Kitabı oku: «Their Majesties' Servants. Annals of the English Stage (Volume 2 of 3)», sayfa 9

If he was inexorable in enforcing the payment of what was due to him, he was also nobly generous with the fortune he amassed. Meanness was not among the faults of Quin. The greatest injury has been done to his memory by the publication of jests, of a very reprehensible character, and which were said to be his, merely to quicken their sale. He lived in coarse times, and his jokes may have been, now and then, of a coarse quality; but he also said some of the finest things that ever fell from the lips of an intellectual wit.

Of all Quin's jests, there is nothing finer than two which elicited the warm approval of Horace Walpole. Bishop Warburton, in company at Bath, spoke in support of prerogative. Quin said, "Pray, my Lord, spare me; you are not acquainted with my principles. I am a republican; and, perhaps, I even think that the execution of Charles I. might be justified." "Ay!" said Warburton, "by what law?" Quin replied: "By all the laws he had left them." Walpole saw the sum of the whole controversy couched in those eight monosyllables; and the more he examined the sententious truth the finer he found it. The Bishop thought otherwise, and "would have got off upon judgments." He bade the player remember that all the regicides came to violent ends, – a lie, but no matter. "I would not advise your Lordship," said Quin, "to make use of that inference, for, if I am not mistaken, that was the case of the twelve apostles." Archbishop Whately could not have more logically overthrown conclusions which discern God's anger in individual afflictions.

There is little wonder, then, that Warburton disliked Quin; indeed there was not much love lost between the two men, who frequently met as guests in the house of Ralph Allen, of Prior Park, Bath, – the original of Fielding's Squire Allworthy, and the uncle (Walpole says the father) of Warburton's wife. The Bishop, seldom courteous to any man, treated Quin with an offensively patronising air, and endeavoured to make him feel the distance between them. There was only a difference in their vocations, for Quin, by birth, was, perhaps, rather a better gentleman than Warburton. The latter once, at Allen's house, where the prelate is said to have admonished the player on his too luxurious way of living (the bishop, however, loving custard not less than the actor did John Dory), requested him, as he could not see him on the stage, to recite some passages from dramatic authors, in presence of a large company then assembled in the drawing-room. Quin made some little difficulty; but after a well-simulated hesitation consented, and stood up to deliver passages from "Venice Preserved;" but in reciting the lines he so pointedly directed his looks, at "honest men" to Allen, and at "knaves" to Warburton, that the company universally marked the application, and the bishop never asked for a taste of the actor's quality again. And yet he is reported to have imitated this very act, with less warrant for it. When Dr. Terrick had been recently (in 1764) promoted from Peterborough to the see of London, a preferment coveted by Warburton, the latter preached a sermon at the Chapel Royal, at which the new Bishop of London was present, amid more august members of the congregation. Warburton took occasion to say that a government which conferred the high trusts of the Church on illiterate and worthless objects betrayed the interests of religion; – and on saying so, he stared Terrick full in the face.

 
"Honest men
Are the soft easy cushions on which knaves
Repose and fatten,"
 

There was no man for whom Quin had such distaste as this unpleasant Bishop of Gloucester, who published an edition of Shakspeare. When this was announced, the actor remarked in the green-room of old Drury, "He had better mind his own Bible, and leave ours to us!" Quin was undoubtedly open to censure on the score of his epicurism. He is said to have so loved John Dory as to declare, that for the enjoyment of it, a man "should have a swallow from here to the antipodes, and palate all the way!" and we are told that if, on his servant calling him in the morning, he heard that there was no John Dory in the market, he would turn round, and lazily remark, "then call me again to-morrow." But these are tales more or less coloured to illustrate his way of life. There is one which has more probability in it, which speaks of another incident at Bath. Lord Chesterfield saw a couple of chairmen helping a heavy gentleman into a sedan, and he asked his servant if he knew who that stout gentleman was? "Only Mr. Quin, my lord, going home, as usual, from the 'Three Tuns.'" "Nay, sir," answered my lord, "I think Mr. Quin is taking one of the three home with him, under his waistcoat!"

His capacity was undoubtedly great, but the over-testing it occasionally affected his acting. An occasion on which he was playing Balance, in the "Recruiting Officer," Mrs. Woffington acting Sylvia, his daughter, affords an instance. In the second scene of the second act he should have asked his daughter, "Sylvia, how old were you when your mother died?" instead of which he said "married." Sylvia laughed, and being put out of her cue, could only stammer "What, sir?" "Pshaw!" cried the more confused justice; "I mean, how old were you when your mother was born?" Mrs. Woffington recovered her self-possession, and taking the proper cue, said, "You mean, sir, when my mother died. Alas! so young, that I do not remember I ever had one; and you have been so careful, so indulgent to me, ever since, that indeed I never wanted one."

