Chapter IX: Part THE SECOND (7)

[44] The “Green Man” (rebuilt) stands east of Portland Road, Metropolitan Railway Station, on the site of the “Farthing Pie House,” at which scraps of mutton put into a crust were sold for a farthing. The rural state of this neighbourhood, and the regrets which the spread of London awakened, are set forth in Dr. Ducarel’s speech in the chapter, “Nothing to Eat,” in Ephraim Hardcastle’s (William Henry Pyne’s) delightful _Wine and Walnuts_:--

“‘Verily I cannot get this mighty street out of my head,’ said the Doctor. ‘And then there is the new park--what do you call it? Mary-le-bone--no, the Regent’s Park: it seems to be an elegant, well-planned place, methinks, and will have a fine effect, no doubt, with its villas and what not, when the shrubs and trees have shot up a little. But I shall not live to see it, and I care not; for I remember those fields in their natural, rural garb, covered with herds of kine, when you might stretch across from old Willan’s farm there, a-top of Portland Street, right away without impediment to Saint John’s Wood, where I have gathered blackberries when a boy--which pretty place, I am sorry to see, these brick-and-mortar gentry have trenched upon. Why, Ephraim, you metropolitans will have half a day’s journey, if you proceed at this rate, ere you can get a mouthful of fresh air. Where the houses are to find inhabitants, and, when inhabited, where so many mouths are to find meat, must be found out by those who come after.’”

[45] Smith seems to have understated the facts. James Easton, the author of a curious work, entitled “_Human Longevity_, recording the name, age, place of residence, and year of the decease of 1712 persons, who attained a century and upwards, from A.D. 66 to 1799, etc.” (Salisbury, 1799), enumerates sixty-one cases in this year as against Smith’s forty-eight. He gives the following particulars of the three cases named by Smith:--

“Mrs. Keithe--133, of Newnham, Gloucestershire. She, lived moderately, and retained her senses till within fourteen days of her death. She left three daughters, the eldest aged one hundred and eleven; the second one hundred and ten; the youngest one hundred and nine. Also seven great, and great great grandchildren.

“Mr. Rice--115, of Southwark, cooper.

“Mrs. Chun--138, near Litchfield, Staffordshire; resided in the same house one hundred and three years. By frequent exercise, and temperate living, she attained so great longevity. She left one son and two daughters, the youngest upwards of one hundred years.”

[46] According to one story, Mother Damnable was Jinney, the daughter of a Kentish Town brick-maker, named Jacob Bingham. After living with a marauder named Gipsy George, who was hanged for sheep-stealing, Jinney passed from the protection of one criminal to another, until she was left a lonesome and embittered woman. She lived in her own cottage, built on waste land by her father, and abused everyone.

“’Tis Mother Damnable! that monstrous thing,
Unmatch’d by Macbeth’s wayward women’s ring.
For cursing, scolding, fuming, flinging fire
I’ the face of madam, lord, knight, gent, cit, squire.”

The story went that on the night of her death hundreds of persons saw the Devil enter her house. On the site rose the inn which bore her portrait as its sign. Smith’s mention of the terror with which it was regarded may have reference to its loneliness and gruesome traditions. In his own day the inn was a pleasant resort. “Then the old Mother Red Cap was the evening resort of worn-out Londoners, and many a happy evening was spent in the green fields round about the old wayside houses by the children of poorer classes. At that time the Dairy, at the junction of the Hampstead and Kentish Town roads, was not the fashionable building it is now, but with forms for the pedestrians to rest on, they served out milk fresh from the cow to all who came” (John Palmer, _St. Pancras_). This dairy, so long a landmark to North Londoners, has just disappeared in favour of a “Tube” railway station.

[47] This curious work may still be seen in Little Denmark Street, where its forty or fifty writhing figures, incrusted with grime, look at a little distance like some ordinary floral design. The original “Resurrection Gate” was erected about the year 1687, in accordance with an order of the vestry. The bill of expenses is extant, and its terms were contributed by Dr. Rimbault to _Notes and Queries_ of June 23, 1864, showing the cost to have been £185, 14s. 6d., of which £27 was paid for the carving to an artist named Love. In 1900, the present Tuscan gate in Little Denmark Street was erected with the old carving inserted.

[48] Probably Charles Harriot Smith, the architect, who was at first a stone-carver. He died in 1864.

[49] The Reverend James Bean was Vicar of Olney, Buckinghamshire, and assistant librarian at the British Museum. He died in 1826, and was buried in St. George’s, Bloomsbury, burial-ground.

[50] Strype says these almshouses bore the inscription, “St. Giles’s Almshouse, anno domini 1656.” They were removed in 1782.

[51] Originally Queen Anne’s Square and now Queen Anne’s Gate.

[52] The Pound stood, as Smith indicates, in the broad space where St. Giles High Street, Tottenham Court Road, and Oxford Street met; it was removed in 1765.

[53] This song, entitled “Just the Thing,” is valuable as a portrait of the eighteenth-century “hooligan,” ancestor of Mr. Clarence Rook’s nineteenth century “Alf” in _Hooligan Nights_:--

“On Newgate steps Jack Chance was found,
And bred up near St. Giles’s Pound,
My story is true, deny it who can,
By saucy, leering Billingsgate Nan.
Her bosom glowed with heartfelt joy
When first she held the lovely boy.
Then home the prize she straight did bring,
And they all allow’d he was just the thing.

At twelve years old, I have been told,
The youth was sturdy, stout, and bold;
He learn’d to curse, to swear, and fight,
And everything but read and write.

But when he came to man’s estate,
His mind it ran on something great,
A-thieving then he scorn’d to tramp;
So hir’d a pad and went on the scamp.
At clubs he all Flash Soup did sing.
And they all allow’d he was just the thing.

His manual exercise gone through,
Of Bridewell, Pump, and Horse Pond too,
His back had often felt the smart
Of Tyburn strings at the tail of a cart.
He stood the patter, but that’s no matter,
He gammon’d the Twelve, and work’d on the water,
Then a pardon he got from his gracious King,
And swaggering Jack was just the thing.

