Event Comment: Betterton's Company. The date of the first performance is not known, but the fact that the play was advertised in the Post Boy, 25-28 April 1696, suggests that it was acted not later than the period preceding Passion Week (6-11 April 1696). In addition, the large number of minor performers in the cast suggests a Lenten performance by the young actors. In Act I, Scene i, there is an Entertainment of Instrumental Musick, Compos'd by Signior Finger: Then a Song, set by Mr John Eccles, and Sung by Young La Roche. In III, iii: A Dialogue set by Seignior Baptist. The play is an adaptation of John Webster's Cure for a Cuckold. A Comparison Between the Two Stages (1702): The City Bride, by another Player, Damn'd

Event Comment: Macbeth with cast as 27 Nov. 1718 was advertised in the Daily Courant, but Rich's Register lists The Mourning Bride. On 14 Jan. The Mourning Bride is advertised with the heading: Acted but twice these Two Years, suggesting either that it was not given on 13 Jan. or that the bill, already made up, was not changed for the printer, an unlikely event

Event Comment: Betterton's Company. The date of the first performance is not certain, but the evidence points to this day as a strong Possibility. Downes, Roscius Anglicanus (p. 44) states that it was given thirteen days consecutively, and John Coke (see 16 March 1696@7) states that it was acted "till Saturday" (16 March 1696@7). If the tragedy was acted on Wednesdays but not Fridays, as was often the practice in Lent, and if the farce alluded to for Saturday, 16 March 1696@7, comprised the entire program, this day was probably the premiere. The following sequence of performances is based on these premises. Downes, Roscius Anglicanus, p. 44: The Mourning Bride...had such Success, that it continu'd Acting Uninterrupted 13 Days together. Gildon, English Dramatick Poets, p. 23: This Play had the greatest Success, not only of all Mr Congreve's, but indeed of all the Plays that ever I can remember on the English Stage, excepting some of the incomparable Otway's. Aston, A Brief Supplement (in Cibber, Apology, II, 302): His [Betterton's] Favourite, Mrs Barry, claims the next in Estimation. They were both never better pleas'd, than in Playing together.--Mrs Barry outshin'd Mrs Bracegirdle in the Character of Zara in the Mourning Bride, altho' Mr Congreve design'd Almeria for that Favour

Event Comment: Betterton's Company. This performance is known from a playbill apparently no longer extant: W. R. At the Desire of several Persons of Quality. At the New Theatre in Little Lincoln's-Inn Fields, this present Tuesday, being the 27th of February, will be presented, a Tragedy call'd The Mourning Bride. The Moorish? Entry perform'd by The Little? Boy. Vivant Rex. (W. J. Lawrence, The Elizabethan Playhouse and Other Studies (Stratford, 1913). See also R. W. Lowe, Thomas Betterton (London, 1891), and Fitzgerald, A New History, I, 389

Event Comment: Benefit for Miss Macklin (Cross). Receipts: #180 (Cross). Ladies to send for tickets for the places they taken at Miss Macklin's, Russel St. next door to Tom's Coffee House. Part of Pit laid into Boxes and Amphitheatre on stage. Afterpiece: By Particular Desire. Last time of Performing till the Holidays. On seeing Miss Macklin in the character of the Mourning Bride: @Should Death (for Oh! what power can save Our tragic heroine from the grave)@At Cibber aim his dart:@Tears should forever speak my moan,@For oh! 'tis she, and she alone@Can melt the feeling heart.@Britannia spake, when Lo! a Voice@Britain be happy, and rejoice,@That, when your Cibber dies@The Gods have yet in store for thee,@A Macklin; and in her you'll see@Another Cibber rise.--Public Adveriser@

Event Comment: Benefit for Noverre and Miss Bride. Afterpiece: By Desire. No Building on Stage. N.B. Burton and Packer have deferr'd their Benefit, which was to have been tomorrow, to Saturday the 15th of May, when The Jealous Wife will be perform'd, Oakly by Garrick

Event Comment: Benefit for Shawford, Berrisford, Roberts, Miss Bride. Tickets delivered by Spilsbury will be taken

Event Comment: Benefit for Foley, Bride Berrisford, Tomlinson, Smith, Atkinson. [Cross lists The Virgin Unmasked as the afterpiece, but not so advertised in the papers.] Receipts: #200 (Cross)

Event Comment: Benefit for Mrs Davies and Miss Bride. No building on stage

Event Comment: This night it was currently reported in the Green Room that Miss Bride was taken into keeping by Mr Calcraft (Hopkins Diary--MacMillan). Receipts: #119 14s. (MacMillan)