Joyousest of once embodied spirits, whither at length hast thou flown?
to what genial region are we permitted to conjecture that thou has
flitted.
Art thou sowing thy WILD OATS yet (the harvest time was still to come
with thee) upon casual sands of Avernus? or art thou enacting ROVER
(as we would gladlier think) by wandering Elysian streams?
This mortal frame, while thou didst play thy brief antics amongst us,
was in truth any thing but a prison to thee, as the vain Platonist
dreams of this _body_ to be no better than a county gaol, forsooth, or
some house of durance vile, whereof the five senses are the fetters.
Thou knewest better than to be in a hurry to cast off those gyves; and
had notice to quit, I fear, before thou wert quite ready to abandon
this fleshly tenement. It was thy Pleasure House, thy Palace of Dainty
Devices; thy Louvre, or thy White Hall.
What new mysterious lodgings dost thou tenant now? or when may we
expect thy aërial house-warming?
Tartarus we know, and we have read of the Blessed Shades; now cannot I
intelligibly fancy thee in either.
Is it too much to hazard a conjecture, that (as the school-men
admitted a receptacle apart for Patriarchs and un-chrisom Babes) there
may exist--not far perchance from that storehouse of all vanities,
which Milton saw in visions--a LIMBO somewhere for PLAYERS? and that
Up thither like aërial vapours fly
Both all Stage things, and all that in Stage things
Built their fond hopes of glory, or lasting fame?
All the unaccomplish'd works of Authors' hands,
Abortive, monstrous, or unkindly mix'd,
Damn'd upon earth, fleet thither--
Play, Opera, Farce, with all their trumpery--
There, by the neighbouring moon (by some not improperly supposed
thy Regent Planet upon earth) mayst thou not still be acting thy
managerial pranks, great disembodied Lessee? but Lessee still, and
still a Manager.
In Green Rooms, impervious to mortal eye, the muse beholds thee
wielding posthumous empire.
Thin ghosts of Figurantes (never plump on earth) circle thee in
endlessly, and still their song is _Fye on sinful Phantasy_.
Magnificent were thy capriccios on this globe of earth, ROBERT WILLIAM
ELLISTON! for as yet we know not thy new name in heaven.
It irks me to think, that, stript of thy regalities, thou shouldst
ferry over, a poor forked shade, in crazy Stygian wherry. Methinks I
hear the old boatman, paddling by the weedy wharf, with raucid voice,
bawling "SCULLS, SCULLS:" to which, with waving hand, and majestic
action, thou deignest no reply, other than in two curt monosyllables,
"No: OARS."
But the laws of Pluto's kingdom know small difference between king,
and cobbler; manager, and call-boy; and, if haply your dates of life
were conterminant, you are quietly taking your passage, cheek by
cheek (O ignoble levelling of Death) with the shade of some recently
departed candle-snuffer.
But mercy! what strippings, what tearing off of histrionic robes,
and private vanities! what denudations to the bone, before the surly
Ferryman will admit you to set a foot within his battered lighter!
Crowns, sceptres; shield, sword, and truncheon; thy own coronation
robes (for thou hast brought the whole property man's wardrobe with
thee, enough to sink a navy); the judge's ermine; the coxcomb's wig;
the snuff-box _à la Foppington_--all must overboard, he positively
swears--and that ancient mariner brooks no denial; for, since the
tiresome monodrame of the old Thracian Harper, Charon, it is to be
believed, hath shown small taste for theatricals.
Aye, now 'tis done. You are just boat weight; _pura et puta anima_.
But bless me, how _little_ you look!
So shall we all look--kings, and keysars--stript for the last voyage.
But the murky rogue pushes off. Adieu, pleasant, and thrice pleasant
shade! with my parting thanks for many a heavy hour of life lightened
by thy harmless extravaganzas, public or domestic.
Rhadamanthus, who tries the lighter causes below, leaving to his
two brethren the heavy calendars--honest Rhadamanth, always partial
to players, weighing their parti-coloured existence here upon
earth,--making account of the few foibles, that may have shaded thy
_real life_ as we call it, (though, substantially, scarcely less a
vapour than thy idlest vagaries upon the boards of Drury,) as but of
so many echoes, natural repercussions, and results to be expected from
the assumed extravagancies of thy _secondary_ or _mock life_, nightly
upon a stage--after a lenient castigation, with rods lighter than
of those Medusean ringlets, but just enough to "whip the offending
Adam out of thee"--shall courteously dismiss thee at the right
hand gate--the O.P. side of Hades--that conducts to masques, and
merry-makings, in the Theatre Royal of Proserpine.