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 ^^
 
 MEMOIRS 
 
 INCLUDING 
 
 A HISTORY OF THE STAGE, 
 
 FROM THE TIME OF GARRICK TO THE PRESENT 
 PERIOD. 
 
 BY JAMES BOADEN, ESQ. 
 
 " Nihil metus in vultu : gratia oris supererat. 
 
 " BONUM VIRUM facile crederes, MAGNUM libenter." 
 
 TACIT, in v. Agric- 
 
 " THIS was the noblest ROMAN of them all!" SHAKSP. 
 
 IN TWO VOLUMES. 
 VOL. II. 
 
 LONDON: 
 
 PRINTED FOR 
 
 LONGMAN, HURST, REES, ORME, BROWN, AND GREEN, 
 
 PATERNOSTER-ROW. 
 1825.
 
 
 
 THE 
 
 LIFE 
 
 OF 
 
 JOHN PHILIP KEMBLE, Esg, 
 
 BOOK THE SECOND CONTINUED. 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 SEASON OF 1789-90. MRS. SIDDONS ABSENT. MR. 
 
 KEMBLE'S RESOURCES. COVENT GARDEN. THE AU- 
 THOR'S FRIEND, HARLEY. HIS TALENTS. KEMBLE 
 
 IN HENRY V. THE TEMPEST. PURCEL's MUSIC. 
 
 VANBRUGH'S FALSE FRIEND. MR. KEMBLE IN THE 
 
 LIBERTINE. THE IRON MASQUE. KING AT COVENT 
 
 GARDEN. THE CRUSADE. THE HAUNTED TOWER. 
 
 MRS. BERN'S ROVER. QUICK IN RICHARD. SUMMER 
 
 THEATRE. PALMER'S RETURN. WINTER SEASON OF 
 
 1790-1. DUKE OF CUMBERLAND'S DEATH. DISIN- 
 TERMENT OF THE SUPPOSED REMAINS OF THE GREAT 
 MILTON. ENQUIRY INTO THE FACT. MR, KEMBLE'S 
 CONVICTION ON THAT SUBJECT. 
 
 MR. KEMBLE experienced, as a manager, some diffi- 
 culty during the season of 1789-90. Mrs. Siddons 
 had suffered in her health by the severe continu- 
 ance of her professional duties ; and she resolved 
 VOL. n. B
 
 2 ABSENCE OF MRS. SIDDONS. 
 
 to avail herself at length of a variety of invitations, 
 which tempted her in a series, that brought her to 
 the beautiful scenery of Devonshire. The trage- 
 dies of female interest were therefore either to be 
 weakened by inferior representation, or for a time 
 laid aside. The latter was the safer course. But 
 the inexhaustible stores of Shakspeare presented to 
 Mr. Kemble a highly tempting monodram, in the 
 play of King Henry V. ; and he thought, how 
 justly we shall shortly see, that the conqueror of 
 Agincourt fell more completely within the range 
 of his powers, than the characters of John or 
 Richard III. ; for reasons as much mental as per- 
 sonal the pleasantry which so agreeably in Kemble 
 relieved his severer habits, and the heroic perfection 
 of his countenance and his figure. He therefore 
 set himself seriously to prepare the play for repre- 
 sentation. Now this, in Mr. Kemble's notion of 
 the business, was, not to order the prompter to write 
 out the parts from some old mutilated prompt copy 
 lingerington his shelves ; but himself to consider it 
 attentively in the author's genuine book : then to 
 examine what corrections could be properly admit- 
 ted into his text ; and, finally, what could be cut out 
 in the representation, not as disputing the judgment 
 of the author, but as suiting the time of the repre- 
 sentation to the habits of his audience, or a little 
 favouring the powers of his actors, in order that 
 the performance might be as uniformly good as it 
 was practicable to make it. The stage arrange-
 
 MR. KEMBLE'S RESOURCES. 3 
 
 ments throughout the play were all distinctly 
 marked by him in his own clear exact penmanship, 
 and when he had done his work, his theatre re- 
 ceived, in that perfected copy, a principle of ex- 
 actness, which was of itself sufficient to keep its 
 stage unrivalled for truth of scenic exhibition. 
 
 Another play that he prepared, and rendered 
 prodigiously attractive, was the Tempest, admit- 
 ting in a temperate way some of the additions of 
 D* Avenant and Dryden. These rendered it fuller 
 as a stage spectacle, and secured the assistance of 
 Miss Farren in Dorinda, and Mrs. Goodall in Hip- 
 poly to. It gave a terrible dance of Furies in one 
 place, and a masque of Neptune and Amphitrite in 
 another j and a beautiful accession indeed in the 
 occasional Epilogue, written by the elegant Bur- 
 goyne, and spoken by Miss Farren. After laugh- 
 ing at the present monsters of the Isle the HE Miss 
 Milliners, and the stringed and cravat fed Exquisites, 
 he comes to objects worthy of a people's gaze, and 
 thus alludes to his present Majesty, whqp Prince 
 of Wales : 
 
 " High o'er the crowd, inform'd with patriot fire, 
 Pure as the virtues that endear his sire, 
 See one who leads as mutual trials prove 
 A band of brothers to a people's love : 
 One, who on station scorns to found controul, 
 But gains pre-eminence by worth of soul. 
 These are the honours that, on reason's plan, 
 Adorn the Prince, and vindicate the man ; 
 While gayer passions, warmed at Nature's breast, 
 Play o'er his youth the feathers of his crest." 
 B 2
 
 4 FIRST APPEARANCE OF HARLEY. 
 
 Acquainted by age with the points of this allusion, 
 I add with sincere pleasure, that no compliment, 
 that experience presents to my memory, ever sur- 
 passed the above in propriety, and none ever ap- 
 proached it in delicacy and beauty. I would offer 
 the last couplet triumphantly, as an attestation to 
 the refined genius of Burgoyne. The mixed tone 
 of tenderness, airiness and respect, with which Miss 
 Farren delivered the last line, can never be for- 
 gotten 
 
 " Play o'er his YOUTH the feathers of his crest." 
 
 Having thus noticed what Mr. Kemble had pre- 
 pared, to supply at all events the means of battle, 
 though his great ally had not joined him, I pass 
 over to the other theatre to remark upon the first 
 appearance of my early friend, Harley ; who came 
 up with great distinction from Norwich to supply 
 in part, if possible, the loss of Henderson. Harley 
 had been bred to business in the banking-house of 
 Lefevre, Currie and Co., in Cornhill. He was dis- 
 tinguished even there for quickness and accuracy ; 
 he played with what others would have called toil ; 
 and not in the least clashing with his duty, he found 
 leisure to enlarge his mind ; to read the best authors 
 with much discrimination ; and to bind about him 
 some few friends, who cultivated poetry without 
 ostentation, and imparted their pleasures and their 
 difficulties to each other. It may be supposed that 
 a stage adorned by the peculiar powers of Hender- 
 son, would be attended by Harley with avidity j
 
 BARLEY'S INTRODUCTION TO HENDERSON. 5 
 
 perhaps he a little resembled him, and such resem- 
 blance is usually decisive as to the choice of a 
 model. There was nothing about him that could 
 at all lead his hopes into the school of Kemble. 
 
 To Henderson he had no introduction whatever, 
 but a letter written with so much modesty and ta- 
 lent, that it procured for him the zealous friendship 
 of that great and good man. He enquired into his 
 studies ; heard him recite ; seemed at once to dis- 
 cover that he had formed an able pupil unknown to 
 himself; and at length perceiving that the bent of 
 his mind was decidedly theatrical, he only then 
 thought of the best means of preparing him, pru- 
 dently, for his own profession. He recommended 
 him to fence regularly with Angelo, and he ex- 
 tended his steps rather beyond the common limits 
 of dancing. Mr. Kemble, though a graceful figure, 
 learned his perfect stage deportment under Le Picq. 
 Henderson made him known, as a young man whom 
 he esteemed, to Cumberland and to Hayley, to Mr. 
 Whitefbrd and Mr. Steevens ; and Harley knew 
 how to profit by such minds, and become agreeable 
 to such men. 
 
 At length the young actor announced toLefevre's 
 people his determination as to the stage j the resi- 
 dent partner heard him recite some scenes of 
 Richard ; saw, as every body else did, the decided 
 talent of his cashier, and assured him of his friendly 
 aid upon all occasions. At length the trial was 
 made at Norwich, and completely succeeded. He 
 
 B 3
 
 6 HARLEY AT COVENT GARDEN. 
 
 wrote to me the particulars of his debut, and of his 
 first alarm upon encountering Murray in Rich- 
 mond ; who, with the usual condescension of a 
 veteran, took his chance of overthrowing him by a 
 charming exterior elegantly attired ; or of gracing 
 himself by promoting the success of the young 
 candidate. 
 
 When Harley appeared at Covent Garden, a 
 similar fate awaited him. The elegant George 
 Holman condescended to fence with him in Rich- 
 mond ; and the public were paragraphed by Top- 
 ham into the knowledge, that though Mr. Holman 
 had obtained possession of Richard, even during 
 the life-time of Henderson, his zeal for the pro- 
 fession led him to act the part of Richmond to 
 Mr. Harley. The World abounded with little dis- 
 crediting half lines to his prejudice ; sometimes 
 pretending a veneration for Garrick, as if it were 
 some odd impeachment of a man's modesty, to act 
 a character which that mighty creature had sus- 
 tained; at others, he resembled Henderson so 
 much, that it might be true, as had been reported, 
 that he was really his son; some resemblances, 
 moreover, tljey discovered between him and Mr. 
 Kemble, but these were unattended by any scandal 
 whatever, for two human beings in person, gesture, 
 and utterance, could not be more decidedly unlike. 
 All these tricks, at the bottom, meant nothing more, 
 than that he was really formidable to the wear and 
 tear tribe of unthinking actors; and he was decidedly
 
 KEMBLE IN HENRY V. 7 
 
 a favourite with the town, in Richard and lago, in 
 Shylock, and even in Lear. A reverend critic of 
 that day, independent of his colleague's opinion, 
 enumerated some of Harley's felicitous points in 
 dialogue, and firmly added, " If he can continue 
 "to do this, he is an actor." Substantially, no 
 doubt, the style of Harley was that of Henderson, 
 and it is a disadvantage to an actor, to remind the 
 spectator of another ; besides, he never attained to 
 the mellowness of his master in tragedy his voice 
 was harsher and less flexible. Another misfortune 
 attended him, that he never could lay claim to any 
 of the rich comedy of Henderson. But he was a 
 man of sterling sense, and an actor of great energy; 
 and, as what was imitative in him dropt off, he re- 
 mained, on his own stock, the paragon representa- 
 tive of rough honesty and unshaken principle. Of 
 Smith and Holman in tragedy, I should say, that I 
 think they never got beyond Chamont ; a hot, 
 high, honourable soldier. Of Harley, that he stopt 
 somewhere about Kent in Lear, and all those parts, 
 in tragedy or comedy, " which trace him in the 
 " line" of unsophisticated principles and purposes 
 never to be shaken. The reader sees, that by this 
 manner of expressing myself, I do not design to 
 object to their higher efforts ; but that I think their 
 real excellence did not reach beyond the characters 
 by which I measure it. 
 
 On the 1st of October, Mr. Kemble acted the 
 part of Henry V. The play had not been done 
 
 B 4t
 
 8 REVIVAL OF THE TEMPEST. 
 
 for 20 years. This stage indifference to the record 
 of our brightest period may, perhaps, be accounted 
 for on a ground by no means political. It may be 
 presumed, that the mob always like to be told, that 
 Englishmen, extenuated by disease, and in numbers 
 as one compared with ten, are yet sure to become 
 the conquerors of France. But there is so little 
 female interest in the drama, that we cannot wonder 
 at the coldness of our fair countrywomen to these 
 fighting plays. Fair Catharine of France, and her 
 broken English, or equally indifferent French, is 
 not likely to attract the polished females of modern 
 times. As far as Mr. Kemble was concerned, I 
 do not think that even his Coriolanus exceeded his 
 " royal HAL." As a coup de Theatre^ his starting 
 up from prayer at the sound of the trumpet, in the 
 passage where he states his attempted atonement to 
 Richard the Second, formed one of the most 
 spirited excitements that the stage has ever dis- 
 played. His occasional reversions to the " mad 
 wag," the " sweet young prince," had a singular 
 charm, as the condescension of one who could be 
 so terrible. Of the other performers, James Aickin 
 and Baddeley claim a distinguished praise, in 
 which they share, humbly, with Kemble, that is, as 
 Exeter, and Fluellen, being unapproachable, for 
 tenderness and humour. 
 
 On the 13th of October, he brought out his revi- 
 sion of the Tempest, of which I have already 
 spoken. I have, I hope, sufficiently guarded myself
 
 .; FALSE FRIEND OF VANBRUGH. 9 
 
 against any presumed admiration of this production. 
 The scenes of Hippolyto and Dorinda are very 
 prettily written in that loose play of fancy, which 
 Dryden mistook for nature. He usually combines 
 in such dialogue an affected inexperience of life 
 with a highly metaphysical intellect ; and he passes 
 indecency not seldom through the lips of enquiring 
 chastity. All this was, no douht, enchanting among 
 the voluptuaries of Charles's court. In addition 
 to the unearthly music of PURCEL, in this opera, the 
 flowing melodies of Arne and the judicious accom- 
 paniments of Linley, filled the " Isle with noises" 
 more appropriate than even the music of Macbeth. 
 When the young student, in that charming science, 
 has mazed himself in the difficult execution of 
 foreign composers, let him meditate the symphony 
 to the air 
 
 " Full fathom five thy father lies," 
 
 and try himself to sing the air, with all its genuine 
 expression j and he will then know, that he has a 
 language yet to learn, and no master to assist him, 
 grounded essentially in our common nature, but 
 only well spoken by beings of the most refined 
 sensibility. 
 
 Mr. Kemble also made a few changes in the 
 False Friend of Vanbrugh, and acted the principal 
 character himself. It has so long been dismissed 
 to those dramatic shades called libraries, that a few 
 words may be proper as a sketch of its interest.
 
 10 MR. KEMBLE IN THE LIBERTINE. 
 
 Don John is one of those Spanish libertines, whom 
 no considerations can disturb in their unhallowed 
 pursuits. After violating every tie in life, they 
 usually leave it by the stiletto they have provoked, 
 or one destined to the bosom of another. The 
 latter is the fate, which Vanbrugh doomed for the 
 hero of the present comedy. Mr. Kemble tried to 
 reform and save him ; but to repent of villainy 
 could not be possible in Don John ; and the 
 character died, though he saved the man. 
 
 It may be proper, on this occasion, to express 
 some surprise, that Mr. Kemble should ever have 
 conceived himself a fit representative of such 
 characters. He never looked in the least like Don 
 Giovanni. He had none of the high sanguine 
 temperament, none of the careless hurry and auda- 
 cious impudence of the fighting lover of the whole 
 sex. His looks belied his tongue ; and what might 
 be credited, coming from Palmer, seemed morally 
 impossible when uttered by Kemble. Don John 
 begins his day usually in beating his valet, who is 
 his master in both policy and wit ; he then com- 
 mences his more serious business of deceiving every 
 living being, young or old, who may meet him ; 
 and passes his nights in lurking under verandas, or 
 stealing into chambers, ruining reputations or de- 
 stroying peace of mind, inflicting dishonour or 
 death, or both, as he was provoked. Let us con- 
 sider this in the unbending stateliness of Kemble's 
 deportment, and the grave, prudent steadiness of
 
 THE IRON MASQUE. 11 
 
 his physiognomy. To use the title of one of his 
 alterations, " O, it's impossible !" and to this revi- 
 val, there could be no conceivable temptation, but 
 his thinking the character one suited to his powers, 
 for there is nothing else in the play, that could be 
 attractive, unless from the personal beauty of the 
 actress. 
 
 The French Revolution had now opened upon 
 the world in all its horrors ; and the stage, " which 
 " echoes but the public voice," was now destined to 
 rave about that cage of tyranny, the bastile, which, 
 like Newgate in the year 1780, had been besieged 
 by a virtuous populace, and all its dark secrets re- 
 turned to the light of day and the blessings of 
 freedom. The Hon. J. St. John, proud of his 
 achievement, Mary Queen of Scots, and the people 
 of Drury, as Skeffington used to say, " wanting him 
 " to do something for them," he did the romantic 
 incident, called, perhaps with more propriety than 
 is suspected, " VOLTAIRE'S Masque de fer" or 
 Man in the Iron Masque ; whom, supposing him 
 to have actually existed, Gibbon triumphantly 
 proves to have been a slip of Anne of Austria j and 
 consequently a brother of Louis the Fourteenth ; 
 and who, when her husband's imbecility no longer 
 could father her offspring, might have, by strength 
 of resemblance, thrown into question the reigning 
 branch of the House of Bourbon. 
 
 Kelly acted the Iron Mask, and the entertain- 
 ment really possessed considerable interest. Allu- 
 sions to what was passing in France were plentiful,
 
 12 KING AT COVENT GARDEN. 
 
 and one as to the dissolution of nunneries was 
 loudly applauded by such as knew nothing but the 
 abuses of such institutions. It should be remem- 
 bered, that under the eye of one of the most gentle 
 and forbearing of kings, the wretched Chenier's 
 tragedy of Charles the Ninth was acting with the 
 most furious applause every night ; and the Pari- 
 sians were instructed that " the operation of time 
 " would teach the grandeur of the State* to succeed 
 " to that of the Throne. The people resuming 
 " their splendor, and overthrowing the imposture 
 " of ancient prejudices, would reclaim their rights 
 " founded by NATURE. Their bliss, springing from 
 " the very bosom of their miseries, would lead them 
 " to destroy all those horrid Bastiles, bathed so 
 " long with tears of blood ; and acknowledging 
 " their leaders, then no more their masters, they 
 " would be happy under a monarch, the friend of 
 " equity, and restorer together of liberty and the 
 '' laws." And thus having rendered the very 
 name of monarch odious, they flattered him out of 
 all possibility of resistance, and finally sent him and 
 his family to expire as traitors under the tranchant 
 of the Guillotine. 
 
 Mr. King had, in November, agreed to act a 
 few nights at Covent Garden Theatre, and on the 
 20th, he played Touchstone, in As You Like It 
 
 * The old expedient. See Dryden's Absalom and Achitophel. 
 
 " Thought they might ruin him they could create, 
 Or melt him to that GOLDEN CALF a State."
 
 THE HAUNTED TOWER. 13 
 
 But the style of this fine actor was at an immense 
 distance from any thing about him, and he seemed, 
 like the poor stag, one 
 
 " Left and abandoned of his velvet friends." 
 
 The Dramatist had been running on at that 
 theatre, with a success never equalled in my re- 
 membrance 5 and the author, not finding on the 
 sudden, a second subject for comedy, equal to his 
 first, had gone to work upon a shewy piece, to be 
 called the Crusade, in which, by making a knight 
 of Edwin, and what he could not well avoid doing, 
 a beauty of Mrs. Billington, with music and 
 scenery, that were in course to cost him nothing, 
 he hoped to retain his influence with the town, or 
 what he always valued more, his interest with the 
 manager. 
 
 On the 24th of November, Mr. Cobb produced 
 his opera of the Haunted Tower. Time has a 
 little changed our taste in music ; but, long after 
 the year 1789, the music which Stephen Storace 
 compiled and composed on this occasion, was heard 
 with unabated delight. The composers of that 
 time cultivated a pure and flowing melody like 
 Paesiello ; they had nothing of the flight; hurry, 
 and almost excessive brilliancy of Rossini the 
 language with them still stood for something, how- 
 ever little. There was a business in this opera just 
 enough to carry the singers into their places on the 
 stage j nothing that merited the important term of
 
 14 MRS. BEHN'S ROVER. 
 
 a fable. But there was great ability in the cast ; 
 for with Kelly, Baddeley, Moody, Suett, Dignum, 
 Sedgwick, and young Bannister among the men, 
 were Mrs. Crouch, Romanzini (poor Mrs. Bland), 
 and Storace for the fairer part of the performance ; 
 and they were all distinguished for talent of 
 superior kind, and execution in the fullest contrast 
 to each other. 
 
 Storace was certainly one of the most effective 
 burletta singers in the world. She took business 
 as a pleasure, and seemed always happy while em- 
 ployed. In the discharge of her public duty she 
 was highly exemplary ; laughed at colds and ner- 
 vous complaints ; used her shoes in the dry, and 
 her pattens in the wet, to convey her to and from 
 the theatre, and had not a grain of affectation about 
 her. Nor have I yet done with the display of 
 Kemble's activity in the present season ; he made 
 a very attractive comedy out of Mrs. Behn's Rover, 
 which was beautifully acted ; and just before the 
 close, my most respected friend, Mr. Prince Hoare, 
 gave to the stage a musical farce, called No Song 
 No Supper, which must be delightful as long as 
 there is any thing like the whim of Bannister, 
 Suet, or Storace, in the successive ornaments of 
 the stage. Mr. Kemble thus terminated a very 
 successful season, with little outlay of money ; fer- 
 tile of attraction, in the absence of the greatest 
 attraction of all j and proved his management to be 
 at least equal to his acting.
 
 QUICK IN RICHARD. 15 
 
 A circumstance at the other theatre this season 
 realized a pleasantry a few years back. Henderson 
 one morning rehearsed his Richard the Third in 
 the manner of little Quick, and the company was 
 convulsed with laughter. Mr. Quick, no doubt, 
 was aware that in " every man's thought" the 
 performance of Richard by him would be deemed 
 a most ludicrous achievement ; but he fancied it 
 would bring him a fine benefit night, and he tried 
 it. He had, however, much too high a veneration 
 for Shakspeare to play it otherwise than seriously j 
 so that all he had to struggle with were some tones 
 inveterately comic, and the associations of himself 
 with comedy by the audience ; and these came 
 sometimes into their minds uncalled by any lapse 
 into usual attitude or whimsical utterance. 
 
 I have already noticed the preparation of the 
 Crusade. It was by some strange management 
 brought out in the run of the benefits, so that if it 
 hit strongly, it could proceed only at intervals, and 
 at most could be but a turn over to the following 
 season. The burlesque chivalry of Edwin did not 
 prove captivating, and the author considered the 
 production as rather weakly. The florid poets of 
 the time assisted him in the songs ; but the truth 
 is, that Reynolds, although occasionally highly suc- 
 cessful in the play with spectacle and music, is 
 never there more than half himself : in fair broad 
 comedy he luxuriates. The serious dialogue of his 
 dramas always wants strength and poetry.
 
 1G DUKE OF CUMBERLAND'S DEATH. 
 
 The summer theatre offered a few pleasing Fea- 
 tures. Palmer, a little recovering from his Royalty 
 embarrassments, returned to Colman's, where he 
 was invaluable and Parsons, too, who had some 
 odd mode of consulting his health, without forsaking 
 his favourite usquebaugh, appeared there for the 
 benefit of Mrs. Bannister, in Dr. Bartholo. Ban- 
 nister, on his own night, wisely devolved the cha- 
 racter of Gondibert on Palmer, and became himself 
 a very excellent Gregory Gubbins through the 
 long continuance of the Battle of Hastings. 
 
 The winter season of 1790-1 had scarcely com- 
 menced when the theatres were closed by the death 
 of the late King's brother, the Duke of Cumberland. 
 His Royal Highness was born on the 7th Novem- 
 ber 1745; in 1771 had married the widow Horton, 
 sister of Earl Carh'ampton, and this match, while it 
 excited some very unpleasant opposition to him in 
 his family, became a source also of savage persecu- 
 tion out of it. The use that was made of it by 
 Junius, will never be forgotten. By this marriage 
 his Royal Highness left no issue. Upon the sub- 
 ject of any other, reference may at any time be made 
 to the Princess Olive of Cumberland, who will take 
 every suitable pains to establish her title. The late 
 Duke came much into public, was distinguished by 
 great condescension, and good humour, loved music 
 passionately, and passionately admired Mrs. Bil- 
 lington. You looked for his Royal Highness about 
 the orchestra at the Opeja, and seldom missed him.
 
 SUPPOSED DISINTERMENT OF MILTON. 17 
 
 He as seldom missed the trial of Warren Hastings, 
 while his health permitted him to attend ; and thus 
 he passed his life innocently and happily ; not in- 
 decently opposing the government of his sovereign 
 and his brother ; and lending neither his counte- 
 nance nor his allowance to any faction in the state. 
 He had lingered some time under the combined 
 attacks of asthma and consumption had passed 
 from Windsor to the coast, and back again to 
 Windsor, with little improvement ; and an invete- 
 rate cancer in the throat and mouth terminated his 
 existence on the 18th of September. In conversa- 
 tion his Royal Highness had the hurried manner of 
 his family, and gave easy utterance to any gay 
 levity that struck his fancy. These trifles were 
 malignantly weighed with the occasions that pro- 
 duced them, and brought forward to impeach his 
 understanding; but had they proceeded from a 
 facetious judge, or, if the character be acknowledged, 
 facetious father of the church, the mere expres- 
 sions would have excited little surprise and not the 
 slightest derision. 
 
 About this time an occurrence, which may, I 
 hope, be termed singular, frighted the whole island 
 from its propriety. I allude to the disinterment of 
 a coffin in Cripplegate church, supposed to contain 
 the body of the great author of the Paradise Lost. 
 Milton, though without any theatrical purpose, has 
 left his muse among the graces of the modern stage, 
 by having written, for Ludlow Castle, his magnifi- 
 
 VOL. II. C
 
 18 SUPPOSED DISINTERMENT OF MILTON. 
 
 cent Masque of Comus. With the severe and truly 
 Grecian tragedy of Agonistes our stage has never 
 yet become acquainted. About the year 1741 a 
 gentleman, of the name of Dixon, meditated its 
 performance in public, and he had fallen upon some 
 distribution of it into parts, which, in his own 
 opinion at least, was calculated to produce a very 
 powerful effect. Sincerely as I admire the poem 
 in the closet, (and few offer more frequent splen- 
 dors of diction to my memory,) I should be unwil- 
 ling to display the hero upon our common stages : 
 and should survey the attempt to do so, with an 
 alarm that sacrilege was about to invade the mind 
 as well as the person of the great bard. To the 
 latter atrocity I am fortunately restricted, and a 
 short account of it shall be laid before the reader. 
 
 The best things are so liable to perversion, that 
 it will excite little surprise to learn that the pro- 
 fanation alluded to arose out of a design to do 
 honour to the epic glory of our country. A monu- 
 ment had been intended to Milton in the church of 
 Cripplegate ; and this naturally enough begot a 
 desire to ascertain, if practicable, the precise situa- 
 tion of his remains. Among the mouldering coffins 
 of past generations tradition lends her feeble taper, 
 in the memories of hereditary sextons and pew 
 openers. The search was accordingly made under 
 the immediate direction of Mr. Strong, a solicitor, 
 and a man of science, and Mr. Cole, one of the 
 churchwardens. On the 3d of August, word was
 
 ENQUIRY INTO THE FACT. 19 
 
 brought to these gentlemen, that the coffin of the 
 poet was found ; it was a leaden one, and reposed 
 upon another of wood, conceived to contain the 
 body of his father. They immediately repaired to 
 tlie spot, and ordering water and a brush to be 
 brought, they cautiously washed the surface, to 
 ascertain whether any inscription was yet legible, 
 to remove all doubt upon the subject. The coffin 
 appeared to be old, much corroded, and without 
 plate or inscription of any kind. Further these 
 gentlemen did not think it proper to proceed. 
 Fully satisfied as to the material fact, they retired ; 
 and leaving the sacred ashes undisturbed, ordered 
 the ground to be closed. But the parish had the 
 honour to possess at this time, for its overseers, a 
 Mr. Laming, a pawnbroker, and a Mr. Fountain, a 
 publican ; and at a merry-making in the house of 
 the latter, the subject being mentioned, they re- 
 solved, on the following day, to see all that it was 
 possible for them to discover. They brought the 
 coffin to the edge of the excavation, where the light 
 fell upon it ; cut it open with a chisel, both at 
 the head and the foot, and had a distinct view 
 of the body upon turning down the lead. It ap- 
 peared to be perfect, completely enveloped in a 
 shroud of many folds ; the ribs standing up regu- 
 larly. When they disturbed the shroud, the ribs 
 in course fell. These miscreants made various 
 attempts to extract the teeth, and one of them, the 
 pawnbroker, had a mind to take the whole of the
 
 20 ENQUIRY INTO THE FACT OF 
 
 k>wer jaw as a pledge ; but probably from the failure 
 of any present supply of his friend the publican's 
 spirits, threw it back again into its place. From 
 such guardians, the coffin passed into the custody 
 of Mrs. Hoppey the sexton's servant, Elizabeth 
 Grant, who discharged, I suppose by some male 
 deputy, the functions of grave-digger in this well- 
 conducted parish. Elizabeth Grant, by the aid of 
 a light and in company with the workmen, exhi- 
 bited the body to as many people as chose to look 
 at it ; and the teeth and the smaller bones and the 
 hair were, at vile prices, sold to a great number of 
 persons. A player of the name of Ellis had taken 
 some hair and one of the ribs away in a piece of 
 paper. As this person was an ingenious worker in 
 hair, he meditated a larger purchase ; but he was 
 afterwards refused admittance. Mr. Neve published 
 his succinct account of the transaction on the 24th 
 of August, and entertained not the smallest doubt 
 that the body so treated was that of Milton ; he 
 closes his narrative with this strong and terrible 
 sentence : "The blood of the lamb is thus 
 " dashed against the door posts of the perpetrators, 
 " not to save, but to mark them to posterity." 
 
 There could be but one opinion as to the shame- 
 ful usage of the body ; but there were two as to 
 the question, whether that body was or was not 
 Milton's. Mr. Steevens, the commentator upon 
 Shakspeare, distinguished himself, as usual, by the 
 diligence of his enquiries, and the subtlety of his
 
 MILTON'S DISINTERMENT. 21 
 
 inferences. He decided against Mr. Neve's opinion ; 
 and maintained that Milton had certainly escaped 
 this profanation, on the following grounds : 
 
 First Because Milton was buried in the year 
 1674, and that this coffin was found in a situation 
 previously assigned to the Smiths, a wealthy family, 
 unconnected with his own. See their mural monu- 
 ment, dated 1653, immediately over the place of 
 the supposed Milton's interment 
 
 Secondly Because the hair of Milton was de- 
 cidedly of a light hue, and that of his pretended 
 skull of the darkest brown, without any mixture of 
 grey among it. Now Milton was 66 years old 
 when he died, a period at which human locks are 
 in a greater or less degree always interspersed 
 with white. 
 
 Thirdly Because the skull in question is re- 
 markably flat arid small, and with the lowest of all 
 possible foreheads j whereas the head of Milton was 
 large, and his brow conspicuously high. 
 
 Fourthly Because the hands of Milton were 
 full of chalk stones. Nothing of the kind was found 
 in the hand of the substitute, though time does not 
 destroy the trace, where the fingers are preserved ; 
 a fact ascertained* upon a subject almost coeval 
 with Milton. 
 
 Fifthly Because from the smallness of the bones 
 the slight insertion, whiteness, evenness, and 
 soundness of the teeth, it was most probably a fe- 
 male, one of the three Miss Smiths. The sex 
 
 c 8
 
 22 ENQUIRY INTO THE FACT OF 
 
 could not absolutely be determined. If not a 
 female, it might be the favourite son, John Smith,: 
 for whom an expensive receptacle had been ordered, 
 
 Sixthly Because Milton was not in affluence 
 expired in an emaciated state in a cold month, 
 and his funeral was ordered by his widow. One 
 of such expence was, therefore, little likely to come 
 from a rapacious woman, who oppressed his children 
 while he was living, and cheated them after he was 
 dead. 
 
 Such are the strong points of Mr. Steevens's case. 
 I will not weaken them by some, which prove 
 nothing but the writer's pleasantry. His conclud- 
 ing reflections every reader would complain, if I 
 omitted. I therefore insert them for two reasons : 
 first, as expressing a right feeling upon the subject ; 
 and second, as presenting a lively portrait of the 
 very peculiar mind of a gentleman, with whom I 
 delighted to converse; and who, to antiquarian 
 sagacity, united a pleasantry, that seemed eternally 
 " mocking the meat he fed on." 
 
 " Thanks to fortune (says Mr. Steevens,) Mil- 
 " ton's corpse has hitherto been violated but by 
 " proxy ! May his genuine reliques (if aught of 
 " him remains unmingled with common earth) 
 " continue to elude research, at least, while the 
 " present overseers of the poor of Cripplegate are 
 " in office ! Hard, indeed, would have been the 
 " fate of the author of Paradise Lost, to have re- 
 " ceived shelter in a chancel, that a hundred and
 
 r 
 MILTON'S DISINTERMENT. 23 
 
 " sixteen years after his interment his domus ultima 
 " might be ransacked by two of the lowest human 
 " beings, a retailer of spirituous liquors, and a man 
 " who lends sixpences to beggars, on such des- 
 " picable securities as tattered bed-gowns, cankered 
 '* porridge-pots, and rusty gridirons. Cape saxa 
 " manuy cape robora, Pastor! But an ecclesias- 
 " tical court may yet have cognizance of this more 
 " than savage transaction. It will then fre deter- 
 " mined whether our tombs are our own, or may 
 " be robbed with impunity by the little tyrants of 
 " a workhouse. 
 
 " If charnel-houses, and our graves, must send 
 Those that we bury back, our monuments 
 Shall be the maws of kites." 
 
 After a careful consideration of the subject, the 
 only reason for supposing this body to be the poet's 
 is, that it was found exactly in the situation which 
 tradition had assigned to it ; I mean, under the 
 clerk's desk, as it stood in Milton's time. Every 
 thing else is against it. What, then, it may be said, 
 became of the actual coffin of the great Republican? 
 He was buried in the year 1674, and the church 
 was repaired eight years after the interment. . Let 
 us recollect, that the year 1682 was a year of vio- 
 lent contest. The sectarists were assailed in their 
 city fastnesses, and threatened with a court perse- 
 cution, at least as violent as their own former per- 
 secution of the court. The citizens had to struggle 
 
 c 4
 
 24 MR. KEMBLE'S OPINION OF 
 
 with a mayor, nominated, in fact, by the king, and' 
 who arbitrarily appointed their officers. Perhaps 
 the elders of Cripplegate might apprehend some 
 violation of the Poet's remains. What they had 
 already seen in the case of the regicides, they 
 might behold in the case of him, who certainly did 
 not aid, but as certainly did justify all that they 
 had done. Such an apprehension might change 
 the situation of the coffin. If this be deemed a 
 gratuitous and uncalled for supposition, it can only 
 be so from the fair presumption, that a frame worn 
 out by complicated disease was of easy decomposi- 
 tion ; and that one hundred and sixteen years was 
 a period adequate to the demolition of all but the 
 literary remains of Milton. 
 
 Mr. Kemble took great trouble to inform him- 
 self upon the subject. Ellis the player showed to 
 him the spoils he had brought away from the grave; 
 and he went to Cripplegate, and I think he saw 
 Mr. Neve, who had convinced himself, that the 
 body so profaned was really Milton's. But on 
 being shown the objections of Mr. Steevens, he said 
 they were absolutely unanswerable ; and he added, 
 " 111 as the commentator has behaved to me, I al- 
 " ways admired the force of his mind, and am 
 " happy that he has exerted it, as I think, triumph- 
 tf antly, on the present occasion." We had long 
 after this an opportunity of reviving the subject, 
 when Bacon's most enchanting bust of Milton was 
 put up in the front of the north gallery. He walked
 
 MILTON'S DISINTERMENT. 25 
 
 with me into the city one Saturday morning, and 
 while the servants were cleaning the church for 
 the Sunday's service, we took our seats in the op- 
 posite gallery, and enjoyed this triumph of the elder 
 Bacon over Rysbrack, whose bust of the poet, 
 auditor Benson at length contrived to get into 
 Westminster Abbey. I hope he mentioned it to 
 Mrs. Siddons, because her own knowledge both of 
 sculpture and Milton merited such a gratification.
 
 CHAP. IV. 
 
 SEASON OF 1790-1. MRS. ESTEN, HER FINE TALENTS. 
 
 MR. KING REPLACED AT DRURY LANE, BY MR. KEMBLE. 
 
 DEATH OF EDWIN. GRIMACE. MR. KEMBLE ACTS 
 
 CHARLES SURFACE. MR. MUNDEN*S FIRST APPEARANCE. 
 
 MRS.SIDDONS RE-ENGAGED. SIEGE OF BELGRADE. 
 
 SCHOOL FOR ARROGANCE. DEATH OF BEARD. SKETCH 
 
 OF HIM. PANTHEON OPERA. BATE DUDLEY. HIS 
 
 WOODMAN. O'KEEFE. MERRY. WILD OATS. OLD 
 DRURY FINALLY CONDEMNED. ACCOUNT OF HER LAST 
 
 MOMENTS. OLD AND MODERN THEATRES COMPARED, 
 
 THE HON. F. NORTH'S KENTISH BARONS. .NEXT DOOR 
 
 NEIGHBOURS. COLMAN*S SURRENDER OF CALAIS. 
 
 THE first event of any theatrical importance in 
 the winter season of 1790-1, was an acquisition 
 of an enchanting woman and most interesting 
 actress to the boards of Covent Garden. I allude 
 to the performance of Mrs. Esten, in Rosalind, on 
 the 20th of October. In her figure she was deli- 
 cate, not tall, but graceful, and aware of the inter- 
 est attached to the languor of sensibility. She had 
 an eye that really did any thing that it pleased, 
 aided by such lengthened fringes, as Byron or 
 Moore have bestowed upon the beauties of warm 
 climates.
 
 MRS. ESTEN. 27 
 
 The daughters of Comedy have a Scylla and 
 Charybdis in their art, like other people ; and rarely 
 pass with such perfect skill, as to be uninjured by 
 either affectation or vulgarity. The highest refine- 
 ment, to a mixed audience, always savours of the 
 former. A careless indulgence of mirth, and a de- 
 sire to provoke excessive laughter, drops blamed, 
 or unblamed, into the latter. 
 
 Mrs. Esten's mother was the once celebrated 
 Mrs. Bennett, upon whose novels our ladies de- 
 pended for all the interesting romance of upper 
 life, and looked not always in vain for a charm 
 against the morning's ennui. No man need be 
 ashamed of such reading as could amuse our great- 
 est statesmen ; and I confess I am inclined to at- 
 tribute greater merit to such inventions, than to 
 productions of a graver character, but so con- 
 structed, as to be useless to the wise and repulsive 
 to the unlearned. From this mother Mrs. Esten 
 received her mental accomplishments perhaps 
 something of the novel adhered to her through 
 life. 
 
 She had really produced a great sensation in 
 Edinburgh. From the quality of her voice, her 
 tragedy coloured a little after Mrs. Siddons. In 
 comedy she seemed as if her effects would be as 
 gay and brilliant as those of Miss Farren, did not 
 some concealed uneasiness check the animal spirits, 
 and whisper to the actress, that she herself was not 
 happy. But this characteristic quality of Mrs.
 
 28 MR. KING REPLACED AT DRURY LANE. 
 
 Esten was highly favourable to her in such a cha- 
 racter as Rosalind. " Dear Celia, I show more 
 " mirth than I am mistress of;" and passages out 
 of number of a similar nature will crowd into the 
 reader's memory to verify this remark. Her In- 
 diana, a part seldom now before us, was given with 
 infinite delicacy and grace. Her Monimia, her 
 Ophelia, her Lady Townley, her Belvidera, all 
 evinced more or less captivations in the actress ; 
 and after the two greatest names of her time, and 
 as combining partially some of the excellencies of 
 both, I know nothing that ought to stand before 
 Mrs. Esten. Again I must notice the eloquence 
 of her eye, as the unrivalled magic, that perhaps 
 compels me to this decision. 
 
 On the 23d of October, Mr. Kemble replaced 
 Mr. King, in the business at Drury Lane, for which 
 he was so qualified ; but perhaps in doing so re- 
 placed him in those town habits which were so 
 fatal to his fortune. After playing all night with 
 a sharper, at a fashionable club, and losing every 
 thing, KING discovered that he had been bubbled, 
 arid hinted his suspicions to his antagonist; who 
 coolly said to him, " I always play with marked 
 " cards ; why don't YOU ?" King was happy in the 
 new arrangement, for it gave him all the support 
 in his art that he had been used to, without the 
 mortification of a nominal management divested 
 even of the shadow of authority. 
 
 On the 30th of the same month, Covent Garden
 
 DEATH OF EDWIN. Q9 
 
 lost, if not in value, yet in utility, more than Drury 
 Lane acquired Edwin died. This singular being 
 was the absolute victim of sottish intemperance. 
 I have seen him brought to the stage-door at the 
 bottom of a chaise, senseless and motionless. Poor 
 Brandon, on these occasions, was the practising 
 physician of the theatre. If the cloaths could be 
 put upon him, and he was pushed on to the lamps, 
 he rubbed his stupid eyes for a minute, conscious- 
 ness and brilliant humour awakened together, and 
 his acting seemed only the richer for the bestial 
 indulgence that had overwhelmed him. His last 
 performance was at the Haymarket Theatre, al- 
 ways the palace of jocularity, there, on the 2d of 
 August he acted the Gregory Gubbins of the Battle 
 of Hexham, and announced unconsciously the 
 wonderful alteration that came upon him. On the 
 6th of November they buried him in the church- 
 yard of St. Paul's, Covent Garden, and near to the 
 grave of Shuter, an actor of voluptuous broad-faced 
 humour, who had little in common with Edwin. 
 The fun of Edwin was of a coyer nature, " that 
 " would be wooed and not unsought be won," 
 you waited for it, but were never disappointed* 
 He classed, I imagine, rather with Weston, and 
 Weston seems to have had the fortune of our own 
 Liston in his face, that no earthly being could see 
 it without being thrown into convulsive fits of 
 laughter.
 
 30 KEMBLE IN CHARLES SURFACE. 
 
 
 
 I take the liberty to remark, that however agree- 
 able it may be to excite this burst of laughter, it is 
 in reality little flattering to the actor ; it is natural 
 distortion or pure grimace; features below the 
 standard of just expression, or gestures silly and 
 even indecent, that for the most part excite it. The 
 great fame of the actor can only arise from just de- 
 lineation of character. A proper estimate of the 
 art itself or a rational self esteem, should equally 
 lead a man to disdain what a mere trick can ac- 
 quire, and the exhibition of personal debasement 
 usually provokes. A great actor forbad his chil- 
 dren to see him in his farcical characters ; he there- 
 fore thought that mummery degraded him. 
 
 On the 10th of November Mr. Kemble acted, for 
 the first time in London, the part of Charles 
 Surface in the School for Scandal. I should better 
 have liked to see him in Joseph. However, al- 
 though the public never admired the performance, 
 he told me himself that Mr. Sheridan complimented 
 Jiim with having entirely executed his design. I 
 confess I a little doubted the sincerity of the declara- 
 tion, and well knowing the author's peculiar anxiety 
 to keep up the strength of his cast, I can forgive 
 the finesse by which he strove to retain the greatest 
 name in his theatre in the hero of his greatest pro- 
 duction. When I say above, that I had rather have 
 seen Mr. Kemble in Joseph, I would guard against 
 any implied preference of him to Palmer; that
 
 FIRST APPEARANCE OF MUNDEN. 31 
 
 actor's representation of this sentimental hypocrite 
 was as perfect a thing as even King's Lord Ogleby, 
 or Parsons's Corbaccio. 
 
 On December 2d, Mr. Munden, an actor of great 
 provincial celebrity, made his first bow at Covent 
 Garden Theatre in the character of Sir Francis 
 Gripe, in the Busy Body. Since the days of Shuter 
 nothing had been so rich, for Wilson was not a 
 tithe of him ; and his mind seemed teeming with 
 every surprise of comic humour ; which his features 
 expressed by an incessant diversity of playful 
 action, and his utterance conveyed in an articula- 
 tion of much force and neatness. He was received 
 by a very crowded house with triumphant ap- 
 plause ; and, with the proper confidence of a great 
 master in his art, he acted in the farce also, the 
 facetious Jemmy Jumps. Here he felt some little 
 alarm from the recent impression of poor Edwin ; 
 but he was above imitation, and played from him- 
 self so peculiarly and divertingly, that he pleased 
 even those who could not think him equal to Edwin ; 
 and although the latter was a master in musical 
 science, Munden sang the Fair-haired Laddie in a 
 style so powerful, as to show that burletta had 
 gained in him nearly as much as comedy. 
 
 Mr. Kemble now announced that Mrs. Siddons 
 was re-engaged at Drury Lane. By his own energy, 
 the house had suffered little from her absence. 
 She had, in various places during her tour, gained 
 money along with the grand object, health ; and
 
 32 SCHOOL FOR ARROGANCE. 
 
 strengthened a number of honourable connexions 
 by paying visits to our nobility at their mansions in 
 the country. After an absence therefore of two 
 years, our great actress returned to Isabella on the 
 7th of December, and the Grecian Daughter on 
 the 14th. The admirers of genius crowded again 
 as usual about her standard, though the manager 
 only called upon her three times in the whole month 
 of December. 
 
 On the 1st day of the new year he was ready with 
 the Siege of Belgrade, to employ ah 1 his musical 
 strength, under such a composer as Storace, and 
 Cobb had tried to equal the effect of his own 
 Haunted Tower in situations of operatic effect. 
 The letter duet, introduced in the present opera, 
 perfectly enchanted the audience. 
 
 Mr. Holcroft has occasionally been mentioned as 
 a very assiduous writer for the stage. He was 
 studious in modern languages, and saw the English 
 use to be made of French comedies, though he did 
 not succeed so well as Murphy in their naturaliz- 
 ation. On the 4th of February he produced, at Co- 
 vent Garden Theatre, his School for Arrogance, and 
 the critics of the day, " being sand-blind, high-gra- 
 vel-blind," could only fancy that the original play 
 was French. Topham had now lost the powerful 
 hand which sustained the World newspaper ; and 
 though Mr. Este was eccentric in point of style, 
 yet he was a scholar, a gentleman, and a man of 
 general reading ; and with respect to theatricals,
 
 SCHOOL FOR ARROGANCE. 33 
 
 lie really understood the subject ; was conversant 
 with foreign stages, as well as our own ; and actually 
 threw out in his rapid hints, rather than essays, 
 much good remark and refined taste. 
 
 Holcroft had merely followed Mrs. Inchbald 
 into the comic theatre of Destouches, and brought 
 away Le Glorieux ; drest him in English drugget, 
 and compelled him to speak-prose, while he remained 
 in this country. The arrogance of this play is purely 
 French, and the school of it solely disciplined by 
 French manners. Perhaps the only way to pro- 
 duce the full effect of such plots and characters in 
 our language, is to throw them about a century 
 further back by which our blank verse might be 
 obtained as some balance for the versification of the 
 original ; and our poetical and figurative diction 
 might compensate for the want of airiness and 
 naivete, which are not in our character, and con- 
 sequently not in our language. I believe Holcroft 
 subsequently cut this play down to three acts, a 
 treacherous and degrading experiment. Let co- 
 medy die at once, rather than lead the life of a 
 farce the consequence of the play is gone, and 
 its fable becomes unintelligible. Besides, if the 
 matter composing two acts can be cut away, and no 
 deficiency be apparent, w r hat is the skill of the 
 author where the unity and continuity of his in- 
 terest ? A manager will sometimes say to an 
 author, " If you will not do it, I must?'* Perhaps, 
 if he regards his reputation, he will curtail his piece 
 
 VOL. II. D
 
 34 DEATH OF BEARD. 
 
 himself; if he consults his interest, he will intreat 
 the manager to do it for him. It has been stated to 
 me formerly^on great authority, that managers 
 have been won, by the solicitation for a song, to 
 think favourably of a whole opera. 
 
 On the date last mentioned (4th February, 1791), 
 died at his house, at Hampton, John Beard, Esq., 
 formerly one of the patentees of Covent Garden 
 Theatre. Mr. Beard was, in his youth, regularly 
 bred to music in the King's Chapel, and he sang in 
 one other chapel, that of Cannons, by the wanton 
 satire of Pope thus characterised : 
 
 " And now the chapel's silver bell you hear, 
 That summons you to all the pride of pray V: 
 Light quirks of music, broken and uneven, 
 ?\Iake the soul dance upon a jig to Heaven."* 
 
 And thus did the tender bard of Twickenham 
 allude to the sublimities, probably of the great 
 
 * With all my adoration of Pope's verses, I could never be the 
 dupe of his pretended virtues. When one considers the trem- 
 bling hypocrisy, the occasional falsehoods consequent upon his 
 practice, it appears to be astonishing that, for the affected 
 moral ends of satire, any being can be found to persist in so 
 hateful a course. What, after all, is this satire, for whose indul- 
 gence a man sacrifices so many of the virtues ? The strong 
 feeling of the ridiculous in others always arises from our PRIDE : 
 were we alive to our own imperfections, we should be ashamed 
 of our mirth, and alarmed at our egotism. When Pope crawled 
 so malignantly among the splendors of Cannons, he merited 
 that Johnson should have growled through the Grotto at 
 Twickenham, in his hearing, 
 
 " A charming habitation for a TOAD."
 
 SKETCfH OF BEARD. 35 
 
 Handel, whose Esther was performed at Cannons, 
 and young Beard assisted in the choir, before the 
 Duke of CHANDOS and his noble visitors. 
 
 Mr. Beard became eminent both as an actor and 
 singer. His merits won for him the affections of 
 Lady Henrietta Herbert, daughter of James Earl 
 Waldegrave, and widow of Lord Edward Herbert. 
 She had, unfortunately, nothing to bestow upon 
 him but her hand, and he struggled through many 
 embarrassments, that she might not feel uneasy in 
 the declension of her consequence. But the una- 
 voidable conviction, that she had only plunged in 
 difficulties the person whom she best loved, preyed 
 upon her spirits, and she fell a victim to the dis- 
 orders, which melancholy brought upon her, in the 
 year 1753. He had acted with Garrick now for 
 some years, when a second marriage, with the 
 daughter of Mr. Rich, of the Theatre Royal, Covent 
 Garden, changed the scene of his utility, and soon 
 gave him the management, along with a con- 
 siderable fortune. His first appearance there was 
 on the 10th of October, 1759, when he acted 
 Macheath in the Beggar's Opera ; the celebrated 
 Miss Brent was his Polly. How he acted and sang 
 may be conceived from the circumstance, that the 
 piece again ran 52 nights. Jn 1768 he retired 
 from the theatre, and as in those days it was prac- 
 ticable to do, with a handsome fortune; which 
 enabled him, in private life, to gratify to the utmost 
 the liberality and benevolence of his nature. They, 
 
 D 2
 
 3(> PANTHEON OPERA. 
 
 who were the best able to appreciate him, have in- 
 variably stated, that he was unrivalled as a singer, 
 delightful as a companion, steady in his friendships, 
 and honourable in every relation of life. For the 
 advantage of the world, that life was extended to 
 the term of 74 years. Some slight parallel, which 
 my mind was forming between Beard and Kemble, 
 may be allowed as natural, and only lamented as 
 deficient. I did once expect, with confidence, that 
 we should hear of Kemble's Theatre, as we had 
 heard of Garrick's that a splendid fortune would 
 have compensated a life of labour ; and that his 
 retirement and his death might have been among 
 us. But I must not anticipate details, that await 
 the progress of this narrative. 
 
 My first mention of Mrs. Esten expressed what 
 I felt from the series of her efforts. She added, on 
 the llth, a very beautiful edition of Isabella, and 
 placed herself, unquestionably, next to Mrs. Sid- 
 dons in her most captivating achievement. Four 
 days after this, her Letitia Hardy,' in the Belle's 
 Stratagem, exhibited her captivations of every 
 sort ; but, I confess, Mrs. Pope in this part reigned 
 paramount with me; unapproachable for either 
 grace or enthusiasm. 
 
 On the lyth of February, the Pantheon opened 
 as an opera-house. The effect of the building, thus 
 changed from its original use, I perfectly remem- 
 ber. The boxes were small, and the whole had a 
 confined appearance. The stage, too, wanted
 
 PANTHEON OPERA. 37 
 
 amplitude, and the dancers came nearer to the pit 
 than was desirable to their best display. I heard 
 the last act of Armida from Pacchierotti and Mara, 
 and consequently the perfection of musical expres- 
 sion. The Theodore with Didelot in the ballet of 
 Amphion and Thalia, exhibited an union of grace 
 and agility, which suitably closed a day always to 
 be remembered by me. I had dined, I recollect, 
 that day at Mrs. Cowley's with a party of great 
 conversational powers. Poetry, ancient and mo- 
 dern, found advocates, and the beauties marshalled 
 on either side were brilliantly recited. The display 
 of Hebrew sublimities, which were provoked from 
 De Coetlegon, by rather too strong a praise from 
 his fair host of modern lyrics, led me, at my leisure, 
 to Lowth, and the Bishop to an examination, the 
 result of which, as might be supposed, reached 
 beyond mere literary criticism. 
 
 Mr. Kemble had done much for opera, by the 
 combination which I have recently alluded to ; yet 
 Mr. Harris was a manager of great tact, ably 
 seconded by Lewis, and though his singers were 
 decidedly of the native school, yet with such a pure 
 simplicity as William Shield to compose for them, 
 they were sure of admiration from all those (no 
 small body) who boasted themselves superior to all 
 foreign trick and sophistication, and called for 
 strains such as flowed from the inspiration of Purcel 
 and Handel, and who found their utmost ornament 
 in the fancy of Arne. 
 
 D 3
 
 38 
 
 For such an audience, Dudley Bate conceived 
 his opera of the Woodman, and it was performed, 
 during the season, 31 nights. The talent of this 
 gentleman was of the adaptable useful class. With- 
 out having left anything so perfect' as to last, he 
 could in various departments of letters ensure a 
 very brilliant success : his great fund was a know- 
 ledge of actual life, through which he had passed, 
 with sometimes little prudence, always with great 
 courage. The editors of daily papers formerly 
 defended their paragraphs with their swords, and 
 in the storm of party conflict few escaped without 
 injury. I wish the Reverend Gentleman had left 
 behind him any sincere narrative of his most 
 eccentric life ; from what I know of him myself) 
 and have heard from persons of credit, it would 
 leave the pages of romance comparatively insipid. 
 
 O'Keefe, too, strengthened Covent Garden by 
 his pleasant farce, called Modern Antiques, or the 
 Merry Mourners ; and Quick, Munden, and Mrs. 
 Mattocks sent home the audiences " laughing to 
 " their beds." Covent Garden Theatre, it may be 
 remarked, had the decided preference of Majesty 
 in its favour ; so that Mr. Harris stood his grountl 
 firmly against all that Mr. Kemble could array 
 against him. Merry, so well known by his lyric 
 verse, and anxious to write for Miss Brunton, whom 
 he afterwards married, completed a tragedy called 
 Lorenzo ; but I was, I confess, disappointed in this 
 play. He was assuredly not dramatic : so that a
 
 O'KEEFE'S WILD OATS. 39 
 
 few violent incidents excepted, the only chance it 
 had, was the elegance of its diction, and some 
 rather too palpable imitations of Shakspeare. 
 
 Mr. O'Keefe wound up the season, at this house, 
 by his five-act comedy of Wild Oats, in which he 
 placed his Jack Rover to run against the Dramatist 
 of Reynolds. The same mercurial actor, Lewis, 
 performed these rapid gentlemen ; and without 
 trying either play by standards to which they never 
 submitted, it is but justice to both to say, that more 
 amusement was never given. All is bustle, and 
 whim, and laugh ; and criticism has seldom under- 
 taken more ungracious toil than in its elaborate 
 attempts to persuade the audiences of Reynolds and 
 O'Keefe, that they ought, by no means, to have 
 allowed themselves to be entertained. 
 
 Drury Lane Theatre was finally condemned, and 
 the last performance of the company, on Garrick's 
 stage, was on the 4th June, 1791, when they acted 
 the Country Girl, with No Song No Supper. 
 
 The following pleasantry, on this occasion, merits 
 to be preserved. 
 
 " THE DEATH OF OLD DRURY. 
 
 " On Saturday night, of a gradual decay, and in 
 the 1 17th year of her age, died Old Madam Drury > 
 who existed through six reigns, and saw many 
 generations pass in review before her. She remem- 
 bered Betterton in his declining age ; lived in inti- 
 macy with Wilkes, Booth, and Gibber ; and knew 
 old Macldin when he was a stripling. 
 
 r> 4
 
 40 OLD DRURY CONDEMNED. 
 
 "Her hospitality exceeded that of the English 
 character, even in its early days of festivity, having 
 almost through the whole of her life entertained 
 from one to two thousand persons, of both sexes, six 
 nights out of seven in the week. She was an ex- 
 cellent poetess, could be grave and gay by turns, 
 and yet sometimes (catching the disorder from in- 
 trusive guests} could be dull enough in all conscience. 
 
 " Her memory was most excellent, and her singing 
 kept on in such a gradual state of improvement, 
 that it was allowed her voice was better the three 
 or Jour last years of her life, than when she was in 
 her prime at the latter end of the last century. 
 
 " She had a route of near two thousand people at 
 her house the very night of her death ; and the old 
 lady found herself in such high spirits, that she said 
 she would give them * No Supper* without a 
 * Song ;' which being complied with, she fell gently 
 back in her chair, and expired without a groan. 
 
 " Dr. Palmer (one of her family physicians) at- 
 tended her in her last moments, and announced her 
 dissolution to the company." 
 
 Things look lovely and facile in prospect, and 
 the new tneatre was expected to rise, like an exhal- 
 ation, out of the ground, at the waving of Sheri- 
 dan's hand. The progress was, however, tardy, 
 lor what that singular man seemed most to value 
 all his life, an expedient, presented itself, in the 
 new house erected in the Haymarket for the Italian 
 Opera. While he could lease this theatre, the
 
 HER LAST MOMENTS. 41 
 
 other was not at all pressing ; and it was only when 
 matters were really pressing, that Sheridan could 
 ever be got to do anything. 
 
 I shall not at the proper time refuse to Mr. Hol- 
 land the credit of erecting the most beautiful play- 
 house that I have ever seen. But I shall be in- 
 dulged in a few expressions of mere gratitude to its 
 predecessor ; which Wren had constructed and the 
 Adamses improved ; and which had been, I was 
 going to say, consecrated by the verse of Dr. 
 Johnson, and rendered the steady temple of fame 
 and fortune, by the genius and the prudence of Mr. 
 Garrick. If intellectual power were to be mea- 
 sured by an architectural scale, I should readily 
 admit, that while you -could conceive a grander 
 edifice, fancy might be allowably suffered to exert 
 itself upon a theatre worthy of Mrs. Siddons and 
 Mr. Kemble, Miss Farren and Mrs. Jordan. 
 
 Our present theatres differ materially from that 
 of Garrick. The gallery formed more of his plan, 
 than it does of ours. It came down upon the lower 
 circle of boxes, and its visitors were not seldom ex- 
 ceedingly intelligent persons and passionate ad- 
 mirers of the drama : they sat in a very favorable 
 position for the enjoyment of a play, and seconded 
 the pit in the just distribution of censure and praise. 
 The boxes did not contain anything like the num- 
 ber of persons now nightly visitors of the theatre, 
 but certainly more real fashion. The necessities of 
 proprietors had not then multiplied new renters
 
 42 OLD AND MODERN THEATRES COMPARED. 
 
 upon old renters, nor opened their doors to a free 
 list extending beyond authors and newspapers, to 
 nearly every review and magazine, which takes any 
 sort of cognizance of theatrical amusements. Their 
 private boxes, too, were few what there was 
 showed itself fairly as audience. Upon great occa- 
 sions seven or eight rows of the pit were laid into 
 the boxes, and then the old Drury exhibited, two 
 months before it closed, ^412 as the total taken at 
 the door for the first benefit of Mrs. Siddons, after 
 her return. London, however, was rapidly in- 
 creasing, and it was conceived that larger theatres 
 were demanded. Ah 1 the articles of consumption, 
 too, were upon the rise ; among these were the 
 salaries of performers ; and the patentees thought 
 that they needed not only more spectators, but 
 greater prices. Both of these objects, they now 
 determined to carry, on what they thought sure, 
 because reasonable grounds. We may leave them 
 for the present to mature their plan, while we turn 
 to the theatre which should always be called Col- 
 man's, if the little theatre, in the changes of public 
 taste, be not thought the more attractive ap- 
 pellation. 
 
 The late Earl of Guilford, whom I had once the 
 honour to call my friend, whose conviviality and 
 pleasantry endeared the name of Frank North, 
 wherever it was heard, had written, like Colman, a 
 play upon old English manners, which he called the 
 Kentish Barons, and on the 25th of June it was
 
 NORTH'S KENTISH BARONS. 43 
 
 acted for the first time at the summer theatre. 
 There was occasionally a vein of genuine poetry in 
 the dialogue ; but the incident was one of pure in- 
 vention, but little probable ; and his antiquarian 
 zeal had run costume much beyond convenience. 
 They who amuse themselves with Strutt's collec- 
 tions, or glean from the useful chapters with which 
 Dr. Henry enriched his History of England, may 
 have learned, that there was a time when our beaux 
 wore enormous pikes to their boots or shoes ; and 
 thai these were chained to the knees of the wearer j 
 so as to exhibit a man, at perfect liberty, walking 
 in fetters. The author's punctilious exactness ex- 
 cited a smile, and perhaps to see the solemn 
 Bensley skating through a scene in these cum- 
 brous appendages was rather a severe tax upon 
 gravity 
 
 " For RIGHT, too rigid, hardens into wrong." 
 
 Mr. Kemble himself carried the attention to cos- 
 tume far, but as far only as he found grace ; there 
 he stopt. Exactness might load these pikes upon 
 the shoes with portable mirrors, and looking down- 
 ward be once more an argument of self-love in stead 
 of confusion. 
 
 Mrs. Inchbald, pursuing her course of French 
 literature, now produced her very entertaining 
 comedy called Next Door Neighbours ; and in con- 
 formity with her title, she took, as a sort of cause 
 and effect, two French pieces to work upon, Le
 
 44> NEXT DOOR NEIGHBOURS. 
 
 Dissipateur and L' Indigent. These she treated 
 with that skill which she had now acquired, and the 
 theatre was certainly indebted to her facility. 
 
 Mrs. Jordan kindly came this season to act for 
 Mrs. Bannister's benefit. Every body was disposed 
 to assist a lady whom all respected and admired. In 
 the mean time, Colman was in rehearsal with a 
 second old English play, which took off some of 
 the lavish raw material, that had dressed the Kentish 
 Barons ; and from its popularity wore out its habili- 
 ments I allude to the Surrender of Calais, an- 
 other of those happy imitations, which, however 
 close, are not servile, and seem to resemble Shak- 
 speare, as a sport, rather than a necessity. How 
 far our great dramatic poet looked at the state of 
 his company, while writing his play, I cannot de- 
 termine he seems to have been governed, as to 
 characters, solely by his fable. The summer 
 manager always appeared to write for his green- 
 room, and to value himself upon exactly fitting his 
 actors with proper vehicle for their talents. What 
 he did in this way for Bannister, was really an 
 achievement ; but the interest about him, and the 
 unsophisticated nature of his acting, made him one 
 of the surest cards that any manager could play 
 with. 
 
 Bensley, in the grand tirade before Edward, as 
 Eustache de St. Pierre, became absolutely sublime, 
 from the virtuous energy, that seemed to dilate his 
 person, and thunder from his sonorous organ. It
 
 COLMAN*S SURRENDER OF CALAIS. 45 
 
 really was a display not to be forgotten. The play, 
 commencing the 30th of July, was acted 28 times 
 in the brief remainder of the summer season. 
 
 As an amusing instance how hints may be taken, 
 in the grave scene in Hamlet, one delver asks the 
 other, " Who builds stronger than the mason, 
 " the shipwright, or the carpenter ?" The answer 
 is, " The gallows maker, for that frame out- 
 " lives a thousand tenants :" on this hint, Colman 
 constructed a brace of these frame-makers ; and 
 sent on Parsons to " pluck out the heart of their 
 " mystery.'* The scene, like its original, was a fa- 
 vourite always ; and Colman defied, though Garrick 
 did not, the criticism of Voltaire, and all the La- 
 harpes and Chateaubriants he had left behind him. 
 The author of Zaire found no great difficulty in 
 overthrowing the feeble fences that Horace Wai- 
 pole set up against him, when he advanced to in- 
 sult, rather than attack, the territory of Shakspeare 
 but the race of French critics seem to have slunk 
 away from the preface of Johnson ; where, indeed, 
 the seal is put upon all the flimsy pretences of that 
 vain people of critical legislators : I say people of 
 critics, for they ALL detail the same arguments, and 
 there is little difference in their force between the 
 Abbe and the Shopkeeper.
 
 CHAP. V. 
 
 WINTER SEASON OF 1791-2. MR. FAWCETT AT COVENT 
 GARDEN. MR. CHARLES KEMBLE. DRURY LANE RE- 
 MOVED TO THE HAYMARKET. NEW PRICES. PRELUDE. 
 
 OSCAR AND MALVINA, BY BYRNE. REYNOLDS'S NOTO- 
 RIETY. MRS. BILLINGTON. RYDER DIES. DAY IN 
 
 TURKEY. LADY MARY WORTLEY MONTAGUE. WAR- 
 
 BURTON'S SINGULARITY AS TO HER LETTERS. MRS. 
 
 JORDAN. PUBLIC OPINION. HER APOLOGY. MR. 
 
 KEMBLE'S DIFFICULTIES. CYMON REVIVED. --HUNIADES. 
 
 MRS. SI DDONS ACTS Q. ELIZABETH IN RICHARD III. 
 
 MR. KEMBLE FORCED JNTO A DUEL BY MR. J. AICKIN. 
 ROAD TO RUIN. RICHARDSON'S COMEDY OF THE FU- 
 GITIVE. JEALOUS WIFE. MR. KEMBLE AND MRS. SID- 
 DONS. DRURY ITALIANIZED. P. HOARE's DIDO. 
 
 LITTLE THEATRE. MRS.WHITELOCK. MRS. SHERIDAN'S 
 
 DEATH. MRS. BANNISTER RETIRES. 
 
 4* 
 
 THE winter season of 1791-2 was opened by 
 Covent Garden with the Dramatist, in which Mrs. 
 Merry, formerly Miss Brunton, acted for the first 
 time since her marriage. To have yielded to the 
 ardour and accomplishments of Merry could be a 
 matter of no surprise to any person who had en- 
 joyed his society. Bating his tendency to play, 
 which was a fever in him that nothing could render 
 intermittent, he was one of the most original and 
 captivating men whom I have ever known. But
 
 MR. FAWCETT AT COVENT GARDEN. 47 
 
 unhappily for himself and his former associates, he 
 now became perfectly rabid with the French revo- 
 lution ; associated himself with the radical press, 
 and spoke its furious and disgusting language ; by 
 degrees he detached himself from men who could 
 not echo, and disdained to humour him ; and 
 though complexionally indolent, his political pas- 
 sion lashed him into a daily ridicule of all that ages 
 have respected, and he became one of the eyes of 
 Argus (a newspaper so named), and amused him- 
 self with what he called " common stuff" and 
 " stars and strings." Over this transformation 
 even the muse possessed no power ; and the poet 
 and the gentleman vanished together. 
 
 The 21st of September brought upon the 
 boards of Covent Garden Theatre Mr. Fawcett, the 
 younger, from the York company. He made his entre 
 in Caleb, in He would be a Soldier, a part of great 
 nonsense and rattle, in which a man of Fawcett's 
 sound common sense descends to amuse vulgarity; 
 conscious at the same time, that he possesses powers 
 of higher value ; which, without any great refine- 
 ment, interest deeply, and urge the moral lesson 
 home to the heart. There is in this actor, whenever 
 the opportunity is given, as great a command over 
 the tender affections as can be displayed in charac- 
 ters of middle life. I have a pleasure in thus detach- 
 ing his real excellencies from a crowd of buffoon- 
 eries, which he always seems to disdain while he 
 exhibits them ; and for which there are beings 
 naturally gifted.
 
 48 MR. CHARLES KEMBLE. 
 
 Mr. Kemble, during the summer, had been 
 greatly alarmed by the very serious illness of his 
 brother Charles, then a youth of fifteen, whom he 
 had placed, three years before, at the College of 
 Douay, in order to his obtaining all those advan- 
 tages which he had himself formerly derived. The 
 reported attainments of his brother gave him the 
 highest satisfaction. But on this journey he ex- 
 pected to find him in a very dangerous state of 
 health. He had, however, happily recovered ; and, 
 under the care of a friend, was proceeding on his 
 way to England. They met upon the road. 
 
 Mr. Kemble was sitting alone in his carriage, 
 reading. As the other carriage advanced in the 
 opposite direction, he raised his eyes from the book, 
 and exclaimed, " Charles !" The meeting was 
 quite theatrical ; for, though neither Henry the 
 Eighth nor Francis the First, yet certainly one day 
 the Wolsey and Cromwell of the drama, like the 
 monarchs just named, 
 
 " Those two lights of men 
 Met in the vale of Arde ;" 
 
 and probably in their embraces, as much exceeded 
 the kings in sincere affection, as the latter in splen- 
 dor surpassed every previous exhibition of royal 
 fraternity. Mr. Kemble was never an " inquisitive 
 traveller ;" he wanted only to see his brother ; he 
 now saw him quite restored, and they returned 
 to this country in company. 
 
 Upon his arrival, Mr. Charles Kemble, for a short
 
 DRURY LANE IN THE HAYMARKET. 49 
 
 time, accepted a situation in the Post Office, and 
 he was removed from one position in it to another ; 
 but the foreign department proving no more to his 
 taste than the inland, with the tendency of all his 
 family, he resolved to try his fortune on the stage. 
 He soon, therefore, quitted Lombard Street, to 
 make that experiment, which, after a year's rusti- 
 cation, sent him to the metropolis : a result which 
 has so gratified the public, and, I can fairly add, 
 done honour to the profession. 
 
 The removal of the Drury Lane company to a 
 theatre so uncommonly splendid as Novosielski's 
 Opera-house, seemed to the patentees a favourable 
 opportunity for asking a small encrease of the 
 prices of admission ; and, after much noise and 
 clamour, they established six shillings for the boxes 
 and three shillings and sixpence for the pit. A 
 prelude, called Poor Old Drury ! slight, but well 
 enough aimed, and written by Cobb, suffered more 
 than any thing in the contest. The great joke was 
 the damage done in transferring the scenery and the 
 properties from one house to the other. But the 
 spectators seemed to think that the splendid theatre 
 itself suffered most by these invasions. Nothing 
 but a conflagration ever produces uniform scenery. 
 The old, though too low for the encreased size, is 
 found too good and too plentiful to be thrown 
 away, and its adaptation is always a very disjointed 
 business. To one point of this prelude a reason- 
 able objection may be raised. It is said most ridi- 
 
 VOL. II. E
 
 50 OSCAR AND MALVINA. 
 
 culously by an Italian singer and a French dancing 
 master, that dancing and the opera should always 
 go together in contempt of sense and nature* It 
 would be well if writers who sport such ideas as 
 these, in compliment to old prejudices, would a 
 little enquire what they mean. It did not become 
 the author of the Siege of Belgrade, a mere farrago 
 from a hundred Italian operas, to talk in this way j 
 and those who at best in dancing reach only as far 
 as divertisement, might learn a little respect for the 
 learned and enchanting ballets of Noverre. I once 
 sat with Dr. Charles Barney during the representa- 
 tion of Iphigenie en Aulide, and his classic mind 
 was in perfect ecstacy at the deep interest and 
 graceful splendor of that beautiful version of Gre- 
 cian history or fable. And then, here comes a 
 farce writer, in his rudiments, and lectures away 
 upon sense and nature! And all this, moreover, in 
 a house constructed for opera, and soon to exhibit 
 operas again; and which had afforded the destitute 
 a seasonable shelter for the sense and nature to 
 which they so exclusively pretended. The period, 
 too, when most of these qualities were to be found 
 in us, produced a beautiful species of entertainment 
 combining both the opera and the ballet : I allude 
 to the MASQUE, of which Jonson was the actual 
 inventor, and which Milton, in emulation of that 
 great poet, did not disdain to compose. 
 
 Indeed Covent Garden Theatre, on the 20th of 
 October, exhibited a very captivating ballet, called
 
 REYNOLDS'S NOTORIETY. 51 
 
 Oscar and Malvina, which the good taste of Mr. 
 Byrne had rendered a nearly permanent attraction 
 of the theatre. Byrne himself took Oscar, and 
 Follet strode through his fierce rival Carrol ; and 
 for Malvina he brought over Mad. St. Amand from 
 Paris ; and her ease and grace, her pointed action 
 and just expression, delighted the spectators. Scen- 
 ery and music lent their brilliant aids to the in- 
 ventor of the ballet, and thus Mr. Bryne drew in- 
 terest from the page of Ossian, as Noverre had done 
 from that of Euripides. 
 
 The Crusade had not drawn Reynolds very 
 widely away from his proper sphere, for by the 5th 
 of November he was ready with another dramatist 
 under the title of Notoriety. The title implies the 
 passion of Nominal, the hero. As the first comedy 
 aimed to make dramatic effects popular; the second 
 endeavoured to render popular effects dramatic ; 
 and they succeeded equally, and by means some- 
 what similar ; for the characters were conceived to 
 run tolerably parallel to each other. In short, it 
 was the gay and entertaining effort of a young au- 
 thor, with a very quick discernment of the ridicul- 
 ous in life ; who occasionally threw in very happy 
 points of dialogue, and whom dulness never ap- 
 proached for a moment. Among those points 
 which amused the audience, he allowed himself a 
 joke at the sleeping partners of the greatest house 
 in the nation. This in Reynolds was rather taste 
 than politics, He hated long speeches much j but
 
 52 MRS. BILLINGTON. 
 
 he at all times hated faction more, and should not 
 have raised a laugh for the gloomy assailants of our 
 representatives. It may be as well to show, as a 
 lesson to managers, that Mr. Harris cast into 
 Notoriety, Lewis, Quick, Wilson, Munden, John- 
 stone, and Farren, the father of the present actor 
 of that name. The ladies were Mrs. Webb, Mrs. 
 Wells, and Mrs. Esten. 
 
 The success of music at the rival theatre led 
 Mr. Harris to re-engage Mrs. Billington, who had 
 been absent for a couple of seasons. Kemble im- 
 mediately added Madame Mara to his operatical 
 strength, and she appeared in Mandane on the 17th 
 November. There was little, to be sure, in which 
 Madame Mara could be employed, unless a series 
 of operas had been written for her of the com- 
 plexion of Artaxerxes. She was in truth a most 
 exquisite musician, but not the least of an actress. 
 Majesty she could not assume ; she was too feeble 
 in her person ; and even when to sing in an orches- 
 tra, sometimes gave offence, because she was com- 
 pelled to be seated, when she was expected to be 
 standing. Add to this that she never spoke our 
 language tolerably, and much could not reasonably 
 be expected. Yet she sang the melodies of Arne, 
 as she did those of Handel, in a style so pure, and 
 in a manner so easy, as to place her first most 
 decidedly among the greatest singers of her time, 
 or any time. 
 
 Mr.. Ryder, the comedian, died on the 25th of
 
 A DAY IN TURKEY. 53 
 
 this month, at Sandy Mount in Ireland. He had 
 a great deal of hard and diversified talent : was 
 always useful, but 'never, I think, pleasing. He 
 was a man of reading and reflexion ; and one of his 
 daughters was singularly accomplished. I have 
 read some of her translations of modern latinity, 
 in which she could have had no predecessor or 
 guide ; and her versification was exact and elegant. 
 While this praise is given to the lady, it is necessa- 
 rily reflected upon the father ; for to what less than 
 parental care could such accomplishment be owing? 
 Rudiments, particularly of the dead languages, are 
 always too painful to be the objects, I think, of 
 female choice : those once given, to proceed may be 
 pleasing, as it gratifies curiosity, and confers dis- 
 tinction. 
 
 On the 3d of December Mrs. Cowley brought 
 out her comedy called A Day in Turkey, or The 
 Russian Slaves. The charming letters of Lady 
 Mary Wortley Montague are in every hand, and 
 in consequence every body became enabled to dis- 
 play the secrets of Turkish harems j our fancies 
 teemed with visions of lazy luxury, and the tur- 
 ban'd Turk became a resource to our dramatist at 
 second hand, when actual observation fell short, 
 and domestic life among ourselves supplied no no-, 
 velty. Female plays usually build a good deal upon 
 the sex; Mrs. Cowley secured the talents in her pre- 
 sent comedy of Mrs. Pope, Mrs. Esten, Mrs. Mat- 
 tocks, and Mrs. Martyr. The interest springs from 
 
 E 3
 
 54f LADY MARY WORTLEY MONTAGUE. 
 
 the hatred of Russians and Turks, and was by no 
 means strongly felt by the audience. That happened 
 to Mrs. Cowley, which has happened to others ; that 
 things glorious in imagination are but cold in their 
 realities. In her Belle's Stratagem the enthusiasm 
 with which she points to some of the incidents of the 
 present play, might have led one to expect uncom- 
 mon effort in their exhibition but there was much 
 bustle to little purpose. The piece should clearly 
 have been an opera. 
 
 As I have alluded. to Lady Mary Wortley's let- 
 ters, I take the opportunity of showing a degree of 
 literary blindness, insensibility, or prejudice seldom, 
 I believe, equalled. I have now before me a manu- 
 script letter from Bishop Warburton, dated from 
 Prior Park, July 17^3, and intended to amuse the 
 ladies at Mount Edgecombe. He thus speaks 
 of the genius, that his friend Pope had adored. 
 " But literary news, while I have my senses, is more 
 " in my province. I suppose, as fashionable ladies, 
 " (for you see I am not disposed to compliment) 
 " you have read Lady Mary's letters with great 
 " eagerness, and laid them aside with as much con- 
 " tempt. I suppose they are genuine, even from 
 " their very insignificance." That editors adopt 
 the passions of the authors whom they publish, is a 
 disgraceful truth. The unmanly persecution of 
 this lady by Pope should have ceased with his ex- 
 istence. Warburton thought himself warranted to 
 omit the indecencies of the poet's writings, and
 
 MRS. JORDAN. 55 
 
 preserved his hatred where it disgraced him. The 
 Christian and the bishop were equally "strong 
 against the deed." -At this very time (1?63) 
 Doctor Smollet thus characterised her epistolary 
 writings. " The publication of these letters will 
 " be an immortal monument to the memory of Lady 
 " M. W. M., and will show, as long as the English 
 " language endures, the sprightliness of her wit, 
 " the solidity of her judgment, the elegance of her 
 " taste, and the excellence of her real character. 
 " These letters are so bewitchingly entertaining, 
 " that we defy the most phlegmatic man on earth to 
 " read one without going through with them, or, 
 " after finishing the third volume, not to wish there 
 " were twenty more of them." But then Smollett 
 himself) according to Warburton, " was a vagabond 
 " Scot, who wrote nonsense ten thousand strong." 
 And thus the GUIDES of reason persecute one another ! 
 I take this opportunity to observe, that, during 
 the present season, apologies had been fre- 
 quently made for Mrs. Jordan's indispositions, and 
 perhaps the theatre itself might lend some counte- 
 nance to the complaints made by the daily press. 
 But this charming woman lay open to attacks of 
 another nature, and she addressed an explanation 
 of her conduct as to the provision she had made for 
 her children, dated, oddly enough, Treasury Office, 
 30th November, 1791. In this letter there was a 
 phrase sufficiently unguarded "I would not ob- 
 " trude upon the public an allusion to any thing 
 
 E 4
 
 5G PUBLIC OPINION.- 
 
 " that does not relate to my profession, in which 
 " alone, I may without presumption say, I am 
 " accountable to them." 
 
 Her assertion that she had never capriciously de- 
 serted her duty to the public, and was always un- 
 able to act, when she had declined to appear, was 
 not accepted by certain persons ; and she was con- 
 siderably annoyed on the 10th of December, when 
 she acted Roxalana in the Sultan. She therefore 
 suddenly advanced to the lamps, and addressed the 
 audience in the following words : 
 
 " LADIES AND GENTLEMEN, 
 
 " I should conceive myself utterly unworthy of 
 your favour, if the slightest mark of public disap- 
 probation did not affect me very sensibly. 
 
 " Since I have had the honour and the happiness 
 to strive here to please'you, it has been my constant 
 endeavour, my unremitting assiduity, to merit your 
 approbation. I beg leave to assure you, upon my 
 honour, that I have never absented myself one 
 minute from the duties of my profession, but from 
 real indisposition. Thus having invariably acted, 
 I do consider myself under the public protection." 
 
 And thus, at all events, an end was put to the dis- 
 turbance before the curtain. As to any that occa- 
 sionally reached me as happening behind it, ah 1 that 
 I need say is, that it is a perplexing situation, to 
 manage without absolute controul How all the
 
 MR. KEMBLE'S DIFFICULTIES. 57 
 
 claims of jarring interests are to be conciliated how 
 all imputations of very natural partiality are to be 
 disproved or silenced, is of the utmost moment to a 
 theatrical community, and a burthen under which 
 few managers absolutely preserve their equanimity. 
 Nor is^this all ; there is sometimes interference from 
 persons, whose attachments only connect them with 
 the stage, and a cabal is often formed that shakes 
 the sceptre of the monarch of a theatre, 
 
 By this time Mr. Kemble began to feel that, how- 
 ever smoothly the conditions of the management 
 had been arranged, there were impediments in the 
 way of his plans j and of these he at times could 
 not but complain. Drury Lane was besides para- 
 lyzed by getting to the western side of the Hay- 
 market, and the plunge into the Opera-house re- 
 newed the fable of Salmacis : 
 
 Quisquis in hos fontes vir venerit, exeat inde 
 Semivir ; et tactis subito mollescat in undis. 
 
 METAM. Lib, iv. v. 385. 
 
 Nothing short of absolute perusal of all the offered 
 pieces should convince me, that the talent of the 
 country was so debased as to afford nothing better 
 than what was now produced. A vast deal of money 
 was lavished upon Garrick's trifling opera of 
 Cymon. The literary talents of Mr. Garrick were 
 absolutely confined to epigram and epilogue. His 
 letters have little neatness, and his attempts at the 
 drama should be narrowly scrutinized, that his actual 
 part in them may be ascertained. Cymon decorated 
 highly, and its three females, Urganda, Sylvia and
 
 58 HUNIADES. 
 
 Fatima, acted by Mrs. Crouch, Miss Hagley and 
 Mrs. Jordan, brought some fashionable audiences 
 into that beautiful theatre ; and showed, in spite 
 of their prelude, a leaning to the original uses of the 
 house. The performance of Cymon closed the 
 year 1791. 
 
 The reader will have seen that the Siege of Bel- 
 grade had furnished a subject for opera of consi 
 derable attraction. The siege of that place in 1456 
 by the Turks, under Mahomet the Second, now 
 was worked into a tragedy by Miss Hannah Brand. 
 The besiegers are repelled by the valour of Hun'f- 
 ades, a character performed by Mr. Kemble. The 
 authoress herself acted the heroine Agmunda. 
 How it was effected I now forget, but she abso- 
 lutely withdrew the play for the purpose of cutting 
 out the hero, and the tragedy was evidently not 
 the worse for his departure ; for the audience were 
 not a jot more indifferent to the new title of Ag- 
 munda, than they had been to the more barbarous 
 name of Huniades. If my memory does not de- 
 ceive me, the costume hi this play was somewhat 
 unusual, and provoked a laugh, I think, black 
 with gold ornaments ; and the first of May unluckily 
 offered an association, which struck the fancy with 
 images unfriendly to tragedy. 
 
 Mrs. Siddons had resumed her performances by 
 the magical Isabella, to which I have always seen 
 her admirers the most strongly attracted. Probably 
 to strengthen her brother's Richard III. on the 
 7th of February, she acted Queen Elizabeth in that
 
 MRS. SIDDONS IN QUEEN ELIZABETH. 59 
 
 tragedy. There is no question about her pre- 
 eminence in this " relenting shallow-thoughted 
 " woman." But the unsparing ambition of Richard 
 has something of an immoral effect upon the audi- 
 ence 5 and their proper sympathy with his victims 
 is blunted by the certainty of his success, and the 
 daring intrepidity with which he hurries them on 
 from one atrocity to another. There is something 
 in triumphant villany against which the moral 
 sense is never sufficiently guarded. The scene 
 with the princes is not to me greatly affecting ; it 
 tires rather than softens the hearer ; it is disagree- 
 able rather than distressing ; and I have commonly 
 retreated from my place, until it had passed away. 
 As this could never be done with Mrs. Siddons, I 
 sat the scene out. Her look and action when she 
 exclaims, " I am their mother, Sir," and endea- 
 vours to pass on with the children, absolutely beg- 
 gared all description. 
 
 I certainly do not court occasions of differing 
 with Mr. Steevens, and I need frequently my ut- 
 most strength to resist the power or the skill of his 
 attacks. He has consigned the character of Queen 
 Margaret in this play, and the dream of Clarence, 
 to ridicule and contempt. I am sure that if Mrs. 
 Siddons had remained longer on the stage, and de- 
 voted her last energies to the curses of Margaret, 
 that she would literally have lifted the hair upon 
 the heads of those who heard her, and left an im- 
 pression of her power stronger than any part of her 
 Lady Macbeth has supplied. The visit to the
 
 60 MR. KEMBLE'S DUEL WITH MR. j. AICKIN. 
 
 " bottom of the monstrous world," and the other 
 images of the dream, are in my judgment trans- 
 cendant and sublime. 
 
 An occurrence took place about this time, that 
 menaced the life of our great tragedian. He had, 
 I know not how, found himself at table with Mr. 
 James Aickin. Although the tones of that gentle- 
 man's voice were among the sweetest that ever met 
 the ear, yet I have heard his temper was not happy. 
 He had conceived himself injured by some arrange- 
 ments of Mr. Kemble's management, and in this 
 convivial meeting sought various opportunities to 
 be personally rude to him. On the morning of the 
 1st of March, he walked with Mr. Kemble to some 
 field in Marylebone, and there took his own mode 
 of obtaining satisfaction. The elder Bannister 
 somehow was pressed into the business. They 
 placed Kemble exactly as they pleased. Aickin 
 went a few paces from him, perhaps he hardly 
 knew how many, and fired at his manager for- 
 tunately for himself, as well as Kemble, he missed 
 his aim. To return his fire, Mr. Kemble refused 
 " He had required satisfaction, and what he re- 
 " quired he had now received." A reconciliation, 
 as they call it, was then effected. He spoke to me 
 afterwards upon the subject, and said " he saw 
 " from his adversary's levelling at him, that he 
 " was in no danger." Why is not a defiance of 
 law by a positive breach of the peace punishable 
 after the parties are satisfied ? Should not the jus- 
 tice of the country be also satisfied ? A heavy fine
 
 ROAD TO RUIN. 6l 
 
 might teach the duellist to moderate these violent 
 tendencies. 
 
 Perhaps at no time in my remembrance did 
 Covent Garden ever make equal effort to distance 
 its proud rival. Merry's opera of the Magician no 
 Conjurer failed on the 4th night, but the Road to 
 Ruin, the most perfect of Mr. Holcroft's comedies, 
 was acted thirty-eight nights in this season, though 
 not brought out till the 18th of February. As it is 
 nearly now as popular as it was two-and-thirty 
 years ago, I am precluded from more than a general 
 admission of its interest, its truth and nature. The 
 ruined Goldfinch, as acted by Lewis, though extra- 
 vagant, was astonishingly entertaining ; and Mun- 
 den's excellence in old Dornton has, I think, never 
 been surpassed. Let me add, that Holman's young 
 Dornton was extremely characteristic ; ardent, ge- 
 nerous, and affecting, a transcript from his own 
 nature. 
 
 Mr. Joseph Richardson had a reputation for 
 talent, which led the town to expect much from his 
 comedy of the Fugitive, produced on the 20th of 
 April. He had been received into the party and 
 associated himself closely (too closely for his health) 
 with Sheridan. He seemed to be always looking 
 to the Rivals as his model, and affects the turn of 
 his friend's sentences. He loves the indiscretions of 
 youthy and runs a tilt against early prudence. But 
 with a violation of propriety, of which Sheridan has 
 no example, he has thrust his moral or immoral 
 sententiousness into the mouth of an Admiral,
 
 62 RICHARDSON'S FUGITIVE. 
 
 and makes his Cleveland declaim in the following 
 style : 
 
 " Old Manly. Yes, my son too, an abandoned profligate. 
 
 Admiral. Nay, if that were all, there might be hopes. 
 The*early little irregularities that grow out of the honest pas- 
 sions of our nature, are sometimes an advantage to the ripened 
 man ; they carry their own remedy along with them ; and when 
 remedied they generally leave the person wiser and better than 
 they found him wiser for his experience, and better for the 
 indulgence which they give him towards the infirmities of 
 others but a canting, whining, preaching profligate a ser- 
 mon maker at twenty a fellow that becomes a saint before 
 he's a man a beardless hypocrite a scoundrel that cannot 
 be content with common homely sinning, but must give it a re- 
 lish by joining a prayer with it in his mouth of such a fellow 
 there can be no hopes." 
 
 The sentiments here delivered are decidedly 
 Sheridan's, and may be found in his plays. Apo- 
 logies like these are incentives to youth they 
 pimp to the passions, and predict moral improve- 
 ment as the ripened result of profligacy. Where 
 utter perdition is escaped, let us rejoice with him 
 who redeems his errors by his virtues j but let us 
 not send out our youth upon the forlorn hope, and 
 confidently expect their safe return. The arrange- 
 ment of the latter half of the tirade echoes the tune 
 of Absolute's reproof of Falkland. 
 
 " A poor industrious devil like me, who have toil'd, and 
 drudg'd, and plotted to gain my ends, and am at last disap- 
 pointed by other people's folly, may, in pity, be allowed to 
 swear and grumble a little; but a captious sceptic in love, a 
 slave to fretfulness and whim, who has no difficulties but of his 
 own creating, is a subject more fit for ridicule than compas- 
 sion." Rivals, p. 78.
 
 CAST OF CHARACTERS IN THE FUGITIVE. 63 
 
 I have thought it important to notice a hazard- 
 ous moral in a work of elegance. 
 
 The Fugitive is, perhaps, rather too like the 
 heiress in the principal incident. Julia Wingrove 
 is a second Miss Alton, more worked out, as Mrs. 
 Jordan was to act it. In the cast of the play the 
 author was peculiarly happy. Both theatres, at pre- 
 sent, might be challenged in vain to exhibit united 
 such a host of positive first-rate ability. The men 
 were Bensley, Wroughton, Parsons, Palmer, 
 Dodd, King, Wewitzer, Barrymore. The women 
 Miss Farren and Miss Pope ; Mrs. Ward, Mrs. 
 Webb, Mrs. Kemble, Mrs. Jordan. He had a pro- 
 logue from Tickel, and an epilogue from Burgoyne. 
 The parallel drawn by the former between the 
 novice author, and the novice dressed for St. James's, 
 was really worthy of his name. . 
 
 " Close to the palace as her chair draws near, 
 The very tassels seem to quake with fear." 
 
 The General, working for Mrs. Jordan, fell 
 greatly below what he had occasionally written for 
 Miss Farren. The piece succeeded amply j but a 
 degree of indolence came over its author, and he 
 could not conquer it. He was a senator, and did not 
 speak ; a man of letters, and did not write ; a pro- 
 prietor of a theatre, who slept over its interests ; 
 he lived a few years the life of Sheridan, and as 
 early as his 47th year, from the effects of a ruptured 
 blood vessel, at an inn near Bagshot, he " died 
 " and made no sign." Few men entered life with
 
 64. MRS. SIDDONS'S JEALOUS WIFE. 
 
 more brilliant hopes than Richardson ; he dis- 
 tinguished himself greatly at Cambridge; he did 
 not follow his profession at the bar, but he contri- 
 buted to the classical pleasantries then in vogue ; 
 his learning preserved his taste. That great dis- 
 cerner of merit, the late Duke of Northumberland, 
 testified a sincere regard for him, and had, in 
 return, Mr. Richardson's decided veneration. Mr. 
 Richardson was convivial without much effort, was 
 generally beloved and long regretted. 
 
 On the 28th of April, Mrs. Siddons acted Mrs. 
 Oakley. Mr. Kemble performed Oakley, and Pal- 
 mer the Major. The passion of jealousy tending 
 strongly to tragedy, I thought it, in comedy, strong 
 enough for Mrs. Siddons. Mrs. Oakley has ex- 
 cited more laughter in other hands, but not, I 
 think, more attention. The performance was full of 
 spirit and nature. Another novelty from this great 
 actress I have to mention. After her Katharine, in 
 Henry VIII. she recited Collins's Ode on the Pas- 
 sions, and assumed them in her look and gesture. 
 Perhaps they never played round features equally 
 expressive ; and as an ardent admirer of the genius 
 of Collins, I could not but wish, that his melan- 
 choly had been soothed by so bright a vision ; but 
 his end was dark and cheerless. 
 
 I have sported above with the conversion of the 
 Drury Lane company to operatical uses. I am 
 now to show the full extent, to which the tendency 
 was carried. Mr. Prince Hoare was employed 
 upon the Didone Abondonnata of Metastasio ; and
 
 DRURY ITALIANIZED. 65 
 
 fitted its music, I fear, not with suitable, but Eng- 
 lish words, distributed into recitative and air ; and 
 Dido, with immense splendor of scenery, dresses 
 and decorations, was brought out on the 23d of 
 May. Madame Mara was your Dido, Kelly lar- 
 bas, and the pious Eneas Mrs. Crouch herself! 
 There was, for garnish, a masque, in which Ban- 
 nister was the Neptune, Miss Collins Venus, and 
 the three Graces, Misses Decamp, Jacobs, and 
 -Heard. And yet all this, with the aid of Sedge- 
 wick, and Dignum, and Master Welsh, with super- 
 numeraries out of number, lived only three or four 
 nights, and then vanished like a dream. But the 
 lovely power of Metastasio must not suffer from the 
 harshness of another language, and the taste of a 
 people requiring bolder situations in the drama, 
 and a crowd of incidents arranged with little arti- 
 fice, and ambitious only of striking effects. I have 
 no means of consulting Mr. Hoare's version, but I 
 willingly leave, upon this and every occasion, my 
 sincere, though friendly attestation to his talent. 
 
 On the 1st of June, Covent Garden closed its 
 brilliant season, that the theatre might be rebuilt j 
 and on the 15th, the Haymarket also shut up, and 
 left the little manager opposite to make his hay 
 without further encroachment. 
 
 For he still considered any period beyond the 
 middle of May as encroachment, and pleasantly 
 told the great Patentees this, among other truths, 
 
 VOL. II. F
 
 60 MRS. WHITELOCK. 
 
 in a prelude, entitled Poor Old Hay market > or Two 
 Sides of the Gutter. He laughed then, and has 
 always done so, at the rage for splendid theatres ; 
 and might easily, like others, have embarked a set 
 of subscribers in a building scheme, had he thought 
 that any thing more was essential to the purposes 
 of playing, than neat accommodation, pieces care- 
 fully written brilliantly, if possible ; and ably, if 
 not powerfully, acted. 
 
 On the 15th of June, Mrs. Whitelock, a sister of 
 Mrs. Siddons, made her first appearance at the 
 summer theatre, in the heroic Margaret of the 
 Battle of Hexham. She certainly was Siddonian 
 in figure and in countenance, and though suited to 
 a theatre of more stately dimensions, approved her- 
 self to be a mistress of her profession. She most 
 resembled the look of Mrs. Siddons in comedy. 
 In tragedy, that wonderful woman assumed sub- 
 limity as a birthright, and had it in unapproachable 
 possession. 
 
 On the 28th of June, Mr. Sheridan lost his wife, 
 a lady of great personal loveliness, and possessing 
 talent as a singer, which her husband, in his 
 greatest need, would not consent should be ex- 
 hibited for hire. She was, perhaps, the purest and 
 sweetest vocalist of the English school. But the name 
 of Linley is of great celebrity in musical science. 
 Her portrait, by Sir Joseph Reynolds, is elegant 
 and yet simple ; singing and accompanying herself. 
 He has caught her expression so happily, that I
 
 MRS. BANNISTER RETIRES. 6j 
 
 have no doubt he heard, as well as saw, his most 
 accomplished sitter. 
 
 The novelties of the summer season were of no 
 moment ; the manager himself was not ready, and 
 Covent Garden had literally taken all that had any 
 promise in the market. Just as the dog-days were 
 over, on the 15th of August, Miss Decamp under- 
 took Macheath, and the courtship of two such 
 enormous jilts as old Bannister and Johnstone in 
 Polly and Lucy. She acquitted herself with great 
 spirit, and evidently surprised the audience with the 
 extent of her musical powers. 
 
 After sustaining the heroines of English opera 
 for 14 years, Mrs. Bannister, now seriously engaged 
 with the cares of her young family, determined to 
 retire, and on the 5th September, took her leave of 
 the public on the same spot where, in the year 
 1778, she first received their applause. Anything 
 like their censure, she had never for a moment ex- 
 perienced. There was an appearance of timidity 
 constantly about her efforts; but her voice had 
 great compass and sweetness, and her shake was 
 pure and liquid. 
 
 Bannister returned thanks at the end of the 
 season, and in the name of the proprietor invited 
 the public next year to the present cottage, after 
 they had enjoyed the splendid palaces prepared 
 for the winter. He also thanked them for Lingo, 
 a part to which he had succeeded on the death of 
 Edwin.
 
 68 
 
 CHAP. VI. 
 
 HOLLAND'S NEW COVENT GARDEN THEATRE. RIOT AT THE 
 
 NEW PRICES. THE PIRATES. MORTON'S PLAY OF 
 
 COLUMBUS. MORTON AND REYNOLDS COMPARED TO- 
 GETHER. KEMBLE HIGHLY DISSATISFIED WITH HERl- 
 
 DANi POWER OF THAT GREAT MAN. MURDER OF THE 
 
 FRENCH MONARCH. KEMBLE AND HIS SISTER AT COL- 
 
 MAN's. EVERY ONE HAS HIS FAULT. MRS. JORDAN 
 
 ANNA FORCED ON MR. KEMBLE. THE AUTHOR'S 
 
 OWN DEBUT. THE PRIZE. MURPHY'S SISTERS 
 
 PARTICULARLY EXAMINED OUT OF RESPECT TO HIM. 
 MURPHY'S FIGURE. MR. KEMBLE'S PROLOGUE FOR HIS 
 
 PLAY. FALSE COLOURS. ARMOURER. HOW TO GROW 
 
 RICH. MRS. JORDAN'S LADY RESTLESS. MRS. GIBBS. 
 
 LONDON HERMIT. MR. KEMBLE*S OCTAVIAN ITS 
 
 PICTURESQUE POWER GREAT EFFECTS IN IT. SET- 
 TLEMENT WITH THE MANAGER. 
 
 MR. HARRIS thought that the rise of prices, which 
 had become absolutely necessary, would be at all 
 events better justified by an obvious and recent 
 expense. He therefore determined to make his 
 innovation in his new building ; and Mr. Holland 
 had constructed, in the recess, a theatre in the 
 lyral form, rather solid than light in its appearance, 
 and of which the fronts of the boxes bulged some- 
 thing in the curve of a ship's side. The effect was
 
 NEW COVENT GARDEN THEATRE. (39 
 
 grand and imposing, as to the tiers and number of 
 the boxes ; but the gallery called the first, or two 
 shilling gallery, had been hoisted up to the mansions 
 of the gods ; and those turbulent deities were in- 
 discreetly banished the house altogether. The 
 solitary shilling, however splendid, was disdained 
 in the new establishment. This plan insulted two 
 classes of frequenters. The gout de comparaison 
 leads people to be tolerably content with their own 
 position, while they see another worse. But when 
 the persons who used to inhabit the first gallery, 
 coming down as it did upon the roof of the lower 
 boxes, saw themselves hoisted over three tiers, and 
 scarcely able to see the actors, or what alone was 
 of much moment, their faces j when they saw, too, 
 no misery beyond their own ; they could not but 
 feel, that their modest quota had subjected them 
 to contempt ; and that they were to be worse 
 treated than they had been, simply because their 
 pockets had been spared. Thus the very humble 
 man was denied his amusement altogether ; and 
 the next class was put into a worse situation, where 
 every thing but his own condition seemed improved. 
 As I cannot report the confusion of Babel, I shall 
 say little as to the riot on the first night the cat- 
 call, the legitimate pipe of displeasure, that gives 
 
 was triumphant in the strife, and the actors played 
 
 F 3
 
 70 RIOT AT THE NEW PRICES. 
 
 unheard. Lewis was singularly qualified for the 
 situation in which, as stage-manager, he now found 
 himself: there was a frankness about him that 
 testified to the honest truth that came from him. 
 He was firm, as a gentleman always is ; and with 
 much tact seized .upon a point, about which no- 
 body in the house cared a rush, and assured the 
 audience, that a shilling gallery should be erected as 
 speedily as possible. By the third night all opposition 
 slept in peace, and it was established that for the 
 future, the gentle tenants of the boxes should pay 
 their six shillings for admission, and the frequenters 
 of the pit three shillings and sixpence each person. 
 After a slight arithmetical difficulty, as to the amount 
 of specie that would be required to be provided at 
 the pit door, in which it was luckily ascertained, 
 that three persons came to just half a guinea, and 
 required no change ; and that a shilling, added to 
 half a crown, certainly produced three and six- 
 pence j the new rate was found rather a convenience 
 than otherwise. As the prelude with which the 
 new theatre opened was withdrawn on the third 
 night along with the disturbance, what it was about 
 has never transpired. The influence of association 
 is powerful over most minds j was it therefore his 
 courage or his fears that made Mr. Harris open his 
 expensive theatre with the Road to Ruin? Twenty- 
 five thousand pounds were said to be expended 
 upon this new erection j and yet when fifteen years
 
 THE PIRATES. 71 
 
 after, it was destroyed by fire, it was said that it 
 could not have stood many years longer. But the 
 mysteries of architecture are like those of its moral 
 mimic, free-masonry, and are totally dark to the 
 uninitiated. Mr. Pope had returned this season to 
 Covent Garden, and the high favour of the mana- 
 ger. But upon his^ assuming Evander in the Gre- 
 cian Daughter, the feelings of F. Aickin were hurt, 
 and he threw up his engagement. A very pleasing 
 loyal farce, called Hartford Bridge, by Mr. Pearce, 
 was acted on the 3d of November, and was very 
 frequently repeated. 
 
 Cobb and Storace had been again at work on an 
 opera for Drury Lane in the Haymarket, and 
 the 21st of November it came out under the title 
 of the Pirates. The music was much applauded; 
 as to the interest, it may be sufficient in " the 
 hurly," as Shakspeare writes, to say, that Kelly, 
 Suett, Sedgwick, Bannister, Dignum, Wewitzer, 
 acted the parts they had been playing all their acting 
 lives, and that Mrs. Crouch, Mrs. Bland, Signora 
 Storace and Miss Decamp, were equally fortunate. 
 Such pieces, with us, are indeed " pegs to hang 
 notes upon," a little changing the application of an 
 ingenious pleasantry. Mr. Cobb, though a man of 
 business, kept his dramatic carnival with great 
 regularity, and contributed very essentially to the 
 public amusement. In private life Mr. Cobb was 
 particularly decorous and amiable. By the direc- 
 tors of the East India Company, he was always 
 
 F 4
 
 72 MORTON'S PLAY OF COLUMBUS. 
 
 highly respected ; and they were liberal enough to 
 think that a man might be an excellent secretary 
 for India affairs, though he was an open and dili- 
 gent cultivator of the drama, I suppose, before 
 the Board, he must, after his operas, have presented 
 himself like the prologue in Henry the Eighth. 
 
 " I come no more to make you laugh ; things now, 
 That bear a weighty and a serious brow, 
 We shall present." 
 
 I am next to notice the first dramatic offering , 
 of not merely a speaking acquaintance, but an old 
 and intimate friend. On the 1st of December 
 1792, appeared the play of Columbus, written by 
 Thomas Morton, and brought out at CoventGarden . 
 Theatre with such aids of scenery and decoration 
 as a brilliant and foreign subject required, and the 
 confidence of the manager in his author led him to 
 supply. His old schoolfellow Holman is said to 
 have taken some part of the dialogue upon him, 
 and exerted himself in the performance with that 
 ardour which in truth it was not possible for him 
 to want. It is unnecessary to detail the plot of a 
 play so well known as this ; but the combination 
 of Alonso and Cora, with the grand incident of 
 Columbus, it should be recollected, was not caught 
 by Morton from Kotzebue, but evinced his own 
 early knowledge of dramatic effect. To employ 
 the talent of Lewis was a temptation that suggested 
 the excrescence of Harry Herbert, an Englishman
 
 MORTON AND REYNOLDS COMPARED. 73 
 
 following the fortunes of Columbus. Some of his 
 comic business seemed exotic, and transplanted 
 from the British Isles ; though a lawyer and a 
 physician commonly find their way into every 
 variety of climate ; but I fear seldom attended with 
 the pleasantries of Munden and Quick. 
 
 Although this piece is by no means upon a level 
 with the maturer efforts of Morton, yet it was a 
 highly creditable commencement, and announced 
 a mind of which the bent was decidedly dramatic, 
 fertile in combinations, and looking strongly to 
 character. Authors are commonly supposed to 
 be an irritable and usually a selfish race. It is to 
 the credit of Morton, and Reynolds, and Holman, 
 that their rivalry never disturbed their friendship ; 
 they commonly consulted together in their difficul- 
 ties, and promoted each other's success as fervently 
 as if they had divided the receipts. 
 
