charms of Mrs. Horton.  The latter was a strolling player recently admitted to the sacred precincts of Drury.  She had been in the habit of “ranting tragedy in barns and country towns, and playing Cupid in a booth, at suburban fairs.  The attention of managers was directed towards her; and Booth, after seeing her act in Southwark, engaged her for Drury Lane, where her presence was more agreeable to the public than particularly pleasant to dear Mrs. Oldfield."[B]

[Footnote A:  ’Tis true, they none of them had more than a negative merit, in being only able to do us more harm by their leaving us without notice, than they could do us good by remaining with us:  For though the best of them could not support a play, the worst of them by their absence could maim it; as the loss of the least pin in a watch may obstruct its motion.—­CIBBER.]

[Footnote B:  Dr. Doran’s “Annals of the Stage.”]

So wagged the mimic world with Nance as its most attractive figure.  Sometimes she laughed her way through a play; and again she committed suicide for the edification of the audience, as when she appeared in “Busiris.”  This was a windy tragedy by Dr. Young (he of the “Night Thoughts"), wherein Wilks, as Memnon, also had to kill himself.  The performance was, naturally enough, far from cheerful, and no particular inspiration could have been obtained from the presence of Busiris himself, that semi-savage Egyptian king to whom Ovid referred: 

  “’Tis said that Egypt for nine years was dry;
  Nor Nile did floods, nor heaven did rain supply. 
  A foreigner at length informed the King
  That slaughtered guests would kindly moisture bring. 
  The King replied, ’On thee the lot shall fall;
  Be thou, my guest, the sacrifice for all.’”

Certainly a most ungenial host.

There were times when Oldfield could even arouse enthusiasm amid the dullest and most unappealing surroundings.  This she did, for instance, in the stupid “Sophonisba” of James Thomson, who could write delightful poetry about nature without being able to carry any of that nature into the art of play-making.  It was in this artificial tragedy that the famous line occurred:  “Oh Sophonisba!  Sophonisba, o!” which was afterwards parodied by “Oh!  Jemmy Thomson!  Jemmy Thomson, oh!” and it was in the same ill-fated compilation that Cibber had the distinction of being hissed off the stage.  The latter, unlike Oldfield, had a sneaking fondness for tragedy, and when “Sophonisba” was first read in the green room he appropriated to his own use the dignified character of Scipio.  His egotism and foolishness had their full reward.  For two nights successively, as Davies tells us, “Cibber was as much exploded as any bad actor could be.  Williams, by desire of Wilks, made himself master of the part; but he, marching slowly, in great military distinction, from the upper part of the stage, and wearing the same dress as Cibber, was mistaken for him, and met with repeated hisses, joined to the music of cat-calls [notice, ye theatre-goers of 1898, that the cat-call is not the invention of the modern gallery god]; but, as soon as the audience were undeceived, they converted their groans and hisses to loud and long continued applause.”  Three years later, in 1733, Cibber retired from the stage.