Rotunda.[217] A sufficient idea of its general appearance may be gained
by glancing at some of the contemporary prints and by noticing a few
salient features. Writers of the time compare it to “the Pantheon at
Rome”: the Londoner of to-day will think rather of the British Museum
Reading Room which it resembled in size and, to some extent, in general
appearance. The circumference was 555 feet and the internal diameter
150 feet. It was entered by four Doric porticoes opposite one another,
and the interior architecture corresponded with the exterior.
On the exterior was an arcade encircling the building, and above this
arcade was a gallery reached by steps placed at the porticoes.
In the interior was a circle of fifty-two[218] boxes, separated by
wainscotting. Each box had its “droll painting” and its bell-lamp with
candles; and in each seven or eight people could be accommodated with
refreshments. Benches covered with red baize were dispersed about the
area, and the plaster floor was covered with matting.
Above the circle of boxes was a gallery containing a similar range of
boxes which were entered by folding-doors from the gallery outside
the building. The Rotunda was lighted by sixty windows, and the chief
material used in its construction was wood.
The ceiling was painted an olive colour, with a rainbow round the
extremity, and there hung from it numerous chandeliers, each ornamented
with a gilt crown and containing crystal bell-lamps of candles. When
all the candles were lighted, the sight, we are told, was “very
glorious.”
In the centre of the building was a remarkable square erection
supporting the roof, and made up of pillars and arches elaborately
decorated. This “grand and elegant structure” was nothing more or less
than a fireplace containing a chimney and an open fire. On cold days in
February and March the best place was “one of the hot blazing red-cloth
benches” by the fire. This fireplace structure had originally contained
the orchestra, but after a few years the orchestra was, for acoustic
reasons, moved to the side of the Rotunda. Behind the orchestra was an
organ by Byfield, set up in 1746.[219]
[Illustration:
_The Inside View of the Rotunda in Renelagh Gardens with the
Company at Breakfast._
_Vue de la Compagnie à Dejeuner dans la Rotonde au
Mellieux des Jardines de Renelagh._
THE ROTUNDA AT RENELAGH, _circ._ 1751.]
Johnson declared that “the _coup d’œil_” of Ranelagh was “the
finest thing he had ever seen.”[220] When Johnson first entered
Ranelagh and its brilliant circle, it gave, as he told Boswell,[221]
“an expansion and gay sensation” to his mind, such as he had never
experienced anywhere else. Miss Lydia Melford, in _Humphry
Clinker_, wrote about Ranelagh to her ‘dear Willis’ with an
enthusiasm less restrained, and without Dr. Johnson’s moralising
comment:--“Alas, Sir, these are only _struggles_ for happiness.”
“Ranelagh (she writes) looks like the enchanted palace of a genio,
adorned with the most exquisite performances of painting, carving, and
gilding, enlightened with a thousand golden lamps that emulate the
noonday sun; crowded with the great, the rich, the gay, the happy and
the fair; glittering with cloth of gold and silver, lace, embroidery,
and precious stones. While these exulting sons and daughters of
felicity tread this round of pleasure, or regale in different parties,
and separate lodges, with fine imperial tea and other delicious
refreshments, their ears are entertained with the most ravishing
delights of music, both instrumental and vocal.”
§ 3. _The entertainments and the company._
The usual charge for admission was half a crown,[222] which always
included the ‘regale’ of tea, coffee and bread and butter. Foote called
Ranelagh the Bread and Butter Manufactory, and, except on ball nights,
no other refreshments seem to have been procurable.
The place was usually open on three days in the week, Mondays,
Wednesdays and Fridays.[223] The regular season for the evening
concerts and garden-promenade began at Easter, but the Rotunda was
often open in February, or earlier, for the dances. In the early days
of Ranelagh the public breakfastings and the morning concerts at twelve
were a constant feature. About 1754 the proprietors of Ranelagh were
refused a license for music, and the breakfasting took place that year
without concerts: these breakfasts and morning concerts do not appear
to have been subsequently renewed.
The evening concerts (from May 1742, onwards) generally began, at 6.30
or 7. Between the Acts the company walked in the gardens to the music
of horns and clarinets, and a garden-orchestra was erected about 1764.
The gardens were illuminated, but fireworks did not become a prominent
feature till about 1767.
The gardens themselves were somewhat formally laid out. There were
several gravel walks, shaded by elms and yews; a flower-garden, and “a
beautiful octagon grass plat.” The principal walk led from the south
end of Ranelagh House to the bottom of the gardens, where there was
a circular Temple of Pan. At night the walks were prettily lit with
lamps attached to the trees. There was also a canal with a Temple
indifferently described as the Chinese House and the Venetian Temple.
