_The
Bath Comedy_
_By_
_Agnes & Egerton Castle_
_Authors of 'The Pride of Jennico,' &c._
_London
Macmillan and Co., Limited
1900_
_All rights reserved_
GLASGOW: PRINTED AT THE UNIVERSITY PRESS
BY ROBERT MACLEHOSE AND CO.
Dedicated
to our Sister
Mrs. Francis Blundell of Crosby
("M. E. Francis")
who, over the MS. of this frivolous
drama, was the first to
give us the kindly
criticism of
laughter
_Contents_
PREFACE
SCENE I.
SCENE II.
SCENE III.
SCENE IV.
SCENE V.
SCENE VI.
SCENE VII.
SCENE VIII.
SCENE IX.
SCENE X.
SCENE XI.
SCENE XII.
SCENE XIII.
SCENE XIV.
SCENE XV.
SCENE XVI.
SCENE XVII.
SCENE XVIII.
SCENE XIX.
SCENE XX.
SCENE XXI.
SCENE XXII.
SCENE XXIII.
SCENE XXIV.
SCENE XXV.
_Preface_
_The Royal Crescent--_
"_Open we here on a Spring day fine..._"
_the first scene of this Bath Comedy._
_The precise year, however, may not be given. A sufficient reason for
reticence in the matter of exact date will be found in the unfortunate
predicament of the then Bishop of Bath and Wells: undoubtedly a most
mortifying episode in the life of an invariably dignified Divine. Now
there were several Bishops of Bath and Wells during the second half of
the 18th century, and this trifling lack of circumstantiality will do
away with the least trace of scandal._
_The second half of the century, however, is admitted. The fact,
indeed, would be revealed at once to the curious in the matter, by the
mention, on the one hand, of the King's Circus (which dates from the
last years of second George), and on the other by the reference to
Bathwick Meadows as a solitary site and still fitted at the time to an
honourable meeting, whereas it has been known as a place of popular
resort (under the name of Sydney Gardens) since the year 1795._
_A few other points, again (should anyone think worth his while to
consider so trifling a question), might serve to fix within a few
lustres the date of Mrs. Kitty Bellairs' cantrips as they affected,
among other things, Lady Standish's domestic happiness, Mr. O'Hara's
connubial hopes, and my Lord Verney's sentimental education._
_It may be noticed, for instance, that the gentlemen wear their swords.
That was, as most people know, a distinction strenuously denied them so
long as the immortal Master of Ceremonies, Mr. Richard Nash, reigned as
King of Bath. Now, his autocratic rule came to an end before George
the Third was King. As another landmark it will be recalled that the
notorious and indecorous encounter between Richard Brinsley Sheridan
and that unpleasant personage, Captain Matthews, was the last duel with
swords fought in the Kingdom: and it was fought in 1772._
_Furthermore, our Captain Spicer (whether veraciously or not) claims to
have been a favoured pupil of the famous Angelo--and such a perfecting
course in the noble art could not have been acquired before the early
sixties. Then, again, there is still a good deal of powder in our
actors' head-dress. The slippers of our actresses are still delicious
and high-heeled: the sandal of the nineties has not yet made its
dreadful appearance. And the ladies visard, if not so universal as it
once had been, is still an accepted institution._
_It will suffice, in short, to say of our characters (if once more we
may be allowed to paraphrase some of Mr. Austin Dobson's dainty verses)
that_
_They lived in that past Georgian day,
When men were less inclined to say
That "Time is Gold" and overlay
With toil their pleasure...._
_Those were, on the whole, rather more joyous times than our own, and
more different than the mere lapse of one century seems to account for.
The gentlemen then, dressed almost as handsomely, prinked and plumed
themselves as elaborately, as the ladies. Gallantry in both senses and
ready wit were their most precious claim: a fight was considered a full
remedy to a slight, a sharp epigram to an injury. Heavy drinking was
held an indispensable accompaniment to good-fellowship; and love-making
was a far suppler art than seems known to this more earnest century--a
pastime for "the quality," something on par with the gambling passion.
