Precede the play in mournful verse, As undertakers stalk before the hea.r.s.e; Whose doleful march may strike the harden'd mind, And wake its feeling for the dead behind.

People, indeed, began rather to wonder why they had ever required or been provided with a thing that was now found to be, in truth, so entirely unnecessary.

The prologues of our stage date from the earliest period of the British drama. They were not so much designed, as were the prologues of the cla.s.sical theatre, to enlighten the spectators touching the subject of the forthcoming play; but were rather intended to bespeak favour for the dramatist, and to deprecate adverse opinion.

Originally, indeed, the prologue-speaker was either the author himself in person, or his representative. In his prologue to his farce of "The Deuce is in Him," George Colman, after a lively fashion, points out the distinction between the cla.s.sical and the British forms of prefatory address:

What does it mean? What can it be?

A little patience--and you'll see.

Behold, to keep your minds uncertain, Between the scene and you this curtain!

So writers hide their plots, no doubt, To please the more when all comes out!

Of old the Prologue told the story, And laid the whole affair before ye; Came forth in simple phrase to say: "'Fore the beginning of the play I, hapless Polydore, was found By fishermen, or others, drowned!

Or--I, a gentleman, did wed The lady I would never bed, Great Agamemnon's royal daughter, Who's coming hither to draw water."

Thus gave at once the bards of Greece The cream and marrow of the piece; Asking no trouble of your own To skim the milk or crack the bone.

The poets now take different ways, "E'en let them find it out for Bayes!"

The prologue-speaker of the Elizabethan stage entered after the trumpets had sounded thrice, attired in a long cloak of black cloth or velvet, occasionally a.s.suming a wreath or garland of bays, emblematic of authorship. In the "Accounts of the Revels in 1573-74," a charge is made for "bays for the prologgs." Long after the cloak had been discarded it was still usual for the prologue-speaker to appear dressed in black. Robert Lloyd, in his "Familiar Epistle to George Colman," 1761, writes:

With decent sables on his back (Your 'prologuisers' all wear black) The prologue comes; and, if it's mine It's very good and very fine.

If not--I take a pinch of snuff, And wonder where you got such stuff.

Upon this subject, Mr. Payne Collier notes a stage direction in the Induction to Heywood's "Four 'Prentices of London," 1615: "Enter three, in black cloaks, at the doors." Each of them advancing to speak the prologue, the first exclaims--"What mean you, my masters, to appear thus before your times? Do you not know that I am the prologue?

Do you not see this long black velvet cloak upon my back? Have you not sounded thrice?" So also, in the Induction to Ben Jonson's "Cynthia's Revels," two of the children of the chapel contend for the privilege of speaking the prologue, one of them maintaining his claim by pleading "possession of the cloak."

The custom of regarding the "prologuiser" as the author or his representative, seems gradually to have been departed from, and prologues came to be delivered by one of the chief actors in the play, in the character he was about to undertake, or in some other a.s.sumed for the occasion. A certain solemnity of tone, however, was usually preserved in the prologue to tragedy--the goodwill and merciful consideration of the audience being still entreated for the author and his work, although considerable licence was permitted to the comedy prologue. And the prologues acquired more and more of a dramatic nature, being divided sometimes between two and three speakers, and less resembling formal prologues than those Inductions of which the early dramatists, and especially Ben Jonson, seem to have been so unreasonably fond. The prologue to "The Poetaster" is spoken, in part, by Envy "rising in the midst of the stage," and, in part, by an official representative of the dramatist. So, the prologue to Shakespeare's Second Part of "King Henry IV." is delivered by Rumour, "painted full of tongues;" a like office being accomplished by Gower and Chorus, in regard to the plays of "Pericles" and "King Henry V."

It is to be noted that but few of Shakespeare's prologues and epilogues have been preserved. Malone conjectures that they were not held to be indispensable appendages to a play in Shakespeare's time.