 Morton never had the industry of Reynolds, and 
 like him had avoided the engagement of a regular 
 profession. He had, however, a secure reliance in 
 the liberal affection of his uncle, Mr. Maddison, 
 and his expectations at that gentleman's death 
 might have been realised into positive independ- 
 ence, had not the benevolence of that excellent 
 man extended itself in all directions, and but little 
 been recovered of what was lent on slight or no 
 security. Morton, however, could wait better than 
 his friend the temptings of a good dramatic subject, 
 and write at leisure, when he did find himself in
 
 74 MORTON AND REYNOLDS COMPARED. 
 
 the vein. Reynolds no sooner had ascertained the 
 profits of one play, than he turned in with invin- 
 cible perseverance to the composition of another, 
 which was " no less material to him" than the former. 
 And, in fact, in the space of twenty-four years, he 
 produced six-and-twenty dramatic offerings, of 
 which only four were indifferently received. Mor- 
 ton, in the same period of time, had written only a 
 third part of the number. But he had more of the 
 artist about him than his gay friend, and with 
 better plots laid his interest deeper in the passions. 
 He never would admit himself to be excited by any 
 thing but the hope of gain, and always pleasantly 
 ridiculed the ambition that looked to fame as its 
 pre-eminent reward. It was no uncommon thing 
 for Morton to receive a thousand pounds for a 
 comedy; and looking at the transaction as one 
 merely commercial, it was worth a manager's while, 
 even at such a rate, to secure his powerful assist- 
 ance. The dramatic writers of the present day, 
 repressed by the more prominent claims of the 
 equestrian order, are narrowed to a badly paid 
 j300 ; or, as the spirit of some lawyer arranged it, 
 33 6s. Sd. for nine nights : there was a tradition, 
 that a one-and-twentieth night once ensured a 
 further benevolence, 
 
 " But WHEN, 
 
 Extends beyond their catalogue." 
 
 Mr. Kemble, as it has been stated, found himself
 
 KEMBLE DISSATISFIED WITH SHERIDAN. 75 
 
 greatly annoyed in his management ; and he attri- 
 buted his impediments to the indolence, often 
 often er, I think, to the yielding good humour, of 
 Sheridan. He was, with the greatest difficulty, 
 induced to retain his situation. Matters were car- 
 ried, in defiance of his judgment, and thus there 
 were persons encouraged to contemn his authority. 
 I was present one night in Suffolk Street, when he 
 denounced his fixed, his unalterable determination. 
 He expected Sheridan there after the house should 
 be up, and aware of the great disarming powers of 
 the orator, in a sort of inarticulate murmur, alarmed 
 the party with the prospect of a scene j and as some 
 very excellent claret was near him, he proceeded to 
 fortify himself for the engagement. At length Sheri- 
 dan arrived, took his place next to Mrs. Crouch at 
 the table, looked at Kemble with kindness, but the 
 kindness was neither returned nor acknowledged. 
 The great actor now looked unutterable things, 
 and occasionally emitted a humming sound like that 
 of a bee, and groaned in the spirit inwardly. 
 Crouch whispered two words in Sheridan's ear, 
 which let him know, I believe, the exact cause of 
 the present moody appearance of his manager. A 
 considerable time elapsed, and frequent repetitions 
 of the sound before mentioned occurred ; when at 
 last, " like a pillar of state," slowly up rose Kern- 
 ble, and in these words addressed the astonished 
 proprietor. " I am an EAGLE, whose wings have 
 " been bound down by frosts and snows ; but now
 
 76 POWER OF SHERIDAN. 
 
 " I shake my pinions, and cleave into the general 
 " air, unto which I am born." He then deliber- 
 ately resumed his seat, and looked as if he had 
 relieved himself from insupportable thraldom. 
 Sheridan knew the complacency of man under the 
 notion of a fine figure, and saw that his eagle was 
 not absolutely irreclaimable ; he rose, took a chair 
 next to the great actor ; in two minutes resumed 
 his old ascendency. The tragedian soon softened 
 into his usual forgiving temper ; and I am ashamed 
 to say how late it was when, cordial as brothers, I 
 took one arm of Kemble, and Sheridan the other, 
 and resolutions were formed " that melted as 
 " breath into the passing wind.'* 
 
 And such WAS the power of Sheridan upon this 
 and every occasion. With Kemble he might be 
 said to have a friend in the citadel, for that good 
 man's veneration for him was extreme ; and most 
 certainly I never heard him speak with equal 
 warmth of any other existing talent. Of politics 
 he knew absolutely nothing ; of passing events 
 scarcely anything. Newspapers he did not read : 
 so that when I occasionally repeated to him, what 
 I had heard from Mr. Pitt, or read in the publica- 
 tions of Burke, he always recurred to his grand 
 theme, the eloquence of Sheridan ; and, as Mrs, 
 Kemble often said, on that subject he was an in- 
 veterate idolater. Yet he sometimes threw oft' his 
 allegiance. " I know him thoroughly," he said ; 
 " all his sophistry, all his paltry artifices but I
 
 MURDER OF THE FRENCH KING. 77 
 
 " will become a member of his own society, the 
 " FRIENDS of the PEOPLE ; and when he rises to 
 " speak, I'll PUT HIM DOWN." These were only 
 the ebullitions of disappointed attachment and 
 rooted affection ; arid having persuaded himself of 
 a very extraordinary likeness that Sheridan bore to 
 the countenance of Shakspeare, I incline to think, 
 if Mr. Kemble had formed a scale of which the 
 author of Hamlet was at the summit, the next degree, 
 among the fervours of genius, would have been 
 occupied by the author of the School for Scandal. 
 Upon the arrival of that intelligence, which 
 struck every liberal mind with horror, I mean the 
 murder of Louis the Sixteenth, Mr. Kemble pro- 
 perly closed his theatre. On the 24th of January, 
 1793, there was no play. Copied, as this atrocity 
 was, from one which stains the annals of England, 
 there result, from comparing the two events, some 
 circumstances in our favour. Charles had appealed 
 to arms Louis was the most pacific of monarchs ; 
 and we had the decency, at all events, to let our 
 monarch die like a gentleman. We did not force 
 him to die a " living death*' in the dirty heartless 
 persecution of his confinement. 
 
 " Let me be cruel, not unnatural.'* 
 
 The Italian Opera being now arranged, and re- 
 quiring possession of its own stage, Mr. Kemble 
 and his sister, on the 26th, performed the characters 
 of Hastings and Shore at the little theatre. This
 
 78 KEMBLE AND HIS SISTER AT COLMAN*S. 
 
 temporary occupation of his theatre led Mr. Kemble 
 to the knowledge of the subject Mr. Colman was 
 now treating, and he decided that nobody should 
 act the Octavian of the Mountaineers but himself. 
 The effect of that determination, as it respected the 
 play, and subsequently the friendship between the 
 poet and the actor, shall be told in due, that is, the 
 summer season. 
 
 That ingenious satirist, Mr. Sneer, in the Critic, 
 gives the following account of a comedy, which he 
 introduces to Bangle's patronage, under the title 
 of TJie Reformed Housebreaker, and the author, it 
 seems, had discovered, " that the faults and foibles 
 " of society are subjects unworthy the notice of the 
 " comic muse, who should be taught to stoop only 
 " at the greater vices and blacker crimes of 
 " humanity gibbeting capital offences in five acts, 
 " and pillorying petty larcenies in two in short, 
 " his idea is to dramatize the penal laws, and make 
 " the stage a court of ease to the Old Bailey." We, 
 were making hasty strides to realise the new species 
 of comedy. On the 29th of this month, the tragi- 
 comedy of Every One has his Fault, by Mrs. 
 Inchbald, was acted with great applause at Covent 
 Garden. The interest here is in a Captain Irvin, 
 who, having married the daughter of Lord Norland, 
 betakes himself to America to repair his circum- 
 stances, and comes back desperate at his ill success. 
 His mind settles upon suicide, and he goes to a 
 coffee-house to commit the act; but his better
 
 EVERY ONE HAS HIS FAULT. 79 
 
 genius holds his hand, and in his way back to his 
 lodging, he merely robs his father-in-law of his 
 pocket-book, and a large quantity of stage bank- 
 notes which it contains. But he is irresolute as to 
 property as he had been with regard to life, and 
 returns the stolen goods by a servant. The 
 messenger, tempted by the large reward for the 
 apprehension of the robber, first gives information 
 as to the thief, and then himself runs away with the 
 money. The peer is relentless, and resolves to pro- 
 secute, and the only evidence against Irvin is the 
 pocket-book, which his father-in-law is himself pos- 
 sessed of. (The new court has some singular no- 
 tions as to evidence.) But even this sheet-anchor 
 of vengeance is destined to break away from him, 
 for Irvin's son, whom he had adopted on the condi- 
 tion that he should disclaim his father, has the 
 parental tendency as to pocket-books, and from 
 motives of pure humanity brings it to Lady Caro- 
 line Irvin. He is immediately rewarded by the 
 amazing discovery, that the wife of the robber is 
 his own mother. Lord Norland enters, and is im- 
 moveable ; the youth determines to remain with 
 his mother. After many vain attempts to reconcile 
 this unhappy family, Mr. Harmony succeeds by a 
 ^pretended letter from the daughter, announcing her 
 husband's death. The old blockhead repents of 
 his cruelty, and poetical justice is achieved by a 
 compromise of the felony. Whether the search after 
 great strength of interest, such as the above, has
 
 80 MRS. JORDAN'S ANNA. 
 
 had a tendency to refine or debase the national 
 taste, is a question which I have no right to deter- 
 mine. Pure comedy cannot be written on easier 
 terms, than much observation of character and 
 manners, and an elegant and pointed dialogue, if 
 the portion of wit should fall below the abundance 
 of Congreve and Sheridan. The German drama, 
 however, was happily at hand to solve this and all 
 other doubts as to dramatic composition, and settle 
 us in a region of monstrous incidents and false 
 morals, from which our escape is little to be ex- 
 pected. Satisfied with our new masters, we have 
 learned to invent in their taste, and indeed our 
 original productions might be almost taken for 
 translations. The melo-drama, pure from the Ger- 
 man, or the germanised French stages, is the prin- 
 cipal ornament of our splendid national theatres. , 
 
 Mr. Kemble always did his utmost to keep down 
 this rage after novelty, but he found it beyond his 
 power, Mrs. Jordan was ambitious to be written 
 for, and not very careful as to the competence of 
 the author. Nay, she was reported to have written 
 herself a considerable part of the comedy of Anna, 
 in which she made her first appearance. fc 
 
 This piece had been literally forced upon Kem- 
 ble, and he resented it strongly. He had told the 
 parties concerned that there was nothing in it, and 
 that it really wasted the time employed in the 
 rehearsals. The Jordan triumphed until the night 
 of its appearance^ the 25th of February ; but long
 
 THE AUTHOR'S OWN DEB^T. l 
 
 before the fall of the curtain, the fate of her friend's 
 comedy was irrevocably sealed. The fable was 
 utterly without interest the only character an 
 amorous old mother; and the dialogue distinguished 
 only by its vulgarity. But I have shown " a touch 
 of Harry in the night." I have exhibited Mr. 
 Kemble in his mood, upon such an insult to his 
 judgment and his authority. 
 
 On the 2nd of March, Miss Decamp acted, in a 
 very interesting manner, the character of Adelaide 
 in the Count of Narbonne. I notice it, not because 
 there were any indications of first-rate power in 
 tragedy, but because there was fine deportment, 
 good sense, and just feeling ; and as she knelt 
 before Mrs. Siddons, the illusion was perfect ; she 
 could scarcely be thought any thing but her 
 daughter. 
 
 Mr. Boaden, in reading the Guzman d'Alfarache, 
 or Spanish Rogue, had thought that the story of 
 Ozmyn and Daraxa might take the form of an 
 opera, and afford an opportunity to display the 
 musical science of his young friend Atwood. He 
 therefore applied some leisure hours to it, and Mr. 
 Sheridan gaily told him, " that his songs were better 
 " written, than any which he had read since the 
 " Duenna." How far this compliment was justi- 
 fied, he has now no means of estimating. Sheridan 
 paid him faithfully for the piece, of which the 
 author, happy as he was, kept n-o copy. 
 
 Storace's benefit had the attraction of an excel- 
 
 VOL. II. G
 
 82 THE PRIZE. 
 
 lent farce from the pen of Prince Hoare The 
 Prize, or 2538. The astonishment of Bannister, 
 when lie read the letter from the lottery office 
 his re-commencement of the letter his laugh 
 his extasy, are vivid in my recollection, and 
 among the most amusing instances of his pecu- 
 liar talent. While plain farce was permitted 
 to hold up the train of Shakspeare and Otway, of 
 Southern and Howe, no farce was oftener repeated 
 than the Prize j and Bannister with ^10,000 trans- 
 ferring his business of an apothecary to such a 
 journeyman as Suett, with the finished style of 
 Storace as a singer, formed a " good night" of no 
 very sentimental, but certainly most exhilarating 
 character. 
 
 Mr. Kemble had a great respect for the veteran 
 Murphy, and had looked over his tragedy of the 
 Rival Sisters, written in 1?83, and published with 
 his other writings in 1786, but till then, as I un- 
 derstood him, never seen by managers. The sub- 
 ject is that of Ariadne supplanted by her sister 
 Phaxlra, and abandoned by Theseus, whom she had 
 saved from the labyrinth of Minos, It had been 
 treated by the younger Corneille under the title of 
 Ariane, and written in the short space of 40 days, 
 in the year 167$. It should be observed that the 
 conduct of Ariane vastly resembles that of Andro- 
 maque by Racine, in 1(>67, and as Voltaire wrote 
 with so obvious a leaning to Racine, I wonder he 
 did not point out Corneille's obligation to thai fine
 
 MURPHY'S SISTERS. M j 
 
 poet. He speaks of Ariane as one of the happiest 
 
 subjects of antiquity, greatly superior to that of 
 Diilo, \vlio lias done nothing fur Kiu-as, and is not 
 betrayed by her sister. He throws out a careless 
 touch of his penetration, in accounting for the 
 .success of the play. " Les hommes, tout ingrats 
 qu'ils sont, s'inte>essent toujours a une femme 
 tendre, abandonnee par un ingrat j etlesfemmcs, 
 qui se retrouvent dans cette peinture, pleurent sur 
 elles-memes." The famous La Champnu lc in 
 Ariane excited tin- tears of Madame de Sevigne, 
 and those of the Lafayettes of her brilliant, day; 
 
 and it might have been expected, that Mrs. Siddons 
 would prove equally attractive in the English 
 Ariadne. Hut attention could be secured only 
 M\ nights, which 1 would lain not impute to any 
 indiflerence to the subject inrivly because it was 
 classical. In looking carefully lor some cause of 
 its slender effect, I think I find one in the un- 
 supported situation of the heroine she has no 
 confidante in the Knglish play, and consequently no 
 obvious female sympathy. The value of such a 
 p.-r-onage is very distinctly seen in the Anna of 
 Lady Randolph : the heroine is there reflected by 
 a faithful mirror. Mrs. Siddons had collisions only 
 with 1'eriander and I'irithous in her scenes of 
 doubt and apprehension, and the effect was hard 
 and tiresome. The fourth act, however, had some 
 noble agonies of tragic passion. Theseus is in truth 
 
 a most Contemptible scoundrel, l-'ale is the prin- 
 
 <; >
 
 84- MURPHY'S SISTERS EXAMINED. 
 
 ciple on which he excuses his Romeo-like fickle- 
 ness, and black ingratitude. This is sufficiently in 
 Grecian manners ; but should have been attributed 
 to the wrath of some divinity. The language of 
 Murphy is too little like common speech ; he has 
 no finely-felt yielding to colloquial terms, which 
 leaving dignity to sustain itself, secure the effect of 
 passion, by going direct to the heart. It was 
 rather late, too, in his life, to compose a tragedy, 
 and a few marks of careless diction shall be pointed 
 out for the use of the poetical student; and an 
 occasional happiness in thought or expression, from 
 sincere respect to the worthy author, whom, though 
 in his decline only, I had the happiness to know. 
 In the 4th act Ariadne makes her exit, 
 
 " Wild as the tempest's rage, 
 As if a conflagration of the soul 
 To madness fir'd her brain." 
 
 And yet the speaker fears that 
 
 " She went to brood in secret to think." 
 
 Surely the apprehension of her destruction was more 
 likely, in so alarming a state of excitement. People 
 brood in melancholy ; in despair they rave, and 
 frenzy, and destroy. In the same scene Phaedra, in 
 two following speeches, slabbers out the common 
 place nothingness of exclamation, 
 
 " It is too muck, 
 Too much, to bear this agony of mind."
 
 MURPHY'S SISTERS. 85 
 
 Pirithous interposes but three lines, and Phaedra 
 again rejoins her usual 
 
 " No more ; it is too much" 
 
 A little further on we have the misery of epithet 
 useless, because previously implied 
 
 " Instructed how to roll the bidden glance." 
 
 He deals too in perpetual asides. I think I never 
 observed such a series as Phaedra presents us with. 
 Enough of slight faults. 
 
 Burke has somewhere in his works a fine passage 
 of the approximations by which a politician finally 
 changes his party. Murphy uses it to a noble 
 moral purpose. 
 
 " Pirithous. Beware, beware of the deceitful garb 
 That vice too oft assumes. The first approach, 
 With bland allurements, with insidious mien, 
 Wears the delusive semblance of some virtue. 
 The siren spreads her charms, and fancy lends 
 Her thousand hues to deck the lurking crime. 
 ' OPINION changes ; 'tis no longer guilt ; 
 * 'Tis amiable weakness, generous frailty, 
 . ' Involuntary error." On we rush ; 
 The sophistry of vice deludes us all." 
 
 In the ravings of his heroine, he has contrived to 
 give that aching stretch of thought incident to her 
 feeling, a very high degree of poetical beauty. 
 
 " Or blow me hence upon the warring winds 
 To climes unknown beyond the verge of nature, 
 G 3
 
 g(j MURPHYS SISTERS. 
 
 To the remotest planet in the void ; 
 That never, never can approach this world ; 
 But rolling onward, farther, farther still, 
 Holds in the wilds of space its fated round." 
 
 It is easy here to conceive the piercing intensity 
 of Mrs. Siddons's gaze, as if she followed with her 
 eye the illimitable track. I have only room for a 
 happy remembrance of Shakspeare's arrangement 
 in Lear "I never gave you kingdom," &c. 
 
 Ariadne (to Periander.) 
 
 " Why do you smile upon me ? 
 I never serv'd YOU ; never sav'd YOUR life ; 
 Made YOU no promise : why should YOU deceive me ?" 
 
 He has another imitation of Shakspeare in Romeo 
 and Juliet, and one remembrance of Horace and 
 his translator, Milton. I linger over this last pro- 
 duction of the last of the Romans. Murphy lived 
 among us uncontaminated by our fashions, the fine 
 old gentleman of a former age. There was some- 
 thing about his lofty figure, to which all classes paid 
 respect ; but his costume excited the same atten- 
 tion, as when, from a crowded levy,, we see a gen- 
 tleman in a court dress hurry through the street. 
 His great happiness in the decline of life was, that 
 he had assigned himself a task ; and before he 
 went to rest, something was daily or nightly to be 
 done towards the complete translation of his favour- 
 ite historian, TACITUS. Thus, though nearly left in
 
 MR. KEMBLE'S PROLOGUE. 87 
 
 solitude, his solitude was never cheerless. Steevens 
 used to annoy him by insidious attacks in the news- 
 papers, and call upon him to see his countenance 
 while he read them ; but Murphy knew him as 
 well as Sir John Hawkins did ; though the plays of 
 the former might not suffer so much, as the history 
 of music, from the criticisms of the modern Zoilus. 
 To the play of the Rival Sisters Mr. Kemble him- 
 self contributed a Prologue : as it was a produc- 
 tion in the maturity of his mind, and he did not 
 often lend this sort of aid, I shall lay it before the 
 reader ; for being written subsequently to the pub- 
 lication of the play, it has never accompanied that 
 to which it forms so suitable an introduction ; and 
 very few, except his particular friends, know even 
 that he wrote one. 
 
 MR. KEMBLE'S PROLOGUE TO THE RIVAL SISTERS. 
 Spoken by Mr. Wroughton. 
 
 Whene'er the poet, in retiring vein, 
 Proclaims his purpose ne'er to write again, 
 The threaten'd town interprets the kind way, 
 And takes an interest in his next last play. 
 
 Not that our bard has play'd you fast and loose, 
 Or pleads this general candour for excuse ; 
 He dares not trifle with the public sense, 
 But thinks such folly downright impudence : 
 Brought, not advancing, since he then appears, 
 To risk the well-worn fame of forty years, 
 He trusts distinct indulgence you'll afford 
 Not he, but Ariadne, breaks his word. 
 
 From ancient stores we take our plot to-night, 
 Form'd on the mournful tale of Theseus' flight ; 
 G 4,
 
 88 FALSE COLOURS. 
 
 The time, that golden JEra, some relate, ' 
 When equal Minos rul'd the Cretan state. 
 
 Hail, holy sage, who taught'st licentious man 
 To find his freedom where the laws began ; 
 Whose fame in arms, redoubted from afar, 
 From thine own shores deterr'd invasive war 
 Whilst thy mild genius o'er a prosperous isle 
 Gave every GOOD and every GRACE to smile ; 
 'Till thine to all thy subjects were as dear, 
 As GEORGE'S virtues to his Britons here. 
 
 To all our author bids me humbly bend, 
 But deprecate no foe, and court no friend : 
 With grateful pride he thinks of honours past, 
 And hopes you'll bid those valued honours last. 
 Freely to you he now commends his cause 
 Should he deserve you'll not withhold applause. 
 
 Mr. Kemble himself acted the character of Piri- 
 thous he therefore held in his own grasp the dif- 
 ficult disclosure to Ariadne of the baseness of 
 Theseus. He neither expected nor wished to make 
 a splendid effect for himself in this play, but gave 
 the crown to Ariadne 
 
 " Tenues volat ilia per auras." 
 
 On the 3d of April, Mr. Morris, a barrister, ulti- 
 mately a Master in Chancery, whom I used occa- 
 sionally tp meet, brought out a comedy at the Hay- 
 market, called False Colours. It was neatly, if not 
 powerfully written ; but his legal preferment with- 
 drew certainly no Congreve from the comic muse. 
 The veteran Cumberland again ventured one of
 
 HOW TO GROW RICH. 89 
 
 his hurried compositions, a comic opera called the 
 Armourer ; the music by an amateur. But it lived 
 only three nights, though the names of the actors 
 alone did a great deal for it. But Covent Garden 
 easily repaired its failures the activity of Mr. 
 Harris was always provided. On the 18th, Reynolds 
 was again before the town, with the peculiar secret 
 How to grow Rich, and he cleared by that comedy 
 620/. The author now boldly attacked the fashion* 
 able income of Faro Banks, and the splendid accom- 
 modations of a well-known sheriffs officer ; and 
 frolicked his way through life, as he saw it, to the 
 infinite amusement of the town. In the epilogue I 
 remember Lewis produced a lady's pad from under 
 his coat ; and the house had been drilled into such 
 excellent temper through the evening, that the pro- 
 minence was received with convulsions of merri- 
 ment. Any thing so gay, so irresistible as Lewis 
 upon such an occasion, I have never seen. 
 
 A few farces, not worth specifying, carried the 
 two great theatres through their season, and 
 Mrs. Jordan acted Lady Restless for the first time, 
 in All in the Wrong. This performance on her 
 own brilliant night, was certainly not for her own 
 benefit : she was nothing like the character. The 
 charm of Jordan was in a sort of comic enjoyment 
 of her own personal situation in the piece. But 
 she loved to see herself in elegant comedy, and 
 had no sort of reluctance to the tender heroines of 
 tragedy j though she neither had, nor could assume,
 
 gQ LONDON HERMIT. 
 
 the high tone of manners characteristic of the for- 
 mer, and still less what Racine, a fine critic as well 
 as poet, calls " cette tristesse majestueuse," which 
 produces our whole delight in the latter. 
 
 The Haymarket, on the 15th of June, had the 
 good fortune to repossess Mrs. Gibbs, an actress 
 who, by unpretending diligence and fine temper, 
 has gone through even a theatrical life without an 
 enemy j and, below professional greatness, been 
 for many years one of the greatest supports of a 
 theatre. In the recollections of my intercourse 
 with theatrical persons, many a pleasing image rises 
 of this kind, unaffected woman j who, with very 
 considerable acquirements, and much accurate 
 study of her art, is yet more admired for the cheer- 
 fulness of her mind, and the goodness of her heart. 
 
 The pen of O'Keefe has seldom been more ludi- 
 crously employed than in delineating the London 
 Hermit, and his rambles in Dorsetshire. John- 
 stone in Tully, and his "describing book," and the 
 " devil of a hermit," and a crowd of pleasantries, re- 
 vive at the mere title of the piece ; which proved 
 extremely attractive, and ascertained that in the 
 Irish character Johnstone never had a rival. The 
 London Hermit was first acted on the 29th of 
 June. 
 
 I now come to a very important feature in Mr. 
 Kemble's dramatic life the performance of Octa- 
 vian in the Mountaineers. By whatever epithet 
 his other characters might be distinguished, I 
 should decidedly term Octavian the most pic-
 
 MR. KEMBLE'S OCTAVIAN. 91 
 
 turesqtie. The author and the actor seem to have 
 asked themselves, how best a series of portraits of 
 expressive misery could be diversified and arranged; 
 and never was an author's conception more ex- 
 tended and exalted, than the Octavian of Colman 
 was in the performance of Mr. Kemble. True, it 
 occupies scarcely so much as the latter half of the 
 play ; but it bursts upon you with fine effect, after 
 the very Shakspearian preparation of the scene be- 
 tween the two goatherds. 
 
 Octavian is not Cardenio he has more of the 
 misanthropy of Timon : the address of the latter to 
 the sun perhaps suggested that of Octavian, His 
 uniform sensibility as to woman, forms a delightful 
 contrast with his rough and usually savage treat- 
 ment of his own sex. On the sudden entrance of 
 Agnes to part him and Sadi, Kemble's exclama- 
 tion, " Woman!" was, intone and look, a volume 
 his assumption of the new office of torch-bearer be- 
 fore the votaries of true love his ardent look 
 and various action, his costume, his firm step, his 
 thrilling enthusiasm 
 
 " O ! wander, boundless love, across the wild !" 
 
 the revulsion upon the murder of his own peace 
 the words *' and with it pluck' d out hope !" the 
 slight pause, " Well, well, no matter," and the 
 swell of his chest, and the vigorous action of his 
 head and throat at the words 
 
 " Despair burns high within me "
 
 92 PICTURESQUE POWER OF 
 
 if they have not been seen, will never be conceived; 
 until such another countenance and person arise, to 
 execute the fine conception of the poet. Perhaps 
 greater effect was never produced than in the satiri- 
 cal scene with the goatherd "the road to one 
 poor ducat." The agitation and the caution in 
 taking the picture from his bosom the limner 
 
 " As the dull clod unmov'd did stare upon thee" 
 
 a bitter, lover-like rebuke of the usual absorption 
 of artists, not in the sitter, but the picture not 
 the beauty of the original, but how it is to be trans- 
 lated into the language of art. 
 
 I am tracing the power of Mr. Kemble, and only 
 incidentally here insist upon the poet's talent Few 
 men have written better than the passage upon the 
 countenance of Roque : it is modelled after the 
 antique, and Shakspeare would not have disdained 
 it 
 
 " No Providence has slubber'd it in haste. 
 Tis one of her unmeaning compositions 
 She manufactures when she makes a gross. 
 She'll form a million such and all alike 
 Then send them forth, asham'd of her own work, 
 And set no mark upon them." 
 
 The actor again showed his mastery in the art by 
 the tone and manner of 
 
 " Give me thy hand, Roque." 
 and the expression of hopeless sorrow, when he
 
 KEMBLE'S OCTAVJAN. 03 
 
 faltered out " I'm past jesting with" the inter- 
 view with Floranthe his fainting at her feet 
 the melancholy 
 
 " It has chanc'd, before, 
 That I have dream' t this " 
 
 the hysteric laugh, and the modulation of the 
 voice in 
 
 " I shall weep soon, and then I shall be better." 
 
 To which should be added the characteristic glow 
 at the last 
 
 " For no man else could I restrain the transport 
 That gushes on my soul, when I have pull'd, 
 At last, one flinty father to my feet." 
 
 - 
 
 I have paid my tribute, thus, to the actor's genius. 
 As to the author, what more need I say, than that 
 his greatest power is in the Mountaineers? His 
 diction is occasionally stiffened, by what are now 
 the expletives, do and did : his fable is not well 
 involved, and has no unity. His two incidents 
 follow each other, as they do in the Sierra Morena; 
 and upon the whole he has not business for more 
 than his three short acts. Had he amplified his 
 fable, and strengthened his dramatis personae, the 
 reign of George the Third would have produced a 
 tragedy, which in passion and character, in senti- 
 ment and poetic diction, was worthy of the bright- 
 est period of dramatic literature.
 
 94 KEMBLE'S OCTAVIAN. 
 
 After the complete success of the play, the rival 
 geniuses, whose convivial were quite upon a par 
 with any of their other powers, sat down to enjoy 
 their triumph. Octavian on this occasion relin- 
 quished his proud boast 
 
 " Thou hot and rolling sun, I rise before thee" 
 
 for he had been many hours in his course before 
 Kemble rose from this perfect celebration. I saw 
 the piece several times during its run, but found 
 little change in his manner. He had by meditation 
 so settled the part in his mind, that the successive 
 representations were only stronger or fainter im- 
 pressions of the same design. 
 
 What remained was an affair of business, seldom 
 pleasant. Kemble, in his love for Octavian, had 
 sacrificed much of the usual produce of his sum- 
 mer. Colman could not afford the worth of the 
 performance ; his season was short his receipts 
 moderate. What he could do, he did he pro- 
 posed the following basis of settlement between 
 Mr. Kemble and himself. " Put me as the author 
 " of a new play out of the question. Let it be 
 41 supposed that the sole attraction is ..yourself. 
 " Look then at the receipts during the whole 
 " number of nights by Cocker, so MUCH. Then 
 " take a worn-out play, the ' Battle of Hexham,' if 
 " you will, for the same number of nights de- 
 " duct the second from the first, and let us divide 
 " the difference.*' There can be no doubt that
 
 SETTLEMENT WITH THE MANAGER. 95 
 
 Mr. Kemble would have gotten five times the sum, 
 had he listened to the offers made to him by the 
 country theatres : but looking to his FAME, the 
 diversification afforded by a character so peculiar, 
 so great and original, was worth the sacrifice, large 
 as it was, which had been made to it. Disappoint- 
 ment certainly was expressed upon the subject on 
 the one part, and much regretted on the other.
 
 CHAP. VII. 
 
 MRS. RADCLIFFE'S ROMANCE OF THE FOREST. MR. BOADEN 
 
 DRAMATISES IT. HOW TO DRESS A GHOST. MR. HAR- 
 
 RIS'S RECEPTION OF THE PLAY, AND ITS AUTHOR. NEW 
 DRURY. MR. KEMBLE'S TASTE IN SCENERY. MR. CAPON 
 SELECTED. HIS KNOWLEDGE AND UNWEARIED PAINS. 
 
 MR. KEMBLE'S PERFECT COLLECTION OF THE DRAMA. 
 
 DRURY AT COLMAN'S IN THE WINTER OF 1793-4. 
 MORTON'S CHILDREN IN THE WOOD. MISS POOLE'S 
 
 OPHELIA. HAMLET DREST A LA VANDYKE AT COVENT 
 
 GARDEN. THE PICTURES IN THE PLAY. MUNDEN IN 
 
 POLONIUS. MR. KEMBLE IN YOUNG MARLOW. BAN- 
 NISTER, JUN. BOLD STROKE FOR A WIFE. RICHARD 
 
 TICKELL. MRS. WEBB DIES. MISS LEAKE. DREAD- 
 FUL ACCIDENT AT COLMAN'S. NOVELTIES. THE GRAND 
 
 NATIONAL THEATRE OPENED. THE AUTHOR'S FON- 
 
 TAINVILLE FOREST. LUDICROUS NIGHT REHEARSAL OF 
 
 IT. REMONSTRATES WITH MR. HARRIS. NEW EFFECT. 
 
 DRURY OPENS FOR PLAYS WITH MACBETH. BANISH- 
 MENT OF BANQUO'S GHOST. MR. CHARLES KEMBLE IN 
 
 MALCOLM. PROLOGUE AND EPILOGUE. THE JEW BY 
 
 CUMBERLAND. BANNISTER. BISHOP WATSON'S OPI- 
 NION OF CUMBERLAND AS A LOGICIAN. MR. PYE. MR. 
 
 H. SIDDONS. LODOISKA DONE BY MR. KEMBLE. 
 
 GLORIOUS FIRST OF JUNE. SUMMER SEASON. PALMER 
 
 IN OCTAVIAN. DEATH OF THE ELDER COLMAN. 
 
 MR. BOADEN had read the Romance of the Forest 
 witli great pleasure, and thought that he saw there 
 the ground-work of a drama of more than usual
 
 ROMANCE OF THE FOREST. 97 
 
 effect. He admired, as every one else did, the 
 singular address by which Mrs. Radcliffe contrived 
 to impress the mind with all the terrors of the ideal 
 world j and the sportive resolution of all that had 
 excited terror into very common natural appear- 
 ances ; indebted for their false aspect to circum- 
 stances, and the overstrained feelings of the 
 characters. 
 
 But, even in romance, it may be doubtful, 
 whether there be not something ungenerous in thus 
 playing upon poor timid human nature, and agon- 
 izing it with false terrors. The disappointment is, 
 I know, always resented, and the laboured expla- 
 nation commonly deemed the flattest and most 
 uninteresting part of the production. Perhaps, 
 when the attention is once secured and the reason 
 yielded, the passion for the marvellous had better 
 remain unchecked ; and an interest selected from 
 the olden time be entirely subjected to its gothic 
 machinery. However this may be in respect of 
 romance, when the doubtful of the narrative is to be 
 exhibited in the drama, the decision is a matter of 
 necessity. While description only fixes the incon- 
 clusive dreams of the fancy, she may partake the 
 dubious character of her inspirer; but the pen of 
 the dramatic poet must turn everything into shape, 
 and bestow on these " airy nothings a local habita- 
 " tion and a name." 
 
 Notwithstanding, therefore, his alarm at ventur- 
 ing within that circle, which none but Shakspeare 
 
 VOL. II. H
 
 i)8 HOW TO DRESS A GHOST. 
 
 had hitherto trodden with success, Mr. Boaden 
 decided to make his experiment, and ascertain 
 whether the failure of others had not proceeded 
 from defective preparation as to the supernatural 
 incident, or from its imperfect or vulgar exhibition. 
 I have, early in this work, stated my opinion, that 
 nothing ever was more tasteless than the stage 
 exhibition of the Ghost in Hamlet. The great 
 author has written with his highest power ; he has 
 displayed unbounded knowledge of effect ; he has 
 given to frequent repetition the absolute power of 
 novelty ; and yet, as far as the royal shade himself 
 is concerned, all this charm is dispelled by the 
 heavy, bulky, creaking substantiality of the spirit. 
 Whereas the whole of this " gracious figure" should 
 look as if it was collected from the surrounding air, 
 and ready, when its impression should be made, to 
 melt into " thin ah*" again. 
 
 Perhaps the sublimest effort of painting is the 
 figure of the Royal Dane, as he appeared in the 
 large composition of Mr. Fuseli for the Shakspeare 
 Gallery. It has what seems person, invested in 
 what seems to be armour ; it bears the regal 
 sceptre; its countenance is human in its lineaments, 
 though it inspires more awe than mere humanity- 
 can excite. How is all this produced ? By recol- 
 lecting some of the known principles of the su- 
 blime. By the artifices of the pallet ; by keeping 
 down all too positive indications of substance ; by 
 the choice of a cold slaty prevalent colour, touched
 
 MR. HARRIS'S RECEPTION OF THE AUTHOR. 99 
 
 slightly with the pale silvery tone of moonlight ; 
 by a step gigantic in its extent, and action of the 
 most venerable dignity and command. 
 
 How far the author might be able to get such an 
 effect attempted upon the stage was matter of 
 much anxiety. He wrote his play with some care, 
 he thinks, as to the diction (for he has never read 
 it since) ; and after taking the opinion of certain 
 friends and brother authors, he sent his work to 
 Mr. Harris, to whom, at that time, he had not 
 the honour to be known. It is now with a mourn- 
 ful pleasure he retraces the interview he had with 
 that gentleman in the library of his house at 
 Knightsbridge the smile with which he first of 
 all announced his acceptance of the play ; and then 
 the peculiar glance of thought he turned upon me, 
 when he proceeded to rid me of some obvious 
 encumbrances to the action, sundry useless charac- 
 ters, and enforced the duties of compression, or ex- 
 planation, or omission all which, he said, long 
 experience, rather than critical study, had dis- 
 covered to him. There was a benevolence, a pater- 
 nity in his manner, that won my entire confidence. 
 A few alterations I had to make, but they were 
 easily done. The author took his play home, not 
 back, and left his new friend, the manager, happy 
 beyond measure, sure that his play would be acted 
 in the coming season, and really but little fearing 
 the grand ordeal of the public. 
 
 I anticipate the reader's curiosity, whether, en- 
 H 2
 
 100 . NEW DRURY. 
 
 joying the honour of Mr. Kemble's friendship, I 
 made him acquainted with the subject that now 
 occupied me ? Unquestionably I did, and he ad- 
 vised me to be satisfied with nothing less than a 
 five-act play. As the subject presented itself to 
 me, I did not see the possibility of working out the 
 leading character to an importance worthy of his 
 great talent ; and as to the heroine, I had no view 
 beyond the powers of a young actress, the wife of 
 a friend j but all my arrangements of this kind 
 were set aside by the policy of the theatre ; the 
 manager told me who must act the principal male 
 and female of my play. 
 
 Mr. Kemble at this time did not conceal (at 
 least from me he did not) that at Drury Lane 
 Theatre " they did not want plays ; the treasures 
 " of our ancient authors were inexhaustible. Shewy 
 " after- pieces and laughable farces might be neces- 
 " sary ; but what could be expected now in the 
 " way of the regular drama, that previously had 
 " not been better done ?" This, to be sure, ad- 
 mitted of no dispute. Mr. Harris, I dare say, 
 thought of the mighty dead with similar respect ; 
 but he acted in a way more beneficial to the living : 
 and by steady encouragement of such talent as 
 there was, punctual and even liberal payment, and 
 constant vigilance and forecast, he stood against the 
 greatest mass and variety of talent that ever com- 
 bined into one dramatic company. 
 
 The new theatre was now rapidly advancing to
 
 MR. WILLIAM CAPON. 101 
 
 its completion ; and Mr. Kemble' s active mind had 
 full employment in the preparations for the stage 
 itself. As the dimensions of the new theatre were 
 calculated for an audience, the price of whose ad- 
 mission would amount, even at 6s. in the boxes, to 
 more than j^VOO, it was quite clear that for all 
 grand occasions they would want scenery of greater 
 height and width than had been exhibited at old 
 Drury ; and that in fact but little of the old stock 
 could be used at all. On this occasion it gives me 
 sincere pleasure to mention the very great acquisi- 
 sition Mr. Kemble had met with in an old friend 
 of mine, who really seemed expressly fashioned, as 
 a scene-painter, to carry into effect the true and 
 perfect decorations which he meditated for the 
 plays of Shakspeare : the artist to whom 1 allude is 
 Mr. William Capon, who has the honour of being 
 draughtsman to H. R. H. the Duke of York. Mr. 
 Capon, like his old acquaintance, the late John 
 Carter, was cast in the mould of antiquity ; and his 
 passion was, and is, the ancient architecture of this 
 country. With all the zeal of an antiquary, there- 
 fore, the painter worked as if he had been upon 
 oath ; and as all that he painted for the new theatre 
 perished in the miserable^ conflagration of it a few 
 years after, I indulge myself in some description 
 of the scenery, which so much interested Mr. 
 Kemble. The artist had a private painting room, 
 and Mr. Kemble used to walk me out with him to 
 inspect the progress of these works, which were to 
 
 H 3
 
 102 MR. KEMBLE'S TASTE IN SCENERY. 
 
 be records as well as decorations, and present with 
 every other merit, that for which Kemble was born, 
 truth. 
 
 A chapel of the pointed architecture, which 
 occupied the whole stage, for the performance of 
 the Oratorios, with which the new theatre opened 
 in 1794. 
 
 Six chamber wings, of the same order, for ge- 
 neral use in our old English plays very elaborately 
 studied from actual remains. 
 
 A view of New Palace Yard, Westminster, as it 
 was in 1793.- 41 feet wide, with corresponding 
 wings. 
 
 The ancient palace of Westminster, as it was 
 about 300 years back ; from partial remains, and 
 authentic sources of information put together 
 with the greatest diligence and accuracy the 
 point of view the S. W. corner of Old Palace Yard. 
 About 42 feet wide and 34 feet to the top of the 
 scene. 
 
 Two very large wings, containing portions of the 
 old palace, which the artist made out from an 
 ancient draught met with in looking over some 
 records of the augmentation office in Westminster. 
 it was but a pen and ink sketch originally, but 
 though injured by time, exhibited what was true. 
 
 Six wings representing ancient English streets ; 
 combinations of genuine remains, selected on ac- 
 count of their picturesque beauty.
 
 MR. KEMBLE'S COLLECTION OF THE DRAMA. 103 
 
 The tower of London, restored to its earlier 
 state, for the play of King Richard III. 
 
 The late venerable president of the Royal Aca- 
 demy used frequently to honour the artist with a 
 call, and enjoy these scenes of past ages, the ac- 
 curacy and bold execution of which he greatly 
 commended. Capon, among the other able artists 
 of the theatre, formed a distinct feature, like the 
 black-letter class of a library. Such, with some 
 modern views, were the first works he executed 
 for the new theatre. 
 
 In our conversations, Mr.Kemblenow opened to 
 me many of the great improvements that he meditat- 
 ed; and notwithstanding sundry difficulties, which 
 would not always be charmed away, his ambition rose 
 along with the splendid pile of Mr. Holland ; and 
 the grand national theatre was the term that he not 
 too partially appropriated to the edifice which Mr. 
 Burke thought an encroachment upon the architec- 
 tural majesty of our temples. Mr Kemble now 
 steadily pursued his object of forming a complete 
 collection of the drama the newspapers oc- 
 casionally reported the large sums given by him for 
 single plays. It became him, he thought, to possess 
 every thing relative to his art, and his collection, 
 at last, was greatly superior to that of his illustrious 
 predecessor, Garrick. To give him ample room, 
 he had enlarged the library of his house in Caroline 
 Street, Bedford Square. I speak of him always, I 
 am sure, with respect but although there was no 
 
 H 4
 
 101- DRURY AT THE LITTLE THEATRE. 
 
 doubt about the superiority of the house in Great 
 Russcl Street, I yet fancied him happier in the 
 former than the latter ; there was more freedom, 
 fewer guests, less of ceremony, and equal hospi- 
 tality. 
 
 At the commencement of the winter season of 
 1793-4, the Drury Lane company were obliged to 
 bend under the low roof of the little theatre in the 
 Haymarket, and there was something affected in 
 the terms by which this event was announced. It 
 was, in short, " Mr. Colman, Jun. having made the 
 " necessary arrangements with the Proprietors of 
 " the Drury Lane Patent, opened the theatre on 
 " the 19th of September under their authority, 
 " in order that the public might not be deprived 
 " of the advantage of an option of theatrical en- 
 " tertaiment, derivable from having a second Play- 
 " house to resort to, during the winter months.*' 
 Perhaps an announcement more cautious, and better 
 calculated to still the alarm of the Lord Chamber- 
 lain, will not easily be found. The advantage of 
 the option too is a lucky discovery. The humility 
 of the term, second playhouse, so fortunately re- 
 vived in defiance of the more classical and dignified 
 word THEATRE, must have its share of approbation. 
 
 I have already given a slight sketch of Morton, 
 and I think just touched upon that very amiable 
 part of his character which led him to court re- 
 tirement, and to study nature in her simplest, and 
 perhaps loveliest garb. He was not one of those
 
 MORTON'S CHILDREN OF THE WOOD. 105 
 
 alluded to by Mr. Addison, who are unable to 
 divest themselves of the little images of ridicule 
 which are suggested by lowly interest unadorned 
 by art In common with that most elegant of 
 critics, he had felt the powerful appeal of the ballad 
 called " The Children in the Wood," and conceived 
 that by saving the little innocents from the assassin, 
 he should heal the wound he previously made, and 
 not only keep up the interest, but render it delight- 
 ful. He read his piece to Reynolds at Chambers, 
 who admired it, and was the bearer of it to Colman; 
 by that gentleman it was accepted, coupled with the 
 condition, that the real author was to be unknown. 
 It was brought out on the 1st of October, and 
 succeeded beyond the most sanguine hopes of the 
 parties. In this unappropriated condition, Rose 
 used to ask how it went off, with a seeming interest 
 in the question ; Tom Vaughan did the same thing. 
 Churchill has given the latter gentleman a lift, by 
 making him the trumpeter to Murphy, by the name 
 of Dapper ; and he clearly had no indifference to 
 any little fame that was floating about. For the 
 piece itself, it was a most delicious little thing, and 
 exhibited Bannister's genius in the happiest way 
 imaginable. I do not know any part by which he 
 was better appreciated, nor wherein he was more 
 unapproachable. The scene of Walter's heroism fell 
 into the hands of another man of genius, Mr. 
 Westall ; who preserved a very bold and perfect
 
 106 MISS POOLE'S OPHELIA. 
 
 resemblance of Bannister, in a composition of great 
 interest and beauty. 
 
 Morton, I believe, never enquired what Shak- 
 speare's cotemporary, Yarrington, had done with 
 his fable ; he was contented with the BALLAD, of 
 which the simplicity, I think, is rather the result of 
 imitation, than poverty of poetical sentiment and 
 expression ; particularly, if the office of the Robin 
 be imitated, as, I confess, seems probable, from that 
 of Horace's doves.* In stating this to be my 
 opinion as to the Children in the Wood, I take the 
 opportunity to extend that opinion to many a bal- 
 lad, written, as I conceive, in the most poetical 
 age of our literature, and affecting occasionally the 
 ' silly sooth" of traditional expression. 
 
 On the 9th of October, at Covent Garden Thea- 
 tre, Miss Poole, whose fame as a singer was after- 
 wards carried very high indeed, under the name of 
 Dickons, made her first stage appearance in the cha- 
 racter of Ophelia. The lovely maniac's " snatches 
 of old lauds"t were on this occasion augmented by 
 
 * " Till Robin-red-breast piously 
 
 Did cover them with leaves." Ballad, 
 
 " Fronde nova puerum palumbes 
 Texere." HORACE, Ode iv. b. 3. 
 
 f This passage is a lively instance of the little taste which 
 has been exerted in the composing a text of Hamlet from the 
 old 4-to and the folio 1623.~ Shakspeare wrote very evidently 
 lauds, as the quarto proves ; i. e. she chaunted old hymns : no- 
 thing can be more regular. The easier, or more common word.
 
 HAMLET A LA VANDYKE. 107 
 
 the grand cantata " Mad Bess." But Hamlet, on 
 the present night, received a complete dressing in 
 the taste of Vandyke, and has ever since been fixed 
 in costume of black satin and bugles. A new mode 
 of treating the pictures of the late and the present 
 King of Denmark, though applauded by certain 
 critics, was unquestionably wrong. The late king, 
 called the " poison* d prince," was a half-length on 
 the wall, and the present, a miniature worn by her 
 majesty as a bracelet. Now the words, " a station" 
 prove the figure to be standing, as Mercury would 
 do, darted down as a herald, and alighted on a 
 lofty eminence. The usurper stood, too, but how ? 
 " Like a mildewed ear" of corn, unsightly by the 
 side of one springing up in purity and perfection. 
 The two pictures should be whole lengths, the con- 
 stant furniture of royal apartments, and thus inci- 
 dentally supplying to Hamlet a powerful, obvious, 
 and undeniable illustration. However, the royal 
 painter of the court of Denmark must have been a 
 man of primitive sincerity, indeed, to allow the 
 living ass to figure so " vilely" by the side of the 
 dead lion. The name of the jester on that establish- 
 ment is happily come down to us ; but of the por- 
 trait painter we are quite ignorant. Munden, in 
 Polonius, said, I remember, beatified Ophelia, in.- 
 
 tunes, is a very imperfect substitute. To chaunt old tunes is 
 literally omitting all subject in the melodies. LAUDS should, 
 therefore, be restored as essential to the meaning of this tender 
 account of Ophelia's last moments.
 
 108 MR. KEMBLE IN YOUNG MARLOW. 
 
 stead of beautified, and was reproved for his innova- 
 tion ; but he had seen it in Theobald, who started 
 beatified, because he thought it more consonant 
 with the other terms applied to Ophelia by Hamlet, 
 " the celestial/' and " my soul's idol." Nay, he 
 has assigned, too, a reason, why Polonius called it 
 a vile phrase, namely, that, as a catholic, he deemed 
 it prophane. Of this emendation Warburton ap- 
 proved, and, I half suspect, had forgotten that it 
 was his own. Of such trifles more, perhaps, than 
 enough ; but when the actors offer their correc- 
 tion to me politely, as the Witches did to Macbeth, 
 with a 
 
 " Say, had'st thou rather hear it from our mouths 
 Or from our MASTERS ?" 
 
 I answer always, like the monarch, " Let me see 
 THEM." 
 
 Mr. Kemble, on the 15th of the same month, 
 acted, for the first time in town, the part of Young 
 Marlow, in that most improbable of all comedies, 
 " She Stoops to Conquer," and surely it must be 
 " meat and drink," indeed, to see a clown, when 
 such a booby savage as Tony Lumpkin can enter- 
 tain a civilized assembly. 
 
 There was an idle notion once, it appears, " that 
 the profligate man, who is at ease with a strumpet, 
 is abashed in the society of virtuous women." To 
 have lost the relish for goodness is incident to all 
 perseverance in vice : but Marlow is a gentleman 
 and a scholar, who, however incredible the fact, is
 
 SHE STOOPS TO CONQUER. 109 
 
 paralyzed by a silk petticoat, and can neither see 
 nor hear, feel nor comprehend, when he is compelled 
 to stand in the presence of a young gentlewoman. 
 
 Such is his disorder, that Miss Hardcastle trusts 
 her natural manner in her second dress ; and 
 although in her first she literally exhausts herself 
 in brilliant attacks upon Marlow, yet he is quite in- 
 sensible of the identity. In the Belle's Stratagem, 
 Miss Hardy adopts a total change of voice and man- 
 ner, in addition to which precautions, she wears a 
 mask, and Doricourt has some excuse for his want 
 of suspicion. Marlow is represented as having 
 neither ear nor eye in the first interview : to call 
 any thing Miss, deprives him of his senses. He 
 swallows, too, the extravagant fiction of Lumpkin, 
 and takes Mr. Hardcastle's house for an inn, as if 
 he were as little conversant with gentlemen's houses 
 as with modest women ; and is rude and violent in 
 a just proportion to his sheepishness and timidity. 
 
 When we sometimes suffer pain from the tre- 
 mendous critical inflictions of Dr. Johnson, we can- 
 not forbear a degree of astonishment, that he could 
 ever be brought to countenance Goldsmith's come- 
 dies ; and, one would think, he must have walked 
 out of the theatre, could HE have either seen or 
 heard She stoops to Conquer. The advantage taken of 
 some sentimental comedies, to impress upon us the 
 notion, that this was the " real Simon Pure," was 
 well sustained by the Johnson Club, but Garrick 
 did more than all of them together, in his most for-
 
 110 RICHARD TICKELL. 
 
 tunate Prologue, spoken by Woodward, in deep 
 mourning, one of the happiest approaches in the 
 world to such a structure. 
 
 The difficulty once got over, opposed by Kem- 
 ble's fine intelligent countenance, and Young Mar- 
 low being completely out of his "five wits,*' no- 
 thing could be better than Kemble in the character. 
 I have spoken with great freedom of his comedy ; 
 but he acted this part quite as whimsically as it has 
 ever been done. 
 
 Bannister, on the 29th of October, acted, for the 
 first time, the character of Col. Feignwell, in the 
 comedy called A Bold Stroke for a Wife. His suc- 
 cess in the part kept the play upon the stage for a 
 series of years ; and it not only took its turn with 
 the Busy Body and the Wonder of the ingenious 
 author, but it became the constant substitute 
 when any great card failed to play in Drury Lane 
 Theatre. 
 
 Richard Tickell, as having, like Sheridan, mar- 
 ried into the Linley family, and being also the au- 
 thor of an opera, claims some notice in this place. 
 If he really was a descendant from the Tickell of 
 Addison, the genius of the family, and perhaps 
 more than its genius, had degenerated. Richard has, 
 among the collectors of political jeux d* esprit, the 
 fame of a lucky anticipation of parliamentary ora- 
 tory. He was fortunate in one friendship, to which 
 he owed a pension and the appointment of a com- 
 missioner of the stamp duties, and the apartments
 
 DEATH OF MRS. WEBB. Ill 
 
 in the palace of Hampton Court, from the window 
 of which he, I fear, threw himself, on the 4th of 
 November, 1793. 
 
 The allusion to his illustrious namesake reminds 
 me of the highest ploratory verse in the language ; 
 I allude to the lines on the death of Addisom 
 Dr. Johnson thinks the lines upon Cato skilful ; 
 and I venture to produce his comparison of the 
 illustrious Roman with the aged oak, either as to 
 form or influence, among the most unaffected and 
 happiest efforts of poetry. 
 
 " The aged oak, thys rears his head in air, 
 His sap exhausted, and his branches bare ; 
 Midst storms and earthquakes he maintains his state, 
 Fixt deep in earth, and fasten'd by his weight: 
 His naked boughs still lend the shepherds aid, 
 And his old trunk projects an awful shade." 
 
 If he be the real translator of the rival version to 
 Pope's first book of Homer, I can only say that, in 
 the transfusion of Homer, he stiffened his verse, 
 beyond all parallel in his original compositions. 
 
 In the passage through our stage seasons, not 
 very often distinguished by genius of our own 
 times, I feel happy to select, not, I hope, obtrus- 
 ively, beauties that must be of ALL times, and which 
 uphold the poetical character of my country. 
 
 The stage this year sustained a heavy loss in the 
 death of Mrs. Webb. It is perhaps mortifying to 
 a woman ever personally to excite laughter a 
 huge hill of flesh surmounted by a front of a fiery
 
 MISS LEAKE IN ROSETTA. 
 
 fretful expression, and bellowing forth a voice 
 scarcely susceptible of a minor key, is altogether a 
 compound so unsuited to delicate minds, that there 
 should be rich compensation in the genius for the 
 pain ensured by the appearance. In many instances 
 this has decidedly been the case. The class of 
 nurses, Heidelbergs, Malaprops, and Cheshires, 
 has been, from Mrs. Green to Mrs. Davenport, ad- 
 mirably filled. 
 
 A very amiable girl and most pleasing singer, 
 Miss Leake, acted Rosetta, at the Haymarket, for 
 the first time, on the 21st of January, 1794. She 
 was a pupil of Dr. Arnold's, and calculated exactly 
 to succeed Storace in English opera. But, after 
 every prospect of the most brilliant success in her 
 profession, she was compelled to retire from it by 
 one of those insurmountable attacks upon the organ 
 of execution, which diminished the volume of 
 voice, narrowed its compass, and rendered it feeble 
 and untrue. 
 
 On the 3d of February, at Colman's theatre, an 
 accident happened absolutely unparalleled as to its 
 magnitude among the casualties of the playhouse. 
 Their Majesties had graciously condescended to 
 enjoy an evening's amusement, with such accom- 
 modation as could be given in the little theatre, 
 and they commanded (a rare occurrence) three 
 farces written by one gentleman, Mr. Prince Hoare, 
 
 " My Grandmother" " No Song no Supper" 
 
 and " The Prize."
 
 DREADFUL ACCIDENT. 113 
 
 The opportunity of having so near a view of the 
 royal party rendered the pit an object of particular 
 choice, and an immense crowd was collected in the 
 Haymarket before that only entrance to it, and 
 when the door was at last opened, the rush was 
 terrific and overwhelming. If it had been a straight 
 passage, some persons might have suffered from 
 pressure ; but here was, by a fatal mistake in the 
 builder, an unguarded and rather precipitous stair- 
 case of about sixteen steps to descend, and the loss 
 of footing by one person produced a succession of 
 falls from the pressure behind; and the crowd 
 continued to spring upon and trample their fellow- 
 creatures, lying suffocated below. Fifteen persons 
 lost their lives on this melancholy evening. In the 
 only case where animation suspended was at all re- 
 stored, the recovery was baffled ; the gentleman 
 died. Eight of the sufferers were females of great 
 respectability in life. It was rather remarkable 
 that, of the males trampled to death on this occa- 
 sion, two were heralds Benjamin Pingo, Esq. 
 York Herald, and J. C. Brooke, Esq. Somerset 
 Herald. There were about twenty other sufferers, 
 from bruises and fractures of the legs and arms ; 
 and some of these died. 
 
 Their Majesties were kept uninformed of the 
 accident until the entertainments of the evening 
 were concluded. But it made, I know, a deep 
 impression upon their minds ; and they commanded 
 a very minute report to be made to them, as to the 
 
 VOL. II. I
 
 114 NOVELTIES. 
 
 sufferers and the condition of their respective fami- 
 lies. In the course of the evening, upon entering 
 the box lobby, I found a dismay, a consternation 
 so generally diffused in the house, that there must 
 have been singular precaution, at many points, to 
 prevent an appearance of some alarm about the 
 royal boxes. 
 
 There were at Covent Garden Theatre some no- 
 velties, which met with various success. Mr. Hoi- 
 croft had a comedy called Love's Frailties, which 
 had one slight defect, namely, that it was writ- 
 ten with the impassioned philosophy of the new 
 school, and the hope of urging on the demolition 
 of rank and title, then so happily consummated in 
 France. The very prologue, of which part was the 
 suggestion of Mr. Thelwall, evinced the tone and 
 temper of the piece, in a couplet, by the author's 
 own instruction, thus appropriated : 
 
 THELWALL. " Or running footmen" (happily completed ly) 
 
 HOLCROFT. " sent with hoop and hollo, 
 
 Types of the VAPID THINGS that are to follow." 
 
 In the play itself \ the preference given " to the 
 " artist and the tradesman over that less useful 
 " and less worthy personage," who it should be 
 remembered employs them, alarmed the GENTILITY 
 of the audience, and such frailties in the author 
 were pronounced incurable on this side the grave ! 
 Bate Dudley's opera, the Travellers in Switzerland, 
 by the dexterity of the whole business, was as sue-
 
 NATIONAL THEATRE OPENED. 11,5 
 
 cessful as any thing of that sort can be good 
 music and good scenery operating upon inoffensive 
 matter, suggested by a mind of singular adroitness, 
 and usually with great certainty attaining its object. 
 The fable was a puzzled skein not worth unravel- 
 ling, though part of it winds through an enchanted 
 castle, in the fashion of that day. Dudley was 
 somehow a sure card. Nor was the Haymarket 
 without an amusing comedy at this season from the 
 pen of the veteran Cumberland, called the Box- 
 lobby Challenge. The title had no great pro- 
 priety, if I remember ; but it was fortunate one 
 way, it secured a very sportive epilogue from the 
 younger Colman, containing the preliminaries of a 
 shop-boy duel. The Hon. Fr. North wrote a pro- 
 logue, of which the point was to compare other 
 people's plays to other people's children, always 
 insufferable except to the parents. He has seldom 
 succeeded better than in the present sprightly ver- 
 sification. This comedy, though not written with 
 the full power of Cumberland, had attraction of a 
 cheerful cast, and was well received. 
 
 On the 12th of March the town was at once 
 astonished and delighted by the opening of the new 
 Theatre Royal, Drury Lane. Its spaciousness was 
 entirely sunk in its lightness and proportion. 
 Had I the construction of twenty theatres, this 
 should be their model. It seemed to grow out of 
 the pointed architecture, from its effect ; though 
 its parts did not imitate that mysterious order, or 
 
 i 2
 
 HO FONTAINV1LLE FOREST. 
 
 perhaps disorder, of composition. Why, since* 
 theatres have affected so solid an inside front, it 
 were perhaps fruitless to enquire. As to their ex- 
 terior, convenience is the only principle that is im- 
 perative in such piles ; and that, consequently, has 
 been put out of sight altogether. The carriages 
 have hardly any space to move in, and the audience 
 are exposed to the wet, as speedily as possible, on 
 their leaving the lobbies. The exit doors are still 
 too few. 
 
 The oratorios were naturally well attended ; and 
 the coup d'oeil of the orchestra, piled up in Capon's 
 actual building of a Gothic chapel, magnificent 
 and even sublime. The house was at once ascer- 
 tained to be a fine musical structure ; and when 
 applied to its positive purposes, with a company 
 upon its stage seldom equalled and never surpassed 
 with all the leading beauties of England at the 
 head of the polite, the liberal, the intelligent 
 public again, I say, our dear Kemble's heart 
 might swell with pride at being manager of such a 
 theatre. 
 
 I am brought back to the rival theatre, by being 
 myself selected to supply part of the means by 
 which Drury Lane was to be opposed. I have already 
 ventured, some pages back, to interest the reader 
 in the discussion, how the supernatural may best 
 be exhibited upon the stage : and I, at the same 
 time, showed that the author of Fontainville Forest 
 meditated some improvements which were sug-
 
 NIGHT REHEARSAL. 11? 
 
 gested to him by the sister art of painting. How 
 far the stage execution might correspond with his 
 notion was matter of experiment. A ludicrous 
 misconception of his instructions might have ruined 
 his whole design. Perhaps the reader may find 
 some amusement in the miseries of an author. 
 The great contrivance was, that the spectre should 
 appear through a blueish-grey gauze, so as to 
 remove the too corporeal effect of a * live actor,' 
 and convert the moving substance into a gliding 
 essence. 
 
 As, to speak the absolute truth, any great effect 
 in this play depended on the management of the 
 ghost scene*, Mr. Harris ordered a night rehearsal 
 of it, that the author might judge how happily the 
 stage had seconded his conceptions. Mrs. Pope 
 had charmed us with the pathos of her recitation 
 the entrance of the spectre approached. On came 
 good, honest, jolly Thompson, " in his habit as he 
 " liv'd," with the leathern pilch, " time out of 
 " mind the player's armour" as thick nearly as he 
 
 was long, 
 
 " And over all, that he might be 
 
 Equipt from top to toe, 
 His grey gattse VEIL, as buckram stiff, 
 Right manfully did throw." 
 
 * " Why should your terror lay my proudest boast ? 
 Madam, I DIE, if I give up the GHOST." 
 
 Authors Epilogue. 
 I 3
 
 118 REMONSTRANCE WITH MR. HARRIS. 
 
 No ; never, except a river god in some procession, 
 with all his sedge about him ; never did I behold 
 such a figure! I was rivetted to my seat with 
 astonishment. Mr. Harris, who sat in the front by 
 my side, said he thought the effect very good. 
 But not staying to dispute this opinion, I made no 
 secret of my distress and alarm ; and clearly ex- 
 plained to him what my own idea really was. He 
 laughed heartily at the mistake, and we soon found, 
 across a portal of the scene, a proper place for the 
 gauze worn by old Thompson. The clumsy effect 
 of the traditional stage armour he did not so soon 
 admit, and asked at last, rather briskly, how it 
 could be made better ? I told him that, in the first 
 place, the present ghost must be laid, and a much 
 higher spirit be invoked ; and at length we found 
 the tall, sweeping figure, that was to freeze the 
 spectator with horror, in the person of Follet, the 
 clown so royally celebrated for the eating of camots 
 in the pantomimes. Follet readily agreed to lend 
 his person on this momentous occasion his stride 
 might have delighted Mr. Fuseli himself his 
 figure was of the heroic height his action what- 
 ever you chose to order. But notwithstanding all 
 these requisites for the part, there occurred one 
 formidable difficulty. The ghost had but two 
 words to utter, " PERISH'D HERE :" now " that 
 " will be exactly the case with the author," said 
 Follet, if / speak them." The fable had taught
 
 NEW EFFECT. 119 
 
 every body, that though the animal might be con- 
 cealed, the voice would betray him. We therefore 
 settled it, that, in imitation of the ancients, he 
 should be only the MIME, to make the action on 
 the stage, and that poor Thompson, disencumbered 
 from the pilch of the Majesty of Denmark, should 
 yet at the wing, with hollow voice, pronounce the 
 two important words ; to which the extended 
 arm of Follet might give the consentaneous action. 
 All that remained now was to dress the spirit ; 
 for which purpose I recommended a dark blue grey 
 stuff, made in the shape of armour, and sitting 
 close to the person ; and when Follet (of course un- 
 known) was thus drest, and faintly visible behind 
 the gauze or crape spread before the scene, the 
 whisper of the house, as he was about to enter, 
 the breathless silence, while he floated along like a 
 shadow,. proved to me, that I had achieved the 
 great desideratum j and the often-renewed plaudits, 
 when the curtain fell, told me that the audience 
 had enjoyed 
 
 " That sacred terror, that severe delight," 
 
 for which alone it is excusable to overpass the 
 ordinary limits of nature. 
 
 For a whimsical dilemma that occurred, I may 
 be excused in speaking of myself. I can only add 
 that the public was extremely indulgent to my 
 effort, and that I found the author's receipts very 
 considerable indeed.' 
 
 i 4
 
 120 DRURY LANE OPENS WITH MACBETH. 
 
 On the 21st of April 1794, Drury Lane Theatre, 
 erected as a proud monument to the fame of Shak- 
 speare, was opened for the performance of plays. 
 With the declared intention to devote the pile to 
 his honour, it might have been advisable to delay 
 two days for the object of commencing on the 
 bard's birth-day. Saint Monday, however, carried 
 it with the treasury, and Wednesday lost the ho- 
 nour and the coincidence. I never yet was able 
 to get any extraordinary honours paid to this day, 
 though the poet also died upon it ; and yet, heaven 
 knows ! if the proprietors of theatres were to be 
 estimated by what they write of Shakspeare at the 
 bottom of their play-bills, not even Schlegel him- 
 self by " taffeta phrases" could more mystify his 
 excellencies. 
 
 Mr. Kemble opened with Macbeth, and with his 
 sister in the Lady displayed the utmost perfection 
 of the art I have long since exhausted the sub- 
 ject; and, along with my ever-lamented friend 
 Opie, preferred the proper presentment of Banquo's 
 spirit to his banishment. I have proved the poet's 
 own notions by his own directions, preserved in the 
 folio 1623.* And as Macbeth never till then was 
 submitted to the press, it avoided all the chances 
 of corruption, from numerous impressions, edited 
 carelessly, if edited at all. Nor could this particu- 
 lar play have suffered by frequent transcription in 
 
 * " Enter the Ghost of Banquo, and sits in Macbeth's place."
 
 BANISHMENT OF BANQUO's GHOST. 
 
 the playhouse itself: it was written subsequent to 
 the accession of JAMES, and printed from the 
 prompt-book of the very theatre for which it was 
 written, and of which the author was a proprietor. 
 It was therefore acted, at first and after, as Shak- 
 speare himself directed. This one point well cleared 
 and put at rest, the question that remains is, with 
 regard to our modern notions, whether it is not 
 more advisable that Macbeth should fancy the 
 dreadful visitor, than that the assembled court of 
 Scotland should be conceived incapable of seeing, 
 what the audience, as well as Macbeth, perceive 
 to be a ghastly body sitting in the royal chair? 
 
 The same critics who banish Banqub from the 
 feast, applaud the banishment of the dancing spirits 
 during the dream of Queen Katharine. Before 
 confirming their decree, a judicious spectator would 
 ask, what there was in the vision, that a man, with 
 the knowledge of D'Egville, would not render a 
 sourceof even sublime and beautiful embellishment? 
 Look at the effect of these circling and ascending 
 spirits in Mr. Fuseli's picture of that scene, (where 
 he has used Rembrandt with great skill) I say 
 boldly, that the stage is competent to all HIS effect, 
 and more. In the mean time, the reader is referred 
 to the description of the scene as originally written j 
 and he may thence conceive a higher gratification 
 than one of Handel's songs, sung by a Miss Any- 
 body in a modern frock, trying to disturb, rather 
 than assist, the last slumbers of the dying Queen.
 
 122 MR. CHARLES KEMBLE IN MALCOLM. 
 
 To close with Macbeth On this occasion Mr. 
 Kemble allowed his brother Charles to appear in 
 the character of Malcolm; and, with a love for 
 him that has rarely been equalled, compelled him 
 to acquire the art, by passing through its grada- 
 tions. It is to the credit of that gentleman, that he 
 submitted implicitly to his brother's judgment, 
 who bespoke my attention to him early, by saying, 
 " Boaden, you will see shortly two young men in 
 " the profession, in whom I take an interest ; one 
 " of them is my brother, Charles : HE will make 
 " an actor." The other person alluded to, in his 
 time, I have no doubt, made many an actor, for he 
 possessed the theory of the art in great perfection ; 
 but in his own efforts he certainly confirmed the 
 unfavourable judgment, which privately had been 
 given against him. 
 
 It might perhaps have been expected that 
 Sheridan would open his new theatre with verse of 
 his OWN ; but General Fitzpatrick, with some 
 French leanings as to our irregularity in the drama, 
 closed about fifty lines, spoken, I remember, by 
 Kemble, with the prediction that Britons, through 
 many a distant age, should hail the founder of our 
 drama! 
 
 " And from the cavils of pedantic spleen, 
 
 Defend the glories of their Shakspeare's scene." 
 
 George Colman got up a pantomime epilogue 
 most gaily for Miss Farrenj who shows off the new
 
 PROLOGUE AND EPILOGUE. 12$ 
 
 theatre, in the style of a noble lord's housekeeper. 
 In obedience to her wand, the reservoir rushed 
 forth, to prove that the audience had water to 
 dread rather than fire ; and should even the scenery 
 take fire, an iron curtain would instantly drop be- 
 tween the conflagration and the audience. All 
 this nonsense had proceeded from engineers, who 
 could find inventions, while managers could find 
 money ; and were caught at by the latter, to make 
 a strong effect upon the public mind. 
 
 Except as to panic, fire can do nothing in the- 
 atres, where every eye is open and every hand 
 ready to extinguish it. As Shakspeare himself 
 expressed it, 
 
 " Through NIGHT and NEGLIGENCE such fires are spied 
 In populous cities." 
 
 And, when they are, what security is found in 
 reservoirs without water, and iron curtains that 
 would soon be fire heat in a conflagration ? The 
 watchman, too, like other mortals, drowsy, if not 
 absolutely sleeping, by degrees remitting his search 
 upon having so constantly found all well, is at the 
 critical moment terrified beyond his reason. All 
 becomes alarm, noise, hurry, and the struggle to 
 save individual property ; and the " court and 
 " guard of safety" is speedily a mass of flaming 
 ruin. However, for the present, founded, as they 
 expressed themselves, upon a rock, guarded by 
 science, and confident in their immense attraction
 
 THE JEW BY CUMBERLAND. 
 
 of every kind, they must be allowed to feel their 
 triumphant security, unchecked by our fatal know- 
 ledge of what fifteen short years were to bring to 
 pass. 
 
 One of the first and best novelties produced in 
 the new theatre was the comedy of the Jew, writ- 
 ten by Cumberland. That ancient people had been 
 rather scurvily treated by either the political or 
 literary world. Their wealth, a distinction which 
 they owe to themselves, subjects them to hatred for 
 its use, and to pillage on every indecent pretext. 
 Even Shakspeare, who has made his Shylock 
 triumphant in his logic, and affecting in his misery, 
 seems to enjoy his defeat by a quibble, and his con- 
 version by a halter. But this ill-used people, on 
 the 8th of May, had the satisfaction to see their be- 
 nevolent feelings admitted by a great nation, and 
 Sheva pronounced at least as natural a character 
 as Shylock. I hope the gratitude of Duke's place 
 now compensated the failure of the author to move 
 the Lords of the Treasury. Bannister merited a 
 statue for the very able performance of Sheva ;* 
 though, subsequently, Cumberland used to talk of 
 Dowton's as the finest acting in the world. 
 
 The Epilogue, spoken by Miss Farren, set out 
 with great pleasantry on the origin of woman, but 
 dwindled away its point, and ended hardly intelli- 
 gible. The Jew became popular all over these 
 islands; and, except the Wheel of Fortune, is 
 clearly the best of Mr. Cumberland's latter pieces.
 
 BISHOP WATSON. 
 
 I dined with him at Bannister's ; and found him a 
 little open to pleasantry : he sported parodox upon 
 parodox " Handel was no composer," "It was 
 " quite impossible for any man to reason, without 
 " depth in * mathematical science,*' and so on ; but 
 his own attainments were to be measured, one day, 
 by the contemptuous logical restriction of Bishop 
 Watson. 
 
 " I had too great contempt for his powers of ar- 
 " gumentation to answer anything he published 
 " against me : he had merit as a versifier and a 
 " writer of essays ; but his head was not made for 
 " close reasoning. * There are,' says Locke, ' some 
 " men of one, some of two syllogisms, and no more, 
 " and others that can advance but one step fur- 
 " ther. These cannot always discern that side on 
 " which the strongest proofs lie.' Mr. Cumber- 
 " land w r as at most a two syllogism man." The 
 Bishop's Life, vol. i, p. 124. 
 
 See, however, on this subject the admirable discrimination 
 of Warburton, at p. 19. of the Introduction to his Julian, 1751. 
 " It may seem, perhaps, too much a paradox to say, that long 
 " habit in this science incapacitates the mind for reasoning at 
 " large, and especially in the search of moral truth. And yet, 
 " I believe, nothing is more certain. The object of Geometry 
 " is demonstration, and its subject admits of it, and is almost the 
 " only one that doth. In this science, whatever is not demon- 
 " stration is nothing; or at least below the sublime inquirer's 
 " regard. Probability through its almost infinite degrees, from 
 " simple ignorance up to absolute certainty, is the terra incog- 
 " nita of the Geometer. And yet here it is that the great busi- 
 " ness of the human mind is carried on, the search and discovery 
 " of all the important truths which concern us as reasonable 
 " beings."
 
 126 MR. PYE. 
 
 At the other house, a tragedy in three acts, called 
 the Siege of Meaux, from the pen of the laureat, 
 Pye, was acted, on the 19th of May, with applause. 
 It must not be confounded with the celebrated and 
 terrible siege of that place, in 1421, by our hero, 
 the Fifth Henry. It is narrow in its business, and 
 of little interest, written with great purity, as was 
 to be expected, being the work of so eminent a 
 scholar. It is often extremely painful to be obliged 
 to remind a man of genius and learning, that every 
 profession must be learned ; and the great effects 
 of the drama can only proceed from intimate ac- 
 quaintance with the stage. The drama, by its occa- 
 sional profits, tempts beyond the other walks of 
 literature : a successful play producing, by less 
 than 100 pages, a reward beyond quartos of histo- 
 rical research and painful elaboration. But Pye, 
 though even the author of an epic poem, was not 
 at all turned to tragedy. 
 
 Mr. Henry Siddons, the son of the great 
 actress, had dramatised the Sicilian Romance of 
 Mrs. Radcliffe, and he allowed Middleton to act it^ 
 for his benefit, on the 28th. He had learned, at 
 all events, to "shape his ends" dramatically, and the 
 work was creditable to his industry. 
 
 Mr. Kemble had been amusing himself by trans- 
 lating, from the French, a musical romance, called 
 Lodoiska. There is a bustle about it that will 
 always interest strongly : it seems to have been the 
 model of all the fortresses subsequently stormed. 
 Kera Khan and his Tartars Princess Lodoiska,
 
 LODOISKA DONE BY MR. KEMBLE. 127 
 
 Count Floreski, with flaming walls and delightful 
 music, mixed excellently well together, and brought 
 a mine of wealth into the theatre. Charles Kemble 
 took a young Tartar, called Kajah, under that 
 greatest of Tartar chiefs, Barrymore ; and worked 
 every night like a Turk, to come at last into broad 
 day-light. As Drury Lane Theatre had com- 
 menced its operations late in the season, it did not 
 close them until the 8th of July, having, however, 
 on the 2d, acted the Country Girl, with Jordan, for 
 the benefit of those who were left desolate and desti- 
 tute by the glorious deaths on the 1st of June. 
 Cobb, one of the ready writers of that day, put a 
 little afterpiece together, in which everybody 
 acted, and with the immense resources of the new 
 stage, a sea-fight was given, in which a seaman 
 might find something to admire. To this piece, 
 called TJie Glorious First of June, Richardson wrote 
 a Prologue of great beauty, which Mr. Kemble 
 himself spoke. The points were frequent, and yet 
 graceful. 
 
 " No : every eye, in generous drops bedew'd, 
 Shall own that bounty here is gratitude." 
 
 The appeal to the gallant spirits, who had sealed, 
 with their blood, the safety of their country, was 
 extremely eloquent e. g. 
 
 " If of your former being ought survive, 
 And memory holds her dear prerogative."
 
 128 MR. PALMER IN OCTAVIAtf. 
 
 But the strong point was in the surprise, when the' 
 great hero himself was named : 
 
 " Glory itself at such a shrine may bow, 
 And what is glory, but a name for HOWB ?" 
 
 I only add the dexterous union of the victors and 
 the public 
 
 " They, who have won the laurel You who give" 
 
 Surely conviviality had few more accomplished vic- 
 tims than Joseph Richardson. 
 
 The summer theatre was now to do its best to 
 compensate the want of Mr. Kemble in Octavian. 
 The young manager had been indecently accused 
 of predilection for his own pieces. I should call it 
 rather attention to his own interest. His produc- 
 tions had a decided fashion about them, that did 
 not attend those of his cotemporaries ; and I know 
 that he never refused his stage to a novelty of de- 
 cent promise. The Mountaineers was of necessity 
 to be played, though the delightful Octavian could 
 not sacrifice any more time to its performance in 
 town. I saw Mr. Palmer in the character. Though 
 not naturally a tragedian, he was an able actor he 
 had energy, he had pathos he had a fine, yet rather 
 full, figure j but his countenance, though handsome, 
 was not marking ; and his attitudes, though bold, 
 were not picturesque. His appearance indicated 
 nothing of solitude and distraction, and blighted 
 hope. He was a living contradiction in terms, and 
 his Octavian implied a miracle.
 
 DEATH OF THE ELDER COLMAN. 129 
 
 There was yet another important substitute this 
 season, Fawcett for John Bannister, who went to 
 Liverpool. Much of Bannister Fawcett could not 
 touch age must be given to the character to force 
 out the pathetic that was in him. His humour, too, 
 did not seem to spring from Jlight : absurdity 
 looked considerate in Fawcett. But Col man soon 
 found out his peculiar force, and wrote for him ad- 
 mirably. The attention of this worthy man, and 
 able actor, was always unfailing to every duty 
 of his profession. 
 
 In the midst of the son's triumphs as a writer, 
 the elder Colman was drawing to the close of an 
 existence suffering under mental alienation. After 
 the termination of his season, in the year 1785, he 
 had gone to Margate, and was there affected by 
 palsy ; but it was not until 1789, that any disorder 
 of the intellect became apparent. He was reduced 
 to a condition of nervous imbecility ; and died at a 
 house in Paddington, under proper care, on the 
 14th of August, aged 62. 
 
 Mr. Colman was born at Florence, where his 
 father was resident for his Britannic Majesty ; and 
 this procured the honour of a royal godfather, in 
 the person of King George the Second. His 
 mother was a sister of the Countess of Bath. He 
 received his education at Westminster and at Christ 
 Church, Oxford. He took his degree of Master of 
 Arts on the 18th of March 17<58, and brought out 
 his first farce in the year 1760. School friend- 
 
 VOL. II. K
 
 130 COLMAN AS A WRITER. 
 
 ships are often decisive of future engagements. 
 The associate of Lloyd, Churchill, and Bonnel 
 Thornton, was infinitely more likely to become a 
 connoisseur than a lawyer. The Jealous Wife 
 proved him to possess the very highest power as a 
 comic writer ; his Terence established his fame as 
 the neatest of all translators. By the deaths of 
 Lord Bath and General Pulteney in 1764 and 1767* 
 he found himself in circumstances, vehemently to 
 be desired by all followers of the muses. His taste 
 led him to the theatre ; and he purchased first into 
 Covent Garden, and finally into the Haymarket. 
 The numerous productions of his pen are before 
 the public, and will long remain so : he collected 
 even his fugitive pieces, and was sufficiently alive to 
 his reputation as an author, to think of correctness 
 even in trifles. As a critic, he had that integrity 
 of judgment which leads to the exact truth j while 
 spirits equally, perhaps more, subtle, fly often 
 away after hypotheses, useless and untenable. His 
 achievement as to the epistle of Horace AD PISONES 
 has had the highest praise. His skill in the Latin 
 language was particularly acknowledged by Dr. 
 Johnson. He lived in the full affluence of fame, 
 beloved by the greatest and the best of men, till a 
 cloud gathering in the decline of his course, he was 
 covered from our view, and shortly after sunk 
 below the horizon.
 
 131 
 
 CHAP. VIII. 
 
 MR. HARRIS RESTORES A ONE SHILLING GALLERY. HOL- 
 
 CROFT'S PRELUDE. MRS. DAVENPORT. REYNOLDS, 
 
 THE RAGE, MR. KEMBLE ACTS PUBLIUS. BADDELEY*S 
 
 DEATH. MRS. ROBINSON. HER COMEDY OF NOBODY. 
 
 AUTHOR'S ACQUAINTANCE WITH THAT LADY. VARIETY 
 
 OF NEW PIECES. MR. KEMBLE REVIVES ALL'S WELL 
 
 THAT ENDS WELL, AND MEASURE FOR MEASURE. 
 
 DEATH OF THE ADMIRABLE PARSONS. MR. KEMBLE, 
 
 WITH D'EGVILLE FOR HIS BALLET-MASTER, GIVES THE 
 
 SPLENDID PROGRESS OF ALEXANDER THE GREAT. MR. 
 
 KEMBLE'S PARTICULAR ATTENTION TO THE WHEEL OF 
 
 FORTUNE. NOVOSIELSKI DIES. FIRST LOVE. MR. 
 
 BO ADEN'S SECRET TRIBUNAL. WANT OF HELMETS. 
 
 ZORINSKI. MRS. S. KEMBLE. THE KNIGHTS. MISS 
 
 MANSELL. CUMBERLAND'S HURRY. REYNOLDS'S SPECU- 
 LATION SUCCEEDS. MR. KEMBLE ACTS ALEXANDER. 
 
 COOPER FAILS IN MACBETH. DAYS OF YORE. HOL- 
 
 CROFT'S MAN IN TEN THOUSAND. MORTON'S WAY TO 
 GET MARRIED. NOVELTIES. IRON CHEST. 
 
 THE merits of our stage architecture are discern- 
 ible at first sight ; a second usually dispels the 
 charm. Covent Garden had recently cost a large 
 sum, to be rendered perfect. A shilling gallery 
 had been left out of the original plan, but was 
 
 K 2
 
 132 IIOLCROFT'S PRELUDE. 
 
 placed at length so as to render the gods invisible 
 to men below. Indeed, those far-seeing powers 
 had no common obstruction to their own view. 
 " Phidias," says the great lecturer, " had discovered 
 " in the nod of the Homeric Jupiter the character- 
 " istic of majesty, inclination of the head : this 
 " hinted to him a higher elevation of the neck 
 " behind, a bolder protrusion of the front, and the 
 " increased perpendicular of the profile." All 
 these sublime arts had in vain been practised by 
 our theatric gods : for any earthly enjoyment, they 
 might as well have been in heaven, as where 
 they were. Now, however, by cutting away a 
 painted gallery, the shilling was permitted to see 
 the stage: indeed, the whole cieling was new. The 
 frontispiece also a new one. The former column 
 became a pilaster. The general character of the 
 house was a fawn colour, with green and gold pan- 
 nels. The cappings of the boxes were of green 
 morocco leather; the seats stuffed of the same 
 colour. The seats through the whole house were 
 raised. Behind the curtain some red borders were 
 soberly changed for green, and the machinist, an 
 ancient as well as modern divinity, 
 
 " Namque erit ille mihi semper Deus," 
 
 obtained more room for his operations. Conscious 
 of all these improvements, Mr. Harris got Holcroft 
 to scribble a prelude for him, called the Rival 
 Queens j in which, perhaps without design, the su-
 
 MRS. DAVENPORT. 133 
 
 perior title was attached to the other house (Jueen 
 Covent Garden, Empress Drury. The head tire 
 was equally unfortunate, for the former bore the 
 Piazza upon her crown, and the latter wore the 
 cupola surmounted by Apollo. If Kemble had 
 desired a symbol of difference between them, is not 
 this precisely what he would have chosen ? 
 
 On the 24th of September that excellent actress, 
 Mrs. Davenport, made her first curtsey at Covent 
 Garden ; and from that time to the present has 
 remained one of the most diligent and diverting 
 performers that ever amused the public. Mrs. 
 Green was rather cooler ', but Davenport Jiaming 
 in the front of Lewis, Quick, Munden, and Fawcett, 
 was a meteor of infinite value. The comic harmony 
 of all their tones was really past belief. Miss 
 Wallis, in October, returned to this theatre in 
 Imogen, considerably advanced in talent, but re- 
 taining all her native retiring modesty. 
 
 Reynolds's comedy, semper eadem, as Mr. 
 Harris used to tell him, was as like in its success 
 as in its structure or characters. The Rage for- 
 tunately was supposed to be personal Old P.'s 
 were taken for old Q.'s a boxing Peer was pro- 
 perly named Savage : and the husband of a cele- 
 brated singer was as decidedly exhibited under the 
 name of Cygnet, as Flush might stand for any one 
 of the tribe of money-lenders. Seduction, disguise, 
 disinheritance, adoption, are the nerves which sup- 
 port him through his five-acts ; whimsical incidents, 
 
 K 3
 
 134 MR. KEMBLE IN PUBLIUS. 
 
 practical jokes, and very sparkling dialogue, render 
 his plot of no great consequence amusement 
 constantly attends him, and every body who wishes 
 to be amused. It is almost a fortune to give, to 
 such an actor as Lewis, the name of Gingham. 
 But Reynolds passed his whole time in thinking 
 comedies; and only lived by writing them. He 
 was so popular, that he had all the gay world run- 
 ning after him ; and the grave preferred their 
 exhilaration to their criticism. 
 
 Mr. Kemble's decided pre-eminence in the Roman 
 character, makes it necessary to record his per- 
 formance of Publius, in the play of the Roman 
 Father, on the 15th of November, Mrs. Siddons 
 was the Horatia. As this people aimed to be supe- 
 rior to the sympathies of nature, they excite little 
 . n&tural sympathy. In France at this time every 
 thing was Roman, even to the style of a wig. 
 Delation arrived at a climax among the mimics, 
 from which I believe the savage originals them- 
 selves shrunk and children denounced the aris- 
 tocracy or federalism of their parents, and were 
 applauded for their VIRTUE ! 
 
 The stage suffered a considerable loss on the 
 20th of this month by the death of poor Baddeley. 
 On the evening before, he was seized with a n't, 
 while dressing for Moses in the School for Scandal. 
 He was taken home to his house in Store Street, 
 and every effort made to preserve him, but he 
 lived only to the next day. His Swiss and his Jews,
 
 DEATH OF BADDELEY. 135 
 
 his Germans and his Frenchmen, were admirably 
 characteristic they were finely generalized by 
 Baddeley, and played from actual knowledge .of. 
 the people, not from a casual snatch at individual 
 peculiarities. Baddeley left money for a dramatic 
 mass to be said for him for ever, in the green-room 
 of Drury Lane Theatre. Baddeley's cake and 
 Dogget's coat and badge, constitute a fame, from 
 which the merits of the actor are said to shrink. 
 The gift of Baddeley keeps his name with good 
 taste in the mouths of the profession of which he 
 was an ornament j and there certainly would be 
 more of such memorials, but that the successful are 
 willing to forget their humbler rank, and those who 
 fail, in their decline have nothing to bequeath. 
 
 No season presented more indifferent pieces than 
 the present they departed usually like the sha- 
 dows they were. Among the sons and daughters of 
 disappointment was that very amiable unfortunate 
 Mrs. Robinson. A perfect martyr to the rheu- 
 matism ; the use of the lower limbs quite gone ; 
 carried from room to room, or from her house to 
 her carriage like an infant ; she yet had the nerve 
 to control her bodily sufferings, so as to indulge a 
 constant use of the pen, except at the periods of 
 refection and exercise. Among the numerous 
 trifles that soothed her lonely hours, was a comedy 
 in two acts, entitled, Nobody. I remember the 
 warmth with which she chaunted the kindness of 
 Mrs. Jordan in accepting the principal character j 
 
 K 4
 
 MRS. ROBINSON. 
 
 and I cannot forget the way, when the storm be- 
 gan, in which the actress, frightened out of her 
 senses, " died and made no sign." Mrs. Robinson 
 at the time lived in St. James's place, and very un- 
 affectedly entertained the few literary friends she* 
 had. She was delighted in the opportunity it gave 
 her of hearing all that passed in the world, and of 
 mingling in the conversation her full share of in- 
 telligence and grace she still sat a remarkably 
 interesting woman, and disdained to intrude upon 
 conversation any evidence of pain actually suffered 
 at the moment. So that at the jest of others, and 
 sometimes during her own repartee, the counte- 
 nance preserved its pleasant expression, while a 
 cold dew was glistening upon the forehead. She- 
 ridan very often looked in for an hour in the 
 evening, and on this occasion had to endure the 
 eloquent indignation of his fair friend. She cer- 
 tainly considered herself ill used, and MEEKY, as 
 he used ironically to call her, made her attacks 
 rather powerfully. But I have before described 
 the manner of Sheridan. It forms no part of my 
 design to indulge the appetite of scandal, and most 
 assuredly this lovely woman had severely expiated 
 the errors of her early life. The respect of the 
 liberal part of society she always retained during 
 the period when I had the happiness to know her. 
 Her father, Captain Darby, had been intimate with 
 mine, and I had heard of the childish graces of 
 
 o 
 
 MARY from a most benevolent man, no bad judge
 
 MR. KEMBLE'S RIVALS. 137 
 
 of merit, whom they had entirely captivated. She 
 spoke remarkably well, and with a depth of tone 
 somewhat remarkable. She was conversant with 
 the French, Italian, and German literature, and had 
 a facility of composition almost approaching to 
 that of Mrs. Cowley. 
 
 I am led by the date, as well as the allusion just 
 made, to notice next, a comedy produced on the 
 6th of December, called The Town before You. What 
 it wanted was some one leading interest. It had 
 not been well considered ; the subject had been 
 rather created by labour, than suggested by fancy ; 
 and the play was withdrawn to be altered, a fruit- 
 less process. Cobb's Cherokee, at the other theatre, 
 never returned into the treasury the expence of 
 getting it up. In its cast it had prodigious strength, 
 but it was inferior in power or good fortune to his 
 other operas. Andrews, perhaps assisted, brought 
 out at Covent Garden what was called, erroneously, 
 a dramatic tale of the Mysteries of the Castle. But 
 Mysteries were very far indeed from the touch of 
 the writers ; and taking the name of Montoni from 
 Udolpho, and the name only, they fabricated a 
 non-descript of every sort of absurdity ; and having 
 long debauched the public taste, succeeded perhaps 
 beyond expectation, certainly beyond desert. 
 
 Mr. Kemble had revived two of Shakspeare's 
 comedies this season, with his usual care All's Well 
 that Ends Well, and Measure for Measure. In the 
 former he condescended to Bertram ; in the latter 
 he acted the Duke with a dignity, a venerable pro-
 
 138 DEATH OF PARSONS. 
 
 priety, and picturesque effect never surpassed. The 
 Isabel of Mrs. Siddons was a model of cloistered 
 purity, and en ergy,'and grace. I clearly never have 
 seen a more perfect delineation. When she after- 
 wards read the play in public, she projected this 
 character rather beyond the rest, perhaps more 
 from the habit of acting it herself, than any designed 
 departure from the equality imposed by reading. 
 
 Among the greatest losses, which the stage of 
 my time has sustained, is most unquestionably to 
 be classed that of William Parsons, on the 3d of 
 February 1795. He had all his life suffered from 
 asthma, and it terminated his existence in his 59th 
 year. Parsons was born on the 29th of February 
 1736. His father was a builder, who lived in Bow 
 Lane, and his son in consequence profited by the 
 education of St. Paul's school, at once the nearest 
 and the best. His father, properly looking upward 
 for his son, designed him to be an architect, and 
 therefore, after grounding him well as a classic 
 scholar, placed him as a pupil to Sir Henry Cheere. 
 Here he cultivated the fine arts assiduously : he 
 mixed landscape with architectural designs, and 
 painted flowers with great success. For his 
 amusement he painted occasionally through life ; 
 and he illustrated from his early profession when 
 speaking of the stage. He would say [of any crude 
 unstudied performance, " Sign-post daubing!" 
 Parsons first acted Kent, in King Lear, and felt 
 his way for some years in the profession, till, being 
 invited from Edinburgh by Garrick, that great
 
 PARSONS AS AN ACTOR. 139 
 
 master led him ultimately to what he was fitted for 
 by nature j and some hardnesses being rubbed 
 down, a strong tendency to grimace confined to 
 occasional sallies, and above all things, at last 
 measuring and waiting the proper moment of effect, 
 and being rich enough in expression to keep the 
 spectator in waiting, and happy to wait, he threw 
 in his heightening touches into the living com- 
 position before you, so judiciously and irresistibly, 
 that he became the master of his audience, and his 
 rivals alike. But IJiave long since endeavoured to 
 paint this great and unrivalled actor, to whom we 
 are indebted for many delightful hours of relax- 
 ation in our passage through life. His last per- 
 formance was Sir Fretful Plagiary, in the Critic, 
 on the 19th of January 1795. From his arrival at 
 Drury Lane Theatre, in 1762, to his death, he had 
 never quitted it, nor would he be tempted by the 
 strongest offers that could be made, when his 
 earliest friend, and almost brother, Powell, went to 
 the other theatre. This principle, so honourable in 
 itself, so advantageous to the community, so con- 
 ducive to the perfection of the art, must be again 
 revived, or the stage will lose its legitimate fame 
 of good acting, and exist only by a series of con- 
 temptible tricks. This subject is not below legis- 
 lative interference. 
 
 " A nation's TASTE depends on you ; 
 Perhaps a nation's MORALS too."
 
 1 iO MR. KEMBLE IN PENRUDDOCK. 
 
 On the 6th of February, a grand-daughter of the 
 illustrious Dr. Arne came out in Gay's Polly. She 
 had sweetness and taste, an interesting figure and 
 countenance, and indeed every requisite but force. 
 In a room, I heard that she was delightful. 
 
 D'EoviLLE, whom I have always thought the 
 greatest artist of ballet in England, being allowed 
 full latitude at the new theatre, produced his most 
 triumphant work, the Progress of Alexander the 
 Greaf t a spectacle worthy of Greece in all its glory. 
 Mr. Kemble had now realised his plan of acting 
 the sterling old plays with a perfection never before 
 attempted ; and of directing the appetite for noise 
 and show to objects, in which the refined taste 
 found even superior gratification to that enjoyed by 
 the crowd, for whose amusement they had princi- 
 pally been designed. I was now very frequently 
 with him, and know the great pains he took with 
 the character of Penruddock, in the Wheel of For- 
 tune. It came at length upon the stage, on the 
 28th of February, one of the most perfect imper- 
 sonations, that had ever excited human sympathy. 
 He had fashioned every sentence of the part to his 
 own organs, so that it seemed a decided reality ; 
 and his personal manner was so little disturbed, 
 that the spectator, by an easy delusion, almost fan- 
 cied that Mr. Kemble was relating some striking 
 misfortunes that had happened, in early life, to 
 himself: I most seriously affirm, that, for identity, 
 Penruddock would hardly admit of competition.
 
 DEATH OF NOVOSIELSKI. 141 
 
 Here, from the great intimacy between us, he ad- 
 vised with me as to the plain and almost quaker 
 attire he wore ; and I saw in his walk, and occa- 
 sionally in his countenance, the image of that noble 
 wreck of treachery and love, which was shortly to 
 command the tears of a whole people. He had a 
 habit, by intense meditation, of working himself 
 into a character which he considered important, 
 and calculated to diversify the usual range of his 
 performances. Penruddock merited his pains. 
 
 As the architect and scene-painter of the Opera- 
 house, in which Mr. Kemble had acted, he regret- 
 ted the death of that gentlemanly man, Mr. Novo- 
 sielski. He was born at Rome in the year 1750 j 
 and, when Wyatt was engaged upon the Pantheon, 
 and required the assistance of a young man of 
 genius, Dr. Frey named Novosielski to go over 
 from Rome to England for that purpose, which was 
 completely answered in his diligence' and skill. 
 Novosielski, though at that time under twenty, was 
 almost a victim to the severity of his application. 
 He died on the 8th of April, at the age of 45, in 
 the Isle of Thanet ; and I believe his children are 
 yet living among us, highly respected for merits 
 congenial with those of their parent. A few days 
 only are past since a pupil of his mentioned him to 
 me with great feeling. 
 
 .. Cumberland with, if not his utmost power, yet 
 with great care and feeling, had constructed a
 
 142 FIRST LOVE. 
 
 comedy on the sentimental subject of First Love, 
 and Mr. Kemble brought it out on the 12th of 
 May. It had the good fortune to combine the 
 talents of Miss Farren and Mrs. Jordan. The 
 interest is of this kind : Lord Sensitive having 
 gone through the ceremony of marriage with Sabina 
 Rolet, an emigrant at Padua, yet abandons her 
 and addresses Lady Ruby. In the mean time, 
 Frederick Mowbray, who had originally been 
 attached to her Ladyship, has become so interested 
 by Sabina, as to offer her his hand. Lady Ruby, 
 in the graces of Miss Farren, assails the reason and 
 the conscience of Lord Sensitive so forcibly, that he 
 resolves to acknowledge Sabina, and seek her in 
 Italy without delay. The journey is, however, 
 rendered unnecessary by that lovely and persecuted 
 creature's being in the very house of Lady Ruby j 
 Frederick recurs joyfully to his passion for Lady 
 Ruby, and Jirst loves are rendered triumphant 
 through the whole drama. 
 
 The reader sees, that all this is elegant and 
 well mannered, and judiciously entangled. He need 
 not question the melancholy music of Mrs. Jordan's 
 voice, and he may always rely upon the accom- 
 plished energy of Miss Farren. Palmer acted ably 
 and carefully, as he had a real pleasure in scenes 
 that combined him with Miss Farren ; but 
 Wroughton, in such characters as Lord Sensitive, 
 had a merit quite peculiar to himself; and without
 
 BOADEN'S SECRET TRIBUNAL. 143 
 
 elegance of person, and with a small style of features 
 of no very refined expression, seemed so absolutely 
 in earnest, that he banished all notion that he was 
 acting ; and, to the extent of his powers, has never, 
 I think, been equalled. It may look like minute 
 criticism ; but it is of importance as a lesson in the 
 art, to say, that Wroughton's unsophisticated man- 
 ners left his deportment entirely at its ease ; and 
 he was the only stage gentleman, whom his arms 
 did not embarrass he wore them always where 
 they should be. 
 
 On the 3d of June, a second tragedy from the 
 pen of Mr. Boaden was acted, with applause, at 
 Covent Garden Theatre. It was called the Secret 
 Tribunal, and founded upon the romance, by Pro- 
 fessor Kramer, called Herman of Unna. A critic 
 of that time was pleased to write of it, that " the 
 " successive scenes were awful and impressive ;" 
 that " the characters were drawn with a bold and 
 " spirited hand, and the general effect such as the 
 ' author certainly intended." I can hardly be ex- 
 pected to dispute so favourable a sentence; and 
 yet, if the writer of it be living, which I cannot 
 know, I shall amuse him by saying, that I now 
 think I ought to have done more with the subject; 
 chiefly in the way of preparing a strange and un- 
 heard of institution. The author of the romance 
 had three volumes to work out his interest, and 
 unfold his terrors. I had occupied but 70 pages in
 
 144 WANT OF HELMETS. 
 
 conducting my play to its catastrophe. Shakspeare 
 nowhere is more truly an artist, than when he 
 throws in a scene of simple interlocution between 
 two nameless lords, or gentlemen, or peasants, by 
 which his leading characters are saved unnatural 
 explanations, and his audience are fully aware of 
 the scope of the serious business to come. But I 
 had the fine notion of a regular play before me ; 
 and, I see, left every thing rather touched than 
 explored ; and even the passion of the scene too 
 sudden and evanescent, to cling about the heart 
 and intimately control the feelings. My charming 
 friend, Miss Wallis, gave to my heroine, Ida, every 
 captivation of form, and delicacy, and fervour. 
 But the resources of the stage were reserved for 
 melo-dramatic objects ; and though the terror of the 
 scene depended completely upon the judges being 
 unknown, and therefore sitting with their helmets 
 closed, I could by no means relieve the tribunal 
 from the hereditary gowns and wigs, which ' dis- 
 "Jigured" rather than " presented" what was de- 
 signed to be awful. I wanted the worthy knight 
 of La Mancha to furnish my secret judges with his 
 pasteboard supplements'- to the simple casque or 
 morion. As no such Quixote could be found in 
 the MANAGEMENT, my tribunal sat muffled up in their 
 cloaks, as if they had been dressed by the under- 
 taker, rather than the armourer of Wirtemberg. 
 My play was exceedingly well acted, arid Lord
 
 MORTON'S ZORINSKI. 145 
 
 Loughborough had the condescension to let me 
 know, through Miss Wallis, that he had been 
 interested by my management of the subject. 
 
 On the 9th of June, the little theatre in the Hay- 
 market opened with a prelude called New Hay at 
 the Old Market. Colman knew that the public is 
 never obliged by its own accommodation ; and that 
 they were quite ready to indulge in a laugh against 
 ,the undertakers of new theatres and the authors of 
 successful plays ; so he let his fancy loose upon the 
 great houses, and Mr. Cumberland, who had re- 
 cently, at all events, done much for one of them. 
 Sheridan was a little hurt by this warfare ; and 
 used to talk of the stable-yard he had in the Hay- 
 market ; that he would build a summer theatre 
 opposite to the little man, bring his Drury Lane 
 company to act against him, and shut him up. The 
 HAY-MAKER knew too well the diligence of his great 
 opponent, to be much in fear of him ; and as to 
 Cumberland, his sincere admiration of any writings 
 but his own was a point equally well known so 
 he continued in his course. 
 
 Morton had now acquired confidence enough to 
 own Zorinski as his production at once ; and on "the 
 20th of June it was received with great applause. 
 Barry more, by a constant attention to Kemble, was 
 become a steady tragedian ; rather vehement than 
 energetic ; but by no means ungraceful, and fully 
 to be relied upon. To him the real hero of the 
 piece was entrusted ; for as to Casimir, the king 
 
 VOL. II. L
 
 14() BANNISTER IN SHYLOCK. 
 
 of Poland, though the interest centers in him, he 
 is but at one time the prey of conspiracy, and at 
 another its bane, and villany drops its dagger at the 
 feet of the milder virtues. The play was diversified 
 by scenes of comedy and music, and composed 
 in three acts, upon the declared summer model. 
 Morton did not write his serious scenes in blank 
 verse ; and when Sheridan came afterwards to dress 
 up Pizarro from the German, he also kept to a 
 poetical prose, which allowed of greater freedom, 
 and consequently more variety in the expression. 
 To possess the full power of blank verse, a long 
 habit is essential, without which it is never suffi- 
 ciently broken to be natural ; and is, in fact, a 
 series of lines elegantly modulated to one tune ; 
 from which rhyme seems to be unaccountably with- 
 drawn. 
 
 The little theatre had suffered greatly by deaths 
 and desertions, this the first season on the manager's 
 own account; and he was reminded, very illiberally, 
 that his father in his first season had the following 
 names in his company : Foote, Henderson, Par- 
 sons, Edwin, Palmer, John and Robert, Baddeley, 
 Bannister, Digges, Aickin ; Miss Barsanti, Miss 
 Farren, Mrs. Hunter, &c. &c. The " sweet re- 
 membrancer" would have eternally obliged the 
 younger Colman, if he had added the information 
 where such a company was now to be collected. 
 Bannister, emboldened by his Sheva, on the 3d of 
 August ventured upon the Jew that " Shakspeare
 
 THE THREE AND THE DEUCE. 147 
 
 drew," he left the fame of Shylock, where it will 
 ever rest, upon the memories of Macklin and Hen- 
 derson. Mrs. Stephen Kemble had really done 
 every thing of consequence this season, and Mr. 
 Kemble and Mrs. Siddons kindly acted Douglas 
 and Lady Randolph, for her benefit. It was not till 
 the close of the season, the 2d of September, that 
 TJie Three and the Deuce, by Prince Hoare, could 
 be got ready for Bannister's exhibition of the three 
 Singles. It will always be the vehicle of the thea- 
 trical Atalls ; who, like Bottom, are for acting 
 Pyramus, and Thisbe, and the Lion also. 
 
 The winter season of 1795-6 commenced at Co- 
 vent Garden, by additions to the company. The 
 Knights succeeded to Edwin and Mrs. Wells in 
 Jacob and our Bridget, in the Chapter of Accidents. 
 Mr. Knight also acted Skirmish in the Deserter ; 
 he was a just, critical actor, and literally analysed 
 a part in the most scientific margins that a play- 
 book ever displayed. His wife was the sister of 
 Miss Farren, and had a strong resemblance of the 
 beautiful countenance of that delightful actress. 
 She, however, remained at an immense distance 
 from her powers in the art. 
 
 Cramer's sister-in-law, Mrs. Serres, made a rather 
 successful appearance in Rosetta ; her science was 
 indisputable, but she huddled her dialogue toge- 
 ther with the usual impatience of singers, who seem 
 to disdain all effect that is not musical. 
 
