very kind of elephant does
To the white Elephant Buitenacke.
And thou alone shall have from me
Jimminy, Gomminy, whee, whee, whee,
The Gomminy, Jimminy, whee."

To which the lovely maiden answers:

"The great Jaw-waw that rules our Land,
And pearly Indian sea
Has not so absolute Command
As thou hast over me,
With a Jimminy, Gomminy, Gomminy,
Jimminy, Jimminy, Gomminy, whee."

[Footnote A: Theatrical performances in this reign generally began at
5 p.m.]

When the play is over Nance can take a new part, that of a feminine
conqueror. She has overshadowed Colley Cibber, who is more dazed than
chagrined at the _denouement_, and she has proved more potent for the
public amusement than all the beauties of "Jimminy, Gomminy," with its
elephants, its jaw-waw, and its pearly Indian Sea. As she sits in the
green-room, smiling in girlish triumph while she looks around at the
beaux and players who crowd about her, anxious to worship the rising
star, her eloquent glance falls on George Farquhar. There is a tear
in his eye, but a radiant expression about the face. What does the
Oldfield's success mean to the Captain? Perhaps Anne knows, as she
throws him a tender recognition; perhaps she thinks of that song in
"Sir Courtly Nice" which runs:

"Oh, be kind, my dear, be kind,
Whilst our Loves and we are Young;
We shall find, we shall find,
Time will change the face or mind,
Youth will not continue long.
Oh, be kind, my dear, be kind."

CHAPTER II

AN ENTRE-ACTE

While Anne Oldfield is resting from her first triumph and preparing
for another, let us glance for a moment at the theatrical conditions
which surround her. Curious, perplexing conditions they are, marking
as they do a transition between the brilliant but generally filthy
period of the Restoration--a period in which some of the worst and
some of the best of plays saw the light--and the time when the
punctilio and artificial decency of the age will cast over the stage
the cold light of formality and restraint. The nation is but slowly
recovering from the licentiousness which characterised the merry reign
of Charles II., that witty, sceptical sovereign, who never believed in
the honesty of man nor the virtue of frail woman. The playwrights are
recovering too, yet, if anything, more tardily than the people; for
when a nasty cynicism, like that pervading the old comedies, is once
boldly cultivated, many a long day must ela