MRS. BULKLEY. The Epilogue? MISS CATLEY. Yes, the Epilogue, my dear. MRS. BULKLEY. Sure you mistake, Ma'am. The Epilogue I bring it. MISS CATLEY. Excuse me, Ma'am. The Author bid me sing it. Recitative. Ye beaux and belles, that form this splendid ring, MRS. BULKLEY. Why sure the girl's beside herself: an Epilogue of singing, A hopeful end indeed to such a blest beginning. Besides, a singer in a comic set! Excuse me, Ma'am, I know the etiquette. MRS. BULKLEY. And she, whose party's largest, shall proceed. I've all the critics and the wits for me. MISS CATLEY. I'm for a different set.-Old men, whose trade is Recitative. Who mump their passion, and who, grimly smiling, Still thus address the fair with voice beguiling. Air-Cotillon. Turn, my fairest, turn, if ever Strephon caught thy ravished eye; Yes, I shall die, hu, hu, hu, hu, MRS. BULKLEY. Let all the old pay homage to your merit: Of French friseurs, and nosegays, justly vain, Who take a trip to Paris once a year To dress, and look like awkward Frenchmen here; MISS CATLEY. Ay, take your travellers, travellers indeed! Give me the bonny Scot, that travels from the Tweed. TUNE-A bonny young lad is my jockey. Air. I'll sing to amuse you by night and by day, With Sandy, and Sawney, and Jockey, MRS. BULKLEY. Ye gamesters, who, so eager in pursuit, Make but of all your fortune one va toute : Ye jockey tribe, whose stock of words are few, "I hold the odds.-Done, done, with you, with you." Ye barristers so fluent with grimace, 66 My Lord,-your Lordship misconceives the case." Doctors, who cough and answer every misfortuner, "I wish I'd been called in a little sooner," Assist my cause with hands and voices hearty, Come end the contest here, and aid my party. MISS CATLEY. Air-Balleinamony. Ye brave Irish lads, hark away to the crack, For sure I don't wrong you, you seldom are slack, Still to amuse us inventive, And death is your only preventive: MRS. BULKLEY. Well, Madam, what if, after all this sparring, MISS CATLEY. And that our friendship may remain unbroken, Agreed. Agreed. MRS. BULKLEY. MISS CATLEY. MRS. BULKLEY. And now with late repentance, Unepilogued the poet waits his sentence. To thrive by flattery, though he starves by wit. [Exeunt. AN EPILOGUE, INTENDED FOR MRS. BULKLEY. THERE is a place-so Ariosto sings A treasury for lost and missing things; Lost human wits have places there assigned them, And they who lose their senses, there may find them. But where's this place, this storehouse of the age? The moon, says he; but I affirm, the stage— At least, in many things I think I see His lunar and our mimic world agree : |