Like a captain bold, well arm’d for war.
With bludgeon stout, or iron bar,
At heading a mob, he never did fail,
At burning a mass-house, or gutting a jail;
But a victim he fell to his country’s laws,
And died at last in religion’s cause.
NO POPERY! made the blade to swing,
And when tuck’d up he was just the thing.”

[54] Mr. George Clinch, in his _Marylebone and St. Pancras_, says that there is some reason to think that a portion at least of Capper’s farm still remains. A large furniture establishment at Nos. 195-198, Tottenham Court Road, exhibits on a wall in the rear two tablets marking the boundary of St. Pancras and St. Giles-in-the-Fields, and bearing eighteenth-century dates. An old lease of the property, Mr. Clinch adds, contains a clause binding the tenant to keep stabling for forty head of cattle, and it is known that the premises were once used as a large livery stable.

[55] Hanway Street now boasts only one milliner, but has several art and curiosity shops of the kind Smith loved. The “Blue Posts” (rebuilt) is still at the corner of Hanway Street. Mr. Joshua Sturges’ book, published in 1800, was on draughts, not chess. It was entitled _Guide to the Game of Draughts_, and was dedicated by permission to the Prince of Wales. It has an engraved frontispiece, “Figure of the Draught Table.”

Sturges was probably not buried, as Smith states, in the Hampstead Road, but in St. Pancras cemetery (see _Notes and Queries_, Series II. x. 64). Lovers of draughts may be glad to have a copy of his epitaph. It ran thus: “SACRED TO THE MEMORY of MR. JOSHUA STURGES. Many years a RESPECTABLE LICENSED VICTUALLER in this Parish; who departed this Life the 12th of August, 1813. Aged 55 years. He was esteemed for the many excellent Qualities he possessed, and his desire to improve the Minds, as also to benefit the Trade of his Brother Victuallers. His Genius was also eminently displayed to create innocent and rational amusement to Mankind, in the Production of his Treatise on the difficult game of Draughts, which Treatise received the Approbation of his Prince, and many other Distinguished Characters. In private Life he was mild and unassuming; in his public capacity neither the love of Interest or domestic ease, could separate this faithful Friend from the Society of which he was a Member, in the performance of Duties which his Mind deemed Paramount to all others. His example was worthy of Imitation in this World. May his Virtues be rewarded in the next. Peace to his Soul, and respected be his Memory.”

[56] Goodge Street (named after a Marylebone property owner) still retains some of its original houses, but no house whose ground floor has not been converted into a shop. Windmill Street, on the other hand, is a quaint little street of artificers in wood and metal, instrument makers, etc., many of its houses remaining in their first state, with forecourts. The rural traditions of this street are supported at No. 40 by a vine, bearing bunches of unripened grapes in August 1903. Colvill Court is now called Colvill Place, but it is essentially a court. The name Gresse’s Gardens (after the father of Alexander Gresse the water-colour painter) survives in Gresse Street, a queer little dusty, dusky byway, easy to enter from Rathbone Place, but difficult to quit at its southern end by Tudor Place. Here His Majesty’s mail vans are stabled.

[57] This pond is plainly marked also in Rocque’s map of 1745. Considering its interesting name, it has obtained singularly little mention by topographers.

[58] Whitefield built his chapel--in 1756, not 1754--on land leased for seventy-one years from General Fitzroy. He opened it on November 7th of the same year, preaching a sermon from the text, “Other foundation can no man lay than that is laid, which is Jesus Christ.” A house for the minister and twelve almshouses were added, and the chapel enlarged. Whitefield proposed to be buried in its vaults, and told to his congregation, “Messrs. John and Charles Wesley shall also be buried there. We will all lie together.” All three were buried elsewhere, but Mrs. Whitefield was buried here: her remains and those of all other persons, except Augustus Toplady, were removed to Chingford cemetery when the present building was begun. A remarkable monument was that to John Bacon, R.A., the sculptor, with its impressive inscription: “What I was as an artist seemed to me of some importance while I lived, but what I really was, as a believer in Jesus Christ, is the only thing of importance to me now.” After a serious fire in 1857, the original brick building was altered out of knowledge, and was finally demolished in 1889. For some years an iron chapel and an appeal for subscriptions occupied the ground. In 1892 the present ornately fronted chapel, inscribed “Whitefield Memorial,” was built. In 1903, the present minister, the Reverend C. Silvester Horne, received “recognition” as the thirteenth minister in succession to Whitefield.

[59] More correctly, Crab and Walnut Tree Field.

[60] Smith makes a slip in locating the historic fight between Broughton and Slack in April 1750, at the “Adam and Eve” tavern. It took place in Broughton’s own Amphitheatre near Adam and Eve Court in the Oxford Road. Smith correctly states the position of this Amphitheatre in his _Antient Topography of London_ (1810): “Broughton’s Amphitheatre is still standing; it is at the south-west corner of Castle Street, Wells Street; the lower part is a coal shed, the upper a stage for timber.” Its site is now occupied by No. 62 Castle Street East, close to Adam and Eve Court.

Here it was that the founder of the modern prize-ring, whose “Broughton rules” were observed everywhere until 1838, met disaster in his fight with the plucky Norwich butcher. The result was his retirement from the ring, and the loss by his backer, the Duke of Cumberland, of a bet of £10,000. In his later years, Broughton lived in Walcot Place, Lambeth, where he died, aged 85. He was buried in Lambeth Church. A monument to him in the West Walk of the Cloisters of Westminster Abbey describes him as “Yeoman of the Guard”; and it is stated in the _Dictionary of National Biography_ that a place among the Yeomen was obtained for him by the Duke of Cumberland. In his _Historical Memorials of Westminster Abbey_, Dean Stanley says: “After his name on the gravestone is a space, which was to have been filled up with the words ‘Champion of England.’ The Dean objected, and the blank remains.” But the blank does not remain. It was filled in 1832 with the names of Roger Monk, another Yeoman of the Guard, and his wife. It is worthy of note, too, that the _earliest_ name on the tablet is that of Broughton’s wife, Elizabeth, who was actually buried here.

[61] See note p. 105.

[62] Fischer had the further distinction of being married to a daughter of J. T. S., whose other daughter married a Mr. Smith, a sculptor.

