Accordingly, I have poetasted The Admirable Bashville in the rigmarole style. And lest the Webster worshippers should declare that there is not a single correct line in all my three acts, I have stolen or paraphrased a few from Marlowe and Shakespear (not to mention Henry Carey); so that if any man dares quote me derisively, he shall do so in peril of inadvertently lighting on a purple patch from Hamlet or Faustus. I have also endeavored in this little play to prove that I am not the heartless creature some of my critics take me for. I have strictly observed the established laws of stage popularity and probability. I have simplified the character of the heroine, and summed up her sweetness in the one sacred word: Love. I have given consistency to the heroism of Cashel. I have paid to Morality, in the final scene, the tribute of poetic justice. I have restored to Patriotism its usual place on the stage, and gracefully acknowledged The Throne as the fountain of social honor. I have paid particular attention to the construction of the play, which will be found equal in this respect to the best contemporary models. And I trust the result will be found satisfactory. The Admirable Bashville; or, Constancy Unrewarded ACT I _A glade in Wiltstoken Park_ _Enter_ LYDIA LYDIA. Ye leafy breasts and warm protecting wings Of mother trees that hatch our tender souls, And from the well of Nature in our hearts Thaw the intolerable inch of ice That bears the weight of all the stamping world. Hear ye me sing to solitude that I, Lydia Carew, the owner of these lands, Albeit most rich, most learned, and most wise, Am yet most lonely. What are riches worth When wisdom with them comes to show the purse bearer That life remains unpurchasable? Learning Learns but one lesson: doubt! To excel all Is, to be lonely. Oh, ye busy birds, Engrossed with real needs, ye shameless trees With arms outspread in welcome of the sun, Your minds, bent singly to enlarge your lives, Have given you wings and raised your delicate heads High heavens above us crawlers. [_A rook sets up a great cawing; and the other birds chatter loudly as a gust of wind sets the branches swaying. She makes as though she would shew them her sleeves._ Lo, the leaves That hide my drooping boughs! Mock me--poor maid!-- Deride with joyous comfortable chatter These stolen feathers. Laugh at me, the clothed one. Laugh at the mind fed on foul air and books. Books! Art! And Culture! Oh, I shall go mad. Give me a mate that never heard of these, A sylvan god, tree born in heart and sap; Or else, eternal maidhood be my hap.