Event Comment: Louisa Dudley first time Miss Hopkins very well receiv'd (Hopkins Diary). Mrs Smith being hoarse, the Wedding Ring deferr'd. Paid Miss Berkley on note 25 Aug. #2 2s.; Mrs Sykes for women's Cloaths #21. Receipts: #163 16s. (Treasurer's Book)

Event Comment: Benefit for Mrs Bradshaw, Mrs Millidge, Mrs Johnston. Afterpiece by Allan Ramsay, with the Original Music, New Accompanyments, and a New Medley Scotch Overture. By Particular Desire. Paid Properties #1 17s. 7d. (Treasurer's Book). Receipts: #207 15s. Charges: #65 10s. Profits: #142 5s. (Treasurer's Book)

Event Comment: Music by Fisher. The whole to conclude with a Capital Scene by Servandoni. Books of the Songs, Chorusses &c. [of the afterpiece] to be had at the Theatre. [Customary note on all succeeding bills advertising the Sylphs this season. Mrs Williams was probably Mrs Willems.

Event Comment: [Lady who played Mrs Oakly identified as Mrs Hunter by Hopkins MS Notes.

Event Comment: Afterpiece: A New Comedy (by Hugh Kelly] of 2 Acts never perform'd. [Written, as the author states in his Advertisement to the Edition of 1774, at the instigation of and on the inspiration of Mrs Abington. The Larpent MS 379 lists a partial cast and the lengths for each part: 10 Hector Strangeways-Mrs Green; 7 1!2 Zelinda 1!2 Jenny-....(A Length was 42 lines of dialogue.)] [From the +Westminster Magazine, Dec: Though there is scarce anything new in the Plot, Characters, Dialogue of this piece; yet upon the whole we found it extremely entertaining. The Indian servant is well introduced to satirize the follies and vices of the metropolis; and Sir Hector and his son give us a good dish of sea terms, well served up by Messrs $Shuter">Shuter; 7 Brownlow-$Bensley; 5 Ormsby-$Clarke; 6 Bussora-...; 5 +Orson-...; 6 +Pillage-$Dunstall; 1!2 Servant-...; 5 +Lady Strangeways-$Mrs Green; 7 1!2 Zelinda 1!2 Jenny-....(A Length was 42 lines of dialogue.)] [From the +Westminster Magazine, Dec: Though there is scarce anything new in the Plot, Characters, Dialogue of this piece; yet upon the whole we found it extremely entertaining. The Indian servant is well introduced to satirize the follies and vices of the metropolis; and Sir Hector and his son give us a good dish of sea terms, well served up by Messrs $Shuter and Quick."

Event Comment: Benefit for Wright, Messink, and Widow Rooker. Receipts: #188 14s. Charges: #74 14s. Pbofits to Messink, Mrs Wright, Mrs Rooker: #114 (Treasurer's Book)

Event Comment: Benefit for Mrs Smith. The Farce was much hiss'd (Hopkins Diary). The overture and Songs in it entirely new, composed by Theodore Smith. The farce by Thomas Hull. Paid 1!2 years Poor's rate to Xmas last #32 9s. 6d. Receipts: #98 6s. Charges: #70 6s. Profits to Mrs Smith: #28 (Treasurer's Book)

Event Comment: Benefit for Waldron and Mrs Greville. Mainpiece: Not acted these 3 years. [See 23 April 1772.] Mrs Greville Sir Harry Wildair very bad (Hopkins Diary). Receipts: #58 4s. Charges: #65 19s. Deficit to Waldron and Mrs Greville: #7 15s. (Treasurer's Book)

Event Comment: Benefit for Waldron & Mrs Greville. Public Advertiser, 19 Apr.: Tickets to be had of Waldron, No. 16, Glanville-street, Rathbone Place; of Mrs Greville at the Orange Warehouse, the Corner of King-street, Covent Garden. Receipts: #178 15s. (69.0; 15.1; 0.0; tickets: 94.14) (charge: #74 14s.)