 On the 8th of October, a young lady, named
 
 148 MISS MANSELL. 
 
 Mansell, of a respectable family in Wales, made her 
 debut in Sophia, in the Road to Ruin. It might, in 
 most cases, seem a hazardous, and in many a hope- 
 less undertaking, to come to a town like this, un- 
 aided and alone, and secure not only an engage- 
 ment, but inviolable respect, by no overpowering 
 talent, but by the mere unpretending possession of 
 good sense, cultivated manners, and a pleasing per- 
 son. This was, notwithstanding, achieved by the 
 present Mrs. Reynolds. On this occasion, 1 avow 
 the most decided partiality. The experience of 
 her virtues, for a long series of years, renders me 
 happy in devoting a few lines to the praise of one 
 of the best and most amiable of women. 
 
 Cooper, an actor, I believe, instructed by Hoi- 
 croft, appeared on the 19th of October, at Covent 
 Garden Theatre, in the character of Hamlet ; but, 
 to repeat a former expression, he left the part with 
 Henderson or Kemble ; for anything rational, in 
 my time, never dreamed of a third. 
 
 Mr. Cumberland had done recently so much, that 
 I suppose five weeks were as long a period as he 
 allowed to the composition of a comedy. On the 
 20th of this month he occupied Drury Lane stage 
 with a thing called The Dependent. It was not suf- 
 fered to linger in its uneasy station, but was brushed 
 away on the first night. 
 
 Reynolds was certainly never guilty of this hurry 
 in composition j he usually occupied six months 
 upon a comedy ; and on the 7th of November
 
 MR. KEMBLE ACTS ALEXANDER. 149 
 
 brought out Ins Speculation, which amply succeeded. 
 Here we had the King's Bench, and some of its 
 customary tenants, men of project, without principle. 
 Tanjore, in the hands of Lewis, was rendered ex- 
 tremely fertile of amusement he dissipates a for- 
 tune, which is easily done, by gambling in the west ; 
 and what is not quite so easy, or at air events so 
 usual, goes to the east without bettering his con- 
 dition. He escapes from a gaol in India ; and on 
 his return to England, being out of suits with for- 
 tune, is arrested at the suit of a tailor. But rich 
 relations being always within thefancy of an author, 
 Tanjore, by a fortunate arrival, is rendered happy 
 in all his objects. Miss Mansell acted in this 
 comedy with great zeal. 
 
 The extraordinary preparations that were made 
 by Mr. Kemble for D'Egville's grand ballet of 
 Alexander the Great, like a skilful general, he con- 
 verted to some of the purposes of playing ; and 
 accordingly, on the 23d of November, he revived 
 Lee's Rival Queens, and himself performed the 
 Macedonian Hero. It is recorded of Betterton, 
 that in his old age, struggling with the gout, and 
 with a figure rather encumbered and never ap- 
 proaching to the heroic, he yet by the fire of his 
 imagination, and the music of his declamation, so 
 fascinated his audience, as to render the rival of 
 Achilles peculiarly his own. When it is remembered 
 that he played the character in the cast court 
 dress and voluminous wig of some noble, and that 
 
 L 3
 
 150 CUMBERLAND S DAYS OF YORE, 
 
 he must have looked in his habit like King Arthur 
 in Tom Thumb, some astonishment is excited, that 
 our ancestors could endure a costume so absurd and 
 so utterly false. 
 
 Mr. Kemble was a genuine Greek in his appear- 
 ance, and in the prime of life, with infinite ardour 
 and activity, afforded, perhaps, as much truth in the 
 part of Alexander as the stage can ever know. 
 You might easily credit the hero's devotion to 
 Homer, when you saw Kemble. The Iliad seemed 
 to be the source from which his mind was 
 nourished ; and the passage of the Granicus, as 
 described by Lee, hardly exceeded the terror he 
 inspired. They who love battles upon the stage 
 saw now the perfection of such things. 
 
 At Covent Garden, on the last day of the month, 
 Mr. Cooper attempted Macbeth ; but he was ob- 
 viously then defective in the very nerves of tragedy. 
 He had no dawn of the poetical feeling, and did 
 not quite drop to what is called the natural of 
 acting. I heard, with pleasure, that in America 
 he became, by great application, a judicious and 
 valuable tragedian. 
 
 On the 13th of January, 1796, Mr. Cumberland 
 was again upon the boards, with a serious piece 
 called Days of Yore. The interest is in the pre- 
 tended idiotcy of Voltimur, the son of Hastings. 
 This character is exhibited with great success 
 disdaining all treachery, he delivers his great enemy, 
 Alfred, without knowing him, declaring at the same
 
 MAN IN TEN THOUSAND. 151 
 
 time, that were it Alfred himself, his conduct 
 would be the same. The great king rewards him 
 by obtaining for his saviour the hand of Adela, 
 though it had been pledged, by her father, to 
 another. Pope, in Voltimur, acted with great 
 energy and feeling, and encreased his claim to the 
 honours of tragedy. Mrs. Pope still retained the 
 youthful heroines of those who looked beyond the 
 surface. Cumberland had long written for her. 
 
 Mr. Kemble certainly did not spare himself, as 
 an actor, for the toils of management. He accepted 
 the principal character in a comedy called A Man 
 of Ten Thousand, which was produced on the 23d 
 of January, written by the other Mr. Endless 
 Holcroft. He had here got a useful fable to em- 
 body, and meditated a striking lesson in the Timon 
 of comedy. Dorrington has a profuse turn of mind, 
 keeps a splendid house and table, and entertains all 
 those, who will gratify vanity by indulgence at its 
 cost. But the arrival of a man of the name of 
 Hudson, from the West Indies, with a story of a 
 tornado, which has demolished the plantations of 
 Dorrington, leaves him speedily to solitude, and the 
 ingratitude of his former guests. However, the 
 poet of the day disposes of fortune literally upon 
 her wheel) (that of the lottery,) and bestows a 
 ,20,000 prize upon Hairbrain, who bought the 
 ticket itself out of the bounty of Dorrington. 
 Hairbrain, or, as I should write it, Harebrain, has 
 the heart of generosity to compensate for his levity ; 
 
 L 4
 
 MORTON'S WAY TO GET MARRIED. 
 
 and therefore flies to the relief of his patron ; but 
 fortune had settled the prize unshared, and Dor- 
 rington learns, that Hudson's news was entirely 
 unfounded. The joy of this event took from the 
 poet all power of arranging the yet unavoidable 
 nuptials of Dorrington and Olivia. The piece did 
 not take greatly. 
 
 On the same evening, at the other house, Morton 
 produced the first of that series of pleasant come- 
 dies, by which the author and the theatre so con- 
 siderably benefited. The expense of their produc- 
 tion was trifling ; a scene or two to be painted or 
 altered, and a few smart coats and waistc.oats. 
 My readers all know, that I allude to that most 
 agreeable mixture of the serious with the comic, 
 called The Way to get Married ; the plot of this 
 play is rather loose, and the author has disclaimed 
 all unity of design. His interest lies in a variety of 
 distinct circumstances, combined sometimes rather 
 forcibly, but always of consequence enough to 
 move with pity or laughter, as his contrast requires. 
 He gives himself a projector to cool down ; selfish- 
 ness to chastise ; laxity of principle to be reclaimed 
 by generosity ; and filial piety to reproach, by un- 
 merited consolation, the conscience of an erring 
 parent. All this is achieved with great dexterity, 
 in language usually energetic, or pointed, or gay, 
 perhaps rather suited to the stage than the closet, 
 as a play made to be acted rather than read. Its 
 success was unbounded, and no theatre in these
 
 NOVELTIES. 153 
 
 kingdoms was long without The Way to get Mar- 
 ried. It is no very great improbability, that at one 
 hour, in some one evening of the week, the whole 
 play-going part of the community of Great Britain, 
 through all her cities, were applauding the work of 
 Morton. 
 
 On the 2d of February, the good fortune of the 
 Covent Garden manager sent him a farce, called 
 Lock and Key, written by that genius of entertain- 
 ments. Prince Hoare. The effect of Munden in 
 Old Brummagen, and of Fawcett's story in Ralph, 
 kept the house in a state of unceasing laughter ; 
 and frere again the manager was not obliged to buy 
 his audience. 
 
 The Plain Dealer of Wycherley was revived by 
 Mr. Kemble on the 27th of this month. His Manly 
 yields in comedy only to his Penruddock. It is 
 singular that our critics upon this play should turn 
 only to the Misanthrope of Moliere for points of 
 imitation ; and not perceive the use that a man of 
 the town, like Wycherley, has made of Shakspeare 
 himself. Manly, Fidelia, and Olivia, are in the exact 
 relative situations of Orsino, Viola, and Olivia, in 
 Twelfth Night : the only difference in the treatment 
 results from the manners of the authors or the times. 
 Wycherley turns the purity of his model into pro- 
 fligacy ; but both the Olivias are equally captivated 
 by the female nuncio in male attire ; and the 
 Fidelia and Viola are equally in love with the Manly 
 and Orsino of the two comedies.
 
 154- NOVELTIES. 
 
 The Plain Dealer was beautifully acted upon the 
 whole ; though Bannister felt what it was to suc- 
 ceed Yates in Jerry Blackacre. Mr. Kemble, on 
 the present occasion, was quite enchanted with the 
 melody of Mrs. Jordan's speaking voice in Fidelia; 
 and expressed himself whimsically, I remember, in 
 the language of Sterne's Sentimental Journey. The 
 reader may indulge his fancy in appropriating the 
 passage. 
 
 Mrs. Goodall played the disgusting profligate 
 Olivia, and her maid Lettice was given to Miss 
 Mellon. Mrs. Hopkins had all the Blackacres in 
 fee simple. 
 
 The power displayed by Colman in the Moun- 
 taineers had led the patentee of Drury Lane Thea- 
 tre into a negociation for a play with music, with a 
 character written expressly up to the talents of 
 Mr. Kemble ; and it was stipulated that the author 
 was to receive a thousand pounds for an attraction 
 of such importance. In his summer prelude he 
 had treated the great theatre with contempt but 
 nothing could be more obvious than the fact, that, 
 as a manager of a theatre, one line of policy may 
 be necessary; and that the mere author is a 
 " chartered libertine," who may carry his commo- 
 dity even to his managerical enemies. Colman 
 had been struck with the strength of the incidents 
 in Godwin's Caleb Williams, and was then quite 
 indifferent to its political tendency. Innocence, 
 persecuted by power, and a chivalrous honour con-
 
 NOVELTIES. 155 
 
 ducting to the most atrocious baseness, were inci- 
 dents of sufficient interest to furnish a play ; and if 
 poor Larpent did not, or could not, see the libel- 
 lous mischief of the whole business how it en- 
 dangered all that ennobled our nature, and sullied 
 the purity even of our tribunals, why then he 
 was as a licenser more than " sand blind, high 
 " gravel blind," and the state must run the peril, 
 which its dramatic guardian of the night did not 
 apprehend. I never knew how the author of the 
 romance vindicated to his own candor the choice 
 of the name of FALKLAND for so accomplished a 
 villain as his victim of a high sense of honour.* 
 The pure and unsullied adherent of Charles the 
 First merited at least an abstinence from his name 
 on this occasion, even as a man of principle, acting, 
 as the author might think, in error. But I take the 
 liberty to say, on behalf of this high sense of ho- 
 nour, that it could not have been so wounded at 
 all by the infliction of brutal violence. The first 
 question that an honourable, highly-cultivated spirit 
 
 * On this occasion my heart and head equally recognise the 
 propriety of quoting, perhaps the sublimest passage in the works 
 of Bishop Kurd, an allusion of the great Platonist, More, to 
 Falkland, Hyde, and Chillingworth. 
 
 " O ! profane not the glories of immortal, though success- 
 less virtue, with such reproaches. Those adored names shall 
 preach honour to future ages, and enthrone the majesty of vir- 
 tue in the hearts of men, when wit, and parts, and eloquence, 
 and poetry, have not a leaf of all their withered bays to recom- 
 mend them." DIALOGUES, p. 36, ed. 1759.
 
 156 COLMAN'S IRON CHEST. 
 
 would have asked was, whether the offender stood 
 within the lists of gentlemanly appeal ? If he did 
 NOT, he would leave the laws to avenge their vio- 
 lated peace. The strength of ONE brute would 
 have moved our genuine Falkland, no more than 
 the KICK of another; and assassination plunged 
 him below his rival ; inasmuch as it was more fero- 
 cious violence, equally remote from chivalrous 
 principle, and a more outrageous violation of the 
 laws. Thus all his crimes and his sufferings are 
 made to reflect upon a principle, from which they 
 never could spring, and the GENTLEMANLY FEELING 
 is assailed, in consequence of actions which a gen- 
 tleman would never commit. 
 
 Colman found in Gilpin's Forest Scenery some 
 poachers, and other persons of a picturesque cast, 
 that enabled him to compose a picture as though 
 some anachronism had combined Salvator Rosa 
 with Spagnoletti. Storace, poor fellow, sang the 
 last melancholy breathings of his spirit upon the 
 present occasion, to complete the gloomy work, 
 from which so much was expected. 
 
 On the 12th of March it was produced, and 
 found to be heavy, and insufferably long. Every 
 disaster had attended its progress. Its author was 
 too ill to attend its rehearsals ; and nobody would 
 venture, for him, to cut away those excrescencies, 
 which that very useful critic, a stop-watch, must 
 necessarily have pointed out. In addition to all 
 this, his great actor was himself as ill as the part
 
 KEMBLE IN SIR EDWARD MORTIMER. 157 
 
 he played is stated to be ; and we all know, that 
 spirits 'worn down by indisposition are, and must be, 
 unequal to the display of the fierce struggle of the 
 mind forcing an emaciated body into action. It is 
 a call upon the actor for all the energy he can have 
 to be at his command, checked and kept down oc- 
 casionally by exhaustion and remitting vehemence. 
 I have said this, because it was absurdly enough 
 stated, that Mr. Kemble's own illness assisted him 
 in the just exhibition of Sir Edward Mortimer. 
 As, for many reasons, I paid the greatest attention 
 to this performance, I must be allowed to say that, 
 skilful as Mr. Kemble was in lulling and stifling his 
 cough, he was THAT night too ill, to do more than 
 walk through anything. He ought by no means 
 to have brought out the play, whatever the trea- 
 sury required. When a crowded audience, in full 
 expectation, is teased rather than delighted, it 
 fastens upon a harmless levity, as often as a tire- 
 some solemnity, in the declaration of its displea- 
 sure. Old Adam Winterton, a sort of superan- 
 nuated Vellum, in the Drummer, felt their displea- 
 sure on more than one occasion ; and though the 
 part was beautifully acted by Dodd, it put the 
 whole play in peril, to produce him on the stage. 
 There was a great deal of very perfect acting in 
 the piece Wrough ton's plain country-gentleman, 
 Fitzharding, was admirable. Bannister's Wilford 
 was full of nature, and at times terrific. Miss De- 
 camp stamped upon Judith an impress, that has
 
 158 RECEPTION OF THE IRON CHEST. 
 
 lasted, in stage prescription, as the only, because 
 true, mode of exhibiting a variety of Amazons, 
 quite unconscious of such an origin. Of the mu- 
 sic, the opening glee will not easily be paralleled ; 
 and the dialogue and chorus have great merit; 
 but the Jinale seemed built upon the idea of sur- 
 rounding seraphs whispering peace to a departing 
 spirit 
 
 The author was severely annoyed by the treat- 
 ment of his play, and wrote a very angry preface, 
 which the good-humoured world valued at a GUINEA ! 
 and though it has been long omitted, I should yet 
 be afraid, in a sale-room, to mark the comparative 
 prices of the Iron Chest with the bloody knife of 
 the author's vengeance, and of one without it. 
 Among the very unusual things in this play is a 
 passage describing some of the antiquarian pursuits, 
 which were attributed commonly to the great 
 actor : the anticipated application of them, I fancy, 
 diverted the author too much to allow him to ques- 
 tion their delicacy or wisdom. 
 
 " Edward is all deep reading, and black letter ; 
 He shews it in his very chin. He speaks 
 Mere dictionary ; and he pores on pages 
 That give plain men the head-ache. ' Scarce and curious' 
 Are baits his learning nibbles at. His brain 
 Is cramm'd with mouldy volumes, cramp and useless, 
 Like a librarian's lumber-room." 
 
 The object of all this is not in the play. Morti- 
 mer is no such person. The " black-letter" was in
 
 ELLISTON IN SIR EDWARD MORTIMER. 1,59 
 
 daily use in his time, and long after. The " scarce 
 " and curious," too, of the library wanted TIME, to 
 become " baits for learning to nibble at." It is 
 obvious modern satire, and, where it stands, is an 
 anachronism. I heard this, at the time, from one 
 person interested in the play j but it was certainly 
 not Mr. Kemble ; who, I verily believe, would 
 have spoken the lines, had he found them in his 
 part, so perfectly insensible was he to what the 
 multitude might think of him or his pursuits. 
 With a very sincere regard for both these gentle- 
 men, I yet determined, that it would be unmanly 
 to avoid the subject altogether. Mr. Kemble never 
 replied to the preface himself '; there were, perhaps, 
 too many, eager to thrust themselves into the order, 
 which the French, with characteristic equivocation, 
 call avocats officieux. 
 
 Mr. Colman brought out his play at the little 
 theatre, and certainly established there, that the 
 most vigorous health was required to sustain the 
 almost infernal agonies of the hero. Never did 
 any actor in my time make such dreadful exertions 
 as were made by Elliston, then in the vigour of his 
 youth, and in the command of a voice unequalled, 
 perhaps, in power. I remember well the effects he 
 produced ; he will forgive me, but the melancholy 
 shade of original greatness was not there ; thefand- 
 like composure oj ^calculated falsehood, and the inter- 
 nal struggles of not quite annihilated principle, were 
 not to be seen, as a palsy upon the countenance,
 
 160 RECONCILIATION OF COLMAN AND KEMBLE. 
 
 that should have awed by purity and beauty. No; 
 these were only to be found in the art, or wonder- 
 ful expression of Kemble. So identified, I may 
 say, was he with Sir Edward Mortimer, that, if his 
 voice had utterly failed him, and he had been 
 merely able to act and look the part, he would have 
 conveyed a more graphic exhibition of it, than all 
 the actors from 1796 to the present hour have been 
 ably to supply. But it was quite impossible for the 
 play to recover itself at Drury Lane Theatre. 
 Some years elapsed, I believe, without the least 
 approach of the parties to reconciliatiDn ; and Mr. 
 Kemble himself told me, that such a thing was im- 
 possible, and I must leave it where it stood : how- 
 ever, to Lord Mulgrave and to Frank North, he at 
 last yielded up the point j the parties met, "wine 
 " exerted its natural power upon dramatic as well as 
 other kings ;" and he, I am quite sure, excused what 
 was too gross in the attack, and at all events unjust 
 to his talents, by considering the usual irritability of 
 authors, and the absolute injury of his own unlucky 
 indisposition. Mr. Kemble knew, too, that he had 
 really taken very great pains in the preparations for 
 this play, and studiously decorated it with all the 
 truth of scenery that the studies of Capon could 
 supply. It would be folly to ascribe these aids to 
 any other taste or zeal than those of Mr. Kemble. 
 The artist invariably worked by his instruction. 
 For Vortigern, let me say, he only altered two 
 scenes. For the Iron Chest, he executed an ancient
 
 NEW SCENERY FOR THE IRON CHEST. 161 
 
 baronial hall, the architecture of the times of 
 Edward IV. and Henry VI. The library of Sir 
 Edward Mortimer, from the most perfect specimens 
 of the Gothic in existence. The vaulting of the 
 groined ceiling, taken from a part of the beautiful 
 cloister of the monks of St. Stephen, Westminster ; 
 the very book-cases had similar antiquity and 
 beauty. 
 
 VOL. II. M
 
 Hhi 
 
 CHAP. IX. 
 
 MR. KEMBLE IN VORTIGERN. SHAKSPEARE PAPERS. 
 
 SOME NATURALLY EXPECTED. AT LENGTH STATED TO 
 
 BE DISCOVERED. TERMS AS TO VORTIGERN. MR. KEM- 
 
 BLE'S OPINION. SHERIDAN'S. IRELAND'S HAND-BILL. 
 VORTIGERN, HOW CAST. SPEECH IN IT. CONSE- 
 QUENCES. CANDID REMARK AS TO THE AUTHOR. 
 
 LORD SOUTHAMPTON'S AUTOGRAPH. 
 
 \VHILE Mr. Kemble thus suffered in the opinion 
 of an able man from his indisposition, during the 
 the first night's performance of the Iron Chest, he 
 was shortly after to bear, from an impudent one, 
 the imputation of having played the critic, when 
 he should have acted Vortigern, and by downright 
 treachery producing the damnation of Shakspeare 
 himself. For many reasons the reader will require 
 an account of this affair from ME ; and the transac- 
 tion is of too much moment to be slightly handled 
 in any work that embraces the business of the stage. 
 I shall, therefore, preserve all that is material in 
 an attempt to palm a series of forgeries for the 
 genuine writings of Shakspeare ; and show how 
 much probability aided the contrivers of the papers
 
 SHAKSPEARE PAPERS. 163 
 
 in the sacrilegious imposition, which would have 
 placed the tragedy of Vortigern among the works 
 of our greatest poet. 
 
 It was a subject of infinite surprise to the ad- 
 mirers of Shakspeare's genius, to observe from age 
 to age, that while discoveries, very material to our 
 knowledge of the period in which he lived, occa- 
 sionally occupied the press, yet that with respect to 
 himself little could be known ; and all the effusions 
 that friendship or business must have poured from 
 his pen during a town life, and the reasonable pro- 
 duce of his retirement from a mind so essentially 
 active, ALL, as if collected together and in one mass 
 destroyed BY AUTHORITY, had vanished away, and 
 were entirely lost to posterity. This wonder was 
 encreased by our knowledge, that he had neither 
 lived in obscurity nor died in want, but that the 
 general love and admiration had constantly sur- 
 rounded him ; and that individual importance 
 might best indulge its vanity by showing the com- 
 munications of his esteem, or the private treasures 
 that might remain with his family, of which there 
 was a natural and even learned guardian in his son- 
 in-law, Dr. Hall. 
 
 Family papers have become a very interesting 
 and valuable feature in our literary stores. In 
 none such is there any fragment of Shakspeare. 
 He had been patronised by Elizabeth and James, by 
 Essex, and Southampton, and the two Pembrokes ; 
 had lived in the closest intimacy with Jonson and 
 
 M 2
 
 1(J1. TERMS AS TO VORTIGERN. 
 
 his friends ; and yet not a single letter can be 
 found subscribed with his name, nor one tributary 
 effusion of his muse to show that he ever yielded to 
 the NOT idle habit of congratulating success, and 
 soothing the disappointment sometimes of cotempo- 
 rary genius. Every probability, therefore, drew the 
 conclusion, that the task of collection had by some 
 affectionate hand been duly made ; and that, per- 
 haps, in our times a rich assemblage of Shakspeare 
 papers would start forth from some ancient reposi- 
 tory, to solve all our doubts, and add to our rever- 
 ence and our enjoyment. 
 
 In this state of very reasonable expectation, the 
 public is at length gratified to learn, that this pre- 
 cious repository has at last been found; that it 
 contains a miscellany as rich and various as his 
 genius now sublime, now sportive j now dramatic, 
 now critical relics even of his person and his 
 dress his hair, his rings, his portrait, and his 
 books, and plays of which the number was not at 
 once ascertained ; BUT a tragedy called, Vortigern, 
 was certainly there, perfect and excellent, as the 
 great national theatre would shortly feel by the 
 immense audiences it would be sure to collect, when 
 acted by so accomplished a company as was now 
 under the management of Mr. Kemble. The 
 terms agreed upon between Sheridan and Richard- 
 son on the one part, and the father, Ireland, for 
 the son, then a minor, on the other, were that 
 .300 should be paid down ; or, in the Drury Lane
 
 MR. KEMBLE'S OPINION. 165 
 
 mode, notes given, at short periods, payable at 
 Hammersley's j and this sum was, at all events, got 
 by the forgery. The other part of the agreement 
 was a division of the receipts (after deducting 
 charges) for sixty nights ! None of the parties 
 seemed to entertain the slightest suspicion, that the 
 piece might fail. Mr. Ireland, in his Confessions, 
 has reported that Sheridan was by no means an 
 enthusiast as to Shakspeare ; yet that, upon reading 
 a few pages of the manuscript he was going to buy, 
 he was struck with some unstrung lines, and crude 
 passages, as below the general character of the 
 poet ; but, as the inferiority might proceed from 
 his youth, he still relied in the fullest confidence 
 upon the external evidences of paper and ink, and 
 the character of the penmanship. 
 
 As to Mr. Kemble all this time, his opinion, as 
 one of the most correct of our Shakspearians, was 
 little regarded. He had by no mea?is a mind easy 
 to satisfy on such a question ; and very frequently 
 expressed to me his wonder, that Sheridan should 
 have troubled himself so little about Shakspeare, 
 when he really was a greater master of Spenser, 
 than any other reader of the present day. I have 
 myself heard him recite passages of great length and 
 beauty ; and his fondness for that poet, 'which be- 
 gan in his youth, originated, I think, in some such 
 accident as that recorded of Covvley. He had 
 whole cantos of the Faery Queene by heart. 
 
 From the beginning of the invasion upon Sbak- 
 M 3
 
 1C() MR. M ALONE. 
 
 peare, Mr. Kemble had borne " a wary eye*' upon 
 the combatants ; and he was duly informed by me 
 of the successive arrivals from IRELAND, and of the 
 reported conviction of certain venerable critics of 
 the greatest name and authority. But his friend 
 Malone had some strong suspicions, I believe, be- 
 yon di poetical character; and neither he nor Steevens 
 would go to Norfolk Street, for the purpose of in- 
 specting the papers. Mr. Ireland could not be 
 expected to concede to the two commentators the 
 royal prerogative of being waited upon in their pa- 
 laces of Hampstead and Queen Ann Street with 
 the manuscript ; and so converted the implied con- 
 tempt of ^their refusal into a conspiracy against 
 Shakspeare himself, unless he made his appearance 
 under their own guardianship. 
 
 But to Mr. Malone I am confident Mr. Kemble 
 owed that present of Hsemony, which kept him 
 from the slightest danger, in the midst of the en- 
 chantment. 
 
 " For by this means 
 
 He knew the foul inchanter, though disguis'd, 
 Enter'd the very lime-twigs of his spells, 
 And yet came off." COMUS, v. 644. 
 
 The controversy as to the miscellaneous papers, 
 it was said, had been on both sides overlaid. 
 Whether Shakspeare, when in love and seventeen, 
 had knotted his own hair and written soft nonsense 
 to his intended bride whether he wrote connun- 
 drums for Maister Cowley, and scrawled his own
 
 IRELAND'S HAND-BILL. 167 
 
 arms without knowing the dexter side of the shield ; 
 whether FOR, the preposition, was ever spelt FORRE, 
 or the conjunction, AND, had ever been written with 
 a final E, were points on which people might differ 
 long, and contract animosities as violent, as trifles 
 of a different kind, but not greater importance, 
 have inspired, since men began to love themselves. 
 But the whole concern was now to be submitted to 
 another kind of test the sovereign genius of our 
 dramatic lord was about to display itself on a pub- 
 lic stage, in an historical drama never seen before, 
 and his countrymen were to ask their heads and 
 their hearts the obvious questions " Are these 
 ** the sentiments, is this the language, of Shak- 
 " speare?" 
 
 Ireland's fancy or his fears had converted that 
 mild gentleman, Mr. Malone, into a furious Sara- 
 cen, fighting with poisoned weapons against Vorti- 
 gern ; and he accordingly issued a hand-bill on the 
 night of performance, bespeaking the candour of 
 the audience. This his son could not procure, 
 when writing on the subject ; but it lies before me, 
 and shall be preserved as the last instance of his 
 paternal care of Vortigern. 
 
 " VORTIGERN. 
 
 " A malevolent and impotent attack on the 
 " Shakspeare MSS. having appeared on the eve of 
 " representation of the play of VORTIGERN, evi- 
 " dently intended to injure the interest of the pro- 
 
 M 4
 
 168 PASSAGES JMITATED. 
 
 " prietor of the MSS., Mr. Ireland feels it impossi- 
 " ble, within the short space of time that intervenes 
 " between the publishing and the representation, 
 " to produce an answer to the most illiberal and 
 " unfounded assertions in Mr. Malone's Inquiry. 
 " He is therefore induced to request that the play 
 " of Vortigern may be heard with that candour, 
 " that has ever distinguished a British audience." 
 
 On the 2d of April the play was acted. In order 
 to be quite right, the number of lines in it had been 
 regulated by one of Shakspeare's acknowledged 
 dramas ; and there were some other points of imi- 
 tation, which a fair critic will also offer to the 
 reader's attention. The Seven Ages, from As You 
 Like It, produced a division into lustres, not the 
 most luminous j but the laughter was too excessive to 
 allow the close of this brief history of man. The rash 
 hand of our youth could not abstain from plunder- 
 ing the sublime eulogy on our composition in the 
 play of Hamlet, ft is astonishing that even young 
 Ireland did not see, or that his friend Talbot did 
 not admonish him, that a GREAT GENIUS does not 
 repeat HIMSELF in this way. With the representa- 
 tive truth of nature, he shares in her abundance, 
 and is known by his endless diversity. To re- 
 semble the mighty father of our drama, therefore, 
 the forger must not think of the same things, but 
 feel in the same manner. 
 
 If this be just as to mere descriptive or moral
 
 VORTIGERN, HOW CAST. 169 
 
 beauties, it applies with even greater force to the 
 treatment of any PASSION. Let us consider, for a 
 moment, that of jealousy, as it exhibits itself from 
 the mind of Shakspeare. See how it is diversified 
 by the natures on which it operates ; view it in all 
 its varieties of temperament, in Leontes and Ford, 
 in Posthumus and Othello. But neither these nor 
 any considerations of prudence or criticism seem 
 to have crossed our forger in his progress; confident 
 that the world would be deceived, he appears, at 
 times, to have revelled in the grossness of his impo- 
 sitions. 
 
 The principal members of the cast were, Mr. BENS- 
 LEY (shortly to close his theatric life) in the cha- 
 racter of Const antius ; Mr. C. Kemble Pascentius; 
 Mr. KEMBLE himself Vortigem. Mrs. Siddons 
 (prescient of some storm) had begged to be ex- 
 cused, and Edmunda was sustained by Mrs. POWELL; 
 Mrs. JORDAN (I used to think a true believer /) 
 Flavia; and Rowena, the beautiful Miss Miller. 
 The eternal attendant, Tidswell, with two aides- 
 de-camp, Misses Leake and Heard, were in waiting 
 on Edmunda. 
 
 Great importance was naturally attached to the 
 mode in which this sublime work of the author of 
 King Lear should be ushered to the public audi- 
 ence. The laureate was flattered with this compli- 
 mentary task. That true scholar and upright man, 
 Mr. Pye, in the company of one of our most 
 accomplished antiquaries, visited the mass of papers
 
 170 MR. PYE'S PROLOGUE. 
 
 in Norfolk Street. For a short period, I remember, 
 he believed, and resisted the positive judgment of 
 his friend. But let it in candour or courtesy be 
 remembered, that Mr. Pye's studies had lain chiefly 
 among the Greek and Roman writers, and their 
 earliest imitators, the Italians. Of quj[_ ancient 
 language he had made no particular study. But 
 when he came to look at the consequences of a 
 positive affirmation by himself of the TRUTH of at 
 all events a doubtful matter, he drew himself back 
 with the aid of Touchstone, and placed his pro- 
 logue under the convenient panoply of the virtuous 
 conjunction. 
 
 " IF in our scenes your eyes delighted find 
 Marks that denote the mighty master's mind ; 
 IF, at his words the tears of pity flow, 
 Your breasts with horror thrill, with rapture glow ; 
 Demand no other proof: 
 
 But IF these proofs should fail ; IF in the strain 
 Ye seek the Drama's awful sire in vain, 
 Should critics, heralds, antiquaries join 
 To give their FIAT to each doubtful line, 
 Believe them not." 
 
 It may readily be imagined, that this cautious 
 introduction, however approved by the manager, 
 would seem frigid to the flaming faith of old Ire- 
 land ; but he softened his rejection of it to the 
 decent remark, " that it did not strongly enough 
 " assert the authenticity of the play." 
 
 Another poet presented himself, who had not 
 been alarmed into equal Discretion, or whose usual
 
 SPEECH IN VORTIGERN. 171 
 
 critical judgment had been " blasted with extasy," 
 
 and Sir James Bland Burges assured the audience, 
 
 in his prologue, with undoubting confidence, that 
 
 " Before the court immortal SHAKSPEARE stands." 
 
 That court was thronged to suffocation ; but the 
 row in the front boxes, which I had secured, gave 
 me the complete view of the box inhabited by the 
 " great possessors" of the treasures ; and no earthly 
 sum could compensate the agonies, which I saw 
 them endure that evening. INTEGRITY, TALENT, 
 PROFIT were all in jeopardy 
 
 " The storm was up and all things on the hazard." 
 
 The fatal mischief was the want of interest in the 
 play it was a dull chronicle put in action, en- 
 livened occasionally by the lubberly aukwardness 
 of Dignum and Phillimore ; and now and then 
 pressed into a laborious comparison with some REAL 
 flight of the poet, too accurately remembered by 
 the author. Mr. Kemble himself had one of these 
 fine things in his custody, which he gave with re- 
 markable energy to the house. 
 
 Vortigern. 
 
 " Full fifty breathless bodies struck my sight ; 
 And some with gaping mouths did seem to mock me ; 
 Whilst others, smiling in cold death itself, 
 Scoffingly bade me look on that, which soon 
 Would wrench from oft' my brow this sacred crown, 
 And make me too a subjltt like themselves.
 
 172 PROFITS OF VORTIGERN. 
 
 Subject! to whom ? to thee, O sovereign Death ! ^ 
 
 Who hast for thy domain this world immense. 
 
 Church-yards and charnel-houses are thy haunts, 
 
 And hospitals thy sumptuous palaces. 
 
 And when thou wouldst be merry, thou dost choose 
 
 The gaudy chamber of a dying king. 
 
 O, then thou dost ope wide thy hideous jaws, 
 
 And with rude laughter and fantastic tricks 
 
 Thou clapp'st thy rattling fingers to thy sides. 
 
 And when the solemn mockery is o'er, 
 
 With icy hand thou tak'st him by the feet, 
 
 And upward so, till thou dost reach the heart, 
 
 And wrap him in the cloak of lasting night." 
 
 This passage is a good deal in the taste of Dr. 
 Blair's poem of the Grave, with some palpable 
 struggles after the frantic imagery of King John 
 and the melancholy of Richard II. The reference 
 to FalstafPs death and the handy action of poor 
 Mrs. Quickly convulsed the audience with merri- 
 ment. The solemn mockery was indeed over, and 
 a lasting night threatened to enfold the genius of 
 the Pseudo-Shakspeare. 
 
 An Epilogue, written by Merry, and still keep- 
 ing up the positive ascription of the play to 
 Shakspeare, was spoken, with much effort, by 
 Mrs. Jordan ; and on the following morning the 
 Treasury accounted with the elder Ireland, for the 
 receipt of the night, 206/. ; charges being first de- 
 ducted. The son got 60/., he tells us, out of the 
 300/. paid down ; and 30/. more out of the 103/. ; 
 the half of the ONLY receipt out of the promised 
 SIXTY.
 
 REMARKS ON VORTIGERN. 173 
 
 Such was the close of this unadvised and unprin- 
 cipled attempt upon the prejudices and the purses 
 of the public. It was a defeat from which there 
 was no rallying exposure brought on confession 
 sincerity, if it really spoke at last, spoke without 
 belief; the father refused to credit the talent that 
 was in his son : alienation, resentment, shame^ 
 and unceasing perplexity, have followed from the 
 opening this modern CHEST of Pandora, out of 
 which even Hope itself had now flown. 
 
 But let me find, in this record of ruin, a few lines 
 to regret, that a really poetical mind should have 
 been sacrificed to this tempting imposition. By 
 whomsoever written, the following lines in the play 
 of Henry the Second, came from the same source ; 
 and that source if a man is to be believed upon his 
 oath, was the fancy of a youth, not eighteen years 
 of age : 
 
 " Henry. That I could mellow now this iron tongue, 
 
 And fashion it to music of soft love ! 
 
 But so it is that, from my childhood upwards, 
 
 I have been bred in hoarse and jarring war. 
 
 My spring of youth within a camp was spent : 
 
 There have I sat upon a soldier's knee ; 
 
 Whilst round my neck was twin'd a GIANT ARM 
 
 So toughly set, that one might say indeed 
 
 The sinews that did work it were of BRASS." 
 
 Surely the young nurseling of a camp never sat for 
 his portrait to an abler painter. 
 
 That Mr. Kemble was very deeply concerned at 
 this failure, I do not affect to say. The proprie-
 
 IRELAND'S FORGERY OF 
 
 tors of the theatre had thought proper to enter into 
 competition with Mr. Harris for this play of Vorti- 
 gern. But it was written, with the exception of 
 Mrs. Powell, for the people who acted it ; and as an 
 affair of business, perhaps the speculation was worth 
 the trial. But the 300/. down was an extraordi- 
 nary oversight ; because the whole of that sum was 
 lost, and all that had been laid out in scenery and 
 decorations. The play, bad as it was, turned out 
 the only source of profit to the Irelands. The BOOK 
 was detected before it could be subscribed off or 
 sold ; and many reams of most magnificent paper 
 hung as a heavy debt over the head of the editor. 
 I incline to think that, had the illegible MSS. been 
 kept, at all events, longer from the press, and been 
 rendered the mere heralds of the plays, suspicion, it 
 is true, could not have been banished ; but disco- 
 very would have been averted or delayed. The 
 plays, under the notion of curtailment (always ne- 
 cessary to Shakspeare it seems), might have been 
 purified sufficiently for success ; our enthusiasm 
 would soon have heightened to the wonderful any 
 tolerable passages they might contain ; and, at the 
 PRESENT HOUR, some people might have thought it 
 possible for Shakspeare to have written Vortigern ! 
 In the mean time, money, for either benefit nights 
 or copyright, would have poured in upon the pro- 
 jectors of the scheme : but, when once the book 
 exhibited the autographs to the world in general, 
 the whole business was demonstrated to be a
 
 LORD SOUTHAMPTON'S AUTOGRAPH. 175 
 
 forgery. The MUSEUM had shown, that Lord South- 
 ampton, the patron of the poet, if he wrote at all to 
 Shakspeare, communicated not only in legible, but 
 elegant, penmanship. The signature of that noble- 
 man never varied ; and the handwriting is in every 
 turn confirmed by the copy of Sidney's Arcadia, in 
 my library (the folio, 1593) ; on the title page of 
 which he has inscribed his name. IRELAND, not 
 being able to tell how his Lordship signed himself, 
 took his own left hand into use for the occasion, 
 and made him scrawl his benevolence to the poet 
 in characters that disgraced it. I shall leave this 
 short chapter of IMPOSITION " unmixed with baser 
 matter," for a reason that seldom occurs ; namely, 
 that, at least in literary subjects, none baser will 
 easily be found. 
 
 " Such then, said Una, as she seemeth here, 
 Such is the face of Falshood; such the eight 
 Of fowle Duessa, when her borrowed light 
 Is laid away, and counterfesaunce knowne. 
 
 Thus when they had the witch disrobed quight, 
 And all her filthy feature open showne, 
 They let her goe at will, and wander waies unknowne." 
 
 Faerie Queene,\).l. c. viii. s. 49.
 
 CHAP. X. 
 
 CONSEQUENCES OF THE FAILURE TO MR. KEMBLE. MISS 
 
 LEE'S ALMEYDA. MAHMOUD. KIRK*S CRUELTIES. 
 
 MR. BENSLEY RETIRES FROM THE STAGE. MRS. KEMBLE 
 
 ALSO. COLMAN'S. ELLISTON, ACTS OCTAVIAN. 
 
 PREPARATORY TO SIR EDWARD MORTIMER. PREFACE 
 
 TO THE IRON CHEST. DEATH OF DODD. NO TRUE SUC- 
 CESSOR TO HIM. LAMASH. DIFFICULTIES IN DRURY. 
 
 MR. KEMBLE THROWS UP THE MANAGEMENT. MR. 
 
 PITT, A GLANCE AT HIM. ELLISTON AT COVENT GARDEN. 
 
 MADEMOISELLE PARISSOT. DOWTON. THOMSON'S 
 
 EDWARD AND ELEONORA. ALCESTIS. FORTUNE'S 
 
 FOOL. JEPHSON. HOLMAN. HOLCROFT. FORCE 
 
 OF RIDICULE. MISS FARREN. ARNOLD. CURE FOR 
 
 THE HEART ACHE. MRS. POPE*S DEATH. GARRICK 
 
 AND THAT ACTRESS. MISS FARREN*S MARRIAGE. 
 
 REYNOLDS GOES TO DRURY LANE. GARRICK's MONU- 
 MENT. 
 
 OHAKSPEARE being now left to his legitimate 
 honours j and the indifference or bad taste of the 
 proprietors of Drury Lane having received not 
 only a check, but an exposure, a good deal of 
 irritation remained, and the -ratification of Mr. 
 Kemble's sentence by the public, however agree- 
 able to himself, could not be expected to be palat- 
 able to those who had infringed upon his province
 
 MISS LEE'S ALMEYDA. 177 
 
 to the detriment of their property. The elder 
 Ireland, too, kept up a constant battery against 
 Kemble, as having by his conduct injured his 
 employers equally with the author of the play, by 
 which one convenient moral principle is established ; 
 THAT a stage manager owes nothing to the public, 
 to Shakspeare, to truth, to honour : he is a man 
 bound to fetter his understanding ; to lend a lie 
 the confidence of truth, and swallow his own dis- 
 grace ; although he have been as confident all 
 along of the imposition, as he was of his own re- 
 monstrance. It was unfortunate, too, that the 
 management was not prepared with any tragedy, 
 that promised very brilliant success : the spurious 
 was bad, and the genuine not good. Miss Lee, a 
 lady of considerable talent, turned perhaps rather 
 to romance than tragedy, had long been known to 
 Mrs. Siddons, who accepted the character of 
 Almeyda, in her tragedy so called. The principal 
 male character, Alonzo, was acted by Mr. Kemble. 
 This was a poetical and busy play, but it lived only 
 four nights, and it is therefore useless to go into 
 its fable. 
 
 The opera of Mahmoud, by Prince Hoare, had 
 been the last work of magnitude undertaken by 
 Stephen Storace ; and, as the piece had been 
 powerfully written, Mr. Kemble acted the hero in 
 his happiest style ; and the opera succeeded to the 
 full wishes of its modest author, who presented his 
 profits to the widow of his friend, the composer. 
 
 VOL. II. N
 
 MR. BENSLEY RETIRES. 
 
 The elder son of the sultan being supported by. out 
 great tragedian, the younger was sustained by Mr. 
 Braham, who thus commenced his exertions upon 
 the stage of a theatre royal, to which he was des* 
 tined to impart a perfection of musical science and 
 execution hitherto unconnected with our opera, 
 and to which eight-and-tvventy years have never 
 offered the shadow of a rival. 
 
 Mr. Hoare was now so popular, that a tragedy 
 formerly composed by him upon the subject of 
 Kirk's cruelties, and called Such Things were, was 
 acted on the stage of Drury Lane for Mrs. Siddons's 
 benefit, on the 2d of May, two days after the 
 appearance of his opera. As to his farces, they 
 were constantly before the public. . 
 
 The 6th of May, 1796, witnessed the last perform- 
 ance of Mr. Bensley on the English stage. He acted 
 Evander in the Grecian Daughter, and embraced 
 an Euphrasia worthy of him in the person of Mrs. 
 Siddons. I have not, I hope, slighted the peculiar 
 talents of this very accomplished gentleman, whose 
 retirement added no few parts to the range of Mr. 
 Kemble's performances : he could now, if he chose, 
 relinquish Jaffier for Pierre, and Othello occasion- 
 ally for lago ; but where, then, could be found an 
 equal substitute for the conspirator and the moor ? 
 Wroughton did not quite rise to heroic tragedy ; 
 and Palmer, except in a few tragedies, hardly 
 seemed to be in earnest. Barrymore was not 
 above second rate j and Charles Kemble yet young
 
 MRS. KEMBLE RETIRES. 
 
 and almost untried. Bensley was therefore a serious 
 loss in the current business ; besides the respect- 
 ability that his name, his literature, and his con- 
 nexions conferred upon any theatrical community. 
 A retirement of an honourable kind was provided 
 for him, the appointment of Barrack-master at 
 Knightsbridge ; Mr. Bensley hating originally 
 served in the army. 
 
 There was yet another retirement this season 
 from the same theatre. Mrs. Kemble had sus- 
 tained a line of business on the stage, of a very in- 
 teresting though not a striking kind. The reader 
 will understand the cast by one instance, Maria 
 in the School for Scandal. Her comedy, though 
 sprightly and sensible, had never any great force ; 
 and she had not increased her voice with the 
 dimensions of the theatre. Mr. Kemb*le now 
 determined that she should quit the profession ; 
 and on the 23d of May, she attempted to take 
 her leave. The' task of talking forty verses to an 
 audience would perhaps have been painful to her 
 at any time ; but connected with her present feel- 
 ings, she could hardly articulate what her friend 
 Greatheed had written for the occasion. Mr. Kem- 
 ble came forward to receive her ; and taking her 
 hand, expressed, in his most graceful manner, his 
 own sensibility for that constant kindness of the 
 audience, which had attended her on that spol, at 
 all events, from her infancy. 
 
 The little theatre this summer was considerably 
 N 2
 
 180 FIRST APPEARANCE OF ELLISTON. 
 
 strengthened j both the Palmers were engaged ; 
 and Elliston, from the Bath Theatre, made his first 
 appearance in Octavian on the 25th of June. It 
 was, in substance, the Octavian df Kemble, some 
 of the subtler spirit flown off; and the partial loss 
 of what was poetical and picturesque compensated, 
 as far as such wants admit of compensation, by the 
 ardour of youth and a voice of very unusual power j 
 manly beyond the age and figure of the actor. No 
 young man in my experience ever exhibited higher 
 promise : but Elliston at the very first was as high 
 in the art as he could reach. I remember that 
 Mr. Kemble expressed himself pleased at the per- 
 formance, while at the same time he pointed out 
 some passages, where the young artist was, what 
 he used to call, " abroad" : but the audience were 
 enthusiastic in their reception of Mr. Elliston ; and 
 it is yet a subject of astonishment, how he could 
 allow tragedy to slip away from him. In the farce 
 of My Grandmother, he acted Vapour on the night 
 of his Octavian : such very opposite pretensions 
 rarely preserve any balance. GARRICK, HENDER- 
 SON, alone in our times, left it doubtful to which 
 muse they most inclined. 
 
 It has been unfortunately my province to notice 
 of late too many failures of established authors. 
 The Alfred, or, as according better with the author, 
 the magic banner of O'Keefe, was no more endur- 
 able than the other attempts to exhibit the great 
 King upon the stage and the Don Pedro, or
 
 ELLISTON AT THE HAYMARKET. 181 
 
 Diabolo of Cumberland, merely afforded a noisy 
 blusterer to John Palmer, of little benefit to the 
 theatre. In short, the manager's season was, as 
 usual, to depend upon himself, and on the 29th of 
 August, the great attempt was made to render the 
 Iron Chest popular, and, what followed of course, 
 profitable to the author. Elliston was destined to 
 Sir Edward Mortimer, and the piece, except as to 
 curtailment, was unaltered. I have, upon the oru 
 ginal production of the play, sufficiently spoken my 
 own sentiments : and shall here therefore record 
 the opinions of some attentive observers, who, glad 
 that the experiment succeeded at the Haymarket, 
 saw grounds enough why equal favour might be 
 missed at another theatre. It first then struck 
 them, that no paring down could render the play 
 otherwise than heavy, nor its interest of a kind cal- 
 culated to give the proper enjoyment of tragedy ; 
 that the composition was more than bearably tur- 
 gid, particularly in the ravings of Sir Edward. 
 By the just influence of a manager over his com- 
 pany, and timing the scenes with proper attention 
 at the rehearsals, he had excited less languor, and 
 NO disgust in his audience ; but it was applauded 
 only where the actor laboured for applause ; and 
 two or three violent explosions of Elliston were 
 alone commended or remembered. It was, in fact, 
 still a failure; from the unfortunate choice of a 
 subject, the offspring of POLITICAL SPLEEN, and ex-, 
 hibiting a character that, in either manly or gentle- 
 
 N 3
 
 COLMAN'S SJNCVLAR PREFACE. 
 
 manly nature, never did exist, to disgrace oor spe- 
 cies. They said of his singular preface, that, if it 
 added to his reputation as a writer, it took away 
 much from his usual distinctions of candour and 
 temper. They reminded him, that disapprobation 
 had been expressed at Drury Lane before the en- 
 trance of Mr. Kemble ; and that he had himself 
 admitted the want of curtailment ; and left it only 
 as a duty of implication upon those, who con- 
 ceived they should insult a man of genius, by pre- 
 tending thus to condemn what had been written 
 with full knowledge and long experience of the 
 stage. 
 
 On the 12th of September, Mr. Harris opened 
 his theatre for the winter season. The reader has 
 been, no doubt, astonished, with the writer, at the 
 hurry and ignorance, and confidence of architects; 
 the new editions of their works, with correction^ 
 and additions, which came out every season. 
 There is a literature of the day, and an architec- 
 ture : 
 
 " You laid out twenty thousand pounds before ; 
 Well, do you feel it ? Why then lay out MORE." 
 
 The entrances of the house were now altered. 
 Its grand saloon, " a name without a thing," among 
 ourselves, was converted into a coffee-room : what 
 once held the celebrated Beefsteak Club was to 
 produce comfort of a thinner kind, and afford space 
 to the loungers in the lobbies : 
 
 " Of the camelion's dish I eat, the AIR."
 
 DEATH OF DODD. 183 
 
 Seven rows of seats were added to eleven of the 
 centre boxes of the second and third tiers, which 
 would merely admit 144 persons more than usual, 
 and the produce of this accommodation nightly 
 could be only 43 4s. to the manager, and noi 
 140/., as had been asserted falsely ; I think, hbeU 
 lously. To be serious, if possible, the manager 
 always expected the miraculous draught, provided 
 his nets could but be made large enough to contain 
 the fish. 
 
 I am almost to exemplify the truism in the Night 
 Thoughts 
 
 " We take no note of time, but from some loss." 
 
 On the lyth of September, 1796, the constant as- 
 sociate of Parsons in Comedy, and like himself un- 
 rivalled, the genteel, the airy coxcomb of another 
 age, William Dodd, tottered into the grave. I re- 
 prove myself for a ludicrous expression, caught 
 from the recollection of his manner ; and besides, 
 the death of such a comedian is indeed a serious 
 thing : serious, because much of the comedy of 
 the last age has since absolutely wanted an inter- 
 preter. After the usual and indispensable novici- 
 ate in country theatres, during which Dodd had 
 acted tragedy as well as comedy, he yielded to an 
 invitation from Garrick in the year 17(>5, and on 
 the 3d of October made his firs.t bow in the cha- 
 racter of Faddle, in the Foundling, a comedy by 
 Edward Moore. From that time, under Mr. Gar- 
 
 N 4
 
 184- NO TRUE SUCCESSOR TO DODD. 
 
 rick and his successors, lie continued at the theatre 
 royal, Drury Lane, where he had learned and prac- 
 tised his art for a period of more than THIRTY YEARS. 
 How it happened I do not know, but no actor 
 seems ever to have made Dodd his model ; and, in 
 consequence, all have been as unlike the accom- 
 plished beau of Gibber, as they were to his repre- 
 sentative at Drury Lane. The tasselled cane, the 
 china snuff-box, have lost their honours, and with 
 the management of these weapons is fled the un- 
 embarrassed display of the person, and the mode 
 of speaking pointed language. Here even Mr. 
 Kemble's knowledge was unavailing. Bannister 
 used to call him an excellent judge of comic acting, 
 and so in truth he was ; but not HIMSELF professing 
 that part of the art devoted to the exhibition 
 of life where the foibles of man compose his 
 character, he could not teach the way to ex- 
 cellence like Dodd's. Lamash had great advan- 
 tages ; but though, perhaps, he might have been 
 said to promise one day to become a coxcomb, yet 
 as he never kept a promise of any kind, THAT, 
 among the rest, was passed over. In one part 
 only did he reach excellence and hold it, the cha- 
 racter of Idle. 
 
 The reader has probably borne rather steadily in 
 mind the two singular addresses to the public on 
 the subject of the stage-management of Drury 
 Lane Theatre. One from King, who had run 
 away violently from responsibility without an atom 
 of power ; the other from Mr. Kemble, who seemed
 
 DIFFICULTIES IN DIIURY. 18,5 
 
 fully satisfied with the terms of his trust, who anti- 
 cipated no difficulties that he could not surmount, 
 and found himself in the condition of Pyrrha's ad- 
 mirer in Horace. 
 
 " Qui semper vacuam, semper amabilem 
 Sperat, nescius aurae 
 Fallacis! Miseri, quibus 
 INTENTATA nites." 
 
 But I have already given some strong indications, 
 that whatever opinion had been formed of Mr. Kem- 
 ble, it was impossible even for HIM to be left to 
 the direction of his own judgment. Influence, in a 
 variety of ways, thwarted him ; absurd schemes 
 annoyed him ; and, above all, difficulties arising 
 from old debts and the building of a new theatre, 
 really took him more time to remove, though only 
 for the passing day, than all the proper business of 
 his station, twice told. A variety of pleasant billets 
 announced to the treasurer, that " a leading actor 
 " or actress would not go on, without the arrears of 
 " salary were paid up." One of the stage furnishers 
 " would not supply an article essential to a coming 
 " novelty, on all the pledges of the proprietors, 
 " unless Mr. Kemble would pass his word for the 
 " payment." His goodnature often led him into 
 such engagements ; and, usually, money was found 
 to keep him harmless. At length, I well remem- 
 ber, my friend had the mortification to be arrested 
 on one of these engagements, and his indignation 
 was extreme to be so wickedly disgraced. When 
 the duty he had to discharge was considered, per-
 
 186 MR. KEMBLE RESIGNS. 
 
 haj>s a 'seat should have been provided in a certain 
 assembly, to secure the public appearance of the 
 manager upon all occasions, by the inviolability of 
 his person.* If ever there was one individual more 
 particularly than another scrupulous as to fair deal- 
 ing in the world, that one was Mr. Kemble ; but 
 his ways and means were all simple and direct. 
 He was, through life, a child even in the forms of 
 business j but, in the literal sense of the terms, a 
 punctual paymaster and strictly honest man. On 
 this occasion the person got his money; and 
 Mr. Kemble relinquished the management. Mr. 
 Wroughton, it was announced, succeeded him j 
 and the theatre opened on the 20th of September, 
 after the plan of the minor house, with three farces. 
 The distracted state of the concern was obvious in 
 the very play-bills ; and Wroughton was, perhaps^ 
 as little the object of envy, as any manager ever 
 was : the house overwhelmed with debt ; the sala- 
 ries often unpaid ; and succeeding also such a man 
 as Mr. Kemble. There is one cpmfort that waits 
 upon real greatness ; a man loses no respect, by 
 ceasing to command. The mimic world resem- 
 bles the real. When Mr. Pitt, Heaven knows why! 
 was succeeded by Mr. Addington, it was the most 
 amusing thing in this town, to see him walking 
 
 . * There is another and a more honourable reason, which 
 was assigned in the case of Roscius, and applies equally to 
 Mr. Kemble. " Whom the people of Rome know to be a better 
 man, than he is an actor ; and while he makes the first figure 
 on the stage for his art, is worthy of the senate for^his virtue."
 
 MADEMOISELLE PARISSOT. 187 
 
 aloiig the Strand leisurely and alone, and enjoying 
 idleness like a sinecure. Kemble now was at lei- 
 sure for book sales, and even shop windows ; and 
 gave himself up to such amusements as were suit- 
 able to his taste. 
 
 Elliston had done so much at the Haymarket, 
 that he was tempted to the greater scene of Covent 
 Garden, and acted Cumberland's Jew there on the 
 21st of September. Murray followed him on the 
 30th in the Jew of Shakspeare, and the farcical 
 character of Bagatelle. This gentleman was a 
 permanent acquisition to the company, an actor of 
 great feeling and propriety. 
 
 D'Egville, whom Mr. Kemble had placed at the 
 head of the ballet department, had composed a 
 very pleasing dance, called the Triumph of Love t 
 for the purpose of introducing a novelty in the art 
 in the person of Mademoiselle Parissot. She be- 
 came very fortunately a perfect rage. As a dancer 
 she was nothing ; but her attitudes had a power of 
 fascination, to which all ages among us rendered 
 homage. Yet her look guarded her whole person 
 from any risque in its display it was a species of 
 floating grace, that has peopled the air often in the 
 angelic forms of the Italian painters ; but never 
 seemed to have pressed upon earth before. There 
 was something also interesting in her story. She 
 was a person of distinction ; one of the vicunas of 
 the revolution, who had turned her accomplish- 
 ment into a profession; and, by immense appli- 
 cation, at last needed only an occasional resort
 
 188 THOMSON'S EDWARD AND ELEONORA. 
 
 to mere attitude. Still, however, posture was her 
 perfection. 
 
 I have already mentioned Cumberland's admira- 
 tion of Dowton ; it procured him an engagement 
 at Drury Lane, and on the llth of October he 
 acted that author's Jew. In Dowton's serious speak- 
 ing there is a slight tremor allied something to the 
 enthusiastic, which excites on the stage in degree, 
 what it produces more abundantly elsewhere, deep 
 interest. His humour seems to the present day pe- 
 culiar : it reminds me only of Yates ; who probably 
 reminded some very old stagers of Doggett. And 
 this merits observation. Notwithstanding the end- 
 less diversity among individuals, partial affinity and 
 the demands of language^ produce a classification 
 both of mankind and their representatives. In 
 stage history, therefore, the succession of actors to 
 each other's business is regulated by that parallel 
 talent, which though never quite touching, (that is, 
 becoming identical} is sufficiently near, because it 
 takes the same course ; and, a little over or a little 
 under its predecessor, arrives at the same end. 
 
 At whose recommendation, I know not, probably 
 Mr. Kemble's, who had been, as we have seen, look- 
 ing to Thomson for additions to Coriolanus, that 
 author's Edward and Eleonora was on the 22d of 
 October revived for himself and his sister. But the 
 heroic devotion of the Princess is better to hear of 
 than see ; and accordingly is detailed by Daraxa 
 to the audience in the third act. Now this scene
 
 ALCESTIS. 189 
 
 fades to nothing before its original, the Alcestis of 
 Euripides. The student of poetry will be im- 
 proved as well as gratified by comparing the de- 
 scriptions of the two attendants with each other. 
 He will find in the English poet no one additional 
 circumstance of either grace or pathos, and the ex- 
 quisite simplicity of Milton's Greek favourite mud- 
 dled away into common cant and philosophical ab- 
 straction " spotless white" "the altar" " the 
 eternal mind," and so on, instead of nature's own 
 actions detailed in the obvious descriptive terms, 
 and genuine emotion bursting into its only lan- 
 guage. Alcestis, when the day of her generous 
 self-devotion arrives, laves her pure limbs in not 
 purer water from the fountain : and then, woman 
 as well as pagan, turns over her wardrobe, and 
 selects from her apparel a splendid robe ; and thus 
 gorgeously arrayed for this great sacrifice of the 
 heart, implores of the goddess, Vesta, unions less 
 disastrous for her children. She then punctiliously 
 visits every altar in the palace ; there repeats her 
 vows, and decorates them with flowers. " She 
 heaves no sigh, she sheds no tear," and preserves 
 the " natural ruby on her cheek" until sh? enters 
 her chamber, and presses the nuptial couch : then 
 first she softens into grief, and apostrophises the 
 scene of her chaste endearments. She kisses the 
 unconscious bed, breaks from it, and returns as 
 often bathing it with her tears. Then, as her 
 children hang upon her robe, she raises them in
 
 I9Q FORTUNE'S FOOL. 
 
 succession, and folds them to her breast Among 
 the' weeping servants she next administers consola- 
 tion j speaks to each of them as she tenders her right 
 hand, and permits the meanest to speak to her in re- 
 turn. But I must here break off, however reluctant- 
 ly, to relate that Edward andEleonora was a flat and 
 creeping business, and never called for by a second 
 audience. Very conveniently for the author's re- 
 putation, after it had been cast and rehearsed in 
 the year 1739, at Covent Garden, the Lord Cham- 
 berlain interposed his, that is, the ROYAL veto; 
 against the performance of the Leicester House 
 Tragedy. To a reader of our own times -it has 
 nothing very formidable. There might originally 
 have been something more. Party, too, is very dex- 
 terous as to applications, which perish with the times. 
 My friend Reynolds, on the 29th of October^ 
 presented to the town one. of his annual pleasantries 
 called Fortune's Fool, made up from the results of 
 a Trip to Gretna, and the trickery of a match- 
 making woman. The reader is by this time aware 
 of the grand secret, and therefore ready to burst 
 in . upon me with, " Well, but tell me what was 
 Lewis m the piece ?" and, " Spare your arithmetic f 
 never. count the turns, once, and a million." Mr* 
 Lewis, Sir, I answer, since you will not allow me 
 to tell Reynolds's story (indeed I never knew a man 
 who could tell one of his stories after HIMSELF ;) 
 Mr. Lewis was a Welch gentleman of great spright* 
 liness named Haphazard ; Mr. Quick cultivated
 
 ABROAD AND AT HOME. 
 
 the black-letter; Mr. Fawcett, but enough, I 
 see you understand much of his design, and can 
 guess at its execution. 
 
 I have had great pleasure in commemorating the 
 esteem of Mr. Kemble for Captain Jephson. That 
 author had written a tragedy upon the subject of 
 the Clemenza di Tito, called The Conspiracy.. But 
 the " Roman portraits" of this author were denied 
 the popularity of his other writings. A scanty 
 dramatis personae on such a subject is not to the 
 taste of an English audience ; and the crowded 
 business, with which Shakspeare fills his Roman 
 stage, is absolutely essential, unless, with the un- 
 sullied splendor of Addison, you have such a per- 
 sonage to present as CATO himself. Mr. Kemble. 
 was the Sextus of the conspiracy ; Mrs. Siddons, 
 Vitellia ; Palmer, Titus. 
 
 At the other theatre Holman followed his friend 
 Reynolds with an opera, called Abroad and at 
 Home, of which the success was considerable. It 
 was at times difficult to ascertain the parts in a com- 
 position proceeding from the little knot of intimates, 
 Andrews, Reynolds, Morton, and Holman : but it is 
 quite apparent that much of Abroad and at Home 
 must have come from the pen of Holman. It was 
 prose more pointed and of a better tune, such as 
 an actor will, if he writes, always endeavour at, as 
 easier to deliver. Gibber is a master in this well- 
 balanced dialogue see passim, the Careless 
 Husband.
 
 192 A CURE FOR THE HEART ACHE. 
 
 On the 6th of December, Holcroft again occu- 
 pied the stage of Drury Lane, with a comedy called 
 the Force of Ridicule. It was perdurably damned. 
 The play had been put up for Tuesday the 29th of 
 November j but Miss Farren did not come to the 
 theatre to dress, and at seven o'clock Palmer had 
 to announce that she was too ill to leave her room. 
 But she had a large arrear of salary due to her, and 
 took the occasion, that a new play afforded, of in- 
 sisting upon her money : as that did not arrive in 
 Green Street, the lovely actress did not arrive at 
 the theatre. At another season, I will insert some 
 of Mr. Kemble's own supplications to Peake, the 
 treasurer, very characteristic of a theatre under 
 Mr. Sheridan. 
 
 On the 10th of December, young Arnold suc- 
 ceeded in a musical afterpiece, called the Ship- 
 wreck : his father, the doctor, composed for him ; 
 and he began, as an author, to rise from under the 
 sarcasm of Colman ; who, when dunned to accept 
 his pieces, and pay a debt to the father, said " the 
 two demands involved a contradiction it was 
 impossible to do BOTH." 
 
 Morton had written very carefully a comedy, 
 which, like those of Reynolds, depended principally 
 upon Lewis, and, on the 10th of January 1797, it 
 appeared under the title of A Cure for the Heart 
 Ache. The Rapids and the Vortexes were among 
 the most amusing characters of the modern stage. 
 At the age of 52, Mrs. Pope was selected by the
 
 MRS. POPE'S DEATH. 193 
 
 judgment of Morton to perform one of his youth- 
 ful heroines ; but she was taken ill during the run 
 of the comedy, and, after a struggle of some weeks, 
 expired on the 15th of March, 1797. 
 
 The loss of such an actress as Mrs. Pope, really 
 indisposes the mind to remember either the Friend 
 in Need of Hoare, or the Raymond and Agnes of 
 Farley ; yet they were both highly serviceable to 
 the theatre. I have alluded, in my own sketch of 
 her as an actress, to the eulogium pronounced upon 
 her by Mr. Harris. I am of opinion, that a fitter 
 occasion will not offer, to combine her with another 
 manager, Mr. Garrick himself. The last time he 
 acted the crown of all his achievements, King Lear, 
 Miss Younge was his Cordelia ; and her hand, as it 
 is usual, was fast locked in his at the dropping of 
 the curtain. He led her thus into the Green Room ; 
 and, remembering with a sigh, that one more night 
 would terminate his dramatic existence, he ex- 
 claimed to her, " Ah, Bess ! this is the last time of 
 " MY being your father ! You must now look out, 
 " therefore, to be adopted by some one else." " Why 
 " then, Sir," said Miss Younge, " give me a father's 
 " blessing :" and she threw herself gracefully upon 
 her knees before him. Garrick kindled with the 
 enthusiasm of his favourite, and replied with great 
 energy, "God bless you !" Then, raising his eyes 
 to the rest of the performers, he solemnly added, 
 " And may God bless you all !" His emotion was 
 
 VOL. II. O
 
 ig-1 MISS FARREN'S MARRIAGE. 
 
 too high to trust longer to language, for he instantly 
 retired. 
 
 Mrs. Pope lies in the west cloister of the abbey, 
 between the graves of two celebrated men, Dr. 
 Dupuis, a great harmonist, and Sir Richard Jebb, 
 a celebrated physician. 
 
 But the stage suffers sometimes from other 
 tyranny than that of death, and we were shortly to 
 sustain certainly an equal loss at the demand of 
 RANK. Elizabeth, Countess of Derby, daughter 
 of James, Duke of Hamilton, dying on the 14th of 
 March 1797 > the Earl of Derby announced his 
 intention to Miss Farren of elevating her speedily 
 to a coronet ; and on the 8th of April, she appeared 
 for the last time on the stage in the character of 
 Lady Teazle. She declined addressing the audience 
 herself on this occasion, and stood at a slight dis- 
 tance, supported on the arms of Mr. King and Miss 
 Miller, while Wroughton announced her departure, 
 and apologized for the silence which it had been 
 arranged was to be preserved by the Countess 
 elect. The ten lines spoken by Wroughton had 
 the character of Lord Derby's muse, who now 
 verified his old prediction 
 
 " Perhaps a FARREN may return no more." 
 
 She, however, advanced after the verses had been 
 spoken, and made the three established curtsies, to 
 the right and left sides of the house first, and then,
 
 THE WILL. 195 
 
 in the front of the stage, to the general mass of the 
 people. The house on this night was remarkably 
 brilliant. There was a strong curiosity among the 
 ladies, to see how she would look upon this occa- 
 sion. But it was not a head that could suffer. 
 Her dwelling-house had been long graced by the 
 portraits of the Derby family ; and the union was 
 not less desired, than expected, by the children of 
 the first marriage. On the 1st of May the nuptial 
 ceremony was performed at the Earl's house, in 
 Grosvenor Square, and the parties left town imme- 
 diately for the Oaks. 
 
 The intimacy between Mr. Wroughton and Rey- 
 nolds, and the complete possession of the comic stage 
 now secured to Mrs. Jordan, led the dramatist to offer 
 his comedy of The Witt to Drury Lane Theatre, and 
 it was accepted. To be sure there was some good- 
 humoured astonishment expressed at the boldness 
 of a Covent Garden author thus invading the 
 domain of genuine comedy ; and the almost miracle 
 of getting their salaries, from the success of this 
 very play, hardly removed the film from the eyes 
 of the company. Mrs. Jordan's Albina, in a naval 
 uniform, was a point of peculiar interest. It has 
 more bustle, I think, than any of his comedies. 
 Andrews and Rogers together, contrived a re- 
 markably pleasant parody on the Seven Ages of 
 Shakspeare, as an epilogue to this play ; the best 
 point is the school-girl but the wife in the patent 
 coffin was in course the favourite. 
 
 o 2
 
 1$6 MONUMENT TO OARRICK. 
 
 Covent Garden, as a sort of balance, gave on the 
 25th of April, a comic opera called the Italian Vil- 
 lagers, written by Prince Hoare, rather in Shak. 
 spearian language ; and this, again, was followed 
 by a frequently pillaged play of Dr. Hoadley's, 
 called The Tatlers. Mrs. Siddons took her benefit 
 on the 1st of May, this season, and Kemble and 
 she acted the Wilmots in Lillo's Fatal Curiosity. 
 At the conclusion of the evening's entertainments, 
 forth came the Queen of Tears, to weep over the 
 loss of comedy* and wish every happiness to her 
 wedding-day even Fatal Curiosity was pressed into 
 the service, and the Deuce was in 'em, if with such 
 honours and talents, the noble pair were not com- 
 pletely happy! This sad trash was gently insinuated 
 to come from Mrs. PiozzL I should incline to 
 think, it must have taken more cups of tea than 
 ever she poured out in ten hours for Dr. Johnson, 
 to lower her really brilliant spirit to such a com* 
 position. 
 
 On Sunday the llth of June, the mural monu- 
 ment, put up in Westminster Abbey to the memory 
 of Garrick, was opened to the public. It is Sir 
 Joshua's thought, of Garrick between Comedy and 
 Tragedy, utterly spoiled by a Mr. Webber ; and 
 Mr. Pratt has inscribed upon the marble twelve 
 lines of the most wretched plagiarism that ever 
 rhymed together. When, some years afterwards, I 
 saw the venerable and tasteful Dr. Vincent turn his 
 back upon them, to pronounce his affecting tribute
 
 VICTORY OF EARL ST. VINCENT. 197 
 
 over the grave of Cumberland, I could not but 
 wish that, as dean, he had been curator also of 
 monuments, and ensured that all inscriptions, in the 
 abbey of Westminster, should be in classical Latin, 
 or, at least, unvulgar English. 
 
 It should be recorded, although I think the 
 mode of the relief improper, that on the 14th of 
 June, a benefit was given to the widows and 
 orphans of those brave men who fell in the glorious 
 action of the 14th of February 1797, under Lord 
 St. Vincent. On this occasion, every description 
 offeree was brought into the field. The entertain- 
 ments selected were, the Country Girl, Peggy's 
 Love, No Song No Supper, and the grand ballet 
 of Cupid and Psyche : and the Covent Garden 
 company were strengthened by Mrs. Abingtqn, 
 Mrs. Jordan, Sig. Storace, and the whole corps de 
 ballet from the Opera. The receipt was immense. 
 It may hardly be necessary to explain myself 
 further in the objection hinted at above ; but I am 
 decidedly of opinion, that the state is the only 
 medium through which public services should be 
 rewarded. The people constitutionally act through 
 their representatives. I dislike any of these amusing 
 supplements to the solemn propriety of a grant from 
 Parliament. 
 
 \ o .3
 
 198 
 
 CHAP. XL 
 
 LOSSES OF THE STAGE. OLD MACKLIN DIES. HEIR AT 
 
 LAW. CHARACTER OF FAWCETT. MR. BOADEN*S ITALIAN 
 
 MONK. PALMER PERFECT. MISS DECAMP IN ROSALBA. 
 
 MRS. LITCHFIELD. MRS. ABINGTON. HAPPY PRO- 
 LOGUE FOR HER BY COLMAN. MISS FARREN, HOW SUC- 
 CEEDED. CHEAP LIVING. MRS. CRAWFORD. MONK 
 
 LEWIS. CASTLE SPECTRE. MR. KEMBLE IN THAT PLAY. 
 
 MORTON'S SECRETS WORTH KNOWING. COLMAN'S BLUE- 
 BEARD. THE STRANGER. MR. KEMBLE. MRS. HAL- 
 
 LER. CHARACTER DISSECTED. PERFECTION OF KEM- 
 BLE IN THE STRANGER. NOVELTIES. BLUE DEVILS. 
 
 FRENCH FABLE. LE TEXIER. CAMBRO BRITONS. 
 
 PALMER'S FAREWELL TO THE AUTHOR. HIS DEATH. 
 BENEFITS FOR HIS CHILDREN. 
 
 WE have recently seen too many of the sons and 
 daughters of the stage taken from it ; and on the 
 llth of July 1797, the father of the stage, old 
 Macklin himself expired. He appears to have 
 been born on the 1st of May 1690, and consequently 
 to have attained the extraordinary age of 107 years 
 2 months and 10 days. That so little should be 
 known of his life, is one of the remarkable parts of 
 his character. He had most probably omitted to 
 put down the transactions of his youth, and in his
 
 DEATH OF MACKLIN. 199 
 
 decline a few floating, nearly vague recollections, 
 about the middle of his existence, were all that he 
 could attempt to detail. I have already laid before 
 the reader my opinion of him as an actor, and 
 shown something of the critical force of his mind. 
 What remains is to notice the place of his inter- 
 ment, which was a new vault under the chancel of 
 St. Paul's, Covent Garden. 
 
 The character of the stage history is best de- 
 scribed by the great master of the stage itself it 
 is compounded of extremes, and passes from melan- 
 choly to mirth with the swift transition of a scene. 
 
 " With mirth in funeral, and with dirge in marriage, 
 In equal scale weighing delight and dole," 
 
 is not more characteristic of the majesty of Den- 
 mark, than it is of the few adjacent pages. The 
 reader will be entirely of this opinion, when he 
 shall find the Heir at Law the next feature to the 
 decease of Macklin. That most delightful comedy 
 was acted the first time on the 15th of July, the 
 evening of the day on which the veteran was buried, 
 and Munden, after attending the funeral, had to 
 perform a new character in the play. 
 
 Whatever doubt might exist as to the Iron Chest, 
 not the slightest was ever heard about the Heir at 
 Law. It was one of the lightest and gayest among 
 a better description of modern comedies : not ab- 
 solutely original, for vulgarity has often been driven 
 from usurped and ill-suited honours j but still so 
 
 o 4
 
 200 HEIR AT LAW. 
 
 rich in manners, so whimsical in situation, so broad 
 in humour, so happy in combination, that it was 
 received as a chef d' ceuvre by every order of critic. 
 But Fawcett must share with Colman the honours 
 of Pangloss. He here at once attained the perfec- 
 tion of the art as a comedian, distinct imperson- 
 ation. He was enough of the scholar, to under- 
 stand, to enjoy, and to display either the vanity, 
 the pedantry, or the servility of the tutor. His un- 
 tiring ardour, his rapidity, and his happy blunt 
 interjectional point of hem! placed him out of the 
 reach of rivalry in the part. Let me seize the 
 opportunity, afforded by his merit as an actor, to 
 say something of Fawcett as a man. In every 
 situation in which he has met me through no short 
 life, he was always plain, direct, sincere, and steady. 
 He never truckled to the diurnal dispensers of an 
 actor's fame he could not flatter, and he did not 
 care for flatterers. He performed, as a manager, 
 a hundred kind acts without ostentation ; and your 
 interest never drooped in his hands, nor slept in his 
 custody. If I were to inscribe his grave, I would 
 do it in the eulogy pronounced by Lear upon his 
 faithful Kent, his Caius, 
 
 " 'TWAS A ROUGH HONESTY." 
 
 The order of this work compels me again to 
 speak of myself j but the recommendation of the 
 illustrious doctor, just commemorated, shall be 
 attended to. 
 
 " On their own merits MODEST men are dumb."
 
 MB. BOADEN'S ITALIAN MONK. 201 
 
 Hitherto I had written nothing for the summer 
 Theatre. I sent, through that worthy man, Wal- 
 dron, the Italian Monk to Mr. Colman. He told 
 me that he liked it much, and that he would bring 
 it out with all the care that could be given to it ; 
 and that as far as the means of a little theatre and 
 a short season would go, decoration as to scenery 
 and dresses was at my command. Marinari in- 
 vented some beautiful Italian landscape for the 
 piece, and it came into rehearsal under favourable 
 auspices. Dr. Arnold looked into Gluck for a 
 sublime chorus of nuns, and wrote, himself, in a 
 very powerful manner. The piece was strongly 
 cast, and Palmer was pleased with the character of 
 Schedoni. All however rested upon him, and Col- 
 man told me in my ear, that " I must take care of 
 " him, or he would not know one word of it." I 
 got hold of him one day and secured him effectually. 
 I told him " that Schedoni offered to him an oppor- 
 " tunity of showing both his manager and the 
 " public that it was not absolutely necessary to 
 " engage Mr. Elliston for tragedy of any strength, 
 " while HE was in the Theatre." His indolence 
 was banished at once ; after rehearsals he twice 
 begged that I would read Schedoni to him in his 
 dressing-room ; he used his pencil frequently as to 
 emphasis, and occasionally asked the reason of any 
 conception differing from his own. To the astonish- 
 ment of the manager and the whole company, he 
 'went through the character, on the last rehearsal
 
 202 MISS DECAMP IN ROSALBA. 
 
 but two, quite perfect in the words, with the part un- 
 disturbed peeping out of his coat pocket. Colman 
 said, slily, " You are safe. He is in earnest." And 
 he was really so ; he acted it beautifully, so as to 
 draw tears from George Steevens, who honoured 
 me by his presence. But it was altogether for- 
 tunate. I had been the means of drawing forth 
 some unsuspected declamation from that charming 
 young actress, Miss Decamp. I received her, I 
 remember, at the wing, as she came off the stage 
 as Rosalba, in triumph, with an applause from the 
 house following her for some minutes; and her 
 grateful feeling led her to say openly, " Dear Sir, 
 " you will make my fortune, if you write for me in 
 " this manner." There is something in dramatic 
 success so intoxicating, that even the profits of 
 your achievement come but coldly after it. 
 
 Mr. Kemble's brother Charles acted Vivaldi in 
 the play, and was rapidly advancing in the art. It 
 was not very difficult at this time to see the strong 
 interest which he felt in the success of my heroine; 
 and the green room of the Haymarket arranged, 
 by anticipation, the union, that some years after 
 took place between him and Miss Decamp. 
 
 The winter season of 1797-8 opened under cir- 
 cumstances extremely unfavourable. Among the 
 novelties, which secured permanent reputation in 
 the art, 1 remember Mrs. Litchfield with sincere 
 pleasure. She acted at Covent Garden Theatre, 
 on the 20th of September, Marianne in the Drama-
 
 RETURN OF MRS. ABINGTON. 203 
 
 tist, a character of great sprightliness ; but her true 
 powers were in the train of the sister muse. Had 
 she been favoured with a figure rising to the 
 majestic, and features of greater prominence, the 
 powers of her mind, so seconded, would, perhaps, 
 still have retained her in the very highest rank of 
 tragedy. 
 
 Some aid the manager hoped to find in the re- 
 turn of Mrs. Abington to the scene of her former 
 victories ; but her person had become full, and 
 her elegance somewhat unfashionable ; yet she still 
 gave to Shakspeare's Beatrice what no other actress 
 in my time has ever conceived; and her old 
 admirers were willing to fancy her as unimpaired 
 by time as the character itself. Colman, to intro- 
 duce her, wrote one of the happiest prologues in 
 my remembrance. A few points I shall try to 
 preserve a degree of attention which he himself 
 may not feel disposed to pay to these temporary 
 effusions. The first thought is tender. 
 
 " When melancholy counts each friend gone by, 
 True as religion strings her ROSARY; 
 The eye grows moist for many in silence laid, 
 And drops that bead, which nature's self has made." 
 
 Time and casualty ravage the mimic world with 
 the fury even of war. 
 
 " Here death to a chill grave some actor carries, 
 Here Hymen beckons, and an actress marries."
 
 204- MISS BETTERTON. 
 
 Can we not, to supply these chasms, lure back 
 some favourite of the comic muse ? 
 
 " Thalia calls and Abington appears : 
 Ye, Abington too long we've been without her, 
 With all the school of Garrick still about her. 
 Mature in pow'rs, in playful fancy vernal, 
 For NATURE, charming nature, is eternal" 
 
 Mr. Harris brought out, on the 12th and 13th of 
 October, two young actresses of very superior 
 merit Miss Betterton, since Mrs. Glover, in 
 Elwina ; and Mrs. Spencer, afterwards Mr. Pope's 
 second wife, in Monimia. For the first of these 
 ladies I had fancied the succession to Mrs. Abing- 
 ton iii comedy ; to the second, some venerable 
 admirers assigned the innocent sensibility and 
 pathetic sweetness of Mrs. Gibber. How far the 
 conveyance of the rich gift was perfected, I really 
 am too young to judge. Mrs. Spencer was a very 
 lovely woman, and a very interesting actress. 
 
 The reader sees here what he will find to be 
 invariable in stage history, that, whenever any 
 accomplished actor or actress dies, TWO, at least, 
 must be engaged to supply the place FIVE, fre- 
 quently, to compensate the loss. At Drury Lane, 
 Wroughton had to look about him on Miss Farren's 
 retirement, and his search produced two actresses 
 of the secon^l and fourth rates Miss Biggs and 
 Mrs. Humphreys ; but Mercutio will touch it for 
 us in the way of comparison. " Laura to his
 
 HARRY JOHNSTONE IN YOUNG NORVAL. 205 
 
 "LADY was but a kitchen-wench, Dido a dowdy, 
 " Cleopatra a gipsy, Helen and Hero hildings 
 " and harlots : Thisbe a grey eye or so, but not to 
 " the purpose" 
 
 Reynolds was now a seeming transfer to Drury 
 Lane Theatre, and on the 2 1st of October produced 
 a second comedy, called Cheap Living. The title 
 of the play proceeds from the character of Sponge, 
 performed by Bannister, Jun. But the hopes of the 
 piece were on the youthful shoulders of Sir Edward 
 Bloomley, an adept, at sixteen, in all the fashionable 
 vices, and acted by Mrs. Jordan. The baronet is 
 also as wise as he is wanton, which the author, on 
 this occasion, certainly was not. 
 
 Mrs. Crawford returned again to Covent Garden 
 Theatre, on the 23d of this month, to act Lady 
 Randolph to the Young Norval of Harry John- 
 stone. As Reynolds's mother was the particular 
 friend of that great actress, I wonder he did not 
 prevail upon her to save the growing infirmities of 
 age from recollection so injurious to her present 
 appearance. 
 
 There was a benefit, as usual, for the sufferers by 
 the victory of Lord Duncan over the Dutch Admi- 
 ral Winter, whose letter to his masters, written on 
 board the ship of his conqueror, is one of the most 
 pathetic things in all history. Cumberland wrote 
 an Address for Drury Lane, spoken" by Wrough- 
 ton, but inferior to Richardson's upon Lord Howe's 
 success.
 
 300 THE CASTLE SPECTRE. 
 
 Cumberland seemed to be now writing, Dice 
 Reynolds, at Covent Garden for in his False Im- 
 pressions, a comedy acted on the #3d of Novem- 
 ber, though the fable and the characters were only 
 his novel of Henry produced in action, yet the action 
 was brisker than he allowed himself previously, and 
 he seemed to be complying, against nature, with 
 the prevalent taste. His persons of the drama were 
 few, but Miss Betterton, in Emily Fitz- Allen, had 
 the best of them. 
 
 The Drury Lane management was now at its 
 wits end, when a lucky hit by Monk Lewis, as 
 he was called from his romance, filled the treasury 
 nightly. I allude to his dramatic romance, called 
 the Castle Spectre, acted for the first time (the last 
 is not yet known) on the 14th of December 1797. 
 But it is too strongly impressed upon the memories 
 of all my readers to require in this place any detail 
 of its story. The precedent given by myself was 
 followed with beautiful effect, and I yet bring before 
 me, with delight, the waving form of Mrs. Powell, 
 advancing from the suddenly illuminated chapel> 
 and bending over Angela (Mrs. Jordan) in mater- 
 nal benediction ; during which slow and solemn 
 action, the band played a few bars, or rather the full 
 subject at all events, of Jomelli's Chaconne, in his 
 celebrated overture in three flats. Pardon, my dear 
 Kemble, the captivation of an unearthly music. I 
 will attend upon Percy and yourself immediately. 
 
 There was one remarkable point of character in
 
 SECRETS WORTH KNOWING. 207 
 
 Mr. Kemble; that, out of the management, and 
 where responsibility was upon others, he was the 
 gentlest of all great actors " He would DO any- 
 thing" So that when he was cast into Percy, in the 
 present piece, a sort of Harlequin hero, who gets 
 into his enemy's castle after his Columbine, Angela ; 
 he had to climb from a sofa to a Gothic window, 
 and, being alarmed by his black guards, he has to 
 fall from the height flat again at his length upon 
 the 'said sofa, and seem asleep, as they had before 
 seen him. This he did, as boldly and suddenly, as 
 if he had been shot. When people complimented 
 him upon his unsuspected agility, " Nay, he used 
 " to say, gentlemen, Mr. Boaden has exceeded all 
 " compliment upon this feat of mine, for he coun- 
 " selled me from Macbeth, to 
 
 " Jump the life to come" 
 
 But it was melancholy to see the abuse of such 
 talents. It is only in a barn, that the CATO of a 
 company should be allowed to risk his neck. 
 
 Morton, on the llth of January 1798, again met 
 with his usual success at Covent Garden Theatre. 
 His Secrets worth knowing were later wills to dis- 
 possess sordid wretches presuming themselves heirs, 
 and papers entitling the needy to considerable 
 affluence. This comedy has not kept its sta- 
 tion so firmly as his Way to get Married, Cure 
 for the Heart-ache, and Speed the Plough ; but, at
 
 208 COLMAN'S BLUE BEARD. 
 
 the time, was thought to be not at all inferior to his 
 other productions. 
 
 The critic, who, in the preface to the Iron Chest, 
 had made himself so merry with the ponderous ma- 
 chinery, the splendid processions, the elephants and 
 the triumphal cars of Drury Lane Theatre, was 
 induced to lend himself to the great work of cor- 
 rupting the public taste, and succeeded beyond all 
 competition in the dramatic romance of Blue Beard. 
 This nursery tale no doubt was intended to repress 
 female curiosity. It is dramatically drawn out by 
 Mr. Colman, with striking effect and occasional 
 pleasantry. The music, by Kelly, was remarkably 
 well conceived, and the parts were all acted in the 
 happiest manner imaginable. But one of the per- 
 formers made herself a fame out of it so absolute 
 and engrossing, that perhaps it was injurious to the 
 fascinating actress, and stopped her progress in the 
 profession. I allude to the Irene of Miss Decamp. 
 The personal display, the ballet action, the turret, 
 and the piercing tones of her voice, conspired to 
 establish a scale of her merits from which it was 
 hardly possible to descend. The public acquired a 
 taste for her in pantomimic exhibition, and they 
 have never encouraged, to their value, the greater 
 qualities that she possessed. 
 
 As to the stage preparations of the piece, they 
 hung fearfully the first night ; and Colman, as be- 
 fore, needed curtailment. But the scenery and 
 dresses were really splendid, and the machinery in-
 
 Mil. KEMI3LE IN THE STRANGER. 209 
 
 genious. It got smooth by repetition, and must 
 have brought immense receipts into the house. 
 With such singers as Crouch, Decamp, Bland and 
 Kelly, must be remembered the rare skill of Suett, 
 whose notes on the words " I'll not hear you," 
 were clear, distinct, and true beyond all compari- 
 son. I have had enough, perhaps too much, of 
 imitations in my life ; but as to poor Suett, always 
 resembled, let me say, that Caulfield was, by the 
 very side of him, absolutely another self. Mr, Hoi- 
 croft not only occupied the stage of Drury Lane, 
 on the 25th of January, by his comedy of Knave 
 or not, but is believed to be the real author of an- 
 other at Covent Garden, on the 13th of February, 
 called He's much to Blame. Of these the latter 
 was the livelier production. The diligence and 
 variety of Holcroft were astonishing. The favour- 
 ite theme of his school was the energies of mind. 
 He possessed himself a share, among ourselves, at 
 all events, quite unexampled. The facility of 
 Lope de Vega would be incredible, but for the com- 
 positions actually printed. 
 
 We left Mr. Kemble enjoying the fame of his 
 agility in the Castle Spectre. The doctrine of 
 compensations is. true in the dramatic world as 
 well as the moral ; both his head and his heart 
 were soon to experience a very serious call indeed; 
 I allude to the preparation and performance of the 
 Stranger. Although I had many times perceived, 
 upon entering his library, pretty strong indications 
 
 VOL. II. P
 
 210 . MRS. HALLER. 
 
 of the present study, yet I certainly never knew 
 any other take such severe hold upon his coun- 
 tenance and general manner. He relapsed from 
 his usual kindness into gloomy abstraction ; and 
 admirably neat as he was in general, I saw for some 
 days a carelessness about his person.* On the 
 24th of March, the result astonished the town in 
 the performance of one of his finest efforts, the 
 Stranger of Kotzebue. 
 
 The tendency of this play is, I presume, what it 
 has been styled, immoral. Our sympathy with 
 Mrs. Haller may be generous or just, as you will; 
 but the wretched victim of perfidy, the silent re- 
 cord of unutterable anguish, the Stranger, as he 
 looked and moved in Kemble, was of all exhibitions 
 that I have ever seen, the most affecting. 
 
 The popularity of jthe Stranger made it a subject 
 of contention. The acted play was the translation 
 of Thompson, who has given to English readers all 
 the really valuable plays of the German theatre. 
 But there were others, I presume, equally skilled 
 in the German, among whom was a Mr. Schinck, 
 probably himself a native, and this gentleman had 
 sent his own translation to Drury Lane about a year 
 and a half earlier, and received it back most likely 
 
 * In his cloaths and dress Mr. Kemble preserved the Cice- 
 ronian medium, " a perpetual cleanliness, without the appear- 
 " ance of pains ; free from the affectation of singularity - r and 
 " avoiding the extremes of a rustic negligence, and foppish 
 " delicacy."
 
 CRITICISM ON MRS. HALLER. 211 
 
 unread, and with such an excuse as it suited the 
 mood or the business of the time to give it. Mn 
 Schinck had saved the honour of Mrs. Haller. 
 " She had eloped, a frightful crime ! but saw her 
 " error just before the purpose of her seducer was 
 " accomplished." Thompson, thinking rightly, that 
 the distress must be less as the crime was lowered, 
 left her story as he found it. From any unfair 
 proceeding as to Mr. Schinek he sufficiently vin- 
 dicates himself; but he literally owed his reception 
 to the good fortune of sending his piece to Mr. 
 GRUBB, whom the great angler had now hooked 
 into the concern. He was a good-natured person, 
 sufficiently humble not to be too busy ; and he was 
 allowed occasionally to advance an opinion, but 
 more frequently his money. Mr. Grubb put it into 
 the hand of Sheridan, with, I suppose, a request that 
 he would read it. I dare say it was the first German 
 play he ever did read ; he became fond of the in- 
 terest, and touched upon the language occasionally; 
 and a most pathetic song for Mrs. Bland, written 
 by Sheridan, " / have a silent sorrow," and sung in 
 the Stranger's hearing, thrilled to every heart, in a 
 melody from the genius of the Duchess of Devon- 
 shire. 
 
 I suppose I shall be accused of heresy from the 
 true faith, but I have no sort of doubt that Mrs. 
 Haller, as a great part for a performer, is incal- 
 culably inferior to the Stranger. It is hardly a 
 character it is never distinguished by manner. 
 
 p 2
 
 CRITICISM ON MRS. HALLER. 
 
 Mrs. Haller snperintends the family, takes a walk 
 in the park, sends out her heart in charity, as some 
 alleviation to the silent sorrow that preys upon it, 
 but the forms of life invest her she must con- 
 trol even her countenance. She has sinned beyond 
 forgiveness, and hopes to steal though life in 
 penance and unknown. I have no doubt that, on 
 the first night, Mrs. Siddons felt all this greatly 
 enfeebling her exertion, for she certainly sunk 
 under her brother. The triumphant success of 
 the piece, and the sure sympathy that waited upon 
 her tears in the great scene, raised the whole by 
 degrees to a respectable level ; but the grandeur, 
 the intellectual dignity of the person, all assured 
 you, that Mrs. Haller herself must have been as 
 different a being from Mrs. Siddons, as Lavater 
 could have drawn, had he intended to exemplify 
 the two qualities of fortitude and weakness. Let 
 us look a little at the account that this lady gives 
 us of herself "She knows that her husband's 
 " confidence in deceitful friends, and the great ex- 
 " pences that she herself occasioned, had embar- 
 " rassed his circumstances and clouded his spirits. 
 " Yet, instead of curbing him in the lavish outlay 
 " of his fondness, she thinks (hear it, ye worship- 
 " pers of Mrs. Haller !) she THINKS, that he denies 
 " her pleasures and amusements still within their 
 " reach. She accordingly begins to fancy him 
 " cold she has lived with him three years j she 
 " has borne to him the pledges of their mutual
 
 CRITICISM ON MRS, HALLER. 
 
 " love ; yet this wife, this mother, listens to a 
 " man who had not even the usual captivations of 
 " his craft (for she tells you that in every thing 
 " that merits either admiration, respect, or love, he 
 '* was far, far beneath her husband) ; she believes 
 " the tale of that husband's love for some other 
 " woman ; looks at a few forged letters ; demands 
 " no explanation ; pursues him to no detection ; 
 " but elopes, as a thing of course, with her seducer, 
 " tears away their mother from the unoffending in- 
 " fants, and in a few weeks finds out that she is a 
 " wretch." Spirit of the lovely IMOGEN, speak to 
 this woman, and to thousands more, the noble, the 
 beautiful rebuke given to lachimo, who had plan- 
 ned precisely the same attack, and adduced him- 
 self as the witness of the disloyalty in Posthumus, 
 which he reported ! 
 
 " Away ! I do condemn mine ears, that have 
 
 So long attended thee. If thou wert honourable, 
 Thou woulds't have told this tale for VIRTUE, not 
 For such an end thou seek'st, as base as strange." 
 
 What could there remain in such a profligate as 
 this, of either, sound principle or just feeling*, 
 
 * Hear the purest spirit of modern times, Cowper. 
 
 " Virtue and vice had boundaries in old time 
 Not to be passed: and she, that had renounced 
 Her sex's honour, was renounced herself 
 By all that prized it; not for prudery's sake, 
 But dignity's, resentful of the wrong. 
 
 'Twas 
 P 3
 
 PERFECTION OF KEMBLE 
 
 worth disentangling from the fatal web that either 
 pleasure or credulity had wound about her ? Had 
 the author lowered the husband to the worthy man 
 of plain exterior and retired habits, and invested 
 the seducer with all those personal captivations 
 that by their power over the senses corrupt the 
 reason, and silence the conscience, an apology 
 might rise (a bad one in truth,) proportioned to the 
 temptation, and irregular passion really, at length, 
 expire at the feet of returning virtue. But here 
 are PROFUSION in a husband's difficulty, and 
 ADULTERY without passion ; two features of de- 
 pravity, that pronounce the head and the heart of 
 woman utterly worthless. 
 
 But enough of the lady. Let me endeavour to 
 describe Mr. Kemble in her husband. The great 
 and peculiar merit of him then was, that the bye- 
 play, as it is termed, was a language constantly 
 displaying the character, and suitable to that alone. 
 He had weighed everything he had calculated 
 every gesture through the piece. The utterance 
 was equal to the action. Some beauties, by their 
 prominence, start from my general recollection, 
 and a few shall have such a feeble record as I can 
 
 'Twas hard perhaps, on here and there a waif, 
 Desirous to return, and not received : 
 But was an wholesome rigour in the main, 
 And taught th' unblemished to preserve with care 
 That purity, whose loss was loss of ALL." 
 
 Task, Book iii.
 
 IN THE STRANGER. 
 
 give of them. Upon a harsh impeachment of his 
 honest servant's motives, R. Palmer said to him, 
 and well said it, " Sir, that did not come from 
 " your heart." The answer of goodness betrayed 
 into injustice, simple, at once, and final, is, " FOR- 
 ' GIVE ME." Kemble's look, his sigh, his tone in 
 this ejaculation, was his whole history conveyed in 
 two short words. 
 
 Another beauty of his masterly elocution courted 
 the nice ear, when his former friend Steinfort, in 
 the ardour of affectionate surprise, exclaims, on 
 seeing him, " CHARLES ! " Kemble's rejoinder, 
 " Steinfort ! " was equally removed from either 
 surprise or joy ; all emotions but of one class had 
 died away, and he bore in that a living death about 
 him. 
 
 But there was a beauty of action in the scene 
 with his wife, that showed how happily he evinced 
 the most refined delicacy ; and how his very hands 
 spoke, what could in no way be conveyed by lan- 
 guage. When the Countess has put into his pos- 
 session the details of her infamy, that he may di- 
 vorce himself from her polluted person, the pause 
 for a few seconds ; the deliberate tearing of the pa- 
 pers ; and the way in which he let them escape 
 rather than threw them from his hands ; were so 
 consummate a proof of his feeling and judgment, 
 that it remains before me with no parallel in any 
 other performance. 
 
 I have been the fuller upon this occasion, be- 
 p 4-
 
 216 THE ECCENTRIC LOVER. 
 
 cause as succeeding actors do and must form them- 
 selves on this great model, all that is now to be 
 seen is certainly Kemble's, as well as what will 
 never be seen again, I will suppose," (I shall not 
 hastily allow it) that the minds of some among his 
 successors maybe equal to his; but a countenance 
 as expressive does not exist ; nor a figure, near to 
 the stage requisites of his form. As I love on 
 most occasions to ascertain causes fully adequate 
 to the effects, so I mention among those contribut- 
 ing to the perfection of Mr. Kemble's Stranger, 
 his actual freedom from the toils of management. 
 It left him with a single object ; and here we had 
 the full benefit of his abstraction. I do not think 
 that he ever equalled his first performance of the 
 Stranger. 
 
 As I have every proper regard for Sheridan, I 
 wish Thompson, when he printed the play, had 
 been either so kind or just as to inform us WHAT 
 specifically were those alterations and additions by 
 which, as he allows, the effect of the play was so 
 improved. The POCO PIU, the little heightenings 
 of so great a master, should be known. It was thus 
 in Henry the Sixth, that Shakspeare went over the 
 work of Marlow. 
 
 From dramatic genius, thus heightened by every 
 care that could attend upon it, I am to descend 
 to one of Cumberland's fading shadows of life, 
 a comedy called The Eccentric Lover, who ap- 
 peared upon the stage of Covent Garden Theatre
 
 BLUE DEVILS. 217 
 
 on the 30th of April, but, upon the opportune ill- 
 ness of Quick, 
 
 " Shrunk in haste away, 
 And vanish'd from our sight." 
 
 On the 12th of May, a daughter of Mr. Murray's 
 acted Perdita for her father's benefit, and displayed 
 talent of the right sort. This young lady, in the 
 year 1802, became the daughter-in-law of Mrs* 
 Siddons, by a marriage with her eldest son. 
 
 The rest of the winter season displayed a little 
 novelty among the benefits, but very little talent. 
 O'Keefe failed in a comedy for Mrs. Jordan, called, 
 rightly, She's Eloped it was heard of no more. 
 Smith returned for a night to act Charles for his 
 friend King's benefit, and except a slight failure 
 about the legs, I thought him quite unimpaired 
 either in figure or spirits, by a recess of ten years. 
 
 The Haymarket season of 1798 opened with a 
 new farce by Colman, called Blue Devils, from the 
 French of Patrat ; it is a sketch of English gloom, 
 in the person of a Mr. Megrim, meditating suicide, 
 from absolute weariness of existence. He is re- 
 lieved from his doldrum by opportunities presented 
 to him of making others happy. This reminds me 
 of a more interesting fable worked up with great 
 skill, which that enchanting creature Le Texier 
 read once to us at Lisle Street in manuscript. 
 
 The master of a poor inn is burdened with the presence of a 
 yet poorer poet, and would put an end to his daily supplies,
 
 018 LE TEXIER. 
 
 but for the opposition of his wife, whose vanity is gratified oc- 
 casionally by the poet's numbers. Matters, however, are pro- 
 ceeding fast towards his ejectment, when a stranger guest, of a 
 most portentous exterior, whom they discriminate only as 
 L'homme noir, attracts our poet's attention. The stranger in- 
 veighs against the miseries of existence, and touches in a mas- 
 terly way those of the scribbler before him. The poet dines 
 with the man in black, and dispatches the contents of the 
 dishes with that extravagant voracity, which lays in for appe- 
 tites to come. The last cover being removed, a brace of pis- 
 tols display themselves, and the English miserable invites the 
 French to close life's feast, agreeably to the November ritual, 
 by the bullet. But self-destruction is by no means the passion 
 of the French poet. However, he does not venture to dispute 
 its propriety he only wishes to delay the consummation until 
 he hears the fate of a dramatic sketch that he has presented to 
 the theatre. The man in black considers this to be but reason- 
 able, and en attendant requests to be indulged with a hearing of 
 the drama. The poet promises to read the piece to him, and 
 they separate. 
 
 At the appointed time the bard comes fully prepared, takes 
 his seat before his sable friend, and commences the reading 
 with a catalogue raisonne of the persons and their business in 
 the drama. The scene, I need not say, is that of their own 
 auberge he describes the host, the hostess, himself, and then 
 the English hypochondriac by his name, JOHNSON. An invo- 
 luntary astonishment bursts from the lips of the hearer, who is 
 then informed of the circumstances under which he left his 
 family, and they are all described, the wife, the daughter, nay, 
 thejllle de chambre is not forgotten; they arrive, it is said, at 
 the inn, in search of their unhappy friend. The door of the 
 room in which they are sitting here suddenly opens, and the 
 persons who enter are of course no creatures of the poet's 
 brain, but the actual family of our melancholy countryman, 
 whom the poet had seen on their arrival, and whose business 
 his usual address had elicited. His happy invention suggests 
 to him this dramatic introduction of the travellers; but all 
 anticipation by the audience is carefully avoided.
 
 CAMBRO-BRITONS. 219 
 
 Le Texier read this, as he did every thing, 
 inimitably. Whether he himself was the author, I 
 did not ask at the time, and since have enquired in 
 vain. Mrs. Piozzi, when on her travels, met with, 
 I suppose, Patrafs sketch, and said Andrews should 
 have it. Le Texier's she has not alluded to, and 
 probably never saw. 
 
 The Castle Spectre had given an agreeable pic- 
 ture to the lovers of the marvellous, and I had 
 turned my attention to a rival shade, taking care 
 to supply an adequate cause for supernatural inter- 
 position. I had also, in the bold resistance of 
 Llewellyn to our Edward, an opportunity of meet- 
 ing the menaces of foreign invasion, in the year 
 1798, with patriot sentiment, and I had in the 
 Bards of Cambria, the means of showing the bard 
 of Gray in action, with all the aids of appropriate 
 scenery, dress, and music. I drew the real habi- 
 liments of the bards, by his permission, from Mr. 
 Fuseli's sketch-book; and Johnston, the machinist, 
 came from Drury Lane Theatre to superintend all 
 our equipments. By the parallel, I carried up my 
 shade through the grand window of the cathedral, 
 and some very admirably painted clouds devolved 
 about the figure contrived by Marinari. We 
 prospered, and upon a hasty revisal of my play, I 
 am tempted to say that it contains some passages 
 which I am not even now displeased to have writ- 
 ten. But Mr. Kemble, I remember, wrote to 
 inform me, that they had been commended to him
 
 220 PALMER'S DEATH. 
 
 by his friend Jackson of Exeter, an elegant critic, 
 and a composer superior to any praise of mine. 
 
 While we were in rehearsal, Mr. Palmer one 
 morning came upon the stage, and took me aside. 
 " He said that he could not quit London without 
 " in a particular manner thanking me for the part 
 " of Schedoni. He expressed his concern that he 
 " could not aid me on the present occasion ; and 
 " with very singular emotion, wished that I might 
 " always meet with men as sensible to kindness as 
 " he himself should ever be." He even wrung 
 me by the hand, and took his leave in haste and in 
 tears. I should perhaps have thought of this but 
 as " a trick of custom," and so it might really be : 
 but I know nothing of the secret anticipations of 
 the mind. Palmer quitted London to return to it 
 NO MORE, for on the second of August he expired 
 suddenly on the stage at Liverpool, while acting 
 the character of the Stranger. On the 29th of 
 July, he dined with some friends belonging to the 
 company, and appeared to be low spirited ; but 
 on Wednesday, the 1st of August, he gave the 
 Lyar, with all the vivacity of earlier days. On 
 the 2nd, to a very genteel audience, he acted the 
 character of the Stranger with powerful effect, 
 till he came in the third act to the remarkable 
 passage 
 
 " There is another and a better world." 
 He had no sooner uttered the words, than he fell
 
 PALMER AS AN ACTOR. 
 
 backwards, heaved a convulsive sigh, and imme- 
 diately expired. He was carried off the stage, 
 and surgical aid speedily procured, but the veins 
 yielded not a drop of blood. Aickin endeavoured 
 to make the audience acquainted with his death, 
 but was unable to articulate a single word. They 
 were informed of their great loss by Incledon. 
 
