Event Comment: ferpiece subsequently called Hob. See 19 Oct.] Receipts: #82 7s. 6d

Event Comment: Les Comediens Francais representeront aujourdhui...par Suscription. [To begin at six o'clock.Prices: 5s., 3s., 2s. Mainpiece]: Comedie du Nouveau Theatre Italien. [Afterpiece]: Opera comique. On Tuesday night there was a great Disturbance...at the French Play, it being the Night of Opening; the first Act was very much disturbed and some Persons were wounded (Daily Advertiser, 16 Nov.). [Same paper carries advertisement offering reward for identification of five or six men who had assaulted a person in the gallery; "they seemed to come from the upper Side-Boxes on the right Hand of the Stage; they were of the first Party that came into the Gallery with Swords."] Whereas it has been maliciously reported...that I [Lord Trentham] was active in the Disturbance...last Tuesday Night: I do declare...that I was neither in the Pit nor Gallery where the Disturbance happened during the Time of Performance...nor was I present at the first and chief Disturbance (Daily Advertiser, 20 Nov.). [Lord Trentham was at the time running against Sir George Vandeput for parliament. The latter led by 100-150 votes until the very last moment when Trentham won by 175. A recount was called for.

Event Comment: We hear the French Players intend next week to play a Burlesque, Comedy called Il Nous Faut Partir

Event Comment: Benefit Signor Laschi, with Comic Interludes between the Acts, called La Serva Padrona. The music composed by Sig Gio. Batista Pergolesi

Event Comment: A little Noise at ye Singing & Dancing (Cross). Nn Saturday night was played for the first time a new Masque called Alfred, at the Theatre Royal in Drury Lane, before a very numerous and splendid audience. The Piece itself, as it justly deserved met with great and universal applause: However, the spectators rightly found fault with some improprieties in the performance of the inferior dancers and actors, which we hear will be all corrected in this night's representation (General Advertiser). Receipts: #160 (Cross)

Event Comment: mong the Addresses of the Lords and Commons to the Sovereign which appeared in the Gentleman's Magazine (Nov. 1751, pp. 513-14) one recommended that provision be made for suppressing audacious crimes of robbery and violence. A contributor called Mr Urban's attention to a "method of reformation earnestly recommended more than 40 years ago by an eminent Divine" (Dean Swift). In this treatise occured the following paragraph: "The Reformation of the Stage is entirely in the power of the Court; and in the consequence it hath upon the minds of younger people, doth very well deserve the strictest care. Surely a pension would not be ill employed on some men of wit, learning and virtue, who might have power to strike out every offensive and unbecoming passage from plays already written, as well as those that may be offered to the stage for the future, by which, and other wise regulations, the theatre might become a very innocent and useful diversion instead of being a scandal and reproach to our religion and country."] Receipts: #120 (Cross)

Event Comment: [lso called Fifty-sixth Night.

Event Comment: At Phillips's Great Theatrical Booth, facing the Great Til'd Booth, Bowling Green, To begin at Twelve noon during the time of the Fair. Boxes 2s. 6d. Pit 1s. 6d. Upper seats 6d. [For security Phillips has erected no Gallery. Presumably the Patent Theatres were demanding more rigid enforcement of the Licensing Act as indicated in the notice from the Daily Advertiser 18 Sept.: Whereas the Fair called Lady Fair...in the Borough of Southwark...any person or persons..who person..(who ) shall act and exhibit any Droll or Shew (after 20 Sept.) shall be prosecuted and punished according to Law.'

Event Comment: Tomorrow Gli Amanti Gelosi and on Friday a New Comic Opera called Lo Studente a la Moda

Event Comment: On Tuesday next a New Tragedy called Philoclea. On Monday 28 January will be a Benefit for Sga Nicolina Giordani, A comic Opera with dances. Tickets and places for the Boxes may be had at Sg Giordani's Lodging, at Mr Milbourn's Grocer, in James St. Covent Garden. To the Young Gentlewoman who has performed Hermione [see 19 Jan.]: @Great was th' Applause you met, great your desert,@You charm'd the Eye, the Ear, the Head, the Heart.@Amaz'd we saw you at the first appear,@Ev'n in the hardest part, a perfect play'r.@Your person, your deportment set to view,@The youthful princess that the poet drew.@All was propriety, and all was grace,@We read the author's meaning in your face.@Your elocution was both just and strong,@Mix'd with due ease, and not an accent wrong,@Such varied Musick in your voice we heard,@That in the Tones both Taste and Sense appear'd.@Love, Jealousy, and Rage so well expres't@Engag'd our souls, nor knew we which was best,@'Twas Nature all-she form'd you for the stage,@Follow her steps, and glad th' Admiring Age.-Public Advertiser@

