Mrs. BULKLEY.

And she whose party's largest shall proceed.
And first, I hope you'll readily agree
I've all the critics and the wits for me.
They, I am sure, will answer my commands:
Ye candid judging few, hold up your hands.
What! no return? I find, too late, I fear,
That modern judges seldom enter here.

Miss CATLEY.

I'm for a different set:-Old men, whose trade is
Still to gallant and dangle with the ladies.

Recitative.

Who mump their passion, and who, grimly smiling,
Still thus address the fair with voice beguiling:

AIR.-Cotillon.

Turn, my fairest, turn, if ever

Strephon caught thy ravish'd eye,
Pity take on your swain so clever,
Who without your aid must die.
Yes, I shall die, hu, hu, hu, hu!
Yes, I must die, ho, ho, ho, ho!

Mrs. BULKLEY.

Let all the old pay homage to your merit;

Give me the young, the gay, the men of spirit.
Ye travell❜d tribe, ye macaroni train,

Of French friseurs and nosegays justly vain,

Who take a trip to Paris once a-year

[Da Capo.

To dress, and look like awkward Frenchmen here,—

Lend me your hands: O fatal news to tell,

Their hands are only lent to the Heinel.

Miss CATLEY.

Ay, take your travellers-travellers indeed!

Give me my bonny Scot, that travels from the Tweed. Where are the chiels? Ah, ah! I well discern

The smiling looks of each bewitching bairn.

Goldsmith.

18

AIR.-A bonny young lad is my Jockey.
I'll sing to amuse you by night and by day,
And be unco merry when you are but gay;
When you with your bagpipes are ready to play,
My voice shall be ready to carol away

With Sandy, and Sawney, and Jockey,

With Sawney, and Jarvie, and Jockey.
Mrs. BULKLEY.

Ye gamesters, who, so eager in pursuit,

Make but of all your fortune one va toute:

Ye jockey tribe, whose stock of words are few, "I hold the odds.-Done, done, with you, with you!" Ye barristers, so fluent with grimace,

"My Lord, your Lordship misconceives the case;" Doctors, who cough, and answer every misfortuner— "I wish I'd been call'd in a little sooner;"

Assist my cause with hands and voices hearty,
Come, end the contest here, and aid my party!
AIR.-Ballinamony.

Miss CATLEY.

Ye brave Irish lads, hark away to the crack,
Assist me, I pray, in this woful attack;

For sure I don't wrong you-you seldom are slack,
When the ladies are calling, to blush and hang back.
For you're always polite and attentive,
Still to amuse us inventive,

And death is your only preventive:
Your hands and your voices for me.
Mrs. BULKLEY.

Well, Madam, what if, after all this sparring,
We both agree, like friends, to end our jarring?
Miss CATLEY.

And that our friendship may remain unbroken,
What if we leave the Epilogue unspoken?
Mrs. BULKLEY,

Agreed.

Agreed.

Miss CATLEY.

Mrs. BULKLEY.

And now with late repentance,

Un-epilogued the Poet waits his sentence.
Condemn the stubborn fool who can't submit

To thrive by flattery, though he starves by wit.

[Exeunt.

SONG.

Intended to have been sung in the Comedy of" She Stoops to Conquer."

AH me! when shall I marry me?

Lovers are plenty; but fail to relieve me.

He, fond youth, that could carry me,

Offers to love, but means to deceive me.

But I will rally, and combat the ruiner:

Not a look, not a smile shall my passion discover. She that gives all to the false one pursuing her, Makes but a penitent—loses a lover.

EPILOGUE.

Spoken by Mr. Lee Lewes, in the Character of Harlequin,
at his Benefit.

HOLD! Prompter, hold! a word before your nonsense:
I'd speak a word or two, to ease my conscience.

My pride forbids it ever should be said,

My heels eclips'd the honours of my head;
That I found humour in a pye-bald vest,

Or ever thought that jumping was a jest. [Takes off his mask.
Whence, and what art thou, visionary birth?
Nature disowns, and reason scorns thy mirth:
In thy black aspect every passion sleeps,
The joy that dimples, and the woe that weeps.
How hast thou fill'd the scene with all thy brood
Of fools pursuing, and of fools pursued!

Whose ins and outs no ray of sense discloses,
Whose only plot it is to break our noses;
Whilst from below the trap-door demons rise,
And from above the dangling deities:
And shall I mix in this unhallow'd crew?
May rosin'd lightning blast me if I do!
No-I will act-I'll vindicate the stage:
Shakespeare himself shall feel my tragic rage.
Off! off! vile trappings! a new passion reigns!
The madd'ning monarch revels in my veins.
Oh! for a Richard's voice to catch the theme,—

“Give me another horse! bind up my wounds!—soft-'twas

but a dream."

Ay, 'twas but a dream, for now there's no retreating,

If I cease Harlequin, I cease from eating.

'Twas thus that Æsop's stag, a creature blameless, Yet something vain, like one that shall be nameless, Once on the margin of a fountain stood,

And cavill'd at his image in the flood:

"The deuce confound," he cries, "these drumstick shanks They never have my gratitude nor thanks;

They're perfectly disgraceful! strike me dead!

But for a head, yes, yes, I have a head:

How piercing is that eye! how sleek that brow!
My horns!-I'm told horns are the fashion now."

Whilst thus he spoke, astonish'd, to his view,
Near, and more near, the hounds and huntsmen drew;
"Hoicks! hark forward!" came thund'ring from behind:
He bounds aloft, outstrips the fleeting wind;

He quits the woods, and tries the beaten ways;
He starts, he pants, he takes the circling maze:
At length, his silly head, so prized before,
Is taught his former folly to deplore;
Whilst his strong limbs conspire to set him free,
And at one bound he saves himself-like me.

[Taking a jump through the stage door.

PLAYS.