It was a brilliant period for the Stage. Kean was to make his appearance on the boards, but then Mrs. Siddons and Kemble retired. Death, too, was busy with some old dramatic favourites, and people connected with the Stage. In these nine years were called away—R. Cumberland, W. T. Lewis, Malone, G. F. Cooke, Chas. Dibbin, Chas. Burney, Mrs. Abingdon, H. Siddons, Mrs. Jordan, Sheridan, Signora Storace, and Miss Pope.
In 1811 there were but three regular theatres in London—Drury Lane, Covent Garden, and "The Little Theatre" in the Haymarket—and they all did a good business, although the prices charged their audiences were very moderate, so were the salaries of the actors. The pit was all pit, and the pittites were a discriminating audience, who were neither ashamed nor afraid to applaud, or censure, as their judgment led them. The plays were frequently changed. There were no runs of hundreds of nights, and the consequence was that the actor, "playing many parts," could not acquire mannerism, and gained greater experience in his profession.
In 1811 there were two persons, amateurs, who mightily affected theatrical company, namely, the Baron Geramb and Romeo Coates. The Baron was principally known for his enormously long whiskers—so feelingly alluded to by the Regent (vol. ii. p. 85), and there is a very good account of him in The Annual Register, April 6, 1812:—
"The much talked of Baron Geramb, who has, for a year or two past, made so conspicuous a figure in this metropolis, is, at last, ordered out of the country. This singular person ushered himself into public notice by publishing a most inflated and ridiculous letter, which he dedicated to the Earl of Moira; in which he described himself as a Hungarian baron who had headed a corps of volunteers in the cause of Austria against France, and stated that, after the peace, he went to Spain to give the benefit of his courage and profound military experience to the oppressed patriots of the Peninsula. He accompanied this production with every other mode of obtaining notoriety, such as filling print-shop windows with three or four different engravings of his person, which few fools bought, in various costumes; a star, a death's head and cross-bones, and other terrific emblems, adorned the person of the baron. Nobody has walked the public streets for some time past who does not know this redoubtable nobleman.
"Wherever notoriety could be acquired, there was the Baron Geramb. At the funeral of the late Duke of Albuquerque he exhibited himself in all the parade of grief, in a jet black uniform. Where money alone could not gain admittance, the magnificent exterior of this seeming magnate of Hungary was sure of procuring an introduction. At the Opera, at the Theatres, and the Park, his furred mantle and resplendent stars were seldom missed. When that wonderful master of histrionic art, Mr. Coates, played, or rather attempted to play, Lothario, last winter, at the Haymarket, the Hungarian baron sat with indescribable dignity in the stage box, and appeared the patron of the absurdities of the night, consoling the white-plumed Lothario with his nods, and bows, and cheers, for all the coarse and severe, but justly merited, raillery which was unsparingly dealt out to him from the pit and galleries.
"But the baron was formed to embellish a Court as well as to dignify a playhouse. He was frequent in his inquiries after the health of the British Sovereign at St. James's; and appeared with more than usual splendour at the celebrated fête of the Prince Regent at Carlton House. The fascinations of that scene of courtly festivity and princely elegance became the subject of the Baron's pen; and he accordingly published a letter to 'Sophie' describing, in the most romantic language, all the splendid objects of the night.... The baron, it is reported, has had uncommon success in certain gaming houses. He is now at Harwich, on his way to the Continent. He is said to be a German Jew, who, having married the widow of a Hungarian baron, assumed the title by which he passed."
Robert Coates, generally known as Romeo, was the son of a merchant and sugar planter at Antigua; he was educated in England, and then returned to his father. At his death, in 1807, young Coates came back to England not only very wealthy, but with a large collection of splendid diamonds. He settled at Bath, which town he soon made lively by his vagaries. He drove about, drawn by white horses, his curricle being shaped like a kettledrum, in front of which was a large gilt cock, and its motto was, "While I live I'll crow." He developed a curious craze for theatricals, and on the 9th of February, 1810, he appeared at the Bath Theatre as Romeo. Let Capt. Gronow tell the story of that night:—
"His dress was outré in the extreme; whether Spanish, Italian, or English, no one could say; it was like nothing ever worn. In a cloak of sky blue silk, profusely spangled, red pantaloons, a vest of white muslin, surmounted by an enormously thick cravat, and a wig à la Charles II., capped by an Opera hat, he presented one of the most grotesque spectacles ever witnessed upon the stage. The whole of his garments were evidently too tight for him; and his movements appeared so incongruous that every time he raised his arm, or moved a limb, it was impossible to refrain from laughter.
"But what chiefly convulsed the audience, was the bursting of a seam in an inexpressible part of his dress, and the sudden extrusion through the red rents, of a quantity of white linen, sufficient to make a Bourbon flag, which was visible whenever he turned round. This was at first supposed to be a wilful offence against common decency, and some disapprobation was evinced; but the utter unconsciousness of the odd creature was soon apparent, and then unrestrained mirth reigned throughout the boxes, pit, and gallery....
"In the midst of one of Juliet's impassioned exclamations, Romeo quietly took out his snuff-box, and applied a pinch to his nose; on this a wag in the gallery bawled out, 'I say, Romeo, give us a pinch,' when the impassioned lover, in the most affected manner, walked to the side boxes, and offered the contents of his box, first to the gentleman, and then, with great gallantry, to the ladies....