86 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



[2"'! S. No 109., Jan. 30. '58. 



Lord Mountstuart, to whose interposition I find I am in- 

 debted for your first comm.inds, relative to Tlie Trip to 

 Calais, by Mr. Chetwyud, and your final rejection of it 

 by Colonel Keen.' 



" • Lord Mountstuart has, I presume, told your Lord- 

 ship, that he read with me those scenes to which your 

 Lordship objected, that he found them collected from 

 general nature, and applicable to none but those who, 

 through consciousness, were compelled to a self-applica- 

 tion: to such minds, my Lord, The Whole Duty of Man, 

 next to the Sacred Writings, is the severest satire that 

 ever was wrote ; and to the same mark, if Comedy directs 

 not her aim, her arrows are shot in the air ; for by what 

 touches no man, no man will be mended. Lord Mount- 

 stuart desired that I would suffer him to take tlie play 

 •with him, and let him leave it with the Duchess of King- 

 ston : he had my consent, my Lord, and at the same time 

 an assurance, that I v.-as willing to make any alteration 

 that her Grace would suggest. Her Grace saw the play, 

 and, in consequence, I saw Her Grace ; with the result of 

 that interview I shall not, at this time, trouble your Lord- 

 ship. It may perhaps be necessary to observe, that Her 

 Grace could not discern, which your Lordship, I dare sa}', 

 will readily believe, a single trait in the character olF 

 Lady Kitty Crocodile that resembled herself. 



" ' After this representation, your Lordship will, I doubt 

 not, permit me to enjoy the fruits of my labour ; nor will 

 you think it reasonable, because a capricious individual 

 has taken it into her head that I have pinned her rufiles 

 awry, that I should be punished hj a poniard stuck deep 

 in my heart: 3'our Lordship has too much candour and 

 justice to be the instrument of so violent and ill-directed 

 a blov/. 



" ' Your Lordship's determination is not only of the 

 greatest importance to me now, but must inevitably de- 

 cide my fate for the future; as, after this defeat, it will 

 be impossible for me to muster up courage enough to face 

 Folly again : between the Muse and the Magistrate there 

 is a natural confederacy; what the last cannot punish, 

 the first often corrects ; but when she finds herself not 

 only deserted by her antient ally, but sees him armed in 

 the defence of her foe, she has nothing left but a speed}- 

 retreat: adieu then, my Lord, to the stage. Valeat res 

 ludicra, to which, I hope, I may with justice add Plaudite, 

 as, during my continuance in Ihe service of the Public, I 

 never profited by flattering their passions, or falling in 

 with their humours, as, upon all occasions, I have ex- 

 erted my little powers (as, indeed, I thought it my duty) 

 in exposing follies, how much soever the favourites of the 

 day; and pernicious prejudices, however protected and 

 popular. This, my Lord, has been done, if those may be 

 believed who have the best right to know, sometimes 

 ■with success ; let me add too, that in doing this I never 

 lost my credit with the Public, because they knew that I 

 proceeded upon principle, that I disdained being either 

 the echo or the instrument of an}' man, however exalted 

 his station, and that I never received reward or protec- 

 tion from smy other hands than their own. I have the 

 honour to be, &c. 



" ' Samuel Foote. 



"' l^° Mr. Foote intends soon to pidjlish the scenes in 

 his Trijj to Calais, objected to by the Lord Chamberlain, 

 as a justification of his own conduct, with a prefatory 

 dedication to the Duchess of Kingston.' 



" The intimation couched in the Postscript to the above 

 Letter produced on the loth instant the publication of the 

 following Letters, which were introduced on the part of 

 Her Grace of Kingston with the following Preface : — 



" ' Mr. Foote, interdicted by the Chamberlain from re- 

 presenting the libellous piece called a Trip to Calais, 

 threatened to publish the scenes, and dedicate them to 



Her Grace of Kingston. It was in vain that the malig- 

 nity as well as injustice of such a procedure were repre- 

 sented to Mr. Foote in the strongest colours. The mimic 

 would not yield one tittle to the remonstrance of humanity, 

 though he appeared attentive to the call of interest; in 

 obedience to which call, he acquaintedtla friend ^of the 

 Duchess of Kingston's, that " he would consent to sup- 

 press the publication of the scenes, if her Grace would 

 give him Two Thousand Pounds for the copy." It may 

 be easily supposed that so impudent a demand shared the 

 fate of refusal. Baffled thus [in his hopes, and finding 

 that his threats of publication could not intimidate the 

 Duchess into compliance, Mr. Foote had recourse to his 

 levee of scribblers, for the purpose of furni.shing news- 

 paper defamation. The following letter was received 

 only on Sunday afternoon, and in the St. James's Chro- ' 

 nicle, on Saturday evening, a most scurrilous invective 

 against her Grace'of Kingston was dated from Mr. Foote's 

 Theatre in the Hay-Market.' " 



(Then follow tlie letters given by Piiilo -Wat,- 

 POLE ; in the two copies of which, however, there 

 are several verbal variations of more or less im- 

 portance. In the Duchess's reply, I will notice 

 two. The copy before me is headerl, " A Servant 

 was directed to return the foUowini^ Answer." 

 And the note at the foot begins, "Mr. Foote is 

 descended," not " is said to be descended." In 

 Foote's rejoinder there is an omission which 

 should be supplied. The sentence beginning, "In 

 those scenes," &c., should end thus : after " in- 

 cidents of your life — which have excited the cu' 

 riosity of the Orand Inquest for the county of 

 Middlesex^) 



After this letter, the Magazine article pro- 

 ceeds : — 



" Hero the Correspondence stopped, though much 

 abuse and invective continued to be thrown out in the 

 public Prints, by the friends of both parties, till the ap- 

 pearance of the'following Affidavit on the 19th put an 

 end to the contest, nothing having been published by 

 either side since that time." 



" < Affidavit. 



V to wit. 



" ' Middlesex 

 and 

 Westminster 



" ' The Rev. Mr. John Forster, A.M., Chaplain to her 

 Grace the Duchess of Kingston, maketh oath, That in the 

 month of July last he waited on Mr. Samuel Foote at his 

 house at North-End, by the direction of her Gr.ace the 

 Duchess of Kingston, to return to the said Mr. Foote a 

 manuscript Comedy, entitled a Trip to Calais, which he 

 the said Mr. Foote" had left with her Grace for her pe- 

 rusal, which he did accordingl}- deliver to l-.im : That at 

 this time he took an opportunity to dissuade Mr. Foote 

 from publishing the said Comedy, which he was informed 

 was his intention to do, as it might verj' much disoblige 

 the Duchess of Kingston, and make in her a powerful 

 enemy, who was capable of being a very valuable friend : 

 That on these considerations he advised the said iMr. 

 Foote to make a compliment of tfio Copy of this Piece to 

 her Grace the Duchess of Kingston, especially as the 

 public performance of it had been prohibited by the Lord 

 Chamberlain: That the said Mr. Samuel Foote replied, 

 that unless the Duchess of Kingston would give him Two 

 Thousand Pomids, he would publish the Ttip to Calais, 

 with a Preface and Dedication to her Grace; and that 



