After Mdlle. la Fontaine came Mdlles. Roland and Prévost; the famous Camargo and her rival Sallé, of whom some mention has already been made; Mdlle. Marie Madeleine Guimard, exquisitely graceful and fascinating, but of such slender proportions that she obtained the surname of "le squelette des Grâces," while witty but malicious, perhaps jealous, Sophie Arnould described her as "the spider;" Mafleuroy, who married Boeldieu, and Mercandotti, who married Mr. Ball Hughes, otherwise "Golden Ball," the greatest gambler of his time, which is saying a good deal; Noblet and the Ellslers; Pauline Leroux, who became the wife of Lafont, the most elegant actor of the modern theatre; Duvernay and Taglioni—to name no more, for we have now come to surviving artists—these are among the more famous of the "Reines de la Danse" who have ruled absolutely at the Académie Royale of Paris and elsewhere.
In England ballet has enjoyed many triumphs, while it has
nevertheless experienced sundry disasters. There was great trouble, for instance, at Drury-lane Theatre in 1755, when Mr. Garrick's "Chinese Festival" with its French dancers was sternly, even savagely, condemned by the audience. The manager was over-fond of spangles and spectacles, or inclined to over-estimate his public's regard for such matters, and a sharp but necessary lesson was read to him upon that occasion. Then he was very obstinate, and in such wise roused the British lion inordinately. He would not withdraw the play from his stage; promptly the audience determined that no stage should be left him upon which to represent either the "Chinese Festival" or anything else. Of course he had to yield at last, as managers must when playgoers are resolute; he had to live by pleasing, not displeasing. But he did not give way until there had been some six nights of uproar and riot. In vain did various noble lords and gentlemen, friends of the management, and supporters of spectacle and the ballet, draw their swords, endeavouring to awe malcontents, to restore order, and to defend the theatre from outrage. The mob would have its way. The benches were torn up, the decorations torn down, chandeliers smashed, even scenes and properties were ruthlessly destroyed. There was, indeed, a wild proposition rife at one time to fire the house and burn it to the ground. Garrick could but strike his flag, and yield up his "Chinese Festival." Still it was agreed that he had hesitated too long. The mob therefore repaired to Southampton Street, and smashed his window-panes, doing other mischief to his property there. He began even to tremble for his life, and from his friends in power obtained a guard of soldiery to protect him. Strange to say, on two of the nights of riot the king was present—a fact that did not in the least hinder or mitigate the violent demonstrations of the audience.
But it was not so much the ballet that gave offence as the ballet-dancers whom Garrick had brought from Paris. They were chiefly Swiss, but the audience believed them to be French, and at that time a very strong anti-Gallican feeling prevailed in the land. The relations between England and France were of an unfriendly kind; the two countries were, indeed, on the eve of war. The French, by their conduct in America, had incurred the bitterest English enmity. It is true that Garrick had projected his spectacle months before this feeling had arisen. He
was careful so to inform the public, and further to state that his ballet-master, M. Noverre, and his sisters were Swiss and of a Protestant family; his wife and her sister, Germans; and that of the whole corps de ballet, sixty in number, forty were English. But this availed not. The pit would not regard it, holding fast to their opinion that no management should bring over parley-voos and frog-eaters to take the bread out of English mouths. Peace was at length restored in Drury Lane, and the dancers sent back. The management lost £4000; Garrick purchasing knowledge of his public at rather a high rate.