In his latest days, his powers of retort never failed him. He was in that closing season when a fop condoled with him on growing old, and asked what the actor would give to be as young as he was? "I would almost be content to be as foolish!" was Quin's reply.

Old Hippisley, who, from a candle-snuffer became a favourite low comedian, owed much of his power of exciting mirth to a queer expression in his distorted face, caused by a scar from a severe burn. Having some intention to put his son on the stage, he asked Quin's advice as to the preparatory measures. "Hippy," said Quin, "you had better begin by burning him."

Nobody bore with his sharp sayings more cheerfully than Mrs. Woffington. We all know his remark, when Margaret, coming off the stage as Sir Harry Wildair, declared that she believed one half the house thought she was a man. Less known is his comment when, on asking her why she had been to Bath, she answered saucily, "Oh, for mere wantonness!" whereon Quin retorted with, "And have you been cured of it?"

He was one of the few men who could stand a fall with Foote, and come off the better man. Foote, who could not endure a joke made on himself, broke friendship with Quin on account of such offence. Ultimately, they were reconciled; but even then Foote referred to the provocation. "Jemmy, you should not have said that I had but one shirt, and that I lay a-bed while it was washed!" "Sammy," replied Quin, "I never could have said so, for I never knew that you had a shirt to wash!"

In the roughest of Quin's jests there was no harm meant, and many of his jokes manifested the kindliness of his heart. Here is an obscure actor, Dick Winston, lying, – hungry, weary, and disengaged, – on a truckle bed, in the neighbourhood of Covent Garden. He had wilfully forfeited an old engagement, turned itinerant, starved, and had returned, only to find his old place occupied. He is on his back, in utter despair, as Mr. Quin enters, followed by a man carrying a decent suit of clothes; and the great actor hails him with a "Now, Dick, how is it you are not up and at rehearsal?" Quin had heard of his distress, got him restored to his employment, and took this way of announcing it. Winston dressed himself in a state of bewilderment; a new dress and a new engagement, – but no cash wherewith to obtain a breakfast!" Mr. Quin," said he, unhesitatingly, "what shall I do for a little ready money, till Saturday arrives?" "Nay!" replied Quin; "I have done all I can for you; but as for money, Dick, you must put your hand in your own pocket." Quin had put a £10 note there!

Again; when Ryan asked, in an emergency, for a loan, the answer from Quin was, that he had nothing to lend; but he had left Ryan £1000 in his will, and Ryan might have that, if he were inclined to cheat the government of the legacy duty!

Frederick, Prince of Wales, was not half such a practically good patron to Thomson, as James Quin was. When the bard was in distress, Quin gave him a supper at a tavern, for half of which the poet expected he would have to pay; but the player designed otherwise. "Mr. Thomson," said he, "I estimate the pleasure I have had in perusing your works at £100 at least; and you must allow me to settle that account, by presenting you with the money." What are the small or the great faults of this actor of "all the Falstaffs," when we find his virtues so practical and lively? In return, the minstrel has repaid the good deed with a guerdon of song. In the Castle of Indolence, he says:

 
"Here whilom ligg'd th' Aesopus of the age;
But, call'd by Fame, in soul ypricked deep,
A noble pride restored him to the stage,
And roused him like a giant from his sleep.
Even from his slumbers we advantage reap:
With double force th' enlivened scene he wakes,
Yet quits not Nature's bounds. He knows to keep
Each due decorum: now the heart he shakes,
And now with well-urged sense th' enlightened judgment takes."
 

The actor had a great regard for the poet, and was not only active in bringing forward his posthumous tragedy, "Coriolanus," in which Quin played the principal character, in 1749, but spoke the Hon. George Lyttleton's celebrated prologue with such feeling, that he could not restrain his tears; and with such effect, that the audience were moved, it is said, in like manner: —

 
"He lov'd his friends; – forgave this gushing tear;
Alas! I feel I am no actor here;"
 

and Quin's eyes glistened, as he went through the noble eulogy of a poet, whose

 
"Muse employ'd her heaven-taught lyre,
None but the noblest passions to inspire;
Not one immoral, one corrupted thought,
One line, which, dying, he could wish to blot."
 