[63] Gooseberry Fair followed the suppressed Tottenham Fair. Both were held in and about the Adam and Eve Tavern. Richard Yates and Ned Shuter appeared together at various London fairs.

[64] Charles Fleetwood threw Drury Lane into confusion both behind and before the scenes, by his unpunctual payment of salaries, and by attempting to introduce pantomimes against the wishes of the old play-goers. This led to noisy scenes in 1744, in one of which Horace Walpole stigmatised Fleetwood as “an impudent rascal” from his box, and was embarrassed by the enthusiastic approval of the audience.

[65] The exact site of the famous Footsteps is not easily determined. Dr. Rimbault (_Notes and Queries_, February 2, 1850) says that it was reputed to be “at the extreme termination of the north-east end of Upper Montague Street.” It is placed a little farther west by Robert Hill, the water-colour painter, who stated in a letter, quoted by Mr. Wheatley in his _London_: “I well remember the Brothers’ Footsteps. They were near a bank that divided two of the fields between Montague House and the New Road, and their situation must have been, if my recollection serves me, what is now Torrington Square.” Smith says the Footsteps were “on the site of Mr. Martin’s chapel, or nearly so.” Mr. John Martin, the Baptist minister, had the chapel in Keppel Street. It still exists. This brings the Footsteps a few yards south, but Smith’s indefiniteness must be taken into account. That these markings were visible as late as 1800 is proved by the following entry in the Commonplace Book of Joseph Moser: “June 16th, 1800. Went into the fields at the back of Montague House, and there saw, for the last time, the Forty Footsteps: the building materials are there to cover them from the sight of man.” The feeling with which these curious marks were regarded by educated people may be judged by a letter quoted in the _Gentleman’s Magazine_ of December 1804, in which the writer expresses his conviction that “the Almighty has ordered it as a standing monument of his great displeasure of the horrid sin of duelling,” an opinion in which the poet Southey concurred. In 1828, Miss Jane Porter published her novel, _The Field of the Forty Footsteps_.

[66] Nearly a hundred years later, a similar superstition survived in London, and is thus noted by Brand in his _Popular Antiquities_: “In the _Morning Post_, Monday, May 2nd, 1791, it was mentioned ‘that yesterday, being the first of May, according to annual and superstitious custom, a number of persons went into the fields and bathed their faces with the dew on the grass, under the idea that it would render them beautiful.’”

[67] The occasion was a dinner at Tom Davies’s in 1762. “BOSWELL: Does not Gray’s poetry, sir, tower above the common mark? JOHNSON: Yes, sir; but we must attend to the difference between what men in general cannot do if they would, and what every man may do if he would. Sixteen-string Jack towered above the common mark.” Dr. William Bell, whom Rann robbed, was Rector of Christ Church, London, 1780-99, and treasurer of St. Paul’s Cathedral.

[68] Probably a mistake. These nosegays were given to condemned criminals on their way to Tyburn by the St. Sepulchre authorities. Rann was one of the last to receive the gift.

[69] Saunders Welch, the father of Mrs. Nollekens, was educated in Aylesbury workhouse, and for many years was a grocer in Museum Street, then Queen Street. He succeeded Fielding as a Justice of the Peace for Westminster. Smith says in his _Nollekens_ that he met many people who recollected seeing him as High Constable of Westminster, “dressed in black, with a large, nine-storey George the Second’s wig highly powdered, with long flowing curls over his shoulder, a high three-cornered hat, and his black baton tipped with silver at either end, riding on a white horse to Tyburn with the malefactors.” A long and warm friendship existed between Saunders Welch and Dr. Johnson. “Johnson, who had an eager and unceasing curiosity to know human life in all its variety, told me that he attended Mr. Welch in his office for a whole winter, to hear the examinations of the culprits” (Boswell).

[70] To-day, High Street, Marylebone, is perhaps the most perfect High Street left in London. Neither from its north end in Marylebone Road nor from Oxford Street does it receive heavy traffic; its shops exist for the fine streets and squares around it, and it offers them the best of most things, from a tender chicken to a county history.

[71] “In the year 1741, the old church in which Hogarth has introduced his “Rake at the Altar with the Old Maid” was taken down, and the present one built on its site; so that the writers who have stated that the scene took place in the present edifice must acknowledge their error, if they will take the trouble to refer to Hogarth’s fifth plate of the Rake’s Progress, where they will find its publication to have taken place June 25, 1735.”--S.

[72] Probably Christopher Norton, of the St. Martin’s Lane Academy.

[73] Tradition reports that from Elizabeth it came to the Forsyths, and thence to the Duke of Portland. In his _Marylebone and St. Pancras_, Mr. Clinch writes: “In the year 1703 a large school was established here by Mr. De la Place. That gentleman’s daughter married the Rev. John Fountayne, Rector of North Sidmouth, in Wiltshire, and the latter succeeded Mr. De la Place in the school. The school is said to have obtained a considerable reputation among the nobility and gentry, whose sons there received an educational training previously to their removal to the universities.”

[74] “Mr. Fountayne had one son, afterwards Dean of York, and three daughters, viz. Mrs. Hargrave, Mrs. Jones, and Mrs. Metz. Mrs. Hargrave was lately living; she was the wife of Counsellor Hargrave, and was esteemed a great beauty. Another daughter of Monsieur De la Place married the Rev. Mr. Dyer, brother to the author of _Grongar Hill_, to whose nephew, the late Mr. Dyer, the printseller, I am obliged for some parts of the above information.”--S.

[75] Reproduced in Mr. Clinch’s _Marylebone and St. Pancras_ (1890).

[76] Michael Angelo Rooker (1743-1801), the water-colour painter and engraver. “His works are drawn with conscientious accuracy, and show a sweet pencil” (Redgrave). He died March 3, 1801, in Dean Street, Soho, and was buried in the ground belonging to St. Martin-in-the-Fields, in the Kentish Town Road. Examples of his work are hung at South Kensington.

[77] The wonderful extra-illustrated copy presented to the Museum by John Charles Crowle, and valued at £5000.

[78] That is to say tiled.

