The Palmy Days of Nance Oldfield Part 17

[WIDOW _is led away. Exeunt_ LADIES.

Thus runs the comedy, trippingly as the tongue of a gay _raconteur_.

Sometimes the scenes are exaggerated, sometimes the characters may be overdrawn, but the satire is true, and the wit is of the best.

Take, for instance, the picture reproduced above. Are not its colours--albeit bold and merciless--tinged with the redeeming hue of naturalness? And of you, fair daughters of Eve (if any of you condescend to read these pages), let the author ask one impertinent little question: Is there not something in the conversation of d.i.c.k Steele's First Lady, or his Second Lady, or all the other Ladies, which suggests the charity and intellectuality that doth hedge in an afternoon tea?

CHAPTER X

THE BARTON BOOTHS

"Sweet are the charms of her I love, More fragrant than the damask rose; Soft as the down of turtle-dove, Gentle as winds when zephyr blows; Refres.h.i.+ng as descending rains, On sun-burnt climes, and thirsty plains."

Thus rhapsodised the great Barton Booth, who could write harmless poetry when the cares of acting did not press too hard upon him. In this case the verses were addressed to the object of his pa.s.sion, a lady who seems to have been, at first, a trifle parsimonious in her smiles; for, in another song intended for the same siren, the lover asks:

"Can then a look create a thought Which time can ne'er remove?

Yes, foolish heart, again thou'rt caught, Again thou bleed'st for Love.

"She sees the conquest of her eyes, Nor heals the wounds she gave; She smiles when'er my blushes rise, And, sighing, shuns her Slave.

"Then, Swain, be bold! and still adore her Still the flying fair pursue: Love, and friends.h.i.+p, still implore her, Pleading night and day for you."

[Ill.u.s.tration: BARTON BOOTH]

Who was this "flying fair" that the swain pursued with such despairing fervour? Nance Oldfield? Nay, there was no romance there, for while Booth could make the most exquisite stage love to the actress, he never carried that love beyond the mimic world. Rather was it the lovely Mistress Santlow, that dancing bit of suns.h.i.+ne, who turned the heads of many an amorous spectator, and had enough of the temptress about her to lead a mighty warrior from the path of domestic constancy, and bring a Secretary of State almost to the verge of matrimony.[A] She seemed the apotheosis of grace, did this merry, moving Hester, and when she forsook the art she so delightfully adorned, and took to the "legitimate," there were not a few among her admirers who regretted the change. "They mourned," says Dr. Doran, "as if Terpsich.o.r.e herself had been on earth to charm mankind, and had gone never to return. They remembered, longed for, and now longed in vain for that sight which used to set a whole audience half distraught with delight, when in the very ecstacy of her dance, Santlow contrived to loosen her cl.u.s.tering auburn hair, and letting it fall about such a neck and shoulders as Praxiteles could more readily imagine than imitate, danced on, the locks flying in the air, and half-a-dozen hearts at the end of every one of them."

[Footnote A: The Duke of Marlborough and Secretary Craggs respectively.]

At the end of one of those locks was the throbbing heart of Barton Booth, which he had completely lost in watching the auburn hair and the poetic movements of the _coryphee:_

"But now the flying fingers strike the lyre, The sprightly notes the nymph inspire.

She whirls around! she bounds! she springs!

As if Jove's messenger had lent her wings.

"Such were her lovely limbs, so flushed her charming face So round her neck! her eyes so fair!

So rose her swelling chest! so flow'd her amber hair!

While her swift feet outstript the wind, And left the enamor'd G.o.d of Day behind."

Certes, Booth was in love when he wrote this eulogy.

