XVII.THE THEATRE.

“Bounce, Jupiter, bounce!”—O’Hara.

Ladies and Gentlemen,

As it is now the universally-admitted, and indeed pretty-generally-suspected, aim of Mr. Whitbread and the infamous, bloodthirsty, and, in fact, illiberal faction to which he belongs, to burn to the ground this free and happy Protestant city, and establish himself in St. James’s Palace, his fellow committeemen have thought it their duty to watch the principles of a theatre built under his auspices. The information they have received from an undoubted authority—particularly from an old fruit-woman who has turned king’s evidence, and whose name, for obvious reasons, we forbear to mention, though we have had it some weeks in our possession—has induced them to introduce various reforms—not such reforms as the vile faction clamour for, meaning thereby revolution, but such reformsas are necessary to preserve the glorious constitution of the only free, happy, and prosperous country now left upon the face of the earth. From the valuable and authentic source above alluded to, we have learnt that a sanguinary plot has been formed by some United Irishmen, combined with a gang of Luddites, and a special committee sent over by the Pope at the instigation of the beastly Corsican fiend, for destroying all the loyal part of the audience on the anniversary of that deeply-to-be-abhorred-and-highly-to-be-blamed stratagem, the Gunpowder Plot, which falls this year on Thursday the fifth of November. The whole is under the direction of a delegated committee of O. P.’s whose treasonable exploits at Covent Garden you all recollect, and all of whom would have been hung from the chandeliers at that time, but for the mistaken lenity of Government. At a given signal, a well-known O. P. was to cry out from the gallery, “Nosey! Music!” whereupon all the O. P.’s were to produce from their inside pockets a long pair of shears, edged with felt, to prevent their making any noise, manufactured expressly by a wretch at Birmingham, one of Mr. Brougham’s evidences, and now in custody. With these they were to cut off the heads of all the loyal N. P.’s in the house, without distinction of sex or age. At the signal, similarly given, of “Throw him over!” which it now appears always alluded to the overthrow of our never-sufficiently-enough-to-be-deeply-and-universally-to-be-venerated constitution, all the heads of the N. P.’s were to be thrown at the fiddlers, to prevent their appearing in evidence, or perhaps as a false and illiberal insinuation that they have no heads of their own. All that we know of the further designs of these incendiaries is, that they are by-a-great-deal-too-much-too-horrible-to-be-mentioned.

The Manager has acted with his usual promptitude on this trying occasion. He has contracted for 300 tons of gun powder, which are at this moment placed in a small barrel under the pit; and a descendant of Guy Faux, assisted by Col. Congreve, has undertaken to blow up the house, when necessary, in so novel and ingenious a manner, that every O. P. shall be annihilated, while not a whisker of the N. P.’s shall be singed. This strikingly displays the advantages of loyalty and attachment to government. Several other hints have been taken from the theatrical regulations of the not-a-bit-the-less-on-that-account-to-be-universally-execrated monster Bonaparte. A park of artillery, provided with chain-shot, is to be stationed on the stage, and play upon the audience, in case of any indication of misplaced applause or popular discontent (which accounts for the large space between the curtain and the lamps); and the public will participate our satisfaction in learning that the indecorous custom of standing up with the hat on is to be abolished, as the Bow-street officers are provided with daggers, and have orders to stab all such persons to the heart, and send their bodies to Surgeons’ Hall. Gentlemen who cough are only to be slightly wounded. Fruit-women bawling “Bill of the Play!” are to be forthwith shot, for which purpose soldiers will be stationed in the slips, and ball-cartridge is to be served out with the lemonade. If any of the spectators happen to sneeze or spit, they are to be transported for life; and any person who is so tall as to prevent another seeing, is to be dragged out and sent on board the tender, or, by an instrument to be taken out of the pocket of Procrustes, to be forthwith cut shorter, either at the head or foot, according as his own convenience may dictate.

Thus, ladies and gentlemen, have the committee, throughmy medium, set forth the not-in-a-hurry-to-be-paralleled plan they have adopted for preserving order and decorum within the walls of their magnificent edifice. Nor have they, while attentive to their own concerns, by any means overlooked those of the cities of London and Westminster. Finding on enumeration that they have, with a with-two-hands-and-one-tongue-to be-applauded liberality, contracted for more gunpowder than they want, they have parted with the surplus to the mattock-carrying and hustings-hammering high-bailiff of Westminster, who has, with his own shovel, dug a large hole in the front of the parish-church of St. Paul, Covent Garden, that, upon the least symptom of ill-breeding in the mob at the general election, the whole of the market may be blown into the air. This, ladies and gentlemen, may at first make provisionsrise, but we pledge the credit of our theatre that they will soonfallagain, and people be supplied, as usual, with vegetables, in the in-general-strewed-with-cabbage-stalks-but-on-Saturday-night-lighted-up-with-lamps market of Covent Garden.

I should expatiate more largely on the other advantages of the glorious constitution of these by-the-whole-of-Europe-envied realms, but I am called away to take an account of the ladies and other artificial flowers at a fashionable rout, of which a full and particular account will hereafter appear. For the present, my fashionable intelligence is scanty, on account of the opening of Drury Lane; and the ladies and gentlemen who honour me will not be surprised to find nothing under my usual head!!

ByTHE REV. G. C.[85]

[THE REV. GEORGE CRABBE.]

[Mr. Crabbe died 3rd February, 1832, in his 78th year.]

“Nil intentatum nostri liquêre poetæ,Nec minimum meruêre decus, veetigia GræcaAusi deserere, et celebrare domestica facta.”Hor.

“Nil intentatum nostri liquêre poetæ,Nec minimum meruêre decus, veetigia GræcaAusi deserere, et celebrare domestica facta.”

Hor.