 On the 6th of August, 1798, he was buried 
 at Walton, a village near Liverpool, and all 
 the coaches that could be obtained followed his 
 hearse. Mr. Palmer was the most general actor 
 that ever lived. He was, after Henderson, the 
 best Falstaff and Comus; he was the only Sir 
 Toby Belch, Stukely, Surface, Sneer, Villeroy. 
 In the long list of tyrants in tragedy, and fine gen- 
 tlemen in comedy, he was better, oh, how much 
 better, than all other men ! and in the Brushes 
 and Duke's Servants, the Lyar, and a myriad of 
 others, beyond even the hope of an author. I 
 should put his age at near 57. Palmer, before the 
 unfortunate business of the Royalty Theatre, had 
 indulged himself in rather expensive habits, and 
 at his house in Kentish Town, seemed to affect 
 the splendid hospitalities of Barry. His noble 
 figure and graceful manners threw him into a 
 variety of temptations, difficult to be resisted, and 
 sworn foes to professional diligence and severe 
 study. But, such as he was, during the whole of 
 his course as an actor, he was fairly entitled to the 
 greatest salary in the theatre, as he combined the
 
 BENEFITS FOR PALMER'S CHILDREN. 
 
 most general utility with talent often surprising, 
 'frequently excellent, and always respectable. 
 
 The Liverpool Theatre, on the 1 3th, gave a free 
 benefit to the children of Mr. Palmer, and Holman 
 spoke an address upon the occasion- written by Mr. 
 Roscoe there is too much of it it is exceeding- 
 ly metaphysical but has some nervous lines. This 
 proper example was followed in town by the sum- 
 mer company, who went over to the Opera-house 
 on the 18th of August, and there acted the Heir 
 at Law and the Children in the Woody for the bene- 
 fit of the four youngest Orphans ; and Drury Lane 
 Theatre on its first night, the 15th of September, 
 with melancholy propriety, performed the Stranger 
 itself, with Mr. Kemble and Mrs. Siddons, for the 
 same object. In the farce Mrs. Jordan and Ban- 
 nister both gave their aid, and the Citizen detained 
 a very crowded audience to the " last scene of all."
 
 CHAP. XII. 
 
 WINTER SEASON OF 1798-9. MR. KEMBLE OPENS WITH 
 THE STRANGER. EMERY COMES FROM YORK. KOTZE- 
 
 BUE. LOVERS' vows. RAMAH DROOG. NOVELTIES. 
 REYNOLDS RETURNS TO COVENT GARDEN. LAUGH 
 
 WHEN YOU CAN. AURELIO AND MIRANDA. THE AU- 
 
 THOR'S ACCOUNT OF IT. KEMBLE MOST KIND AS WELL 
 
 AS EXCELLENT. HOLMAN, VOTARY OF WEALTH. 
 
 FEUDAL TIMES. MR. MORRIS. KOTZEBUE's BIRTH 
 
 DAY. MR. KEMBLE IN MONTVAL. PIZARRO, DONE 
 
 BY SHERIDAN HIMSELF. THE STRANGE PROLOGUE. 
 
 SHERIDAN'S FEELINGS DURING ITS PERFORMANCE. 
 
 KEMBLE IN ROLLA. MRS. JORDAN. MRS. SIDDONS. 
 
 ELVIRA CONSIDERED. SUCCESS OF THE PLAY POLITI- 
 CAL FEELINGS. MR. PITT. PLAY PRINTED. COL- 
 
 MAN'S. NOVELTIES THERE. FETE AT FROGMORE. 
 
 REFLECTIONS. 
 
 I HAVE already informed the reader that the win - 
 ter season of 1798-9 opened with the Stranger. 
 The common notion was, that the last words uttered 
 by poor Palmer were parts of a passage com- 
 mencing with an apostrophe to the Deity, and that 
 the agony attending their delivery had destroyed 
 the actor. The house was therefore in considerable
 
 EMERY COMES FROM YORK. 
 
 alarm till the real Stranger had got over words that 
 had proved so fatal. And some degree of surprise 
 buzzed along the seats when Mr. Kemble, in the 
 proper tone of resignation, uttered the calm address 
 to Francis, in the first scene of the third act : 
 
 Stranger. 
 
 " Have you forgotten what the old man said this morning ? 
 There is another and a better world !' Oh, 'twas true. 
 Then let us hope with fervency, and yet endure with patience!" 
 
 From the Bath or the York companies, most of 
 our great actors have proceeded. There is little 
 mystery in this : the demand for excellence usually 
 finds it or creates it. We had Mrs. Siddons from 
 Bath j Mr. Kemble from York. By this I mean to 
 say, that Bath and York were the scenes of their 
 greatest popularity their theatric homes. From 
 York we had received an excellent actor in Faw- 
 cett, and were to owe another, more limited, but 
 equally perfect, in Emery. He had found in the 
 rustics of Morton, matter remarkably suited to his 
 talents ; and in truth he was destined to exhibit the 
 entire range of his ability in that author's comedies 
 from Frank Oaf lands to his Bobby Tike, exhausts 
 nearly the whole soul of the countryman, and the 
 art of Emery. His Caliban was a brute, it is true, 
 and what he should not have been, a Yorkshire one ; 
 but there was no poetry in his conception of the 
 character. It has been alwavs roared down the
 
 LOVERS' vows. 225 
 
 throats of the vulgar ; but Caliban is not a vulgar 
 creation. It is of " imagination all compact." 
 
 We had now begun the long line of Kotzebue's 
 dramas, and the passion always found about them 
 ensured their success, if even respectably acted. 
 Mrs. Inchbald brought out Lovers 9 Vows, at Co- 
 vent Garden, on the llth of October. Frederick 
 was supported by Pope, and the Agatha and Amelia 
 by the Mrs. Johnson from America, and Mrs. John- 
 stone, the wife of Henry Johnstone, a lady of very 
 considerable merit in melo dramas. With any other 
 merits or demerits the world has sufficiently amused 
 itself, to be tired, I hope, by this time of the subject. 
 
 My old friend Taylor, who has written more 
 prologues in less time than any bard that ever did 
 live, on the occasion of Lovers' Vows supplied one 
 of his best. The allusion to all our Spectres is 
 very happy and pointed 
 
 " The monstrous charms of terrible delight." 
 
 Mr. Palmer, of the Temple, sent on Munden, the 
 rhyming Butler of the play, with an epilogue of 
 about seventy rambling, but sufficiently ludicrous 
 verses. 
 
 The glorious victory of the Nile was in course to 
 be dramatised, and T. Dibdin launched a pantomi- 
 mic entertainment of song, dance, and dialogue, at 
 Covent Garden, on the 25th of October. Cumber- 
 land, catching at something between Cowley and 
 
 VOL. II. <i
 
 RAMAH DROOG. 
 
 Dry den, supplied a prologue, spoken with great 
 animation by H. Johnstone. 
 
 At the same theatre, on the 12th of November, 
 Cobb, with some of his India knowledge, brought 
 us entertainment from the Malabar coast ; and his 
 comic opera of Ramah Droog flourished like an 
 adventure of Bandannoes and Pullicat Romals. 
 The females of this piece are all of them unknown 
 to fame, but their names look astonishing in stage 
 history. Mrs. Mills and Mrs. Chapman, with the 
 six Misses Mitchell, Waters, Sims, Gray, Wheat- 
 ley and Walcup, and, I hope, in the language of 
 that great stage manager, Peter Quince, " here is 
 an opera fitted." It had one charm of great value 
 about it : namely, that Richards painted a series of 
 scenes from the exquisite designs of Daniel, made, 
 as every body knows, by him in India. 
 
 At Drury Lane, Prince Hoare translated and 
 adapted the French piece of Camille, or le Souler- 
 rain; and with some clever scenery, and music by 
 Dussek, a man of science and invention, it was 
 successful under the title of the Captive qfSpilburg. 
 Dussek, sitting in society at the piano forte, and 
 improvising upon the progress and succession of the 
 PASSIONS, was an object of perfect astonishment, 
 and never to be forgotten. 
 
 Mr. Cumberland followed on the 5th of Decem- 
 ber, with a comedy called, A Word for Nature ; 
 it was but a word. It had the slightest of all his 
 plots, nothing whatever of character, and the
 
 LAUGH WHEN YOU CAN. 
 
 interest was never the subject of the smallest 
 doubt or alarm through the whole five acts. 
 
 At Covent Garden, Dibdin, with a most divert- 
 ing farce, called the Jew and the Doctor, preceded 
 the return of Reynolds on the 8th of December to 
 his head quarters. His title was a lesson equal to 
 any in Cornaro's treatise, Laugh when you Can. 
 Here he had all his tried friends ; Lewis lighter 
 than air in Gossamer, and Fawcett in Sambo, and 
 a Bonus in Munden ; Holman, the Popes, the 
 Mattocks, the Gibbs, and in Emily, Miss Mansell. 
 Madame Genlis's Souterrain was to have the 
 honours of both our houses, and Cobb's Albert 
 and Adelaide, the rival of the Captive of Spilburg, 
 was done at Covent Garden on the llth. It was 
 a useful AFTER-piece, and as every thing unfortu- 
 nately now was, splendidly got up. Steibelt and 
 Atwood between them furnished the music. We 
 now half lived upon the Germans and the French; 
 and our native drama was estimated as a very 
 secondary business indeed by managers, who 
 turned their authors to foreign plays, foreign spec- 
 tacles, foreign romances to every thing foreign 
 to English habits, feelings, and character. 
 
 I had hitherto never written a part for a man, 
 entitled by his friendship as well as talent to every 
 attention from me. The masterly presentment of 
 Ambrosio in the Monk, by Mr. Lewis, though not 
 original*, struck me forcibly in the perusal, and I 
 
 4 
 
 * Without travelling farther back, Ambrosio and his temp- 
 tations ma be found under the names of Father Henrick and
 
 AURELFO AND MIRANDA. 
 
 worked, as I thought, rather successfully upon the 
 subject, in a sort of Colman drama of three acts. 
 I showed it to Mr. Kemble, and he at once 
 decided that he would act the monk. " But," he 
 said, " why three acts? Why innovate upon esta- 
 " blished usage ? a play should be in five acts, 
 " for this sound reason among others, that it 
 " affords four pauses ; and consequently the RE- 
 " LIEF which is necessary to the attention. In a 
 " full piece you must occupy the usual three 
 " hours, and you create a heaviness by compelling 
 " the audience to listen to an uninterrupted busi- 
 " ness, or act, one hour long. Don't tell me that 
 " there may not be matter enough in your subject 
 " fbrjfa'e acts ; because then I ask how you expect 
 " to be endured, if you make business only sufficient 
 " for three acts occupy the time of five?" To all 
 this I really had no good reply, and consequently 
 made none at all. He himself suggested some 
 additional interest, and Aurelio and Miranda went, 
 through Wroughton, to Mr. Sheridan himself. 
 He read it with great kindness, and wrote his 
 opinion in the margin of every scene. Of many 
 parts he expressed decided admiration he gave 
 me but little additional trouble. The play was 
 
 Miranda, in the novel called the Fair Jilt, written by Mrs. 
 Aphra Behn. Mr. Kemble's recollection of her writings, and 
 of this particular story, made him assign the name of Miranda 
 to my heroine; and might lead him to suggest the high birth 
 of the friar as a ground for dispensing him from his vows, and 
 ultimately uniting him to Miranda.
 
 ACCOUNT OF AURELIO AND MIRANDA. 229 
 
 accepted, and Mr. Siddons by letter informed me 
 " that though Miranda was not quite so important 
 " in the piece as Mrs. Siddons was accustomed to 
 " be, yet that it was such a part as they should 
 " never refuse, and that she would act it for me." 
 All therefore looked successfully; the greatest 
 dramatic genius admired my work, and the greatest 
 theatric talent had resolved to act it. But it was 
 weak in its structure; the two last acts were 
 entirely an hors d'ceuvre ; and, what was worse 
 than all, a storm of indignation was excited, that 
 so immoral a work as the Monk should be resorted 
 to for the purposes of an exhibition, however 
 moral in its tendency. There were not wanting 
 an accident or two to help on the work of preju- 
 dice; yet the play survived all opposition for 
 seven nights, greatly applauded in its best scenes, 
 but in my own judgment unfitted for a longer 
 existence. It was first acted on the 29th of 
 December, 1798. 
 
 Yet let me say, that all I had ever conceived of 
 either the dignity or sanctity of the monacal order, 
 was as nothing compared with the awful grace 
 with which the whole figure of Kemble became 
 invested. .The nearest resemblance that picture 
 affords is to be found in a FORM, that it would be 
 irreverence to name upon such an occasion as the 
 present ; but the expression of the head, and the 
 folds of the drapery, seemed to be studied in the 
 
 Q 3
 
 230 VOTARY OF WEALTH. 
 
 transfiguration of Raphael. That noble gentle- 
 man, the late Duke of Leeds, came to me in the 
 Green Room, and begged to present me to the 
 Duchess in her box, though he candidly avowed 
 that his religious feelings hardly allowed him to 
 tolerate the powerful effects, which he saw pro- 
 duced upon the stage. But it was not only on 
 the first night that Mr. Kemble displayed for me 
 his highest powers prevention as to the subject 
 failure in some weaker parts violent clamour 
 all on this occasion were unheeded by him, 
 and he exerted himself to the last, for his friend, 
 the author, SLS if his own reputation were at 
 stake, and somehow involved with the success of 
 the play. 
 
 " For ALL our thanks." 
 
 I may mention that when, after the play, Mr. 
 Kemble had put on his. lay habiliments, and we 
 were both admitted into Mrs. Siddons's dressing- 
 room, our friend, the late Dr. Charles Burney, came 
 in, and told us in few words, that " the subject was 
 " fatal, and we should not do." I was myself 
 decidedly of his opinion. 
 
 Holman, on the 5th of January 1799, presented 
 the town with a comedy, called the Votary of 
 Wealth. It is a satire against the irregular attain- 
 ment of riches where the passion renders the 
 being who entertains it false in every thing, and 
 the dearest of his friends is as certainly the prey of
 
 FEUDAL TliMES. 
 
 his rapacity, as " the indifferent children of the 
 earth." Mr. Holman, as usual, distinguished him- 
 self by some scenes powerfully written ; but, in the 
 general structure of the fable, he reminded one 
 greatly of his two comic associates ; and, indeed, 
 they frequently wrote in conjunction. With all 
 this the public had no concern ; their entertain- 
 ment was in the merit of the work, and there was 
 certainly much interest in the Votary of Wealth. 
 it is a singularity, but of the comic writers to 
 whom I have alluded, the strong interest in their 
 plays is hardly ever female in this, looking to 
 the sympathy of an audience, they would be in 
 error, but that the comparative talents of the sexes 
 in the Covent Garden company rendered their 
 choice an affair of discretion. 
 
 It is so dangerous to attack ! The even-handed 
 justice of time usually makes to itself a sport, as 
 well as a duty, to have the " Engineer hoisted with 
 his own petard." So Mr. Colman, who had assailed 
 Kemble as the translator of Lodoiska, now, I sup- 
 pose, blushed to scribble over Feudal Times, in 
 which Lodoiska itself was imitated, and the Castle 
 Spectre and Blue Beard invited into his Banquet 
 Gallery. Here was a mine sprung in the close of 
 the piece with great effect. On the subject of this 
 eternal stage practice, let me say, to the credit of 
 their sappers and miners, that it invariably suc- 
 ceeds ; and the conflagration of the fortress only 
 lights the lovers to each others embraces. A blow 
 
 Q. 4
 
 KOTZEBUts BIRTH DAY. 
 
 up at the end of a piece was formerly a metaphor 
 and signified its perdition ; it is now a reality, and 
 ensures its success. 
 
 That ingenious gentleman, Mr. Morris, in his 
 Secret, a comedy acted at Drury Lane Theatre on 
 the 2d of March, wrote a very interesting part for 
 Mrs. Jordan, called Rosa. It was now become no 
 secret, that she rather inclined to the characters of 
 deserted daughters, plundered orphans, and the 
 whole family of sentiment, rather than to the indul- 
 gence of her own proper talent in the comedies of 
 the last age. 
 
 The liberality of young Dibdin, on the 16th of 
 this month, bestowed Five Thousand a-year upon 
 Mr. Lewis for his benefit ; of which that gay but 
 most prudent manager took the proper care, and 
 the town, for many nights together, congratulated 
 him upon his success. To drop the allusion, the 
 sketch of the interest of this comedy indicated at 
 least design, and exemplified a common danger. 
 The accession of a young gentleman to unexpected 
 fortune leads to the prudent determination, on his 
 part, to avoid the tempting baits of wine, play, 
 altercation, and, above all, love. By very naturally 
 contrived incitements he falls into every mischief 
 he had resolved to shun, and the audience enjoyed 
 the dilemmas of so provident a personage. 
 
 Kotzebue again supplied the. theatre with per- 
 manent attraction. His Birth Day prepared for 
 us, after city translation, by young Dibdin, was
 
 MR. KEMBLE IN MONTVAL. 233 
 
 acted inimitably by Munden, Fawcett, and Mrs. 
 Davenport. The scenes between Bertram and Junk, 
 in the hands of Munden and Fawcett, were as 
 finely contested acting as I ever saw upon a stage. 
 Though naval characters, they evidently sprung 
 from the military pair in Tristram Shandy; yet 
 there was positive genius in the appropriation, by 
 Kotzebue, of our Yorick's greatest achievement. 
 
 Mr. Kemble had only one novelty of much con- 
 sequence during the remainder of the season. For 
 the Rev. T. S. Whalley, he acted the Old Count 
 Montval, in a tragedy written on the subject of a 
 father condemned to a dungeon by his son and 
 Mrs. Siddons the wife of the parricide. It was 
 poetically written, but being, as to its fable, drawn 
 from a popular French miscellany, and having 
 been some time in the manager's hands, his dungeon 
 interest had been anticipated in the Castle Spectre, 
 and the reverend poet was partially defrauded of 
 his effects. Whalley, if I remember rightly, was 
 the friend of Pratt and Hayley; and of a better 
 poet than either, Potter of Seaming, a man admired 
 by Mr. Pitt the unrivalled translator of Eschylus, 
 Sophocles, and Euripides. 
 
 The novelty to which I have particularly alluded 
 was the celebrated part of Rolla, in Sheridan's 
 alteration of Kotzebue's Pizarro, a play of which 
 the performance is never likely to cease, and of 
 which the heroic character of Rolla is the soul. It
 
 PIZAKIIO. 
 
 had been many months under the correction of 
 Sheridan, who not only gave that sustained 
 character to the dialogue, which a German some- 
 times invades by trivial or familiar language, but 
 he added some very glowing thoughts occasionally, 
 and a passage of infinite value in the address of 
 Holla to the Peruvian soldiers. As I do not 
 remember that any critic has pointed out these ori- 
 ginal effusions of the mind of Sheridan ; as they 
 are moreover the only specimens of tragic compo- 
 sition from his pen ; and, as the reader will subse- 
 quently find, were noticed by Mr. Pitt, I shall here 
 insert the most prominent, to which Kotzebue never 
 supplies more than a fit place to receive them. 
 Perhaps the trial of Warren Hastings led him to 
 fill his mind generally with images of the higher 
 emotions, expressed in the richest terms, though 
 not in the metre of poetry. 
 
 THE ADDRESS OF ROLLA TO HIS SOLDIERS. 
 
 (Act II. Sc. 2.) 
 
 " My brave associates partners of my toil, my feelings and 
 my fame ! Can Holla's words add vigour to the virtuous ener- 
 gies which inspire your hearts ? No \ou have judged, as 
 I have, the foulness of the crafty plea by which these bold 
 invaders would delude you. Your generous spirit has com- 
 pared, as mine has, the motives, which, in a war like this, can 
 animate THEIR minds, and OURS. THEY, by a strange frenzy 
 driven, fight for power, for plunder, and extended rule WE 
 for our country, our altars, and our homes. They follow an 
 adventurer whom they fear, and obey a power which they 
 hate. WE serve a Monarch whom we love a God whom
 
 HOLLA S ADDRESS TO HIS SOLDIERS. 
 
 we adore. Where'er they move in anger, desolation tracks 
 their progress! Where'er they pause in amity, affliction 
 mourns their friendship ! They boast, they come but to im- 
 prove our state, enlarge our thoughts, and free us from the 
 yoke of error ! Yes THEY will give enlightened freedom 
 to OUR minds, who are themselves the slaves of passion, ava- 
 rice, and pride. They offer us their protection Yes, such 
 protection as vultures give to lambs covering and devour- 
 ing them ! They call on us to barter all of good we have 
 inherited and proved, for the desperate chance of something 
 better which they promise. Be our plain answer this : The 
 throne WE honour is the PEOPLE'S CHOICE the laws we reve- 
 rence are our brave fathers' legacy the faith we follow 
 teaches us to live in bonds of charity with all mankind, and die 
 with hope of bliss beyond the grave. Tell your invaders 
 this, and tell them, too, we seek no change ; and least of all, 
 such change as THEY would bring us." * 
 
 Then that beautiful description of a mother's 
 joys given to Cora, in the first scene of the second 
 act 
 
 Cora. " The extasy of his birth I pass, that in part is 
 selfish; but when first the white blossoms of his teeth appear, 
 breaking the crimson buds that did incase them, that is a 
 day of joy : next, when from his father's arms he runs without 
 support, and clings, laughing and delighted, to his mother's 
 knee, that is the mother's heart's next holiday : and sweeter 
 still the third, whene'er his little stammering tongue shall utter 
 the grateful sound of father ! mother ! Oh ! that is the dearest 
 joy of all!" 
 
 Again, in that splendid soliloquy of Elvira's, at 
 the end of the third act 
 
 " 'Tis well ! 'tis just I should be humbled. I had forgot my- 
 self, and in the cause of innocence assumed the tone of virtue ;
 
 BEAUTIES IN PIZARRO. 
 
 'twas fit I should be rebuked and by Pizarro. Fall, fall, 
 ye few reluctant drops of weakness the last these eyes shall 
 ver shed. How a woman can love, Pizarro, thou hast 
 known too well how she can hate, thou hast yet to learn. 
 Yes, thou undaunted ! Thou whom yet no mortal hazard 
 has appalled ! Thou on Panama's brow didst make alliance 
 with the raving elements, that tore the silence of that 
 horrid night; when thou didst follow, as thy pioneer, the 
 crashing thunder's drift, and stalking o'er the trembling 
 earth, didst plant thy banner by the red volcano's mouth > 
 Thou, who, when battling on the sea, and thy brave ship was 
 blown to splinters, wast seen as thou did'st bestride a frag- 
 ment of the smoaking wreck to wave thy glittering sword 
 above thy head as thou would'st defy the world in that ex 
 tremity ! Come, fearless man now meet the last and fellest 
 peril of thy life meet! and survive an injured woman's 
 fury, if thou canst." 
 
 Also that elegant apostrophe to nature, spoken 
 by Rolla in the fourth act 
 
 " O, holy nature ! thou dost never plead in vain. There is 
 not; of our earth, a creature bearing form, and life, human or 
 savage native of the forest wild; or giddy air around 
 whose parent bosom, THOU hast not a cord entwined of power 
 to tie them to their offspring's claims, and at thy will to 
 draw them back to thee. On iron pinions borne the blood- 
 stained VULTURE cleaves the storm yet is the plumage closest 
 to her heart soft as the cygnet's down, and o'er her unshell'd 
 brood, the murmuring ring-dove sits not more gently." 
 
 There are several other additions, but these are 
 the most striking, and, from the first part of the 
 second scene in the fifth act, the translation ceases, 
 new incidents are introduced, and, excepting the 
 death of Rolla, the conclusion is totally different, 
 particularly in the re-appearance of Elvira, and the
 
 CAST OF PIZARUO. 237 
 
 fall of Pizarro, through her intervention. I am not 
 quite sure, but I think he used a translation made 
 for him by Mr. Geisweiler, a German possessing both 
 languages, and who afterwards rendered Sheridan's 
 alteration back into German, confronted page for 
 page by the English. Every care was taken in 
 the getting up of this splendid drama scenery and 
 dresses of the most striking beauty were invented, 
 and Kelly, % who prepared the music, introduced 
 some very eloquent strains, which he had composed 
 formerly, and they were always greatly admired. 
 It was first acted on the 24th of May 1799- 
 The original cast should be noted here. It shows 
 that the reward of tractable diligence at length 
 arrived. Alonzo was entrusted to Charles Kemble, 
 who, in the third act in particular, rendered very 
 important service.* 
 
 Pizarro, ... Barrymore. 
 
 Alonzo, - C. Kemble. 
 
 Las Casas, - - Aickin. 
 
 Ataliba, .... Powell. 
 
 Rolla, - - KEMBLE. 
 
 Elvira, - * V - Siddons. 
 
 Cora, ' ' - - Jordan. 
 
 How unwillingly Sheridan always worked, may 
 be judged by the following fact. Instead of pre- 
 paring a prologue that should bear some remote 
 
 * Sheridan was so sensible of this, that for a long time after- 
 wards he used to salute him as " his Alonzo."
 
 238 MRS. JORDAN IK CORA. 
 
 reference to the interest of his play, he sent King on to 
 speak one, written by himself, to be sure, but which 
 had preceded Lady Craven's Miniature Picture in 
 1780.* It breathed of neither lieroism nor love 
 but takes the dust in Rotten Row in the person of 
 a cit on his hack Bucephalus ; and, sauntring with 
 white-rob'd Misses in Kensington Gardens, listens 
 to the small questions of the promenade, so vastly 
 usual, that they require no answer. The verses for 
 music in this piece, I believe, were supplied by 
 Grub, always happy to be employed. 
 
 Although in substance this play was Kotzebue's, 
 yet Mr. Sheridan seemed to feel .for it a full pater- 
 nal solicitude. He sat in his' box through the 
 night with Richardson, in a state of unappeasable 
 anxiety. The reader will hardly conceive the 
 object of his greatest fear ; but I tell it to him with 
 the fullest knowledge of the fact. As to Mrs. 
 Jordan in Cora, he was sufficiently miserable 
 "she could not speak aline of it;" but he was 
 dissatisfied with Mrs. Siddons ; she had not fallen 
 in with his notion of the character ; and at her 
 
 Cicero, we are told, upon looking over his treatise on 
 Academic Philosophy, discovered that he had used the same 
 preface that he had prefixed to his book on Glory. It was his 
 custom, it seems, to prepare at leisure a number of different 
 proems, adapted to the general view of his studies, and ready 
 to be applied to any of bis works, which he should afterwards 
 publish. Sheridan, I apprehend, did not abound in either pre- 
 faces or prologues,
 
 ELVIRA CONSIDERED. 239 
 
 opening of this precious piece of profligacy, he 
 exclaimed, " There, there, I told you, Richardson, 
 " that she never would fall into the character !" 
 and he was querulous to the last degree. With 
 Kemble, however, he was perfectly transported ; 
 as HE declaimed, he said to Richardson, " Beautiful! 
 sublime ! perfection ! nothing ever equalled THAT." 
 At length the great actress burst through the em- 
 barrassment of her situation, and produced a strong 
 feeling in the house ; on which Richardson, a 
 cooler judge, retorted his own terms upon him ; 
 and when he expressed his pleasure, and was begin- 
 ning an " I told you, Richardson," in another key, 
 " YES," said his friend, " and remember / told YOU, 
 " Sheridan, that she would fall into it at last." 
 
 Whether Mrs. Siddons would fall into the 
 character, or fall with it, was not very long a ques- 
 tion. She elevated Elvira even into respect ; and, as 
 her brother said to me, upon my praise of his Rolla, 
 " NAY, nay, I have every thing to aid me ; it is a 
 " noble character. Carry your wonder to Mrs. 
 " Siddons ; she has made a heroine of a soldier's 
 trull." 
 
 The term used by my friend for this lady is 
 somewhat strong, but a little reflection will leave it 
 undisturbed. With the glory of Pizarro expired 
 Elvira's love of him. Virtue of the noblest kind is, it 
 seems, her passion. She meets in Rolla a being of the 
 true temper : he has remained, at the risk of his
 
 240 PORTRAIT OF KEMBLE IN ROLLA. 
 
 own life, that his friend might escape from prison. 
 This admirer of glory labours by every art to con- 
 vert him into an assassin ; arms him herself for the 
 occasion, and leads him into the conqueror's tent, 
 that he may stab him as he lies asleep. Holla 
 is himself, and awakes Pizarro from his slumbers. 
 Elvira is detected and imprisoned ; but she makes 
 her escape at a very critical juncture, and again 
 arms Alonzo with a weapon, by which Pizarro 
 is at last destroyed. She then, with infinite pro- 
 priety, decides upon devoting herself to a reli- 
 gious life, to expiate her original foible. What the 
 cloister might gain it is impossible to say ; but it 
 is sufficiently evident the profane world had no 
 great loss of her. 
 
 I really do not wonder at Sheridan's doubt 
 whether Mrs. Siddons 'would fall into such a 
 character. 
 
 The noble portrait of Mr. Kemble bearing off 
 the child, by Sir Thomas Lawrence, expresses 
 most accurately the vigour and picturesque beauty 
 of his action. The herculean effort of his strength 
 his passing the bridge his preservation of the 
 infant, though himself mortally wounded, excited 
 a sensation of alarm and agony beyond any thing 
 perhaps that the stage has exhibited. But, in truth, 
 from his entrance to his death, the character was 
 sustained with a power of elocution, a firmness of 
 deportment, and an intensity of expression, that 
 he alone could combine together.
 
 POLITICAL POINT IN PIZARRO. 241 
 
 All this excellence produced effects fully corre- 
 sponding Pizarro was acted thirty-one nights in 
 succession, that is, leaving out the Sundays in course 
 from the 24th of May to the 29th of June ; the 
 season did not close till the 4th of July. It may 
 be observed that Addison's Cato, with all political 
 factions to aid it, on its first run was acted only 
 eighteen times. The continued performance of 
 Pizarro was therefore, in the serious drama, up to 
 that time unprecedented. Comedy and opera have 
 been allowed, perhaps, in a few cases, an unin- 
 terrupted progress equal to this ; but I presume 
 tragedy to have intermitted, more on account of 
 its superior fatigue, than from any inferiority of 
 attraction. 
 
 There was a political point, of no mean import- 
 ance, obvious in this play ; we had Mr. Sheridan 
 (formerly furious in the cause of France, invoking 
 destruction upon the heads of the BRITISH CABINET, 
 and coveting for himself the " blow of vengeance"*) 
 NOW speaking with the heart and voice of his 
 country, his perfect abhorrence of the conduct and 
 the principles of revolution ; and urging by every 
 oratorical charm his countrymen to resist and dis- 
 dain the arms and arts of France. If any very 
 furious Whig, anxious for the political wisdom or 
 the consistency of Sheridan, should remind me 
 that this intruded harangue is in the character of a 
 PERUVIAN, and its invectives pointed at a SPANISH 
 
 VOL. II. R
 
 242 PLAY OF PIZARRO PRINTED. 
 
 invader ; I think myself able to prove, that they 
 were inserted because they applied to the con- 
 dition of this country. If he were to add, that 
 even this concluded nothing as to the real senti- 
 ments of Mr. Sheridan ; I confess I should feel 
 indifferent on that point, provided he allowed, as 
 I think he must do, that, even in Mr. Sheridan's 
 opinion, Holla but uttered the feelings and the sen- 
 timents of the English people. 
 
 Among his audience Sheridan had the honour to 
 number Mr. Pitt. The minister smiled significant- 
 ly at the speech of Holla; recognised some favorite 
 figures, that he had before admired at the trial 
 of Mr. Hastings j and pronounced Mr. Kemble to 
 be " the NOBLEST ACTOR that he had ever seen." 
 
 The press sent forth 30,000 copies of this play, 
 which was read with the greatest avidity ; and the 
 author, after it had brought at least fifteen thou- 
 sand pounds into the theatre in its first season, in a 
 strain of marital gallantry, not very usual among 
 managers, declared that " Mrs. Sheridan's appro- 
 bation and delight in its applause were to HIM the 
 highest gratification its success had produced." 
 Here, however, appeared to open a vein of wealth 
 which, followed out with decent industry, might 
 have relieved the theatre and its proprietor soon from 
 a crowd of embarrassments ; and yet I shall almost 
 immediately have to show the usual want of re- 
 sources, and the old menaces of retirement from
 
 NOVELTIES. 243 
 
 the scene, if money were not provided by the 
 treasury. 
 
 The summer theatre presented to us the current 
 rage. Kotzebue, and his self immolation, under the 
 title of Family Distress. Pope sustained the mise- 
 rable victim, Maxwell ; and though the scene was 
 laid in London, the spectator doubted that such 
 complicated wretchedness could here attend an 
 honest but unfortunate man. Yet in London does 
 not the sharper seek an associate does not the 
 attorney findjalse witness ? Is not the man absorbed 
 in domestic affliction of his own, however incon- 
 sistently, indisposed to attend to that of others? All 
 her charities, and she is among cities the first for 
 charitable provision, all her charities must frequently 
 fail to reach the timid and retiring virtue, abashed 
 as well as ruined destitute and silent. 
 
 The Castle of Sorrento, which Fawcett had fully 
 prepared for, was extremely attractive here, and in 
 Paris had been acted 60 nights in succession. Le 
 Texier had employed his astonishing talent upon 
 it during the winter. I think Fawcett heard him 
 read it ; nothing, however, could well be more 
 effective than his own Blinval. 
 
 On the SOth of July, Prince Hoare fitted up 
 another drama "of Kotzebue' s, called Sighs ! or the 
 Daughter. But he introduced a sort of Cocker in 
 the person of Totum, calculated to exhibit the pe- 
 culiar humour of Fawcett and sent on him and 
 
 R 2
 
 244 FETE AT FROGMORE. 
 
 Mrs. Gibbs with an epilogue, written by himself it 
 appeared, but that every body must have attributed 
 to Colman, in which numbers were very pleasantly 
 sported with from the deuce to the audience. 
 
 Holman, too, admiring strongly the Robbers of 
 Schiller, produced an alteration under the title of 
 the Redcross Knights, which came out on the 21st 
 of August, and ran through the rest of the season. 
 The little manager at the close, complained of the 
 growing curtailment of his period, but he had en- 
 couragement from the public, and what he lost as 
 a manager by the winter potentates, he contrived, 
 as we have seen, to get back as an author. 
 
 The youngest daughter of their Majesties, the 
 Princess Amelia, being recovered from a dangerous 
 illness, her illustrious sister, the Princess Elizabeth, 
 on the 7th of August, at Frogmore, planned an 
 entertainment to the nobility on the occasion, and 
 Mr. Wyatt was at hand to execute the design of her 
 Royal Highness, The building was in the shape 
 of a barn, and had three arched roofs or divisions 
 supported by two rows of pillars. The middle 
 space was allotted to the dancers j the sides to the 
 company : all the effect was rustic. The chande- 
 liers were, in form, bee-hives, crowned with wheat 
 the pillars were only the supporters of artificial 
 flowers and the very lamps were united by ropes 
 of wheat interlacing blue-bells, violets, and lilies of 
 the valley. The very chairs for the company were 
 cottage furniture.
 
 PERFORMERS ENGAGED AT IT. 245 
 
 When a royal mind, accustomed to painted halls 
 and gilded roofs, turns its fancy to some exquisite 
 enjoyment, the scene of it we find is in a cottage, 
 or a barn, and a rusk chair is the greatest personal 
 indulgence. Upon a variety of occasions an atten- 
 tive observer will recollect an external sympathy of 
 nature with remarkable events all antiquity is 
 uniform as to such singular accompaniments. This 
 day of festivity was remarked for a deluge of rain 
 that came down incessantly. The lovely OBJECT 
 of the entertainment was not destined long to sur- 
 vive ; and some circumstances attending her disso- 
 lution pressed so poignantly upon her venerable 
 father, that a long night of reason succeeded and 
 attended him to the grave. 
 
 In looking over my papers, as to what associates 
 the above fete with theatrical history, I find that 
 Quick, Mrs. Mattocks, and Elliston, were profes- 
 sionally employed that Mrs. Mattocks screamed 
 out Falstaff, and Mr. Elliston, in the character of 
 Merlin (him of Hanover Square ?) was, poor man, 
 doomed to deliver some lines of superlative dulness, 
 written with the best intention by a "person of 
 " honour" The Princess Amelia was thus sa- 
 luted 
 
 " And thou, sweet maid, permit ME THEE to greet" 
 
 But the Princess of Orange came in for the 
 choicest sweets of the muse. 
 
 " Thou, too, my greetings sharst, respected Dame ! 
 
 Soon shall BATAVIA'S land thy presence claim." 
 
 R 3
 
 24-6 FETE AT FROGMORE. 
 
 The reader sees how happily on such occasions 
 we had now forgotten HIM, who equalled Shak- 
 speare in the Masque of Queens ; and taught the 
 lyric strain to Milton in the Vision of Delight, and 
 a long succession of learned and elegant inven- 
 tions, by which he charmed, and generally employed, 
 the courts of James and Charles.
 
 24? 
 
 CHAP. XIII. 
 
 SEASON OF 1799-1800. MORE DECORATIONS. MANAGE- 
 MENT. TURNPIKE GATE. THE WISE MAN OF THE EAST. 
 
 THE EAST INDIAN MR. KEMBLE ACTS IN IT. 
 
 OTHER NOVELTIES. MODERN DRAMA FOUNDED ON MO- 
 RAL PARADOX. FATAL TENDENCY. SPEED THE PLOUGH. 
 
 MISS BAILLIE. DE MONFORT. MR. KEMBLE. 
 
 PRINCE HOARE. SEDUCTION. LIBERAL OPINIONS. 
 
 ATTEMPT UPON THE KING'S LIFE DESCRIBED. HIS 
 
 MAJESTY'S FIRMNESS. THE ASSASSIN HIS TRIAL 
 
 CONSIDERATIONS. DEATH OF GEORGE STEEVENS. 
 
 CHARACTER OF HIM BY HAYLEY. SKETCH OF HIM BY 
 
 THE AUTHOR. COLMAN's. 
 
 ON the 16th of September, Covent Garden Thea- 
 tre opened for the season of 1799-1800, and 
 Drury Lane on the day following. The former 
 house again boasted of its decorations ; but I really 
 am heart-sick of this most childish folly, now grown 
 into a ruinous evil. Cumberland wrote an address 
 spoken by Pope, which must have astonished the 
 audience. He told them that their triumphs had 
 spread from the Texel to the Nile that from 
 Syria their career advanced, and stretched still on- 
 ward from tjje spicy shore of Ceylon to the citadel 
 of rich Mysore. He told them, moreover, that 
 
 R 4
 
 MANAGEMENT. 
 
 their taste was to point the genius of the stage ; 
 and the actor added 
 
 " We are your servants and it is agreed, 
 
 SERVANTS should follow MASTERS should precede" 
 
 Mischievous nonsense ! the usual falsehood of those 
 who debauch the public taste. We are your ser- 
 vants! To be sure. So was Shakspeare; but to 
 lead, not follow, the people into rational and digni- 
 fied amusements. 
 
 Reynolds, on the last day of October, brought 
 out his comedy, called Management. Professional 
 habits cling to a man. In going slightly, of course, 
 over this author's fables, it is amusing to see the 
 eternal recurrence of bill, bond, and will the 
 plaintiff, the bailiff and the gaol. We have another 
 of his widows, and a bad specimen of the order. 
 Mrs. Dazzle has a reversion of one hundred thou- 
 sand pounds, if Juliana marries. As she is devoted 
 to Lavish, a young spendthrift, the widow mea- 
 sures the young lady's purity by her own, and 
 imagines that she will not, by the church's aid, di- 
 vest herself of her fortune. She therefore agrees 
 to wave her own claim for an annuity of .#200. 
 per annum, and so removes the only bar to their 
 legal union. 
 
 Lavish, a captain by the bye, is a character 
 written for Lewis, and frequently found in life, 
 who, unable to resist a present temptation to ex- 
 pence, indulges the whim, if he is to save it a
 
 TURNPIKE GATE. 
 
 thousand ways ; these disproportioned outlays to 
 be compensated by petty self-denials, are among 
 the delusions of fancy, and heralds of disaster. It 
 was as moral in its tendency, as entertaining in 
 its progress. 
 
 The comedy was finely acted, and stood its 
 ground, in defiance of the German genius, that 
 mental COMET, as Taylor well called it in his Pro- 
 logue, which had darted upon us from a distant 
 sphere. He was fortunate also in an epilogue by 
 Colman, spoken by Fawcett, as a manager of a 
 country theatre, sold off to various buyers. 
 
 " A sturdy farmer bought the walls why then, 
 What was a barn, will be a barn again. 
 Corn on the stage, not mummers will be seen ; 
 And oats be thresfid where ACTORS should have been." 
 
 Knight, the actor, a man of talent, by the opera 
 of the Turnpike Gate, increased his value greatly 
 with the manager. His own Maythorn was beau- 
 tiful acting and Munden valued himself always 
 highly upon the performance of Crack, in the 
 Turnpike Gate. 
 
 At Drury Lane, Linley, under the title of the 
 Pavilion, tried an Arabian Night's entertainment, 
 but it did not suit the climate. 
 
 We had been indebted to Kotzebue, in the 
 summer, for Family Distress. The Wise Man of 
 the East changes the sex of the victim. The 
 infamy which constitutes the fable of this play is a
 
 250 WISE MAN OF THE EAST. 
 
 nonpareil in depravity a heartless invention of 
 the German muse, and a libel upon our nature. 
 
 Ellen Metland, from the distresses of her pa- 
 rents, becomes dependent upon Lady Diamond. 
 Her ladyship has planned the ruin of young Cla- 
 renceforth, and Ellen flies to save him, by possess- 
 ing him of the plan and some of the means. In 
 making this discovery she in course loses her 
 patroness, and therefore begs him to procure a 
 coach for her, and send her to her friends. The 
 gratitude of this monster leads him to lodge her in 
 a brothel, for the purposes of seduction. Ellen 
 effects her escape, passes the night under a shed, 
 and in the morning implores the other jewel, Lady 
 Diamond, not to acquaint her family with the step 
 she had taken. That virtuous lady had however 
 been already with them, and turned her virtue 
 into pitch, to punish her honesty. Ellen throws 
 herself into the Thames, and the Humane Society 
 restore her, as in the summer they did Mr. Max- 
 well, by their agent, the wise man of the East, 
 Ava Thoanoa, who turns out to be the father 
 of Young Hopeful: the son repents his errors, 
 (ERRORS!) and instead of being hanged, is re- 
 warded with a virtuous woman. 
 
 And this is comedy ! and these are human 
 beings ! 
 
 Covent Garden Theatre being thus provided 
 happily, on the 30th of November, with an enter- 
 tainment as moral as its piazzas, Mr. Lewis, on
 
 THE EAST INDIAN. 51 
 
 the 7th of December, supplied the rival house, in 
 the regular way, with a stock of equal value, called 
 the East Indian. I say in the regular way ; be- 
 cause I believe Mrs. Jordan and Mrs. Powell had 
 each of them been benefited by the lesson at the 
 close of the last season. 
 
 Dorimont, a married man, of the most exalted 
 sentiments, abuses the friendship, the confidence, 
 the hospitality of Mortimer, and debauches his 
 daughter. The young lady, a person of infinite 
 merits, and the delight of a fond and virtuous 
 father, elopes from him to live as the mistress of 
 her seducer, and devote her parent to agonies 
 unutterable. The guilty are victims of remorse, 
 as they deserve to be ; but time operates in their 
 favour, which they did not merit; and by re- 
 moving the wife seasonably, enables Mr. Dorimont 
 to marry his mistress. 
 
 Mr. Kemble did Mr. Lewis the honour to act 
 the father, Mortimer, in this play. The scene in 
 which he is by accident led to the abode of his 
 daughter the scene of her contrition and his 
 forgiveness, he acted in a manner so exquisitely 
 tender, he touched the parental character with 
 such powerful truth, as to bear the play triumphant 
 through the moral assault which it had provoked. 
 Miss Biggs, in Zorayda, showed herself worthy to 
 act with him. 
 
 Mr. Cumberland had now procured an unpub- 
 lished romance, by the fashionable German: how- 
 
 *
 
 ADELAIDE. 
 
 ever he took the credit of re-writing it entirely. 
 It was called Joanna, and Busby composed music 
 for it. As it was a spectacle of lavish expence, 
 and not at all a favourite, Kotzebue thought it 
 worth his while publicly to disclaim every thing in 
 it that was offensive. It was produced on the 
 16th of January, 1800. 
 
 Mr. Pye, as a scholar and a critic, had every 
 claim to Mr. Kemble's aid. Accordingly he acted 
 Richard for him, in a tragedy called Adelaide, the 
 name of the heroine sustained by Mrs. Siddons. 
 There were two powerful scenes; one in which 
 Adelaide vindicates herself to Richard from the 
 villanous aspersions of his brother John ; another 
 wherein Richard, to the legate of the pope, unfolds 
 the storm of reason and policy, that would one day 
 snatch mankind from the tyranny of imposture and 
 unholy ambition. The play exhibited a powerful 
 struggle with intractable materials. 
 
 The reader, who has done me the honour to 
 attend to my brief illustrations of the MODERN 
 DRAMAS, will have remarked with surprise, and I 
 hope with disgust, that they were most of them 
 built upon moral paradox. He will remember to 
 have heard from those same venerable men, who 
 stood in the relation to him of parent, w r hether of the 
 person or the mind, that all VICE had a contagious 
 influence ; that any single enormity, long indulged, 
 from the natural operation of our self love, begot a 
 specious sanction that satisfied the conscience ;
 
 SPEED THE PLOUGH. 253 
 
 and by the extension of similar palliation to kin- 
 dred crimes, the whole mind became irrecoverably 
 tainted, and the BEING obnoxious and to be avoided. 
 The German secret of interest tended to strengthen 
 the self-delusion in actual life; it laid the "flatter- 
 ing unction to the soul," that any one vice might 
 maintain its power in the most amiable minds; 
 and exhibited the adultress, and the seducer, and 
 the robber, and even the murderer, as the most 
 generous of the species. The sort of thing became 
 popular, from the passion it set in motion, as well 
 as the balm it infused into the festering wounds of 
 memory. The most guarded had some imperfec- 
 tions, which they would fain hope to be venial ; 
 they were now systematically taught, that even 
 GOODNESS might consist with errors far more cri- 
 minal than their own. Thus sympathy usurped 
 the place of censure, and a door was opened to 
 that fatal fallacy, of making a compromise with 
 morals, and setting the vices to which we were not 
 inclined, as a sort of balance to those in which we 
 were determined to indulge. 
 
 I have already expressed my opinion of the talent 
 of Morton. He saw the strong leaning of the public 
 taste, and in Speed the Plough, without the sacrifice 
 of any principle, constructed an interest of deep 
 pathos, and sufficiently romantic. Sir P. Bland- 
 ford, on the eve of marriage, finds his mistress in 
 the embraces of his own brother. He stabs him 
 upon the spot. The intended bride subsequently
 
 2.54 MISS JOANNA BAFLLIE. 
 
 bears a son, the fruit of that disastrous connexion. 
 By a more propitious union Sir Philip has a daugh- 
 ter, whom accident leads into an attachment to her 
 unknown cousin. The brother, recovered from the 
 effect of his wound, secretly watches over the ex- 
 cesses of Sir Philip at length discloses himself to 
 that victim of remorse, and their children are per- 
 mitted to unite their hands. 
 
 Morton was fond of agricultural improvements, 
 and had a taste for ingenious machinery. The 
 abuse of such pursuits suggested to him the Handy 
 family, and they became in his hands a source of 
 fine comic satire. His love of the country brought 
 him acquainted with farmer Ashfield and his family. 
 Of these materials he composed a comedy, of which 
 the town was extremely fond a play admirably 
 acted in all its parts ; and so powerful as to sup- 
 port every company of comedians who have per- 
 formed it. The first night of Speed the Plough was 
 the 8th of February 1800. 
 
 Miss Joanna Baillie, a rather metaphysical dra- 
 matist, had published a series of plays upon the 
 passions. If she executed her design, each play 
 was to be in fact the history of some one passion ; 
 its rise, its progress, its gratification, which in tra- 
 gedy, of course, was its extinction in the death of 
 the person whose bosom it had usurped. 
 
 A very admirable critic showed at the time with 
 great felicity, the delusion as to the moral effect of 
 such a play, and the absurd narrowness of its plan,
 
 DE MONTFORT. 255 
 
 as precluding from so many sources of pleasure, and 
 auxiliaries of the greatest importance. 
 
 Mr. Kemble, however, had been struck with De 
 Montfort, which I then read by his desire, and he 
 told me of his intention to make some alterations 
 to bring it better within the scope of stage repre- 
 sentation, and to act the character himself \ consign- 
 ing his nobler sister to the care of Mrs. Siddons. 
 
 In pursuance of the modern creed, which I am 
 at all times ready to combat, De Montfort is a most 
 excellent being, cherishing through life an unap- 
 peasable hatred against Rezenvelt; whose pleasantry- 
 had, in their boyhood, annoyed him, and whose free 
 castigation inflicted, in his progress through life, 
 many a wound upon a mind suffering constantly 
 from apprehension. His hatred at one time pro- 
 duces a duel. Rezenvelt is there also his master. 
 Lady Jane, the sister of De Montfort, becomes an 
 object of admiration to Rezenvelt, and this embroils 
 her admirer again with her brother : however, she 
 commands with much dignity a reconciliation be- 
 tween them, and " speaks of peace, where there is 
 no peace." De Montfort hearing that Rezenvelt 
 is to pass through a neighbouring forest, after one 
 of the usual combats between honour and hatred, 
 lies in wait for him in the track, and barbarously 
 murders him. The groans of the dying man alarm 
 a neighbouring convent ; the assassin is secured, to 
 die of remorse in all the hells of guilt. 
 
 This is all of the story that need be told. I pre-
 
 256 I>E MONTFORT. 
 
 sume the greater part of mankind feel an involun- 
 tary scepticism as to the character itself. I remem- 
 ber it was corroborated by the story of a bedrid- 
 den victim to the gout, who, having afforded hospi- 
 tality to a schoolfellow whom he had hated, crawled 
 out of his bed-room in the night time, and finding 
 his guest asleep, cut his throat and then retreated 
 to his own chamber, with horrible satisfaction. 
 The cause assigned was a generous suggestion of 
 his school-fellow, for which he ought to have adored 
 him, " that they should take at school a punish- 
 " ment upon themselves, which two poorer boys 
 " had actually merited." 
 
 But it must be sufficiently obvious that these in- 
 stances, to use the language of the catalogue, are of 
 " rare occurrence" The lesson is therefore too 
 limited in its application for general purposes ; and 
 the passion too disgusting to be endured in all its 
 singleness, and without any of the palliations, which 
 render other passions objects of respect or pity even 
 in their excesses. But though I must venture 
 these objections to the plan and conduct of De 
 Montfort, I yet feel the highest respect for the 
 mind capable of such exemplifications of human 
 nature in its debasement ; and admire the nervous 
 diction in which the author displays her very 
 original conceptions. 
 
 The acting of Mr. Kemble was amazingly power- 
 ful; and he showed how well he could conceive and 
 display the features of a passion, from which he was
 
 SEDUCTION. 257 
 
 personally more free than most men of his time. 
 He was, as I well know, (for some of the records 
 remain under his own hand,) a most unsparing 
 censor of his own failings ; an indulgent and bene- 
 volent extenuator of those in other men. At all 
 the vulgar persecution which barked about him in 
 his career, he seldom deigned to be angry ; and 
 never, as he might have done, silenced it by autho- 
 rity which he could have employed, or attentions 
 which were unmerited. 
 
 Every care was taken in the decoration of De 
 Montfort. Capon painted a very unusual pile of 
 scenery, representing a church of the 14th century 
 with its nave, choir and side aisles, magnificently 
 decorated ; consisting of 'seven planes in succession. 
 In width this extraordinary elevation was about 56 
 feet, 52 in depth, and 37 feet in height. It was 
 positively a building. 
 
 The play, however, was found to be heavy, and 
 on the whole unpleasing, and could only be kept 
 alive eleven nights. Yet Mrs. Siddons exerted 
 herself powerfully in the Countess Jane ; and the 
 Hon. F. North wrote a prologue to recommend 
 it, and the Duchess of Devonshire an epilogue to 
 enforce the doctrines of its ingenious author. 
 
 Comedy, at both theatres, trod in its accustomed 
 steps. Seduction supplied Prince Hoare a field for 
 the display of the golden medium, which it seems 
 puts all these domestic concerns in the happiest 
 train imaginable 
 
 VOL. II. S
 
 '258 LIBERAL OPINIONS. 
 
 First, Parents, do not be too rigorous on the 
 subject of your children's affections. 
 
 Secondly, Children, never think of running 
 from the paternal roof with the first 'villain that 
 asks you. 
 
 Here was a family oddly enough named Bur- 
 leigh ; and the old gentleman of the name, in the 
 course of the piece, assumes the disguise of an old 
 woman. He discovers, in his disguise, that his 
 daughter is innocent, though she had been a fugi- 
 tive, and is reconciled to her, and to her union with 
 Clermont. The reader sees that the desire to have 
 Bannister burst like a fury out of his old woman's 
 garb, and offer to fight the whole company, takes 
 everything like dignity from the serious interest; 
 and the comic incident, of Maxim seeking a wife 
 through the newspapers, though highly diverting, 
 forms no contrast ; for nothing in the ludicrous 
 can exceed the Pere de famille Burleigh himself. 
 But King and Bannister, with Jordan, Pope and 
 Biggs, could not fail to be entertaining ; and 
 though this author's comedies were never equal to 
 his farces, yet a mind fertile in whimsical inventions 
 could not but afford abundance of amusement in 
 five acts. 
 
 Dibdin's Liberal Opinions was also an amusing 
 production, nearly allied to farce. The progress of 
 refinement produces the gradual encroachment of 
 the ranks of life upon each other. The neces- 
 saries of existence, easily obtained, are exchanged
 
 ATTACK ON THE KING. 259 
 
 for the luxuries. An idle competition for the un- 
 essential involves society in debt. The stage echoes 
 the complaints of the real world, and our comedies 
 now teemed with all the frauds by which the needy 
 would become wealthy, and everlasting DEBT bolted 
 upon you in the train of the comic muse. In the 
 present play, debt is the great hinge of the interest. 
 Bailiffs are flying about in all directions, and ten 
 thousand pounds are ript from the lining of an 
 old drab coat. The Liberals are all happily dis- 
 posed of in marriage ; and a thing of infinitely 
 more difficulty, the Jew resigns the ten thousand 
 pounds found in the lining of the drab coat. The 
 name of this unhappy person is Ephraim j but, I 
 suppose, prayers were immediately put up in the 
 Synagogue for his recovery from so unaccountable 
 a lunacy. 
 
 The levity of the preceding paragraph was the 
 natural result of a mind at ease, inclining to the 
 various course of the narrative, and exhibiting from 
 day to day the transactions, whether serious or 
 comic, of the theatres of London. But I am now 
 to speak of an event so horrible in its nature, so 
 surprising in all its circumstances, so perfectly 
 without a motive, and yet so transcendent in its 
 mischief, that I need these few lines of preparation 
 to assume the proper tone for a detail so unparal- 
 leled. On the 15th day of May 1800, the late 
 amiable sovereign, George the III., upon his en- 
 trance into the royal box at Drury Lane Theatre,
 
 2(R) FIRMNESS OF GEORGE III. 
 
 was fired at, by a frantic miscreant in the pit, with 
 a pistol loaded with two slugs. And on the same 
 day, His Majesty, in the morning, attending the field 
 exercises of the grenadier battalion of the guards 
 in Hyde Park, a gentleman named Ongley, stand- 
 ing in the direction, and not twenty yards from 
 the royal person, was shot by a ball fired from the 
 musquet of some soldier in the ranks unknown. 
 I put the two events together, because, in all pro- 
 bability, they were instantly associated in the royal 
 mind ; arid His Majesty must have conceived, that 
 some assassins that day were taking every means to 
 destroy him. The King, upon hearing the report 
 of the pistol, stood firm, at about four paces in 
 advance from the door of the box ; but amid the 
 alarm and horror, and the thousand voices that 
 called to seize the assassin, with the self-possession 
 that became a sovereign, perhaps expecting to have 
 a second shot fired in the tumult from some other 
 quarter, His Majesty calmly advanced to the very 
 front of the box, where he remained, as such a man 
 only could be, perfectly undismayed. Upon seeing 
 the Queen enter, he at first with his hand waved 
 her back, but upon her enquiring what was the 
 matter, the King considerately replied, " Only a 
 squib! they have beenjiring squibs" After the 
 assassin, across the orchestra, had been taken out 
 of the pit, the Queen, in great agitation, came for- 
 ward and curtsied, and asked His Majesty, " whether 
 " they should stay ?" His answer was, " WE WILL
 
 THE ASSASSIN. 
 
 NOT STIR ; we will stay the WHOLE of the ENTER- 
 TAINMENTS." 
 
 The Princesses in their alarm fainted, except 
 the Princess Elizabeth, whose more powerful 
 nerves enabled her to assist in their recovery. The 
 heroism of their Sovereign, and his escape, exalted 
 the joy of the people to rapture, and it was with 
 no common feelings, that the national anthem was 
 delivered ; GOD had indeed that day saved the 
 King. 
 
 James Hadfield, the assassin, was about 29 years 
 of age, had served on the Continent under 
 H. R. H. the Duke of York, who remembered him 
 in the 15th Dragoons, and one of his orderlies. 
 On the 26th of the following month, this man's 
 trial for high treason took place, before Lord 
 Kenyon ; it was what is termed a trial at bar in the 
 Court of King's Bench. Mr. Erskine was assigned 
 to him for counsel ; and whether with respect to 
 his stating the law upon the case, or his elucida- 
 tions of mental aberration, his speech was among 
 the most interesting efforts of his powerful talent. 
 When he called his witnesses, such a stream of 
 facts, that could not have been coloured for the 
 purpose, flowed in full conviction of the prisoner's 
 insanity, that, by Lord Kenyon's direction, and 
 Mr. Attorney General's entire concurrence, the 
 Jury, without retiring, recorded a verdict of Not 
 guilty. He was in course taken proper care of for 
 his life. 
 
 s 3
 
 S(jj2 REFLECTIONS. 
 
 The dreadful wounds which he had received in 
 the service had injured the brain, and produced, 
 at various times, very alarming results. When not 
 in the paroxysm of his disorder, the man was 
 gentle, kind, and industrious : but he had tried to 
 bayonet the preserver of his life in 1796, and 
 attempted to murder his infant child but two days 
 before his attack upon the person of the King. 
 Yet of his child he was dotingly fond, and he 
 never mentioned His Majesty without blessings, 
 because it was from his bounty he derived his 
 pension. 
 
 I wish to make but one reflection upon this 
 business, and I could have desired it to come with 
 all the authority of the seat of Justice. It is this : 
 that when the relatives of persons acting in the 
 manner of Hadfield, pass over the ravings or the 
 violences of their lunacy, satisfied with an interval 
 of calmness, a glimpse of returning reason, and 
 allow such unhappy beings to be the actual masters 
 of their conduct, they incur a fearful responsibility 
 indeed before God and man. It is not a matter 
 for their speculation or indulgence they are 
 bound to ask the judgment and the aid of a branch 
 of the profession of the highest importance in 
 society, and whose studies lie in that region of our 
 structure, which, all of it " fearfully and wonder- 
 fully made," is there more peculiarly wonderful 
 and to be feared*
 
 REFLECTIONS. 263 
 
 It is hardly of consequence to enquire the mo- 
 tive that frenzy assigns for an act so atrocious ; 
 but Hadfield was possessed with an opinion, that 
 it was proper he himself should die. Suicide, as 
 he conceived, would rob him of decent burial ; he 
 therefore, without intending the death of the King, 
 fired into his box, knowing that the deliberate 
 attempt alone was sufficient to bring about that 
 death, which he persuaded himself was necessary 
 to society. Before the exact state of the man 
 could be known, (for the Attorney General did not 
 know it, even upon the trial,) the King, as I heard, 
 entertained some notions of systematic violence; 
 because he said, " If with my /amily I cannot 
 " enjoy my amusements in the midst of my people, 
 *' let them take my life, for existence is not worth 
 " holding upon such conditions." 
 
 Sheridan and Richardson were both dreadfully 
 annoyed by this miserable business. The royal 
 favour had for a long time rather inclined to the 
 rival theatre. Mr. Sheridan, upon some late occa- 
 sions, showed, that he knew how to drop the 
 language of PARTY upon any grand and vital ques- 
 tion. The King had applauded his ENGLISH 
 feeling on the subject of invasion ; and now they 
 apprehended such an outrage would beget a dis- 
 taste to the place where it was perpetrated, and 
 Drury Lane once more become a stranger to the 
 royal presence. But the condition of the maniac 
 
 s 4
 
 DEATH OF GEORGE STEEVENS. 
 
 dispelled every doubt; and, however untrue the 
 position, (for FACTION seldom rages without the 
 murderer in her train,) it was best to have it 
 thought, that the blameless life of the Sovereign 
 secured him, as reasonably it ought to have done, 
 from even the possibility of a personal enemy. It 
 is well for government to hold such language, but 
 it would be criminal indeed to act upon the pre- 
 sumption that it was true. Forty years' experience 
 have at least settled my own conviction upon this 
 subject. 
 
 The reader would be little likely to excuse me, 
 if I omitted to notice during the theatrical seasoq, 
 the death of a gentleman to whom all English 
 stages are under eternal obligation. George Stee- 
 vens, the editor of Shakspeare, died on the 22d 
 January 1800, at his house on Hampstead Heath, 
 in the 64th year of his age. Of his knowledge as 
 an antiquarian, a critic, and a scholar, he has left 
 his brief but expressive compositions, to speak for 
 him. on pages from which they cannot be removed. 
 In my first volume I have spoken, with the 
 feeling which it excited, of a very unnecessary 
 publication -by Mr. Hayley, rendered even mali- 
 cious, when it is considered, that in a place where 
 there should enter nothing but the spirit of TRUTH, 
 he had himself exhibited the following verses as 
 the character of Mr. Steevens. I make not the 
 least apology for their insertion in this place-, 
 they do proudly keep one over his grave, and are
 
 SKETCH OF GEORGE STEEVENS. 265 
 
 inimitable for nicety of discrimination, and, as I 
 think, perfect resemblance. 
 
 " Peace to these ashes ! once the bright attire 
 Of Steevens, sparkling with ethereal fire! 
 Whose talents, varying as the diamond's ray, 
 Could fascinate alike the grave or gay. 
 f 
 
 " How oft has pleasure in the social hour 
 Smil'd at his wit's exhilarating power ! 
 And truth attested, with delight intense, 
 The serious charms of his colloquial sense ! 
 His genius, that to wild luxuriance swell'd, 
 His large, yet latent, charity excell'd : 
 Want with such true beneficence he chear'd, 
 All that his bounty gave his zeal endear'd. 
 
 " Learning, as vast as mental power could seize, 
 In sport displaying, and with graceful ease, 
 Lightly the stage of chequer'd life he trod, 
 Careless of chance, confiding in his God ! 
 
 " This tomb may perish, but not so his name 
 Who shed new lustre upon Shakspeare's fame ! " 
 
 A few venial errors " set off his head," I affirm 
 the above to be a just record of George Steevens. 
 Yet this gentleman has been assailed with a perfect 
 wantonness of abuse, and his censurers have for- 
 gotten the sanctuary afforded by the grave, to 
 errors infinitely greater than his. The elements 
 were in truth very strangely mingled in him. You 
 heard frequently of sportive mischief, that pro- 
 voked your anger and your laughter ; you also 
 heard of munificence, of tenderness and charity,
 
 SKETCH OF GEORGE STEEVENS. 
 
 that made the bosom swell, and filled the eyes 
 with tears. 
 
 For several successive years, I used to converse 
 with Mr. Steevens, frequently three times during 
 the week, and enjoyed, with very dear friends, his 
 wisdom and his wit. He appeared to me to have 
 made his morning walk from Hampstead, an equal 
 exercise to his fancy and his frame; and many of 
 the pleasantries with which he daily amused the 
 town, were, no doubt, among the reveries of this 
 " solitary walker" 
 
 It was assuredly no slight misfortune to come 
 under the lash of George Steevens ; for he had so 
 sure a tact in seizing upon the ludicrous points of 
 a vain, a weak, or a false character, and his exhi- 
 bitions were so neat and peculiar, and given in 
 terms so provokingly apt and so sure to be remem- 
 bered, that a dozen words might have the effect of 
 rendering their object, at least for years, ridiculous. 
 He had not perhaps taken the most favourable view 
 of our mixed and imperfect nature, and commonly 
 .received with suspicion the attentions which were 
 paid to him from sincere regard. So absolutely 
 had this feeling worked itself into a habit, that 
 when, in the dangerous illness before his last, I 
 walked out to Hampstead to see him, he asked with 
 earnestness, " whether I had really taken the trou- 
 ble for that sole object." And upon my assuring him 
 that such was positively the fact, the peculiar 
 glance of distrust vanished from his countenance,
 
 SKETCH OF GEORGE STEEVENS. 267 
 
 and he became, though then far from well, as ani- 
 mated, as cordial, and even more communicative, 
 than I had ever known him to be. 
 
 I remember that, while we were enjoying the 
 fine air from the heath together, he gave me a very 
 interesting topography of his neighbourhood. The 
 house he lived in had been one of public entertain- 
 ment, known by the title, perhaps sign, of the 
 Upper Flask ; to which Addison and Steele, a cen- 
 tury back, had resorted, and where, if the subjects 
 of the Tatlers and Spectators were not conceived, 
 the minds were certainly invigorated, which pro- 
 duced that unparalleled series of periodical essays. 
 
 A doubt was once started, however remarkable, 
 whether Mr. Steevens, though he had chosen Shak- 
 speare as the basis of his literary fame, had a sound 
 and hearted preference for his genius. His opi- 
 nion as to the character of Hamlet, that as to his 
 Sonnets, replete as they are with the very language 
 of his plays, and a variety of notes not very respect- 
 fully couched, will be adduced by those who advo- 
 cate such a suspicion. The taste of Mr. Steevens 
 may be reasonably deduced from his composition ; 
 and that is invariably marked by sarcasm and point. 
 His genius led him to satire and to epigram. I am 
 not likely to forget the peculiar animation with 
 which he this day expatiated as to the powers of 
 Dryden. " Were I," said he, "a young man, I would 
 " begin the study of English versification in the 
 " rhymed plays of Dryden." As I suppose I ex-
 
 268 SKETCH OF GEORGE STEEVENS. 
 
 pressed some surprise at this singular declaration, 
 he asked, " Where in the whole compass of our 
 " literature I could find any thing superior to the 
 " following passage in the second part of the Con- 
 " quest of Grenada ? " He then, from memory, 
 recited in his silver voice, and giving the full har- 
 mony of every line, the satirical exclamation of 
 Lyndaraxa, in the second scene of the third act. 
 
 " O, how unequally in me were join'd 
 A creeping fortune, with a soaring mind ! 
 O lottery of fate ! where still the wise 
 Draw blanks of fortune, and the fools the prize ! 
 These cross, ill-shuffl'd lots from Heav'n are sent ; 
 Yet dull Religion teaches us content. 
 But when we ask it where that blessing dwells, 
 It points to pedant colleges and cells ; 
 There, shows it rude, and in a homely dress, 
 And that proud WANT mistakes for happiness." 
 
 Mr. Kemble, upon my quoting it to him, said it 
 was a noble specimen of the peculiar force of Dry- 
 den. But as I am not going, at least on this occa- 
 sion, to give a full detail of my observation of Mr. 
 Steevens, I here take leave of a character too vari- 
 ous to be easily drawn, too important to be slightly 
 handled ; at once a lesson and a problem. 
 
 I may, however, indulge a wish, that he should 
 retain the proud distinction of being, perhaps, the 
 best editor of Shakspeare ; and that, differing toto 
 ccelo as they did on many points, Mr. Steevens 
 should not entirely merge into Mr. Malone ; and, 
 if the practice continue, at last sink, in the accu-
 
 COLMAN'S. 269 
 
 mulating stream of illustration by which the mar- 
 gin of Shakspeare is in danger to be overflowed. 
 I could really desire to be permitted to replace him 
 in the modest limits of his own FIFTEEN volumes ; 
 with a few improvements as to disposition merely ; 
 and the very slender accession indeed of certain 
 amendments of the text, and explanations which, 
 on the whole, appear to be more felicitous even 
 than his own. 
 
 The Haymarket Theatre was now, in its turn, to 
 be given up to the foul fiend. Accordingly, on the 
 2d of July, the pantomimical drama of Obi, or 
 Three -fingered Jack, the maimed hero, Prohpudor! 
 by that elegant actor, Charles Kemble, was per- 
 formed before a most crowded, brilliant, and judi- 
 cious audience. The additions thus made to the 
 vulgar tongue were of great value. We became 
 acquainted with the Obi woman, with Tuckey, and 
 Jenkannoo, Quashee and Quashee's wife ; and the 
 region of Foote and the Colmans was shifted into 
 that of Sadler's Wells, or Astley's, or the Circus. 
 
 But on the 16th Charles Kemble redeemed the 
 credit of the theatre, by his very clever play called 
 the Point of Honour, which was in the first place 
 extremely interesting, and in the second, exceed- 
 ingly well acted, by himself as well as others. It 
 was a maiden production. 
 
 The manager of this theatre now assumed, I have 
 no sort of doubt with the royal sanction, the names 
 of Arthur Griffenhoofe, Jun. which, if my friend,
 
 Sir George Naylor, can examine for laughter, he 1 
 may probably find duly enregistered in the College 
 of Arms ; if he do not prefer seeing and enjoying 
 the Review, or the Wags of Windsor ; for which 
 he need not wait long, while Caleb Fawcett, I beg 
 his pardon, Quotem, is in existence. For John 
 Lump, it is with sincere regret that I announce, 
 from alarming symptoms of late, my despair of the' 
 perfect recovery of that Yorkshire Bumpkin.
 
 271 
 
 CHAP. XIV. 
 
 SEASON OF 1800-1801. KEMDLE DESIROUS TO PURCHASE, 
 
 RE-ASSUMES THE MANAGEMENT. MRS. MONTAGU. 
 
 KEMBLE'S REMARK THAT LADY'S WISDOM. DR. MON- 
 
 CEY. MARBLES. CONDESCENSION. CATO IN LYBIA.' 
 
 " THE SOLDIERS. BLANCHARD. MRS. S. KEMBLE. 
 
 VIRGINIA. GEORGE COOKE AT COVENT GARDEN s 
 
 CHARACTERISED HIS RICHARD CRITICISED COM- 
 PARED WITH KEMBLE. LIFE, BY REYNOLDS. ANTO- 
 NIO FAILS. COOKE'S KITELY. MR. KEMB^E'S LEAR. 
 
 LETTERS. KING JOHN. POOR GENTLEMAN. CYMBE- r 
 
 LINE. DEAF AND DUMB. LA PEROUSE COOKE'S SIR 
 
 GILES. ADELMORN. COOKE'S CONDUCT. 
 
 T HE winter season of 1800-1801 commenced about 
 the usual time ; Drury Lane Theatre once more 
 under the management of Mr. Kemble. He re-, 
 turned to this unthankful office with some idea of 
 still closer connexion with that house. Sheridan 
 had thrown out hints tha| upon a proper consider- 
 ation, he should be willing to dispose of a part of 
 the property, and Mr. Kemble conceived that if 
 he were himself in possession of a FOURTH of the 
 concern, and by the steady assertion of a right,
 
 272 KEMBLE RE-ASSUMES THE MANAGEMENT. 
 
 could restrain Mr. Sheridan from his intromissions, 
 or, perhaps, buy him out altogether, the theatre 
 might flourish once more under him, as it had done 
 under Mr. Garrick, and his career close, as he 
 wished it to do, by his being patentee of Drury 
 Lane play-house. 
 
 Should the reader feel astonishment at the im- 
 providence of his entering into such a scene of piti- 
 ful disgraces and endless embarrassments, I then 
 tell him from Mr. Kemble's own mouth, " that 
 " the theatre, fairly treated^ was a profitable con- 
 " cern; this was a fact," he said, " about which he 
 " could not be mistaken, as all the accounts during 
 " his former management had in course been in- 
 " spected by him, and were accurately known to 
 " him." But he was sensible of the necessity of a 
 very entire reform ; and as he was always an object 
 of real or feigned dread to the whole generation of 
 fattening reptiles about such a concern, so his 
 return to the management was attended by the 
 usual obsequiousness and the usual hypocrisy. 
 But it was not new to him. Horace touches the 
 state of things, within and without the walls of 
 Drury, to the syllable. 
 
 " Seditione, dolis, scelere, atque libidine, et ira, 
 Iliacos intra muros peccatur, et extra. 1 ' 
 
 Epist. ad Lollium, v. 15. 
 
 Mr. Kemble, as well from prudence as taste, 
 opened with Hamlet. The beginning of a season
 
 DEATH OF MRS. MONTAGU. 
 
 is rather thinly attended, but Shakspeare's attraction 
 is always superior to any other ; besides, it was 
 cause and consequence closely united in the 
 management of your greatest actor you will enjoy 
 your greatest poet. 
 
 Shakspeare had just lost his illustrious pupil, his 
 most eloquent defender, Mrs. Montagu, at an 
 advanced age. She died on the 25th of August 
 1800. The preparation of her mind was excellent ; 
 the great author of the Life of Cicero* assisted in 
 her education. Of her book upon Shakspeare, 
 without expecting the praises of commentators, it 
 may be fame enough to ask, where there is such 
 anotlier ? Her house was the resort of the learned 
 and the tasteful, and her charities were more orna- 
 mental toPortman Square than her abode, elegant as 
 it was, and still remains. As Mr. Kemble passed the 
 front of it with me, he pointed to the newly placed 
 hatchment, and exclaimed in a subdued tone, 
 
 " There's a GREAT SPIRIT gone !" 
 
 But the reader shall not take this upon even his 
 word, and yet it was one that never paltered with 
 the TRUTH. I will place before him a part of her 
 counseltoa learned, but eccentric physician of sixty- 
 five,who talked to her of retirement from active life. 
 Remark the dignity of tone the male power of 
 expression. 
 
 " I much approve of the style and temper of 
 
 * Dr. Conyers Middleton. 
 VOL. II. T
 
 LETTER OF MRS. MONTAGU. 
 
 " your last letter, as far as it inclines to that decent 
 " share of retirement and meditation, which be- 
 " comes the age of sixty-five. But, as in a gay and 
 " dissipated life, the faults and levities of YOUTH 
 " would continue longest upon you, have a care 
 " those of AGE do not advance faster in your retreat 
 " It is the great misfortune of man never to be 
 " without enemies. The passions in his own breast 
 " are the most dangerous he has. No bolt or bar 
 " can exclude them. In the silence of the night 
 " they are heard ; they invade every solitude, how- 
 " ever deep. When the gay illusions of the world 
 " spread no longer their temptations to our fancy, 
 " there may arise spirits of great power and in- 
 ' fluence to haunt our dark retreats. Pride, dis- 
 " content, suspicion, selfishness, and the whole train 
 " of unsocial passions, like the spectres of the 
 " night, stalk about us. 
 
 " We had better entertain idle affections than 
 " MALIGNANT PASSIONS. If you retire, from an 
 *' opinion, that mankind are insincere, ungrateful, 
 " and malignant, you will grow PROUD, by reflect- 
 " ing, that YOU are not like these Pharisees. We 
 " should retire, from a sense of our own faults, 
 " with a desire to correct them, and have leisure 
 " for self-examination. This is the spirit of Christian 
 " philosophy. By frequently considering our own 
 " errors, we lose the bitterness we should perhaps 
 " express when we perceive the vices of others. 
 " If you find you grow more indulgent to your fel-
 
 ANECDOTE OF KEMBLE. $75 
 
 " low-creatures in your retirement, be assured you 
 " have spent your time VERY PROFITABLY. I should 
 " have a higher opinion of the uses of retirement, 
 *' if I saw it produce the fruits of BENEVOLENCE, 
 
 " Of HUMILITY, Of CHARITY. 
 
 * * * * 
 
 *' In your retired hours, think much of your own 
 " state in respect to God and the world ; as little 
 " as you can of the conduct of others towards YOU. 
 " Do not harden your heart against mankind by 
 " too intense meditation on their vices and follies. 
 " Consider them as you do your patients ; ad- 
 " minister to their infirmities : give to some advice, 
 " and to ALL a good example." 
 
 The letter from which the above is extracted, 
 was written in the year 1762, to Dr. Moncey, of 
 Chelsea. Her portrait by Sir Joshua Reynolds, 
 was not long since exhibited in Pall Mall. I 
 regarded it with veneration, for it was absolute 
 identity. An exquisite profile of her, when young, 
 shows that she was then as beautiful as she was 
 wise. 
 
 From Portman Square, Mr. Kemble and I con- 
 tinued our walk, till we came to Park Lane, where 
 he saw some chimney-sweeps playing at marbles. 
 Poor fellows," said he, " they have lost their 
 patroness!" then going up to them "Do you 
 know, Boaden, that I think TAW the best thing I 
 play?" I laughed, I believe, at the fancy; but he 
 suddenly called out, as he had done when a boy,
 
 ">7 (> MARBLES. 
 
 " Fain dribbling," and taking up a marble that lay 
 at the greatest distance from the ring, he knuckled 
 down, and in the real and true style struck out of 
 it the marble he aimed at. He rose in the greatest 
 glee to find he had lost no skill in this early ac- 
 complishment, and, dropping a shilling into the 
 ring, in the name of Mrs. Montagu, passed on. 
 
 They who love the light parts of a SOLID CHA- 
 RACTER, will not disdain this whim of my great 
 friend. They who are obliged to keep a rigid 
 stateliness in their OWN movements, will think 
 this condescension of Cato ought to have been 
 spared. 
 
 This peculiarity of doing a whimsical thing with 
 the most Cervantic gravity, displayed itself on 
 another occasion in the lobby of the theatre, while 
 he was manager. I had been dining with him and 
 Mrs. Kemble, and in the evening we walked down 
 to the house, as was his custom, to give his ultimate 
 instructions for the night. As we entered the hall 
 of the theatre, about a dozen soldiers were stand- 
 ing on each side of the fire-place, who had, perhaps, 
 carried him off the stage, as Alexander, upon their 
 shields. Upon seeing their leader, they all took 
 off their hats to him, and stood firmly, as a soldier 
 is taught to do. Kemble turned himself suddenly 
 round to me, and said, " If you have a guinea 
 about you, give it to me." He but seldom, I 
 think, took much money out with him, and NEVER 
 carried it long. I gave him what he wanted, and
 
 CATO AND THE SOLDIERS. 277 
 
 then, with a wink, that led me to observe him, he 
 gravely advanced to the soldiers, and thus ad- 
 dressed them. 
 
 " Soldiers ! when Cato led his army across the 
 " burning deserts of Lybia, he found himself 
 " parched up with drowth ; in plainer words, he 
 " was very dry. One of the soldiers stepped out 
 " on this, unperceived, and brought him presently 
 " some water in his steel cap. What do you think 
 " Cato said to the soldier? I'll tell you. * Com- 
 " rade,' said he, * drinker*/ YOURSELF.' Now, I 
 " dare say, Cato never in his life led braver men 
 " than I at present see before me ; therefore, to 
 " follow so great an example, do you drink that for 
 " ME." And he put the guinea into the hands of a 
 non-commissioned officer. The manly troop sent 
 after him a " God bless your honour!" and we went 
 on to his dressing-room. " Boaden," said he, " I 
 " doubt I am not quite right in my story, but the 
 " BEER will help our friends to swallow it." He 
 repaid me the loan very pleasantly, for he added 
 to it, I remember, ONE HUNDRED pounds, that, 
 some how or other, he had gotten for me from the 
 treasurer. To resume the regular course of my 
 narrative. 
 
 On the 27th of September, Mrs. Siddons opened 
 her season, with the character of Isabella, and Mr. 
 Kemble acted Biron in his usual interesting man- 
 ner. A long tried and very useful servant of the 
 public, Mr. Blanchard, on the 1st of October, 
 
 T 3
 
 #78 MR. BLANCHARD. VIRGINIA. 
 
 made his debut in town, at Covent Garden, in 
 Acres, in Sheridan's Rivals, and Crack, in Knight's 
 Turnpike Gate. He was then, and is still, fitter 
 for the latter style of character than the former. 
 I was going to say with Hamlet, that " millions of 
 Acres" would hardly weigh against the FEE SIMPLE 
 of Dodd, in the land of Folly. 
 
 Mrs. Stephen Kemble being in town, on a visit 
 to Mrs Siddons, Mr. Kemble asked her for a single 
 night, to act Ophelia to his Hamlet. She followed 
 it by a Cowslip of artless nature, and in both cha- 
 racters showed the town what they lost, by her 
 unavoidable residence in the north. 
 
 Mrs. Plowden, a fashionable lady, the wife, I 
 believe, of the author of Jura Anglorum, had 
 fancied herself strong enough for dramatic com- 
 position, and an opera by her, called Virginia, was 
 acted at Drury Lane on the 30th of October ; it 
 was not bearable in any one scene, and could not 
 be given out by all the efforts of John Bannister. 
 Mr. Kemble came forward, and very emphatically 
 impressed his management upon the public ear; for 
 thus he addressed the audience. " The respect, 
 " ladies and gentlemen, that I have always shown 
 " to your opinion, whenever I have had the honour 
 " of conducting the public amusements of this 
 " theatre, leads me to regret that it should be 
 " adverse to this piece. I must naturally feel 
 <* interested in the success of every dramatic work 
 " that is presented at this theatre ; but at the same
 
 FIRST APPEARANCE OF COOKE. 279 
 
 " time I most sensibly feel the deference which is 
 " due to your decision." He then withdrew the 
 fair author and her opera, and announced that 
 everlasting stop-gap at Drury, A Bold Stroke for 
 a Wife. 
 
 The 31st of October was an era in stage history. 
 Mr. Harris, in the person of the celebrated George 
 Cooke, obtained an actor, who in some characters 
 of tragedy was thought by the crowd even superior 
 to Kemble, But it was not only by the million that 
 he was so esteemed; there were men of consider- 
 able intelligence who joined in this decision. Mr. 
 Cooke made his first appearance in the character 
 of Richard III. In his expression he was sar- 
 castic ; in his figure, manly ; in his gait and the 
 motion of his arms awkward, but impressive. The 
 singularity of his utterance was, that he spoke with 
 two voices, one of which was harsh and acrimo- 
 nious, the other mild and caressing. The great 
 secret of his effect in speaking, was a rapid tran- 
 sition from one of these sounds to the other: He 
 used the first either to control or convince the 
 second to soothe or betray. 
 
 When I first saw Cooke, his fin-like arms moving 
 like a tortoise, and heard for half an hour his rage 
 and his cunning, I confess I thought he might be 
 given up to the pencil of Stephana in the Tempest. 
 
 Ste. " Four legs and two voices ; a most delicate monster ! 
 " his fonvard voice now is to speak well of his friend ; his 
 " backward voice is to utter foul speeches and to detract." 
 
 T 4
 
 280 COOKE CHARACTERISED.. 
 
 But I learned to moderate this censure, and even 
 to look upon him, as far as effect was concerned, 
 to be a " tower of strength." It is true, he was 
 only the robust half of Digges, at best, for he had 
 not the slightest pathos ; and so convinced were 
 his audiences of this want, that I do think a white 
 handkerchief in the hand of Cooke would have 
 thrown them into a fit of immoderate laughter. 
 
 Cooke was by nature a strong man, and, as far 
 as bad habits permitted, had great strength of 
 mind : his acting evinced both ; he never tired 
 under the extremest vociferation ; he never yielded 
 his own judgment, or seemed at all to value the 
 opinions of others. His temper was critical and 
 sarcastic, and it led him to subtle distinctions, that 
 looked like thought, but were frequently any thing 
 but reasonable. When, in the 7th scene of the 
 oth act, the heroic mind of Richard is hurrying on 
 to the grand point, the charging of the ENEMY, the 
 following passage occurs, in which two of his 
 admired varieties were to be found. 
 
 CCATESBY hastily enters, having been dispatched by Richard 
 to lord Stanley.] 
 
 K.Rich. What says Lord Stanley? will he bring his power? 
 
 Gate. He does refuse, my lord ; he will not stir. 
 
 K. Rich. Off with his son George's head. [Distant march.'] 
 
 Norf. My lord, the foe's already past the marsh : 
 After the battle let young Stanley die. 
 
 K. Rich. Why, after be it then. 
 
 A thousand hearts are swelling in my bosom : 
 Draw, archers, draw your arrows to the head : 
 Spur your proud horses hard, and ride in blood.
 
 COOKE'S RICHARD CRITICISED. 281 
 
 At tliis juncture, his decision as to young George 
 Stanley is a thing of the instant ; either his life or 
 death are of little moment ; they are as grains of 
 sand whirled from a chariot-wheel in rapid rota- 
 tion. Mr. Cooke fastened upon this precise point 
 of time to affect deliberation, and stood, as his ad- 
 mirer acknowledges, swaying his body backwards 
 and forwards, till he settled the fate of young 
 George, and relieved the almost agonized spec- 
 tators, by " after be it then." The very next line, 
 the reader sees, makes it impossible that Richard 
 could have been deliberating about a thing so 
 trifling : 
 
 " A THOUSAND hearts are SWELLING in my bosom!' 
 
 If Cooke did say " my bosom," (I think he did,) 
 he was wrong again. Richard does not mean to 
 indulge his vanity ', by an insult to OTHER natures : 
 he hoped, perhaps believed, his followers to be as 
 brave as himself. He merely expresses the ex- 
 panding energy and thick palpitation of the heart, 
 by words that mean, " I feel as if I had a thousand 
 " hearts within me." But the best fooling, after 
 all, was the attempt to dismount the archers from 
 the horses, which, without his new emphasis, he 
 conceived it must be inferred they bestrid. 
 
 " Spur your proud horses hard," 
 
 addressed to the cavalry j having already ordered 
 the foot soldiery, the English bowmen. As 'if the 
 
 <*- ft* 

 
 COOKE'S RICHARD CRITICISED. 
 
 two directions were not already as separate as sense 
 could make them 
 
 Draw, ARCHERS, draw your arrows to the head! 
 Spur your proud horses hard, and ride in blood ! 
 
 and a turn of the head sufficing to show, that they 
 were applied to different divisions of his force ! 
 
 The best of the joke is, that the new emphasis, 
 if it did not leave the foot on horseback, ordered 
 PARTICULAR men to spur at least their coursers hard, 
 whatever others who had horses might do, mounted 
 or dismounted. 
 
 " Spur YOUR proud horses hard, and ride in blood." 
 
 To prove all these points we have nothing to do 
 but to look at original Shakspeare. Richard's in- 
 struction there as to young Stanley, is , 
 
 " Off instantly with his son George's head." 
 
 And upon Norfolk's suggestion that it should be 
 after the battle, the intrepid tyrant disdains to 
 waste a single word upon such a subject, and never 
 notices the advice of Norfolk, nor decides upon it 
 AT ALL ! Shakspeare, too, himself, settles the whole 
 business of the archers, and the cavalry, by making 
 Richard address distinctly THREE distinguished 
 parts of his army his yeomen his archers 
 his knights or lancers. 
 
 Fight, gentlemen of England ! fight, bold yeomen ! 
 
 * * * * * #
 
 COOKERS REAL EXCELLENCE. 283 
 
 Draw, archers, draw your arrows to the head ! 
 * *f*. * * * * 
 
 Spur your proud horses hard, and ride in blood; 
 Amaze the welkin with your broken staves ! 
 
 And thus men get the fame of learned acting : 
 aye, and of being Shakspeare's best commentators 
 too, who, like their great leader, QUIN himself, 
 never on any occasion look at a single page of his 
 genuine works. 
 
 I have just touched these points, to show that 
 the fame at least of some new readings is not likely 
 to be very old, and that every understanding is not 
 calculated to add to the prescribed meanings of the 
 stage. The real excellence of Cooke, like that of 
 Macklin, was a certain sturdy force and cunning 
 combined, which fitted him for the very parts in 
 which the veteran himself excelled. Not suffi- 
 ciently heroic nor dexterous for Richard, he suc- 
 ceeded powerfully in Shylock, in lago, and in the 
 Man of the World. In these he did not fear, and, 
 in honest truth, had no occasion to fear, any com- 
 petition in his own times. But his Sir Pertinax, on 
 the whole, wanted the mellowness of Macklin ; and 
 the lago and Shylock were inferior to Henderson's, 
 the former in deep revenge, the latter in passion. 
 He sometimes, too, in a plain blue coat, and black 
 stockings, with a round hat in his hand, commu- 
 nicated so much consequence to a character, (Pe- 
 regrine, for instance,) that nobody could touch him. 
 A sizeable shelf of pamphlets, I believe, might
 
 ggt COOKE COMPARED WITH KEMBLE. 
 
 even yet be found, all written by utterly disin- 
 terested persons, comparing Cooke with Kemble, 
 in Richard. The writers professed to know per- 
 sonally neither of those actors, and to write their 
 very falsehoods purely for the love of TRUTH. The 
 reader shall judge by a small sample. "In soliloquy 
 " Mr Kemble' s eyes and attentions were entirely 
 " devoted to the audience ; nothing could exceed 
 " in this respect the delicate caution of Mr. Cooke. 
 " The indifference of Kemble in the scene with 
 " Lady Anne rendered his suit quite hopeless ; the 
 " wheedling Jlattery of Cooke was the likeliest 
 ' thing on earth to succeed." Both actors, it will 
 be observed, necessarily spoke the same words. 
 " When Richard has attained his object, and his 
 " brows are circled with a 'glorious diadem,' the 
 " reflection on the means by which he had obtain- 
 " ed it, and its probable insecurity, rendered the 
 " manner of Cooke fretful ; that of Kemble was, it 
 " seems, uniform" As Benedick says, " I can see 
 " yet without spectacles," and I saw no such 
 thing. " In Mr. Kemble's three first acts," and 
 probably the critic thinks, the first jour, " he had 
 " neither intelligent action nor expression." The 
 vinegar aspect of Mr. Cooke and the wagging 
 of his fins shall pass for both, with all my heart, to 
 people capable of forgetting the features of Mr. 
 Kemble, and the graceful and yet powerful em- 
 ployment of every part of his figure. The author 
 of these profound parallels " would have the great
 
 REYNOLDS'S NEW COMEDY, LIFE. 285 
 
 characters of Shakspeare performed with that sim- 
 plicity with which they are written." I have 
 no objection, certainly, wherever that simplicity 
 can be found : only I cannot say I should have 
 chosen Mr. Cooke for the model. Old Ireland used 
 to talk of the sweet simplicity of Shakspeare's soul ; 
 but then he might judge from the body of his 
 works in his own possession. How often must 
 these people be told, that Shakspeare, in serious 
 composition, is a more elaborate writer than even 
 Milton. 
 
 Theatres, like every thing else, produce their 
 fruits of season ; one of these is a comedy by Fre- 
 derick Reynolds. Accordingly, on the 1st of Nov, 
 Covent Garden exhibited one of his best, called 
 Life, of which the fable was extremely interesting, 
 and even pure, beyond this writer's usual practice. 
 The Marchmonts were beautifully acted by Murray 
 and his daughter. The incident it turns upon is 
 too much, I am afraid, like life. The husband is 
 seduced from his wife by a regular decoy. March- 
 mont is ruined, and the wife disappears, and, it is 
 supposed, dies. She has given to her husband a 
 daughter, of whom he is dotingly fond, and of 
 whose education he takes the utmost care. Time 
 operates some changes in NATURE ; more, and more 
 rapidly, in the DRAMA, Under the name of Belford 
 the mother becomes the governess to her own 
 daughter. Marchmont, recovered from his delu- 
 sions, turns author ; and his wife sends her own
 
 286' MR. GODWIN'S TRAGEDY OF ANTONIO. 
 
 story to him as a novel she is composing; this leads 
 to recognition and reconciliation. Old Primitive, 
 her father, who has patronised her also, without 
 the smallest notion that she was his daughter, is at 
 hand, with the treasury of the stage at his disposal. 
 This secures a proper husband for the grand- 
 daughter, in Sir Harry Torpid, who is rather a 
 misnomer, since he contributes to the happiness of 
 others. 
 
 The farcical incidents of the piece (for such there 
 must be, it seems) are found among the Lackbrains, 
 whose cottage Primitive expects to see again, 
 modest and humble, like its owners ; but he finds 
 the house turned out of doors his protege drunk, 1 
 and his wife giving a route. Their destiny is 
 therefore reversed, and better people in his own 
 family receive the old gentleman's property. 
 
 That a daughter may have outgrown her father's 
 knowledge is possible; but that a husband, while 
 their daughter is still young, should not know his 
 wife, is a strain of probability, detected by Jigure, 
 features, manner, and the most unchangeable of all 
 things, voice. But these are venial stage offences, 
 and the play had great and deserved popularity. 
 
 Mr. Kemble, on the 13th of December, brought 
 out a tragedy written by Mr. Godwin, called An- 
 tonio, or the Soldier's Return. The second title 
 was too trivial almost for comedy. This play had 
 been accepted during the recess in Mr. Kemble's 
 management The author is a man of genius, cal-
 
 FABLE OF ANTONIO. 
 
 culated rather to furnish the materials of plays 
 than the plays themselves. Few men have more 
 deeply meditated the drama than Mr. Godwin. 
 How he could conceive the fable of Antonio suffi- 
 cient for a tragedy of five acts is, I confess, sur- 
 prising to me. 
 
 With the royal sanction, Helena D'Almanza is 
 married to Don Guzman. She had been previously 
 betrothed to Rodrigo, who has been taken prisoner 
 in battle. Her brother Antonio arriving to solicit 
 his friend's ransom, finds that he has lost his in- 
 tended bride as well as his liberty. Spanish honour 
 leads him, by the aid of his brother Henry, to carry 
 off their sister from a country seat of her husband. 
 They place her in a convent with great secresy, 
 and she is compelled to take the vows. The 
 husband in vain tries to discover the place of his 
 wife's concealment. At length Don Henry, re- 
 penting his share of the violence, reveals the name 
 of the convent. She is brought to court, and, to 
 end all contest, begs to be allowed to fulfil her 
 vows. The king is resolute for her remaining with 
 her husband. Antonio, to save his honour, and 
 signalise his revenge, stabs his sister to the heart. 
 The fable of Tancred and Sigismunda is but slight, 
 yet is it infinitely more interesting, as well from 
 the rank of the lover, as the struggle in the heroine 
 between affection and duty. She is a victim, more- 
 over, because she renders the latter triumphant. 
 
 Dr. Johnson remarks upon a description of plays
 
 288 COOKE IN KITELY.. 
 
 among us, " which, by changing the catastrophe, 
 " were tragedies to-day and comedies to-morrow.*' 
 Surely if Antonio's arm had been held, or his sword 
 mastered by Guzman, nobody would have been 
 surprised to find this whole fable in one of Mrs. 
 Centlivre's comedies. But when a writer has great 
 force of sentiment and great splendor of diction, he 
 is apt to think he can render captivating a fable of 
 no intrinsic power. 
 
 The play failed altogether, notwithstanding 
 Kemble was the Antonio and Mrs. Siddoris the 
 Helena. Charles Kemble was of course her other 
 brother. Mr. Godwin on this occasion was really 
 a philosopher ; and I think himself all but enjoyed 
 the ridiculous stage dilemma about his catastrophe. 
 Here, again, as in the case of Colman's Iron Chest, 
 I am apt to suspect the fear of offending the author 
 injured the play. The part of Alonzo was heavy, 
 and of unconscionable length. Mr. Kemble had 
 much better have used his knife than burdened 
 his memory. The names recurred, too, so inces- 
 santly upon the ear, that it must have been obvious 
 no one but an author's could endure them. 
 
 Cooke at the other theatre added really to his 
 reputation by]acting the character ot'Kitely, in Ben 
 Jonson's Every Man in his Humour. The rank in 
 life of Kitely was not above the manners of Cooke. 
 His hasty striding of the stage backwards and for- 
 wards, the circular position of his arms, and the see- 
 saw of the body during his meditation, were in
 
 REVIVAL OF KING LEAH. 289 
 
 Kitely appropriate, but in Macbeth vulgar and in- 
 sufferable. I have already dilated upon the acade- 
 mic and vulgar styles in acting. At the head of 
 each, meaning the best of each by infinite degrees, 
 I place Kemble and Cooke. 
 
 Mr. Bayes, at Drury Lane this Christmas, ex- 
 hibited himself in pantomime with great effect ; he 
 called it Harlequin Amulet, or the Magic of Mona. 
 Johnston, the mechanist, made them a dragon of 
 surprising terror, and serpents that were anything 
 but tempting. The historians of Harlequin record, 
 that in this pantomime Mr. Byrne ran up a perpen- 
 dicular wall, and over the top of a house, with such 
 amazing velocity, that it was impossible to detect 
 the means by which he was assisted. It was a very 
 popular performance. 
 
 Mr. Kemble's principle was, as I have often 
 stated, to keep Shakspeare as his own great dis- 
 tinction. On the 3d of January, 1801, he revived 
 his King Lear with every care of management, and 
 it was productive of both fame and profit to the 
 theatre. It is really delightful to have a mingled au- 
 dience all gratified, and the wisest man among them 
 take no exception to the source of their pleasure. 
 
 Lear was followed by King John, most splen- 
 didly decorated ; but there was the usual difficulty 
 to obtain, notwithstanding the great houses, either 
 salary for those who brought them, or even colours 
 and canvas in the painting-room. How other peo- 
 ple wrote may be easily imagined, when the follow- 
 ing reached the treasury from Mr. Kemble. 
 
 VOL. n. u
 
 290 DIFFICULTIES AT DRURY. 
 
 " MY DEAR PEAKE, 
 
 " Let me remind you, that you are to send me 
 FIFTY pounds for Mrs. Siddons to-day, or we 
 shall have no King John on Saturday. 
 
 " If you possibly can, send me a draft for the 
 fifty pounds (which you promised to have given 
 me last Monday se'nnight) for the author of 
 Deaf and Dumb. 
 
 " They are standing still in Greenwood's room, 
 for want of a little canvas. Unless you 'help us 
 there, we can have no Cymbeline, nor no panto- 
 mime at Christmas. My wish is to bring out the 
 pantomime two or three days before Christmas. 
 
 " I am very lame, but mending. Do call on 
 one, as you go by. 
 
 " Yours, J. P. KEMBLE. 
 
 " Thursday, Nov. 27th, 1800. 
 " No. 89, Great Russell Street, 
 " Bloomsbury Square." 
 
 A REMINDER. 
 
 " MY DEAR PEAKE, 
 
 " We are all at a stand for want of colours. If 
 you will help us, you shall have Cymbeline and 
 full houses. Otherwise, we must go on with the 
 West Indian, &c. Yours, J. P. KEMBLE. 
 
 " Monday Morning." 
 
 " ONE MORE, and that's the last." OTHELLO. 
 
 " Tuesday, half-past five. 
 " MY DEAR PEAKE, 
 
 " It is now two days since my necessity made
 
 DIFFICULTIES AT DRURY. 
 
 me send to you for SIXTY pounds. My request 
 has been treated with a disregard, that I am at a 
 loss how to account for. 
 
 " I certainly shall go, and act my part to-night 
 but, unless you send me a HUNDRED pounds 
 before Thursday, I will not act on Thursday 
 and if you make me come a-begging again, it 
 will be for TWO hundred pounds before I set 
 my foot in the theatre. 
 
 " I am, dear Peake, yours, 
 
 " J. P. KEMBLE." 
 / 
 
 The reader has had now a peep at some of the 
 " secrets of that prison-house," the treasury of a 
 theatre ; and has seen how the very manager of it 
 was compelled to dun incessantly for himself and 
 others. He may also perceive how the aids re- 
 quired dribbled out from the strong box, and that 
 they never supplied more than one exigence at a 
 time. King John ought to have been done on the 
 29th of November, 1 800 ; I suppose Mrs. Siddons 
 did not get her fifty pounds, for the play was not 
 ready till the 14th of January. Cymbeline, it ap- 
 pears, was all but ready, as far as it rested with 
 Mr. Kemble, the beginning of December ; but it 
 could not be brought out till the 12th of February, 
 1801. The Dragon and the Rattle-snakes, however, 
 were absolutely at work on the 22d of December. 
 
 Mr. Colman this year produced a comedy at 
 Covent Garden Theatre, called the Poor Gentleman. 
 It was acted the first time on the 1 Ith of February, 
 
 u 2
 
 292 THE POOR GENTLEMAN. 
 
 and received with great and merited applause. 
 With respect to his ground-work, Mr. Colman's 
 fancy had been more excursive than usual some 
 of his characters are from Canada, some even from 
 Russia. The Brambles are here all entertaining 
 people the author seems to have respected the 
 name that Smollet has immortalised. The Worth* 
 ingtons are the worthiest people in the world ; and 
 as to Ollapod, the doctor, the sportsman, and the 
 cavalry volunteer, it was such a compound of 
 whimsical extravagance, that it found full employ- 
 ment for the vigorous humour of Fawcett. Some- 
 thing very like the character Colman, perhaps, 
 saw in this period of military passion. The Lucretia 
 Mac Tab of Mrs. Mattocks was a class rather than 
 an individual, and received with shouts of laugh- 
 ter by the audience. Lewis had, in Frederick 
 Bramble, that struggle in which he delighted, be- 
 tween dissipation and humanity, and never distin- 
 guished himself more happily. 
 
 Mr. Kemble at last delivered to the general ad- 
 miration the result of what his taste and judgment 
 had enabled him to do for Cymbeline. The 
 anachronisms of the great poet combine the gene- 
 rals of Augustus with modern Italians, human sa- 
 crifices and modern luxuries in Britain. More in- 
 congruity than this play exhibits will not easily be 
 found; but all-atoning nature in the characters, 
 the sentiments and the expression, with incidents 
 picturesque in the truest sense, and nearly endless 
 variety, render it a favourite on the stage of our
 
 KEMBLE IN POSTHU.MUS. 
 
 times. Here a problem arises of difficult solu- 
 tion as to Shakspeare. If we did not know the 
 contrary, we should be apt to conclude that, dra- 
 matically, he lived upon anticipation. His fancy 
 for ever prompted him with scenery, that his Globe 
 could never even affect to exhibit ; and it was, 
 probably, some strong feeling of the contrast be- 
 tween his means and ends, that led Mr. Steevens, 
 against all authority, to conclude, that there must 
 have been moveable, painted, perspective scenes in 
 the theatres of Shakspeare's time. 
 
 However, the period was come when we no 
 longer had to request the spectators to 
 
 " Piece out our IMPERFECTIONS with their thoughts" 
 
 The scenery of this play, with some bearing 
 upon the confusion of the manners, was a beautiful 
 melange. The acting of Posthumus by Kemble 
 was then, as ever, delightful. Imogen had the full 
 charm of the Siddons, and every body else did all 
 that could be expected from zeal and diligence 
 under so able a teacher. But what Mr. Kemble 
 used to call the prettiest thing he ever saw upon 
 the stage, was the elegant rusticity of the two boys, 
 Guiderius and Arviragus, performed by C. Kem- 
 ble and young Decamp ; who really looked to be 
 of the same family. 
 
 In the last scene of the play, Belarius presents to 
 the King the young Princes whom he had stolen, and 
 kept with him in his banishment. The exclamation 
 of their father is full of nature. 
 
 u 3
 
 DEAF AND DUMB. 
 
 " If these be they, I know not how to wish 
 A pair of worthier sons. Guiderius had 
 Upon his neck a mole, a sanguine star ; 
 It was a mark of wonder." 
 
 The innocent enjoyment with which Charles Kem- 
 ble presented himself for the verification of this 
 natural test, did not escape the tasteful eye of his 
 brother. " THAT now, Charles," said he, " was the 
 " POETRY of acting." Thus he had fixed there, with 
 no fading charms, Lear, John, and Cymbeline, and 
 they brought a succession of very brilliant houses. 
 
 Nor was this the end of our able manager's la- 
 bours for the season : he had, as his letter already 
 given shows, procured a translation from the play of 
 Mr. Bouilly, called Deaf and Dumb ; and, as was his 
 custom, revised it with the utmost care. He deter- 
 mined upon acting the virtuous Abbe de FEpfe him- 
 self, and cast the interesting unfortunate Theodore, 
 I will say, equally well. Miss Decamp had a power 
 of expression in look and gesture, that was even 
 more intelligent than language ; it was the light- 
 ningofthe mind, and reduced the labour of disclosure 
 to a, point, and the detection of villany to a, glance. 
 
 Mr. Kemble aided this pantomime of my fair 
 friend by a benevolence that was quite paternal j 
 he appeared to love his pupil as a son, and followed 
 his indications with the decision and the zeal of the 
 most enlightened philanthropy. The play was in 
 all its parts most perfectly acted. The great mas- 
 ter of the English stage needed no foreign lessons 
 in his own art j but, when writing to his brother
 
 LA PEROUSE. 
 
 from Paris, in the summer of 1802, he notices that 
 he had seen his rival, Monvel, in the Abbe, and ad- 
 mired his performance ; tfre rest of the performers 
 he thought inferior to the English. The play here 
 had the greatest possible attraction. 
 
 Mr. Fawcett, at the other house, took his turn to 
 amuse, if not instruct, by his really clever historical 
 pantomime of La Perouse, or the Desolate Island. 
 This piece was founded upon a drama by the prolific 
 Kotzebue. The navigator becomes another Robin- 
 son Crusoe, and his preserver is a better sort of 
 Ourang Outang, named a Champanzee, whose 
 sagacity is not only diverting, but often very essen- 
 tial. Poor Menage skipped through this semi-rational 
 brute with untiring activity and intelligence. Far- 
 ley, every way the first in this sort of exhibition, 
 directed the whole performance. I seize the pre- 
 sent opportunity to express my sense of his indefa- 
 tigable exertions for the public amusement during 
 a long series of theatrical seasons. He is a master 
 in his art, and a most worthy man. 
 
 Michael Angelo Rooker, an artist of very great 
 talent, died on the 3d of March this year, in Dean 
 Street. In small figure, for book embellishment, 
 he equalled De Loutherbourg ; and some of his 
 scenery for old Colman was quite upon a par with 
 what that great artist had left in Garrick's theatre. 
 When a child, I remember looking over him in the 
 front of the house, while with a rapid pencil he 
 freely, but adequately, sketched the procession of 
 the Jubilee, as the characters passed.
 
 COOKE IN SIR GILES OVERREACH. 
 
