MISS CATLEY in the Character of EUPHROSYNE Theatre-Royal in Covent-Garden. Regulated from the Prompt-Book, By PERMISSION of the MANAGERS, Printed for JoHN BELL, near Exeter-Exchange, in the Strand, MDCCLXXVII. PRE FACE. THIS HIS Mafque was firft reprefented at Ludlow-Castle, on Michaelmas-day, 1634; before the right honourable the earl of Bridgwater, lord prefident of Wales. The principal performers were the lord Brackly, Mr. Thomas Egerton, and the lady Alice Egerton. In the year 1774, it was abridged, and has ever fince been performed as an afterpiece at the Theatre Royal, in Covent. Garden. The following were the reafons offered to the public in favour of the abridgment, and were prefixed to an edition of the piece then published in its curtailed itate. "Pure poetry unmixt with paffion, however admired in the clofet, has fcarce ever been able to fulain itself on the stage. In this abridgment of Milton's Comus, no circumftance of the Drama contained in the Original Mafque, is omitted. The divine arguments on temperance and chastity, together with many defcriptive paffages, are indeed expunged or contracted: but, divine as they are, the most accomplished declaimers have been embarraffed in the recitation of them. The speaker vainly laboured to prevent a coldness and languor in the audience; and it cannot be diffembled, that the Mafque of Comus, with all its poetical beauties, not only maintained its place on the theatre chiefly by the affistance of mufic, but the mufic itself, as if overwhelmed by the weight of the drama, almost funk with it, and became *The mufic was originally compofed by Mr. Henry Lawes, who alfo reprefented the attendant Spirit: the prefent mufic is the compofition of Dr. Arne. in a manner loft to the ftage, That mufic, formerly heard and applauded with rapture, is now restored; and the Mafque on the above confiderations is curtailed. As a further argument in favour of the drama in its prefent form, it might perhaps be urged, that the feltivity of the character of Comus is heightened by his asfifting in the vocal parts, as well as in the dialogue; and that theatrical propriety is no longer violated in the character of the lady, who now invokes the Echo in her own perfon, without abfurdly leaving the fcene vacant, as heretofore, while another voice warbled out the song which the Lady was to be fuppofed to execute. To conclude: it may not be impertinent to observe, that the Faithful Shepherdefs, of Beaumont and Fletcher, which is esteemed one of the most beautiful compofitions in our language, not only afforded our author the first hint of this Mafque, but that feveral brilliant paffages of Comus are imitated from that excellent performance. Yet it is remarkable, that the play of the Faithful Shepherdefs, being merely poetical, was condemned on its first reprefentation; for which hard fate, though fucceeding critics have reprehended the barbarism of that age, yet no attempt has ever been hazarded to restore the hapless drama to the ftage." PRO |