A Book of the Play | Page 6

dances, scenes, and rhymes, High language often,
ay, and sense sometimes.
There was an end of dramatic poetry, as it was understood under
Elizabeth. Blank verse had expired or swooned away, never again to be
wholly reanimated. Fantastic tragedies in rhyme, after the French
pattern, became the vogue; and absolute translations from the French
and Spanish for the first time occupied the English stage. Shakespeare
and his colleagues had converted existing materials to dramatic uses,
but not as did the playwrights of the Restoration. In the Epilogue to the
comedy of "An Evening's Love; or, The Mock Astrologer," borrowed
from "Le Feint Astrologue" of the younger Corneille, Dryden, the
adapter of the play, makes jesting defence of the system of adaptation.
The critics are described as conferring together in the pit on the subject
of the performance:
They kept a fearful stir In whispering that he stole the Astrologer: And
said, betwixt a French and English plot, He eased his half-tired muse on
pace and trot. Up starts a Monsieur, new come o'er, and warm In the
French stoop and pull-back of the arm: "Morbleu," dit-il, and cocks, "I
am a rogue, But he has quite spoiled the 'Feigned Astrologue!'"
The poet is supposed to make excuse:
He neither swore, nor stormed, as poets do, But, most unlike an author,
vowed 'twas true; Yet said he used the French like enemies, And did
not steal their plots but made them prize.
Dryden concludes with a sort of apology for his own productiveness,

and the necessity of borrowing that it involved:
He still must write, and banquier-like, each day Accept new bills, and
he must break or pay. When through his hands such sums must yearly
run, You cannot think the stock is all his own.
Pepys, who, born in 1633, must have had experiences of youthful
playgoing before the great Civil War, finds evidence afterwards of "the
vanity and prodigality of the age" in the nightly company of citizens,
'prentices, and others attending the theatre, and holds it a grievance that
there should be so many "mean people" in the pit at two shillings and
sixpence apiece. For several years, he mentions, he had gone no higher
than the twelvepenny, and then the eighteenpenny places. Oftentimes,
however, the king and his court, the Duke and Duchess of York, and
the young Duke of Monmouth, were to be seen in the boxes. In 1662
Charles's consort, Catherine, was first exhibited to the English public at
the Cockpit Theatre in Drury Lane, when Shirley's "Cardinal" was
represented. Then there are accounts of scandals and indecorums in the
theatre. Evelyn reprovingly speaks of the public theatres being abused
to an "atheistical liberty." Nell Gwynne is in front of the curtain
prattling with the fops, lounging across and leaning over them, and
conducting herself saucily and impudently enough. Moll Davis is in
one box, and my Lady Castlemaine, with the king, in another. Moll
makes eyes at the king, and he at her. My Lady Castlemaine detects the
interchange of glances, and "when she saw Moll Davies she looked like
fire, which troubled me," said Mr. Pepys, who, to do him justice, was
often needlessly troubled about matters with which, in truth, he had
very little concern. There were brawls in the theatre, and tipsiness, and
much license generally. In 1682 two gentlemen, disagreeing in the pit,
drew their swords and climbed to the stage. There they fought furiously
until a sudden sword-thrust stretched one of the combatants upon the
boards. The wound was not mortal, however, and the duellists, after a
brief confinement by order of the authorities, were duly set at liberty.
The fop of the Restoration was a different creature to the Elizabethan
gallant. Etherege satirised him in his "Man of Mode; or, Sir Fopling
Flutter," Dryden supplying the comedy with an epilogue, in which he

fully described certain of the prevailing follies of the time in regard to
dress and manners. The audience are informed that
None Sir Fopling him or him can call, He's knight of the shire and
represents you all! From each he meets he culls whate'er he can;
Legion's his name, a people in a man.
* * * * *
His various modes from various fathers follow; One taught the toss,
and one the new French wallow; His sword-knot this, his cravat that
designed; And this the yard-long snake he twirls behind. From one the
sacred periwig he gained, Which wind ne'er blew nor touch of hat
profaned. Another's diving bow he did adore, Which, with a shog, casts
all the hair before, Till he with full decorum brings it back, And rises
with a water-spaniel shake.
Upon another occasion the poet writes:
But only fools, and they of vast estate, The extremity of modes will
imitate,