[Illustration: _The Chinese House, the Rotunda, & the Company
in Masquerade in RENELAGH GARDENS_]
In its earliest as well as in its latest days masquerades attracted
many to the Rotunda and the gardens, but the chief diversion was the
promenade in the Rotunda. A guide-book of 1793 states that “walking
round the Rotundo” was “one of the pleasures of the place.” We hear
much at all periods of “the circular labour” of the company
and “the ring of folly.”[224] Matthew Bramble found one half of the
company “following one another’s tails in an eternal circle like
asses in an olive mill while the other half are drinking hot water
under the denomination of tea.” Mr. Bramble exacted much from places
of amusement, but it is to be suspected from other testimonies that
there was an atmosphere of dulness, a note of ennui, about the
ordinary diversions of this fashionable rendezvous. “There’s your
famous Ranelagh (says ‘Evelina’) that you make such a fuss about; why
what a dull place is that!” A Frenchman describing Ranelagh about
1800--foreigners were always expected to visit it--calls it “le plus
insipide lieu d’amusement que l’on ait pu imaginer,” and even hints at
Dante’s Purgatory. Another Frenchman writing much earlier, _circ._
1749, briefly comments “on s’ennuie avec de la mauvaise musique, du thé
et du beurre.”
Samuel Rogers (_Table Talk_), who must have known Ranelagh from
about 1786 till its close, was struck by the solemnity of the whole
thing: “all was so orderly and still that you could hear the whishing
sound of the ladies’ trains as the immense assembly walked round and
round the room.” An “affray” of the kind familiar at Vauxhall and
not infrequent at Marylebone was practically unknown at Ranelagh. On
May 6th, 1752, Dr. John Hill was caned in the Rotunda by an angry
gentleman, and the newspapers and caricaturists were momentarily
excited, chiefly because Hill’s injuries were supposed to be a sham.
One almost welcomes a scene at Ranelagh. On the 12th of May, 1764, four
footmen were charged before Sir John Fielding with riotous behaviour at
Ranelagh House, “hissing several of the nobility, relative to their not
giving or suffering vails to be taken, pelting several gentlemen with
brick-bats and breaking the windows.”[225]
Throughout its career of more than a hundred and sixty years, Ranelagh
fairly maintained its position as a fashionable resort, but at all
periods the company was a good deal mixed. Philomides, “a gentleman
of sprightly wit, and very solid judgment,” has described[226] the
frequenters of the place four or five years after it was first opened.
My Lord (he says) was sure to meet his tailor there, and Statira would
see her toyman “cursing himself for letting this Statira have a service
of very fine Dresden china, which she assured him her Lord would pay
for immediately.” The ubiquitous Templar was easily recognised--a
pert young fellow in a fustian frock, and a broad-brimmed hat “in an
affected impudent cock.” There was an Oxford scholar, a political
pamphleteer and a spruce military spark smelling of lavender water. A
coxcomb just returned from his travels was more absurd. He had set up
as virtuoso, and brought home a headless Helen and a genuine ‘Otho’
coined at Rome two years ago. He might now be heard talking Italian in
a loud voice and “pronouncing the word Gothic fifty times an hour.”
In 1760 a fashionable lady complains that there were too many
tradesmen’s wives at Ranelagh. But compared with Vauxhall it was
fashionable, at least according to a lady’s maid in “High Life Below
Stairs” (_circ._ 1759, Act I. sc. 2):--
_Lady Charlotte’s Maid_: Well, I say it again, I love Vauxhall.
_Lady Bab’s Maid_: Oh, my stars! Why, there is nobody there but
filthy citizens--_Runelow_ for _my_ money.
[Illustration: THE ATTACK ON DR. JOHN HILL AT RANELAGH, 6 MAY,
1752.]
From about 1774 it was considered fashionable to arrive at the Rotunda
about 11 P.M., one hour after the concert was over. In 1777, according
to Walpole, the company did not arrive till twelve. “The people of the
true ton,” says the satirical “Harlequin in Ranelagh,”[227] (1774),
“come in about eleven, stare about them for half an hour, laugh at the
other fools who are drenching and scalding themselves with coffee and
tea ... despise all they have seen, and then they trail home again to
sup.” The citizens, on the other hand, came to stare at the great, at
the Duke of Gloucester or Lady Almeria Carpenter, or whoever it might
be. They came to see how the great folks were dressed, how they walked
and how they talked. Some worthy men were compelled by their wives to
wear swords, and in the circling promenade found it hard “to adjust the
spit to the humour of those behind and before” them. The ‘Harlequin’
enlarges on some unpleasant characters who haunted Ranelagh, Baron
H----g (for instance), who trails about like a wounded worm, and Lord
C----y who “runs his nose under every bonnet.” It is not to be denied
that Ranelagh, though on the whole decorous, had a tolerable reputation
as a place of assignation.
