Whereas you desire us, by way of exchange, to furnish you with some of the most memorable transactions that have lately fallen out in this part of the globe; we willingly comply with your proposal, and are proud of any opportunity to shew Mr. Haines how much we respect and value him.
Imprimis, Will’s coffee-house, Mr. Haines, is much in the same condition, as when you left it; and as a worthy gentleman has lately distributed them into their proper classes, we have four sorts of persons that resort hither; first, Such as are beaux and no wits, and these are easy to be known by their full periwigs and empty sculls; secondly, Such as are wits and no beaux, and these, not to talk of their out-sides, are distinguish’d by censuring the ill taste of the age, and railing at one another; thirdly, Such as are neither wits nor beaux, I mean your grave plodding politicians that come to us every night piping hot from the parliament-house, and finish treaties that were never thought of, and end wars before they are begun; and fourthly, Such as are both wits and beaux, to whose persons, as well as merits, you can be no stranger.
In the next place, the Playhouse stands exactly where it did. Mr. Rich finds some trouble in managing his mutinous subjects, but ’tis no more than what princes must expect to find in a mixt monarchy, as we take the Playhouse to be. The actors jog on after the old merry rate, and the women drink and intrigue. Mr. Clinch of Barnet, with his pack of dogs and organ, comes now and then to their relief; and your friend Mr. Jevon would hang himself, to see how much the famous Mr. Harvey exceeds him in the ladder-dance.
We have had an inundation of plays lately, and one of them, by a great miracle, made shift to hold out a full fortnight. The generality are either troubled with convulsion-fits, and die the first day of the representation, or by meer dint of acting, hold out to the third; which is like a consumptive man’s living by cordials, or else die a violent death, and are interr’d with the solemnity of catcalls. A merry virtuoso, who makes one of the congregation de propagando ingenio, designs to publish a weekly bill for the use of the two theatres, in imitation of that published by the parish clerks, and faithfully to set down what distemper every new play dies of.
If the author of a play strains hard for wit, and it drivels drop by drop from him, he says it is troubled with a strangury. If it is vicious in the design and performance, and dull throughout, he intends to give it out in his bill, that it died by a knock in the cradle; if it miscarries for want of fine scenes, and due acting, why then he says, ’tis starv’d at nurse; if it expires the first or second day he reckons it among the abortive; and lastly, if it is damn’d for the feebleness of its satire, he says it dies in breeding of teeth.
As our wit, generally speaking is debauch’d, so our wine, the parent of it, is sophisticated all over the town; and as we never had more plays in the two houses, and more wine in city than at present, so we were never encumber’d with worse of the two sorts than now. As for the latter, we sell that for claret which has not a drop of the juice of the grape in it, but is downright cyder. The corporation does not stop short here, but our cyder, instead of apples, is made of turnips. Who knows where the cheat will conclude? perhaps the next generation will debauch our very turnips.
’Tis well, Mr. Haines, you dy’d when you did, for that unhappy place, where you have so often exerted your talent, I mean Smithfield, has fallen under the city magistrate’s displeasure; so that now St. George and the Dragon, the Trojan horse, and Bateman’s ghost, the Prodigal Son, and Jeptha’s Daughter: In short, all the drolls of glorious memory, are routed, defeated, and sent to grass, without any hopes of a reprieve.
Next to plays, we have been over-run, in these times of publick ferment and distraction, with certain wicked things, called pamphlets; and some scriblers that shall be nameless, have writ pro and con upon the same subject, at least six times since last spring.
Both nations are at bay, and like two bull-dogs snarl at one another, yet have not thought fit, as yet, to come to actual blows. What the event will be, we cannot prophesy at this distance, but every little corporation in the kingdom has laid Lewis le Grand upon his back, and as good as call’d him perjur’d knave and villain. However, ’tis the hardest case in the world if we miscarry; our Grub-street pamphleteers advise the shires and boroughs what sort of members to chuse; the shires and boroughs advise their representatives what course to steer in parliament; and the senators, no doubt on’t, will advise his majesty what ministers to rely on, and how to behave himself in this present conjuncture. Thus, advice, you see, like malt-tickets, circulates plentifully about the kingdom; so that if we fail in our designs, after all, the wicked can never say, ’twas for want of advice. We forgot to tell you, Mr. Haines, that since you left this upper world, your life has been written by a brother-player, who pretends he received all his memoirs from your own mouth, a little before you made a leap into the dark; and really you are beholden to the fellow, for he makes you a master of arts at the university, tho’ you never took a degree there. That, and a thousand stories of other people he has father’d upon you, and the truth on’t is, the adventures of thy life, if truly set down, are so romantick, that few besides thy acquaintance would be able to distinguish between the history and the fable. But let not this disturb the serenity of your soul, Mr. Haines, for after this rate the lives of all illustrious persons, whether ancient or modern, have been written. This, Mr. Haines, is all we have to communicate to you at present, so we conclude, with subscribing ourselves,
Your most humble Servants,