Chapter III: Act III: , Mademoiselle's "promises" is a mistake for "premises." The (2)

After many delays, Steele set out, in October, to attend the meetings of the Forfeited Estates Commission at Edinburgh, where he was very well received. He was, however, soon back in London, and, in June, 1718, obtained Letters Patent for the Fish-pool, which was followed by much litigation on the part of a man named Sansome, who said he had rendered valuable aid in developing the scheme. In the autumn, Steele was again in Scotland, and in December he lost his "dear and honoured wife." She was buried in the south transept of Westminster Abbey.

The Peerage Bill was introduced by the Government in 1719, with a view of limiting the power of creating new peers. The real object was to prevent a growth of the influence either of king or people, in both of which the aristocratic Whigs saw danger to themselves. Steele did not agree on this question with the party leaders, and he was honest and bold enough to oppose their bill in a paper called the _Plebeian_. Addison replied in the _Old Whig_, and unfortunately the controversy led to the estrangement of the two friends. There was no opportunity for reconciliation, for Addison died shortly after the appearance of these pamphlets. The Peerage Bill was revived in November, but was thrown out in December, immediately after the publication of another pamphlet by Steele.

The Government at once took steps to punish their candid friend. As early as 1717, the Duke of Newcastle, who then became Lord Chamberlain, had requested the managers of the theatre to accept a licence in place of their patent. This Steele declined to do, and the matter dropped; but in the following year there was further friction, owing to the claim of the managers that they were exempt from the Duke's authority. The Attorney-General was consulted on this point, and upon the question whether Steele had power to sell or alienate his interest in the patent; but the result is not recorded. The first act of revenge was an order, on December 19, 1719, forbidding Cibber--who had dedicated his _Ximena_ to Steele--to act or take part in the management of the theatre. Steele remonstrated, and commenced an interesting periodical called the _Theatre_, in vindication of himself and his fellow-managers. On January 23, 1720, the licence was revoked, and the Lord Chamberlain threatened to obtain a sign manual to silence the theatre. Steele petitioned the King, but on the 25th a warrant was issued forbidding any acting at Drury Lane until further order. On the 27th a licence, to be held during pleasure, was granted to Wilks, Cibber, and Booth; and on March 4, in spite of every effort of Steele's to obtain justice, the King's Company of Comedians were sworn at the office of the Lord Chamberlain, to whom they agreed to be subservient. Next month, in the last number of the _Theatre_, Steele alluded to the loss he had sustained in not being able to produce his own pieces advantageously, and stated that he would forthwith publish a new comedy, called _Sir John Edgar_. This agrees with letters from Dr. Rundle, who wrote that it was said that a most excellent comedy of Steele's was prevented being acted at the Haymarket Theatre, lest its wit and sense should spoil the relish for operas. This comedy, however, never saw the light.

Throughout 1720 the country was occupied with the fortunes of the South Sea Company and other schemes, by which people hoped to make rapid fortunes. Steele, both in and out of the House, again opposed the action of ministers, and his conduct was justified in the autumn, when the bubble burst. Aislabie, the elder Craggs, the Stanhopes, and Sunderland were all compromised; and Walpole became First Lord of the Treasury. Steele, as in the case of the 1715 Rebellion, advocated mercy towards the directors of the company as individuals, though he had fearlessly condemned their action while they had the power of doing harm. On the 2nd of May, 1721, through Walpole's influence, the Lord Chamberlain issued a warrant, ordering the managers of the theatre to account to Steele for his share of the profits, past and future. In the autumn he was again in Scotland.

Articles quadrupartite were entered into on September 19, between Steele, Wilks, Cibber, and Booth, by which it was agreed that Steele's executors should, for three years after his death, receive one-fourth part of the profits of the theatre, and should also have, at his death, £1,200 for his share in the patent, clothes, scenery, &c. Further articles were also signed, which had for their object the protection of the actors in case Steele were again deprived by order of the King or Lord Chamberlain of his interest in the theatre. These agreements did not prevent Steele having difficulty in getting from the other managers his share of the profits, though he had already given them £400 each, in consideration, as they said, of a fourth part of the scenery, &c., which belonged to them. At the close of the year Steele republished _The Drummer_, which had not been included by Tickell in the collected edition of Addison's works, and prefixed to it a vindication of himself from charges made by the editor. In March, 1722, he became Member of Parliament for Wendover.

IX.

