THE WHITEFRIARS LIBRARY OF WIT AND HUMOUR. EDITED BY W. H. DAVENPORT ADAMS. "Quid verum atque decens curo et rogo, et omnis in hoc sum.” HORACE. "We shall spare no pains to make instruction agreeable to our readers and their diversion useful. For which reasons we shall endeavour to enliven morality with wit, and to temper wit with morality that our readers may, if possible, both ways find their account in the speculation of the day." ADDISON (adapted). WILLIAM DAVENPORT ADAMS Author of "A Dictionary of English Literature," "Rambles in Book-Land" WITH PORTRAITS OF F. C. BURNAND, W. S. GILBERT, AND G. R. SIMS LONDON HENRY AND CO., BOUVERIE STREET, E.C. PREFACE. IN N the pages that follow, I make no attempt to supply a consecutive and comprehensive history of English stage travestie. This would have been impossible within the limits assigned to me. My object has been simply to furnish an introduction to such a history, supplemented by sketches of the various groups into which English stage burlesques naturally fall, with such extracts as might serve to exhibit the respective methods of individual travestiewriters. My business has been with the literary rather than the histrionic side of burlesque-with the witty and humorous, rather than the purely theatrical, features of the subject with which I had to deal. At the same time, I hope that the details I have been able to give concerning dates, and "casts," and so on, may be useful to at least a large section of my readers. I ought to say that, while I have endeavoured to mention all the most representative burlesques of which our stage history keeps record, I have intentionally left outside of my scheme all “ extravaganzas," "bouffoneries musicales," and other such miscellaneous varieties of comic 433575 |