[Footnote A: According to Edmund Bellchambers, Anne Oldfield "would have possessed a tolerable fortune, had not her father, a captain in the army, expended it at a very early period.">[
Yet the laughter of Thalia and the unbending of her sister Muse were hardly likely to make much impression in the Oldfield household, where money had more admirers than mythology, and so we are not surprised to learn that, with the death of the gallant captain, this "incomparable sweet girl," who would ere long reconcile even a supercilious Frenchman to the English stage, had to seek her living as a seamstress. How she sewed a bodice or hemmed a petticoat we know not, nor do we care; it is far more interesting to be told that, though only in her early teens, the toiler with the needle found her greatest recreation in reading Beaumont and Fletcher's plays. The modern young woman, be her station high or low, would take no pleasure in such a literary occupation, but in the days of Nance Oldfield to con the pages of Beaumont and Fletcher was considered a privilege rather than a duty. Then, again, the little seamstress had a soul above threads and thimbles; her heart was with the players, and we can imagine her running off some idle afternoon to peep slyly into Drury Lane Theatre, or perhaps walk over into Lincoln's Inn Fields, where the noble Betterton and his companions had formed a rival company. The performance over, she hurries to the Mitre Tavern, in St. James's Market, and here she is sure of a warm welcome, as is but natural, since the Mrs. Voss who rules the destinies of the hostelry is Anne's elder sister[A]. Here the girl loves to spend those rare moments of leisure, reading aloud the comedies of long ago and dreaming of the future; and here, too, it is that dashing Captain Farquhar listens in amazement as she recites the "Scornful Lady."
[Footnote A: According to one authority Mrs. Voss was Anne's aunt. We adhere, however, to Dr. Doran's account of the relationship.]
George Farquhar—how his name conjures up a vision of all that is brilliant, rakish, and bibulous in the expiring days of the seventeenth century! It is easy to picture him, as he stands near the congenial bar of the tavern, entranced by the liquid tones and marvellous expression of Nance's youthful voice. He has a whimsical, good-humoured face, perhaps showing the rubicund effects of steady drinking (as whose features did not in those halcyon times of merry nights and tired mornings?), and a general air of loving the world and its pleasures, despite a secret suspicion that a hard-hearted bailiff may be lying in wait around the corner. His flowing wig may seem a trifle old, the embroidery on his once resplendent vest look sadly tarnished, and the cloth of his skirted coat exhibit the unmistakable symptoms of age, but, for all that, Captain Farquhar stands forth an honourable, high-spirited gentleman. And gentleman George Farquhar is both by birth and bearing. Was he not the son of genteel parents living in the North of Ireland, and did he not receive a polite education at the University in Dublin? So polite, indeed, has his training been that he is already the author of that wonderful "Love and a Bottle," a comedy wherein he amusingly holds the mirror up to English vices, including his own. And, speaking of vices, he can now look back to those salad days when he wrote verses of unimpeachable morality, setting forth, among other sentiments, that—
"The pliant Soul of erring Youth
Is, like soft Wax, or moisten'd Clay,
Apt to receive all heav'nly Truth,
Or yield to Tyrant Ill the Sway.
Shun Evil in your early Years,
And Manhood may to Virtue rise;
But he who, in his Youth, appears
A Fool, in Age will ne'er be wise."
Poor fellow! He never will be wise in the material sense; he will trip gracefully through life with more brains and bonhomie than worldly discretion, yet eclipsing many steadier companions by writing the "Recruiting Officer" and other sparkling plays, not forgetting "The Inconstant," which will last even unto the end of the nineteenth century. At present—and 'tis the present rather than the past or future that most concerns the captain—he holds a commission in the army, which he is foolish enough to relinquish later on, and he has come to the very sensible conclusion that he is far more at home in the writing of comedies than the acting therein. For he has been on the stage, and precipitately retired therefrom after accidently wounding a fellow performer[A]. In the course of two or three years Farquhar will make a desperate attempt to be mercenary by marrying a girl whom he supposes to be wealthy; he will find out his mistake, and then, like the thoroughbred that he is, will go on cherishing her as though she had brought him a ton of rent-rolls. When he is dead and gone, Chetwood, the veteran prompter of Drury Lane, will tell us, quaintly enough, how "it was affirm'd, by some of his near Acquaintance, his unfortunate Marriage shortened his Days; for his Wife (by whom he had two Daughters), through the Reputation of a great Fortune, trick'd him into Matrimony. This was chiefly the Fault of her Love, which was so violent that she was resolved to use all Arts to gain him. Tho' some Husbands, in such a Case, would have proved mere Husbands, yet he was so much charm'd with her Love and Understanding, that he liv'd very happy with her. Therefore when I say an unfortunate Marriage, with other Circumstances, conducted to the shortening of his Days; I only mean that his Fortune, being too slender to support a Family, led him into a great many Cares and Inconveniences."
[Footnote A: Farquhar was playing in "The Indian Emperor" being cast for Guyomar, a character whose pleasant duty it is to kill Vasquez, the Spanish general. This particular Guyomar forgot to change his sword for a theatre foil, and in the subsequent encounter gave Vasquez too realistic a punishment].
No one would have appreciated the unconscious humour of Chetwood's assertion about "some husbands" more than Farquhar himself. One trembles to think, by the way what a "mere husband" must have been in the reigns of William or Anne.
In the meantime we are almost forgetting young Mistress Oldfield, who is still reading the "Scornful Lady," and putting new life and grace into lines which nowadays seem a bit academic and musty. The captain has not forgotten her, however; on the contrary, he is so charmed with what he hears that he makes some flimsy excuse to get into that room behind the bar whence the silvery voice proceeds. There he first meets Nance, surrounded by what audience we know not, and is struck dumb at the lovely figure standing out in bashful relief, as it were, against a background of wine bottles and ale tankards. There is an awkward pause, no doubt, and if the girl of fifteen comes to a sudden stop in her recital, Farquhar is no less embarrassed on his part.
The handsome, rosy face of a strapping tavern wench would not have startled him, but he was not gazing upon a bouncing serving maid or the hoydenish daughter of a prosperous innkeeper. He beheld a creature in all the gentle bloom of highbred beauty—tall, well-formed, and radiating a sort of natural elegance, with a fine-shaped, expressive face, to which great speaking eyes and a mouth half pensive, half smiling, lent an air of rare distinction. These were the eyes which in after years Anne would half close in a roguish way, as when, for instance, she meditated a brilliant stroke as Lady Betty Modish, and then, opening them defiantly, would make them glisten with the spirit of twinkling comedy. These were the eyes, too, which would shine forth such unutterable love when she played Cleopatra that one might well pardon the peccadilloes of poor Antony. But as yet there was no thought of drooping eyelids or amorous glances; all was natural, and nothing more so than the coyness of Nance upon seeing the author of "Love and a Bottle."