But however sprightly and deftly did this charmer pirouette, she could not deny herself the luxury of appearing as a regular actress. Her first venture in this direction was as the Eunuch of "Valentinian,"

wherein she donned boy's attire, and was much more successful in masculine garb than have been not a few better artists. From this part to that of Dorcas Zeal in Shadwell's play, "The Fair Quaker of Deal,"[A] was but a step, and a step, be it said, which for the moment consoled the public for her desertion from the ballet. According to Cibber, Santlow was the happiest incident in the fortune of the play, and the Laureate tells us that she was "then in the full bloom of what beauty she might pretend to."[B] He adds that "before this she had only been admired as the most excellent dancer, which perhaps might not a little contribute to the favourable reception she now met with as an actress in this character which so happily suited her figure and capacity: the gentle softness of her voice, the composed innocence of her aspect, the modesty of her dress, the reserv'd deceny of her gesture, and the simplicity of the sentiments that naturally fell from her, made her seem the amiable maid she represented. In a word, not the enthusiastick Maid of Orleans was more serviceable of old to the French army when the English had distressed them, than this fair Quaker was at the head of that dramatick attempt upon which the support of their weak society depended."

[Footnote A: Produced at Drury Lane in February, 1710.]

[Footnote B: It might appear from this remark of Colley's that the Santlow was not over handsome. Yet if a picture taken from life does not belie her the dancer was most fair to look upon.]

This "weak society" was the new company recruited by William Collier for Drury Lane Theatre, and wherein could be found, in addition to the light-limbed Hester, such players as her adoring swain, Barton Booth, Theophilus Keen, George Powell, Francis Leigh, Mrs. Bradshaw and Mrs.

Knight. Colley was at that time (1710) in opposition to Drury, his interest lying with the Hay market management, and it is very evident that the success of the "Fair Quaker"--a success made in face of the counter attraction furnished by the long trial of Dr. Sacheverel--went sorely against the grain with him.[A] The fact was that things at the Hay market were not flouris.h.i.+ng, and the prosperity enjoyed by the Drury Lane comedy--and the Sacheverel show--seemed tantalising to bear.

[Footnote A: Shadwell evidently had Cibber in mind when he wrote in the preface to the "Fair Quaker of Deal": "This play was written about three years since, and put into the hands of a famous comedian belonging to the Haymarket Playhouse, who took care to beat down the value of it so much as to offer the author to alter it fit to appear on the stage, on condition he might have half the profits of the third day; that is as much as to say, that it may pa.s.s for one of his, according to custom. The author not agreeing to this reasonable proposal, it lay in his hands till the beginning of this winter, when Mr. Booth read it, and liked it, and persuaded the author that, with a little alteration, it would please the town."]

Even in after years Colley grew bitter in thinking of the "Fair Quaker," and could not help indulging in a dig at its expense when he came to write the "Apology." He likewise paid his satirical compliments to the new-fangled Italian opera which was given at the Haymarket during the season of 1709-10, on the days when the regular dramatic company did not appear. The opera had already proved a drawing attraction, but at the time here mentioned the popular interest in the performances had fallen off, and the dear and ever fickle public, of high and low degree, prefered either Drury Lane or the trial of Sacheverel to the artistic delights of music and the drama at the rival house. And so Cibber plaintively sighs.

"The truth is, that this kind of entertainment [opera] being so entirely sensual, it had no possibility of getting the better of our reason but by its novelty; and that novelty could never be supported but by an annual change of the best voices, which, like the finest flowers, bloom but for a season, and when that is over are only dead nosegays. From this natural cause we have seen within these two years even Farinelli singing to an audience of five and thirty pounds, and yet, if common fame may be credited, the same voice, so neglected in one country, has in another had charms sufficient to make that crown sit easy on the head of a Monarch, which the jealousy of politicians (who had their views in his keeping it) fear'd, without some such extraordinary amus.e.m.e.nt, his Satiety of Empire might tempt him a second time to resign."[A]

[Footnote A: The monarch alluded to was evidently Victor Amadeus, King of Sardinia. The tenor Farinelli (whose real name was Carlo Broschi) was born in the dukedom of Modena in 1705, and died 1782.]

