Page images
PDF
EPUB

While botanists, all cold to smiles and dimpling,
Forsake the fair, and patiently go simpling -
When every bosom swells with wondrous scenes,
Priests, cannibals, and hoity-toity queens-.
Our bard into the general spirit enters,
And fits his little frigate for adventures.

With Scythian stores, and trinkets, deeply laden,
He this way steers his course, in hopes of trading —
Yet ere he lands he has ordered me before,

To make an observation on the shore.

Where are we driven? our reckoning sure is lost!
This seems a barren and a dangerous coast.
Lord! what a sultry climate am I under!

Yon ill-foreboding cloud seems big with thunder,

[Upper gallery.

There mangroves spread, and larger than I've seen them-

Here trees of stately size—and turtles in them

Here ill-conditioned oranges abound

[Pit.

[Balconies. [Stage.

And apples, [takes up one and tastes it] bitter apples strew the

ground.

The place is uninhabited, I fear;

I heard a hissing-there are serpents here!
O! there the natives are- - a dreadful race!
The men have tails, the women paint the face.
No doubt they're all barbarians—yes, 'tis so;
I'll try to make palaver with them, though;

[Making signs.

'T is best, however, keeping at a distance. Good savages, our Captain craves assistance : Our ship's well stored-in yonder creek we've laid her;

[blocks in formation]

This is his first adventure; lend him aid,

Or you may chance to spoil a thriving trade.

His goods, he hopes, are prime and brought from far —
Equally fit for gallantry and war.

What! no reply to promises so ample?
I'd best step back—and order up a sample.

INTENDED EPILOGUE

TO SHE STOOPS TO CONQUER.

Enter Mrs. BULKLEY, who curtseys very low as beginning to speak. Then enter Miss CATLEY, who stands full before her, and curtseys to the audience.

MRS. BULKLEY.

HOLD, Ma'am, your pardon. What's your business here ?

[blocks in formation]

Sure you mistake, Ma'am. The Epilogue? I bring it.

MISS CATLEY.

Excuse me, Ma'am. The author bid me sing it.

Recitative.

Ye beaux and belles, that form this splendid ring,
Suspend your conversation while I sing.

MRS. BULKLEY.

Why, sure the girl's beside herself! an Epilogue of singing? A hopeful end indeed to such a blessed beginning.

Besides, a singer in a comic set!

Excuse me, Ma'am, I know the etiquette.

[blocks in formation]

And she, whose party 's largest, shall proceed.
And first, I hope, you'll readily agree,

I've all the critics and the wits for me.
They, I am sure, will answer my commands;
Ye candid-judging few, hold up your hands;
What! no return? I find too late, I fear,
That modern judges seldom enter here.

MISS CATLEY.

I'm for a different set.

Old men, whose trade is

Still to gallant and dangle with the ladies.

Recitative.

Who mump their passion, and who, grimly smiling, Still thus address the fair with voice beguiling:

Air-Cotillon.

Turn, my fairest, turn, if ever

Strephon caught thy ravished eye;

Pity take on your swain so clever,

Who without

your aid must die.

Yes, I shall die, hu, hu, hu, hu,

Yes, I must die, ho, ho, ho, ho,

Da Capo.

MRS. BULKLEY.

Let all the old pay homage to your merit :
Give me the young, the gay, the men of spirit.
Ye travelled tribe, ye macaroni train

Of French friseurs, and nosegays justly vain,
Who take a trip to Paris once a year

To dress and look like awkward Frenchmen here;
Lend me your hands. O, fatal news to tell,
Their hands are only lent to the Heinel.

[merged small][merged small][ocr errors]

Give me my bonny Scot, that travels from the Tweed.
Where are the chiels? Ah! ah, I well discern
The smiling looks of each bewitching bairn.

Air

[ocr errors]

- A bonny young lad is my Jockey.

I'll sing to amuse you by night and by day,
And be unco merry when you are but gay;
When you with your bagpipes are ready to play,
My voice shall be ready to carol away

With Sandy, and Sawney, and Jockey,
With Sawney, and Jarvie, and Jockey.

MRS. BULKLEY.

Ye gamesters, who, so eager in pursuit,
Make but of all your fortune one va toute :
Ye jockey tribe, whose stock of words are few,
"I hold the odds-done, done, with you, with you."
Ye barristers so fluent with grimace -

“My Lord, — your Lordship misconceives the case.”
Doctors, who cough and answer every misfortuner —
"I wish I'd been called in a little sooner,"
Assist my cause with hands and voices hearty,
Come, end the contest here, and aid my party.

MISS CATLEY.

Air-Ballinamony.

Ye brave Irish lads, hark away to the crack,
Assist me, I pray, in this woful attack;

For sure I don't wrong you, you seldom are slack,
When the ladies are calling, to blush and hang back.

For you 're always polite and attentive,

Still to amuse us inventive,

And death is your only preventive :

Your hands and your voices for me.

MRS. BULKLEY.

Well, Madam, what if, after all this sparring,
We both agree, like friends, to end our jarring?

MISS CATLEY.

And, that our friendship may remain unbroken,
What if we leave the Epilogue unspoken?

[blocks in formation]

Un-epilogued the poet waits his sentence:

Condemn the stubborn fool who can't submit

To thrive by flattery — though he starves by wit.

ANOTHER INTENDED EPILOGUE

TO SHE STOOPS TO CONQUER.

To be spoken by Mrs. Bulkley.

THERE is a place—so Ariosto sings
A treasury for lost and missing things;

[Exeunt.

« ՆախորդըՇարունակել »