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The heroine, Evadne, has been in secret a mistress of the king, who marries her to Amintor, a gentleman of his court, because, as she explains to her bridegroom, on the wedding night, I must have one To father children, and to bear the name Of husband to me, that my sin may be More honorable.
In The Forced Marriage she seems to have remembered The Maid's Tragedy. The situation between Alcippus and Erminia, Act ii, III, has some vague resemblance to that of Amintor and Evadne, Act ii, I. Aminta also faintly recalls Dula, whilst the song 'Hang love, for I will never pine' has a far-off echo of 'I could never have the power. But Mrs.
p. 186 The Maids Tragedy. Mrs. Behn refers to Act ii, I, and Act iii, I. Hart acted Amintor; Mohun, Melantius; Wintershall, the King; Mrs. Marshall, Evadne. Rymer particularly praises Hart and Mohun in this tragedy, saying: 'There we have our Roscius and Aesopus both on the stage together. After 1683 it was differently cast.
It was devised for an audience of aristocrats in the reign of James I, and the dramatic struggle is founded upon the doctrine of the divine right of kings. Amintor, in the play, has suffered a profound personal injury at the hands of his sovereign; but he cannot avenge this individual disgrace, because he is a subject of the royal malefactor.
She is troth-plight wife to Amintor, and after he, by the king's command, has forsaken her for Evadne, she disguises herself as a man, provokes her unfaithful lover to a duel, and dies under his sword, blessing the hand that killed her. This is a common type in Beaumont and Fletcher, and was drawn originally from Shakspere's Ophelia.
The crisis and turning-point of the entire drama is a scene in which Amintor, with the king at his mercy, lowers his sword with the words: But there is Divinity about you, that strikes dead My rising passions: as you are my king, I fall before you, and present my sword To cut mine own flesh, if it be your will.
It will be remembered that Melantius was Betterton's last role, in which he appeared for his benefit 13 April, 1710, to the Amintor of Wilks and the Evadne of Mrs. Barry. He died 28 April, a fortnight after. p. 187 Wills Coffee House. This famous coffee-house was No. 1 Bow Street, Covent Garden, on the west side corner of Russell Street. It derived its name from Will Unwin who kept it.
"You must know I have often had some desire for the life of action," said Mr. Waverton. To which the Colonel earnestly, "I have never known a man more fit for it," and upon that they entered my lady's drawing-room. Miss Lambourne was singing Carey's song of the nightingale: "While in a Bow'r with beauty blest The lov'd Amintor lies, While sinking on Lucinda's breast He fondly kiss'd her Eyes.
This scene is, perhaps, the most affecting and impressive in the whole range of Beaumont and Fletcher's drama. Yet when Evadne names the king as her paramour, Amintor exclaims: O thou hast named a word that wipes away All thoughts revengeful. In that sacred name "The king" there lies a terror. What frail man Dares lift his hand against it?
The Maids Tragedy see the Scene of undressing the Bride, and between the King and Amintor, and after between the King and Evadne All these I Name as some of the best Plays I know; If I should repeat the Words exprest in these Scenes I mention, I might justly be charg'd with course ill Manners, and very little Modesty, and yet they so naturally fall into the places they are designed for, and so are proper for the Business, that there is not the least Fault to be found with them; though I say those things in any of mine wou'd damn the whole Peice, and alarm the Town.
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