_Time from the 12th to the present century._ PROLOGUE.[268] IN CHARACTER. Too long the triumphs of our early times, With civil discord and with regal crimes, Have stain’d these boards; while Shakespeare’s pen has shown Thoughts, manners, men, to modern days unknown. Too long have Rome and Athens been _the rage_; [_Applause._ And classic Buskins soil’d a British stage. To-night our bard, who scorns pedantic rules, His plot has borrow’d from the German schools; The German schools—where no dull maxims bind The bold expansion of the electric mind. Fix’d to no period, circled by no space, He leaps the flaming bounds of time and place. Round the dark confines of the forest raves, With _gentle_ Robbers[269] stocks his gloomy caves; Tells how Prime Ministers[270] are shocking things, And _reigning Dukes_ as bad as tyrant Kings; How to _two_ swains[271] _one_ nymph her vows may give, And how _two_ damsels[271] with _one_ lover live! Delicious scenes!—such scenes _our_ bard displays, Which, crown’d with German, sue for British, praise. Slow are the steeds, that through Germania’s roads With hempen rein the slumbering post-boy goads; Slow is the slumbering post-boy, who proceeds Thro’ deep sands floundering on those tardy steeds; More slow, more tedious, from his husky throat, Twangs through the twisted horn the struggling note. These truths confess’d—Oh! yet, ye travell’d few, Germania’s _plays_ with eyes unjaundiced view! View and approve!—though in each passage fine The faint translation[272] mock the genuine line; Though the nice ear the erring sight belie, For _U twice dotted_ is pronounced like _I_;[272] [_Applause._ Yet oft the scene shall nature’s fire impart, Warm _from_ the breast, and glowing _to_ the heart! Ye travell’d few, attend!—On _you_ our bard Builds his fond hope! Do you his genius guard! [_Applause._ Nor let succeeding generations say A British audience _damn’d_ a German play! [_Loud and continued Applauses._ _Flash of lightning.—The ghost of_ PROLOGUE’S GRANDMOTHER _by the Father’s side, appears to soft music, in a white tiffany riding-hood._ PROLOGUE _kneels to receive her blessing, which she gives in a solemn and affecting manner, the audience clapping and crying all the while.—Flash of lightning._—PROLOGUE _and his_ GRANDMOTHER _sink through the trap-doors._ THE ROVERS; OR, THE DOUBLE ARRANGEMENT. ACT I. SCENE I.