Page:Poems of Anne Countess of Winchilsea 1903.djvu/69
spring of her brain, has been refused by the theater, is by a vulgar series of double meanings interpreted into an acknowledgment by her of a crime that should be laid at the door of Mrs. Townley, the immoral heroine of the farce. The character of Phœbe Clinket is drawn merely for the purpose of caricaturing a learned lady. A brief analysis of the first act will serve to show the points of general satire as well as the points to be interpreted as especially applying to Lady Winchilsea.
When Mrs. Clinket appears on the stage she has on an ink-stained dress, and pens are stuck in her hair. She is accompanied by her maid carrying strapped to her back a desk on which her mistress may write. The following conversation shows the authoress in the throes of creation:
Maid.I had as good carry a raree-show about the street. Oh! how my back aches!
Clink.What are the labours of the back to those of the brain? Thou scandal to the muses, I have now lost a thought worth a folio, by thy impertinence.
Maid.Have I not got a crick in my back already, that will make me good for nothing, with lifting your great books?
Clink.Folio's call them and not great books, thou monster of impropriety. But have patience, and I will remember the three gallery-tickets I promised thee at my new Tragedy.
Maid.I shall never get my head-cloaths clear-starch'd at this rate.
Clink.Thou destroyer of learning, thou worse than a bookworm! Thou hast put me beyond all patience. Remember thou my lyric ode bound about a tallow-candle; thy wrapping up snuff in an epigram; nay, the unworthy usage of my Hymn to Apollo, filthy creature! read me the last lines I wrote upon the Deluge, and take care to pronounce them as I taught you.
Maid.Swell'd with a dropsy, sickly Nature lies,
And melting in a diabetes, dies.
[Reads with an affected Tone.]
Clink.Still without cadence!
Maid.Swell'd with a dropsy—