Of Rich, Garrick wrote:—
"When Lun appeared with matchless art and whim,
He gave the power of speech to every limb;
Though masked and mute conveyed his quick intent,
And told in frolic's gestures all he meant."
Rich, however, erred in thinking himself a better actor than a Pantomimist; and, in fact, he thought himself a finer actor than the great Garrick himself. "You should see me play Richard!" was a favourite cry of his.
In 1782, after seeing the Pantomime of "Robinson Crusoe," Walpole said, "How unlike the Pantomimes of Rich, which were full of wit, and coherent, and carried on by a story."
As I have shown above, Rich had, like many other people, his own particular little idiosyncrasies, and when in the season 1746-7 he netted nearly £9,000 from his Pantomimes, to the chagrin of Garrick and Quin, he was very angry and much annoyed because he, as Harlequin, had contributed little or nothing. Another mannerism of his was to despise the regular drama on these occasions, and he has been known to look at the packed audience through a small hole in the curtain, and then ejaculate, "Ah! you are there, you fools, are you? Much good may it do you!"
Rich used to address everyone as "Mister." On one occasion Foote, being incensed at being so addressed, asked Rich why he did not call him by his name. "Don't be angry," says Rich, "I sometimes forget my own name." "I know," replied Foote, "that you can't write your own name, but I wonder you should forget it."
The first of Rich's successes was "Harlequin Sorcerer." On its production Pope wrote:—
"Behold a sober sorcerer rise
Swift to whose wand a winged volume flies;
All sudden, gorgon's hiss and dragon's glare,
And ten horned fiends and giants rush to war.
Hell rises, heaven descends, and dance on earth,
Gods, imps and monsters, music, rage and mirth,
A fire, a jig, a battle, and a ball,
Till one wide conflagration swallows all;
Thence a new world to nature's laws unknown,
Breaks out refulgent with a heaven its own;
Another Cynthia her new journey runs,
And other planets circle after suns.
The forests dance, the rivers upwards rise,
Whales sport in woods, and dolphins in the skies;
At last, to give the whole creation grace,
Lo! one vast egg produces human race."
Of Harlequin, in "Harlequin Sorcerer," being hatched from an egg by the rays of the sun. This has been called a master-piece of Rich's Miming "From the first chipping of the egg (says Jackson) his receiving of motion, his feeling of the ground, his standing upright, to his quick Harlequin trip round the empty shell, through the whole progression, every limb had its tongue, and every motion a voice."
As probably occurring in "Harlequin Sorcerer," there is an amusing incident. The belief in the possibility of a supernatural appearance on the stage existed (says an old writer) about the beginning of the eighteenth century. A dance of infernals having to be exhibited, they were represented in dresses of black and red, with fiery eyes and snaky locks, and garnished with every pendage of horror. They were twelve in number. In the middle of their performance, while intent upon the figure in which they had been completely practised, an actor of some humour, who had been accommodated with a spare dress, appeared among them. He was, if possible, more terrific than the rest, and seemed to the beholders as designed by the conductor for the principal fiend. His fellow furies took the alarm; they knew he did not belong to them, and they judged him an infernal in earnest. Their fears were excited, a general panic ensued, and the whole group fled different ways; some to their dressing-rooms, and others, through the streets, to their own homes, in order to avoid the destruction which they believed to be coming upon them, for the profane mockery they had been guilty of. The odd devil was non inventus. He took himself invisibly away, through fears of another kind. He was, however, seen by many, in imagination, to fly through the roof of the house, and they fancied themselves almost suffocated by the stench he had left behind. The confusion of the audience is scarcely to be described. They retired to their families, informing them of this supposed appearance of the devil, with many of his additional frolics in the exploit. So thoroughly was its reality believed that every official assurance which could be made the following day did not entirely counteract the idea. The explanation was given by Rich himself, in the presence of his friend Bencraft, the contriver, and perhaps the actor of the scheme, which he designed only as an innocent affair, to confuse the dancers, without adverting to the serious consequences which succeeded.