As early as 1720 Steele spoke in the _Theatre_ of "a friend of mine" who was lately preparing a comedy according to the just laws of the stage, and had introduced a scene in which the first character bore unprovoked wrong, denied a duel, and still appeared a man of honour and courage. This was clearly an allusion to the play eventually to be published as _The Conscious Lovers_. And in a paragraph in Mist's _Weekly Journal_ for November 18, 1721, printed a year before the play appeared, readers were informed that "Sir Richard Steele proposes to represent a character upon the stage this season that was never seen there yet: His _Gentleman_ has been two years a dressing, and we wish he may make a good appearance at last." In June, 1722, Vanbrugh, in a letter to Tonson, lamented the absence of new plays of any value. "Steele, however," he said, "has one to come on at winter, which they much commend." On September 22 the _British Journal_ stated that a considerable number of new plays were promised at Drury Lane that season, and that Steele's new comedy would be set up immediately after Mrs. Centlivre's _The Artifice_. In October the newspapers announced that Steele's play would be called _The Unfashionable Lovers_, or as others said, _The Fine Gentleman_. When the play was produced, on November 7th, the title chosen was _The Conscious Lovers_.

Mrs. Oldfield, Mrs. Younger, Booth, Wilks, and Cibber took the principal parts in what was, in many respects, Steele's best play, and Benjamin Victor says that the author, with whom he sat at the first performance, was charmed with all the actors except Griffin, who represented Cimberton, a very ungrateful part. The play ran for eighteen nights, which at that time meant a great success, and there were eight further performances during the season. It was published in December,[8] with a dedication to the King, for which Steele appears to have received five hundred guineas.

In the Preface the success of the play was attributed to the excellent manner in which every part was acted; for a play is meant to be seen, not read. "The chief design of this was to be an innocent performance, and the audience have abundantly showed how ready they are to support what is visibly intended that way; nor do I make any difficulty to acknowledge that the whole was writ for the sake of the scene of the fourth act, wherein Mr Bevil evades the quarrel with his friend; and hope it may have some effect upon the Goths and Vandals that frequent the theatres, or a more polite audience may supply their absence." The general idea of the play was taken from Terence's _Andria_, but after the first two acts Steele's indebtedness to Terence is very slight. Cibber, however, rendered valuable assistance. "Mr. Cibber's zeal for the work," wrote Steele, "his care and application in instructing the actors, and altering the dispositions of the scenes, when I was, through sickness, unable to cultivate such things myself, has been a very obliging favour and friendship to me." Theophilus Cibber, who had a part in the original cast, says that when Steele finished the comedy, the parts of Tom and Phillis were not in it, and that Colley Cibber, when he heard it read, said he liked it upon the whole, but that it was rather too grave for an English audience, who think the end of a comedy is to make them laugh. Steele thereupon agreed to the introduction of some comic characters, and at his request the play received many additions by Cibber. The piece was, as Victor says, "the last blaze of Sir Richard's glory"; and it is probable that Cibber deserves all the thanks Steele gave him for preparing for the stage the manuscript which had for so long been in preparation, and which, without assistance, might never have been completed. It is difficult, however, to accept Theophilus Cibber's account in its entirety, because the germ of the delightful scene in which Tom, the gentleman's gentleman, describes how he fell in love with Phillis, is to be found in No. 87 of the _Guardian_, where Steele says he had in mind a scene which he had recently observed while passing a house. This is the form which the story ultimately took:--

_Tom._ Ah! Too well I remember when, and how, and on what occasion I was first surprised. It was on the first of April, one thousand seven hundred and fifteen, I came into Mr. Sealand's service; I was then a hobbledehoy, and you a pretty little tight girl, a favourite handmaid of the housekeeper. At that time we neither of us knew what was in us: I remember I was ordered to get out of the window, one pair of stairs, to rub the sashes clean; the person employed on the inner side was your charming self, whom I had never seen before.

_Phillis._ I think I remember the silly accident: What made ye, you oaf, ready to fall down into the street?

_Tom._ You know not, I warrant you--You could not guess what surprised me. You took no delight, when you immediately grew wanton, in your conquest, and put your lips close, and breathed upon the glass, and when my lips approached, a dirty cloth you rubbed against my face, and hid your beauteous form; when I again drew near, you spit, and rubbed, and smiled at my undoing.

_Phillis._ What silly thoughts you men have!

_Tom._ ... Oh, Phillis! Phillis! shorten my torment and declare you pity me.

_Phillis._ I believe it's very sufferable; the pain is not so exquisite but that you may bear it a little longer.

"If I were rich," said Phillis in another place, "I could twire and loll as well as the best of them. Oh, Tom! Tom! Is it not a pity that you should be so great a coxcomb, and I so great a coquette, and yet be such poor devils as we are?"

