After some time of this division of labour, the position of the two playmates was reversed. It was Garrick who sat on Goldsmith's knees and did the gesticulating, while the poet attempted to deliver his lines after the manner of the player. The effect was even more ludicrous than that of the previous combination; and then, in the middle of an affecting passage from Addison's "Cato," Goldsmith began to sing the song which he had been compelled to omit from the part of Miss Hardcastle, owing to Mrs. Bulkley's not being a singer. Of course Garrick's gestures during the delivery of the song were marvellously ingenious, and an additional element of attraction was introduced by Dr. Burney, who hastily seated himself at the pianoforte and interwove a medley accompaniment, introducing all the airs then popular, but without prejudice to the harmonies of the accompaniment.
Reynolds stood by the side of his friend, Miss Kauffman, and when this marvellous fooling had come to an end, except for the extra diversion caused by Garrick's declining to leave Goldsmith's knees--he begged the lady to favour the company with an Italian song which she was accustomed to sing to the accompaniment of a guitar. But Miss Angelica shook her head.
"Pray add your entreaties to mine, Miss Horneck," said Sir Joshua to the Jessamy Bride. "Entreat our Angel of Art to give us the pleasure of hearing her sing."
Miss Horneck rose, and made an elaborate curtsey before the smiling Angelica.
"Oh, Madame Angel, live forever!" she cried. "Will your Majesty condescend to let us hear your angelic voice? You have already deigned to captivate our souls by the exercise of one art; will you now stoop to conquer our savage hearts by the exercise of another?"
A sudden cry startled the company, and at the same instant Garrick was thrown on his hands and knees on the floor by the act of Goldsmith's springing to his feet.
"By the Lord, I've got it!" shouted Goldsmith. "The Jessamy Bride has given it to me, as I knew she would--the title of my comedy--she has just said it: '_She Stoops to Conquer_.'"
As a matter of course, Colman objected to the new title when Goldsmith communicated it to him the next day; but the latter was firm on this particular point. He had given the play its name, he said, and he would not alter it now on any consideration.