251 184 You couldn't go off kneeling, could ye?: An exit attended with almost equal difficulty is in The Rehearsal (iii, 2) where Prince Volscius, torn betwixt Honour and Love, makes his exit" with one Boot on, and the other off."

252 198 Lord Burleigh: William Cecil (1520-1598), created Baron of Burghley in 1571, and in the next year Lord High Treasurer of England. "To follow his career from this point to its close would be to write the history of England; for by him, more than by any other single man during the last thirty years of his life, was the history of England shaped." (Dictionary of National Biography.)

252 216 More cannon to fire: In Jupiter, Sheridan had used trouble with stage "ordnance" for comic effect. (See Introduction, p. lxxxv.) 253 222 The minuet in Ariadne: Arianna (Ariadne), an Italian opera, music by Handel, was first represented in London in 1734 (score dated 1733). "The minuet in the first scene was long popular." Cyclopedia of Music and Musicians, I, 67. One of Tony Lumpkin's "shabby fellows" at the alehouse says: "May this be my poison if my bear ever dances but to the very genteelest of tunes - Water Parted, or the minuet in Ariadne" (She Stoops to Conquer, i, 2). In Sheridan's Jupiter is this line, "This hint I took from Handel." Taken in connection with the previous passage about the " ordnance," it seems evident that Sheridan was here utilizing the material of his earlier farce.

256 340 Parry Carte: A" parry in quart" guards against the "thrust in quart," in fencing. The "thrust in tierce" is another regular term in fencing, but the " flankonade" is to be found only in Puff's dictionary. "A palpable hit" is Osric's famous phrase "A hit, a very palpable hit" (Hamlet, v, 2, 292). Sheridan's own " palpable hits at Hamlet must have been especially appreciated by the first-night audience, as The Critic was played as an " after-piece to Hamlet.

258 387 Edge away at the Top: At the back of the stage.

259 408 Drake at the Armada: Sir Francis Drake commanded under Lord Howard in the conflict with the Spanish Armada.

261 466 Gravesend: On the south bank of the Thames, some score or more miles below London, and not far from Tilbury Fort.

ACT III. SCENE 1

263 32 Now, pray mark this Scene: In the burlesque "recognition scene " which follows there may be some instances of specific parody of passages in Home's well-known tragedy, Douglas (1756). (See Introduction, p. civ, and especially Appendix, p. 330.)

264 41 My Name's John Wilkins — Alias have I none: Sheridan may have intended to parody the most familiar lines in Douglas (ii),

My name is Norval," etc. Norval turns out to be the alias for young Douglas. It must be remembered, however, that the scene which Dangle pronounces to be "one of the finest Discovery scenes I ever serves as a general burlesque of numerous absurd recognition scenes in contemporary drama.

saw"

265 83 Perdition catch my soul, but I do love thee: This line which "Shakespeare made use of first" is in Othello, iii, 3, 90-91.

266 119 Lord Burleigh comes forward, shakes his head, and exit: For a possible hint in Fielding that may have suggested this passage, see Introduction, The Sources of The Critic, p. lxxxix. 270 205 Thrust in tierce: A fencing term. 270 208 nity — he would have added: Perhaps Sheridan had in mind the conclusion of Hotspur's dying speech: Hot. And food for – [Dies]. Prince. For worms, brave Percy (1 Henry IV, v, 4, 86–7).

See note, p. 311.

272 255 Now then for my magnificence: For a possible parallel, see Introduction, The Sources of The Critic, p. lxxxvii.

272 264 Those are his Banks: Sheridan's Thames with his Banks recalls somewhat, as has sometimes been suggested, the dance of Earth, Moon, and Sun in the last act of The Rehearsal. Thames fails to remain between his Banks, while, in The Rehearsal," by the very nature of this Dance, the Earth must be sometimes between the Sun and the Moon, and the Moon between the Earth and Sun; and there you have both your Eclipses."

the fleets engage:

273 (stage direction) Scene changes to the sea See Introduction, The Element of Actual History in The Critic.

273 (stage direction) Handel's water musick: A suite of twenty-one movements, "first performed on the Thames, Aug. 22, 1715, when George I. and the Royal family sailed from Limehouse to Whitehall. Handel followed the Royal barge with his orchestra, and performed this suite to the delight of the king, who asked the name of its composer." (Cyclopedia of Music and Musicians, III, 566.) The sequel was the restoration of Handel, then in disgrace, to royal favor and an increased pension.

273 (stage direction) The march in Judas Maccabæus: Handel's oratorio, Judas Maccabæus, was first performed in London in 1747.

