Part 9
The following advertisement appeared at the same time: "Mr. Rich and others having petitioned her Majesty against an order for silencing of acting Plays, Operas, &c. under the patents granted by King Charles II. and touching a forcible entry made by Mr. Collier into the Theatre Royal; the matters of which having been referred to her Majesty's Attorney and Solicitor-general to examine; it is said they have made their report of the facts, and of the right of Mr. Rich and other petitioners under the Patents being a franchise in fee; and that speedy application will be made to her Majesty in Council to determine the same. The Town seems very desirous to have two companies, to emulate one the other, and create more variety of theatrical diversions without raising the price."
Almost immediately after Messrs. Clayton, Haym, and Dieupart, prevailed upon the Authors of the Spectator to insert the ensuing notice, from which it may be inferred that they had in some degree baffled their own designs in introducing the Italian Opera: "Mr. Spectator, You will forgive us professors of musick, if we make a second application to you, in order to promote our design of exhibiting entertainments of musick in York-buildings. It is industriously insinuated, that our intention is to destroy Operas in general; but we beg of you to insert this plain explanation of ourselves in your paper. Our purpose is only to improve our circumstances by improving the art which we profess; we see it utterly destroyed at present, and as we were the persons who introduced Operas, we think it a groundless imputation that we should set up against the Opera in itself: what we pretend to assert is, that the songs of different authors injudiciously put together, and a foreign tone and manner which are expected in every thing now performed amongst us, has put musick itself to a stand; insomuch that the ears of the people cannot now be entertained with any thing but what has an impertinent gaiety without any just spirit, or a languishment of notes without any passion or common sense. We hope those persons of sense and quality who have done us the honour to subscribe will not be ashamed of their patronage towards us; and not receive impressions that patronising us is being for or against the Opera, but truly promoting their own diversions in a more just and elegant manner than has been hitherto performed."
There was an established Cockpit in Prescot-street, Goodman's-fields, 1712: there the Gentlemen of the East entertained themselves, while the Nobles and others of the West were entertained by the edifying exhibition of the agility of their running footmen. His Grace of Grafton declared _his_ man was unrivaled in speed; and the Lord Cholmondeley betted him 500 guineas that _his_ excelled even the unrivaled: accordingly the ground was prepared for a two-mile heat in Hyde-park; the race was run, _and one of the parties was victor_, but _which_ my informant does not say.
In the same month a curious Brass Gun was advertised to be shot for at Hoxton: it was in the shape of a walking-cane, and might be used as gun or pistol, contained a telescope, a dial on the head, and a perpetual almanack.
The Spectator, No. 436, enables us to form a correct idea of the brutal sports of the Bear-garden--the Theatre for the double exhibition of natural brutes and the degeneracy of human nature. The ridiculous movements of the bear appear to have been too innocent an amusement for the populace; they therefore gave place to pugilism and fighting with swords: the latter _diversions_ were certainly countenanced by the customs of the Antients; but the tyranny of their government and the ferocious nature of their people were palliatives that Englishmen could not plead. Their emperors and senates erected stupendous amphitheatres for public games; youths were tutored from infancy for gladiators, and slaves fought for the entertainment of their masters; the populace were used to see gashes, blood, and death, nay to see criminals rot in their streets; and the males hardened female feelings by their military plunder of and cruelty to the surrounding nations. But the British populace knew not of those horrible proceedings; and most probably Miller and Buck were ignorant that a Roman state ever existed. We therefore cannot but be surprised, that so many years were suffered to elapse before the vigilance of the Magistracy was roused to suppress the hateful wickedness of a few miscreants who had it in their power to attract men around a stage to view their fellow-citizens endeavouring to maim each other; but, however disgusting the recollection that such things have been, we must rejoice that no Serjeant _now_ dare offer, or Human Butcher receive, a challenge similar to the following:
"I James Miller, serjeant (lately come from the frontiers of Portugal), master of the noble science of defence, hearing in most places where I have been of the great fame of Timothy Buck of London, master of the said science, do invite him to meet me, and exercise at the several weapons following: back-sword, sword and dagger, sword and buckler, single falchon, case of falchons, quarter-staff."
