Havingtaken upon me in the prologue to this play, to give the auditors some short account of that part of it which SirJohn Vanbrughleft unfinished, and not thinking it adviseable in that place, to limit their judgment by so high a commendation as I thought it deserved; I have therefore, for the satisfaction of the curious, printed the whole of what he wrote, separately, under the single title he gave it ofA Journey to London, without presuming to alter a line.
Yet when I own, that in my last conversation with him, (which chiefly turned upon what he had done towards a comedy) he excused his not shewing it me, 'till he had reviewd it, confessing the scenes were yet undigested, too long, and irregular, particularly in the lower characters, I have but one excuse for publishing what he never designed should come into the world, as it then was, viz. I had no other way of taking those many faults to myself, which may be justly found in my presuming to finish it.
However, a judicious reader will find in his original papers, that the characters are strongly drawn, new, spirited, and natural, taken from sensible observations on high and lower life, and from a just indignation at the follies in fashion. All I could gather from him of what he intended in thecatastrophe, was, that the conduct of his imaginary fine lady had so provoked him, that he designed actually to have made her husband turn her out of his doors. But when his performance came, after his decease, to my hands, I thought such violent measures, however just they might be in real life, were too severe for comedy, and would want the proper surprise, which is due to the end of a play. Therefore with much ado (and 'twas as much as I could do with probability) I preserved the lady's chastity, that the sense of her errors might make a reconciliation not impracticable; and I hope the mitigation of her sentence has been since justified by its success.
My inclination to preserve as much as possible of SirJohn, I soon saw had drawn the whole into an unusual length; the reader will therefore find here a scene or two of the lower humour that were left out, after the first day's presentation.
The favour the town has shewn to the higher characters in this play, is a proof, that their taste is not wholly vitiated, by the barbarous entertainments that have been so expensively set off to corrupt it: but, while the repetition of the best old plays is apt to give satiety, and good new ones are so scarce a commodity, we must not wonder, that the poor actors are sometimes forced to trade in trash for a livelihood.
I cannot yet take leave of the reader, without endeavouring to do justice to those principal actors, who have so evidently contributed to the support of this comedy: And I wish I could separate the praises due to them from the secret vanity of an author: For all I can say will still insinuate, that they could not have so highly excelled, unless the skill of the writer had given them proper occasion. However, as I had rather appear vain, than unthankful, I will venture to say of Mr.Wilks, that in the last act, I never saw any passion take so natural a possession of an actor, or any actor take so tender a possession of his auditors——Mr.Millstoo, is confess'd by every body, to have surprised them, by so far excelling himself——But there is no doing right to Mrs.Oldfield, without putting peoplein mind of what others, of great merit, have wanted to come near her——'Tis not enough to say, sheHere Out-didher usualExcellence. I might therefore justly leave her to the constant admiration of those spectators, who have the pleasure of living while she is an actress. But as this is not the only time she has been the life of what I have given the public, so perhaps my saying a little more of so memorable an actress, may give this play a chance to be read, when the people of this age shall be ancestors——May it therefore give emulation to our successors of the stage, to know, That to the ending of the year 1727, a cotemporary comedian relates, that Mrs.Oldfieldwas, then, in her highest excellence of action, happy in all the rearly-found requisites, that meet in one person to complete them for the stage——She was in stature just rising to that height, where thegracefulcan only begin to shew itself; of a lively aspect and a command in her mein, that like the principal figure in the finest paintings, first seizes, and longest delights the eye of the spectators. Her voice was sweet, strong, piercing, and melodious: her pronunciation voluble, distinct, and musical; and her emphasis always placed where the spirit of the sense, in her periods, only demanded it. If she delighted more in the Higher Comic, than in the Tragic strain, 'twas because the last is too often written in a lofty disregard of nature. But in characters of modern practised life, she found occasions to add the particular air and manner which distinguished the different humours she presented. Whereas in tragedy, the manner of speaking varies, as little as the blank verse it is written in——She had one peculiar happiness from nature, she looked and maintained theagreeable, at a time when other fine women only raise admirers by their understanding——The spectator was always as much informed by her eyes as her elocution; for the look is the only proof that an actor rightly conceives what he utters, there being scare an instance,where the eyes do their part, that the elocution is known to be faulty. The qualities she hadacquiredwere thegenteelandelegant. The one in her air, and the other in her dress, never had her equal on the stage; and the ornaments she herself provided, (particularly in this play) seemed in all respects theparaphernaliaof a woman of quality. And of that sort were the characters she chiefly excelled in; but her natural good sense and lively turn of conversation made her way so easy to ladies of the highest rank, that it is a less wonder, if on the stage she sometimeswas, what might have become the finest woman in real life to have supported.
Theatre-Royal.Jan. 27,172⅞
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