Event Comment: [Miss Chapman was from the Margate theatre. Account-Book, 27 Oct.: Paid Miss Chapman, expenses from Margate #5 5s.] Receipts: #246 (242.13.6; 3.6.6)

Event Comment: Benefit for Miss Chapman. Tickets delivered for The Toy will be admitted. 3rd piece [1st time; D 1, author unknown. Larpent MS 950; not published. Songs by John Collins and Charles Dibdin (MacMillan, Larpent Catalogue, 157-58)]. Morning Herald, 14 May: Tickets to be had of Miss Chapman, No. 16, Henrietta-street, Covent-Garden. Receipts: #244 18s. (122.10; 13.5; tickets: 109.3) (charge: #105)

Event Comment: 2nd piece [1st time; D 3, by Henry Neuman, based on Der Opfertod, by August Friedrich Ferdinand von Kotzebue. Text (R. Phillips, 1799) assigns no parts]. Boxes 5s. Pit 3s. 1st Gallery 2s. 2nd Gallery 1s. The Doors to be opened at 6:00. To begin at 7:00 [same throughout season]. Places for the Boxes to be taken of Rice, at the Theatre. The Theatre, since the last Season, has been newly Decorated. [Beginning with 19 June the playbill: Printed by T. Woodfall, Drury Lane; on 4 Sept.: No. 104, Drury Lane.] Morning Chronicle, 27 June 1799: This Day is published Family Distress (2s.). Gentleman's Magazine, May 1800, pp. 406-8, prints a letter from "J. B." in which strong exception is taken to Kotzebue in general, and this play in particular. "Theatrical entertainments have an extensive influence upon the manners of Society. When well regulated, and the pieces for representation well selected both as to matter and manner, they may be esteemed friendly to morality, and improvers of public taste. But what shall we say when both these ends are disregarded; when moral virtue is banished from the scene, and purity of taste is destroyed by affected language and pantomimical decorations? Improvements in almost every art and science have been within a few years, rapid and important. But that is not the case with the stage; nor can it be, while Kotzebue and his friends usurp the venerable boards of Shakespeare." The writer then, in sarcastic terms, outlines the plot of Family Distress. [Pope and Miss Chapman were both from cg.

Event Comment: Benefit for Miss Chapman. Morning Herald, 3 May: Tickets to be had of Miss Chapman, No. 16, Henrietta-street, Covent-Garden. Receipts: #263 5s

Event Comment: Benefit for Miss Chapman. [In 1st piece the Young Lady is identified in Morning Herald, 20 May, only as "Niece to the late Alexander Fordyce, Esq., and a pupil of the veteran Macklin."] Morning Herald, 10 May: Tickets to be had of Miss Chapman, No. 33, Norfolk-street, Strand. Receipts: #199 8s. 6d. (62/4/0; 10/12/6; tickets: 126/12/0)

Event Comment: Benefit for Miss Chapman. Morning Chronicle, 14 May: Tickets to be had of Miss Chapman, No. 33, Norfolk-street, Strand. Receipts: #176 12s. 6d. (59.5.6; 3.14.0; tickets: 113.13.0)

Event Comment: [In mainpiece the playbill retains Mrs Esten, but she "being indisposed, Davies apologized for her absence, and Miss Chapman sustained the part with...good sense, delicacy and feeling" (Morning Herald, 16 Jan.).] Receipts: #194 2s. (189.17; 4.5)

Event Comment: Benefit for the Author [of mainpiece, who is named in the Account-Book, but not on the playbill]. "A considerable tumult prevailed last night among the audience of this Theatre, on account of the unavoidable substitution of Miss Chapman and Mrs Harlowe for Mrs Esten and Mrs Wells (who are both indisposed). It was not that the audience objected to the former two, but because the names of Mrs Esten and Mrs Wells were printed in the bills usually sold about the Theatre, though not in those properly issued from the House. [Mrs Esten's name, however (but not Mrs Wells'), is listed in the "House" playbill for this night.] The audience were very violent, and the actors, after having nearly finished the first Act twice, were obliged to begin the Comedy a third time, before it was suffered quietly to proceed" (Morning Herald, 9 Feb.). "The fracas at Covent-garden Theatre on Wednesday evening was occasioned by the dexterity of certain Lottery Office keepers, who, in order to give notoriety to their shops, daily cause spurious Dramatis Personae of the theatres to be circulated; and on the reverse of these bills is conspicuously held forth the advantages of the public paying their cash into their gambling treasuries" (Morning Herald, 10 Feb.). Receipts: #191 17s. 6d. (187.2.6; 4.15.0; tickets: none listed)

