read it! What makes it more certain is, that my father guessed it was yours the first time he saw it praised in the paper."

crown.

This statement respecting the epilogue would, if true, deprive Sheridan of one of the fairest leaves of his poetic It appears, however, to be but a conjecture hazarded at the moment, and proves only the high idea entertained of Mrs. Sheridan's talents by her own family. The cast of the play at Bath, and its success there and elsewhere, are thus mentioned in these letters of Miss Linley:

"Bath, February 18, 1775. "What shall I say of The Rivals!-a compliment must naturally be expected; but really it goes so far beyond any thing I can say in its praise, that I am afraid my modesty must keep me silent. When you and I meet I shall be better able to explain myself, and tell you how much I am delighted with it. We expect to have it here very soon :—it is now in rehearsal. You pretty well know the merits of our principal performers :-I'll show you how it is cast.

(A new actor of great merit, and a sweet figure.)

Julia
Lucy

Mr. Brunsdon.

Mrs. Wheeler.

Miss Wheeler.

(Literally, a very pretty romantic girl, of seventeen.)

Mrs. Didier.
Mrs. Brett.

There, Madam, do not you think we shall do your Rivals. some justice? I'm convinced it won't be done better any where out of London. I don't think Mrs. Mattocks can do Julia very well."

"Bath, March 9, 1775.

"You will know by what you see enclosed in this frank my reason for not answering your letter sooner was, that I waited the success of Sheridan's play in Bath; for, let me tell you, I look upon our theatrical tribunal, though not in quantity, in quality as good as yours, and I do not believe there was a critic in the whole city that was not there. But, in my life, I never saw any thing go off with such uncommon applause. I must first of all inform you that there was a very full house :-the play was performed inimitably well; nor did I hear, for the honour of our Bath actors, one single prompt the whole night; but I suppose the poor creatures never acted with such shouts of applause in their lives, so that they were incited by that to do their best. They lost many of Malaprop's good sayings by the applause: in short, I never saw or heard any thing like it ;-before the actors spoke, they began their clapping. There was a new scene of the N. Parade, painted by Mr. Davis, and a most delightful one it is, I assure you. Every body says,-Bowers in particular, that yours in town is not so good. Most of the dresses were entirely new, and very handsome. On the whole, I think Sheridan is vastly obliged to poor dear Keasberry for getting it up so well. We only wanted a good Julia to have made it quite complete. You must know that it was entirely out of Mrs. Didier's style of playing: but I never saw better acting than Keasberry's,-so all the critics. agreed."

--

"Bath, August 22d, 1775. "Tell Sheridan his play has been acted at Southampton:above a hundred people were turned away the first night. They say there never was any thing so universally liked. They have very good success at Bristol, and have played The Rivals several times:-Miss Barsanti, Lydia, and Mrs. Canning, Julia."

To enter into a regular analysis of this lively play, the best comment on which is to be found in the many smiling

faces that are lighted up around wherever it appears, is a task of criticism that will hardly be thought necessary. With much less wit, it exhibits perhaps more humour than The School for Scandal, and the dialogue, though by no means so pointed or sparkling, is, in this respect, more natural, as coming nearer the current coin of ordinary conversation; whereas, the circulating medium of The School for Scandal is diamonds. The characters of The Rivals, on the contrary, are not such as occur very commonly in the world; and, instead of producing striking effects with natural and obvious materials, which is the great art and difficulty of a painter of human life, he has here overcharged most of his persons with whims and absurdities, for which the circumstances they are engaged in afford but a very disproportionate vent. Accordingly, for our insight into their characters, we are indebted rather to their confessions than their actions. Lydia Languish, in proclaiming the extravagance of her own romantic notions, prepares us for events much more ludicrous and eccentric, than those in which the plot allows her to be concerned; and the young lady herself is scarcely more disappointed than we are, at the tameness with which her amour concludes. Among the various ingredients supposed to be mixed up in the composition of Sir Lucius O'Trigger, his love of fighting is the only one whose flavour is very strongly brought out; and the wayward, captious jealousy of Falkland, though so highly coloured in his own representation of it, is productive of no incident answerable to such an announcement:-the imposture which he practises upon Julia being perhaps weakened in its effect, by our recollection of the same device in the Nut-brown Maid and Peregrine Pickle.

