"Madam," said the page, timidly, "if you would but favor us with a
specimen of the old style

"Well, child, why not? Only what makes you mumble like that? but they all
do it now, I see. Bless my soul! our words used to come out like
brandy-cherries; but now a sentence is like raspberry-jam, on the stage
and off."

Cibber chuckled.

"And why don't you men carry yourself like Cibber here?"

"Don't press that question," said Colley dryly."

"A monstrous poor actor, though," said the merciless old woman, in a mock
aside to the others; "only twenty shillings a week for half his life;"
and her shoulders went up to her ears--then she fell into a half reverie.
"Yes, we were distinct," said she; "but I must own, children, we were
slow. Once, in the midst of a beautiful tirade, my lover went to sleep,
and fell against me. A mighty pretty epigram, twenty lines, was writ on't
by one of my gallants. Have ye as many of them as we used?"

"In that respect," said the page, "we are not behind our
great-grandmothers."

"I call that pert," said Mrs. Bracegirdle, with the air of one drawing
scientific distinctions. "Now, is that a boy or a lady that spoke to me
last?"

"By its dress, I should say a boy," said Cibber, with his glass; "by its