CIBBER ON THE WANE.

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are rising to fame, and young Mrs. Cibber disappears for awhile from the stage, and from her married home, for ever. Colley Cibber now and then plays at £50 a night to crowded houses, but most so when he acts some of his old beaux and fops. His Richard did not so well please; and one night, when playing this character, he whispered to Victor, that he would give £50 to be in his easy chair again, by his fire-side. There was a Richard at hand who was likely to drive him there, and keep all others from the stage. Of course, the new actor was David Garrick.

CHAPTER XXII.

GARRICK, QUIN, MRS. PORTER.

GARRICK had selected the part of Richard III., for reasons which now appear singular. "He had often declared," says Davies, "he would never choose a character that was not suitable to his person; for, said he, if I should come forth in a hero, or in any part which is generally acted by a tall fellow, I shall not be offered a larger salary than 40s. a week. In this," adds the biographer, "he glanced at the follies of those managers who used to measure an actor's merits by his size." On the 19th of October, 1741, there was no very great nor excited audience at Goodman's Fields. The bill promised a concert, to begin at six o'clock; admission by tickets "at three, 2s. and 1s." Between the two parts of the concert, it announced that the historical play of the "Life and Death of Richard III.," with the ballad-opera of "The Virgin Unmasked," would be "performed gratis by Persons for their Diversion." The part of King Richard, "by a gentleman who never appeared on any stage," is an announcement, not true to the letter; but the audience were not troubled therewith. the moment the new actor appeared they saw a Richard and not an actor of that personage. Of the audience, he seemed unconscious, so thoroughly did he identify himself with the character. He surrendered himself to all its requirements, was ready for every phase of passion, every change of humour, and was as wonderful in quiet sarcasm as he was terrific in the hurricane of the battle-scenes. Above all, his audience were delighted with his "nature." Since Betterton's death, actors had fallen into a rythmical, mechanical, sing-song cadence. Garrick spoke not as an orator, but as King Richard himself might have spoken. The chuckling exultation of "So much for Buckingham!" was long

From

GARRICK IN THE ASCENDANT.

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a tradition on the stage. His "points" occurred in rapid succession. The rage and rapidity with which he delivered

"Cold friends to me! What do they in the North,

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When they should serve their sovereign in the West ?"

made a wonderful impression on the audience. Hogarth has shown us how he looked, when starting from his dream; and critics tell us that his cry of "Give me another horse!" was the cry of a gallant man; but that it fell into one of distress as he said, “Bind up my wounds," while the "Have mercy, Heaven,” was moaned on bended knee. The battle-scene and death excited the enthusiasm of an audience altogether unused to acting like this. And yet, for seven nights, the receipts averaged but about £30 a night; and Garrick only slowly made his way. Then, suddenly, the town was aroused. The western theatres were abandoned. 'Mr. Garrick," says Davies, "drew after him the inhabitants of the most polite parts of the town. Goodman's Fields were full of the splendour of St. James's and Grosvenor Square. The coaches of the nobility filled up the space from Temple Bar to Whitechapel." Among these, even bishops might have been found. Pope came up from Twickenham, and without disparaging Betterton, as some old stagers were disposed to do, only feared the young man would be spoiled, for he would have no competitor." Quin felt his laurels shaking on his brow, and declared that if this young man was right, he and all the old actors must be wrong. But Quin took courage. Dissent was a-foot, and he compared the attraction of Garrick to the attraction of Whitfield. The sheep would go astray. It would all come right by-and-bye. The people, he said, who go to chapel will soon come to church again.

Meanwhile let us trace the new actor through his only season in the east. From the 19th of October, 1741, to the 29th of May, 1742, Garrick acted more comic than tragic characters; of the latter he played Richard (eighteen times), Chamont, Lothario, the Ghost in "Hamlet" (Giffard, the manager, playing the Dane), Aboan, Lear, and Pierre. In comedy, he played Clodio, Fondlewife, Costar Pearmain, Witwoud, Bayes, Master Johnny ("School Boy"), Lord Foppington, Duretete, Captain Brazen, and two characters in farces, of which he was the original representative; Jack Smatter in "Pamela," and Sharp in the "Lying Valet." This is, at least, a singular selection! The most important of his comic essays was in the part of Bayes. His great scene was

