Event Comment: By Command of Their Royal Highnesses the
Prince and Princess of Wales [who were present]. Mainpiece: Written by
Beaumont and
Fletcher. Afterpiece: Written by the Author of the
Toy Shop. [For a letter on the disputes between the footmen and the gentlemen, see
Grub St. Journal, 17 March.] [There is in the
Bennett Collection, I, 93, in the
Birmingham Library, an exceptionally curious advance notice for a performance to be given at
Drury Lane soon after Easter of
The Conscious Lovers and
The Devil to Pay, with no cast for either play in the bill. The announcement appears to refer to the spring of 1737 and presumably appeared around the middle of March. It is intended for the benefit of a Widow under Misfortunes and the bill bears the heading: Gift and Pleasure. According to the announcement, the widow has been left Italian pictures, antiqees, jewels, and precious stones; and she intends, for the encouragement of her benefactors, to make a gift of all the objects, which will be placed in three hundred parcels.
Tickets for the performance are advertised at five shillings, and no one is to be admitted with
out a ticket. The pit and boxes are to be put together at two
tickets for each person, and the first and second galleries are placed together at one ticket for each spectator. The
tickets are not to be left with the door-keepers as usual, but only shewn and kept. On the day following the benefit a raffle will be held, by Mr
Foubert's Patent Mathematical Machine, at
Hickford's Great Room in
Brewers Street,
Golden Square, and only holders of
tickets will be admitted to the raffle, After this entry was set, an advertisement was found in the
Daily Advertiser, 18 April 1738, announcing this performance for 13 May 1738. The
Daily Advertiser on 5 May 1738, however, announced that the proposed performance had been cancelled.