The author of the above paper declares he witnessed the combat the challenge occasioned; and I shall endeavour to shew it to the reader in its true colours, divested of that romantic and chivalric air with which it is glossed in the paper alluded to. Two drummers, whose bodies were disfigured by the wounds they had received in battle, preceded the challenger, a stout athletic man with a blue ribband tied round his right arm, accompanied by a fell dæmon, a _second_ or friend, one who is described as bearing in his breast that malice which darted amongst the crowd through his organs of sight, the _crowd_ whose eagerness had arisen to frenzy; keen expectation marked their features and convulsed their limbs, motion impelled motion, the stout overwhelmed the weak, the tallest the short, impatience and anger prompted removals, and instantly a grand transfer of places ensued: the spectators rushed from the gallery into the area, and from the area into the gallery; and confusion reigned triumphant till Buck appeared, when all was hushed. Now observe the picture: the combatants, stripped to their shirts, _shake hands_ to show that they kill each other in _good will_, and prepare to injure and defend. Turn to the spectators, examine their breasts, what is the result?--Humanity? Pity? Fear? Horror? No: those passions would have rendered the Bear-garden desolate. The painter finds but one dreadful chaos, a compound of features expressive of eagerness, partiality, and hope; not that Miller or Buck may escape injury, but that Buck may conquer Miller, or Miller Buck. Mark the issue: Miller has received a dreadful cut in the forehead, and his eyes stream with blood. Who leaps upon the stage to staunch it, or part the fiends?--no one. What then succeeds?--a _yell of satisfaction, a huzza from the crowd_. But, not to dwell on this horrible scene, a gash on Miller's left leg terminated the combat. "The wound was exposed to the view of all who could delight in it, _and sewed up on the stage_." One solitary female shed tears for Miller, and hid her face; but, my author seems to hint, her humanity was selfish.
A far more innocent amusement was announced directly after the battle, in No. 533. Mr. Clinch of Barnet entertained the publick at the Queen's-arms tavern, Ludgate-hill, for one shilling each, by imitations with his voice of the Flute, double Curtel, the Organ with three voices, the Horn, Huntsman, and Pack of Hounds, the Bells, &c. &c.
Dawks's News-letter of April 2, 1713, has the following article: "Yesterday a trial of skill was fought at the Bear-garden between Henry Clements and Parks of Coventry, _where there was good sport, hacking and hewing_. It is thought they got 50_l._ apiece, the French ambassador being there, _and giving them money very liberally_." Soon after three bouts "at threshing flail" were announced; and a flourish of "no cut, no bout."
A Renter's share in Drury-lane Theatre was advertised for sale June 1714 (a 36th) the terms 170_l._ for 23 years: 2_s. per_ night for acting days, and free admission.
The Weekly Packet of Nov. 6 says, "Christopher Rich, Esq. the patentee of the Playhouse, and a great encourager of poetical performances, died two days since without seeing his new Theatre in Lincoln's-inn-fields perfected, which is left to the care, with other legacies, of his eldest son Mr. John Rich." The same paper adds, Nov. 13, that Mr. Rich, driven from the Theatre of Drury lane by his rebellious subjects, was buried at St. Andrew's Holborn from his house adjoining the King's Theatre, accompanied by several of those who had resisted his authority when living.
And in the publication of December 18, is the following paragraph: "This day the new Playhouse in Lincoln's-inn-fields is to be opened, and a comedy acted there called _The Recruiting Officer_ by the company that act under the patent, though it is said that some of the gentlemen who have left the house in Drury-lane for that service are ordered to return to their colours, upon pain of not exercising their lungs elsewhere; which may in time prove of ill service to the patentee, that has been at vast expence to make his Theatre as convenient for the reception of an audience as any one can possibly be."
