YORK HOUSE. YORK STAIRS. DURHAM HOUSE.
Percy, it may be observed, was Hannah More's most important play. The author had previously published a pastoral drama, The Search after Happiness, for the edification of school children, and her tragedy, The Inflexible Captive, was acted on one occasion in Bath. Her fourth play, The Fatal Falsehood, failed, at Covent Garden, in 1779. The success of Percy was largely due to Garrick's friendly help. Wroughton, "Gentleman" Lewis, and Mrs Crawford played the principal parts. Garrick wrote the epilogue, as well as the prologue, and, by the following lines from the latter, gave great offence to a French lady, Mlle. D'Eon, a reputed natural daughter of Louis XV., who had a "violent passion" for the military dress of an officer in preference to the gown and petticoat of her own sex:
"To rule the man our sex dame Nature teaches;
Mount the high horse we can, and make long speeches;
Nay, and with dignity, some wear the breeches.
And why not wear them?—
Did not a lady-knight, late chevalier,
A brave smart soldier in your eyes appear?
Hey! presto? pass! His sword becomes a fan;
A comely woman rising from a man!
The French their Amazonian maid invite;
She goes—alike well skill'd to talk or write,
Dance, ride, negotiate, scold, coquet, or fight.
If she should set her heart upon a rover,
And he prove false, she'd kick her faithless lover."
In January, 1778, Hannah More, flushed with the success of her tragedy, was paying a round of visits in London. On one night she dined with Mrs Delany, Mrs Boscawen, and the Duchess of Portland: on the next, "at the Garricks with the sour crout party"—a weekly dinner in the Adelphi of learned men (sour crout being one of the dishes), to which Hannah More was always invited. She was taken ill during this month, and Mrs Garrick tried to induce her to stay with her, an invitation which was not accepted. Mrs Garrick "would have gone herself to fetch me a physician, and insisted upon sending me my dinner, which I refused; but at six this evening, when Garrick came to the Turk's Head to dine, there accompanied him, in the coach, a minced chicken in the stew-pan, hot, a canister of her fine tea, and a pot of cream. Were there ever such people! Tell it not in Epic, or in Lyric, that the great Roscius rode with a stew-pan of minced meat with him in the coach for my dinner." The Turk's Head, by the way, was "a noted rendezvous of painters" and the home of the Artists' Club before, in the year 1764, Johnson and Sir Joshua Reynolds founded the famous "Literary Club," the members of which met weekly for supper and conversation. Garrick had been a member for three years when he brought the invalid's repast from the Adelphi to the Turk's Head—which was in Gerrard Street, at the corner of Greek Street and Compton Street. The actor was also kind enough to invest the profit on Percy, on the best security and at five per cent., so that it made a considerable addition to the income of the young writer.
On a certain memorable Thursday, in 1778, Hannah More dined with the Garricks in the Adelphi, and, in the evening, Garrick accompanied his guest to a reception given by Sir Joshua Reynolds; the party included Gibbon, Johnson, Hermes Harris, Burney, Chambers, Ramsey, the Bishop of St Asaph, Boswell, and Langton; "and scarce an expletive man or woman among them. Garrick put Johnson into such good spirits that I never knew him so entertaining or more instructive. He was as brilliant as himself, and as good-humoured as any one else."
The end of a great career was, unhappily, now approaching. Mr and Mrs Garrick had been invited to spend the Christmas of 1778 at the country seat of Earl Spencer, where they were honoured guests. In the midst of the festivities, Garrick was seized with a return of an old disorder—an affection of the kidneys. Early in January, however, he had so far recovered that he was able to travel to London. He arrived at his house in the Adelphi on January 15, and several physicians were called in. One of them, seeing that the illness was serious, and knowing that its course was certain, thought it necessary to tell the actor that, if he had any worldly affairs to settle, "it would be prudent to dispatch them as soon as possible." But Garrick made answer that nothing of that sort lay on his mind, that he was not afraid to die. About two days before his death, he was visited by an old friend, who was persuaded to stay and dine with Mrs Garrick, who was greatly fatigued by her long and constant attendance upon her husband, a duty to which she invariably attended. While she was talking to the friend, the dying actor came into the room; "but, oh! how changed! divested of that vivacity and sprightliness which used to accompany everything he said and everything he did! His countenance was sallow and wan, his movements slow and solemn. He was wrapped in a rich night-gown, not unlike that which he always wore in Lusignan, the venerable old king of Jerusalem [in Zara]; he presented himself to the imagination of his friend as if he was just ready to act that character. He sat down; and during the space of an hour, the time he remained in the room, he did not utter a word. He rose, and withdrew to his chamber. Mrs Garrick and the Gentleman dined." What a sad dinner that must have been!
Just before his death, Garrick confided to a friend that he did not regret being childless, for he knew that the quickness of his feelings was so great that, in case it had been his misfortune to have disobedient children, he could not have borne such an affliction. On seeing a number of gentlemen in his apartment a few hours before the end, he enquired who they were, and, on being told that they were physicians who sought to do him service, he shook his head, and repeated the following lines from Nicholas Rowe's Fair Penitent:—
"Another, and another, still succeeds;
And the last fool is welcome as the former."
He died, with great composure, at eight o'clock on the morning of January 20, 1779. On Monday, February 1, the body was conveyed from the Adelphi to Westminster Abbey, and interred in Poet's Corner, a spot made still further memorable in the annals of the stage by the burial here—and close by the graves of David Garrick and Samuel Johnson—of the remains of Henry Irving.