Part 8
These Juries omitted noticing a most barbarous _amusement_ which prevailed to great excess, as will appear by the ensuing advertisements issued in the same year: "At the Royal Cockpit on the South side of St. James's-park, on Tuesday the 11th of this instant February, will begin a very great Cock-match; and will continue all the week; wherein most of the considerablest Cockers of England are concerned. There will be a battle down upon the Pit every day precisely at three o'clock, in order to have done by day-light. Monday the 9th instant March will begin a great match of Cock-fighting betwixt the Gentlemen of the City of Westminster and the Gentlemen of the City of London for six guineas a battle, and one hundred guineas the odd battle, and the match continues all the week, in Red-Lion-fields."
In the following April another match commenced, to continue for a week, at four guineas a battle, and forty guineas the odd battle, between the Gentlemen of London, and those of Warwickshire, at the new Cockpit behind Gray's-Inn-walks.
The presentments were, however, of some service, as the proprietors of the Bear-garden advertised subsequently "_without beat of drum_." Wrestling was exhibited by them, and the prizes were gloves at two shillings and sixpence _per_ pair. Lambeth-wells opened on Easter Mondays, and had public days on Mondays, Thursdays, and Saturdays, with musick from seven in the morning till sunset; on other days till two. The price of admission was three pence; the water one penny _per_ quart to the affluent, and _gratis_ to the poor.
The good people at Bartholomew Fair were entertained in 1701 by a Tiger, who had been taught to pick a fowl's feathers from the body. This feat seems to have roused the proprietors of the Theatre in Lincoln's-Inn-fields; and they immediately, "at the desire of several persons of quality," exhibited "that delightful exercise of vaulting on the managed horse according to the Italian manner," after the play of the Country Wife.
Amongst the variety of amusements with which London has abounded, public exhibitions may be fairly included. The first upon record within the century appears to have been certain models representing William the Third's palaces at Loo, Keswick, and Hunslaerdike: those were shown in 1701 from ten in the morning till one, and from two till eight at night, "at the White head near Pall-Mall facing the Haymarket, _within two doors of the glass lamps_." The proprietors elegantly observe in their advertisement, that they were "brought over lately by _outlandish_ men;" and that, "to render those diversions altogether more delightful and acceptable, there will be a collection of several curiosities to be sold and raffled for at the opening, and likewise every Monday and Friday following, those days being appointed the public raffling-days, besides a great variety of rarities: and to entertain the nobility and gentry (who, the undertakers hope, will countenance them with the honour of their company) there shall be on Wednesday the 14th instant (January) a _concert_ of musick by the best performers; and if all these diversions please such for whom they are intended, there shall be from time to time great additions made."
However pleasing and moral the Stage may be at present, we are in great measure indebted to our Ancestors for the improvements which have taken place. In the reign of Charles II. the licence permitted to Dramatic Authors was indecent and infamous in the extreme, and the profane and immoral expressions inserted in many plays really rendered the use of masks necessary for those ladies who possessed the least delicacy of sentiment.
In 1701-2 another and effectual effort was made to reform this evil, by a prosecution instituted in the Court of King's-bench, and tried before Lord Chief Justice Holt. The Jury on this occasion found the players of Lincoln's-Inn-fields play-house guilty of uttering impious, lewd, and immoral expressions.
In April 1702, an advertisement appeared in the papers, inviting the publick to see the skeleton of a Whale then lately caught in the Thames, which the proprietors had carefully scraped and put together in the field near King-street, Bloomsbury. They asserted that one bone of his head weighed 40 cwt. The price of admission was threepence.
This stupendous exhibition accompanied another of the model of Amsterdam, which almost vied with it in size: the length was between twenty and thirty feet, the breadth twenty; and the artist or artists were occupied twelve years in completing it. The place of exhibition was Bell-yard, Fleet-street.
