Memoirs of the Life of the Rt. Hon. Richard Brinsley Sheridan Volume I Part 17

"_Sir B._ Power over me! What is there you could not command me in?

Have you not wrought on me to proffer my love to Lady Sneerwell? Yet though you gain this from me, you will not give me the smallest token of grat.i.tude.

"Enter CLERIMONT behind.

"_Mar._ How can I believe your love sincere, when you continue still to importune me?

"_Sir B._ I ask but for your friendship, your esteem.

"_Mar._ That you shall ever be ent.i.tled to--then I may depend upon your honor?

"_Sir B._ Eternally--dispose of my heart as you please.

"_Mar._ Depend upon it, I shall study nothing but its happiness. I need not repeat my caution as to Clerimont?

"_Sir B._ No, no, he suspects nothing as yet.

"_Mar._ For, within these few days, I almost believed that he suspects me.

"_Sir B._ Never fear, he does not love well enough to be quick sighted; for just now he taxed me with eloping with his sister.

"_Mar._ Well, we had now best join the company.

"[_Exeunt._]

"_Cler._ So, now--who can ever have faith in woman! D--d deceitful wanton! why did she not fairly tell me that she was weary of my addresses? that, woman-like, her mind was changed, and another fool succeeded.

"_Enter_ LADY SNEERWELL.

"_Lady S._ Clerimont, why do you leave us? Think of my losing this hand. (_Cler._ She has no heart)--five mate--(_Cler._ Deceitful wanton!) spadille.

"_Cler._ Oh yes, ma'am--'twas very hard.

"_Lady S._ But you seem disturbed; and where are Maria and Sir Benjamin? I vow I shall be jealous of Sir Benjamin.

"_Cler._ I dare swear they are together very happy,--but, Lady Sneerwell--you may perhaps often have perceived that I am discontented with Maria. I ask you to tell me sincerely--have you ever perceived it?

"_Lady S._ I wish you would excuse me.

"_Cler._ Nay, you have perceived it--I know you hate deceit."

I have said that the other sketch, in which Sir Peter and Lady Teazle are made the leading personages, was written subsequently to that of which I have just given specimens. Of this, however, I cannot produce any positive proof. There is no date on the ma.n.u.scripts, nor any other certain clue, to a.s.sist in deciding the precedency of time between them.

In addition to this, the two plans are entirely distinct,--Lady Sneerwell and her a.s.sociates being as wholly excluded from the one, as Sir Peter and Lady Teazle are from the other; so that it is difficult to say, with certainty, which existed first, or at what time the happy thought occurred of blending all that was best in each into one.

The following are the Dramatis Personae of the second plan:--

Sir Rowland Harpur.

---- Plausible.

Capt. Harry Plausible.

Freeman.

Old Teazle. [Footnote: The first intention was, as appears from his introductory speech, to give Old Teazle the Christian name of Solomon.

Sheridan was, indeed, most fastidiously changeful in his names. The present Charles Surface was at first Clerimont, then Florival, then Captain Harry Plausible, then Harry Pliant or Pliable, then Young Harrier, and then Frank--while his elder brother was successively Plausible, Pliable, Young Pliant, Tom, and, lastly, Joseph Surface. Trip was originally called Spunge; the name of Snake was in the earlier sketch Spatter, and, even after the union of the two plots into one, all the business of the opening scene with Lady Sneerwell, at present transacted by Snake, was given to a character, afterwards wholly omitted, Miss Verjuice.] (_Left off trade_.)

Mrs. Teazle.

Maria.

From this list of the personages we may conclude that the quarrels of Old Teazle and his wife, the attachment between Maria and one of the Plausibles, and the intrigue of Mrs. Teazle with the other, formed the sole materials of the piece, as then constructed. [Footnote: This was most probably the "two act Comedy," which he announced to Mr. Linley as preparing for representation in 1775.] There is reason too to believe, from the following memorandum, which occurs in various shapes through these ma.n.u.scripts, that the device of the screen was not yet thought of, and that the discovery was to be effected in a very different manner--

"Making love to aunt and niece--meeting wrong in the dark--some one coming--locks up the aunt, thinking it to be the niece."

I shall now give a scene or two from the Second Sketch--which shows, perhaps, even more strikingly than the other, the volatilizing and condensing process which his wit must have gone through, before it attained its present proof and flavor.

"ACT I.--SCENE I

"OLD TEAZLE _alone._

"In the year 44 I married my first wife; the wedding was at the end of the year--aye, 'twas in December; yet, before Ann. Dom. 45, I repented.

A month before we swore we preferred each other to the whole world-- perhaps we spoke truth; but, when we came to promise to love each other till death, there I am sure we lied. Well, Fortune owed me a good turn; in 48 she died. Ah, silly Solomon, in 52 I find thee married again!

Here, too, is a catalogue of ills--Thomas, born February 12; Jane born Jan. 6; so they go on to the number of five. However, by death I stand credited but by one. Well, Margery, rest her soul! was a queer creature; when she was gone, I felt awkward at first, and being sensible that wishes availed nothing, I often wished for her return. For ten years more I kept my senses and lived single. Oh, blockhead, dolt Solomon!

Within this twelvemonth thou art married again--married to a woman thirty years younger than thyself; a fashionable woman. Yet I took her with caution; she had been educated in the country; but now she has more extravagance than the daughter of an earl, more levity than a Countess.

What a defect it is in our laws, that a man who has once been branded in the forehead should be hanged for the second offence.

"_Enter_ JARVIS.

"_Teaz._ Who's there? Well, Jarvis?

"_Jarv._ Sir, there are a number of my mistress's tradesmen without, clamorous for their money.

"_Teaz._ Are those their bills in your hand?

"_Jarv._ Something about a twentieth part, Sir.

"_Teaz._ What! have you expended the hundred pounds I gave you for her use?

"_Jarv._ Long ago, Sir, as you may judge by some of the items:-- 'Paid the coach-maker for lowering the front seat of the coach.'

"_Teaz._ What the deuce was the matter with the seat?

"_Jarv._ Oh Lord, the carriage was too low for her by a foot when she was dressed--so that it must have been so, or have had a tub at top like a hat-case on a travelling trunk. Well, Sir, (_reads._) 'Paid her two footmen half a year's wages, 50_l_.'

"_Teaz._ 'Sdeath and fury! does she give her footmen a hundred a year?