Dean Swift, who had had so much to do with the inception of the opera and who had contributed to it some of the most stinging verse, would have been present had he not been in Ireland at the death-bed of his beloved Stella, and so also would have been Congreve but that he was blind and in feeble health.
It was seen at the very commencement that the audience was not disposed to accept the innovations of the "Beggar's Opera" without protest.

To begin with there was no time-honoured prologue, and worse, there was no preliminary overture.

They could not understand the dialogue between a player and the beggar, introduced as the author, with which the opera opens.

They grumbled loudly.

They thought they were to be defrauded of their usual music and they wouldn't allow the dialogue to proceed.