May Fair opened this year with the usual _splendid_ entertainments, and, if the managers of these elegant diversions were to be credited, with more than common _eclat_. There was Mr. Miller's booth "over against" Mr. Barnes the rope-dancer's, where was "presented an excellent droll called Crispin and Crispianus, or a Shoemaker a Prince, with the best machines, singing, and dancing _ever yet in the Fair_." This and other excellent performances attracted the lasses and lads of London, whose spirits, exhilarated by the season from which the Fair was named, met in vast numbers, and with them the thief and the prostitute, who, as usual, did not permit the attractions of _drolls_ to _divert_ them from business: indeed they were so extremely active in their vocations, that the Magistrates thought proper to thin the number of the latter by commitments; but in the execution of this plan the Constables were resisted by a set of Soldiers, who determined to protect the _Fair_, which they did in such serious earnest, that Mr. John Cooper, one of the peace-officers, lost his life, and in due time was buried at St. James's Church Westminster, where a Funeral Sermon was preached by Josiah Woodward, D. D. Minister of Poplar Chapel, before the Justices, High Constable, &c. and which he published at their request. The Observator, a paper published twice a week at that period, says ironically of May Fair; "Oh the piety of some people about the Queen; who can suffer things of this nature to go undiscovered to her Majesty, and consequently unpunished! Can any rational man imagine that her Majesty would permit so much lewdness as is committed at May Fair for so many days together so near her Royal Palace, if she knew any thing of the matter? I do not believe the patent for that Fair allows the Patentees the liberty of setting up the _Devil's shops_, and exposing his merchandise to sale; _nor was there ever one Fair or Market in England constituted for this purpose_. But this Fair is kept contrary to Law, and in defiance of Justice; for the last Fair, when the Civil Magistrate came to keep the Queen's peace there, one Constable was killed, and three others wounded." The man who committed the above murder escaped, and a butcher of Gloucester was hanged for the crime; but the real culprit finally suffered: and thus tragically ended the Fair of May 1702.
Mr. Pawlet had a great dancing-room near Dowgate, Thames-street; hither the gay were invited to a "_Consort_" produced by violins, hautboys, flutes, and _a trumpet_, with singing. The admission 1_s._ 6_d._
The following quotation from the first number of "The Secret Mercury," published September 9, 1702, gives a better idea of one of the Drolls or Interludes of the day than any I have previously met with: "Wednesday September 2, having _padlocked my pockets_, and trimmed myself with Hudibras from head to foot, I set out about six for Bartholomew Fair; and, having thrown away _substantial silver_ for visionary Theatrical entertainment, I made myself ready for the Farce; but I had scarce composed myself when bolts me _into the Pit_ a bully beau," &c. &c. "The curtain drew, and discovered a nation of beauish machines; their motions were so starched, that I began to question whether I had mistaken myself and Dogget's booth for a Puppet-shew. As I was debating the matter, they advanced toward the front of the stage, and making a halt began a singing so miserably, that I was forced to tune my own whistle in romance ere my brains were set strait again. All the _secret_ I could for my life discover in the whole grotesque was the consistency or drift of the piece, which I could never demonstrate to this hour. At last all the childish parade shrunk off the stage by matter and motion, and enter a _hobletehoy_ of a dance, and Dogget in old woman's petticoats and red waistcoat, as like Progue Cock as ever man saw; it would have made a Stoick split his lungs, if he had seen the temporary harlot sing and weep both at once; a true emblem of a woman's tears. When these Christmas carols were over, enter a _wooden_ horse; now I concluded we should have the ballad of Troy-town, but I was disappointed in the scene, for a dancing-master comes in, begins a complimenting the horse, and fetching me three or four run-bars with his arm (as if he would have mortified the ox at one blow) takes a frolick upon the back of it, and translates himself into cavalry at one bound: all I could clap was the _patience_ of the beast. However, having played upon him about half a quarter, the conqueror was pursued with such a clangor from the crusted clutches of the mob in the _sixpenny place_, that for five minutes together I was tossed on this dilemma, that either a man had not five senses, or I was no man. The stage was now overrun with nothing but Merry Andrews and Pickle-herrings. This Mountebank scene was removed at last, and I was full of expectation the successor would be Pills, Pots of Balsam, and Orvietan; but, alas, they were but half Empiricks, and therefore _Exeunt omnes_."
