The
heroine in the English play, Mrs. Millisent, (Celia), marries the
roguish servant, Warner (Mascarille), who takes all his master's
blunders upon himself, is bribed by nearly everybody, pockets insults
and money with the same equanimity, and when married, is at last proved
a gentleman, by the disgusting Lord Dartmouth, who "cannot refuse to own
him for my (his) kinsman." With a fine stroke of irony Millisent's
father becomes reconciled to his daughter having married a serving-man
as soon as he hears that the latter has an estate of eight hundred a
year. Sir Martin Mar-all is far more conceited and foolish than Lelio;
Trufaldin becomes Mr. Moody, a swashbuckler; a compound of Leander and
Andres, Sir John Swallow, a Kentish knight; whilst of the filthy
characters of Lord Dartmouth, Lady Dupe, Mrs. Christian, and Mrs.
Preparation, no counterparts are found in Moliere's play. But the scene
in which Warner plays the lute, whilst his master pretends to do so, and
which is at last discovered by Sir Martin continuing to play after the
servant has finished, is very clever. [Footnote: According to Geneste,
_Some Accounts of the English Stage_, 10 vols., 1832, vol. i., p.
76, Bishop Warburton, in his _Alliance of Church and State_ (the
same work is mentioned in Note 2), and Porson in his _Letters to
Travis_ alludes to this scene.
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