The last night Quin played as an engaged actor, was at Covent Garden, on the 15th of May 1751; the play was the "Fair Penitent," in which he acted Horatio to the Lothario of Barry, and the Calista of Mrs. Cibber. After this he quietly withdrew, without leave-taking, returning only once or twice to play for the benefit of a friend. In his later years, his professional income is said to have reached £1000 a year. He was the first English actor who received £50 a night, during a part of his career. The characters he created were in pieces which have died off the stage, save Comus, which he acted with effective dignity in the season of 1737-8; – a part in which Mr. Macready distinguished himself, during his memorable management of Drury Lane.

Quin's social position, after leaving the stage, was one congenial to a man of his merits, taste, and acquirements. He was a welcome guest at many noble hearths – from that of ducal Chatsworth to that of modest Allen's at Prior Park. At the former he and Garrick met. There had not been a cordial intimacy between the two as actors; but as private gentlemen they became friends. This better state of things was owing to the kindly feeling of Quin. The two men were left alone in a room at Chatsworth, and Quin made the first step towards a reconciliation by asking a question the most agreeable he could put – inquiring after Mrs. Garrick's health. In this scene the two men come before me as distinct as a couple of figures drawn by Meissonier – quaint in costume, full of character and life, pleasant to look at and to remember.

Quin was Garrick's guest at Hampton, when he was stricken in 1765 with the illness which ultimately proved fatal. He died, however, in his own house in Bath. "I could wish," he said the day before, "that the last tragic scene were over; and I hope I may be enabled to meet and pass through it with dignity." He passed through it becomingly on the 21st of January 1766; and Garrick placed the following lines on the old actor's tomb in the Abbey – a pyramid of Sienna marble, bearing a medallion portrait of Quin, resting on a sarcophagus, on which the inscription is engraved, supported by the mask of Thalia and the dagger of Melpomene.

 
"That tongue which set the table in a roar,
And charmed the public ear, is heard no more;
Clos'd are those eyes, the harbingers of wit,
Which spake, before the tongue, what Shakspere writ.
Cold is that hand which, living, was stretch'd forth
At friendship's call, to succour modest worth.
Here lies James Quin. Deign, reader, to be taught,
Whate'er thy strength of body, force of thought,
In nature's happiest mould however cast,
To this complexion thou must come at last."
 

Kind-hearted people have remarked that Garrick never said so much to, or of, Quin when he was alive. Perhaps not. He struggled with Quin for mastery – vanquished him; became his friend, and hung up over his grave a glowing testimony to his talent and his virtues. This was in the spirit of old chivalry. What would kind-hearted people have? Was it not well in Garrick to speak truthfully of one dead whom, when living, he thus with pleasant satire described as soliloquising at the tomb of Duke Humphrey at St. Albans —

 
"A plague on Egypt's art, I say!
Embalm the dead! On senseless clay
Rich wines and spices waste!
Like sturgeon, or like brawn, shall I
Bound in a precious pickle lie,
Which I can never taste?
Let me embalm this flesh of mine
With turtle fat, and Bordeaux wine,
And spoil th' Egyptian trade!
Than Humphry's Duke more happy I,
Embalm'd alive, old Quin shall die
A mummy ready made."
 

As a tailpiece to this sketch, I cannot, I think, do better than subjoin Foote's portrait of Quin, which, I will hope, was not drawn to disparage any of Quin's great survivors, but in all honesty and sincerity. "Mr. Quin's deportment through the whole cast of his characters is natural and unaffected, his countenance expressive without the assistance of grimace, and he is, indeed, in every circumstance, so much the person he represents, that it is scarcely possible for any attentive spectator to believe that the hypocritical, intriguing Maskwell, the suspicious superannuated rake, the snarling old bachelor, and the jolly, jocose Jack Falstaff are imitated, but real persons.

"And here I wish I had room and ability to point out the severe masterly strokes with which Mr. Quin has often entertained my imagination, and satisfied my judgment, but, under my present confinement, I can only recommend the man who wants to see a character perfectly played, to see Mr. Quin in the part of Falstaff; and if he does not express a desire of spending an evening with that merry mortal, why, I would not spend one with him, if he would pay my reckoning."

"With a bottle of claret and a full house," it may well be concluded, from all concurrent testimony, Quin was, in fat Jack, unapproachable. In the traditions of the stage, he still remains the Falstaff, though Henderson was subsequently thought to have equalled him in many of the points of that character.