Ifthe following poem should be fortunate enough to be selected for the opening address, a few words of explanation may be deemed necessary, on my part, to avert invidious misrepresentation. The animadversion I have thought it right to make on the noise created by tuning the orchestra will, I hope, give no lasting remorse to any of the gentlemen employed in the band. It is to be desired that they would keep their instruments ready tuned, and strike off at once. This would be an accommodation to many well-meaning persons who frequent the theatre, who, not being blest with the ear of St. Cecilia, mistake the tuning for the overture, and think the latter concluded before it is begun.

—“One fiddle willGive, half-ashamed, a tiny flourish still,”

was originally written “one hautboy will;” but, having providentially been informed, when this poem was on the point of being sent off, that there is but one hautboy in the band, I averted the storm of popular and manageriaindignation from the head of its blower: as it now stands, “one fiddle” among many, the faulty individual will, I hope, escape detection. The story of the flying play-bill is calculated to expose a practice much too common, of pinning play-bills to the cushions insecurely, and frequently, I fear, not pinning them at all, if these lines save one play-bill only front the fate I have recorded, I shall not deem my labour ill employed. The concluding episode of Patrick Jennings glances at the boorish fashion of wearing the hat in the one-shilling gallery. Had Jennings thrust his between his feet at the commencement of the play, he might have leaned forward with impunity, and the catastrophe I relate would not have occurred. The line of handkerchiefs formed to enable him to recover his loss, is purposely so crossed in texture and materials as to mislead the reader in respect to the real owner of any one of them: for, in the statistical view of life and manners which I occasionally present, my clerical profession has taught me how extremely improper it would be, by any allusion, however slight, to give any uneasiness, however trivial, to any individual, however foolish or wicked.

G. C.[88]

Interior of a Theatre described.—Pit gradually fills.—The Check-taker.—Pit full.—The Orchestra tuned.—One fiddle rather dilatory.—Is reproved—and repents.—Evolutions of a Playbill.—Its final Settlement on the Spikes.—The Gods taken to task—and why.—Motley Group of Play-goers.—Holywell Street, St. Pancras.—Emanuel Jennings binds his Son apprentice—not in London—and why.—Episode of the Hat.

’Tis sweet to view, from half-past five to six,Our long wax-candles, with short cotton wicks,Touch’d by the lamplighter’s Promethean art,Start into light, and make the lighter start;To see red Phoebus through the gallery-paneTinge with his beam the beams of Drury Lane;While gradual parties fill our widen’d pit,And gape, and gaze, and wonder, ere they sit.

At first, while vacant seats give choice and ease,Distant or near, they settle where they please;But when the multitude contracts the span,And seats are rare, they settle where they can.

Now the full benches to late-comers doomNo room for standing, miscall’dstanding-room.

Hark! the check-taker moody silence breaks,And bawling “Pit full!” gives the check he takes;Yet onward still the gathering numbers cram,Contending crowders shout rise frequent damn,And all is bustle, squeeze, row, jabbering, and jam.

See to their desks Apollo’s sons repair—Swift rides the rosin o’er the horse’s hairIn unison their various tones to tune,Murmurs the hautboy, growls the hoarse bassoon;In soft vibration sighs the whispering lute,Tang goes the harpsichord, too-too the flute,Brays the loud trumpet, squeaks the fiddle sharp,Winds the French horn, and twangs the tingling harp;Till, like great Jove, the leader, figuring in,Attunes to order the chaotic din.Now all seems hush’d—but no, one fiddle willGive, half-ashamed, a tiny flourish still.Foil’d in his crash, the leader of the clanReproves with frowns the dilatory man:Then on his candlestick thrice taps his bow,Nods a new signal, and away they go.

Perchance, while pit and gallery cry “Hats off!”And awed Consumption checks his chided cough,Some giggling daughter of the Queen of LoveDrops, reft of pin, her play-bill from above;Like Icarus, while laughing galleries clap,Soars, ducks, and dives in air the printed scrap;But, wiser far than he, combustion fears,And, as it flies, eludes the chandeliers;Till, sinking gradual, with repeated twirl,It settles, curling, on a fiddler’s curl,Who from his powder’d pate the intruder strikes,And, for mere malice, sticks it on the spikes.

Say, why these Babel strains from Babel tongues?Who’s that calls “Silence!” with such leathern lungs?He who, in quest of quiet, “Silence!” hoots,Is apt to make the hubbub he imputes.

What various swains our motley walls contain!—Fashion from Moorfields, honour from Chick Lane;Bankers from Paper Buildings here resort,Bankrupts from Golden Square and Riches Court;From the Haymarket canting rogues in grain,Gulls from the Poultry, sots from Water Lane;The lottery-cormorant, the auction-shark,The full-price master, and the half-price clerk;Boys who long linger at the gallery-door,With pence twice five—they want but twopence more,Till some Samaritan the twopence spares,And sends them jumping up the gallery-stairs.

Critics we boast who ne’er their malice balk,But talk their minds—we wish they’d mind their talk;Big-worded bullies, who by quarrels live—Who give the lie, and tell the lie they give;Jews from St. Mary Axe,[91]for jobs so wary,That for old clothes they’d even axe St. Mary;And bucks with pockets empty as their pate,Lax in their gaiters, laxer in their gait;Who oft, when we our house lock up, carouseWith tippling tipstaves in a lock-up house.

Yet here, as elsewhere, Chance can joy bestow,Where scowling Fortune seem’d to threaten woe.

John Richard William Alexander DwyerWas footman to Justinian Stubbs, Esquire;But when John Dwyer listed in the Blues,Emanuel Jennings polish’d Stubbs’s shoes.Emanuel Jennings brought his youngest boyUp as a corn-cutter—a safe employ;In Holywell Street, St. Pancras, he was bred(At number twenty-seven, it is said),Facing the pump, and near the Granby’s Head:He would have bound him to some shop in town,But with a premium he could not come down.Pat was the urchin’s name—a red-hair’d youth,Fonder of purl and skittle-grounds than truth.

Silence, ye gods! to keep your tongues in awe,The Muse shall tell an accident she saw.

