Mrs. Garrick departed this life when seated in her armchair, in the
front drawing-room of her house in the Adelphi Terrace." [The first
floor of which is now occupied by the Literary Fund Society.] "She had
ordered her maid-servants to place two or three gowns upon chairs to
determine in which she would appear at Drury Lane Theatre that evening,
it being a private view of Mr. Elliston's improvements for the season.
Perhaps no lady in public and private life held a more unexceptionable
character. She was visited by persons of the first rank; even our late
Queen Charlotte, who had honoured her with a visit at Hampton, found
her peeling onions for pickling. The gracious queen commanded a knife
to be brought, saying 'I will peel some onions too.' The late King
George IV. and King William IV., as well as other branches of the Royal
Family, frequently honoured her with visits."
In the year previous to her death, Mrs. Garrick went to the British
Museum to inspect the collection of the portraits of Garrick which Dr.
Burney had made. She was delighted with these portraits, many of which
were totally unknown to her. Her observations on some of them were
very interesting, particularly that by Dance, as Richard III. Of that
painter she stated that, in the course of his painting the picture, Mr.
Garrick had agreed to give him two hundred guineas for it. One day,
at Mr. Garrick's dining table, where Dance had always been a welcome
guest, he observed that Sir Watkin Williams Wynne, who had seen the
picture, spontaneously offered him two hundred guineas for it. "Did you
tell him it was for me?" questioned Garrick. "No, I did not."--"Then
you mean to let him have it?" Garrick rejoined. "Yes, I believe I
shall," replied the painter. "However," added Mrs. Garrick, "my husband
was very good: he bought me a handsome looking-glass, which cost him
more than the agreed price of the picture; and that was put up in the
place where Dance's picture was to have hung."
"Mrs. Garrick, being about to quit her seat, said she would be glad to
see me at Hampton. 'Madame,' said Mr. Smith, 'you are very good, but
you would oblige me exceedingly by honouring me with your signature on
this day.' 'What do you ask me for? I have not taken a pen in my hands
for many months. Stay, let me compose myself; don't hurry me, and I
will see what I can do. Would you like it written with my spectacles
on, or without?' Preferring the latter, she wrote, 'E. M. Garrick,' but
not without some exertion.
"'I suppose now, sir, you wish to know my age. I was born at Vienna,
the 29th of February, 1724, though my coachman insists upon it that I
am above a hundred. I was married at the parish of St. Giles at eight
o'clock in the morning, and immediately afterwards in the chapel of the
Portuguese Ambassador, in South Audley Street.'"
A day or two after Mrs. Garrick's death, Mr. Smith went to the Adelphi,
to know if a day had been fixed for the funeral. "No," replied George
Harris, one of Mrs. Garrick's confidential servants, "but I will let
you know when it is to take place. Would you like to see her? She is
in her coffin."--"Yes I should." Upon entering the back room on the
first floor, in which Mrs. Garrick died, Mr. Smith found the deceased's
two female servants standing by her remains. He made a drawing of
her, and intended to have etched it. "Pray, do tell me," said Smith
to one of the maids, "why is the coffin covered with sheets?"--"They
are their wedding sheets, in which both Mr. and Mrs. Garrick wished
to have died." Mr. Smith was told that one of these attentive women
had incurred her mistress's displeasure by kindly pouring out a cup of
tea, and handing it to her in her chair: "Put it down, you hussy: do
you think I cannot help myself." She took it herself, and a short time
after she had put it to her lips, she died.
This lady continued her practice of swearing now and then, particularly
when anyone attempted to impose upon her. A stonemason brought in his
bill, with an overcharge of sixpence more than the sum agreed upon; on
which occasion he endeavoured to appease her rage by thus addressing
her: "My dear Madam, do consider--" "My dear Madam! what do you mean,
you d--d fellow? Get out of the house immediately. My dear Madam,
indeed!"
On the day of the funeral Smith went with Miss Macaulay, the
authoress, to see the venerable lady interred; but when they arrived
at Westminster Abbey, they were refused admittance by a person who
said: "If it be your wish to see the waxwork, you must come when the
funeral's over, and you will then be admitted into Poet's Corner, by a
man who is stationed at the door to receive your money."
"Curse the waxwork!" said Smith, "this lady and I came to see Mrs.
Garrick's remains placed in the grave."--"Ah, well, you can't come in;
the Dean won't allow it."--"As soon as the ceremony was over," says
Smith, "we were admitted for sixpence at the Poet's Corner, and there
we saw the earth that surrounded the grave, and no more, as we refused
to pay the demands of the showmen of the Abbey."
