Continuing, after diverse moral reflections, Nance made this appeal to her hearers: 

  “You, you then, ladies, whose unquestion’d lives
  Give you the foremost fame of happy wives,
  Protect, for its attempt, this helpless play;
  Nor leave it to the vulgar taste a prey;
  Appear the frequent champion of its cause,
  Direct the crowd, and give yourselves applause.”

“Zounds, madam,” cries a beau who is ogling a woman of quality in a stage box, “they say Anne Oldfield will never see forty-two again, but I’ll warrant you, madam, she looks not a day older than yourself.”  And the woman of quality, who is over forty, bows at the compliment, as well she may.  Bellchambers records that Lady Townley was universally regarded as Oldfield’s ne plus ultra in acting.  “She slided so gracefully into the foibles, and displayed so humorously the excesses, of a fine woman too sensible of her charms, too confident in her strength, and led away by her pleasures, that no succeeding Lady Townley arrived at her many distinguished excellencies in the character."[A] And the writer goes on to say that “by being a welcome and constant visitor to families of distinction, Mrs. Oldfield acquired a graceful carriage in representing women of high rank, and expressed their sentiments in a manner so easy, natural, and flowing, that they appeared to be of her own genuine utterance.”  Pray, sir, what is there so remarkable about that?  Had not Anne as gentle blood as that which coursed through the veins of many a lady of rank?

[Footnote A:  The Lady Townleys of later years included Mrs. Spranger Barry and the imposing Mistress Yates.]

But the triumphs of the first Lady Townley were fast drawing to a close; the curtain would soon be rung down for ever upon that radiant face, with its angelic smile and dancing eyes, and the stage, whether Drury Lane or mother earth would see her no more.  Ill health began to follow in her once careless path, and there were times when the duties of acting seemed almost unbearable.  Yet she was a brave woman, and kept a merry front to the audience, although she was obliged, on occasions, to turn away from the house, that it might not see the tears of pain flowing down her cheek.  Here was a combination of comedy and tragedy, with a vengeance!

Still Nance went on, delighting the town as of yore, and putting into her last original role, that of Sophonisba, a fire which breathed not of sickness nor failing powers.  At last there came a day when she played her final part, and left Drury Lane only to be driven tenderly home to her death-bed.  Think of the pathos of this last performance, this giving up of all that was most alluring in life, and let none of us poor moderns presume to analyse the heart-broken woman’s feelings as she said good-bye to the dear old theatre.  Anne worshipped art, and the public, in turn, worshipped her; she had acted her many parts, laughed, cried, sinned, and waxed exceeding happy—­and now she was to be cast out into the darkness.  Must she not have shivered when she entered her house in Lower Grosvenor Street for the last time?  Poor lovable creature!  There could be for her now neither lights, nor laughter, nor applause; all would be gloom and weariness to the end.