The Tatler, Volume 1, 1899 by George A. Aitken (best e reader for android txt) 📕

stage, to divert us with the representation of them there.

FRIEND. No, no: as you say, there might be some hopes of redress of these grievances, if there were proper care taken of the theatre; but the history of that is yet more lamentable than that of the decay of conversation I gave you.

AC. Pray, sir, a little: I haven't been in town these six years, till within this fortnight.

FRIEND. It is now some years since several revolutions in the gay world had made the empire of the stage subject to very fatal convulsions, which were too dangerous to be cured by the skill of little King Oberon,[181] who then sat in the throne of it. The laziness of this prince threw him upon the choice of a person who was fit to spend his life in contentions, an able and profound attorney, to whom he mortgaged his whole empire. This Divito[182] is the most skilful of all politicians: he has a perfect art in being unintelligible in discourse, and uncomeatable in business. But he having no understanding in this polite way, brought in upon us, to get in his money, ladder-dancers,[183] rope-dancers, jugglers, and mountebanks, to strut in the place of Shakespeare's heroes, and Jonson's humorists. When the seat of wit was thus mortgaged, without equity of redemption, an architect[184] arose, who has built the muse a new palace, but secured her no retinue; so that instead of action there, we have been put off by song and dance. This latter help of sound has also begun to fail for want of voices; therefore the palace has since been put into the hands of a surgeon,[185] who cuts any foreign fellow into an eunuch, and passes him upon us for a singer of Italy.

AC. I'll go out of town to-morrow.

FRIEND.[186] Things are come to this pass; and yet the world will not understand, that the theatre has much the same effect on the manners of the age, as the bank on the credit of the nation. Wit and spirit, humour and good sense, can never be revived, but under the government of those who are judges of such talents, who know, that whatever is put up in their stead, is but a short and trifling expedient, to support the appearance of them for a season. It is possible, a peace will give leisure to put these matters under new regulations; but at present, all the assistance we can see towards our recovery, is as far from giving us help, as a poultice is from performing what can be done only by the Grand Elixir.


Will's Coffee-house, May 6.

According to our late design in the applauded verses on the Morning,[187] which you lately had from hence, we proceed to improve that just intention, and present you with other labours, made proper to the place in which they were written. The following poem comes from Copenhagen, and is as fine a winter-piece as we have ever had from any of the schools of the most learned painters. Such images as these give us a new pleasure in our sight, and fix upon our minds traces of reflection, which accompany us whenever the like objects occur. In short, excellent poetry and description dwell upon us so agreeably, that all the readers of them are made to think, if not write, like men of wit. But it would be injury to detain you longer from this excellent performance, which is addressed to the Earl of Dorset by Mr. Philips,[188] the author of several choice poems in Mr. Tonson's new Miscellany.[189]

Copenhagen, March 9 , 1709.
From frozen climes, and endless tracks of snow,
From streams that northern winds forbid to flow;
What present shall the muse to Dorset bring;
Or how, so near the Pole, attempt to sing?
The hoary winter here conceals from sight
All pleasing objects that to verse invite.
The hills and dales, and the delightful woods,
The flowery plains, and silver streaming floods,
By snow disguised, in bright confusion lie,
And with one dazzling waste fatigue the eye.

No gentle breathing breeze prepares the spring,
No birds within the desert region sing.
The ships unmoved the boisterous winds defy,
While rattling chariots o'er the ocean fly.
The vast leviathan wants room to play,
And spout his waters in the face of day.
The starving wolves along the main sea prowl,
And to the moon in icy valleys howl.
For many a shining league the level main
Here spreads itself into a glassy plain:
There solid billows of enormous size,
Alps of green ice, in wild disorder rise.

