The National Register. — London, England, 1815-12-31 00:00:00

torc. TWE N,ATION and Eve, in our only epic. poem, moves ift the same sphere with the first of poets. In wit they partake of Shulce. speare's spirit, and are tainted with his faults, which were the faults of the ate. Their humour isaomytimes coarse,, and their languagi indelicate, hot it is alwaysAbe.language of th-ir low characters They make beggars , and , Pe- speak grossly; hut their gentlemen are wits, soldiers, and scholars, with princely minds, noble feelings, and'graceftd , speech, neither wanting in dignity nor in manners, They love a quibble, and so do we, and so does. everroni.; butt the quibble of the ignorantis,a quibble out-of piker, like : st, pun io a 'er'non or a quibble constantly usurplerthe place of better things, as in the perpetual puns and , ballivf the. modern comedy, whither they are drawn by force, for want. of a richer store, to supply the materials of the dialogue. In the Comedy of the Beggar's, Rush, Van. Dunk,, over come with liquor, after abusing Wolfort, plays upon the. word uphold, and refuses to take Macre: hand,, till h e! has given his assurance that he does not. uphold Wijifort. Then says the merry drunkard, " HOLD Mt This,l is nature, and therefore true wit, just what is seen every , day, when liquor, having usurped the place of calm reason*i and a nicer taste, has given ferment to the very feculesseiee, of our fancy. What was thought decent in the times ot our ancestors, would be intolerable now ;a—not becauset we are perhaps better ; for we doubt whether our private, bacchanalian orgies, at the tables whereMorrisorliiwerdine. were frequent guests, did not lately sink far below any in times past, except when Rochester was the Court Buffoon; but because we have learnt to cover in public, every thing! which may be offensive to nice delicacy; aatheanciests hadt refined so far, and the French have followed them, as to, banish all actual scenes of blood from their whole drama.. The opinion of their cotetnporaries was certainly much ite favour of our authors.; and when we consider that one was; the son of a bishop, and the other of a judge, we must fairly presume, that their taste and manners were not low. Love... lace, a poet of some eminence, speaking of the great. deli.. cacy of expression, in " The Custom of the Country s "' says, 46 Minerva might have spoke in Venus' face;" such. is his sense of the purity of their language. Dryden, on tke contrary, thinks it flat bawdry, and we are certain that: it. would. be intolerable now ; but we conclude from it, amt. manners were eltered, and words which at onetime are. offensive must formerly have been in common use. Before we quit these general observations on Beaumont and Fletcher, we cannot omit to mention- our surprise at. the extraordinary union of talent which they formed, con. stantly wri ing in copartnership, in such a manuer, that no one has been able to distinguish their different styles. Fat. , staff, though as heavy as two men, says, he is rout what he seems, with Percy on, his back,--not a double man ; but Beaumont and Fletcher are quite a miracle of a coalition; they are, to borrow a quibble of Colman's, " two single poets well rolled into one," and have not been unaptly compared by one of, their panegyristsio Latin, to Parma. MS biceps hill, on the two forks of which poetic genius is said to have placed its Deity, in the ancient mythology. The prese n t play is, in the commendatory ‘41.. ses of Gardner and lia/s, attributed wholly to Fletcher. Mr. Colman, whose edition of our authors was published in 1.778, says,, that until within a few years it used to be freqaently repreitented at Covent Garden Theatre ;. in con *rotation of . which, we know a gentleman who saw it three- • • . r .. ,::::aoit~ 837 ncl-forty.. years age. 4n. tite,.year; 17W', air. tiuit made same alterations in it 4 and with the, addition of ser.)ral songs, brought it out as an Opera, under the title of the Royal MPrchant it is now: published with the name of Mr. Douglas Kinaaird l to whotn,we are indebted. for the revival. What alteration it underwent in Mr. Colman's ima s we. are not informed. At present s Mt. Kits:laird opeue.to have done.no more than use the pruning knife, by cutting out all that was strugling and irregular. so as to encumber the action ; but what he haeengrafted, consistieg principally of three some, is ratherdue to . Mr. Lainbe•and Mr; Hubhouse, the latter of whom has. written the. pro. !ogee andiepilogue. The first scene is ofigieel, but short, and iamade to supply) one which the hist edition condemns as cold and superilitoas. The pieetnow-opens with a song from Higgail l the sentiment:of- which must be allowed to he at least as just,. in these days, when the lives of old Kings, we• fear, outlive. theire memories, except in the re. ports of their physicians, aod,cortainly- ranch more decent than the old , one, of " Take her and hug. her," sung by the-same character, in the. 3d act of the ori4inal.. From this song, we should conjecture, Mr. Lansbe is of opinion, that the loyalty which- begins, in a bumper toast, and ends if hip—hip--hip, and•three times three, is but.of a beg, tett , sort, and, in truth, we think he is right. SONG.—By ITionEN. By the Honourable Mr. Lambe. Well, brother - e, oar merry old Kingis dead, What mutters ? We'll soon have another instead; He would -not have cried, Had you or I died ; Teen :mum, him no longer, but merrily sing, Rest, Kest, to the hones of our merry old King, Drain the can brother; We'll soon have another ; Drink till our eye, with tears shall swell, Teats of brandy , alone, Asld the monarch that's gone Shall be wept in the liquor he lov'd so well. Of the play itself, we repeat our former praise. It an acquisition to any stage, in any time, and for happiness of incident is. remarkable. It fails to excite strong irate. rest, because the plot is so long concealed, that the denoue. ment bursts upon us somewhat too soddenly. But the man. tiers of the Beggars, which are well preserved ; the anxi ous affection of Gerald ; the noble generosity, the painful irritation during a failure of credit, the strict adherence to his word, in preference to the gratification of the most virr tuous passion, in the Royal Merchant, are among the best •samples of the dramatic art. Allowing for the improba,. (lity of all such plots, without which plays could not bet written, there is not a word misplaced, not a sentiment that does not naturally flow from the situation of the character, Nor an incident which is not must simple, easy, aucl natural. We thought we could perceive among the female pas of the audience, at least in the boxes, a want of interest its the humour of the beggars. There is a fastidious delicacy among our elegsnt females which repels all that is low. Tom Jones and Partridge begin to be out of relish amongst our fishionable novel.readers, and with such tastes Prig and Higsren must be quite odious. But the tradesinen'i wives ia ti;e pit, all the gods in the ;aeries, and at least some of the critic , , every where, must be deligho-ti w.th the satire, which, like the arrows of Death, strikes the 4rett and the mean, ~ he beggar and the king, at the -Arne time. Who does not feel, that when Prig says, if he is king, g , lee must have his capons and his tarkics.brougikt him