Event Comment: A new Musical Entertainment. Written by Mr Rolt, and set to Musick by Mr Arne. To begin at 6:30 p.m. Pit and Boxes 5s. Gallery 3s. Originally announced for 4 Feb.; postponed to 11 Feb. because of the illness of Mrs Arne, and again. Mr Arne is obliged to inform the Publick...his new English Opera is called Eliza and the performance stopped by a Prohibition from the Lord Chamberlain (Daily Advertiser, 21 March)

Event Comment: Compos'd by Sg Pergolesi. Benefit of the Managers of the Italian Company who played the Burlettas at Covent Garden Theatre this Season. Boxes 5s. Pit 3s. Gallery 2s. To begin at 7 p.m. Will be presented the Second Concert of Vocal and Instrumental Musick...Between the first and second part of the Concert will be given, gratis, an Italian Interlude, called, La Serva Padrona

Event Comment: Some Noise at the Dancers, but not great (Cross). Tomorrow will be publish'd The Dancers Damn'd; Or The Devil to Pay at the old House. Price 6d. Printed for R. Griffiths. [Appears to be an eyewitness, journalistic account, but turns into a considered attack upon mob patriotism. Author purports to describe the action which took place Wednesday night 12 Nov. 1755: 'When the Chinese scene was expos'd, the leader of the Loyal party advanced to the front of the Gallery and thus bespake the House: "O Britons! O my Countrymen! Ye will certainly not suffer these foreign clogs to amuse us. Our destruction is at hand. These sixty dancers are come over with a design to undermine our constitution. This Navarre is Marshall Lewendahl, and the least amongst them is an ensign, disguised in order to perpetrate our ruin!"' After alternate encouragement and abuse Reason, who had descended from the clouds, spoke: "I came hither by the persuasion of Truth and Justice to tell you that amongst all this number of dancers that now stand ready to entertain you there are no more than Four French men and about the same number of females; that their Chief is a Swiss Protestant, who, had not his merit protected him would have been hiss'd off the stage at Paris, for being a Swiss Protestant. And will you damn him for the same reason? Will you pay less regard to Genius than a French Audience? Here a cat-call and one cried out: 'Swiss! What the devil do we know of Swiss! a Swiss is a foreigner, and all foreigners are Frenchmen; and so damn you all!"'] Receipts: #140 (Cross)

Event Comment: A Free Benefit for Ryan. Mainpiece: Not acted these 4 years. [See 3 April 1756.] Written by the late Mr Hughes. [For Afterpiece, see note.] Receipts: Door, #87 7s. Tickets #121 17s. (boxes 267; pit 286; gallery 122). (Account Book). [Ryan had advertised his benefit on 15 March to be The Siege of Damascus and a new Dramatic Satire called The Anniversary, being a Sequel to Lethe. On 16 March the following letter appeared in the Public Advertiser: "Upon reading Ryan's advertisement of a New Dramatic Satire, I was extremely pleas'd with a Description of the motive that occasioned it. He being last week at dinner with a set of particular friends, they inquired what Play and Farce he had chose this year for his Benefit. He inform'd them the Siege of Damascus and Lethe. Lethe, replied a Gentleman is very pleasing, but your friends have seen it, and you must fall into the fashion of having a new additional Scene; for a little bit of novelty may give assistance to its merit, and prove to your advantage. Why, then, said a facetious Gentleman, who sat very near him, Pray sir, do you write him one; 'twill cost you little trouble, and, you know, you are very capable. No more capable than yourself, Good Sir, answered the other; but to show I am full as willing, if you'll attempt to please his friends with one, upon my word I'll use my best endeavor to do the same, in writing of another. We need not fear Severity, for none will blame a friendly inclination to serve a man, who, I believe everyone wishes well. "Twas agreed, but Ryan judiciously observed, 'twould be a shame that two Gentlemen, each capable of writing to give an audience satisfaction, should condescend to make mere Lacqueys of their pens, and send them forth to hold the tail of Lethe; therefore if they should once begin, let them each write only one Hour longer, and they might raise a Structure of their own. They kindly undertook it, and in a Week sent him the piece he has now advertised."

