put in a second time. "And let me tell you," says he, "though he speaks but little, I like the old fellow in whiskers as well as any of them." Captain Sentry, seeing two or three wags who sat near us 5 lean with an attentive ear towards Sir Roger, and fearing lest they should smoke the knight, plucked him by the elbow, and whispered something in his ear, that lasted till the opening of the fifth act. The knight was wonderfully attentive to the account 10 which Orestes gives of Pyrrhus's death, and at the conlcusion of it, told me it was such a bloody piece of work, that he was glad it was not done upon the stage. Seeing afterwards Orestes in his raving fit, he grew more than ordinarily serious, and took 15 occasion to moralize (in his way) upon an evil conscience, adding, that Orestes, in his madness, looked as if he saw something.

As we were the first that came into the house, so we were the last that went out of it; being re20 solved to have a clear passage for our old friend,

whom we did not care to venture among the justling of the crowd. Sir Roger went out fully satisfied with his entertainment, and we guarded him to his lodging in the same manner that we brought him 25 to the playhouse; being highly pleased for my own part, not only with the performance of the excellent piece which had been presented, but with the satisfaction which it had given to the old man.

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1

Hor. Sat. iii. Lib. 1. 18.

3

I FIND the tragedy of the Distressed Mother 2 is published to-day. The author of the prologue, I suppose, pleads an old excuse I have read somewhere, of "being dull with design"; and the gentleman who writ the epilogue has, to my knowledge, 5 so much of greater moment to value himself upon, that he will easily forgive me for publishing the exceptions made against gayety at the end of serious entertainments in the following letter: I should be more unwilling to pardon him, than anybody, a 10 practice which cannot have any ill consequence but from the abilities of the person who is guilty of it.

"MR. SPECTATOR,

"I had the happiness the other night of sitting very near you, and your worthy friend Sir Roger, 15 at the acting of the new tragedy, which you have, in a late paper or two, so justly recommended. I was highly pleased with the advantageous situation fortune had given me in placing me so near two gentlemen, from one of which I was sure to 20 hear such reflections on the several incidents of the

play as pure nature suggested, and from the other, such as flowed from the exactest art, and judgment: though I must confess that my curiosity led me so much to observe the knight's reflections, that I 5 was not well at leisure to improve myself by yours. Nature, I found, played her part in the knight pretty well, till at the last concluding lines she entirely forsook him. You must know, sir, that it is always my custom, when I have been well entertained at 10 a new tragedy, to make my retreat before the facetious epilogue enters; not but that those pieces are often very well written, but having paid down my half-crown, and made a fair purchase of as much of the pleasing melancholy as the poet's art 15 can afford me, or my own nature admit of, I am willing to carry some of it home with me: and cannot endure to be at once tricked out of all, though by the wittiest dexterity in the world. However, I kept my seat the other night, in hopes of finding 20 my own sentiments of this matter favored by your

5

friend's; when, to my great surprise, I found the knight entering with equal pleasure into both parts, and as much satisfied with Mrs. Oldfield's gayety as he had been before with Andromache's greatness. 25 Whether this were no more than an affect of the knight's peculiar humanity, pleased to find at last, that, after all the tragical doings, everything was safe and well, I do not know; but for my own part, I must confess I was so dissatisfied, that I was sorry

the poet had saved Andromache, and could heartily have wished that he had left her stone-dead upon the stage. For you cannot imagine, Mr. Spectator, the mischief she was reserved to do me. I found my soul, during the action, gradually worked up 5 to the highest pitch, and felt the exalted passion which all generous minds conceive at the sight of virtue in distress. The impression, believe me, sir, was so strong upon me, that I am persuaded, if I had been let alone in it, I could, at an extremity, 10 have ventured to defend yourself and Sir Roger against half a score of the fiercest Mohocks; but the ludicrous epilogue in the close extinguished all my ardor, and make me look upon all such noble achievements as downright silly and romantic. 15 What the rest of the audience felt, I cannot so well tell. For myself I must declare, that at the end of the play I found my soul uniform, and all of a piece; but at the end of the epilogue it was so jumbled together, and divided between jest and 20 earnest, that, if you will forgive me an extravagant fancy, I will here set it down. I could not but fancy, if my soul had at that moment quitted my body, and descended to the poetical shades in the posture it was then in, what a strange figure it 25 would have made among them. They would not have known what to have made of my motley specter, half comic and half tragic, all over resembling a ridiculous face that at the same time laughs

on one side and cries on the other. The only defence, I think, I have ever heard made for this, as it seems to me the most unnatural tack of the comic tail to the tragic head, is this, that the minds 5 of the audience must be refreshed, and gentlemen and ladies not sent away to their own homes with too dismal and melancholy thoughts about them: for who knows the consequence of this? We are much obliged, indeed, to the poets for the great 10 tenderness they express for the safety of our persons, and heartily thank them for it. But if that be all, pray, good sir, assure them, that we are none of us like to come to any great harm; and that, let them do their best, we shall in all probability live out the 15 length of our days, and frequent the theaters more than ever. What makes me more desirous to have some information of this matter is, because of an ill consequence or two attending it: for, a great many of our church musicians being related to the 20 theater, they have, in imitation of these epilogues, introduced, in their farewell voluntaries, a sort of music quite foreign to the design of church services, to the great prejudice of well-disposed people. Those fingering gentlemen should be informed, that 25 they ought to suit their airs to the place and business, and that the musician is obliged to keep to the text as much as the preacher. For want of this, I have found by experience a great deal of mischief. When the preacher has often, with great