An Epilogue at Wallack's

The play was done; The mimic lovers of the stage Were safe united, with their mimic battles won; But while the prompter closed his well-scored page, And on his bell a willing finger laid, An old man, stately, kind, and hale, In mould of courtly fashion made, Set forth the moral of the tale. Much bent with time, The frost that silvered on his brow Had left its markings, lined and figured like the rime, Which on the pane the warming noon-day glow Has smoothed and softened with its cheery smile. And while he spoke they lent him willing ears; For warmest youth of heart the while Shone through the winter of his years. ’T was not the words, For they were simple as the tales Some good old nurse’s well-taxed memory hoards Against the time when fairy folk-lore fails. He spoke in well-worn terms of good advice: How fathers should not draw too ready rein, Nor sons take umbrage in a trice At fathers’ counsels,—these and more again. But as he spoke The threadbare words they knew so well, Came rippling streamlets of applause that broke In throbbing oceans as the curtain fell. For youth and age, pride, poverty, e’en sin, Fair maid and bloodless pedagogue, All felt the world of nearer kin The while John Gilbert spoke—The Epilogue.