The audience must indeed have been qualmish prudes. Of all plays it is the most harmless. The scene in the fourth Act to which exception was taken seems to have been No. II, after the marriage of Gasper and Antonia, a most trifling and inept business. In Act V, IV, Alexis says to Viola: ‘As for you Madam bread and water, and a dark chamber shall be your lot--’ but Sebastian (Bannister, jun.), who has married Viola, breaks in crying: ‘No, Sir,--I am the arbiter of her lot;--however, I confirm half your punishment; and a dark chamber she shall certainly have.’ To this speech in the 4to Mrs. Cowley appends the following note: ’.his is the expression, I am told, which had nearly prov’d fatal to the Comedy. I should not have printed it, but from the resolution I have religiously kept, of restoring every thing that was objected to.’ Imagination and ingenuity fail to fathom the cryptic indecency. _The School for Greybeards_ is, in fine, a modest and mediocre comedy of little value. 12 December, 1786, Walpole, writing from Berkeley Square to the Countess of Upper Ossary, says: ‘To-night ... I am going to Mrs. Cowley’s new play, which I suppose is as _instructive_ as the _Marriage of Figaro_, for I am told it approaches to those of Mrs. Behn in spartan delicacy; but I shall see Miss Farren, who, in my poor opinion, is the first of all actresses.’ Writing three days later to the same lady he has: ‘_The Greybeards_ have certainly been chastised, for we did not find them at all gross. The piece is farcical and improbable, but has some good things, and is admirably acted.’ Those ‘good things’ are entirely due to Mrs. Behn. To the Right Honourable _Laurence_, Lord _Hyde_, Earl of _Rochester_, one of his Majesty’s most Honourable Privy Council, Lord High Treasurer of _England_, and Knight of the Noble Order of the Garter. My Lord,