at the rehearsal of the play, when he corrected the players, and gave imitations of contemporary actors. Garrick began with Delane, a comedian of merit. In taking him off, Garrick "retired to the upper part of the stage, and drawing his left arm across his breast, rested his right elbow upon it, raising a finger to his nose; he then came forward in a stately gait, nodding his head as he advanced, and in the exact tone of Delane, spoke the famous simile of the Boar and the Sow." This imitation was enjoyed by no one more than by handsome Hale of Covent Garden. But when Hale recognised himself in the plaintive accents of a speech delivered without feeling, he was as disgusted as Giffard, who was so nettled by Garrick's close mimicry of his peculiarities that he challenged the mimic, fought with him, and wounded him in the sword-arm! Ryan, more wisely, let Garrick excite what mirth he might from the imitation of the hoarse and tremulous voice of the former. Quin was left untouched, salient as were his points, on the ground, according to Murphy, of Quin's excellence in characters suited to him.

From a salary of £1 a night, Garrick went up at once to half profits. The patent theatres remained empty when he played at Goodman's Fields, and accordingly the patentees threatening an application to the law, in support of their privileges, shut up the house, made terms with Giffard, and Garrick was brought over to Drury Lane, where his salary was speedily fixed at £600 per annum. His first appearance at Drury Lane was in May, 1742, when he played gratuitously (for the benefit of Harper's widow,) the part of Chamont, in the " Orphan." Mrs. Pritchard, whom a critic in the Times has described as of the Garrick school, was now so finished an actress, that she played Monimia to him. With Bayes, Lear and Richard, each part played once, he brought his preliminary performances at Drury to a close. In June, 1742, with Mrs. Woffington, he crossed to Dublin. During an unusually hot summer he drew such audiences that a distemper became epidemic among those who visited the ill-ventilated theatre, which proved fatal to many, and which received the distinction of being called the Garrick fever!

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Of course, Garrick had not equally affected all the judges. Neither Gray nor Walpole allowed him to be the transcendant actor which the town generally held him to be. Did I tell you about Mr. Garrick, that the town are horn-mad after?" writes Gray to Chute; "There are a dozen dukes of a night at Goodman's Fields, sometimes; and yet I am stiff in the opposition."

OPINION OF WALPOLE AND GRAY.

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In May, 1742, Walpole writes in like strain to Mann:-" All the run is now after Garrick, a wine-merchant, who is turned player at Goodman's Fields. He plays all parts, and is a very good mimic. His acting I have seen, and may say to you, who will not tell it again here, I see nothing wonderful in it; but it is heresy to say so. The Duke of Argyll says he is superior to Betterton!" Old Lord Cobham was of the same opinion with the Duke; but they could only contrast Betterton in his decline, with Garrick in his young and vigorous manhood. When Louis XIV. signed the revocation of the Edict of Nantes, he lost 800,000 Protestant subjects, filled England with 50,000 able artizans, and gave David Garrick to the English stage! The grandfather of David was among the fugitives. That he prospered may be believed, since his son ultimately held a captain's commission in the English army. Captain Garrick married a lady named Clough, the daughter of a Litchfield vicar; and the most famous son of this marriage, David, was born at Hereford, his father's recruiting quarters, in February, 1716. His boyhood was passed at Litchfield, where he became more remarkable for his mania for acting than for application to school studies. At the age of eleven years, chief of a boyish company of players, he acted Kite, in the "Recruiting Officer," in which one of his sisters represented the Chambermaid, and to which Master Samuel Johnson refused to supply an introductory address. From Litchfield he made a trip to Lisbon, and therewith an attempt to fix himself in a vocation. His failure was no source of regret to himself. His uncle, a wine-merchant in the Portuguese capital, was not disposed to initiate the volatile lad into the mysteries of his craft, and David returned to Litchfield, with such increase of taste for the drama, that "several of his father's acquaintance," says Davies, "who knew the delight which he felt in the entertainment of the stage, often treated him with a journey to London, that he might feast his appetite at the playhouse." Booth was then stricken with the illness which killed him, and Garrick thus failed to study the greatest of actors since the era of Betterton. This ardent youth returned to Litchfield with more desire than ever to achieve fame and fortune on the stage. To supply what had been lacking in his education, he became the pupil of Samuel Johnson; but master and scholar soon wearied of it, and they together left Litchfield for London, Garrick with small means and great hopes, Johnson with means as small and his tragedy of Irene."

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