1759.

"is right," said Quin, decisively. "I' faith, Bracey," said Et. 31. Cibber, taking snuff, and turning to his ancient partner in

theatrical glory, Mrs. Bracegirdle, "the lad is clever!"

Justly was Garrick proud of that opinion; for only a year before, the Apology had given proof of what a masterly critic Cibber was, and all the old man's prejudices and tastes went strongly counter to the admission thus wrung from him. That it was given, however, and in still stronger terms, may fairly be inferred from what Garrick goes on to say to his brother, in this letter dated the 22nd December. "You perhaps would "be glad to know what parts I have play'd. King Richd, "Jack Smatter in Pamela, Clody Fop's Fortune, Lothario "Fair Penitent, Chamont Orphan, Ghost Hamlet, and shall "soon be ready in Bays, in ye Rehearsal, and in ye part of "Othello, Both which I believe will do Me and Giffard

great service. I have had great success in all, and 'tis not

yet determin'd whether I play Tragedy or Comedy best. "Old Cibber has spoke with ye Greatest Commendation "of my Acting." Of course the reader has observed that the grave question as to Harlequin has not been answered. But it creeps into the letter before its close. "As to 'playing a Harlequin, 'tis quite false. Yates* last season was taken very ill, and was not able to begin ye Entertainment; so I put on ye Dress, and did two or three scenes

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"He plays all parts, and is a very good mimic. His acting I have seen, and may say to you, who will not tell it again here, I see nothing wonderful in it; but "it is heresy to say so the Duke of Argyll says, 'he is superior to Betterton.'" Coll. Lett. i. 189.

* Then a brother actor at Goodman's-fields, who afterwards married the cele brated actress, his second wife, for whom Goldsmith, as will hereafter be seen, had the highest admiration. The occasion was, no doubt, when Yates in the preceding March had to appear with Miss Hippisley, a Columbine, in a new pantomime called "Harlequin Student; or, the Fall of Pantomime with the Restoration of the Drama, "the whole to conclude with a representation of Shakespeare's Monument as lately erected." Some Account of the English Stage (Bath, 1832) iii. 641.

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"for him, but Nobody knew it but him and Giffard. I know 1759. "it has been said I play'd Harlequin at Covent Garden, Et.31. "but 'tis quite false." With which imperfect explanation Peter's ruffled dignity had to compose itself, as best it might.

The anticipation of a triumph in Bayes proved thoroughly well-founded. After Bayes there was no disputing the predominance he had reached. To the roar of laughter and delight at its imitations, what still remained of the old school came tumbling down irrecoverably. Heresy," growled Quin;* "Reformation," cried Garrick; and the smartness of the retort showed off also his pretensions as a man of wit. Noblemen had him to their houses; Pope came out of his retirement to see him play; the great Mr. Murray, leader of the King's Bench, forgot his briefs and his politics to entertain him at supper in Lincoln's-inn-fields; ladies fell in love with him; he had to write to Lichfield to protest he was not going to be married; and if, in the last letter I shall quote from this remarkable collection, and which is Idated within less than six months from the first I have quoted, he refers to some of these distinctions and compliments with a modest and manly pride, let us admit that some such set-off was needed to all the bitter mortifications his brother Peter had been heaping upon him, and that while he remains victor in the epistolary duel, he sings no

"This Garrick is a new

"Pooh! pooh!" exclaimed that old stage despot. "religion. Whitfield was followed for a time, but they'll all come to church "again." It was the "Bayes" which gave Quin mortal offence. Quin was not himself among the actors who were ridiculed, but he took to himself the laughter at others who were in fact his imitators and disciples. "Delane" says

Murphy was at the head of his profession. He was tall and comely; had a "clear and strong voice, but was a mere declaimer. Garrick began with him. "He retired to the upper part of the stage, and drawing his left arm across his "breast, rested his right elbow on it, raising a finger to his nose; and then came forward in a stately gait, nodding his head as he advanced, and in the exact "tone of Delane, spoke," &c., &c. Life, i. 53. And see Davies, Life, i. 47-8.

1759.

