Don Carlos, Governor of Cadiz, who has been contracted to Julia, now married to a rich old churl, Francisco, in order to gain her, mans a galley, which has been captured from the Turks, with some forty or fifty attendants disguised as ferocious Ottomans; and whilst she, her husband and a party of friends are taking a pleasure trip in a yacht, they are suddenly boarded and all made prisoners by the supposed corsairs, who carry them off to a country villa a few miles from the town belonging to Carlos’ friend, Antonio, which, however, they are firmly convinc’d is a palace inhabited by the Great Turk himself. Here Carlos appears, dressed as the Sultan, with much pomp, and Francisco, overwhelmed with terror, speedily relinquishes Julia to his captor. In order to punish her for her intolerable arrogance, Isabella, Francisco’s daughter by his former wife, who is designed to wed Antonio, is introduced to a chimney-sweep, Guiliom, masquerading as a noble of high degree. She forthwith strikes up a match with the False Count, leaving Antonio free to marry Clara, Julia’s sister, whom he loves. No sooner, however, has the knot been securely tied than Guiliom, appearing in his sooty rags and with smutched face, publicly demands and humiliates his haughty bride. The trick of the feigned Turks is discovered by the arrival at the villa of Baltazer, Julia’s father. Don Carlos, however, claims his mistress by reason of his former contract, which is perforce allowed.
SOURCE.
Guiliom, masquerading as a Count, is of course directly derived from Les Précieuses Ridicules, first performed 18 November, 1659, and Isabella is a close copy of Cathos and Magdelon. Flecknoe had already adapted Molière in The Damoiselles à la Mode, unacted (4to 1667); and seven years later than Mrs. Behn, Shadwell, in his fine comedy, Bury Fair (1689), drew largely from the same source. His mock noble is a French peruke-maker, La Roch, who marries Lady Fantast’s affected daughter. Miller, in his The Man of Taste; or, The Guardian (1735), blended the same plot with L’Ecole des Maris. The stratagem of the feigned Turkish ship capturing the yacht is a happy extension of a hint from the famous galley scene (Que diable allait-il faire à cette galère?), Act ii, 7, Les Fourberies de Scapin. This, however, is not original with Molière, being entirely borrowed from Le Pédant Joué, Act ii, 4, of Cyrano de Bergerac (1654). What is practically a translation of Les Fourberies de Scapin by Otway, was produced at the Duke’s Theatre in 1677, and in the same year Ravenscroft included a great part of it in his Scaramouch a Philosopher, Harlequin a Schoolboy, Bravo, Merchant, and Magician.
In the Epilogue Mrs. Behn asserts that she wrote The False Count with ease in something less than a week. This may be a pardonable exaggeration; but there are certainly distinct marks of haste in the composition of the play. In Act iii, I, she evidently intended Francisco and his party to be seized as they were returning home by sea, at the end of the act she arranges their sea trip as an excursion on a yacht.
THEATRICAL HISTORY.
The False Count; or, A New Way to Play an Old Game was produced at the Duke’s Theatre, Dorset Garden, in the autumn of 1682, not later than the end of October. An excellent rattling farce, it seems to have kept the stage at intervals for some twenty years. On 11 August, 1715, there was a revival at Lincoln’s Inn Fields. It is billed as ‘not acted ten years’. Spiller played Guiliom, Mrs. Moor Isabella, and Mrs. Thurmond Julia. There is no further record of its performance.
THE FALSE COUNT: or, A New Way to play an old Game.
PROLOGUE.
Spoken by Mr. Smith.
Know all ye Whigs and Tories of the Pit,
(Ye furious Guelphs and Gibelins of Wit,
Who for the Cause, and Crimes of Forty One
So furiously maintain the Quarrel on)
Our Author, as you’ll find it writ in Story,
Has hitherto been a most wicked Tory;
But now, to th’joy o’th’ Brethren be it spoken,
Our Sister’s vain mistaken Eyes are open;
And wisely valuing her dear Interest now,
All-powerful Whigs, converted is to you.
’.was long she did maintain the Royal Cause,
Argu’d, disputed, rail’d with great Applause;
Writ Madrigals and Doggerel on the Times,
And charg’d you all with your Fore-fathers Crimes;
Nay, confidently swore no Plot was true,
But that so slily carried on by you:
Raised horrid Scandals on you, hellish Stories,
In Conventicles how you eat young Tories;
As Jew did heretofore eat Christian _Suckling;
And brought an Odium on your pious Gutling:
When this is all Malice it self can say,
You for the good Old Cause devoutly eat and pray.
Though this one Text were able to convert ye,
Ye needy Tribe of Scriblers to the Party;
Yet there are more advantages than these,
For write, invent, and make what Plots you please,
The wicked Party keep your Witnesses;
Like frugal Cuckold-makers you beget
Brats that secur’d by others fires shall sit.
Your Conventicling Miracles out-do
All that the Whore of_ Babylon e’er knew:
By wondrous art you make Rogues honest Men,
And when you please transform ‘em Rogues again.
To day a Saint, if he but hang a Papist,
Peach a true Protestant, your Saint’s turn’d Atheist:
And dying Sacraments do less prevail,
Than living ones, though took in Lamb’s-Wool-Ale.
Who wou’d not then be for a Common-weal,
To have the Villain covered with his Zeal?
A Zeal, who for Convenience can dispense
With Plays provided there’s no Wit nor Sense.
For Wit’s profane, and Jesuitical,
And Plotting’s Popery, and the Devil and all.
We then have fitted you with one to day,
’.is writ as ‘twere a Recantation Play;
Renouncing all that has pretence to witty,
T’oblige the Reverend Brumighams o’th’ City:
No smutty Scenes, no Jests to move your Laughter,
Nor Love that so debauches all your Daughters.
But shou’d the Torys now,—who will desert me,
Because they find no dry bobs on your Party,
Resolve to hiss, as late did Popish Crew, |
By Yea and Nay, she’ll throw her self on you, |
The grand Inquest of Whigs, to whom she’s true. |
Then let ‘em rail and hiss, and damn their fill,
Your Verdict will be Ignoramus still.