ROYALTY AND THE DRAMA
It is affirmed that the ex-monarch Dionysius died of excess of joy at
receiving intelligence that a tragedy of his own had been awarded a
poetical prize at a public competition. Whatever the truth of this
story, there can be no doubt that, even in its primitive form, the
monarch, like his subjects, interested himself in the production and
performance of the drama. At an early period in our own history the
courts of our kings and the castles of the great earls and barons “were
crowded with the performers of the secular places, where they were well
received and handsomely rewarded.”[133] Thus Eleanora of Aquitaine,
queen of Henry II., patronised representations nearly allied to the
regular drama, and we find Peter of Blois congratulating his brother
William on his tragedy of Flaura and Marcus played before the Queen.
Richard III., when Duke of Gloucester, entertained a company of players,
and in the reign of Henry VII. dramatic performances seem to have been
frequent throughout England. When Margaret, the King’s eldest daughter,
was sent to Scotland on her marriage with James IV., John English was
the principal member of a company of players forming part of the
retinue of the Princess. Sometime after the birth of Prince Arthur in
1486, there was a company of actors under the name of “The Prince’s
Players” who were required to contribute to the amusement of the Court.
In the household books of Henry, extending from 1492 to 1509, we find
numerous items relating to the theatrical amusements at this period.
During the first four years of his reign, Henry VIII. kept up the
theatrical establishment of his father, but in 1514 he added a new
company of actors to his domestic retinue, and henceforth we find
payments to the “King’s players” and to the “King’s old players.” And
associated with the year 1516 we find an enumeration of the players’
dresses under the title of “Garments for Players,”[134] which is of
considerable value and interest as throwing light on the nature of the
theatrical amusements of the period. It appears that the nobility
continued to patronise plays, and, following the example of the King,
most of them kept theatrical retainers of their own. According to
Collier,[135] one of the earliest indications of anything like a
classical taste in matters connected with the English stage is to be
found in 1520, when, for the entertainment of four French hostages who
had been left in this country for the execution of the treaty relating
to the surrender of Tournay, Henry caused his great chamber at Greenwich
to be staged when, among the performances, “there was a goodly comedy
of Plautus played.”
Princess Mary’s connection with the drama dated from childhood, for
before she had completed her sixth year we read of dramatic
representations held in her presence and for her entertainment; and by
an account in the Chapter House, Westminster, of the household expenses
of the natural son of Henry VIII., who had been created Duke of Somerset
and Richmond in June 1525, it appears[136] that “he had been several
times entertained by the performances of players,” and that the council
appointed for his care and custody had paid £3, 18s. 8d. for rewards to
actors and minstrels. Mary ascended the throne in 1553, and a play was
ordered on the occasion, but a month had barely transpired when she
issued a proclamation, one object of which was to prevent the
performance of plays calculated to advance the principles and doctrines
of the Reformation. Mary kept up the theatrical and musical
establishments of her father at an expense of between two and three
thousand pounds a year in salaries only, independently of board,
liveries, and incidental charges. The same establishment under
Elizabeth, in the fourth year of her reign, was on a much more
economical scale. But during her reign the stage found every
encouragement, for her Majesty caused a stage to be erected at Windsor
Castle for the regular performance of the drama, “with a wardrobe for
the actors, painted scenes, and an orchestra consisting of trumpeters,
luterers, harpers, ringers, minstrels,” &c.
On the 18th January 1561, an English tragedy in five acts, entitled
“Ferrex and Porrex, or Gorbaduc,” was performed before Queen Elizabeth,
being the joint composition of her cousins, Sir Thomas Sackville and
Thomas Norton. In her progress in 1564, Elizabeth was entertained at
King’s College, Cambridge, with a play entitled “Ezechias,” and two
years afterwards she witnessed a performance in Christ Church Hall,
Oxford, of Edwards’s “Palamon and Arcyte.” At this period plays were
occasionally exhibited on a Sunday in spite of the denunciations of the
Puritans. Elizabeth herself visited a theatrical exhibition on Sunday,
and in after years James I. allowed plays to be acted at Court on the
same day. It appears that in 1586 a correspondence took place between
the Court and the city of London regarding the fitness or unfitness of
certain theatrical representations, especially on Sundays.