Pat Jennings in the upper gallery sat,But, leaning forward, Jennings lost his hatDown from the gallery the beaver flew,And spurn’d the one to settle in the two.How shall he act? Pay at the gallery-doorTwo shillings for what cost, when new, but four?Or till half-price, to save his shilling, wait,And gain his hat again at half-past eight?Now, while his fears anticipate a thief,John Mullens whispers, “ Take my handkerchief.”“Thank you,” cries Pat; “but one won’t make a line.”“Take mine,” cried Wilson; and cried Stokes, “Take mine.”A motley cable soon Pat Jennings ties,Where Spitalfields with real India vies.Like Iris’ bow down darts the painted clue,Starr’d, striped, and spotted, yellow, red, and blue,Old calico, torn silk, and muslin new.George Green below, with palpitating hand,Loops the last ’kerchief to the beaver’s band—Uproars the prize! The youth, with joy unfeign’d,Regain’d the felt, and felt what he regain’d;While to the applauding galleries grateful PatMade a low bow, and touch’d the ransom’d hat.

Gentlemen,

Happening to be wool-gathering at the foot of Mount Parnassus, I was suddenly seized with a violent travestie in the head. The first symptoms I felt were several triple rhymes floating about my brain, accompanied by a singing in my throat, which quickly communicated itself to the ears of everybody about me, and made me a burthen to my friends and a torment to Doctor Apollo; three of whose favourite servants—that is to say, Macbeth, his butcher; Mrs. Haller, his cook; and George Barnwell, his book-keeper—I waylaid in one of my fits of insanity, and mauled after a very frightful fashion. In this woeful crisis, I accidentally heard of your invaluable New Patent Hissing Pit, which cures every disorder incident to Grub Street. I send you inclosed a more detailed specimen of my case: if you could mould it into the shape of an address, to be said or sung on the first night of your performance, I have no doubt that I should feel the immediate effects of your invaluable New Patent Hissing Pit, of which they tell me one hiss is a dose.

I am, &c.,Momus Medlar.

[EnterMacbethin a red nightcap.Pagefollowing with a torch.]

Go, boy, and thy good mistress tell(She knows that my purpose is cruel),I’d thank her to tingle her bellAs soon as she’s heated my gruel.Go, get thee to bed and repose—To sit up so late is a scandal;But ere you have ta’en off your clothes,Be sure that you put out that candle.Ri fol de rol tol de rol lol.

My stars, in the air here’s a knife!I’m sure it cannot be a hum;I’ll catch at the handle, add’s life!And then I shall not cut my thumb.I’ve got him!—no, at him again!Come, come, I’m not fond of these jokes;This must be some blade of the brain—Those witches are given to hoax.

I’ve one in my pocket, I know,My wife left on purpose behind her;She bought this of Teddy-high-ho,The poor Caledonian grinder.I see thee again! o’er thy middleLarge drops of red blood now are spill’d,Just as much as to say, diddle diddle,Good Duncan, pray come and be kill’d.

It leads to his chamber, I swear;I tremble and quake every joint—No dog at the scent of a hareEver yet made a cleverer point.Ah, no! ’twas a dagger of straw—Give me blinkers, to save me from starting;The knife that I thought that I sawWas nought but my eye, Betty Martin.

Now o’er this terrestrial hiveA life paralytic is spread;For while the one half is alive,The other is sleepy and dead.King Duncan, in grand majesty,Has got my state-bed for a snooze;I’ve lent him my slippers, so IMay certainly stand in his shoes.

Blow softly, ye murmuring gales!Ye feet, rouse no echo in walking!For though a dead man tells no tales,Dead walls are much given to talking.This knife shall be in at the death—I’ll stick him, then off safely get!Cries the world, this could not be Macbeth.For he’d ne’er stick at anything yet.

Hark, hark! ’tis the signal, by goles!It sounds like a funeral knell;O, hear it hot, Duncan! it tollsTo call thee to heaven or hell.Or if you to heaven won’t fly,But rather prefer Pluto’s ether,Only wait a few years till I die,And we’ll go to the devil together.Ri fol de rol, &c.

Whohas e’er been at Drury must needs know the StrangerA wailing old Methodist, gloomy and wan,A husband suspicious—his wife acted Ranger,She took to her heels, and left poor Hypocon.Her martial gallant swore that truth was a libel,That marriage was thraldom, elopement no sin;Quoth she, I remember the words of my Bible—My spouse is a Stranger, and I’ll take him in.With my sentimentalibus lachrymæ roar ’em,And pathos and bathos delightful to see;And chop and change ribs, à-la-mode Germanorum,And high diddle ho diddle, pop tweedle dee.

To keep up her dignity no longer rich enough,Where was her plate?—why, ’twas laid on the shelf;Her land fuller’s earth, and her great riches kitchen-stuff—Dressing the dinner instead of herself.No longer permitted in diamonds to sparkle,Now plain Mrs. Haller, of servants the dread,With a heart full of grief, and a pan full of charcoal,She lighted the company up to their bed.

Incensed at her flight, her poor Hubby in dudgeonRoam’d after his rib in a gig and a pout,Till, tired with his journey, the peevish curmudgeonSat down and blubber’d just like a church-spout.One day, on a bench as dejected and sad he laid,Hearing a squash, he cried, Damn it, what’s that?’Twas a child of the count’s, in whose service lived Adelaide,Soused in the river, and squall’d like a cat.

Having drawn his young excellence up to the bank, itAppear’d that himself was all dripping, I swear;No wonder he soon became dry as a blanket,Exposed as he was to the count’ssonandheir.Dear Sir, quoths the count, in reward of your valour,To show that my gratitude is not mere talk,You shall eat a beefsteak with my cook, Mrs. Haller,Cut from the rump with her own knife and fork.

Behold, now the count gave the Stranger a dinner,With gunpowder-tea, which you know brings a ball,And, thin as he was, that he might not glow thinner,He made of the Stranger no stranger at all.At dinner fair Adelaide brought up a chicken—A bird that she never had met with before;But, seeing him, scream’d, and was carried off kicking,And he bang’d his nob ’gainst the opposite door.

