The Palmy Days of Nance Oldfield | Page 6

of his work that in itself
had but little merit. She was so fond of humour, in what low part soever
to be found, that she would make no scruple of defacing her fair form
to come heartily into it;[A] for when she was eminent in several
desirable characters of wit and humour in higher life, she would be in
as much fancy when descending into the antiquated Abigail of Fletcher
('Scornful Lady') as when triumphing in all the airs and vain graces of a
fine lady, a merit that few actresses care for. In a play of D'Urfey's,
now forgotten, called the 'Western Lass,' which part she acted, she
transformed her whole being, body, shape, voice, language, look, and
features, into almost another animal, with a strong Devonshire dialect,
a broad, laughing voice, a poking head, round shoulders, an
unconceiving eye, and the most bediz'ning, dowdy dress that ever
cover'd the untrain'd limbs of a Joan Trot. To have seen her here you
would have thought it impossible the same creature could ever have
been recover'd to what was as easy to her, the gay, the lively, and the
desirable. Nor was her humour limited to her sex; for, while her shape
permitted, she was a more adroit pretty fellow than is usually seen upon
the stage. Her easy air, action, mien, and gesture quite chang'd, from
the quoif to the cock'd hat and cavalier in fashion. People were so fond
of seeing her a man, that when the part of Bays in the 'Rehearsal' had
for some time lain dormant, she was desired to take it up, which I have
seen her act with all the true coxcombly spirit and humour that the
sufficiency of the character required."
[Footnote A: Davies, in his "Life of Garrick," says of Peg Woffington

that "in Mrs. Day, in the 'Committee,' she made no scruple to disguise
her beautiful countenance by drawing on it the lines of deformity and
the wrinkles of old age, and to put on the tawdry habilaments and
vulgar manners of an old hypocritical city vixen."]
Let us cry peace to her manes and then wander back to Mistress
Oldfield, whom we have a very ungallant way of leaving from time to
time.
Well, Verbruggen having been taken out of the dramatic lists "most of
her parts," as Colley chronicles, "were, of course, to be disposed of, yet
so earnest was the female scramble for them, that only one of them fell
to the share of Mrs. Oldfield, that of Leonora in 'Sir Courtly Nice'; a
character of good plain sense, but not over elegantly written."
A "female scramble" it must have been with a vengeance, as any one
who knows aught of theatrical ambition will easily understand. The
only really distinguished actress of the Drury Lane coterie _hors de
combat_, and a bevy of feminine vultures of no particular pretension,
anxiously waiting to dispose of her histrionic remains! Think of it, ye
managers who have to subdue the passions and limit the extravagant
hopes of your players, and pity poor, unfortunate Mr. Rich. Do you
wonder that Nance only contrived to get the plain-spoken Leonora?
The wonder of it is that she obtained any rôle whatsoever.
Let Cibber continue the story, while he frankly confesses that even he
could form a false estimate of a colleague:
* * * * *
"It was in this part Mrs. Oldfield surpris'd me into an opinion of her
having all the innate powers of a good actress, though they were yet but
in the bloom of what they promis'd. Before she had acted this part I had
so cold an expectation from her abilities, that she could scarce prevail
with me to rehearse with her the scenes she was chiefly concerned in
with Sir Courtly, which I then acted. However, we ran them over with a
mutual inadvertency of one another. I seem'd careless, as concluding
that any assistance I could give her would be to little or no purpose; and

she mutter'd out her words in a sort of mifty manner at my low opinion
of her. But when the play came to be acted, she had just occasion to
triumph over the error of my judgment, by the (almost) amazement that
her unexpected performance awak'd me to; so forward and sudden a
step into nature I had never seen; and what made her performance more
valuable was that I knew it all proceeded from her own understanding,
untaught and unassisted by any one more experienced actor."
* * * * *
In the original text, Cibber, in pursuance of that old-fashioned method
of capitalising every third or fourth word without any particular rhyme
or reason, has spelled occasion with a big O. Well he might, for it was,
perhaps, the