§ 4. _Annals of Ranelagh 1742–1769._
From this general sketch of Ranelagh and its frequenters, we may pass
on to some details of its amusements year by year.
The principal performer at the concerts in the earliest days
(1742–_circ._ 1760) was the well-known actor and vocalist Beard,
who was considered by Dibdin to be, “taken altogether, the best English
singer.” Giulia Frasi, young and interesting, with her “sweet clear
voice,” was heard in 1751 and 1752. Michael Festing at first led the
band, and was succeeded (about 1752) by Abram Brown, a performer who
(according to Burney) had “a clear, sprightly and loud tone, with a
strong hand,” but who was deficient in musical knowledge and feeling.
Parry, the Welsh harper (1746), and Caporale, the violoncello player,
were also among the earlier performers.[228]
At first, choruses from oratorios (this was still the case in 1763)
were a feature of the concerts, but the performances soon came to
differ little from those of Vauxhall and Marylebone. In 1754 an
entertainment of recitation, with a procession, was given under the
name of Comus’s Court. In 1757 “Acis and Galatea” was performed for
the benefit of the Marine Society. On 10 June, 1763[229] Bonnell
Thornton’s ‘Burlesque Ode on St. Cecilia’s Day’ was performed,
“adapted (by Burney) to the antient British music, viz.: the salt-box,
the Jew’s-harp, the marrow-bones and cleavers, the hum-strum or
hurdy-gurdy, etc., etc.” The performers sang the recitative, airs and
choruses in masquerade dresses, and the salt-box song was especially
successful. The fun must have been rather forced, though Johnson, who
read the Ode when printed, “praised its humour,” seemed much diverted
with it, and repeated the lines:--
In strains more exalted the salt-box shall join,
And clattering and battering and clapping combine;
With a rap and a tap while the hollow side sounds,
Up and down leaps the flap, and with rattling rebounds.
In 1762–1764 the principal singer was the Italian Tenducci,[230] whose
voice, according to Miss Lydia Melford, was “neither man’s nor woman’s;
but it is more melodious than either, and it warbled so divinely, that
while I listened I really thought myself in Paradise.”
On 29 June, 1764, Mozart, then eight years old, performed on the
harpsichord and organ several of his own compositions. On 12 May,
1767,[231] Catches and Glees were rendered with instrumental parts by
Arne, an addition considered necessary on account of the size of the
Rotunda. This was stated to be the first public performance of the kind
in England.
In 1769 Dibdin was a singer of ballads, and on 12 May of this year
there was a Jubilee Ridotto, an event at which we may pause to recall
some of the earlier masquerades and balls which, from time to time,
enlivened the routine of Ranelagh.
The most famous of these entertainments was the “Grand Jubilee
Masquerade, in the Venetian taste,” that took place on Wednesday,
26 April, 1749, to celebrate the proclamation of the peace of
Aix-la-Chapelle. The Masquerade (says Horace Walpole[232]) “had nothing
Venetian in it, but was by far the best understood and prettiest
spectacle I ever saw; nothing in a fairy tale ever surpassed it....
It began at three o’clock; at about five, people of fashion began to
go; when you entered, you found the whole garden filled with masks and
spread with tents, which remained all night very commodely. In one
quarter was a Maypole dressed with garlands, and people dancing round
it to a tabor and pipe, and rustic music, all masked, as were all the
various bands of music that were disposed in different parts of the
garden; some like huntsmen with French-horns, some like peasants, and
a troop of harlequins and scaramouches in the little open temple on
the mount. On the canal was a sort of gondola, adorned with flags and
streamers, and filled with music, rowing about. All round the outside
of the amphitheatre were shops, filled with Dresden china, Japan, &c.,
and all the shopkeepers in mask. The amphitheatre was illuminated, and
in the middle was a circular bower, composed of all kinds of firs in
tubs, from twenty to thirty feet high; under them, orange trees, with
small lamps in each orange, and below them all sorts of the finest
auriculas in pots; and festoons of natural flowers hanging from tree
to tree. Between the arches, too, were firs, and smaller ones in the
balconies above. There were booths for tea and wine, gaming-tables, and
dancing, and about two thousand persons. In short, it pleased me more
than the finest thing I ever saw.”