That Cibber knew something of the wrangles which inevitably follow in the wake of an operatic troupe may be seen from the next paragraph:

"There is, too, in the very species of an Italian singer such an innate, fantastical pride and caprice, that the government of them (here at least) is almost impracticable. This distemper, as we were not sufficiently warn'd or apprized of, threw our musical affairs into perplexities we knew not easily how to get out of. There is scarce a sensible auditor in the Kingdom that has not since that time had occasion to laugh at the several instances of it. But what is still more ridiculous, these costly canary birds have sometimes infested the whole body of our dignified lovers of musick with the same childish animosities."

It was merely an ill.u.s.tration of the melancholy fact that the heavenly maid of music is too often attended by the handmaiden of discord. But to continue:

"Ladies have been known," says Colley, "to decline their visits upon account of their being of a different musical party. Caesar and Pompey made not a warmer division in the Roman Republick than those heroines, their country women, the Faustina and Cuzzoni, blew up in our commonwealth of academical musick by their implacable pretentions to superiority.[A] And while this greatness of soul is their unalterable virtue, it will never be practicable to make two capital singers of the same s.e.x do as they should do in one opera at the same time! No, tho' England were to double the sums it has already thrown after them.

For even in their own country, where an extraordinary occasion has called a greater number of their best to sing together, the mischief they have made has been proportionable; an instance of which, if I am rightly informed, happen'd at Parma, where upon the celebration of the marriage of that Duke, a collection was made of the most eminent voices that expence or interest could purchase, to give as complete an opera as the whole vocal power of Italy could form.

[Footnote A: Francesca Cuzzoni and Faustina Bordoni Ha.s.se, whose famous rivalry in 1726 and 1727 is here referred to, were singers of remarkable powers. Cuzzoni's voice was a soprano, her rival's a mezzo-soprana, and while the latter excelled in brilliant execution, the former was supreme in pathetic expression. Dr. Burney("History of Music," iv. 319) quotes from M. Quanta the statement that so keen was their supporter's party spirit, that when one party began to applaude their favourite, the other party hissed!--R.W. LOWE, "Notes to the Apology."]

"But when it came to the proof of this musical project, behold! what woful work they made of it! every performer would be a Caesar or Nothing; their several pretentions to preference were not to be limited within the laws of harmony; they would all choose their own songs, but not more to set off themselves than to oppose or deprive another of an occasion to s.h.i.+ne. Yet any one would sing a bad song, provided n.o.body else had a good one, till at last they were thrown together like so many feather'd warriors, for a battle-royal in a c.o.c.k-pit, where every one was oblig'd to kill another to save himself!

What pity it was these froward misses and masters of musick had not been engag'd to entertain the court of some King of Morocco, that could have known a good opera from a bad one! With how much ease would such a director have brought them to better order? But alas! as it has been said of greater things,

"'Suis et ipsa Roma viribus ruit.'

"Imperial Rome fell by the too great strength of its own citizens! So fell this mighty opera, ruin'd by the too great excellency of its singers! For, upon the whole, it proved to be as barbarously bad as if Malice itself had composed it."

It was a pity, no doubt, that the light of opera shone but dimly at the Haymarket, yet the ill wind which almost extinguished that light blew a blessing towards the nimble Santlow. For the dear creature prospered exceeding well as Dorcas Zeal; the heart of the public waxed warm toward the ex-dancer, and so did the cardiac organ of Barton Booth. A few years later Booth married the charmer, and she, having become virtuous and prim, made the remainder of his life a bed of domestic roses.

And now for the brief story of Booth's dignified career. Barton came of good English stock, and his father, with a true British desire to rule the destinies of his family, mapped out a clerical life for the boy. But the latter had no thought of the pulpit, and from the time that he acted in the "Andria" of Terence, at Westminster School, his hope was all for the stage. 'Tis very easy to applaud that hope now; perhaps his relations looked upon it as a temptation offered by the Evil One. When he reached the mature age of seventeen, and had orders to begin his university training, what does the youth do but run away from home, and, taking the theatrical bull by the horns, appear on the Dublin boards.

