Chapter 57

_To these, HUNT_

HUNT. The game's up, Deacon. I'll trouble you to come along with me.

BRODIE (_behind the table_). One moment, officer: I have a word to say before witnesses ere I go. In all this there is but one man guilty; and that man is I. None else has sinned; none else must suffer. This poor woman (_pointing to JEAN_) I have used; she never understood. Mr. Procurator-Fiscal, that is my dying confession. (_He snatches his hanger from the table, and rushes upon HUNT, who parries, and runs him through. He reels across the stage and falls._) The new life ... the new life! (_He dies._)

CURTAIN

BEAU AUSTIN

DEDICATED WITH ADMIRATION AND RESPECT

TO

GEORGE MEREDITH

BOURNEMOUTH, _1st October, 1884_

PERSONS REPRESENTED

GEORGE FREDERICK AUSTIN, called "Beau Austin" _Ætat._ 50

JOHN FENWICK, of Allonby Shaw " 26

ANTHONY MUSGRAVE, Cornet in the Prince's Own " 21

MENTEITH, the Beau's Valet " 55

A ROYAL DUKE. (Dumb show.)

DOROTHY MUSGRAVE, Anthony's Sister " 25

MISS EVELINA FOSTER, her Aunt " 45

BARBARA RIDLEY, her Maid " 20

VISITORS TO THE WELLS

The Time is 1820. The Scene is laid at Tunbridge Wells. The Action occupies a space of ten hours.

PROLOGUE

"To all and singular," as Dryden says, We bring a fancy of those Georgian days, Whose style still breathed a faint and fine perfume Of old-world courtliness and old-world bloom: When speech was elegant and talk was fit, For slang had not been canonised as wit; When manners reigned, when breeding had the wall, And Women--yes!--were ladies first of all; When Grace was conscious of its gracefulness, And man--though Man!--was not ashamed to dress. A brave formality, a measured ease, Were his--and hers--whose effort was to please. And to excel in pleasing was to reign, And, if you sighed, never to sigh in vain.

But then, as now--it may be, something more-- Woman and man were human to the core. The hearts that throbbed behind that quaint attire Burned with a plenitude of essential fire. They too could risk, they also could rebel. They could love wisely--they could love too well. In that great duel of Sex, that ancient strife Which is the very central fact of life, They could--and did--engage it breath for breath, They could--and did--get wounded unto death. As at all times since time for us began Woman was truly woman, man was man. And joy and sorrow were as much at home In trifling Tunbridge as in mighty Rome.

Dead--dead and done with! Swift from shine to shade The roaring generations flit and fade. To this one, fading, flitting, like the rest, We come to proffer--be it worst or best-- A sketch, a shadow, of one brave old time; A hint of what it might have held sublime; A dream, an idyll, call it what you will, Of man still Man, and woman--Woman still!

W. E. H.

BEAU AUSTIN

MUSICAL INDUCTION: "Lascia ch'io pianga" (_Rinaldo_), HANDEL