In King James's Reign he had been some time employ'd in the Secretary's Office in Ireland (his native Country) and remain'd in it till after the Battle of the Boyn, which completed the Revolution. Upon that happy and unexpected Deliverance, the People of Dublin, among the various Expressions of their Joy, had a mind to have a Play; but the Actors being dispersed during the War, some private Persons agreed in the best Manner they were able to give one to the Publick gratis at the Theatre. The Play was Othello, in which Wilks acted the Moor; and the Applause he received in it warm'd him to so strong an Inclination for the Stage, that he immediately prefer'd it to all his other Views in Life: for he quitted his Post, and with the first fair Occasion came over to try his Fortune in the (then only) Company of Actors in London. The Person who supply'd his Post in Dublin, he told me, raised to himself from thence a Fortune of fifty thousand Pounds. Here you have a much stronger Instance of an extravagant Passion for the Stage than that which I have elsewhere shewn in my self; I only quitted my Hopes of being preferr'd to the like Post for it; but Wilks quitted his actual Possession for the imaginary Happiness which the Life of an Actor presented to him. And, though possibly we might both have better'd our Fortunes in a more honourable Station, yet whether better Fortunes might have equally gratify'd our Vanity (the universal Passion of Mankind) may admit of a Question.
Upon his being formerly received into the Theatre-Royal (which was in the Winter after I had been initiated) his Station there was much upon the same Class with my own; our Parts were generally of an equal Insignificancy, not of consequence enough to give either a Preference: But Wilks being more impatient of his low Condition than I was, (and, indeed, the Company was then so well stock'd with good Actors that there was very little hope of getting forward) laid hold of a more expeditious way for his Advancement, and returned agen to Dublin with Mr. Ashbury, the Patentee of that Theatre, to act in his new Company there: There went with him at the same time Mrs. Butler, whose Character I have already given, and Estcourt, who had not appeared on any Stage, and was yet only known as an excellent Mimick: Wilks having no Competitor in Dublin, was immediately preferr'd to whatever parts his Inclination led him, and his early Reputation on that Stage as soon raised in him an Ambition to shew himself on a better. And I have heard him say (in Raillery of the Vanity which young Actors are liable to) that when the News of Monfort's Death came to Ireland, he from that time thought his Fortune was made, and took a Resolution to return a second time to England with the first Opportunity; but as his Engagements to the Stage where he was were too strong to be suddenly broke from, he return'd not to the Theatre-Royal 'till the Year 1696.[262]
Upon his first Arrival, Powel, who was now in Possession of all the chief Parts of Monfort, and the only Actor that stood in Wilks's way, in seeming Civility offer'd him his choice of whatever he thought fit to make his first Appearance in; though, in reality, the Favour was intended to hurt him. But Wilks rightly judg'd it more modest to accept only of a Part of Powel's, and which Monfort had never acted, that of Palamede in Dryden's Marriage Alamode. Here, too, he had the Advantage of having the Ball play'd into his Hand by the inimitable Mrs. Monfort, who was then his Melantha in the same Play: Whatever Fame Wilks had brought with him from Ireland, he as yet appear'd but a very raw Actor to what he was afterwards allow'd to be: His Faults, however, I shall rather leave to the Judgments of those who then may remember him, than to take upon me the disagreeable Office of being particular upon them, farther than by saying, that in this Part of Palamede he was short of Powel, and miss'd a good deal of the loose Humour of the Character, which the other more happily hit.[263] But however he was young, erect, of a pleasing Aspect, and, in the whole, gave the Town and the Stage sufficient Hopes of him. I ought to make some Allowances, too, for the Restraint he must naturally have been under from his first Appearance upon a new Stage. But from that he soon recovered, and grew daily more in Favour, not only of the Town, but likewise of the Patentee, whom Powel, before Wilks's Arrival, had treated in almost what manner he pleas'd.
Upon this visible Success of Wilks, the pretended Contempt which Powel had held him in began to sour into an open Jealousy; he now plainly saw he was a formidable Rival, and (which more hurt him) saw, too, that other People saw it; and therefore found it high time to oppose and be troublesome to him. But Wilks happening to be as jealous of his Fame as the other, you may imagine such clashing Candidates could not be long without a Rupture: In short, a Challenge, I very well remember, came from Powel, when he was hot-headed; but the next Morning he was cool enough to let it end in favour of Wilks. Yet however the Magnanimity on either Part might subside, the Animosity was as deep in the Heart as ever, tho' it was not afterwards so openly avow'd: For when Powel found that intimidating would not carry his Point; but that Wilks, when provok'd, would really give Battle,[264] he (Powel) grew so out of Humour that he cock'd his Hat, and in his Passion walk'd off to the Service of the Company in Lincoln's-Inn Fields. But there finding more Competitors, and that he made a worse Figure among them than in the Company he came from, he stay'd but one Winter with them[265] before he return'd to his old Quarters in Drury-Lane; where, after these unsuccessful Pushes of his Ambition, he at last became a Martyr to Negligence, and quietly submitted to the Advantages and Superiority which (during his late Desertion) Wilks had more easily got over him.
WILLIAM PENKETHMAN.