Sir Fret. O lud, no!-anxious !-not I,-not the least, -I,-but one may as well hear, you know.

Dang. Sneer, do you recollect?-[Aside to SNEER.]Make out something.

Sneer. [Aside to DANGLE.] I will.-[Aloud.] Yes, yes; I remember perfectly.

Sir Fret. Well, and pray now-not that it signifieswhat might the gentleman say?

Sneer. Why, he roundly asserts that you have not the slightest invention or original genius whatever; though you are the greatest traducer of all other authors living. Sir Fret. Ha! ha! ha!-very good!

Sneer. That as to comedy, you have not one idea of your own, he believes, even in your common-place-book-where stray jokes and pilfered witticisms are kept with as much method as the ledger of the lost and stolen office.

Sir Fret. Ha ha! ha!-very pleasant!

Sneer. Nay, that you are so unlucky as not to have the skill even to steal with taste:-that you glean from the refuse of obscure volumes, where more judicious plagiarists have been before you; so that the body of your work is a composition of dregs and sentiments-like a bad tavern's worst wine.

Sir Fret. Ha! ha!

Sneer. In your more serious efforts, he says, your bombast would be less intolerable, if the thoughts were ever suited to the expression; but the homeliness of the sentiment stares through the fantastic encumbrance of its fine language, like a clown in one of the new uniforms!

Sir Fret. Ha! ha!

Sneer. In short, that even the finest passages you steal are of no service to you; for the poverty of your own language prevents their assimilating; so that they lie on the surface like lumps of marl on a barren moor, encumbering what it is not in their power to fertilise.

Sir Fret. [After great agitation.] Now, another person would be vexed at this.

Sneer. O but I wouldn't have told you-only to divert you.

Sir Fret. I know it-I am diverted.-Ha! ha ha!

S

not the least invention!-Ha! ha! ha!-very good!— very good!

Sneer. Yes-no genius! Ha! ha! ha!

Dang. A severe rogue! Ha! ha! ha! But you are quite right, Sir Fretful, never to read such nonsense.

Sir Fret. To be sure—for if there is anything to one's praise, it is a foolish vanity to be gratified at it; and, if it is abuse,-why one is always sure to hear of it from one confounded good-natured friend or another!

SHERIDAN.

THE CRITIC.

Second Selection.

Dangle, SneeR. Enter PUFF.

Dang. My dear Puff!

Puff. My dear Dangle, how is it with you?

Dang. Mr. Sneer, give me leave to introduce Mr. Puff

to you.

Puff. Mr. Sneer is this?-Sir, he is a gentleman whom I have long panted for the honour of knowing-a gentleman whose critical talents and transcendent judgment— Sneer. Dear sir

Dang. Nay, don't be modest, Sneer; my friend Puff only talks to you in the style of his profession.

Sneer. His profession!

Puff. Yes, sir; I make no secret of the trade I follow : among friends and brother authors, Dangle knows I love to be frank on the subject, and to advertise myself vivâ voce. I am, sir, a practitioner in panegyric, or, to speak more plainly, a professor of the art of puffing, at your service or any body else's..

Sneer. Sir, you are very obliging!- I believe, Mr. Puff, I have often admired your talents in the daily prints.

Puff. Yes, sir, I flatter myself I do as much business in that way as any six of the fraternity in town. Very hard work all the summer, friend Dangle,-never worked harder! But, hark 'ee, the winter managers were a little sore, I believe.

Dang. No; I believe they took it all in good part.

Puff. Ay! then that must have been affectation in them; for, egad, there were some of the attacks which there was no laughing at !

Sneer. Ay, the humorous ones.-But I should think, Mr. Puff, that authors would in general be able to do this sort of work for themselves.

Puff. Why, yes-but in a clumsy way. Besides, we look on that as an encroachment, and so take the opposite side. I dare say, now, you conceive half the very civil paragraphs and advertisements you see, to be written by the parties concerned, or their friends? No such thing: nine out of ten manufactured by me in the way of business. Sneer. Indeed!

:

Puff. Even the auctioneers now-the auctioneers, I say —though the rogues have lately got some credit for their language-not a particle of the merit theirs take them out of their pulpits, and they are as dull as catalogues !— No, sir; 'twas I first enriched their style-'twas I first taught them to create a delightful vicinage without the assistance of a neighbour; or fix the temple of Hygeia in the fens of Lincolnshire!

