lizabethan romantic comedy. In particular, the
character of the bride, Annabel (Arabella in Harris's adaptation), has a
universal appeal. _The City Bride_, a very close copy of its original,
retains its virtues, and has some additional virtues of its own.

Not much is known of its author, Joseph Harris. Genest first notices him
as playing Bourcher, the companion of a French pirate, in _A
Common-Wealth of Women_. Thomas Durfey's alteration of _The Sea Voyage_
from the Beaumont and Fletcher folio, which was produced about September
1685. His subsequent roles were of a similar calibre, but if he never
rose to be a star he seems to have become a valued supporting player,
for in 1692 he was chosen to join the royal "comedians in ordinary." He
did not at first side with Thomas Betterton in his quarrel with the
patentees of the theatre in 1694-5, but he withdrew with him to
Lincoln's Inn Fields. Genest notices him for the last time as playing
Sir Richard Vernon in Betterton's adaptation of _1 Henry IV_, which was
produced about April 1700.

During his career on the stage Harris found time to compose a
tragi-comedy, _The Mistakes, or, The False Report_ (1691), produced in
December 1690; _The City Bride_, produced in 1696; and a comedy and a
masque, _Love's a Lottery, and a Woman the Prize. With a New Masque,
call'd Love and Riches Reconcil'd_ (1699), produced about March 1698/9.
_The Mistakes_ is clearly apprentice work, for Harris acknowledges in a
preface the considerable help of William Mountfort, who took the part of
the villain, Ricardo. Mountfort, who had already written three plays
himself, cut one of the scenes intended for the fifth act and inserted
one of his own composition (probably the last) which not only clarified
the plot but also elevated the character of the part he was to play. The
company seems to have done its best by the budding dramatist, for Dryden
wrote the prologue, a rather unusual one in prose and verse, and Tate
supplied the epilogue. Harris professed himself satisfied with the
play's reception, but owned that it was Mountfort's acting which really
carried it off.

_The City Bride_, on the other hand, shows its author completely
self-assured, and rightly so. No doubt some of his ease comes from the
fact that he had nothing to invent, but in large part it must derive
from his ten-years' experience on the stage. Harris added nothing to the
plot of _The City Bride_, although he commendably shifted it