 On the 12th of March, Mrs. Jordan resumed her 
 performances for the season with the Country Girl. 
 It seemed to be understood at Drury, that she now 
 entirely laid down the dagger of the serious muse. 
 Universality is a proud hope to indulge, but in 
 practice mischievous. If, in the train of either 
 muse, an actress suffers by comparison, t\\e failure 
 in the one operates as an abatement of the excel- 
 lence in the other ; and persons, who would not be 
 thought malignant, are among the foremost to ex- 
 claim " Aye, but did you see THALIA in tragedy 
 " the other night? THERE was a business!" 
 
 Mr. Cooke, at Covent Garden, on the 8th of 
 April, added Sir Giles Overreach to his list of parts. 
 He played it as he did Richard, and there he was 
 strictly right in every thing he did. In the con- 
 vulsive agony, however, he was only noisy ; his 
 face refused to supply what breath failed to utter. 
 Still, the exultation and the horror, alike, were per- 
 fect only in Henderson. 
 
 The stage is condemned to perpetual imitation. 
 A ghost is followed by a long train of spectres. 
 Even defects of nature take their turn to interest, 
 and the deaf and the dumb and the blind are selected 
 for amusement. The success of Deaf and Dumb 
 at Paris, probably conducted Morton to the Blind 
 Girl. He therefore, not entirely, casts away a 
 surgeon on the coast of Peru, who, by his huma- 
 nity, first saves a lovely blind girl from violation, 
 and ultimately by his skill restores her to sight 
 The reader will naturally expect the nuptial couch
 
 ECCENTRICITIES OF COOKE. 297 
 
 to be the reward of so successful an experiment. 
 This was an opera, with some character, equivoque, 
 pleasantly, song, dance, procession and picturesque 
 dresses well acted and greatly admired. It was 
 first performed on the 12th of April. 
 
 Mr. Kemble next produced a tragedy by Mr. 
 Sotheby, the accomplished translator of Oberon. He 
 struggled with the tedious horrors of Count Julian, 
 through five acts, the detail of which I omit, be- 
 cause the play proved completely unsuccessful. 
 
 To Adelmorn, the outlaw, he was not quite so 
 complaisant ; that hero was bestowed upon Charles 
 Kemble. Monk Lewis promised here to surpass 
 the effect even of the Castle Spectre. His ghost 
 appeared three times on the first performance, 
 but once was afterwards found more than sufficient. 
 The dialogue was rather mean, and was often re- 
 ceived with laughter by the audience. It occupied 
 a few nights of the month of May. 
 
 On the llth of this month Mr. Cooke took the 
 first of those strange liberties with the public, that 
 afterwards became insulting and insufferable. He 
 came on in Richard, and could not be heard ; and, 
 upon being desired to speak out, had the audacity 
 to exhibit signs of contempt and menace to a part of 
 the audience ; and, in an abrupt manner, walked 
 off the stage at nearly the end of the fourth act. 
 Upon his coming on again, and showing some signs 
 of contrition, he was permitted to finish the part. On 
 the 17th and 18th of June the winter theatres closed.
 
 298 
 
 CHAP. XV. 
 
 SEASON OF 1801-2. THE GREAT RIVALS. COOKE DIS- 
 APPOINTS THE PUBLIC. MRS. BILL1NGTON AT BOTH 
 
 THEATRES. HENRY SIDDONS. ESCAPES. COOKE's 
 
 AUDIT. MRS. BILLINGTON'S ILLNESS. REYNOLDS. 
 
 FOLLY AS IT FLIES. BROWNE. MRS. LICHFIELD. 
 
 KEMBLE'S ZANGA. HIS REQUEST. BRAHAM IN THE 
 MANLY ROBE. HENRY THE FIFTH. A RIOT QUEL- 
 LED BY THE MILITARY. R. PALME R FALSTAFF. 
 
 ALFONSO. URANIA. THE CABINET. THE DILETTANTI. 
 
 MR. KEMBLE ANNOUNCES THE DUKE OF BEDFORD'S 
 
 DEATH. THE WINTER'S TALE. COOKE*S SIR PERTI- 
 
 NAX. STRAWBERRY HILL COMEDY. MR. KING'S RE- 
 TIREMENT. HONOURS PAID TO HIM. CLOSE OF THE 
 
 SEASON. MR. KEMBLE QUITS DRURY LANE. THEATRI,- 
 
 CAL PROPERTY. SOME CLAMOUR AGAINST HIM AND 
 
 HIS FAMILY. NOVELTIES AT COLMAN's. 
 
 THE summer theatre, during the season of 1801, 
 lost the valuable aid of Charles Kemble, who had 
 determined to indulge himself in a tour through 
 Germany. Miss Decamp, too, declined the same 
 summer engagement, and their retreat made room 
 for Henry Johnstone and his wife. Mr. Colman 
 this summer was so amply frequented to his stock 
 pieces, that he needed but little novelty, and the
 
 RIVAL TRAGEDIANS. 299 
 
 little he had was of no value. There was a two- 
 act farce, called the Gypsey Prince, which was 
 rendered bearable by some very pretty music by 
 Kelly ; and a thing called the Corsair, or the 
 Italian Nuptials. The vigour of H. Johnstone 
 and Farley, with a program a yard long, and new 
 scenes by the dozen, rendered it somewhat in- 
 telligible to the spectators, arid I am afraid, in the 
 long list of annual horrors of this kind, that the 
 Corsair must have been often pirated. 
 
 On the 12th of September, the Drury Lane com- 
 pany commenced the season of 1801-2 with the 
 performance of Richard the Third and. No Song No 
 Supper ; and it was intended that the rival trage- 
 dians should decide their difference in Bosworth 
 Field, and a mighty difference, to be sure, existed 
 between .them. But on the 14th, Covent Garden 
 Theatre was found wanting in its champion, and 
 some most flighty extravagancies from the over- 
 heated zeal of Murray drove him from the contest 
 with the pit orators. Lewis then advanced, and 
 offered the discontented their money back. Seven 
 o'clock, however, having by this time arrived, and 
 the majority remaining immoveable, the whole 
 audience took Lovers' Vows with Selima and Azor 
 instead of their money ; and having by this ac- 
 quired some taste for the drunken insolence of 
 Cooke, they now waited for all the tribe of apolo- 
 getic letters, certificates from physicians, true as 
 to the illness, but in course concealing the cause of
 
 300 MRS. BILLINGTON. 
 
 it, and the prodigy's own excuse, if he could be 
 kept in his senses to make one. In the summer 
 his marriage with Miss Daniels, fortunately for the 
 lady, had been annulled by Sir William Scott. 
 
 We were now advancing rapidly to that ex- 
 travagance in the terms demanded by great sing- 
 ers, which nothing short of madness would think 
 of complying' with. The instance which I am 
 about to offer, is one as to a lady, for whom I have 
 expressed always the warmest admiration. Mrs. 
 Billington had formed an engagement to sing 
 alternately at the two theatres, from October to the 
 April following, for which the proprietors were to 
 secure to her (benefits included) 20001. from each 
 treasury. She sang on the 3d and 8th of October, 
 and (in her case 1 may say) acted Mandane in 
 Arne's noble opera Artaxerxes, with powers little 
 short of wonderful. Mrs. Billington's figure here 
 was, as it should be, majestic ; there was that visibly 
 about her, that rendered the interest credible. We 
 are grown tired, or ought to be by tliis time, of 
 receiving every slip of a girl, with neither manners 
 nor motion above a ballad-singer, warbling, how- 
 ever prettily, the sublimities of Arne. We should 
 feel the ridiculous still more strongly, if they were 
 to endeavour to miss the higher parts in tragedy. 
 
 On the 8th of October, Mr. Henry Siddons, the 
 elder son of the great actress, made his first ap- 
 pearance in London. He very unluckily chose 
 for his debut the character of a German lawyer in
 
 THE ESCAPES. 
 
 a very moral insipidity, called Integrity. It lasted 
 only a second night, and no author was named for 
 the failure. It might be the actor's own. The 
 appearance of this gentleman denoted very clearly 
 the stock he came from but he walked the stage 
 ungracefully, and though his features were ex- 
 pressive, the expression was not captivating ; and 
 the judgment, that regulated his delivery, could 
 do little in the modulation of a hoarse and heavy 
 quality of voice. He was ardent and sensible, 
 feeling and correct but the most that prepos- 
 session even could do, was to breathe a wish 
 that he might not have deceived himself in his 
 choice of a profession. On the 12th, he showed 
 more of his powers in the great trial part of Hamlet. 
 Defective modulation of the organ was principally 
 to be noted, and the character was neither " the 
 glass of fashion, nor the mould of form." Siddons 
 never was etherial ; he was a studious, ingenious, 
 and careful man, greatly respected, but as an 
 actor only respectable. 
 
 A very pleasing afterpiece, called the Escapes, or 
 the Water Carrier, claims a line of notice, because it 
 had some really charming music, selected from 
 Cherubini, and composed by Attwood, and also 
 that it was extremely serviceable to Covent 
 Garden. 
 
 At that theatre, on the 19th of October, Mr. 
 Cooke came to his audit for the disappointment 
 which he had occasioned on the first night of the
 
 30 MR. BILLFNGTON IN MANDANE. 
 
 present season. He entered before the curtain 
 in the dress of Richard, and addressed the au- 
 dience. " He acknowledged that he had no 
 " permission to stay in the country so long as 
 " he did ; that it was certainly in his power- to 
 " have appeared at the proper time before them ; 
 " he expressed his deep regret for their disappoint- 
 " ment, and would now do his best in their service 
 " if they were so indulgent as to permit him." 
 
 In all these cases the present result is clear ; a 
 people, who come to be amused, will not go away 
 without their entertainment. He who can gratify, 
 will always be pardoned ; but the ease of his absolu- 
 tion confirms him in his trespass ; at last he grows 
 too indecent to be borne, too insecure to be trusted ; 
 and, in an odd sort of struggle between his vice 
 and his necessity, is sometimes docile, and at others 
 refractory ; followed, in spite of his errors, on 
 account of genius which they seem to enlarge ; 
 till intemperance finally destroys the frame, and he 
 is regretted, bya strange inconsistency, often beyond 
 the steady, the umblameable servant of the public. 
 
 The disappointments suffered from the gentler 
 sex in theatres are at all events of a gentle cha- 
 racter slight caprice, not often; real indis- 
 position ; and, in the greatest talents indeed, an 
 affection for home on certain evenings of the week, 
 commonly known by the name of boa: fever. 
 
 Poor Mrs. Billington, on the 21st of October, 
 acted Mandane again at Drury Lane, and through
 
 FOLLY AS IT FLIES. 03 
 
 two acts had exerted herself, so that no illness was 
 felt to fetter her powers at all, and she sang with 
 her utmost brilliancy. At the end of the second act, 
 she had suddenly dropped down, and a succession 
 of most alarming fits rendered it impossible for her 
 to go on with the character* Mr. Kemble himself 
 explained her situation to the public, and they allow- 
 ed the farce to begin, instead of any mutilated 
 attempt at the third act of the opera. 
 
 The real cause was, that the day before, she had 
 sent for Mr. Heaviside, the surgeon, to inspect her 
 arm, which was much inflamed, and gave her very 
 acute pain. Mr. Heaviside at length, on the morn- 
 ing of the 21st, took out an entire needle from be- 
 low the right shoulder. The arm had assumed a 
 black appearance, and her friendly surgeon dissuaded 
 her strongly from venturing to the theatre ; but 
 she could not bear to disappoint the public, and 
 yet struggled in vain against the dread of mortifi- 
 cation from the blackness of the arm. Happily, 
 no such consequence followed the accident. In a 
 fortnight she got well. 
 
 On the 29th, Reynolds again delighted the town 
 with a comedy called Folly as it Flies. The serious 
 incidents are the consequences of dissipation; but 
 his Lady Melmoth not being depraved, though 
 deluded, recovers her wits at last by the aid of her 
 virtues, and even comfort is secured by cutting off 
 ail entail in the fifth act. Fortunately that entail 
 was not the generous Tom Tick (Lewis), nor the
 
 304 PETER POST QUIT. 
 
 legacy hunter, Peter Post Obit (Munden). This 
 character, the hwredipeta of antiquity, untouched, 
 I think, upon the modern stage, was suggested by 
 the 197th and following paper of the Rambler. 
 Dr. Johnson exposes the folly of sacrifices in order 
 to obtain legacies and shows that the tricks to 
 conciliate favour may be always betrayed by an 
 accomplice. Reynolds looked at the character, as 
 he commonly did at ALL characters, on the ludi- 
 crous side. He contrives, therefore, to embarrass 
 his legacy-hunter with all the debts of Tom Tick, 
 in order to become his heir, and assigns over to 
 him even a guardianship of Leonard's mistress* 
 So that seriously and comically he is provided 
 amply to his catastrophe. 
 
 Peter Post Obit, it should be stated, is not at all 
 indebted to Le Legataire, of Regnard, which the 
 author, I believe, never read to the present hour. 
 The French nation once delighted in the wit, in 
 the sallies of pleasantry, in the general air of 
 enjoyment, that breathed through the writings of 
 Regnard. His gaiety is cultivated, his eccen- 
 tricity is amiable. But the spectators of such a poet 
 must learn to be hearers, and enjoy themselves 
 like rational beings. They, like ourselves, must 
 get back again from the eye to the ear, or all that 
 is excellent in the drama will be, like the other 
 antiquities of the nation, the entertainment of the 
 studious, and confined to the closet. 
 
 On the 27th of November, to the Gamester of
 
 THE REVENGE. 305 
 
 Mr. Browne, a very judicious actor, Mr. Cooke 
 performed Stukely with considerable effect ; not 
 so plausible, not so genteel as John Palmer, yet 
 the visual prepossession against him got over, he 
 played it powerfully. I mean by this, that any- 
 body might be gulled by him, who could once 
 bring himself to endure his company ; but Palmer 
 looked qualified to ensnare and ruin the brightest 
 spirit. Mrs. Litchfield made a very powerful im- 
 pression indeed, in Mrs. Beverley, among those 
 accustomed to the wonders of Mrs. Siddons. Is 
 it possible to bestow praise more enviable ? Mur- 
 ray, in Jar vis, had more passion than Aickin, and 
 was, personally, quite as respectable. 
 
 Mr. Kemble, on the 4th of December, revived 
 Dr. Young's tragedy, the Revenge. His Zanga, 
 at any time, repaid the utmost attention of a re- 
 fined audience. Dr. Young, though not a secure 
 model for tragic writers, because he is frequently 
 turgid, and, as in the Night Thoughts, (a subject 
 still more solemn,) devoted to flowery prettiness, 
 and Italian conceits, is nevertheless, in the charac- 
 ter of Zanga, always poetical, impassioned, and 
 sometimes even sublime. To this part, therefore, 
 Mr. Kemble ardently devoted every congenial 
 feeling of his mind, and it was a performance that 
 ranked absolutely with the author's power. On 
 this night he had a great house, and one, unfortu- 
 nately, uncommonly noisy. In a word, they were 
 not Athenians. In the middle of the fourth act, 
 
 VOL. II. X
 
 306 EXPOSTULATION. 
 
 he saw clearly, that if the gods thus continued to 
 keep their " dreadful pudder" o'er his head, his 
 fine burst, in the fifth act, where the whole con- 
 centered venom of the fiend thunders out 
 
 " Know then, TWAS I," 
 
 might be as well sung as spoken ; so he suddenly 
 stopped, in the midst of a speech, and addressed 
 the noisy, with a sweetmeat of respect, to induce 
 them to bear a dose of very cool and even sarcastic 
 counsel. I insert it, though some succeeding 
 managers have gone far beyond him in the tone 
 of such expostulations. 
 
 " LADIES AND GENTLEMEN, 
 
 " We cannot express how much we feel obliged 
 " to you, for the honour of your attendance ; but, 
 " at this rate, the object of your visit must be 
 " completely frustrated. We must, therefore, 
 " entreat you to condescend to favour us with a 
 " little more of your ATTENTION." 
 
 The turbulent were literally quelled by it; " go- 
 '* verned their roaring throats," and vehemently 
 " applauded their monitor." 
 
 The 9th of December, 1801, claims a particular 
 record in stage history, as introducing Braham, 
 now an adult, to the complete honours of vocal 
 excellence. He acted the generosity of Alia Ben- 
 salla, a king of Ceuta ; and sang such music as
 
 REVIVAL OF HENRY V. 307 
 
 Mazzinghi and Reeve supplied for himself and 
 Storace, in an opera written for them expressly by 
 Prince Hoare, called Chains of the Heart, or the 
 Slave by Choice. Munden bustled through the 
 business of a grand slave-master, and Storace was 
 his favourite. Fawcett was remembered for a 
 dancing-master, and Johnstone was an O'Pfelim, 
 a cook to a regiment of Portuguese. The piece 
 needed improvement, and by the authors docility, 
 became somewhat better in its progress. 
 
 Mr. Kemble, on the 14th, at the other house, 
 revived again his Henry V., and was as greatly 
 and justly admired in that hero as ever. Let me 
 grace even Kemble with praise from the judicious. 
 The late Earl of Guilford esteemed his fifth Henry 
 the most perfect of his performances. He wrote 
 an essay upon it, in my possession, with the ut- 
 most elegance, and quite decisive as to its various 
 merits, if any body, critically, had ever questioned 
 them. 
 
 On the 26th of December, one of those dis- 
 gusting scenes of barbarous riot occurred at 
 Covent Garden, originating from the monstrous 
 practice of carrying spirits into the theatre, and 
 generally providing, among the lower orders, for 
 a few hours' entertainment, as if they were to gar- 
 rison a town besieged. The play was Richard III. 
 The first missile that threatened execution was a 
 wine glass. On the entry of Betterton, as Tressel, to 
 Murray, who acted King Henry VI. a quart bottle 
 
 x 2
 
 308 RIOT AT COVENT GARDEN. 
 
 grazed his hat ; the actor took it up, and walked 
 off the stage. The indignation of the audience 
 burst out against the villain, who was, after an 
 obstinate resistance, secured where he sat, in the 
 front row of the two-shilling gallery, on the King's 
 side, Some very unlucky alterations in the per- 
 formances, from indisposition, kept up the Satur- 
 nalian licence of the rabble, and the trumpets, and 
 the shouts of Bosworth Field, could not be heard. 
 The actors became a sort of Shrove Tuesday sport 
 to these brutes ; and they enjoyed and prolonged 
 the agile feats of Emery, who jumped away with 
 singular misery, from the various throws at him, 
 consisting of all the apples and oranges supplied 
 by the fruit women. Something like this occurs 
 in international warfare, and the merchant pro- 
 fitably supplies the enemy with ammunition, to be 
 used against his country. 
 
 The farce was hurried over ; the ladies would 
 not, at last, come upon the stage ; the pit took 
 part in the tumult ; the lights were extinguished, 
 and the benches were becoming unseated, when 
 BRANDON, at the head of a few remaining soldiers, 
 with their bayonets fixed, about Jive guardsmen, 
 on a sudden appeared in the gallery. The glitter- 
 ing steel had a very calming effect upon the mis- 
 chievous, and this cruel and dastardly mob slunk 
 away in haste out of the theatre, then nearly quite 
 dark. 
 
 And if " considerations infinite" did not make
 
 R. PALMER IN FALSTAFF. 309 
 
 against it, considerations to which theatres, with 
 their whole treasures of either instruction or amuse- 
 ment, are indeed nothing, I could always wish the 
 MILITARY to act on such occasions ; because, when 
 the storm rages, any other action is very bad acting 
 indeed. Nothing but the fear of their lives will 
 alarm our rabble sufficiently to quiet them. 
 
 Dibdin, this year, invented for Mr. Harris, a 
 very clever pantomime, called Harlequin's Alma- 
 nack, or the Four Sea-sons. It was quite a maga- 
 zine of changes, and the scenery was beautifully 
 painted by Hollogan, Whitmore, and Cresswell. 
 
 On the ilth of January, 1802, Mr. Kemble 
 allowed R. Palmer to attempt the character of 
 Falstaff, in the first part of Henry IV. He had 
 the bustle and the roar of an old stager, who might 
 have been endured in Pistol, but never advanced 
 to the brain of FalstafF. To see how grossly un- 
 founded theatrical pretensions will sometimes be : 
 here was an actor of no marked comic humour, 
 seldom seen too in any parts of more than slight 
 importance, bold enough to try to swagger through 
 the compilation of all humours, the " mountain 
 of delight," 
 
 " The COMIC WORLD in one." 
 
 For thus Sir John is characterised by Garrick, 
 in an Ode, remarkably true as to character, how- 
 ever defective in the higher tone of poetry. 
 
 Mr. Kemble and Wroughton were the Hotspur 
 x 3
 
 S10 ALFONSO. 
 
 and King Henry, and very admirable indeed was 
 the skill they both displayed. Only that one 
 wanted more of it, I thought Kemble's Hotspur 
 quite upon a par with hisjlfth Harry. 
 
 On the 15th, Mr. Lewis's tragedy of Alfonso, 
 King of Castile, was brought out at Covent Garden 
 Theatre. This writer was a man of talent, and one 
 of the coolest conversers that I ever knew. It was 
 only in his inventions, or perhaps imitations, that 
 he revelled in guilt and horror. His fancy teemed 
 with monsters ; treason, frenzy, lust, poison, 
 stabbing, shooting, parricide, suicide; the dun- 
 geon, the battle, and that MINE of dramatic wealth, 
 a blow up, with the usual garb of language for such 
 members, extravagant and bombastic rants, and 
 such a prodigy as Alfonso stalked portentously 
 before a gaping croud. 
 
 I should really sicken, to tell the story of this 
 tragedy, which embraces every one of the charming 
 characteristics just enumerated. But let me not 
 defraud the meritorious. Mrs. Litchfield, in the 
 disgusting Ottilia, was extremely powerful ; the 
 Johnstones, male and female, did, I think, full 
 justice to the author ; and the virtues of Orsino sat 
 unusually well upon Cooke. I remember, it was 
 a full hour too long ; some critics said FOUR. 
 
 The Hon. Mr. Spencer, on the 22d, exhibited 
 Miss Decamp in a very pleasing musical enter- 
 tainment, called Urania. There is a print of her 
 in this character, and riot very unlike. Charles
 
 THE CABINET. 
 
 Kemble was a prince of a preternatural turn, whose 
 illuminated mind is devoted to unseen intelligences, 
 etherial spirits, and the whole rabble of the Rosi- 
 crusian system, by which vanity has been led to 
 presume peculiar gifts, and not the wisest of our 
 race have fancied themselves superior to their 
 " even Christian." By a trick he falls in love 
 with the Princess Urania. 
 
 The Popes, in the month of January, passed to 
 Drury Lane Theatre, and were both well received. 
 Among Mr. Kemble's revivals in this, his last 
 season, were the Distressed Mother, the Mourning 
 Bride, the Orphan, the Double Dealer^ and the 
 Winter's Tale. 
 
 At the other house, T. Dibdin's very entertaining 
 opera of the Cabinet began its musical course on 
 the 9th of February, and as my readers are per- 
 fectly acquainted with a piece so popular and 
 amusing, I hardly need to preserve more in this 
 work than the names of a perfect concert of com- 
 posers, who joined in the music of the Cabinet 
 Reeve, Moorhead, Davie, Corri, and Braham ; and 
 to add that, for vocal strength, it had the powers of 
 Braham, Incledon, and Storace ; and that of acting 
 merit, it boasted of Munden, Fawcett, Emery, and 
 Blanchard ; Mrs. H. Johnston, Mrs. Mattocks, and 
 Mrs. Davenport. 
 
 It is not dramatically true, that, " when things 
 " are at the worst, they will mend." Mr. Cumber-
 
 312 A DILLETANTJ SOCIETY. 
 
 land had been writing himself down, with a zealous 
 rapidity quite unequalled, and on the 2d of March 
 he distressed his friends before and behind the 
 curtain equally, by a non-descript, called Lovers 9 
 Resolutions. It was heard to the end, and properly 
 withdrawn by the author. % 
 
 I dare say, that it is at present but partially 
 known, that the concert of ancient music was once 
 given in Tottenham Street; however inconveniently 
 the rooms at that time were situated for the attend- 
 ance of the higher orders. A dilletanti society, in 
 March 1802, opened the place for the performance 
 of French two-act comedies and proverbs the 
 subscribers paid five guineas each, and one guinea 
 in lieu of the Pic-nic. As they needed wine at 
 their collations, and none could be sold there, so 
 Mrs. Gilpin's own resource, 
 
 " They would be furnished with their own, 
 Which is both bright and clear." 
 
 Six bottles composed a single quota ; half white, 
 half red. The whole, no doubt, originated with a 
 set of ruined emigrants from France, whom exile 
 and poverty still found gay, and therefore anxious 
 for the spectacle, if they even exhibited themselves. 
 Among the performers, I find the name of my old 
 friend, M. de Nogent, a gentleman of the most tri- 
 umphanttemper, that ever blessed a human creature. 
 In society, the gentlest, blandest being that I ever
 
 TRIBUTE TO THE DUKE OF BEDFORD. 313 
 
 knew. Contented with little, unaffected and divert- 
 ing ; he was better than Harlequin to a child, and 
 more than a physician to its father. 
 
 On the 9th of March, after the Beggar's Opera, 
 Mr. Kemble, in full mourning, came forward, and 
 in the name of the proprietors announced, that on 
 Thursday next, that theatre would be closed, on 
 account of the funeral of the Most Noble Francis 
 Duke of Bedford. This tribute of respect to the 
 ground landlord of the edifice was feelingly ap- 
 proved by the audience. His grace's character is 
 matter now of history ; but charity may hope, 
 that it is more accurately drawn by Mr. Fox, 
 though impassioned at the moment by recent loss 
 
 and remembered kindness, than by Mr. Burke, 
 
 t 
 
 irritated by attack, and resenting an injury. But 
 I am sensible that, in a great degree, party feeling 
 will long continue to decide between compositions 
 so opposite in their character and tendency. I 
 leave upon my page, with pleasure, the most striking 
 paragraph of Mr. Fox's eulogy. 
 
 " Let it not be thought, to whatever degree I 
 " may be supposed to feel the obligations of private 
 " gratitude or affection, or in whatever light I may 
 " view actions, which whether in relation to the 
 " largest and most important, or to the very least 
 " concerns of my life, will endear his memory to 
 " my heart to the latest hour of it ; let it not be 
 " supposed, that I have taken this unusual oppor- 
 " tunity of expressing them, only to strew flowers
 
 314 MRS. SIDDONS IN THE WINTER S TALE. 
 
 ' over his grave. No, sir ; it is for the sake of 
 " impressing his great example upon the public ; 
 " it is that men may see it, that they may feel it, 
 " that they may talk of it in their domestic circles, 
 " and hold it up, wherever it can be imitated, to 
 " the imitation of their children and posterity." 
 
 The Duke died of the operation for strangulated 
 hernia, in the 3yth year of his age. 
 
 It was on the 24th of the month that Mr. Kemble 
 presented his revival of the Winter's Tale, in all 
 the splendor of decoration and power of acting, 
 that he could impress upon it. I have already 
 remarked the studies of Mrs. Siddons after the 
 antique ; in Paulina's chapel, she now stood one of 
 the noblest statues, that even Grecian taste ever in- 
 vented. The figure composed something like one 
 of the muses in profile. The drapery was ample in 
 its folds, and seemingly stony in its texture. Upon 
 the magical words, pronounced by Paulina, 
 " Musick ; awake her : strike ;" the sudden action 
 of the head absolutely startled, as though such a 
 miracle had really vivified the marble ; and the 
 descent from the pedestal was equally graceful and 
 affecting. In Leontes Mr. Kemble was every thing 
 that either feeling or taste could require ; and the 
 affection of Paulina never had a representative 
 equal to Mrs. Powell. The Perdita was a very 
 delicate and pretty young lady of the name of 
 Hickes, thus much I remember of her; but whether 
 she had more or fewer requisites than other candi-
 
 BRAZEN MASK. 315 
 
 dates for this lovely character, I am now unable to 
 decide. I incline to think that this part is one of the 
 few upon the stage that never was adequately per- 
 formed. It is so difficult, at the proper age of the de- 
 butante, to find a simplicity, almost rustic, combining 
 with the princely impulses that urge their way either 
 to brave disaster, or partake the kindling wonders of 
 unexpected restoration. Our stage princesses are 
 so seldom personally at their ease, and are too sen- 
 sible of an audience, to be much like the royal 
 virgin. Our Perdita seems, in spite of the fifth act 
 of the play, condemned never " to be found." 
 
 Perhaps no revival ever drew greater crowds than 
 this did. 
 
 At Covent Garden, Fawcett invented a terrible 
 robber, called Brazen Mask, who bursts through 
 all fastnesses, and seems something supernatural ; 
 and Mr. Cooke, on the 10th of April, acted Sir 
 Pertinax Mac Sycophant in Macklin's Man of the 
 World, for the first time in London. Although I 
 myself thought the veteran a better impersonation 
 of his own conceptions, yet Mr. Kemble expressed 
 the most unqualified admiration of Mr. Cooke's 
 performance, and said, " that comedy had nothing 
 " like it.*' If any one should remark sagaciously, 
 that " he never said this, nor anything like it, of 
 " his tragedy :" I answer, that he did not want 
 candour enough to make such an admission, had he 
 really thought it ; but it was impossible for him to
 
 316 FASHIONABLE FRIENDS. 
 
 think so ; his conception of all tragedy was of 
 another CLASS but I need not repeat myself. 
 
 There is frequently about managers a desire to 
 profit out of the regular course of business. General 
 Conway's comedy, called Fake Appearances, had 
 been thus smuggled into Drury Lane Theatre, and 
 now a second importation, from some of the family, 
 followed, under the title of Fashionable Friends. 
 Rumour stated it to have been found among Lord 
 Orford's papers ; and it was acted, it seems, at 
 Strawberry Hill, by a set of fashionable friends, I 
 trust of a " better leer" than those of the comedy ; 
 who literally, for their hypocrisy and treachery, 
 their indecency and their sensuality, ought to have 
 been executed in the last act, as an example to an 
 age, of which' they pretended to be a specimen. If 
 it can be fairly fathered upon neither the General, 
 nor Horace, perhaps it might be the enfant trouve 
 of Richard Bentley, not the commentator, but his 
 son, who, with various talents, did nothing to the 
 purpose, in a life of unwilling and sometimes rebel- 
 lious dependance. 
 
 On the second night, 23d March, it was decidedly 
 withdrawn. 
 
 The reader of stage history, if, like myself, he 
 have really seen and known many eminent per- 
 formers, will, like me, suffer pain, NOT equal to his 
 enjoyment, (for such a measure never can be dealt,) 
 but still considerable pain, when, in the decline of
 
 RETIREMENT OF KING. 
 
 31? 
 
 life, a great actor quits a profession of which he has 
 been the distinguished ornament 
 
 I have announced many of these closing scenes, 
 in the course of this work, and the majority of them 
 have unfortunately withdrawn from the stage what, 
 most favourably considered, can never be speedily 
 replaced ; I mean MATURE EXCELLENCE. The 24th 
 of May, 1802, was saddened by the farewell of Mr. 
 King, whose merits, as I always warmly felt them, 
 so I trust they have received from me a suitable 
 and characteristic encomium. He was the father 
 of that respectable circle of performers, who had 
 been bred in the school of Garrick, and who con- 
 tinued through life (none more zealously than Mr. 
 King), to bear testimony to the excellence of their 
 great master. 
 
 Mr. King had latterly been a good deal dis- 
 tressed by failure of memory, and he needed a very 
 painful tensity of care, to keep even his old studies 
 in tolerable condition. However, he acted his 
 favourite, Sir Peter Teazle in the School for Scandal, 
 with considerable effect, for the last time though 
 his face bore rather too evident signs of the ravages 
 of age : indeed, it at all times was very strongly 
 marked, and not flexible to many changes of ex- 
 pression. 
 
 At the termination of the comedy, he came for- 
 ward to address the audience in lines, which Mr. 
 Cumberland had written for him ; and Charles 
 Kemble, with the graceful attention of Orlando to
 
 318 FAREWELL OF KING. 
 
 the old Adam of As You Like It, came on with him, 
 in order to give the- word, if, in his agitation, Mr. 
 King should be for a moment at a loss. I was 
 anxious to see accurately how the great comedian 
 struggled with his feelings, and placed myself im- 
 mediately under him. His eye showed but little 
 but his lip trembled, and his voice faltered. A 
 few lines of the address will merit to be here pre- 
 served. 
 
 " Whilst in my heart those feelings yet survive, 
 That keep respect and gratitude alive 
 Feelings which, though all others should decay, 
 
 WlLL BE THE LAST THAT TIME CAN BEAR AWAY." 
 
 The uneasy notion, that defect must need indulg- 
 ence, is beautifully put. 
 
 " Who, that retains the sense of brighter days, 
 
 Can sue for PARDON, while he pants for PRAISE ? 
 ' On well-earn'd fame the mind with pride reflects, 
 But PITY sinks the man whom it protects" 
 
 Amid the thunders of applause, which the specta- 
 tors bestowed upon a service, an able and finished 
 service, of FIFTY-FOUR years, Mrs. Jordan advanced 
 to lead off the highly-honoured actor, and she con- 
 ducted him to a seat in the Green Room. 
 
 After a little pause, that he might recover from 
 the shock he had just sustained, Mr. Dowton re- 
 quested that he would take a cheerful draught out 
 of a silver cup, which his brothers and sisters of the 
 theatre begged of him to accept, with the accoui-
 
 CLOSE OF THE SEASON. 319 
 
 panying salver, as a mark of their admiration and 
 grateful regard. Suitable return to this was made 
 by Mr. King, who, in the expression of his sensi- 
 bility, assured them that, if his health permitted, 
 he should gratify himself by frequently coming 
 among them. The motto on the cup is happy be- 
 yond parallel. It is from Henry V. Act 5. 
 
 " If he be not fellow with the best king, 
 
 Thou shalt find him the best KING of good fellows." 
 
 The cup was then passed round, and all the 
 children of Thespis drank the KING'S health. Who 
 shall say that the decline of life is divested of its 
 comforts ? The slope sun, westering fast and 
 hastening to its descent, sends up a reviving gleam 
 of radiance to cheer the passenger, before the shades 
 of evening finally enfold him, and he must journey 
 on his way with, at best, subsidiary light. 
 
 On the 24th of June the theatre closed for the 
 season, with Shakspeare's comedy of Twelfth Night 
 and the Flitch of Bacon. Mr. Kemble made the 
 usual acknowledgments for the proprietors and the 
 performers. It was now understood publicly that 
 his connection with the theatre of Drury was at an 
 end, and that he had determined to pass some 
 months in a tour upon the continent. 
 
 The fact was, that he had been in treaty, through 
 Mr. Morris, a very amiable friend, and a dramatic 
 writer, for the purchase of one FOURTH of the 
 Drury Lane property : but Morris was a very
 
 320 KEMBLE AT COVENT GARDEN. 
 
 able lawyer, and the concern could not make him 
 out a title on which he thought it advisable for 
 Mr. Kemble to risk his whole fortune ; the treaty 
 therefore broke off, and Mr. Kemble carried his 
 offer to the rival theatre. 
 
 I shall in course take care, in the notice of this 
 transfer of the Kemble family from the stage of 
 Garrick to that of Rich, to avoid all comments 
 drawn from the event. What primd facie ap- 
 peared to me, for I am indifferent as to any clamour 
 at the time, was that I never could obtain, even 
 from my dear friend himself, any reason for his 
 eager desire to become a purchaser. Suppose, for 
 instance, he was convinced, communibus annis, that 
 theatres were not losing concerns ; he must often 
 have experienced failures from accidental causes, 
 quite out of the controul of the most provident 
 manager that ever existed. A wet season, a severe 
 winter, public calamity, or public caprice, any or 
 all of these, would at times occasion difficulty, 
 without the surer opposition of other not less form- 
 idable circumstances ; such as co-proprietors long 
 radicated in the concern, of great name, and powers 
 and influence, whom it might be frequently im- 
 practicable to conciliate, and certainly ruinous 
 either to thwart or indulge. 
 
 Suppose him to have paid down j30,000, or 
 some other large sum, to Mr. Sheridan, as the price 
 of his fourth share, it followed, in course, that the 
 money must have paid off, at best, some of the
 
 RAGE FOR SPECTACLE. 321 
 
 embarrassments of the house ; or it would give him 
 only a legal title to a bankrupt concern. If thus 
 bestowed, what was afterwards to supply the even 
 moderate demands of a man with the high rank in 
 society which Mr. Sheridan, on the score of his 
 talents, was obliged to maintain? He never did 
 depend upon party his political conduct was 
 marked by some sturdy features of independence. 
 As a member of administration, his dearest friends 
 confessed that he was not calculated for regular 
 application. He was too indolent for office, and 
 too proud at any time to be bought. Richardson 
 was as indolent as himself. 
 
 Surely, surely, the mere " whistling of a name," 
 as one of our poets expresses it, or " the fine notion 
 " of a busy man," in the language of Cowley, ought 
 to have been minor objects to Mr. Kemble, who by 
 professional talent alone, at least commanded near 
 THREE THOUSAND a year, while he had his health ; 
 without a care, because without a risk.* He had 
 seen the signs of these times, and been himself j for 
 others, obliged to obey them. The rage for spectacle 
 he saw ruined a theatre in its wardrobe and paint- 
 ing-room. There could be no hope that the mo- 
 derate days of Garrick would ever return. He had 
 a decent fortune, or he would not have purchased. 
 His sister was even wealthy and he had himself 
 no children. 
 
 * Mr. Kemble's salary, as actor and manager, was 5Q- 14*. 
 per week. 
 
 VOL. II. Y
 
 322 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 I am myself convinced, however irreconcileable 
 such a thing might be .to his general prudence, that 
 he expected to survive those with whom he should 
 connect himself; and that he really then ambitioned 
 a theatre, to be called exclusively after his name. 
 As a proof 'of this, afterwards, in his agreement with 
 Mr. Harris, an additional clause was attached to 
 the deed, by which he was, on the death of the 
 chief proprietor, to have an option of purchasing 
 THE WHOLE at a specific sum, 150,000. 
 
 The clamour to which I have above alluded 
 started from persons connected with the theatre, 
 who endeavoured to excite odium against the mem- 
 bers of a family, which, they said, " had made their 
 " fortunes under the roof of Drury, and now left 
 " it to its fate, to carry all their talents and their 
 " connexions to the rival house." But I have suf- 
 ficiently shown, that they were very disagreeably 
 situated as to the salaries for which they laboured, 
 and they were large creditors of the concern. Even 
 patience itself cannot be entirely without limits. 
 
 The Haymarket season was rather unsuccessful. 
 A three-act comedy, which is rather strongly attri- 
 buted to Morton, and called Beggar my Neighbour, 
 fell under the displeasure it excited : as it was not 
 printed, I cannot, however willing, " dispute the 
 " judgment of the senate ;" besides that it will 
 readily be conceived that Morton, in any dramatic 
 work, would not write meanly, though he might 
 employ his pains upon an unthankful subject.
 
 FAIRY REVELS. 323 
 
 A farce, by Oulton, called the Sixty Third Letter, 
 in the character of Dulcet by Fawcett, afforded 
 rather a novelty ; a footman ballad-mad, who can- 
 not contain himself; if he hear a street organ. But 
 then this is Farce ! utter absurdity rewarded by 
 broad-faced laughter. 
 
 The success, in Paris, of the Jugement de Salo- 
 mon, by M. Caigniez, led me to translate and adapt 
 it for Column's, under the title of the Voice of 
 Nature. I am fully sensible of the impropriety of 
 such a subject NOW, either religiously or morally 
 considered. And I wish no more of it to be re- 
 membered than my thanks to the very excellent 
 performers of the characters. It however excited 
 the feelings of the audience very strongly, and was 
 serviceable to the theatre. 
 
 As far as I remember, the Burletta called Fairy 
 Revels was the first of those pieces, which have 
 littered our stages with precocious children ; some 
 of whom must be admitted to have been prodigies. 
 When we consider the Jlattery or the severity that 
 were necessary to fix the attention of infancy, and 
 make it do the work of maturity ; when we add to 
 this AVARICE in the parent, the danger of late hours, 
 and the indecency of public exposure as they re- 
 spect the children ; the early food supplied to vanity ', 
 and, as a consequence, the utter loss of modesty^ 
 that early and most charming grace of youth j even 
 a corrupt people must shudder, if they are troubled 
 with the slightest reflection in their amusements.
 
 324 ARRANGEMENTS AT THE HAYMARKET. 
 
 Mr. Colman, this season, announced to his per- 
 formers, and at the close of it to the public, that he 
 could engage no one who was not at liberty to join 
 him on the 15th May, and continue with him till 
 the 15th September. This struggle has often been 
 made, and made in vain. The summer manager 
 may " skir the country round" and try to collect 
 an independent troop of at least kindred merit with 
 those which sustain the winter houses. If he suc- 
 ceed, even the excellent soon yield to the stronger 
 temptation of winter engagements, and then as to 
 him become limited ; if he fail, his inferiority will 
 be noticed and his theatre deserted ; for even the 
 decent -will not be borne, if better can be had. 
 
 The best part of Mr. Colman's invitation to the 
 public was " the pledge of his own farther attempts 
 " at dramatic composition, whose pen he hoped, 
 " however long they had encouraged it, was not 
 " yet quite worn out in their service." The whole 
 address, at great length, was very ardently delivered 
 by Fawcett, the acting manager, after the Voice of 
 Nature.
 
 325 
 
 BOOK THE THIRD. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 SEASON OF 1802-3. JOHN BANNISTER STAGE MANAGER. 
 
 MR. GRAHAM AND HIS BOARD. DWYER. COOKE's HAM- 
 LET. CORRECT TEXT, HOW IMPORTANT. COLLINS. 
 
 S. KEMBLE IN FALSTAFF. LEWIS SUDDENLY STRUCK WITH 
 
 APOLEXY. DELAYS AND BLUNDERS. TALE OF MYSTERY. 
 
 MELO DRAME, WHAT. A HOUSE TO BE SOLD. MRS. 
 
 LITCHFIELD. POPE IN KEMBLfi's CHARACTERS. FAMILY 
 
 QUARRELS. THE JEWS. MRS. SIDDONS DISTURBED IN 
 
 IRELAND. DUBLIN LYING-IN HOSPITAL. HER LETTER 
 
 TO F. E. JONES. HOLCROFT'S HEAR BOTH SIDES. CAPT. 
 CAULFIELD'S HAMLET. RANGER. DIMOND'S HERO OF 
 
 THE NORTH. COLMAN's JOHN BULL ITS MERITS. A 
 
 MONODRAME. DEATH OF MR. RICHARDSON. SINGULAR 
 
 CONDUCT OF SHERIDAN. MRS. POPE, THE SECOND, DIES. 
 
 SUMMER THEATRE. CHARLES MATTHEWS. MRS. WIG- 
 GINS. ALLINGHAM. COLMAN*S EPILOGUE TO THE 
 
 MAID OF BRISTOL. ASTLEY's AMPHITHEATRE AGAIN 
 
 BURNT. 
 
 THE departure of Mr. Kemble from Drury Lane 
 Theatre, with the consequent loss of the other 
 members of his family, threw an almost impenetra- 
 ble cloud over its future destiny. Every thing 
 
 y 3
 
 326 BANNISTER STAGE MANAGER. 
 
 seemed to indicate unavoidable ruin. Mrs. Siddons 
 had gone to Ireland. Mr. Charles Kemble still 
 remained, and very awkward it was to remain, in a 
 concern where his duty compelled him to serve a 
 cause, which his family were considered to have 
 deserted. With all his temper and prudence many 
 things must have occasionally reached his ear, not 
 calculated by any delicacy for such a hearer. 
 
 My pleasant friend, John Bannister, undertook 
 the stage department, for which he was exceedingly 
 well qualified ; and in some way or other, HOW can 
 only be accounted for by x the mania, which a theatre 
 excites, and so seldom cures, Mr. Graham, the 
 magistrate, seated himself at the head of a board of 
 management; the other four members, I think, 
 interfered but little. Dramatic productions were 
 read and considered by Mr. Graham j and, what 
 was of greater importance to their authors, his 
 cheques upon the house of Hammersley were^/re- 
 quently paid without difficulty. 
 
 " Magnus ab integro .... nascitur ordo." 
 
 Among the accessions to this company were 
 Dwyer, who was a very passable Belcour, and Cherry, 
 who, as an actor, was the best substitute for King, 
 and sometimes Dodd, that modern times have seen, 
 until Mr. W. Farren, who probably never saw 
 King, returned him to us " renewed in all his 
 " strength, and fresh with life." It gives me no 
 common pleasure to pay this passing compliment
 
 COOKE IN HAMLET. 327 
 
 to the son of my old friend. After long experience 
 in the school of studious and finished acting, I pro- 
 nounce this gentleman to be really an ARTIST. He 
 sees everything in a character; he neglects nothing 
 in his preparation of it, internal or external j a 
 few more such men, with their whole minds in the 
 profession, and we might be stopped in the descent 
 of the art, and find it as intelligent as it will always 
 be amusing. 
 
 On the 27th of September, at the other theatre, 
 Mr. Cooke ventured to perform what he chose to 
 think, Hamlet. I arn pretty conversant with the 
 text of Shakspeare, original and derived. I know 
 the creeping infusion of Hanmer's particles, and 
 the daring alterations of Warburton's lofty confi- 
 dence. I also know the almost incredible igno- 
 rance of our ancient language, common to all the 
 early commentators. But such a text as Mr. Cooke 
 then spoke in the part of Hamlet, I never yet 
 read, and doubt whether it can be found in print. 
 George Steevens used to talk about the town, 
 Harry Howe, the trumpeter's edition of Macbeth ; 
 and a delicious thing I see it is, now lying before 
 me. But Cooke's Hamlet was the greater effort 
 His "definement suffered entire perdition it was 
 " not possible to understand him in a mother 
 " tongue." "Now this," stretching beyond poor 
 Cooke, to all actors and to all times, "is villanous." 
 It is not coxcomry, it is neglectful impudence, or 
 
 Y 4
 
 328 COLLINS. 
 
 insulting ignorance. To be perfect in the words is 
 always in the power of humble diligence. I have 
 seen, in this duty of the performer, such a man as 
 Claremont shame an actor of twenty pounds a week. 
 The great actor may here say, " Look at the com- 
 parative length of our respective characters." I do 
 so ; and merely add, that the lower actor, through 
 the season, probably performs TWENTY different 
 parts in tragedy, comedy, opera, and farce, for the 
 great man's one. But the audience should cure 
 this : they would, if they were as well acquainted 
 with their authors as the French are. How Mr. 
 Cooke acted Hamlet is now not worth talking about. 
 It is quite useless to look into the detail-of one mass 
 of awkward error, besides to the natural admirers 
 of ungraceful men, I should expatiate in vain ; no 
 " euphrasy * or rue" will purge their visual faculty. 
 To the cultivated I have said enough. 
 
 Drury Lane this season had no slight acquisition 
 in Collins, from the Southampton Theatre, an actor 
 not unlike that exquisite rustic, Blanchard of Co- 
 vent Garden, whose plough-boy will long " whistle 
 " o'er the lea" in the ear of the true lover of the 
 art. Stephen Kemble, too, came again to town, and 
 presented in, perhaps, rather more than person, a 
 natural Falstaff. He jested, in a prologue written 
 by himself, with his " huge hill of flesh," and 
 Bannister, who delivered it, was often cheered by 
 
 * " The herb eye-bright and the herb of grace,"
 
 FALSTAFF. 
 
 excessive laughter. But the reader shall judge of 
 the excitement by a few lines. 
 
 " Upon the northern coast by chance we caught him, 
 And hither in a broad-wheel" d ivaggon brought him ; 
 For in a chaise the varlet ne'er could enter, 
 And no mail-coach on such a fare would venture." 
 
 If he should be deficient in the wit and humour 
 of 'the part 
 
 ' He then to better men will leave his sack, 
 And go, as ballast, in a collier back." 
 
 The impression upon my mind is that the natural 
 bulk on the stage distresses with an unlucky asso- 
 ciation of disease ; and that the made-up knight is 
 the only agreeable Sir John. Mr. Stephen Kemble 
 was a man of reading, and an actor of vigour and 
 firmness. His voice was loud and overpowering, 
 and sometimes, in course, deficient in modulation. 
 He was, perhaps, best at the Boar's Head, after the 
 robbery though he was good also, at Shrewsbury, 
 displayed the flimsy texture of honour with much 
 discrimination, and claimed the reward of Percy's 
 death in a novel mode that drew down repeated 
 thunders of applause. His Falstaff brought several 
 excellent houses. 
 
 On the 18th of October, while rehearsing the 
 part of Sapling, in a new comedy by Reynolds, 
 called Delays and Blunders, Mr. Lewis, in the last 
 act, suddenly stopped and seemed to be struck by
 
 330 MIDAS. 
 
 apoplexy. He uttered a sort of shriek, whirled 
 round as if giddy, and dropped upon the stage in a 
 fit. He was first bled in the arm, but without the 
 smallest effect ; Dr. Kennedy and my poor friend, 
 Wilson, were soon at his side, and by cupping they 
 at length relieved the head, to which there had been 
 noticeable, early in the day, a strong determination 
 of the blood. I do not know a more disagreeable 
 service than attending, in winter time, a stage re- 
 hearsal ; the bleak currents of air that assail you in 
 all directions, are, I believe, extremely injurious ; 
 and against this, from the nature of the place, no 
 remedy can be provided. 
 
 The first considerable effort of the new manage- 
 ment of Drury, was the revival of Kane O'Hara's 
 Midas. Their machinist, by a false stage, took up 
 his celestials in a very magnificent way ; and by 
 the help of good singing from Kelly, Sedgwick, 
 and Dignum, and the ladies, Mountain, little 
 Bland, and the still less Tyrer (Mrs. Liston), with 
 Suett in Midas, the piece prospered exceedingly. 
 
 Lewis being recovered from his very alarming 
 attack, on the 30th of October, Delay sand Blunders 
 appeared for the first time at Covent Garden. The 
 serious incidents were in the true German taste. 
 The murder of a father-in-law an expected trial 
 for the murder to open the play, and the confine- 
 ment of a lady on a false accusation of lunacy. Butr 
 I am quite sure such incidents must have been as 
 uncomfortable to my gay fHend as they could have
 
 THE TALE OF MYSTERY. 331 
 
 been to any devoted admirer of Farquhar ; (no one 
 indeed more so than himself;) and that he cursed 
 his compliance with the rage until the moment of 
 counting his profits. To venture upon any detail, 
 how his comic incidents were combined with all 
 this criminal horror, is quite impossible he, how- 
 ever, in compliment to his father's profession, in- 
 vented an honest attorney, and Paul Postpone, in 
 the hands of Fawcett, produced the six and eight- 
 pences in the seasonable number. A sprig of 
 nobility, Lord Orlando de Courcy, was cut away 
 from the piece on the second night, and a wretched 
 epilogue by Mrs. Mattocks, was brayed down by 
 an ass in the gallery, to the infinite delight of the 
 pit and boxes. A few tags, therefore, at the end of 
 the play were spoken afterwards by six of the cha- 
 racters, and the piece rose nightly in reputation, 
 though not, if I remember, to Reynolds's^r-tf rank 
 of praise. 
 
 The 13th of November was to be marked with a 
 permanent acquisition in Holcroft's Tale of Mys- 
 tery. The dumb eloquence of Farley, and the 
 energy of H. Johnstone, operating upon a really 
 interesting French story, with some very speaking 
 music by Dr. Busby, rendered this melo-drame one 
 of the most powerful things of its class. 
 
 As the term melo-drame then affectedly burst 
 upon us from the French, and no precise idea 
 seemed attached to the compound, I shall throw 
 away at worst but a line or two, upon some kind of
 
 332 A HOUSE TO BE SOLD. J 
 
 explanation. The Greek word MEAO^ (nlelos) 
 is a synonime with membrwn ; and therefore used 
 to signify carmen, a song of regular parts, or recur- 
 ring measures: but it is hazardous to interpret a 
 French usage by the aid of our lexicons. As to 
 the melo-drame, therefore, we may be still thank- 
 ful for the explanation, which that acute critic 
 Geoffroy has left us. " A melo-drame (says he) 
 " is an opera in prose, which is merely spoken; and 
 ' in which music discharges the duty of a valet de 
 " chambre, because her office is simply to announce 
 " the actors." 
 
 On the l?th, the French furnished Mr. Cobb 
 with la maison a Vendre, a musical farce, acted at 
 Drury Lane, under the same title, '"A House to 
 " be Sold :" and thus the bill of the day, stuck 
 upon the walls of the theatre, was visibly called 
 " a fraud upon the stamp office," a public " adver- 
 " tisement" for sale, that paid no duty. As a not 
 infrequent sequel, crowds of people went in to see the 
 house, but nobody could be found to buy it. 
 
 Mrs. Litchfield, on the 19th, broke away alike 
 from modern comi-tragedy and tragi-comedy, and 
 acted the Widow Brady in a style of the greatest 
 excellence. Her tone was inimitably true, and in 
 spirit, I thought her very near indeed to Mrs. 
 Crawford herself. 
 
 Pope, this year, sustained what very few actors 
 would have dared, and came with credit from the 
 attempt. He acted Leon, and Leontes, and the
 
 FAMILY QUARRELS. 833 
 
 Abbe de Vepee, after Mr. Kemble, upon the very 
 site of that great man's triumphs. It would be in- 
 sulting to say, that he approached his predecessor; 
 it would be unjust not to mention, that he was 
 greatly and properly applauded. 
 
 On the 15th of December, after acting Shy lock, 
 S. Kemble, in the dress of Falstaf took his leave 
 of the town, in a second address written by him- 
 self j and ended with the warm wish that the 
 audience, passing over his imperfections, might say 
 at his departure, 
 
 " We could have better spar'd a better man." 
 
 On the 18th of this month, T. Dibdin's comic 
 opera, called Family Quarrels, met with a very 
 stormy reception : Fawcett, in the character of 
 Proteus, becomes a Jew and sells slippers with the 
 " patient shrug" of the peculiar people. It was 
 Saturday, and Braham sang in the opera, two good 
 reasons for gathering the Hebrews together: a day 
 on which they dare not work seems, at its close, 
 allowably to terminate in play. There might be 
 some hint given abroad that they were to be served 
 up to contempt, and Argus no sooner puts his eye 
 upon the presumed Jew r , than he exclaims, " I 
 " never have any dealings with your people." Here 
 was indeed a vital attack, an injury upon t/ie back 
 of an insult. 
 
 The very great address of Fawcett, who was sent 
 on ; his general particularity his " that part" of
 
 33i FAMILY QUARRELS. 
 
 the audience j " any part" of the audience : his 
 mode of letting them understand that Dibdin, in 
 rather a complimentary way, had been to Duke's 
 Place before all really afforded a high treat at the 
 time ; and he had carried his point, but that some 
 of those horrible brochures, called Books of the 
 Songs, with their usual grammar and point and 
 print, had fallen into the hands of the Christians. 
 Jerusalem was not to be delivered. 
 
 There was a song in this mass of waste-paper, 
 which Fawcett went off without singing ; the reason 
 was, that it would have been throwing oil upon fire. 
 The Christians read it in their glimmering studies, 
 and bursting with laughter at its jokes, roared 
 vociferously for its delivery, that they might enjoy 
 the torture of the Jews. Fawcett told them why he 
 omitted it, but if they insisted upon having it, he 
 was ready to obey their pleasure. Accordingly he 
 sang it, and was cJutritably encored. Effectually 
 trodden down and vanquished, all opposition was at 
 length silenced on the part of the poor Jews j who 
 amidst long ages of persecution, can find little that 
 is consolatory to their feelings, except the comedy 
 of Cumberland, which bears their name, and, I 
 hope, records their virtue. 
 
 The music of this opera, by various composers, 
 was often beautiful ; but the piece itself, I thought, 
 even in its very humour, below the pitch of Dibdin's 
 ready and whimsical mind. 
 
 I have already stated that Mrs. Siddons went to
 
 MRS. SIDDONS'S EXPOSTULATION. 335 
 
 Ireland, upon the family retirement from Drury 
 Lane Theatre. It was this lady's fate to be con- 
 tinually assailed on the same ground, want of 
 liberality. The reader remembers the old persecu- 
 tion of her as to performers' benefits. She had been 
 violently accused, this winter, of refusing her aid 
 to a public charity, the Dublin Lying-in Hospital. 
 The trustees of that institution publicly contradicted 
 the calumny, in a way that ought to have been 
 satisfactory ; they said, " Mrs. Siddons had most 
 " certainly never refused to act for them, and, in- 
 " deed, had never been requested to do so." How- 
 ever, something as to her having been Expected to 
 act for one of the public charities of that kingdom, 
 is admitted by Mrs. Siddons herself; whose perfect 
 vindication it were cruel either to omit or curtail, 
 as it does credit to her name and character. I 
 therefore preserve her letter to the Irish manager^ 
 Jones. 
 
 SIR, Dublin, Dec. 8, 1802. 
 
 " I TAKE the liberty of addressing you on a sub- 
 ject which has caused me much uneasiness. Public 
 censure is, under any circumstances, well calculated 
 to wound our feelings, but it is peculiarly distressing 
 when it is heightened by injustice. That reports, 
 most injurious to me, have been circulated, can no 
 longer be doubted, when I assure you that I under- 
 stand it is generally believed that I refused to play 
 for the Lying-in Hospital. On this subject, you
 
 530 MRS. SJDDONS'S EXPOSTULATION. 
 
 will, I am sure, be as anxious to do me justice, as 
 I am solicitous to vindicate myself in the eyes of 
 the public. I therefore beg leave to bring to your 
 recollection, that you did me the honour of calling 
 on me, at my house in Park-street, last summer, 
 when it was liberally proposed on your part, as it 
 was most cheerfully accepted on mine, that I should 
 perform for some charily. You also recollect, that 
 it was considered by us both as a compliment justly 
 due to Lady Hardwicke, that she should have the 
 choice of the particular charity for which I was to 
 perform; and you thought it likely that her Excel- 
 lency would give her preference to the Lying-in 
 Hospital. You also, Sir, must remember, that I 
 was not only willing, but desirous, of exerting my- 
 self for the benefit of so laudable an institution. 
 
 " Why so amiable a purpose was not immediately 
 promoted, 1 cannot even guess ; but sure I am, 
 that its postponement cannot be attributed to any 
 backwardness on my part. The same motives 
 which actuated me then, are no less powerful now ; 
 and it will give me infinite pleasure, if, by the ex- 
 ertion of any powers I possess, I can be able to 
 promote an important object of public utility. 
 
 " And now, Sir, if I may be permitted to speak 
 of myself as a private individual, I have only to 
 regret the sad necessity imposed upon me of vindi- 
 cating my character from the imputation of a fail- 
 ing as unamiable as, I trust, it is foreign to my 
 nature. I regret that I should be constrained, from
 
 HEAR BOTH SIDES. 337 
 
 unfortunate circumstances to endeavour to rescue 
 myself from an obloquy, which, I hope, I have 
 never incurred by my conduct I regret that the 
 country in which I am obliged to do so should be 
 Ireland. 
 
 " I have the honour to be, Sir, 
 
 *." Your obedient Servant, 
 
 (Signed) S. SIDDONS." 
 
 " To Frederic Edward Jones, esq" 
 
 The great actress had speedily a real affliction 
 ' to sustain ; when she wrote the above letter she was 
 unacquainted with the death of her father, which 
 occurred two days before the date of it. The 
 reader will find a communication of that event to 
 Mr. Kemble while upon his travels, and his very 
 affecting commemoration of his virtues. 
 
 " Fashion," said the best writer of comic pro- 
 logues, " in every thing bears sovereign sway ;" 
 Reynolds, in October, had started that black swan, 
 an honest attorney ; and Holcroft, with his usual 
 feeling as to innovations, determined to bring him 
 into full practice : by the 29th of January he ex- 
 hibited his friend Fairfax, in a comedy properly 
 named Hear both Sides. Our lawyer is assailed 
 throughout four acts by a storm of execration from 
 the very miserable victims of his persecution. He 
 hears the charges with anger, and threatens ample 
 revenge. At the proper moment, he calls his 
 accusers together, and solemnly puts himself upon 
 
 VOL. II. Z
 
 338 CAPTAIN CAULFIELD'S HAMLET. 
 
 his trial, when it evidently appears that he had 
 been all the time deliberately and wisely labouring 
 for the benefit of those, whom superficially he had 
 seemed to injure. No doubt exists of the perfect 
 propriety of acquitting the honnete criminel, and 
 amazement settles in grateful affection. But though 
 well acted, it was not relished by the audience ; 
 indeed it was somewhat carelessly written. 
 
 " His TRUTH was too stale, or loo feeble his FICTION, 
 And they could not endure his anomalous DICTION." 
 
 MAUSOL. 
 
 It is very seldom indeed, that I have considered 
 myself warranted to intrude any amateur perform- 
 ances upon the notice of my readers, but the 
 debut of a Captain Caulfield, of the guards, on the 
 2d of February, at Covent Garden, in the cha- 
 racter of Hamlet, merits something in tbe way of 
 exception. Acting is an art that must be practised, 
 as well as a science that must be studied. - Captain 
 Caulfield had in private diligently applied himself, 
 and had acquired much of the theory and the 
 practice. His fault arose out of his profession. 
 He had probably accustomed himself to consider 
 those " who berattle the common stages" as vulgars, 
 and conceived a something more exquisite, as re- 
 quired to denote either the gentleman or the prince. 
 In consequence he fell under the censure of Ham- 
 let himself. 
 
 " Ham. He did comply with his dug, before he sucked it. 
 Thus has he, and many more of, the same breed, that I know
 
 RANGER. 339 
 
 the drossy age dotes on, only got the tune of the time, and 
 outward habit of encounter ; a kind of yesty collection, which 
 carries them through and through the most fond and winnowed 
 opinions." Act 5. sc. ii. 
 
 Captain Caulfield accordingly was the most "curled 
 darling," the genteelest thing in nature ; always in 
 attitudes, and merely shifting from one elegance 
 of personal display to another. In certain society 
 this display of himself had excited peculiar admira- 
 tion, and his admirers cherished the best hopes of 
 his public excellence ; but though he was oc- 
 casionally animated and correct, and even im- 
 pressive, the powers of voice seemed to fail under 
 any protracted exertion, and he therefore tried 
 next the character of Ranger, that his gay gentility 
 might carry him through at a smaller expense of 
 the lungs. But to the general astonishment, as a 
 rake he was only the modern substitute, a fribble, 
 and being found flat and spiritless, the mantling of 
 his theatric honours soon ceased ; and I have no 
 pleasure in following him into a retirement of 
 difficulty, from which at all events his merits as an 
 actor were not strong enough to deliver him. 
 
 On the 19th of February, Mr William Dimond, 
 son of the patentee of the Bath and Bristol Thea- 
 tres, brought out at Drury Lane Theatre, an 
 historical play with music, of the Colman cast, 
 called the Hero of the North. His interest was 
 nearly the same with that of Brooke's Gustavus 
 Vasa, except that it was 'treated with less of tragic 
 
 z 2
 
 34-0 DJMOND'S HERO OF THE NORTH. 
 
 gloom, and unvaried blank verse, and shared in the 
 now preferred features of the romantic drama. Our 
 young author had derived the usual intricacy of 
 dilemma from the celebrated instance in Mr. PufPs 
 tragedy. Gustavus menaces a fort garrisoned by Car- 
 lowitz and his Danes. The besieged bring out to ex- 
 ecution Gunilda, the sister of Gustavus that hero 
 resiles from the test now is the lady's turn for . 
 heroism, and 'egad she refuses life on such conditions. 
 Your Danes, enraged, in course, at what they ought 
 to admire, are about to plunge their daggers into 
 her breast, when Carlowitz, who has broken from 
 his allegiance, yet retains a nobleness of soul, com- 
 mands them to deliver her, and trust to their own 
 courage for defence. Gustavus is not a man to 
 be thus virtuously braved, and he immediately 
 volunteers a personal conflict with Carlowitz. This 
 palpable hit throws the rebel upon his knees in 
 penitence, and in its result seats our Hero of the 
 North upon the throne of Sweden. 
 
 But let me say that as a spectacle it was exceed- 
 ingly picturesque ; that its sentiments were glow- 
 ing, and its interest varied and well mixed together; 
 and that neither the ear nor the eye had cause to 
 disdain the Hero of the North. 
 
 The Gustavus of Brooke had one astonishing 
 effect, when in the year J805, sixty-six years after 
 its production, it was licensed by the Lord Cham- 
 berlain, it absolutely unsealed the eyes of Master 
 Betty's admirers. His failure in Gustavus was the
 
 COLMAN'S JOHN BULL. 341 
 
 more astonishing, because, though frequently at 
 that time grossly ignorant, he certainly never in 
 his action wanted SPIRIT. 
 
 On the 5th of March, Covent Garden Theatre 
 exhibited the most popular of Mr. Colman's plays, 
 John Bull. It seized upon general admiration as 
 by a charm, and has held it as by a patent. Of a 
 play so well known it is useless to detail the in- 
 cidents. The fable is excessively slight : Peregrine 
 lands, like Hamlet, from a shipwreck, and pro- 
 duces all the ensuing events. He delivers the 
 daughter He enriches her father He supplants 
 his younger brother Sir Simon, and secures, con- 
 sequently, his son for the brazier's daughter. The 
 denouement of this piece is therefore its opening ; 
 and every following event distinctly foreseen. But 
 it would have been difficult for the author's most 
 intimate friend to foresee the unbounded humour 
 with which Muckslush heath overflows the 
 triple brass of Job Thornberry the energy of 
 his great scene. The pathos, moral efficacy, the 
 character, the contrast, which, from the rise of the 
 curtain to its fall, press continually upon you, leave 
 a doubt whether at any exhibition you were ever 
 made wiser, or better, or happier. 
 
 There is only one indecorum of which, to a prudent 
 man or a politician, the temper of the times might 
 have suggested the impolicy the exhibition of a 
 magistrate who refused to do justice. However 
 rare such instances (dnd I sincerely believe them 
 
 z 3
 
 BLANCHARD IN SIR SIMON ROCHDALE. 
 
 to be rare), in periods of popular delusion, every 
 aspersion upon the seat from which coercion is 
 to proceed is eagerly caught at, and by analogy 
 applied to cases highly dissimilar. He has read 
 the trials of some of our reformers tojittle purpose, 
 who has not observed that, according to the nerve 
 of the person, they all strive to throw the greatest 
 odium upon the BENCH ; to represent its very con- 
 victions as any thing but convictions of the under- 
 standing; as the compromise that place makes 
 with power ; as the dread to unsettle inveterate pre- 
 judice and error, in the apprehension that tyranny 
 itself may fall when its base gives way. 
 
 As to the mere incident of the play to which I 
 have alluded, if Mr. Colman knew such laxity of 
 principle to exist, it was certainly competent to 
 him to administer the moral corrective of the 
 drama. He was not at that time licenser ! had he 
 filled the chair of old Larpent, I will do him the 
 justice to say, that I think he would have decided 
 more justly, where he was himself a party, than he 
 has made Sir Simon Rochdale do. 
 
 Incidentally I just notice, that Munden refused 
 to act the character just named, because Fawcett's 
 was a better part He therefore conferred a trea- 
 sure upon that valuable actor, Blanchard, who has 
 played it twenty years together, and gained infinite 
 credit by the ability which he has shown in it. I 
 will preserve the original cast of John Bull : it was 
 gloriously acted.
 
 MONK LEWIS'S CAPTIVE. 343 
 
 Peregrine, rrfal .<** Mr. Cooke. 
 
 Sir Simon Rochdale, - Mr. Blancbard. 
 
 F.Rochdale, . ' '. * Mr. H. Johnston. 
 
 Lord Fitz-Balaam, - ; Mr. Waddy. 
 
 Hon. T. Shuffieton, Mr. Lewis. 
 
 Job Thornberry - - Mr. Fawcett. 
 
 Dan - Mr. Emery. 
 
 Dennis Brulgruddery, - Mr. J. Johnstone. 
 
 Lady Car. Braymore - Mrs. H. Johnston. 
 Mrs. Brulgruddery - Mrs. Davenport. 
 
 Mary Thornberry Mrs. Gibbs. 
 
 Johnstone sang a very whimsical Epilogue, written 
 by the author of the comedy, to an old Irish tune : 
 it was encored. 
 
 Mrs. Litchfield, on the 22d of this month, under- 
 took, for Monk Lewis, the performance of what he 
 called, properly enough, a monodrame, which, under 
 the title of the Captive, exhibited, in one act, an 
 accumulation of horrors, caught from the Lazar- 
 house of Milton, 
 
 " Demoniac phrenzy, moping melancholy, 
 And moon-struck madness, pining atrophy. 
 Dire was the tossing, deep the groans, despair 
 Tended the sick busiest from couch to couch." 
 
 The actress was so powerful in this scene of 
 miseries, that several ladies fainted ; and the Ger- 
 man taste of the author received the proper reproof 
 from the better feeling of his countrymen. 
 
 The author just mentioned, who " supped full 
 with horrors" on all occasions, dressed up for the 
 
 z 4
 
 344 DEATH OF Mil. BICHARDSON. 
 
 benefit of his friends, the Johnstons, his translation 
 of Schiller's Minister, which he now called the 
 Harper's Daughter. Cooke was to have acted in 
 it, but he chose to quit the cabinet, and afforded 
 H. Siddons an opportunity to distinguish him- 
 self in a very disgusting, but certainly powerful 
 subject. 
 
 On the 9th of June, Mr. Richardson, one of the 
 proprietors of Drury Lane, died from the effects of 
 a ruptured blood-vessel. I formerly touched with 
 regret upon the early close of a life, that might, 
 under a change of habits, have been highly useful, 
 as it was certainly ornamental. I noticed that he 
 had his full share in the classical pleasantries of his 
 time. He was [a contributor, with Ellis and Dr. 
 Lawrence, to the Rolliad and Probationary Odes. 
 My pleasant and constant friend through life, Mr. 
 Taylor, knew Richardson well before the spell of 
 Sheridan took hold upon him ; and has fondly de- 
 scribed him to me as one of the gayest spirits about 
 town. A man of lively imagination, great reading, 
 sound judgment, and possessing an almost unerring 
 perception of character. 
 
 Richardson once said a strong thing of Sheridan : 
 " It was his sincere conviction, that could some 
 " enchanter's wand touch him into the possession 
 " of fortune, he would instantly convert him 
 " into a being of the nicest honour, and most 
 " unimpeachable moral excellence." Riches are 
 so often quoted as the corrupters of our nature,
 
 SINGULAR CONDUCT OF SHERIDAN. 345 
 
 that I could not suppress even a fancy of their 
 moral efficacy. 
 
 Sheridan had for Richardson all the affection that 
 a careless man can have for any thing. He made 
 a point, therefore, of going down to Egham, to see 
 the last offices performed over his remains. Mr. 
 Taylor says, they arrived too late by about a quarter 
 of an hour. The clergyman had just retired from 
 the grave. Sheridan was in an agony of grief at 
 this disappointment ; but his powerful name, pro- 
 perly enforced upon the rector, procured a polite 
 and humane repetition of the close of the service, to 
 enable the tardy orator to say that he had attended 
 the funeral of his friend. 
 
 The party dined together at the Inn, and after 
 the cloth was removed, their kindness for the de- 
 ceased broke forth in designed testimonials to his 
 merits. Dr. Combe was to choose the kind of stone 
 .for his mausoleum, and Sheridan him self 'undertook 
 to compose a suitable inscription ; but no curious 
 stone ever covered his remains, and the promised 
 inscription never was written. Such are the hasty 
 pledges of recent grief, and the performances of 
 indolent genius. 
 
 Mr. Richardson, by the kindness and munifi- 
 cence of the late Duke of Northumberland and 
 other friends, had been enabled to purchase a quar- 
 ter of the Drury Lane concern : and his widow 
 and daughters in vain tried to obtain, from the late 
 Mr. Whitbread, some compensation for the pro-
 
 34-6 DEATH OF MRS. POPE. 
 
 perty so unfortunately embarked : but his constant 
 reply was, that he really had not nerve enough to 
 go into the consideration of the claim j and a few 
 renter's shares that nobody would buy, and some 
 trifling situation in the wardrobe, was all that about. 
 38,000/. ever produced to his family. On the 
 weekly pay-list of the theatre, Sheridan's name 
 stands charged with a regular 311. 105.; Richard- 
 son's, 15L 15s. ; Tom. Sheridan's, 6/. 10s. ; and 
 Grubb's, 91. 
 
 There was yet'anotber loss to this theatre during 
 the month of June ; that very interesting woman, 
 and elegant actress, Mrs. Pope, was seized, while 
 acting Desdemona, with an apoplectic fit on the 
 night of the 10th, and died on the 18th of the 
 month. She had acted Monimia, in Dublin, at 
 the early age of 17, on the 17th of February 1790 ; 
 in 1797 she was greatly admired, at Covent Garden 
 Theatre, in the same beautiful character, and Mr. 
 Pope married her in the year following. Mr. Shee's 
 portrait of her, in Juliet, is a very perfect likeness 
 of her figure and expression. It is engraved. 
 
 I am now to notice the experiment made by 
 Colman, at the summer theatre, to form and con- 
 tinue a company, independent of the winter houses ; 
 to review the very valuable talents that he brought 
 forth, and to introduce to the London public the 
 very peculiar powers of my young friend, Charles 
 Matthews, a man whose genius has made him, one 
 way, the rival of Foote, and the most attractive
 
 CHARLES MATTHEWS. 347 
 
 name among us. Colman was not a man likely, 
 in a reasonable design, to want supporters. In the 
 present, he found the highest and the best. The 
 late King honoured him with a command on his 
 second night. He had one very considerable auxi- 
 liary in Elliston, who accepted the stage ma- 
 nagement, and secured to himself the possession, as 
 an actor, of every part, serious or comic, that he 
 chose to play. Chapman, from Worcester, proved 
 to be a sensible, and steady^ speaker. But his far- 
 cical prop was Charles Matthews, from the York 
 company, the son of a bookseller in the Strand. His 
 father, I think, was a dissenting teacher, in one of 
 the milk et une sects, in which jbftfa under the 
 name of conscience, leads men to abjure at least the 
 forms of the established church. What sectarists 
 in general think of theatres, is commonly under- 
 stood. I dare say old Matthews thought the 
 stage mania of his son an ample punishment for 
 all the sins with which he was able to charge 
 himself. 
 
 What Charles carried away with him from this 
 town into the country was little beyond a love of 
 mimicry. What I saw of his youthful acting really 
 alarmed me for his welfare. I knew, however, that 
 little is refused to devoted labour, and the perse- 
 verance of man in a pursuit which he loves ; he 
 probably benefited by the obstructions to his 
 advancement. Incledon told me, that he found
 
 348 MATTHEWS IN LINGO, 
 
 him in Ireland in the most distressing state that 
 could be imagined. It strikes me that Matthews 
 actually formed himself, in a great degree, upon 
 the eccentric Tate Wilkinson. In the York com- 
 pany, he certainly laid the foundations of that comic 
 versatility, which, in the most rapid changes of 
 voice and manner, and even personal appearance, 
 made him master of the whole surface of life at an 
 early period of his own. Studies of a peculiar kind, 
 the employment of his leisure, have at length given 
 mind to the external mass ; and perhaps, either as 
 to thought or action, the infinite diversities of human 
 nature find in Matthews " a glass that features 
 " them," aftjilfffom him might be securely estimated 
 the greater as well as less features of either national 
 or local peculiarity. 
 
 On Colman's first night, he acted the meagre 
 Jabal, in Cumberland's Jew, and followed it by 
 Lingo, in the Agreeable Surprise. Matthews was 
 a nervous man, and like the class, too much in a 
 hurry to be rid of what he felt embarrassing; but 
 there was enough drollery in his manner to render 
 him at first a diverting, and soon a favourite actor. 
 
 The influence obtained by Mr. Colman at the 
 palace, on the present trial, may be judged of by 
 the immediate appearance of their Majesties this 
 season ; nine years having passed away, without a 
 single visit, since the melancholy accident at their 
 last command, on the 3d of February 1794.
 
 MRS. WIGGINS. 34-9 
 
 Mrs. Goodall, the Floranthe of the Mountaineers, 
 when Kemble performed Octavian, returned to the 
 Haymarket, on the 19th of the month, to act with 
 the younger strength of Elliston, and the company 
 wore an appearance of duration. Mrs. Gibbs, in 
 herself, was no slight attraction. 
 
 The farce of Mrs. Wiggins, on the 27th, gave 
 Matthews an opportunity of convulsing the audience 
 with laughter, in the character of a bloated country 
 gentleman, who, running away from a termagant 
 helpmate, finds it quite impracticable to run from 
 the name. Some Mrs. Wiggins or other is for ever 
 bursting upon a moment's quiet. This farce was 
 written by a Mr. Allingham, of whom I know 
 little, but that he diversified his leisure by me- 
 chanics, and disdaining the ascending power of 
 gas, like the artist in Rasselas, " taught himself 
 " the office of a fowl;" and by a very artificial con- 
 struction of wings, with springs of steel, succeeded 
 sufficiently to break his shins, in fluttering about 
 his apartments like a dab chick. 
 
 So happy a commencement was a spur to his 
 invention. He calculated the duration of his 
 strength, and saw that he needed some supplement 
 to the power of his arms. He therefore attached 
 the balloon to his apparatus ; which, filled with 
 common steam, he imagined capable to sustain his 
 weight, standing in a sort of wooden shoes, so as 
 to leave him no care but the management of his 
 wings. He now appeared, to himself \ to have com-
 
 350 PROFITS OF JOHN BULL. 
 
 bined a principle of government along with the 
 ascending medium. 
 
 " Thus, with expanded wings, he steer'd his flight, 
 Aloft, incumbent on the dusky air, 
 That felt unusual weight." 
 
 PARADISE LOST. 
 
 " Thrice he assayed, and thrice in spite of skill" 
 burst his balloons. Poor fellow ! the experiments 
 cost him more than two hundred pounds, and the 
 loss of time that, dramatically employed, would 
 have produced three times the money. Allingham 
 had yet another distinction he exchanged shots 
 with a DAILY CRITIC in a turnip-field. 
 
 The sequel is melancholy j with an agreeable 
 person, and a jovial temper, he led a life of un- 
 thinking gaiety ; became dreadfully embarrassed in 
 his circumstances, and died yet young the victim 
 of disease, brought on by intemperance. 
 
 The season of 1802-3 had been one of the best 
 that Covent Garden Theatre had ever known ; and 
 against Colman's theatre, they acted his John Bull 
 to the 23d of June, their last night. A rough 
 estimate carried the profits of Mr. Harris to 
 30,000/. 
 
 But notwithstanding the severe check furnished 
 by his own genius, Colman was now doing very 
 well in his lovely little summer box. Elliston con- 
 tinued to be attractive in Octavian, Sir Ed ward Mor- 
 timer, Gondibert, St. Pierre, and even Richard III.
 
 POPULARITY OF ELLISTON. 351 
 
 Under the style of Arthur Griffinhoof, the manager 
 produced unefolie, as they called it in Paris, by the 
 title of Love laughs at Locksmiths ; and he contri- 
 buted to Mr. Boaden's Maid of Bristol, an epilogue, 
 which, as far as verse could do, laid bare the atro- 
 cious ambition of the Corsican. There was a 
 nerve in this composition, that reminded you of the 
 rough vigour of Churchill. In my time no lines 
 spoken on a stage ever produced equal effect. 
 How well he understood his object, WELLINGTON 
 has demonstrated. 
 
 " God ! must this mushroom despot of the hour 
 The spacious World encircle with his power ? 
 Forbid it Heaven ! and forbid it man ! 
 Can man forbid it ? YES : the ENGLISH CAN." 
 
 The Theatres Royal were at this period not so 
 identified with the Amphitheatre of Mr. Astley, as 
 they have since become. They are now the winter 
 stables of his horses, and a change of scene for the 
 noble brutes, who are thought able to entertain an 
 enlightened public, and reward the spirit of an 
 enterprising manager. Thus, without feeling a 
 gratitude for which no cause then existed, the 
 historian of the stage records with sincere sorrow 
 the destruction, by fire, of the Amphitheatre, a 
 second time, on the 2d of September 1803. 
 
 A fatal neglect on the part of those, whose duty 
 it was to see every light in the theatre extinguished, 
 allowed some flame or spark to communicate with
 
 352. THE AMPHITHEATRE DESTROYED BY FIRE. 
 
 combustibles collected together for occasional fire- 
 works ; and the destruction of the whole premises 
 was known to be inevitable at the first perception of 
 the disaster. Mrs. Woodham, the mother of Mrs. 
 Astley, jun., who slept in an apartment in the front 
 of the house, aged and infirm, perished in the flames. 
 Perhaps, at least forty contiguous houses were con- 
 sumed in the rapid conflagration. The distress of the 
 sufferers, their shrieks, and the fruitless attempts to 
 save part of their slender property, menaced as 
 much by thieves as by the flames, composed a scene 
 of wretchedness, to which the pecuniary loss of the 
 Astley s, considerable as that appeared to be, was of 
 little moment.* A liberal subscription, or a few suc- 
 cessful seasons, may repair the losses of atheatre; but 
 the few articles about the dwellings of the poor are 
 accumulated with difficulty ; are the produce often, 
 and the pride of a life of labour ; are seldom in- 
 sured ; and the loss of them is an almost hopeless 
 destitution, that " weighs upon the heart," and 
 hastens the already faltering feet to the last abode 
 of infirmity and age. 
 
 * The theatre was estimated at 30,0001. ; little or nothing 
 was insured. The horses, by great address and perseverance, 
 were all saved.
 
 353 
 
 CHAP. II. 
 
 WEEKLY SALARIES IN MR. KEMBLE*S LAST YEAR AT DRURY 
 LANE. MR. KEMBLE NEGOCIATES, THROUGH MRS. INCH- 
 BALD, WITH MR. HARRIS. SETS OUT ON HIS TRAVELS. 
 
 HIS LETTER FROM PARIS. DESCRIPTION. FRENCH 
 
 THEATRE. FRIENDS THERE. LORD EGREMONT. 
 
 LORD HOLLAND. TALMA. NAPOLEON's HAT. MA- 
 DRID. LA TYRANNA. LETTER FROM MR. KEMBLE 
 
 WHILE AT MADRID HIS ACCOUNT OF THAT CAPITAL 
 
 ITS POPULATION ITS BUILDINGS THEIR THEATRES 
 
 LA RITA LUNA A BULL FIGHT HOW HE WAS AC- 
 COMMODATED. CENSURES OF HIS COUNTRYMEN. HIS 
 
 OWN CORRECT FEELING. THE DEATH OF OLD MR. 
 
 KEMBLE. HIS SON*S LETTER ON THAT EVENT. 
 
 FILIAL PIETY. MRS. KEMBLE, HIS MOTHER. HIS 
 
 WIFF/S AFFECTION AND CHEERFULNESS- HOW HIS 
 
 FATHER'S REMAINS SHOULD BE DISTINGUISHED. ADVICE 
 
 TO HIS BROTHER CHARLES. RETURNS TO ENGLAND. 
 
 DUTIES OF A STAGE-MANAGER. MR. WILLIAM LEWIS 
 
 HIS DAILY HABITS PECULIAR OPINIONS ONCE A 
 
 PROPRIETOR. SCHISM IN THE THEATRE. MRS. LEWIS 
 
 ALARMED. RELINQUISHES HIS SIXTH SHARE OF COVENT 
 
 GARDEN. MR. KEMBLE PURCHASES. VALUE OF THE 
 
 PROPERTY AND DISTRIBUTION OF IT. IMPROVE- 
 MENTS OF THE HOUSE. 
 
 BEFORE we attend Mr. Kemble upon his travels, it 
 may be worth while to look a little at the arrange- 
 ments of the theatre which he had just quitted. 
 The scale of expense, as to the performers, was 
 
 VOL. II. A A
 
 354 WEEKLY SALARIES IN MR. KEMBLE S 
 
 then, at all events, moderate. In our own times 
 engagements have been compulsorily formed be- 
 tween managers and actors, which it may be quite 
 clear the former would never concede, had they a 
 less fearful alternative than absolute ruin or no 
 profit. If they yield to the enormous demands and 
 pay the salaries, they cannot gain, with the utmost 
 success if they resist demands quite wanton and 
 really disproportioned to the talent, they are then 
 certainly ruined, because the public will never fol- 
 low substitutes of lower powers or prices. 
 
 I am, as I ought to be, quite indifferent as to the 
 opinion which may follow my disclosure. Any in- 
 fluence but that of truth and justice, I hope always 
 to disdain. But I confess I have a wish to try, at 
 all events, to save the stage, by recalling the subject 
 to a new and temperate examination. With this 
 view, I publish the following authentic list of the 
 weekly salaries of the Drury Lane company in the 
 last season of Mr. Kemble's management, 1801-2. 
 
 THEATRE ROYAL, DRURY LANE, PAY LIST. 
 
 Mr. Kemble* 
 
 - 56 14 
 
 Brought up 
 
 Bannister 
 
 - 17 
 
 Mr. C. Kemble - 
 
 King 
 
 - 16 
 
 Barrymore - 
 
 Pope 
 
 - 13 
 
 Byrne - - 
 
 Kelly - - 
 
 - 16 
 
 R. Palmer - 
 
 Wroughton 
 
 - 15 
 
 Wathen - - 
 
 Sueit - - 
 
 - 12 
 
 Raymond 
 
 Dowton - - 
 
 - 8 
 
 Wewitzer 
 
 
 153 14 
 
 
 212 14 
 That is, as actor and manager.
 
 LAST YEAR AT DRURY. 
 
 355 
 
 Brought up - j212 14- 
 
 Brought up - 245 14 
 
 Hr. Sedgwick - - 60 
 
 Mr.Grimaldi - .... 4 
 
 Powell - - 60 
 
 Packer - - V 1 3 o 
 
 Holland ... 50 
 
 Decamp * - - 3 O 
 
 Caulfield - - 40 
 
 TWenty-five Gentle- 
 
 Powell (Prompter) 4- 
 
 men of great or re- 
 
 Dignum - - 40 
 
 spectable talents, 
 
 Cooke ... 4-0 
 
 received weekly a 
 
 
 
 total of sS255 14 
 
 a245 14 
 
 | V 
 
 As to the Ladies, 
 
 Mrs. Jordan averaged 
 
 Brought up - sl02 10 
 
 about - - - s3l 10 
 
 Mrs. Powell - - 10 
 
 (During the season of 
 
 Ansell ... 50 
 
 1804-5 I find she re- 
 
 Miss Mellon - 50 
 
 ceived al081 10S., 
 
 Tyrer ... 50 
 
 Mrs. Crouch that year 14- 
 
 Mrs. Harlow - - 40 
 
 Reduced the next 
 
 Miss B. Menage - 30 
 
 to 7. 
 
 Hicks --- 30 
 
 Miss Decamp - - 12 
 
 Campbell - - SO 
 
 Mrs. Mountain - - 120 
 
 Mrs. Sparks 3 
 
 Bland ... 12 
 
 Henry ... 30 
 
 Pope ... 11 
 
 Sontley ... 30 
 
 Young (cidevant 
 
 Campbell (2d) - 3 
 
 Miss Biggs) - 10 
 
 Byrne (dancer) 5 
 
 a!02 10 
 
 20 Female performers 157 10 
 
 All the salaries below 3. per week I purposely omit, that I 
 may not seem to discredit the names of very deserving people. 
 
 When Mr. Kemble quitted Drury Lane Theatre, 
 it was decidedly with a view to the purchase of 
 one-sixth of the property of the rival house. The 
 intermediate person was Mrs. Inchbald, who con- 
 ducted to its close the negociation between 
 
 A A 2
 
 3.56 MR. KEMBLE TRAVELS. 
 
 Harris and himself. Mr. Kemble was not a wealthy 
 man ; but he could be at no loss for aid in making 
 the purchase ; Mr. Heathcote was anxious to sup- 
 ply what was required on the occasion. In so 
 total a change of interest, the shifting of his scene 
 of action was judged a matter calling for some in- 
 terval of preparation. He therefore seized the 
 opportunity of revisiting the continent in the com- 
 pany of his very dear friend, Mr. R. Heathcote; 
 and ever " bearing a wary eye" to what might con- 
 tribute to the perfection of the English stage, he 
 determined not only to inspect the improvements of 
 our polite neighbours, but to visit the Spanish 
 theatre, which in the cast of its drama bore a closer 
 affinity to our own. 
 
 The reader shall, however, have the satisfaction 
 of reading Mr. Kemble's own account of the prin- 
 cipal features of his tour ; and, if I mistake not, the 
 great actor will become endeared to him from the 
 unaffected excellence of the man. The first letter 
 which I shall communicate, was written from Paris 
 to his brother Charles ; it is extremely character- 
 istic of his feeling and sincerity. 
 
 " Paris, July 23, 1802. 
 " MY DEAR CHARLES, 
 
 " How does my mother do ? Is she in the country, 
 or does she prefer staying in town ? Tell me every 
 thing about her health, and give my duty to her 
 and to my father.
 
 LETTER FROM PARIS. 3.57 
 
 " After a circuit, Lille, Douai, and Arras, I 
 arrived here safe and sound a few days ago. You 
 know, perhaps, that we were detained a whole week 
 at Lord Guilfbrd's, who was inexpressibly kind to us, 
 by poor Heathcote's illness. Every thing in Douai 
 is in a state of ruin, poverty, and desolation not to 
 be described. I had not the heart to go up to my 
 old room. The neighbours, with whom I talked, 
 have a notion that the English are coming back, 
 and are overjoyed when they tell you so. 
 
 " This place (Paris) is such a scene of magnifi- 
 cence, filth, pleasure, poverty, gaiety, distress, 
 virtue and vice, as constitutes a greater miracle 
 than was ever chronicled in history. The plays I 
 have seen are, Iphigenie en Aulide, by Racine ; 
 Oreste, by Voltaire ; La Mere Coupable, by Beau- 
 marchais ; and a farce or two. I will not pretend 
 to say anything of the actors or the theatres, till I 
 have seen a little more of them. Talma and I are 
 grown very well acquainted ; he seems an agreeable 
 man. Last night I was presented to Contat, who 
 is not what she was. I know Michot, Fleury, 
 Dazincourt, Baptiste, and one or two more of the 
 Comedie Franchise, a little. I should have told you, 
 that I have seen 1'Abbe de PEpee. Monvel acts 
 the Abbe as well as possible ; the other characters 
 were very much inferior to the English. There 
 cannot be a more kind reception than I meet with 
 here. My Lord Egremont, Lord and Lady Hol- 
 land, who live most splendidly, insist on our dining 
 
 A A 3
 
 358 LETTER FROM PARIS. 
 
 with them every day, and with one or the other 
 we do dine every day, and then you know comes 
 the spectacle. 
 
 " I have promised Talma to procure a copy of 
 Pizarro, that he may see whether it can be adapted 
 to the French stage. Buy a book of it, make it up 
 in separate packets, and send it me by the next 
 post. I am afraid they will not be able to turn it 
 to any use. Texier told me he would give me a 
 letter or two to some persons of his acquaintance 
 here, who he thought might be useful and pleasant 
 to a stranger. Pray upbraid him with having for- 
 got me. He may send them still, if he pleases. 
 God bless you, my boy! Don't forget to tell me how 
 you do, and be sure to remember all the news. 
 You are to direct to me, Hotel de Courland, Place 
 de la Concorde, Paris. Remember me to every 
 body I ought to remember. 
 
 " Yours, J. P. KEMBLE." 
 
 When we came afterwards to talk over the French 
 theatre together, he frankly confessed that their 
 mode of acting tragedy did not please him. There 
 can be little doubt, that much of the former grand 
 style had disappeared, like all other greatness, in 
 the progress of their revolution. La Clairon, late 
 in life, .wrote her complaint of the vulgarity of 
 action and the carelessness of pronunciation, on the 
 modern stage. She had lived to hear the quantity 
 of the verse sadly misconceived, from the de-
 
 KEMBLE'S RECEPTION AT PARIS. 359 
 
 ficiency of grammatical studies ; and the mea- 
 sured beauty of diction sacrificed to those fiery 
 bursts of passion, which bore no proportion what- 
 ever to the actual sentiment of the poet. 
 
 Mr. Kemble was indeed received warmly in 
 Paris. But my friend was a genuine Englishman, 
 and little likely to answer that demand of display, 
 that is so natural to a Frenchman. The Parisians 
 accordingly wondered at his silence he appeared 
 to them thoughtful and reserved ; but they admired 
 the grace of his manners, and were charmed with 
 the courtesy which so brightened the expression 
 of a countenance essentially tragic. Among other 
 complimentary things, the Parisians thought Mr. 
 Kemble wonderfully, like the grand Bonaparte in 
 countenance ; the representative of the greatest of 
 the Romans had an opportunity of remarking the 
 restless action of Napoleon, and by no means saw, 
 or endeavoured to persuade himself that he per- 
 ceived, any external indications of that powerful 
 character, which' predominated over all the san- 
 guinary factions of France. He told me that one 
 of Napoleon's hats was presented to him, that he 
 might judge of the comparative capacity of their 
 heads ; but this is, indeed, high matter, and as it 
 would be impossible to exhaust the subject in any 
 given number of volumes, it shall occupy no greater 
 space in the present. 
 
 It had often formed a topic of our conversation, 
 that when Mr. Kemble got to Madrid, he would 
 
 A A 4-
 
 KEMBLE AT MADRID. 
 
 enquire what could now be told of a prodigy of 
 whom Mr. Cumberland speaks in his life. That 
 agreeable writer describes an actress, called La 
 Tyranna, of whose caprice he gives many instances, 
 and one of them, as may be imagined, flattering to 
 himself. She let him know when she fancied her- 
 self " in the vein" to exhibit her full tragic power, 
 and literally overwhelmed him with astonishment 
 at the dreadful energies she possessed ; and then 
 complacently enjoyed the wonder and the sympathy 
 she had raised. Considerable time, however, had 
 now elapsed, and Mr. Kemble could hear nothing 
 from the actors of Madrid of this terrible ornament 
 of their profession ; but he was himself almost as 
 fortunate as Mr. Cumberland had been ; as will be 
 seen by the following extract from one of his 
 letters, which, however, I shall not confine to that 
 subject, but allow the reader all that is not of a pri- 
 vate nature in the communication. 
 
 " AFTER wishing you many, many new years, 
 " each happier than that which went before it, I will 
 " give you the satisfaction of knowing, that I am 
 " safe and well here, after only two overturns on the 
 " way. I believe you know all the places I have seen 
 " a great deal better than I do ; yet of Madrid I 
 " will tell you, that it Is a village to any one who 
 " has lived in London. A town that you may easily 
 " walk round in an hour and a half, and whose po- 
 " pulation does not probably exceed a hundred and
 
 LETTER FROM MADRID. 361 
 
 " fifty thousand souls, does not convey a very lofty 
 " idea of the metropolis of a great monarchy. Seen 
 " from some points, however, this village, as I have 
 " ventured to call it, is beautiful, and even magni- 
 " ficent. The old spires and towers of the con- 
 " vents and churches, the gay fronts of the public 
 "buildings, and the extensive mansions of the 
 " nobility, give it at once an air of gaiety and gran- 
 " deur. I speak only of four or five particular 
 " streets ; for the rest of them, in general, are too 
 " narrow for carriages to pass each other without 
 ' danger; and they are latterly grown so dirty, 
 " that I wonder, considering the intolerable heat of 
 " their summers, that the plague is not as common 
 " here as at Constantinople. 
 
 " There are here two theatres. Senor Mayques, 
 " who manages that called Los Canos del Peral, 
 " has been in France ; he is an intelligent actor, 
 " and certainly the best in the company. In this 
 " theatre they principally act translations of French 
 " comedies and vaudevilles. In the other, that 
 " called de la Cruz, an actress, who is styled La 
 " Senora RITA LUNA, by her sole and superior 
 " merit sustains the fame of the old and celebrated 
 " authors of Spain. The discernment and natural 
 " good taste of this lady show to her with exact- 
 " ness the idea of the character she has to re- 
 " present. Her countenance, from the amazing 
 " flexibility of her features, displays every thing 
 " that passes in her mind. The action of ordinary
 
 362 SPANISH BULL-FIGHT. 
 
 " performers fails simply because they know not 
 " how to dispose of their lifeless frames : that of 
 " la Rita Luna adds the most speaking graces to a 
 " voice so musical, that, in Spanish expression, her 
 " mouth might be styled the shell of Apollo. In a 
 " word, I have only seen one actress to whom I 
 " think la Rita Luna inferior in the art. Highly 
 " distinguished as she is by Melpomene, la Rita 
 " Luna is yet more decidedly a favourite of Thalia; 
 " and she told me herself, that she never, with 
 " perfect goodwill, set herself about any tragic 
 " studies. But it is difficult to conceive how that 
 " can be done reluctantly, which is so trans- 
 " cendant. * 
 
 " You know what bustle they keep in England 
 " about the pride, pomp, and circumstance of a 
 " Spanish bull-fight j by the best good luck in the 
 " world there has been one since I came to Madrid ; 
 '* it is exactly like all the rest of the exaggerated 
 " descriptions of too many travellers. I do assure 
 " you, that it is so far from being a splendid or in. 
 " teresting spectacle, that if I lived in Spain for 
 " the rest of my life, I hardly believe I should 
 " have the least desire to see another. 
 
 " The King and Queen are expected to return 
 " to Aranjuez in the course of next week, when 
 " the greatest part of the immense train of the no- 
 
 * The passage relative to the theatres, Mr. Kemble wrote 
 in the Spanish language, which he was learning diligently at the 
 time. He read the authors currently before he left England.
 
 ACCOMMODATIONS OF MADRID. 363 
 
 " bility, who have attended their Majesties in their 
 " tour, will, it is supposed, be very well contented 
 " to come back to their own houses, and restore 
 " some spirit to Madrid, which, they say here, is 
 " very dull for want of them. If they would bring 
 " some Jire, as well as spirit, with them, I should 
 " be among the foremost to bid them welcome. 
 " Will you believe it? I am in what is called a 
 " very good lodging, and am at this present writ- 
 " ing hereof absolutely freezing. What do you 
 " think of the month of January, and colder than 
 " it is in London, joined with a great square bare 
 " white-washed room, and not a possibility of hav- 
 " ing a morsel of fire ? There is hardly such a 
 " thing as a chimney in Madrid, and the pans of 
 " charcoal, over which the Spaniards crouch and 
 " coddle themselves, turn me so sick in ten mi- 
 " nutes, that I dare not go near them. There is 
 ' no such thing as a window-shutter, that closes 
 " within half a foot and the frames gape so wide 
 " from all the doors, that you may almost walk 
 " into any apartment, without the trouble of open- 
 " ing them. 
 
 " Well, never mind all this. I like the Spaniards 
 " very much, and shall be glad, as long as I live, 
 " that I have seen them. The French have ma- 
 " naged matters so as to be a good deal unpopular 
 " in Spain : the English, on the contrary, are in 
 " high favour ; and would be received everywhere 
 " on a footing more easy and familiar even than
 
 364* CORRECT FEELING OF KEMBLE. 
 
 " they already are, were it not that the Spanish 
 " gentry are a little out of humour, and, indeed, I 
 " must say, not unreasonably, with some of our 
 " countrymen, who, after having been most hos- 
 " pitably admitted to their tables, parties, &c. 
 " have acted more like spies than liberal travellers, 
 " by ridiculing, in their publications, those man- 
 " ners and customs for the knowledge of which 
 " they were beholden to that GENEROSITY, which 
 " ought to have made its errors sacred from their 
 " MOCKERY." 
 
 Such is the close of my admirable friend's letter* 
 Such was the high and gentlemanly feeling of his 
 mind, and his practice through life was in the most 
 strict and rigorous conformity. In the unthink- 
 ing levity of youth, how prone are we all to show 
 our folly in our criticism, and to mock at customs 
 of which we know not the origin, and manners that 
 may differ even for the better from our own. We 
 have of late been excited to a perfect storm of 
 .indignation by the writings of sundry foreigners, 
 who have published their observations upon our 
 national and social manners. It were unjust to 
 infer more malignity in the travellers of other 
 countries than in our own : equal mistake may be 
 candidly allowed ; and the necessity of longer ob- 
 servation and deeper knowledge may at last silence 
 the cravings of the press itself, and limit our foreign 
 travels to what is CERTAINLY TRUE, and also PROPER 
 
 TO BE TOLD.
 
 DEATH OF KEMBLE'S FATHER. 365 
 
 I have thus exhibited Mr. Kemble as an amiable 
 and intelligent traveller, and I hope demonstrated 
 the soundness of his personal character. While 
 he was in Madrid, his brother Charles had the 
 melancholy task of informing him of their father's 
 death. I have before mentioned his dutiful and 
 cordial manners to his parents, and I have little 
 doubt that the following touching expression of his 
 feelings under the loss he had sustained will be 
 thought by most readers the brightest page of his 
 life. When his brother Charles read over to me 
 the various letters in his possession, that I might 
 select such as I should think of public interest, 1 
 did not find one in the whole collection in which 
 a wise, a moral public, had a deeper interest than 
 in this natural record of the good man's sorrows. 
 
 " Madrid, December 31, 1802. 
 
 " MY DEAREST FRIEND, 
 
 " How sincerely I always loved my father, and 
 respected his sound understanding, you know too 
 well for it to be necessary that I should even men- 
 tion what I feel this moment on opening your letter. 
 God Almighty receive him into his everlasting 
 happiness ! and teach me to be resigned, and re- 
 solute to deserve to follow him, when my appointed 
 hour is come. My poor mother, though I know 
 she will exert becoming firmness of mind in this 
 and every passage of her life, cannot but feel a 
 melancholy void in losing the companion of her
 
 306 FILIAL PIETY. 
 
 youth, the associate of her advancing years, and 
 the father of her children. I regret from the very 
 bottom of my heart, that I cannot with the most 
 dutiful affection assure her at her feet, that what a 
 grateful son can offer and do shall never be wanting 
 from me, to promote her content, and ease and 
 happiness. How in vain have I delighted myself 
 in thousands of inconvenient occurrences on this 
 journey, with the thought of contemplating my 
 father's cautious incredulity while I related them 
 to him ! Millions of things uninteresting, may be, 
 to any body else, I had treasured up for his surprise 
 and scrutiny ! It is God's pleasure that he is gone 
 from us once more, the peace of the just be with 
 him ! The resignation I had long observed in him 
 to the will of Heaven, and his habitual piety, are 
 no small consolation to me ; yet I cannot help feel- 
 ing a dejected swelling at my heart, that keeps me 
 in a flood of tears for him in spite of all I can do 
 to stop J em. Again, God bless him ! This is 
 Friday, there is no post to the North till Tuesday 
 morning. In a few hours I don't doubt my being 
 better able to write." 
 
 " January 1st. 
 
 " THIS day ought to begin with congratulations 
 and good wishes to my mother and you, and I beg 
 you both to accept them from me. You see 
 Michael Sharpe sometimes, I suppose. Pray 
 desire him to take care of my father's picture for
 
 KEMBLE'S ADVICE TO HIS BROTHER. 367 
 
 me it is like him, though not quite what I could 
 wish at least, I used to think so. It is precious 
 now, however. Perhaps my mother would choose 
 to have it ; if she would, let it be framed for me 
 as it ought to be, and hung up in her drawing 
 room. The letters I write my wife I consider as 
 letters to you all ; you hear from time to time, as 
 she receives them, what I do, what I see, and that 
 I am well. I can't imagine a more amiable friend 
 and companion to anybody under affliction than 
 my wife she is affectionate at once, and cheerful, 
 and I know how particularly she would stifle her 
 own feelings, and exert herself, to be a consolation 
 to my mother. You must have had much to un- 
 dergo, Charles ; much of grief and much of trouble 
 I wish I had been at home to partake them with 
 you, and be some ease to you, Nothing, in my 
 opinion, could be better judged than your interring 
 my poor father without the least affectation of any 
 parade ; and I agree with you entirely that his 
 remains should be protected by a simple stone ; 
 but I beg that in the plain memorial inscribed on 
 it, his AGE may be mentioned. Long life implies 
 virtuous habits, and they are real honours. 
 
 " I thank you for the news you send me, though 
 you don't find me at this moment in a disposition 
 to think much about the THEATRE. As far as 
 regards your own particular in it, you have nothing 
 now to do but to act your best, let your part be 
 what it will, for your own progress in your art j
 
 3G8 KEMBLE RETURN^ TO ENGLAND. 
 
 to do whatever is within your power for your em- 
 ployers, out of common honesty. 
 
 " 1 need not ask you to find the strongest and 
 the tenderest terms to offer my duty to my mother 
 in. Sid, Sally, Cicely, Harry, all have my love. 
 I write to my wife by this post. I have only re-; 
 ceived a letter from Charles Moore (of Nov. 21st), 
 by the mail that brought me your sad account of 
 December 14th. I will write to him very soon, 
 tell him. Adieu, my dear Charles. 
 
 " Ever your affectionate brother, 
 
 " J. P. KEMBLE." 
 
 It would be very like insult to offer any thing in 
 the way of comment upon such a letter as the fore- 
 going. But I will risk the imputation even of 
 officious criticism, to notice the beautiful reason 
 assigned by Mr. Kemble for inscribing his father's 
 age upon the stone which was to cover him, namely, 
 that " long life implied virtuous habits," and that 
 those, without any kind of dispute, were " real 
 " honours." It is difficult to select a more preg- 
 nant and convincing truth, conveyed in happier 
 terms. 
 
 Mr. Kemble returned from this excursion greatly 
 improved in health, and full of respect for the 
 Spanish character. He spoke the language of the 
 country very agreeably when we visited our friend 
 Mr.-Mitchel together, who is even an excellent 
 critic in that noble and copious tongue.
 
 MR. WILLIAM LEWIS. 
 