To finish my tale without roundaboutation,Young master and missee besieged their papa;They sung a quartetto in grand blubberation—The Stranger cried Oh! Mrs. Haller cried Ah!Though pathos and sentiment largely are dealt in,I have no good moral to give in exchange;For though she, as a cook, might be given to melting,The Stranger’s behaviour was certainly strange,With this sentimentalibus lachrymæ roar ’em,And pathos and bathos delightful to see,And chop and change ribs, à-la-mode Germanorum,And high diddle ho diddle, pop tweedle dee.

George Barnwell stood at the shop-door,A customer hoping to find, sir;His apron was hanging before,But the tail of his coat was behind, sir.A lady, so painted and smart,Cried, Sir, I’ve exhausted my stock o’ late;I’ve got nothing left but a groat—Could you give me four penn’orth of chocolate?Rum ti, &c.

Her face was rouged up to the eyes,Which made her look prouder and prouder;His hair stood on end with surprise,And hers with pomatum and powder.The business was soon understood;The lady, who wish’d to be more rich,Cries, Sweet sir, my name is Milwood,And I lodge at the Gunner’s in Shoreditch.Rum ti, &c.

Now nightly he stole out, good lack!And into her lodging would pop, sir;And often forgot to come back,Leaving master to shut up the shop, sir.Her beauty his wits did bereave—Determined to be quite the crack O,He lounged at the Adam and Eve,And call’d for his gin and tobacco.Rum ti, &c.

And now—for the truth must be told,Though none of a ’prentice should speak ill—He stole from the till all the gold,And ate the lump-sugar and treacle.In vain did his master exclaim,Dear George, don’t engage with that dragon;She’ll lead you to sorrow and shame,And leave you the devil a rag on.Your rum ti, &c.

In vain he entreats and imploresThe weak and incurable ninny,So kicks him at last out of doors,And Georgy soon spends his last guinea.His uncle, whose generous purseHad often relieved him, as I know,Now finding him grow worse and worse,Refused to come down with the rhino.Rum ti, &c.

Cried Milwood, whose cruel heart’s coreWas so flinty that nothing could shock it,If ye mean to come here any more,Pray come with more cash in your pocket:Make Nunky surrender his dibs,Rub his pate with a pair of lead towels,Or stick a knife into his ribs—I’ll warrant he’ll then show some bowels.Rum ti, &c.

A pistol he got from his love—’Twas loaded with powder and bullet;He trudged off to Camberwell Grove,But wanted the courage to pull it.There’s Nunky as fat as a hog,While I am as lean as a lizard;Here’s at you, you stingy old dog!—And he whips a long knife in his gizzard.Rum ti, &c.

All you who attend to my song,A terrible end of the farce shall see,If you join the inquisitive throngThat follow’d poor George to the Marshalsea.If Milwood were here, dash my wigs,Quoth he, I would pummel and lam her well;Had I stuck to my prunes and figs,I ne’er had stuck Nunky at Camberwell.Rum ti, &c.

Their bodies were never cut down;For granny relates with amazement,A witch bore ’em over the town,And hung them on Thorowgood’s casement,The neighbours, I’ve heard the folks say,The miracle noisily brag on;And the shop is, to this very day,The sign of the George and the Dragon,Rum ti, &c.

BY T. H.[102]

[Mr. Hook died 24th August, 1841, in his 53rd year.]

“Rhymes the rudders are of verses,With which, like ships, they steer their courses.”Hudibras.

“Rhymes the rudders are of verses,With which, like ships, they steer their courses.”

Hudibras.

Scene draws,and discoversPunchon a throne,surrounded byLear,Lady Macbeth,Macbeth,Othello,George Barnwell,Hamlet,Ghost,Macheath,Juliet,Frair,Apothecary,Romeo,andFalstaff.—Punchdescends and addresses them in the following

RECITATIVE.

As manager of horses Mr. Merryman is,So I with you am master of the ceremonies—These grand rejoicings. Let me see, how name ye ’em?—Oh, in Greek lingo ’tis E-pi-thalamium.October’s tenth it is: toss up each hat to-day,And celebrate with shouts our opening Saturday!

On this great night ’tis settled by our manager,That we, to please great Johnny Bull, should plan a jeer,Dance a bang-up theatrical cotillion,And put on tuneful Pegasus a pillion;That every soul, whether or not a cough he has,May kick like Harlequin, and sing like Orpheus.So come, ye pupils of Sir John Gallini,[103a]Spin up a tetotum like Angiolini:[103b]That John and Mrs. Bull, from ale and tea-houses,May shout huzza for Punch’s Apotheosis!

They dance and sing.

Air, “Sure such a day.”—Tom Thumb.

LEAR.

Dance, Regan! dance, with Cordelia and Goneril—Down the middle, up again, poussette, and cross;Stop, Cordelia! do not tread upon her heel,Regan feeds on coltsfoot, and kicks like a horse.See, she twists her mutton fists like Molyneux or Beelzebub,And t’other’s clack, who pats her back, is louder far than hell’s hubbub.They tweak my nose, and round it goes—I fear they’ll break the ridge of it,Or leave it all just like Vauxhall, with only half the bridge of it.[103c]

OMNES.

Round let us bound, for this is Punch’s holyday,Glory to Tomfoolery, huzza! huzza!

LADY MACBETH.

Ikill’d the king; my husband is a heavy dunce;He left the grooms unmassacred, then massacred the stud.One loves long gloves; for mittens, like king’s evidence,Let truth with the fingers out, and won’t hide blood.

MACBETH.

When spoonys on two knees implore the aid of sorcery,To suit their wicked purposes they quickly put the laws awry;With Adam I in wife may vie, for none could tell the use of her,Except to cheapen golden pippins hawk’d about by Lucifer.

OMNES.

Round let us bound, for this is Punch’s holyday,Glory to Tomfoolery, huzza! huzza!

OTHELLO.