The names of some of the characters recall earlier writings, for Lucinda and her father, Mr. Sealand, Mr. Charles Myrtle, and Humphrey, the servant, had all appeared in the _Theatre_, while there was another Myrtle in the _Lover_. There are, too, passages which at once remind us of the style of the earlier periodicals; thus Bevil, after escorting a music-master to the door, says to Indiana, "You smile, madam, to see me so complaisant to one whom I pay for his visit: Now, I own, I think it is not enough barely to pay those whose talents are superior to our own (I mean such talents as would become our condition, if we had them). Methinks we ought to do something more than barely gratify them for what they do at our command, only because their fortune is below us"; to which Indiana replies, "You said, I smile; I assure you it was a smile of approbation; for, indeed, I cannot but think it the distinguishing part of a gentleman to make his superiority of fortune as easy to his inferiors as he can." Or, to take another passage in the conversation of these same "conscious lovers," Bevil remarks, "If pleasure be worth purchasing, how great a pleasure is it to him, who has a true taste of life, to ease an aching heart, to see the human countenance lighted up with smiles of joy on receipt of a bit of ore which is superfluous and otherwise useless in a man's own pocket." He even remembers to praise Addison: "The moral writers practise virtue after death: This charming Vision of Mirza! Such an author consulted in a morning sets the spirit for the vicissitudes of the day better than the glass does a man's person." And when Sir John Bevil observes that, "What might injure a citizen's credit may be no strain to a gentleman's honour," Mr. Sealand says, "Sir John, the honour of a gentleman is liable to be tainted by as small a matter as the credit of a trader." Much the same lesson is taught, less sententiously, when Phillis exclaims, "Oh, Tom! Tom! thou art as false and as base as the best gentleman of them all."

Parson Adams said that he thought _The Conscious Lovers_ the only play fit for a Christian to see; "indeed," he added, "it contains some things almost solemn enough for a sermon." In this kindly satire Fielding indicated the weakness of the play. The chief interest of the piece is sentimental, and the hero is not always free from priggishness. Yet the duelling scene, for which, as Steele says, the whole was written, has much dramatic interest, and the protest against false ideas of honour--"decisions a tyrant custom has introduced, to the breach of all laws both divine and human"--was at that time courageous, and much needed. If some of the things expressed in this play are more suited for a paper in the _Spectator_, there is nothing in true comedy which makes it incongruous to convey, in a manner suited to that form of art, a serious lesson of life. If, again, as some say, there is more pathos than is allowable in the scene in which Sealand recovers his long-lost daughter and sister, the end is that of true comedy; the "pedantic coxcomb" Cimberton no longer wants Sealand's daughter when he finds that, by the discovery of Indiana, Lucinda's fortune will be halved; Bevil is able, in marrying Indiana, the lady he loves, to comply with his father's wish that he should be united to Sealand's daughter; and Bevil's friend, Myrtle, the true lover whose affection is not lessened by change in the lady's dowry, is rewarded with the hand of Lucinda. The friends, formerly supposed by one of them to be rivals, thus become brothers.

Steele alluded to current criticism when he said, in his Preface, that the incident of the threatened duel and the case of the father and daughter were thought by some to be no subjects of comedy; "but I cannot," he continued, "be of their mind, for anything that has its foundation in happiness and success must be allowed to be the object of comedy." His object, as Welsted said in the Prologue, was to

"please by wit that scorns the aid of vice;
The praise he seeks, from worthier motives springs,
Such praise, as praise to those that give, it brings."

It was for the audience

"To chasten wit, and moralise the stage."

If success is to be measured by the amount of discussion caused by a work, _The Conscious Lovers_ was, indeed, fortunate. Dennis began the attack in a pamphlet before the play was publicly acted, and afterwards returned to the charge. Much of what he said was personal abuse, but some of his remarks are interesting, and show what were then held to be the weak points in the piece. He complained that Bevil was given the qualities of an old man, and maintained that the characters were not just images of their contemporaries, that patterns for imitation were set up instead of follies and vices being made ridiculous, and that the subject of the comedy was not by its constitution comical. Bevil's filial piety, he said, was carried too far, and his behaviour to Indiana was still more unaccountable, for though he had in one sense concealed his passion, there was no retreat with honour for him, because by his generosity and constant visits he had raised a passion for him in Indiana, and had compromised her. The catastrophe, he confessed, was very moving, but it might have been more surprising, if handled differently. The action in Terence's play was natural, as, for example, the conduct of Glycerium at the funeral of Chrysis; but the scene at the masquerade between Bevil and Indiana was an absurd imitation, for Indiana did not know that her affection was returned. As for Bevil, "this man of conscience and of religion is as arrant an hypocrite as a certain author," and was constantly dissimulating. Dennis concluded by saying that the sentiments were often frivolous, false, and absurd; the dialogue awkward, clumsy, and spiritless; the diction affected, barbarous, and too often Hibernian.