Horace Walpole, though he wrote a bitter letter upon Garrick's funeral,
and some strange opinions of his acting, left some good-humoured
remarks upon Mrs. Garrick: he writes to Miss Hannah More: "Mrs. Garrick
I have scarcely seen this whole summer. She is a liberal Pomona to me,
I will not say an Eve, for though she reaches fruit to me, she will
never let me in, as if I were a boy, and would rob her orchard."
[Illustration: Charles Mathews the Elder.]
Mathews, a Spanish Ambassador.
Mathews once personated a Spanish Ambassador; a frolic enacted by him
at an inn at Dartford. An account of the freak was written by Tom
Hill, who took part in the scene, acting as Mathews's interpreter. He
called it his "Recollections of his Excellency the Spanish Ambassador's
visit to Captain Selby, on board the _Prince Regent_ one of his
Majesty's frigates stationed at the Nore, by the Interpreter."
The party hired a private coach, of large capacity, and extremely
showy, to convey them to Gravesend as the _suite_ of Mathews, who
personated an ambassador from Madrid to the English Government, and
four smart lads, who were entrusted with the secret by the payment
of a liberal fee. The drivers proved faithful to their promise. When
they arrived at the posting-house at Dartford, one of the drivers
dismounted, and communicated to the inn-keeper the character of the
nobleman (Mathews) inside the coach, and that his mission to London
had been attended with the happiest result. The report spread through
Dartford like wildfire, and in about ten minutes the carriage (having
by previous arrangement been detained) was surrounded by at least
two hundred people, all with cheers and gratulations, anxious to
gain a view of the important personage, who, decked out with nearly
twenty different stage jewels, representing sham orders, bowed with
obsequious dignity to the assembled multitude. It was settled that
the party should dine and sleep at the Falcon Tavern, Gravesend,
where a sumptuous dinner was provided for his Excellency and _suite_.
Previously, however, to dinner-time, and to heighten the joke, they
promenaded the town and its environs, followed by a large assemblage
of men, women, and children at a respectful distance, all of whom
preserved the greatest decorum. The interpreter (Mr. Hill) seemed to
communicate and explain to the Ambassador whatever was of interest in
their perambulation. On their return to the inn, the crowd gradually
dispersed. The dinner was served in a sumptuous style, and two or three
additional waiters, dressed in their holiday clothes, were hired for
the occasion.
The ambassador, by medium of his interpreter, asked for two soups, and
a portion of four different dishes of fish with oil, vinegar, mustard,
pepper, salt, and sugar, in the same plate, which, _apparently_ to the
eyes of the waiters, and to their utter astonishment and surprise, he
eagerly devoured. The waiters had been cautioned by one of the _suite_
not to notice the manner in which his Excellency ate his dinner, lest
it should offend him; and their occasional absence from the room gave
Mathews or his companion an opportunity of depositing the incongruous
medley in the ashes under the grate--a large fire having been provided.
The ambassador continued to mingle the remaining viands, during dinner,
in a similar heterogeneous way. The chamber in which his Excellency
slept was brilliantly illuminated with wax-candles, and in one corner
of the room a table was fitted up, under the direction of one of the
party, to represent an oratory, with such appropriate apparatus as
could best be procured. A private sailing-barge was moored at the
stairs by the fountain early the next morning, to convey the ambassador
and his attendants to the _Prince Regent_ at the Nore. The people again
assembled in vast multitudes to witness the embarkation. Carpets were
placed on the stairs at the water's edge, for the state and comfort of
his Excellency; who, the instant he entered the barge, turned round and
bade a grateful farewell to the multitude, at the same time placing his
hand upon his bosom, and taking off his huge cocked hat. The captain
of the barge, a supremely illiterate, good-humoured cockney, was
introduced most ceremoniously to the ambassador, and purposely placed
on his right hand. It is impossible to describe the variety of absurd
and extravagant stratagems practised on the credulity of the captain by
Mathews, and with consummate success, until the barge arrived in sight
of the King's frigate, which by a previous understanding, recognized
the ambassador by signals. The officers were all dressed in full
uniform, and prepared to receive him. When on board, the whole party
threw off their disguises, and were entertained by Captain Selby with a
splendid dinner, to which the lieutenants of the ship were invited.