Wife, come to life, forgive what your black lover did,Spit the feathers from your mouth, and munch roast beef;Iago he may go and be toss’d in the coverletThat smother’d you, because you pawn’d my handkerchief.

GEORGE BARNWELL.

Why, neger, so eager about your rib immaculate?Milwood shows for hanging us they’ve got an ugly knack o’ late;If on beauty ’stead of duty but one peeper bent he sees,Satan waits with Dolly baits to hook in us apprentices.

OMNES.

Round let us bound, for this is Punch’s holyday,Glory to Tomfoolery, huzza! huzza!

HAMLET.

I’m Hamlet in camlet; my ap and peri-heliaThe moon can fix, which lunatics makes sharp or flat.I stuck by ill luck, enamour’d of Ophelia,Old Polony like a sausage, and exclaim’d, “Rat, rat!”

GHOST.

Let Gertrude sup the poison’d cup—no more I’ll be an actor inSuch sorry food, but drink home-brew’d of Whitbread’s manufacturing.

MACHEATH.

I’ll Polly it, and folly it, and dance it quite the dandy O;But as for tunes, I have but one, and that is Drops of Brandy O.

OMNES.

Round let us bound, for this is Punch’s holyday,Glory to Tomfoolery, huzza! huzza!

JULIET.

I’m Juliet Capulet, who took a dose of hellebore—A hell-of-a-bore I found it to put on a pall.

FRIAR.

And I am the friar, who so corpulent a belly bore.

APOTHECARY.

And that is why poor skinny I have none at all.

ROMEO.

I’m the resurrection-man, of buried bodies amorous.

FALSTAFF.

I’m fagg’d to death, and out of breath, and am for quiet clamorous;For though my paunch is round and stanch, I ne’er begin to feel it ere IFeel that I have no stomach left for entertainment military.

OMNES.

Round let us bound, for this is Punch’s holyday,Glory to Tomfoolery, huzza! huzza!

[Exeunt dancing.

THE END.

LONDON:PRINTED BY WILLIAM CLOWES AND SONS, LIMITED,STAMFORD STREET AND CHARING CROSS.

[0a]See Note at p. xiv.

[0b]12mo., 1833. The first published by Mr. Murray. The “Preface” was written by Horace Smith; the “Notes” to the Poems by James Smith.

[0c]Samuel Whitbread, M.P. He died by his own hand in 1815.

[0d]This was Horatio, the writer of the present Preface. The envelope which enclosed his Address to the Committee was sold with two volumes of the original Addresses at Mr. Winston’s sale, Dec. 14, 1849, and was inscribed inside “Horatio Smith, 36, Basinghall Street.”

[0e]The passage, as originally written, continued thus: “and among others, so difficult is it to form a correct judgment in catering to the public taste, by the very bibliopolist who has now, after an interval of twenty [onlyseven] years, purchased the copyright from a brother bookseller, and ventured upon the present edition.” To this, on the proof-sheet, the late Mr. Murray appended the following note:—“I never saw or even had the MS. in my possession; but knowing that Mr. Smith was brother-in-law to Mr. Cadell, I took it for granted that the MS. had been previously offered to him and declined.” Mr. H. Smith consequently drew his pen through the passage.

[0f]Between 1807 and 1810. TheMonthly Mirrorwas edited by Edward Du Bois, author of “My Pocket-Book,” and by Thomas Hill; the original Paul Pry; and the Hull of Mr. Theodore Hook’s novel of “Gilbert Gurney.”

[0g]Miss Lydia White, celebrated for her lively wit and for her blue-stocking parties, unrivalled, it is said, in “the soft realm ofblueMay Fair.” She died in 1827, and is mentioned in the diaries of Scott and Byron.

[0h]See note on “The Beautiful Incendiary,” p. 56.

[1]“The first piece, under the name of the loyal Mr. Fitzgerald, though as good we suppose as the original, is not very interesting. Whether it be very like Mr. Fitzgerald or not, however, it must be allowed that the vulgarity, servility, and gross absurdity of the newspaper scribblers is well rendered.”—Jeffrey,Edinburgh Review.

William Thomas Fitzgerald.—The annotator’s first personal knowledge of this gentleman was at Harry Greville’s Pic-Nic Theatre, in Tottenham-street, where he personated Zanga in a wig too small for his head. The second time of seeing him was at the table of old Lord Dudley, who familiarly called him Fitz, but forgot to name him in his will. The Viscount’s son (recently deceased), however, liberally supplied the omission by a donation of five thousand pounds. The third and last time of encountering him was at an anniversary dinner of the Literary Fund, at the Freemasons’ Tavern. Both parties, as two of the stewards, met their brethren in a small room about half an hour before dinner. The lampooner, out of delicacy, kept aloof from the poet. The latter, however, made up to him, when the following dialogue took place:

Fitzgerald (with good humour). “Mr. —, I mean to recite after dinner.”

Mr. —. “Do you?”

Fitzgerald. “Yes: you’ll have more of ‘God bless the Regent and the Duke of York!’”

The whole of this imitation, after a lapse of twenty years, appears to the Authors too personal and sarcastic; but they may shelter themselves under a very broad mantle:

“Let hoarse Fitzgerald bawlHis creaking couplets in a tavern-hall.”—Byron.

Fitzgerald actually sent in an address to the Committee on the 31st of August, 1812. It was published among the otherGenuine Rejected Addresses, in one volume, in that year. The following is an extract:—

“The troubled shade of Garrick, hovering near,Dropt on the burning pile a pitying tear.”

What a pity that, like Sterne’s recording angel, it did not succeed in blotting the fire out for ever! That failing, why not adopt Gulliver’s remedy?

[2]Mr. B. Wyatt, architect of Drury Lane Theatre, son of James Wyatt, architect of the Pantheon.

[3a]In plain English, the Halfpenny hatch, then a footway through fields; but now, as the same bards sing elsewhere—

“St. George’s Fields are fields no more,The trowel supersedes the plough;Swamps huge and inundate of yore,Are changed to civic villas now.”