Finally, Quin's will is not uninstructive as an illustration of the actor's character. There is, perhaps, not a friend he had possessed, or servant who had been faithful to him, who is forgotten in it. Various are the bequests, from £50 to a cousin practising medicine in Dublin, to £500 and a share of the residue to a kind-hearted oilman in the Strand. To one individual he bequeaths his watch, in accordance with an "imprudent promise" to that effect. James Quin did not like the man, but he would not break his word! Requiescat in pace!

CHAPTER XI
ENGLAND AND SCOTLAND

In 1753-4 Mrs. Cibber returned to Drury; she played Juliet to Garrick's Romeo, and with him in every piece that admitted of their playing together. But Barry gained in Miss Nossiter a Juliet, not, indeed, equal to Mrs. Cibber, but one who increased his own ardour and earnestness in Romeo, his tenderness and anxiety in Jaffier, and his truth and playfulness as Florizel, inasmuch as that they were mutually in love, and all the house was in the secret.

Miss Nossiter, however, did not realise her early promise. Contemporary critics speak of the novice as being of a delicate figure, graceful in the expression of distress, but requiring carefulness in the management of her voice, and a more simple elocution. One of her judges curiously remarks: – "She frequently alarmed the audience with the most striking attitudes." The critic recovers from his alarm when speaking of another debutante (Mrs. Elmey), who acted Desdemona to Barry's Othello. "No part," he says, "has been better represented in our memory," and "we scarce knew what it was before she acted it."

Of poor Miss Nossiter there is little more recorded than that, at the end of a brief career, she died, after bequeathing to Barry, the Romeo, for whom more than Miss Nossiter professed to be dying, – £3000.

Mossop succeeded Quin, at Drury Lane, with credit.⁶² Foote left "entertaining" at the Haymarket to play the Cibber parts in comedy, and he was ably seconded by Woodward, Mrs. Pritchard, and Kitty Clive. Miss Bellamy and Shuter passed to the Garden, the latter increasing in favour each night, as opportunity afforded. With the exception of minor pieces, and a revival of "King John," in which Garrick was an unlikely Faulconbridge, and Mossop a superb tyrant, the audiences were taken back to heavy classical tragedies. Drury played Glover's "Boadicea," a criticism of which is amusingly given by Walpole. "There is a new play of Glover's, in which Boadicea (Pritchard) rants as much as Visconti screams; but, happily, you hear no more of her after the third act, till, in the last scene, somebody brings a card with her compliments, and she is very sorry she cannot wait upon you, but she is dead. Then there is a scene between Lord Sussex and Cathcart, two captains" (Ænobarbus and Flaminius – Mossop and Havard), "which is most incredibly absurd; but yet the parts are so well acted, the dresses so fine, and two or three scenes pleasing enough, that it is worth seeing." Archbishop Herring thought the last two acts admirable. "In the fifth particularly, I hardly ever felt myself so strongly touched."

Of a second tragedy, Crisp's "Virginia," Walpole says it flourished through Garrick's acting. Murphy states that "the manner in which Garrick uttered two words, crowned the play with success; when in a low tone of voice that spoke the fulness of a broken heart, he pronounced, 'Thou traitor!' the whole audience was electrified, and testified their delight by a thunder of applause." It was, however, a poor play, even for a custom-house officer, who, by the way, made Appius (Mossop) propose to marry Virginia. Marcia was played by Mrs. Graham; Garrick did not think much of her; but we shall hear of her again as the great Mrs. Yates.

The third classical tragedy was Whitehead's "Creusa," founded on the Ion of Euripides. Walpole praises the interest, complexity, yet clearness and natural feeling of the plot. "It is the only new tragedy that I ever saw and really liked. The circumstance of so much distress being brought on by characters, every one good, yet acting consistently with their principles towards the misfortunes of the drama, is quite new and pleasing." As a reading play, I think "Creusa" is the greatest success Whitehead has achieved.

On the other hand, M'Namara Morgan's romantic tragedy "Philoclea" owed much of its ephemeral success to the fire, grace, beauty, and expression of Barry and Miss Nossiter (Pyrocles and Philoclea), the two lovers. The house literally "sighed like furnace" for very sympathy. The Rev. Mr. Genest says truly, "that the play is a poor play, but that the epilogue is not bad;" – it is a mass of uncleanness, worthy of the Ravenscroft whom Genest admired. As for Dr. Francis's "Constantine," in which Barry and Mrs. Bellamy played Constantine and Fulvia, it was a failure; but, therefore, Mrs. Bellamy recommended the author to the patronage of Fox; and it is certain that the father of Sir Philip Francis owed his promotion to the Suffolk rectory of Barrow to Lord Holland. There is something amusing in the idea of George Anne Bellamy indirectly nominating to Church benefices!