 Before I introduce Mr. Kemble upon the new 
 stage of his professional life, every consideration of 
 respect and propriety calls upon me for particular 
 reference to the stage-manager, whom Mr. Kemble 
 was now to succeed. I shall take the opportunity 
 to notice cursorily the duties of that station. I 
 shall look a little at the composition of the Covent 
 Garden company, and endeavour to display its 
 feelings upon the expected change ; and then accu- 
 rately exhibit the property into which Mr. Kemble 
 was now admitted. The succeeding chapter will 
 then delineate his first season, and display the full 
 strength of the new arrangements. 
 
 The late Mr. William Lewis was better known 
 to the public as an actor than as a manager. On 
 the stage, he was always the most vivacious, and 
 at times the most elegant comic actor of his day. 
 As the stage manager, his duties were the almost 
 daily attendance upon rehearsals ; and that often 
 uncomfortable intervention between the manager, 
 Mr. Harris, and his authors or his actors. The 
 energy of Mr. Harris, though he was usually at a 
 distance, was constantly felt. Mr. Lewis gave im- 
 mediate effect to his decisions. The monarch re- 
 served, for the most part, matters of grace and 
 favour to himself, and they were usually granted in 
 person on his coming to town. His deputy had 
 always to announce his displeasure, and to 
 carry through the discipline of the stage. There 
 was a kindness, a pleasantry about his manner, 
 
 VOL. II. B B
 
 370 DUTIES OF A MANAGER. 
 
 which almost reconciled an offender to his sentence. 
 He knew exactly how to use the dreaded name of 
 " Demogorgon" and got through the business with 
 the feeling of a friend and the spirit of a gentleman. 
 One part of the duty of a stage-manager is to cast 
 and arrange the plays which are brought out. This, 
 in course, requires a just estimate of the talents and 
 steadiness of the company j and, in some instances, 
 much address, to overbear the false estimate that 
 human vanity is for ever making of its own merits. 
 In new plays, to be sure, the stage manager may be 
 supposed to get the assistance of their authors* 
 But it is only the veteran bard, who can be of the 
 least use on such occasions. There are so many 
 points on which his manuscript affords no instruc- 
 tion, that a young writer is cruelly startled when 
 he is asked, in a particular scene, " how many at- 
 " tendants he will have on ?" Or, " what parts of 
 " the stage" his characters are to occupy? The same 
 unforeseen puzzle falls upon him, when he is de- 
 sired "to move" his performers during the dialogue, 
 so as that their positions at last may be convenient 
 for the exit. In the getting up of old plays, or such 
 as have lain aside even for a few years, the first 
 question asked upon a stage is, " How is the bust- 
 " ness done ; who knows it ?" The acting manager 
 should, therefore, be a person of long experience, 
 and have served himself under able generals. The 
 drill is the principle of order If you seldom re* 
 hearse, your acting will be intolerable. Where a
 
 DUTIES OF A MANAGER. 371 
 
 part is written out with the mere accompaniment 
 of the cues, a perception must be very quick indeed 
 to be reasonably sure of the meaning. Questions, 
 therefore, continually occur, how such a passage 
 should be spoken ? Your acting manager should 
 be as ready in his reply, as the bow or courtesy is 
 which always follows the information. Again, in 
 well regulated theatres, the pronunciation should be 
 uniform. If he should chance to catch, during the 
 rehearsal, a little barn-door syllable or false accent, 
 lie will take the proper opportunity, aside, to refine 
 the utterance, with neither tart derision nor growl- 
 ing severity. As to the cadence of the speakers, 
 it is almost impossible to meddle with it perhaps 
 the performer may be allowed his own tune, pro- 
 vided he sings it agreeably. About emphasis the 
 manager may be as learned as he will. 
 
 Now, Mr. Lewis, though an Englishman by birth, 
 had acted so long in Irish theatres, that lie pro- 
 nounced like the cultivated Irishman. In Mer- 
 cutio, for instance, he used to exclaim " a Jewelist, 
 " a Jewelist !" and other preferences he had, of a 
 similar quality, many of which disfigure the pages 
 of Sheridan's dictionary. The old gentleman used 
 to justify his singularity by the authority of Swift, 
 the friend of his father. But Swift, without a 
 reference to the doubtful question about his birth, 
 affected to speak as an Irishman, and half his verbal 
 wit will be nojoke at all, if read in the English man- 
 ner. Qualified, however, amply by temper, man- 
 
 B B 2
 
 372 HABITS OF LEWIS. 
 
 ners, and judgment, for a manager, Mr. Lewis had 
 sustained the toils of rehearsal in the morning, with 
 the additional labours of his own study and per- 
 formance as an actor always before the town, for a 
 period of TWENTY years, and standing as high at 
 the theatre with his brethren, as he did with the 
 patentee. He kept himself in unfailing health and 
 spirits, by a daily walk between rehearsal and dinner 
 up to Hyde Park and back again. For many years 
 together, he was as noticeable to the full in this 
 range as the Duke of Queensberry ; and it was 
 obvious that his gaiety was not a forced plant of the 
 hot-house it flourished, like his slender switch, 
 in the open air. Pleasant, sensible, worthy Lewis, 
 many a whimsical story have I heard from you in 
 this your beaten track! In talking* of old actors, 
 he would sometimes utter heresies. But O'Brien, 
 in comedy, was his idol. \J4oodward he considered 
 positively vulgar, and Garrick himself hardly 
 genteel. 
 
 Mr. Lewis, from his long connexion with Mr. 
 Harris, was permitted to purchase one-sixth part of 
 the Covent Garden property, for which he paid 
 twenty- three thousand pounds ; and in doing this 
 he then conceived himself to have secured a de- 
 sirable and permanent provision for his family. I 
 have been told, that Mrs. Lewis never could feel 
 happy in this purchase, and that it was finally at 
 her entreaty it was given up. Admirable Sir Fretful ! 
 * Upon my soul, the women are the best judges
 
 SCHISM IN THE THEATRE.. 373 
 
 " after all." It might probably occur to her, that 
 in addition to the public fickleness, PROPERTY is a 
 frightful test of friendship ; and she might tremble 
 at the possibility, however slight, of any ground of 
 difference between her husband and Mr. Harris, in 
 whom besides, for his life, the absolute management 
 of the concern was vested. 
 
 I had once intended to pass over in profound 
 silence a mutiny in the concern, which had pro- 
 duced very important, if not ruinous results, but 
 for the invincible firmness of Mr. Harris. The 
 following gentlemen figured on this occasion, during 
 the year 1800, as the GLORIOUS EIGHT, who had 
 undertaken the redress of all wrongs, and defini- 
 tively to raise the profession from what they 
 imagined a degrading servitude to the consequence 
 of their rank as gentlemen and artists : Messrs. 
 Holman, Pope, Munden, Fawcett, John Johnstone, 
 H. Johnston, Incledont and T. Knight, who had 
 first thrown down the apple of discord in Covent 
 Garden.* 
 
 The whole dispute was referred at last to my 
 Lord Salisbury, then Lord High Chamberlain, and 
 determining most decidedly in the main for the 
 manager, he regulated that performers should have 
 
 * As the reader may feel a wish to know the personal result 
 as to the performers, I have to remark that Mr. Holman was 
 the sacrifice on this occasion. The other seven wandering 
 stars were soon happily reinstated in their spheres, and became 
 quite obedient to the cloud-compelling Jupiter. 
 
 B B 3
 
 37'A MR. LEWIS SELLS OUT. 
 
 three weeks' previous notice of the nights fixed for 
 their respective benefits. The dread of similar dis- 
 turbances produced its natural effect upon the mind 
 of Lewis. He knew that a house so divided could 
 not long flourish ; he felt also the certainty, that 
 theatrical property, communibus annis, gave misera- 
 ble interest for money. Foresight once alarmed, 
 quickened into the perception, that the house itself 
 was getting old ; and that a new theatre could only 
 be built by a further advance of capital, or entail- 
 ing a burthen of new renters upon the concern. 
 He, therefore, after holding the property only a 
 single year, at his own request, relinquished the 
 purchase ; and the stronger ambition of Mr. Kem- 
 ble subsequently led him to acquire that sixth of 
 the concern at the former price of twenty-three 
 thousand pounds. 
 
 A few considerations here offer themselves to the 
 mind as to the union of persons so long opposed to 
 each other, and the introduction of a man into the 
 concern, who must cease to be himself if he con- 
 curred in the usual system of the Covent Garden 
 management. The whole mind of Mr. Kemble was 
 bent upon rendering his present house the palace of 
 Shakspeare; all that he had done, at the other 
 theatre, towards a more perfect representation of 
 his plays, was to be now therefore transferred to 
 one devoted to a different scale of expense, and a 
 less ambitious principle of management. In point 
 of consequence and character, Mr. Kemble's system
 
 MR. KEMBLE PURCHASES. 3J5 
 
 was great and captivating. He withdrew from 
 Drury Lane its former classical feature, stamped 
 originally by Garrick, and perpetuated by the great 
 talents of his sister, and his own. The policy of 
 Mr. Harris was cautious ; and he might conceive 
 himself obtaining on this occasion all that he wanted 
 on the one hand, while, as to the rest of the arrange- 
 ments, the absolute power of the management gave 
 him full opportunity to indulge the town with 
 novelties ; which, however slighted by his partner, 
 he had found in a commercial view highly profit- 
 able, and not too expensive. As to his avowed 
 passion, therefore, Mr. Kemble was greatly in- 
 dulged, but he did not entirely govern. Still, as 
 may be supposed, considerable alarm was felt, by 
 the old friends of the concern, at the coming in of 
 a gentleman so inflexible in his taste ; and the per- 
 formers of the company had no few apprehensions 
 that the future business of the stage might be more 
 troublesome than the past had been, from the great 
 zeal and critical accuracy of the new manager. 
 
 The estimated value of Covent Garden Theatre, 
 patent, house, wardrobe, scenery, machinery, and 
 every description of stage properties, at the time 
 Mr. Kemble came into the concern, was jl 38,000. 
 The proprietors and their respective shares stand 
 thus upon the deed, and I use the terms of that in- 
 strument to convey an exact knowledge of the dis- 
 tribution. 
 
 B B 4'
 
 VALUE OF PROPERTY AT COVENT GARDEN. 
 
 Thos. Harris was possessed of six undivided twelfth"! 
 
 parts, being equal to > 12 24ths. 
 
 a moiety - - - J 
 John P. Kemble ...... of two undivided twelfth 1 
 
 parts, being equal to > 4r-24'ths. 
 
 one-sixth part - J 
 George White ...... of one undivided twelfth 
 
 part, and one moiety 
 
 or half part of another 
 
 undivided twelfth part 
 
 3-244hs. 
 
 being together equal 
 to one-eighth part 
 thereof - - - - 
 
 A. Martindale ... ... the same as Geo. White 3-24?ths 
 
 Henry Harris of the remaining or other"v 
 
 undivided twelfth part I o_24ths 
 of, and in the said ( 
 Theatre Royal - - ) 
 
 24 Total, 
 
 Upon a comparison with that loveliest of all 
 theatres, the Apollo Drury, the interior of Covent 
 Garden was always considered heavy. It was 
 therefore determined to lighten the general effect. 
 The frontispiece of the theatre was raised ten feet. 
 The slips, instead of carrying the rudeness of the 
 gallery all round the house, were now con verted into 
 boxes. The fronts of the boxes were painted 
 chastely dead white and gold, and their insides 
 party-coloured green, with suitable ornaments. 
 To show, too, what were the expectations from the 
 fashionable world, on thus transferring the seat of 
 tragedy, sixteen private boxes were built, and let 
 at *300 a year each, and among their proprie- 
 tors were found the Duchesses of Northumberland
 
 IMPROVEMENTS AT COVENT GARDEN. 37? 
 
 and Devonshire, the Marchioness of Abercorn, the 
 Earl of Egremont, Lady Holland, Lady Milner, 
 Mrs. Vaughan, Mrs. Morton Pitt, &c. &c., 
 the declared patrons and admirers of the Kemble 
 family. A connexion was thus fixed to the house, 
 at least as splendid as the talents by which it was 
 attracted. The higher orders being accommodated, 
 the gentry had an additional seat given to the boxes 
 in their two tiers, and the note of preparation 
 sounded strongly through all the departments. The 
 royal arms in the centre of the drop curtain had 
 been used in the Lincoln's Inn Fields Theatre 
 during the days of Gibber, Wilkes, and Booth, and 
 they seemed triumphantly to announce the return 
 of theatric glory.
 
 378 
 
 CHAP. III. 
 
 THE AUTHOR'S EXPLANATION. NOTICE OF THE CHANGE 
 
 IN THE COVENT GARDEN MANAGEMENT. FEELINGS OF 
 
 THE COMIC WRITERS. DINNER GIVEN BY MR. KEMBLE. 
 HIS FIRST APPEARANCE AT COVENT GARDEN. REVIVALS. 
 
 PIZARRO TRANSFERRED. RAISING THE WIND. 
 
 THE CARAVAN. THE DOG. ENGLISH FLEET. ELLIS- 
 TON AND HIS BENEFIT. HIS COPIOUS ADDRESS. MISS 
 
 DUNCAN. BLIND BARGAIN. KEMBLE'S KINDNESS TO 
 
 ITS AUTHOR. TOBIN. PECULIAR FATE OF MR. KEM- 
 BLE. MASTER BETTY. SKETCH OF HIM. HOUGH. 
 
 BELFAST. EDINBURGH AND MR. JACKSON. HOME, THE 
 
 AUTHOR OF DOUGLAS. MACREADY. ROSCIUS IN TOWN. 
 
 IMMENSE CROWD. HOW HE APPEARED. CRITICALLY 
 
 EXAMINED. HIS HOUSES THE FIRST SEASON. DECLINE 
 
 OF HIS INFLUENCE. MANIA CURED, AND HOW. 
 
 I HAVE now arrived at the opening of the winter 
 season of 1803-4, and having thus brought the 
 particular notice of the drama, with its authors and 
 actors, down to a period within almost general re- 
 collection, the limits of my work may allowably re- 
 strict me to the leading events of the stage and the 
 personal history of Mr. Kemble. I say the limits 
 of my work, because I by no means feel, or affect 
 to feel, any apprehension, where it may be neces-
 
 NOTICE OF STAGE MANAGEMENT. 379 
 
 sary to treat of existing merits. It is surely possi- 
 ble, even in criticism, to catch that tone of urbanity, 
 which qualifies rebuke by the obvious conviction, 
 that the writer can have no spleen to gratify. Dif- 
 ference o'f opinion may be expected in the fluctua- 
 tions of taste ; but a smile of superior genius will 
 easily dispose of inveterate prejudice in the s critic, 
 who cannot help his birth in another century, and 
 may, perhaps, pride himself upon being taught in 
 a different school. 
 
 The change of the stage management was very 
 properly noticed from the stage by Fawcett, who 
 spoke and sang an occasional address, composed on 
 the spur of the moment, probably by Dibdin. It$ 
 object was to let Mr. Lewis down comfortably from 
 his command to that private station in the company, 
 which, as he filled it, was distinction enough for any 
 man. The feeling of this address, whoever wrote 
 it, partook more of affection to the old course than 
 triumph in the new. 
 
 " In fame's gazette, perhaps our mimic band 
 Has advertis'd some change in its command ; 
 Has told you, here a. fay rite chief you'll find, 
 Vice another favourite resign'd : 
 And our new captain we salute with pride, 
 Since by your judgment he's approv'd as tried. 
 Yet inclination, duty, each impel 
 To speak of him who lately rul'd so well ; 
 Who though he quit a truncheon for the ranks, 
 His mirthful efforts still shall ask your thanks ; 
 And hold while flatter'd here with approbation 
 His post of honour in a private station."
 
 380 FEELINGS OF THE COMIC WRITERS. 
 
 The writer then goes on to enumerate the coming 
 ^claims of comedy and opera and the accession of 
 the two greatest tragedians in the world is hinted 
 only in the phrase that, in laughter's interval, at 
 times the audience will hear 
 
 " Melpomene petition for a tear." 
 
 Surely the situation of Leontes is here evinced 
 among the company 
 
 " I have tremor cordis on me my heart dances ; 
 But not for joy not joy." WINTER'S TALE. 
 
 l ; . 
 
 Melpomene too was in no very mendicant condi- 
 tion, maintaining, as she did, Jive members of 
 the Kemble family in her suite at this theatre 
 Mr. Kemble himself) Mr. Charles Kemble, Mr. 
 H. Siddons, Mrs. Siddons, and her daughter-in-law, 
 Mrs. H. Siddons. 
 
 The comic writers for that theatre were by no 
 means pleasant under the change ; they had found 
 the field open long, and were alarmed at any invasion. 
 Mr. Harris said what he could to still their appre- 
 hensions, but they bore their dismay in legible 
 characters about with them. One of Thalia's chief 
 supporters, upon this serious advent, was advised 
 " to fall in gratitude to his knees, that Heaven had 
 " blessed him with only two children." He did 
 the only proper thing on the occasion he imparted 
 the advice received to Mr. Kemble himself, who 
 told me of it, almost suffocated with laughter.
 
 DINNER BY MR. KEMBLE. 381 
 
 In England every thing is settled by a dinner, 
 and the new allies invited Sheridan to witness their 
 mutual felicity. When the wine had circulated 
 freely, the proprietors of Covent Garden began to 
 express their sentiments in a vein of the greatest 
 cordiality upon which Sheridan, with very bitter 
 pleasantry, reproached them with their facility or their 
 hypocrisy. " Two fellows," said he, <* that have 
 " absolutely hated each other deadly all their lives," 
 " Fake" said Mr. Harris, (very whimsically,) 
 " we have not hated each other these six weeks - 
 " have we, Kemble ?" 
 
 The truth is, that there is nothing in liberal 
 competition, for either fame or fortune, that should 
 unfit men for union. Cicero has long since told 
 us, that the most effectual cement is the familiariz- 
 ation to each other of minds marked by their 
 integrity. " Sed omnium societatum nullapraestan- 
 " tior estnullafirmior, quam cum VIRI BONimoribus 
 " similes familiaritate conjuncti sunk" De Qfficiis, 
 lib. i. 
 
 Before Mr. Kemble entered upon his allotted 
 management, he entertained the leading actors of 
 Covent Garden at his house, in Great Russel Street, 
 and his great rival, Cooke, attended the invitation, 
 as it appeared to me, with very sincere pleasure. 
 Mr. Const, Mr. Reynolds, and myself) were invited, 
 although we had never trod the boards, and a very 
 peculiar and not unentertaining day we had of it. 
 Before dinner was served up, I fell into conversa-
 
 PLEASANTRY OF H. JOHNSTON. 
 
 tion with Cooke in the library, and if I had not 
 acquired too decisive evidences of his indiscretion 
 to doubt the charges against him, from anything 
 done or said by him on that day, I should never 
 have suspected his firmness, but have left him 
 thoroughly a convert to his well-informed mind 
 and gentlemanly manners. 
 
 I shall by no means remove the veil, which in 
 decent life should always be thrown between the 
 convivial and the calm observer. One pleasantry 
 we had, late of course in the sittings, which burst 
 from the prolific fancy of H. Johnston. He chose 
 to imagine, in the Christmas preparation of a Pan- 
 tomime, the sudden and alarming indisposition of 
 the Harlequin ; and he made Mr. Harris himself 
 announce the event to the company, and call upon 
 their zeal for the property, to show with what suc- 
 cess they could supply the place of that knight of 
 the wooden sword. The course he prescribed to 
 himself for each person was a remonstrance in their 
 tone of voice their perfect action in rising to 
 make the attempt, in the circular run, in the 
 rolling of the head, and the usual attitudes ; con- 
 cluding with a leap at the door, to imitate the agile 
 escape of that hero. He spared neither the absent 
 nor the present members of the fraternity, and no 
 man in the room more enjoyed the harlequin of 
 Mr. Cooke, than he did himself. 
 
 Mr. Johnston, however, was then no longer a 
 member of the Covent Garden company, having
 
 KEMBLE'S APPEARANCE AT THE GARDEN. 383 
 
 concluded an engagement at the other theatre ; and 
 Mr. Charles Kemble filled his line of business 
 under the new management. Incledon obliged us 
 with some of his finest airs, given with a power of 
 tone, and a pathos, that I never, before or since, 
 have heard so astonishingly combined. The vibra- 
 tion he excited in the room, (an extremely fine 
 one,) seemed absolutely to threaten every thing 
 vitreous around him. I retired not among the latest 
 of the guests, in the fear that something might 
 occur to break in upon recollections so agreeable. 
 
 It was on the 24th of September 1803, that Mr. 
 Kemble made his first appearance at Covent Garden 
 Theatre in his favourite Hamlet, which part, pre- 
 cisely TWENTY years before, had introduced him to 
 a London audience, at the rival house. The ap- 
 plause was extreme upon his entrance, and his new 
 friend, Mr. Harris, paid him the compliment of. 
 attending his performance. 
 
 Mrs. Siddons, with similar policy, kept to her 
 original charm, and acted Isabella on the 27th. 
 She excited and justified the highest admiration. 
 
 The new manager had made an arrangement 
 with Mr. Cooke, calculated to conciliate their rival 
 claims, in consequence of which, on the 3d of 
 October, to Mr. Cooke's Richard Mr. Kemble 
 performed the Earl of Richmond. On the 5th Mr. 
 Kemble acted one of his most admired pails in 
 comedy, Lord Townley, and Miss Louisa Brunton, 
 a younger sister of Mrs. Merry, made her debut in
 
 384 PIZARRO TRANSFERRED. ' 
 
 his Lady, and gave the promise of a very elegant, 
 if not a great and original, votress of the comic 
 muse. This play was perfectly acted in all its parts. 
 The John Moody of Emery was what Lear calls 
 the " thing itself ';" look, action, tone, dialect, feel* 
 ing, all true, and all Yorkshire. 
 
 The beautiful tragedy of Douglas followed, on 
 the 6th, in which Mr. Kemble now acted the 
 Stranger, and H. Siddons his adopted son. The 
 printing of Sheridan's Pizarro laid it open, of 
 course, to every stage, and Mr. Kemble got it up at 
 his present theatre with great splendor. In nearly 
 all its essentials the play, though it had changed its 
 scene, retained its original performers j with the 
 exception now of Murray and his daughter, in 
 Ataliba. and Cora. Cooke, it was supposed, would 
 be very powerful in Pizarro. I think Sir Wilful 
 Witwood, in the third degree of drink, is also said 
 to be "powerful." Upon his entrance it was soon 
 apparent, that he knew nothing that he did, and 
 the audience could understand nothing that he said* 
 He fell back overpowered, before the conclusion 
 of the first act, and, in the opinion of the specta- 
 tors, was dead drunk. Mr. Kemble came, on, and 
 assured the house that " Mr. Cooke was really 
 unwell, and unable to proceed j" of which, in 
 truth, there could not be the smallest doubt; and 
 Mr. Siddons even distinguished himself in reading 
 the character. Three days afterwards, Cooke was 
 allowed very indulgently to perform Pizarro; I
 
 RAISING THE WIND. 385 
 
 believe without the dramatic certificate of any phy- 
 sician a document at all times of infinite value 
 for its accuracy. 
 
 One of Mr. Kemble's favourite afterpieces was 
 Arthur and Emmeline, so finely acted formerly by 
 himself and Miss Farren. Their present repre- 
 sentatives were Charles Kemble and Mrs. H. Sid- 
 dons. It was still delightful. 
 
 The 5th of November presented the first drama- 
 tic production of James Kenney, in the farce called 
 Raising the Wind. The needy adventurer, Jeremy 
 Diddler, who has lost every thing but his spirits, 
 and makes them carry him through every thing, in 
 the hands of Lewis was a source of exquisite diver- 
 sion. Often as I bring that delightful actor before 
 me, and renew faintly (which Mr. JONES does not- 
 do) the astonishing varieties of his hilarity, I re- 
 peatedly see his accomplished deportment covering; 
 the unfortunate rents in his only coat, and borrow- 
 ing such a thing as two and ten-pence, or some 
 such odd and broken sum of money. As Mr. 
 Reynolds, on the 12th, chose to transfer his three 
 per cents, from the stock of the Governor and Com- 
 pany of Covent Garden, I have nothing to say. In 
 my opinion, the interest was as good as he could 
 procure in any other fund; and if he had waited 
 but a single day, there would have been a great 
 demand in the market, and a consequent rise of 
 " 3 per cents." But he had latterly been amusing 
 himself with water-works; and imagined that the 
 
 VOL. ii. c c
 
 386 THE CARAVAN. 
 
 actual element, flowing between canvas rocks and 
 painted herbage, overshaded by immoveable foliage, 
 would be a vast improvement in our stage ; and 
 that a real dog would make a real splash in a trough 
 containing real water. All this he put in proof on 
 the 5th of December in his serio-comic romance 
 called " The Caravan," at the Theatre Royal, 
 Drury Lane. No man ever took better measure of 
 the public mind than Reynolds. 
 
 There was a little scandal in the theatre, on the 
 subject of this dog. The brave fellow, who plunged 
 into the stream, and actually saved the child, was 
 a native of Newfoundland, and named Carlo. Now: 
 it was said, that the animal who "smelt the lamps*' 
 was actually a mastiff, in the service of the stage 
 manager, Bannister himself. It was reported, too, 
 that, when presenting himself to the house, he* 
 dressed himself up in clothes of the same colour and 
 cut as those worn by the diver, even to the hair 
 and the queue, and stood impudently before the 
 spectators with all the swagger of having performed 
 the achievement. So, gentle reader, in our panto- 
 mimes, there is one ground Harlequin, who does 
 the motions, and another who takes the leap. 
 
 This afterpiece was extremely popular, brought 
 very good latter accounts, and was followed by an- 
 other, Cinderella; which, combined with the Soldier's 
 Daughter, a very successful comedy, by Cherry, 
 saved Drury Lane from the ruin, that might rea- 
 sonably have been apprehended, the strength con- 
 '
 
 THE ENGLISH FLEET. 387 
 
 sidered which had been attached to the rival 
 theatre. So thai Bannister, as he well might, took 
 some credit to his management, when returning 
 thanks at the close of the season. They had, in 
 fact, received at the doors, in their 200 nights, the 
 sum of 49,427^ Is., which gave an average of 
 242/. 2s. Sd. per night. 
 
 The other house, during the season, brought 
 forward a most successful opera, The English Fleet 
 in 1342, by the dexterous and indefatigable Dib- 
 din ; and Braliam, Incledon, and Storace, without 
 any great difficulty, rendered it triumphant. 
 
 As to the division of the management exclusively 
 Mr. Kemble's, he had planted in his new garden 
 some of those hardy children of nature, that must 
 ever flourish, with proper attention to them, and re- 
 turned thanks himself to the public, in fact for 
 crediting themselves by attending the finest represen- . 
 tations in the world of our sterling drama. 
 
 The summer season produced little noticeable, 
 except the beginning address of that extraordinary 
 man Mr. Elliston. On the 10th of September he 
 solicited the public to countenance a benefit at the 
 Opera House the little theatre being too small 
 either for his attraction or his hopes. He announced 
 Pizarro, with Love Laughs at Locksmiths, and it 
 was one o'clock in the morning before the doors of 
 the theatre could be secured. Any temporary in* 
 
 c c a
 
 388 ELLISTON AND HIS BENEFIT. 
 
 vasion of this region of fashion has always beerr 
 precious to the visitors of our common theatres ; 
 they consider it in short as a cheap luxury they 
 enter the almost forbidden circle of the higher 
 orders, and imagine raptures in the experiment 
 " that they never know." 
 
 But as the half-guineas at a pit door of the opera 
 are rather deliberately laid down, and no money can 
 ever be taken in its season at the box door, the 
 architect of the house never planned any securities, 
 to keep the people from entering too rapidly. 
 They in truth dropt rather than rusht in. On the 
 present occasion, a multitude assembled at the 
 doors, before whose pressure they ere long gave 
 way, and all the petty impediments of the Italian 
 gentry were swept aside : some paid their money 
 and got no cheques ; others threw down bank notes 
 ^and took no change many were carried in by a 
 torrent, that was too rapid even for the operations 
 of the plunderer. 
 
 Our inimitable friend came forward to notice 
 that the terms of admission had in very many cases 
 not been complied with. " Good phrases," says 
 Bardolph, " surely are, and ever were, very com- 
 " mendable." His appeal to the honour of the 
 audience was most liberally answered on their parts. 
 Some of his friends, wtih pewter plate* in their hands, 
 collected through the pit ; and the most assiduous 
 churchwardens never heard the offerings of charity 
 clatter more cheerfully. The honour of our hero
 
 ELLISTON'S COPIOUS ADDRESS. 389 
 
 was pledged to supply change for the notes that 
 had been taken ; and in spite of accidents, he was 
 said to have received, at least, 600/. that evening. 
 
 After bleeding, quiet usually is restored to the 
 agitated frame : but no sooner was the curtain up, 
 than the stage was found almost covered with peo- 
 ple standing ten rows deep. A violent storm once 
 more arose among the visitors in the body of the 
 house, who figured to themselves what a business 
 Pizarro would make of it, with at least three 
 hundred English in the Peruvian army. But Ellis- 
 ton turned a nuisance into perfume by a second ad- 
 dress, as to " the necessity of accommodating those 
 " who had done him an honour, the remembrance 
 " of which would never be eradicated from his 
 " heart." He added " I humbly trust, therefore, 
 " that to a Briton you .will not deny that favour, 
 " which your spontaneous goodness formerly granted 
 " to a Foreigner" 
 
 The plea of course was irresistible ; not that the 
 present audience knew one tittle of the case that 
 was cited for their emulation ; which, in fact, was 
 an opera benefit for Madame Banti; when, in 
 truth, it little signified who were on or off the stage, 
 so as she herself was but there. 
 
 The close of the little theatre called for more of 
 his dexterity for they had somehow dispensed, in 
 the latter part of the mountaineers, with both Sadi 
 and Agnes. On he comes, and, as usual, to the 
 purpose. Hear him 
 
 c c 3
 
 ELLISTON'S COPIOUS ADDRESS. 
 
 " To this I believe I may impute that partial 
 " disapprobation which I have just heard. The 
 *' circumstance might have been glossed over, but 
 " we always prefer speaking the TRUTH." 
 
 When he comes to return thanks for the MANA- 
 GER, he slily takes credit for the copia verborum 
 of his own compliments " It is difficult (not 
 " for HIM) to vary the expressions of gratitude, 
 " which your favour has so repeatedly excited." 
 
 " The PERFORMERS, ladies and gentlemen, join 
 " with me in acknowledging the fullest force of 
 " your liberality and support; and we mostrespect- 
 " fully, most gratefully, and most affectionately, bid 
 ' you farewell." 
 
 I should be afraid to trust such spontaneous flow 
 with deliberate composition. Mr. Pitt was said not 
 to be quite felicitous upon paper. I almost wish 
 that Elliston would refuse even to write an 
 order. 
 
 My pleasant bustling friend is supposed by some 
 people to be rather too fond of these personal ap- 
 peals^ and there have been occasions, on which 
 even his prudence in making them seems rather 
 questionable. Besides, from his success, a fashion 
 attaches to such things ; and now, " every puny 
 whipster gets his sword :" but I can safely afford 
 him the praise of being the great and unrivalled 
 master of all moving accidents; the courageous 
 captain of compliments ; the standing advertise-
 
 MISS DUNCAN. 391 
 
 ment of his own success ; and the happiest sedative 
 that was ever exhibited to an unruly body. 
 
 Although I shall be obliged to occupy great 
 space in the notice of the young Roscius, yet it 
 would be unpardonable to omit the appearance in 
 the metropolis of an actress so excellent as Miss 
 Duncan. When quite an infant, Miss Farren ex- 
 jressed her admiration of the little wonder, as she 
 called her, and hoped to see her, at maturity, .the 
 future Farren of Drury Lane Theatre. This Miss 
 Farren did not see, but the Countess of Derby, I 
 hope, both saw it, and patronized her best repre- 
 sentative. In some respects she surpasses her 
 model; she is a good singer and a fine dancer. 
 She has more force than her great predecessor, but 
 not equal delicacy ; and, with a finer figure, is less 
 interesting. But she is an actress. Her first ap- 
 pearance was on the 8th of October 1804, when 
 she performed Lady Teazle at Drury Lane Theatre. 
 Matthews was her Sir Peter, and Elliston Ctiarks ; 
 and both of them sinking " ten thousand fathoms" 
 below the originals, and yet both possessing no 
 mean degree of talent, 
 
 At Covent Garden Theatre on the 24th, from 
 the non-arrival of Charles Kemble, Reynolds had 
 to exhibit the new PATENTEE in his comedy of the 
 Blind Bargain I He ventured, with a suitable 
 apology, to ask Mr. Kemble to supply his brother's 
 place. He received the following characteristic 
 
 reply. 
 
 c c 4
 
 392 BLIND BARGAIN. 
 
 (Copy.) 
 
 " MY DEAR REYNOLDS, 
 
 " I intended to do what you wish I should ; and 
 all I have to ask in return is, that you will think 
 it no favour at all. 
 
 " Best compliments to Mrs. Reynolds. 
 
 " Yours, J. P. KEMBLE." 
 
 He sustained the play, by the energy with which 
 he represented the sufferings and the worth of 
 Villars. This is refined virtue ; Emery gave to the 
 rustic, Woodbine, a perfection which, like Mr. 
 Kemble, he alone could impart. The fun of the 
 piece was found in lexicography Sir Andrew 
 Analyse (Fawcett) equals Johnson himself in ludi- 
 crous definition. An AUTHOR is a man " who 
 " never lives till he dies ;" and a DUN .is a fellow 
 " such a favourite; in the fashionable squares, that 
 ** he is always desired to call again." 
 
 The play was w r ell received. 
 
 I have in general felt disposed to advocate the 
 decisions of managers; because it confessedly is 
 their interest to welcome every novelty of promise. 
 The only thing in the way of sound discretion is 
 when the director of the stage combines the two- 
 fold functions of caterer and actor. In this di- 
 lemma Mr.Garrick was placed, in the few instances, 
 where his decision was refuted by complete success. 
 Those instances were the Douglas of Home, the 
 Clcone of Dodsley, the Orphan of China, by Mur-
 
 TOBIN. 393 
 
 phy. The true reason in all these of his coldness 
 was, that the female interest predominated that 
 Mrs. Gibber would have entirely overwhelmed him. 
 This reason he was not bold enough to assign ; so 
 the first was too " simple and undramatic /" the 
 second " cruel, bloody r , and unnatural ;" and the 
 third, after Murphy had complied with all his stric- 
 tures, was "totally wifit" for the stage. His answers 
 might have been couched in three words " Lady 
 Randolph," " Cleone," " Mandane." 
 
 The modern scribblers assail managers with the 
 delightful Honey Moon, 
 
 " Etplorata diu mem'mistisjhta BIONIS." 
 
 Had the genius of poor Tobin, say they, received 
 a suitable welcome, his* health would not have 
 declined, and an amiable and excellent poet might 
 have lived long among us in the enjoyment of his 
 enviable reputation. Yet even here, though per- 
 haps very few may be entitled to plead the prece- 
 dent, even here Mr. Sheridan might reasonably 
 have said, and Mr. Kemble certainly did say 
 "The Honey Moon as to character and language 
 " is an absolute cento from Shakspeare and his co- 
 " temporaries : What more are the Duke and his 
 " wife than Petruchio and Catherine ? The sham 
 " duke is Christofero Sly. Rolando is Duretete. 
 " In addition to all which, we have the Viola of 
 " Shakspeare combining with the equally enchant-
 
 394- PECULIAR FATE OF MR. KEMBLE. 
 
 " ing Beltarw of Fletcher, to form another faithful 
 " pilgrim in the train of love." 
 
 The language was equally modelled after our 
 Augustan period ; and struck the ear (high praise 
 indeed !) like rescued leaves from Mr. Warburton's 
 Cookwench, preserving from the bottoms of his 
 pies some of the lamented treasures of the author 
 of Philaster and the Faithful Shepherdess. That, 
 perhaps, Fletcher thus at second hand should be 
 " devoutly wished" pure taste might decide in the 
 affirmative, but no vehement censure will lie 
 against a manager who rejects not only certain but 
 glaring plagiarism. The experiment might have 
 failed, has often failed. 
 
 There was something peculiarly hard in the thea- 
 trical life of Mr. Kemble ; and a frequent return 
 of the annoyance showed it to be his fate, ' to find 
 the popular favour perpetually wrested from him 
 by candidates, whom he could not respect, if) in- 
 deed, he did not rather despise them. Cooke, if 
 not advanced before him by the MANY, which I 
 think he was, they at least allowed to stand by his 
 side, whenever he could stand but Kemble, and 
 even Cooke himself, were now doomed to the 
 danger that once menaced Shakspeare and his fel- 
 lows at the Blackfriars, the danger and the morti- 
 fication of being beaten by a child. 
 
 William Henry West Betty, the son of W. Henry 
 and Mary Betty, as it appears on the parish regis-
 
 MASTER BETTY. 3Q5 
 
 ter of St. Chad's, Shrewsbury, was born the 13th of 
 September 1791. His mother, whose maiden name 
 was Stanton, was the daughter of a most respecta- 
 ble gentleman residing near Worcester. His father, 
 a few years after the birth of his son, retired to his 
 native place, and carried on the linen manufactory 
 at or near Ballynahinch, county Down. 
 
 In looking for the accidents which suggest or 
 promote a favourite propensity, the first thing 
 remarkable is, that the mother of the youth was 
 exceedingly fond of dramatic amusements, and her- 
 self, it seems, an interesting speaker ; she was even 
 fond of acting in private with her sisters. Her son 
 therefore conceived a love of declamation from the 
 lips of his mother. 
 
 The summer of 1802 carried Mrs. Siddons to 
 Belfast, and the manager got up Pizarro with much 
 splendor for that great woman's performance of 
 Elvira. His father took Master Betty then, for the 
 first time, to see a play ; and fortunately for him 
 his youthful sight first opened on perfection. An 
 enthusiasm so ardent was kindled in his mind, that 
 his life would have been endangered by the disap- 
 pointment of his hopes ; he resolved to be an actor, 
 and, with the simplicity of a child, he thought of 
 nothing but Elvira : he spoke only the speeches 
 of Elvira : the voice of Siddons perpetually 
 sounded in his ear, and it was some time before his 
 studies would take the direction even of his sex.
 
 390 Mil. HOUGH. 
 
 As soon as his parents saw that our youth was 
 steady in his determination, they took the best 
 means within their reach of ascertaining what others 
 might think of their son's requisites for the stage ; 
 and they consulted the Belfast manager, Mr. Atkins, 
 and his prompter, Mr. Hough, The latter gentle- 
 man was evidently the mind of Betty's acting j an 
 interesting person, a prepossessing countenance, eyes 
 of much intelligence, great animation and ardor, in- 
 finite energy, and the utmost grace at a period when 
 even the graceful are commonly awkward, com- 
 pleted the attractions, which for some time took 
 entire possession alike of wisdom and folly, the 
 elevated and the humble ; and produced a delirium^ 
 with which there could be no contending ; for it 
 reduced the greatest men among us to drivel non- 
 sense on this subject, which has never been ex- 
 ceeded in the most remarkable delusions of 
 taste. 
 
 Mr. Hough was now constituted the guardian 
 angel of Betty, and directed his studies. Those 
 who reject everything that is not miracle, transferred 
 to a boy of eleven years old the CONCEPTION of all 
 the characters that he performed ; but the real 
 truth may be found in the recorded opinion of one 
 who could not but know it, and it was this : " Mr. 
 " Hough found that he possessed a docility even 
 '* greater than his genius ; for whatever he was 
 " directed to do, he could instantly execute, and
 
 FIRST APPEARANCE OF MASTER BETTY. 
 
 "was sure never to forget. He found that his 
 " feelings could take the impression of every passion 
 " and sentiment. Whatever was properly presented 
 " to his mind he could immediately lay hold of, 
 " and seemed to seize, by a sort of intuitive sagacity, 
 " the spirit of every sentence, and the prominent 
 " beauties of every remarkable passage." And all 
 this is indeed extraordinary in a youth of no greater 
 age ! I know the way in which an early sketch 
 suggests to the imagination ; and how she fills up 
 the outline, which TIME refuses so constantly to 
 confirm. I therefore willingly allow a retreat to 
 the rashness of prophetic admiration, and permit 
 even those who would have erected statues to him 
 THEN, to exclaim now, " I only said, the boy was a 
 " clever boy" 
 
 But something is due to the offended feelings of 
 mature excellence, for a season thrown aside as 
 comparatively worthless ! Looking, as a manager 
 must look at it, to the engagement of Master Betty 
 as a fine commercial speculation, as an actor, Mr. 
 Kemble could not but feel deeply humbled by the 
 absurd preference which it implied. 
 
 The first engagement of this youth was at 
 Belfast, in the month of August 1803, and the 
 Osman of Voltaire's Zara was the character chosen 
 for his debut. Mr. Hough had made his pupil do 
 every thing that his own memory and judgment 
 suggested in the character j and though he could
 
 MASTER BETTY AT EDINBURGH. 
 
 not divest him of the vulgarisms of habitual speech; 
 he yet gave him a good tune at least to carry them 
 off; and nature had fully enabled the youth to put 
 a good face upon the matter. His success was 
 prodigious. 
 
 But the great bell was rung to him by Jackson; 
 of Edinburgh, who literally must have lost his wits, 
 were We to judge of him by the flighty stuff, which 
 he wrote upon the boy. One paragraph, as he 
 must have wished, shall be preserved in stage 
 history. 
 
 " It is one of those singularities of nature, that 
 " neither * history nor tradition can furnish, but 
 " which is now beheld by us ; but never can be 
 " seen again, till the AUTHOR of all things shall, 
 " when he thinks meet, condescend to endue another 
 " stripling in embryo with a similar incredible com- 
 " bination of stage endowments, for the gratifica* 
 " tion of cotemporary admiration." 
 
 But he does far better than this, at all events in 
 Scotland, for the fame of his stripling for he 
 places John Home himself, the author of Douglas, 
 in his old seat at the first wing, to enable him to 
 judge the merits of young Betty, whose back lie 
 could clearly discover the whole of the performance. 
 Home was at this time in his 70th year. The 
 
 * Mr. Jackson, by this, seems at all events to have been 
 ivell read in history. The state of our frame when it is " endued 
 with stage endowments" i. e. in embryo, is particularly learned.
 
 HOME'S OPINION OF MASTER BETTY. 39ft. 
 
 applause was such as the play had never before 
 received, and the veteran bard seemed to think it 
 excited by the play then ; accordingly he rose from 
 his seat, suddenly rushed before the curtain, bowed 
 respectfully to the audience, and thus snatched the 
 MOB CAP from the head of Betty. 
 
 His opinion, however, the opinion of the author 
 of the play, of Home himself, speaking of Betty 
 himself Oh, 
 
 " If that had been forgotten, 
 It had been as a gap in our great feast, 
 And all things unbecoming." 
 
 Sir, said he, to the learned Jackson " This is. 
 " the Jirst time I ever saw the part of Douglas 
 "played; that is, according to my ideas of the 
 " character, as at the time I conceived it, and as 
 " I wrote it." Poor dear man, I am afraid he had 
 not quite cleared his head from the misprision of 
 applause just noticed, and therefore it would be 
 cruel to bind his judgment too strongly down. 
 He had seen Diggs, when young, in Edinburgh, 
 he had seen Barry, when young, in London yet 
 this was thejirst time ; but I honour him for the 
 first scene of his third act, and will not insult his 
 memory ! 
 
 My old friend Macready had requested Jackson 
 to engage the Roscius for the Birmingham Theatre. 
 He loved a cheap article, and was delighted that 
 Jackson obtained him for ten pounds per night.
 
 4-00 MASTER BETTY IN LONDON. 
 
 But when he arrived, he no sooner saw him than 
 he wished to be let off so ruinous an engagement. 
 The friends of Betty had no objection, provided he 
 should be indemnified for the journey from Edin- 
 burgh to Birmingham. Macready hit upon a com- 
 fortable arrangement. " From the nightly receipts 
 " first deduct, said he, SIXTY pounds, and then we 
 " divide the remainder equally." It was imme- 
 diately agreed to, and our cautious manager paid 
 the boy FIFTY pounds per night instead of fen. 
 
 But at length we return to London, where he 
 was to have at each theatre 50 guineas per night, 
 and a free benefit. Mrs. Litchfield was then dis- 
 engaged; but Mr. Kemble came himself and 
 renewed her engagement. Her height suited the 
 figure of the boy better than the overpowering 
 stature of Mrs. Powell at the other house. He came 
 to Covent Garden Theatre seemingly a very gentle, 
 modest, well disposed youth ; very ingenuous, not 
 in the least conceited or spoiled, but delighted to 
 act, and always doing his best. In rehearsing with 
 him he appeared to be perfectly composed, and 
 thoroughly initiated in what is called the business 
 of the play. 
 
 Saturday the 1st of December, 1804, was the, 
 day distinguished by the first performance in town 
 of the young Roscius. As early as one o'clock 
 the crowd began to assemble about Covent Garden 
 Theatre, filling the piazzas on one side of the 
 house, and Bow Street on the other. At the proper
 
 ANXIETY TO SEE THE ROSCIUS. 401 
 
 time all the popular arts were practised to obtain 
 admission. 
 
 " The Theatre, too small, did suffocate 
 
 Its squeez'd contents, and more than it admitted 
 Did sigh at their exclusion, and return 
 Ungratified. For BETTY there, the boy, 
 Did strut, and storm, and straddle, stamp and stare, 
 And show the world how GARRICK did not act. 
 
 TASK, B. vi. 
 
 The utmost danger was apprehended now, because 
 those, who had quite ascertained that it was im- 
 possible for them to get in, by the dreadful pressure 
 behind them could not get back. At length, they 
 themselves called for the soldiers, who with their 
 usual temper and firmness, soon cleared the fronts 
 of the entrances, and then posting themselves 
 properly, lined the passages, permitting any one to 
 return, but none to enter. The pit was half filled 
 by gentlemen who had sprung down from the 
 boxes. The actual occupiers of the boxes by force 
 retained them against the owners of the places, and 
 the police officers, who attempted to be their 
 ushers. All that the gallantry of the men would 
 consent to was allowing ladies, in some cases, to 
 occupy the front seat, while the remainder of the 
 box was held by the strong right of possession. 
 Drury Lane Theatre had a weak bill on that oc- 
 casion, and really benefited 200/., by the turn-over. 
 They had 237 1. 16s. &d. at the first account to 
 Busy-Body, and a half-price of 6?/. 
 
 VOL. II. D D
 
 402 MASTER BETTY IN BARBAROSSA. 
 
 i. The play was Dr. Brown's Barbarossa, a verjr 
 good and spirited imitation of the Merope of Vol- 
 taire, in which Garrick had formerly acted Achmet 
 to the tyrant of Mossop. On the present occasion 
 the cast was this : 
 
 Barbarossa - Mr. Hargrave. 
 
 Achmet (Selim,) - - Betty. 
 
 Othman, - - Murray. 
 
 Sadi, - - - Cresswell. 
 
 Aladin, - - Cory. 
 
 Zaphira, ... Mrs. Litchfield. 
 Irene, ... H. Siddons. 
 
 An occasional address was intended, and Mr. C. 
 Kemble attempted to speak it. But they would 
 not have heard even the address of Dr. Johnson, 
 unless Master Betty himself had delivered it ; and 
 this notion, Heaven knows how, had entered the 
 heads, I found, of some quantity of barren specta- 
 tors. The play proceeded through the first act 
 with a tempest rather stronger than that which 
 announces the first appearance of a pantomime. 
 In the first scene of the second act, Mrs. Litchfield's 
 skill made them apply a speech of Zaphira to 
 Bonaparte. 
 
 At length Barbarossa ordered Achmet to be 
 brought before him ; " attention held them mute ;'* 
 not even a whisper could be heard, till the highly 
 honoured object of their curiosity stood in their 
 presence. Upon the thunder of applause that 
 ensued he was not "muck moved". he bowed
 
 YOUNG ROSCIUS CRITICALLY EXAMINED. 403 
 
 very respectfully, but with amazing self-possession 
 in a few moments turned him to his work, with the 
 intelligence of a veteran, and the youthful passion 
 that alone could have accomplished for a task so 
 arduous. As a slave, he wore white linen panta- 
 loons, a close and rather short russet jacket, trimmed 
 with sable, and a turban hat. 
 
 What first struck me was, that his voice had con- 
 siderable power and a depth of tone beyond his ap- 
 parent age. At the same time it appeared heavy 
 and unvaried. His great fault grew out of the 
 want of careful tuition in the outset. In the pro- 
 vincial way, he dismissed the aspirate ; and, in his 
 closing syllables, ending in m, or n, he converted 
 the vowel i frequently into e, and sometimes more 
 barbarously still into u. Whether he obtained this 
 from careless speakers in Ireland or England, I 
 cannot be sure j but this inaccuracy I remember 
 to have sometimes heard even from Miss O'Neil. 
 
 He was at times too rapid to be distinct, and at 
 others too noisy for any thing but rant. I found no 
 peculiarities that denoted minute and happy studies. 
 He spoke the speeches as I had always heard them 
 spoken, and was therefore only not wrong where he 
 laid vehement emphasis. The wonder was how 
 any boy, who had just completed his 13th year, 
 could catch passion, meaning, cadence, action, ex- 
 pression, and the discipline of the stage, in TEN 
 very different and arduous characters, so as to give 
 the kind of pleasure in them, that needed no indul- 
 
 D D 2
 
 401' SUCCESS OF THE YOUNG ROSCIUS. 
 
 gence, and which, from that very circumstance,- 
 heightened satisfaction into enthusiasm. 
 
 His admirers made him their divinity ; when he 
 was ill, he had all the beauties of England at his 
 door, and a bulletin announced the degrees of his 
 convalescence to a fevered and impatient public. 
 
 The patentees of Covent Garden Theatre had 
 hoped to keep him to themselves ; but there 
 seemed, in an engagement for a certain number 
 of nights, no reason why he should not be at liberty 
 to dispose, as his parents judged fit, of the re- 
 mainder of his time. They would naturally hus- 
 band his powers as much as was consistent with 
 that first law in the exhibition of such ventures, 
 namely, to " take the current while it served." 
 This, I believe, was done ; and in his youth an ample 
 fortune secured for his maturity. 
 
 Covent Garden Theatre was not quite so large 
 as the Apollo Drury. I therefore, in citing his 
 receipts for 28 nights at the latter, show the utmost 
 force of his attraction. They were all royal nights. 
 I give accurately both first and second accounts, 
 that so curious a detail may be publicly known. 
 For his first three nights he received 150 guineas, 
 and after that 100 guineas nightly.
 
 RECEIPTS OF MASTER BETTY'S NIGHTS. 405 
 
 o 
 
 00 
 
 M 
 o 
 x 
 
 
 
 03 
 
 w- 
 
 % 
 
 < 
 
 ri 
 
 * 
 
 SS 
 P 
 s! 
 
 a 
 
 j 
 < 
 
 H 
 
 O 
 
 (S 
 
 w 
 M 
 H 
 
 a 
 
 3 
 
 H 
 
 .- ^ >. 
 
 a S < Q p o < a H o
 
 406 SALARY OF MASTER BETTY. 
 
 Thus the reader has seen, in the accurate detail 
 of the treasurer, that the sum taken by the house 
 on his eight and twenty performances, was to the 
 astonishing amount of Seventeen thousand two 
 hundred and ten Pounds, Eleven Shillings, sterl- 
 ing money. That this gives an average receipt 
 nightly, of Six Hundred and Fourteen Pounds, 
 Thirteen Shillings, and Three Pence. That the 
 treasury paid him for these services no less than 
 
 ^"2782. 10. being, 3 nights at 50 guineas . . 157 10 
 25 do. 100 do. 2625 
 
 ^2782 10 
 
 This is independent of his benefits, which were all 
 free, and of which he had four in the season j and 
 these, with presents, must have been each worth 
 1000 guineas to him. 
 
 The boy, however, as I have said, was certainly 
 extraordinary still there was, rather too appa- 
 rent, a great deficiency of elementary knowledge. 
 One of his admirers proposed two measures, which 
 in his judgment, would supply all deficiencies. 
 " Let them," said he, " buy him a Jirst folio of 
 " Shakspeare ; and get some clergyman to teach 
 " him Greek" Both of these desiderata were, I 
 think, subsequently conferred upon Mr. Betty. I 
 believe too, that he taught himself English, not 
 less necessary to his perfection than the language 
 of Eschylus. But it was the prodigy that we fol- 
 lowed, nnd not the powers. Our love could not
 
 PORTRAITS OF THE YOUNG ROSCIUS. 407 
 
 last to his years of discretion ; and when he really 
 acted by his own understanding, his admirers had 
 come to their senses. 
 
 In the mean time, all the favouritism, and more 
 than the innocence, of former patronesses was 
 lavished upon him. He might have chosen, among 
 our titled dames, the carriage he would honour 
 with his person; and the young Roscius had 
 " wiped away all trivial fond records" of the excel- 
 lencies of Siddons and Kemble. The ARTS strove 
 to perpetuate his countenance and his figure : OPIB 
 painted him on the Grampian hills, as the shepherd 
 Norval NORTHCOTE exhibited him in a Vandyke 
 costume, retiring from the altar of Shakspeare, as 
 having borne thence, not stolen, 
 
 " Jove's authentic fire." 
 
 Heath engraved the latter picture, which the 
 father published himself; and inscribed to H. R. H. 
 the Duke of Clarence, a decided patron of the 
 stage. Several heads adorned the fugitive lives of 
 him, more or less like, as the artist had been fa- 
 voured with a private or public view of his features ; 
 and his bust was the rival of his pictures in our ex- 
 hibitions. Amidst all this adulation, all this despe- 
 rate folly, be it one consolation to his mature self, 
 that he never lost the genuine modesty of his car- 
 riage, and that his temper at least was as steady as 
 his diligence. 
 
 n D 4
 
 408 DECLINE OF THE YOUNG KOSCIUS. 
 
 Mrs. Siddons was confined by a severe and tedi- 
 ous indisposition. 
 
 Mr. Kemble all this time said little ; he acted 
 Penruddock occasionally, and took a part of jno 
 great moment in a passing novelty. Indeed what 
 can a sensible man decide, in such a night, but 
 attendre lejour ? It arrived at the close of the first 
 season. Mrs. Litchfield, with her husband, had always 
 been a devoted admirer of Mr. Kemble in tragedy. 
 She had been an intelligent observer, a close one, 
 of the : new favourite, and had anticipated the re- 
 turn of the people to better attraction. It struck 
 her to try, for her benefit, a tragedy of Shakspeare, 
 acted by the veteran artists, and she asked Mr. 
 Kemble whether he would play Othello for her 
 night ? His answer was, that he would do so with 
 the greatest pleasure, but felt himself bound to tell 
 her, that he thought the choice a weak one. She 
 had concluded otherwise ; and made the attempt to 
 render the town ashamed of its injustice. Mr. 
 Kemble acted Othello in a style of surpassing dig- 
 nity and emotion. Cooke gave his utmost insinu- 
 ation to lago ; and C. Kemble acted Cassio, so as to 
 bestow a third fine male character upon the play. 
 Mrs. H. Siddons, a lovely actress, was the Desde- 
 mona j she herself Emilia. Mr. Heathcote had 
 the stage box, and the young Roscius sat in the 
 front of it j and, I have no sort of doubt, received 
 a great and hearty pleasure from the performance. 
 The audience were enthusiastic in their applause,
 
 RETORT COURTEOUS. 409 
 
 and there were persons who said openly " The 
 charm is dispelled the business is settled." I 
 can almost forgive indignant excellence, for insult- 
 ing the public, in its turn, with the production 
 of a Roscia, in the infantine pertness of Miss 
 Mudie.
 
 410 
 
 CHAP. IV. 
 
 COLMAN'S THEATRE. POOR SUETT. THE VILLAGE 
 
 FRACAS. ELLISTON AND MATTHEWS. THE FORMER 
 
 COMPARED TO ACHILLES ! HOW AN AUDIENCE SHOULD 
 
 BE ADDRESSED. DOWTON. THE TAILORS. DEATH. 
 
 RETREAT OF THE TEN THOUSAND. MASTERS OF THE 
 
 ORDER. WINTER OF 1805-6. ZANGA. GLOSTER. 
 
 ROWE REALLY DOES IMITATE SHAKSPEARE IN SHORE. 
 
 - PROOFS IN ABUNDANCE. BETTY'S RETURN. RECEIPTS 
 
 CONTRASTED. MR. HARGRAVE. BETTY IN BROBDIG- 
 
 NAG. SEASON OF 1806-7. THE TRIUMPH OF CORIO- 
 
 LANUS. THOMSON. SIDDONS. INSULT, HOW NOTICED 
 
 BY KEMBLE. THEODORE HOOK. TEKELI. MOTHER 
 
 GOOSE. ISAAC REED. TOBIN*S CURFEW. LE1TER 
 
 TO THE AUTHOR FROM MR. KEMBLE. NOEL DESEN- 
 
 FANS, ESO,. 
 
 MR. COLMAN now disposed of a part of the Hay- 
 market Theatre to his brother-in-law, Mr. Morris, 
 Mr. Winston, an old stager, and an attorney of the 
 name of Tahourdine ; a circumstance greatly in- 
 deed to be regretted ; but I apprehend, at the time, 
 unavoidable. I frankly confess that I could have 
 wished a property created by genius, continued and 
 perpetuated by genius, had still kept itself from the 
 contamination of bargain and sale and commercial 
 speculation. But " who can controul his fate ?"
 
 COLMAN'S THEATRE. 411 
 
 The genius who now held it, certainly not inferior 
 to his predecessors, had a mind of so singular a cast, 
 that he rather courted difficulty than avoided it 
 He paid at least twice over for every hundred 
 pounds he obtained j and, to use his own figure, 
 could not avoid the circuitous in any thing. " If 
 you wanted to be in the pit of the Opera," said he, 
 "YOU would cross the street from where we now 
 " stand ; a thing impossible to ME." A much loved 
 friend of my youth had offered me the use of ten 
 thousand pounds, for any theatrical speculation 
 that I inclined to, dividing the profits with me. I 
 mentioned the circumstance to Colman He 
 laughed and said "he had too much regard for me." 
 " My dear fellow, I will not allow a friend to share 
 my difficulties with me." In his usual way, he 
 added a pleasantry relative to Sheridan's recent 
 partner, which from delicacy I suppress. I should 
 explain that this had no reference whatever to the 
 present arrangement, which, I believe, then had 
 never even been thought of. For many reasons I 
 wish he had been less scrupulous. Bred a man of 
 business, I could have aided his talent where alone 
 he wanted help ; and at the present moment Col- 
 man's theatre would have been his own house. 
 
 It had been an object of sincere regret to the 
 lovers alike of comedy and opera, to see that Suett 
 was rapidly sinking into the grave. I am silent 
 over a man's indiscretions, when they do not clash 
 with his professional duties 1 have no right to
 
 412 DEATH OF SUETT. 
 
 pursue him into private life, and measure the pro- 
 gress of a destructive habit. Mr. Suett was a vic- 
 tim to nervous irritability. In our happy sympo- 
 sium, at Colman's theatre, a slight refection was 
 for some time taken in the carpenter's room, where 
 there was a regular president for the two hours of 
 our sittings, and where, from Sheridan to very 
 humble names indeed, the authors and patrons of 
 the theatre mixed in the highest good humour with 
 the performers of both sexes, acting on any parti- 
 cular evening. The greatest decorum prevailed. 
 On. one of these nights, I remember, I was presi- 
 dent, and sat decorated with the ribband and the 
 medal : and poor Suett drew his seat next to my 
 throne. He was uncalled for a few minutes, 
 during which he gave me a most curious and unaf- 
 fected detail of the horrors that invaded him nightly, 
 whenever sleep surprised him, and left his fancy 
 " to sport at will her wild creations." I solemnly 
 declare that no powers, of even German invention, 
 have yet given a series of images so terrific, nor dis- 
 played so graphically, as was this record of mise- 
 ries sustained by Suett. 
 
 " I was afraid, methinks, to hear him tell it." 
 
 Poor fellow, he was buried on the 15th of July, in 
 the burying-ground on the north side of St. Paul's 
 Cathedral. He was attended to his grave by his 
 two sons, and four private friends, with a consider- 
 able number of his theatrical brethren. Suett had
 
 MR. CHERRY'S VILLAGE. 413 
 
 received the rudiments of his musical education in 
 her Majesty's choir ; and the Queen's boys were 
 consequently in attendance, and, with the assist- 
 ance of some professional singers, an Anthem was 
 intended, and expected by a numerous assemblage 
 of persons " who loved him living, and his memory 
 when dead." But it was found that the design, if 
 persisted in, would incur additional fees to the 
 cathedral, amounting to THIRTY-EIGHT pounds, and 
 it would, I suppose, have " prophaned the service 
 " of the dead to sing a requiem," unless the 
 established fees had been conceded to the chapter. 
 
 The age inscribed upon the coffin of Richard 
 Suett, was forty-seven. No spleen in human nature 
 could resist him, but his own. 
 
 Perhaps few places of public amusement, gene- 
 rally speaking, could boast of more harmony in the 
 green-room than the little theatre. But a ludicrous 
 instance of human frailty started forward on the 
 following occasion. The late Mr. Cherry, a man 
 of talent, had undertaken to dispel that delusion, 
 (of poetry, surely, rather than life,) that the country 
 is the seat of the virtues. In a comedy, called the 
 Village, or the World's Epitome, he displayed what 
 few villages, I believe, are too small to contain, co- 
 quetry, selfishness, and litigation. Two London 
 adventurers, who sought for simplicity and purity 
 QUt of town, return convinced that the village is 
 only the miniature of the metropolis. Alas ! it is 
 not even THAT !
 
 4*14 ELLISTON AND MATTHEWS. 
 
 The piece was only just "glossed over*' on the 
 first night ; on the second its fate was sealed ; an- 
 other play was to be given out, when on the stage 
 rushed Elliston, and, in his confidential style said to 
 the spectators " I am so much agitated, on ac- 
 " count of the TREATMENT I have received behind 
 " the scenes, that I cannot NOW speak ; but I will 
 " shortly address you." 
 
 Great consternation arose in the house upon this 
 intimation. What the treatment could have been 
 was a profound mystery ; they looked curiously at 
 the actor's person ; nothing about him seemed 
 ruffled but his temper. While Mr. Elliston was 
 recovering himself, a gentleman from the boxes, or 
 an imitation by Matthews, called out to him 
 Mr. Elliston, take care what you do." The ad- 
 monition had all the effect of superior power. He 
 at length told them, that " no consideration vchat- 
 " ever should deter him from speaking the TRUTH," 
 (which produced the loudest applause from an 
 almost bursting curiosity.) But he never said one 
 word as to the TREATMENT which had so agitated 
 him ; and only sonorously declaimed upon " the 
 ' triple duty that he owed to the audience, the 
 " proprietors, and the author." He " solemnly 
 " declared," that " on the first night he had given 
 M the piece out, contrary to his OWN opinion, and 
 ** now finding the house decidedly against it, 
 * he begged to substitute the Dramatist for the 
 " following night."
 
 ELLISTON COMPARED TO ACHILLES. 415 
 
 Every classic reader will here be reminded of 
 the effect of Pallas upon the equally enraged 
 Achilles ; and rejoice that hostilities were not pur- 
 sued in public by Mr. Elliston. Dryden's four 
 lines of translation add the beauty of reluctance to 
 the action by which Homer testifies the hero's obe- 
 dience to the goddess. 
 
 " The gods are just, and when, subduing sense,* 
 We serve their pow'rs, provide the recompence. 
 He said ; with surly faith believ'd the word, 
 And in the sheath, reluctant, plung'd the sword." f 
 
 What produced all this, it is said, was a hint 
 from the manager that, had otJier actors done their 
 duty, as he Iiimselfhad, the result would have been 
 different. 
 
 Our pleasant friend Matthews set out in life with 
 a solid principle, " never to give an affront, nor hear 
 " one." He accordingly retorted that, in his 
 opinion, " all concerned had done their duty 
 " equally well with Mr. Elliston, and some even 
 " better" I believe he never, like Brutus, softened 
 the term by a query ". Did I say better ?" 
 
 Elliston here used, I am afraid, the only other 
 
 * Feeling, not reason. 
 
 \ I will add that the word plung'd is the happiest that 
 even Dry den could choose on this occasion; its smartness, 
 singly as its stands here, does more infinitely than " sent the 
 blade home to its rest." It is a verb combining passion with 
 action. It is not in Homer, whose sense is literally given by 
 Pope. In the line preceding, however, they both, with an equal 
 lack of truth and taste, omit the characteristic description 
 " X tr P /Sap**." IL A. v. 219. 
 
 " The silver hilt his ponderous hand imprest."
 
 416 HOW TO ADDRESS AN AUDIENCE. ' 
 
 word which, like hell, is never mentioned in a 
 polite ear; and, it was said, that he was immediately 
 knocked down. As a story usually gains by telling 
 it, the manager was said to have repeated his -pro- 
 vocation and his fall. But, at a distance from the 
 event, it seems singular that the great pride should 
 have been to keep his legs under an assault. He 
 himself admits an altercation attended with some 
 warmth ; says nothing whatever as to any blow 
 given or returned ; but as to being knocked down, 
 asserts that " those who know him best must be 
 " sensible, that he is not likely to be seen in any 
 " such state of degradation." 
 
 To confirm his words, out flew not " millions of 
 " flaming swords,*' but a declaration, putting a de- 
 cided negative upon the knocking down ; and signed 
 by Robert Palmer, Charles Taylor, John Palmer, 
 W.T. P. Hutton, and the prompter, F. G. Waldron. 
 It was dated the 21st of July, 1805. 
 
 I should never have thought this worthy of no- 
 tice, but that it may help me to repress a growing 
 evil. An actor, who feels in himself any remarkable 
 fluency, is apt to get fond of addressing an audience: 
 if in consequence of any dexterity, in this mock 
 humility of appeal, he prevail upon the noisy to be 
 quiet, or the offended to pardon, he may even court 
 occasions to go on and talk to them : and thus it hap- 
 pened in the present instance ; when a really clever 
 man flies before them, without considering what he 
 had to say touches, because he could not address 
 them, on a matter with which they had nothing to 
 \
 
 THE TAILORS. 417 
 
 do familiarly acquaints them with his agitation, 
 but comforts their presumed eagerness to hear him 
 with the promise that he would shortly address 
 them. 
 
 Now all this proceeds from a mistake as to the 
 relative position of the parties. Whoever are col- 
 lected together in a theatre are to be treated by 
 the actor as the PUBLIC. There ought to be always 
 great awe in addressing such a body : it should 
 be as seldom done as possible, and always with in- 
 finite respect. They are to be treated as PATRONS 
 .whom you reverence; not even as FRIENDS, between 
 whom passes a reciprocation of benefits ; and least 
 of all as CUSTOMERS, who are welcome to carry their 
 money to another market, if they find your bazar 
 incommodious, or your wares not durable, because 1 
 badly manufactured. A\\ familiarity on such occa- 
 sions is as absurd as it is impudent. FLATTERY is 
 the fulsome medium by which egotism seeks to 
 gratify its busy importance. When Louis XV. 
 passed Voltaire, after honouring with his presence 
 the performance of Le Temple de la Gloire, " Eli ! 
 " bien," said the poet, " TRAJAN, est il content ?" 
 The monarch rebuked the indecorum, the flatter}', 
 and the vanity, by not deigning to reply. 
 
 I no sooner get clear of one nuisance, but another 
 calls for notice. That excellent actor, Dowton, 
 announced for his benefit, after the Birth-day, a 
 burlesque piece, erroneously attributed to Foote, 
 called the Tailors; or a Tragedy for Warm Weather, 
 
 VOL. II. E E
 
 418 DEATH. 
 
 It was now the 15th of August. Dowton himself 
 received menacing letters informing him that seven- 
 teen thousand tailors would attend to oppose the 
 performance. Now dividing that number by NINE, 
 as it is usual, Dowton saw that it gave an aggregate 
 of one thousand eight hundred and eighty-eight 
 men, and eight odd tailors, which at the Haymarket 
 is a house, if they should not choose to be an au- 
 dience. One " forcible Feeble," who signed him- 
 self DEATH, wrote to Winston, a proprietor, and 
 stated that, in addition to the seventeen thousand 
 which I have already disposed of in the pit and 
 galleries, there should, if necessary, be ten thousand 
 more (" GEESE, villain?") tailors, sir. 
 
 In the galleries nothing but tailors could be seen. 
 The only rivals in the needle were two females, 
 who might be relations, but here history is silent. 
 As soon as Dowton presented himself in character, 
 perfectly in character also, a pair of sheers was 
 thrown at him. He offered 20/. reward for the appre- 
 hension of the offender. Although 201. might have 
 almost tempted the stones to rise and inform against 
 him, yet neither Dung nor Flint would " prate of 
 " his whereabout, or take the present horror from 
 " the time." They would say nothing, they would 
 hear nothing Dowton offered to substitute the 
 Village Lawyer for the Tailors. They would not 
 endure the word Lawyer The LAW they had 
 taken into their own hands, they had been in- 
 sulted, and breathed nothing but vengeance.
 
 RETREAT OF THE TEN THOUSAND. 419 
 
 If such were the proceedings inside the theatre, 
 leitho ut it was clear the menaces of DEATH were 
 not to be disregarded. The door-keepers reported, 
 that the ten thousand were arrived, and threatened 
 to burst in. Mr. Graham, the magistrate, was sent 
 for ; he was a man of firmness and came immedi- 
 ately, with the officers from Bow-street ; he made 
 special constables of about eight stout men belong- 
 ing to the theatre, and stationed his force at the 
 proper points for effect. He wrote to the com- 
 manding officer of the Life Guards, requiring a full 
 guard immediately, and that most excellent body 
 was there in a few minutes, and the retreat of the 
 ten thousand was speedily commenced. 
 
 Mr. Graham then seized the most conspicuous 
 of the internal agitators, and, with one exception, 
 they proved to be all tailors. Sixteen were admit- 
 ted to bail in 50/. each, with two sureties in 4>Ql. 
 Four were remanded for want of bail, and " the 
 " rest they ran away," being discharged. In all 
 these cases, the historian is bound to do strict jus- 
 tice. Had it been in the beginning of the week, 
 there had been no sacrifice of their interest to their 
 feeling ; they would none of them have been at 
 work. Mr. Dowton's night was Thursday, and 
 yet they took their measures accordingly. A friend 
 of mine is of opinion, that the connivance, if not 
 the furtherance, of the MASTERS was secured on 
 this occasion. I confess I am slow to suspect any 
 such feeling in the higher orders of that respectable 
 
 E E 2
 
 420 FIRST APPEARANCE OF LISTON. 
 
 community. I have seen, to be sure, the rather 
 eager exchange of the term tailor, for one not so 
 tasteful* ; I mean that of clothier ; and am aware 
 of the many instances, in which their original lofty 
 seats have stooped to the lower house of parlia- 
 ment. 
 
 " Et quantum vertice ad auras 
 JEtherias, tantum radice in Tartara tendit. 
 MENS IMMOTA MANET." Mneid. iv. 445-9. 
 
 But the Haymarket had this season a prouder 
 distinction than even tailors can confer LISTON, 
 from the Newcastle Theatre, made his first town 
 appearance there on the 1 8th of June, in the cha- 
 racter of John Lump. Nothing merits a more 
 distinct examination than the success of this sur- 
 prising actor. If Miss Tyrer had then whispered 
 to him, that he should ever be in such estimation 
 as to demand a salary of sixty pounds per week, he 
 
 * " Not so tasteful" The reader shall judge. The English 
 word is derived from the French tailleur ; that again from the 
 verb tailler, which the French academy thus admirably ex- 
 plain. TAILLER, say they, " is to cut, to separate a part from 
 any thing ; to take from it the superfluous ; in order to give it a 
 certain form or shape, and^/ft it to a certain object." A defini- 
 tion certainly neither " inadequate nor delusive." And what is 
 to CLOTHE ? Why " to cover with cloth," simply ; nothing more 
 can be made of it. Here is no ART implied ; no cutting out ; 
 no form, no shape, that is to add to grace where it exists, and 
 bestow it where it is not. Worse than all, there is not the 
 smallest hint, that the skilful operator always takes atvay the 
 superfluous!
 
 HOWE S IMITATIONS OF SHAKSPEARE. 421 
 
 would have thought it equally probable for that 
 morsel of woman to have attained his own height, 
 or himself to have acquired that mellow sweetness, 
 which charmed every ear in the voice of his future 
 wife. 
 
 The winter campaign of 1805-6 opened rather 
 strongly under Mr. Kemble. He played his Zanga 
 with even increased effect, and brought that fine 
 tragedy, the Revenge, still closer to the stage power 
 of Shakspeare. Although the fond MANY had 
 settled King Richard's diadem upon the head of Mr. 
 Cooke, and it might not be even the policy of the 
 management to try to disturb it, Mr. Kemble took 
 the liberty to remind the town of his former preten- 
 sions to that crown ; and he showed them how 
 boldly he could both conceive and execute the 
 character of the son of York, by quitting his former 
 part of Hastings in Jane Shore, and assuming that 
 of the Protector, Gloster. 
 
 Rowe in 1709 published an edition of Shakspeare, 
 whose works, therefore, he may be presumed to 
 have read, perhaps with more ambition to display 
 their prominent beauties than critically to study the 
 mechanism of his style, so as, in full possession of 
 his secret, to become his imitator. However, four 
 years after the appearance of his octavo edition of 
 that great poet, he produced the celebrated tragedy 
 of Jane Shore, written in professed imitation of the 
 elder bard. Dr. Johnson says, " in what he thought 
 " himself an imitator of Shakspeare it is not easy to
 
 PROOFS OF HOWE S IMITATIONS. 
 
 " conceive." The doctor thinks that even the 
 numbers and the diction are remote in the utmost 
 degree from his manner. Perhaps he had no very 
 distinct recollection of Rowe when he wrote this 
 passage, for the diction is often not only similar, 
 but identical. In the part of Gloster, and among 
 Jiis confederates, such instances abound. The very 
 first speech in the play has two of these lines, and 
 a great number may be traced by diligence and 
 memory. As to diction, not to point out the miser- 
 able shifts of awkward elisions and strange oaths 
 " Beshrew me" " y'have" " 'twere pity" 
 " go to !" and such small deer ; there are passages 
 so turned, that even memory is deceived by like- 
 ness, and considers them stolen from the stores of 
 Shakspeare, till she ascertain her mistake by a 
 fruitless search for them. I am afraid, however, he 
 thought his resemblance most secure in violated 
 metaphor. 
 
 " But thus it is when rude calamity 
 Lays its strong gripe upon these mincing minions ; 
 The dainty gew-gaw forms dissolve at once, 
 And skiver at the shock." 
 
 ACT in. SCENE 1. 
 
 But it is sufficient to have hinted such matters to 
 the eye of taste. The general reader may search 
 however for better imitations than the following; 
 
 o 
 
 from Macbeth. 
 
 " Glost. Who can wonder 
 
 If riot and misrule o'erturn the realm, 
 When the crown sits upon a baby brow?"
 
 KEMBLE IN GLOSTEll. 423 
 
 " Glost The council (much I'm bound to thank 'em fort,) 
 Have placd a pageant sceptre in my hand, 
 Barren of power." 
 
 The second passage may be illustrated by the 
 original, because where he changes even a word 
 in the line imitated, he cannot consent to lose it, 
 but uses it immediately in the line following. 
 
 " Macb. Upon my head they placd a fruitless crown, 
 And put a barren sceptre in my gripe." 
 
 But the greatest effect made by Mr. Kemble in 
 Gloster, was in a speech which, to use a Burkeism, 
 is Shakspeare " all over." 
 
 " Behold my arm, thus blasted, dry, and wither d, 
 Shrunk like afoul abortion, and decay 'd 
 Like some untimely product of the seasons. 
 This is the sorcery of Edward's wife, 
 Who, in conjunction with that harlot Shore, 
 And other like confed'rate midnight hags, 
 By force of potent spells, of bloody characters, 
 
 | And conjurations terrible to hear, 
 Call fiends and spectres from the yawning deep, 
 And set the MINISTERS of HELL at work, 
 To torture and despoil me of my life." 
 
 Sure I am, that had Gibber introduced the pre- 
 ceding into the 3d act of his Richard III. it would 
 have had the fate of his own masterly speech upon 
 conscience, and been spoken and read as genuine 
 Shakspeare to the end of the world. As to Kem- 
 ble, the effect he produced in the passage cited was 
 
 E E 4
 
 424 RETURN OF THE YOUNG R6SCIUS. 
 
 quite electrical. The way he rush'd upon the tablej 
 the sudden baring and display of his arm, and the 
 overwhelming energy of the accusation, brought to 
 mind some of the recorded explosions of Ciceronian 
 vehemence. 
 
 Mrs. Siddons, I believe, at last settled to Shore ; 
 and Mrs. Litchfield consequently sustained Alicia; 
 and, though somewhat alarmed at the mighty 
 genius beside her, acted powerfully throughout: 
 Charles Kemble now received the gentle 'Hastings 
 into his care, and, with Hargrave in Shore, was 
 greatly admired and applauded. 
 
 The young Rosclus returned in the month of 
 December to both theatres, but his attraction this 
 season sensibly diminished. His greatest receipt 
 was now 5507. his lowest 227/. 1 5s., on Satur- 
 day the 15th of February. It was to his Zanga, 
 and after Kemble's sublime effort, I imagine shame 
 kept the people away. He was now held up with 
 strong after-pieces too; the Sleeping Beauty, Forty 
 Thieves, &c. They had frequently stronger houses 
 without him. An average now taken of his twenty 
 nights had sunk almost half from that of the first 
 season it was no more than 341 /. 12s. 9d. per 
 night. He acted Tancred for his benefit, on the 
 17th of May, and had only 301/. 18s. in his house ; 
 when Mrs. Jordan had 309/. I?*. Gd., and Bannister 
 345/. 10s. 6d., Miss Duncan 310/. 6s., Mr. Braham 
 
 /. Ss. 6d. .Li 
 On the add of December 1805, one of those
 
 BETTY IN BIIOBDIGNAG. 425 
 
 things occurred that disgust a delicate mind, and 
 render the stage a profession hardly liberal Master 
 Betty that night performed Achmet in Barbarossa. 
 Just before the commencement of the 4th act, on 
 came ingenuous Murray, to tell the house, that in 
 consequence of the disapprobation of some part of 
 the audience, Mr. Hargrave (Barbarossa ! the man 
 playing a part to tear a cat in) " had suddenly 
 " withdrawn himself from the theatre and could not 
 " be found." 
 
 Time has almost worn away from my mind the 
 impressions of this gentleman's acting; but I think 
 he was a sensible judicious speaker, perhaps rather 
 like Mr. Bensley. But the wantonness of a few 
 idiots had driven him from his profession : he was 
 not to be brought back. He had, again resembling 
 Bensley, once been in the ARMY, and carried away 
 from it the feelings of a gentleman ; he could not 
 submit to have them insulted by either folly or 
 malignity, and therefore returned to his proper 
 station. 
 
 While Betty was lord of the ascendant, a rather 
 Lilliput arrangement was made for liim in the 
 theatre j but on his second voyage (season), like 
 Gulliver, he foundered upon Brobdignag, and saw 
 himself in the power of giants. When he acted 
 Gustavus, he was attended by Bennett and Cress- 
 well, two of the tallest and largest men in the 
 theatre. His mother was Mrs. St. Leger, a vast and 
 towering figure, that overlaid all the hero in Gus-
 
 426 REVIVAL OF COUIOLANUS. 
 
 tavus. His fate in town was sealed. His fashion- 
 able worshippers began to think the old service 
 might be more truly rational 
 
 " Enchanting NOVELTY, that moon at full, 
 That finds out every crevice of the head 
 That is not sound and perfect, had in theirs 
 Wrought the disturbance But the "wane was near, 
 And his own cattle must suffice him soon." 
 
 THE WINTER SEASON OF 1806-7 
 
 Had one proud ^distinction, great beyond all modern 
 rivalry, the revival, by Mr. Kemble, of Coriolanus. 
 It has given a cognomen to Kemble ; and remains 
 at the head of his performances, and of the art itself^ 
 as one of those felicitous things where the actor is 
 absolutely identified with the part, and it becomes 
 impossible to think of either the character or the 
 man, without reference to each other. 
 
 There were some circumstances, extraneous to 
 the play itselfj that yet contributed to the actor's 
 triumph. The incumbrances on his fame, the 
 trifling child's play that had amused the town, were 
 no longer of any moment. He felt now assured 
 of confirmed influence upon the public ; " HOPE 
 brightened his crest," and expanded his frame, and 
 perhaps neither memory nor picture has, at any 
 time, presented a more heroic figure than Mr. 
 Kemble displayed, when he rushed upon the stage 
 as Caius Marcius, on the 3d of November 1806. 
 
 I certainly, however pleasing it would be to me, 
 shall not go through the character to mark the pas-
 
 KEMBLE IN CORIOLANl/S. 427 
 
 sages most applauded, and best given. The great 
 Roman lives in the wisest censure, and the tablet 
 of the general memory is inscribed with his per- 
 fections. Mr. Kemble fully shares in Coriolanus 
 with Shakspeare himself. But he gave one passage 
 with sublime effect in this play to which Shakspeare 
 can lay no claim the author of it was the Poet of 
 the Seasons. It is addressed by Coriolanus to Aufi- 
 dius, and is in the last scene : 
 
 " Tis not for such as thou so often spared 
 By her victorious sword, to speak of ROME, 
 But with respect, and awful veneration. 
 Whate'er her blots, whate'er her giddy factions, 
 There is more VIRTUE in one single year 
 Of Roman story, than your Volscian annalg 
 Can boast through ALL your creeping dark duration." 
 
 M 
 
 This is indeed the true tone of tragedy j could he 
 have held it, the fame of Rowe would have melted 
 into thin air before him. 
 
 Nor will I omit one occasion of mentioning the 
 NOBLE WOMAN, who, with sister excellence, per- 
 formed the mother of Coriolanus. She indeed 
 towered above her sex, and seemed worthy to bear 
 about her the destinies of imperial Rome. From 
 the first line to the last, all was coloured from one 
 abstract principle ; THAT, if Rome was the queen 
 of nations, her sway was only commensurate with 
 her COURAGE. This it was that taught her to glory 
 in the wounds of victory, and to mock the feeble 
 shrinking from the sight of blood.
 
 428 INSULT OFFERED TO MRS. SJDDONS. 
 
 V Q 1. His bloody brow 
 
 With his mail'd hand then wiping, forth he goes. 
 Vir. His bloody brow ! O Jupiter, no blood ! 
 Vol. Away, you fool ! it more becomes a man, 
 Than gilt his trophy." 
 
 It really hurts one to remember that persons ac- 
 complished like the two great performers just men- 
 tioned, should ever have been subjected to insult, 
 particularly at the proudest display of their beauti- 
 ful and ennobling'powers. But on the 18th of the 
 month, at a repetition of this tragedy, and at the 
 very moment when Mrs. Siddons was supplicating 
 as Volumnia, the conqueror, her son, to spare his 
 country 5 when every eye should have been rivetted 
 to the scene, every ear burning with the pure flame 
 of patriot vehemence at such a moment an apple 
 was thrown upon the stage, and fell between Mrs. 
 Siddons and Mr. Keinble. He did not, nor would 
 I have had him, quite dismiss the character he 
 played for the manager, but, taking up the apple, 
 he advanced indignantly to the front of the stage, 
 and thus addressed the audience : 
 
 " LADIES AND GENTLEMEN, 
 
 " I have been many years acquainted with the 
 benevolence and liberality of a London audience ; 
 but we cannot proceed this evening with the per- 
 formance unless we are protected, especially when 
 ladies are thus exposed to insult." 
 
 A person in the gallery called out " We can't 
 hear." '
 
 HOOKE'S TEKELf. 429 
 
 Mr. Kemble, (with increased spirit,) I will 
 raise my voice, and the GALLERIES shall hear me." 
 (Great tumult.) 
 
 " This protection is what the AUDIENCE owe it to 
 themselves to grant what the PERFORMERS, for 
 the credit of their profession, have a right to demand 
 and WHAT I will venture so far to assert y that, on 
 the part of the PROPRIETORS, I here offer a hundred 
 guineas to any man, who will disclose the ruffian 
 who has been guilty of this act." (A murmur, 
 only in the gallery.) 
 
 " I throw myself, Ladies and Gentlemen, upon 
 the high sense of breeding, that distinguishes a 
 London audience ; and I hope I shall never be 
 wanting in my duty to the public ; but nothing 
 shall induce me to suffer insult." 
 
 '. 
 
 The gallery told him that this apple of discord 
 was thrown at some of the disorderly females in the 
 boxes, and only by accident fell upon' the stage. 
 Our MORAL friends, too, sent .down a request, that 
 those riotous ladies might be suppressed, and Mr. 
 Kemble good naturedly promised " that all possi- 
 ble methods should be taken to keep them in order." 
 And then the play was finished. 
 
 Under the second management of Wroughton, 
 one of the most ingenious and pleasant men of his 
 time, Theodore Hook, brought his melodrame of 
 .Teketi before the public. His unfailing spirits, his 
 whim, invention and versatility, his improvisation
 
 430 .MOTHER GOOSED 
 
 and keen discernment of character, have delighted 
 me, years ago, in society j and seem now to be set- 
 tling into some public and permanent fame. His 
 Tekeli was admirably played. 
 
 Necessarily compelled to omit much novelty, 
 and contract more, from the rapid approach to my 
 assigned, limits, I should never presume to lift my 
 Christmas glance again towards the sacred symbol 
 of druid superstition, were I capable of omitting 
 the birth of Mother Goose, on the 28th of Decem- 
 ber, in Covent Garden Theatre. She is said to 
 have been a disputed offspring, and claimed alike 
 by Dibdin and by Farley but she has yet supe- 
 rior honours, and derived her true efficacy from 
 the nursery. She brought with her thence that 
 wondrous bird, which, in the language of La- 
 fontaine, 
 
 " Pondoit tous les jours un ceuf-d'oR." 
 
 In a word, the theatre never acquired a more 
 favourite pantomime. Little Simmons, the Roman, 
 thought himself honoured in Mother Goose. 
 Here, too, the Bolognas displayed unrivalled acti- 
 vity, and Grimaldi, who had been slighted at Drury 
 Lane, at once proved himself the great master of 
 his art 
 
 I cannot well avoid another successful piece by 
 Kenney, called Fake Alarms, or My Cousin it 
 was an opera, performed at Drury Lane, for the 
 first time,, on the lth of January 1807, with im-
 
 DEATH OF ISAAC REED. 431 
 
 mense applause. Braham composed his own songs, 
 all of them still vocal, and he accompanied himself 
 on the grand piano forte, when he delivered to 
 every warbler in the land the simple ballad Said a 
 Smile to a Tear. His accompaniment was one of 
 those rattles in music called a battery but his 
 touch is very brilliant, like his style of singing, and 
 he was hardly permitted to leave the instrument. 
 
 Mr. Kemble, about this time, had to regret the 
 loss of his old friend, Isaac Reed, Esq., who died 
 on Monday the 5th of January 1807, having just 
 completed the 65th year of his age. I used to. 
 meet him occasionally at Mr. Kemble's hospitable 
 board, with such men as, either for instruction or 
 amusement, will not easily be excelled, with Mr. 
 Malone and Dr. Charles Burney. On such occa- 
 sions Mr. Reed was always referred to for exact 
 information, The recollection of Mr. Malone was 
 general rather than minute ; he rather knew where 
 tojind anything than carried it about with him. 
 Reed was a repeater as to time. You had only to 
 touch the subject, he struck instantly and truly. 
 He had a look of severity, though one of the gen- 
 tlest of human beings ; and sat with his counte- 
 nance declined, and preserving an unalteredjfrorcv?. 
 He was the shade to the light manner of Mr. Ma- 
 lone, who talked of literature without a tinge of 
 pedantry, with a seeming imitation of the laughing 
 manner of Sir Joshua Reynolds. To draw an 
 illustration from the manly game of cricket, which
 
 CHARACTER OF ISAAC REED. 
 
 I still love to see, - Reed stood at the wicket, and 
 either struck or stopt admirably. Malone some- 
 times bowled to him but never took him off his 
 guard, or caught him out. With a sort of a run 
 and ajlourish before he delivered his ball, he would 
 thus address his stern antagonist : " I think the 
 " most important thing done for Shakspeare (always 
 " excepting our friend Dr. Farmer's Essay,) was 
 " Tyrwhitt's use of that curious pamphlet Greene's 
 " Groatsworth of Wit, which first appeared in the 
 " year 1592 or 1593." Two! struck the accu- 
 rate Reed. 
 
 Mr. Reed seemed to allow of Steevens's ascend- 
 ancy without dispute. The latter used his chambers, 
 his library, himself) in his literary schemes, with- 
 out ceremony: and shy as Mr. Reed was at all 
 times of seeing his name before the public, so as to 
 declare " that if the pillory were the alternative, he 
 " believed he should prefer it," yet Steevens 
 would shroud anything he chose under the well- 
 known editor of Dodsley's old plays, and his friend, 
 if he ventured at times 'a, murmur, was overborne 
 by that plausibility which had not seldom governed 
 the criticism of Doctor Johnson. 
 
 Few men exerted greater influence upon so- 
 ciety than Isaac Reed. He had ably and steadily 
 conducted his magazine for twenty-five years ; and, 
 amid all the changes of opinions, adhered inflexibly 
 to his OWN : they led him to be the strenuous but 
 enlightened defender, of our CHURCH and STATE.
 
 TOBIN S CURFEW. 433 
 
 The extent of his literary labours was prodigious ; 
 but, as it ought always to be, this was as nothing 
 compared with that of his studies. His mind was 
 the spirit of his library. He was indeed a treasure 
 to Mr. Kemble, while forming his dramatic collec- 
 tion. To the stage he had paid an attention which 
 has never been approached. I speak this on the 
 fullest evidence, for his Notitia Dramatica are now 
 lying before me. 
 
 To proceed with our theatrical notices. Ttte 
 Curfew of the excellent TOBIN fully ratified the 
 judgment passed upon his Honey Moon. In 
 thought, in diction, he was decidedly a poet. But 
 he seems to have avoided every claim to originality 
 
 to have coveted the fame of a mimic, and to 
 have been proud of his uncommon likeness to other 
 people. He is in the Curfew like the Revenge 
 like the Castle Spectre like the Battle ofHexham 
 
 like the Iron Chest like the Children in the 
 Wood and the children of most dramatists. But 
 his resemblance never distresses ; it is choice, not 
 necessity, that borrows in Tobin ; and he covers 
 all by a brilliant fancy and a mellifluous versifica- 
 tion. The eagerness of the public to see this piece 
 was extreme. It was finely acted, and but that it 
 had a weak fifth act, might have yet remained a 
 favourite upon our stage. 
 
 Whatever Mr. Kemble thought of the writers of 
 modern comedy, they were often deeply indebted 
 to bis kindness ; and sometimes his performance 
 
 VOL, - ii. F F
 
 THE WOOD DAEMON. 
 
 absolutely saved a weak effort of an able man. It 
 was thus that his Reuben Glenroy brought Morton 
 through in his comedy of Town and Country. The 
 play rose upon the town at every succeeding repe- 
 tition, and became even popular at last, here and 
 in the country. 
 
 The "tales of wonder" were not collected by 
 Monk Lewis merely to astound the people for a 
 time, and then, as Shakspeare expresses himself, 
 " to fust unused" from Lord Ronald, and the 
 grim white woman, the little lord of the NURSERY 
 constructed a new grand romantic melo-drama, 
 called The Wood Daemon, or the Clock has Struck. 
 On its first night the dialogue seemed to have fre- 
 quently emerged from the spot just mentioned; 
 but the childishness was omitted by the author's 
 discretion, and the terrors became worthy of the 
 grown followers of the marvellous. 
 
 " Never shall THOU and glory sunder ! 
 Child of wonder child of WONDER." 
 
 Upon the close of the Covent Garden season on 
 the 23d of June, with Hamlet and Mother Goose, 
 Mr. Kemble left town on a visit to his kind friend, 
 Lord Guilfbrd, at Wroxton Abbey. While he 
 was there I wrote him an account of poor DESEN- 
 FANS' death, which happened on the 9th of July 4 
 1 807. He thus noticed the communication.
 
 NOEL DESENFANS. 435 
 
 (COPY.) 
 
 " Wroxton Abbey, July I4,th t 1807. 
 
 " MY DEAR BOADEN, 
 
 " So little am I a man of this world, that, I be- 
 lieve, it is nearly a fortnight since I have looked 
 into a public print ; consequently your kind letter 
 was the first intimation I had of the decease of our 
 excellent friend. Knowing, as I did, the state of 
 his health for some time before I left London ; and 
 having, indeed, for years observed with pain the 
 progress of his maladies, it is without surprise, and, 
 as far as regards poor Desenfans himself, without 
 sorrow, that I hear of his release from his pro- 
 tracted and insupportable sufferings. May the 
 innocency of his mind, and the benevolence of his 
 heart, meet that reward which is prepared for the 
 virtuous in a state of perfect and perpetual bliss ! 
 
 " I write to Sir Francis by this post : he has 
 lost an old friend, and I feel keenly for him. 
 
 " Lord Guilford begs his kindest remem- 
 brances to you. Believe me always, my dear 
 
 Boaden, 
 
 " Yours truly, 
 
 " J. P. KEMBLE." 
 
 What the recent grief of Burke stated of the 
 excellent Sir Joshua Reynolds, was in degree ap- 
 plicable to Noel Desenfans. " He was the centre 
 of a very great variety of agreeable societies, 
 " which were dissipated by his death." He de- 
 
 F F 2
 
 43(> NOEL DESENFANS. 
 
 lighted to receive his friends ; and he entertained 
 them with elegance, and even splendor. The room 
 in which we dined was decorated, so as to defy a 
 parallel even in the mansions of our nobles. We 
 were surrounded by thirteen historical subjects by 
 POUSSIN, painted in the finest time of that classic 
 artist. 
 
 If ever man possessed the faculty of rendering 
 society tasteful and happy, it was Desenfans. He 
 was too well bred to be the hero of his own table 
 the charm he possessed was the absence of self 
 display, exchanged for the address to draw forth 
 the talents of others. He could continue any sub- 
 ject just as long as it pleased, and change it without 
 any appearing check or abruptness. In the midst 
 of great bodily sufferings, he excelled ALL in hila- 
 rity, and the goodness of his nature impressed his 
 countenance with uniform benevolence. 
 
 Mr. Desenfans in early life had distinguished 
 himself in polite letters, so as to have received the 
 applause of Voltaire and Rousseau. He was proud, 
 as he well might be, of the great men of his country; 
 but had lived long enough among us to have ac- 
 quired the true feeling for English genius. His 
 infirmities confined him, for the most part, to the 
 house, but his curiosity was insatiable after every 
 object of liberal science ; and his friend Sir Francis 
 Bourgeois, who mixed largely in active life, on his 
 return home, delighted to lay before him his daily 
 gleanings from the world without
 
 NOEL DESENFANS. 4-37 
 
 Of his taste in painting, the collection bestowed 
 by Sir Francis, in pursuance of his pleasure, upon 
 Dulwich College, will be at once a record and a 
 monument. Magnificent as his collection certainly 
 was, one desideratum the writer of this faint tribute 
 was so fortunate as to supply. He had great satis- 
 faction in seeing before him the portraits of Louis 
 the Fourteenth and BOILEAU. Chance, during the 
 progress of the French Revolution, led me to pur. 
 chase of an emigrant Rigaud's portrait of RACINE. 
 He was so good as to accept from me the other 
 great poet of that reign, whom the King had joined 
 with Boileau in the task of recording his glories ; 
 and Mr. Desenfans was made infinitely happier by 
 the present, than Racine was by the appointment. 
 
 F F 3
 
 438 
 
 CHAP. V. 
 
 CHARLES YOUNG HIS FIRST HAMLET. RIGHTS OF THE 
 
 WINTER PATENTEES DEFINED IN LAW IN EQUITY. 
 
 THEIR DANGER THEIR ERRORS. THE STAGE. MRS. 
 
 H. JOHNSTON'S RETURN. VIOLENT CLAMOUR. DISCUS- 
 SION. CHARLES KEMBLE'S WANDERER. MISS SMITH. 
 
 HER INTELLIGENCE. BEGONE DULL CARE. THE 
 
 WORLD. THE COMEDY OF ERRORS. RETIREMENTS. 
 
 MISS POPE HER MERITS. INIMITABLE BURLESQUE OF 
 
 TRAGEDY. STORAGE. MRS. MATTOCKS. BOTH QUIT 
 
 THE PROFESSION. THE STEADINESS OF COOKE. THE 
 
 MISERABLE CONFLAGRATION OF THE THEATRE. 
 
 I STEP a little back in my narrative to have the 
 pleasure of 'noticing the first performance in town 
 of Charles Young, and in the character of Hamlet. 
 My amiable and accomplished friend, Mr. R. 
 Westall, I remember, begged that we might see 
 this debut together : he had a side-box at the Hay- 
 market on that night, and we received very great 
 satisfaction from that able and judicious actor. 
 Confessedly, however, it was the Hamlet of Kem- 
 ble ; discriminated only by the personal perfections, 
 or, if you will, imperfections of the performer. It 
 was not so philosophic, but more solemn there
 
 PATENT RIGHTS. 43Q 
 
 was more vehemence and less pathos the volume 
 of voice was great, and of good tone, but the articu- 
 lation was not nice, and he laboured under a lisp 
 whenever the letter s occurred. But there was 
 great ardour, vast animation, powerful action, un- 
 tiring energy, and good sense. We were able very 
 sincerely to congratulate him, upon what announced, 
 to suck a man, the certainty of fame and fortune. 
 Mrs. Litchfield was the Gertrude of the play, and 
 the best that I have seen. 
 
 I do not anticipate any occasion for a more 
 minute discussion of the subject, and therefore 
 during a rather considerable " blank of nature's 
 (t works" at the theatres, I am tempted to look into 
 the PATENT RIGHTS of the winter proprietors. The 
 evil which I predicted, from the error as to the 
 Royalty, had fearfully increased ; the non-descript 
 minor theatres became seriously alarming, if they 
 even failed j ruinous, if they succeeded. Every 
 body knows, without touching upon the public 
 amusements of families, that it is not indifferent to 
 the evening wanderer, whether he pays a shilling 
 more for his entertainment or a shilling less ; that of 
 so numerous a crowd, many are not nice, so as they 
 are amused ; and some, from their kind of bringing 
 up, actually prefer the coarser^entertainment To 
 open, therefore, ANY places of amusement must 
 injure the play-house. What other injury it may 
 do, may be left to the imagination, if indeed such 
 
 F F 4
 
 440 PATENT RIGHTS. 
 
 a question cannot be more accurately resolved by 
 the memory. 
 
 The patentees at length felt themselves seriously 
 bound to submit their case to their legal advisers, 
 and counsel were of opinion " THAT they might 
 " and ought to put down the encroachments upon 
 " their property. THAT his Majesty having gra- 
 " ciously made his election, by patent appointment, 
 11 as to what theatres should exist in Westminster, 
 " the Lord Chamberlain cannot infringe on those 
 " patents, or legally license any other place for 
 " theatrical representation, without the consent of 
 " the patented theatres. And certain it is, that from 
 " the day the first royal patent was granted to old 
 " Drury, through the whole of Mr. Garrick's time, 
 " and ever since, until the chamberlainship of Lord 
 " Salisbury, the uniform practice at the Chamber- 
 " Iain's office was, to refuse to listen to an applica- 
 " tion even for a single night, though for a charity 
 " benefit, unless the party applying brought with 
 " them the previous consent, in writing, of the pro- 
 " prietors of the established theatres." So much 
 for the LEGAL right, grounded on patent, confirmed 
 by usage. 
 
 But let us look a little at their title in EQUITY ; by 
 which it must appear that the Lord Chamberlain, 
 even, jex officio, if the right were in him, is bound 
 by positive covenant not to grant any new license 
 for any dramatic exhibition FOR, after the result 
 of a long discussion and arbitration, a regular deed
 
 PATENT RIGHTS. 441 
 
 was executed, styled the FINAL ARRANGEMENT, re- 
 cognizing and guaranteeing the exclusive rights of 
 the three established theatres, which deed received 
 the sanction of his Majesty, and was signed, under 
 his royal pleasure, by his Chamberlain, the Marquis 
 of Salisbury ; it was also honoured by the concur- 
 rence of his Royal Highness the Prince of Wales, 
 who signed it himself, as did also his Grace the late 
 Duke of Bedford. 
 
 On the faith of this settlement, so guaranteed, 
 the proprietors of Covent Garden Theatre received 
 from the proprietors of Drury Lane Theatre fifteen 
 thousand pounds for their dormant patent. The 
 King's Theatre in the Haymarket contributed 
 thirty thousand pounds, on recovering its license, to 
 the losses of the Pantheon Opera undertaking; and 
 FINALLY, this deed formed the whole foundation for 
 the rebuilding of Drury Lane Theatre, in which 
 undertaking a property of not less than three 
 hundred thousand pounds has been embarked, and 
 all in the confidence and on \\\Q faith of this arrange- 
 ment, secured under such high authority. 
 
 Now with > this irrefragable document before 
 them, the reason of the public will have no difficulty 
 whatever as to the actual RIGHTS of the patentees. 
 How these have been evaded, or compromised, or 
 dropped, would be a tedious enquiry, and very unfit 
 for a work like this, drawing necessarily to its close. 
 But if; on the statement of then existing circum- 
 stances, the grievance seems to be as unaccountable
 
 442 PATENT RIGHTS. 
 
 as it was oppressive, what will be said of their case, 
 when a few revolving months shall have added the 
 unparalleled calamity of two royal theatres, erected 
 or renewed at immense expense, being both totally 
 destroyed by fire, within 157 days of each 
 other ? 
 
 I know the humble pretences and earnest assur- 
 ances by which, at first, office is surprised into in- 
 novation ; and the favourable plea that is generated 
 when once property has been embarked. But I 
 must contend, that in the case above stated, a posi- 
 tive CHARTER was conferred, and has been violated 
 nearly with impunity. 
 
 But in all such matters, we must not look solely 
 to individuals, who may be considered, in the 
 harshest view of their case, as highly favoured trus- 
 tees for the public. The interests of that public, as 
 they originated the trust, under the benevolence of 
 the sovereign, so they are, and should be, para- 
 mount to any individual advantages ; and the state, 
 if it forfeited the grant for any abuses of its enjoy- 
 ment, could compensate, if it was judged expe- 
 dient, any pecuniary suffering. But how should 
 such abuses exist, and have they ever been for a 
 moment pretended ? The Lord Chamberlain, by 
 his office, licenses every production of the stage 
 and bending slightly, as the managers of theatres 
 must do, to the humours and fashions of the day, 
 (still, even so doing, under superior sanction,) will 
 any writer venture to assert, with reading beyond a
 
 PATENT RIGHTS. -1,4,3 
 
 horn book, that the productions a century ago were 
 not infinitely more gross in their plans, and more 
 loose and even prophane in their expression, than 
 anything exhibited in our own times? I do not 
 claim for MANAGERS the whole credit of such a re- 
 formation ; I believe it may be, in a great degree, 
 the better taste of the present day ; which, whether 
 substantially or not improved in virtue, (I hope even 
 THAT,) is unquestionably more averse to the public 
 expression of either prophaneness or indelicacy. 
 The proprietors, then, have not by any moral turpi- 
 tude or indifference, or want of judgment, merited 
 the evils which they sustain ; or the fearful ruin in 
 their prospect, opposed, as they must be, by so 
 many tempting rival exhibitions. 
 
 That I have thought them blameable in many 
 points, I have occasionally said, with that feeling 
 for the stage itself, which he who had it not, would 
 indeed be unworthy to occupy it. In my judgment, 
 they erred in any very considerable enlargement of 
 their houses. It was not likely, that a structure 
 calculated to hold more than 400/. nightly, would 
 bejltfed for that best triumph of the actor's art, 
 the general sight of his expression, the perfect en- 
 joyment of his declamation. A thousand nice 
 sJiades of the one, and almost all the taste of the 
 other, are destroyed by a vast space, across which 
 they cannot pierce ; and therefore, as hopeless 
 efforts, they are at last discontinued. Rant and 
 grimace are the ordinary substitutes. As a proof
 
 44-4 MRS. II. JOHNSTON. 
 
 that, sometimes, TASTE and INTEREST go together, 
 all the losses of the proprietors commenced in their 
 large theatres I had almost said proceeded from 
 them. Enough, however, on this subject for the 
 present. If my notion be incorrect, it is but the 
 sentiment of an individual to whom no great influ- 
 ence attaches any way, that I know of. According 
 to my measure, I certainly endeavour to think 
 rightly, upon this and all subjects I can only, 
 however, assert the integrity of my motives. 
 
 I return to the stage itself with but little plea- 
 sure, for, in addition to the "blank of nature's 
 works" in the drama, the present season made a most 
 fearful one in her representatives, by retirements 
 which have, to the present hour, never been re- 
 placed. Previous to attending the departure of 
 three excellent actresses, whom I had the pleasure 
 to know, I have to mention the return of Mrs. H. 
 Johnston to Covent Garden Theatre, on the 30th of 
 December, after an absence of two years. Beatrice 
 was not exactly the part that I should have chosen 
 in her situation it is too violently pert, too 
 decidedly haggard and reckless. In the present 
 instance it bespoke assurance under* a sense of in- 
 discretion, and provoked rather than soothed any 
 irritation against her. 
 
