The Works of Aphra Behn Volume Iv Part 98

_False Count_ text:

--who will desert me, Because they find no dry bobs on your Party

_False Count_ note:

_dry bobs._ A bob was a sarcastic jest or jibe. cf. _Sir Giles Goosecappe_ (1606), Act V, i. 'Marry him, sweet Lady, to answere his bitter Bob,' and Buckingham's _The Rehearsal_ (1671), Act III, i, where Bayes cries: 'There's a bob for the Court.' A dry bob (literally = a blow or fillip that does not break the skin) is an intensely bitter taunt, cf. _Cotgrave_ (1611), _Ruade seiche_, a drie bob, jeast or nip. _Bailey_ (1731) has '_Dry Bob_. a Taunt or Scoff'.

p. 302 _Starters._ .... cf. also _The Lucky Chance_, I, i: 'I am no Starter.' (Vol. III, p. 193), and note on that pa.s.sage, p. 485.

_Lucky Chance_ note:

_Starter._ This slang word usually means a milksop, but here it is equivalent to 'a b.u.t.terfly', 'a weatherc.o.c.k'--a man of changeable disposition. A rare use.

Errors and Irregularities: The Widow Ranter

In the Notes, alternation between .' and '. at paragraph-end is as printed. The abbreviation "cf." is always lower-case.

Editor's Introduction

and she sinks into his arms to die [his ams]

The Widow Ranter

[Points to _Dull._ _Whim._ _Whiff_, and _Tim._ [_Dull,_ _Whim,_]

[_correction based on ordinary punctuation of this text_]

thy Friend that kept thee Company all the while [taht]

[Goes in. / [All exeunt.

[_bracket before "All exeunt" added for consistency in e-text_]

Critical Notes

p. 261 _a Bob._ [p 261]

THE YOUNGER BROTHER;

OR, THE AMOROUS JILT.

ARGUMENT.

Mirtilla, the Amorous Jilt, who had once been attached to George Marteen, the Younger Brother, married for a convenience the clownish Sir Morgan Blunder. Prince Frederick, who had seen and fallen in love with her during a religious ceremony in a Ghent convent, follows her to England. They meet accidentally and she promises him a private interview. George Marteen had recommended a page to Mirtilla, and the lad is his sister Olivia in disguise. Mirtilla, although she falls in love with her 'smooth-chin'd boy', receives Prince Frederick, but the house wherein she lodges catches fire that night, and it is George Marteen who, in spite of the fact that he knows his friend the Prince is with her, procures a ladder and rescues the lady at some danger to himself. The Prince is able to escape by the same way, and he then carries Mirtilla to his own lodgings, where feigning to be ill with fatigue and terror she begs her lover to leave her to repose. This is done with the idea of entertaining her page, and on Frederick's approach she conceals Olivia, who thus creeps off unseen, beneath the train of her gown, whilst she herself retires with the amorous Prince. None the less, Mirtilla still pursues Olivia, and eventually Frederick discovers she is a wanton jilt, as he surprises her leading the page to her bed.

He is, however, reconciled when Mirtilla discovering to her amaze that the lad is a woman reveals this fact to the Prince to confound him, but afterwards avowing her frailty, throws herself on Frederick's generosity. Olivia has been promised by her old father, Sir Rowland Marteen, to Welborn, whom she has never seen. On meeting Welborn she falls in love with him, without knowing who he is, and he, also, whilst ignorant of her name, is soon enamoured of her in turn. Prince Frederick lodges in the same house as Welborn and it is. .h.i.ther that after the fire she attends Mirtilla. Welborn, supposing her to be Mirtilla's page, out of kindness offers her half his bed, which for fear of arousing suspicion she is bound to accept. She slips away, however, before daybreak, leaving a letter for her companion, by which he learns that the page is none other than the lady whom he had seen in the Mall.

Welborn and Olivia are eventually married. George Marteen's elder brother, Sir Merlin, a boon companion of Sir Morgan Blunder, is a rakeh.e.l.ly dog, who leads a wild town life to the great anger of old Sir Rowland. George, who whilst secretly leading a gay life under the name of Lejere, appears before his father as a demure and sober young prentice, is designed for Lady Youthly, an ancient, toothless crone, palsied and blind with extreme old age, whose grand-daughter, Teresia, is to be married to Sir Rowland himself. George, however, falls in love with Teresia, who is also pursued by Sir Merlin, and finally weds her in despite of his father, brother and the beldame. But Sir Rowland shortly relents and even forgives his eldest son, who has married Diana, the cast off mistress of a gambler, whilst Lady Youthly is left to the tender consolations of her chaplain.

SOURCE.