There were other pamphlets for and against the play, and the newspapers contained many articles on the subject. One writer remarked that a great part of Squire Cimberton's conversation, "some of which has since been omitted," could not be reconciled with rules often laid down by Steele. "He [Steele] must always be agreeable, till he ceases to be at all; and yet it has been always fashionable to use him ill: Blockheads of quality, who are scarce capable of reading his works, have affected a sort of ill-bred merit in despising 'em; and they who have no taste for his writings, have pretended to a displeasure at his conduct."

X.

The remaining years of Steele's life need not detain us long. In 1723 he wrote to his eldest daughter, Betty, "I have taken a great deal of pains to serve the world, and hope God will allow me some time to serve my own family. My good girl, employ yourself always in some good work, that you may be as good a woman as your mother." A few days later Vanbrugh wrote, "Happening to meet with Sir Richard Steele t'other day at Mr. Walpole's in town, he seemed to me to be (at least) in the declining way I had heard he was." The complications arising from the mortgage of Steele's interest in the theatre still troubled him, and from the 18th of June the other managers each took, for his own use, £1 13s. 4d. for every day upon which a play was acted, an arrangement from which Steele was excluded.

The success of _The Conscious Lovers_ encouraged Steele to endeavour to finish another play; and the newspapers reported that it would be acted that winter. This was _The School of Action_, which has for its scene a theatre, mistaken by a lady's guardian for an inn; but the piece was left in a very incomplete condition. There is also a fragment of another play, _The Gentleman_; it was a dramatised version of a paper in the _Spectator_ upon high life below stairs. In September illness forced Steele to go to Bath, and a few weeks later his only surviving son, Eugene, died. "Lord, grant me patience; pray write to me constantly," the father wrote to Betty: "Why don't you mention Molly? Is she dead, too?" In the spring of 1724 he was again in London, and in April a proposal for the payment of his debts was drawn up, from which it appears that, as he lived for more than five years afterwards, his liabilities were probably all met before his death. There was again reference to "a new play, which Sir Richard may produce next winter." In June an indenture quadrupartite was made between Steele, of the first part; Wilks, Cibber, and Booth, of the second part; a number of creditors, of the third part; and the Rev. David Scurlock, of the fourth part, to provide for the payment of debts out of Steele's share of the profits of the theatre. For this purpose Mr. Scurlock--Lady Steele's cousin--was appointed trustee.

The autumn of 1724 was spent at Carmarthen. In February, 1725, Steele was at Hereford, where he received £100 from the King's bounty; and in July he was again at Carmarthen. He retired to the country from "a principle of doing justice to his creditors," and not, as Swift said after his death, because of the "perils of a hundred gaols." In December, 1724, the other managers urged him to return to town at once; the audiences decreased daily, and it was impossible to contend against other forms of entertainment; the profits had fallen by more than a half. Nothing came of this application, and in September, 1725, protracted law proceedings were instituted in the Court of Chancery, by Steele and Scurlock, against Wilks, Cibber, Booth, Castleman, and Woolley. An abstract of the pleadings will be found in the Appendix. The Court gave judgment in February, 1728, confirming the allowance of £1 13s. 4d. a day to each of the three managers; but the case was not brought to a close until July, when, as Cibber says, "Sir Richard not being advised to appeal to the Lord Chancellor, both parties paid their own costs, and thought it their mutual interest to let this be the last of their law suits."

During the remaining three years of his life Steele lived chiefly at Tygwyn, a farm-house overlooking the Towy, and within sight of Carmarthen. There he had a stroke of paralysis, which was accompanied by a partial loss of speech, but he kept his sweetness of temper and kindliness towards others to the last. There is a pleasant anecdote, told by Victor, and fully confirmed elsewhere, that he "would often be carried out on a summer's evening, where the country lads and lasses were assembled at their rural sports, and, with his pencil, give an order on his agent, the mercer, for a new gown to the best dancer." By his will, made in 1727, and witnessed by John Dyer, the poet, he left the residue of his small property, after certain legacies, to his "dear and well-beloved daughters, Elizabeth and Mary." Elizabeth, who had many admirers, afterwards married Lord Trevor; Mary died shortly after her father. Before his death Steele was moved to a house in King Street, Carmarthen, where he passed away on September 1, 1729. On the 4th he was privately buried in the vault of the Scurlocks, in St. Peter's Church. This vault was accidentally opened in 1876, and Steele's remains exposed to view; but they were carefully re-interred, and the skull enclosed in a small lead coffin.