"Virtue" not modesty, was woman's fair fame. A forcible abduction
would at a pinch be argued as an undeniable compliment. Life ran like
a dance then, with merry, tapping heels and light-hearted interchange
of partner: those old-world days were much younger than ours._
_So much for the times, and for the characters. For scenery we have
this gem among prosperous towns. The grey stone city of wealthy,
sedate residences, arranged with noble architectural effect in broad
straight streets, wide open squares, parades, terraces, crescents; tier
upon tier on the slope of a hill down to the water's edge; set serenely
in a wooded valley, with much green in perspective beyond the lazy,
slowly winding Avon._
_Indeed, of its kind, Bath is unique among the cities of Europe:
deprived as it is, by modern conditions, of its former social
attractions, it is still one of the most beautiful._
_Like so many very old towns, it has had a long Roman existence; its
luxurious baths and other remains testify to its splendour when it was
known as Aquae Solis. It filled, also, an important place in the land
as a Mediaeval Borough, wall-girt and defensible: of that period the
Abbey Church, the "Lantern of England" remains a handsome bequest.
But, on the surface at least, there is now nothing to recall vividly
any older past than the days of periwig, of powder and patches, of
"wine and walnut" wit. Its characteristic charm, one which, happily,
the present age has had little power to efface, is par excellence that
of the 18th Century; for it was in early and middle Georgian years
that, with a strange suddenness "The Bath" became an accepted centre of
fashion and pleasure, and assumed its special physiognomy of leisure,
wealth and exclusiveness._
_This old-world air still hangs about the residential part of the Town
and in a singularly haunting way. In those broad streets, calm and
silent and almost deserted at most hours, in those high-windowed
houses, typical of stateliness and cold elegance rather than of lolling
comfort, the very atmosphere seems to this day redolent of
"Chippendale" notions. The sordidly plain modern dress of man is
painfully incongruous. The rattling cab is a discord. It would be a
relief, much more than an astonishment, to note an obvious
three-cornered hat, a broad-skirted coat, on one's fellow man, to hear
on the flags the regular tramp of Chairmen swinging along some dainty
charge deliciously powdered and rouged!_
_The course of an hundred and odd years has obliterated some scenes,
and modified all to some extent. Orange Grove has lost, 'tis true,
much of its discreet character; and its neighbouring chocolate rooms,
so handy to intrigues, are now only memories. The Assembly Rooms are
shorn of all fashion. The new Great Pump Room is not quite a replica
of the old, though it has retained its general air--but the Crescents,
Royal and Lansdowne, the Circus, Gay Street and Queen Square, the
Parades, and the flags of Abbey Place, are still for us. At certain
hours, if we have the mood, we can readily people them again in our
mind's eye with notable guests of "The Bath" in its great days.... Dr.
Johnson and my Lord Chesterfield, Pops, Oliver Goldsmith, Sheridan,
Smollett, Chatham, Gainsborough, Fanny Burney, according to the
fleeting thought--all "faithfuls of the Spa"--Greatness, Literature,
Art, mere Fashion--or, again, shall we say Squire Bramble, or Lydia
Languish, or Sir Anthony Absolute; or blushing, too ingenuous
Evelina...?_
_Why, the place is alive with suggestion! Here a house front, with its
carved stone wreaths and urns and bosses, with its pedimented windows
or its shell-canopied door (still provided with its long since honorary
link-extinguisher) if you look at it enquiringly, seems ready to tell
its tale of by-gone life. But, unlike that of so many buildings of a
past age, the tale of a house in Bath rarely takes the earnest romantic
turn: it is irresistibly a "Comedy," comedy of intrigue and manners, of
fashion and all its consequent frivolity (with perhaps just a little
pathos, but never beyond the limits of elegance) Comedie à la Française
mostly. Je trompe, tu trompes, nous trompons...!_
_In this guise the first stately building at the western extremity of
the Royal Crescent, its pilasters, its stone steps, curvetting
iron-work, clamoured to tell of Lady Standish's so nearly disastrous
experiment on her husband's credulity. The corner house of Gay Street
near George Street (opposite the alluring old-book store of Mr.