But Mr. Collier is probably more correct in a.s.suming that they were often retrenched by the printer, because they could not be brought within the compa.s.s of a page, and because he was unwilling to add another leaf. In addition to those mentioned above, the prologues to "King Henry VIII.," "Troilus and Cressida," and "Romeo and Juliet" are extant, and have the peculiarity of informing the audience, after the old cla.s.sical fashion, something as to the nature of the entertainment to be set before them. To the tragedy of "The Murder of Gonzago,"

contained in "Hamlet," Shakespeare, no doubt, recognising established usage, provided the prologue:

For us and for our tragedy Here stooping to your clemency, We beg your hearing patiently.

Steele, writing in _The Guardian,_ in 1713, expresses much concern for the death of Mr. Peer, of the Theatre Royal, "who was an actor at the Restoration, and took his theatrical degree with Betterton, Kynaston, and Harris." Mr. Peer, it seems, especially distinguished himself in two characters, "which no man ever could touch but himself." One of these was the Apothecary in "Caius Marius," Otway's wretched adaptation of "Romeo and Juliet;" the other was the speaker of the prologue to the play in "Hamlet." It is plain that Mr. Peer's professional rank was not high; for these characters are not usually undertaken by performers of note. Steele admits that Peer's eminence lay in a narrow compa.s.s, and to that attributes "the enlargement of his sphere of action" by his employment as property-man in addition to his histrionic duties. Peer, however, is described as delivering the three lines of prologue "better than any man else in the world," and with "universal applause." He spoke "with such an air as represented that he was an actor and with such an inferior manner as only acting an actor, as made the others on the stage appear real great persons and not representatives. This was a nicety in acting that none but the most subtle player could so much as conceive." It is conceivable, however, that some of this subtlety existed rather in the fancy of the critic than in the method of the player. This story of Mr. Peer is hardly to be equalled; yet Davies relates of Boheme, the actor, that when, upon his first appearance upon the stage, he played with some "itinerants" at Stratford-le-Bow, his feeling but simple manner of delivering Francisco's short speech in "Hamlet"--

For this relief much thanks: 'tis bitter cold, And I am sick at heart--

at once roused the audience to a sense of his merits. "His salary was immediately increased by the manager; and he proved afterwards a great ornament of the stage."

The delivery of a prologue by an actress--that is to say, of course, by a boy in female dress, personating the character of a woman--appears to have been an unusual proceeding upon the Elizabethan stage. Mr. Collier has noted instances, however. In the case of the prologue to "Every Woman in her Humour," 1609, spoken by the heroine Flavia, "Enter Flavia as a Prologue," runs the stage direction; and she begins--"Gentles of both s.e.xes and of all sorts, I am sent to bid ye welcome. I am but instead of a prologue, for a she prologue is as rare as a usurer's alms." And the prologue to Shirley's "Coronation,"

1640, was also delivered by one of the representatives of female character. A pa.s.sage is worth quoting, for its description of ordinary prologue-speaking at this time:

Since 'tis become the t.i.tle of our play, A woman once in a Coronation may With pardon speak the prologue, give as free A welcome to the theatre, as he That with a little beard, a long black cloak, With a starched face and supple leg hath spoke Before the plays this twelvemonth. Let me then Present a welcome to these gentlemen.

If you be kind and n.o.ble you will not Think the worse of me for my petticoat.

It would seem that impatience was sometimes expressed at the poetic prologues and lengthy Inductions of the dramatists. The prologue to Beaumont and Fletcher's "Woman Hater," 1607, begins: "Gentlemen, Inductions are out of date, and a prologue in verse is as stale as a black velvet cloak and a bay garland; therefore you have it in plain prose, thus----." But the alteration did not please, apparently; at any rate, upon a subsequent production of the play, the authors furnished it with a prologue in verse of the old-established pattern.

