interest in his success.  But long after the London players had ceased to make calls and to solicit patronage for their benefits, the practice still obtained in the provinces, and could on no account be abandoned.  Thus, in early life, when a member of the country company of which her father, Roger Kemble, was manager, the great Mrs. Siddons has been seen, as a contemporary writer describes, “walking up and down both sides of a street in a provincial town, dressed in a red woollen cloak, such as was formerly worn by menial servants, and knocking at each door to deliver the playbill of her benefit.”  And to come to a later instance, the reader may bear in mind that before that ornament of Mr. Crummles’s company, Miss Snevellici, took her benefit or “bespeak” at the Portsmouth Theatre, she, in company with Nicholas Nickleby, and, for propriety’s sake, the Infant Phenomenon, canvassed her patrons in the town, and sold tickets to Mr. and Mrs. Curdle, Mrs. Borum, and others.

In pursuance of this principle, we find a notice in the bill for Mr. Bickerstaff’s benefit, at Drury Lane, in May, 1723:  “Bickerstaff being confined to his bed by his lameness, and his wife lying now dead, has nobody to wait on the quality and his friends for him, but hopes they’ll favour him with their appearance.”  And when, just before Mr. Ryan’s benefit at Covent Garden in 1735, he had been attacked by a footpad and seriously injured—­several of his teeth having been shot out, and his face and jawbone much shattered—­he addressed a letter in The Daily Post to his friends, in which he stated the uncertainty of his being ever able to appear on the stage again, and expressed his hopes “that they would excuse his not making a personal application to them.”  So again, on the occasion of Mr. Chapman’s benefit, in 1739, there appears in the playbill an announcement:  “N.B.—­I being in danger of losing one of my eyes, and advised to keep it from the air, therefore stir not out to attend my business at the theatre.  On this melancholy occasion I hope my friends will be so indulgent as to send for tickets to my house, the corner of Bow Street, Covent Garden, which favour will be gratefully acknowledged by their obedient, humble servant, THOMAS CHAPMAN.”  The excuses set forth in these announcements appear to be very sufficient, and no doubt were so regarded by the patrons in each case, while at the same time they demonstrate the conduct required ordinarily of persons anxious for public support on the occasion of their benefits.  Excuses of a lighter kind, however, seem frequently to have been held adequate by the players.  Mr. Sheridan, the actor, notifies in 1745 that, “as his benefit was not appointed till last Friday, he humbly hopes that such ladies and gentlemen as he shall omit to wait on will impute it rather to a want of time than to a want of respect and knowledge of his duty.”  And Mr. Yates, who about the same time had migrated from the West-end stage to the humbler theatre in Goodman’s Fields,