don, and Adonis; together with a collection of receipts to make pastes for the hands, pomatums, lip-salves, white-pots, beautifying creams, water of talc, frog-spawn water, and decoctions for clearing the complexion. Whoever can discover the aforesaid goods, so that they may be had again, shall have fifty guineas for the whole, or proportionably for any part. N.B. Her ladyship is pleased to promise ten pounds for the packet of letters over and above, or five for Philander's only, being her first love. 'My lady bestows those of Strephon to the finder, being so written, that they may serve to any woman who reads them.' P.S.—As I am a patron of persons who have no other friend to apply to, I cannot suppress the following complaint: 'SIR, 'I am a blackmoor boy, and have, by my lady's order, been christened by the chaplain. The good man has gone further with me, and told me a great deal of good news; as, that I am as good as my lady herself, as I am a Christian, and many other things: but for all this, the parrot, who came over with me from our country, is as much esteemed by her as I Besides this, the shock-dog has a collar that I desire also to know, whether now I am a Christian, I am obliged to dress am. cost almost as much as mine. like a Turk, and wear a turban. ‘I am, sir, your most humble servant, 'POMPEY.' [Tatler, No. 245. The Pleasures of the Playhouse THE town grows so very empty, that the greater number of my gay characters are fled out of my sight into the country. My beaux are now shepherds, and my belles wood - nymphs. They are lolling over rivulets, and covered with shades, while we who remain in town, hurry through the dust about impertinencies without knowing the happiness of leisure and retirement. To add to this calamity, even the actors are going to desert us for a season, and we shall not shortly have so much as a landscape or a forest scene to refresh ourselves with in the midst of our fatigues. This may not, perhaps, be so sensible a loss to any other as to me; for I confess it is one of my greatest delights to sit unobserved and unknown in the gallery, and entertain myself either with what is personated on the stage, or observe what appearances present themselves in the audience. If there were no other good consequences in a playhouse, than that so many persons of different ranks and conditions are placed there in their most pleasing aspects, that prospect only would be very far from being below the pleasures of a wise man. There is not one person you can see, in whom, if you look with an inclination to be pleased, you may not behold something worthy or agreeable. Our thoughts are in our features; and the visage of those in whom love, rage, anger, jealousy, or envy, have their frequent mansions, carries the traces of those passions wherever the amorous, the choleric, the jealous, or the envious, are pleased to make their appearance. However, the assembly at a play is usually made up of such as have a sense of some elegance in pleasure; by which means the audience is generally composed of those who have gentle affections, or at least of such, as at that time are in the best humour you can ever find them. This has insensibly a good effect upon our spirits; and the musical airs which are played to us, put the whole company into a participation of the same pleasure, and by consequence, for that time, equal in humour, in fortune, and in quality. Thus far we gain only by coming into an audience; but if we find, added to this, the beauties of proper action, the force of eloquence, and the gaiety of wellplaced lights and scenes, it is being happy, and seeing others happy, for two hours: a duration of bliss not at all to be slighted by so short-lived a creature as Why then should not the duty of the player be had in much more esteem than it is at present? If the merit of a performance is to be valued according to the talents which are necessary to it, the qualifications of a player should raise him much above the arts and ways of life which we call mercenary or mechanic. When we look round a full house, and behold so few that can, though they set themselves out to show as much as the persons on the stage do, come up to what they would appear even in dumb show; how much does the actor deserve our approbation, who adds to the advantage of looks and motions, the tone of voice, man. |