Less happy than Leigh was poor Matthew Medbourne, an actor of merit, and a young man of some learning, whose brief career was cut short by a too fervent zeal for his religion, which led him into a participation in the "Popish Plot." The testimony of Titus Oates caused his arrest, on the 26th of November 1678, and his death;—for poor Medbourne died of the Newgate rigour in the following March. He is memorable, as being the first who introduced Molière's "Tartuffe" on the English stage, in a close translation, which was acted in 1670, with remarkable success. Cibber's "Nonjuror" (1717), and Bickerstaffe's "Hypocrite" (1768), were only adaptations—the first of "Tartuffe," and the second of the "Nonjuror." Mr. Oxenford, however, reproduced the original in a more perfect form than Medbourne, in a translation in verse, which was brought out at the Haymarket, in 1851, with a success most honestly earned by all, and especially deserving on the part of Mr. Webster, who played the principal character.
Sandford and Smith were two actors whose names constantly recur together, but whose merits were not all of the same degree. The tall, handsome, manly Smith, frequently played Banquo; when his ghost, in the same tragedy, was represented by the short, spare, drolly ill-featured, and undignified Sandford! The latter was famous for his villains—from those of tragedy to ordinary stage ruffians in broad belt and black wig—permanent type of those wicked people in melodramas to this day. This idiosyncrasy amusingly puzzled Charles II., who, in supposed allusion to Shaftesbury, declared that the greatest villain of his time was fair-haired.
The public of his period were so accustomed to see Sandford represent the malignant heroes, that when they once saw him as an honest man, who did not prove to be a crafty knave before the end of the fifth act, they hissed the piece out of sheer vexation. Sandford rendered villainy odious by his forcible representation of it. By a look, he could win the attention of an audience "to whatever he judged worth more than their ordinary notice;" and by attending to the punctuation of a passage, he divested it of the jingle of rhyme, or the measured monotony of blank verse.
So misshapen, harsh, fierce, yet craftily gentle and knavishly persuasive could Sandford render himself, Cibber believes that Shakspeare, conscious of other qualities in him, would have chosen him to represent Richard, had poet and player been contemporaneous. The generous Colley adds, that if there was anything good in his own Richard, it was because he had modelled it after the fashion in which he thought Sandford would have represented that monarch. Sandford withdrew from the stage, after thirty-seven years' service, commencing in 1661 and terminating in 1698.
The career of his more celebrated colleague, Smith, extended only from 1663 to 1696, and that with the interruption of several years when his strong Toryism made him unacceptable to the prejudiced Whig audiences of the early part of the reign of William.[38] He originally represented Sir Fopling Flutter (1676), and Pierre (1682); Chamont (1680), in "The Orphan," and Scandal (1695), in "Love for Love." In the following year he died in harness. The long part of Cyaxares, in "Cyrus the Great," overtaxed his strength, and on the fourth representation of that wearisome tragedy, Smith was taken ill, and died.
King James, in the person of Smith, vindicated the nobility of his profession. "Mr. Smith," says Cibber, with fine satire, "whose character as a gentleman could have been no way impeached, had he not degraded it by being a celebrated actor, had the misfortune, in a dispute with a gentleman behind the scenes, to receive a blow from him. The same night an account of this action was carried to the King, to whom the gentleman was represented so grossly in the wrong, that the next day his Majesty sent to forbid him the court upon it. This indignity cast upon a gentleman only for maltreating a player, was looked upon as the concern of every gentleman! and a party was soon formed to assert and vindicate their honour, by humbling this favoured actor, whose slight injury had been judged equal to so severe a notice. Accordingly, the next time Smith acted, he was received with a chorus of catcalls, that soon convinced him he should not be suffered to proceed in his part; upon which, without the least discomposure, he ordered the curtain to be dropped, and having a competent fortune of his own, thought the conditions of adding to it, by remaining on the stage, were too dear, and from that day entirely quitted it." Not "entirely," for he returned to it in 1695, after a secession of eleven years, under the persuasion, it is believed, of noble friends and ancient comrades. Dr. Burney states that the audience made a political matter of it. If so, Whigs and Tories had not long to contend, for the death of this refined player soon supervened.
Of the two most eminent ladies who joined the Duke's Company previous to the union of the two houses, Lady Slingsby (formerly Mrs. Aldridge, next Mrs. Lee,) is of note for the social rank she achieved; Mrs. Barry for a theatrical reputation which placed her on a level with Betterton himself. Lady Slingsby withdrew from the stage in 1685, after a brief course of ten or a dozen years. She died in the spring of 1694, and was interred in old St. Pancras churchyard, as "Dame Mary Slingsby, Widow." That is the sum of what is known of a lady whom report connects with the Yorkshire baronets of Scriven. Of her colleague, there is more to be said; but the "famous Mrs. Barry" may claim a chapter to herself.
FOOTNOTES:
[33] Anthony Aston, from whom this description is quoted, says that it was not modesty that prevented his understanding why he was admired, but sheer stupidity.