_The Younger Brother; or, The Amorous Jilt_ was written (in great part at least) by Mrs. Behn a good many years before her death, after which it was brought on the stage under the auspices of Gildon, in 1696; and in the Epistle Dedicatory he expressly says 'all the Alterations which I made were in the first Act, in removing that old bustle about _Whigg_ and _Tory_ (which was the subject of most of the Second Scene) and placing the Character of a _Rake-h.e.l.l_ in its room.' Mrs. Behn probably wrote the first Act sometime about the years 1681-3, when there was a continual 'rout with Whigging and with Torying', and afterwards completed the remainder at her leisure. In his notice of this comedy Langbaine's editor (Gildon), who finds Mirtilla 'genteel', says that Astrea took a portion of the plot 'from a true story of the brother of Col. Henry Martin, and a Lady that must be nameless. See the Novel call'd _Hatige_.' _Hattige: or, the Amours of the King of Tamaran.

A Novel_, by Gabriel de Bremond, was translated in 1680. (12mo. For Simon the African: Amsterdam, [R. Bentley? London.]) A biting satire on Charles II and Lady Castlemaine, the tale is told with considerable spirit and attained great vogue. Another edition was issued in 1683, and under the t.i.tle _The Beautiful Turk_ it is to be found in _A Select Collection of Novels_ (1720 and 1729), Vol. III. This novel had first appeared anonymously at Cologne in 1676--_Hattige ou la Belle Turque, qui contient ses amours avec le roi Tamaran_--and Nodier in his _Melanges d'une pet.i.te Bibliotheque_ describes a 'clef'. Hattige is, of course, Lady Castlemaine; Tamaran, Charles II; and the handsome Rajeb with whom the lady deceives the monarch, Jack Churchill. It is a wanton little book, and at the time must have been irresistibly piquant. Beyond the likeness between the characters of Mirtilla and Hattige the novel has, however, little in common with Mrs. Behn's play. Gildon's comment is, of course, founded upon the pa.s.sage in _Oroonoko_ which says: 'We met on the river with Colonel Martin, a man of great gallantry, wit and goodness, and whom I have celebrated in a character of my new comedy by his own name in memory of so brave a man.'

In D'Urfey's _The Royalist_, an excellent comedy produced at Dorset Garden, 1682 (4to, 1682), the author introduces a certain damsel Philippa, who, disguised as a page, follows the loyal Sir Charles Kinglove with whom she is enamoured. At the end of the second Act her boy's clothes involve her in the same predicament as befalls Olivia in Act IV of _The Younger Brother_. Although Genest prefers Mrs. Behn's treatment of the situation, it must, I think, be allowed that D'Urfey has managed the jest with far greater verve and spirit. Honest Tom D'Urfey is in fact one of the least read and most maligned of all our dramatists. He had the merriest comic gifts, and perhaps when the critics and literary historians deign to read his plays he will attain a higher position in our theatrical libraries.

Some critics have suggested that D'Urfey, in his _The Intrigues at Versailles_, produced at Lincoln's Inn Fields, 1697, may have taken a hint from Mrs. Behn's Mirtilla, and Wycherley's Olivia (_The Plain Dealer_) for his 'Madame de Vandosme a right jilt in all humours', a role created by Mrs. Barry. There is indeed some resemblance between all these three characters, base heartless coquettes; and D'Urfey, in making his jilt prefer Sir Blunder Bosse, 'a dull sordid brute and mongrel, whose humour is to call everybody by clownish names', to all her other gallants, seems not to have forgotten Mirtilla's marriage with Sir Morgan Blunder. The very names call attention to the plagiarism.

_The Intrigues at Versailles_ is none the less a clever and witty comedy, but a little overcrowded with incident and business.

THEATRICAL HISTORY.

As sufficiently explained by Gildon, under whose auspices this posthumous play was produced at Drury Lane in 1696, _The Younger Brother; or, The Amorous Jilt_ met with brutal treatment from the audience. There appears to have been a faction, particularly in evidence at its first performance and on the third day, who were steadfastly resolved to d.a.m.n the comedy, and in spite of fine acting and every advantage it was hissed from the boards. Gildon attributes the failure to 'the tedious Scenes in Blank Verse betwixt Mirtilla and Prince Frederick' which he thinks demanded 'another more easy Dress,' but, in truth, it can only be attributed to the most verjuiced spite and personal malice. The plot, though somewhat complicated with perhaps a press of crowding incidents, is none the less highly interesting, and the characters are most of them excellently, all well, drawn and sustained. The fact that certain episodes had to be cut in representation in order to bring the comedy within a reasonable time limit, though it may have tended to obscure the connection of the intrigue, could not have insured in spite of its many real merits so absolute a doom for the much maltreated play, a sentence which seems to have wantonly precluded any revival.

THE EPISTLE DEDICATORY

TO

Collonel Codrington.

