The play, when presented to the theatre, met with unexpected opposition from the government, then directed by Queen Mary, in the absence of her husband. This was not very surprising, considering the subject of the play, and Dryden's well-known principles. The history of an exiled monarch, soliciting, in the court of an ally, aid to relieve his country from a foreign yoke, and to restore him to the throne of his fathers, with the account of a popular insurrection undertaken for the same purposes, were delicate themes during the reign of William III.; at least, when the pen of Dryden was to be employed in them, whose well-known skill at adapting an ancient story to a modern moral had so often been exercised in the cause of the house of Stuart. Besides, he had already given offence by his prologue to the "Prophetess," when revived, which contains some familiar metaphorical sneers, as Cibber calls them, at the Irish war, the female regency, and even the Revolution itself. This prologue had been forbidden; and a similar exertion of authority was deemed fit in the case of "Cleomenes." Accordingly, before the inoffensive nature of the piece could be explained, the court took alarm at the subject in the abstract, and the performance of the piece was prohibited by the Chamberlain.[28] It appears, the exertions of Lord Rochester, the maternal uncle of Queen Mary, and of his family, had been sufficiently powerful to guarantee the harmless nature of the play, and to procure a recal of the mandate, by which the acting of the piece, and the consequent profits of the author, had been for some time suspended. When the play was performed, our author had the satisfaction to see the first character admirably represented by the well-known Mrs Barry, to whom he has paid, in the preface, the splendid compliment of saying, "that she had gained by her performance a reputation beyond any woman he had ever seen on the theatre."[29] If this expression, as Cibber seems to think, be a little over-stretched, it at least serves to prove to us, that the play was well received; for, otherwise, the intercourse of civility between the author and performers is generally very slender. Cleomenes was acted and published in 1692. FOOTNOTES: [Footnote 26: The whole passage is so very fine, that I think I may venture to extract it from this beautiful and forgotten tragedy. Caratach and Hengo, the uncle and nephew, are besieged on a rock by the Romans, and reduced to extremity by hunger. They are decoyed by some food, hung on a rock by the centurion Judas. CARATACH _and_ HENGO _on the rock_. _Caratach._ Courage, my boy! I have found meat: Look, Hengo, Look where some blessed Briton, to preserve thee, Was hung a little food and drink; cheer up, boy, Do not forsake me now! _Hengo._ Oh uncle, uncle, I feel I cannot stay long; yet I'll fetch it, To keep your noble life. Uncle, I'm heart-whole, And would live. _Car._ Thou shalt, long, I hope.