MARRIAGE A-LA-MODE:

A COMEDY.

_--Quicquid sum ego, quamvis
Infra Lucili censum ingeniumque, tamen me
Cum magnis vixisse, invita fatebitur usque
Invidia, et fragili quaerens illidere dentem,
Offendet solido._
HORAT. SERM.

MARRIAGE A-LA-MODE

Marriage a-la-mode was one of Dryden's most successful comedies. A
venerable praiser of the past time, in a curious letter printed in the
Gentleman's Magazine for 1745, gives us this account of its first
representation. "This comedy, acted by his Majesty's servants at the
Theatre-Royal, made its first appearance with extraordinary lustre.
Divesting myself of the old man, I solemnly declare, that you have
seen no such acting, no, not in any degree since. The players were
then, 1673, on a court establishment, seventeen men, and eight women."
_Gent. Mag._ Vol. xv. p. 99. From a copy of verses, to which this
letter is annexed, we learn the excellence of the various performers
by whom the piece was first presented. They are addressed to a young
actress.

Henceforth, in livelier characters excel,
Though 'tis great merit to act folly well;
Take, take from Dryden's hand Melantha's part,
The gaudy effort of luxuriant art,
In all imagination's glitter drest;
What from her lips fantastic Montfort caught,
And almost moved the thing the poet thought.
These scenes, the glory of a comic age,
(It decency could blanch each sullied page)
Peruse, admire, and give unto the stage;
Or thou, or beauteous Woffington, display
What Dryden's self, with pleasure, might survey.
Even he, before whose visionary eyes,
Melantha, robed in ever-varying dies,
Gay fancy's work, appears, actor renowned.
Like Roscius, with theatric laurels crowned,
Cibber will smile applause, and think again
Of Harte, and Mohun, and all the female train,
Coxe, Marshal, Dryden's Reeve, Bet Slade, and Charles's reign.

Mrs Monfort, who, by her second marriage, became Mrs Verbruggen, was
the first who appeared in the highly popular part of Melantha, and the
action and character appear to have been held incomparable by that
unquestionable judge of the humour of a coquette, or coxcomb, the
illustrious Colley Cibber. "Melantha" says Cibber, "is as finished an
impertinent as ever fluttered in a drawing-room; and seems