al of secrecy. And his appeal to these friends was very significant
of the pride he felt in the manuscript. Here is what he wrote to
Adams, on January 15, 1775:

Inclosed are for your amusement two Acts of a dramatic
performance composed at my particular desire. They go to you as
they came out of the hand of the Copier, without pointing or
marking. If you think it worth while to make any other use of
them than a reading, you will prepare them in that way & give
them such other Corrections & Amendments as your good Judgment
shall suggest.

It gradually became known among Warren's friends who the real writer
of the satire was, much to the consternation of Mrs. Mercy Warren. She
was modest to the extreme, usually being thrust into writing on
particular subjects by the enthusiasm of her friends. For example, she
wrote a poem on the Boston Tea Party, and, in sending it to her
husband, she confessed that it was a task

done in consequence of the request of a much respected friend.
It was wrote off with little attention.... I do not think it has
sufficient merit for the public eye.

By the same post, she sent him another scene from "The Group."

Whatever you do with either of them [meaning the manuscripts],
you will doubtless be careful that the author is not exposed,
and hope your particular friends will be convinced of the
propriety of not naming her at present.

Mrs. Warren was the author of several other plays, among them "The
Adulateur" and "The Retreat," which preceded "The Group" in date of
composition, and "The Sack of Rome." The latter was contained in a
volume of poems issued in 1790, in which "The Ladies of Castile" was
dedicated to President Washington, who wrote the author a courteous
note in acknowledgment.

In the preface to this volume, Mrs. Warren gives her impressions of
the stage, which are excellent measure of the regard Americans of this
period had for the moral influence of the playhouse. Thus, she writes:

Theatrical amusements may, sometimes, have been prostituted to
the purposes of vice; yet, in an age of taste and refinement,
lessons of morality, and the consequences of deviation, may,
perhaps, be as successfully enforced from the stage, as by modes
of instruction, less censured by the severe; while, at the same
time, the exhibition of great historical events, opens a field
of contemplation to the reflecting