Event Comment: [Miss Walcup is identified in London Chronicle, 24 Jan. Afterpiece in place of Mago and Dago, advertised on playbill of 22 Jan.] Receipts: #134 12s. (125.18; 8.14)

Event Comment: [Miss Morris is identified in European Magazine, Nov. 1792, p. 379.] Receipts: #287 8s

Event Comment: Benefit for Farley, Mrs Chapman & Mrs Mills. 1st piece: Not acted these 3 years. 2nd piece [1st time; M. INT 1]. 3rd piece: With Alterations and Additions. Not acted these 20 years [acted 29 Oct. 1781.] Receipts: #313 12s. 6d. (95.13.0; 3.1.6; tickets: 214.18.0)

Event Comment: Benefit for Farley, Waddy & Mrs Chapman. Afterpiece: To conclude with the Ceremony Usual at the Death of a Deserter. Receipts: #412 18s. (78.5; 4.4; tickets: 330.9)

Event Comment: Benefit for Pope. 1st piece [1st time; D 4. Larpent MS 1249; not published synopsis of plot in Universal Magazine, Apr. 1799, p. 273]: Translated from [Der Graf von Burgund, by August Friedrich Ferdinand von? Kotzebue (Author of The Stranger, Lover's Vows, &c.) by Miss Anne? Plumptre, and adapted to the English Stage by Alexander? Pope. Morning Chronicle, 25 26 Mar.: Tickets to be had of Pope at his house, No. 5, Half Moon-street, Piccadilly. [This was Mrs Abington's last appearance on the stage.] "The perpetuated evidence of youth was in character with her person and her powers; the slimness of her figure, the fulness of her voice, the freshness of her spirits, the sparkle of her eye, and the elasticity of her limbs, savoured alike of a juvenility that puzzled the mind, whilst it pleased it: of her it was justly said that 'she had been on the stage thirty years; she was one-and-twenty when she came, and one-and-twenty when she went!'" (John Bernard, Retrospections of the Stage, 1830, II, 228-29). Receipts: #334 19s. 6d. (194.1.0; 2.5.0; tickets: 138.13.6)

Event Comment: Benefit for Hill, Rees and Miss Sims. Morning Chronicle, 6 June: Tickets to be had of Hill, No. 24, Bow-street, opposite the Pit Door. [Others not listed.] 2nd piece [1st time: M. INT 1]. Receipts: #287 7s. (50.17.6; 4.0.6; tickets: 232.9.0)

Event Comment: Benefit for Miss Wallis [whose 1st appearance as Lady Eleanor Irwin was at Bath, 2 May 1793, and as Lady Bab Lardoon also at Bath, 15 Mar. 1791]. 2nd piece: With a view of High-street, Portsmouth, at the time of an Illumination. Morning Herald, 18 Apr.: Tickets to be had of Miss Wallis, No. 76, Gower-street, Bedford-square. Receipts: #377 15s. 6d. (182.16.6; 10.3.0; tickets: 184.16.0)

Event Comment: Benefit for Miss Waters. Afterpiece: By permission of the Proprietors of the Theatre-Royal, Drury Lane. Morning Chronicle, 3 May: Tickets to be had of Miss Waters, No. 43, Conduit-street, Hanover-square. Receipts: #461 0s. 6d. (172.11.0; 5.1.0; tickets: 283.8.6)