[79] The Rev. John Fountayne was more than “noticed” by Handel; the two men were intimate. A grandson of Fountayne wrote in 1832: “One evening as my grandfather and Handel were walking together and alone, a new piece was struck up by the band. ‘Come, Mr. Fountayne,’ said Handel, ‘let us sit down and listen to this piece--I want to know your opinion of it.’ Down they sat, and after some time the old parson, turning to his companion, said, ‘It is not worth listening to--it’s very poor stuff.’ ‘You are right, Mr. F.,’ said Handel, ‘it is very poor stuff--I thought so myself when I had finished it.’ The old gentleman, being taken by surprise, was beginning to apologise; but Handel assured him there was no necessity; that the music was really bad, having been composed hastily, and his time for the production limited; and that the opinion given was as correct as it was honest” (Hone’s _Year Book_). “Clarke” was doubtless Dr. Adam Clarke, the Wesleyan, who died in Bayswater in 1832, and was well known for his bibliographical and theological works.

[80] Lady Harrington might well lend her jewels, since she often borrowed. Horace Walpole tells how, at the Coronation of George III., she appeared “covered with all the diamonds she could borrow, hire, or seize, with the air of Roxana, the finest figure at a distance.”

[81] The great actress. She played Violante to Garrick’s Don Felix in the actor’s last appearance.

[82] In his _Memoirs_, the Rev. John Trusler, who was educated at Dr. Fountayne’s school, does not spare Mrs. Fountayne’s tuft-hunting tendencies. In one instance she was covered with ridicule through the action of a Soho pastry-cook named Jenkins, who, wishing his son to enter the school, arranged that he should do so under the name of the Prince De Chimmay. When Mrs. Fountayne discovered that his father made tarts a mile from the school door, “she had the laugh so much against her, that she could not show her face for months.”

[83] The Royal College of Physicians, then housed in Warwick Lane.

[84] Norfolk Street was the northern continuation of Newman Street; it is now merged in Cleveland Street.

[85] John Baptist Locatelli, a native of Verona, had his studio in Union Street, Tottenham Court Road, from 1776. He was befriended by Horace Walpole, with whom he quarrelled bitterly over a group representing Theseus offering assistance to Hercules. Walpole refused to take this work, although he had already paid the sculptor £350 on account, and was probably justified, since Nollekens said the group looked “like the dry skins of two brickmakers stuffed with clotted flocks from an old mattress.” Locatelli worked also for the brothers Adam, and he superintended the carving of the basso-relievos put up by Nollekens on the outside of the Sessions House, Clerkenwell Green. In 1796 he left England for Milan, where Buonaparte employed him and granted him a pension. (See Smith’s _Life of Nollekens_, 1829, pp. 119-123, and Thornbury’s _British Artists_, vol. ii. pp. 9-16).

[86] Wilson, upon whom a note has been given under the year 1766, lived at No. 36 Charlotte Street, Fitzroy Square, within a few minutes’ walk of this group of elms. He was accustomed of a fine evening, says Redgrave, to throw open his window and invite his friends to enjoy with him the glowing sunset behind the Hampstead and Highgate hills. Fitzroy Square was not begun until 1790-94. To-day the miles between Charlotte Street and these northern heights are filled by streets. Nevertheless, Hampstead church can still be seen from Charlotte Street, piercing the northern distance, and, but for the slight deflection of Rathbone Place, it would be visible from Oxford Street. John Constable afterwards lived in the same street. The elms under which Wilson and Baretti walked must have had their roots in the ground on which the east side of Cleveland Street is built.

[87] It is difficult to form an idea of this instrument. It was beaten with a rolling-pin, and appears to have been used as a drum in such a way (according to the manner in which it was struck) as to produce something like notes. This is indicated in Bonnell Thornton’s burlesque, _Ode to St. Cecilia’s Day_, in which occur the well-known lines which amused Dr. Johnson:--

“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.”

The character of the neighbourhood round the “Farthing Pie House” (Portland Road Station) in Smith’s boyhood, may be judged by Smith’s statement in his _Vagabondiana_, that “when the sites of Portland Place, Devonshire Street, etc., were fields, the famous Tommy Lowe, then a singer at Mary-le-bone Gardens, raised a subscription, to enable an unfortunate man to run a small chariot, drawn by four muzzled mastiffs, from a pond near Portland Chapel, called Cockney Ladle, which supplied Mary-le-bone Bason with water, to the ‘Farthing Pie House’ … in order to accommodate children with a ride for a halfpenny.”

[88] By Queen Anne Street Smith means the street which has borne the successive names of Little Queen Anne Street, Queen Anne Street East, Foley Place, and (now) Langham Street. The present Queen Anne Street is on the _west_ side of Portland Place; it was originally Great Queen Anne Street, then Queen Anne Street West. A curious interest attaches to these streets, neither of which runs, as it seems destined to do, into Portland Place. Thus:--

Their failure to run directly into Portland Place (see dotted lines) is a relic of Foley House which occupied the site of the Langham Hotel, and interposed its gardens where these streets would have joined. It was afterwards intended to build a Queen Anne Square at the foot of Great Portland Street, but this project fell through.

[89] There were many ponds in the fields on which the streets of St. Pancras and Marylebone are built. In an early view of Whitefield’s Tabernacle, a pond is delineated on a spot now covered, as nearly as may be judged, by Torrington Square. Farther west, on the site of Duke Street, Portland Place, was the Cockney Ladle, in which small boys bathed at the risk of having their clothes seized by the parish beadles. Close by this--on the site of the backs of the east side of Harley Street--was the Marylebone Basin, a dangerously deep water. Many drownings occurred in ponds of which no trace or memory remains. Thus, the _St. James’s Chronicle_ of August 8, 1769, says: “Two young chairmen [_i.e._ carriers of sedan chairs] were unfortunately drowned on Friday Evening last, in a Pond behind the North-Side of Portman-Square. They had been beating a Carpet in the Square, and being thereby warm and dirty agreed to bathe in the above Pond, not being aware of its great Depth. The Man who first went in could swim, and while he was swimming his Companion went in, but being presently out of his Depth he sunk. The Swimmer immediately made to the Place to save his Companion; but he, coming up again under the Swimmer, laid fast hold of him, and they both sunk down together and were drowned.”