And in England the ballet had other enemies than those who concerned themselves in regard to the nationality of its professors. It was held by many to be, if an art at all—why, then, an art of a shocking kind; they could see nothing in it but gross impropriety and unseemliness. Now, of course, the ballet has its vulnerable side—it almost needs, at any rate it has always assumed, a scantier style of dress than is otherwise in ordinary use. And then the movements of the dancer of necessity involve greater display of the human form than is required by the simpler acts of riding, walking, or sitting. In dancing it is inevitable that there should be swaying and bending of the figure, possibly waving to and fro of the arms, certainly some standing upon the toes, and raising of the nether limbs more or less high in the air. Bereft of these measures dancing could not be; still here were matters upon which moralists, or persons who so styled themselves, were able greatly to enlarge, and concerning which Pharisees, who did not so style themselves, but were such nevertheless, had much to say. Now just at the close of the last century the world was in very sad case; society had gone on from bad to worse: low life was of course lower than it had ever before been known to be, and high life was not nearly so high as it should have been. There was profligacy in very exalted places, and, indeed, dissoluteness and immorality everywhere. Thereupon, in 1798, a certain Bishop of Durham made a speech from his place in Parliament in regard to the wickedness of the period; and especially he drew attention to the dancers of the opera-house. The excuse for the prelate's speech was a divorce bill; for in those days the peers spiritual and temporal were much occupied in discussing and passing divorce bills—an employment of which they have only been deprived during quite
recent years. His Grace took occasion to complain of the frequency of such bills, and, being a true patriot, charged the French Government with the despatch of agents to this country especially to corrupt our manners. "He considered it a consequence of the gross immoralities imported of late years into this country from France, the Directory of which country, finding that they were not able to subdue us by their arms, appeared as if they were determined to gain their ends by destroying our morals; they had sent over persons to this country who made the most improper exhibitions in our theatres." Now it was true that the manager of the opera-house at this time relied greatly upon the attractions of his ballet; operas and opera-singers having for a while lost favour with the impresario's subscribers and supporters. A leading dancer at this time, however, was an Englishwoman—an exception to the rule that makes every première danseuse of French origin—Miss Rose, reported to be of plain features, but of exquisite figure, and gifted with singular ease and grace of movement. It is possible that Miss Rose had adopted a scantier and lighter method of attire than had prevailed with preceding dancers. She had been caricatured, yet not very unkindly, by Gillray, the drawing bearing the motto, "No flower that blows is like the Rose." The bishop's speech was not without effect. Indeed, he had announced his intention upon some future day to move an address to the king praying that all opera-dancers might be ordered out of the kingdom, as people likely to destroy our morality and religion, and as very probably in the pay of France. The manager of the opera-house deemed it advisable to postpone his ballet of "Bacchus and Ariadne" until new and improved dresses could be prepared for it. Upon the entertainment being reproduced, it was found that there had been enlargement and elongation of the skirts of the performers, with the substitution of inoffensive white silk stockings for the reprehensible hose of flesh-colour that had originally been assumed. Of course much talk followed upon this, with great laughter and ridicule; caricatures of the spiritual peers and the opera-dancers abounded. In a drawing by Gillray, Miss Rose, with other danseuses, is depicted performing what is called "La Danse à l'Évêque;" the ladies have assumed, out of excessive regard for decorousness and the bishop's arguments, that apron
of black silk which has long been thought peculiar to prelates. Another satirical illustration bore the title of "Ecclesiastical Scrutiny; or, The Durham Inquest on Duty." Bishops were represented as attending in the dressing department of the opera-house; one is seen to be measuring the dancers' skirts with a tailor's yard; another arranges their stockings in an ungraceful fashion; while a third inspects their corsets, decreeing some change in the form of those articles of attire. The Bishop of Durham was further portrayed in another broadsheet as armed with his pastoral staff, and sturdily contesting hand to hand with the Spirit of Evil arrayed in ballet costume. In short, this subject of the bishops and the ballet-girls occupied and amused the public very considerably, and doubtless proved profitable, as an advertisement of his wares, to the manager of the opera-house.
Still the bishops kept a watchful eye upon the proceedings of the theatre. In 1805 there is record of a riot at the opera-house, "some reforming bishops having warned the managers that if the performances were not regularly brought to a close before twelve o'clock on Saturday evenings, prosecutions would be commenced." Accordingly, the performances were shortened by the omission of an act of the ballet of "Ossian," greatly to the dissatisfaction of the audience, who assaulted Mr. Kelly, the manager, commenced an attack upon the chandeliers, benches, musical instruments, &c., and indeed threatened to demolish the theatre. The curtain had fallen at half-past eleven, which the audience thought much too early. Of a certain prelate it was recorded that he frequently attended the Saturday-night performances at the opera-house, and that upon the approach of midnight he was wont to stand up in his box holding out his watch at arm's length, by way of intimating to the spectators that it was time for them to depart and for the theatre to close. Of course this bishop could hardly have avoided seeing the ballet; but for whatever distress he may have endured on that account, a sense of his efforts to benefit his species, including of course the opera-dancers, no doubt afforded him a sufficient measure of compensation.