“What things,” exclaims Beaumont in his verses to Ben Jonson, “have we not seen done at the Mermaid!
Wit able enough to justify the town
For three days past, wit that might warrant be
For the whole city to talk foolishly!”
I cannot say the same of the Southampton— — —, though it stands on classic ground, and is connected by vocal tradition with the great names of the Elizabethan age. What a falling off is here! Our ancestors of that period seem not only to be older by two hundred years, and proportionably wiser and wittier than we, but hardly a trace of them is left, not even the memory of what has been. How should I make my friend Mounsey— — — stare, if I were to mention the name of my still better friend, old honest Signor Friscobaldo, the father of Bellafront:—yet his name was perhaps invented, and the scenes in which he figures unrivalled might for the first time have been read aloud to thrilling ears on
opinion altogether incorrigible, and according to the suggestions of others, should be hanged out of the way without judge or jury for the safety of church and state. Marry, hang them! they may be left to die a natural death: the race is nearly extinct of itself, and can do little more good or harm!
