THEATRES DESTROYED. Drury-Lane was built in 1662, destroyed by fire 1672, rebuilt 1674, pulled down 1791, rebuilt 1794, destroyed again by fire, on Friday evening, Feb. 24, 1809. Covent-Garden was built 1733, enlarged 1792, destroyed by fire, Sept. 1808. Opera-House, Haymarket, opened 1704, burnt down 1789, the foundation of the present house laid 1790. Pantheon, Oxford Street, opened 1772, converted to an OperaHouse 1784, burnt down 1792. Astley's Amphitheatre burnt down on the Duke of York's birth night, 1794; rebuilt, and burnt down a second time in 1803.! Royal Circus destroyed by fire on the Prince of Wales's birth-day, 1805. THIS is an aweful text, Mr. Editor, and it will take some time to remove the fears, which it inspires. Had the burning of Covent-Gar den theatre, but more especially that of Drury-Lane, taken place during a representation, no human means could have saved the audience from almost entire destruction. It is well remembered that the magnificent theatre in Drury-Lane, now a heap of rubbish, was provided with an iron curtain, and a river of water, which made, we were told," assurance double sure." Now it is true that the river was dry, and the iron curtain rusty and immoveable; but had it been otherwise, their aid would have been useless, since the force and rapidity of the devouring flames were such, that nothing could have impeded their progress-Had the Thames rol led through the house, it had rolled in vain. On the opening of this theatre, on Monday, the 21st April, 1794, Mr. COLMAN wrote an epilogue, which was spoken by Miss FARRen. Amongst other assurances, expressed with that playfulness of wit, which never forsakes him, the poet tells us The very ravages of fire we scout, For we have wherewithal to put it out; Should the flame spread, sit still, there's nothing in it, As this tended to quiet fears, it was very well, but nothing more could have been hoped from such precautions. In looking forward and benefiting by the past, I hope some better security will be devised, << some security to him, who goes to the play, that in so doing, he shall not walk into his tomb." See the Earl of Carlisle's Pamphlet on the Stage. A power of throwing open the theatre in all directions, seems the only plan that can insure the safety of lives. Drury-Lane theatre full, would take three quarters of an hour to empty, each facilitating the other's progress, but full and on fire, no length of time would be sufficient. Then let it be recollected, that in less! than a quarter of an hour after the alarm, the whole of this building, crowded with combustible matter, was in flames, from its summitto its base. Its becoming a Hecatompylos, another Thebes, with its hundred gates, can alone provide against this horror. Covent-Garden theatre was not insulated, and its neighbours suffered. Drury-Lane theatre was so, and the advantage to the vicinity was incalculable. The former is now prudently building in an insular form, and I have merely to add, that if the only other regular theatre be suffered to remain in its present situation, folly is at its height, and it is untrue that." Experience makes fools wise." If the Little Theatre in the Haymarket were to take fire, the whole neighbourhood would in all probability be consumed. The law respecting the erection of powder-mills, should in some measure be extended to theatres. die bebi JAQUES. I SHAKSPEARE'S LEARNING. BY CAPEL LOFFT, ESQ. HAVE been reperusing Dr. Farmer's Essay on the Learning of Shakspeare. I continue to think that he was neither so unlearned as Farmer, nor so learned as Upton supposes; but that he imbibed a decent tincture of the learning (I mean in languages) of that learned age, and more than a common share of general information, even were we to consider him as of the present age, when general information is certainly more diffused. Dr. Farmer cannot believe he ever was a schoolmaster. I see no improbability as to his having been, from sixteen, when boys at that time even went to college, an usher in some school. On the claim of Heywood to the two translations from Ovid, I confess that there are doubts and difficulties. Heywood might translate the two epistles and Shakspeare too; and with the rashness of vanity might have said, without ever vending them, that they were his. But if Heywood had republished them verbatim, either he has made a false claim, and while Shakspeare yet lived; or Jaggard, who might do so without the knowledge of Shakspeare, who seems to have been habitually careless of his works, must have published Heywood's poems unwarrantably as Shakspeare's. Of the character of Heywood, except that he was a voluminous writer, I know little. And whichever way I turn, I find, upon this strange question, only a choice of exceeding great difficulties. There is certainly nothing in the translations of a value which could be reasonably supposed to tempt the ingenuous spirit of Shakspeare to a most disingenuous claim. That he should be ignorant of the conduct of Jaggard, is less strange than it would be now. That Jaggard may be innocent, and the presumption and injustice be imputable to Heywood, seems more likely than that they should not be Shakspeare's, especially as they have passages, which have the air of his diction and of his numbers. Were it an issue at law, and with no more evidence than we possess, , the determination would certainly be that they are Shakspeare's upon every principle of legal evidence and presump tion. And if they were Heywood's, why did he not offer some evidence beyond mere assertion, and when he published them as his, after they had been published as Shakspeare's, justify the act, by some circumstances to support his claim? Troston Hall, 11 S. 1808. FURTHER REMARKS. WITH regard to the Shaksperian question, the more I think of it, the more my confidence strengthens. If he had been incapable of translating Ovid for want of sufficient knowledge of Latin, many of his contemporaries would have been glad to have told us so. But for a century and an half, there appears to have been no suspicion of his not being the author of those translations. The suspicion when it comes, comes too late, and is unsupported by any shadow of proof. His Venus and Adonis, which is so much Shakspeare in its faults and in its beauties, is not only prefaced by that spirited and appropriate distich-" Vilia miretur vulgus," with which a young poet ignorant of Latin would hardly have introduced it to the Earl of Southampton, but it almost translates the Virgilian description of a horse in the Georgics, and the fine Homeric and Virgilian simile, “ Qualis ubi abruptis." It is not enough to say he could get these hints from transla tions. His style is too deeply tinctured with Latin idiom to leave it credible to me that he was ignorant of Latin. That he leaves but few indications of classic reading, is not wonderful. His facility of invention and composition, the fervour and promptness, and singular poetic character of his vast and rapid mind, hurried him far away. The etherial spirit of what he had learnt from books, he extracted, he assimilated, and raised it to higher powers by his own energies. However great had been his knowledge of either antient or modern languages, or both, I am little inclined to think that he would have made it very apparent. His subjects for the most part gave him no great or frequent opportunity, even if he were inclined to it, to give proof of this learning. He had his own admirable dramatic character. This, of all kinds of poetry, requires a réserve as to imitation. His other poe tic remains, which have come down to us, are in quantity but small; and chiefly of a kind where he was more likely to imitate, and I think not unfrequently has imitated, the Italian poetry. S. 26. QUARRY. TO THE EDITOR OF THE MONTHLY MIRROR. DEAR BROTHER, THE conjectural criticism in your last magazine, p. 127, on the word quarry, as used in Shakspeare's line: "And fortune on his damned quarry smiling," may be supported by the following passage of Col. Venable's Experienced Angler, where the word must mean prey: "Hawking and hunting have had their excellencies celebrated with large encomiums by divers pens, and although I intend not any undervaluing to those noble recreations, so much famed in all ages and by all degrees, yet I must needs affirm that they fall not within the compass of every one's ability to pursue, being, as it were, only entailed on great persons and vast estates; for if meaner fortunes seek to enjoy them, Acteon's fable often proves a true story, and those birds of prey not seldom quarry upon their masters." I am, Dear Brother, Yours, with respect and good-will, ORIGINAL POETRY. HORACE IN LONDON. BOOK V.ODE XV. TO A COQUET. Nox erat et cælo fulgebat Luna sereno, &c. 'Twas night, and modest Cynthia's flame Then thus began my soul's delight— As Scotia's sons adhere to places: "While folly is the food of wit, sila ni kg) And politics dissension nourish ; While Epsom races charm the cit, So long our mutual love shall flourish." O falser than the Goodwin sand! I'll be no longer pleas'd with ruin, on Eld I'll break the web thy cunning plann'd, And sink the Jerry in the Bruin. Henceforth my heart like thine shall roam Anger than slighted love is stronger: No longer nibbling at thy hook, Go, for another blockhead look; Go, for another gudgeon angle! And thou, fond youth, who mock'st my woe, Of Cupid's forces joint paymaster High as thy tide of wealth may flow, Drain'd by her hand 'twill ebb much faster. Y-VOL, V. |