After the banquet, Mathews, in his own character, kept the company in
high spirits by his incomparable mimic powers for more than ten hours,
incorporating with admirable effect the entire narrative of the journey
to Gravesend, and his, "acts and deeds" at the Falcon. Towards the
close of the feast, and about half-an-hour before the party took their
departure, in order to give the commander and his officers "a touch
of his quality," Mathews assumed his ambassadorial attire, and the
captain of the barge, still in ignorance of the joke, was introduced
into the cabin, between whom and his Excellency an indescribable scene
of rich burlesque was enacted. The party left the ship for Gravesend
at four o'clock in the morning--Mathews, in his "habit as he lived,"
with the addition of a pair of spectacles, which he had a peculiar way
of wearing to conceal his identity, even from the most acute observer.
Mathews again resumed his station by the side of the captain, as a
person who had left the frigate for a temporary purpose. The simple
captain recounted to Mathews all that the Spanish ambassador had
enacted, both in his transit from Gravesend to the Nore, and whilst he
(the captain) was permitted to join the festive board in the cabin,
with singular fidelity, and to the great amusement of the original
party, who, during the whole of this ambassadorial excursion, never
lost their gravity, except when they were left to themselves. They
landed at Gravesend, and from thence departed to London, luxuriating
upon the hoax.
[Illustration: Grimaldi as Clown. After De Wilde.]
Grimaldi, the Clown.
Joseph Grimaldi had for his paternal grandfather a dancer, so vigorous
as to rejoice in the appellation of "Iron Legs." His son, the father of
_our_ Grimaldi, was a native of Genoa, and in 1760 came to England as
dentist to Queen Charlotte. He soon, however, resigned this situation,
commenced dancing and fencing-master, and was appointed ballet-master
of Drury Lane Theatre and Sadler's Wells with the post of primo
buffo. He was an honest and charitable man, and was never known to be
inebriated, though he was very eccentric. He had a vague and profound
dread of the fourteenth day of the month: at its approach he was always
nervous, disquieted, and anxious; directly it had passed he was another
man again, and invariably exclaimed, in his broken English, "Ah! now
I am safe for anoder month." It is remarkable that he actually died
on the fourteenth day of March; and that he was born, christened, and
married on the fourteenth of the month. This was the same man who, in
the time of Lord George Gordon's Riots, when people for the purpose of
protecting their houses from the fury of the mob, inscribed upon their
doors the words "No Popery," actually with the view of keeping in the
right with all parties, and preventing the possibility of offending
any by his form of worship, wrote up "No Religion at all," which
announcement appeared in large characters in front of his house in
Little Russell Street: the protective idea was perfectly successful.
Joseph Grimaldi, our "Joe," was born out of wedlock on the 18th of
December, 1778, in Stanhope Street, Clare Market; his mother being
Rebecca Brooker, who had been from her infancy a dancer at Drury Lane,
and subsequently at Sadler's Wells played old women. Joe's eccentric
father was then more than seventy years old; and twenty-five months
afterwards was born another son, Joseph's only brother.
_Our_ Joe Grimaldi, at the age of one year and eleven months, was
brought out by his father, on the boards of Old Drury, as "the little
clown," in the pantomime of _Robinson Crusoe_, at a salary of 15_s._
per week. In 1781 he first appeared at Sadler's Wells, in the arduous
character of a monkey: here he remained (one season only excepted)
until the termination of his professional career, forty-nine years
afterwards, when in his farewell address, at Sadler's Wells, he
said:--"At a very early age, before that of three years, I was
introduced to the public by my father, at this theatre." This is not
very clear, since it would seem to contradict the statement of his
having appeared at Drury Lane. During the first piece in which little
Joe played at Sadler's Wells, he had nearly lost his life: in one of
the scenes, the clown, his father, was swinging him as a monkey, round
and round by a chain, which broke, and he was hurled a considerable
distance into the pit, fortunately into the very arms of an old
gentleman who was sitting gazing at the stage with intense interest.
