stable, keep fretting away their hours on the boards until warrants are obtained from Union Hall, and they are put in limbo to atone for their offences. BERWICK STREET. FRIDAY, 8th MARCH. PIZARRO.-MONSIEUR TONSON. This evening we had a grand trial of skill between PIZARRO ALONZO, and ROLLA. Each endeavoured to outdo the others in rendering himself more contemptible and more ridiculous, and they succeeded, we must admit, in exposing their stupidity and ignorance. PIZARRO was something like a shirtless Bond-street lounger, ROLLA a puppet-shew-man, and ALONZO growled like a baited bear. All the others were well worthy of the trio, and'as bad as could be wished. The afterpiece set the house in an uproar. THE MINOR PRIVATE COMPANY. [We intend, from time to time, to give a notice of the different private performers, and commence with some of the Minor Private Company.] BURNS is middling in some things; he will never arrive at any thing but respectability-even if he does at that. CRESSWELL, of musical celebrity, added to a plentiful stock of conceit and impudence, has a most enchanting lisp! His performances are all of the same kind-execrable. COLLINS's action is forced, and his delivery like a school-boy's; he is, moreover, rather bombastic, but may improve in time, and be qualified for second-rate characters. Cook never played any thing well in his life, and never will; he is not suited for the stage in any particular. We have heard that he has a great passion for fencing, and in practising a combat with his fist, passing through Covent Garden market, last summer, he had the misfortune to upset an old barrow-woman, and break a great quantity of crockery-ware at a china-shop. To the Editor of the Rambler's Magazine. SIR,-As a proprietor of three minor theatres, and two " preparatory barns" for green-horns to study in, I have to say, that you have done me much injury in my vocation, by your critiques on the performances: several of my best hands have left me, and gone over the water to adorn the national theatre for the cor rection of taste, in Botany Bay: others, whose masters have inspected their tills, were to me, TILL then, very useful, are now off the stage, and exhibiting as East India recruits!! My females are now, not on the boards, but treading the flags, and my audience are but a “ shadow and a name." I hope you do not mean to ruin me—accept of one hundred and fifteen free admissions for the three theatres, and pray give me a lift, or I must go down, like Lucifer, "never to hope again." Your obedient, unhappy servant, Hopkins Street, Soho. Anecdotes, Bon Mots, Jeux d'Esprits, &c. A fashionable countess, asking a young nobleman which he thought the prettiest flower, roses or tulips?—he replied, with great gallantry, "Your ladyship's two lips before all the roses in the world." 66 A lady, who is a strong advocate for the rights of women, being lately engaged in a dispute with a gentleman, asserted, that an army of women would be in every respect competent to take the field against an army of men, adding, “ Suppose I were the com. mander of 10,000 women, each of whom had a military education, and you of 10,000 men, how would you get an advantage that you might not have, in an equal degree, over men?"—" Madam," replied he, "I would keep from a general engagement—I would make propositions of peace—and, during the treaty, the male and female officers and soldiers must frequently meet to settle the conditions; and, at the end of eight or nine months, when all of you ought to be in the field, you would be in the straw." A GREAT DUKE IN A PASSION.-The Duke of W- -ton has no more wit than is sufficient to carry him through the Hells of St. James's, where he always plays the losing game; yet often he can hit upon a good thing. "Your Grace speaks without reason, and in a passion," said a little tidy Spanish wench, in reply to a proposal; "Ah! my dear, reason has nothing to do in this case, and passion is desirable when we are entering into immediate action!" LADY DACRE AND THE BISHOP." Why do you expose your arms quite bare?" said the Bishop of W- to Lady Dacre, Why, my Lord, because my long sleeves are like your lawn sleeves, so much out at elbows, that I am ashamed to wear them." 86 ON THE DEATH OF I. DIRT, Esq. HAMPTON COURT. That DIRT lays low is very just, "Tis nat'ral DIRT should turn to DUST. KING MURAT AND THE DUCHESS OF REGGIO.-Murat, when King of Naples, was very popular, and mixed with his subjects on every occasion where he could do so with propriety. He danced at a ball given by the Duchesse del Reggio; her seat was only a few miles distant from the Taro, or Straits of Messina, where, every day, and every night, the British and Sicilian gunboats were engaged with those of Naples. The Duchesse remarked to his Majesty, That he did not care much for his enemies, when on the very field of battle he devoted so much of his time to, his friends." "I do so," said he, "Madam, in order that I may prevent those friends from becoming enemies, which they are very much inclined to be." The Duchesse took the hint, and was, silent. MARSHAL MACDONALD AND SIR THOMAS TROWBRIDGE.