Et. 31.

strained or excessive song of triumph. "The favor I meet “with from ye Greatest men," he writes to his brother on the 19th of April, "has made me far from repenting of "my choice. I am very intimate with Mr. Glover, who will "bring out a Tragedy next winter upon my acct. Twice I "have sup'd wth ye Great Mr. Murray, Counsell', and shall "wth Mr. Pope, by his Introduction. I sup'd with ye Mr. Littleton, ye Prince's Favourite, last Thursday night, and "that with ye highest Civility and complaisance. He told "me he never knew what Acting was till I appeared, and said "I was only born to act wt Shakespear writ. These things daily occurring give me Great Pleasure. I din'd with L “Hallifax and Ld Sandwich, two very ingenious Noblemen, "yesterday, and am to dine at Ld Hallifax's next Sunday "with Ld Chesterfield. I have the Pleasure of being very "intimate, too, with Mr. Hawkins Browne, of Burton.* In "short, I believe nobody (as an Actor) was ever more caress'd, and my Character as a private Man makes 'em more desirous of my Company. (All this entre nous, as one "Broth to another.) I am not fix'd for next year, but shall certainly be at ye Other End of ye Town. I am offered 500 "guineas and a Clear Benefit, or part of ye Management."

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Here, then, I leave him, rapidly on his way to the other end of town, manager in expectancy already, the architect in six months of a fortune which went on increasing for thirtysix years, now as always the darling of the great, and a

* The author, among other things, of A Pipe of Tobacco (the original of the Rejected Addresses, Odes and Addresses, &c. &c.), which Goldsmith praises deservedly in his Beauties of English Poetry, not on the ground that the parody is ridiculous, but that the imitation is excellent. "I am told" he remarks "that "he had no good original manner of his own, yet we see how well he succeeds "when he turns an imitator." i. 261. Johnson thought him the best "converser" he had ever met. Mrs. Piozzi, 173.

"I dined to-day at Garrick's," writes Horace Walpole to Bentley (August 15, 1755): "there were the Duke of Grafton, Lord and Lady Rochford, Lady Holder

1759.

taster by anticipation of the bitters as well as the sweets of the cup so plentifully filled for him. For those reproaches Et. 31. of his brother's had a sting to be remembered when his brother's outraged dignity had been long forgotten. The latter we have seen sensibly assuaged even in the letters quoted; and its conclusion and moral might be yet more pointedly drawn out of others of later date in the same collection, which show Mr. Peter Garrick solely indebted to the actor for retrieval of his shattered fortune, a successful suppliant for favours over and over again conferred on him, and finally indebted to no less a friend and patron of David's than the Duke of Devonshire for "the finger" that "lifted" himself "out of those cursed wine-vaults." But notwithstanding all this, very correctly did Peter's first shock of horror on learning that David had become a player, reflect a feeling which others used throughout his life to gall and to humiliate him; which, while it could not shut against him the favours of the great, for that reason more bitterly exposed him to the malice and insult of the little; which threw him into uneasy relations with men of his own social station; obscured too often his better nature; and remains for us the clue by which, if we would judge him favourably, we may unravel what appears least consistent in his character. I have had the less scruple in giving at some length, therefore, even to the temporary interruption of my narrative, that critical passage of his life which till now has never been authentically told.

66 ness, the crooked Mostyn, and Dabreu the Spanish minister; two regents, of "which one is lord chamberlain, the other groom of the stole; and the wife of a 66 secretary of state. This is being sur un assez bon ton for a player! Don't you "want to ask me how I like him? Do want, and I will tell you.-I like her exceedingly; her behaviour is all sense, and all sweetness too. I don't know "how, he does not improve so fast upon me: there is a great deal of parts, and vivacity, and variety, but there is a great deal too of mimicry and burlesque." Coll. Lett. iii. 139.

CHAPTER III.

OVERTURES FROM SMOLLETT AND MR. NEWBERY.

1759-1760.

BUT, at the door of Mr. Oliver Goldsmith, Doctor Smollett 1759. and Mr. Newbery have been waiting us all this while, and Et. 31. neither of them belonged to that leisurely class which can very well afford to wait. The Doctor was full of energy and movement always, as one of his own headlong heroes; and who remembers not the philanthropic bookseller in the Vicar of Wakefield, the good-natured man with the redpimpled face, who had no sooner alighted but he was in haste to be gone, “for he was ever on business of the utmost importance, and was at that time actually compiling materials "for the history of one Mr. Thomas Trip." But not on Mr. Thomas Trip's affairs had the child-loving publisher* now ventured up Break-neck Steps; and upon other than the old Critical business was the author of Peregrine Pickle a visitor in Green Arbour Court. Both had new and important schemes in hand, and with both it was an object to secure the alliance and services of Goldsmith. Smollett had

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"He called himself their friend," says Doctor Primrose, "but he was the "friend of all mankind. . . he had published for me against the Deuterogamists "of the age, and from him I borrowed a few pieces." And see Nichols's Literary Anecdotes, iii. 731-2.