Rejected Addresses | Page 5

among the awkward squad of the Magazines. In general,
they bear a close resemblance to each other; thirty of them contain
extravagant compliments to the immortal Wellington and the
indefatigable Whitbread; and, as the last- mentioned gentleman is said
to dislike praise in the exact proportion in which he deserves it, these
laudatory writers have probably been only building a wall against
which they might run their own heads.
The Editor here begs leave to advance a few words in behalf of that
useful and much abused bird the Phoenix; and in so doing he is biassed
by no partiality, as he assures the reader he not only never saw one, but
(mirabile dictu!) never caged one, in a simile, in the whole course of his
life. Not less than sixty-nine of the competitors have invoked the aid of
this native of Arabia; but as, from their manner of using him after they
had caught him, he does not by any means appear to have been a native
of Arabia Felix, the Editor has left the proprietors to treat with Mr.
Polito, and refused to receive this rara avis, or black swan, into the
present collection. One exception occurs, in which the admirable
treatment of this feathered incombustible entitles the author to great
praise: that Address has been preserved, and in the ensuing pages takes
the lead, to which its dignity entitles it.
Perhaps the reason why several of the subjoined productions of the
MUSAE LONDINENSES have failed of selection, may he discovered
in their being penned in a metre unusual upon occasions of this sort,
and in their not being written with that attention to stage effect, the
want of which, like want of manners in the concerns of life, is more
prejudicial than a deficiency of talent. There is an art of writing for the
Theatre, technically called TOUCH and GO, which is indispensable
when we consider the small quantum of patience which so motley an
assemblage as a London audience can be expected to afford. All the
contributors have been very exact in sending their initials and mottoes.
Those belonging to the present collection have been carefully preserved,
and each has been affixed to its respective poem. The letters that
accompanied the Addresses having been honourably destroyed
unopened, it is impossible to state the real authors with any certainty;
but the ingenious reader, after comparing the initials with the motto,
and both with the poem, may form his own conclusions.
The Editor does not anticipate any disapprobation from thus giving

publicity to a small portion of the Rejected Addresses; for unless he is
widely mistaken in assigning the respective authors, the fame of each
individual is established on much too firm a basis to be shaken by so
trifling and evanescent a publication as the present:
- neque ego illi detrahere ausim Haerentem capiti multa cum laude
ceronam.
Of the numerous pieces already sent to the Committee for performance,
he has only availed himself of three vocal Travesties, which he has
selected, not for their merit, but simply for their brevity. Above one
hundred spectacles, melodramas, operas, and pantomimes have been
transmitted, besides the two first acts of one legitimate comedy. Some
of these evince considerable smartness of manual dialogue, and several
brilliant repartees of chairs, tables, and other inanimate wits; but the
authors seem to have forgotten that in the new Drury Lane the audience
can hear as well as see. Of late our theatres have been so constructed,
that John Bull has been compelled to have very long ears, or none at all;
to keep them dangling about his skull like discarded servants, while his
eyes were gazing at pieballs and elephants, or else to stretch them out
to an asinine length to catch the congenial sound of braying trumpets.
An auricular revolution is, we trust, about to take place; and as many
people have been much puzzled to define the meaning of the new era,
of which we have heard so much, we venture to pronounce that, as far
as regards Drury Lane Theatre, the new era means the reign of ears. If
the past affords any pledge for the future, we may confidently expect
from the Committee of that House every thing that can be
accomplished by the union of taste and assiduity. {0}

PREFACE TO EIGHTEENTH EDITION {1}

In the present publishing era, when books are like the multitudinous
waves of the advancing sea, some of which make no impression
whatever upon the sand, while the superficial traces left by others are
destined to be perpetually obliterated by their successors, almost as
soon as they are found, the authors of the Rejected Addresses may well
feel flattered, after a lapse of twenty years, and the sale of seventeen
large editions, in