At this time, "the little clown's" full-dress was embroidered coat and
breeches, silk stockings, paste buckles, and cocked-hat; and a guinea
in his pocket, which he one day gave to a distressed woman, for which
act his father gave him a caning (though not till five months after),
which he remembered as long as he lived. Old Grimaldi died in 1788,
leaving 1,500_l._, but the executor becoming bankrupt, the two sons
lost the whole of their fortune. Joe stuck to the stage, and at Drury
Lane Mr. Sheridan raised his salary, unasked, to 1_l._ a-week. His
leisure was now passed in breeding pigeons and collecting insects; of
the latter he had a cabinet of 4,000 specimens. He now removed with his
mother to Pentonville, where the house is to this day pointed out in
Penton Place. About this time, early one morning, Joe found near the
Tower of London a purse of gold coin and a bundle of Bank-notes, which,
on his way home, he sat down to count upon the spot where now stands
the Eagle Tavern, in the City Road. There were 380 guineas and 200_l._
in notes, making in the whole 599_l._ Grimaldi repeatedly advertised
in the daily newspapers the finding of the money, but he never heard
a syllable regarding the treasure he had so singularly acquired. His
maternal grandfather, it appears, once left a purse of gold, nearly
400_l._, upon a post near the Royal Exchange, and found it there
untouched after the lapse of nearly an hour.
Joe Grimaldi appeared, as usual, at Sadler's Wells in 1788, but at this
time his salary of fifteen shillings a-week was reduced to three, on
which pittance he remained for three years, making himself generally
useful: in 1794, he had grown so popular at Sadler's Wells, that his
salary had risen from three shillings to four pounds. In 1800, Joe
married Miss Maria Hughes, eldest daughter of a proprietor and the
resident manager of Sadler's Wells: she died in the same year, and
was interred in the grave-yard of St. James's, Clerkenwell, where the
following was inscribed on a tablet at her request:--
"Earth walks on earth like glittering gold;
Earth says to earth we are but mould;
Earth builds on earth castles and towers;
Earth says to earth all shall be ours."
On Monday, March 17th, 1828, Grimaldi took his farewell benefit at
Sadler's Wells, when he delivered an address, and the whole concluded
"with a brilliant display of fireworks, expressive of Grimaldi's
thanks." He, however, played a short time in 1832, and then quitted
the Wells finally. After this premature retirement from the stage,
poor Joe lived at No. 33, Southampton Street, Pentonville, in a house
which was furnished for him by his friends. At this time he frequented
the coffee-room of the Marquis of Cornwallis tavern, the proprietor of
which, considering his infirmity, or the loss of the use of his lower
extremity, used to fetch him on his back, and take him home in the same
manner. On May 31st, 1837, he was thus brought to the coffee-room and
seemed quite exhilarated, his conversation, and humour, and anecdotes
smacking of the vivacity of former years. He was carried home as usual;
he retired to rest, and next morning was found dead in his bed. On June
5th, he was buried in the ground of St. James's Chapel, Pentonville,
next to the grave of his friend, Charles Dibdin: his grave-stone states
his age at fifty-eight years.
Thomas Hood wrote this touching "Ode to Joseph Grimaldi, senior," upon
his retirement:--
"Joseph! they say thou'st left the stage
To toddle down the hill of life,
And taste the flannell'd ease of age
Apart from pantomimic strife.
'Retir'd' (for Young would call it so)--
'The world shut out'--in Pleasant Row.
"And hast thou really washt at last,
From each white cheek the red half-moon?
And all thy public clownship cast,
To play the private pantaloon?
All youth--all ages--yet to be,
Shall have a heavy miss of thee.
"Thou didst not preach to make us wise--
Thou hadst no finger in our schooling--
Thou didst not lure us to the skies;
Thy simple, simple trade was--Fooling!
And yet, Heav'n knows! we could--we can
Much 'better spare a better man!'
* * * * *
"But Joseph--everybody's Joe--
Is gone; and grieve I will and must!
As Hamlet did for Yorick, so
Will I for thee (though not yet dust):
And talk as he did when he missed
The kissing crust, that he had kiss'd!
"Ah, where is now thy rolling head!
Thy winking, reeling, _drunken_ eyes,
(As old Catullus would have said),
Thy oven-mouth, that swallow'd pies--
Enormous hunger--monstrous drowth!
Thy pockets greedy as thy mouth!
"Ah! where thy ears so often cuff'd!
Thy funny, flapping, filching hands!
Thy partridge body always stuff'd
With waifs and strays and contrabands!
Thy foot, like Berkeley's Foote--for why?
'Twas often made to wipe an eye.
"Ah, where thy legs--that witty pair?
For 'great wits jump'--and so did they!
Lord! how they leap'd in lamp-light air!
Caper'd and bounced, and strode away.
That years should tame the legs, alack!
I've seen spring through an almanack!
* * * * *
"For who, like thee, could ever stride
Some dozen paces to the mile!
The motley, medley coach provide;
Or, like Joe Frankenstein, compile
The _vegetable man_ complete!
A proper Covent Garden feat.