The King and his Family were either really or _politically_ partial to Drury-lane, in preference to the Italian Opera; and visited the former frequently.
The King's licence under the great seal was granted, in January 1715, to Richard Steele, Esq. to form and keep a company of Comedians, to be styled "The Royal Company of Comedians."
The Evening Post of March 19, 1715, announced, "On Monday next the 21st of March the Bowling-green at Mary-le-bon will be opened, by order of the Nobility and Gentry."
The Weekly Packet of June 25, 1715, shews in few words the extravagant patronage bestowed on the Italian actors at that time: "Seignior Nicolini's quail pipe continues to _lug_ the nobility and gentry by the ears, who have gone very far on his last benefit night towards equipping him for another purchase at Venice, he having already built a stately edifice there near the Rialto, upon which is written, in characters of gold, _Villa Britannica_, as a testimony that Scaliger's saying that we are _hospitibus feri_ is a downright untruth, and falsely imputed to our Nation."
George I. seems to have been partial to aquatic excursions. On the 22d of August, 1715, the King, Prince, and Princess of Wales, and a numerous party of Nobility, went with musick on board their barges from Whitehall to Limehouse. When they returned in the evening, the captains of the shipping suspended lanterns in their rigging, and the houses on both sides of the river were illuminated; an incredible number of boats filled with spectators attended the Royal party, and cannon were continually fired during the day and evening. This amusement is repeatedly noticed in the papers.
Several years elapsed without the least notice of Bartholomew Fair; but Dawks's News-letter of August 27, 1715, mentions, "On Wednesday Bartholomew Fair began, to which we hear the greatest number of black cattle was brought that ever was known. It seems there is not a public licence for booths and plays as formerly; but there is one great play-house erected in the middle of Smithfield for the King's players (as they are called). The booth is the largest that ever was built, and abundance of puppet-shews and other shews are set out in the houses round Smithfield, and public raffling and gaming in the Cloisters (of St. Bartholomew's Hospital), so that the Fair is almost as much resorted to as formerly."
I have hitherto described the amusements of the Londoners on _terra firma_; the frost of 1715-16 enables me to shew how they gamboled on the Thames when frozen. The following advertisement leads the way: "This is to give notice to gentlemen and others that pass upon the Thames during this frost, that over against Whitehall-stairs, they may have their names printed, fit to paste in any book to hand down the memory of the season to posterity.
You that walk there, and do design to tell Your Children's children what this year befel, Go print your names, and take _a dram_ within; For such a year as this has seldom been."
Dawks's News-letter of Jan. 14 says, "The Thames seems now a solid rock of ice; and booths for the sale of brandy, wine, ale, and other exhilarating liquors, have been fixed there for some time. But now it is in a manner like a town: thousands of people cross it, and with wonder view the mountainous heaps of water that now lie congealed into ice. On Thursday a great Cook's-shop was erected there, and gentlemen went as frequently to dine as at any ordinary. Over against Westminster, Whitehall, and Whitefriars, printing-presses are kept upon the ice, where many persons have their names printed, to transmit the wonders of the season to their posterity."
Coaches, Waggons, Carts, &c. are said to have been driven over it; and an Enthusiast preached to a motley congregation _on the mighty waters_, with a zeal fiery enough to have thawed himself through the ice, had it been susceptible of religious warmth. This and other diversions attracted the attention of many of the Nobility, and even tempted the Prince of Wales to visit _Frost Fair_.
On that day there was an uncommonly high spring tide, which overflowed the cellars on the borders of the River, and raised the ice full fourteen feet without interrupting the people from their pursuits.
The Protestant Packet of this period observes, that the Theatres were almost deserted.