Meehan--the genial Bath Antiquary) proclaimed at all the pores of its
crumbling stones, as clearly as if the commemorative tablet had duly
been erected, that the warm-hearted Irishman, the Honble. Denis O'Hara,
had dwelt there in the year 17--. There is another house, at the
southern corner of Queen Square, adorned with Cupid's heads and
cornucopiae, which beyond all manner of doubt in that same year was the
"lodging" (Fashion spoke of lodgings then!) of the ingenious young
widow Bellairs. In the same manner the middle building, facing west,
of Pierrepont's Street, one of the most correct in Bath, has still all
the conscious air of having sheltered once that most excellent young
man, Lord Verney._
_One of the drawbacks of setting down a comedy in narrative form is the
necessary curtailing of all descriptive passages and explanatory
ethical disquisitions: in such a frame, pen and ink pictures of
scenery, and the rendering of atmosphere, are out of place._
_Let it therefore be borne in mind that, in this Butterfly Drama, with
the exception of the penultimate scene enacted at the Inn in Devizes,
the scenery is altogether cast in or about the handsome old grey town;
in its lofty-ceiled, polished-floored rooms, rather bare; on its broad
pavement, clean and trim and as little crowded as any conventional
stage. Of the rest it must be understood that we are in the midst of
what has been extolled as "the Bath manner" and that throughout, as was
said of another, but world-wide known, Bath Comedy,_
"_Love gilds the scene, and woman guides the plot._"
_A. & E. C._
49 Sloane Gardens, S.W.,
_April_, 1900.
The Bath Comedy
SCENE I
"What? My sweet Lady Standish in tears!"
Mistress Kitty Bellairs poised her dainty person on one foot and cast a
mocking, somewhat contemptuous, yet good-humoured glance at the slim
length of sobbing womanhood prone on the gilt-legged, satin-cushioned
sofa.
"Tears," said Mistress Kitty, twirling round on her heel to look at the
set of her new sacque in the mirror and admire its delicate flowered
folds, as they caught the shafts of spring sunshine that pierced into
the long dim room from the narrow street. "Tears, my dear, unless you
cry becomingly, which I would have you know not one in the thousand
can, are a luxury every self-respecting woman ought to deny herself.
Now I," said Mistress Kitty, and tweaked at a powdered curl and turned
her head like a bird for a last glimpse at the mirror before sinking
into an arm-chair and drawing closer to her afflicted friend, "have not
shed a tear since I lost my first lover, and that is--I will not say
how many years ago. I was a mightily precocious child! When I say a
tear, mind you, 'tis a figure of speech. Far be it from me to deny the
charm of a pearly drop--just one: enough to gather on the tip of the
finger, enough just to suffuse the pathetic eye. Oh, that is not only
permissible, 'tis to be cultivated. But such weeping as yours--sobs
that shake you, tears that drench the handkerchief, redden the eyes,
not to speak of the nose--fie! fie! it is clean against all reason.
Come!" with a sudden gentle change of tone, putting her hand on the
abased head, where fair curls luxuriated in all their native sunshine,
"what is it all about?"
Lady Standish slowly and languidly drew herself into a sitting posture,
and raised a countenance marred out of its delicate beauty by the
violent passion of her grief. Swimming blue eyes she fixed upon the
Mistress Kitty's plump dimpling face.
"Alas!" she breathed upon the gust of a sigh that was as wet as an
April breeze, and tripped up by a belated sob. "Alas! you see in me
the most miserable of women. Alas! my heart is broken!"
Here the kerchief, soaked indeed beyond all possible utility, was
frantically held to streaming eyes once more.
"Mercy!" cried the pretty widow, "you could not take on worse if you
had the smallpox: you a three-months' wife!"
"Ah me!" moaned Lady Standish.
"So," said Mistress Kitty, "he has been a brute again, has he? Come,
Julia, weep on my bosom. What is it now? Did he kiss you on the
forehead instead of on the lips? Or did he say: 'Zounds, madam!' when
you upset a dish of tea over his waistcoat? Or yet did he, could he,
the monster!--nay it is not possible, yet men are so--could he have
whispered that Lady Caroline looked--passable last night?"
