Note 290 — QUARRELS OF AUTHORS; (continued 2)

Woodward humorously attributes Hill’s attack on him to his jealousy of his successful performance of Harlequin, and opens some of the secret history of Hill, by which it appears that early in life he trod the theatrical boards. He tells us of the extraordinary pains the prompter had taken with Hill, in the part of Oroonoko; though, “if he had not quite forgotten it, to very little purpose.” He reminds Hill of a dramatic anecdote, which he no doubt had forgotten. It seems he once belonged to a strolling company at May-fair, where, in the scene between Altamont and Lothario, the polite audience of that place all chorused, and agreed with him, when dying he exclaimed, “Oh, Altamont, thy genius is the stronger.” He then shows him off as the starved apothecary in Romeo and Juliet, in one of his botanic peregrinations to Chelsea Garden; from whence, it is said, he was expelled for “culling too many rare plants”—

“I do remember an apothecary, Culling of simples——.”

Hill, who was often so brisk in his attack on the wits, had no power of retort; so that he was always buffeting and always buffeted.