The handsome, rosy face of a strapping tavern wench would not have startled him, but he was not gazing upon a bouncing serving maid or the hoydenish daughter of a prosperous innkeeper.  He beheld a creature in all the gentle bloom of highbred beauty—­tall, well-formed, and radiating a sort of natural elegance, with a fine-shaped, expressive face, to which great speaking eyes and a mouth half pensive, half smiling, lent an air of rare distinction.  These were the eyes which in after years Anne would half close in a roguish way, as when, for instance, she meditated a brilliant stroke as Lady Betty Modish, and then, opening them defiantly, would make them glisten with the spirit of twinkling comedy.  These were the eyes, too, which would shine forth such unutterable love when she played Cleopatra that one might well pardon the peccadilloes of poor Antony.  But as yet there was no thought of drooping eyelids or amorous glances; all was natural, and nothing more so than the coyness of Nance upon seeing the author of “Love and a Bottle.”

Captain Farquhar had never before beheld this seamstress from King Street, Westminster, but she must have been familiar with the handsome figure of one who had drunk many a brimming glass at the Mitre Tavern.  Thus, when he made bold to praise her elocution, she was not offended, and, although she ignored his request to continue the “Scornful Lady,” Anne proved sufficiently mistress of the interruption to astonish the intruder by her “discourse and sprightly wit.”  That innate breeding, of which no amount of poverty could deprive her, came to the surface, to show that a woman of quality is none the worse for a surprise.  Farquhar, bowing low with a grace that made his faded clothes seem the pink of fashion, poured forth a torrent of flowery compliments, which became all the stronger when he heard that the girl knew Beaumont and Fletcher nearly by heart.  She must have blushed, looking prettier than ever, as the visitor went on; and how that young heart did leap as he predicted for her a glorious future on the stage!  The stage! the Ultima Thule of all her hopes!  The very idea of acting filled her head with a thousand bewildering fancies, and, as she told Chetwood in after years, “I longed to be at it, and only wanted a little decent intreaties.”

The decent intreaties were forthcoming.  Nance’s mother, who evidently rejoiced in a prophetic spirit not given to all parents, strongly agreed with Farquhar’s opinion that the young lady should try a theatrical career, and the upshot of the whole episode was that Captain Vanbrugh took an interest in the newly-found jewel.  This was a high honour.  Vanbrugh had not yet made for himself a reputation as an architect by building Blenheim Castle for the Marlboroughs, nor had he changed his title of Captain for Sir John; but he was a great man, nevertheless, a successful dramatist and a boon companion of Christopher Rich, manager of Drury Lane.  When the enthusiastic