Lady Standish rose to her feet, crumpled her kerchief in one small hand
and faced her friend with tragic passion.
"It is useless to blind myself," she said. "Cease to gibe at me, pray,
Mistress Bellairs; I must face the truth! My husband loves me no
longer. Oh! Kitty, Kitty," dropping from her height of tragedy very
quickly and landing on a whimper again, "is it not sad? I have tried,
Heaven is my witness, to win him back by the tenderest love, by the
most pitiful pleading. He has seen me weep and pine. 'Rob me of your
love,' I have told him, 'and you rob me of life.' And he, he--oh, how
shall I tell you! As the days go by he is with me less and less. He
walks abroad with others. His evenings he gives to strangers--ay, and
half his nights--while I may sob myself to sleep at home. I saw him
to-day but for two minutes--'twas half an hour ago. He entered here
upon me, looking, ah Kitty! as only he can look, the most elegant and
beautiful of men. I was singing, piping as a poor bird may to strive
and call its mate to the nest. He passed through the room without a
word, without a sign; he that used to say 'twas heaven to sit and
listen to my voice. 'What!' I exclaimed as he reached the door, 'not a
word for poor Julia?' Kitty, at the sound of that cry, wrung from my
heart, he turned and frowned, and said---- (Oh, oh, oh.)"
"Ha!" cried Mistress Kitty, "what said he?" ("Heaven help him," said
she aside; "the woman's a fountain.")
"He said," sobbed Julia, "'Mayn't a man even go for a stroll?' Oh, had
you but heard the cold indifferent tone, you would have understood how
it cut me to the heart. I ran to him and laid my hand upon his sleeve,
and he said----"
Again grief overcame her.
"Well, what said he?"
"He said--oh, oh--he said, 'Julia don't paw me.'"
Mistress Kitty Bellairs, the reigning toast of Bath, the prettiest
woman, in the estimation of her admirers, in all England, and the
wittiest, laughed low to herself, then rose from her chair, took her
tall friend by the shoulders, and walked her up to the mirror.
"Look at yourself," said she, "and look at me."
Lady Standish winced. The contrast between her own dishevelled hair,
her marbled swollen countenance, her untidy morning gown, and the
blooming perfection of the apparition beside her, was more than she
could contemplate. Kitty Bellairs--as complete in every detail of
beauty as a carnation--smiled upon herself sweetly.
"My dear," said she, "I have had thirty-seven _declared_ adorers these
three years, and never one tired of me yet. Poor Bellairs," she said
with a light sigh, "he had two wives before me, and he was sixty-nine
when he died, but he told me with his last breath that 'twas I gave him
all the joy he ever knew."
Lady Standish ceased weeping as suddenly as if her tears had been
mechanically turned off. She regarded the widow earnestly.
"Now, child," said Mistress Bellairs, with all the authority of her
twenty-six years, "here we have been four weeks acquainted, and you
have more than once done me the honour of saying that you considered me
your friend."
"'Tis so," said Lady Standish.
"Then listen to me. There are three great rules to be observed in our
dealings with men. The first rule comprises an extraordinary number of
minor details, but briefly and comprehensively it runs thus: _Never be
monotonous_! Second rule: _Never let a man be too sure of you_! Oh
that is a wonderful wise maxim: reflect upon it. Third: _Never, never
let a man see how--well, how far from lovely you can look_! Tush,
tush, you are a better-looking woman than I am, but not when you have
been blubbering and not when you are fretful."
Lady Standish suddenly sat down as if her limbs could support her no
more. She looked up at the ceiling with tear-dimmed eyes.