In the season of 1754-5, Garrick was relieved by the absence of Barry, who left Rich for Dublin, taking Miss Nossiter with him, at a salary of £1300 for both, for the season, and predicting ruin to Rich. The latter falsified the prediction, by bringing out Sheridan in all his best parts against Garrick, and in "Coriolanus," against Mossop. Sheridan and Dyer also played Romeo, greatly to the benefit of Barry; but Rich got well through his season with the above, and in spite of a tragedy, called "Appius," the ill success of which was reasonably attributed by the author, Moncrieff, to the fact that Sheridan had lopped off the fifth act; pantomime supplied its place.

Garrick, in addition to his old parts, created Achmet in "Barbarossa;" Mossop playing the tyrant, and Mrs. Cibber, Zaphira. His other novelties were the "Fairies," and the masque of Britannia;" the latter Apropos to the war. I do not know if Dr. Browne, the vicar of Great Horkesley, could have civilised the yet uncivilised dominion of Russia, as Catharine invited him to do; but he assuredly wrote a poor yet lucky tragedy, for it has lived while better have sunk into oblivion. It is "Merope" re-cast and dressed. "There is not one new thought in it," wrote Walpole; "and, which is the next material want, but one line of perfect nonsense. 'And rain down transports in the shape of sorrow!' To complete it, the manners are so ill-observed, that a Mahometan princess-royal is at full liberty to visit her lover in Newgate, like the banker's daughter in 'George Barnwell.'"

Walpole's criticism on the "Fairies" is not less smart. "Garrick has produced a detestable English opera, which is crowded by all true lovers of their country. To mark the opposite to Italian opera, it is sung by some cast singers, two Italians, a French girl, and the chapel-boys; and to regale us with sauce, it is Shakspeare's 'Midsummer Night's Dream;' which," he adds, as if he inherited the feelings of Pepys with regard to this poetical play, "is forty times more nonsensical than the worst translation of any Italian opera books."

At the short summer season in the Haymarket, where Theophilus Cibber and his eccentric sister, Mrs. Charke, were at the head of "Bayes's" new-raised company of comedians, there appeared on the 21st of August, 1755, Miss Barton, in Miranda, to Cibber's Marplot. Besides this, and other comic characters, Miss Barton acted Desdemona. Not many years before this she was a shoeless flower-girl, purer looking than any of her own roses, in St. James's Park. We shall hear of her anon, under a name than which there is not a brighter in theatrical annals – the name of Abington.

The season of 1755-6 was remarkable for the fact that Garrick made three very absurd assaults on Shakspeare, by producing emendations of the "Winter's Tale," "Taming of the Shrew," and the "Tempest," cutting, clipping, adding, taking away, and saying the while: —

 
"'Tis my chief wish, my joy, my only plan,
To lose no drop of that immortal man!"
 

This season was also remarkable for the riot consequent on his producing the "Chinese Festival," when the public, hating the French, with whom we were at war, insisted on his asking pardon for the introduction of Swiss, Germans, and Italians! Garrick proudly answered, that if they would not allow him to go on with his part (Archer), he would never, never, again set foot on the stage! It was, further, famous for the failure of "Athelstan," by Dr. Browne, which fell, though it was a better tragedy than "Barbarossa." The disappointed author, it will be remembered, destroyed himself.⁶³ Still more famous was this season, for the fray between the Rival Queens, Woffington – Roxana, and Bellamy – Statira; when the superb dresses of the latter drove poor Peg into such fury, that she nearly stabbed her rival in downright earnest. Failing in her attempt, she stabbed her with words, and taunted Bellamy with having a minister (Henry Fox) who indulged her in such extravagances. "And you," retorted the other "gentle creature," "have half the town who do not!" But not for these things, nor for Foote's satirical farces against Murphy, nor for Murphy's against Foote, was the season so famous, as it was for being that in which Barry, now returned to Covent Garden, entered the lists once more against Garrick, after playing a round of his most successful characters, by acting King Lear with Miss Nossiter as Cordelia, which part Mrs. Cibber played to Garrick's King.