From several circumstances it appears that, notwithstanding the proclamation and feeble exertions of the Corporation of London, these interludes were openly performed in Smithfield: and that the Governors of St. Bartholomew's Hospital actually permitted prostitutes to walk the Cloisters. One of the "Secret Mercuries" has this expression: "Well, I shall catch you _in the Cloysters_;" but the Observator of August 21, 1703, sets the matter beyond doubt: "Does this Market of lewdness tend to any thing else but the ruin of the bodies, souls, and estates, of the young men and women of the City of London, who here meet with all the temptations to destruction? The lotteries to ruin their estates; the drolls, comedies, interludes, and farces, to poison their minds with motions of lust; _and in the Cloisters_ (those conscious scenes of polluted amours) in the evening they strike the bargain to finish their ruin. What strange medley of lewdness has that place not long since afforded! Lords and ladies, aldermen and their wives, squires and fidlers, citizens and rope-dancers, jack-puddings and lawyers, mistresses and maids, masters and prentices! This is not an ark, like Noah's, which received the clean and unclean; only the _unclean_ beasts enter this ark, and such as have the Devil's livery on their backs." And in another paper he says, "they'll raffle with the punks in the Cloysters."
The reader will pardon the introduction of the substance of an advertisement inserted in the Postman, August 19, 1703, by Barnes and Finley, who, after the usual exordium of _their_ superior excellence, mention that the spectator will "see my _Lady Mary_ perform such curious steps on the _dancing rope_, &c. &c." This lady Mary is subsequently noticed in Heraclitus Ridens, No. 7, by Earnest, who says, "Look upon the old gentleman; his eyes are fixed upon my lady Mary: Cupid has shot him as dead as a Robin. Poor Heraclitus! he has cried away all his moisture, and is such a dotard to entertain himself with a prospect of what is meat for his betters; wake him out of his lethargy, and tell him the young noblemen and senators will take it amiss, if a man of his years makes pretensions to what is more than a match for their youth. Those, &c. &c. and roguish eyes have brought her more admirers than ever Jenny Bolton had; it is a pity, say I, she has no more manners, and less ill-nature." Chetwood, in his History of the Stage, mentions a Lady _Isabella_, which name, writing from memory, he has evidently mistaken for Mary, who was the daughter of noble parents inhabitants of Florence, where they immured her in a Nunnery; but, most fruitlessly careful of their beautiful offspring, she accidentally saw a Merry Andrew, who unfortunately saw her; in consequence of which a clandestine intercourse took place, an elopement followed, and finally this villain taught her his infamous tricks, which she exhibited for his profit till vice had made her his own; as Heraclitus proves. The catastrophe of the Lady Mary was dreadful; her _husband_, impatient of delays or impediments to profit, either permitted or commanded her to exhibit on the rope when eight months had elapsed in her pregnancy: encumbered by her weight, she fell, never more to rise; her infant was born on the stage, and died a victim with its Mother.
Mr. Abel advertised a concert and dancing at Covent Garden Theatre for Tuesday December 29, 1702: the performers, himself, Monsieur l'Abbé, Mr. Isaac's _scholar_, and others. The galleries were let for the benefit of the proprietors of the Playhouse.
Hitherto we have had to notice amusements which involved the performers in little corporeal injury, unless from accidents, or sudden quarrels. I shall now introduce an _entertainment_ the very zest of which consisted in a great number of broken pates. "At the White Horse at _Bristol_ Causeway (now denominated Brixton) in Surrey, three miles from London in the road to Croydon, will be a Hat played for at Cudgels, on the 23d of April, 1703; the Country against the Londoners. _He that breaks most heads_ to have the hat; he that plays puts in sixpence." Smock-races were run at this elegant place of resort "by young women and maids," to the utter disgrace of the neighbouring Magistracy.
