Drip! drip! drip! There's nothing here but dripping.
In the original copy of the Play, in the first scene of the fourth act, Isidore _had_ commenced his soliloquy in the cavern with the words:
Drip! drip! a ceaseless sound of water-drops,--
as far as I can at present recollect: for, on the possible ludicrous association being pointed out to me, I instantly and thankfully struck out the line." I repeat this story as told by Mr. C. himself, because it has been otherwise told by others. I have little doubt that it was more pointedly than faithfully told to him, and can never believe that Mr. S. represented a ludicrous line as a fair specimen of the whole Play, or his tenacious adherence to it as the reason for its rejection. I dare say he thought it, as Lord Byron afterwards thought _Zapolya_, "beautiful but not practicable." Mr. Coleridge felt that _he_ had some claim to a friendly spirit of criticism in that quarter, because he had "devoted the firstlings of his talents," as he says in a marginal note, "to the celebration of Sheridan's genius,"[50] and after the treatment described "not only never spoke unkindly or resentfully of it, but actually was zealous and frequent in defending and praising his public principles and conduct in the _Morning Post_"--of which, perhaps, Mr. S. knew nothing. However, in lighter moods, my Father laughed at Sheridan's joke as much as any of his auditors could have done in 1806, and repeated with great effect and mock solemnity "Drip!--Drip!--Drip!--nothing but dripping." I suppose it was at this time,--the winter of 1806-7--that he made an unsuccessful attempt to bring out the Tragedy at Drury Lane.[51]
When first written this Play had been called _Osorio_, from the principal character, whose name my Father afterwards improved into _Ordonio_. I believe he in some degree altered, if he did not absolutely recast, the three last acts after the failure with Mr. Sheridan, who probably led him to see their unfitness for theatrical representation.[52] But of this point I have not certain knowledge. It was when Drury Lane was under the management of Lord Byron and Mr. Whitbread, and through the influence of the former, that it was produced upon the stage. Mr. Gillman says, "Although Mr. Whitbread did not give it the advantage of a single new scene, yet the popularity of the Play was such, that the principal actor, (Mr. Roe,) who had performed in it with great success, made choice of it for his benefit night, and it brought an overflowing house." This was some time after Mr. Coleridge took up his residence at Highgate, in April, 1816. After all I am happy to think that this drama is a strain of _poetry_, and like all, not only dramatic poems, but highly poetic dramas, not to be fully appreciated on the stage.