The Poetical Writings of Fitz-Greene Halleck/To E. Simpson, Esq.

by Fitz-Greene Halleck and Joseph Rodman Drake

TO E. SIMPSON, ESQ.,
ON WITNESSING THE REPRESENTATION OF THE NEW TRAGEDY
OF BRUTUS.

have been every night, whether empty or crowded,
And taken my seat in your Box No. 3;
In a sort of poetical Scotch mist I’m shrouded,
As the far-famed Invisible Girl used to be.

As a critic professed, ’tis my province to flout you,
And hiss as they did at poor Charley’s³⁴ Macheath;
But all is so right and so proper about you,
That I’m forced to be civil in spite of my teeth.

In your dresses and scenery, classic and clever;
Such invention! such blending of old things and new!
Let Kemble’s proud laurels be withered forever!
Wear the wreath, my dear Simpson, ’tis fairly your due.

How apropos now was that street scene in Brutus,
Where the sign “Coffee-House” in plain English was writ!

By-the-way, “Billy Niblo’s”³⁵ would much better suit us,
And box, pit, and gallery, roar at the wit.

How sparkled the eyes of the raptured beholders,
To see Kilner,³⁶ a Roman, in robes “à la Grec!”
How graceful they flowed o’er his neatly-turned shoulders!
How completely they set off his Johnny-Bull neck!

But to hint at the thousand fine things that amuse me,
Would take me a month—so adieu till my next.
And your actors, they must for the present excuse me;
One word though, en passant, for fear they’ll be vexed.

Moreland, Howard, and Garner, the last importation!
Three feathers as bright as the Prince Regent’s plume!
Though puffing is, certainly, not my vocation,
I always shall praise them, whenever I’ve room.

With manners so formed to persuade and to win you,
With faces one need but to look on to love,
They’re like Jefferson’s “Natural Bridge” in Virginia—
“Worth a voyage across the Atlantic,” by Jove!

H.