And yet but lately have I seen e'en here,
The winter in a lovely dress appear;
Ere yet the clouds let fall the treasured snow,
Or winds begun through hazy skies to blow.
At evening a keen eastern breeze arose;
And the descending rain unsullied froze.
Soon as the silent shades of night withdrew,
The ruddy morn disclosed at once to view
The face of nature in a rich disguise,
And brightened every object to my eyes.
For every shrub, and every blade of grass,
And every pointed thorn, seemed wrought in glass,
In pearls and rubies rich the hawthorns show,
While through the ice the crimson berries glow.
The thick-sprung reeds the watery marshes yield,
Seem polished lances in a hostile field.
The stag in limpid currents with surprise,
Sees crystal branches on his forehead rise.
The spreading oak, the beech, and towering pine,
Glazed over, in the freezing ether shine.
The frighted birds the rattling branches shun,
That wave and glitter in the distant sun.

When if a sudden gust of wind arise,
The brittle forest into atoms flies:
The crackling wood beneath the tempest bends,
And in a spangled shower the prospect ends.
Or if a southern gale the region warm,
And by degrees unbind the wintry charm;
The traveller a miry country sees,
And journeys sad beneath the dropping trees.

Like some deluded peasant, Merlin leads
Through fragrant bowers, and through delicious meads;
While here enchanted gardens to him rise,
And airy fabrics there attract his eyes,
His wandering feet the magic paths pursue;
And while he thinks the fair illusion true,
The trackless scenes disperse in fluid air,
And woods and wilds, and thorny ways appear:
A tedious road the weary wretch returns,
And, as he goes, the transient vision mourns.


From my own Apartment, May 6.

There has a mail this day arrived from Holland; but the matter of the advices importing rather what gives us great expectations, than any positive assurances, I shall, for this time, decline giving you what I know, and apply the following verses of Mr. Dryden, in the second part of "Almanzor," to the present circumstances of things, without discovering what my knowledge in astronomy suggests to me.

When empire in its childhood first appears,
A watchful fate o'er sees its tender years:
Till grown more strong, it thrusts and stretches out,
And elbows all the kingdoms round about.
The place thus made for its first breathing free,
It moves again for ease and luxury;
Till swelling by degrees it has possest
The greater space, and now crowds up the rest.
When from behind there starts some petty state,
And pushes on its now unwieldy fate.
Then down the precipice of time it goes,
And sinks in minutes, which in ages rose. [190]


[Footnote 180: "I'll teach you a way to outwit Mrs. Johnson; it is a new-fashioned way of being witty, and they call it a bite . You must ask a bantering question, or tell some damned lie in a serious manner, then she will answer, or speak as if you were in earnest, and then cry you, 'Madam, there's a bite .' I would not have you undervalue this, for it is the constant amusement in Court, and everywhere else among the great people; and I let you know it, in order to have it obtain among you, and to teach you a new refinement" (Swift's "Journal"). See the
Spectator , Nos. 47, 504: " A Biter is one who tells you a thing you have no reason to disbelieve in itself; and perhaps has given you, before he bit you, no reason to disbelieve it for his saying it; and if you give him credit, laughs in your face, and triumphs that he has deceived you. In a word, a Biter is one who thinks you a fool, because you do not think him a knave."]

[Footnote 181: Owen McSwiney, a manager of Drury Lane Theatre, and afterwards of the Haymarket Theatre. After living in Italy for some years, he obtained a place in the Custom-house, and was keeper of the King's Mews. On his death in 1754 he left his fortune to Mrs. Woffington.]

[Footnote 182: Christopher Rich, manager of Drury Lane Theatre, who died in 1714, was at this time involved in a quarrel with the principal actors about the profits of their benefits.]

[Footnote 183: Cibber ("Apology," chap. x.) complains that Rich paid extraordinary prices to singers, dancers, and other exotic performers, which were as constantly deducted out of the sinking salaries of his actors. In December, 1709, the Lord Chamberlain ordered that no new representations were to be brought upon the stage which were not necessary to the better performance of comedy or opera, "such as ladder-dancing, antic postures," &c., without his leave.--(Lord Chamberlain's Records, Warrant Book, No. 22.)]

[Footnote 184: Sir John Vanbrugh built the Haymarket Theatre in 1705. The new house was opened with a translation of an Italian opera, "The Triumph of Love", which met with little success. This was followed by Vanbrugh's "Confederacy."]

[Footnote 185: John James Heidegger, who died in 1749,