The introduction of the theatre with dramas played by the King's servants should have raised the character of the Fair. Perhaps it did. In any case, the Theatre of the Fair was not an unpromising place for a young actor to begin. The audience wanted nothing but the presentation of a story, and that a strong and moving story. If an actor failed in the fire and passion of his part, he was pelted off the stage. He was therefore compelled to pay attention to the very essentials of his profession, the presentation visibly and unmistakably of the emotions. A stagey manner would be the result of too long continuance on these boards, but at the outset no kind of practice could be more useful. This was proved by the lovely Mrs. Horton, who was discovered by the manager of Drury Lane playing at the Lady Fair in the play of 'Cupid and Psyche.' He took her away and placed her on his own stage, where she played for many years, leaving behind her a reputation of the finest actress and the most beautiful woman known up to that time.
The Theatre of the Fair is, I think, quite gone. I rejoice in being able to remember one of these delightful shows. There was a great booth with a platform in front and canvas pictures hung up behind the platform. The orchestra occupied one end of the platform, playing with zeal between the performances. The company in their lovely dresses stood on the platform and danced a kind of quadrille from time to time: the clown and the pantaloon, when they were not tumbling, stood at the head of the broad stairs clanging cymbals and bawling that the play was just about to begin. The price of a seat was threepence, with a few rows at sixpence: the play lasted twenty minutes: it was always a melodrama of persecuted and virginal innocence—in white. The joy of the whole performance was to children beyond all power of words: the play: the music: the ethereal beauty of the actresses: the rollicking fun of the clown: the sense of fleeting pleasure conveyed by the roughness of the benches and the grass under our feet: and the general festivity of the noise, the music, the bawling outside make me remember Richardson's Theatre and Messrs. Doggett's and Penkethman's, with the greatest pleasure and the most poignant regret.
I fear, then, that Lady Fair became, in the evening especially, a place in which everybody went 'as he pleased,' and that with so much dancing, drinking, love-making, singing, playing on the flowery slope that the authorities had to interfere. It is, indeed, a most melancholy circumstance that the people cannot be allowed to amuse themselves in the way they would choose. May Fair first, Lady Fair next, one after the other the Fairs of London have been suppressed. Lady Fair succumbed in 1760, when it was finally abolished.
GREENWICH PARK ON WHITSUN MONDAY
(From an Engraving by Rawle, 1802)
May one say a word of two other fairs even more disreputable—those of Charlton and of Greenwich? Charlton Fair was founded in the year 1268, so that it was a very ancient institution, to be held on three days in the year—'the Eve, the day, and the morrow of the Trinity.' The time of the Fair was, however, changed at some time to the day of St. Luke, on October 18. It was one of those Fairs which acquired a distinctive character. Just as Barnet Fair became a Horse Fair, Charlton became a Horn Fair. The obvious—and therefore popular—kind of fooling to be made out of horns and their associations—which are now quite lost and forgotten—as well as the day, which was also connected with those associations—made this Fair extremely popular. The people from London went down to Deptford by boat, joined the people from Greenwich and Deptford, and formed a burlesque procession, everyone wearing horns on his head, or carrying horns to affix to some other person's head. At the fair itself there was exhibited a great quantity of vessels and utensils made of horn: every booth had horns put up in the front: rams' horns were exhibited and sold in quantities; even the gingerbread was stamped with horns. The reason of this display was one quite forgotten by the people: viz. that a horned ox is the recognised symbol of St. Luke. It was customary for men to dress up, for the burlesque procession, in women's clothes; they also amused themselves (see Chambers's 'Book of Days') in lashing the women with furze: probably in pretence only. The procession was discontinued in 1768, the Fair went on until 1871.
We must not forget Greenwich Fair, which was held on Whit Monday. Long after Bartholomew Fair decayed and fell, Greenwich Fair remained. It was one of the greatest holidays of the year for the London folk of the lower class. The amusements consisted of two parts, the first playing in the Park, where there were races and sports: the second the fun of the booths and the shows.
The former began early in the forenoon and went on until the evening. The people came down from London in boats for the most part, and by the Old Kent Road in vehicles of every description, or even on foot for the whole five miles. If it was a fine morning the park was filled with the working classes and the young men and maidens belonging to the working classes. The sports were primitive: the favourite amusement was for a line of youths and girls to run down hill hand in hand. The slope was steep, the pace was rapid: before long half of them were sprawling headlong or rolling over and over, with such displays and derangements as may be imagined. Or there were games of kiss in the ring and thread-my-needle: or there were sailors showing the Cockneys how to dance the hornpipe; men with telescopes through which could be seen the men hanging in chains on the Isle of Dogs, or St. Paul's Cathedral: or there were the old pensioners telling yarns of the battles they had fought, especially the Battle of Trafalgar, when to every man, as it seemed, Fortune had caused the hero Nelson to fall into his arms. Outside the Park the street was filled with booths where everything could be bought, as at Lady Fair, which was worthless, including gingerbread. There were theatrical booths, shows of pictures, pantomimes, Punch and Judy, exhibitions of monsters, dwarfs, giants, bearded ladies, mermaids, menageries of wild beasts, feats of legerdemain, fire-eaters, boxers and quarterstaff players, cock fighting, and every other conceivable amusement. In the evening, beside the Theatre, there were the dancing booths. The same cause which led to the suppression of the Lady Fair brought about that of Greenwich Fair. It was suppressed, I think, about the year 1855. I myself saw it in 1851, but only in the afternoon, when it was already, I remember, a good-natured crowd playing horse tricks upon each other, and making a noise, which, with the bellowing of the show folk, the blaring of the bands, the cries of the boys and girls on the merry-go-rounds, and the roar of the crowd, one will never forget. For my own part I am of opinion that the noise was the worst part of the fair: that what went on in the evening would have gone on just as much outside the Fair as in it: and that it did very little harm to let the people enjoy themselves in their own way, which was a coarse, somewhat drunken and somewhat indecent way.