Among the Harleian MSS. is an interesting account of the entertainments
given before Elizabeth and her Court in 1568, wherein we find a payment
of £634, 9s. 5d. to Sir Thomas Benger, for materials and work “within
the Office of the Revels,” between the 14th July 1567 and the 3rd March
1568, during which interval it appears “seven plays” and “one tragedy”
were represented before her Majesty.[137] And, it may be added, that it
was apparently part of the duty of the Master of the Revels to have the
plays rehearsed to him before they were presented at Court.
In 1574 the grant of the first “Royal Patent” was conceded in this
country to performers of plays, whereby the persons named in it were
empowered, during the Queen’s pleasure, to use, exercise, and occupy the
art and faculty of playing comedies, tragedies, interludes, and stage
plays, as well for the recreation of the Queen’s subjects as for her own
solace and pleasure, within the City of London and its liberties, and
within any cities, towns, and boroughs throughout England. Associated
with the theatrical amusements were the masks and shows, which were
conducted on a very expensive and imposing scale, an account of which we
have given elsewhere. And, as it has been often pointed out, many of
these were specially provided to gratify the vanity of the Queen, to
whom some marked and delicate compliment was generally made. In the
summer of 1601, the Queen was at an entertainment given by the Lord
Keeper, and on her way to the mansion she was entertained by a dialogue
“betweene the Bayly and the Dary-mayd,” in which the following was
supposed to be spoken by the bailiff of the Lord Keeper: “The Mistress
of this fayre companie, though she knowe the way to all men’s hearts,
yet she knowes the way to few men’s houses, except she love them very
well.”
James I., some years before he succeeded to the English throne, evinced
a strong disposition to favour theatrical amusements. In the Society of
Antiquaries is preserved a manuscript which shows the extent and amount
of his dramatic establishment, and from it we find that the annual fee
of the Master of the Revels had been raised to £100, besides diet in
Court, although each of the players was only allowed--as they had been
from the time of Henry VIII.--£3, 6s. 8d. per annum.
Prince Henry had a company of players, and after his death, and on the
marriage of the Elector Palatine of the Rhine to the Princess Elizabeth,
the players transferred their services to the Prince Palatine, and “it
is a new feature in theatrical history,” writes Collier,[138] “that on
this occasion they produced a patent under the Great Seal very similar
to that which James I. had granted about ten years before to Laurence
Fletcher, William Shakespeare, and the other servants of the Lord
Chamberlain.”
But it seems that the plays acted at Court did not always give
satisfaction, for in one of John Chamberlain’s letters to Sir Dudley
Carlton occurs this paragraph: “They have plays at Court every night,
both holidays and working days, wherein they show great patience, being
for the most part such poor stuff that, instead of delight, they send
the auditory away with discontent.” And he adds, “Indeed our poets’
brains and inventions are grown very dry, insomuch that of five new
plays there is not one that pleases; and therefore they are driven to
furbish over their old, which stand them in best stead, and bring them
most profit.”
The fondness of James for theatricals is further evidenced by the fact
that in 1617, during his journey to the north, he was attended by a
regular company of players, and a warrant issued for their payment is
thus recorded in the registers of the Privy Council: “11th July 1617.--A
warrant to the L. Stanhope, Treasurer of his Majestie’s Chambers, to
cause payment to be made to certain players for three Stage Playes, that
were acted before his Majestie, in his journey to Scotland, such summes
of money as is usual in the like kinde.”
Prince Charles retained a company of musicians in his pay, besides his
dramatic performers; and after his accession to the throne we find
entries of payment for plays performed at Court at Christmas, and
Twelfth-tide. It would seem that, at a very early date, players who
called themselves the servants of any particular nobleman, usually wore
his badge or livery. Accordingly in 1629 we find the King’s players
allowed, every second year, four yards of bastard scarlet for a cloak,
and a quarter yard of crimson velvet for a cape to it.
