Of the vizard-masks, Cibber tells the whole history in a few words: "I remember the ladies were then observed to be decently afraid of venturing bare-faced to a new comedy, till they had been assured they might do it without insult to their modesty; or if their curiosity were too strong for their patience, they took care at least to save appearances, and rarely came in the first days of acting but in masks, which custom, however, had so many ill consequences attending it, that it has been abolished these many years."
The poets sometimes accused the ladies of blushing, not because of offence, but from constraint on laughter. Farquhar's Pindress says to Lucinda, "Didn't you chide me for not putting a stronger lace in your stays, when you had broke one as strong as a hempen-cord with containing a violent _ti-hee_ at a ---- jest in the last play?"
Cibber describes the beaux of the seventeenth century as being of quite a different stamp from the more modern sort. The former "had more of the stateliness of the peacock in their mien," whereas the latter seemed to place their highest emulation in imitating "the pert air of a lapwing." The greatest possible compliment was paid to Cibber by the handsome, witty, blooming young fop, Brett, who was so enchanted with the wig the former wore as Sir Novelty Fashion, in "Love's Last Shift," that fancying the wearing it might ensure him success among the ladies, he went round to Cibber's dressing-room, and entered into negotiations for the purchase of that wonderful cataract perriwig. The fine gentlemen among the audience had, indeed, the credit of being less able to judge of a play than of a peruke; and Dryden speaks of an individual as being "as invincibly ignorant as a town-sop judging of a new play."
Lord Foppington, in 1697, did not pretend to be a beau; but he remarks, "a man must endeavour to look wholesome, lest he make so nauseous a figure in the side-box, the ladies should be compelled to turn their eyes upon the play." It was the "thing" to look upon the company, unless some irresistible attraction drew attention to the stage; and the curtain down, the beau became active in the service of the ladies generally. "Till nine o'clock," says Lord Foppington, "I amuse myself by looking on the company, and usually dispose of one hour more in leading them out."