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ELAN LIBR

BRARY

GODLEJA

23 FEB 83

OXFORD

“IN* early Greece, and in a barb'rous age, “ A wietched tumbrel was the actor's stage.” -Oh! were a cart, indeed, their stage again, (The last sad stage, of fallen highwaymen!) Rather than thus, the world should longer see These mimic tyrants murder liberty, And take upon themselves to swear, and vouch, No law, is law, but that of Scaramouch; The stern Lycurgus of the present day, Who damns the wretch, that dares to damn his play, Enacts new laws, when old ones chance to fail, And sends e’en women, if they squeak, to jail.

* Vide Mr. Kemble's Prologue on the Opening of the Now Theatre-Royal, Covent-Garden. ,,

A ?

nan

'Tis time these gilded vermin to suppress,
At least, to strip them of their tinsel trash, .
And o'er them place the beadle and the lash;
And should they wish to flourish now and then, ')
Let them at night, be kings and gentlemen,
But, ev'ry morning, vagabonds again.
Vain wish! revolving ages have refin’d,
And purg'd the optics of the human mind;
These buskin’d gentlemen are alter'd things,
They rule the roast, and cock the nose at kings,
High in the green-room chair-supremely sit
Lords paramount, and arbiters of wit.
No more they roam, the very scorn of Heav'n,
From town to town, from post to pillar driv'n, ..
On dirty banks content to lay their heads,
And leave to gentlefolks their feather beds,
Nor under hedges, nor in barns display, ..
Their pompous nonsense from a throne of hay;
There, for a moment, wither with their frowns,
The lusty hearts of gaping wond’ring clowns,
Or crack the sides, or stop the gasping breath,
Or tickle ale-wives with their fun to death; ,

Then, could they pilfer but an ass at most,
A straggling smock, or sucking pig to roast,
Nor e’en in dreams, to greater state aspire,
Than donkey-mounted, pacing thro' the mire.

Such was an actor's life in days of yore, But actors now, are vagabonds no more; Thanks, to the quick discernment of an age, Which starves the Church to idolize the Stage; Which gives to learn’d professors of grimace, The splendid stipend of a statesman's place, Pours in the laps of slaves who sing and dance, (For aught we know, the spies and tools of France) A golden flood, while English genius sighs Unseen, unknown, or seen, insulted dies.

Gods! shall these mushrooms, fungi of a night, Assume the nod, and teach us what is right, Stop all our mouths, and bandy words and blows, And lead a gallant nation by the nose ? Forbid it Heav'n! forbid it common sense!

Nor yield the town a prey to insolence..

Pad

Curses

What! shall the sneering world be told, that we;
The proud assertors of our liberty, . ;
Are gagg’d and bound, and threaten'd with the stocks,
For blabbing secrets of a private box ! !
Those private boxes !-curses on the name,
Their very mention sets my blood on flame.si
From lustful Italy, they claim descent, in
Italians, best can tell for what they're meant; .. .
From thence to France they sped without delay,
And taught, e'en France, to Hell another way.

We hate this nation, but I can't tell how, We scarcely bend, but in a Frenchman's bow; We call them monkies, tygers, knaves, and fools, Yet follow most implicitly their rules; Our shirts and shifts, our very coats and breeches, Are cut and slash’d, and work'd in foreign stitches; But this were nothing, could the mania stop, Nor spreading, rage beyond a tailor's shop; But, not content to crown them lords of ton, We make their morals, manners, all our own;

What wonder then in this enlighten'd age, · When (save ourselves) improving is the rage,