The Elizabethan dramatists often took occasion in their prologues to lecture the audience upon their conduct in the theatre, exhorting them to more seemly manners, and especially informing them that nothing of an indecorous nature would be presented upon the scene. The prologue to "The Woman Hater," above mentioned, p.r.o.nounces "to the utter discomfort of all twopenny gallery men," that there is no impropriety contained in the play, and bids them depart, if they have been looking for anything of the kind. "Or if there be any lurking amongst you in corners," it proceeds, "with table books who have some hope to find fit matter to feed his malice on, let them clasp them up and slink away, or stay and be converted." Of the play, it states: "Some things in it you may meet with which are out of the common road: a duke there is, and the scene lies in Italy, as those two things lightly we never miss." The audience, however, are warned not to expect claptraps, or personal satire. "You shall not find in it the ordinary and overworn way of jesting at lords and courtiers and citizens, without taxation of any particular or new vice by them found out, but at the persons of them; such, he that made this, thinks vile, and for his own part vows that he never did think but that a lord, lord-born, might be a wise man, and a courtier an honest man." In the same way Shakespeare's prologue to "Henry VIII." welcomes those "that can pity," and "such as give their money out of hope, they may believe." But they are plainly told they will be deceived who have come to hear a merry graceless play--

A noise of targets, or to see a fellow In a long motley coat guarded with yellow.

The prologue to Ben Jonson's "Staple of News" entreats the audience to abstain from idle conversation, and to attend to his play, so that they may hear as well as see it.

He'd have you wise, Much rather by your ears than by your eyes; And prays you'll not prejudge his play for ill, Because you mark it not and sit not still, But have a longing to salute or talk.

Alas! what is it to his scene to know How many coaches in Hyde Park did show Last spring? what fun to-day at Medley's was?

If Dunstan or the Phoenix best wine has? &c. &c.

In the Induction the prologue is interrupted by the entrance of four gentlewomen, "lady-like attired," representative of Mirth, Tattle, Expectation, and Censure or Curiosity. The last-named is charged with coming to the theatre "to see who wears the new suit to-day; whose clothes are best formed, whatever the part be; which actor has the best leg and foot; what king plays without cuffs, and his queen without gloves; who rides post in stockings and dances in boots." It is to be noted, too, that at this time the audience occupying the humbler places in the theatre are very harshly spoken of in the prologues. They are referred to as--

The vulgar sort Of nutcrackers that only come for sport--

and as "grounds of your people that sit in the oblique caves and wedges of your house, your sinful sixpenny mechanicks," &c.

It is plain, however, that the rudeness of Ben Jonson's prologues had given offence, for, indeed, he employed them not merely to lecture his audience, but also to lash and laugh to scorn rival playwrights. So to "The Magnetic Lady" no prologue was provided, but an Induction, in the course of which "a boy of the house" discourses with two gentlemen concerning the play, and explains that the author will "not be entreated to give it a prologue. He has lost too much that way already, he says. He will not woo the Gentile ignoramus so much. But careless of all vulgar censure, as not depending on common approbation, he is confident it shall super-please judicious spectators, and to them he leaves it to work with the rest by example or otherwise." Further, the boy gives valuable advice upon the subject of criticism, bidding the gentlemen take seats and "fly everything you see to the mark, and censure it freely, so you interrupt not the series or thread of the argument, to break or pucker it with unnecessary questions. For I must tell you that a good play is like a skein of silk, which, if you take by the right end you may wind off at pleasure on the bottom or card of your discourse in a tale or so--how you will; but if you light on the wrong end you will pull all into a knot or elf-lock, which nothing but the shears or a candle will undo or separate."

After the Restoration prologues appear to have been held more than ever necessary to theatrical exhibitions. The writing of prologues even became a kind of special and profitable vocation. Dryden's customary fee for a prologue was five guineas, which contented him, until in 1682 he demanded of Southerne ten guineas for a prologue to "The Loyal Brothers," alleging that the players had hitherto had his goods too cheaply, and from that time forward ten guineas would be his charge. Dryden is to be accounted the most famous and successful of prologue writers, but it must be said that his productions of this cla.s.s are deplorably disfigured by the profligacy of his time, and that all their brilliancy of wit does not compensate for their uncleanness. Dryden's prologues are also remarkable, for their frequent recognition of the critics as a cla.s.s apart from the ordinary audience; not critics as we understand them exactly, attached to journals and reviewing plays for the instruction of the public, but men of fashion affecting judicial airs, and expressing their opinions in clubs and coffee-houses, and authors charged with attending the theatres in the hope of witnessing the demolition of a rival bard. The prologue to "All for Love" opens with the lines--

What flocks of critics hover here to-day, As vultures wait on armies for their prey, All gaping for the carcase of a play!