The News-letter of February 15 announces the dissolution of the ice, and with it the "baseless fabrick" on which Momus had held his temporary reign. The above paper enables me to conclude this article, as I began it, with a scrap of doggrel:
"Thou beauteous river Thames, whose standing tide Equals the glory of thy flowing pride, The City, nay the World's transferr'd to thee, Fix'd as the land, and richer than the sea. The various metals Nature can produce, Or Art improve for ornament or use, From the Earth's deepest bowels brought are made To shine on thee, and carry on the trade. Here Guilleaum, fam'd for making silver pass Through various forms---- And Sparks as fam'd for brass. There's T----, 'tween God and gold who ne'er stood neuter, And trusty Nicholson, who lives by pewter; Wrote o'er their doors having affix'd their names, We under-writ removed to the Thames, Who on the slippery substance seek their food, Some miles together for the common good. Here healing Port-wine, and there Rhenish flows, Here Bohea-tea, and there Tobacco _grows_. In one place you may meet good Cheshire cheese, And in another whitest Brentford peas; Here is King George's picture, there Queen Anne's, Now nut-brown ale in cups and then in canns; One sells an Oxford dram as good as can be, Another offers General Peper's brandy. See! there's the Mall, and in that little hut The best Geneva's sold, and love to boot. See there a sleek Venetian envoy walks; See here an Alderman more proudly stalks. Behold the French Ambassador, that's he; And this is the honest Sire and Captain Leigh. Here is St. James's street, yonder the Strand: In this place Bowyer plies; that's Lintot's stand."
The Societies of the two Temples gave grand entertainments at their Halls to the Lord Chancellor and many of the Nobility in February; but the most remarkable accompaniment to these convivial meetings was the representation of the comedy of _The Chances_, performed within the greater Hall by the Comedians of Drury-lane Theatre.
The present representatives of the Societies will forgive my transition from their elegant amusements to those of a Bear-garden, "the back-side of Soho-square," where the proprietors had an amphitheatre of three gradations; the lowest of which let at 2_s._ 6_d._ for each seat, the next 5_s._ and the third 10_s._ 6_d._ There, "at the desire of several persons of Quality," a Leopard, twelve feet in length, was advertised to be baited to death on the 24th of March; and gentlemen who chose to risk their dogs were permitted to assist in the destruction of this monstrous animal, which appears to have been the first so used within the century. The Leopard was shewn with other beasts in a room "at the boarded-house, Mary-le-bon-fields." We will leave the "Quality" in full enjoyment of their classical entertainment; and follow another description of citizens to Wanstead, where a female had long resided, who annually attracted notice by the following advertisement, in which she then mentioned her age for the first time: "This is to give notice to all my honoured masters and ladies, and the rest of my loving friends, that _my lady_ Butterfield gives a challenge to ride a horse, to leap a horse, or run on foot, or halloo, with any woman in England seven years younger, but not a day older, _because I won't undervalue_ myself, being now 74 years of age. My Feast will be the last Wednesday of this month, April, where there will be good entertainment for that day and all the year after in Wanstead in Essex."
From a paragraph in a newspaper we subsequently find the Boarded House at Mary-le-bon to have been used as a Theatre for Pugilism.
The Prince of Wales frequently visited the Theatre during his father's first absence in Germany. The visit of Thursday night the 6th of December, 1716, appears to have been a dangerous one, and very similar to that of his successor George III. in May 1799; and, what is more remarkable, Drury-lane was the place selected for a Royal assassination twice within a century. A Mr. Freeman attempted to enter a box facing the Prince's in a very coarse dress, which excited suspicion of the Box-keeper, who, with the assistance of a centinel, discovered a pistol under his coat; this he immediately discharged at the Soldier, and wounded him in the neck; but before he could accomplish farther mischief, the people knocked him down, and, searching his person, found other loaded pistols. These circumstances led to farther enquiries, when it was found that he had a servant in waiting with a horse at the door of the Theatre. It is observed in the papers which relate this occurrence, that the Prince evinced no signs of agitation, though there was every reason to suppose the assassin aimed at his life; and in this particular he has been emulated by his present Majesty under more trying circumstances.