Event Comment: By Permission [of the Lord Chamberlain]. Benefit for Mrs Jewell. The out-standing Tickets of Jewell's, for September the 2d, will be admitted

Event Comment: Benefit for Mrs Sharp and Mrs Brereton. Public Advertiser, 27 Apr.: Tickets to be had of Mrs Sharp, No. 10, Bow-street; of Mrs Brereton, No. 11, Tavistock-street. Receipts: #133 9s. 6d. (79.13.0; 25.0.0; 0.8.6; tickets: 28.8.0) (charge: #75 9s. 6d.)

Event Comment: By Permission of the Lord Chamberlain. Benefit for Mrs Lefevre. [Author ofPrologue unknown.] Afterpiece: Never performed here [acted 5 Apr. 1734]. Doors to be opened at 5:15. To begin at 6:15. Tickets and places to be had of Mrs Lefevre, No. 25, Frith Street, Soho, and of Rice at the Theatre. Tickets delivered by Holland will be taken

Event Comment: Benefit for Mrs Wells. Morning Herald, 22 Apr.: Tickets to be had of Mrs Wells, No. 417, Strand. Mainpiece: Not acted these 2 years [not acted since 24 Apr. 1779]. Receipts: #172 2s. 6d. (64/16/0; 26/7/6; 0/6/0; rickets: 80/13/0) (charge: #108 4s. 2d.)

Event Comment: Benefit for Mrs Barnes. Morning Herald, 15 Apr.: Tickets to be had of Mrs Barnes, No. 21, Crown-street, Westminster. Receipts: #134 11s. 6d. (69/3/6; tickets: 65/8/0) (charge: #105)

Event Comment: Benefit for Mrs Hunter. Tom Thumb [announced on playbill of 19 May] is unavoidably obliged to be changed, on account of Mrs Kennedy's Indisposition. Receipts: #170 17s. 6d. (77/15/6; tickets: 93/2/0) (charge: #105)

Event Comment: [In mainpiece the playbill assigns Diana to Mrs Martyr, but "News of Mrs Martyr's husband's death having reached her the day before, an apology was made for her not playing Diana; Miss Wheeler, however, from the other house proved a very agreeable substitute" (.European Magazine, Oct. 1783, p. 310). In afterpiece the playbill assigns Lucy to Mrs Wilson, but on the Kemble playbill a MS annotation substitutes Mrs Davenett.] Receipts: #134 19s. 6d. (133/9/0; 1/10/6)

Event Comment: By Permission of the Lord Chamberlain. Benefit for Watts. Mainpiece: Written by Mrs Centlivre; Not acted these 40 years [not acted since 27 Apr. 1731, at Goodman's Fields]. Prologue written by a Gentleman [unidentified; printed in Town and Country Magazine, Apr. 1784, p. 214. The playbill for this performance is as printed in Morning Chronicle, 8 Mar. Gazetteer, 8 Mar., assigns Captain Constant to Reynolds, Laura to Miss Beaufield, Maria to Mrs Green, Belinda to Miss Johnson]. The Doors to be opened at 5:00. To begin at 6:30. Tickets to be had of Connolly, at the King's Head Tavern, Fenchurch-street; of Watts, No. 2, Upper James-street, Golden-square

Event Comment: Benefit for Mrs Bannister. Mainpiece: Never acted here. The Music by Dr Arne. With a Grand Procession of the different Orders of the Knights of Chivalry. Public Advertiser, 6 Mar.: Tickets to be had of Mrs Bannister, No. 6, Great Russel-street, Covent Garden. Receipts: #252 8s. 6d. (177/14/6; tickets: 74/14/0) (charge: #105)

Event Comment: Benefit for Staunton and Mrs Hedges. Gazetteer, 8 May: Tickets to be had of Staunton, No. 9, St. Martin's-street, Leicester-fields; of Mrs Hedges, opposite Old Bond-street, Piccadilly. Receipts: #208 1s. 6d. (15/13/0; 19/15/6; 0/16/0; tickets: 171/17/0) (charge: #106 0s. 11d