 It will always be a disputed question, whether the 
 public have any right to refer to the private con- 
 duct of those whose talents are displayed lor their
 
 VIOLENT CLAMOUR. 445 
 
 amusement. I neither remember the particular 
 allegations made against Mrs. H. Johnston, nor the 
 very opposite statements by her and her husband. 
 I am rather disposed to look a little at the principle 
 of public censure with relation to the professors of 
 the stage. Let us state an extreme case, which, as 
 it never may have occurred, so it never may be 
 likely to occur, where this check exists. Let us 
 suppose an actress of the greatest, or of humbler 
 powers, a wife and a mother ; let us suppose 
 such a woman notoriously light while she remains 
 with these ties, and utterly shameless when she 
 throws them off; let us see her, under the pro- 
 tection, as it is called, of wealth and fashion, be- 
 coming again a parent ; and, under many changes, 
 renewing that sacred character, but with a total in- 
 difference to the children, lawful or unlawful, which 
 she has produced ; let us further suppose, (for 
 there is a necessity for this supposition to warrant 
 the notice,) that these are facts as well known as the 
 theatre which they sully, and as capable of proof 
 as any miserable larceny that peoples either our 
 prisons or our remote settlements : is a public to 
 be told, that it has in such a case no jurisdiction ; 
 that its sole duty is to enjoy its amusement, whe- 
 ther to weep or laugh, while it encourages infamy in 
 its course, and makes harder by its indifference even 
 the callous heart? Whatis the great corrector of life? 
 Public opinion. What most deters from crime? Pub- 
 lic opi nion. But it may be said, the culprit is not single
 
 446 MRS. H. JOHNSTON IN LETITIA HARDY. 
 
 in her offence : Perhaps not. Bat if there exist 
 instances by thousands which you cannot reach, are 
 you for that reason to spare the offender whom you 
 can ? Nay, more, are you to fawn upon the talent, 
 while you loathe its possessor ? Are you to worship, 
 by the glare of the stage, that WANTON, who'se ex- 
 ploits, in the public journals, cannot be read by 
 decency at your breakfast table ? I leave the VIR- 
 TUOUS and the RATIONAL of society to reply to the 
 question. But I beg pardon of the reader ; I have 
 been too long detained from Mrs. Johnston. A 
 perfect yell of fury burst out on her appearance ; 
 evidently private vengeance, rather than public 
 justice : the great mass of the spectators was con- 
 fessedly unprejudiced, and therefore humane, if 
 not favourable. Poor creature, she seemed con- 
 vulsed with emotion, breathless and incapable of 
 utterance, dying almost where she stood. Sud- 
 denly, however, she sprung forward to the front of 
 the stage, and lifting up her clasped hands, silently 
 besought the mercy or protection of the house. It 
 was afforded, and she struggled with difficulty 
 through the character and the evening. On the 8th 
 of the following month, having prepared her way 
 in the newspapers, she made a second appearance, 
 in Letitia Hardy, in the Belle's Stratagem. A 
 stronger force was now embodied against her ; 
 both sides were prepared. The uproar was terrific, 
 the actress was bathed in tears, but collected ; she 
 advanced, and her action procured attention to
 
 THE WANDERER. 447 
 
 what she should say she told the audience that in 
 " many instances she had been much wronged, and 
 " endured much unmerited reproach." Another cla- 
 mour in the shape of denial, was shouted against her. 
 The spectators, however, wanting the play, it pro- 
 ceeded, except when any point in the dialogue 
 offered an opportunity to her persecutors. Upon 
 the fine burst of Miss Hardy, as to what she would 
 do for a HUSBAND " worthy of her love,*' the gale 
 became a perfect hurricane, as might naturally be 
 expected. She found it impossible to recover her 
 powers, so as to do even her slender justice to the 
 character ; and the evening of the 8th of January 
 afforded no enjoyment, unless to the least MANLY 
 part of the audience. 
 
 On the 12th of January 1808, Charles Kemble 
 got up from the French a drama, in three 
 acts, called The Wanderer. It afforded some 
 striking opportunities to Miss Smith, a young lady 
 of fine talents, with a face of very powerful ex- 
 pression, and in its effect a good deal like that 
 of Mrs, Siddons. The intelligence of her look 
 was amazing. She had made studies of no mean 
 extent in her art, and ought always to have super- 
 seded the annoyance, not necessity, of a vast crowd 
 of young ladies, annually "piping their hysteric 
 " changes on Juliets and Dorindas, Pollys and 
 " Ophelias." This lady is the present Mrs. Bart- 
 ley: it may be agreeable to her to know, that a 
 very attentive observer of the stage, for more than
 
 448 RETIREMENT OF MISS POPE. 
 
 FORTY years, still thinks of her mute expression of 
 the PASSIONS with unabated pleasure. Her action 
 was beautifully appropriate, and at every change, 
 she composed her figure into a position so graceful, 
 as to seem the prepared study of some profound 
 artist. 
 
 Lest her rivals, in the most jealous of all profes- 
 sions, should suppose this the tribute of private 
 friendship, I guard it by the declaration, that, off 
 the stage, even her person is unknown to me ; and 
 that to the present hour I have never had the honour 
 of speaking to her. 
 
 I could wish to be able to afford more than a 
 passing word to the comedy of Begone dull Care, 
 and a much better one called The World, by Ken- 
 ney. The Two Gentlemen of Verona, purified by 
 Mr. Kemble, and splendidly decorated, though 
 acted by himself and Pope, and Miss Smith, and Miss 
 Norton, with the rich comedy of Liston, Munden, 
 and Blanchard, was a revival that might as well 
 have slept undisturbed ; for, except a few prettU 
 nesses in the dialogue, it is, though Shakspeare, 
 Samson shorn of his vigour, and trifling in the 
 flowery lap of Dalilah. 
 
 On the 26th of May, Miss Pope, the dramatic 
 heiress of Kitty dive, the chambermaid par emi- 
 nence, quitted Drury Lane Theatre, and the pro- 
 fession of which she was so great a mistress. She 
 acted for the first, and only time, Deborah Dowlas 
 in Colman's Heir at Law; and I imagine he sup-
 
 Miss POM. 449 
 
 plied the few lines, which she spoke after the play 
 in the character of Audrey* wherein she truly said, 
 that " she had parted with Touchstone (King), and 
 " was now come to part with her other friends." 
 They were, on that night, uncommonly numerous 
 and brilliant, and kind, and she received their last 
 applause wisely, without claiming or needing a par- 
 ticle of their indulgence. Yet she had continued 
 to act on the stage of Drury Lane for a period of 
 more than FIFTY years. 
 
 Clive, when she was young, paid the highest 
 compliment to Miss Pope's understanding; for 
 when she was going on the stage, to act, for the 
 second time, Corinna in the Confederacy, she said 
 to her, " My dear Pope, you played for a young 
 actress particularly well on your first night You 
 " must now endeavour to act still better, and yet 
 " expect to meet with less applause. It is proper 
 " you should be told this, lest disappointment 
 " damp your spirits, and sink you below yourself." 
 
 On the 6th of May 1802, their Majesties com- 
 manded her to act Mrs. Heidelberg, in the Clandes- 
 tine Marriage, for the express purpose of seeing 
 how she could replace, in that part, the admirable 
 Clive. She was at this time the only surviving per- 
 former of its original cast. 
 
 Perhaps her fame, like all other reputation, will 
 rest most securely upon truth. She, as an actress, 
 held the mirror [steadily] up to nature." Yet she 
 had a singularly fine talent for burlesque. The 
 
 VOL, ii. G G
 
 450 INIMITABLE BURLESQUE OF TRAGEDY. 
 
 critic of my standing touches upon a style in female 
 tragedy, which has long been discontinued ; it re- 
 sulted from the fashion of the dress it might be 
 called the swimming or voluptuous; and the actress 
 seemed to totter under the weight of her superior 
 charms. The spectator's eye was attracted to the 
 visible palpitations of the heroine; and as the spread 
 of the hoop below kept the arms in a nearly con- 
 stant movement of floating grace, the hand, more 
 frequently than it is now, was prest upon the 
 bosom : it was the MODE, and perhaps perfectly 
 decorous. Mrs. Siddons never thought it so ; and 
 from the external quiet of that seat of emotion was 
 most stupidly indeed alleged to feel really nothing 
 while on the stage. What should, or can be felt by 
 any perfect artist, has been thoroughly discussed by 
 nobody but Diderot. But to return to Miss Pope ; 
 with the usual sauciness of comedy towards her im- 
 perious sister, she had looked attentively at all this 
 discipline of the former queens of the stage; and in 
 Tilburina in the Critic let her personal satire fly at 
 the moving charms of her earlier days. Mrs. Craw- 
 ford must have been ready to expire at this bur- 
 lesque, in all the exquisite approaches, the jets and 
 balances, swoonings and ravings of Tilburina. Of 
 late years the ridicule seemed misplaced, for it 
 was like nothing that the young had ever seen in 
 tragedy. 
 
 On the 30th of the same month, Madame 
 Storace, the unapproachable buffa of English opera
 
 MADAME STORAGE. 
 
 and musical farce, also took leave. She actually 
 made, as Shakspeare has it, " a swan-like end, 
 " dying in music," for she warblud her farewell in 
 two dozen most applicable lines, written for her by 
 Colman : but strong as she certainly was, she had 
 miscalculated her force ; the last line " Farewell 
 " and bless you all for ever," quite subdued 
 her ; and she was borne off the stage in a senseless 
 state. 
 
 Mrs. Mattocks, eight days after this, withdrew 
 herself from the stage of Covent Garden. The 
 play was the Wonder, and it was one truly, as to 
 Jirst appearance as well as last. Mrs. Mattocks acted 
 Flora with all her original sprightliness, though she 
 had been an actress close upon sixty years. Mr. 
 Cooke acted for her Don Felix, being his first ap- 
 pearance in the fiery Spaniard Emery, then first 
 in town, tried to convert his genuine York into 
 broad Scotch and Miss Smith then began to sus- 
 tain Violante with delicacy and point Poor Cooke 
 had no shyness in promising his aid on kind occa- 
 sions like the present, only he sometimes too ob- 
 viously needed help himself. But here he would 
 do, and lie did do, ALL nobly. After the play, he 
 recited Garrick's ode to Shakspeare ; and, retiring 
 for an instant, returned leading in Mrs. Mattocks. 
 Through the whole of her address, which was in 
 plain prose, thanking the audience for the public 
 favour of 58 years, Mr. Cooke supported her. A 
 rather too solemn announcement of prepara- 
 
 o G 2
 
 RETIREMENTS. 
 
 " tion for the journey which we must all take" 
 almost overpowered her ; but she recovered enough 
 to make her most scientific and graceful courtesies 
 to the house ; and her steady friend led her off the 
 stage, with all the honours that could crown so 
 valuable an actress. 
 
 As to successor, she has had none her widows 
 renounce administration, and the Mac Tabs have 
 retired to their native seats ; where they may be 
 presumed, with somewhat less effect, to value 
 themselves equally upon the antiquity of their 
 families. 
 
 The most disastrous of seasons commenced at 
 Covent Garden Theatre on the 12th of September 
 1808. The entertainments of the evening were 
 Macbeth and Raising the Wind. Mr. Kemble had 
 been unwell, but was now quite recovered. Mrs. 
 Siddons had not acted for many months ; indeed a 
 notion was abroad that she had absolutely retired 
 from the stage. She had, however, returned to it 
 in the best health, and at all events, in such charac- 
 ters as were now preferred, with even augmented 
 power, the silent operation of experience and time. 
 Together, these incomparable tragedians seldom 
 failed in their efficacy upon the town j and an au- 
 dience piled to the roof attested the attraction of 
 Shakspeare and themselves. In eight days from 
 this " great feast" of dramatic excellence, the 
 splendid scite of the triumph was a mass of flaming 
 ruins.
 
 BURNING OF COVENT GARDEN THEATRE. 4*53 
 DESTRUCTION OF COVENT GARDEN THEATRE* 
 
 About four o'clock in the morning of September 
 the 20th, this extensive building was discovered to be 
 in flames ; and so fierce and rapid was the fire, that 
 no exertion could stop its course. Within less than 
 three hours after its commencement, the whole of 
 the interior was destroyed : nearly all the scenery, 
 wardrobe, musical and dramatic libraries, and pro- 
 perties of all kinds, were a heap of smoking ruins. 
 A considerable number of engines promptly at- 
 tended, but there was a total want of water for 
 some time, the main pipe having been cut off with 
 the intention of laying down a new one, and above 
 an hour elapsed before the engines could be sup- 
 plied. They afterwards played with the greatest 
 possible effect for more than an hour ; when the 
 roof of the theatre fell in with a dreadful crash, and 
 thus announced the destruction of the interior of 
 the building. The fire raged with most violence 
 at the upper end of Bow-Street, on the western side 
 of which seven houses were destroyed, including 
 the public-house called the Struggles In Hart- 
 Street the flames communicated to the houses on 
 the opposite side of the street from the theatre, and 
 four of them caught fire at the same moment j but 
 by the great activity of the people and firemen, 
 they suffered little more than a severe scorching. 
 Great apprehensions were entertained for the safety 
 of Drury Lane Theatre, as the flakes of fire were 
 
 G G 3
 
 454 BURNING OF COVENT GARDEN THEATRE. 
 
 carried by the wind with much force in that direc- 
 tion. A great number of people mounted the roof, 
 ready, in case of actual fire, to open the large cis- 
 tern of water provided there. All the people in 
 the neighbourhood were employed with their ser- 
 vants in extinguishing the flakes of fire as they fell 
 upon the roofs or in the yards. This was the whole 
 extent of injury sustained in the neighbourhood ; 
 but the theatre itself was totally consumed. The 
 Ship tavern, and part of Mr. Brandon's, the box- 
 keeper's office, were all that remained at that angle. 
 The most painful part of this disastrous event 
 remains to be described. At an early stage of the 
 fire, a party of firemen broke open the great door 
 .under the Piazza, Covent Garden ; and having in- 
 troduced an engine into the passage, they directed 
 it towards the galleries, where the fire appeared to 
 burn more fiercely ; when, dreadful to relate, the 
 burning roof of the passage fell in, and buried them, 
 with several others who had rushed in along with 
 them, in the ruins. It was a considerable time be- 
 fore the rubbish, which now blocked up the door, 
 could be cleared away. When it was effected, a 
 miserable spectacle presented itself. The mangled 
 bodies of the dead and dying appearing through 
 the rubbish, or being discovered in each advance 
 to remove ft. At twelve o'clock eleven -dead bodies 
 had been removed into the church-yard of St. Paul's, 
 Covent Garden. Three of them were firemen be- 
 longing to the Phoenix Fire-office. Some were
 
 DREADFUL LOSSES. 455 
 
 sent to the Middlesex Hospital, miserably mangled, 
 with broken limbs, and dreadful bruises. Several 
 respectable young men having approached too near 
 the flames, perished by the steam which arose from 
 the burning ruins upon which the engines were 
 playing. The number of persons whose lives were 
 unfortunately sacrificed to their activity and assi- 
 duity amounted to 0. Many others (more perhaps 
 in number) were severely and dangerously wounded. 
 The insurances on the house did not exceed 
 50,000/., and the savings from the Shakspeare pre- 
 mises about 3,500/. more ; the whole not more 
 than one-fourth part of the sum requisite to replace 
 the theatre. The actual loss was immense j besides 
 the usual stock of .scenery, there was an additional 
 quantity for a new melo-drama, which was shortly 
 to have been brought forward. T)f the originals of 
 the music of Handel, Arne, and many other emi- 
 nen^ composers, there were no copies; and of 
 many other pieces of music an outline only had 
 been given. Some excellent dramatic productions, 
 the property of the theatre, were also lost for ever. 
 The Bedford and Piazza Coffee-houses escaped 
 .the flames, owing to a wall which had been erected 
 by the proprietors of the theatre a short time before, 
 to guard themselves from the danger of the adjoin- 
 ing premises. Another accident happened on the 
 Wednesday, by the falling of a wall in Hart-Street, 
 which killed one man, and bruised several others. 
 
 G G 4
 
 4-56 HEAVY LOSS OF THE PERFORMERS. 
 
 They had been warned of their danger, but dis- 
 regarded it 
 
 The organ, left by Handel as a legacy to the 
 theatre, stated to be worth upwards of 1000 
 guineas, and which was only used for the oratorios, 
 was consumed. The Beef-Steak Club, which held 
 its meetings at the top of the theatre, lost their 
 stock of wines, valued at 1500/. Mr. Ware, the 
 leader of the band, lost a violin worth 300/., which 
 had been left behind that night for the first time in 
 two years. Mr. Munden, his wardrobe, not to be 
 replaced under 3007. Miss Bolton, her jewels ; 
 and the other performers property, in the aggre- 
 gate, to a considerable amount. Some of the 
 private houses were not insured, and others but 
 partially. The receipts of the preceding night's 
 performance, with the books and papers belonging 
 to Mr. Brandon's office, were the only property of 
 consequence belonging to the theatre saved. It is 
 almost too painful to describe the situation of those 
 persons who were dug out of the ruins alive ; they 
 were, in general, so dreadfully burned, as scarcely 
 to be recognised by their nearest relatives, and 
 their flesh, in several instances, literally peeled from 
 off the bone. The dead bodies taken from the 
 same place were nearly shapeless trunks. An 
 immense concourse of spectators thronged all the 
 avenues to the ruins on the three first days ; and 
 among the nobility who visited the coffee-houses
 
 AWFUL LOSS OF LIVES. 
 
 adjoining, were the Dukes of York and Cambridge, 
 Marquis Tweedale, &c. Too much praise cannot 
 be bestowed on the prompt attendance and active 
 exertions of the volunteer corps, who prevented 
 many depredations. 
 
 Twelve persons perished by the falling in of the 
 Apollo Room, viz. : R. Cadger, J. Holmes, J. 
 Hunt, W. Jones, J. Evans, J. Crabb, T. Mead, 
 W. Wrigglesworth, J. Kilby, T. James, and two 
 more whose names were unknown. 
 
 J. Sayers, a fireman of the Phoenix Insurance 
 Company ; Mr. Hewitt, a plumber ; J. Beaumont, 
 a private in the 1 st Guards ; T. Harris, jun., of 
 Hyde-Street, optician ; R. Bird, a coach-maker ; 
 J. Pilkins, a labourer ; Steevens, an engineer of 
 the Phoenix, died in St. Thomas's Hospital; asecond 
 private of the 1st Guards, in the greatest agonies, 
 at the Military Hospital ; Musket and Fish, two 
 other firemen of the Phoenix, in St. Thomas's 
 Hospital. 
 
 Let it be remembered that all these sufferers 
 perished, from that ardour that made them disdain 
 their personal security. They left a melancholy 
 feeling indeed in the breasts of the proprietors of 
 the theatre, who all declared, that their losses as to 
 property, immense as that was in its amount, were 
 in their estimation trifling, compared with such a 
 sacrifice of the brave, the humane men, who 
 perished for them. A subscription was imme- 
 diately opened for the pecuniary relief of their 
 families.
 
 458 RESIGNATION OF THE PROPRIETORS. 
 
 In the morning after the fire, as soon as I had 
 breakfasted, I hastened to Great Russel Street, to 
 ascertain the state of the sufferers, and give any 
 little aid that I might be able to render. Honest 
 John Rousham in silence let me in, and walked up 
 stairs before me into Mr. Kemble' s dressing-room. 
 He was standing before the glass, totally ab- 
 sorbed, and yet at intervals endeavouring to shave 
 himself. 
 
 Mrs. Kemble was sitting in tears upon a sopha, 
 and on seeing me exclaimed, " O Mr. Boaden, we are 
 totally ruined, and have the world to begin again!" 
 
 His brother Charles, wrapt up just as he came 
 from the fire, was sitting attentive, upon the end of 
 the sopha ; and a gentleman, much attached to 
 Mr. Harris, who in and about the theatre was fami- 
 liarly styled old Dives, with his back to the wall, 
 and leaning upon his cane, sat frowning in a corner. 
 It was not a situation that called for speech ; our 
 salutations were like those at a funeral. I took a 
 chair, and sat observing the manner and the look 
 of Kemble. Nothing could be more natural than 
 for Mrs. Kemble to feel and think of their personal 
 loss in this dreadful calamity. Her husband, I am 
 convinced, while I saw him, never thought of him- 
 self at all. His mind was rather raised than de- 
 jected, and his imagination distended with the pic- 
 tured detail of all the treasures, that had perished 
 in the conflagration. At length he broke out in 
 exclamation, which 1 have preserved as character- 
 istic of his turn of mind.
 
 MR. KEMBLE'S FEELINGS. 459 
 
 " Yes, it has perished, that magnificent theatre, 
 " which for all the purposes of exhibition or com- 
 " fort was the first in Europe. It is gone, with all 
 <e its treasures of every description, and some which 
 " can never be replaced. That LIBRARY, which 
 " contained all those immortal productions of our 
 " countrymen, prepared for the purposes of repre- 
 " sentation ! That vast collection of MUSIC, com- 
 " posed by the greatest geniuses in that science, 
 " by Handel, Arne, and others ; most of it ma- 
 " nuscript, in the original score ! That WARDROBE, 
 " stored with the costumes of all ages and nations, 
 " accumulated by unwearied research, and at in- 
 credible expense ! SCENERY, the triumph of the 
 " art, unrivalled for its accuracy, and so exquisitely 
 " finished, that it might be the ornament of your 
 drawing-rooms, were they only large enough to 
 contain it ! Of all this vast treasure nothing now 
 " remains, but the ARMS of ENGLAND over the en- 
 " trance of the theatre and the ROMAN EAGLE 
 standing solitary in the market place !" 
 
 Soon after this Lord Mountjoy, I think, and 
 other friends, called upon them, and among the 
 topics of consolation, his Lordship turned his at- 
 tention to the general sympathy that would cer- 
 tainly be excited by such a loss. Indeed, said he, 
 the world in general are highly sensible of what you 
 have done for the stage. It will be but gratitw/c 
 in the people to compensate your loss. Mr. Kemble, 
 with great ardour and quickness, turned himself
 
 4-60 CONDESCENSION OF THE KING. 
 
 round, and thus noticed the expression : - " Gra- 
 " titude, my Lord ! the gratitude of the world and 
 " the people ! My Lord, CHRIST was crucified ; 
 " DE WIT was assassinated : so much for the world 
 " and the people !" 
 
 There could be no doubt about the instances he 
 gave. The agitated and impetuous feeling of the 
 moment will perhaps excuse ONE of the allusions 
 besides, that it was essential the Saviour should 
 suffer, for a world that, be it remembered, HE 
 thought worthy of so great a sacrifice. And 
 whatever may be said, and truly said, of the grati- 
 tude of the world and the people, Mr. Kemble soon 
 had the unspeakable delight to find, that there 
 were individuals, who felt even the deepest interest 
 in his merits and his misfortune. 
 
 Would I could be more particular in alluding to 
 the munificent conduct of the FIRST PERSON in the 
 realm ! the delicacy with which the aid was given, 
 the princely charm, which secured its reception ! 
 The terms which his Royal Highness had the con- 
 descension to use, written with his own hand, I 
 could wish to be at liberty to make public ; but I 
 refrain, from the respect I bear to the illustrious 
 giver, and my deference to the decision of my inva- 
 luable friend. 
 
 It was on this occasion, that his Grace the late 
 Duke of Northumberland wrote to Mr. Kemble, 
 and after expressing his concern for the accident 
 that had befallen him, assured him that he had not
 
 KINDNESS OF THE DUKE OF NORTHUMBERLAND. 46l 
 
 forgotten his readiness in attending to a request 
 which he had formerly made to him ; and that if 
 the use of such a sum as ten thousand pounds 
 would be any convenience to him, it was entirely 
 at his service upon his simple bond. Mr. Kemble 
 expressed his sensibility for an offer so gracious ; 
 but he added that he felt a difficulty in accepting 
 it, arising out of an apprehension, that from the 
 situation of his concerns with the theatre, he might 
 not be so punctual in the payment of the interest 
 upon the loan as it was imperious upon him to be. 
 The Duke answered that he would take care 
 that should be made perfectly easy to him, and that 
 his steward should receive his express instructions 
 to that effect. Thus encouraged, Mr. Kemble, 
 with suitable acknowledgments, accepted the loan, 
 and signed a bond for its repayment, bearing 
 simple interest, until the principal should be dis- 
 charged. 
 
 The occasion on which Mr. Kemble was con- 
 ceived by his great patron to have obliged him, 
 was the giving a few lessons in elocution to Lord 
 Percy, at his Grace's desire, intimated to him 
 through his friend Dr. Raine of the Charter-house. 
 At first the doctor spoke of it, without naming the 
 nobleman for whom he applied to him ; and Mr. 
 Kemble said, however flattered by the implied com- 
 pliment, that, from a want of sufficient leisure, he 
 must respectfully decline the proposal. Dr. Raine 
 said he regretted the refusal, as the Duke of
 
 462 LORD PERCY. 
 
 Northumberland would be greatly disappointed : 
 " Stop, doctor," said Mr. Kemble, " the Duke of 
 " NORTHUMBERLAND has a right to command me .'* 
 and then informing his friend of the kindness of the 
 Duke to him, when he was in the York company, 
 he readily conceded the object requested. He ac- 
 cordingly attended Lord Percy. 
 
 One day, when he was talking to me of his 
 Grace's goodness to him, I asked him what aid he 
 had been so happy as to render to the young noble- 
 man ? His answer was " Lord Percy is a very ac- 
 " complished speaker; he needed no assistance from 
 " me. However, in obedience to his Grace, we 
 " read occasionally together ; but the aid I gave, 
 " if any was given, was to point to Lord Percy's 
 " attention something as to the presentment of the 
 " person, when addressing a numerous assembly ; 
 " and I added some hints as to the management of 
 " the voice, so as at all times to be distinctly heard, 
 " and without exhaustion of the speaker. And in 
 " this part of my art I do flatter myself, that I was 
 " competent to advise him." 
 
 Whoever remembers the neatness of Mr. Kem- 
 ble's articulation, the small volume of his voice, 
 and the address with which he lulled or stifled an 
 almost habitual cough, will be of opinion, that he 
 was an absolute master indeed of public delivery ; 
 and properly appreciated a very peculiar merit, 
 that must have cost him infinite pains in its 
 attainment.
 
 463 
 
 CHAP. VI. 
 
 THE COVENT GARDEN PERFORMERS TAKE REFUGE IN THE 
 
 HAYMARKET THE EXILE. RAISING OF THE NEW 
 
 THEATRE. FOUNDATION LAID BY THE PRINCE OF 
 
 WALES. THE DINNER. MR. KEMBLE. THE LATE 
 
 DUKE OF NORTHUMBERLAND. THE DESTRUCTION BY 
 
 FIRE ALSO OF THE THEATRE ROYAL, DRURY LANE. PRO- 
 CEEDINGS OF THE PARTIES CONCERNED. 
 
 AMONG all the evils which attend upon our condi- 
 tion here, it is fortunate that, when once ascertained, 
 the mind of man invariably turns itself to seek for 
 consolation : nor is this relief confined to the ex- 
 pectation or the hope of GOOD, but often springs 
 from a conviction that what has really befallen us 
 might have been even yet more severe. 
 
 Something like this, I know, did strike the pro- 
 prietors of Covent Garden Theatre, when the effect 
 of their first shock a little subsided. The sum re- 
 covered on the policies of insurance was, I think, 
 44,500/., itself no inconsiderable part of a fund by 
 which to commence another building. Calamity, 
 too, gives a claim upon the liberal, more promptly 
 obeyed than the call of unsuffering speculation.
 
 464- COVENT GARDEN IN THE HAYMARKET. 
 
 Mr. Harris knew one side of the Theatre to be un- 
 sound, and he was confident that in a very few 
 years the proprietors must have raised a new pile 
 exclusively from their own funds. 
 
 What, therefore, ultimately remained, that ad- 
 mitted only the palliative of time, was the miserable 
 loss of lives by the over hardihood at the great 
 piazza door. The commercial character of the con- 
 - cern, to speak the language of business, was high. 
 The proprietors of this theatre were men to be 
 relief on. They could easily have raised twice the 
 sum they did, and it would have been better for 
 them to have done so. 
 
 Mr. Kemble turned himself to the task. of pre- 
 paration with great method and invincible applica- 
 tion. The hospitable roof of the Opera-House was 
 once again his shelter, and the sliding partitions 
 being removed, the boxes were soon rendered even 
 comfortable to the dramatic visitor. By the 26th 
 of the same month, only six days after their confla- 
 gration, the Covent Garden company performed 
 Douglas in the King's Theatre. After God save 
 the King, which implies, in England, the salvation 
 of every thing valuable, Mr. Kemble came forward 
 to address the people, who received him with almost 
 rapturous applause. After apologizing for any im- 
 perfection in his thanks, imputable to the full sense 
 of all their favours to him, he proceeded to inform 
 them that the proprietors had not even delayed the 
 performance of their duty to the humble, talents by
 
 DIFFICULTIES OF MR. KEMBLE. 4f)5 
 
 which they were surrounded they had supplied 
 the pressing wants of the workmen in their employ, 
 while they were busied in. the arrangements to re- 
 sume their place among the amusements of the 
 town. He then laid before them the necessity for 
 their indulgence in the exhibition of our native 
 drama in the theatre of Italian Opera j but assured 
 them daily progress would be made in bettering 
 the provision there, while they immediately set 
 about the erection of a new theatre worthy of the 
 Metropolis, and in which their hope was to be ready 
 to receive the public by next September. 
 
 Even in their disaster they were too strong to 
 fear competition. The other house had no promi- 
 nent feature but Mrs. Jordan, and was overwhelmed 
 with its embarrassments. To show, however, some- 
 thing as to the entire destitution of Covent Garden 
 Theatre at this time, I one morning met Mr. Kem- 
 ble, who said to me " Shew me where Mrs. 
 " Bland lodges, and come and help me to persuade 
 " her." We were close to the door ; she was at 
 home, and we went up to her. " My dear," said 
 Mr. Kemble, " we are going to do As You Like If, 
 " and Ware (the leader) can manage pretty well as 
 to the rest of the music, but he can't get the air 
 " you sing in the last act, ' Good Duke, receive 
 " thy Daughter' one of Arne's, of which we had 
 " the score." So, she said, " Dear me, I have it 
 " not ; beside if I had, it would only be the voice 
 " part, and then what would you do for the orches- 
 
 VOL. II. H H
 
 4.()f> KEYNOLDS'S EXILE. 
 
 "tra?" "Why, if 'you will note the song dowir 
 " for us," said the manager, " Ware can put the 
 " harmony to it ; if not Arne's, near enough to pass 
 " for the occasion." This the really kind creature 
 said she would do with all her heart, and after a 
 few complimentary expressions we took our leave. 
 
 They did, indeed, daily augment their provisions 
 of scenery and decoration ; for by the 7th of Oct. 
 they brought forth a new melodrama, called The 
 Forest of Hermanstadt, in which Listen was let 
 loose upon Parissot and Deshayes, and stept forth 
 at once the farcical dieu de la danse. Mrs. H. John- 
 ston became even popular now, by the beauty of 
 her attitudes and the loveliness of her expression. 
 This was a compression of Skeffington's Mysterious 
 Bride, by T. Dibdin, who produced a very interest- 
 ing piece in two acts. 
 
 Reynolds in the mean time had read the enchant- 
 ing romance of Madame Cottin, called Elizabeth, 
 which he dramatised under the title of The Exik ; 
 and it was first acted with infinite splendor at the 
 Opera-house, on the 10th of November. The 
 effect of it was prodigious it has been a fortune 
 at every distinct revival on our stage, and its pro- 
 cession was both graceful and elegant. The long 
 peregrination of the daughter lost much of its pathos 
 in the shifting of stage scenery it is " as fleet as 
 " a glance of the mind." The remembrance of 
 the romance was absolutely needed for the interest 
 of the heroine. Here again Mrs. Johnston was
 
 YOUNG IN DA11AN. 
 
 fortunate in being cast into Alexine ; and for state 
 and majesty few empresses, even of the stage, could 
 compete with the towering grandeur of Mrs. St. 
 Leger. 
 
 Pope was now again with the Covent Garden 
 manager j and to show the total want of manage- 
 ment at the other house, they had allowed Kemble 
 to possess himself of Young also ; so that tragedy 
 could really be acted nowhere else. He performed 
 Daran with characteristic ardour, and the Exile, 
 perhaps, has equalled the attraction even of Pizarro. 
 But the combination of talent was extreme Rey- 
 nolds had persuasion equal to his tact, and secured 
 the further aid of Mrs. Dickons and Incledon, and 
 Munden, and Fawcett, and Liston. And this is 
 no trifling art in the preparation of an author's 
 triumph. 
 
 The grand incident, rushing into the sovereign's 
 presence, reminded the critics of Mr. Col man and 
 his Africans. How enviable was the lot of Madame 
 Cottin on this occasion, who really invented the 
 situation ! 
 
 Mr. Robert Smirke, jun, was selected to be the 
 architect of the new Theatre Royal ; and the anti- 
 cipation of classical structure was carefully kept 
 awake by reports of his travels and his taste, and 
 his peculiar study of theatres. The site of the new 
 play-house, (if such a word still remain in our lan- 
 o-uage,) was somewhat extended a circumstance 
 afterwards affecting a legal covenant j some adja- 
 
 H H 2
 
 408 NEW COVENT GARDEN THEATRE. 
 
 cent liases were bought, so as to open the area r 
 the architect might have surrounded the house by 
 a colonade, and facilitated the departure of the 
 spectators by stair-cases of considerable width, and 
 doors to be open only at the close of the amusement. 
 He did not choose such a plan ; but loaded his de- 
 sign with a bleak, a barren, and portentous portico, 
 and strengthened his walls, as though they were 
 bound to resist every thing but the " crack of 
 " doom." So solid an edifice required funds to no 
 mean amount even in the outset, and 50,000/. in 
 500/. shares, were subscribed in a very few days. 
 They secured a deposit of 40 per cent, and the re- 
 mainder was conveniently enough arranged j the 
 whole, with 44,500/. from the fire-offices, was to 
 be paid into the banking-house of Stephenson, Bat- 
 son, and Co., there to be expressly and solely \ 
 appropriated to the erection, and completion, and 
 furnishing of the new theatre. The most costly 
 materials were always chosen ; the proprietors 
 seemed never to recollect their personal responsi- 
 bility for every thing they were building a temple 
 and a palace, as if it had been voted by the people 
 of England, and their representatives had consti- 
 tuted them the committee of taste for its erection. 
 
 The 30th of December was the day devoted to 
 the ceremony of laying the first stone of the build- 
 ing. His Royal Highness the Prince of. Wales was 
 present on the occasion ; and deputations from the 
 Masonic Lodges in town assembled at Freemasons'
 
 LAYING THE FIRST STONE. 469 
 
 Tavern to meet their grand master. A merely wo- 
 minal alliance may be better than none : whatever 
 union might once have existed between the symbol 
 and its subject, the free and the real MASON, I pre- 
 sume at the present day, unless the architect should 
 condescend to be a mason, few members of the craft 
 know a triglyph from a metope. I have never pre- 
 sumed to enter the Hall of Mystery in Queen 
 .Street, and therefore, as Gibbon observes of Virgil, 
 in reference to the Eleusinian mysteries*, " Should 
 " it appear probable, that I had no opportunity of 
 " learning the SECRET, it will be something more 
 " than probable, that I shall not reveal what I 
 " never knew." 
 
 The whole of the proceedings were under the 
 direction of Mr. Kemble, who paid every possible 
 attention, as well to the accommodation of those 
 v.ho were admitted to see the formalities, as to the 
 ceremony itself. The streets surrounding the 
 theatre were lined by the Life Guards, and detach- 
 ments of infantry were placed in situations to 
 
 * On this subject even the wonderful reading of Gibbon, in 
 his reply to Warburton, left his argument unsatisfactory. It 
 was not necessary for Virgil to be initiated in the mysteries of 
 Ceres to make them a subject of his pOm. In the letters of 
 Cicero to Atticus, he seconds the entreaties of his friend CHI- 
 LIUS, the poet, to send to him an account of these very rites. 
 They were, therefore, no doubt, ready for the poetical use of 
 VIRGIT,, without either the trouble of initiation, or sustaining 
 personally the anathema of Horace. " Chilius te rogat, et ego 
 " ejus rogatu EufwXsn&v -jcdf^" Cic. Gronov. p. 858. 
 
 HH3
 
 470 CEREMONY OF LAYING THE FIRST STONE OF 
 
 secure a facility of access to the doors of admission, 
 and keep off the crowd. Covered platforms were 
 raised within the interior of the building, for the 
 accommodation of the spectators, and an open plat- 
 form, from the grand entrance in Bow-street to the 
 north-east part of the building, where the stone was 
 laid, was railed off, and the flooring covered with 
 green cloth, bordered with crimson, directing the 
 progress of the masonic brethren to the spot where 
 the ceremony was to take place. At the north-east 
 extremity of this platform, in a raised gallery, were 
 placed the bands of the Life Guards, and of the 
 Coldstream ; and at the opposite side -of the plat- 
 form, the Duke of York's band was stationed, and 
 played alternately the most admired martial pieces. 
 A marquee was also erected, provided with re- 
 freshments ; and a covered way built up for the 
 masons to retire to in case of rain. The grenadier 
 companies of the Foot Guards were stationed at 
 the grand entrance door ; flags were hoisted at the 
 four corners of the building, and about forty Life 
 Guards, who were masons, lined the space along 
 which the procession was to pass. The company 
 began to assemble as early as ten o'clock, and be- 
 fore twelve the seats were occupied with elegant 
 females, the gentlemen standing on a raised plat- 
 form behind them. The other parts of the stage 
 erected for public accommodation, were also 
 crowded, and the workmen employed upon the
 
 COVENT GARDEN THEATRE. 471 
 
 building were placed on scaffolds at a greater dis- 
 tance. 
 
 Mr. Harris and Mr. Kemble, the latter of whom 
 was made a mason only on the preceding evening, 
 both wearing the insignia of masons, received his 
 Royal Highness as he alighted from his carriage, 
 and conducted him to the marquee, where the grand* 
 officers were waiting his arrival, the band playing 
 the Grenadier's March. The Prince was accom- 
 panied by the Duke of Sussex, the only branch of 
 the royal family who was a mason except his Royal 
 Highness, and Earl Moira, as deputy grand master. 
 Colonel Bloomfield, one of his Royal Highness's 
 household, was also of the party, dressed in the old 
 uniform. 
 
 The company all rose as his Royal Highness 
 passed along the platform, the gentlemen remained 
 uncovered, and the workmen gave three cheers, the 
 band playing, " God save the King." A royal 
 salute of twenty-one guns was then fired from car- 
 ronades placed in the building, and the upper part 
 of" the stone was raised for the purpose of the 
 ceremony. 
 
 After the Prince had passed a short time with the 
 grand officers and others in the marquee, he 
 came forward, uncovered, and prepared to lay the 
 stone. The grand treasurer of the superior lodge 
 deposited a bronze box, containing divers coins and 
 medals of the King's reign, in the cavity of the 
 foundation stone ; and the cement being prepared, 
 
 H H 4
 
 472 CEREMONY OF LAYING THE FIRST STONE OF 
 
 the Prince, as Grand Master, spread the same 
 abroad with his silver trowel, and the stone, weigh- 
 ing upwards of three tons, was then let down, the 
 bands continuing to play a martial air. The senior 
 and junior wardens, and the Deputy Grand Master, 
 the Earl of Moira, having severally presented his 
 Royal Highness with the plumb, the level, and the 
 square, and the Prince having applied them to the 
 fabric, and, pronouncing the work correct, he gave 
 the stone three knocks with his mallet, and the 
 ceremony of placing the stone was finished. 
 
 Three cups were then given to his Royal High- 
 ness, containing corn, wine, and oil, which he scat- 
 tered and poured upon the stone ; then placing a 
 plan of the building in the hands of Mr. Smirke, 
 the architect, he desired him to complete the 
 structure, according to that plan. His Royal High- 
 ness then turning to Mr. Harris and Mr. Kemble, 
 wished prosperity to the building, and the objects 
 connected with it, and success and happiness to 
 the proprietors and managers. The ceremony 
 being finished, the band played Rule Britannia, and 
 the Prince, the Duke of Sussex, and Earl Moira, 
 were escorted back to the Prince's carriage, by the 
 managers and the grand officers, under a second 
 salute of 21 guns. 
 
 The brothers of the masonic lodges then re- 
 turned to their hall, in Queen Street, and the grand 
 lodge was closed, after making a formal minute of 
 the proceedings. Sir John Earner and Mr. Alder-
 
 COVENT GARDEN THEATRE. 473 
 
 man Newnham were among the grand officers. 
 The Prince looked extremely well, and wore the in- 
 signia of Grand Master of the masons. The Duke 
 of Sussex also appeared in good health and spirits, 
 and walked side by side with his royal brother. 
 The servants of the Prince wore their full dress 
 liveries, and he was attended by the gentlemen of 
 his household, in the same way as when he goes to 
 court. 
 
 Among the articles deposited in the box, inclosed 
 in the foundation, was a gold medal, stating, in 
 Latin, that George, Prince of Wales, laid the 
 foundation of the theatre with his own hand ; and 
 on the reverse is a bust of his Royal Highness, and 
 the year 1808. Also another medal, of the same 
 size, of copper, with the following inscription : 
 
 Under the auspices of 
 
 His most sacred Majesty, George III. 
 
 King of the United Kingdoms of Great Britain and Ireland, 
 
 The Foundation Stone of the Theatre, Covent Garden, 
 
 Was laid by his Royal Highness 
 
 George Prince of Wales, 
 
 M.DCCCVIII. 
 
 On the reverse is : 
 
 ROBERT SMIRKE, Architect. 
 
 Amidst the multitude who attended, it was im- 
 possible to distinguish individuals, though there 
 ware many persons of distinction present. Almost 
 all the actors and actresses were there. 
 
 Mrs. Siddons looked extremely well, and wore a
 
 474- MUNIFICENT DONATION OF 
 
 large plume of black feathers. She expressed a 
 great deal of anxiety for her brother, Mr. Kemble, 
 who, from having been confined to his chamber 
 for above a month, came forward upon the occa- 
 sion, accommodating his dress to the ceremony, 
 and stood bare-headed under the rain. 
 
 Mr. Kemble was indefatigable in his exertions ; 
 he was full dressed in blue and white, with white 
 silk stockings. Mr. Smirke, the architect, and 
 Mr. Copeland, the builder, were also present. 
 
 The houses in the streets adjoining the theatre 
 were crowded to the roof tops ; and notwithstand- 
 ing many thousands were collected on the outside, 
 I did not hear of a single accident. 
 
 The proprietors and their friends on this great 
 day dined together; and Mr. Kemble rose with 
 the most grateful emotion to address them. He 
 held in his hand a paper, which had been that mo- 
 ment delivered to him from His Grace .the Duke of 
 Northumberland. It noticed the business of the 
 day as rendering it one of. the proudest in Mr. 
 Kemble's life, and conveyed his Grace's deter- 
 mination to make it one of the happiest ; and as no 
 doubt the joy of all concerned would demand and 
 justify a bonfire on the occasion, he begged that 
 Mr. Kemble would use the enclosed (his bond for 
 10,000/. cancelled) to light the pile. 
 
 In the accounts that have been given of this 
 transaction, Mr Kemble is made, with the utmost 
 regularity, to pay the interest as the quarters be-
 
 THE DUKE OF NORTHUMBERLAND. 475 
 
 came due ; and the world may properly give my 
 friend the credit of doing, to the syllable, every 
 thing that ought to be done upon such an occasion. 
 But as the writers themselves very accurately state, 
 that the loan took effect soon after the burning of 
 the theatre on the 20th of September 1808, and 
 the bond itself was returned cancelled on the 31st 
 of December of the same year, it is certain that the 
 noble Duke did not permit any vast exercise of 
 Mr. Kemble's punctuality, as the quarters became 
 due. 
 
 The act itself is one of those proud things in the 
 history of a great family, which evince the mighty 
 power of hereditary character and hereditary 
 wealth. The nobleman, who thus distinguished 
 Mr. Kemble, lived to receive the written expres- 
 sion of his sensibility and his gratitude. Thejame 
 of such beneficence is of vast importance to man- 
 kind; inasmuch as it ensures, from every DE- 
 SCENDANT of the house of PERCY, the liberal use 
 of that opulence, which is not merely a possession, 
 but a trust, to be inherited only with honour, as 
 it is dispensed with joy. 
 
 The cloud which had been cast over the thea- 
 trical world seemed at length to be breaking away; 
 and although the full magnificence of Holland's 
 design, as to Drury Lane Theatre, had been stinted 
 by insufficient means, yet it was expected NOW, 
 that its exterior would in some way be completed, 
 so as to put it more upon a level with the classical
 
 4-76 LIBERALITY OF SECTARISTS. 
 
 pile, which Mr. Smirke was to erect on the site of 
 the old theatre in Covent Garden. But it was 
 THEN only to be on a level with its rival by a simi- 
 lar destruction. 
 
 It may hardly be worth the notice, but the fact 
 is unquestionable, that there will be always, among 
 the sour spirits of our sectarists, many who look 
 upon all elegant amusements as vanities, and upon 
 theatres as the most pernicious of the tribe. To 
 such persons the destruction of a play-house be- 
 tokens the vengeance of an incensed Deity, and 
 they point with very solemn triumph to the ruins 
 of a profane and dissolute temple. The fate of 
 Covent Garden, I remember, led them to some 
 expressions, which seemed to threaten as well as 
 prophecy and it was currently said, that the 
 other Belial would soon be grovelling in the dust. 
 Every consideration, however, seemed to call upon 
 the persons about Drury Lane Theatre for extreme 
 vigilance and care. In the month of September 
 1808, they had been assiduously employed on their 
 roof, to guard their own Apollo from the fiery flakes 
 that fell in showers from the burning theatre so 
 nigh at hand. As details came to be known of the 
 progress of this calamity, they learned that no 
 'water could be had for a long while to supply the 
 engines, the main having just at this time been cut 
 off for the purpose of laying down new pipes. 
 Covent Garden, it was supposed, was destroyed 
 from the wadding of a musket fired in Pizarro,
 
 CAUTIONS AT DRURY. 477 
 
 which being discharged upwards, had been driven 
 deeply into some combustible substances, and there 
 at length kindled into blaze the fuel which sur- 
 rounded it. 
 
 What is the inference from all this ? Why, that 
 accident, if it occurred, would never surprise them 
 unprepared. The utmost vigilance would be used 
 that no risk should be run ; workmen would not 
 be left entirely to themselves, whether sober or 
 otherwise ; and if on the stage a double care was 
 taken to point the fire-arms, or they blew off, with 
 the customary stench, a little harmless powder 
 only, to startle the gentler part of their spectators, 
 they would not tlierefore think themselves at liberty 
 to abandon spacious apartments of the house com- 
 municating with the boxes to the liquid flames of 
 varnish, which either carelessness might leave to 
 their natural effect, or malice secretly direct to the 
 destruction of the building. But if even this 
 were so, and the ample sweep of the audience por- 
 tion of the building took Jire, some persons should 
 ' have been in the way, to be apprized either by 
 smoke, or noise, or light, of what was at work 
 around them. The iron curtain should have been 
 ready, to secure one half of the pile from the flames; 
 and the reservoir on the roof at least not empty, and 
 ready to pour its streams of water upon the burn- 
 ing circles of the other half. 
 
 I do not therefore wonder that, with no more
 
 478 CONJECTURES. 
 
 interval for carelessness to grow to its height than 
 five short months, there should be found HUNDREDS 
 of calm and observing persons, who utterly refused 
 to credit the alleged cause of the fire when it hap- 
 pened, and persisted in the opinion, that Drury 
 Lane Theatre perished by design, and design with 
 perfect science to aid it. " If," says a cotemporary 
 writer, " it had been a night of performance, and 
 " the flames had spread with the same rapidity, 
 " many hundreds must have perished." The 
 flames could not have spread with the same ra- 
 pidity ; for an excessive fire could not have been 
 made in the coffee-room by 'workmen. The usual 
 tea-makers would have been there ; and no more 
 fire in the stove than sufficed to boil the water. 
 But he goes on : " If it can be believed that this 
 " was the work of some basely interested or mali- 
 " cious incendiary, the time chosen, (a Friday in 
 " Lent,) appears to shew a feeling of conscience 
 " even in such a villain ; if not, we have only a 
 " further, though needless confirmation, that, as in 
 " the fall of a sparrow, so in the most awful scenes 
 " of waste, ' there is a Providence/ " 
 
 This is a dark and inscrutable subject. The 
 short-sighted humanity or justice, given to us for 
 guides, might humbly suggest, that if special inter- 
 vention were deigned in such a case, PROPERTY 
 might have been saved as well as LIVES, by a sud- 
 den effect either upon the mind or hand of the
 
 FIRE AT DRURY. 
 
 incendiary, and all the long train of evils averted, 
 which fell so heavily upon the dependents on the 
 theatre. But let us look to the event. 
 
 The Circassian Bride, and the Unconscious 
 Counterfeit, were advertised for the performances 
 of Saturday the 25th. It being Lent, no perform- 
 ance took place on the 24th. After a strict inves- 
 tigation, it was generally believed, that this 
 melancholy catastrophe was oecasioned by accident. 
 It appeared that the stove in the upper coffee-room 
 was of slight construction, for the mere purpose of 
 accommodating the customers of the evening with 
 water for tea, &c., and quite surrounded with wood- 
 work. * In this stove the workmen, who had been 
 employed during the day, had made a much larger 
 fire t than it was customary to make there, the re- 
 mains of which were left in it at four o'clock, and 
 it was reasonable to suppose, had communicated to 
 the surrounding woodwork, and that the fire had 
 been gaining strength t from that time to the mo- 
 ment of its bursting forth. 
 
 * A fire-place, in a theatre too, surrounded with woodwork ! 
 
 f " A much larger fire." Who states this? If the workmen, 
 why leave it in at four o'clock, since it was no longer needed ? 
 
 If the servants of the house, who remarked it as extraordinary, 
 
 why did not they watch it or extinguish it ? 
 
 From that time to the, SfC. That is, from four o'clock to 
 eleven at night, seven hours ; during which the fire was left to 
 go out or destroy, and no one creature in the building was near 
 the room, to know how these workmen had left the combustible 
 articles they were using, and known to be using!
 
 480 FIRE AT DRURY. 
 
 In less than a quarter of an hour from that time, 
 the fire spread in one unbroken flame over the 
 whole of the immense pile, extending from Brydges- 
 street to Drury Lane ; so that the pillar of fire was 
 not less than 450 feet in breadth. In a very few 
 minutes all that part of the theatre, together with 
 the front row of boxes, was on fire, and the rapidity 
 of the flames was such, that before twelve o'clock 
 the whole of the interior was one blaze. The 
 theatre was at this time left to its fate, and the 
 appearance was tremendously grand. Never before 
 did I behold so immense a body of flame ; and the 
 occasional explosions that took place, were awful 
 beyond description. The interior was completely 
 destroyed by one o'clock. Some of the houses par- 
 tially caught fire in Russel-street, but the engines, 
 with a plentiful supply of water, continued to play 
 on those contiguous to the theatre. The ad- 
 vantage of having a great public structure of this 
 kind in an insulated situation, was apparent upon 
 this awful and melancholy occasion. Although the 
 engines could not arrest the progress of the flames 
 in the theatre, they were able to play upon the sur- 
 rounding buildings, and thus saved the neighbour- 
 hood from destruction. Neither the burning of 
 Covent Garden Theatre, nor the late fire at St. 
 James's Palace, could be compared in terrific gran- 
 deur with this conflagration. The Thames appeared 
 like a sheet of fire. 
 
 At three o'clock the flames had nearly subsided:
 
 TRIFLING INSURANCE OF THE THEATRE. 481 
 
 that once magnificent structure presented to the 
 view nothing but an immense heap of ruins \ and 
 at five o'clock the flames were completely subdued. 
 Of the immense property of all sorts, in scenery, 
 machinery, dresses, decorations, music, instruments, 
 plays, &c. of which nothing was saved, no estimate 
 can be formed. It was insured for the exact fol- 
 lowing sums : 
 
 Imperial -. - ;: - , > egl 3,500 
 
 Hope - - - - 10,000 
 
 Eagle - - V-" * -/ 6,500 
 
 British - .^ +**- 5,000 
 
 ^35,000 
 
 The whole of this insurance has been attached 'in 
 the different offices by His Grace the Duke of Bed- 
 ford, the ground landlord, &c. The treasury 
 having a party wall, was unhurt, and but for the 
 injudicious zeal of some of the assistants, in oppo- 
 sition to the better judgment of Mr. Peake, none 
 of the books or papers would have been lost that 
 loss, however, was not of very great moment, since 
 all the accounts are now closed. The whole of the 
 property of Mrs. Jordan, and some belonging to 
 Messrs. Matthews and Decamp, were the only 
 things saved. All the splendid furniture that for- 
 merly ornamented the dwelling of Mr. Sheridan, 
 when Treasurer of the Navy, (the fruits of office,) 
 
 VOL. n. i i
 
 482 MR. FOX PETITIONS THE HOUSE OF COMMONS. 
 
 were destroyed. Mr. Phillips, who resides in Cross- 
 court, Russel-court, gave the first alarm at the 
 stage door. Not a single life was lost. 
 
 The plan of the late theatre included an area of 
 upwards of 320 feet in length, by 155 in breadth, 
 and the height of the building, measuring from the 
 substratum to the roof, was 118 feet. On the 5th 
 of March 1794-, Mr. Fox brought up a petition in 
 the House of Commons from Mr. Sheridan, in be- 
 half of himself and the other proprietors, praying 
 certain powers to clear the avenues of the theatre 
 for the accommodation of the public. The petition 
 was referred to a committee, and the intended im- 
 provements were incomplete when the edifice sunk 
 in flames.* The front in Brydges-street was to 
 have been ornamented by buildings, containing a 
 coffee-house, tavern, library, shops of various sorts, 
 and residences for the performers. According to 
 the plan, it would have been one of the most com- 
 plete theatres in Europe, and worthy the British 
 capital ; but it fell before it reached perfection. 
 The ornaments of the house had a rich effect, and 
 at the same time a simplicity which gratified the 
 
 * On the night of the conflagration, I stood, with my boots 
 covered by the water, in the middle of the street, until I saw 
 ftejigure on the summit of the house sink into the flames ; that 
 APOLLO which a contemptible vanity had thrust up into the 
 place, that, in England, should always be occupied by SHAK- 
 SPEARE : to whose honour, moreover, be it remembered, the 
 pile, on its erection, professed itself to be consecrated.
 
 PERFORMERS SHIFT FOR THEMSELVES. 483 
 
 eye, without reducing the effect of the stage deco- 
 rations. The drop scene was considered by artists 
 a rare production of architectural design. The 
 building of this theatre cost 129,0007. The debts 
 upon it amounted to 300,0001. The situation of 
 all concerned was dreadful in the extreme. Mr. 
 Sheridan experienced on this calamitous occasion 
 the sympathy of the House of Commons j but he 
 must have called up no vulgar philosophy to sustain 
 him. Men carry their veneration for genius a great 
 way ; but for such a person as Mr. Sheridan to 
 struggle with the old debt, incur a new one, and 
 rebuild his theatre, was utterly impossible. His 
 habits had rendered confidence, at least, no com- 
 mercial failing. 
 
 The performers in the mean time no longer "re- 
 joicing in their matchless chief)" met to consider 
 what was to be done for themselves. Here were 
 some hundreds of ingenious persons fitted for their 
 work, with theirfactory in ruins, and their employers 
 reduced to beggary. Thus matters stood till the 1st 
 of March, when Mr. Sheridan resigned all controul 
 over the ladies and gentlemen of the late establish- 
 ment, and with his good wishes left them to their for* 
 tune. Perhaps " the tears resided in an onion," 
 that on the part of the performers " watered this 
 sorrow." They were not suffered long to indulge 
 the feeling, whatever it was ; for THREE HOURS 
 after this, he sent them word, that " he would re- 
 
 i i 2
 
 484 APPLICATION TO THE LORD CHAMBERLAIN. 
 
 main with them, and that they must provide for him 
 and his son Tom" 
 
 They utterly refused to receive him, and settled 
 upon endeavouring to procure a licence from the 
 Lord Chamberlain for themselves. This was a great 
 deal too loose a scheme ; the performers could 
 hardly have considered its unavoidable results. 
 Condemning their former governor to exist upon 
 his wits, might not strike them as imposing upon 
 HIM any calamity without due preparation He 
 had done this all his life. But that the PROPRIE- 
 TORS of the theatre the RENTERS, the CRE- 
 DITORS, should for 300,000/., absolutely lost, solicit 
 no attention from the government ; that they should 
 assemble amid their own ruins, and, in tender re- 
 collection, contentedly carry away each of them a 
 brick as a specimen and a relic, was too much to 
 expect from any set of people who looked to their 
 own interest. Accordingly, when the Actors waited 
 upon the Lord Chamberlain, even so early as at ten 
 o'clock in the morning, they found that Mr. Sheri- 
 dan had been there before them, and they had some- 
 thing to endure very like reproach, that they could 
 think of such a violent and selfish usurpation of the 
 rights of others. But let me do them justice ; they 
 did not mean to slip by a LICENCE into the pos- 
 session of the PATENT, and snatch from the great 
 sufferers all hope of future benefit ; they wanted 
 THEN, at that moment of extreme and miserable
 
 PERFORMANCES IN THE HAYMARKET. 485 
 
 need, to give bread to the retainers of the establish- 
 ment under three pounds per week ; and if they 
 should be allowed to act at the Lyceum, the re- 
 ceipts of which could be but moderate, they then 
 had resolved constantly to pay in full all such sala- 
 ries, and suffer a deduction to be made from those 
 of the higher performers, who could struggle better 
 for themselves, and were contented to do so. 
 
 There was something in this that struck the Lord 
 Chamberlain ; the urgency, too, was extreme, and 
 he granted the performers his licence to act three 
 nights, for their own particular benefit, at the King's 
 Theatre in the Hay market. Mr. Taylor, it was 
 understood, gave them a his shelter, I believe he 
 charged them only the actual expences incurred 
 for they had his corps de ballet, as well as his house, 
 and they ventured to infringe a little upon play- 
 house prices. On these nights the public with 
 cheerfulness gave 7*. in the boxes, 5s. in the pit, 
 and 2s. 6d. in the gallery. On these three nights 
 upwards of 2,200/. was taken at the doors. They 
 did not suffer this timely aid to shrink away by pe- 
 culation they knew well the mysteries of door- 
 keepers and check-takers ; persons some how be- 
 yond all check, and the "heart of whose mystery" 
 seems, like the soul of the " brethren three" in 
 Spenser, to be regularly transferred at departure. 
 They therefore, in succession, received the money 
 and checked themselves ; and were enabled, lite- 
 rally, to give bread to the starving. They obtained 
 
 i i 3
 
 486 PERFORMANCES AT THE LYCEUM. 
 
 at the same theatre, three nights more from Mr. 
 Taylor's liberality ; but on the llth of April, they 
 opened at the Lyceum, and continued, by permis- 
 sion of the Lord Chamberlain, to act there to the 
 10th of June. The six nights at the Opera-house 
 had the distinction given by the talents of Mrs. 
 Siddons, on the 3d of April, in Lady Randolph, 
 and on the 10th by those of Madame Catalani, in 
 Semir amide. On the latter occasion, there was an 
 overflow, that swept away all bars and bolts, and 
 checks and their receivers. The charity of the pub- 
 lic, to hear Madame Catalani, on this occasion, is 
 ' said, in very numerous instances, to have forgotten 
 the usual donation at the door. 
 
 It only remains for me to state that, upon some 
 remarkable depreciation in the 500/. shares of this 
 theatre after thejire, the unfortunate holders being 
 contented to take whatever they could get, a 
 public advertisement, from the PROPRIETORS, re- 
 commended them to be cool; and to be assured, 
 that every endeavour towards a just and equitable 
 arrangement with them would precede any attempt 
 towards rebuilding the theatre. Some of them, I 
 believe, became quite cold before that astonishing 
 event.
 
 4<87 
 
 CHAP. VII. 
 
 BUILDING OF THE NEW THEATRE. ITS EXTERIOR. RE- 
 MARKS. INTERIOR. THREATENED STORM AS TO NEW 
 
 PRICES. THE O. P. RIOT. THE DINNER. THE STAGE. 
 
 TERMINATION OF THE CONTEST. 
 
 FROM the destruction of the one theatre the mind 
 recovers something of its elasticity in contemplating 
 the rapid erection of the other. The excavations 
 for the foundation began about the end of Novem- 
 ber. The last day of the year witnessed the cere- 
 mony of laying the foundation stone, and the whole 
 building was finished on the 18th of September 
 
 1809. 
 
 To accomplish this rapid task with the security 
 that was equally essential in the work, horse-mills 
 were erected to grind the lime and prepare the 
 mortar that, too, was used immediately in a hot 
 state, to prevent any interruption from frost, and 
 courses of Yorkshire stone, at every interval of four 
 feet in height, were worked into the walls, to render 
 them sufficiently strong. 
 
 The whole of the roof; by the dexterous employ- 
 ment of machinery, was raised and fixed in one 
 
 i i 4
 
 488 EXTERIOR OF THE NEW THEATRE. 
 
 month j it was nearly 100 feet in length, and 
 130 feet in width ; every principal pair of rafters 
 sustained, by calculation, a weight of 30 tons. 
 
 The outside of the theatre rests upon an area of 
 about 220 feet in length, and 170 in breadth. The 
 only insulation that merits the name is on the 
 eastern side, Bow-street, and the western of 
 Prince's Place. A fire in Hart-street, with a north 
 wind to assist it, must do great injury to the theatre, 
 even if they were speedily supplied with water. 
 The Bedford avenue is gloomy, and would be in- 
 effectual as to danger from the south. 
 
 There is, externally, not a particle of tas'te a 
 heavy portico of four doric columns, the largest in 
 any modern building, astonishes by its ponderous 
 inutility ; the columns are 5 feet 6 inches in 
 diameter. The doric, it should be observed, was 
 the earliest of the three orders properly Grecian 
 the enormous thickness of the column diminished 
 with the refinement of art, and the accom- 
 plished Corinthian consummated the invention of 
 the Greeks. 
 
 We are told that the Bow-street front is an imi- 
 tation of the Temple of Minerva in the Acropolis. 
 Partially it may be ; but it has no interior columns 
 no point of sight from which it can be viewed, 
 or its proportions discerned. The lower part of 
 the bulling is of stone, the upper of cement very 
 dingy, and liable to scale off or crack. Referring 
 to the archetype, the ornaments on the tympanum
 
 REMARKS. 4,39 
 
 and frieze are omitted, so are those on the corners 
 of the pediment. 
 
 Men are so liable to be carried away by a catch- 
 word: meutionfreedom, and they seem to think all 
 curb unnecessary. Talk of the classic, and they do 
 not think of utility, and never even ask whether 
 theatres, among the ancients, bore the external 
 form of temples. Here everything was conse- 
 quently to be classical. The greater part of the bos 
 reliefs in front are quite unintelligible, except 
 to the artist and the antiquary Minerva, the 
 Muses, Apollo, Bacchus, the Eumenides Eschy- 
 lus, Sophocles, Euripides. Even the modern drama 
 has too much classic tendency for Milton is our 
 epic, not dramatic, wonder, and Comus and Ago- 
 nistes belong to the Grecian drama. 
 
 It is true we have Shakspeare in the employment 
 of his preternatural power ; he calls forth the in- 
 habitants of his enchanted Isle j but would himself 
 probably wonder that the triformed Hecate, in her 
 car drawn by oxen, followed by Lady Macbeth 
 with the daggers, and her husband turning away 
 from the murdered Duncan, should be the sole evi- 
 dences of the English genius for the STAGE ; and he 
 might now venture to enquire whether all his come- 
 dies had perished, and if they had, whether nothing 
 of BEN JONSON, or FLETCHER, or MASSINGER sur- 
 vived, to fill so great a chasm? One might suppose 
 him to imagine, that even the successors of our 
 greatest dramatists merited some place among the
 
 490 INTERIOR OF THE NEW THEATRE. 
 
 reliefs of an English theatre j and that DRYDEN, 
 and CONGREVE, and FARQUHAR and VANBRUGH, as 
 they could fill the interior occasionally, merited 
 some little attention on the outside of an English 
 play-house. 
 
 As to the two Muses of the drama, MELPOMENE, 
 though not discriminated as to attitude from the 
 common figure of Melancholy, he would, perhaps, 
 think sufficiently attributed : the other figure, 
 with the shepherd's crook, or pedum, on her right 
 shoulder, he might refer to his classical friend BEN; 
 and upon being assured by him, that all was correct, 
 with a gracious smile of deference, contentedly re- 
 ceive it for COMEDY. 
 
 The halls and stair- cases of this theatre, its lob- 
 bies and saloons, are really wretched, when com- 
 pared with the contrivances of Wyatt at Drury- 
 Lane ; and to allow such a clownish exhibition as 
 the long unmeaning figure, called Shakspeare, to 
 remain where it stands a single night, proves 
 nothing, but that the managers of the house must 
 pass always by it as rapidly as the people do. 
 
 In speaking of it as a play-house, its highest ex- 
 cellence was the stage itself, constructed by Mr. 
 Saul ; certainly the most perfect with which I am 
 acquainted. In the audience part of the building 
 some positive improvements claim to be stated. 
 
 The boxes were calculated to hold as many 
 people as they did in the former theatre ; only, 
 from the encroachment of the private circle, now
 
 INTERIOR OF THE NEW THEATRE. 491 
 
 occupying the whole of the third tier, 140 persons 
 were accommodated in the lower circles. Six feet 
 six inches were now the average depth of the three 
 rows, which had been only six feet three inches in 
 the old theatre, and but six feet in Drury Lane. 
 
 The pit had still its former twenty seats, but the 
 declivity, instead of being, as formerly, only three 
 feet, was now four feet nine inches. 
 ^ In the two-shilling gallery of Drury Lane a 
 person seated in the back row was one hundred feet 
 from the stage-door ; in the old Covent Garden 
 he was eighty-eight feet, and in the present only 
 eighty-six. In the upper gallery these relative dis- 
 tances were one hundred and four feet, ninety- 
 three feet, and eighty-five feet. 
 
 The house was lighted by glass chandeliers in 
 front of each circle 270 wax-candles was the 
 nightly supply : 300 patent lamps lighted the stage 
 and its scenery. The prevailing colour of the 
 house was white ; the ornament, gold upon a light 
 pink ground j the box doors were all of solid 
 mahogany. 
 
 The first and second circles of the boxes were 
 appropriated to the public. From the third circle 
 they were entirely excluded the boxes here were 
 let annually, and each of them had a small anti- 
 room about six feet wide, opening outwards into a 
 general saloon, appropriated to these renters, as 
 that below was to the public. To these boxes the 
 entrances were private.
 
 492 THEATRICAL STORM. 
 
 In a commercial concern, like the building of a 
 new theatre, men who bring forward a large 
 capital, or what is the same thing, burthen them- 
 selves with a long and heavy debt, may be excused 
 for any sanguine hope of reimbursement arising 
 out of an invidious and dangerous distinction. The 
 annual property in boxes at the Opera is tolerated 
 for the comfort of those who alone are competent 
 to such an enjoyment : but even there no separa- 
 tion exists from the public at large whoever pays 
 at the pit-door may then range at will among the 
 circles of our nobility, whose boxes only contain 
 the requisite number of chairs, without anti-rooms, 
 which fancy can fill with profligacy unseen, and 
 without what was really an objection, (for the im- 
 morality was a pretence,) the absolute seclusion of 
 a PRIVILEGED ORDER from all vulgar contact. 
 
 The necessity of the actors, who had been burnt 
 out of the rival theatre had led them to ask 7s. for 
 their boxes in the Opera-house for six representa- 
 tions it was given by the public cheerfully and 
 graciously. A critical friend of mine expressed a 
 hope, " that this would not be drawn into a prece- 
 " dent." The proprietors of the Theatre Royal, 
 Covent Garden, demonstrated that they could only 
 be reimbursed for their enormous outlay, by a rise 
 in the prices, which would place the boxes at seven 
 shillings, the pit at four, leaving the still far dis- 
 tant galleries at the old rates of two shillings 
 and one.
 
 THREATENED STORM. 493 
 
 Enough had transpired of their intentions to ex- 
 cite a vast deal of displeasure among our young 
 men, who commonly use the theatres as their even- 
 ing relaxation. My professional habits at this time 
 led me to be almost daily in the public offices ; 
 where, as a man of business, who had once written 
 for the stage, and whose intimacy with Mr. Kemble 
 was well known, many very respectable persons in 
 those offices would frequently exceed the usual 
 official intercourse, and ask my opinions relative to 
 the theatre and its concerns. 
 
 I found that a great proportion of their body was 
 decidedly opposed to the new scheme ; and I saw 
 a prospect of annoyance, such as made me tremble 
 for my friends. I told Mr. Kemble what I knew ; 
 but he smiled at my terrors and so late as two 
 o'clock on the day of opening, I saw him in Bow- 
 street, quite perpendicular and confident, with a 
 heap of papers under his arm, which he was him- 
 self going to deliver at the offices of our jour- 
 nals; the feelings of which, as might be imagined, 
 referred to politics rather than to plays the tory 
 newspapers advocating the new prices, and the whig 
 or radical invariably the old. 
 
 On the 18th of September, the new theatre, 
 which had been completely finished within nine 
 months, opened with Macbeth, the most attractive, 
 tragedy of Shakspeare, and the musical farce of The 
 
 Quaker. 
 
 A slight advance in the price of admission had
 
 494 THE O. P. RIOT. 
 
 been announced in the play-bills, and adequately 
 justified by the proprietors. To obviate a clamour, 
 which assigned the engagement of Madame Cata- 
 lani as the cause of this advance, it was distinctly 
 affirmed that, had that lady been unknown to the 
 public, the proprietors would have felt themselves 
 compelled to solicit their indulgence as to the rate 
 of admission. 
 
 The theatre was soon filled, and the audience 
 took their seats without any striking demonstration 
 of the hostile intentions among them. The orchestra 
 commenced with the national anthem, and God 
 save the King was sung by the whole vocal strength 
 of the theatre. It was attended by the usual tokens 
 of respect from the audience. 
 
 Mr. Kemble then made his appearance with the 
 intention of speaking a poetical address, upon the 
 opening of the new theatre. As he was, almost 
 immediately after, to re-enter as Macbeth, he ap- 
 peared in the dress of that character. The sight 
 of him was the assigned moment for displaying 
 hostility ; and he was saluted by a yell of clamour 
 and execration, which did not allow one line of his 
 address to be heard in the body of the house. It 
 spoke, however, of the origin and progress of the 
 drama, and when it arrived at its brightest period, 
 it took credit for the improvements of scenic re- 
 presentation in the following couplet 
 
 " Thus Shakspeare's fire burns brighter than of yore; 
 And may the stage that boasts him burn no more"
 
 RIOT ACT READ. 495 
 
 It ended with no very poetical allusion to the so- 
 lidity of the building, and the burthen of its cost ; 
 and expressed a hope, that the ardour to raise a 
 nation's taste would be repaid by its liberality. 
 
 The tumult was kept up, whatever performers 
 were upon the stage ; but the faction distinguished 
 itself by a peculiar clamour on the appearance of 
 any member of Mr. Kemble's family. They demon- 
 strated their taste, as well as contempt, by standing 
 with their backs turned to the stage, and keep- 
 ing their hats on during the whole of the per- 
 formance. 
 
 On the termination of these entertainments, two 
 gentlemen appeared upon the stage, who were sup- 
 posed to be magistrates from the Bow-street office. 
 One of them attempted to speak, but, not being 
 able to obtain the slightest attention, took a paper 
 from his pocket, which was presumed to be the 
 Riot Act. The hisses with which they were 
 saluted induced them, after a short time, to with- 
 draw but several riotous persons were, by the 
 police, take into custody, and held to bail for their 
 appearance at the ensuing sessions. 
 
 I have neither space nor inclination to follow a 
 systematic conspiracy through a continued annoy- 
 ance of SIXTY-SIX nights. It must have been 
 attended with no inconsiderable expence to its per- 
 petrators ; for, besides the price paid on their ad- 
 mission, many thousand hand-bills and placards 
 were printed, in every variety of type ; and even
 
 496 SEIZURE OF THE RIOTERS. 
 
 banners painted, sometimes ingenious enough in 
 their designs, but always persona], malignant, or 
 indecent in their inscriptions. Occasional irrup- 
 tions were made by Townshend and his assistants 
 into the pit the fortified camp of the assailants ; 
 and sometimes, after desperate conflicts, the offi- 
 cers bore away in triumph the standards of the 
 enemy. 
 
 Mr. Kemble was a man of very uncommon self- 
 possession, great temper, and power of nerve j but 
 there, and every where, if his opponents were not 
 to be satisfied by reason, he was contented to want 
 all other means of carrying his purpose. 
 
 When he could make himself heard, during any 
 partial cessation of the clamour, he endeavoured to 
 impress them with certain most unquestionable 
 truths : he told them that, in the reign of Queen 
 Anne, one hundred years ago, the admission to the 
 pit had been three shillings ; and left to their jus- 
 tice the inference that would naturally arise from 
 the consideration, that every article of their con- 
 sumption had even prodigiously increased in price. 
 With his characteristic and manly simplicity, he 
 assured them, that the proprietors, for the last ten 
 years, had not received six per cent, for their 
 money ; money too, ventured in a property so 
 fluctuating and precarious ; and this, he added, 
 " I declare to you, upon my honour, I, who would 
 " not tell a LYE for all that this theatre is worth." 
 
 The objects of sympathy are naturally various in
 
 REFERENCE TO A COMMITTEE. 497 
 
 a mixed assembly. One sagacious person had 
 stated, that he should not demur, for his own part, 
 to the new arrangements, provided the actors were 
 to benefit by the receipts. It was an easy matter 
 for Mr. Kemble to shew, that the performers of the 
 stage now enjoyed three times the emoluments of 
 their greatest predecessors. On a subsequent occa- 
 sion he told them, that the proprietors by no means 
 wished to be judges in their own cause; that 
 they therefore proposed to submit their books to 
 the inspection of a committee, whom it was impos- 
 sible for them to influence ; to consist of the go- 
 vernor of the Bank of England, His Majesty's 
 Attorney and Solicitor General, with the most re- 
 spectable of our merchants Mr. Baring, Mr. 
 Angerstein, and others. That such committee, 
 after due investigation, would make a specific re- 
 port upon the actual state of facts ; and this, as it 
 was a criterion from which the proprietors by no 
 means shrunk, so he trusted that it would terminate 
 all disputes upon the subject, and prove a full and 
 perfect satisfaction to the public. He added that, 
 " until this document could be prepared and laid 
 " before them, the theatre must necessarily con- 
 " tinue shut." Indeed this measure was, on every 
 principle, absolutely essential ; for even the go- 
 vernment could not be indifferent to the nightly 
 resistance of its police, and the defiance of its ma- 
 gistracy; to the means afforded of disciplining 
 a mob for popular purposes, in declared violation of 
 
 VOL. II. K K
 
 498 OPINION OF LORD MANSFIELD. 
 
 the law, as it was laid down in the case of Macklin 
 by Lord Mansfield himself. That profound and 
 admirable judge having declared " that any persons 
 " who went to the theatre, night after night, for 
 " the purpose of preventing an actor from exer- 
 " cising his profession, or to injure managers or 
 " proprietors, would not only be subject to an 
 " action at law, but might be indicted for the 
 " offence : and further, that if the parties concur, 
 " although not previously acquainted with each 
 " other, it is a CONSPIRACY." 
 
 It must be obvious that nothing admitted of 
 easier proof than the injury sustained on this occa- 
 sion ; inasmuch as the brutal, the ferocious, and 
 the infamously indecent conduct of these rioters, 
 rendered it impossible for its usual frequenters to 
 enter the theatre at all; or, if they did, to receive, 
 what they had a right to expect, the gratification of 
 the drama. That future times may have no* doubt 
 as to the indecency to which I have alluded, they 
 may here be told, that the appearance of any LADY 
 in the circle of private boxes became a signal for 
 every unmanly description of insult ; for lan- 
 guage, which never, I believe, polluted the lips of 
 any other monsters, except those in a neighbouring 
 nation, who assailed with untranslatable filth the 
 unhappy person of Antoinette, and the elegant fe- 
 males of her court. 
 
 Those who take a cynical pleasure in surveying 
 human nature in its lowest state of degradation,
 
 AN O.P. RIOTER EQUIPPED. 499 
 
 (I say lowest state, because it was voluntary,} may 
 amuse themselves by contemplating the efficient 
 O. P. rioter, dressing for exhibition in the theatre. 
 He had to pass, though unsearched, at the doors, 
 and to squeeze himself through an iron or wooden 
 hatch, of our usual width, encumbered as he might 
 be with his watchman's rattle, or dustman's bell, 
 or post-boy's horn, or French-horn, or trombone, 
 with a white night-cap in his pocket his placards 
 of a dozen feet in length wound about his body, 
 and his bludgeon for close action with the enemy. 
 He had to practise his O. P. dance, and rave him- 
 self as hoarse as a night coachman in winter he, 
 at the hazard of his limbs, had to make the central 
 rush from the back of the pit down to the orchestra, 
 which trembled at every nerve of catgut it con- 
 tained. And, in addition to all this, he became 
 skilled in the most seemingly desperate sham-fights, 
 ending with roars of laughter, or real combats, to 
 maintain his position in the field. 
 
 Among the remarkable circumstances of this 
 
 O 
 
 riot, a reader of the present day may find the per- 
 secution of Mr. Kemble and his family the most 
 unlooked-for occurrence. A party of the cham- 
 pions was ordered to visit his house in Russel- 
 street, after the usual close at the theatre of an 
 evening to remain there only a certain time, and 
 then disperse. This was humanely aimed at the 
 nerves of Mrs. Kemble and her female domestics. 
 The magistrates came there and gave the necessary 
 
 K K 2
 
 500 FIRMNESS OF MR. HARRIS, SENIOR. 
 
 orders in case the building should be forced, or an 
 attempt made to set it on fire. There was a party 
 of the military close at hand. 
 
 The truth of this matter is, that the thoughtless 
 play-goer soon became a mere tool in the hands of 
 the politician nor did the secret fairly escape 
 until the O. P. dinner, when some visitors at the 
 table, holding office under the crown, to their 
 amazement and disgust heard, that the committee 
 in the next room, who were framing their resolu- 
 tions, consisted (very properly) of the same gen- 
 tlemen who had managed the funds of the West- 
 minster election. Now Mr. Harris, the father, and 
 his son, between them, held seven twelfths of the 
 property of the theatre, and Mr. Kemble but two; 
 it naturally followed that, as to the measures taken, 
 the latter was more likely to give effect to the de- 
 cisions of the superior interest, than determine all 
 by his own avarice or vanity, or any other of his 
 infinite bad qualities! But it was publicly an- 
 nounced that the old gentleman, though destroyed 
 in his health by exposure to the rain on the day of 
 the foundation, was come to town, ill as he was, 
 and with his characteristic bravery, said, " he would 
 " risk the last shilling of his property rather than 
 " submit." Theatrically speaking, therefore, there 
 was no reason for the flattering preference given in 
 this business to Mr. Kemble. If Mendoza and 
 other boxers were introduced into the theatre, he 
 was the very last man about the concern to suggest 
 such interference, or to think of either public or
 
 PERSONAL HOSTILITY TO Mil. KBMBLE. ,501 
 
 private resistance of the kind implied by such 
 
 agents. 
 
 There is a fluttering tribe of songsters about the 
 town, who are so afraid of being dull, that they are 
 never rational, and from such persons, not malici- 
 ous, but simply wanton, the O. P.'s derived verses, 
 sometimes above their comprehension, and always 
 better than they deserved. Mr. Kemble was in- 
 variably the hero of these levities. Stunned by the 
 noise, irritated by the vulgar abuse of this mob, 
 personally ill, and under the influence of his con- 
 stant resort, opium, he one night, using the very 
 idle formulary of genteel periods, said, *' Ladies 
 " and Gentlemen, I wait to know what it is you 
 " want." This variation for the better term, 
 " your pleasure," was laid hold of with great ve- 
 hemence. Usually sufficiently guarded, this phrase 
 had escaped from his infirmity ; but his system as 
 to the public was address of profound respect. In- 
 deed he could not but feel, that the actor should 
 do this for his own sake ; or otherwise what 
 is his condition ? To be anyway the servant of 
 the PUBLIC, may gratify even a lofty nature : this 
 term alone, kept steadily in view, liberalizes the 
 profession ; for he whose talent is prostituted to the 
 amusement of a RABBLE, must, as a man of either 
 sense or feeling, shrink in disgust from the mean- 
 ness of his occupation. 
 
 Mr. Kemble ardently loved his profession he 
 thought that the theatre, more than any other pub-
 
 ADDITIONAL MODES OF ANNOYANCE. 
 
 lie place, was bound to speak with extreme pro- 
 priety the language of the country. He conse- 
 quently, upon principle, took infinite pains in his 
 own pronunciation. Walker, who had written ably 
 on the subject, used to visit him, and I think he 
 commonly agreed with that orthoepist. He had 
 not forgotten Garrick's epigram as to the old vice 
 of pronunciation, and constantly therefore took 
 care " that / should never be mistaken for Z7." 
 Finding at least a hundred proofs, without much 
 trouble, that the plural aches was written formerly 
 in our verse as a word of two syllables, and conse- 
 quently so spoken, when he acted Prospero he 
 threatened Caliban, with the. word and the utter- 
 ance of his countrymen, from Shakspeare to Swift 
 The blockheads, who would have been safe before 
 Cade's committee as knowing nothing " of a noun 
 " or a verb," had a banner with Mr. Kemble's 
 figure painted, and the motto 
 
 " Be quiet Mr. Kemble's head aitcJies!" 
 
 The hatred of Kemble was as much political, as 
 any other part of the business. I remember the 
 person of the honest lawyer, as they called him, 
 (I suppose because he had no practice). He wore 
 the uniform of the whigs. Now it should be re- 
 membered, that Mr. Kemble had quitted the theatre 
 of the Coryphoeus of that party: that the adherents 
 to Mr. Sheridan bore him no good will for his de- 
 sertion to the other standard : that the building 
 of Covent Garden Theatre, upon the personal ere-
 
 FEELINGS OF THE RIVAL THEATRE. 503 
 
 dit of its proprietors, seemed almost to strew with 
 salt the desperate ruins of the other house. Per- 
 haps, therefore, it was without any great pain, that 
 some persons saw the cup of triumph fly from the 
 expectant lips of their rivals 
 
 " As once it fled the lip of TANTALUS." 
 
 What though the Jield was won, ALL was not won 
 there were still grounds of dissention, which 
 could be done away only by long contest or sub- 
 mission ; either of which lowered the crest of their 
 once secure, but now harassed and apprehensive 
 competitors. If the managers of Covent Garden 
 should ultimately succeed, a victory would be gained, 
 which, by shewing greater GAINS in future, might 
 lead the speculative to replace their own Apollo. 
 If they failed, it shewed the folly of struggling any 
 longer for the rival erection j and time and despair 
 would dispose of its enormous debts with the lost 
 books of LIVY, or any other irrecoverable treasures 
 of antiquity. 
 
 There was an expression very like enjoyment 
 upon the faces of many persons who had been 
 connected with the other house. Perhaps we never 
 altogether grieve at the calamity of a rival. Cer- 
 tainly the attachment to Mr. Kemble in such 
 people never drew them into any altercation with 
 his persecutors. If they spoke at all upon the sub- 
 ject, they spoke the same language. 
 
 But to return to the course of this narrative. I 
 K K 4>
 
 504 RESULT OF THE COMMITTEE'S ENQUIRY. 
 
 cannot imagine such egregious folly in the pro- 
 prietors of Covent Garden, as to suppose that any 
 declaration, however respectable, made upon in- 
 spection of their books, would satisfy the sort of 
 persons who assailed them. However, it might be 
 proper to publish such a statement, to keep firmly 
 on their side the leading authorities, and the per- 
 sons of fortune and consideration in town that 
 thejirsf might be assured an alarming riot was not 
 resisted for an object whose necessity was not 
 cogent, and the other classes convinced that they 
 were not taxed in their amusement without the true 
 commercial ground for it " that in no other way 
 " could the patentees obtain a suitable interest on 
 " their capital." The committee consisted of- 
 Sir Charles Price, Bail. M.P.; Sir Thomas Plumer, 
 Knt. his Majesty's Solicitor General; John Syl- 
 vester, Esq. Recorder of the City of London; John 
 Whitmore, Esq. Governor of the Bank of England; 
 and John Julius Angerstein, Esq. 
 
 On the 3d of October, those gentlemen, fully 
 satisfied of the facts, after a most minute investiga- 
 tion of the books of the concern, authorised the 
 publication of the result, which was in substance 
 tins: 
 
 " The rate of profits actually received, upon an 
 average of the last six years, is a sum of 6| per 
 cent, on the CAPITAL embarked. If the WHOLE of 
 the property had been insured, it would have been 
 little more than 5 per cent.
 
 AVERAGE PROFITS OF THE THEATRE. 50,5 
 
 " The future profits of the theatre, at the pro- 
 posed advance in the prices of admission, if the 
 whole capital expended in the new building were to 
 be insured, could be only 3% per cent. and if 
 driven back upon the former prices, under their 
 present burthens, the proprietors would annually 
 sustain A LOSS of f per cent, upon the amount of 
 capital!" 
 
 The average profit of the last six years, alluded 
 to above, was only the inconsiderable sum of 
 S34<51. 6s. %d. or 6 per cent, upon a capital of 
 rather more than 130,900/. at which calculation of 
 capital, be it remembered, Mr. Kemble himself 
 purchased his SIXTH share in the theatre. As to the 
 perfect co mpetence of the parties to the investiga- 
 tion, there could be no more doubt, than as to their 
 high honour and integrity. The public never 
 knew any thing before, as to this hazardous de- 
 scription of property. 
 
 A few arithmetical illustrations may yet be of 
 use, drawn, in fact, from the statement so authen- 
 tically made. They will shew a theatre, of all com- 
 mercial speculations to be the most desperate. 
 The receipts of the six years, taken together, 
 amounted to 365,983/. 17*. Id., of which the highest 
 year (the boy Betty's first) is 70,7^7^- 9s. lOd. ; 
 the lowest (1808-9,) only 46,343/. 18s. But the 
 average of the whole six is 60,997^- 6* &/. > this 
 sum divided by 200, the number of acting nights, 
 gives 300/. per night, a prodigious receipt for six
 
 506 SMALL RETURNS OF A THEATRE, 
 
 years together. But let us look at their payments. 
 In the six years they had absolutely paid ex- 
 pences of the theatre only - - *307,912 
 And left unpaid debts for which they 
 
 were responsible - - 8,000 
 
 The outlay to bring the receipts was .315,912 
 Here was a concern, therefore, actually disburs- 
 ing per year 52,652/., or 2637. per night, so that 
 the whole gain upon the concern to the proprietors 
 was reduced to 37 L per night ALL that an im- 
 mense capital brought them, standing, moreover, 
 themselves a risk from fire of nearly 100,0007. and 
 liable to all the caprices of taste, and the perils of 
 weather and of great public calamities. Again, I 
 repeat, there is a fascination about theatres, and 
 those who adorn them, irresistible by prudence, de- 
 fying all calculation : tempting to take up, splen- 
 did in possession, impossible to relinquish : in 
 which hope and disappointment eternally succeed 
 each other, and carry the victims usually through 
 life, by the possibility of acquiring temporary aid 
 leaving at last a questionable possession, loaded 
 with debt, to be the theme for endless dispute, and 
 the profit only of the salaried performer and the 
 lawyer. 
 
 The statement produced no alteration in the con- 
 duct of the rioters. On the 4th of October, at his 
 first appearance before them, Mr. Kemble was 
 driven off the stage unheard j and Mrs. C. Kemble,
 
 LEGALITY OF THE PROPRIETORS* CONDUCT. 507 
 
 in Gay's Lucy, was pelted with bitten apples, which 
 she stooped to take up, evidently in a pregnant 
 state, and then threw them gently off the stage at 
 the side scenes. In the course of the evening Mr. 
 Kemble again came forward, and with a suitable 
 compliment to the gentlemen, who had, not pro 
 forma, but most elaborately, gone into so complex 
 an investigation and statement, hoped that the 
 fullest satisfaction would result from the publica- 
 tion, and that liberal justice would be done to the 
 proprietors. 
 
 It may be as well here to observe, that the pa- 
 tentees acted as to the new prices in strict pursuance 
 of the power vested in them by their patent ; and 
 I shall here quote the very terms by which the right 
 is conceded. 
 
 " And that it shall and may be lawful, to and for 
 " the said Sir William D'Avenant, his heirs and 
 " assigns, to take and receive of such of our sub- 
 " jects, as shall resort to see or hear any such plays, 
 " scenes and entertainments whatsoever, such sum 
 " or sums of money, as either have accustomably 
 " been given, and taken, in the like kind, or as 
 " shall be thought reasonable by HIM or THEM, in 
 " regard of the great expences of scenes, music, and 
 " such new decorations, as have not been formerly 
 " used." 15th Jan., 44th Charles II., 1662. 
 
 Thus both the necessity and the right on the part 
 of the proprietors are clearly established. 
 
 Bills were found by the grand jury against a
 
 508 SEIZURE OF HENRY CLIFFORD. 
 
 considerable number of the riotors, but nothing 
 could be done against them this year. A rather 
 strong measure, on the 31st of October, by James 
 Brandon, gave into the custody of Samuel Taunton, 
 a constable, the redoubted person of Henry Clifford, 
 the honest barrister ; and him the said chief and 
 leader of the O. P.'s did violently take before James 
 Read, Esq., the sitting magistrate at Bow-street. 
 For which the lawyer brought his action against the 
 zealous Brandon, tried before Sir James Mansfield 
 and a special jury, in the Court of Common Pleas, 
 on the 5th day of December. Sir James Mansfield 
 charged the jury strongly in favour of the defendant ; 
 but in case their verdict should be for the plaintiff, 
 he requested them to say, whether it was on the 
 grourid of Mr. Clifford's not being concerned in the 
 riot, or of his not being apprehended before he was 
 out of the theatre. This special jury found a ver- 
 dict for the plaintiff, damages five pounds, amid the 
 loudest acclamation from the crowd in court ; and 
 the foreman, with reference to his Lordship's re- 
 quest, said that being unanimous as to the illegal 
 apprehension of Mr. Clifford, they did not deci- 
 sively discern the other point of his implication in 
 the riot 
 
 The learned Judge felt excessively hurt at the 
 matter's being left as equivocal as ever ; and ap- 
 prehended that the dangerous delusion already gone 
 forth, might, in consequence of this sort of deci- 
 sion, still continue.
 
 THE O. P. DINNER. 509 
 
 Mr. Kemble had come down to the trial witli his 
 usual fearlessness ; but he could not put his head 
 into the Court ; and as his " excellent good friends" 
 came out in triumph, received with indifference, or 
 contempt, or pity, the gentlemanly salutations of 
 the faction. He now told me, that his mind was 
 made up. 
 
 The usual course of confusion had been repeated, 
 nightly, with little variation, to the 13th inst in- 
 clusive. 
 
 On the 14th, however, a public dinner was to 
 take place at the Crown and Anchor, to which 
 were invited all those who disapproved of the con- 
 duct of the managers and proprietors of the theatre: 
 and it was announced that Henry Clifford, a bar- 
 rister at law ! was to be in the chair. 
 
 The company consisted of about 300 persons. 
 Mr. Clifford took the chair ; and after the cloth 
 was removed, gave the health of the King j which 
 was received with great applause. 
 
 Mr. Clifford then informed the company, that, in 
 consequence of his having been chosen to preside 
 at that meeting, he had that morning received a 
 message from Mr. Kemble, who had expressed a 
 great desire to attend this meeting, could he 
 be guaranteed in a polite reception, and pre- 
 served from insult or injury. He (Mr. Clifford), 
 as their Chairman, had, upon this, ventured to 
 assure him that his reception and entertainment
 
 510 MR. KEMBLE AT THE O. P. DINNER. 
 
 should be such as one gentleman ought to receive 
 from others ; if he were supported in this pledge, 
 he would immediately desire Mr. Kemble, who 
 was in the house, to be invited to meet them, and, 
 if possible, carry into effect those conciliatory mea- 
 sures which the proprietors were inclined to adopt. 
 
 A show of hands being made upon this subject, 
 the room unanimously agreed to receive Mr. 
 Kemble, and to treat him with every mark of 
 politeness and respect, as they were pledged to do 
 by their Chairman. 
 
 Soon after this, Mr. Kemble entered the room, 
 and was received with as much applause as ever 
 marked his finest piece of acting on the stage. He 
 advanced to the top of the room, and took his seat 
 on the right hand of Mr. Clifford. 
 
 Mr. Clifford then addressed the meeting again. 
 As Mr. Kemble was now in the room, he would 
 inform them of the substance of what had passed 
 at the interview he had with that gentleman. 
 Mr. Kemble had expressed himself sincerely sorry 
 for the interruption occasioned to that good under- 
 standing which had ever existed between the public 
 and the stage. He had also, on the part of him- 
 self and his fellow proprietors, expressed a strong 
 desire to do every thing in their power to conci- 
 liate the public, and restore that harmony and 
 unison of feeling, which had heretofore been so 
 happily common to them. 
 
 A conversation ensued which does not merit to
 
 TERMS OF RECONCILIATION. 511 
 
 be preserved, besides that the pith of it is found in 
 the resolutions brought in by a committee, which 
 had retired for the purpose of framing them. 
 
 Mr. Clifford, in proposing them from the chair, 
 commenced by saying, that he considered them 
 as perfectly equitable ; and on a call being made 
 for the names of the committee, he observed, that 
 he did not know all their names ; but the meeting 
 might be satisfied with their independency and pub- 
 lic spirit, when he told them that they were the 
 same gentlemen who were entrusted with the ma- 
 nagement of the funds subscribed on the West- 
 minster election ! ! 
 
 The resolutions were then read as follows : 
 " We presume that the public will be satisfied 
 with these, if acceded to on the part of the pro- 
 prietors this evening, viz : 
 
 " I. That the private boxes shall be reduced to 
 the same state as they were in the year 1802. 
 [This Mr. Clifford explained to be before Mr. 
 Kemble went to Covent Garden, which he did in 
 that year.] 
 
 " II. That the pit shall be 3s. Gd. the 
 boxes 7s. [Much noise and clamour, and some 
 opposition to the latter part.] 
 
 " III. That an apology shall be made, on the 
 
 part of the proprietors, to the public; and Mr. 
 
 Brandon shall be dismissed. [Great applause.] 
 
 IV. That all prosecutions and actions, on 
 
 both sides, shall be quashed."
 
 512 RECONCILIATION. 
 
 Owing to the tokens of disapprobation at the lat- 
 ter part of the second resolution, the chairman put 
 them, seriatim, to the vote of the meeting; and 
 they were carried, almost unanimously ; some 
 dozen of hands only being held up in opposition to 
 the continuance of the box price at 7*- 
 
 Mr. Clifford said, that, having submitted these 
 propositions of the committee to the consideration 
 of the managers, he begged leave to propose, as a 
 toast, 
 
 " May this day's meeting produce a reconcilia- 
 tion between the managers of Covent Garden 
 Theatre and the public, equally advantageous to. 
 both." 
 
 This toast was drank with three cheers. 
 
 Mr. Kemble then stood up, amidst great ap- 
 plause, and said 
 
 " Gentlemen, 
 
 " Before I withdraw for the purpose of making 
 the necessary preparations for stating the arrange- 
 ment that has taken place, in to-morrow's newspa- 
 pers, I beg leave to express to you my hope, which 
 I do from the bottom of my heart, that the propo- 
 sitions now agreed to will lay the foundation of a 
 lasting good understanding between the public and 
 the theatre. [Plaudits.] I have also to return to 
 you, personally, my best thanks, for the kind and 
 polite treatment I have received since I came into 
 this room." 
 
 Mr. Kemble then withdrew, with shouts and
 
 THE STAGE. 513 
 
 clapping from the company. " His health," how- 
 ever, was previously given by the chairman ; and 
 " Thanks to him for the handsome manner in 
 which he had come forward on this occasion." 
 This toast was received with a burst of approba- 
 tion ; and soon after, the majority of the meeting 
 departed. 
 
 The noise and tumult at the new theatre this 
 night by no means rose to the excess which many 
 apprehended, in consequence of the meeting and 
 dinner which took place at the Crown and Anchor 
 Tavern, and from whence it was expected the com- 
 pany would have proceeded to the theatre in a for- 
 midable body. The interruption during the play 
 was partial, and proceeded principally from the 
 communications made almost every minute from 
 the Crown and Anchor company to the pit At 
 length the universal cry was " Mr. Kemble, Mr. 
 Kemble ;" and at the end of the first act of the 
 farce, Mr. Kemble made his appearance, in his 
 walking-dress half-boots, great-coat, round hat, 
 and cane, as he had come from the tavern. It re- 
 quired near half an hour to procure what was 
 universally bawled for silence. At length he 
 
 said, 
 
 " LADIES AND GENTLEMEN, 
 
 " I ask a thousand pardons for presuming to ap- 
 pear before you in a dress so little suitable to the 
 very high respect which I feel, and which it is my 
 anxious wish ever to shew you in this place." 
 
 VOL. II. L L
 
 M4 HOSTILITY TO MR. BRANDON. 
 
 After some interruption, but all from the incessant 
 demand for silence, he resumed " It is entirely 
 owing to the circumstance of my not being ap- 
 prized that I should have the honour of appearing 
 before you this night. Ladies and gentlemen, I 
 have been with the company of gentlemen who 
 have dined together at the Crown and Anchor 
 Tavern ; where a set of propositions were submitted 
 to us for consideration, and to which the proprietors 
 have agreed. The first proposition is, that the boxes 
 should continue at 7*." [Applauses and murmurs.] 
 " That the pit should be lowered to the old price ; 
 that the tier of private boxes, (the tier of boxes in 
 the front of the house,} should be thrown open and 
 restored to the public at the end of the present 
 season. And, ladies and gentlemen, that no trace 
 or recollection of the unfortunate differences, which 
 have unhappily prevailed so long, should remain, I 
 am further to say, that we most sincerely lament the 
 course that has been pursued ; and we engage that 
 all legal proceedings shall forthwith be put a stop 
 to on the part of the proprietors ; I pledge my- 
 self that instructions to that effect shall be given 
 immediately." [Applause.] " Now, ladies and 
 gentlemen, before I retire, give me leave to express 
 my most lively sense " Here a tumult arose, 
 which Mr. Kemble was unable to appease ; he 
 therefore bowed and retired : he no doubt dis- 
 tinguished clearly enough the sacrifice demanded 
 amidst all this fury, and perhaps hoped something
 
 MR. BRANDON WITHDRAWS. 515 
 
 from not tlien meeting the question. He was mis- 
 taken j there was no mercy for any one. 
 
 The only object of any great moment now, was 
 the dismission of poor Brandon ; the zeal with which 
 he had discharged his duty to his employers was an 
 offence that admitted of no pardon. Mr. Munden 
 attempted to introduce him for the purpose of read- 
 ing an apology which he held in his hand. This 
 detestable rabble received him with a perfect storm 
 of execration ; they threw at him oranges and sticks, 
 so that his life became in danger j the good creature 
 was compelled to withdraw. Mr. Munden soon 
 after introduced to them Mr. Henry Harris ; that 
 gentleman with an air of much submission ventured 
 to tell them that Mr. Brandon was an old and faith- 
 ful servant of his father's. The answer to this was, 
 " He must be dismissed," it is a sine qua non, dis- 
 charge him. Mr. Harris bowed and retired. 
 
 On the following night, as soon as Mr. Kemble 
 appeared in Penruddock, the usual savage war- 
 whoop of the O. P.s was resumed : the calumet of 
 peace was never to be smoked, unless Brandon were 
 discharged. Quiet, not order, being at length re- 
 stored, Mr. Kemble addressed them in these few 
 words: 
 
 " LADIES AND GENTLEMEN, 
 
 " Having had the misfortune to incur your dis- 
 pleasure, Mr. Brandon has withdrawn himself from 
 the office of box-book and house-keeper to the 
 
 theatre." 
 
 L L 2
 
 516 TERMINATION OF THE CONTEST. 
 
 By making this sacrifice the first act of the play 
 passed with little interruption. 
 
 Emboldened by this success, they now resolved 
 that the manager should drink the cup of bitterness 
 even to its dregs, and they accordingly demanded 
 a specific apology for the employment, as they 
 said, of Jews and boxers to coerce the public. 
 
 Mr. Kemble immediately came forward and 
 spoke to the following effect : 
 
 " I understand your displeasure now arises, gen- 
 tlemen, that an apology has not yet been made for 
 the introduction of improper persons to this theatre. 
 I ask your pardon for not having made it sooner ; 
 and I now, in my own name, and on the part of the 
 other proprietors, most humbly apologize for the 
 same ; we are very sorry for what is passed, and beg 
 leave to assure you that inclination and duty will 
 alike render it our first pride, for the time to come, 
 to prevent any thing of the kind from occurring 
 again." 
 
 Mr. Kemble was here cheered by an universal 
 huzza, and the O. P.s, who came prepared for their 
 victory, hoisted a large placard in the pit, with the 
 words inscribed, 
 
 " We are satisfied." 
 
 In the course of the evening this ratification of 
 the peace was a second and a third time displayed, 
 and amidst universal shouts of joy the curtain dropt 
 that night upon the disgraces of the stage.
 
 517 
 
 CHAP. VIII. 
 
 A MISCELLANEOUS CHAPTER. PRONUNCIATION. ACHES, 
 
 MR. KEMBLE'S OWN DEFENCE OF THAT DISSYLLABLE. 
 
 PASSAGE IN MACBETH. HIS NOTION AS TO EMPHASIS. 
 
 ROMAN CHARACTER. MR. KEMBLE PARTICULARLY DE- 
 VOTED TO ITS THREE FINEST DISPLAYS, CORIOLANUS, 
 BRUTUS, AND CATO. THE AUTHOR'S VIEW OF THE CATO. 
 
 MR. KEMBLE MENTALLY AND PERSONALLY CONSIDERED, 
 
 TO SHOW THE RADICAL DIFFERENCES BETWEEN MR. GAR- 
 RICK AND HIMSELF. THE SPORTIVE EXUBERANCES OF 
 
 THE ONE THE RESERVE OF THE OTHER AS TO MIMICRY. 
 
 HOW COURTED BY THE GREAT. HIS RECEPTION AT 
 
 CARLETON-HOUSE. 
 
 AFTER the conclusion of so fierce a storm as that 
 which we have just described, the reader may be 
 glad of an opportunity to discuss some points of a 
 pure literary character, in which Mr. Kemble 
 himself will assign his reasons for a peculiar pro- 
 nunciation or a preferable emphasis. 
 
 We have just seen, that the rioters who advo- 
 cated the old prices, had, among their other quali- 
 ties, assumed those of the critic, and made them- 
 selves, at all events, extremely merry with the 
 sound of the word aches. Among the performances 
 of Mr. Kemble, his Prospero, in the Tempest, had 
 
 LL 3
 
 518 MR. KEMBLE'S PRONUNCIATION OF ACHES. 
 
 excited remarkable notice from the groundlings, 
 not so much from the awful dignity, or paternal 
 goodness which were certainly to be found in it, as 
 from a single word in a speech of the Magician to 
 Caliban, which Mr. Kemble dared to pronounce 
 agreeably to the intention of Shakspeare. It occurs 
 in the second scene of the first act. 
 
 " If thou neglect'st, or dost unwillingly 
 
 What I command, I'll rack thee with old cramps ; 
 Fill all thy bones with aches ; make thee roar, 
 That beasts shall tremble at thy din." 
 
 The reader here sees, that the line would be 
 incomplete, if the disputed word were not pro- 
 nounced as one of two syllables. The more 
 modern akes can only have the power of a mono- 
 syllable. It would at this time of day be assuredly 
 useless to recapitulate, from either the ancient or 
 modern writers, the numerous proofs of Mr. Kem- 
 ble's accuracy. He was commonly, but very 
 erroneously, supposed to be a man extremely grati- 
 fied by scholastic peculiarity, and a sort of know- 
 ledge far fetched and worth but very little. Few 
 men of his time were less addicted to enquiries of 
 such a nature. On the subject of this painful word 
 acJieSy disputes often arose in society, and the topic, 
 as is usual, was argued with more heat than know- 
 ledge : on one such occurrence the difference of 
 opinion terminated in a bet ; the most proper thing 
 in the world ; as presumption ought undoubtedly 
 to pay for its ignorance, or its obstinacy. Mr. Rees,
 
 PRONUNCIATION DEFENDED. 
 
 of Paternoster Row, although sufficiently confident 
 as to Mr. Kemble's practice and its motive, ad- 
 dressed a letter to him, late in his dramatic life, the 
 answer to which I insert here for the sake of closer 
 reference to a disputed matter. 
 
 (COPY.) 
 " MY DEAR SIR, 
 
 " I never do pronounce the word aches in two 
 syllables, (like the word aitches,) but when the 
 metre of a verse (that is, but when the measure of 
 the poetry or verse) requires it. So much for the 
 wager, fa 
 
 " The old pronunciation of the word aches in 
 two syllables is so entirely laid aside in common 
 conversation, and in all modern use, that it would 
 be ridiculous indeed to use it familiarly, and idle 
 to attempt its revival in poetical composition : yet 
 when the word occurs as a dissyllable in our elder 
 poets, it must be so pronounced; because in a 
 metrical work, the metre must be observed. These 
 lines are in Pope's Essay on Man : 
 
 Ask of thy mother Earth, why oaks are made 
 Taller or stronger than the weeds they shade ? 
 Or ask of yonder argent fields above, 
 Why Jove's satellites are less than Jove.' 
 
 The word satellites is now-a-days pronounced 
 in three syllables, and a man would be a coxcomb 
 to affect to pronounce it otherwise ; but it was pro- 
 nounced as four in Mr. Pope's time, and he em- 
 
 L L 4
 
 520 AUTHORITIES ADDUCED. ' 
 
 ploys it as four, and a man would be thought 
 very ignorant, who, in reciting Mr. Pope's lines, 
 should destroy their metre by giving this word its 
 modern pronunciation. If the old use and pro- 
 nunciation of the word aches can be decided by 
 authority, I should think Baret, in his Alvearie, 
 F. 1580, conclusive on the question. 
 