The unjust Sentence this Play met with before very partial Judges in the Acting, will, I'm pretty sure, be revers'd by the more unprejudiced Readers, and it's evident, Merit will exert itself so far, as to justify my Presumption in Dedicating it, notwithstanding its small success, to you, Sir, for whom I must always profess the highest Esteem and Value, sprung from that n.o.bleness of your Nature that takes a G.o.d-like Delight in redressing the Misfortunes of 'em, more than fly to you for their unhappiness; a generous Soul indeed, never gives a greater Proof of her Excellence, than in her Protection of the Unfortunate; for tho suffering Merit challenges a Regard from all, yet it meets with it from none but such as you, Sir, who are so Eminent for that Vertue, which more than all the rest, commands the Esteem and Veneration of the Thinking World, your Generosity I mean, Sir, which gives the most Perfect Touches of that likeness, man can have to his Almighty Original; for those are but scurvey awkard Copies of Him that want it. 'Tis, I may say, the very Essence of G.o.d, Who with our _Beings_, dispenses the grateful Knowledge of Himself in the Benefits He bestows.

The narrow Virtues of the Old Philosophers, [which] were rather Vices, if winnow'd well, form'd to gratify their Proud, Lazy, Superiority, at the Expence of all the Publick Duties inc.u.mbent on mankind, whom they pretend to Purge from his Pa.s.sions, to make him happy, by that means to amuse our Curiosity with Chymera's, whilst we lost our real Good, will still naturally flow from those Springs of Pleasure, Honour, Glory, and n.o.ble Actions, the Pa.s.sions given us by Heaven for our common Good. But their own Practice generally shew'd the Vanity of their Emperic Boasts, when they Buried all the n.o.bler Pleasures of the Mind in Avarice, and Pedantick Pride, as _Lucian_ has pleasantly made out in _Hermotimus_.

Those Notional Excellencies that divert us from, or weaken a Publick Spirit, are always False and Hypocritical, that under a gaudy out-side conceals a rotten Carca.s.s, full of Infectious Distempers that destroy the n.o.blest end of our Being, _The doing good to one another_. Vanity has always been the Refuge of little Souls, that place their Value in a False Greatness, Hyppocrisie, and great t.i.tles. What a seeming Holiness does for the Avaritious, Designing Saint; t.i.tles do for the proud Avarice of the meer Man of Quality, cheaply Purchasing a Respect from the many; but 'tis the Generous man only that fixes himself in the Hearts of the most valuable part of mankind, when proper Merit only is esteem'd, and the Man, not his Equipage, and Accidental Appurtenances respected.

The Application of this, I shall leave to all that know you, Sir, who are all sensible what Virtues you make your Darlings, and choice of Virtue shews the n.o.bleness of our Temper, as much as Choice of Friends, the degrees of our Understandings; and if that be true that most Men choose those Virtues which are nearest a-kin to their Darling Vices, I'm sure 'twill be a strong proof, that ev'n your Failings (for ev'ry Man has his share of them too) are more Beneficial to the world than the Vertues of a numerous part of Mankind. In Collonel _Codrington_ indeed, we find the true Spirit and Bravery of old _Rome_, that despises all dangers, that in the Race of Glory thou art the n.o.ble Chace. Nor can the manly Roughness of your Martial Temper (Fierce to none but your Countries Foes) destroy that ingaging sweetness your agreeable Conversation abounds with, which heightened with so large a share of Wit, Learning, and Judgment, improves as well as delights; so that to have known you any way, must give us some advantage or other. This it was that encourag'd me to dedicate this Play, Sir, to you, of which I may venture to say more, and with more a.s.surance, than if it had been my own.

Mrs. BEHN was a Woman so Accomplish'd, and of so Established a Fame among the Men of Sense, that I cou'd not suppose a very severe treatment from the Town, which has been very indulgent to the Performances of others; especially when, besides the Reputation of the _Author_, the Play itself had an Intrinsic Merit; for we find it full of Humour, Wit, and Variety; the Conversation Gay and Genteel, the Love Soft and Pathetic, the incidents Natural, and Easy, and the Conduct of the Plot very Justifiable. So that I may reasonably impute its miscarriage to some Faction that was made against it, which indeed was very Evident on the First day, and more on the endeavours employed, to render the Profits of the Third, as small as could be.

It suffer'd not, I'm sure, in the Action, nor in Mr. _Verbruggen's_ reading of some of his Part, since he lost nothing of the Force of Elocution, nor Gracefulness of Action; nor indeed can I, with Justice to my self, impute it to any part that I ventur'd to add to the Original; for all the Alterations which I made were in the first Act, in removing that old bustle about _Whigg_ and _Tory_, (which was the Subject of most of the Second Scene) and placing the Character of a _Rake-h.e.l.l_ in its room, which was so little, that it could not Influence a more Capricious Audience, to the d.a.m.ning of the whole. There might indeed be some objections about the Plot, but not very Rational, I think; I'm sure, at least, 'tis the first Play, for some Years, could be quarrell'd at for having too much Plot. In the Edition however I have put in a great deal, which the length of the Play oblig'd me to cut out for the Action.