Mr. Cibber was now in private life, a mild edition of his own Lord
Foppington; he had none of the snob-fop as represented on our
conventional stage; nobody ever had, and lived. He was in tolerably good
taste; but he went ever gold-laced, highly powdered, scented, and
diamonded, dispensing graceful bows, praises of whoever had the good luck
to be dead, and satire of all who were here to enjoy it.
Mr. Vane, to whom the drama had now become the golden branch of letters,
looked with some awe on this veteran, for he had seen many Woffingtons.
He fell soon upon the subject nearest his heart. He asked Mr. Cibber what
he thought of Mrs. Woffington. The old gentleman thought well of the
young lady's talent, especially her comedy; in tragedy, said he, she
imitates Mademoiselle Dumenil, of the Theatre Francais, and confounds the
stage rhetorician with the actress. The next question was not so
fortunate. "Did you ever see so great and true an actress upon the
whole?"
Mr. Cibber opened his eyes, a slight flush came into his wash-leather
face, and he replied: "I have not only seen many equal, many superior to
her, but I have seen some half dozen who would have eaten her up and spit
her out again, and not known they had done anything out of the way."
Here Pomander soothed the veteran's dudgeon by explaining in dulcet tones
that his friend was not long from Shropshire, and-- The critic
interrupted him, and bade him not dilute the excuse.
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