Event Comment: Benefit for Mrs Bellamy. Mainpiece: Not acted these 3 years. "Mrs Bellamy was too much frightened to speak the address [written by Charles Stuart (European Magazine, May 1785, p. 354)], and Miss Farren spoke it--Mrs Bellamy herself added some few words in prose" (Genest, VI, 342). But Stuart's address was abandoned, and in its place Miss Farren spoke one written by Alexander Bicknell (Gentleman's Magazine, June 1785, pp. 449-50). This occurred at the end of the play; following the address the curtain rose, and Mrs Bellamy "succeeded in muttering a few words, expressive of her gratitude" (Reynolds, I, 282-83). [This was Mrs Yates's last appearance in London. In July of this year she was acting in Birmingham (Morning Chronicle, 18 July). Mrs Bellamy's last appearance on the stage was at CG, 1 June 1780.] Receipts: #306 4s. (188/1/0; 13/3/6; 0/14/6; tickets: 104/5/0) (charge: #113 8s. 10d.)

Event Comment: By Command of Their Majesties. [In mainpiece the playbill assigns Stockwell to Aickin, but "Fearon, in consequence of Aickin's illness, took the part of Stockwell at a short notice and upon the whole acquitted himself respectably" (Morning Chronicle, 6 Oct.).] "There is an infinite combination in Mrs Abington, a power of making everything new yet conformable to the character (Public Advertiser, 14 Oct.). Receipts: #328 11s. 6d. (326/11/0; 2/0/6)

Event Comment: The Carmelite [announced on playbill of 11 Oct.] is obliged to be deferred on Account of the Indisposition of Mrs Siddons. Mainpiece: With accompaniments to the airs composed by Linley [Sen.]. Receipts: #75 16s. (53/12; 21/4; 0/0; tickets not come in: 1/0)

Event Comment: Benefit for Mrs Abington. Pit and Boxes will be laid together. Ladies and Gentlemen are most earnestly requested to come early, to prevent Inconvenience in getting to their Places, and to send their Servants to keep them by Four o'clock. "At the close of the entertainment Mrs Abington came forward, and delivered a short poetical address to her fashionable auditory [written by Maurice Morgann (Monthly Mirror, Nov. 1797, p. 263)], apposite to her feelings on the present occasion" (Morning Herald, 11 Feb.). "The character [of Scrub] throughout was well conceived, and executed with a sprightliness and degree of humour that kept the house in a continual roar of laughter" (Public Advertiser, 11 Feb.) "Mrs Abington's voice was in its usual tone; her manners and deportment were inattentive and torpid, rather than active and interesting" (Morning Post, 11 Feb.). "With all her endeavours to give new points to the character, she entirely failed. Her appearance en culottes, so preposterously padded, exceeded nature. Her gestures to look comical could not get the least hold of the audience, though they had seen her before in men's clothes, when playing Portia in The Merchant of Venice, where her figure, dressed as a lawyer in his gown, gave effect to her excellent delivery on mercy, and the audience had been always delighted. But this leu de benefice, comparatively speaking, was disgusting and absurd as she dressed the character ... However, I have heard it originated in a bet she had previously made" (Henry Angelo, Reminiscenes, 11, 281-82). Receipts: #406 13s. 6d. (249/9/6; 1/9/0; tickets: 155/15/0) (charge: free)

Event Comment: "The simple melody of 'Cease your funning' need alone be adverted to in proof of the pathos of Mrs Billington's manner; and when it was encored, the repetition had every mark of variety" (Morning Herald, 22 Feb.). Receipts: #218 7s. (217/0; 1/7)

Event Comment: Benefit for Mrs Siddons. Part of the Pit will be laid into the Boxes. To prevent Confusion Ladies are desired to send their Servants by half past Four o'clock. Morning Herald, 1 May: Tickets to be had of Mrs Siddons, Gower-street, Bedford-square. "In the apparent assumption of madness [and] the express'd weakness and melancholy of the character Kemble is not equalled by any of his predecessors . . . Till [Mrs Siddons] there never was, in sensible discrimination, as there ought to be, the real madness of Ophelia from the feigned distraction of Hamlet. Till then the dignity, the love, even the pathos of the part [were] but poorly, if at all administered" (Public Advertiser, 17 May). Receipts: #326 14s. 6d. (137/3/0; 7/3/6; 0/4/0; tickets: 182/4/0)(charge: #109 16s.)