  As puffing quacks some caitiff wretch procure, To swear the pill, or drop, has wrought a cure— Thus, on the stage, our play-wrights still depend, For epilogues and prologues, on some friend, Who knows each art of coaxing up the town, And make full many a bitter pill go down: Conscious of this, our bard has gone about, And teas’d each rhyming friend to help him out. “An Epilogue—things can’t go on without it; It could not fail, would you but set about it.” “Young man,” cries one—a bard laid up in clover— “Alas! young man, my writing days are over; Let boys play tricks, and kick the straw; not I: Your brother Doctor there, perhaps may try.” “What, I? dear Sir,” the Doctor interposes; “What, plant my thistle, Sir, among his roses! No, no, I’ve other contests to maintain; To-night I head our troops at Warwick Lane.58 These things are not our forte at Covent Garden.”59 Our Author’s friends, thus plac’d at happy distance, Give him good words, indeed, but no assistance. As some unhappy wight, at some new play, At the pit door stands elbowing away; While oft, with many a smile, and many a shrug, He eyes the centre, where his friends sit snug; His simpering friends, with pleasure in their eyes, Sink as he sinks, and as he rises rise; He nods, they nod; he cringes, they grimace; But not a soul will budge to give him place. Since, then, unhelp’d, our bard must now conform “To ’bide the pelting of this pitiless storm,” Blame where you must, be candid where you can, And be each critic the Good-natured Man. FOOTNOTES:57“The Author, in expectation of an Epilogue from a friend at Oxford, deferred writing one himself till the very last hour. What is here offered owes all its success to the graceful manner of the Actress who spoke it.” 58Where the College of Physicians formerly stood. 59Mr. B. Corney says:—“Colman, the manager of Covent Garden Theatre, had then written about ten prologues and epilogues: Garrick, the joint-patentee of Drury Lane Theatre, had written about sixty.” |
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