"He first apply'd to Mr. Betterton, then to Mr. Smith, two celebrated actors," says Chetwood, "but they decently refused him for fear of the resentment of his family. But this did not prevent his pursuing the point in view; therefore he resolv'd for Ireland, and safely arrived in June 1698. His first rudiments Mr. Ashbury[A] taught him, and his first appearance was in the part of Oroonoko, where he acquitted himself so well to a crowded audience, that Mr. Ashbury rewarded him with a present of five guineas, which was the more acceptable as his last s.h.i.+lling was reduced to bra.s.s (as he inform'd me). But an odd accident fell out upon this occasion. It being very warm weather, in his last scene of the play, as he waited to go on, he inadvertently wiped his face, that, when he enter'd, he had the appearance of a chimney-sweeper (his own words). At his entrance he was surprised at the variety of noises he heard in the audience (for he knew not what he had done), that a little confounded him, till he received an extraordinary clap of applause, which settled his mind. The play was desir'd for the next night of acting, when an actress fitted a c.r.a.pe to his face, with an opening proper for the mouth, and shap'd in form for the nose; but, in the first scene, one part of the c.r.a.pe slip'd off. 'And zounds!' said he (he was a little apt to swear), 'I look'd like a magpie. When I came off, they lamp-black'd me for the rest of the night, that I was flayed before it could be got off again.'"[B]

[Footnote A: Joseph Ashbury, Master of the Revels, in Ireland, actor, and manager of the theatre in Dublin.]

[Footnote B: Chetwood adds in a footnote: "The composition for blackening the face are ivory-black and pomatum, which is, with some pains, clean'd with fresh b.u.t.ter." "Oroonoko" was what we would now call a "black face" part.]

But Booth was too much in earnest to be daunted by anything so trifling as the misplacing of a mask. He studied hard, despite a youthful liking for the jolly joys of Bacchus, and soon made for himself an enviable position upon the Dublin stage. For the youth had all the qualities that went toward the formation of a fine actor; he possessed keen dramatic instinct, poetic sensibility, a beautiful voice, a handsome person, and, above all, a dogged ambition. In after years, when his health began to fail and the sweets of success had, perhaps, become a trifle cloying, the tragedian often went through a part in a perfunctory manner.[A] But those early days in Ireland marked the sunrise of his genius--a time no less n.o.ble, in its freshness and promise, than the later glory of the noontide--and there was in his performance nothing but youthful ardour and devotion.

[Footnote A: He (Booth) would play his best to a single man in the pit whom he recognised as a playgoer, and a judge of acting; but to an unappreciating audience he could exhibit an almost contemptuous disinclination to exert himself. On one occasion of this sort he was made painfully sensible of his mistake and a note was addressed to him from the stage-box, the purport of which was to know whether he was acting for his own diversion or in the service and for the entertainment of the public? On another occasion, with a thin house and a cold audience, he was languidly going through one of his usually grandest impersonations, namely, Pyrrhus. At his very dullest scene he started into the utmost brilliancy and effectiveness. His eye had just previously detected in the pit a gentleman, named Stanyan, the friend of Addison and Steele, and the correspondent of the Earl of Manchester. Stanyan was an accomplished man and a judicious critic.

Booth played to him, with the utmost care and corresponding success.

"No, no!" he exclaimed, as he pa.s.sed behind the scenes, "I will not have it said at b.u.t.ton's that Barton Booth is losing his powers!"--DR.

DORAN.]

With that ardour, only whetted by his popularity in Dublin, Barton travelled to London (1701), and there offered respectful incense at the shrine of Betterton. 'Twas a shrine at which the public still wors.h.i.+pped; and when Roscius extended a helping hand to the kneeling postulant, and brought him before the patrons of Lincoln's Inn Fields, the success of Booth seemed a.s.sured. The latter never forgot the generosity and kindly interest of his idol, and he spoke with all the sincerity of grat.i.tude when he once said: "When I acted the Ghost with Betterton (as Hamlet), instead of my awing him, he terrified me. But divinity hung round that man." Had he been of an egotistic mould Barton might have added, that his Ghost was considered hardly less effective than the Hamlet of the mighty Betterton.

For a decade, or longer, Booth went on this prosperous way, gaining in favour with the theatre-goers, and increasing his artistic resources.