The City Bride | Page 2

for a Cuckold, from which Harris worked, is also largely printed as prose, but has correct verse lineation in the same portion of the first act. It is the more remarkable that Harris, following thus closely the apparent form of his original, could vary from it so successfully. Most notable, probably, are the passages in which he intensified the expression of his source. They may indicate no more than the eternal "ham" in our author; but I think they probably indicate as well a new style of acting, more rhetorical in one way, more natural in another. A good example, in which the new rhetoric is not oppressive, is the account of the sea fight at the end of Act III. Even when Harris followed his original most closely, we seem to hear the actor, speaking in a new tongue, in a more relaxed and colloquial rhythm. The reader will find it both amusing and instructive to compare the two versions of Act II, scene ii. The new cadences do more than merely prove that Harris had no ear for blank verse.
The City Bride does not conform to the dominant type of Restoration comedy, but it belongs to a thriving tradition. Domestic comedy, in adaptations from the Elizabethans, had been staged at intervals for twenty years before The City Bride appeared, and the type was of course destined to supplant gay comedy in the near future. Harris was not, therefore, going against the taste of the town; on the contrary he was regularly guided by contemporary taste and practice. His stage is less crowded: he amalgamated the four gallants of A Cure for a Cuckold in the person of Mr. Spruce, at the expense of a dramatic scene (I, ii, 31-125); and he ended the sub-plot with the fourth act instead of bringing its persons into the final scene, with some loss of liveliness and a concomitant gain in unity of effect. He modernized his dialogue entirely, bringing up to date the usage and allusions of his original, and restraining the richness of its metaphor by removing the figures altogether or by substituting others more familiar. He omitted a good deal of bawdry, especially in Act II, scene ii. All these changes have parallels in other Restoration adaptations. Again, the songs and dances, which are all of Harris's composition, reflect the demand of the Restoration audience for excitement, variety, novelty, in their dramatic fare. When in Act III, scene i, Harris meets this demand by making Bonvile bare his breast to Friendly's sword, and Friendly a little later grovel at Bonvile's feet for pardon, we may condemn the new business as bathetic; but when in Act IV, scene i, he substitutes for Webster's emaciated jokes the bustle of drawers, the sound of the bar bell, and healths all around, we can only applaud the change.
We must also commend Harris for supplying a consistent and relatively believable motivation for the main action. In both A Cure for a Cuckold and The City Bride, Clare (Clara) begins the action by giving her suitor, Lessingham (Friendly), a cryptic message: he is to determine who his best friend is and kill him. In A Cure for a Cuckold, it is never made clear whether the victim should have been Bonvile or Clare herself (she apparently intended to trick Lessingham into poisoning her). This uncertainty has only recently been noticed by students of the drama, who have been forced to emend the text at IV, ii, 165 (see Lucas's note on the passage). Harris's solution is simpler. He will have nothing to do with either murder or suicide. Clara explains to Friendly that the best friend of a lover is love itself.
This is not the place to enumerate all the differences between A Cure for a Cuckold and The City Bride; indeed the reader may prefer making the comparisons for himself. Harris's alterations follow the general pattern of Restoration adaptations from the earlier drama, it is true. On the other hand, a relatively small number of such plays allow us to see the professional actor feeling his way through the emotions and actions of the scenes. To compare a play like The City Bride with its source is like visiting the rehearsals of an acting company of the time. Such a play has an immediacy and liveness that strongly appeals to those who delight to image forth the past.
The City Bride has never been reprinted. The present edition reproduces, with permission, the copy in the Henry E. Huntington Library, omitting Harris's signed dedication to Sir John Walter, Bart., on A2^r-A3^r (A1^v in the original is blank). The top line on page 44, which is partly cut away, reads: Cla. Who (if thou ever lov'dst me ...
Vinton A. Dearing University of California Los Angeles

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