[90] “On Friday last, Mr. Carlile, a Quaker of about 17 years of age, had the misfortune to fall into Marylebone-Bason, and was drowned” (_Daily Advertiser_, June 18, 1744).

[91] And from their contiguity to a French Protestant chapel, founded in 1756.

[92] The difficulty of writing recent history is exemplified by Smith in his account of Marylebone Gardens, which is far excelled by Mr. Warwick Wroth’s chapter on Marylebone Gardens in his _London Pleasure Gardens of the Eighteenth Century_ (1896). Fully to annotate Smith’s chronology of these gardens would require many pages, and the result would be unsatisfactory. I shall therefore deal with only the more prominent names he mentions.

[93] May 7, 1668.

[94] M. Wroth says: “In 1691 the place was known as Long’s Bowling Green at the Rose, and for several years (_circ._ 1679-1736) persons of quality might have been seen bowling there during the summer-time.

‘At the Groom Porters battered bullies play;
Some Dukes at Marybone bowl time away.’”

These lines, often erroneously attributed to Lady Mary Wortley Montague, occur in Pope’s _The Basset-table, an Eclogue_.

[95] Rockhoult, or Rockholt House, was at Leyton, in Essex, and was “for a short period an auxiliary place of amusement for the Summer to the established Theatres” (_Gentleman’s Magazine_, July 1814). It was opened about 1742, and was apparently regarded as “the place to spend a happy day.” A ballad to “Delia” exclaimed--

“Delia, in whose form we trace
All that can a virgin grace,
Hark where pleasure, blithe as May,
Bids us to Rockholt haste away.”

[96] “The principal shareholder and manager of Ranelagh at this date was Sir Thomas Robinson, Bart., M.P., whose gigantic form was for many years familiar to frequenters of the Rotunda; a writer of 1774 calls him its Maypole, and Garland of Delights. Robinson lived at Prospect Place, adjoining the gardens.”

[97] The New Wells belonged to the Islington group of pleasure gardens, and stood on ground now occupied by Lower Rosomon Street, Clerkenwell. It flourished 1737-50, and numbered a collection of rattlesnakes among its attractions.

[98] Cuper’s Gardens, a great resort. The Feathers Tavern at the end of Waterloo Bridge is the successor of the tavern originally in the gardens, the site of which is traversed by the Waterloo Road. They were closed in 1759, after which Dr. Johnson, passing them in a coach with Langton, Beauclerk, and Lady Sydney Beauclerk (mother of his friend), jokingly proposed, to Lady Sydney’s horror, that they should lease them: “She had no notion of a joke, sir; she had come late into life, and had a mighty unpliable understanding.”

[99] Advertised as “the Pariton, an instrument never played in publick before.”

[100] Mary Ann Falkner was a niece of George Falkner, the Dublin printer, whom Foote caricatured on the stage. She appeared at Marylebone from 1747 to about 1752, giving such songs as “Amoret and Phyllis,” “The Happy Couple,” and “The Faithful Lover.” Much sought after, she remained faithful to her husband, a linen draper named Donaldson, until his conduct threw her under the protection of the second Earl of Halifax.

[101] M. Wroth says, on good evidence, that Trusler became proprietor only in 1756.

[102] The career of young John Trusler, afterwards the Rev. Dr. Trusler, is interesting. Without a collegiate training, he took Holy Orders, and officiated as a curate in London. His eye for business revealed to him the possibilities of sermon-mongering, and he was soon making a respectable income by supplying clergymen all over the country with sermons in script characters. His operations became something of a scandal, and Cowper scourged him in “The Task”--

“He grinds divinity of other days
Down into modern use, transforms old print
To zigzag manuscript, and cheats the eyes
Of gallery critics by a thousand arts.
Are there who purchase of the doctor’s ware?
Oh, name it not in Gath! It cannot be
That grave and learned clerks should need such aid.
He doubtless is in sport, and does but droll,
Assuming thus a rank unknown before--
Grand caterer and dry-nurse of the Church!”

Trusler also issued the morning and evening services so printed and punctuated as to indicate to incompetent readers how they should be delivered. Cowper writes--

“He teaches those to read, whom schools dismiss’d,
And colleges, untaught; sells accent, tone,
And emphasis in score, and gives to prayer
The _adagio_ and _andante_ it demands.”

Prospering at this business, Trusler set up a publishing establishment in Wardour Street, from which he issued manuals of all kinds, including his most respectable work, _Hogarth Moralised_, in which Mrs. Hogarth became a partner and collaborator. At the age of 85 he died in his villa at Englefield Green, Middlesex.

[103] Miss Trusler’s seed and plum cakes were famous. In a judgment on Mrs. Cornelys for keeping an objectionable house, Sir John Fielding sagely remarked that her Soho assemblies were unnecessary, having regard to the many attractions elsewhere, such as “Ranelagh with its music and fireworks, and Marylebone Gardens, with music, wine, and plum-cake.”

[104] The arrival of three Cherokee Indian chiefs in the spring of 1762 roused the liveliest interest in London. These braves came over in token of friendship after the ratification of a treaty of peace at Charlestown, South Carolina. They were well-made men, six feet in height, and were dressed, says the _Gentleman’s Magazine_ (May 1762), “in their own country habit with only a shirt, trousers, and mantle round them; their faces are painted of a copper colour, and their heads adorned with shells, feathers, ear-rings, and other trifling ornaments. They neither of them can speak to be understood, and very unfortunately lost their interpreter in their passage. A house is taken for them in Suffolk Street, and cloaths have been given them in the English fashion.” Among the thousands of Londoners who went to see the “Cherokee Kings” was Oliver Goldsmith.

[105] By an indenture dated August 30, 1763. This document, which Smith’s namesake Thomas Smith quoted in his _History of the Parish of Marylebone_, shows that the Gardens were attached to the Rose Tavern, and that they contained walks, statuary, boxes, benches, and musical appliances and books. Lowe’s lease was for fourteen years at the annual rent of £170.

