of a cream-cheese; but mum for that, fellow-traveller.

Mir. If a deep sense of the many injuries

I have offered to so good a lady, with a sincere remorse, and a hearty contrition, can but obtain the least glance of compassion, I am too happy.-Ah, madam, there was a time!-but let it be forgotten-I confess I have deservedly forfeited the high place I once held of sighing at your feet. Nay, kill me not, by turning from me in disdain.—I come not to plead for favor; nay, not for pardon; I am a suppliant only for your pity-I am going where I never shall behold you

more

Sir Wil. How, fellow-traveller! you shall go by yourself then.

Mir. Let me be pitied first, and afterwards forgotten.-I ask no more. Sir Wil. By'r Lady, a very reasonable request, and will cost you nothing, aunt! Come, come, forgive and forget, aunt. Why, you must, an you are a Christian. Mir. Consider, madam, in reality, you could not receive much prejudice; it was an innocent device; though I confess it had a face of guiltiness,-it was at most an artifice which love contrived; and errors which love produces have ever been accounted venial. At least think it is punishment enough, that I have lost what in my heart I hold most dear, that to your cruel indignation I have offered up this beauty, and with her my peace and quiet; nay, all my hopes of future comfort.

Sir Wil. An he does not move me, would I may never be o' the quorum! 97—an it were not as good a deed as to drink, to give her to him again, I would I might never take shipping!-Aunt, if you don't forgive quickly, I shall melt, I can tell you that. My contract went no farther than a little mouth glue, and that's hardly dry;-one doleful sigh more from my fellow-traveller, and 't is dissolved. Lady Wish. Well, nephew, upon your account-Ah, he has a false insinuating tongue!-Well, sir, I will stifle my just resentment at my nephew's request.-I will endeavor what I can to forget, but on proviso that you resign the contract with my niece immediately. Mir. It is in writing, and with papers of concern; but I have sent my servant for it, and will deliver it to you, with all

acknowledgments for your transcendent goodness.

Lady Wish. Oh, he has witchcraft in his eyes and tongue!-When I did not see him, I could have bribed a villain to his assassination; but his appearance rakes the embers which have so long lain smothered in my breast.

(Apart.)

(Enter Fainall and Mrs. Marwood.)

Fain. Your date of deliberation, madam, is expired. Here is the instrument; are you prepared to sign?

Lady Wish. If I were prepared, I am not impowered. My niece exerts a lawful claim, having matched herself by my direction to Sir Wilfull.

Fain. That sham is too gross to pass on

me-though 't is imposed on you, madam. Mrs. Mil. Sir, I have given my consent. Mir. And, sir, I have resigned my pretensions.

Sir Wil. And, sir, I assert my right and will maintain it in defiance of you, sir, and of your instrument. S'heart, an you talk of an instrument, sir, I have an old fox 98 by my thigh that shall hack your instrument of ram vellum to shreds, sir! It shall not be sufficient for a mittimus 99 or a tailor's measure. Therefore withdraw your instrument, sir, or by'r Lady, I shall draw mine.

Lady Wish. Hold, nephew, hold! Mrs. Mil. Good Sir Wilfull, respite your valor.

Fain. Indeed! Are you provided of your guard, with your single beef-eater there? but I'm prepared for you, and insist upon my first proposal. You shall submit your own estate to my management, and absolutely make over my wife's to my sole use. As pursuant to the purport and tenor of this other covenant, I suppose, madam, your consent is not requisite in this case; nor, Mr. Mirabell, your resignation; nor, Sir Wilfull, your right.

-You may draw your fox if you please, sir, and make a bear-garden flourish somewhere else: for here it will not avail. This, my Lady Wishfort, must be subscribed, or your darling daughter's turned adrift, like a leaky hulk, to sink or swim, as she and the current of this lewd town can agree.

1

Wit. No.

Pet. Not I; I writ, I read nothing.
Mir. Very well, now you shall know.-
Madam, your promise.