[3b]Covent Garden Theatre was burnt down 20th September, 1808; Drury Lane Theatre (as before stated) 24th February, 1809.

[4a]The east end of St. James’s Palace was destroyed by fire, 21 Jan., 1809. The wardrobe of Lady Charlotte Finch (alluded to in the next line) was burnt in the fire.

[4b]Honourable William Wellesley Pole, now (1854) Earl of Mornington, married, 14th March, 1812, Catherine, daughter and heir of Sir James Tylney Long, Bart; upon which occasion he assumed the additional names of Tylney and Long.

[5a]“The author does not, in this instance, attempt to copy any of the higher attributes of Mr. Wordsworth’s poetry; but has succeeded perfectly in the imitation of his mawkish affectations of childish simplicity and nursery stammering. We hope it will make him ashamed of hisAlice Fell, and the greater part of his last volumes—of which it is by no means a parody, but a very fair, and indeed we think a flattering, imitation.”—Jeffery,Edinburgh Review.

[5b]Jack and Nancy, as it was afterwards remarked to the Authors, are here made to come into the world at periods not sufficiently remote. The writers were then bachelors. One of them [James], unfortunately, still continues so, as he has thus recorded in his niece’s album:

“Should I seek Hymen’s tie,As a poet I die—Ye Benedicks, mourn my distresses!For what little fameIs annexed to my nameIs derived fromRejected Addresses.”

The blunder, notwithstanding, remains unrectified. The reader of poetry is always dissatisfied with emendations: they sound discordantly upon the ear, like a modern song, by Bishop or Braham, introduced inLove in a Village.

[8]This alludes to the Young Betty mania. The writer was in the stage-box at the height of this young gentleman’s popularity. One of the other occupants offered, in a loud voice, to prove that Young Betty did not understand Shakespeare. “Silence!” was the cry; but he still proceeded. “Turn him out!” was the next ejaculation. He still vociferated. “He does not understand Shakespeare;” and was consequently shouldered into the lobby. “I’ll prove it to you,” said the critic to the doorkeeper. “Prove what, sir?” “That he does not understand Shakespeare.” This was Molière’s housemaid with a vengeance.

Young Betty may now [1833] be seen walking about town—a portly personage, aged about forty—clad in a furred and frogged surtout; probably muttering to himself (as he has been at college), “O mihi præteritos!” &c. [He is still alive, 1854. Master Betty, or the “Young Roscius,” was born in 1791, and made his first appearance on a London stage as Achmet in “Barbarossa,” at Covent Garden Theatre, on the lst of December, 1804. He was, therefore, “not quite thirteen.” He lasted two seasons.]

[10a]A “Phoenix” was perhaps excusable. The first theatre in Drury Lane was called “The Cock-pit or Phoenix Theatre.” Whitbread himself wrote an address, it is said, for the occasion; like the others, it had of course a Phoenix. “But Whitbread,” said Sheridan, “made more of the bird than any of them; he entered into particulars, and described its wings, beak, tail, &c.; in short, it was apoulterer’sdescription of a Phoenix.”

[10b]For an account of this anonymous gentleman, see Preface, xiii.

[12a]“The author has succeeded better in copying the melody and misanthropic sentiments ofChilde Harold, than the nervous and impetuous diction in which his noble biographer has embodied them. The attempt, however, indicates very considerable power; and the flow of the verse and the construction of the poetical period are imitated with no ordinary skill.”—Jeffrey,Edinburgh Review.

[12b]This would seem to show that poet and prophet are synonymous, the noble bard having afterwards returned to England, and again quitted it, under domestic circumstances painfully notorious. His good-humoured forgiveness of the Authors has already been alluded to in the Preface. Nothing of this illustrious poet, however trivial, can be otherwise than interesting. “We know him well.” At Mr. Murray’s dinner-table the annotator met him and Sir John Malcolm. Lord Byron talked of intending to travel in Persia. “What must I do when I set off?” said he to Sir John. “Cut off your buttons!” “My buttons! what, these metal ones!” “Yes; the Persians are in the main very honest fellows; but if you go thus bedizened, you will infallibly be murdered for your buttons!” At a dinner at Monk Lewis’s chambers in the Albany, Lord Byron expressed to the writer his determination not to go there again, adding, “I never will dine with a middle-aged man who fills up his table with young ensigns, and has looking-glass panels to his book-cases.” Lord Byron, when one of the Drury-lane Committee of Management, challenged the writer to sing alternately (like the swains in Virgil) the praises of Mrs. Mardyn, the actress, who, by-the-bye, was hissed off the stage for an imputed intimacy of which she was quite innocent.

The contest ran as fellows:

“Wake, muse of fire, your ardent lyre,Pour forth your amorous ditty,But first profound, in duly bound,Applaud the new Committee;Their scenic art from Thespis’ cartAll jaded nags discarding,To London drove this queen of love,Enchanting Mrs. Mardyn.

Though tides of love around her rove,I fear she’ll choose Pactolus—In that bright surge bards ne’er immerge.So I must e’en swim solus.‘Out, out, alas!’ ill-fated gas,That shin’st round Covent Garden,Thy ray how flat, compared with thatFrom eye of Mrs. Mardyn!”

And so on. The reader has, no doubt, already discovered “which is the justice, and which is the thief.”

Lord Byron at that time wore a very narrow cravat of white sarsnet, with the shirt-collar falling over it; a black coat and waist-coat, and very broad white trousers to hide his lame foot—these were of Russia duck in the morning, and jean in the evening. His watch-chain had a number of small gold seals appended to it, and was looped up to a button of his waistcoat. His face was void of colour; he wore no whiskers. His eyes were grey, fringed with long black lashes; and his air was imposing, but rather supercilious. He under-valued David Hume; denying his claim to genius on account of his bulk, and calling him, from the Heroic Epistle,

“The fattest hog in Epicurus’ sly.”