[106] Not the well-known Stephen Storace (who was born only in this year), but his father, a Neapolitan, described by George Hogarth as “a good performer on the double bass in the band of the Opera House.”

[107] Nan Catley won hearts by her breezy manner and air of camaraderie. Hers “was the singing of unequalled animal spirits; it was Mrs. Jordan’s comedy carried into music.… She was bold, volatile, audacious” (Boaden: _Life of Mrs. Siddons_).

[108] Long before this, Dick Turpin had appeared in the Garden itself, and had surprised Mrs. Fountayne, the wife of the Marylebone schoolmaster, with a kiss. He impudently remarked, “Be not alarmed, madam; you can now boast that you have been kissed by Dick Turpin. Good-morning!”

[109] Lowe was now glad to obtain singing engagements at Sadler’s Wells and other tea-gardens. His career from riches to poverty is illustrated in the story, told by John Taylor in his _Records of My Life_, that, soon after becoming master of Marylebone Gardens, he was seen riding thither in his chariot with a large iron trunk behind it, which he explained he had purchased “to place the profits of the Gardens in.” Taylor adds that he had last seen Lowe in a lane near Aldersgate Street, coming out of a butcher’s shop, with some meat in a checked handkerchief.

[110] An editorial note in the third edition of the _Rainy Day_ suggests that this name was made popular by Prior’s “Chloe.” This seems probable, for Prior gave all the vogue of an ideal to this woman, who, in real life, was the wife of a coachman in Long Acre, and was described by Johnson as “a despicable drab of the lowest species.”

[111] See note on Weston, p. 208.

[112] Charles Bannister, the vocalist and actor, father of the more famous John Bannister.

[113] Signor Giovanni Battista Pergolesi, born near Ancona in the first decade of the eighteenth century, composed numerous operas and oratorios. Of the former his _La Serva Padrona_ was revived in London as late as 1873.

[114] Felix Giardini, a Piedmontese musician, came to England in 1750, and met with encouragement. He died in Russia in 1793. After hearing him play at Bath, Gainsborough bought his viol-di-gamba, but was soon disgusted to find that the music remained with the Italian. Horace Walpole was not enthusiastic about Giardini as a composer, and advised Mason to employ Handel to set his _Sappho_. “Your Act is classical Athenian; shall it be subdi-di-di-vi-vi-vi-ded into modern Italian?”

[115] Dr. Arnold’s appearance at Bow Street was in respect of a rocket-stick which had descended in the sacrosanct garden of Mrs. Fountayne.

[116] “To James Winston, Esq. [secretary to the Garrick Club, and several times mentioned in the diary of John Payne Collier], I am obliged for the above notices; indeed, to that gentleman’s disinterested indulgence I am also indebted for many other curious particulars introduced in this work, selected from his most extensive and valuable library of English Theatrical Biography, both in manuscript and in print, a collection formed by himself during the last thirty years.”--S.

[117] “Torré was a printseller in partnership with the late Mr. Thane, and lived in Market Lane, Haymarket.”--S.

[118] Dr. William Kenrick, the rampageous critic and playwright. His comedy _The Duellist_ is his best-remembered work. In July 1774 he began a course of lectures in the “Theatre for Burlettas” at Marylebone Gardens, which he termed “a School of Shakespeare,” an entertainment which he also gave at the Devil Tavern in Fleet Street. Kenrick attacked Dr. Johnson’s Shakespeare. On Goldsmith saying that he had never heard of Kenrick’s writings, the doctor replied: “Sir, he is one of the many who have made themselves public, without making themselves known.”

It is curious that Smith omits to mention Dr. Johnson’s rampageous visit to the Gardens to see Torré’s fireworks, with his friend George Steevens, the Shakesperian commentator. It may have taken place in this year, 1774.

[119] Robert Baddeley began his connection with the stage as cook to Foote. He was the original Moses in the _School for Scandal_. It was he who bequeathed £100 to provide the cake and wine which actors and journalists still consume on Twelfth Night. He is stated by Dr. Doran to have been the last actor to wear the royal livery of scarlet, which, as “His Majesty’s Servants,” the Drury Lane players were entitled to assume.

[120] A posthumous son of Henry Carey, author of “Sally in our Alley.” “Saville Carey I have heard sometimes touch Nan Catley’s manner feebly in the famous triumph of her hilarity, ‘Push about the Jorum’” (Boaden: _Life of Mrs. Siddons_). His worthless daughter, Nance Carey, bore to one Kean, a tailor, or a builder, a child whom she neglected and abandoned. This boy became Edmund Kean, the great actor (Doran’s _Their Majestys’ Servants_, vol. ii. pp. 523-26).

[121] These initials thinly disguise such well-known entertainers as Garrick, Bannister, Mrs. Baddeley, and the singers Mr. Darley, Mr. Vernon, and Nan Catley, all of whom were imitated by the versatile Carey.

[122] As Abel Drugger, one of his finest parts.

[123] The “Forge of Vulcan” was Signor Torré’s masterpiece; in it appeared Venus and Cupid in dialogue, in more or less relevant circumstances of flame and lava.

[124] Fantoccino, the Italian puppet-entertainment, was introduced to France by an Italian named Marion (hence “marionettes”), and then into England. The great London Fantoi show of the eighteenth century was Flockton’s.

Breslaw, the conjurer, began his London appearances in 1772, in Cockspur Street. In 1774 he gave his entertainment on alternate days here and at the “King’s Arms” opposite the Royal Exchange. It is told of him while performing at Canterbury, he promised the Mayor that if the duration of his licence were extended he would give one night’s receipts to the poor. The Mayor agreed, and the conjurer had a full house. Hearing nothing further of the money, the Mayor called on Breslaw to inquire. The following dialogue ensued.

“Mr. Mayor, I have distributed the money myself.”

“Pray, sir, to whom?”

“To my own company, than whom none can be poorer.”

“This is a trick!”

“Sir, we live by tricks.”

[125] Baggio Rebecca, decorative painter, died in 1808. Of his election as Associate of the Royal Academy in 1771, Leslie says: “Academic advancement was rapid in those days. Every man who displayed the least ability was certain of election.” Rebecca had a small share in decorating the Royal Academy lecture-room at Somerset House.

