ears--ha! ha! ha!

_Hard._ Ha! ha! ha! The story is a good one. Well, honest
Diggory, you may laugh at that--but still remember to be
attentive. Suppose one of the company should call for a
glass of wine, how will you behave? A glass of wine, sir,
if-you please (_to_ DIGGORY).--Eh, why don't you move?

_Dig._ Ecod, your worship, I never have courage till I see
the eatables and drinkables brought upo' the table, and then
I'm as bauld as a lion.

_Hard._ What, will nobody move?

_First Serv._ I'm not to leave this pleace.

_Second Serv._ I'm sure it's no pleace of mine.

_Third Serv._ Nor mine, for sartain.

_Dig._ Wauns, and I'm sure it canna be mine."

No doubt all this is very "low" indeed; and perhaps Mr. Colman may be
forgiven for suspecting that the refined wits of the day would be
shocked by these rude humours of a parcel of servants. But all that
can be said in this direction was said at the time by Horace Walpole,
in a letter to a friend of his; and this criticism is so amusing in
its pretence and imbecility that it is worth quoting at large. "Dr.
Goldsmith has written a comedy," says this profound critic, "--no, it
is the lowest of all farces; it is not the subject I condemn, though
very vulgar, but the execution. The drift tends to no moral, no
edification of any kind--the situations, however, are well imagined,
and make one laugh in spite of the grossness of the dialogue, the
forced witticisms, and total improbability of the whole plan and
conduct. But what disgusts me most is, that though the characters are
very low, and aim at low humour, not one of them says a sentence that
is natural, or marks any character at all." Horace Walpole sighing for
edification--from a Covent Garden comedy! Surely, if the old gods have
any laughter left, and if they take any notice of what is done in the
literary world here below, there must have rumbled through the courts
of Olympus a guffaw of sardonic laughter, when that solemn criticism
was put down on paper.

Meanwhile Colman's original fears had developed into a sort of stupid
obstinacy. He was so convinced that the play would not succeed, that
he would spend no money in putting it on the stage; while far and wide
he announced its failure as a foregone conclusion. Under this gloom of
vaticination the rehearsals were nevertheless proceeded with--the
brunt of the quarrels among the players falling who