Mr. Freeman committed horrid outrages some time after his commitment to Newgate, which he commenced by a pretended quarrel with a woman occasionally admitted to his cell. Two of the keepers proceeding to the spot found Freeman without the door, who immediately stabbed Mr. Russell in the breast with a rusty fork he had held in his hand behind him, and then returned to his room, shutting the door, which he refused to open. A guard of Soldiers was called by Mr. Smith, who endeavoured to force it open; and an unfortunate man introducing his hand, Freeman, who was upon the watch, almost severed it with a knife from the wrist. They then threatened to fire through the door: this alarmed him, and he opened it; but the Soldiers met with a fierce resistance in attempting to secure him; and he actually overpowered two ere he was mastered and conveyed to the condemned hole. It is singular that during this contest he had planned the firing of Newgate; and his handkerchief was found burning within his hat in a convenient part of the room for communication. Freeman was afterwards tried at Kingston for the murder of a Trooper, and acquitted as a lunatic.
Moorfields was occasionally used by Showmen and Merry-andrews as their Theatre. The Act of the 12th of Queen Anne was aimed at the suppression of these low amusements. The proprietors of them, fearful of the penalties annexed, endeavoured to prevail upon Mr. Justice Fuller to license them in April 1717, but in vain. Finding this worthy Magistrate obdurate, they ventured to begin their operations; which he was no sooner acquainted with, than he assembled thirty constables, and issued his warrant, supported by the signature of Mr. Rand for their apprehension. When the High Constable and his posse proceeded to Windmill-hill, they found it occupied by Messrs. Saunders and Margaret, two Middlesex Justices, who forbade the execution of the warrant, and declared they would protect the Showmen. The intrepid Fuller, conscious of his own rectitude, commanded the arrest of the principals, which was promptly obeyed; and when conveyed to his residence at Clerkenwell, he committed them to the House of Correction, where they had been but a few hours, when three other _upright Magistrates_ set them at liberty.
The next occurrence under this head seems perfectly in unison with the preceding articles: the proprietors of the Boarded House Soho advertised a savage entertainment for the 21st of May, 1717, which required the support of such Magistrates as Margaret and Saunders, and such spectators as Freeman. They had, during the period between the baiting of the Leopard and May 21, refined upon cruelty to the very _acme_, and were ready to exhibit an African Tiger on a stage four feet high worried by six bull and bear dogs, for 100_l._; a mad bull, and a bear, both covered with fire-works; and, lest those pleasant spectacles should fail to amuse, six young men were to play _at blunts_; in other words he that broke most heads obtained a hat. The miscreants had even the audacity to conclude their detestable advertisement with "_Vivat Rex_."
Tottenham Court-road was another place of resort for the lower orders of society; and their successors even now presume at Easter and Whitsuntide to set order and magistracy at defiance. "Information having been given upon oath to divers of his Majesty's Justices of the Peace for the County of Middlesex, that several lewd and disorderly persons, and players of interludes, had erected booths and sheds at Tottenham-Court in the County of Middlesex aforesaid, wherein were used a great deal of prophane cursing and swearing, together with many lewd and blasphemous expressions, as also several rude, riotous, and disorderly actions committed; eleven of his Majesty's Justices, having duly considered the evil tendency of such wicked and abominable practices, for suppression thereof, and for preventing the like for the future, granted a warrant under their hands and seals, dated the 10th instant, for the apprehension of several of the persons concerned in the management of the said interludes, which hath since been put in execution, and the same have been suppressed accordingly, and the said booths and sheds pulled down and taken away[148:A]."
On Friday evening September 13 several Constables visited Southwark, and particularly Penkethman's booth, whom they apprehended, with others of his company, just as they had concluded a play, and in the presence of near 150 noblemen and gentlemen seated on the stage. They were soon liberated, on making it appear that they were the King's servants. The Prince visited this booth.
In the same month Mr. Rich assigned his patent granted by Charles II. and his right in the New Theatre, Lincoln's-inn-fields, to Messrs. Keene and Bullock, who commenced their reign with the performance of Cymbeline.