide the pelting of this pitiless storm," "
Blame where you must, be candid where you can,
And be each critic the Good-Natured Man.

1 Warwick-lane: Newgate Street to Paternoster Row. John Roberts, an early publisher for Johnson, lived at the Oxford Arms in Warwick-lane. The College of Physicians was located in the Lane.

› To “bide the pelting": King Lear, Act III, Sc. 4.

. By inscribing this slight performance to you, I do not mean sa much to compliment you as myself. It may do me some honor to inform the public, that I have lived many years in intimacy with you. It may serve the interests of mankind also to inform

them, that the greatest wit may be found in a character, without impairing the most unaffected piety.

I have, particularly, reason to thank you for your partiality to this performance. The undertaking a comedy, not merely sentimental, was very dangerous; and Mr. Colman, who saw this piece in its various stages, always thought it so. However, I ventured to trust it to the public; and, though it was necessarily delayed till late in the season, I have every reason to be grateful.

I am, dear sir,

Your most sincere friend

And admirer,

OLIVER GOLDSMITH.

PROLOGUE

BY DAVID GARRICK, ESQ.1

Enter Mr. Woodward,2 dressed in black, and holding a handkerchief te

his eyes.

EXCUSE me, sirs, I pray — I can't yet speak -
I'm crying now and have been all the week!
this mourning suit," good masters;

""T is not alone

"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.

1 Prologue by David Garrick: Garrick (1716-79), the greatest producer of plays England has known, was famous for his prologues, of which he wrote a great many. Concerning She Stoops to Conquer Horace Walpole writes, March 27, 1773, “Garrick would not act it, but bought himself off with a poor prologue."

2 Enter Mr. Woodward: Henry Woodward (1717-77), one of the best comedians of the eighteenth century, was unrivaled as Bobadil, Petruchio, and Touchstone. He had taken the part of Lofty in The Good-Natured Man, but spoke only the prologue in this play.

''Tis not alone: Compare Hamlet, Act I, Sc. 2: ""T is not alone my inky cloak, good mother."

• Shuter: Edward Shuter (1728-76) was considered by Garrick the greatest comic genius he had ever seen. His best characters were Scrub, Trapolin, Launcelot, and Falstaff. His Croaker was the success of Goldsmith's first play.