3-052-337 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

Private theatricals: Miss Hardcastle in "She Stoops to Conquer", 1872. 'Among all the amusements and pastimes, all the gaieties and festivities of this beneficient holiday-season (that is, alas, rushing by so swiftly!), is there one that offers more unmixed pleasure than private theatricals?...The scene is laid in an old country house, the construction, furniture, and appointments of which lend themselves admirably to realise the "old-fashioned house" of Goldsmith's delightful play, "She Stoops to Conquer." The daughter of the house takes the part of Miss Hardcastle. She has certainly all the requisite personal charms, and she has only to supplement a little "gauze and French frippery," and adopt the Dolly Varden jacket and bonnet she wore last summer to dress the part as appropriately. We may suppose her to be entering the room when, dressed "as returning from walking," Hastings introduces his "modest" friend Marlow, her future husband'. From "Illustrated London News", 1880.