One of this extraordinary man’s allegations was, that “fat is an oily dropsy.” To stave off its visitation, he frequently chewed tobacco in lieu of dinner, alleging that it absorbed the gastric juice of the stomach, and prevented hunger. “Pass your hand down my side,” said his Lordship to the writer; “can you count my ribs?” “Every one of them.” “I am delighted to hear you say so. I called last week on Lady —; ‘Ah, Lord Byron,’ said she, ‘how fat you grow!’ But you know Lady — is fond of saying spiteful timings!” Let this gossip be summed up with the words of Lord Chesterfield, in his character of Bolingbroke: “Upon the whole, on a survey of this extraordinary character, what can we say, but ‘Alas, poor human nature!’”

His favourite Pope’s description of man is applicable to Byron individually:

“Chaos of thought and passion all confused,Still by himself abused or disabused;Created part to rise and part to fall,Great lord of all things, yet a slave to all;Sole judge of truth, in endless error hurled—The glory, jest, and riddle of the world.”

The writer never heard him allude to his deformed foot except upon one occasion, when, entering the green-room of Drury-lane, he found Lord Byron alone, the younger Byrne and Miss Smith the dancer having just left him, after an angry conference about apas suel. “Had you been here a minute sooner,” said Lord B., “you would have heard a question about dancing referred to me:—me! (looking mournfully downward) whom fate from my birth has prohibited from taking a single step.”

[14]The first stanza (see Preface) was written by James Smith; the remainder by Horace.

[15a]See Note, p. 8.

[15b]“Holland’s edifice.” The late theatre was built by Holland the architect. The writer visited it on the night of its opening [April 21, 1794]. The performances wereMacbethand theVirgin Unmasked. Between the play and the farce, an excellent epilogue, written by George Colman, was excellently spoken by Miss Farren. It referred to the iron curtain which was, in the event of fire, to be let down between the stage and the audience, and which accordingly descended, by way of experiment, leaving Miss Farren between the lamps and the curtain. The fair speaker informed the audience, that should the fire break out on the stage (where it usually originates), it would thus be kept from the spectators; adding, with great solemnity—

“No! we assure our generous benefactors’Twill only burn the scenery and the actors!”

A tank of water was afterwards exhibited, in the course of the epilogue, in which a wherry was rowed by a real live man, the band playing—

“And did you not hear of a jolly young waterman?”

Miss Farren reciting—

“Sit still, there’s nothing in it,We’ll undertake to drown you in a single minute.”

“O vain thought!” as Othello says. Notwithstanding the boast in the epilogue—

“Blow, wind—come, rack, in ages yet unborn,Our castle’s strength shall laugh a siege to scorn”—

the theatre fell a victim to the flames within fifteen years from the prognostic! These preparations against fire always presuppose presence of mind and promptness in those who are to put them into action. They remind one of the dialogue, in Morton’sSpeed the Plough, between Sir Able Handy and his son Bob:

“Bob. Zounds, the castle’s on fire!Sir A. Yes.Bob. Where’s your patent liquid for extinguishing fire?Sir A. It is not mixed.Bob. Then where’s your patent fire-escape?Sir A. It is not fixed.Bob. You are never at a loss?Sir A. Never.Bob. Then what do you mean to do?Sir A. I don’t know.”

“Bob. Zounds, the castle’s on fire!

Sir A. Yes.

Bob. Where’s your patent liquid for extinguishing fire?

Sir A. It is not mixed.

Bob. Then where’s your patent fire-escape?

Sir A. It is not fixed.

Bob. You are never at a loss?

Sir A. Never.

Bob. Then what do you mean to do?

Sir A. I don’t know.”

[17]A rather obscure mode of expression forJews’-harp; which some etymologists allege, by the way, to be a corruption ofJaws’-harp. No connection, therefore, with King David.

[20]The Weekly Register, which he kept up without the failure of a single week from its first publication till his death—a period of above thirty-three years.

[21]Bagshaw. At that time the publisher or Cobbett’s Register.

[22]The old Lyceum Theatre, pulled down by Mr. Arnold. That since destroyed by fire [16th Feb., 1830] was erected on its site. [The Drury Lane Company performed at the Lyceum till the house was rebuilt.]

[23a]The present colonnade in Little Russell Street formed no part of the original design, and was erected only a few years back.

[23b]An allusion to a murder then recently committed on Barnes Terrace. [The murder (22nd July, 1812) of the Count and Countess D’Antraigues (distantly related to the Bourbons), by a servant out of livery of the name of Laurence—an Italian or Piedmontese, who made away with himself immediately after.]

[24a]At that time keeper of Newgate. The present superintendent (1833) is styled Governor!

[24b]A portentous one that made its appearance in the year 1811; in the midst of the war,

“with fear of changePerplexing nations.”

[25]“The Living Lustresappears to us a very fair imitation of the fantastic verses which that ingenious person, Mr. Moore, indites when he is merely gallant, and, resisting the lures of voluptuousness, is not enough in earnest to be tender.” —Jeffrey,Edinburgh Review.

[26]This alludes to two massive pillars of verd antique which then flanked the proscenium, but which have since been removed. Their colour reminds the bard of the Emerald Isle, and this causes him (more suo) to fly off at a tangent, and Hibernicise the rest of the poem.

[28a]“The Rebuildingis in the name of Mr. Southey, and is one of the best in the collection. It is in the style of the Kehama of that multifarious author, and is supposed to be spoken in the character of one of his Glendoveers. The imitation of the diction and measure, we think, is nearly almost perfect; and the descriptions as good as the original. It opens with an account of the burning of the old theatre, formed upon the pattern of the Funeral of Arvalan.”—Jeffrey,Edinburgh Review.

[28b]For the Glendoveer, and the rest of the dramatis persona of this imitation, the reader is referred to the “Curse of Kehama.”

[28c]“Midnight, and yet no eyeThrough all the Imperial City closed in sleep.”

Southey.