[126] Most of these localities have ceased to be the resort of bird-fanciers. To-day the chief London quarters for song-birds are St. Giles’s, Leadenhall Market, and, above all, Sclater Street in Spitalfields, known as “Club Row.”

[127] The sights in this famous cockpit are recorded by Hogarth in his print of 1759, and by Rowlandson in Ackermann’s _Microcosm of London_ (1808).

Bainbridge Street survives as a narrow lane behind New Oxford Street, leading from Dyott Street to the back of Meux’s brewery.

At the beginning of the eighteenth century the cockpit behind Gray’s Inn (its exact locality is not easily discovered), enjoyed “the only vogue” (Hatton). Mr. William B. Boulton (_The Amusements of Old London_, 1901) quotes a description of it by Von Uffenbach, a German traveller, who says it was specially built for the sport.

Pickled-Egg Walk, afterwards Crawford’s Passage (now Crawford Passage, Ray Street, Clerkenwell), was named after the proprietor of the Pickled-Egg Tavern, who brought from the West of England a recipe for pickled eggs and supplied this novel cate to his customers. Pink mentions a tradition that Charles II. once paused here in a suburban journey and ate a pickled egg. The mains fought at the cockpit here were regularly advertised in the newspapers.

Charles Hughes and Charles Dibdin, the song-writer, opened the “Royal Circus and Equestrian Philharmonic Academy” in 1782.

Cock-fighting was made illegal in 1849, but a statement in _Cocking and its Votaries_ (1895), by S. A. T. (for private circulation), makes it quite manifest that “not a few wealthy men in England still follow up this sport, stealthily but with much zeal--a fact that is as discreditable to the guardians of the law as it is to themselves.” I quote Mr. J. Charles Cox in his admirable edition of Strutt’s _Sports and Pastimes_ (1903).

[128] Behind this formal entry lies the most affecting farewell scene ever enacted on a London stage. The doors of Drury Lane Theatre were opened at “half after five” on that evening of June 10, 1776, and the profits of the performance were announced to be given to the Theatrical Fund. It was but the last of a series of farewell nights in which Garrick had played his great parts for the last time to densely crowded houses. As Mr. Percy Fitzgerald says: “Other actors retire in one night, Garrick’s departure filled a whole season and only culminated on this last night.” “Last night,” he wrote, “I played Abel Drugger for the last time. I thought the audience were cracked, and they almost turned my brain.”

On June 5, King George and his Queen attended to see Garrick’s last “Richard.” Distinguished people were turned nightly from the doors, and many became almost frantic to think that they must see Garrick now or never again. Hannah More wrote: “I pity those who have not seen him. Posterity will never be able to form the slightest idea of his perfections.… I have seen him within three weeks take leave of Benedick, Sir John Brute, Kitely, Abel Drugger, Archer, and Leon.”

On the last night, of all, Garrick played Don Felix in Mrs. Centilivre’s comedy, which he chose, perhaps, as a foil to the tragedy of his farewell. In his Life of the actor Mr. Fitzgerald thus describes the supreme moment: “He retired slowly--up--up the stage, his eyes fixed on them with a lingering longing. Then stopped. The shouts of applause from that brilliant amphitheatre were broken by sobs and tears. To his ears were borne from many quarters the word ‘Farewell! Farewell!’ Mrs. Garrick was in her box, in an agony of hysterical tears. The wonderful eyes, still brilliant, were turned wistfully again and again to that sea of sympathetic faces, one of the most brilliant audiences perhaps that ever sat in Drury Lane; and at last, with an effort, he tore himself from their view.”

[129] Garrick’s last season at Drury Lane was Mrs. Siddons’ first. She was but twenty-one years of age, and made no striking success, though “her type was enlarged in the bill” (Boadley).

[130] A single short fall of lace from the hat has been far from unfashionable in recent years. Fans were carried later than 1776. A print of two ladies in outdoor costume in the _Gallery of Fashion_, published in May 1796, is reproduced by Fairholt, who remarks: “Both ladies carry the then indispensable article--a fan.” Indeed, the fashion-plates of the eighteenth century disclose hardly any period in which fans were not carried out of doors.

[131] Norton Street is now Bolsover Street, running south from near Portland Road Station, parallel east of Great Portland Street. In the eighteenth century it had considerable pretensions. From it Sir William Chambers’s funeral proceeded to the Abbey in March 1796. Wilson, Turner, and Wilkie all painted here. It is now a dull macadamised street in whose houses upholstering, steel-cutting, etc., are carried on.

[132] Smith erroneously notes that “this house, subsequently inhabited by the Duchess of Bolton, Sir John Nicholl, Sir Vicary Gibbs, and by Sir Charles Flower, Bart., has been recently pulled down, and several houses built upon the site.” The premises remain to this day, but they form several houses. As early as 1776 Northouck noted that Baltimore House was “either built without a plan, or else has had very whimsical owners; for the door has been shifted to different parts of the house, being now carried into the stable-yard.”

[133] The map engraved for Northouck’s _History of London in 1772_ shows that Smith was justified in these statements. The unexpected break in the houses which still occurs on the south side of Guilford Street is a relic of the desire to leave this square open to Highgate. This intention was defeated when the north side of Guilford Street was built. Thenceforward the north-westward growth of London was rapid, and by 1845 rurality had been pushed up to Chalk Farm by advancing brick and mortar.

[134] This Italian painter exhibited portraits and water colours at the Royal Academy from 1774 to 1778. He painted the principal ceiling at the old East India House.

[135] This painting is said to represent Mary, and her son James (afterwards James I. of England) as a boy four years of age. Doubts have been thrown on its history. (See _Gentleman’s Magazine_, vols. xlviii. and xlix.)

[136] A fortune-teller by tea-leaves, the leaves being “grouted” or turned over in the cup.

[137] At this time Charles Towneley (1737-1805) was living at No. 7 Park Street (now, with Queen Anne’s Square, named Queen Anne’s Gate), where he entertained, among others, Sir Joshua Reynolds, Nollekens, and Johann Zoffany. The Townley collection of Greek and Roman statues, altars, urns, busts, etc., now in the British Museum, was freely shown to the public in Park Street.

