ticket is given. Doors open at 6 o'clock, commence at half-past. Chorus master, Mr. Rudford; Ballet master, Mr. Smithers; Leader of the Band, Mr. Jackman; Machinist, Mr. Rowe."

After the passing of the new Licensing Act, melodramas were produced with a strong company, and in 1850 the premises were greatly enlarged and improved, though the house was not closed a single night. In 1851, James Anderson was engaged here at a salary of £120 a week, to play a round of Shakespearian parts, and frequently returned on similar terms. Once a year there was always a week or two devoted to Shakespeare, the parts being played by the stock company. On June 29th, 1858, the old Saloon was closed for ever; some adjoining houses were bought, and a new and colossal theatre, that would hold three thousand people, opened in the November of the same year, was erected on the ground. Every variety of entertainment has been given at the Britannia, from Pepper's Ghost to Tom King the pugilist, from champion swimmers, giants, acrobats, to Arthur Orton.

In an interview which Mrs. Lane granted not very long before her death, she remarked upon the change that had come over the audience. The Middleman had just been performed there with great success. "I can remember the time, many years ago," she said, “when The Middleman wouldn't have drawn at all after the first night. In those days we used to put on such awful rigmaroles as Sweeny Todd, the Barber of Fleet Street, who used to murder the people that came to be shaved, cut them up, and sell them to Mrs. Lovat, a pastrycook, to make pies of them. But," she added, "the play must have a good moral, whatever it is; our people wouldn't care for anything that hadn't a moral.”

Not far from the Britannia is THE VARIETY THEATRE, Hoxton, formerly a music-hall; it obtained a theatrical licence in 1871, but has always blended the two styles, playing short pieces, with singing and other entertainments between.

A theatre called THE ALEXANDRA was erected in the grounds of Highbury Barn, by Giovanelli, in 1865, for the performance of farces and light pieces, in which Danvers, J. G. Taylor, Rachel Sanger acted. It disappeared with the gardens in 1871.

Camden Town had its theatre thirty years ago. Built in 1871, it was first called THE PARK, and it was fondly imagined by the proprietor that it might be made a second Prince of Wales's; West End actors were engaged, a West End author wrote a burlesque especially for it, but a lady, with not the least pretensions to talent, by choosing to assume the principal parts in every production, defeated all such possibilities. In 1873 the name of the theatre was changed to the Alexandra, and in 1881 its miserable existence was put an end to by fire.

In Liverpool Street, King's Cross, was a squeezed-up building, with a small portico, that had a curious history attached to it. Built originally by Lanza, a teacher of singing, for the exercise of his pupils, also for musical entertainments, and called the Panharmonium, it was, in 1832, opened by Mrs. Fitzwilliam and Buckstone as THE CLARENCE THEATRE. The speculation proved so unremunerative that these celebrated players quickly abandoned it. The interior was very fantastic, being constructed after the pattern of a Chinese pavilion. In 1838 it was rechristened the "New Lyceum." Manager succeeded manager, and under each speculator it sank lower, until tickets were issued to admit four persons to

the boxes upon the payment of threepence. So utterly disreputable did the audiences become, that the house was at length closed by order of the magistrates. It was then converted into an amateur theatre, and called the Cabinet, and ultimately the King's Cross. In 1870 some witless person once more attempted to convert it into a regular theatre; it soon afterwards sank into oblivion, and was heard of no more in connection with the regular drama.

At the end of 1870 the Philharmonic Music Hall, in the High Street, Islington, became THE PHILHARMONIC THEATRE, under the management of Messrs. Head and Morton. A great success was achieved in the following year by one of the most popular of operas-bouffes, Geneviève de Brabant, with Miss Emily Soldene, who had opened the house in Chilpéric, as Drogan; so admirably was the house appointed, and so excellently was the opera staged and cast, that this suburban theatre soon came to be patronised by West End audiences; Madame Angot, a revival of the Grande Duchesse, etc., followed Geneviève de Brabant, and other operas-bouffes, and occasionally dramas, with more or less success, until the Philharmonic fell a prey to the flames in September, 1882. A new and handsome theatre, THE GRAND, rose upon its ashes, and was opened in the autumn of 1883. Its existence was a brief one, as it was burned down at the end of December, 1887. Rebuilt upon a yet more elaborate scale, it was reopened in the December of the following year, and again perished by fire in February, 1900. It was re-erected and reopened at the end of the same year. With the exception of the Christmas pantomime, the Grand, like all other suburban theatres, is chiefly kept open by West End stars and travelling companies.

Handsome theatres have been erected at Dalston, Stoke Newington, Muswell Hill, and Camden Town, but they have no separate existence; their entertainments are chiefly drawn from the West End stages. Each member of these travelling companies is drilled into a slavish imitation of the original, from which he or she must not depart; the actors are thus converted into automata. No training could be worse, since it does away with all individuality. Now and again some melodrama or farcical comedy that has not received the cachet of the west, written and exploited by some performer of provincial fame, varies the monotony, but seldom or ever runs more than a week. But in the care bestowed upon the productions, the beauty and the comfort of the auditorum, these suburban houses are equal to all, except the highest-class theatres of the more fashionable districts, and very much cheaper.

CHAPTER II

THE SOUTHERN AND THE EAST END THEATRES

Astley's Amphitheatre-The Surrey-The Victoria-The Old Peckham Theatre The Bower Saloon-The Rotunda-The Deptford and Greenwich Theatres-The Elephant and Castle-The New Southern Theatres -The Royalty, Wellclose Square-The City Theatre, Grub StreetThe Pavilion-The Garrick-The City of London-The Standard--The East London-The Oriental-The New Theatres.

IN

N the year 1770, one Philip Astley, formerly a trooper, who had greatly distinguished himself in action, and who had always a great fancy for breaking in and training horses, took upon a lease a piece of waste ground near the foot of Westminster Bridge, and opened what he called a riding-school, though it was really a circus; there was a ring in the centre open to the sky, and seats all round ranged under a canvas roof; the prices of admission were threepence and sixpence. At first he performed without a licence, and proceedings were instituted against him by the Surrey magistrates. One day, however, the King happened to be passing over Westminster Bridge upon a horse that proved unmanageable; Astley, who was looking on, came forward to His Majesty's assistance, and soon rendered the beast docile, for which service he was a few days afterwards rewarded with a licence in due form.

In 1780 he erected a wooden building, with gallery, pit, and boxes, out of the old Covent Garden hustings,