Event Comment: Concert, &c., as 18 June, but Dancing-Herbert, and added: The Early Horn by Barnshaw

Event Comment: [The play was not allowed to conclude, nor was the afterpiece, All the World's a Stage, performed. "Yesterday evening, during the representation of...A Bold Stroke for a Wife, at China Hall, Rotherhithe, a party of the inhabitants, who had laid an information against the performers, rushed into the theatre, behind the scenes, and seized Mr Russell (who played the character of Colonel Feignwell), and carried him, in his stage dress, before Justice Smith, at the Rotation-Office, St Bennet's-hill, who committed him to the House of Correction, for further examination this morning" (Morning Chronicle, 24 July). What happened to Russell is not known, but because of this occurrence the theatre did not re-open until the following season, on 25 May 1778. See my article on the history of this unlucky playhouse, Theatre Notebook, VIII, 76-80.

Event Comment: By Command of Their Majesties. Afterpiece [1st time; INT 1, by Horace Walpole. Text 1st Published in Walpole's Works, vol. II (G. G. and J. Robinson and J. Edwards, 1798)]

Event Comment: Afterpiece: All the scenery, machinery, designed by DeLoutherbourg, and executed under his direction. Receipts: #170 17s. (126.19.0; 43.8.6; 0.9.6)

Event Comment: A Serious Opera [1st time; SER 3, author unknown; a pasticcio]. The Music by several celebrated Composers, and conducted [i.e. arranged] by Bianchi. Public Advertiser, 4 Dec.: Roncaglia was welcomed with merited and very flattering Applause, yet he seemed hurt at sharing with Ansani those marks of public Favour. We exhort them both to remember that Persons of their superior Talents ought to lay aside every petty Prejudice and personal Animosity. "[Ansani] had a finely toned, full, and commanding voice, was a spirited actor, and in the first opera, called Ricimero, sustained the most prominent and important part. But he was unfortunately of a most peevish, quarrelsome temper; Roncaglia was saucy and conceited, and neither could brook the superiority claimed by the other. Their mutual jealousy, and the importance assumed by the tenor soon produced an irreconcilable breach, Ansani threw up his engagement, and the season went on heavily to its close for want of him"(Mount-Edgcumbe, p. 29)

Event Comment: Mainpiece [1st time; C 5, by Thomas Holcroft, based on Le Mariage de Figaro, by Pierre Augustin Caron de Beaumarchais; incidental music by William Shield. In 1789 reduced to an afterpiece of 3 acts. Prologue by the author (Europaen Magazine, Dec. 1784, p. 467)]: With new Dresses, Decorations, &c. Public Advertiser, 10 Mar. 1785: This Day is published The Follies of A Day (1s. 6d.). [For an account of Holcroft's shorthand transcription of the original, taken down during a performance in Paris, and the hasty rehearsals of it in London, see Elbridge Colby, A Bibliography of Thomas Holcroft, 1922, pp. 48-50.]

Event Comment: Mainpiece [1st time; C 5, by Elizabeth Inchbald. Prologue and Epilogue by Geoge Colman, the elder (see text, which also gives names of the speakers)]. Morning Chronicle, 25 July 1786: This Day is published I'll Tell You What (1s. 6d.)

Event Comment: Mainpiece [1st time; CO 3, by Thomas Holcroft]: The Overture and the rest of the music entirely new, by Shield. With new Dresses, &c. Books of the Songs to be had at the Theatre. Public Advertiser, 22 Nov. 1785: This Day is published The Choleric Fathers (price not listed). Receipts: #240 4s. (238/3; 2/1)

Event Comment: Benefit for Mrs Inchbald. Mainpiece: By Permission of Colman [proprietor of the HAY, owner of the copyright of the play, and author of Epilogue]. Morning Chronicle, 22 Apr.: Tickets to be had of Mrs Inchbald, No. 10, Great Russel-street, Covent Garden. Receipts: #107 8s. (71/17/6; 5/1/6; tickets: 30/9/0) (charge: #105)

Event Comment: Mainpiece [1st time; C 5, by Frederick Pilon. Prologue and Epilogue by the author (see text). In 1794 reduced to an afterpiece of 3 acts]. Public Advertiser, 30 Nov. 1786: This Day is published He Wou'd be a Soldier (1s. 6d.). Receipts: #246 6s. (243.5; 3.1)

Event Comment: Mainpiece [1st time; C 5, by Hannah Cowley, based on The Lucky Chance, by Aphra Behn. Prologue and Epilogue by James Cobb (see text)]: With Variety of new Scenes, Dresses, &c. Morning Chronicle, 28 Dec. 1786: This Day is published A School for Grey-Beards (1s. 6d.). Receipts: #220 8s. (206.14; 13.4; 0.10)

Event Comment: Mainpiece [1st time; D 5, by Elizabeth Inchbald. Prologue by Thomas Vaughan. Epilogue by Miles Peter Andrews (see text). Public Advertiser, 14 Feb: Part of Andrews's Epilogue to Eloisa [see 20 Dec. 1786]...was blended with Epilogue spoken on first representation of Such Things Are]: With new Scenes, Dresses, &c. Public Advertiser, 1 Dec. 1787: This Day is published Such Things Are (1s. 6d.). Receipts: #214 10s. (212.10; 2.0)