Event Comment: Benefit for Miss Poole. 3rd piece: Not acted these 6 years [acted 5 May 1790). Morning Chronicle, 7 Apr.: Tickets to be had of Miss Poole, No. 18, Charles-street, Covent Garden. Receipts: #206 12s. (102/8/0; 4/17/6; tickets: 99/6/6)

Event Comment: Benefit for Munden. [Mrs Litchfield is identified in Thespian Dictionary, 1805; as Miss Hay she had acted at cg on 27 May 1796.] 2nd piece [1st time; MF 1, by John O'Keeffe. MS not in Larpent MS; not published]: Altered [by the author] from Sprigs of Laurel. True Briton, 1 May: Tickets to be had of Munden, No. 16, Clement's-Inn. Receipts: #418 8s. 6d. (122.8.6; 9.19.6; tickets: 286.0.6)

Event Comment: [As Miss P. Farren Mrs Knight had 1st appaared in London on 15 May 1777 at the hay.] "[Knight's] simplicity is the type of nature, untainted With buffoonery; and what we very rarely meet with, his attention was so wholly engrossed by the business of the scene as to make him appear unconscious of being before an audience" (Morning Chronicle, 26 Sept.). Receipts: #248 3s. 6d. (240.2.6; 8.1.0)

Event Comment: Benefit for Miss DeCamp. Mainpiece: The Overture, Chorusses, and new Musick by Dr Arnold. The Scenery by Rooker, Marinari, &c. Morning Chronicle, 9 Aug.: Tickets to be had of Miss DeCamp, No. 14, Tottenham Court Road, near Bedford-square

Event Comment: Benefit for Miss Betterton, 2nd piece [1st time; ENT 1]. Times, 26 Apr.: Tickets to be had of Miss Betterton, No. 47, Great Queen-street, Lincoln's Inn Fields. Receipts: #184 8s. 6d. (87.0.0; 8.17.6; tickets: 88.11.0)

Event Comment: 1st piece [1st time; PREL I, by Thomas Holcroft, based on The Covent Garden Tragedy, by Henry Fielding. Larpent MS 1039; not published; synopsis of plot in Morning Herald, 16 Sept.]. "The two Queens are represented by Munden and Fawcett, who are dressed up fantastically, wearing as Crowns Models of the two Theatres" (Morning Chronicle, 16 Sept.). Covent-Garden was crowned with a triangular representation of the Piazza; Drury-Lane with her own Theatre, surmounted by Apollo" (Morning Herald, 16 Sept.). [This was Burton's 1st appearance in London; he was from the Norwich theatre. Miss Cornelys was from the Dublin theatre.] No Money to be returned. Boxes 6s. Second Price 3s. Pit 3s. 6d. Second Price 2s. Gallery 2s. Second Price 1s. Upper Gallery 1s. Places for the Boxes to be taken of Brandon at the Office in Hart-street. The Doors to be opened at 5:30. To begin at 6:30 [see 30 Oct.]. Receipts: #305 1s. 6d. (296.10.6; 8.11.0)

Event Comment: [as Miss Mahon Mrs Second has sung in the cg oratorios in 1789 and 1790.] Receipts: #189 5s. (187.5.6; 1.19.6)

Event Comment: The Opera Dances [Les Delassemens Militaires and Cupid and Psyche, both advertised on playbill of 30 Oct.] are obliged to be deferred till Saturday, on account of Mme Hilligsberg not being sufficiently recovered from her late accident [see 28 Oct.] to perform. [Miss Wheatley, who had 1st appeared at dl, 16 Feb. 1795, is identified in European Magazine, Nov. 1797, p. 339.] Receipts: #119 4s. 6d. (113.7.6; 5.17.0)

Event Comment: Benefit for Mrs Litchfield and Miss Mitchell. 3rd piece: Not acted these 2 years. Morning Chronicle, 25 May: Tickets to be had of Mrs Litchfield, No. 38, Bedford-street, Covent Garden; of Miss Mitchell, No. 3, Park-street, Grosvenor-square. Receipts: #304 15s. 6d. (76.7.6; 1.12.0; tickets: 226.16.0)