Dang. I am sure you have done them infinite service; for now, when a gentleman is ruined, he parts with his house with some credit.

Sneer. Service! if they had any gratitude, they would erect a statue to him; they would figure him as a presiding Mercury, the god of traffic and fiction, with a hammer in his hand instead of a caduceus.-But pray, Mr. Puff, what first put you on exercising your talents in this

way?

Puff. Egad, sir, sheer necessity!-the proper parent of an art so nearly allied to invention. You must know, Mr. Sneer, that from the first time I tried my hand at an advertisement, my success was such, that for some time after I led a most extraordinary life indeed!

Sneer. How, pray.

Puff. Sir, I supported myself two years entirely by my

misfortunes.

Sneer. By your misfortunes!

Puff. Yes, sir, assisted by long sickness, and other occasional disorders; and a very comfortable living I had of it.

Sneer, From sickness and misfortunes! You practised as a doctor and an attorney at once?

Puff. No, egad; both maladies and miseries were my

own.

Sneer. Hey! what the plague!

Dang. Tis true, i' faith.

Puff. Hark'ee!-By advertisements-To the charitable and humane! and To those whom providence hath blessed with affluence!

Sneer. Oh, I understand you.

Puff. And, in truth, I deserved what I got; for I suppose, never man went through such a series of calamities in the same space of time. Sir, I was five times made a bankrupt, and reduced from a state of affluence, by a train of unavoidable misfortunes: then, sir, though a very industrious tradesman, I was twice burned out, and lost my little all, both times: that told very well; for I had the case strongly attested, and went about to collect the subscriptions myself.

Dang. Egad, I believe that was when you first called

on me.

Puff. In November last?-- O no; I was at that time a close prisoner in the Marshalsea, for a debt benevolently contracted to serve a friend. I was afterwards twice tapped for the dropsy, which declined into a very profitable consumption. I was then reduced to-O no-then, I became a widow with six helpless children, after having had eleven husbands pressed.

Sneer. And you bore all with patience, I make no doubt ? Puff. Why, yes; though I made some occasional attempts at felo de se; but as I did not find those rash actions answer, I left off killing myself very soon. Well, Sir, at last, what with bankruptcies, fires, gouts, dropsies, imprisonments, and other valuable calamities, having got together a pretty handsome sum, I determined to quit a business, which had always gone rather against my conscience, and in a more liberal way, still to indulge my talents for fiction and embellishments, through my favourite channels of diurnal communication—and so, sir, you have my history.

Sneer. Most obligingly communicative indeed! and

your confession, if published, might certainly serve the cause of true charity, by rescuing the most useful channels of appeal to benevolence from the cant of imposition. But, surely, Mr. Puff, there is no great mystery in your present profession.

Puff. Mystery, sir! I will take upon me to say, the matter was never scientifically treated nor reduced to rule before.

Sneer. Reduced to rule?

Puff. O lud, sir, you are very ignorant, I am afraid?Yes, sir, puffing is of various sorts; the principal are, the puff direct, the puff preliminary, the puff collateral, the puff collusive, and the puff oblique, or puff by implication. These all assume, as circumstances require, the various forms of "letter to the editor," occasional anecdote," "impartial critique," "observation from correspondent," or "advertisement from the party."

66

Sneer. And do you think there are any who are influenced by this?

Puff. O lud, yes, sir! the number of those who undergo the fatigue of judging for themselves is very small indeed.

Sneer. Sir, I am completely a convert both to the importance and ingenuity of your profession; and now, sir, there is but one thing which can possibly increase my respect for you, and that is, your permitting me to be present this morning at the rehearsal of your new trage

Puff. Hush, for heaven's sake!-My tragedy!-Egad, Dangle, I take this very ill: you know how apprehensive I am of being known to be the author.

Dang. I' faith I would not have told-but it's in the papers, and your name at length in the "Morning Chronicle."

Puff. Oh! those abominable editors never can keep a secret!-Well, Mr. Sneer, no doubt you will do me great honour-I shall be infinitely happy-highly flattered

Dang. I believe it must be near the time-shall we go together?

Puff. No; it will not be yet this hour, for they are always late at that theatre: besides, I must meet you there, for I have some little matters here to send to the papers,