[Colley Cibber's Daughter.]
This unfortunate person was the youngest child of Colley Cibber, and married a singer named Charke: there seems to have been a touch of insanity, certainly there was no power of self-control, in this poor woman. From her childhood she had been wild, wayward, and rebellious; self-taught, as a boy might be, and with nothing feminine in her character or pursuits. With self-assertion, too, she was weak enough to be won by a knave with a sweet voice, whose cruel treatment drove his intractable wife to the stage, where she failed to profit by her fine opportunities. Mrs. Charke loved to play male characters; and of the many, that of Plume was her favourite. At the Haymarket Theatre, in 1745, she played Captain Macheath, and other masculine parts, before she attempted to pass herself off upon the world, or hide herself from it, as a man.
Dr. Doran, in his amusing book, Their Majesties' Servants, writing of the year 1757, that of Colley Cibber's death says: "While the body of the poet Laureate was being carried to Westminster Abbey, there was up away in a hut in then desolate Clerkenwell, and starving, Colley's only daughter, Charlotte Charke. Seven-and-twenty years before, she had just come upon the stage, after a stormy girlhood; and she had a mania for appearing in male characters on, and in male attire off, the stage. By some terrible offence she forfeited the recognition of her father, who was otherwise of a benevolent disposition; and friendless, she fought a series of battles with the world, and came off in all more and more damaged. She starved with strollers, failed as a grocer in Long Acre, became bankrupt as a puppet-show proprietor in James Street, Haymarket; re-married, became a widow a second time, was plunged into deeper ruin, thrown into prison for debt, and released only by the subscriptions of the lowest, but not least charitable, sisterhood of Drury Lane. Assuming male attire, she hung about the theatres for casual hire, went on tramp with itinerants, hungered daily, and was weekly cheated, but yet kept up such an appearance that an heiress fell in love with her, who was reduced to despair when Charlotte Charke revealed her story and abandoned the place. Her next post was that of a valet to an Irish Lord; forfeiting which she and her child became sausage-makers, but could not obtain a living; and then Charlotte Charke cried, 'Coming, coming, sir,' as a waiter at the King's Head Tavern, Marylebone. Thence she was drawn by an offer to make her manager of a company of strolling players, with whom she enjoyed more appetite than means to appease it. She endured sharp distress again and again; but was relieved by an uncle, who furnished her with funds, with which she opened a tavern in Drury Lane, where, after a brief career of success, she again became bankrupt. To the regular stage she once more returned, under her brother, Theophilus, at the Haymarket: but the Lord Chamberlain closed the house, and Charlotte Charke took to working the wires of Russell's famous puppets in the Great Room, still existing in Brewer Street. There was a gleam of good fortune for her, but it soon faded away; and then for nine wretched years this clever but most wretched of women struggled frantically for bare existence, amongst the most wretched of strollers, with whom she endured unmitigated misery. And yet, Cibber's erring and hapless daughter contrived to reach London, where, in 1755, she published her remarkable autobiography, the details of which make the heart ache, in spite of the small sympathy of the reader for this half-mad creature. On the profits of this book, she was enabled to open, as landlord, a tavern at Islington; but of course, ruin ensued; and in a hut, amid the cinder-heaps and worse refuse, in the desolate fields, she found a refuge, and even wrote a novel on a pair of bellows in her lap, by way of desk. Here she lived with a squalid hand-maiden, a cat, dog, magpie, and monkey. Humbled, disconsolate, abandoned, she readily accepted from a publisher who visited her 10l. for her manuscript. This was at the close of the year 1755, and I do not meet with her again till 1759, two years after her father's death, when she played Marplot in The Busy Body, for her own benefit at the Haymarket, with this advertisement: 'As I am entirely dependent on chance for a subsistence, and desirous of getting into business, I humbly hope the town will favour me on the occasion, which, added to the rest of their indulgences, will be ever gratefully acknowledged by their truly obliged and obedient servant, Charlotte Charke.' She died on the 6th of April, 1760."
