PROLOGUE FOR THE WOMEN WHEN THEY ACTED AT THE OLD THEATER IN LINCOLN'S INN FIELDS

[The title proves that this prologue was written between February 26, 1672, when the King's Company began performances in the old theater, and March 26, 1674, when they opened their new house in Drury Lane. It probably came near the beginning of this period; otherwise the jests in it would have lost their savor. It was first printed in Miscellany Poems, 1684.]

WERE none of you gallants e'er driven so hard,

As when the poor kind soul was under guard,

And could not do 't at home, in some by

[The date of this lively comedy, by Dryden, is fixed by the opening lines of the prologue, which apparently "allude to the equipment of the fleet which afterwards engaged the Dutch off Southwold Bay, May 28, 1672" (Malone, I, 1, 106). The play was printed in 1673. The prologue and epilogue, and the second of the two songs, were printed in the Covent Garden Drollery, 1672; both songs appear also in New Court Songs and Poems, by R. V., Gent., 1672; and the second of them in Westminster Drollery, the Second Part, 1672.]

PROLOGUE

LORD, how reform'd and quiet are we grown, Since all our braves and all our wits are gone!

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could,

But powerful guinea cannot be withstood, And they were made of playhouse flesh and blood.

Fate did their friends for double use ordain;

In wars abroad they grinning honor gain, And mistresses for all that stay maintain. Now they are gone, 't is dead vacation here, For neither friends nor enemies appear. 21 Poor pensive punk now peeps ere plays begin,

Sees the bare bench, and dares not venture in;

But manages her last half-crown with care, And trudges to the Mall, on foot, for air. Our city friends so far will hardly come, They can take up with pleasures nearer home;

And see gay shows and gaudy scenes elsewhere:

For we presume they seldom come to hear. But they have now ta'en up a glorious trade,

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And cutting Morecraft struts in masquerade.

There's all our hope, for we shall show

to-day

A masking ball, to recommend our play; Nay, to endear 'em more, and let 'em see We scorn to come behind in courtesy, We'll follow the new mode which they begin,

And treat 'em with a room, and couch within:

But yet too far our poet would not run; Tho' 't was well offer'd, there was nothing done,

He would not quite the woman's frailty bare,

But stripp'd 'em to the waist, and left 'em there:

And the men's faults are less severely shown,

For he considers that himself is one.
Some stabbing wits, to bloody satire bent,
Would treat both sexes with less compli-
ment;

Would lay the scene at home; of husbands tell,

For wenches taking up their wives i' th' Mell;

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[This Song and the following Answer to it are found in Covent Garden Drollery, 1672, and New Court Songs and Poems, by R. V., Gent., 1672, from the latter of which collections the following texts are taken. They were never published under Dryden's name during his lifetime. A parody of the second stanza of the Song appears in the third (1675) and later editions of The Rehearsal. The Key to that piece, published in 1704, states that the song ridiculed was made by Mr. Bayes [Dryden] on the death of Captain Digby, son of George, Earl of Bristol, who was a passionate admirer of the Duchess Dowager of Richmond, called by the author Armida: he lost his life in a sea-fight against the Dutch, the twenty-eighth of May, 1672." The Song may probably be accepted as Dryden's work; the Answer has not so strong evidence in its favor, as it may easily be the work of an imi

tator.

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