Later masquerades, though attended by fashionable people, were
less select, as appears, for example, from an advertisement which
a gentleman inserted in the _Public Advertiser_ of 8 March,
1753[233]:--“This is to inform the Lady that was in a wite mask, red
Beard and Ey’s at the last Masquereade but one, in a brown and silver
flora Pethecoat and head-dress, remarkable gentle, very finely maid,
who lost her company and walked with several masks, perticuler with
one, who in raptorous heared her declare a dislike to gameing and
the intention of Maskquerdes ... on which he asked, wathere single
or ingaged, and under whos care that Night? the lady pointing to a
tall gentleman in black and a bag wigg, said his, my Brother.” His
intentions were honourable, and he begged to see her face. In reply,
“she repetted Part out of the Orphin ‘Trust not a man’; said he had
taken notice enough of her to know her again; bid him look sharp at the
next Makquered, at wich and all other Places he as been dispionted of
seeing her; he therefore hops (if not ingaged) will get her Brother or
some Friend to call on him” as he feels assured he could be happy for
life with her.
On the occasion of the Jubilee Ridotto on 12 May, 1769, the gardens
and the Chinese House were illuminated. “A large sea-horse stuck full
of small lamps floated on the Canal, and had a very agreeable aspect.”
A favourite Ranelagh ‘serenata,’ Dibdin’s ‘Ephesian Matron,’ was
performed at ten, and the Rotunda and gardens were gradually filled by
a brilliant company. The Dukes of York and Cumberland were there, and
one of the prettiest characters was “a rural nymph in rose-coloured
sattin, trimmed with silver.” The tickets, which cost a guinea,
included the supper. Unfortunately, the wine and sweetmeats were not
immediately forthcoming, and some gentlemen broke open the wine cellar
and helped themselves. Sir Thomas Robinson, to make things pleasant,
thereupon sent a general invitation to the company to sup with him. The
dancing began at twelve, and was continued till four, a comparatively
early hour at Ranelagh masquerades.
§ 5. _Later history of Ranelagh, 1770–1805._
A “Gentleman in Town,” writing in _The Town and Country Magazine_
for April 1770 (p. 195) to his friend in the country, enlarges on the
fashionable assemblages to be then seen at Ranelagh three times a
week. And we may note that about this time the tradesmen advertised
their silver Ranelagh silks and Ranelagh waistcoats in gold, silver
and colours. The sweet voice of “the lovely Mrs. Baddeley” was then
to be heard in the Rotunda, and she sang (in the autumn, 1770) in
“The Recruiting Sergeant,” together with Mrs. Thompson, Dibdin, and
Bannister.[234]
The garden concerts, and the fireworks, and transparent pictures in a
building in the grounds had by this time become prominent features of
the place.[235]
The event of 1775 was the Ranelagh Regatta and Ball,[236] which took
place on June 23rd. Early in the afternoon of that day the whole river
from London Bridge to Millbank was covered with pleasure boats, and
scaffold erections were to be seen on the banks, and even on the top of
Westminster Hall. Gambling tables lined the approaches to Westminster
Bridge: men went about selling indifferent liquor, Regatta songs and
Regatta cards. The river banks now resembled a great fair, and the
Thames itself a floating town. Wild calculations fixed the number of
the spectators at 200,000, or “at least” three millions. At 7.30 a
cannon signalled the start of the racing-boats, and about 8.30, when
the prizes had been awarded, the whole procession began to move “in
a picturesque irregularity towards Ranelagh.” The Directors’ barge,
with its band playing and gold REGATTA ensign flying, led the
way, and the fortunate persons who had ball-tickets landed at Ranelagh
Stairs at nine o’clock.
Dancing took place in the Temple of Neptune, a temporary octagon
erection in the grounds. Mrs. Cornelys had been given seven hundred
guineas (it is said) to supply the supper, and it is lamentable to
reflect that the supper was “indifferent, and the wine very scarce.”
However, there was a great company: the Duke of Gloucester, the Duke
of Northumberland, Lord North, the Duchess of Devonshire, Sir Joshua
Reynolds, Garrick, Colman, Samuel Foote. A band of two hundred and
forty instrumentalists, under Giardini, performed in the Rotunda,
and there was singing by Vernon and Reinhold, including the cheering
ballad:--
Ye lords and ye ladies who form this gay throng,
Be silent a moment, attend to our song,
And while you suspend your fantastical round,
Come, bless your sweet stars that you’re none of you drowned.
[Illustration: ADMISSION TICKET, BY CIPRIANI AND BARTOLOZZI.]