Lady Wish. Ay, ay, sir, upon my honor.
Mir. Mr. Fainall, it is now time that you
should know that your lady, while she
was at her own disposal, and before you
had by your insinuations wheedled her
out of a pretended settlement of the
greatest part of her fortur.e-
Fain. Sir! pretended!

Mir. Yes, sir. I say that this lady while a widow, having it seems received some cautions respecting your inconstancy and tyranny of temper, which from her own partial opinion and fondness of you she could never have suspected-she did, I say, by the wholesome advice of friends, and of sages learned in the laws of this land, deliver this same as her act and deed to me in trust, and to the uses within mentioned. You may read if you please (Holding out the parchment) though perhaps what is inscribed on the back may serve your occasions. Fain. Very likely, sir. What's here?— Damnation! (Reads.) A deed of conveyance of the whole estate real of Arabella Languish, widow, in trust to Edward Mirabell.-Confusion!

Mir. Even so, sir; 't is the way of the world, sir, of the widows of the world. I suppose this deed may bear an elder date than what you have obtained from your lady.

Fain. Perfidious fiend! then thus I'll be revenged.

(Offers to run at Mrs. Fainall.) Sir Wil. Hold, sir! Now you may make your bear-garden flourish somewhere else,

kept your promise-and I must perform mine. First, I pardon, for your sake, Sir Rowland there, and Foible; the next thing is to break the matter to my nephew-and how to do thatMir. For that, madam, give yourself no trouble; let me have your consent. Sir Wilfull is my friend; he has had compassion upon lovers, and generously engaged a volunteer in this action, for our service; and now designs to prosecute his travels. Sir Wil. S' heart, aunt, I have no mind to marry. My cousin's a fine lady, and the gentleman loves her, and she loves him, and they deserve one another; my resolution is to see foreign parts-I have set on 't-and when I'm set on 't I must do 't. And if these two gentlemen would travel too, I think they may be spared. Pet. For my part, I say little-I think things are best off or on.3

Wit. I'gad, I understand nothing of the matter; I'm in a maze yet, like a dog in a dancing-school.

Lady Wish. Well, sir, take her, and with her all the joy I can give you.

Mrs. Mil. Why does not the man take me? Would you have me give myself to you over again?

Mir. Ay, and over and over again; for (Kisses her hand) I would have you as often as possibly I can. Well, Heaven grant I love you not too well, that's all my fear.

Sir Wil. S' heart, you'll have him time enough to toy after you're married; or if you will toy now, let us have a dance in the meantime, that we who are not lovers may have some other employment besides looking on.

Mir. With all my heart, dear Sir Wilfull. What shall we do for music?

Foib. Oh, sir, some that were provided for Sir Rowland's entertainment are yet within call.

(A dance.)

Lady Wish. As I am a person, I can hold out no longer; I have wasted my spirits so to-day already, that I am ready to sink under the fatigue; and I cannot but have some fears upon me yet, that my son Fainall will pursue some desperate

course.

Mir. Madam, disquiet not yourself on that account; to my knowledge his circumstances are such he must of force comply. For my part, I will contribute all that in me lies to a reunion; in the meantime, 3 Either one way or the other.

madam, let me-(To Mrs. Fainall) before these witnesses restore to you this deed of trust: it may be a means, wellmanaged, to make you live easily together.

From hence let those be warned, who

mean to wed;

Lest mutual falsehood stain the bridal bed;

For each deceiver to his cost may find That marriage-frauds too oft are paid in kind.

(Exeunt omnes.)

EPILOGUE.

Spoken by Mrs. Bracegirdle.

After our Epilogue this crowd dismisses, I'm thinking how this play 'll be pulled to pieces.

But pray consider, ere you doom its fall, How hard a thing 't would be to please you all.