Charles II., again, was passionately fond of theatrical entertainments.
On one occasion, when Sir William Davenant’s play of “Love and Honour”
was first acted, his Majesty presented Betterton, the actor, with his
coronation suit, in which the player performed the character of Prince
Alonzo. The Duke of York followed his Majesty’s example by giving the
suit which he had worn on the same occasion to Hains, who acted the part
of Prince Prospero.
Previous to the Restoration of Charles II., it may be remembered, no
woman was allowed on the stage, in connection with which Colley Cibber
gives this anecdote: The King coming to the house rather before his
usual time, found the _dramatis personæ_ not ready to appear, whereupon
he sent one of his attendants to ascertain the cause of the delay. The
manager at once went to the royal box, and informed the merry monarch
that “the queen was not yet shaved.” Charles good-humouredly accepted
the explanation, and laughed heartily, until the male queen was
effeminated and the curtain drew up.
At the time of James II. playhouses, and players, were constantly
anathematised by the clergy, and the Duchess of York had a strong moral
objection to the coarse comedies of the era. But she liked a good play,
and was wont to remark that “there was no sin, she believed, in going to
theatres, provided the pieces selected for representation were not of an
objectionable character; but that the stage might and ought to be
rendered a medium of conveying moral instruction to the people, instead
of flattering and inculcating vice.”
Mary II. was a patron of the drama, and, in 1689, she expressed a wish
to see Dryden’s “Spanish Friar” performed, which had been forbidden by
James II. because its licentious comic scenes held up the Romish Church
to ridicule. But her Majesty was disappointed, for, to quote the words
of her friend Nottingham, “the only time she gave herself the diversion
of a play has furnished the town with discourse for a month. Some
unlucky expressions confused her, and forced her to hold up her fan,
often look behind her, and call for her palatine or hood, or anything
she could contrive to speak of to her woman. Every speech in that play
seemed to come home to her, as there was a strong report about town that
her father, James II., was dead in Ireland; and when anything applicable
was said, every one in the pit turned their heads over their shoulders,
and directed their looks most pointedly at her.” “Nor,” as Miss
Strickland writes, “could this be wondered at; for a daughter sitting to
see a play acted, which was too free for the morals of that age, at the
moment when reports were prevalent that her own father was dead, was
indeed a sight to be gazed upon with consternation.”
George I. was fond of seeing the play of “Henry VIII.,” and on one
occasion when it was being acted at Hampton Court, he paid particular
attention to that part of the play where Henry VIII. commands his
minister, Wolsey, to write circular letters of indemnity to every county
where the payment of certain heavy taxes had been disputed--
“Let there be letters writ to every shire
Of the King’s grace and pardon. The grieved commons
Hardly conceive of me. Let it be noised
That through our intercession, this revokement
And pardon comes. I shall, anon, advise you
Further in the proceeding.”
The story goes that on one occasion when the above lines were spoken,
the King said to the Prince of Wales, who had not yet been expelled from
Court, “You see, George, what you have one day to expect.”
George II. has been censured for encouraging the representation of
immoral dramas, “a perverted taste,” which, it is said, “was strong upon
him from the first.”[139] When Prince of Wales he witnessed the acting
of Otway’s “Venice Preserved,” but, on discovering afterwards that
certain scenes had been omitted, he commanded them to be restored. In
the later part of his life, George II. took advantage of his position to
make loud remarks on the performances at which he was present, a
recorded instance of which occurred at Drury Lane, when his Majesty
commanded Farquhar’s “Beaux Stratagem” and Fielding’s “Intriguing
Chambermaid” to be performed. But the representation does not appear to
have given satisfaction, for Walpole, writing to Mann, says: “A certain
king that, whatever airs you may give yourself, you are not at all like,
was last week at the play. The intriguing chambermaid in the farce says
to the old gentleman, ‘You are villainously old, you are sixty-six; you
cannot have the impudence to think of living above two years.’ The old
gentleman on the stage here turned about in a passion and said, ‘This is
d--d stuff!’ and the royal critic was energetically right.”
