"Zounds, madam," cries a beau who is ogling a woman of quality in a stage box, "they say Anne Oldfield will never see forty-two again, but I'll warrant you, madam, she looks not a day older than yourself." And the woman of quality, who is over forty, bows at the compliment, as well she may. Bellchambers records that Lady Townley was universally regarded as Oldfield's ne plus ultra in acting. "She slided so gracefully into the foibles, and displayed so humorously the excesses, of a fine woman too sensible of her charms, too confident in her strength, and led away by her pleasures, that no succeeding Lady Townley arrived at her many distinguished excellencies in the character."[A] And the writer goes on to say that "by being a welcome and constant visitor to families of distinction, Mrs. Oldfield acquired a graceful carriage in representing women of high rank, and expressed their sentiments in a manner so easy, natural, and flowing, that they appeared to be of her own genuine utterance." Pray, sir, what is there so remarkable about that? Had not Anne as gentle blood as that which coursed through the veins of many a lady of rank?
[Footnote A: The Lady Townleys of later years included Mrs. Spranger
Barry and the imposing Mistress Yates.]
But the triumphs of the first Lady Townley were fast drawing to a close; the curtain would soon be rung down for ever upon that radiant face, with its angelic smile and dancing eyes, and the stage, whether Drury Lane or mother earth would see her no more. Ill health began to follow in her once careless path, and there were times when the duties of acting seemed almost unbearable. Yet she was a brave woman, and kept a merry front to the audience, although she was obliged, on occasions, to turn away from the house, that it might not see the tears of pain flowing down her cheek. Here was a combination of comedy and tragedy, with a vengeance!
Still Nance went on, delighting the town as of yore, and putting into her last original rôle, that of Sophonisba, a fire which breathed not of sickness nor failing powers. At last there came a day when she played her final part, and left Drury Lane only to be driven tenderly home to her death-bed. Think of the pathos of this last performance, this giving up of all that was most alluring in life, and let none of us poor moderns presume to analyse the heart-broken woman's feelings as she said good-bye to the dear old theatre. Anne worshipped art, and the public, in turn, worshipped her; she had acted her many parts, laughed, cried, sinned, and waxed exceeding happy—and now she was to be cast out into the darkness. Must she not have shivered when she entered her house in Lower Grosvenor Street for the last time? Poor lovable creature! There could be for her now neither lights, nor laughter, nor applause; all would be gloom and weariness to the end.
During the weeks which followed, the invalid received the untiring attentions of Mistress Saunders, who once upon a time played bouncing chambermaids, but who had, for ten years past, acted as a feminine valet de chambre and general factotum for Mrs. Oldfield. And if ever she played well, 'twas in thus ministering to the dying wants of one who in health had been ever helpful and generous. Pope, who hated the great comedienne in his petty, spiteful way, has immortalised the intimacy of mistress and handmaiden in these lines:
"'Odious! in woolen? 'twould a saint provoke!'
Were the last words that poor Narcissa spoke.
'No, let a charming Chintz and Brussels lace
Wrap my cold limbs and shade my lifeless face;
One would not sure be frightful when one's dead,
And, Betty, give this cheek a little red.'"[A]
[Footnote A: Pope's Moral Essays.]
These ante-mortem directions had no further reality than the imagination of the poet; but it is easy to believe that the woman who had set the fashions for the town these many years would have enough of the feminine instinct left, though Death waited without, to plan a becoming funeral garb. Woollen, forsooth! It was a beastly law which required that all the dead should be buried in that material, and Nance shuddered when she thought of it.[A]
[Footnote A: The dead were then buried in woolen, which was rendered compulsory by the Acts 30 Car. II. c. 3 and 36 ejusdem c. i. The first act was entitled "an Act for the lessening the importation of linnen from beyond the seas, and the encouragement of the woolen and paper manufactures of the kingdome." It prescribed that the curate of every parish, shall keep a register to be provided at the charge of the parish, wherein to enter all burials and affidavits of persons being buried in woolen; the affidavit to be taken by any justice of the peace, mayor, or such like chief officer in the parish where the body was interred…. It imposed a fine of five pounds for every infringement, one half to go to the informer, and the other half to the poor of the parish. This Act was only repealed by 54 Geo. III. c. 108, or in the year 1815. The material used was flannel, and such interments are frequently mentioned in the literature of the time.—ASHTON.]
Soon there were no more thoughts of dress, no more plaintive shudders at the iniquity of the woollen act. The eyes whose kindly light had illumined the dull soul of many a playgoer, closed for ever on the 23rd of October, 1730, and the incomparable Oldfield was no more. Surely old Sol did not shine on London that day; surely he must have mourned behind the leaden English sky for one of his fairest daughters, that child of sunshine who brightened the world by her presence, and made her exit, as she did her entrance, with a smile.