We have already seen the name of Siddons figuring on the Kemble play-bills, when Sarah was only thirteen years of age. We can imagine, therefore, all the opportunities that the young people had of falling in love, rehearsing together, acting together, with the continual communion of interest brought about by their profession. No wonder that even Mr. Evans, a Welsh squire, with three hundred a year, who, enslaved by Sarah’s singing of _Robin, Sweet Robin_, offered her his hand, was ignominiously refused. Her parents, however, took a different view, and, allured by the splendour of Mr. Evans’s offer, revoked the unwilling consent they had given to their daughter’s engagement to Siddons, and summarily dismissed him from the company. The indignant lover had recourse to a method of revenge that seems as novel as it was ungentlemanly. Being allowed a farewell benefit, he took the opportunity—it was at Brecon—of taking the audience into his confidence, and, in doggrel of the worst description, informed them of his woes:— Ye ladies of Brecon, whose hearts ever feel For wrongs like to this I’m about to reveal, Excuse the first product, nor pass unregarded The complaints of poor Colin, a lover discarded. Yet still on his Phyllis his hopes were all placed, That her vows were so firm they could ne’er be effaced; But soon she convinced him ’twas all a mere joke, For duty rose up, _and her vows were all broke_. Dear ladies, avoid one indelible stain, Excuse me, I beg, if my verse is too plain; _But a jilt is the devil_, as has long been confessed, Which a heart like poor Colin’s must ever detest. We only give three verses of the eleven, being as much, we think, as our readers could submit to with patience. How a girl of any spirit could forgive a lover for thus exposing their private affairs, and how a girl of any artistic appreciation could forgive a lover such bad verses, and take him back into her good graces, is more than we can understand. Mrs. Kemble, her mother, seemed to take the most correct view of the situation, for, instead of excusing “the first product” of the luckless poet, “his merits tho’ small,” she amply rewarded with a ringing box on the ears as he left the stage. Jones, a member of Roger Kemble’s company, preserved some verses written by Sarah to her lover, which show her to be as superior to him in taste and poetic perception, as she afterwards proved herself in dramatic power:— Say not, Strephon, I’m untrue, When I only think of you; If you do but think of me As I of you, then shall you be Without a rival in my heart, Which ne’er can play a tyrant’s part. Trust me, Strephon, with thy love— I swear by Cupid’s bow above, Nought shall make me e’er betray Thy passion till my dying day: If I live, or if I die, Upon my constancy rely.