There are some critics so with spleen diseased,

They scarcely come inclining to be pleased:

And sure he must have more than mortal skill,

Who pleases any one against his will. Then all bad poets we are sure are foes, And how their number's swelled, the town well knows:

In shoals I've marked 'em judging in the pit;

Though they're, on no pretence, for judgment fit,

But that they have been damned for want of wit.

Joseph Addison (1672-1719), distinguished himself at Oxford for elegant scholarship," knowledge of Latin poetry, and skill in composing it. He first rose to prominence through his poem, The Campaign (1704), which celebrated Marlborough's victory at Blenheim, and for which the Whigs gave him a government office. He was in Parliament from 1708 till his death, and became a Secretary of State. In a literary way he is best known, of course, for his essays, of a somewhat fresh type, the short familiar essay, contributed especially to The Tatler and The Spectator (1709–12).

The eighteenth century, though not highly distinguished in drama, was notably an era of comedy. Its best work followed the example less of the Elizabethan than of the Restoration comic writers, but raised their moral tone. The chief new feature in comedy was the taste for the superficially ethical and emotional, generally known as sentimentalism. In tragedy the age did not excel. Addison's Cato is the most celebrated tragedy, and as representative as any.

Cato, mostly written as early as 1703, was finished, performed in London twenty times and published in eight editions, in 1713. As a curious illustration of the lack of historical knowledge and imagination in that day, it is interesting to know that (in Macaulay's words) "Juba's waistcoat blazed with gold lace; Marcia's hoop was worthy of a Duchess on the birthday; and Cato wore a wig worth fifty guineas." The play was based on Plutarch's life of Cato, and perhaps on reminiscences of a poor tragedy which Addison had seen in Venice. Its great success with both spectators and readers was partly due to Addison's prestige and the loyalty of his friends, partly to its merits, partly to circumstances. Though he disclaimed partizan intentions, the play was timely. The end of Queen Anne's reign was approaching (she died in 1714), there was no direct heir, and the prospective coming of the Hanoverian dynasty involved danger to English liberty through insurrections in favor of the tyrannical Stuarts, such as actually followed in 1715. A play exciting sympathy for old Roman liberty was sure of attention. The Whigs, Dr. Johnson said, applauded all references to freedom, and the Tories applauded just as loudly lest they should be thought

less zealous in its behalf. The Duke of Marlborough's attempt to gain the office of Captain General for life was felt to give point to Cato's denunciation of Cæsar the military dictator. Though .some critics felt the play, as we do, to be undramatic, its success at the time passed into permanent appreciation; Voltaire praised it as the first regular English tragedy, because it followed French rules (an outward and visible sign of which is its observance of the French practice of beginning a new scene on an important exit or entrance); and its popularity in the past is shown by numerous bits which have become proverbial, such as

and

The woman that deliberates is lost,

Plato, thou reason'st well.

But taste has changed; the play in our time would be impossible to put on the stage, and is read chiefly because Addison wrote it.

Addison was looked up to in his own age as a man of high character, perfect taste, and highly developed sense of propriety, but lacked the spontaneity and warmth for the love of which some men will readily forgive lapses from propriety, taste, and even virtue. It would excite an unfair prejudice against him to compare him to a Pharisee or the Prodigal Son's elder brother, for his caution and moderation were due to his modesty and diffidence, and all testify to his personal charm; but he was more akin to them than to the Publican or the Prodigal himself. He had another side, which expressed itself in the grace, the gentle irony, the human nature, of his essays. But he was well fitted to determine and express the more ambitious literary orthodoxy of the age of Queen Anne, a classicism Latin and critical rather than Greek and original, uninterested in feeling, restrained, dignified. The more formal literary ideals of the age, and the personality of Addison, are not unfairly represented by

Cato.

No criticism of it has oftener been made than that it is emotionally frigid, and the charge is true. None of the characters excites vivid interest, none except Cato excites much sympathy. Hardest of all is for us to give ourselves up to the love-episodes. A man whose first known love-affair was at the age of forty-four with an elderly widowed