-When Sir Thomas Trowbridge commanded the British fleet blockading Naples, in the year 1799, he had occasion to send several letters to Marshal Macdonald, who commanded the French army. To these Sir Thomas received verbal replies of a very indelicate nature; at last he wrote an official dispatch, and entrusted it to a lieutenant, named Duvall; a flag of truce was hung out from the admiral's ship, and answered by the head-quarters of the French general. When Mr. Duvall was ushered into the presence of Macdonald, he presented the dispatch-"Oh!" said the Marshal, tearing open the seal, "from Trowbridge, the greatest blackguard in the British navy." "Yes, Marshal," replied Duvall, “and it should have been addressed to the greatest villain in the French army, it would then readily have found you without my being the bearer." The Marshal was struck with astonishment at the boldness of the retort-beckoned Duvall to follow himand concluded a negociation equally honourable to England, France, and Naples. 66 THE RETORT.-A British and Danish seaman were drinking together in a tavern at Lisbon, when the Dane remarked, that the imprisonment of George the Third's sister was very just, for she vas von dem whoore!" "That is the worse for you," said the British tar, puffing his smoke with uncommon strength from his segar, "for, in that case, your present King must be a damned good-for-nothing bastard!" THE GENEROUS LANDLORD. Sir Squeezewell was crossing his park t'other day, CARDINAL RUFFO AND LORD NELSON.-Cardinal Ruffo threw aside his hat, and assumed the helmet of war; he led the Calabrian army, and by the co-operation of the British, finally placed Ferdinand on the throne of Naples. I saw him at the storming of Castal de Carmenio, near the city of Naples, on horseback, and bare-headed, with a silver crucifix in his hand, and undismayed amidst showers of bullets, animating the soldiers to storm the place. Yet with this hero Lord Nelson could never agree; history records, that Ruffo intended treachery, but was foiled by Nelson; true, the British fleet, continually laying in the Road of Naples, was an eye-sore to Cardinal Ruffo-he sent various false accounts to induce the British admiral to put to sea, but they all failed. Nelson at last consented to an interview with the clerical general, on board the Foudrayant, which did no good for either parties. In a familiar conversation on deck, Ruffo observed, "You have been idle of late, my lord, and are always lying in the port." "The reason," said Nelson, "is, that you are always lying on shore, when you leave off that, I'll leave my station, but not before." READY WIT.-The celebrated good and learned Doctor Beattie one morning in a bookseller's shop at Aberdeen, observed a bill whereon "majesty" was printed in large capitals; placing his fingers upon the M and the Y, he dryly remarked, "what is majesty divested of its externals-A-JEST. 181 Les Amours du Chevalier de Faublas. L This elegant and facinating Romance, was first published in the year 1787. It was written by LOUVET, de Couvray, a member of the Jacobin club, and one of the founders of the French Revolution. We understand that a mutilated translation was published, about twenty years since, which is now entirely out of print, and very rarely to be met with. As the original is so universally read and admired, and an English edition being much called for, a new and faithful translation has been made, and will be immediately printed in two neat pocket volumes, without any curtailment. Being confident that it is a work which will suite the taste of all our readers, we are happy in being able to give them a specimen of it, before publication. The part which we shall select, is where young Faublas, when sixteen, is induced by his friend the Count Rosambert, to put on female attire, and go to a ball with him, in order to mortify a mistress of the Count's. The youth and appearance of Faublas, suiting well for this metamorphosis it was presently put in execution, and leave obtained from his father, for him to continue at the ball all night: * I am going, said the Count to me, to present you to a young lady that I esteem very much; it is full two months since I have sworn an eternal attachment to her, and more than six weeks that I have proved it to her. This language was quite enigmatical to me, but already I began to blush at my ignorance, and I put on a knowing smile, to make Rosambert think that I understood him. As I am going to torment her, continued he, assume an air as if you loved me very much, you see what effect it will make on her! Above all, let me caution you against telling her that you are not a girl. We shall be sure to mortify her. As soon as we appeared in the assembly, all the eyes were fixed on me; I was vexed to feel that I blushed, and could not keep my countenance. Sometimes I thought that a part of my dress must be out of order, or that my borrowed character had betrayed me; but presently, from the general attention of Ram. Mag.-No. IV. |