The year 1703 produced a new source of amusement, which is noticed by _Tutchin_ in the Observator: "But I have some Play-house news to tell you: the great Play-house has calved a young one in Goodman's fields, in the passage by the Ship Tavern betwixt Prescot and Chambers-street. _Observator_--It is in a very good place in Rosemary-lane precinct; I know no reason why the quality at both ends of the town should not have the same diversions. This will be a great ease to the Ladies of Rag Fair, who are now forced to trudge as far as Lincoln's-inn-fields to mix themselves with quality. The mumpers of Knockvargis will now have the Playhouse come to them, who were not able to stump it to the other end of the town on their wooden legs: the Does in Tower-hill Park and Rosemary-lane purlieu will be foddered nearer home this winter; and the sailors will have better entertainment for their loose coins than formerly."
The Grand Jury of Middlesex presented May Fair in November 1703. And early in the ensuing year, the public mind had been so influenced by the dreadful storm of November, the effects of which were felt in every direction, that prelates, the clergy, authors, and in short all men of virtue, joined in one grand exclamation against the obscenity, the immorality, and the blasphemy of the stage, which its most ardent admirers must admit to have arrived at such a height as fully warranted an order from the Queen to restrain it. At the same period the Lord Mayor and Aldermen issued a proclamation, forbidding the cruel practice of throwing at Cocks on Shrove Tuesday; and the Tatler of April 18, 1709, mentions the total abolition of May Fair as far as related to the exhibition of puppets, and similar contemptible traps for the vulgar.
The Theatre in the Haymarket was opened in 1705, when these strange and almost impious lines were pronounced as part of the Prologue:
"Such was our Builder's art, that, soon as nam'd, This fabrick, like the infant World, was fram'd: The Architect must on dull order wait, But 'tis the Poet only can create. In the good age of ghostly ignorance, How did Cathedrals rise, and zeal advance; But now that pious pageantry no more, And Stages thrive as Churches did before."
By Dr. GARTH.
The Theatre in Dorset Garden was taken down about 1709, and the site immediately afterwards converted into a wood-yard and saw-pit.
Firing at marks formed part of the amusement of a certain class of people in 1709; and prizes were offered of various descriptions, particularly one at Islington of a pair of doe-skin breeches worth 3_l._ The terms for the privilege of firing were a subscription of one shilling each by sixty men.
A most tragical occurrence happened in September 1709, at that polite place of resort the Bear-garden at Hockley in the Hole. Christopher Preston, keeper of the Garden, had taught his Bears every thing but forgiveness of injuries; and this he experienced, at an unguarded moment, by an attack from one, who not only killed, but almost devoured him, before his friends were aware of the fact.
In 1710 the publick were offered an exhibition something similar to the modern moving picture at Vauxhall; it was shown for sixpence and a shilling opposite Cecil-street in the Strand, and represented ships sailing out of port, a coach passing over a bridge leading to a city, a cart drawn by two horses with a woman in it, and many other things.
Matches at Cricket were played for many years on Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Saturdays, at the Duke of Ormond's head near Lamb's Conduit-fields.
The Tatler of April 25, 1710, advertises a Pastoral Mask to be performed at York-buildings on the 27th, composed by Mr. Clayton, and for his benefit, who is there said to have introduced the Italian Opera into England.
Mr. Winstanley had a "_Water Theatre_," distinguished by a _Windmill_ on the summit in Piccadilly near Hyde-park, "wherein was shewn the greatest curiosities in water-works, the like being never performed by any." The hours of exhibition were from five to six o'clock every evening in June and July 1710, for his widow's benefit. This gentleman had a house at Littlebury, Essex, where some experiments in Hydraulicks were exhibited for money.
The following notice was issued in August, "that a Gold Ring is to be danced for on the 31st instant, and a Hat to be played for at skittles the next day following, at the Green-gate in Gray's walks, near Lambeth-wells."
The Bowling-green and Cockpit behind Gray's-Inn garden were advertised for sale or to be let in 1710; but, though the publick seem thus to have lost one place of resort, Punch's Opera, under the direction of Powell, was opened at the same time at the _end_ of Lichfield-street, where the prices of admission were, boxes 2_s._ pit 1_s._ gallery 6_d._ This exhibition must have been something like the modern Fantoccini; the figures were dressed in character; and one of the performances was "The History of chaste Susannah."