[29a]This couplet was introduced by the Authors by way of bravado, in answer to one who alleged that the English language contained no rhyme to chimney.

[29b]Apollo. A gigantic wooden figure of this deity was erected on the roof. The writer (horrescit referens!) is old enough to recollect the time when it was first placed there. Old Bishop, then one of the masters of Merchant Tailors’ School, wrote an epigram upon the occasion, which, referring to the aforesaid figure, concluded thus:

“Above he fills up Shakespeare’s place.And Shakespeare fills up his below.”

Very antithetical; but quære as to the meaning? The writer, like Pluto, “long puzzled his brain” to find it out, till he was immersed “in a lower deep” by hearing Madame de Staël say, at the table of the late Lord Dillon, “Buonaparte is not a man, but a system.” Inquiry was made in the course of the evening of Sir James Mackintosh as to what the lady meant? He answered, “Mass! I cannot tell.” Madame de Staël repeats this apophthegm in her work on Germany. It is probably understoodthere.

[31]O. P. This personage, who is alleged to have growled like a bull-dog, requires rather a lengthened note, for the edification of the rising generation. The “horns, rattles, drums,” with which he is accompanied, are no inventions of the poet. The new Covent Garden Theatre opened on the 18th Sept., 1809, when a cry of “Old Prices” (afterwards diminished to O. P.) burst out from every part of the house. This continued and increased in violence till the 23rd, when rattles, drums, whistles, and cat-calls having completely drowned the voices of the actors, Mr. Kemble, the stage-manager, came forward and said that a committee of gentlemen had undertaken to examine the finances of the concern, and that until they were prepared with their report the theatre would continue closed. “Name them!” was shouted from all sides. The names were declared, viz., Sir Charles Price, the Solicitor-General, the Recorder of London, the Governor of the Bank, and Mr. Angerstein. “All shareholders!” bawled a wag from the gallery. In a few days the theatre re-opened: the public paid no attention to the report of the referees, and the tumult was renewed for several weeks with even increased violence. The proprietors now sent in hired bruisers, tomillthe refractory into subjection. This irritated most of their former friends, and, amongst the root, the annotator, who accordingly wrote the song of “Heigh-ho, says Kemble,” which was caught up by the ballad-singers, and sung under Mr. Kemble’s house-windows in Great Russell-street. A dinner was given at the Crown and Anchor Tavern in the Strand, to celebrate the victory obtained by W. Clifford in his action against Brandon the box-keeper, for assaulting him for wearing the letters O. P. in his hat. At this dinner Mr. Kemble attended, and matters were compromised by allowing the advanced price (seven shillings) to the boxes. The writer remembers a former riot of a similar sort at the same theatre (in the year 1792), when the price to the boxes was raised from five shillings to six. That tumult, however, only lasted three nights.

[32]“From the knobb’d bludgeon to the taper switch.” This image is not the creation of the poets: it sprang from reality. The Authors happened to be at the Royal Circus when “God save the King” was called for, accompanied by a cry of “Stand up!” and “Hats off!” An inebriated naval lieutenant, perceiving a gentleman in an adjoining box slow to obey the call, struck his hat off with his stick, exclaiming, “Take off your hat, sir!” The other thus assaulted proved to be, unluckily for the lieutenant, Lord Camelford, the celebrated bruiser and duellist. A set-to in the lobby was the consequence, where his lordship quickly proved victorious. “The devil is not so black as he is painted,” said one of the Authors to the other; “let us call upon Lord Camelford, and tell him that we were witnesses of his being first assaulted.” The visit was paid on the ensuing morning at Lord Camelford’s lodgings, in Bond-street. Over the fire place in the drawing-room were ornaments strongly expressive of the pugnacity of the peer. A long thick bludgeon lay horizontally supported by two brass hooks. Above this was placed parallel one of lesser dimensions, until a pyramid of weapons gradually arose, tapering to a horsewhip:

“Thus all below was strength, and all above was grace.”

Lord Camelford received his visitants with great civility, and thanked them warmly for the call; adding, that their evidence would be material, it being his intention to indict the lieutenant for an assault. “All I can say in return is this,” exclaimed the peer with great cordiality, “if ever I see you engaged in a row, upon my soul I’ll stand by you.” The Authors expressed themselves thankful for so potent an ally, and departed. In about a fortnight afterwards [March 7, 1804] Lord Camelford was shot in a duel with Mr. Best.

[34]Veeshnoo. The late Mr. Whitbread.

[36]Levy. An insolvent Israelite who [18th January, 1810] threw himself from the top of the Monument a short time before. An inhabitant of Monument-yard informed the writer that he happened to be standing at his door talking to a neighbour, and looking up at the top of the pillar, exclaimed, “Why, here’s the flag coming down.” “Flag!” answered the other, “it’s a man.” The words were hardly uttered when the suicide fell within ten feet of the speakers.

[38a]“‘Drury’s Dirge,’ by Laura Matilda, is not of the first quality. The verses, to be sure, are very smooth, and very nonsensical—as was intended; but they are not so good as Swift’s celebrated Song by a Person of Quality; and are so exactly in the same measure, and on the same plan, that it is impossible to avoid making the comparison.”—Jeffrey,Edinburgh Review.

[38b]The Authors, as in gallantry bound, wish this lady to continue anonymous.

[42]From the parody of Walter Scott we know not what to select—it is all good. The effect of the fire on the town, and the description of a fireman in his official apparel, may be quoted as amusing specimens of themisapplicationof the style and metre of Mr. Scott’s admirable romances.—Quarterly Review.

“‘A Tale of Drury,’ by Walter Scott, is, upon the whole, admirably executed; though the introduction is rather tame. The burning is described with the mighty minstrel’s characteristic love of localities . . . The catastrophe is described with a spirit not unworthy of the name so venturously assumed by the describer.”—Jeffrey,Edinburgh Review.

“Thus he went on, stringing one extravagance upon another, in the style his books of chivalry had taught him, and imitating, as neat as he could, their very phrase.”—Don Quixote.

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