And presently occurs the familiar pa.s.sage--

Let those find fault whose wit's so very small, They've had to show that they can think at all.

Errors, like straws, upon the surface flow; He who would search for pearls must dive below.

Fops may have leave to level all they can, As pigmies would be glad to lop a man.

Half wits are fleas, so little and so light, We scarce could know they live, but that they bite.

Another prologue begins--

They who write ill, and they who ne'er durst write, Turn critics out of mere revenge and spite; A playhouse gives them fame; and up then starts From a mean fifth-rate wit, a man of parts.

The more important critics are described as--

A jury of the wits who still stay late, And in their club decree the poor play's fate; Their verdict back is to the boxes brought, Thence all the town p.r.o.nounces it their thought.

"The little Hectors of the pit" are also spoken of, and there is mention of "Fop-corner," the prototype of "Fop's-alley" of later years. Now, "a kind, hearty pit" is prayed for, and now, in a prologue delivered before the University of Oxford, stress is laid upon the advantages of "a learned pit." It may be noted, too, that the prologues of Dryden, apart from their wit, and overlooking, if that can possibly be managed, their distressing grossness, are invaluable for the accurate and minute pictures they present of English life, manners, costumes, and character in the reign of Charles II.

In right of the many quotations it has supplied to literature and conversation, Dr. Johnson's prologue spoken by Garrick upon the opening of Drury Lane Theatre, in 1747, may claim to be considered the most famous production of its cla.s.s. It is not, in truth, however, a prologue as prologues are ordinarily understood, but rather an address, written to suit special circ.u.mstances, and having no connection with any particular play. Boswell describes it as "unrivalled for just and manly criticism on the whole range of the English stage, as well as for poetic excellence," and records that it was during the season often called for by the audience. Johnson's prologue to his friend Goldsmith's comedy of "The Good-natured Man"

was certainly open to the charge brought against it of undue solemnity. The first lines--

Press'd with the load of life the weary mind Surveys the general toil of human kind--

when enunciated in the sepulchral tones of Bensley, the tragedian, were judged to have a depressing effect upon the audience--a conclusion which seems reasonable and probable enough, although Boswell suggested that "the dark ground might make Goldsmith's humour shine the more." Goldsmith himself was chiefly disturbed at the line describing him as "our little bard," which he thought likely to diminish his dignity, by calling attention to the lowness of his stature. "Little bard" was therefore altered to "anxious bard."

Johnson also supplied a prologue to Kelly's posthumous comedy of "A Word to the Wise" (represented in 1770, for the benefit of the author's widow and children), although he spoke contemptuously of the departed dramatist as "a dead staymaker," and confessed that he hated to give away literary performances, or even to sell them too cheaply.

"The next generation," he said, "shall not accuse me of beating down the price of literature; one hates, besides, to give what one is accustomed to sell. Would not you, now"--and here he turned to his brewer friend, Mr. Thrale--"rather give away money than porter?" To his own tragedy of "Irene," Johnson supplied a spirited prologue, which "awed" the house, as Boswell believed. In the concluding lines he deprecated all effort to win applause by other than legitimate means:

Be this at least his praise, be this his pride: To force applause no modern arts are tried; Should partial catcalls all his hopes confound, He bids no trumpet quell the fatal sound; Should welcome sleep relieve the weary wit, He rolls no thunders o'er the drowsy pit; No snares to captivate the judgment spreads, Nor bribes your eyes to prejudice your heads.

Unmoved, though witlings sneer and rivals rail, Studious to please, yet not ashamed to fail.

He scorns the meek address, the suppliant strain; With merit needless, and without it vain.