[138] It was from Mr. Tunnard’s house, on Bankside, that Smith etched the river procession which brought Nelson’s body to Whitehall, mentioned in Smith’s note, p. 182.

[139] The manager, and afterwards part proprietor, of Thrale’s brewery. He hung a fine mezzotint portrait of Johnson in the counting-house, and when Mrs. Thrale, in Johnson’s presence, asked him why he had done so, he replied, “Because, madam, I wish to have one wise man there.” “Sir,” said Johnson, “I thank you. It is a very handsome compliment, and I believe you speak sincerely.”

[140] The Rev. James Beresford became Rector of Kibworth Beauchamp, Lincoln, in 1812. He died in 1840.

[141] Elizabeth Carter, of “Epictetus” fame, the friend of Dr. Johnson. See note, p. 231.

Anna Letitia Barbauld, the well-known miscellaneous writer, whose poem “Life! I know not what thou art” is her one imperishable composition.

Angelica Kauffman, the painter (1741-1807). See Smith’s account of her under the year 1807.

Mrs. Sheridan was the beautiful, clever, and faithful wife of Richard Brinsley Sheridan, whom she assisted in the management of Drury Lane Theatre.

Charlotte Lenox, born in New York, 1720, was the author of _The Life of Harriot Stuart_, in which she portrayed her own youth. She found interest in high quarters, and was given apartments in Somerset House, which, however, she lost when that building was demolished. Dr. Johnson insisted on his friends sitting up all night at the Devil Tavern to celebrate Mrs. Lenox’s “first literary child” (_Harriot Stuart_), an immense apple pie being part of the entertainment. In the morning the waiters were so sleepy that the party had to wait two hours for their reckoning.

Mrs. Montague, the original “blue stocking,” had little womanly taste, but her mind was well stored and active; she lived in an atmosphere of English and foreign talent, and her assemblies at Montague House, in Portman Square, are historical. Dr. Johnson was severe on her _Essay on the Writings and Genius of Shakespeare_, remarking: “Reynolds is fond of her book, and I wonder at it; for neither I nor Beauclerk nor Mrs. Thrale could get through it.”

Hannah More had appeared in the London literary firmament in 1774; her tragedy _Percy_ had just been given by Garrick, and her star was in brightest ascension.

Such was the fame of Mrs. Catherine Macaulay, author of a forgotten _History of England_, that Dr. Wilson, Rector of St. Stephen’s, Walbrook, erected a statue to her in the chancel of that church during her lifetime. It was very properly removed by his successor.

Mrs. Elizabeth Griffith wrote several plays which Garrick presented with success. _The Letters of Henry and Frances_, which she wrote in collaboration with her husband, a dramatist, were popular.

[142] At No. 5 (now No. 4) Adelphi Terrace, Garrick lived between 1772 and 1779. He died at about 8 a.m. The house is distinguished by a commemorative tablet, as also (recently and more artistically) is his previous residence in Southampton Street, Strand.

[143] Boswell says: “Garrick’s funeral was talked of as extravagantly expensive, but Dr. Johnson, from his dislike to exaggeration, would not allow that it was distinguished by an extraordinary pomp. ‘Were there not six horses to each coach?’ said Mrs. Burney. JOHNSON: ‘Madam, there were no more six horses than six phœnixes.’” On this Croker notes: “There certainly were, and Johnson himself went in one of the coach and six.” Richard Cumberland saw Johnson standing beside the grave, at the foot of Shakespeare’s statue, bathed in tears. Horace Walpole wrote to the Countess of Ossory, February 1, 1779: “Yes, madam, I do think the pomp of Garrick’s funeral perfectly ridiculous,” and he gave his reasons with epigrammatic force. Others were of the same opinion; and John Henderson, the actor, wrote “a rather bitter impromptu on Mr. Garrick’s Funeral,” in which Garrick is represented as directing the pageant.

“‘Call all my carpenters--bid George attend.
And ransack Monmouth Street from end to end;
Buy all the black, defraud the starving moth.
Or let him, if he will, defile the cloth:
Bring moth and all--we have no time to lose--
If there’s not black enough, then buy the blues.’
…
Thus far he spoke, in an imperial tone,
And quite forgot the funeral was his own.”

[144] Antonio Zucchi, A.R.A., who became Angelica Kauffmann’s second husband, was employed by the brothers Adam, the architects of the Adelphi. The cost of the mantelpiece is given by Mr. Wheatley as £300, the probable figure. Mrs. Garrick died in the same house in 1822.

[145] The “English Grotto,” as it was called, was one of the Islington group of tea-gardens. Its proprietor, Jackson, pleased his public by an ingenious water-mill, an “enchanted fountain,” and a display of gold and silver fish. A pleasingly rustic view in the Crace collection is reproduced by Mr. Wroth in _London Pleasure Gardens of the Eighteenth Century_.

[146] Francesco Bartolozzi, R.A., was an original member of the Royal Academy, and he engraved its diploma. His rapid rise, and his appointment to be engraver to the King at £300 a year, were disturbing to Sir Robert Strange, who treated him with misplaced contempt. “Let Strange beat that if he can,” exclaimed Bartolozzi, on executing his “Clytia.” Unfortunately he was improvident, and his studio became a manufactory of facile chalk studies, to many of which he put only the finishing touches. After a brilliant career in England, he went to Lisbon, where he was knighted, and died there in 1815, in his 88th year.

[147] John Hinchliffe (1731-94), the son of a livery-stable keeper in Swallow Street, was born in Westminster, and educated at Westminster School. He was consecrated Bishop of Peterborough, Dec. 17, 1769. He bought some of Smith’s youthful imitations of Rembrandt and Ostade. A note on Sherwin will be found under 1782.

[148] In 1781, Mary Robinson (1758-1800), known as “Perdita,” had ceased to be the mistress of the Prince of Wales, afterwards George IV., whose bond for £20,000, never paid, was exchanged for the pension of £500 a year awarded her by Fox in 1783. She was portrayed by Reynolds twice, and by Romney, Gainsborough, Hoppner, Zoffany, and twice by Cosway.