NOTES TO INTRODUCTION
[Footnote 1: The other was William Burnaby. His plays have been given a modern editing by F.E. Budd (Scholartis Press, 1931).]
[Footnote 2: Nicoll, Early Eighteenth Century Drama, Handlist of Plays. For all subsequent statements as to dates of production I follow this source.]
[Footnote 3: It was still too lively, however, to be acted outside London. The Harvard Theatre Collection has a copy once owned by Joe Haines with "cuts" designed to soften it for playing in the provinces. Such lines as, "The Godly never go to Taverns, but get drunk every Night at one another's Houses," "Citizens are as fond of their Wives, as their Wives are of other People," and "Virtue's an Impossibility … every Citizen's Wife pretends to't," are carefully expunged.]
[Footnote 4: E.g., Bloom to Mrs. Driver, "One moment into that Closet, if it be but to read the Practice of Piety" becomes "One Moment into that Closet, Dear, dear Creature; they say it's mighty prettily furnish'd," And in her aside, "I vow, I've a good mind; but Virtue—the Devil, I ne're was so put to't i' my Life," for the words "the Devil" are substituted the words "and Reputation.">[
[Footnote 5: No. 50, Sept. 14; No. 61, Oct. 26.]
[Footnote 6: According to the impression I have of this "morbus" it was a skin-ailment particularly appropriated to beggars, who might contract it upon long exposure to filth and louse-bites. Even then, though there would doubtless be a certain amount "of discomfort about it, it would scarcely prove fatal.]
[Footnote 7: This and subsequent vital statistics as to Baker's university and clerical career are from the account of him in J. and J.A. Venn, Alumni Cantabrigienses, 1922 et sq.]
[Footnote 8: British Apollo, No. 49, Sept. 14, 1709.]
[Footnote 9: Ibid.]
[Footnote 10: Both Paul Bunyan Anderson, "The history and authorship of
Mrs. Crackenthorpe's Female Tatler," MP, XXVIII (1931), 354-60, and
Walter Graham, "Thomas Baker, Mrs. Manley, and The Female Tatler," MP,
XXXIV (1937), 267-72, think that some, at least, of the F.T. is from
Baker's pen, but they disagree as to what part and how much. I am
considering the matter and may have an opinion to express in future.]
[Footnote 11: Victoria History of Bedfordshire, II, 181 n.; III, 128.]
THE
Fine Lady's Airs:
OR, AN
EQUIPAGE of LOVERS.
A
COMEDY.
As it is Acted at the
THEATRE-ROYAL IN DRURY-LANE.
Written by the Author of the Yeoman of Kent.
LONDON:
Printed for BERNARD LINTOTT at the Cross-Keys, between the Two Temple Gates in Fleetstreet.
Price 1_s._ 6_d_.