From this time (1775) till about 1790 the concerts continued as usual,
but Ranelagh seems during the period to have suffered a certain
eclipse. In May 1788 the shares are said to have fallen from their par
value (£1,000) to £900. Ranelagh was “voted a bore with the fashionable
circles,” and its distance from town began to be considered an obstacle.
About 1791, however, its fortunes revived, and numerous masquerades,
sometimes lasting till six or eight in the morning, and firework
displays (chiefly by Caillot and by Rossi and Tessier) remained a
feature of Ranelagh till its close.
Henry Angelo (_Reminiscences_, ii. _p._ 3 _f._), speaking of its later
days, declares that it was frequented by “the élite of fashion.” The
gentlemen wore powder, frills and ruffles, and had gold-headed canes.
“Cropped heads, trousers or shoe-strings” were not to be seen there.
The men used to buy in the ante-room myrtles, hyacinths and roses, not
to wear themselves, but for presentation to the ladies.
A masquerade of 1792 (14 February) was attended by Mrs. Jordan,
“supported” (as the newspapers said) “between the friendly arms of
the Prince of Wales and the Duke of Clarence.” Mr. Petit was good as
a man walking in his sleep with a candle, and amid the usual crowd of
harlequins, sailors and flower-girls, “a monkey of the largest size was
offensively dexterous.”[237] At another masquerade this year (16 May)
a Guy Faux, a ‘Bath Maccarony,’ an African Princess, and three or four
Romps attracted attention.
On May 7th, 1792, the exhibition called Mount Etna was introduced and
remained popular at Ranelagh for several years. A special building with
a scene designed by G. Marinari, ‘painter to the Opera,’ was prepared
for it in the gardens. The idea was evidently borrowed from Torré’s
Forge of Vulcan, the great attraction at the Marylebone Gardens some
twenty years earlier. The scene represented Mount Etna and the Cavern
of Vulcan with the ‘Cyclops’ forging the armour of Mars, “as described
(the advertisements add) in the Aeneid of Virgil.” To an accompaniment
of music “compiled from Gluck, Haydn, Giardini, and Handel,” we see the
‘Cyclops’ going to work. “The smoke thickens, the crater on the top of
Etna vomits forth flames, and the lava rolls dreadful along the side of
the mountain. This continues with increasing violence till there is a
prodigious eruption, which finishes with a tremendous explosion.”
On June 27th, 1793, the Chevalier D’Eon fenced in the Rotunda with M.
Sainville, and received the congratulations of the Prince of Wales and
Mrs. Fitzherbert.[238]
In 1797 (April) there was an enjoyable masquerade, at which there
reigned (we are told) “good nature and pleasant hilarity, without
riot”: all this, in spite of a crowd of imaginary Dutch skippers,
lunatics, coachmen, quack doctors and watercress girls.
At a concert in 1798 (June) Incledon and Madame Mara sang. In 1799 a
January masquerade was diversified by a drawing for fifty twelfth cakes
as prizes for the masks.
The Directors now began to offer prizes for regattas and volunteer
shooting-matches, and a few splendid entertainments mark the closing
years of Ranelagh.
On 2 June, 1802, Boodle’s Club gave an elegant dance at which the
ladies “wore white and silver, ornamented with laurel”--and diamonds,
and amused themselves by drawing prizes of trinkets in a Lottery
Booth. On the 28 June (1802) the Picnic Society gave an “afternoon
breakfast,” and at five o’clock Garnerin, the French aeronaut, and
Captain Sowden ascended in a balloon from the gardens.[239]
On 23 September (1802) Mr. Thomas Todd descended into a reservoir
of water twenty-five feet deep, prepared for him in the gardens.
His awkward diving-tub, and his dress of leather and metal excited
the laughter of spectators born too early to know the diver of the
Polytechnic. Nor is this praiseworthy experiment to be counted among
the splendid entertainments of Ranelagh, for Mr. Todd was “misfitted
by his coppersmith,” forgot to take down his lamp, and did not remain
under water more than five minutes.[240]
On 1 June, 1803, a ball in commemoration of the Installation of
the Knights of the Bath took place and proved one of the finest of
the entertainments. Yet these were only ‘struggles for happiness,’
and attempts to galvanise a nearly lifeless Ranelagh. The unending
promenade, with its sentimental songs and elegant regale of tea and
coffee, had ceased to attract, and the lamp-hung trees, the Chinese
House and the music on the Canal had lost their ancient charm. On 8
July, 1803, the Rotunda of Ranelagh was opened for the last time as a
place of amusement.