Event Comment: TThe London Chronicle 1758 (p. 461): Having already read the play [The London Cuckolds] it was no wonder if my inclinations to attend the exhibition of it were very small; however, being in some measure oblig'd to perform that penance, I paid my money and sat down in the pit, where I underwent three hours entertainment, if I may call it so, only to be rooted in a former opinion, that the author of this comedy deserved to be hanged; and that the only excuse which could be made for suffering it to be acted would be invincible stupidity. This monstruous production of nonsense and obscenity, is the spawn of one Ravenscroft, a writer whose wit was as contemptible as his morals were vitious. He does not seem to have had one sentiment either of a man of Genious of a gentleman, at least if we may judge by the characters he has daubed, which are a pack of reprobates of the lowest kind. Nor are the things which look like incidents in this play the produce of his own invention, but the squeezings from an extravagant novel of Scarron, and two or three ill-chosen fables of LaFontaine; of which ingredients he has contrived to mix up a sort of hog-wash, sweetened with a few luscious expressions and a large portion of the grossest lewdness, to the palates of swine, or what is the same thing, men like them; but which must be odious to, and nauseated by all people of delicate taste, or common modesty. The three gallants in this comedy, Townly, Ramble and Loveit, never make their appearance upon the stage but to talk bawdy, and that in terms very little different from the most vagabond inhabitants of Covent Garden, nor do they make their exit but with a professed intention to commit adultery with one woman or another, who walks off with him very contentedly for that purpose. I must here observe that adultery is committed no less than seven times during the five acts. [The play an insult to the London aldermen and their wives.] There were several men of distinction in the boxes at this play, and I think about eight ladies. What their inward feelings might be I know not; but if one might judge of their thoughts by the gravity of their looks, they were rather mortified than diverted. But of the women of the town, who as we suppose were unwilling to let slip so fair an opportunity of getting a supper and a bed-fellow, there were crowds both in the pit and green boxes...

Event Comment: Mainpiece: By Particular Desire. [The London Chronicle 1758, p. 462, comments fully and very favorably on the performance of The Wonder, specifying the acting of Garrick, Miss Macklin, Palmer, and Mrs Davies, adding: "To this comedy was added a Pantomime Entertainment called Harlequin Ranger, which in spite of whatever may be urged to the contrary, I think diverting. And though it is against the general opinion, Woodward's pantomimes are, in my judgment, much superior to Rich's."] Receipts: #180 (Cross); #153 9s. (Winston MS 8)

Event Comment: Benefit for Shuter. Mainpiece: Not acted in 10 years. Receipts: #194 10s. in cash, plus #147 18s. from tickets (Boxes 378; Pit 356). Charges #64 5s. Advanced to Mrs Ward #30. [Shuter called for imaginative participation of his audience in his Medley Skit (see Larpent MS 171): @"Suppose my dress alter'd with each exhibition....@If I speak like a Dutchman, or Brogue it like Paddy,@Or mimic Monsieur, or lisp like a Lady"@ Parts for The English Sailors in America (by G. A. Steevens) are listed in Larpent MS 172: Indian King , English Captain , Irishman , Sailor Ned and Sailor Ben , a Black Messenger , Guards , White Savage Lady , Black Woman , Image .

Event Comment: MMarybone Gardens are now opened, and will be continued every evening during the summer season: There will be a musical performance in the orchestra, and after that an English burletta called La Serva Padrona. The music composed by Pergolesi, wherein Sga Seratina, who is now pretty well recovered of her late illness, and who has met with such universal applause in these performances, will perform the principal part. The doors will be opened at Five, the Music begin at Six, and the Burletta at Eight o'clock. Admittance 1s. The Books of the Burletta to be had at the Bar of the Gardens. N.B. Mr Truster's daughter continues to make the rich seed and plumb cakes so much admired by the Nobility and Gentry, and will be sent to any part of the town at 2s. 6d. each. She likewise makes almond cheesecakes that excels anything of that kind and are hot at One o'clock, and are sold at 21s. per dozen. [This notice repeated in subsequent bills.

Event Comment: [The following puff appeared in the Public Advertiser: "Yesterday about twelve the Races began on the Bowling Green, Southwark. There were several started for the Plate called Public Approbation, amongst the Rest was a celebrated Theatrical Horse, and two or Three Racers belonging to the same Stable, and some young Colts and Fillies, lately bred in the Stud of an eminent Sportsman in the Haymarket. The dispute laid principally between the noted Don Quixote and the Little Female Minor. The contest was warm, and several Heats were ran [a number of performances during the day?] before it could be decided; which at length was given by a small Majority of the Subscribers and the Clerk of the Course, in favor of the latter. However, her Antagonists being Bloed, they have challenged her to run again, play or pay, for three Days sucessively; and she will start This Day, tomorrow and Monday next, exactly at Twelve. Bets are laid, the Little Minor against the Field; and Eight to Six that in the end she distances the famous Old Horse, and beats him absolutely hollow."