APPENDIX

THE RIVALS

I. CONTEMPORARY CRITICISMS OF THE RIVALS

(a) ON THE FIRST PERFORMANCE, JANUARY 17, 1775

The Public Ledger, January 18, 1775. — The Rivals, as a Comedy, requires much castigation, and the pruning hand of judgment, before it can ever pass on the Town as even a tolerable Piece. In language it is defective to an extreme, in Plot outré and one of the Characters is an absolute exotic in the wilds of nature. The author seems to have considered puns, witticisms, similes and metaphors, as admirable substitutes for polished diction; hence they abound in every sentence; and hence it is that instead of the ‘Metmorphosis' of Ovid, one of the characters is made to talk of Ovid's 'Meat-for-Hopes,' 1 a Lady is called the 'Pine Apple of beauty,' the Gentleman in return ‘an Orange of perfection.' A Lover describes the sudden change of disposition in his Mistress by saying, that 'she flies off in a tangent born down by the current of disdain'; and a second Tony Lumkin, to describe how fast he rode, compares himself to a 'Comet with a tail of dust at his heels.'

1

These are shameful apsurdities in language, which can suit no character, how widely soever it may depart from common life and

common manners.

Whilst thus censure is freely passed, not to say that there are various sentiments in the Piece which demonstrate the Author's no stranger to the finer feelings, would be shameful partiality. .

1 This passage shows how Sheridan did apply "the pruning hand of judgment" in the revision of the play for January 28. A contributor to The Morning Chronicle (January 20, 1775) writes, "The miserable pun used by a footman to a coachman of meat for horses, instead of metamorphosis, is much too contemptible even for a postilion."

Many of the parts were improperly cast. Mr. Lee [Sir Lucius O'Trigger] is a most execrable Irishman. Miss Barsanti [Lydia Languish] is calculated only for a mimic; she has the archness of look and manner, that shrug of the shoulders, which must for ever unqualify her for genteel Comedy; and when she is represented as a girl of thirty thousand pounds fortune, we curse the blind Goddess for bestowing her favours so absurdly; then she has the agreeable lisp of Thomas Hull, and cannot be expected to articulate her words so as to be understood, unless her tongue first undergoes a cutting.

The Morning Chronicle, January 20, 1775. — To the Printer, Sir, There is certainly some evil genius attends the proceedings of Covent Garden Theatre. Our expectations have been some time raised with the hope that they were at last to produce us a truly good comedy; the hour of proof arrives, and we are presented with a piece got up with such flagrant inattention, that half the performers appear to know nothing of their parts, and the play itself is a full hour longer in the representation than any piece on the stage. — This last circumstance is an error of such a nature as shows either great obstinacy in the Author, or excessive ignorance in the managers; but the casting Mr. Lee for the part of Sir Lucius O'Trigger, is a blunder of the first brogue, which Mr. Lee plainly shewed as he was not Irishman enough to have committed for himself. If there had been no one in the theatre fit for the part, it should have been taken out of the piece which is full exuberant enough to spare it. As I find the further representation of it is put off for the present, I suppose this will be the case; for to attempt to continue him in the character will inevitably damn the play. . . . The character of Faulkland is touched with a delicate and masterly hand. . . . There is as much true humour in Acres and David as in any character on the stage whatever. What the characters of Sir Anthony and Sir Lucius ought to have appeared I cannot take upon me to say, but Shuter, from being imperfect appeared to ruin some scenes, which, from the situations, seemed to promise noble effects from his vis Comica. . . . Yours &c. A Friend to Comedy.

The Morning Chronicle, January 20, 1775. Sir, - I cannot avoid taking the earliest opportunity of reprehending, in the severest

manner, one of the performers of Covent Garden Theatre, for his shameful negligence, in not being perfect in a single sentence, at the representation of The Rivals on Tuesday last. Before I name the man, every lover of the drama, will, I am persuaded, point him out: for fear, however, the town should be wrong in their conjecture, and any other person should suffer by it, I will give you, Mr. Printer, his name in capitals. The person I allude to is MR. SHUTER. I will treat him like a gentleman in my appellation, though he probably may not deserve it. If his incorrectness arises from his strong feelings, I really pity his condition, and a public declaration of this kind would do him service, but if it is the effect of inattention, I will be bold to tell him, that, in an equitable consideration, he is more immoral and unjust than a highwayman; for by this shameful usage, he, in all probability may rob an author of four or five hundred pounds, besides what is as dear to man as his existence his reputation.

The Morning Post, January 20, 1775.

One of the Pitt.

Sir, Next to the torment

of sitting out a very dull Comedy, I know not a more uneasy situation than that of hearing an apparently good one mangled in the representation. I think I never saw a performance more disgraceful to a Theatre-Royal than the manner in which the Rivals was performed at Covent Garden; none of the performers seemed to be tolerably perfect except Mrs. Bulkley and Miss Barsanti; Shuter did not know any two lines together, and whenever he was out, he tried to fill the interval with oaths and buffoonery; in all his scenes with Woodward he put him out; and for the Irishman, of all disgusting attempts that ever was damn'd in a strolling company, nothing ever came up to this. The audience shewed great partiality and lenity for the author, in making a distinction between the merit of the piece, and the excessive demerit of the representation of this character; which one would have thought must have damned the best play that ever was written: as it stands, it is absolutely impossible that the piece can go on; the others may get perfect, and do justice to their parts, but Lee never can be suffered in this character, and his deportment in it, is literally such, as will bully even the Author's friends into hissing. Yours, &c. Hibernicus.