A new Cockpit and Bowling-green were opened in March 1711 behind Gray's-Inn gardens; the Gentlemen of Essex against all Britain, at ten guineas a battle, and 500 the odd battle.
That the reader may not be bewildered by my conjectures as to the real nature of the entertainment described in the following advertisement, I shall transcribe it _verbatim_ from the original Spectator, No. 46: "Mr. Penkethman's (I suppose the actor of that time, 1711) wonderful invention called The Pantheon, or the Temple of the Heathen Gods, the work of several years and great expence, is now perfected; being a most surprising and magnificent machine, consisting of five several curious pictures, the painting and contrivance whereof is beyond expression admirable: the figures, which are above an hundred, and move their heads, legs, arms, and fingers so exactly to what they perform, and setting one foot before another like living creatures, that it justly deserves to be esteemed the greatest wonder of the age. To be seen from ten in the morning till ten at night, in the Little Piazzas, Covent-garden, in the same house where Punch's Opera is, price 1_s._ 6_d._, 1_s._, and the lowest 6_d._"
The room in Spring-garden now used as a Toy-shop, and for various exhibitions, was a Masquerade-room in 1711; which amusement was afforded for half a guinea _per_ ticket, and a concert included. No person admitted unmasked or armed.
St. George's-fields abounded with gardens, where the lower classes met to drink and smoke tobacco; but those were not their only amusements. Mr. Shanks near Lambeth-marsh contrived to assemble his customers in 1711 with a grinning match. The prize was a gold-laced hat, and the competitors were exhilarated by musick and dancing: the hour of exhibition twelve at noon, and the admission 6_d._ At six o'clock the same. And every evening another portion of the same class were delighted with contortions of a different description, which had however the sanction of antiquity; posture-masters are represented in the illuminations of very antient MSS. and in attitudes described in the following advertisement: "At the Duke of Marlborough's-head in Fleet-street, in the great room is to be seen the famous Posture-master of Europe, who far exceeds the deceased posture-masters Clarke and Higgins; he extends his body into all deformed shapes, makes his hip and shoulder-bones meet together, lays his head upon the ground, and turns his body round twice or thrice without stirring his face from the place; stands upon one leg, and extends the other in a perpendicular line half a yard above his head, and extends his body from a table with his head a foot below his heels, having nothing to balance his body but his feet; with several other postures too tedious to mention."
Queen Anne was prevailed upon in 1711 to issue her proclamation to the ensuing purport: "Whereas we are informed that the orders we have already given for the reformation of the Stage, by not permitting any thing to be acted contrary to Religion or good manners, have in great measure had the good effect we proposed; and being further desirous to reform all other indecencies and disorders of the Stage: Our will and pleasure therefore is, and we do hereby strictly command, that no person, of what quality soever, presume to stand behind the scenes, or come upon the Stage, either before or during the acting of any Opera or Play; and that no person come into either of our houses for Opera or Comedy without paying first the established prices for their respective places. All which orders we strictly command the managers of both our Opera and Comedy to see exactly observed and obeyed; and if any persons whatsoever shall disobey this our known pleasure and command, we shall proceed against them as contemners of our Royal authority, and disturbers of the public peace." _Gazette, Nov. 15, 1711._
It was in the latter part of the above year that the Spectator first noticed the _Trunk-maker_, a person who appears to have possessed great critical knowledge in theatrical affairs, which he evinced by violent blows aimed at the benches and wainscot of the upper-gallery; in short, according to the accounts of that valuable paper, his judicious manner of bestowing approbation with his stick soon made him a popular leader in criticism, and the arbitrator of applause.
The tradesmen who furnished the several materials necessary for the performance of the Opera in the Haymarket 1710, supported by a subscription from the Nobility, &c. were not paid their several demands by December 1711; in consequence of which they advertised an intended general meeting to concert measures for petitioning the Lord Chamberlain, or commencing law-suits against the Manager, who peremptorily refused payment, although the articles obtained were in constant use.