iii. 419), says that he was informed by Benjamin Webster that Baddeley

was the last actor who wore the uniform of scarlet and gold prescribed for the Gentlemen of the Household, who were patented actors.]

[Footnote 83: The question of the identity of the first English actress is a very intricate one. Mr. Percy Fitzgerald, in his "New History of the English Stage," seems to incline to favour Anne Marshall, while Mr. Joseph Knight, in his edition of the "Roscius Anglicanus," pronounces for Mrs. Coleman. Davies says positively that "the first woman actress was the mother of Norris, commonly called Jubilee Dicky." Thomas Jordan wrote a Prologue "to introduce the first woman that came to act on the stage," but as the lady's name is not given, this does not help us. The distinction is also claimed for Mrs. Saunderson (afterwards Mrs. Betterton) and Margaret Hughes. But since Mr. Knight has shown that the performances in 1656 at Rutland House, where Mrs. Coleman appeared, were for money, I do not see that we can escape from the conclusion that this lady was the first English professional actress. Who the first actress after the Restoration was is as yet unsettled.]

[Footnote 84: Meaning, no doubt, Nell Gwyn and Moll Davis.]

[Footnote 85: Genest points out (i. 404) that Cibber is not quite accurate here. Shakespeare's and Fletcher's plays _may_ have been shared; Jonson's certainly were not.]

[Footnote 86: See memoir of Hart at end of second volume.]

[Footnote 87: Genest says that this regulation "might be very proper at the first restoration of the stage; but as a perpetual rule it was absurd. Cibber approves of it, not considering that Betterton could never have acted Othello, Brutus, or Hotspur (the very parts for which Cibber praises him so much) if there had not been a junction of the companies." Bellchambers, in a long note, also contests Cibber's opinion.]

[Footnote 88: In the season 1735-6, in addition to the two Patent Theatres, Drury Lane and Covent Garden, Giffard was playing at Goodman's Fields Theatre, and Fielding, with his Great Mogul's Company of Comedians, occupied the Haymarket. In 1736-7 Giffard played at the Lincoln's-Inn-Fields Theatre, and Goodman's Fields was unused. The Licensing Act of 1737 closed the two irregular houses, leaving only Drury Lane and Covent Garden open.]

[Footnote 89: Cibber here refers to the Pantomimes, which he deals with at some length in Chapter XV.]

[Footnote 90: Fielding ("Champion," 6th May, 1740): "Another Observation which I have made on our Author's Similies is, that they generally have an Eye towards the Kitchen. Thus, _page 56, Two Play-Houses are like two_ PUDDINGS _or two_ LEGS OF MUTTON. _224. To plant young Actors is not so easy as to plant_ CABBAGES. To which let me add a Metaphor in _page 57_, where _unprofitable Praise can hardly give Truth a_ SOUP MAIGRE."]

[Footnote 91: "Dramatic Operas" seem to have been first produced about 1672. In 1673 "The Tempest," made into an opera by Shadwell, was played at Dorset Garden; "Pysche" followed in the next year, and "Circe" in 1677. "Macbeth," as altered by Davenant, was produced in 1672, "in the nature of an Opera," as Downes phrases it.]

[Footnote 92: Dryden, in his "Prologue on the Opening of the New House" in 1674, writes:--

"'Twere folly now a stately pile to raise, To build a playhouse while you throw down plays; While scenes, machines, and empty operas reign----"

and the Prologue concludes with the lines:--

"'Tis to be feared---- That, as a fire the former house o'erthrew, Machines and Tempests will destroy the new."

The allusion in the last line is to the opera of "The Tempest," which I have mentioned in the previous note.]

[Footnote 93:

"Probitas laudatur et alget." Juvenal, i. 74.]

[Footnote 94: In the Prologue to "The Emperor of the Moon," 1687, the line occurred: "There's nothing lasting but the Puppet-show."]

[Footnote 95:

"Ita populus studio stupidus in funambulo Animum occuparat." Terence, _Prol. to "Hecyra,"_ line 4.]

[Footnote 96: See memoir of Michael Mohun at end of second volume.]

[Footnote 97: See memoir of Cardell Goodman at end of second volume.]

[Footnote 98: Of Clark very little is known. The earliest play in which his name is given by Downes is "The Plain-Dealer," which was produced at the Theatre Royal in 1674, Clark playing Novel, a part of secondary importance. His name appears to Massina in "Sophonisba," Hephestion in "Alexander the Great," Dolabella in "All for Love," Aquitius in "Mythridates," and (his last recorded part) the Earl of Essex, the principal character in "The Unhappy Favourite," Theatre Royal, 1682. After the Union of the Companies in 1682 his name does not occur. Bellchambers has several trifling errors in the memoir he gives of this actor.]

[Footnote 99: Curll ("History of the English Stage," p. 9) says: "The Feuds and Animosities of the KING'S _Company_ were so well improved, as to produce an Union betwixt the two Patents."]

[Footnote 100: Cibber gives the year as 1684, but this is so obviously a slip that I venture to correct the text.]

[Footnote 101: Genest (ii. 62) remarks: "The theatre in Dorset Garden had been built by subscription--the subscribers were called Adventurers--of this Cibber seems totally ignorant--that there were any new Adventurers, added to the original number, rests solely on his authority, and in all probability he is not correct."]

[Footnote 102: Cibber afterwards relates the connection of Owen Swiney, William Collier, M.P., and Sir Richard Steele, with himself and his actor-partners.]

[Footnote 103: The only one of Cibber's contemporaries of any note who was alive when the "Apology" was published, was Benjamin Johnson. This admirable comedian died in August, 1742, in his seventy-seventh year, having played as late as the end of May of that year.]

[Footnote 104: The actor pointed at is, no doubt, Wilks. In the last chapter of this work Cibber, in giving the theatrical character of Wilks, says of his Hamlet: "I own the Half of what he spoke was as painful to my Ear, as every Line that came from Betterton was charming."]

[Footnote 105: Barton Booth, who was probably as great in the part of the Ghost as Betterton was in Hamlet, said, "When I acted the Ghost with Betterton, instead of my awing him, he terrified me. But divinity hung round that man!"--"Dram. Misc.," iii. 32.]

[Footnote 106: "The Laureat" repeats the eulogium of a gentleman who had seen Betterton play Hamlet, and adds: "And yet, the same Gentleman assured me, he has seen Mr. _Betterton_, more than once, play this Character to an Audience of twenty Pounds, or under" (p. 32).]

[Footnote 107: _Ars Poetica_, 102. This is the much discussed question of Diderot's "Paradoxe sur le Comédien," which has recently been revived by Mr. Henry Irving and M. Coquelin, and has formed the subject of some interesting studies by Mr. William Archer.]

[Footnote 108: This is doubtless directed at Booth, who was naturally of an indolent disposition, and seems to have been, on occasions, apt to drag through a part.]

[Footnote 109: Ausonius, II, 8 (_Epigram_, xi.).]

[Footnote 110: "Alexander the Great; or, the Rival Queens,"