Читать книгу The Perplex'd Lovers - Susanna Centlivre - Страница 6

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Oh Woe is me, oh, oh, oh, what shall I say? They charge me here, with sinking of the Play. To you I appeal, and pray do me right, Cou'd I, Sirs, help your hissing t'other Night? I; but said the Poet, I thought your Face Might from the upper Gallery find more Grace; Since all below cou'd not think it my Fault, For all know here, an Epilogue was wrote; Nay and sent to be Licenc'd too, what then It wou'd not pass, so was return'd again. Cou'd you no Credit to poor Scrub afford, Or cou'd you doubt your Brother Dickie's Word? I said you shou'd have an Epilogue to-day, And don't you mind what Men of Honour say? Nay, laugh not, Brethren, for our Author's Friends On all the Murderers Revenge intends. Since she poor Soul is dead, you caus'd her Fall, Like Julius Cæsar in the Capitol. By two-and-thirty Hisses from that Side, Stung to the Heart, the pretty Creature dy'd. Good-natur'd Soul! yet midst these dreadful Scars She made her Will, and left you all her Heirs. First to the Ladies, she bequeaths her Spouse; To th' Beaux, some Copies of soft Billet-doux: She knew that few of them, alas! love thinking, Their chiefest Talent lies in Dress and Winking. To th' pliant Girls, and Gamesters of the Pit, If they cou'd find it out—she leaves her Wit. To all the Soldiers, when the Wars shall cease, She leaves her Pen, to purchase Bread in Peace. Her Plots, Contrivances, and Stratagems, She leaves t' intriguing Wives of Citizens. Dramatick Rules, and Scraps of Poetry, She leaves those—ay, ay, those she leaves to me. Look to't young Men, for I intend to write, Egad I'll swinge you off out of pure Spight; Therefore be civil you had best to-night. And now, Sirs, to conclude our Author's Will, She humbly prays, here in the Codicil, You wou'd the Undertakers Charge defray, By filling up the House upon her Day.