Chapter 8

"Odd's bodikins, man, much better: use
Every man after his desert, and who shall 'scape
Whipping? use them after your own honour
And dignity: the less they deserve, the more
Merit is in your bounty."

_Hamlet_.

"Harris will be _hors de combat_" Bulstrode soon observed, "unless I can
manage to get him from the table.--You know he is to play Marcia this
evening; and, though a _little_ wine will give him fire and spirit for the
part, too much will impair its feminine beauties. Addison never intended
that 'the virtuous Marcia,' in towering above her sex, was to be picked
out of a kennel, or from under a table. Harris is a true Irish peer, when
claret is concerned."

All the ladies held up their hands, and protested against Mr. Harris' being
permitted to act a travestie on their sex. As yet, no one had known how the
characters were to be cast, beyond the fact that Bulstrode himself was to
play Cato, for great care had been taken to keep the bills of the night
from being seen, in order that the audience might have the satisfaction of
finding out, who was who, for themselves. At the close of each piece a bill
was to be sent round, among the favoured few, telling the truth. As Anneke
declared that her father never locked in his guests, and had faithfully
promised to bring up everybody for coffee, in the course of half an hour,
it was determined to let things take their own way.

Sure enough, at the end of the time mentioned, Herman Mordaunt appeared,
with all the men, from the table. Harris was not tipsy, as I found was
very apt to be the case with him after dinner, but neither was he sober.
According to Bulstrode's notion, he may have had just fire enough to
play the 'virtuous Marcia.' In a few minutes he hurried the ensign off,
declaring that, like Hamlet's ghost, their hour had come. At seven, the
whole party left the house in a body to walk to the theatre. Herman
Mordaunt did not keep a proper town equipage, and, if he had, it would
not have contained a fourth of our company. In this, however, we were not
singular, as nine in ten of the audience that night, I mean nine in ten of
the gentle sex, went to the theatre on foot.

Instead of going directly down Crown Street, into Maiden Lane, which would
have been the nearest way to the theatre, we went out into Broadway, and
round by Wall Street, the walking being better, and the gutters farther
from the ladies; the centre of the street being at no great distance from
the houses, in the narrower passages of the town. We found a great many
well-dressed people moving in the same direction with ourselves. Herman
Mordaunt remarked that he had never before seen so many hoops, cardinals,
cocked hats and swords in the