The character of Sir Anthony Absolute is, perhaps, the best sustained and most natural of any, and the scenes between him and Captain Absolute are richly, genuinely dramatic. His surprise at the apathy with which his son receives the glowing picture which he draws of the charms of his destined bride, and the effect of the question, "And which is to be mine, Sir,-the niece or the aunt?" are in the truest

style of humour. Mrs. Malaprop's mistakes, in what she herself calls" orthodoxy," have been often objected to as improbable from a woman in her rank of life; but, though some of them, it must be owned, are extravagant and farcical, they are almost all amusing,—and the luckiness of her simile, "as headstrong as an allegory on the banks of the Nile," will be acknowledged as long as there are writers to be run away with, by the wilfulness of this truly "headstrong" species of composition.

Of the faults of Sheridan both in his witty and serious styles-the occasional effort of the one, and the too frequent false finery of the other-some examples may be cited from the dialogue of this play. Among the former kind is the fol lowing elaborate conceit :

"Falk. Has Lydia changed her mind? I should have thought her duty and inclination would now have pointed to the same object.

“Abs. Ay, just as the eyes of a person who squints: when her love-eye was fixed on me, t'other-her eye of duty-was finely obliqued : but when duty bade her point that the same way, off turned t'other on a swivel, and secured its retreat with a frown.”

This, though ingenious, is far too laboured-and of that false taste by which sometimes, in his graver style, he was seduced into the display of second-rate ornament, the following speeches of Julia afford specimens :

"Then on the bosom of your wedded Julia, you may lull your keen regret to slumbering; while virtuous love, with a cherub's hand, shall smooth the brow of upbraiding thought, aud pluck the thorn from compunction."

Again :-"When hearts deserving happiness would unite their fortunes, virtue would crown them with an unfading garland of modest hurtless flowers; but ill-judging passion will force the gaudier rose into the wreath, whose thorn offends them when its leaves are dropt."

But, notwithstanding such blemishes, and it is easy for the microscopic eye of criticism to discover gaps and inequalities in the finest edge of genius,-this play, from the liveliness of its plot, the variety and whimsicality of its characters, and the exquisite humour of its dialogue, is one of the most amusing in the whole range of the drama; and even without the aid of its more splendid successor, The School for Scandal, would have placed Sheridan in the first rank of comic writers.

A copy of The Rivals has fallen into my hands, which once belonged to Tickell, the friend and brother-in-law of Sheridan, and on the margin of which I find written by him in many places his opinion of particular parts of the dialogue.* He has also prefixed to it, as coming from Sheridan, the following humorous dedication, which, I take for granted, has never before met the light, and which the reader will perceive, by the allusions in it to the two Whig ministries, could not have been written before the year 1784:

"DEDICATION TO IDLENESS.

"MY DEAR FRIEND,

"If it were necessary to make any apology for this freedom, I know you would think it a sufficient one, that I shall find it easier to dedicate my play to you than to any other person. There is likewise a propriety in prefixing your name to a work begun entirely at your suggestion, and finished under your auspices; and I should think myself wanting in gratitude to you, if I did not take an early opportunity of acknowledging the obligations which I owe you. There was a time-though it is so long ago that I now scarcely remember it, and cannot mention it without compunction-but there was a time, when the importunity of parents, and the example of a few injudicious young men of my acquaintance, had almost prevailed on me to thwart my genius, and prostitute my abilities by an application to serious pursuits. And if you had not opened my eyes to the absurdity and profligacy of such a perversion of the best gifts of nature, I am by no means clear that. I might not have been a wealthy

* These opinions are generally expressed in two or three words, and are, for the most part, judicious. Upon Mrs. Malaprop's quotation from Shakspeare," Hesperian curls," &c. he writes, "overdone-fitter for farce than comedy." Acres's classification of oaths, "This we call the oath refe rential," &c. he pronounces to be "very good, but above the speaker's capacity." Of Julia's speech, "Oh woman, how true should be your judgment, when your resolution is so weak!" he remarks, "On the contrary, it seems to be of little consequence whether any person's judgment be weak or not, who wants resolution to act according to it."