The cast of _The Roundheads_ is not given in any printed copy, and we have no exact means of apportioning the characters, which must have entailed the whole comic strength of the house. It is known that Betterton largely refrained from appearing in political comedies, and no doubt Smith took the part of Loveless, whilst Freeman would have fallen to Joseph Williams. Nokes was certainly Lambert; and Leigh, Wariston. Mrs. Leigh probably played Lady Cromwell or Gilliflower; Mrs. Barry, Lady Lambert; and Mrs. Currer, Lady Desbro’. The piece seems to have been very successful, and to have kept the stage at intervals for some twenty years. 337 To the Right Noble HENRY FITZ-ROY, Duke of _Grafton_, Earl of _Sutton_, Viscount of _Ipswich_, Baron of _Sudbury_, Knight of the most Noble Order of the Garter, and Colonel of his Majesties Regiment of Foot-Guards, &c. May it please Your Grace, Dedications which were Originally design’d, as a Tribute to the Reverence and just esteem we ought to pay the _Great_ and _Good_ ; are now so corrupted with Flattery, that they rarely either find a Reception in the World, or merit that Patronage they wou’d implore. But I without fear Approach the great Object, being above that mean and mercenary Art; nor can I draw the Lovely Picture half so charming and so manly as it is; and that Author may more properly boast of a Lucky Hitt, whose choice and Fortune is so good, than if he had pleas’d all the different ill Judging world besides in the business of the _Play_; for none that way, can ever hope to please all; in an Age when Faction rages, and different Parties disagree in all things—- But coming the first day to a new Play with a Loyal Title, and then even the sober and tender conscienc’d, throng as to a forbidden Conventicle, fearing the Cub of their old Bear of Reformation should be expos’d, to be the scorn of the wicked, and dreading (tho’ but the faint shadow of their own deformity) their _Rebellion, Murders, Massacres_ and _Villanies_, from forty upwards, should be represented for the better undeceiving and informing of the World, flock in a full Assembly with a pious design to Hiss and Rail it as much out of countenance as they would _Monarchy, Religion, Laws_, and _Honesty_; throwing the _Act of Oblivion_ in our Teeths, as if that (whose mercy cannot make them forget their old Rebellion) cou’d hinder honest Truths from breaking out upon ’em in Edifying Plays, where the Loyal hands ever out-do their venom’d Hiss; a good and happy Omen, if Poets may be allow’d for Prophets as of old they were: and ’tis as easily seen at a new Play how the Royal Interest thrives, as at a City Election, how the _Good Old Couse_ is carried on; as a Noble Peer lately said, _Tho’ the Tories have got the better of us at the Play, we carried it in the City by many Voices, God be praised!_