One of the greatest honours ever rendered to a dramatist by royalty was
conferred by Queen Caroline, wife of George II., on Mottley, an obscene
playwright. But when his benefit night was announced “as to take place
soon after the Queen’s drawing-room had been held, the Queen herself, in
that very drawing-room, sold Mottley’s tickets, delivering them with her
own royal hand to the purchasers, and condescending to receive gold for
them in return.”[140]
Frederick Prince of Wales, father of George III., was fond of private
theatricals, and endeavoured to instil his taste for dramatic
performances into his children.
More than once we find the little princes and princesses “fretting their
hour upon the stage,” their instructor being the celebrated actor, James
Quin, who was also the stage manager. In after years the old actor took
a pride in speaking of the days when he was a Court favourite, and when
the first speech of George III., delivered from the throne, was much
commended for the graceful manner in which it was spoken; “Ay!” said
Quin, “it was I who taught the boy to speak.”
The first of these juvenile dramatic performances took place on 4th
January 1749--the piece selected for representation being Addison’s
“Cato”--and the last occasion of these juvenile theatricals at Leicester
House appears to have been on 11th January 1750, on which day Bubb
Dodington mentions in his diary that he was invited to witness the
representation of Rowe’s tragedy of “Lady Jane Grey” by the royal
children.
In after days George III.’s early acquired taste for the drama seems to
have kept pace with his life, for so frequent were his visits to the
theatre that the people of London are said to have been as well
acquainted with his features as with those of their next-door neighbour.
His glee during the performance of a broad farce, or a droll hit in a
pantomime, may at times have been too exuberantly manifested, but his
subjects did not love him the less because he was completely at home in
the midst of them. Neither did his sense of the ridiculous prevent his
enjoying the higher beauties of the drama. Frequently Mrs. Siddons, and
sometimes Garrick, were sent for to read plays or poetry in the royal
circle either at Buckingham House, or Windsor.[141] “He is said,” writes
Thackeray,[142] “not to have cared for Shakespeare or tragedy much;
farces and pantomimes were his joy; and especially when the clown
swallowed a carrot, or a string of sausages, he would laugh so
outrageously that the lovely princess by his side would have to say, ‘My
gracious monarch, do compose yourself.’ But he continued to laugh, and
at the very smallest farces, so long as his poor wits were left him.”
But the fondness of George III. for the drama on one occasion was not
unattended with risk, for as he was on his way to the Haymarket
Theatre, on 25th July 1777, a madwoman attacked and did some damage to
his chair. And as he was entering his box in Drury Lane Theatre, on 15th
May 1800, he was shot at by a madman named James Hadfield. But he did
not lose his composure, and he slept as quietly as usual during the
interval between the play and the after-piece. What nowadays would be
considered an unpardonable offence was occasionally taken by actors with
their royal patrons. When Parsons, for instance, was playing the Chief
Carpenter in the “Siege of Calais,” advancing close to the royal box, he
exclaimed, “An’ the King were here and did not admire my scaffold, I
would say, D--n him! he has no taste”--an impudent sally which amused
the King even more than the audience.
An act of indecorum, but trivial compared with that of Parsons, happened
when the young King of Denmark--who married the sister of George
III.--was present in October 1768, at the tragedy of “Jane Shore,”
during the performance of which he went fast asleep, and remained so to
the amusement of the audience, but to the annoyance of Mrs. Bellamy, who
played Alicia.
