| |
By David Garrick, Esq.
Enter MR. WOODWARD, dressed in black, and holding a handkerchief to his eyes
EXCUSE me, sirs, I pray—I can’t yet speak— | |
| I’m crying now—and have been all the week. | |
| “’Tis not alone this mourning suit,” good masters: | |
| “I’ve that within—for which there are no plasters! | |
| Pray, would you know the reason why I’m crying? | 5 |
| The Comic Muse, long sick, is now a-dying! | |
| And if she goes, my tears will never stop; | |
| For as a player, I can’t squeeze out one drop: | |
| I am undone, that’s all—shall lose my bread— | |
| I’d rather, but that’s nothing—lose my head. | 10 |
| When the sweet maid is laid upon the bier, | |
| Shuter and I shall be chief mourners here. | |
| To her a mawkish drab of spurious breed, | |
| Who deals in sentimentals, will succeed! | |
| Poor Ned and I are dead to all intents; | 15 |
| We can as soon speak Greek as sentiments! | |
| Both nervous grown, to keep our spirits up, | |
| We now and then take down a hearty cup. | |
| What shall we do? If Comedy forsake us, | |
| They’ll turn us out, and no one else will take us. | 20 |
| But why can’t I be moral?—Let me try— | |
| My heart thus pressing—fixed my face and eye— | |
| With a sententious look, that nothing means, | |
| (Faces are blocks in sentimental scenes) | |
| Thus I begin: “All is not gold that glitters, | 25 |
| Pleasure seems sweet, but proves a glass of bitters. | |
| When Ignorance enters, Folly is at hand: | |
| Learning is better far than house and land. | |
| Let not your virtue trip; who trips may stumble, | |
| And virtue is not virtue, if she tumble.” | 30 |
| I give it up—morals won’t do for me; | |
| To make you laugh, I must play tragedy. | |
| One hope remains—hearing the maid was ill, | |
| A Doctor comes this night to show his skill. | |
| To cheer her heart, and give your muscles motion, | 35 |
| He, in Five Draughts prepar’d presents a potion: | |
| A kind of magic charm—for be assur’d, | |
| If you will swallow it, the maid is cur’d: | |
| But desperate the Doctor, and her case is, | |
| If you reject the dose, and make wry faces! | 40 |
| This truth he boasts, will boast it while he lives, | |
| No poisonous drugs are mixed in what he gives. | |
| Should he succeed, you’ll give him his degree; | |
| If not, within he will receive no fee! | |
| The College you, must his pretensions back, | 45 |
| Pronounce him Regular, or dub him Quack. | |
| |
