Audrey

So thought honest Cibber, and wrote at leisure to his Virginia

acquaintance. It made small difference whether he wrote or refrained from

writing, for he had naught to do with the destinies of Darden's Audrey.

'Twas almost summer before there came an answer to his letter. He showed

it to Wilks in the greenroom, between the acts of "The Provoked Husband."

Mrs. Oldfield read it over their shoulders, and vowed that 'twas a moving

story; nay, more, in her next scene there was a moisture in Lady Townly's

eyes quite out of keeping with the vivacity of her lines.

Darden's Audrey had to do with Virginia, not London; with the winter,

never more the summer. It is not known how acceptable her Monimia, her

Belvidera, her Isabella, would have been to London playgoers. Perhaps they

would have received them as did the Virginians, perhaps not. Cibber

himself might or might not have drawn for us her portrait; might or might

not have dwelt upon the speaking eye, the slow, exquisite smile with which

she made more sad her saddest utterances, the wild charm of her mirth, her

power to make each auditor fear as his own the impending harm, the tragic

splendor in which, when the bolt had fallen, converged all the pathos,

beauty, and tenderness of her earlier scenes.

A Virginian of that winter, writing of her, had written thus; but then Williamsburgh was not London,

nor its playhouse Drury Lane. Perhaps upon that ruder stage, before an

audience less polite, with never a critic in the pit or footman in the

gallery, with no Fops' Corner and no great number of fine ladies in the

boxes, the jewel shone with a lustre that in a brighter light it had not

worn. There was in Mr. Charles Stagg's company of players no mate for any

gem; this one was set amongst pebbles, and perhaps by contrast alone did

it glow so deeply.

However this may be, in Virginia, in the winter and the early spring of

that year of grace Darden's Audrey was known, extravagantly praised,

toasted, applauded to the echo. Night after night saw the theatre crowded,

gallery, pit, and boxes. Even the stage had its row of chairs, seats held

not too dear at half a guinea. Mr. Stagg had visions of a larger house, a

fuller company, renown and prosperity undreamed of before that fortunate

day when, in the grape arbor, he and his wife had stood and watched

Darden's Audrey asleep, with her head pillowed upon her arm.

Darden's Audrey! The name clung to her, though the minister had no further

lot or part in her fate. The poetasters called her Charmante, Anwet,

Chloe,--what not! Young Mr. Lee in many a slight and pleasing set of

verses addressed her as Sylvia, but to the community at large she was

Darden's Audrey, and an enigma greater than the Sphinx. Why would she not

marry Mr. Marmaduke Haward of Fair View? Was the girl looking for a prince

to come overseas for her? Or did she prefer to a dazzling marriage the

excitement of the theatre, the adulation, furious applause?