The sweetest voice disgust the listening ear,
The sweetest form assume deformity:
Thus shalt thou arm them with their best defence,
And teach them modesty by impudence."
[154] The late Lord Orrery was a singularly formal character. Sir Anthony Branville, in The Discovery, was intended for his portrait, and exhibits a strong likeness. It was sometimes the wish of Mr. Garrick to play upon the suavity of this old nobleman, and induce him to contradict himself. This power he exerted very successfully on the following occasion:—Lord Orrery wrote a letter from Ireland to Mr. Garrick, requesting that Mossop might be engaged. The request of a man of rank was, to the manager of Drury Lane, a command, and Mossop was engaged. When, some months afterwards, the peer came to England, he took an early opportunity of breakfasting with Mr. Garrick: the moment he entered the room, he began his favourite subject.
Orrery. "David, I congratulate you: I inquire not about the success of your theatre; with yourself and Mossop, it must be triumphant. The Percy and the Douglas both in arms, have a right to be confident. Separate, you were two bright luminaries; united, you are a constellation—the Gemini of the theatric hemisphere. Excepting yourself, my dear David, no man that ever trod on tragic ground has so forcibly exhibited the various passions that agitate, and I may say agonize, the human mind. He makes that broad stroke at the heart which, being aimed by the hand of nature, reaches the prince or the peasant, the peer or the plebeian. He is not the mere player of fashion; for the player of fashion, David, may be compared to a man tossed in a blanket: the very instant his supporters quit their hold of the coverlet, down drops the hero of the day. However, as general assertions do not carry conviction, I will arrange my opinions under different heads, not doubting your assent to my declarations, which shall be founded on facts, and built upon experience. First of the first,—his voice; his voice is the vox argentea of the ancients, the silver tone, of which so much has been written, but which never struck upon a modern ear till Mossop spoke,—'then mute attention reigned.'"
Garrick. "Why, my Lord, as to his voice, I must acknowledge that it is loud enough; the severest critic cannot accuse him of whispering his part; for, egad, it was so sonorous, that the people had no occasion to come into the theatre: they used to go to the pastrycook's shop in Russel Court, and eat their custards, and hear him as well as if they had been in the orchestra: 'he made the welkin echo to the sound.' No one could doubt the goodness of his lungs, or accuse him of sparing them; but as to—"
Orrery. "What! you have found out that he roars! you have discovered that he bellows!—Upon my soul, David, you are right; he bellows like a bull. We used to call him 'Bull Mossop'—'Mossop the Bull;'—we had no better name for him in the country. But then, David, his eye is an eye of fire; and when he looks, he looks unutterable things: it is scarce necessary that he should speak, for his eye conveys everything that he means, and excepting your own, David, is the brightest, most expressive, most speaking eye, that ever beamed in a—"
Garrick. "Why, my Lord, with the utmost submission to your Lordship, from whose accurate taste and comprehensive judgment I tremble to differ,—does not your Lordship think there is a—a—a dull kind of heaviness,—a blanket, a—"
Orrery. "What! you have discovered that he is blind?—Egad, David, whatever his eye may be, nothing can escape yours. He is as blind as a beetle. There is an opacity, a stare without sight, a sort of filminess, exactly as you describe. But, notwithstanding I allow that he bellows like a bull, and is blind as a beetle, his memory has such peculiar tenacity, that whatever he once receives adheres to it like glue! he does not forget a syllable of his part."