[360] Thomas Gilliland, whose Dramatic Mirror is still consulted, was not too popular with the actors and actresses whose lives he compiled. He was practically warned off the Green-room of Drury Lane Theatre by Charles Mathews, the elder.
[361] Smith is mistaken as to the date of the first race. This was rowed on August 1, 1716. A portrait of a waterman in his boat, still preserved in the Watermen’s Hall, St. Mary’s Hill, is supposed to represent the first wearer of the coat and badge, a white horse being painted on the back-board of the boat. It is said that John Broughton, afterwards the prize-fighter, and the founder of boxing, was this winner. Under Doggett’s will, only one prize, the coat and badge, was given, but additional prizes have been added under the will of Sir William Jolliff, in 1820, and by the Fishmongers’ Company. These prizes are generous. Even the last of the six young watermen to reach the winning-post is sure of £2; the other unsuccessful candidates receive sums from £3 to £6 each. The winner of the race is £10 in pocket, his name is added to the long roll of previous winners, and he wears Doggett’s coat (made to fit him) among the coated élite of Watermen’s Hall.
A clever and genial man, Doggett was known everywhere by his immense wig, on the top of which, not without the aid of pins, rested a small cocked hat. He carried a rapier, and took snuff incessantly. Only two portraits of him are known: one represents him dancing the Cheshire Round with the motto, “Ne sutor ultra crepidam,” and the Garrick Club has a portrait, but its authenticity is questioned.
[362] The Waterman was, indeed, announced as the after-piece to The Wonder, but Garrick had no part in it, and his great farewell scene rendered its performance impossible alike to actors and audience.
[363] Sarah Sophia Banks (1744-1818) was a virtuoso, and collector of natural history specimens. She kept house for her brother, Sir Joseph Banks, at 32 Soho Square, at the corner of Frith Street. Here Sir Joseph, who is mentioned by Smith elsewhere, gave his Sunday evening conversaziones, at which Cavendish and Wollaston were the prominent guests. Sir Henry Holland describes these evenings in his Recollections. Gifford of the Quarterly remarked to Moore, that the Banks’ mansion was to science what Holland House was to literature. Horace Walpole poked incessant fun at Sir Joseph’s curiosity about remote Atlantic islands, and Peter Pindar scribbled verses like this:—
“To give a breakfast in Soho,
Sir Joseph’s bitterest foe
Must certainly allow him peerless merit:
Where on a wagtail and tom-tit
He shines, and sometimes on a nit: