The place appears to have been respectably conducted, but there is little evidence that it was ever a modish resort, in spite of the assertion of the country-bred Mrs. Hardcastle[266] that no one could “have a manner that has never seen the Pantheon, the Grotto Gardens, the Borough and such places where the nobility chiefly resort.”[267]
The vocal and instrumental concerts which took place every evening in the season (May-September) were of a creditable though not very ambitious character. About fifteen hundred persons are said to have been present on some of the Freemasons’ nights and on the benefit nights of the performers.
Mrs. Baddely.
Numerous singers and instrumentalists were engaged,[268] of whom the best known are Robert Hudson the organist, Miss Snow and Thomas Lowe. Sophia Snow, the daughter of Valentine Snow, sergeant trumpeter to the King, married Robert Baddeley the comedian, who introduced her to the stage at Drury Lane in 1765. As Mrs. Baddeley, she became notorious for her beauty and intrigues. She had some powers as an actress in genteel comedy and her melodious voice made her popular at Ranelagh (from 1770) and Vauxhall.
Lowe was the well-known tenor singer of Vauxhall and lessee of Marylebone Gardens from 1763 to 1768. Becoming bankrupt in 1768, he was glad to accept engagements at the humbler Finch’s Grotto. He was announced to sing in August 1769, and appeared under the designation of Brother Lowe at one of the Freemasons’ Concerts at the Grotto.
Finch died on October 23, 1770, and his successor, a Mr. Williams, advertised the place as Williams’s Grotto Gardens. The concerts were continued and among the musical entertainments were Bates’s “The Gamester” (1771) and Barnshaw’s “Linco’s Travels.”[269]
The programmes of entertainments under Finch and Williams included concertos on the organ, pieces for horns and clarionets, Handel’s Coronation Anthem, an Ode to Summer with music by Brewster, and songs, such as “Thro’ the Wood, Laddie”; “Water parted from the Sea”; “Oh what a charming thing is a Battle”; “British Wives”; “O’er Mountains and Moorlands”; “Cupid’s Recruiting Sergeant” (with drum and fife accompaniment); “Swift Wing’d Vengeance,” from Bates’s Pharnaces; “Shepherds cease your soft complainings;” a satirical song on Garrick’s Stratford Jubilee; “Hark, hark, the joy inspiring horn”; “The Season of Love,” sung by Mr. Dearle, (1765):—
Bright Sol is return’d and the Winter is o’er,
O come then, Philander, with Sylvia away.[270]