 * The ache, or payne of body or minde, &c.' 
 
 * To have ache, payne or griefe, &c. Vide Ake.' 
 
 And under Ake, to which the reader is referred, 
 ' Ake is the verbe of this substantive Aches, ch 
 being turned into k' t &c. 
 
 " So that it appears that anciently the mono- 
 syllabic and dissyllabic pronunciation distinguished 
 the verb and substantive. 
 
 " I beg pardon for taking up your time with so 
 much of this uninteresting matter. 
 
 " I am, my dear Sir, 
 
 " Yours, truly, 
 (Signed) " J. P. KEMBLE." 
 
 " May 13. 1816. 
 No. 89. Great Russel Street, Bloomsbury Square. 
 
 " Ovoen Rees, Esq. 
 Paternoster Rffuo? 
 
 I shall not think it necessary to do more, when 
 Mr. KembleY own defence has been considered, 
 than to recapitulate the authorities on which his
 
 FURTHER AUTHORITIES. 521 
 
 practice was grounded; namely, Shakspeare, Ben 
 Jonson, Beaumont and Fletcher, Massinger, Ford, 
 Davenant, Dryden, Otway, and Swift. Perhaps, 
 however, the reader may pardon the insertion of 
 two passages, which I myself discovered in Hudi- 
 bras. 
 
 " Can by their pains and aches find 
 All turns and changes of the mind." 
 
 Again, 
 
 " As other flames and aches prove." 
 
 It is not a little remarkable, that Mr. Kemble, 
 for twenty years together, whenever he acted the 
 character of Jaffier in Venice Preserved, had given 
 the same pronunciation to this unhappy word, when 
 in the first scene of the second act he thus impre- 
 cates disasters upon Priuli. 
 
 " Kind heaven, let heavy curses 
 Gall his old age ! cramps, aches rack his bones ! 
 And bitterest disquiet wring his heart," 
 
 But I never heard a breath of displeasure there ; 
 the storm seemed to wait only upon the Tempest. 
 Perhaps my friend may be excused, after the long 
 and painful studies he had made, if he did not ex- 
 pect much instruction from a mixed audience ; or 
 seek for any steady illumination from the hurried 
 decisions of the daily critic. Indeed, he very 
 rarely looked into a newspaper.
 
 PASSAGE IN MACBETH. 
 
 It is often extremely difficult to find ears nice 
 enough, to observe how much the elevation of the 
 voice renders emphasis unnecessary; the higher 
 key does all that is expected from the pointed im- 
 pulse. A very ingenious friend of ours, for whom 
 Mr. Kemble entertained the highest regard, in 
 his studies of Shakspeare thought he had found a 
 new point, by placing a strong emphasis on the 
 word bid, in the following passage of Macbeth 
 
 " Macbeth shall never vanquish'd be, until 
 Great Birnham wood to high Dunsinane hill 
 Shall come against him. 
 
 Macb. That will never be ; 
 
 Who can impress the forest ; bid the tree 
 Unfix his earth-bound root ?" 
 
 I have no opportunity of offering to the reader 
 the arguments by which our friend supported his 
 opinion. Mr. Kemble's answer, however, to them 
 was as follows : 
 
 * MY DEAR TAYLOR, 
 
 ' Don't you see, that ' lidding the tree unfix his 
 * earth-bound root 9 is but an amplification, as it 
 were, of ' impressing the forest* and conse- 
 quently, that no emphasis is necessary ? All unne- 
 cessary emphasis must be bad emphasis j for, unless 
 some contradistinction is understood by it, it be- 
 comes nonsensical. You would not expect, per- 
 haps, to find me an enemy to ingenious discove- 
 ries in this kind ; but the truth is, that a poet's
 
 MR. KEMBLE'S NOTION OF EMPHASIS. 523 
 
 literal meaning requires little emphasis, to be tho- 
 roughly understood to an audience ; the empha- 
 sis I wish to see cultivated is of that sort that swells 
 the passion of the scene, and ennobles the senti- 
 ment. 
 
 " Yours, 
 
 " J. P. KEMBLE. 
 
 Dec. 23d, 1795. 
 13, Caroline-street, Bedford Square. 
 
 " I am confined to my room by a bad cough, 
 and can't act to-night you might call for half an 
 hour." 
 
 I have myself no kind of doubt of the propriety 
 of Mr. Kemble's decision. " To lid the tree un- 
 " fix his earth-bound root" is, as he remarks, but 
 an amplification ; or, as I should say, an illustration 
 of the words " impress the forest:" for let us 
 consider the meaning of the whole passage, and Dr. 
 Johnson's interpretation of the first member of it 
 may decide as to that which follows. 
 
 H e sa y S Who can command the forest to 
 " serve him like a soldier impressed ?" To which I 
 may add, that is, bid the trees, of which it is com- 
 posed, unfix their earth-bound roots. A mere 
 illustration of the previous passage. 
 
 Thus the reader sees, that to "impress the forest" 
 necessarily implies the unfixing of its roots, without 
 which, its leafy inhabitants could never march 
 away, to subdue or terrify Macbeth.
 
 ROMAN CHARACTER. 
 
 In the latter part of Mr. Kemble's career, he 
 seems to have devoted himself with infinite solici- 
 tude, to the impersonation of the Roman charac- 
 ter. Coriolanus had, indeed, for many years been 
 considered as a performance absolutely unparal- 
 leled. The high patrician pride of that hero leads 
 him to venture every thing for the Roman NAME ; 
 but he thinks only of the senate, and the triumphs 
 of their arms : for the multitude he has no affec- 
 tion, but as they promote his objects, and are the 
 ready slaves of his ambition. He therefore looks 
 with jealousy upon every popular encroachment, 
 and cannot submit to ask with courtesy for even 
 that which the people are lawfully empowered to 
 bestow. Such men are not at all suited to a free 
 government j and, with amazing inconsistency, 
 they despise other nations for wanting those very 
 popular rights, which, personally, they feel dis- 
 posed at home to deny and to resist. These men 
 value their services at a rate, which the free can 
 never be expected to pay. That sort of fame, 
 which exists but in the popular breath, becomes 
 at length despised from its certainty; and the 
 victor resiles from a cheap and vulgar reward, 
 to gratify his vanity in lonely abstraction, or the 
 permitted applause of a privileged order. In 
 such a frame of mind, disappointment excites a 
 perfect frenzy in the soul ; the principles, which 
 produced the hero at his outset, lose their in- 
 fluence for a season, and the man will some-
 
 AUTHOR'S VIEW OF CATO. 525 
 
 times hurry even into treason for the sole de- 
 light of unnatural vengeance. But he is equally 
 insecure either as a friend or an enemy ; when fight- 
 ing against his COUNTRYMEN, he will allow no one 
 to despise his COUNTRY : a word will revive the 
 original incentive to virtue, and the renegade must 
 be sacrificed by those whom he had served at the 
 hazard of infamy. 
 
 The severe character of CATO allowed of no pal- 
 tering with the freedom of his country : he lived 
 only to promote it. Always full of energy, he had 
 erected its standard in Africa, and drawn every 
 possible advantage during the long fascination in 
 which Caesar was held by Cleopatra. When the 
 amazing fortune, or abilities, of the first and greatest 
 of the Caesars, had subdued even the very hope of 
 resistance, he opened for himself a passage to a 
 purer atmosphere, and died as heroically as he had 
 lived. 
 
 Mr. Gibbon has taken the pains to point out 
 some instances in which BRUTUS, the nephew of 
 this great man, did not act upon the noble princi- 
 ples of his uncle in which he condescended to 
 accept an important trust from the hands of Caasar, 
 the command of the Cisalpine Gaul. That great 
 captain, at this time, had set out for the African 
 war. If Cato had made an irruption into Italy, 
 would his nephew have marched his legions to re- 
 pulse him ? or by his inaction have betrayed the trust 
 reposed in him ? Was the conduct of Cassar ever
 
 526 MR. KEMBLE IN CATO. 
 
 ambiguous? Could Brutus on this subject differ 
 from his uncle Cato ? Why was the latter in arms, 
 but that Caesar was ambitious ? Was his assassin- 
 ation only the glory of Brutus ? 
 
 With a rather amiable inconsistency the Roman 
 historian regrets that there should be any doubt as 
 to the famous letters from Brutus, in which his 
 patriotism is exhibited by himself as superior to all 
 compromise and he declares " that were his 
 " father alive again, he would not suffer him to 
 " possess a power above the laws and the senate." 
 Indeed, when he examines the conduct of his 
 friend Cicero, he hardly treats him with respect 
 as a man, who is not impatient of a master, but 
 only anxious that he should be a person, whom he 
 could influence by his counsels. Brutus, on this 
 head, sees little difference between Antony and 
 Octavius. 
 
 With respect to Mr. Kemble's performance of 
 these illustrious stoics, I can have no doubt that 
 his Cato was the superior effort. Superlatives are 
 continually in our mouths " the present eye 
 " praises the present object," and I can by no 
 means be sure that I have not exhausted the voca- 
 bulary of praise, in speaking of Kemble's Coriola- 
 nus. In the busy variety too, the rush of passion, 
 the quick transition of character, Coriolanus has an 
 immense scope, and offers to such an actor infinite 
 advantages. But Cato stands before me with a 
 venerable unity of principle and purpose, that de-
 
 DR. JOHNSON'S ALLUSION TO CATO. 52 7 
 
 mands and receives our perfect veneration. From 
 the opening speech to the last there was not a line, 
 which Mr. Kemble did not seem to have studied, 
 as if conscious of that Superior Intelligence, whom 
 Seneca presumed to contemplate, with satisfaction, 
 the acts of the divine Cato. 
 
 . -, ~ - .. o . > * _ 
 
 *' No common object to your sight displays, 
 But what with pleasure Heaven itself surveys; 
 A brave man struggling in the storms of fate, 
 And greatly falling with a falling state !" 
 
 POPE'S Pro/. 
 
 Dr. Johnson has an allusion to this character, 
 which bears upon his representative on the stage ; 
 it may be found in the preface to Shakspeare. 
 " Familiar comedy (says that great critic,) is often 
 " more powerful on the theatre, than in the page ; 
 " imperial tragedy is always less. The humour of 
 " Petruchio may be heightened by grimace ; but 
 " what voice or what gesture can hope to add dig- 
 " nity or force to the soliloquy of Cato?" 
 
 I think I am able to answer this question truly 
 in a word : Mr. KEMBLE'S. Indeed I may fear- 
 lessly produce his opening scene of the 5th act, as 
 the unrivalled wonder of his art as an effort sur- 
 passing the highest- wrought imagination, and car- 
 rying the British stage to the summit of its glory. 
 
 Addison's best editor assumes, that " Cato will 
 " be supremely admired by all candid and judi- 
 " cious critics, not as a tragedy, for which the sub- 
 " ject was unfit, but as a work of art and taste."
 
 528 MR. KEMBLE MENTALLY CONSIDERED. 
 
 If he had seen Mr. Kemble's performance, he 
 must have questioned his tragic exclusion of Addi- 
 son ; and have admitted, with the grateful terror, 
 the severe delight, of a mind like his, the utmost 
 sublimity of tragedy, in the scene with Decius, the 
 second of the 2d act : - the fourth scene of the 
 4th act, where he meets the corpse of his son ; 
 and that to which I have already, I hope, excited 
 the utmost attention. I trust that few of my 
 readers have missed an opportunity, which is so 
 little likely to recur : to those, who have wit- 
 nessed Mr. Kemble, and enjoyed the emotions he 
 excited by the following lines, I may recal the mu- 
 sic of virtuous feeling, as it swelled upon the organ 
 of the great actor, and raised humanity above 
 itself. 
 
 CATO, meeting the corpse. 
 
 " Welcome, my son ! here lay him down, my friends, 
 Full in my sight, that I may view at leisure 
 The bloody corse, and count those glorious wounds. 
 How beautiful is death, when earned by virtue !" 
 
 The little struggle with nature for a moment 
 the advance, to meet the honour to his name 
 the " full in my sight" the "glorious wounds" 
 and the soothing tranquillity of the last line, 
 in which virtue becomes taste, and taste virtue 
 only his OWN voice and gesture have ever been 
 able to convey. 
 
 On such an occasion it is melancholy, not merely 
 for the actor, but mankind, that the record lives
 
 JVIR. GARRICK. 
 
 only in the increasing feebleness of the memory, 
 and the insensible departures of imitation. The 
 painter's art can give only the gesture and expres- 
 sion of an instant. Happily our friend, Sir Thomas 
 Lawrence, has preserved the most absolute iden- 
 tity in his portrait of Mr. Kemble revolving the 
 profound doctrine of Plato on the immortality of 
 the soul ; and I know of no subject, even from his 
 own pencil, which surpasses it either in dignity or 
 truth. 
 
 Having thus fully expressed my admiration of 
 this great and transcendent effort of Mr. Kemble's 
 genius, I shall not avoid a subject upon which I 
 know that I am expected to touch one that 
 brings Mr. Kemble, as an actor and a man, in a 
 degree of comparison with the greatest of his pre- 
 decessors. 
 
 When the death of Garrick was said to have 
 " eclipsed the gaiety of nations," the expression 
 was more literal, than it was commonly supposed 
 to be. That great man practised his art wherever he 
 was ; and what Diderot, I think, calls his singerie 
 sublime, rendered him the faithful representative 
 of all human passions and conditions. Indeed he 
 seemed to sport with the emotions he excited, and 
 delighted to pass instantaneously from the horrors 
 of Macbeth's visionary dagger, to the ludicrous 
 disaster of a pie-man's apprentice, who, gaping in- 
 considerately about him, lets his crowded board of 
 pastry fall into the kennel. Such is the faithful 
 
 VOL. II. M M
 
 530 GARRICK'S VERSATILITY. 
 
 report of Grimm, in the yea* 1765, to his friendly 
 patron the Duke of Saxe Gotha. 
 
 While Mr. Garrick was in Paris, Carmontel 
 made a sketch of him, standing in a tragic attitude, 
 and on the same canvas, between folding doors, a 
 comic Garrick, who has surprised himself in his 
 serious mood, and is laughing at his gravity. While 
 he was sitting to this artist, he would not, perhaps 
 could not, remain still an instant, but amused him- 
 self to the great astonishment of the Frenchman, 
 in passing, by a variety of gradations, from the ex- 
 treme of joy, to that of sadness, and kindling his 
 expression onward even to the agonies of horror 
 and despair. This may be called the gamut of the 
 actor, for why should there not be a scale of the 
 passions, as well as one of successive sounds ? 
 
 I have often in life been considerably annoyed, 
 during the nightly display of my friend's talents, by 
 the confidence with which my own cotemporaries, 
 and even juniors, spoke of the powers of Mr. Gar- 
 rick. Some strong and pointed expression on such 
 occasions was commonly found, by which a ques- 
 tion seems for ever decided ; and the present excel- 
 lence is sacrificed to the past, wantonly, unneces- 
 sarily, and perhaps unjustly. To such very deci- 
 sive persons, it may not seem improper to have 
 remarked as follows : " All this may be as you 
 <* have stated it. But pardon me, if I venture to 
 " ask, knowing, I think, your age, How did you, 
 .'" at the requisite period of observation, acquire your
 
 GARRICK AND KEMBLE CONTRASTED. 531 
 
 " knowledge of the art ? Time now has ripened 
 " your faculties, and I can readily admit your pre- 
 " sent discernment, in proportion to your particu- 
 " lar study of the science. I say particular study, 
 " because I shall have to show, if I mistake not, as 
 " to this very art of acting, the greatest minds hur- 
 " ried away by an enthusiasm, that, as usual, per- 
 " mitted no actual operation of the judgment ; 
 " and made even some of the greatest orators of 
 " this country prefer a boy of thirteen to Mr. Gar- 
 " rick himself.'* 
 
 Let not the reader for a single minute conceive 
 that I say this, to insinuate a doubt as to the real 
 talents of Mr. Garrick. I was early taught, on 
 the competent judgment of Mr. Henderson, to 
 know him, for the great and general master of his 
 art. Such is my tendency to admire him, that I 
 put aside the declaration of Dr. Johnson, as to his 
 power in soliloquy j and for my own part do not 
 believe " that one of his scene-shifters, or any per- 
 * son, occupied in the scene upon his stage, could 
 " have spoken the * To be, or not to be* of Ham- 
 " let so well as it was given by Mr. Garrick." 
 
 Nor is it necessary to Mr. Kemble's^w^, that 
 his immortal predecessor should be in the slightest 
 degree undervalued. I see that they were from 
 nature, and habit, and peculiar studies, essentially 
 different from each other that the element of the 
 one actor, if I may so say, was DIGNITY, and of the 
 other, PASSION. I speak here of radical distinction 
 
 M M 2
 
 432 GARRICK AND KEMBLE CONTRASTED. 
 
 between the men ; because I as easily believe that 
 Mr. Garrick could become dignified, as I am sure 
 that Mr. Kemble could be impassioned. Still their 
 qualities were, in the main, as strongly discrimi- 
 nated as their persons. 
 
 But to look farther into the habits of these great 
 men. Johnson objected to Garrick's being ad- 
 mitted into his club j " He will disturb us," said 
 he, " by his buffoonery." He would not have 
 objected to Mr. Kemble. The notions formed by 
 these great actors, of the art they professed, were 
 totally adverse. Mr. Garrick carried its exercise 
 into social mimicry, and the eternal desire to go- 
 vern the muscles of every being with which he 
 came in contact. He would play Punch rather 
 than not be acting ; and seek an audience to his 
 merriment among the servants, if their masters 
 were too desperately grave for him to venture to 
 break in upon them. 
 
 This is to be a comedian; a mind of com- 
 plexional hiliarty, happy alone in the exercise of its 
 powers. Such also was the mind of Henderson ; 
 he assumed to himself the power of entertaining, 
 not as a task, but a privilege, and poured himself 
 out in the most ludicrous delineations of life, in all 
 its endless diversity. Mr. Kemble would have 
 thought himself degraded by any exhibitions of 
 such a nature; he was impressed with a higher 
 sense of the dignity and utility of his art ; and had 
 not found it so easily acquired, as to be an object
 
 MR. KEMBLE'S AVERSION TO MIMICRY. 533 
 
 of sport and momentary assumption : he, there- 
 fore, put on the actor only with the dress of the 
 theatre, and was contented in society with such 
 distinction as the scholar and the gentleman could 
 acquire. He carried this feeling to a very unusual 
 extent j for he could rarely be brought even to 
 recite in company, but would very calmly take 
 down the book for you, which contained a remark- 
 able passage, and tell you to read it for yourself. 
 During thirty years of very unrestrained inter- 
 course, I do not remember his lending even his 
 countenance above three times to any imitation ; 
 the best of these occurred, when he one day de- 
 scribed to me the glorious sculpture at Strawberry 
 Hill, of Henry the Seventh worn to the bone by 
 avarice and care. He, on that occasion, did say, 
 " Stop; I think I can give you the expression." 
 The look he assumed was singular, and not to be 
 forgotten. When I subsequently visited Straw- 
 berry Hill, I immediately recognised the head ; 
 and found that he had neither said, nor done too 
 much, for the character of that amazing effort of 
 
 art. 
 
 Although we should be cautious in assigning 
 limits to either nature or art, yet I shall, perhaps, 
 be justified in saying, that the powers of Kemble 
 and Matthews cannot combine together. There 
 is a mental elevation in the one that cannot stoop 
 to the other. I shall surprise many by the remark 
 I am going to make, but I am clearly of opinion, 
 
 M M 3
 
 534 MR. KEMBLE COURTED BY THE GREAT. 
 
 that there was more nature even than art in his 
 performances by which I mean, that his own 
 nature greatly influenced all his happiest exhibi- 
 tions. They who knew him intimately often smiled 
 at the theatre, to see the man so visible in the cha- 
 racter. As a hint thrown out for his verification, 
 the reader may amuse himself, by thus discriminat- 
 ing occasional looks, and tones, and gestures, through 
 a considerable range of characters, extending from 
 the Plain Dealer, Penruddock, the Stranger, and 
 others of the meditative class, onward to the deep 
 and revolving wisdom of Cato. In all of these, he 
 himself, as I may say, furnished much that was 
 characteristic : not by the assumption of what was 
 foreign to his nature, but by lending his own pro- 
 perties to be the ground-work, which art was to 
 extend and improve. He had much of the mind, 
 that informs these characters ; and, therefore, when 
 he acted them, they seemed in a great degree to be 
 developements of himself. No, I can never regret 
 that he did not descend from this eminence to 
 mark, with either sport or malice, the unfortunate 
 peculiarities of private life. He had, indeed, no 
 temptation whatever to such an abuse of talent. 
 The great, who sought the society of Mr. Kemble, 
 sought it on the only terms which could be honour- 
 able to themselves or him. So it was at Wroxton 
 Abbey, that he was welcomed by Lord Guilford : 
 thus it was that, in the life-time of the late Marquis 
 of Abercorn, he was the happy and honoured guest
 
 HIS RECEPTION AT CARLETON HOUSE. 535 
 
 at the Priory. It was thus that Lord Holland knew 
 and loved Mr. Kemble ; thus that the accomplished 
 Earl of Aberdeen, Lord Egremont, Lord Blessing- 
 ton, and a long list of his noble admirers, bestowed 
 a lasting and most cordial friendship with their 
 notice. And it was for these perfections of the 
 man, his graceful calmness, his unobtrusive wis- 
 dom, his steady principle, and unshakeable attach- 
 ment, that he was honoured by the PRINCE OF 
 WALES with invitations to Carleton House, and dis- 
 tinguished by attentions as tasteful as they were 
 gracious. On one occasion, His Royal Highness, I 
 have heard, smilingly said to Mr. Kemble "I 
 " am afraid that, before so correct a speaker of the 
 " English language, I have mispronounced occa- 
 " sionally during our conversation." " Indeed," 
 with great frankness, " Indeed, NO, Sir," replied 
 Mr. Kemble, " I have heard but a single word in 
 " which I at all differ from your Royal Highness ; 
 and about that people are allowed to differ ; the 
 " word oblige ; which I pronounce in the English, 
 " and not in the French way." 
 
 It is to be remarked, with respect to the pronun- 
 ciation attributed to the illustrious speaker, that 
 Sheridan, in his dictionary, gives both the modes of 
 speaking the word, without an absolute preference, 
 or decision oblige and oblege. It is added 
 that, on a subsequent visit, the Prince conde- 
 scended to take a pinch of snuff from the gold box 
 with which he had presented Mr. Kemble, and 
 
 M M 4
 
 m GREAT PERSONAGE. 
 
 sportively remembered the word in question, by 
 saying, " I am obliged to you, Mr. Kemble." 
 
 This I give as I received it, not, in course, from 
 Mr. Kemble himself, from whom such a communi- 
 cation was not to be expected ; but I give full 
 credit to the anecdote, because I find it character- 
 istic of the gracious manners of the GREAT PER- 
 SONAGE to whom it refers ; and expressive of Mr. 
 Kemble's nature, who knew how to combine a 
 manly sincerity with the most profound respect.
 
 537 
 
 CHAP. IX. 
 
 SITUATION OF THE COVENT GARDEN THEATRE. RECONCI- 
 LIATION DINNER. MORE PERSECUTION. LEWIS 
 
 PUNISHES THE LIVERPOOL RIOTERS. COOKE SHIPT OFF 
 
 TO AMERICA. THE HORSES. JULIUS CESAR. H. 
 
 TOOKE. MALONE. RETIREMENT OF MRS. SIDDONS. 
 
 A POETICAL ADDRESS. NEW DRURY OPENED. LORD 
 
 BYRON'S VERSES. MR. KEMBLE LEAVES COVENT GAR- 
 DEN FOR A TIME. HIS RETURN AND HONOURS. 
 
 FRENCH TRIBUTES. MR. KEAN. HIS OPENING. HOW 
 
 AIDED. MISS O'NEILL ANECDOTE. DEATH OF MR. 
 SHERIDAN. MR. KEMBLE TAKES LEAVE OF THE STAGE 
 
 AT EDINBURGH AND IN LONDON. DEPUTATION FROM 
 
 DRURY LANE. PUBLIC DINNER. GOES TO THE SOUTH 
 
 OF FRANCE. HIS LETTER TO HIS BROTHER. MR. HAR- 
 RIS DIES. MR. KEMBLE DIVESTS HIMSELF OF HIS SHARE 
 IN COVENT GARDEN. NEGOCIATION FOR HIS OLD PLAYS' 
 
 SALE OF HIS BOOKS AND PRINTS. VISITS ITALY. 
 
 RETURN AND DEATH. HIS SERVANT ROUSHAM. CON- 
 CLUSION. 
 
 I MUST now revert a little to the old evil, to show 
 how short all conciliation must have been as to 
 giving the proprietors what was vital to the concern. 
 That persons, who refuse sixpence of their own in 
 the pit, will give a shilling for others in the boxes, 
 need excite little wonder. Perhaps, as to the box- 
 frequenters, the shilling, where it was paid, did but
 
 538 SITUATION OF THE COVENT GARDEN THEATRE. 
 
 compensate slightly for the enormous increase of 
 free admissions, or cheap admissions. Generally 
 speaking, the nightly receipts are not increased. 
 But the blow which was not to be recovered, was 
 the proscription of the private boxes. It is a mor- 
 tifying proof of human weakness, to consider 
 this subject and its frustration. The proprietors 
 had built like the projectors of Babel, and the con- 
 fusion of tongues ensued. They had deemed them- 
 selves sure of twenty-six boxes at 400/. per annum, 
 amounting to 10,4007. What a charming relief, in 
 a season, which, as to the nightly receipts, perhaps 
 produced NOTHING ! They had engaged Madame 
 Catalani, that opera frequenters, with all and more 
 than their usual privacy, might miss no part of their 
 accustomed delight ; and thus, perhaps, tore away 
 from the King's Theatre many of its greatest sup- 
 porters. The nerve of Mr. Taylor, however invi- 
 gorated by his native north, must have been shaken 
 a little by so alarming an invasion. Who even 
 could surmise its end ? The drama, enjoyed with 
 the same comfort as the opera, might at length be- 
 come as eligible ; and the classical projectors in 
 Covent Garden might even precede the Haymarket 
 in the engagement of any continental prodigy in 
 music or the dance. 
 
 Instead of all this, existing but in fancy, we have 
 in future to bear in mind the vast accession of bur- 
 then upon the proprietors, with no other relief than 
 could be drawn from very powerful efforts. All
 
 RECONCILIATION DINNER. 539 
 
 the fascinating captivation of their gorgeous theatre 
 blighted; the charm of novelty dispelled untried ; a 
 lingering displeasure felt as to the price of admis- 
 sion ; and a jealousy as to the few annual boxes, which 
 were still to be retained. It is true that, for a few 
 seasons, the greatest display of their mature talents 
 might yet be hoped from Mr. Kemble and Mrs. 
 Siddons. What leading incidents still claim parti- 
 cular notice, to the retirement of those great per- 
 formers, I now proceed to relate. 
 
 On the 4th of January 1810, the rioters invited 
 Mr. Kemble and Mr. Henry Harris to what was 
 called a reconciliation dinner ; but, by a toast, they 
 marked the displeasure that a learned judge had 
 excited, in the action of Clifford against Brandon- ; 
 and upon Charles Bonnor's venturing to suppose, on 
 the authority of Johnson, that reconciliation did 
 not mean rankling hatred, they scouted his humane 
 effort in favour of James Brandon, and would not 
 on the present occasion listen to such a subject, 
 A renewal, however, of the persecution as to the an- 
 nual or private boxes took place on the following 
 September, and they insisted on the strict perform- 
 ance of the original contract, three private boxes on 
 each side. The proprietors made the attempt to 
 evade it on the plea that Parliament had, by the act 
 for rebuilding Drury Lane Theatre, recognised the 
 right to let annual boxes. On the liberality of a 
 properly constituted public, these gentlemen had a 
 claim, which in all probability would have beeii
 
 540 LIVERPOOL RIOTERS PUNISHED. 
 
 allowed j but as they could appeal only to a repre- 
 sentative body self-elected, inflated by success, 
 and furious at resistance, theytried the experiment 
 for a week and then, shutting the house for one 
 more, opened on the 24th of September with a 
 literal performance of the contract. 
 
 It probably was the safer course for them to take ; 
 yet at this very time, Lewis had obtained a com- 
 plete triumph at Liverpool over his O. P.s, and 
 had it in his option to convict them of conspiracy; 
 but, at the recommendation of Mr. Baron Graham, 
 the count in the information for conspiracy was 
 given up, and the defendants found guilty only of 
 the riot. I have the pleasure to record that, in the 
 November following, Mr. Attorney General brought 
 them up for judgment, and that two of the offenders 
 were sentenced to be imprisoned each twelve months 
 in the Castle of Lancaster, another couple for three 
 months, and two more worthies in the same place 
 for two months each. I shall never cease to regret, 
 that the same direct course could not be taken, or 
 taken with equal effect, against the leaders of the 
 London conspiracy ; who, in the language of the 
 Attorney General, were men systematically delud- 
 ing the unwary, and who, with nothing but liberty 
 in their mouths, were in disposition, and principle, 
 and practice, the veriest and most unfeeling tyrants 
 in the world. 
 
 That devoted being, Cooke, had, in the begin- 
 ning of the year, sullied the Roman Father with
 
 COOKE SHIFT OFF TO AMERICA. 541 
 
 drunkenness, and made his peace in Richard III. : 
 but, on the opening of the next season, after having 
 announced on the 30th of September to Mr. Henry 
 Harris his intention with Mr. Munden to go to 
 town from Liverpool on the Tuesday following ; 
 on the 3rd of October, positively sober (so Mr. 
 Cooper says), he was, not inviegled, but conveyed, 
 secretly on board a vessel bound for New York, 
 unknown even to his friends at Liverpool, and 
 shipt off by the American manager with a skill that 
 baffled all resistance. The treaty between them 
 had commenced, it seems, in the month of August; 
 but I must presume, on the 30th of September, was 
 conceived by Mr. Cooke himself to be at an end. 
 Mr. Cooper was properly anxious on this occasion 
 to vindicate himself from any suspicion of practising 
 upon infirmity ; beside that there is a pecuniary 
 temptation about our transatlantic stages, that the 
 profession seem unable to resist. The Latin adage 
 was verified completely in poor Cooke ; he changed 
 none of his habits either on the voyage or in Ame- 
 rica skiey influences were not felt by such a 
 mind; and to the astonished Americans he dis- 
 played all the professional power and personal 
 inconsistency and debasement, that alternately 
 delighted and provoked the people of England. 
 
 On the 18th of February 1811, in pursuance of a 
 plan, which after long meditation they had deter- 
 mined to adopt, the proprietors of this theatre revived 
 the dramatic romance of Blue Beard, with hitherto
 
 THE HORSES. 
 
 unequalled splendour. There had certainly been 
 in the mind of Mr. Kemble, a strong reluctance to 
 innovate upon the usual entertainment of a theatre 
 royal ; and it is highly probable, that could the 
 concern have been allowed to carry their original 
 plan into effect, they might never have resorted to 
 the attractions of the amphitheatre ; but persecuted 
 as they had been, rather than encouraged, the 
 scruples of exact taste unwillingly gave way, and 
 the horses were introduced into the establishments 
 of the theatre. Early in the second act of Blue 
 Beard, sixteen most beautiful horses mounted by 
 spahis suddenly appeared before the spectators, and 
 were received with immense applause; their various 
 and incessant action produced a delightful effect 
 upon the eye ; and when they were afterwards seen 
 ascending the heights with inconceivable velocity, 
 the audience were in raptures, as at the achieve- 
 ment of a wonder. Subsequently, however, they 
 seemed still more astonished at the sagr city, or re- 
 collection, of the noble animals before them j in 
 the charge, some of the horses appeared to be 
 wounded, and with admirable imitation fainted 
 gradually away. One of them, who in the anguish 
 of his wounds had thrown off his rider, and was 
 dying on the field, on hearing the report of a pistol 
 sprung suddenly upon his feet, as if again to join, 
 or enjoy the battle ; but his ardour not being 
 seconded by strength, he fell again as if totally ex- 
 hausted. It is hardly necessary to say more upon
 
 JULIUS C2ESAR. 543 
 
 the subject, than that this splendid novelty was 
 completely successful, and showed to the proprietors 
 that means, however irregular, still might be found, 
 to compensate in some degree, the losses they had 
 sustained. 
 
 The revival of Cato, and the effect of Mr. Kem- 
 ble's performance, I have conceived to merit a 
 particular investigation; my opinion is already 
 before the reader. On the 29th of February 1812, 
 Mr. Kemble revived the tragedy of Julius Caesar ; 
 he had, as usual, made some very judicious altera- 
 tions and arrangements in the piece, and in his own 
 performance of Brutus exhibited all that purity of 
 patriotism and philosophy, which has been, not 
 without some hesitation, attributed to that illus- 
 trious name. Julius Caasar is almost single, among 
 the dramas of Shakspeare, in the possession of 
 three male characters, of nearly equal force. This 
 theatre, however, in the persons of Mr. Young and 
 Mr. Charles Kemble, possessed two actors capable 
 of sustaining with equal effect, the impetuous 
 Cassius, and the wily Antony. The other cha- 
 racters of the piece were brought out in their rela- 
 tive proportions; and the stage had realised, perhaps 
 exceeded, the effect of one of the most important 
 scenes of antiquity. 
 
 I step a little out of the range of theatrical con- 
 cerns to notice the death of Mr. Home Tooke, on 
 the 18th of March 1812: for this gentleman, as a 
 grammarian, Mr. Kemble entertained the highest
 
 544 HORNE TOOKE. 
 
 respect. I had lent to him my copy of the Diver- 
 sions of Purley, that he might fill up from it the 
 blanks which the printer's fear, or caution, had left 
 at the press. His note, returning the books, now 
 lies before me, and I transcribe, with pleasure, his 
 opinion of the work. 
 
 " However people may differ with Mr. Tooke 
 " in politics, I think it is impossible any reason- 
 " able mind should disagree with him on gram- 
 " mar. I wish we may ever have the conclusion 
 " of his system ! The work would, probably, be 
 " the finest treatise on Philosophical Philology, 
 " that ever was, or ever will be, written." 
 
 I have already stated, that Mr. Kemble was by 
 no means a politician j there was, therefore, but 
 little intimacy between Mr. Tooke and him ; the 
 sage of Wimbledon, however, occasionally dined 
 with Mr. Kemble, and at such times was peculiarly 
 delightful, inasmuch as he contented himself with 
 pouring out that general stream of knowledge by 
 which his mind was so copiously enriched. On the 
 25th of May, of the same year, I had the melan- 
 choly task of announcing to him the death of our 
 excellent friend, Mr. Malone. I am unable to 
 name, in the large circle of Mr. Kemble's ac- 
 quaintance, any gentleman for whom he had a 
 more perfect esteem. He frequently alluded, in 
 conversation, to the elegance of his manners ; and 
 delighted to quote him, as one of the best illustra- 
 tions of the old school. As a commentator upon 

 
 MR. MALONE. 545 
 
 Shakspeare, Mr. Kemble greatly preferred Mr. 
 Malone ; because he saw in him unwearied dili- 
 gence, and the most scrupulous accuracy ; with an 
 utter rejection of that impertinent self-display 
 which had discredited, on too many occasions, the 
 wit, the learning, and the labour of some of his 
 rivals. 
 
 Mr. Malone could by no means be made a con- 
 vert to the necessity for enlarging our theatres. 
 His sight had never been very good ; and, unfor- 
 tunately, with a view to keep the works of Shak- 
 speare within reasonable limits, he had, in the year 
 1790, done the greatest possible injury to his eyes, 
 by selecting types, both for the text and notes of 
 his edition, painfully distressing to the great ma- 
 jority of readers. Whenever, after the play, he 
 walked round to Mr. Kemble's dressing-room, 
 where I have joined him, his usual compliment 
 was, " I dare say it was a very perfect perform- 
 ft ance ; but you have made your houses so large, 
 " that, really, I can neither hear nor see in them." 
 Mr. Kemble sometimes smiled when, with the na- 
 tural feeling of his country, Malone would, while 
 speaking even of Garrick, honour Barry with an 
 occasional parenthesis. The grand theme seemed 
 to be the wonderful beauty of the voice, and its 
 effect in the thrilling ecstacies of love. 
 i The course of events is, as might be expected, 
 tempered to our feelings intervals in the succes- 
 sion of either our pleasures or our pains keep us 
 VOL. ir. N N
 
 ,54-6 BETIREMENT OF MRS. SIDDONS. 
 
 from too intense a measure of either joy or sorrow. 
 Under whatever circumstances, it is notwithstand- 
 ing painful to see the departure of any distinguished 
 talent, and the retirement of Mrs. Siddons from the 
 stage seemed to affect her admirers like the loss of 
 the art she professed. She had frequently inti- 
 mated her intention to withdraw from the scene ; 
 but circumstances had induced her to renew her 
 engagements as the interests of the concern might 
 require. On these occasions, I think, she received 
 FIFTY pounds per night, and either taste or specu- 
 lation would applaud such an arrangement. How- 
 ever, on the 29th of June 1812, she took her 
 leave in the character of Lady Macbeth, which she 
 sustained with all her wonted energy. After re- 
 ceiving the last proof of her terrific talent, the 
 perturbed sleep, the guilt that no weariness could 
 seal down, compelled by our unappeaseable moni- 
 tor nightly to repeat its testimony to the murder- 
 ous fact the audience would bear no more 
 they ordered the curtain down, though an act of 
 the play remained unperformed. Mrs. Siddons 
 was to address them, and they were contented to 
 wait in silence, until she should be ready to appear 
 again before them. Her farewell was in verse, 
 and written by her nephew, Mr. Twiss it every 
 way did him credit. There were persons who 
 thought, that a prose address would have been 
 more striking and suitable to such a parting but 
 I think they did not consider, that there is always
 
 A POETICAL ADDRESS. 547 
 
 something indelicate in sending on a LADY, in her 
 own person, to talk to a mixed assembly of some 
 thousand people. Under a pressing sense of in- 
 justice and persecution, to come suddenly forward, 
 and with a pledge of your innocence, claim their 
 protection, has a quick feeling to urge it, that ab- 
 solves the slight indecorum. A poetical address 
 partakes more of dramatic representation the 
 care as to just recitation, and the uttering the stu- 
 died composition of another mind, relieves in a 
 great degree the performer's own, and ensures al- 
 most the requisite and graceful composure of the 
 last obeisance. The close of this address has but 
 seldom been equalled and I regret that I am 
 unable to afford space to a larger extract. She 
 thus tenderly appealed to her judges and her friends 
 (the latter term here implied both) : 
 
 " Perhaps your hearts, when years have glided by, 
 And past emotions wake a fleeting sigh, 
 May think on HER, whose lips have pour'd so long 
 The charmed sorrows of your Shakspeare's song : 
 On her, who, parting to return no more, 
 Is now the mourner she but seem'd before, 
 Herself subdu'd, resigns the melting spell, 
 And breathes, with swelling heart, her long,herlast farewell !" 
 
 She made her reverences with visible emotion, and 
 Mr. Kemble, with fraternal solicitude, came upon 
 the stage to assist her in quitting a delighted pub- 
 lic. The long-continued applauses of the specta- 
 tors were mingled with the tears of many a gentle 
 bosom j but Mrs. Siddons retired into private 
 
 N N 2
 
 548 NEW DftUfcY OPENED. 
 
 life honoured by all ranks, and in the enjoyment 
 of worldly comforts only inferior to her fame. 
 
 The unavoidable compression of a last chapter 
 compels me to give only a few lines to a subject, 
 which merits pages of even careful particularity, 
 I mean the erection of the New Theatre of Drury 
 Lane, by the skill of Benjamin Wyatt ; and the 
 steady and unequalled zeal of the late Mr. Whit- 
 bread. Nothing short of the high character of the 
 latter gentleman could have raised the necessary 
 funds and inspired confidence where dismay seemed 
 almost a settled impression. However, to his im- 
 mortal honour, the new Drury rose the creature of 
 his bounty and his love. Who but must regret 
 that the engagements of the Theatre, pressing 
 upon a mind too variously occupied, should even 
 be supposed to have contributed to his melancholy 
 end ! I have formerly expressed my steady ad- 
 miration of its really architectural parts. Its halls 
 of approach, its simple and beautiful staircase, and 
 its saloon. I may therefore be permitted to observe 
 freely, 1^iat its stage, in my view at least, could not 
 boast of equal perfection. The great secret, in 
 front of the spectator, is to give the actor his rela- 
 tive importance he was here lost in an immense 
 space, and the scenery which should have borne 
 upon his performance, and given a locality to the 
 character, was a diminutive picture, hung behind 
 him at a distance. You might set a wood, for in- 
 stance, in the back-ground, but the persons of the
 
 LORD BYRON'S VERSES. : 549 
 
 play, however simply attired, were wandering about 
 under gorgeous vaultings, illuminated by massy 
 tripods in the forms of venerable antiquity. Nor 
 did the architect quite answer the expectations he 
 had raised from his pamphlet the structure was 
 not admirable for the conveyance of the voice 
 much of the dialogue came imperfectly even to my 
 ear, assisted by a pretty general memory of the 
 language of our drama. However, on the 10th of 
 October 1812, the house opened with an address 
 from the pen of Lord Byron, spoken by Mr. 
 Elliston. To grace the opening, even the address 
 was an affair of competition ; but having formerly 
 diverted myself with the subject, when perusing all 
 the rejected addresses, I can only say, that the 
 most nervous lines were clearly those composed by 
 Lord Byron. Although I thus give the preference, 
 where it was bestowed by an intelligent committee, 
 yet I do not think the address worthy either of the 
 poet or the occasion. It is inelegantly splendid, 
 and somewhat tedious; its allusions to the triumphs 
 of former days were not happily put ; Loi;d Byron 
 added nothing discriminate to the praise of Siddons, 
 or Garrick, or Brinsley, as Sheridan was styled for 
 the sake of the verse alone. But I forbear, and 
 content myself with expressing my sincere pleasure 
 that we had once again two theatres worthy of the 
 great capital of the British empire. 
 
 Mr. Kemble now seeing that the theatre had got 
 
 N N 3
 
 550 MR. KEMBLE IN IRELAND. 
 
 into a steady course of success which allowed of 
 his absence for a time, resolved to avail himself of 
 a variety of engagements that courted him, and 
 among them, always the most distinguished, his 
 friends in Ireland. Mr. Henry Harris carefully 
 advised him as to their progress in his absence, and 
 to that gentleman, in the year 1813, Mr. Kemble 
 thus replies. 
 
 " For HENRY HARRIS, Esq. T. R. C. G. London. 
 
 " DEAR SIR, 
 
 " I AM very much obliged to you for taking the 
 trouble of acquainting me with the financial state 
 of the Theatre. I wish, with all my heart, the 
 receipt had been greater, that the proprietors might 
 have been able to extinguish more of the debt : 
 but what is past is past remedy, and with me 
 always past regret Hope is a more agreeable 
 companion than repining : though, from what 
 you tell me of the Drury Lane dividend, I am 
 afraid my chance of finding a purchaser is lessened 
 instead of being encreased, as I once thought it 
 might be. My success has been greater than I 
 had any right to expect it would be, and I 
 thank you very sincerely for the pleasure you take 
 in it. My admirers, as you flatteringly call them, 
 will probably see me in the course of the season ; 
 for I shall certainly be in London at some part
 
 HIS RETURN AND HONOURS. 551 
 
 of it, whatever engagements I may form else- 
 where. 
 
 " Mrs. Kemble begs you her best compliments. 
 " I am, my dear Sir, 
 
 " Yours truly, 
 
 " J. P. KEMBLS. 
 " Cork, Sep. 4, 1813. 
 
 " I received your letter only yesterday it has 
 been lying at Limerick." 
 
 X 
 
 On the 15th of January 1814, after an absence 
 of about two years, he returned to act a limited 
 number of nights. By agreement, he had stipu- 
 lated to dress in his own room, a matter easily ar- 
 ranged by the affectionate politeness of Mr.Fawcett, 
 then stage manager : among a long list of the pro- 
 fession with whom Mr. Kemble always stood highly, 
 I know that the respect and admiration borne for 
 him by the gentleman just named has never been 
 exceeded. Mr. Kemble re-appeared in the character 
 of Coriolanus the pride assumed for the patrician 
 sunk at that moment under the pride of the actor 
 the whole pit rose simultaneously to welcome 
 him, and while he bent in grateful acknowledge- 
 ment to the people before him, a circlet of laurel 
 fell from the boxes at his feet. This compliment 
 is not native to us, but adopted from our enthusias- 
 tic neighbours of the Continent. If its continuance 
 among us were regidated by a severe committee of 
 
 ' N N 4
 
 552- MR. BETTY. 
 
 taste, so that it might be at all times judiciously 
 bestowed, I do not know a more elegant compli^ 
 ment. Let us remember, as some consolation to 
 English coldness on such occasions, that, if we do 
 not so warmly flatter the living, we treat the dead 
 with infinitely more respect. In Paris, from the 
 palace to the parish church, all minds are in con- 
 flict whether air actor shall be buried as a Christian; 
 and the service of the church is supposed to be 
 prophaned, if breathed over the chill remains of 
 him, whose powers of elocution have delighted, 
 perhaps instructed, the greatest of their preachers. 
 
 I again must revert to what I have often ob- 
 served I mean the singularity that attended Mr. 
 Kemble's course as an actor. He was now at the 
 very height of popularity ; he drew 600/. houses, 
 and might have been expected to wear his honours 
 undisputed to the end of his career. In his absence, 
 Mr. Betty, too, had returned, and shown himself a 
 good, but not a great actor : little differing from 
 his former self, although his mind had received 
 great cultivation in the interval, it became clear 
 that he had been entirely taught his original lesson ; 
 as indeed every man who 'would think upon the 
 subject always knew. Neither his figure nor his 
 countenance had been improved by his manliness. 
 In a word, his performances were greater, but not 
 better, than they had been, and the wonderful had 
 in course departed from his standard. He therefore
 
 MR. KEAN. 558 
 
 now combated with equal arms, and was certainly 
 inferior to many champions, whom nobody ever 
 thought of comparing with Mr. Kemble. 
 
 But in this period of apparent security, the 
 other theatre had started up from its ashes in all 
 the defiance of property and splendor, and even an 
 actor was produced from a provincial stage, able to 
 dispute, at all events, the palm, even with Mr. 
 Kemble, for years. The reader sees that I allude 
 to Mr. Kean. The way was well prepared for this 
 gentleman by his friends in town. The newspapers 
 noticed, with apparent fondness and hope, the ap- 
 proximation of his name to that of Le Kain, the 
 great actor of France ; and some powerful resem- 
 blances were remarked, between the recorded ter- 
 rors of the one tragedian, and the actual and present 
 powers of the other. He was short, too, like Gar- 
 rick ; had a face, it seemed, of wonderful expression; 
 energy unrivalled; and so a great a versatility, that, 
 whether his Hamlet or his Harlequin were the 
 superior effort, many admirers professed themselves 
 utterly unable to decide. As, however, there 
 seemed no disagreement of age between the means 
 and the ends, on which a wonder might build itself 
 a temporary residence, one was discovered between 
 his habits and his performances, that answered the 
 turn as well. His acting was, therefore, endowed 
 with all the evidences of study, and his life was 
 affirmed to be so careless, as to render study im- 
 possible. How he did what he did, and when and
 
 55 Jb HIS ECCENTRICITIES. 
 
 where it had been acquired, became a charm to the 
 witless, which Kean has never, I think, quite dis- 
 pelled. Well knowing the efficacy of the marvel- 
 lous, through his whole pofessional career some- 
 thing of the wonderful has constantly been kept 
 up. It was said at one time, that after the violent 
 exertions of the stage, he delighted to mount his 
 horse, and ride away the night in its inclemency 
 and loneliness : that he would dismount, and take 
 the occasional shelter of a gate-house, and arrive, 
 on the following day, in time to benefit some com- 
 rade of his earlier life. Eccentricity was the pre- 
 siding principle, and his greatness shunned the 
 resemblance to other men. In this strain, with a 
 happy recollection of the first Caesar, his very relax- 
 ations were studiously appropriate. He bore the 
 crest of Gloster in his barge for an heraldic cogni- 
 zance, and his domestic attendant was a young 
 lion. But hear the great model. 
 
 ** Danger knows full well, 
 That Caesar is more dangerous than he. 
 We are TWO lions littered in one day, 
 And I the elder and more terrible." 
 
 I could wish to be able to review fairly and dis- 
 passionately the performances of Mr. Kean, to 
 whom the hearted admirer of Mr. Kemble has paid 
 very particular attention. Something, indeed, of 
 this sort should be done, to relieve a really able man 
 from extravagant eulogy on the one hand, and the 
 most savage depreciation on the other. Let me find
 
 HIS OPENING. 555 
 
 a few lines just to hint, that though I think his taste 
 very frequently vicious, and his judgment often 
 imperfect ; though he has almost countless vuh 
 garisms in his pronunciation, and a trick, like Cooke, 
 of speaking with different voices, and uttering the 
 most discordant tones ; yet his energy is so un- 
 failing, as to bear down criticism itself in his rage ; 
 and even in the gentler scenes of sorrow, occasional 
 touches of infinite grace and beauty proceed from 
 his imagination. Mr. Kean excited much attention 
 by his Shylock on the 26th of January 1814 ; but 
 his Richard the Third acquired immediately, and re- 
 tains the highest rank in his achievements. When 
 Mr. Kemble had seen him, he said, I remember, 
 Our styles of acting are so totally different, that 
 " you must not expect me to like that of Mr. Kean; 
 " but one thing I must say in his favour, he is at 
 " all times terribly in earnest" 
 
 It might have been feared that the retirement of 
 such an actress as Mrs. Siddons would have covered 
 with a long night a vast proportion of our great 
 female characters. Mediocrity here, like the me- 
 diocrity of verse, can only be borne by inexperience. 
 In addition to which, it may be observed, that it 
 excites no fondness, it forms no fashion it is the 
 still water of a season it is an exhibition with- 
 out a sow/ the audience and the treasury are 
 equally cold to it. But although an actress greatly 
 below the standard of Mrs. Siddons, inferior in dig- 
 nity and power to her latter self, and even in pathos
 
 5,56 MISS O'NEILL; 
 
 greatly exceeded in her earlier days, Miss O'Neill 
 displayed in her very first performance of Juliet, on 
 the 6th October 1814, such rare and bewitching 
 talent, as at once placed her at the summit of her 
 art. Her face and person were lovely without being 
 striking, either as to feature or symmetry she was 
 always genteel, and interesting from the apparent 
 tenderness of her soul. Her attraction was un- 
 bounded, and she left only the regal woes of tra- 
 gedy unsustained. The towering grandeur of Lady 
 Macbeth, and the indignant majesty of Katharine 
 and Constance, own no suitable representative but 
 Mrs. Siddons. Let me observe, too, that through 
 the whole range of characters common to both these 
 actresses, the mental intelligence of Mrs. Siddons 
 seemed to be unapproached and unapproachable. 
 Miss O'Neill appeared equal to the present occasion, 
 whatever it was ; you always conceived the powers 
 of Mrs. Siddons to be superior. It was not given 
 Miss O'Neil to astonish, but she never failed to de- 
 light. If my . deliberate opinion on this subject 
 should experience any dissent, I venture to affirm 
 that it will not be from observation of equal extent. 
 I have seen Mr. Kemble act with his sister and with 
 Miss O'Neill. I know the precise difference that 
 he felt between their talents. I saw their opera- 
 tion upon his own. Perhaps I may not find a fitter 
 place to remember an instance of gentle courtesy, 
 which passed between Mr. Kemble and the lady 
 whom I have just named. Mr. Kemble at times
 
 MR. SHKRTDAN'S DEATH. 557 
 
 suffered extreme agony from the gout ; but if the 
 theatre required his aid, and he could in any man- 
 ner support himself on the stage, he would never 
 keep his room, but with infinite address conceal 
 even his torture from the audience, and sustain the 
 character with real philosophy. On one of these 
 nights he was acting the Stranger to the Mrs. Hal- 
 ler of Miss O'Neill. A friend of mine, on entering 
 the green-room, found him literally groaning with 
 pain ; and being called to the opposite side of the 
 stage, he entreated that gentleman to lead him to 
 his station. On his way thither his dramatic con- 
 sort passed him, and, sustaining the character, ad- 
 dressed him thus "I am very sorry to see my 
 " poor husband in such pain." Tortured as he was, 
 Mr. Kemble replied with equal preservation of 
 character " Yes ; you are a dear creature, and 
 " deserve forgiveness." 
 
 It is a painful course that awaits me in the few 
 remaining pages of my work ; but I am bound to 
 accomplish it, and must find alleviation for the 
 greatest losses in the memory of excellence and 
 the fame which consecrates it. Before I terminate 
 the dramatic career of Mr. Kemble, I am called 
 upon to record the melancholy close of his former 
 friend, Mr. Sheridan. He died on the ?th of July 
 1816. I am afraid that the brilliant opening of 
 his life fatally deceived him ; and that even his 
 own genius had not shielded his decline from indi* 
 gence and embarrassment. A little before he ceased
 
 558 . MR. KEMBLE'S FAREWELL AT EDINBURGH, 
 
 to be, I remember meeting a reverend friend of his 
 and mine, who, with tears in his eyes, unfolded to 
 me what he understood to be the actual condition 
 of that great man. The PROFOUND MORALIST, at 
 the close of his life of Savage, has inculcated the 
 necessity of worldly prudence, in terms which can- 
 not be exceeded for their dignity or their force. I 
 wait, with some anxiety, to see a POET, of infinite 
 sensibility and taste, press the lesson once more 
 upon the heart, in language worthy of the subject 
 and of his own fame. 
 
 Mr. Kemble had anticipated his final departure 
 from the stage by a marked farewell to the audience 
 of Edinburgh, on the 29th of March 1817. On 
 this occasion his friend Sir Walter Scott honoured 
 him with a poetical address, which has the best 
 praise such verse can claim, that of being exact and 
 appropriate. It was spoken and heard with cor- 
 responding emotions. The actor returned, after 
 making, for the last time, one of his chief country 
 excursions, to take his departure also from his usual 
 and long favourite residence in the metropolis. 
 
 On the 23d of June 1817, he acted for the last 
 time in the Theatre Royal, Covent Garden. He 
 chose the character of Coriolanus, I have no doubt, as 
 much from deference to public opinion as any other 
 motive. Perhaps, in exact strictness, he should 
 have closed, as he began, in Hamlet. The illus- 
 trious Roman was never exhibited by this great 
 actor with more complete effect I had secured
 
 AND IN LONDON. 559 
 
 myself a seat in the orchestra, and being exactly 
 below him, saw and enjoyed that amazing power, 
 by which the actor is enabled to subdue even his 
 nerves to the temporary demand of the scene, and 
 lay himself completely aside, to be resumed like a 
 stage revival. I saw nothing that, by a glance or 
 one failing tone, reminded you of the awful LAST. 
 
 When the curtain dropt, the audience enthusiast- 
 ically exclaimed, " No FAREWELL !" They had 
 witnessed an exertion of almost unbounded power, 
 and therefore saw no reason for its cessation. But 
 it was fitting that Mr. Kemble should thus quit their 
 presence, without a claim upon their indulgence. 
 Whenever the time arrives, it is one under which 
 the greatest fortitude may be expected to feel un- 
 nerved, and the language of fiction, as poetry is 
 stiled, can alone lessen the pungent suffering of the 
 actor of sensibility. Mr. Kemble was more affected 
 than I had ever beheld him. I shall clear his 
 speech from the easily conceived interruptions, 
 whether proceeding from his own feelings or those 
 of others, and exhibit the whole of it, I believe, 
 literally. 
 
 " LADIES AND GENTLEMEN, 
 
 I have now appeared before you for the last 
 time : this night closes my professional life. 
 
 " I am so much agitated that I cannot express 
 with any tolerable propriety what I wish to say. 
 I feared, indeed, that I should not be able to take
 
 560 .THE ADDRESS. 
 
 my leave of you with sufficient fortitude, com- 
 posure, I mean, and had intended to withdraw 
 myself from before you in silence ; but I suffered 
 myself to be persuaded that if it were only from 
 .old custom, some little parting word would be ex- 
 pected from me on this occasion. Ladies and 
 Gentlemen, I entreat you to believe, that, what- 
 ever abilities I have possessed, either as an actor, 
 in the performance of the characters allotted to 
 me, or as a manager, in endeavouring at a union 
 of propriety and splendour in the representation of 
 our best plays, and particularly of those of the divine 
 Shakspeare ; I entreat you to believe that all my 
 labours, all my studies, whatever they have been, 
 have been made delightful to me, by the approba- 
 tion with which you have been pleased constantly 
 to reward them. 
 
 " I beg you, Ladies and Gentlemen, to accept 
 my thanks for the great kindness you have invari- 
 ably shown me, from the first night I became a 
 candidate for public favour, down to this painful 
 moment of my parting with you ! I must take 
 my leave at once. Ladies and Gentlemen, I 
 most respectfully bid you a long, and an unwilling 
 farewell !" 
 
 In .this address Mr. Kemble had remembered the 
 farewell of his greatest predecessor. It seemed 
 built upon it, or rather, it was what truth and feeling 
 demanded from both, and ALL that they demanded.
 
 BEHIND THE CURTAIN. 561 
 
 I observed him narrowly, while he was in its pro- 
 gress he evidently regretted his art as much as 
 his patrons ; for when he alluded, as he might in- 
 deed proudly do, to his efforts for the " divine 
 " Shakspeare," his voice faltered upon the words, 
 and his tears became visible. 
 
 At the close he seemed to summon all his 
 strength, and spoke with hurry, and eagerness to 
 foe relieved. He retired with evident emotion, and 
 bowing with graceful and profound respect, till 
 the scene withdrew him from the pursuing gaze of 
 the spectators. 
 
 Behind the curtain another trial awaited him ; 
 the performers, with whom he had so "frequently 
 acted, crouding about him to testify their respect 
 for his talent and affection to his person. He was 
 soon divested of the little properties that last 
 adorned him on the stage. Mr. Matthews took 
 away his sandals, and merited the gift. 
 
 " Things precious long to fancy and to love." 
 
 But the honours of the stage were not to invest 
 Mr. Kemble unaccompanied ; a small circle of his 
 admirers proposed to invite him to a farewell din- 
 ner, attended with sundry gratifying tokens of their 
 esteem, and the design, as it admitted of great a(> 
 'cession, so at last it was found to embrace a vast 
 portion of the rank and talent of the country. A 
 committee was soon formed, and Mr. Kemble ap- 
 pointed Friday the 2?th of June, as the day when 
 
 VOL. II.
 
 562 DEPUTATION FROM DRURY LANE. 
 
 he would have the honour of waiting upon his 
 
 friends* 
 
 On the morning of that day, he received a depu- 
 tation from the performers of Drury Lane Theatre, 
 consisting of Messrs. Rae, Dowton, Johnstone, and 
 Holland. But for Mr. Rae's illness, this would have 
 occurred on the evening of his retirement. There 
 was something about Mr. Rae's address to him, 
 singularly pleasing and characteristic. He said he 
 lamented that Mr. Kemble had withdrawn from the 
 stage, " its pride and distinguished ornament." 
 He reminded him proudly, that it was " at their 
 ' theatre, he had attained and perfected his high 
 " professional character." He justly estimated the 
 " dignity added by Mr. Kemble to the profession, 
 * by his genius in the art itself, and the force of 
 " his example in private life." Mr. Kemble was 
 sensibly alive to such commendation, and paid his 
 compliments to the deputation cordially and im- 
 pressively. 
 
 At seven o'clock dinner was announced in the 
 grand room of the Freemasons' Tavern. Mr. 
 Kemble and the noble president, Lord Holland, were 
 preceded from the drawing room by the com- 
 mittee, the band playing the march from the occa- 
 sional overture. Mr. Kemble sat on the right hand 
 of the chairman, and his Grace the Duke of Bed- 
 ford on the left. Selections from Handel were per- 
 formed during the dinner by the band, and on the 
 removal of the cloth, the matchless non nobis was
 
 PUBLIC DINNER. ;(.'> 
 
 given in all its thrilling awe by the best singers of' 
 it, that I have ever heard, Leete, Nield, Terraii, 
 Master Turle and others. 
 
 After the usual toasts, Mr. Rae and Mr. Matthews 
 handed to Lord Holland the cast and drawing of 
 the Vase, which was to be presented to Mr. Kem- 
 ble. His Lordship immediately rose and addressed 
 the company. The praise he bestowed upon the 
 great man, who sat beside him, was so much the 
 universal sentiment, that it really needs no parti- 
 cular record it was full of all his Lordship's well 
 known taste and kindness, and was received with 
 infinite applause. Mr. Young then recited an Ode 
 written for the occasion by Mr. Campbell, of which 
 one stanza so utterly distances the rest, that I beg 
 to keep it, like Paulina's statue of Hennione, 
 " lovely, apart." 
 
 " His was the spell o'er hearts 
 
 That only Acting lends, 
 The youngest of the sister arts, 
 
 Where all their beauty blends. 
 For Poetry can ill express 
 
 Full many a tone of thought sublime ; 
 And Painting, mute and motionless, 
 
 Steals but one partial glance from Time. 
 But by the mighty Actor brought, 
 
 Illusion's wedded triumphs come, 
 Verse ceases to be airy thought, 
 
 And Sculpture to be dumb J" 
 
 *a7V^ 
 
 Had the rest been equal to this in //'///// and 
 neatness, and he had indulged his muse in a stanza 
 
 o o 2
 
 5(11- PUBLIC DINNER. 
 
 that allowed him more dilation and majesty in the 
 characters of the drama, he had rivalled, if not 
 surpassed, his countryman, Dr. Beattie ; and this 
 I consider to be very high praise indeed. But in 
 my estimation of the modern school, I may be 
 allowed some of the natural recurrences of age. 
 
 Mr. Kemble seems to have been rather chilled 
 and checked by the unavoidable attention to his 
 own praises. He perhaps, with some other persons 
 present, thought of the way in which he had rushed 
 from such a hearing in Coriolanus ; but he did 
 the best that could be done in the circumstances: 
 something of disclaimer, something of pride, mixed 
 up gracefully with sincere thanks ; and he saw the 
 " pleasures of hope," neatly enough, at the bottom 
 of his glass. 
 
 Fawcett made him his General, in a warm and 
 affectionate speech Matthews, his dramatic King. 
 Talma spoke, in English, a compliment not ill- 
 turned ; and Young expressed his conviction, that 
 " lasting reputation was only to be obtained at the 
 " price which Mr. Kemble had paid for it." 
 
 The last toast given was the Ladies ; and a little 
 before twelve o'clock, the noble chairman and his 
 guest rose to depart. As Mr. Kemble passed 
 slowly down the room, the company pressed upon 
 him to grasp his hand ; and, when he retired, 
 they merely drank one bumper to his future health 
 and enjoyment, and immediately quitted the scene
 
 MR. KEMBLE IN THE SOUTH OF FRANCE. 565 
 
 of perfectly rational and ennobling hospitality: 
 Such was, I rejoice to say, 
 
 The grac'd respect that claim'd him to the last." 
 
 It was, I imagine, a notion peculiar to Mr. Kem- 
 ble, that he never could be brought to admit that 
 his cough was asthmatic however, with the evi- 
 dence of other friends suffering in a similar way, 
 I made up my own mind, that such was actually 
 the nature of his complaint. After his retirement 
 from the stage he got worse rather than better, 
 from the irritation of the lungs, and was earnestly 
 advised to try the lovely atmosphere of the south 
 of France. 
 
 At Toulouse he found a residence such exactly 
 as his health required; and there he remained 
 several seasons. But so much must go to the 
 making up a comfortable abode any where to a 
 foreigner, that at length Mr. Kemble found himself 
 obliged to return to Switzerland. His letter on 
 this subject to his brother will be read with deep 
 interest it is highly characteristic of his judg- 
 ment and his temper. 
 
 " From Toulouse, February 27. 1820. 
 COME,- Charles, my good fellow, take courage 
 look your pen and ink boldly in the face, and 
 let one know a little how you are, and what you 
 are about. I am about running away towards 
 Switzerland, I think, presently. Since the death of 
 
 oo 3
 
 566 LETTER TO HIS BROTHER. 
 
 the Duke de Berri, the violence of party is inflamed 
 to such a degree among our Languedocian hot- 
 heads, that the house is growing rather too warm 
 for spectators merely, indifferent to their selfish 
 squabbles and enmities. What with the political, 
 and what with the religious objections people here 
 have towards one another, there is hardly any such 
 thing as society; or ifj by chance, you meet with 
 half a dozen of them any where, you see no ease, 
 no cheerful carelessness ; every one stands on his 
 guard, keeps a wary distance. We unfortunate 
 English are liked by no party. The royalists think 
 we might have taken better care of their interests 
 at the restoration, and Buonaparte's friends will 
 never forgive us their Emperor's defeat at Waterloo, 
 so that I am thinking of packing up. This place, 
 however, that is, the climate, has done me great 
 service. I have never had a cough since I have 
 been at Toulouse, neither last winter, nor this, 
 which has been more severe than any they had felt 
 for thirty years ; my spitting of blood has, I am 
 willing to persuade myself, entirely ceased ; and 
 my fits of the gout have been for this twelvemonth 
 past so slight, that I make a pish at the sufferance. 
 My intention is, to pass next winter in Italy, 
 thoroughly to confirm these corroborations of 
 health : and then, having done all I can for a crazy 
 constitution, and at the same time gratified a laud- 
 able curiosity, I shall return home, well or ill, to 
 pass the rest of my time, as philosophically as I am
 
 LETTER TO HIS BROTHER. 567 
 
 S 
 
 able, among a fewxfrtends and my books. Your 
 youth and activity make you smile, may be, at my 
 visionary tranquil prospects and designs. If I 
 could take my own way, you would see how quietly 
 I should make one step towards my elysium, by dis- 
 engaging myself from every thing that seems to 
 connect me with the concerns and bustle of busi- 
 ness. We cannot live in this place so cheaply as 
 we were told we could. Those who will content 
 themselves to live in dungeons up three or four 
 pair of stairs, and, in short, manage sordidly in 
 every article of food, &c. may contrive not to be 
 at any great expense ; but one may live this way 
 and spend but little money any where. By the re- 
 ceipt Mr. Murray has sent me, I find your houses 
 have hitherto been very indifferent this season. Mr. 
 Elliston, I hear, bears down all before him ; what 
 are you about, to let LA STOCCATA carry it away? I 
 hope, as it happens for ever in theatres, some lucky 
 chance will turn up for us, and that the year will 
 end more successfully than it has hitherto gone on. 
 My wife wrote to Mrs. Charles some time agoj but 
 with our best love to her, tell her that she is as bad 
 a correspondent as I am, who certainly have as little 
 right as any one in the world to complain of ano- 
 ther's want of punctuality on this score : yet I do 
 complain of her, for she writes so agreeably that 
 one is out of humour to miss her letters. How c 
 my Lord and LadyBlessington do ? Pray rememb< 
 me to them in the best manner that can be. 
 
 o o 4
 
 568 . MR. HARRIS'S DEATH. 
 
 my Lord has been fighting in the house for old 
 Ireland ; and I do think it was hard, to saddle my 
 friend Pat with restrictions, who had never made 
 one whince to deserve them. To every body to 
 whom you think they will be welcome, make my 
 kind compliments. We send you our love for your- 
 self Mrs. Kemble, your children, Twiss and all his 
 family, Mrs. Siddons, and Cecilia, if they are in 
 town. 
 
 " Thine always, 
 
 J. P. KEMBLB." 
 
 . Rue Tolosane, No. 10. 
 " For Charles Kemble, Esq." 
 
 Mr. Kemble was suddenly recalled to England 
 by the following event : 
 
 On Monday the 2d of October 1820, Covent 
 Garden Theatre had the misfortune to lose Mr. 
 Thomas Harris, who possessed himself one-half of 
 that property. He died at Wimbledon in, I think, 
 the 78th year of his age. His death was of the 
 utmost moment to the concern. While he lived, 
 the undisputed management of the theatre being 
 in him, there was a unity and directness in their 
 operations at that house always of infinite moment 
 in a business, where obstruction is fatal. At his 
 death this right to manage did not descend to his 
 son. The proprietors were all entitled to be con- 
 sulted, and in a time of difficulty what was to con- 
 ciliate their opinions? It is so easy to figure to
 
 MR. KEMBLE'S SHARE IN COVENT GARDEN. 56'9 
 
 oneself a more favourable result from a difference of 
 system : cheap indeed is the wisdom of fancy, 'wi 
 Had such an event occurred earlier in Mr. Kem- 
 ble's life, and the full objects of the plan for the 
 new theatre been realized, he might have consi- 
 dered the entire property to be a desirable posses- 
 sion j and, though hardly on the conditions of the 
 memorandum of which I have already spoken, he 
 might by the other proprietors have been allowed 
 to purchase the whole. But in a state of health, 
 that rendered his superintendance impossible ; 
 seeing the theatre heavily embarrassed amidst its 
 greatest success ; and little prospect of a speedy 
 termination to the difficulties before them ; he 
 made up his mind, at once, to divest himself of his 
 personal interest j and, accordingly, in the month 
 of November, assigned over his SIXTH of it to his 
 brother Charles. As soon as this, and some few 
 other matters of moment were off his mind, he 
 immediately returned to Lausanne. 
 
 When Mr. Kemble left London, his friendly soli- 
 citor, Mr. Murray, became the occupant of his 
 elegant house in Great Russell-street ; and the only 
 pecuniary objects of much moment to him were his 
 collection of old plays, and his general library, with 
 which it would be idle to encumber a sojourner in 
 a foreign land. As to the first of these, Mr. Evans 
 strongly dissuaded him from a public sale ; the 
 very collection formed with so much skill, must 
 be unmade, and reduced to single plays ; and as
 
 570 NEGOCIATION FOR HIS OLD PLAYS. 
 
 to any object of lasting reference, the motive of its 
 indefatigable collector, the work, if ever to be 
 done, must be absolutely begun again ; and from 
 the rising value of many rare plays among us, per- 
 haps would defy the largest fortune to complete it. 
 The great object, therefore, was to place this un- 
 rivalled monument of our drama in the library of 
 some distinguished nobleman ; and Mr. Kemble, 
 through his friends, Messrs. Payne and Foss, at 
 length transferred the complete collection \>f his 
 plays and play-bills to his Grace the Duke of De- 
 vonshire, for the sum of 2000/. Mr. Kemble had 
 offered them originally for an annuity of 200 
 upon his own life. His kind friends here, with a 
 very rational presentiment, thought such an ar- 
 rangement improvident and quite inadequate. At 
 first they proposed to join Mrs. Kemble's life in the 
 annuity with that of her husband to this, how- 
 ever, there was some objection but the illustrious 
 purchaser made every sacrifice that could be ex- 
 pected . he cancelled the original proposal, by 
 paying down the sum of TWO THOUSAND pounds. 
 
 I am fortunately enabled, by the kindness of 
 Messrs. Payne and Foss, to shew how Mr, Kemble 
 felt upon this interference for his interest ; and how 
 steadily he had determined to fulfil his first proposal 
 to the Duke. His letters to those gentlemen do 
 him infinite honour. But it was proper that such 
 should be the feeling of any party, who was to be 
 mixed up in a transaction with the Duke of DEVON-
 
 LETTER TO MESSRS. PAYNE AND FOSS. 571 
 
 SHIRE. I presume his Grace will convert the pos- 
 session into an heir-loom, so as to take security 
 against the possibility of dispersion. The utility 
 of such a treasure is in its integrity. 
 
 " MY DEAR SIR, 
 
 " I last night received a letter from Mr. Mur- 
 ray, informing me that you had concluded with 
 the Duke of Devonshire for the purchase of my 
 quarto plays for an annuity of two hundred pounds 
 during my life. 
 
 " Mr. Murray tells me that he has, for the pre- 
 sent, declined the putting of this agreement into 
 execution, because he does not think it would be 
 sufficiently advantageous to me, unless .Mrs. Kem- 
 ble's life, at least, is included in the annuity. I 
 am extremely obliged by Mr. Murray's kind con- 
 cern for me on this occasion : but no considera- 
 tion whatever can make me recede in the slightest 
 point from the proposal I originally empowered you 
 to make to his Grace on my behalf) I have written 
 to Mr. Murray, by this post, to the same effect ; 
 and have desired him to ratify the sale and pur- 
 chase, in due form, according to my own original 
 voluntary offer. If, however, before this letter 
 reaches you, it shall have been judged reasonable 
 by the Duke's agent that Mrs. Kemble's life be in- 
 cluded in the annuity, which Mr. Murray seems to 
 think not an impossibility, in that case, I have told
 
 572 LETTERS TO MESSRS. PAYNE AND FOSS. 
 
 him that I am not so stern a moralist as to require 
 a concession so agreeable to me to be expunged. 
 This, however, is an addition which I have no 
 right whatever to expect ; and I abide simply by 
 my terms of the annuity for my own life only. 
 
 " If this interruption to the sale of my plays has 
 given you, as I fear it may, any unnecessary 
 trouble, I assure you I shall regret it very much - r 
 for I place no judgment in competition with yours 
 as to the value of the books, and am thoroughly 
 convinced that you have, as much as possible, my 
 interest at heart in the disposing of them. 
 
 " Pray remember me in the warmest manner to 
 Mr. Foss. Indeed, I address this letter to you 
 both, and wishing both of you many happy and 
 happier new years. I remain, my dear Sir, 
 
 " Your obliged and faithful servant, 
 
 (Signed) " J. P. KEMBLE." 
 
 " Maison Zimmer, 
 Lausanne, Dec. 31st. 1820." 
 
 When you do me the favour of writing to me, 
 pray put (via Paris) in the corner of your direction ; 
 otherwise, they tell me here, your letter will run 
 the risk of making the tour of Germany before it 
 reaches me." 
 
 Messrs. Payne and Foss, 
 Pall Mall, London. 
 (Via Paris.)
 
 LETTER TO MR. PAYNE. 5JS 
 
 For Mr. PAYNE, Bookseller, Pall Mall. 
 
 " MY DEAR SIR, . 
 
 " Mr. Murray tells me in a letter I have this day 
 received from him, that the Duke of Devonshire is 
 willing to give 2,000/. for my quarto plays, instead 
 of the annuity, to which Mr. Murray demurred. 
 I am extremely well pleased with this agreement, 
 and have desired Mr. Murray to conclude it in 
 proper form, that the books may be delivered to 
 the Duke immediately. In moving the plays, bid 
 your people be careful not to let any loose leaves 
 drop out, for there are a few that want to be 
 gummed in, and, if their place should be lost, it 
 might be a troublesome job to find it again. 
 
 " I have assured Mr. Murray, and I repeat to 
 you, that without the Duke's complete approbation 
 of this new agreement, I should have considered 
 myself bound by all the ties of integrity to abide by 
 my original proposal. 
 
 " The post is on the point of setting off, and 
 only gives me time to assure you and Mr. Foss that 
 I shall always be your very much obliged and 
 
 faithful servant, 
 
 " J. P. KEMBLE." 
 
 "Jan. 2d. 1821. 
 Maison Zimmer, Lausanne." 
 
 His very well chosen miscellaneous collection 
 of books sold extremely well. It was not very 
 numerous; but so many persons were found de-
 
 574 MR. KEMBLE VISITS ITALY. 
 
 sirous of obtaining some relick from his library^ that 
 it produced, under the hammer of the judicious 
 Evans, the sum of 2271 /. 15s. His prints, chiefly 
 theatrical, 303/. 6s. 
 
 The house of Mr. Kemble, at Lausanne, has been 
 described to me as well entitled to its name, beau 
 site. He here enjoyed, in the greatest comfort, a 
 romantic situation and a refined society. His gar- 
 den formed his principal amusement ; he rose early 
 and delighted himself in the cultivation of the 
 sweets around him. His day usually began by 
 reading a chapter in the Protestant version of the 
 Bible, and was continued by his usual studious 
 habits, or rides in his neighbourhood, and the re- 
 ceiving and returning the visits of persons of the 
 first consequence at Lausanne* 
 
 His visit to Italy took place only a few months 
 before his decease. The impression of it was ex- 
 actly such as my knowledge of him anticipated. 
 He was not at all to be numbered in the list of 
 curious travellers. Nothing was more usual with 
 him, than to remark that romantic tendency in 
 others, to convert very ordinary appearances into 
 the wonderful. Venice, however, excited his par- 
 ticular attention j and he appeared to consider that 
 singular city as the object of rational admiration. 
 At Rome I know that he saw every thing, that can 
 either tempt or gratify the curiosity of the travel- 
 ler. A considerable number of illustrious English 
 were in that capital during Mr. Kemble's residence
 
 RETURNS TO LAUSANNE. 
 
 there ; and in the society of Lady Charleville and 
 her party, his visits to either its ancient or modern 
 wonders were duly paid. But nothing could, in 
 the mind of this good, humane man, compensate 
 for the squalid debasement of the people. To use 
 his own expression, it absolutely " made him 
 wretched" and he was glad to be rid of a specta- 
 cle so repugnant to his ideas of the just demands 
 of man upon government. Mrs. Kemble had still 
 less disposition to the excursive than her husband, 
 and but seldom could be prevailed upon to stir 
 from her apartment. At Rome, however, Mr. 
 Kemble' s health became visibly impaired, and Dr. 
 Clarke ordered his immediate return to Lausanne. 
 It was with difficulty that he endured the journey. 
 Home had at first its usual effect upon such na- 
 tures as his. No man ever more sincerely loved 
 or more adorned home than Mr. Kemble. He ap- 
 peared revived now, and perfectly happy. His 
 friends conceived him to be rapidly recovering 
 from the ill effects of his late tour ; but they were 
 deceived. I am not competent to write upon the 
 tendency of the human economy to particular dis- 
 orders ; I know nothing of their causes, little of 
 their palliatives ; yet my notion for many years 
 had been, that my friend would expire in the man- 
 ner that he did. 
 
 I use the very accurate detail of his last days, 
 which was transmitted from Lausanne on the best 
 authority; reserving myself for a few remark s .-it
 
 576 ATTACK OF APOPLEXY. 
 
 the close on the most important subject I mean 
 his religious opinions. 
 
 On Wednesday the 19th of February, Mr. Kem- 
 ble dined at the house of an acquaintance in the 
 neighbourhood, and was observed to be in ex- 
 tremely good spirits ; a few friends drank tea with 
 him on the following evening, when he played his 
 rubber (to which he was very partial), and appeared 
 in excellent health. On the Sunday after this day, 
 Mr. Kemble walked for two hours in the sunshine 
 of his garden, and no sign of illness was remarked. 
 He arose on Monday morning as well as usual, and 
 conversed with Mrs. Kemble on different matters ; 
 when, according to his usual custom, he read a 
 chapter in his Bible. He again joined Mrs. Kem- 
 ble in the breakfast-room, and said to her, " Don't 
 " be alarmed, my dear, I have had a slight attack 
 " of apoplexy." Mrs. Kemble .was naturally very 
 much terrified, and assisted him to his chair, and 
 when seated, he took up a number of Galignani's 
 Messenger; but becoming worse, his friend and 
 physician, Dr. Schole, was sent for, who arrived 
 in a short time, and found him in the position 
 already described, but altered, and exhibiting very 
 unfavourable symptoms. His left side had suffered 
 a decided attack, and he could with difficulty arti- 
 culate : but seemed extremely anxious to spare the 
 feelings of Mrs. Kemble. Dr. Schole, with the 
 assistance of his old attached servant George, 
 helped him to his bed, and, in the act of conduct-
 
 HIS DEATH. 57,7 
 
 ing him thither, a second attack took place, so 
 suddenly, that his clothes were obliged to be cut 
 asunder, in order that he might the more speedily 
 be let blood. But nature was fast exhausting ; 
 and one attack succeeded another so rapidly, that 
 Mr. Kemble never spoke afterwards, though- he 
 seemed perfectly sensible at intervals. Until nine, 
 o'clock on Wednesday morning, the 26th of Fe- 
 bruary 1823, he lingered in this speechless state 
 when he expired without any apparent suffering. 
 Thus died this amiable and intellectual man, full 
 of years and honour, in a distant land. 
 
 The funeral took place on Saturday the 1st of 
 March, in a piece of ground adjoining the cimetiere, 
 on the Berne road, procured under the direction of 
 Mrs. Kemble. Mr. Capel and several English are 
 there interred. The Dean of Raphoe, who had 
 lately returned to Lausanne, read the funeral seiv 
 vice at the house of Mr. Kemble j and Mr. Cheese- 
 brough, the resident clergyman, who had read 
 prayers to Mr. Kemble when he could attend to 
 them, and was with him when he died, performed 
 the melancholy ceremony at the grave. The age 
 of sixty-six was recorded on the coffin. The death 
 of Mr. Kemble was sincerely felt by all persons at 
 Lausanne, and his remains were followed to the 
 grave by all the resident English, and by many of 
 the Swiss. The English, indeed, had no parties 
 during the week ; and one foreign lady of fashion 
 
 VOL. II. PP
 
 78 LETTER FROM AN ENGLISH CLERGYMAN. 
 
 put off a splendid assembly on account of Mr. 
 Kemble's decease. 
 
 The following is a copy of a letter from the 
 English clergyman resident at Lausanne to a pro- 
 fessional gentleman, in London, which is interest- 
 ing, inasmuch as it is in itself very amiable, and as 
 it shows the serenity and virtue of Mr. Kemble's 
 domestic life, and confirms the religious peace of 
 his death : 
 
 " SIR, Lausanne, Feb. 26. 1823. 
 
 " It is with deep regret that I announce to you 
 an afflicting and sudden event, the decease of Mr. 
 Kemble, who breathed his last at a quarter past 
 nine o'clock this morning. He had been seized 
 with an apoplectic attack about forty-eight hours 
 before his death ; and though it was not of any very 
 alarming nature at first, yet it was no less fatal, and 
 he gradually declined, till, without a single sigh or 
 groan, his soul, released from its earthly tenement, 
 returned to Him who gave it. 
 
 " During a week or more prior to this attack, 
 his health seemed more satisfactory than for months 
 before, so that poor Mrs. Kemble was very ill pro- 
 vided for so unexpected a blow, and consequently 
 has been in such a distressed state as I cannot pre- 
 tend to describe. She is, indeed, much indisposed 
 at present, from the effects of a violent nervous at- 
 tack, which seized her when all our fears of her
 
 EXCELLENCE OF MR. KEMBLfc's CHARACTER. 579 
 
 husband were confirmed ; but in a little time I have 
 no doubt but a sense of her religious duties, in ad- 
 dition to her excellent understanding, will conduce 
 to her amendment and resignation. To you, Sir, 
 no comments on this excellent man's character here 
 are necessary. I will only say, that he was univer- 
 sally beloved by both his countrymen and natives, 
 and that I am deprived of, in my little flock, a most 
 pious and worthy member but God's will be 
 done ! We are naturally grieved at the loss of what 
 was ever amiable, excellent, and of good report, as 
 a standing example to all around ; but how great, 
 on reflection, should be our joy, that the feeble 
 praise of man is succeeded by the immortal honour 
 and approving smile of the best and greatest of all 
 beings ! I was with him during the greater part 
 of his last hours, and at the final close ; and on 
 commending his soul to his gracious keeping, 
 whose blood and 'mediatorial power could alone 
 present it spotless before God, I could not avoid 
 secretly exclaiming, ' Let me die the death of the 
 righteous, and let my latter end be like his.' 
 
 " It is by Mrs. Kemble's desire that I write to 
 you, who, with her kindest regards, begs you will 
 take upon you as early as possible, the painful task 
 of communicating it to Miss Siddons, and gradually 
 to prepare Mrs. Siddons for such an afflicting 
 stroke, in order that she may not first learn it from 
 any other quarter. Mrs. Kemble's poignancy is in- 
 creased, on considering what will be the agonizing 
 
 pp 2
 
 580 HIS ENLARGED CHARITY. 
 
 feelings of Mrs. Siddons, but calculates much on 
 your kind attention herein. I have written to Mr. 
 Charles Kemble by this post. I beg my respectful 
 compliments to Mrs. Siddons ; and having now 
 hastily fulfilled my truly painful duty, 
 
 " I have the honour to remain, &c. &c." 
 
 The attendance of a Protestant minister upon 
 Mr. Kemble, who stiles him " a pious and worthy 
 member of his little flock," requires some slight 
 elucidation ; inasmuch as Mr. Kemble had been 
 bred a Catholic. On this subject, he thought as- 
 suredly for himself. He avoided the indecency of 
 disclaiming the mode of religion followed by his 
 father ; and looked only to its vital character. If 
 the most enlarged charity towards ALL men bejbol- 
 ishness to the Catholic, I then, from his repeated 
 declarations, pronounce Mr. Kemble to have been 
 a Protestant. But bigotry of any kind was his ut- 
 ter abhorrence j and he easily reconciled, at least 
 to his own satisfaction, ah 1 those discordant cere- 
 monials and notions, which keep human creatures, 
 though Christians, still estranged from each other. 
 
 While I was proceeding in my work, now so 
 speedily at an end, I received a letter from a ser- 
 vant, who had lived twenty years with Mr. Kemble, 
 and served him ably and affectionately. It has been 
 said, " that no man seems a HERO to his valet." 
 He may, notwithstanding, appear something a vast 
 deal better. Let me obtain a minute's attention to
 
 HIS SERVANT ROUSHAM. 581 
 
 the request of JOHN ROUSHAM ; and I must give it 
 faithfully in his own words. 
 
 " As I understand you are writing the life of my 
 poor master, I request, Sir, that you will notice his 
 princely condwt to me. I lived with him twenty 
 years, his faithful servant j so he called me, and 
 treated me more like a brother than a domestic ; 
 for he indulged me in every thing that was proper, 
 and so did Mrs. Kemble. They were the kindest 
 master and mistress that ever lived to me, and to 
 all their other servants. When I left, him, he gave 
 me TWO HUNDRED pounds, to help to set me up hi 
 business. He was the best and most generous of 
 masters, and if you will insert this much of him for 
 ME, you will ever oblige, 
 
 " Sir, your most obedient and 
 
 " Very thankful servant." 
 
 Yes ; the swelling gratitude of a worthy, though 
 humble man, shall find here a record ; and occupy 
 the place of a vain and ostentatious eulogium ! 
 
 CONCLUSION. 
 
 As these pages were drawing to a close, after a 
 day of rather severe application, I took down my 
 Tacitus, to delight myself with the noblest biogra- 
 phy, that was ever written his life of Agricola. 
 Its result upon my mind the reader shall have with 
 
 p p 3
 
 CONCLUSION. 
 
 entire sincerity ; for I would not conceal from him 
 the imperfection of my judgment, after it has been 
 corrected. I had often indulged a hope, that the 
 latter days of Mr. Kemble would have been passed 
 here among us in affluence and honour ! that a 
 theatre under his direction might have extended 
 and perpetuated a sound taste in our amusements ! 
 that while he lived, he might have lived for Shak- 
 speare ; and that in his last moments, the folio of 
 that divine poet might have supported his head, 
 until all memory of his great master was gone ! 
 
 But his own desires, as they were more moderate, 
 had also more wisdom : and, looking to his life, 
 however natural it may be for the fancy to form 
 such a picture, yet upon mature reflection I entirely 
 acquiesce in the " decline and fall" of the great 
 ROMAN ACTOR. The truth is, that enough had been 
 sacrificed to noise and show to the shouts of the 
 multitude, and the yet more agreeable flattery of 
 friendship. The actor had been satiated with ap- 
 plause the man required some interval, previous 
 to the greatest change he had to endure, that he 
 might quite dismiss the " fierce vanities" of the 
 past from his mind, and possess his soul in privacy 
 and in peace. 
 
 But the ruling passion made one last effort, and 
 disturbed the tranquillity of his retirement. The 
 mind of Mr. Kemble had a lofty pitch ; it could 
 change the kind of its indulgence, without lowering 
 its character. His concluding ambition was to tread
 
 CONCLUSION. 583 
 
 the soil, which his Coriolanus, his Brutus, and his 
 Cato had trodden, and trace with a stately step 
 " the ruins of the capitol." He therefore visited 
 Rome, which by a religious, in succession to a mili- 
 tary despotism, is still the mistress of the world, 
 the ETERNAL CITY. But the air of that capital 
 was found unfavourable; by the advice of the 
 faculty he returned to Lausanne ; and all imme- 
 diate danger seemed to have passed away. He re- 
 sumed the placid and endearing course of his 
 domestic life his regular habits, and temperate 
 enjoyments. The scenery of Lausanne is peculiarly 
 striking the beautiful is around, the sublime is 
 in the distance. The powerful features of nature 
 elevate the conception to the GREATEST of all 
 Beings and the BEST. Piety in Mr. Kemble was a 
 lowly and unpresuming virtue You gathered it 
 from what he did not, rather than what you saw 
 him do. He reverentially abstained from idle use 
 of the sacred name at all times, and indulged his 
 truly rational devotion without dogmatism and with 
 general charity. 
 
 In the tenourofthis "noiseless course" a sudden 
 check comes upon the system ; a few hours of 
 struggle elapse ; and he is no more. But fondness 
 for his faithful friend, his monitress, his gentle 
 guide, was the predominant feeling in his breast, 
 and the accents of solicitude as to Mrs. Kemble 
 were the last that faltered from his tongue. What 
 close of life could raise him higher in our estima. 
 
 pp 4
 
 584 CONCLUSION. 
 
 tion than this ; what condition form a better termi- 
 nation to a life of hurry and ambition ? He had 
 wisely, as well as kindly, given to his brother his 
 share in the theatre ; fully aware of all the diffi- 
 culties surrounding such property, he had conferred 
 it upon a " younger strength," in the hope, that 
 zeal and industry might realize it into wealth ; and 
 that his dear Charles would thus owe every thing 
 in this life, but existence, to himself. He died, 
 fortunately I say for him, at a time, when such a 
 hope might be entertained; and before a strife, 
 equally mischievous and unnecessary, had thrown 
 the whole property into chancery, and by every in- 
 dulgence of forensic skill, by all the missiles of bill 
 and cross-bill, demurrer and amendment, impeded 
 for months the business of the concern, and exer- 
 cised the patience of the clearest and most indul- 
 gent mind that ever presided in that court. 
 
 Mr. Kemble, as to his person, might be said to 
 be majestic by effort rather than habit he could 
 become so in a moment. His ordinary gait was 
 careless, his look rather kind than penetrating. He 
 did not, except professionally, strive to be con- 
 sidered the noble creature that he was. Perhaps 
 the discrimination of Tacitus as to the appearance 
 of Agricola, was more than slightly characteristic 
 of Kemble. "He was of that make and stature, 
 " which may be said to be graceful, not majestic. 
 " His countenance had not that commanding air 
 " which strikes with awe : a sweetness of expres-
 
 CONCLUSION. 58$ 
 
 " sion was the prevailing character. You would 
 " have been easily convinced that he was a good 
 " man, and you would have been willing to believe 
 " him a great one."* I have sufficiently, I hope, 
 guarded this application, to Mr. Kemble in private 
 life. On the stage, he burst upon you with a dig- 
 nity, unseen but in his person and gesture ; and 
 embodied all that imagination, perhaps alone, has 
 suggested of ancient manners. 
 
 The great author, whom I have just quoted, thus 
 proceeds " I do not mean to censure the custom 
 " of preserving in brass or marble the shape and 
 " stature of eminent men ; but busts and statues, 
 " like their originals, are frail and perishable. The 
 " soul is formed of finer elements, and its inward 
 " form is not to be expressed by the hand of an 
 " artist with unconscious matter." The mind, 
 which informed the expression of Mr. Kemble, may 
 be truly conceived from a countenance as variable, 
 as the entire circle of the passions the efforts of 
 modern art too acquire a new though humbler life 
 by the fidelity of the graver. Even in this respect 
 Mr. Kemble was highly fortunate. The skilful ad- 
 miration of his friend Sir Thomas Lawrence has 
 fixed upon the canvass the melancholy wisdom of 
 his Hamlet, the lofty confidence of his Coriolanus, 
 the intrepid ardour of his Rolla, the awful rumina- 
 
 * Decentior quam sublimior fuit: nihil raetus in vultu : gratia 
 oris supererat. Bonum virum facile crederes, magnum libenter. 
 VIT. AGRIC. Sec. 44.
 
 586 CONCLUSION. 
 
 tion of his Cato. And many a portrait of the 
 private gentleman, and the scholar, adorn the apart- 
 ments of his particular friends. From such ma- 
 terials statuary should compose a noble work, that 
 may place him for centuries among the illustrious 
 of our country. Thus, as to our Kemble, we can 
 strengthen the feeble record of tradition, and he 
 need not shrink from the award of time. Distant 
 ages may estimate the mental and personal graces 
 that adorned him. For ever the objects of an easy 
 reference, his perfect figure and noble countenance 
 may arrest the arts themselves in their debasement, 
 and genius become ashamed of perpetuating vul- 
 gar features and forms devoid of character and 
 meaning. 
 
 Enough in these volumes has been detailed, to 
 afford the reader a correct idea of the actor and 
 {he man. I have shown him, as he would wish pro- 
 fessionally to be seen, by the side of kindred merit; 
 and, in private life, as his character appeared to one, 
 who really loved him. I have thus endeavoured 
 to repay some of the benefits, which I derived from 
 his friendship ; and vanity may hope to have ex- 
 tended the fame of a man of genuine worth, and 
 an actor of first-rate excellence. What is beyond 
 this object, I consider, as filling up a group of which 
 HE is the principal figure as combining an action 
 in which HIS interest was progressive and import- 
 ant. But though I may flatter myself, that I re- 
 flect no unfaithful image of the stage itself during
 
 CONCLUSION. 587 
 
 his life ; yet, to exhibit KEMBLE was the grand in- 
 ducement to my task : how far my wishes may have 
 been seconded by my powers, I must leave to the 
 decision of judgment and candour. I look at the 
 page of Cowper with delight, and admire the solemn 
 propriety with which he has closed his task. But 
 although in a work, however slight, I should be 
 ashamed to write without a MORAL purpose, yet on 
 the present occasion I DARE pretend only to the 
 amusement of the PUBLIC. 
 
 Yes ; all is in their hands whose praise I seek ; 
 Whose frown can disappoint the proudest strain, 
 Whose approbation prosper even MINE." 

 
 >89 
 
 MR. KEMBLE*S WILL; 
 
 EXTRACTED FROM THE REGISTRY OF THE PREROGATIVE 
 COURT OF CANTERBURY. 
 
 The last important act of existence is sometimes a melancholy 
 record of our prejudices, and should, therefore, in charity, be 
 veiled from the general gaze. In the case of Mr. KEMBLK, like 
 every other meditated act of his life, it is honourable to his 
 memory. 
 
 The clearness of his intentions, or the intelligence of his 
 friendly solicitor, seems, in his case, to have somewhat un- 
 clouded the mystery of legal expression, and it may be read by 
 the unlearned 'without much difficulty, and even with consider- 
 able pleasure. 
 
 Among the provisions of 'Mr. KEMBLE'S trill, there is no 
 lurking vanity, pressing in by idle legacies upon the recollec- 
 tions of the great. All that he had is given exactly where it 
 should be given; and the aids that he had rendered silently 
 during his life are solicitously continued by him during the ex- 
 istence of the parties. 
 
 That the public might have an authentic copy of this ; 
 teresting document, I requested my proctor to obtain the extract 
 from the Prerogative Registry of Canterbury, andcheerfidly 
 paid the serious stamp duty attending the transcript. 
 
 THIS IS THE LAST WlLL AND TESTAMENT of Hie, 
 
 JOHN PHILIP KEMBLE, late of Great Russell Street, 
 Bloomsbury, and at present residing in Argyle Street, ,
 
 590 MR. KEMBLE'S WILL. 
 
 the county of Middlesex, Esquire, made the twenty-second 
 day of November, in the year of our Lord One thousand 
 eight hundred and twenty, in manner following ; that is to 
 say, I do give, devise, and bequeath unto my most ex- 
 cellent and beloved wife, Priscilla Kemble, her executors, 
 administrators) and assigns, all that annuity or clear yearly 
 rent-charge of One thousand Pounds sterling, which hath 
 been granted, and now stands secured to be paid and pay- 
 able to me, my executors, administrators, and assigns, for 
 and during the lives of myself and her my said wife 
 Priscilla, and the life of the survivor, in and by certain 
 indentures of lease and release, bearing date respectively the 
 thirty-first day of July and first day of August, in the year 
 One thousand eight hundred and seventeen, and made be- 
 tween John George Lambton, of Lambton, in the county of 
 Durham, Esquire, of the first part, myself of the second part, 
 and John Griffiths, of the city of Durham, gentleman, (a trus- 
 tee on my part) of the third part ; and in and by a warrant of 
 attorney, bearing even date with the said indenture of re- 
 lease, under the hand and seal of the said John George 
 Lambton, for confessing judgment against him at my suit 
 for the sum of Twenty thousand Pounds sterling and costs : 
 And also in and by an indenture bearing even date with 
 the said indenture of release, and made between the said 
 John George Lambton of the first part, myself of the se- 
 cond part, and John Gregson, of the said city of Durham, 
 gentleman, of the third part; whereby the said John 
 Gregson is appointed receiver of the rents and profits of 
 the hereditaments and premises comprised in the said in- 
 dentures of lease and release, to act therein in case the 
 said yearly rent charge should not be paid as therein men- 
 tioned : And all my estate, right, title, and interest, trust, 
 property, possession, claim, and demand whatsoever, of, 
 in, and to the said yearly rent charge, and all powers and
 
 MR. KEMBLE'S WILL. 
 
 remedies for recovery thereof, together with the said seve- 
 ral Indentures of lease and release and appointment : And 
 the said warrant of attorney and judgment to be entered up 
 thereupon, and all other securities for the same rent charge, 
 to have, hold, receive, and take the said yearly rent charge 
 of One thousand Pounds and premises, unto and by my 
 said wife Priscilla Kemble, her executors, administrators, 
 and assigns, to and for her and their own use and benefit 
 absolutely. I do give and bequeath unto my said wife 
 Priscilla all my household goods and furniture, books, 
 plate, linen, woollen, and china, to and for her own use 
 absolutely. I give and bequeath unto my sister Mrs. Ann 
 Hatton, of the town of Swansea, in the county of Glamor- 
 gan, and her assigns, for and during her life, one clear 
 annuity or yearly sum of Sixty Pounds sterling. And unto 
 my sister Mrs. Jane Mason, of Edinburgh, and her assigns, 
 for and during her life, one clear annuity or yearly sum of 
 Twenty Pounds sterling. And I do direct that both the 
 said annuities of sixty pounds and twenty pounds, whilst 
 respectively subsisting, shall be punctually paid out of the 
 residue of my personal estate, free and clear of and from 
 the legacy or annuity tax or duty for the time 'being, and 
 all other taxes, duties, and deductions whatsoever, by four 
 equal quarterly payments, on the twenty-fifth day of March, 
 the twenty-fourth day of June, the twenty-ninth day of 
 September, and the twenty-fifth day of December, in every 
 year ; the first quarterly payment thereof respectively to be 
 made on such of those days as shall next happen after my 
 decease, and a proportional part of each annuity to be 
 paid to the executors or administrators of each annuitant 
 up to the day of her decease. And as to, for, and con- 
 cerning all other my goods, chattels, stocks, funds, and 
 monies, due and owing unto me, and other monies and 
 securities for money, debts, and all other my personal estate
 
 592 MR. KEMBLE'S WILL. 
 
 whatsoever and wheresoever, not hereinbefore by me 
 given or otherwise disposed of, (subject, however, in the 
 first place to the payment of my just debts and funeral ex- 
 pences, the charges of proving and executing this my Will, 
 and to such legacies as I may give by any codicil or codicils 
 hereto,) I do give and bequeath the same and every part 
 thereof respectively unto my said dear wife Priscilla 
 Kemble and my dear brother Charles Kemble, Esquire, 
 upon trust, that they shall and do, as soon as conveniently 
 may be after my decease, sell and convert into money all 
 such parts thereof as shall not consist of money, or securi- 
 ties for money, and shall and do call in and receive and 
 collect all such parts thereof as consist of money and secu- 
 rities for money, and debts owing unto me ; and shall and 
 do, with all convenient speed thereupon, lay out and invest 
 the monies arising by the sale and conversion into money 
 of such part of the residue of my said personal estate, as 
 shall not consist of money, or securities for money, and the 
 monies which shall be so called in. And all other the said 
 residue of my personal estate, after and subject as aforesaid, 
 in the purchase, from time to time, of Bank Three Pounds 
 per cent. Annuities, in the names of them my said wife and 
 brother, and of two other proper persons to be mutually 
 chosen by them ; and my Will is, and I do hereby direct, 
 that they my said wife and brother, and such two persons 
 so to be chosen, and the survivors and survivor of them, 
 his executors and administrators, shall and do stand and 
 be possessed of and interested in the said Bank Three 
 Pounds per cent. Annuities so to be purchased, in trust, 
 out of the interest or dividends thereof to pay the said two 
 life annuities, while respectively subsisting, as hereinbefore 
 directed ; and to pay unto or permit or authorise my said 
 wife Priscilla, and her assigns, to receive all the surplus or 
 remainder of the said interest or dividends, for and during
 
 MR. KEMBLE'S WILL. 593 
 
 her life, to and for her and their own use and benefit. 
 And from and immediately after her decease, upon trust, 
 to sell and transfer so much of the said Bank Three Pounds 
 per cent. Annuities, as, after payment of brokerage on such 
 sale, shall produce the clear sum of Four thousand Pounds 
 sterling, and do pay the same sum unto such person or 
 persons, and in such shares and proportions as she my 
 said wife shall, in and by her last Will and Testament, to 
 be duly signed arid published by her in the presence of and 
 to be attested by two credible witnesses, shall direct or 
 appoint, or give and bequeath the said sum of four thou- 
 sand pounds : And subject to such direction or appoint- 
 ment, gift or bequest, if any shall be so made as aforesaid, 
 and also subject to the payment of the said two life annu- 
 ities, while respectively subsisting, I do give and bequeath 
 the remainder or the whole of the said Bank Three Pounds 
 per cent. Annuities, as the case may be, unto my said bro- 
 ther Charles Kemble, his executors, administrators, and 
 assigns, to and for his and their use and benefit ; and do 
 direct such Bank Annuities to be transferred unto him or 
 them accordingly, freed and discharged of and from all 
 other trusts then as to the payment of the said two life 
 annuities while respectively subsisting. And I do hereby 
 nominate and appoint my said wife Priscilla Kemble and 
 my said brother Charles Kemble, to be EXECUTRIX and 
 EXECUTOR of this my Will : Provided always, and I do 
 hereby further declare my Will to be, that it shall and may 
 be lawful to and for my said Trustees and Executors act- 
 ing under this my Will, respectively, and their respective 
 heirs, executors, and administrators, by and out of all or 
 any of the monies which, by virtue of this my Will or any 
 of the trusts herein declared, shall come to their or any of 
 their hands, to deduct, and retain to, and reimburse them- 
 VOL. II. Q Q
 
 594- MR. KEMBLE'S WILL. 
 
 . 
 . '- jj? 
 
 -selves respectively ,* and also to allow to their respective 
 co-trustee and executor, their respective heirs, executors, 
 and administrators, all such costs, charges, damages, and 
 expences as they respectively shall or may sustain, incur, 
 or be put unto, in or about the execution of the several, 
 trusts hereby in them respectively reposed, or any of them, 
 or of this my Will. And also that the said trustees and 
 executors respectively, their respective heirs, executors, 
 and administrators, shall be charged and chargeable only, 
 each and every of them, for and with his, her, and 
 their respective receipts, payments, acts, and wilful 
 defaults, and not otherwise ; and shall not be charged or 
 chargeable with or for any sum or sums of money, other 
 than such as shall actually come to their respective hands 
 by virtue of this my Will, the joining in receipts for form's 
 sake notwithstanding. And that no trustee of this my 
 Will, paying or consenting to the payment of money to a 
 co-trustee thereof, with a bona fide intent to accelerate the 
 performance of the trusts thereof, shall be responsible for 
 the conduct or misconduct of the trustee receiving the 
 same, nor be answerable for his or her application or mis- 
 application of such money; nor shall any such trustees be 
 charged or chargeable with or for any loss or damage 
 which shall or may happen, in or about the execution of 
 the several trusts hereby in them respectively reposed, or 
 of this my Will, without their respective wilful default. 
 And lastly, hereby revoking all former and other Wills 
 and Codicils by me at any time heretofore made, I do 
 declare this to be my last Will and Testament. IN 
 WITNESS whereof I have hereunto set my hand, and I 
 have executed, or intend to execute, a duplicate hereof in 
 like manner, the day and year first before written. 
 
 J. P. KEMBLE.
 
 MR. KEMBLE'S WILL. 595 
 
 The Writing contained in this sheet of paper was signed 
 by the said John Philip Kemble, the Testator, and by hi 
 published as and for, and declared to be his last Will and 
 Testament, in the presence of us, who, at his request, in 
 his presence, and that of each other, have hereunto sub- 
 scribed our names as witnesses to such signing and pub- 
 lishing. 
 
 ALEXANDER MURRAY, of Symond's Inn. 
 
 WILLIAM WOODHOUSE, j Qerks to Mr . Murray . 
 HENRY BURGH, -J 
 
 PROVED at LONDON, 26th April, 1823, before the 
 Worshipful Jesse Addams, Doctor of Laws and Surrogate, 
 by the oaths of Priscilla Kemble, Widow, the relict, and 
 Charles Kemble, Esquire, the brother, the Executors, to 
 whom Administration was granted, being first sworn duly 
 
 to administer. 
 
 NATHANIEL GOSTLIND, 1 
 
 R. C. CRESSWELL, > Deputy Registers. 
 
 TER. JENNER, J 
 
 THE END.

 
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