THE

ADVENTURES OF FIVE HOURS.

BY

SIR SAMUEL TUKE.

SIR SAMUEL TUKE, of Temple Cressy, in the County of Essex, was a Colonel of Horse in the King's army, and served against the Parliament, as long as the affairs of his master had any prospect of success. He was very active in that rising in the County of Essex, which ended fatally to some of the chief actors in it. From the prologue to the present play, spoken at Court, it appears that he intended to retire from business, soon after the Restoration, but was diverted from that design for some time, by his Majesty's recommending him to adapt a Spanish play to the English stage, which he executed with some degree of success. On the 31st March, 1664, he was created a BaroHe married Mary, the daughter of Edward Sheldon, a lady who was one of the dressers to Queen Mary, and probably a Roman Catholick, of which persuasion our author seems also to have been. He died at Somerset House, on the 26th of January, 1673, and was buried in the vault under the chapel there. Langbaine, by mistake, says he was alive at the time he published his Lives of the Dramatick Poets.

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Sir Samuel did not escape the censure of his brother poets. ‡ One of them, speaking of Cowley, says, he "Writ verses unjustly in praise of Sam Tuke."

And in the same poem:

"Sam Tuke sat, and formally smil'd at the rest;
But Apollo, who well did his vanity know,
Call'd him to the bar to put him to the test,
But his Muse was so stiff, she scarcely could go.

She pleaded her age, desir'd a reward;

It seems in her age, she doated on praise:
But Apollo resolv'd that such a bold bard

Should never be grac'd with a per'wig of bays."

Sir Samuel was one of the first members of the Royal Society, and wrote a history of the ordering and generation of green Colchester oysters, printed in Spratt's History, p. 307.

The several editions of this play are-in Folio, 1663, and in 4to. 1664, 1671, and 1704.

Heylin's Help to History.

↑ Wood's Ath. Vol. II. p. 802.

+ Dryden's Miscellanies, Vol. II. p. 92.

SINCE it is your pleasure, (noble sir,) that I should hold my fortune from you; like those tenants, who pay some inconsiderable trifle in lieu of a valuable rent, I humbly offer you this poem, in acknowledgment of my tenure: and I am well pleas'd with this occasion to publish my sense of your favours, since it seems to me a kind of ingratitude to be thankful in private.

It was bred upon the terrace-walks in your garden at Aldbury; and, if I mistake not, it resembles the place where it was brought up: the plot is delightful, the elevations natural, the ascents easy, without any great embellishments of art.

I designed the character of Antonio, as a copy of your steady virtue; if it appear to those who have the honour to know you, short of the original, I take leave to inform them, that you have not sat to me long; 'tis possible, hereafter I may gratify my country, for their civility to this essay, with something more worthy of your patronage and their indulgence.

In the interim, I make it my glory to avow, that, had fortune been just to me, she could not have recompensed the loyal industry of my life with a more illustrious title, than that which you have been pleased to confer upon me, of Your Friend. To which (as in gratitude I am bound) I subjoin that of, Your most humble servant,

S. TUKE.

The first SCENE is the City of SEVILLE.

The Prologue enters, with a play-bill in his hand, and reads,

This day, being the 15th of December, shall be acted a new play, never play'd before, call'd "The Adventures of Five Hours."

A NEW PLAY.

Th' are i' the right, for I dare boldly say,
The English stage ne'er had so new a play;
The dress, the author, and the scenes are new.
This ye have seen before ye'll say; 'tis true;
But tell me, gentlemen, who ever saw,
A deep intrigue confin'd to five hours' law.
Such as for close contrivance yields to none:
A modest man may praise what's not his own.
'Tis true, the dress is his, which he submits
To those who are, and those who would be wits;
Ne'er spare him, gentlemen; for, to speak
truth,

He has a per❜lous cens'rer been in 's youth;
And now grown bald with age, doating on praise,
He thinks to get a periwig of bays.

Teach him what 'tis, in this discerning age,
To bring his heavy genius on the stage;
Where you have seen such nimble wits appear,
That pass'd so soon, one scarce could say th'
were here.

Yet, after our discoveries of late

Of their designs, who would subvert the state,
You'll wonder much, if it should prove his lot,
To take all England with a Spanish plot;
But if, through his ill conduct, or hard fate,
This foreign plot (like that of eighty-eight)
Should suffer shipwreck in your narrow seas,
You'll give your modern poet his writ of ease;
For, by th' example of the King of Spain,
He resolves ne'er to trouble you again.

THE PROLOGUE AT COURT.

HE ADDRESSES HIMSELF TO THE FIT.

As to a dying lamp, one drop of oil
Gives a new blaze, and makes it live awhile;
So th' author, seeing his decaying light,
And therefore thinking to retire from *sight,
Was hinder'd by a ray from the upper sphere,
Just at that time he thought to disappear.
He chanc'd to hear his Majesty once say
He lik'd this plot; he stay'd, and writ the play:
So should obsequious subjects catch the minds
Of princes, as your seamen do the winds.
If this attempt then shews more zeal than light,
'T may teach you to obey, though not to write.

Ah! he is there † himself. Pardon my † sight,
My eyes were dazzled with excess of light;
Even so the sun, who all things else displays,
Is hid from us i' th' glory of his rays.
Will you vouchsafe your presence? You, that
were given

To be our Atlas, and support our heaven?
Will you (dread sir) your precious moments lose
To grace the first endeavours of our Muse?
This with your character most aptly suits,
Even Heaven itself is pleas'd with the first-
fruits.

PREFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION.

HAVING been desired by a lady, who has more than ordinary favour for this play (though in other things very judicious) to make a song, and insert it in that scene where you may now read it; I found it more difficult to disobey the commands of this excellent person, than to obtain of myself to write any more upon subjects of this nature.

This occasion'd the revising of this piece, upon which I had not cast my eyes since it was first printed; and finding there some very obvious faults, (with respect to their judgments, who have been pleased to applaud it,) I could not well imagine how they came to escape my last hand; unless poetic rage, or, in a more humble phrase, heat of fancy, will not, at the same time, admit the calm temper of judgment; or that, being importuned by those, for whose benefit this play was intended, I was even forc'd to expose it, before it was fit to be seen in such good company.

This refers only to the dress; for certainly the plot needs no apology; it was taken out of || Don Pedro Calderon, a celebrated Spanish author, the nation of the world who are the happiest in the force and delicacy of their inventions, and recommended to me by his sacred Majesty, as an excellent design; whose judgment is no more to be doubted, than his commands are to be disobeyed: and therefore it might seem a great presumption in me, to enter my sentiments, with his royal suffrage: But as secretaries of state subscribe their names to the mandates of their prince, so at the bottom of the leaf I take the boldness to sign my opinion, that this is incomparably the best plot that I ever met with: and yet, if I may be allowed to do myself justice, I might acquaint the readers, that there are several alterations in the copy, which do not disgrace the original.

This refers to the author's purpose of retirement, at that time when his Majesty recommended this plot to him.

He looking up and seeing the King, starts. He kneels. He rises. Calderon de la Barca was a Spanish officer, who, after having signalized himself in the military profession, quitted it for the ecclesiastical, and then commenced dramatic writer. His plays make nine volumes in 4to. and several of them have been adapted to the English stage. He flourished about the year 1640.

I confess, 'tis something new, that trifles of this nature should have a second edition; but if in truth this essay be at present more correct, I have then found an easy way to gratify their civility, who have been pleased to indulge the errors in the former impressions.

If they who have formerly seen or read this play, should not perceive the amendments, then I have touched the point; since the chiefest art in writing is the concealing of art; and they who discover 'em, and are pleased with them, are indebted only to themselves for their new satisfaction; since their former favour to our negligent Muses has occasion'd their appearing again in a more studied dress and certainly those labours are not ungrateful, with which the writers and readers are both pleas'd.

And since I am upon the subject of novelties, I take the boldness to advertise the reader, that tho' it be unusual, I have in a distinct column prefix'd the several characters of the most eminent persons in the play; that, being acquainted with them at his first setting out, he may the better judge how they are carried on in the whole composition; for plays being moral pictures, their chiefest perfections consist in the force and congruity of passions and humours, which are the fea tures and complexion of our minds; and I cannot chuse but hope, that he will approve the inge nuity of this design, though possibly he may dislike the painting.

As for those who have been so angry with this innocent piece, not guilty of so much as that cur rent wit, obscenity and profaneness: These are to let them know, that though the author converses but with few, he writes to all; and aiming as well at the delight as profit of his readers, if there be any amongst them, who are pleased to enter their haggard Muses at so mean a quarry, they may freely use their poetic licence; for he pretends not to any royalty on the mount of Parnassus : and I dare answer for him, that he will sing no more, till he comes into that choir, where there is room enough for all and such, he presumes, is the good-breeding of these criticks, that they will not be so unmannerly as to crowd him there. FAREWELL.

:

PROLOGUE. SPOKEN BY MR BETTERTON.

If we could hit on't, gallants, there are due
Certain respects from writers, and from you;
Which, well observ'd, would celebrate this age,
And both support, and vindicate the stage.
If there were only candour on your part,
And on the poet's, judgment, fancy, art;
If they remember that their audience
Are persons of the most exalted sense;
And you consider well the just respect
Due to their poems, when they are correct:
Our two houses, then, may have the fate,
To help to form the manners of the state;
For there are crimes arraign'd a' th' poet's bar,
Which cannot be redress'd at Westminster.
Our ancient bards their morals did dispense
In numbers, to insinuate the sense,
Knowing that harmony affects the soul,
And who our passions charm, our wills controul.
This our well-meaning author had in view,
And tho' but faintly executed, you

Indulg'd th' attempt with such benevolence,
That he has been uneasy ever since;
For though his vanity you gratify'd,
The obligation did provoke his pride.
But he has now compounded with ambition,
For that more solid greatness, self-fruition;
And, going to embrace a civil death,
He's loath to die indebted to your breath;
Therefore he would be even w' you, but wants
force;

The stream will rise no higher than the source.
And they who treat such judges, should excell;
Here, 'tis to do ill, to do only well.

He has, as other writers have, good-will,
And only wants (like those) nature and skill;
But, since he cannot reach the envied height,
H' has cast some grains in this to mend the
weight;

And being to part w' you, prays you to accept
This revived piece, as legacy or debt.

This play, in the third edition, from which it is here printed, received some additions and improvements. Downes says, the Earl of Bristol joined in writing it. The first performance of it was VOL. III.

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