"Pray," said Mistress Kitty inquisitorially _ex cathedra_, "how many
times a day do you tell that unfortunate man that you love him? And,
worse still, how many times a day do you want him to say that he loves
you? I vow 'tis enough to drive him to cards, or wine, or something
infinitely worse that also begins with a w! And, pray, if you spend
all you have, and empty your purse, do you think your purse becomes a
very valuable possession? 'Tis a mere bit of leather. Nay, nay, keep
your gold, and give it out piece by piece, and do not give it at all
unless you get good change for it. Oh," cried Kitty, a fine flush of
indignation rising scarlet behind her rouge, "I marvel that women
should be such fools!--to act the handmaid where they should ever rule
as mistress; to cast forth unsought what they should dole out only to
the supplicant on bended knee. Hath a man ever had from _me_ an
unsolicited avowal? Have I ever thrown the most ardent lover more than
a 'perhaps' and 'it may be,' a smile, a dimple, a finger-tip? (What
they have stolen I have not given, that is obvious! And, besides, 'tis
neither here nor there.) And pray, Lady Standish, since when have you
left off putting on rouge and having your hair tired and powdered, and
wearing a decent gown of mornings and a modish sacque, and a heel to
that pretty foot, a jewel in the ear and a patch beneath the lip?"
Lady Standish had ceased contemplating the ceiling; she was looking at
her friend.
"But, madam," she said, "this is strange advice. Would you have me
coquette with my husband, as if--God forgive me for even saying such a
thing--as if I were not wife, but mistress?"
"La, you there," said Mistress Bellairs, and clapped her hands, "there
is the whole murder out! You are the man's lawful, honest wife, and
therefore all tedium and homeliness, all fretful brow and tearful eye.
God save us! who shall blame him if he seek a pleasant glint of vice to
change him of you?"
There fell a silence. Lady Standish rose indignant, grew red, grew
pale, caught a glimpse of herself again in the mirror, shrank from the
sight, and crept back to the sofa with a humble and convicted air.
Then she cast a look of anguished pleading at Mistress Bellairs's
bright unfeeling countenance.
"Tell me," she said with a parched lip, "what shall I do?"
"Do!" cried the widow, rising with a brisk laugh, "get some powder into
your hair, and some colour into those cheeks! And when Sir Jasper
returns (he left you in tears, he will be sullen when he comes home;
'tis a mere matter of self-defence) let him find you gay, _distraite_;
say a sharp thing or two if you can; tell him you do not need his
company this afternoon. Ah, and if you could make him jealous! 'Tis a
very, very old trick, but then, you see, love is a very old game, the
oldest of all. Make him jealous, my dear, make him jealous and you'll
win the rubber yet!"
"Jealous!" cried the three-months' wife, and all the blood of the
innocent country girl leapt to her brow. "Oh, madam, how could that
be?"
"Look out a beau, nay, two or three, 'tis safer! Talk discreetly with
them in the Pump-Room, let them fan you at the ball, let them meet you
in Orange-Grove. Or, if you have not spirit enough--and indeed, my
sweet life, you sadly lack spirit--start but an imaginary one, merely
for the use of your lord and master: I wager you he will rise to the
fly."
"I am afraid Sir Jasper could be _very_ jealous," said the other
uneasily. "I remember before we were wed, when my cousin Harry would
ride with me to the meet, oh, how angry Sir Jasper was! He swore he
would shoot himself, ay, and he was all for shooting Harry too."
"But he was not the less ardent with you on the score of it, I'll
warrant him," said the experienced Mistress Bellairs.
"Ah, no," said Lady Standish, and her lip trembled over a smile, while
the ready water sprang to her eyelashes, and: "Ah, no!" she said again.
"Indeed, he loved me then very ardently."
"And he'll love you so still if you have but a spark of courage. Get
you to your room," said the widow, goodhumouredly, "bustle up and play
your part. Where is that woman of yours?"
She pushed Lady Standish before her as she spoke, herself rang the
call-bell for the tire-woman, and gave a few pregnant suggestions to
that worthy, who advanced all sour smiles and disapproving dips. Then
she strolled back into the drawing-room and paused a moment as she
slipped on her long gloves. Next she drew a letter from her pocket and
began to read it with a thoughtful brow.
"No, no, Sir Jasper," she said half aloud, "you're a fine gentleman,
and a pretty fellow, you have a neat leg, and an eloquent turn of
speech, but I will not have the child's heart broken for the amusement
of an idle day."
She took the letter between each little forefinger and thumb as if to
tear it, thought better of it, folded it again and thrust it back into
its place of concealment.
Presently she smiled to herself, and walked out of the long open window
across the little strip of garden, and so through the iron gate into
the shady back street.