Note 29 — Chapter I

During Sir Robert Walpole’s administration, a troop of French Players had been brought over, but the audience and populace would not suffer them to perform. Another company came over in 1750, but with no better success. Several young men of quality had drawn their swords in the riot, endeavouring to support them: Lord Trentham’s being present had been exaggerated into his being their chief protector. French Players had been no uncommon spectacle in England. The foundation of the late animosity against them was this. The opposition to the Court had proceeded so far, as to be on the point of ridiculing the King publicly on the stage of the little theatre in the Haymarket, in a dramatic satire, called the “Golden Rump,” written by Fielding. Sir R. Walpole, having intelligence of this design, got the piece into his hands—[I have in my possession the imperfect copy of this piece, as I found it among my father’s papers after his death]—and then procured the act to be passed for regulating the stage, by which all theatres were suppressed but such as should be licensed by the Lord Chamberlain. This provoked the people so much, that the French company having a licence granted soon after, when several English companies were cashiered, it was made a party point to silence foreign performers.