Charlotte Charke. After Boitard.
She "is said to have once given imitations of her father on the stage; to have presented a pistol at, and robbed him on the highway, and to have smeared his face with a pair of soles out of her own basket."
[An Eccentric Love-Passage.]
Captain Gronow relates that Mr. Bradshaw, M.P. for Canterbury, "fell in love" with Maria Tree: hearing that the lady had taken a place in the Birmingham mail, he booked the rest for himself in the name of Tomkins, and resolved to make the most of the opportunity afforded him. Unfortunately, his luggage and Miss Tree went by one mail, while Mr. Bradshaw through a mistake travelled by another. On arriving at Birmingham early in the morning, he left the coach and stepped into the hotel, determined to remain there, and go to the theatre on the following evening. He went to bed and slept late the following day; and on waking he remembered that his trunk with all his money had gone on to Manchester, and that he was without the means of paying his way. Seeing the Bank of Birmingham opposite the hotel, he went over and explained his position to one of the partners, giving his own banker's address in London, and showing letters addressed to him as Mr. Bradshaw. Upon this he was told that with such credentials he might have a loan; and the banker said he would write the necessary letter and cheque, and send the money over to him at the hotel. Mr. Bradshaw, pleased with this kind attention, sat himself down comfortably to breakfast in the coffee-room. According to promise, the cashier made his appearance at the hotel, and asked the waiter for Mr. Bradshaw. "No such gentleman here," was the reply.—"Oh, yes, he came by the London mail."—"No, sir; no one came but Mr. Tomkins, who was booked as inside passenger to Manchester." The cashier was dissatisfied; but the waiter added, "Sir, you can look through the window of the coffee-room door, and see the gentleman yourself." On doing so he beheld the Mr. Tomkins, alias Mr. Bradshaw, and immediately returned to the Bank, telling what he himself had heard and seen. The banker went over to the hotel, had a consultation with the landlord, and it was determined that a watch should be placed upon the suspicious person who had two names and no luggage, and who was booked to Manchester but had stopped at Birmingham. The landlord summoned boots—a little lame fellow of most ludicrous appearance—and pointing to the gentleman in the coffee-room, told him his duty for the day was to follow him wherever he went, and never to lose sight of him; but above all to take care that he did not get away. Boots nodded assent, and immediately mounted guard. Mr. Bradshaw having taken his breakfast and read the papers, looked at his watch and sallied forth to see something of the goodly town of Birmingham. He was much surprised at observing a little odd-looking man surveying him most attentively, and watching his every movement; stopping whenever he stopped, and evidently taking a deep interest in all he did. At last, observing that he was the object of this incessant espionnage, and finding that he had a shilling left in his pocket, he hailed one of the coaches that ran short distances in those days when omnibuses were not. This, however, did not suit little Boots, who went up to him and insisted that he must not leave the town. Mr. Bradshaw's indignation was naturally excessive, and he immediately returned to the hotel, where he found a constable ready to take him before the mayor as an impostor and swindler. He was compelled to appear before his worship and had the mortification of being told that unless he could give some explanation he must be content with a night's lodging in a house of detention. Mr. Bradshaw had no alternative but to send to the fair charmer of his heart to identify him; which she most readily did as soon as rehearsal was over. Explanations were then entered into; but he was forced to give the reason of his being in Birmingham, which of course made a due impression on the lady's heart, and led to that happy result of their interviews—a marriage which resulted in the enjoyment of mutual happiness for many years.
[True to the Text.]
A curious instance of this occurred many years ago, at the termination of the tragedy of Richard the Third. Mr. Elliston was enacting the part of Richmond; and having, during the evening, disobeyed the injunction which the King of Denmark lays down to the Queen, "Gertrude, do not drink," he accosted Mr. Powell, who was personating Lord Stanley (for the safety of whose son Richmond is naturally anxious), THUS, on his entry, after the issue of the battle:—