She waited for her opportunity, and having to pronounce the words, “O
thou false lord,” she approached the royal box, and uttered them “in
such a piercing tone, that the King awoke in sudden amazement, but with
perception enough to enable him to protest that he would not be married
to a woman with such a voice though she had the whole world for a
dowry.”[143]
It was on 3rd December 1779, when the “Winter’s Tale” was being played
by royal command at Drury Lane, that the Prince of Wales, afterwards
George IV., was subdued by the beauty of the charming actress, Mary
Robinson, in her character of Perdita. An intrigue ensued, and he
corresponded with her under the name of “Florizel.” He provided for her
a costly establishment, “and when after two years the connection
terminated, she obtained from him a bond for £20,000, which she
afterwards surrendered.” And although he had sworn to be “unalterable to
my Perdita through life,” he abandoned her, and left her to want. But
Charles Fox obtained for her an annuity of £300, and, when sojourning in
France, Marie Antoinette gave a purse knitted by her own fingers to “la
belle Anglaise.”
Queen Victoria, too, not only patronised the drama, but she gave it
every encouragement, the performance of a good play well acted being a
source of recreation which she thoroughly enjoyed. But, as is well
known, owing to the lamented death and irretrievable loss of the Prince
Consort, her Majesty during her many years of mourning abandoned many of
the former amusements of her Court as distasteful in her bereavement;
and it was only in the later years of her life that dramatic
representations were once more occasionally seen at Windsor, the memory
of which is of too recent occurrence to need further notice.
The prominence assigned to the drama in the diversions at the Court of
Louis XIV. did much to encourage this department of literature in
France,[144] for we are told that the stigma attaching to the stage had
to a large extent been wiped away “by the homage of society, the
elevation of the theatre to the level of a State institution,” and a
remark by Louis XIV. that a gentleman did not cease to be one by going
on the stage.
It was in 1680 that Louis XIV. formed a company of players, undertaking
to pay them 12,000 livres a year, and placing them under the control of
the First Gentlemen of the Chamber--the origin of the Théâtre Française,
more popularly designated the Comédie Française. The company consisted
of a sufficient number of members--twenty-seven--“to do justice to a
tragedy or comedy in the Maisons Royales, when his Majesty wished to be
so diverted.” However much the King’s name was maligned in death, in
this outburst of feeling the stage had little or no share, for the
players could not forget that the late King had been a lover of the
drama from his boyhood, and had raised their art to the dignity of a
State institution, and had treated them at Court as on a level with
distinguished men of letters, painters, and savants.[145]
Louis XV., on the other hand, showed an apathetic indifference towards
the stage, and in the words of Matthieu Marais he cared for neither the
drama nor music, and it is said that “the sight of his dull and
immovable face never failed to depress the players’ spirits.”
[Illustration: LOUIS XIV.]
Plays of an irreligious or seditious tendency found no sympathy with
Louis XVI., and he interdicted the production of “The Mariage de Figaro”
by Beaumarchais, remarking that the author of it “scoffs at everything
that ought to be respected in government,” but his Majesty was
eventually induced to withdraw his veto.
Marie Antoinette took a keen interest in all kinds of theatricals, and
private representations were performed in her apartments. According to
Montjoie,[146] she condescended to take characters not always of the
most dignified description; she also played in comic operas. This sort
of amusement, he adds, was imitated, and all classes of society imbibed
a taste for theatrical representations; “there was not a man of rank, a
financier, nor even a citizen in easy circumstances, who would be
without his theatre. Formerly a private gentleman would have been
disgraced if suspected of metamorphosing himself into an actor, even in
a private house. The Queen, however, by her example having put an end to
this prejudice, the head of the magistrates, unmindful of the dignity of
his position, performed the lowest comic parts.”[147] Indeed, the
theatre was a constant topic of conversation at Court, and when the
Queen had not been present she never omitted asking, “Was it well
attended?”
It was in 1774 that the King addressed Marie Antoinette thus: “You are
fond of flowers. Well, I have a bouquet to offer you: it is the Little
Trianon”;--a fatal present, as it turned out, for this “Little Trianon”
became “the imputed cause of ruinous extravagance, and the fancied scene
of improper indulgences.” During her residence here the favourite
amusement was private theatricals, at which the King regularly attended.
On one occasion when Marie Antoinette went to the opera, a striking
proof was given by the audience of their extraordinary and marked
affection for her. The opera of “Iphigenia” by Glück was being
performed, in the second act of which there is a chorus, in which
Achilles sings the first verse, turning to his followers and saying--
“Chantons, célébrez votre reine!”
Instead of that the actor gave these words--
“Chantons, célébrons notre reine,
L’hymen, qui sous ses lois l’enchaîne,
Va nous rendre à jamais heureux.”
The audience took this up with enthusiastic ardour. “All was shouting
and clapping of hands, and--what never happened at the opera before--the
chorus was encored, and there were cries of ‘Long live the Queen,’” at
which expression of feeling the Queen was so affected that she shed
tears.
A similar demonstration occurred the last time the Queen was ever in a
playhouse, the play on this occasion being Grétry’s “Les Evenements
Imprévus.” By mistaken kindness, one of the leading ladies bowed to the
Queen as she sang the words, “Ah, how I love my mistress!” in a duet.
Instantly twenty voices shouted from the pit, “No mistress, no master!
liberty!” A few counter voices cried, “Vive le Roi! Vive le Reine!” but
the pit drowned them, “No master, no Queen!” A quarrel ensued, but the
Queen as composed as before was loudly cheered as she quitted the
theatre--never to be seen again at a dramatic performance.
In Maria Theresa, who became Empress of Germany in 1745, the drama had a
strong supporter, a taste which had always been wisely encouraged. The
story goes that her father composed an opera at a time when war was
raging, his country falling into ruins, and his Court receiving the
bribes of his enemies.
At the Court of Vienna the drama, at one time or another, has been in
popular request. Leopold I. made music and the theatre his great hobby,
next to his passion for hunting. According to Vehse,[148] he had a
theatre, and he caused at Vienna and Schönbrunn brilliant operas and
pastorals to be performed, in which “the scenery and the costumes were
most magnificent.” It is reported that the getting up of one of these
operas, “Il Pomo d’Oro,” cost as much as 100,000 florins--grand battle
scenes, rehearsed under the superintendence of the Court fencing-master,
being introduced. The whole of Vienna, we read, became imbued with the
Emperor’s fondness for music and the drama, which was equally shared by
his second wife, Claudia of Tyrol, who, it is said, sometimes made use
of these operatic representations to “tell her lord and husband things
which he was not likely to hear elsewhere.” Thus on one occasion she had
a piece performed entitled, “La Lanterne de Diogene,” in which the
speeches addressed to Alexander the Great were intended to set forth
before Leopold the abuses rife at the Court. But the Emperor’s third
wife, the saintly Eleanora of Mantua, had no sympathy for the stage, and
it is said accompanied her husband to the opera only with inward groans;
and, instead of reading the libretto, she studied the Psalms.
Joseph II., again, was fond of the theatre, and he did much for it. One
of his favourite comedies was Grossman’s “Not more than Six Dishes,”
which appears to have been an amusing satire on the prodigality and the
general manners of the nobility, who consequently, we are told, did
their utmost to have the piece suppressed. An opera which never failed
to amuse the Emperor was one by Paisiello, called “Il Re Teodoro,” the
libretto of which was another satire, pointed at King Gustavus III. of
Sweden, who, during his stay at Venice in the year 1783, had “displayed
a most ridiculous profusion, which even extended to his dressing-gown.”
As a young man Frederick the Great took great pleasure in theatrical
amusements, and in the year 1737 he acted at Rheinsberg, when he took
the part of Philoctèle in Voltaire’s “Œdipe.” He had a strong partiality
for the French drama, and soon after his accession to the throne he
summoned a French company to Berlin; but he was apt to criticise “the
exaggerated pathos of the French actors,” remarking of Le Cain: “This
man would be the Roscius of our age if he exaggerated less. I like to
see our passions represented as they really are; but as soon as Nature
is crushed by art, I remain quite unmoved.”