Steele's faults are apparent, and they have not been allowed to be forgotten by writers of his own day or of later times. That he was thriftless is manifest, but his income, though it came from various sources, was uncertain and irregular, and he had passed the prime of life before he had anything like handsome means. Many of his debts, too, are to be accounted for by the generosity and open-handedness which are a characteristic of the nation in which he was born. That he sometimes drank more than was wise is equally well known, but that fault does not strike us so much when we remember that hard drinking was then the common practice, and that many could consume, with impunity, an amount which would undoubtedly have upset Steele entirely.

Against these defects, and a certain general weakness of character to which they were due, we have to set his unselfish patriotism, the high aims of his writings, which had a most beneficial effect upon his own and future generations, his affection for wife and children, and his loyalty to his friends. Whatever there is to forgive is more than made up for by these qualities, which have made him, to this day, one of the best-loved characters of his time.

Steele's comedies were often reprinted in separate form during the century following their production, and there were about a dozen editions in which these separate plays were collected together, with a general title-page. The last of these bears the date 1761. In 1809 Nichols published the fragments of two unfinished comedies in his edition of Steele's Correspondence. In the present volume all Steele's dramatic works have for the first time been gathered together, and an attempt has been made to provide such annotation as seemed necessary. Changes of scene, sometimes not noticed in the old copies, have been indicated, and modern conventions respecting spelling and the like have been adopted, while punctuation, which was very erratic in the early issues, has, where necessary, been modified. The text has been collated with the first and later editions of each play.

G. A. AITKEN.

_THE FUNERAL:_

OR

_GRIEF À-LA-MODE._

"Ut qui conducti plorant in funere, dicunt,
Et faciunt propè plura dolentibus ex animo, sic
Derisor vero plus laudatore movetur."[9]
HORACE, _Ars. Poet._ 431-3.

_The Funeral: or, Grief à-la-Mode_, a Comedy, was written in the summer of 1701, and given to Christopher Rich, of the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane, in October. Soon afterwards it was acted, and it was published by Jacob Tonson between December 18 and 20, with the date 1702 on the title-page. The music to the songs, by William Croft, appeared between December 16 and 18. The original cast included Cibber (Lord Hardy), Wilks (Campley), Mills (Trusty), Pinkethman (Trim), Norris (Mrs. Fardingale), and Bullock (Kate Matchlock); with Mrs. Verbruggen (Lady Brumpton), Mrs. Rogers (Lady Harriot), and Mrs. Oldfield (Lady Sharlot). The play was revived occasionally in most of the years between 1703 and 1734, and from time to time during the following half-century, the last date, apparently, being April 17, 1799. The plot is entirely original.

_To the Right Honourable the_

COUNTESS OF ALBEMARLE.[10]

MADAM,

Among the many novelties with which your ladyship, a stranger in our nation, is daily entertained, you have not yet been made acquainted with the poetical English liberty, the right of dedication; which entitles us to a privilege of celebrating whatever for its native excellence is the just object of praise, and is an ancient charter, by which the Muses have always a free access to the habitation of the Graces.

Hence it is that this Comedy waits on your Ladyship, and presumes to welcome you amongst us; though indeed, madam, we are surprised to see you bring with you, what we thought was of our own growth only, an agreeable beauty; nay, we must assure you, that we cannot give up so dear an article of our glory, but assert it by our right in you: for if 'tis a maxim founded on the noblest human law, that of hospitality, that every soil is a brave man's country, England has a very just pretence of claiming as a native a daughter of Mr. Scravenmore.

But your Ladyship is not only endeared to us by the great services of your father, but also by the kind offices of your husband, whose frank carriage falls in with our genius, which is free, open, and unreserved. In this the generosity of your tempers makes you both excel in so peculiar a manner, that your good actions are their own reward; nor can they be returned with ingratitude, for none can forget the benefits you confer so soon as you do yourselves.

But ye have a more indisputable title to a dramatic performance than all these advantages; for you are yourselves, in a degenerate low age, the noblest characters which that fine passion that supports the stage has inspired; and as you have practised as generous a fidelity as the fancies of poets have ever drawn in their expecting lovers, so may you enjoy as high a prosperity as ever they have bestowed on their rewarded. This you may possess in an happy security, for your fortunes cannot move so much envy as your persons love.

I am, Madam,

Your Ladyship's most devoted

Humble Servant,

RICHARD STEELE.