In this contest Garrick carried away the palm. Barry was dignified, impressive, pathetic, but unequal, failing principally in the mad scenes, which appear to have been over-acted. It was precisely there where Garrick was most sublime, natural, and affecting. There was no rant, no violence, no grimacing. The feeble, miserable, but still royal old man was there; slow of motion, vague of look, uncertain, forgetful of all things save of the cruelty of his daughters. It was said for Barry that he was "every inch a king;" for Garrick, that he was "every inch King Lear." The wits who admired the latter repeated the epigram —

 
"The town has found out diff'rent ways,
To praise the different Lears;
To Barry they give loud huzzas!
To Garrick – only tears."⁶⁴
 

others quoted the lines alluding to Garrick's jealousy —

 
"Critics attend! and judge the rival Lears;
While each commands applause, and each your tears.
Then own this truth – well he performs his part
Who touches – even Garrick to the heart."
 

Drury Lane, in 1756-57, offers little for remark. Miss Pritchard appeared in Juliet – only to show that talent is not hereditary; and Garrick ventured King Lear, with a little less of Tate, and a little more of Shakspeare; he was as resolute, however, against introducing the Fool as he was with respect to the Gravediggers in Hamlet. On the other hand, he acted Don Felix. Gracefully as Garrick played the part, Walpole said "he was a monkey to Lord Henry Fitzgerald" (who played this character admirably in private). The Violante of Miss Macklin was acted with astonishing effect. When Garrick was weary, his parts were "doubled" by handsome Holland, the son of the Chiswick baker, and destined to carry grief to the honest heart of Miss Pope. The dramatic poets raised no new echoes in Drury this season – some farces excepted. One of these was the "Reprisal," by Smollet, who showed that if he could not write a good tragedy at nine-and-twenty, he could dash off a lively farce at seven-and-thirty. With this farce the ablest of novelists and harshest of critics closed his theatrical career. The second farce was Foote's "Author," in which he and Mrs. Clive acted Mr. and Mrs. Cadwallader, and the former exultingly held up to ridicule one of his most intimate friends, Mr. Apreece, taking care to have him among the audience on the first night!

At the other house, Barry failed in Richard III.; but the treasury recovered itself by the production, in March, of "Douglas," in which Barry, six feet high, and in a suit of white puckered satin, played Norval to the Lady Randolph of Mrs. Woffington. The originals of those parts, when the piece was first played in Edinburgh, in the previous December, were Digges and Mrs. Ward. This piece was the glory of the Scottish stage, and a scandal to great part of the community. Before the curtain rises let me say a few words on the growth of that stage.

There have been stringent rules in Scotland with regard to the theatre, but they have been accompanied by much general toleration. The Regent Murray cheerfully witnessed the performance of a drama; and the General Assembly, in 1574,⁶⁵ though they prohibited all dramas founded on Scripture, permitted the representation of "profane plays." The licensers were the Kirk Session, before which body the piece was first read; and if license was accorded for its being acted, stipulation was made that nothing should be added to the text which had been read, and that "nae swearing, banning, nor nae scurrility shall be spoken, whilk would be a scandal to our religion and for an evil example to others."

When, however, James VI. manifested a wish to see the English company which arrived in Edinburgh in 1599, by granting it a license to act, the General Kirk Session of the city denounced all players and their patrons – the former as unruly and immodest, the latter as irreligious and indiscreet. This opposition led to a conference between the Session and the angry King, at which the former were obliged to withdraw their denunciations, which had been made from all the pulpits; and they authorised all men "to repair to the said comedies and plays without any pain, reproach, censure, or slander, to be incurred by them." Individual ministers were sorely discontent with such proceedings of the Session; and this feeling increased, when a play, "Marciano, or the Discovery," was acted in 1662, "with great applause, before His Majesty's High Commissioner, and others of the nobility, at the Abbey of Holyrood House, on St. John's night." In the preface of this very play, the drama in Scotland was likened to a "drunken swaggerer in a country church!"

It does not appear that any regular theatre existed in Edinburgh previous to 1679, when the brothers Fountain held from Charles II. the patent of "Masters of the Revels, within the Kingdom of Scotland."⁶⁶ The Fountains not only erected a playhouse, but they subsequently sought to suppress all balls and entertainments held in the dancing-masters' schools, as discouraging to the playhouse, which "the petitioners had been at great charge in erecting." Accordingly, such balls, unless duly licensed, were suppressed. As Mr. Robert Chambers remarks in his Domestic Annals of Scotland, "It sounds strange to hear of a dancing-master's ball in our city, little more than a month after the battle of Bothwell Bridge, and while a thousand poor men were lodging on the cold ground in the Greyfriars' Churchyard!"