68 The Elephant ; or, [[JAN. 



H. Sm th, (aside to J. <S\) That hit you stole from me, as usual. But 

 I shall do the same by you, whenever you shall say any thing as well 

 worth stealing. 



Gr nfiy L ster; The more important question at present, with her, 

 as with all performers, is whether the stage will be able to support her. 



^D'lsr eli. Her popularity is perfectly settled ; she, alone, Jills the 

 ^ouse, and is the only performer, except Vestris, that, play what tricks 

 she will, is only the more popular. I have seen no actress so constantly 

 turn tip her nose at the audience with such perfect impunity. 



Lord Gl ng //. She conquers the grand difficulty of the drama with 

 the ease of habit, and makes all her exits with applause. 



Lord Cstl re gh. Yes ; her end is always her most powerful exhi- 

 bition, and she plays every part with the same force, elevation, weight, 

 and loftiness. 



Lord N g nt. 1 can vouch for her. I know her memory to be 

 stable ; her understanding of the largest dimensions ; and, whatever her 

 female caprices may be, you may rely on her substantial sense at bottom. 

 I say bottom carries it after all. 



C lly Gr-rttan. That all may be in your lordship's experience of 

 public life, but what / applaud is, her delicacy. Though as little indebted 

 to drapery as a woman of fashion, and, like her, obliged to strip when 

 she appears in public, she contrives to make us forget the startling fact, 

 and looks as modest as if she had never been in first-rate society. 

 Though I own there is a tale. 



Lord F s L. G TV r. Yes ; but that's a tail not for every one's 

 mouth, however fit for yours ; like all the great, she may have hangers 

 on. But I should advise them not to hang on by that tail. Ha ! ha! ha ! 



M rq is of Cl nr c rde. Well said, my Lord : but you have 

 4seen in Ireland lately, and that accounts for your hits at the hangers on ; 

 yet, certainly, without meaning any imputation on her general propriety 

 of conduct, I believe that she was lately seen half seas over; and, per- 

 haps, a little more. 



P c ck. Certainly not near Howth, my Lord. Though I allow she 

 might have been thinking of the Main. 



Lady C. B ry. Hoot awa ! my Laird. The puir cratur was thinking 

 o* travelling to see the bonny braes ayont the Tweed, and was only prac- 

 tising a red. 



Hon. Mrs. H rt n. I own I have been charmed with her. Her 

 residence in Paris has not left the most trivial charge of lightness on 

 her. She feels, without sentimentality : she thinks, yet knows the ines- 

 timable value of holding her tongue. She has a voice that can make 

 itself resistlessly heard upon occasion; yet she is a capital listener, and 

 has the true politeness df never making the slightest audible remark 

 upon the infinite impertinences of the well-bred world." 



L F. L. G w r (aside.) (Your panegyric is equal to your beauty, 

 and both are matchless.) But you have omitted one point her pathetic 

 power. She constantly keeps three-fourths of the audience in tiers. 



The Hon. Lord Sth pe. Arid the best of all is, that with all her 

 talents she is not a blue. 



The Hon. Mrs. H rt n (aside']. (Bitter wretch.) Yes, no one hears 

 her, haranguing for ever about Greece ; her school-days do not make her 

 sole recollections, and she wisely does not care if all the Colocotronis 

 were hanged on their congenial Hounslow, 