"Oh, who, like thee, could ever drink,
Or eat, swill, swallow--bolt, and choke!
Nod, weep, and hiccup--sneeze, and wink!
Thy very yawn was quite a joke!
Though Joseph junior acts not ill,
'There's no Fool like the old Fool' still!
"Joseph, farewell! dear, funny Joe!
We met with mirth--we part in pain!
For many a long, long year must go
Ere fun can see thy like again;
For Nature does not keep great stores
Of perfect clowns--that are not _boors_!"
Munden's Last Performance.
In the year 1824, one of Charles Lamb's last ties to the theatre, as a
scene of present enjoyment, was severed. Munden, the rich peculiarities
of whose acting he has embalmed in one of the choicest _Essays of
Elia_, quitted the stage in the mellowness of his powers. His relish
for Munden's acting was almost a new sense: he did not compare him with
the old comedians, as having common qualities with them, but regarded
them as altogether of a different and original style. On the last night
of his appearance, Lamb was very desirous to attend, but every place in
the boxes had long been secured; and Charles was not strong enough to
stand the tremendous rush, by enduring which, alone, he could hope to
obtain a place in the pit; when Munden's gratitude for his exquisite
praise anticipated his wish, by providing for him and Miss Lamb places
in a corner of the orchestra, close to the stage. The play of the
_Poor Gentleman_, in which Munden performed Sir Robert Bramble, had
concluded and the audience were impatiently waiting for the farce, in
which the great comedian was to delight them for the last time, when
Lamb might be seen in a very novel position. In his hand, directly
beneath the line of stage-lights glistened a huge pewter-pot, which he
was draining; while the broad face of old Munden was seen thrust out
from the door by which the musicians enter, watching the close of the
draught, when he might receive and hide the portentous beaker from the
gaze of the admiring neighbours. Some unknown benefactor had sent four
pots of stout to keep up the veteran's heart during his last trial;
and not able to drink them all, he bethought him of Lamb, and without
considering the wonder which would be excited in the brilliant crowd
who surrounded him, conveyed himself the cordial chalice to Lamb's
parched lips. At the end of the same farce, Munden found himself unable
to deliver from memory a short and elegant address which one of his
sons had written for him; but provided against accidents, took it from
his pocket, wiped his eyes, put on his spectacles, read it, and made
his last bow. This was, perhaps, the last night when Lamb took a hearty
interest in the present business scene.[40]
[40] Talfourd's _Letters of Charles Lamb_.
Munden appears to have first imbibed a taste for the stage in his
admiration of the genius of Garrick. He had seen more of Garrick's
acting than any of his contemporaries in 1820, Quick and Bannister
excepted. Munden's style of acting was exuberant with humour. His
face was all changeful nature: his eye glistened and rolled, and lit
up alternately every corner of his laughing face: "then the eternal
tortuosities of his nose, and the alarming descent of his chin,
contrasted, as it eternally was, with the portentous rise of his
eyebrows."
Oddities of Dowton.
William Dowton took his farewell benefit at the Opera House, on June
8th, 1840; he was then in his seventy-ninth year--the only actor,
except Macklin, who continued to wear his harness to such an advanced
period. For nearly half a century he had enjoyed a first-class
reputation, but it was found that, when extreme old age came upon him,
he had saved no money. With the amount produced by the above benefit
was purchased for him an annuity for a given number of years, on which
he subsisted in ease and comfort; but, to the surprise of every one,
by dint of regular habits and an iron constitution, he outlived the
calculated time, and there was danger that he might be reduced to
penury. He died in 1849.
Dowton, in 1836, visited the United States; but he was far too advanced
in life to attract attention or draw money. He came back almost as
poor as he went, but with a change in his political opinions. He
entered the land of freedom a furious republican--he returned from it
an ultra-Tory. He was constitutionally discontented, captious, and
fretful; but, at the same time, warm-hearted and generous. His oddities
were very amusing to those who were intimate with him. He would sit
for hours in his dressing-room arranging and contemplating his wigs,
those important accessories to his stage make-up. One of his peculiar
mannerisms was never to play a part without turning his wig. When
he acted Dr. Pangloss, a bet was made that there he would find his
favourite manœuvre impracticable. He managed it, nevertheless. When
Kenrick, the faithful old Irish servant, comes in exultingly, in the
last scene, to announce the long-lost Henry Moreland, he was instructed
to run against Dr. Pangloss, who thus obtained the desired opportunity
of disarranging his head-gear.