He established the Italian opera in Berlin, and until the Seven Years’
War he was a frequent attendant at the opera and ballet, as well as at
the French comedy. The theatre, we are told, “cost the Emperor nearly
four hundred thousand dollars a year. The admission was free, the boxes
being assigned to the Court, the ministers, privy councillors, &c. The
pit was filled by the military, every regiment of the garrison sending a
certain number of men.” But it would seem that the “gentlemen of the
green-room” gave the Emperor some trouble, for he once wrote: “The opera
people are such a blackguardly set that I am heartily tired of them.”
And on another occasion he wrote still more strongly: “I shall send them
all off to the ----, such blackguards may be had any day; I must have
money for cannon, and cannot spend so much on those mountebanks.”
The dancers, too, caused him some considerable trouble, and even
Vestris, the French _dieu de la danse_, found no engagement in Berlin,
the Emperor remarking, “Mon. Vestris is mad; who in the world but a fool
would give four thousand dollars to a dancer, besides three thousand to
his sister, and one thousand to his brother.”
But, much as Frederick liked theatrical amusements and dancing, he was
an inveterate opponent of aerial feats and rope-dancing shows as highly
dangerous, and forbade them throughout his dominions by a special
cabinet order, which ran thus: “If such people have a wish to break
their necks we cannot prevent their doing so in foreign countries, but
in our own provinces our humanity, and fatherly care for our subjects,
forbid us to allow them an opportunity.”
Never, it is said, were stage representations of such gorgeousness
exhibited in Rome until the period of the sojourn of Christina, ex-Queen
of Sweden, in Italy in 1668, when her influence seems to have had an
extraordinary effect on all classes of society. Thus we are told how the
entire Sacred College were now for ever going to the play, “and the
balcony of her box was every night crowded by cardinals, who looked with
edification on the ballerinas, and listened with delight to the
exquisitely dressed singing-girls, who resorted to Rome at the
invitation of Christina. The etiquette, when she was present, was of the
very strictest, the noblest in Rome being compelled to remain uncovered
as long as she was in the house. The gay cardinals, who lolled over the
balcony in front of her box, alone wore their caps, in allusion to which
privilege a paper was one night fixed beneath the balcony, on which was
inscribed, “Plenary indulgence for the gentlemen in purple.”[149]
In the spring of 1757 a strange event occurred in the little Court of
Stanislaus Leczinski, ex-King of Poland, and who at that time kept his
Court at Nancy. The theatrical company in the service of his Majesty
announced the performance of “Le Glorieux,” for the début of an actor, a
young boy, recently arrived at Nancy. On the appointed evening the
Court, together with every person of distinction in the town, flocked to
the little theatre to witness the appearance of the young actor, who was
to personate the humble character of the poorly dressed lacquey in the
play of Destouches. King Stanislaus was in his box, accompanied by the
Marchioness de Boufflers, anxious to see the boy whose past was so
romantic, and which, briefly told, was as follows: “During the
wanderings of a party of strolling-players, the wife of one of them
augmented the company by giving birth to a boy. The child was placed
under the care of a nurse, with a liberal allowance for its maintenance;
but she lodged it in the hospital of the _Enfans Trouvés_; but after a
lapse of seven years the treachery of the nurse was discovered, and the
child was restored to its parents.” This child was the new _débutant_,
whose natural air and correct accentuation of the little part allotted
to him charmed every one, and when, in accordance with his part, he took
with a cool gesture a pinch of snuff, which was followed by a fit of
sneezing he could not repress, the King smilingly exclaimed, “God bless
you,” words which instantly resounded through the pit.
At the conclusion of the play the child was brought to the King’s box,
and his Majesty drawing him towards him, and wiping away the powder
from his forehead, conferred upon him a royal kiss. The boy was sensible
of the honour, and shyly turning his eyes towards where the Marchioness
was seated, said--
“Ah, all the pretty ladies behind the scenes kissed me and embraced me.”
“And I suppose,” said the King, “you think all the pretty ladies in the
boxes ought to do the same.” And without waiting for the ceremony of
presentation, the boy ran to Madame de Boufflers and kissed her on each
cheek.
Such was the début of Joseph Alvaham Bernard, commonly called Henry, on
making his first appearance at the Court Theatre of Nancy in 1750.[150]