fatal affray
took place during the representation of Davenant's adaptation of
_Macbeth_.

From Dryden's various prologues and epilogues we cull many
sharply-outlined and bright-coloured pictures of the wild and riotous
audiences of those evil days. We see again the "hot Burgundians" in the
upper boxes wooing the masked beauties, crying "_bon_" to the French
dancers and beating cadence to the music that had stirred even the
stately Court of Versailles. Again we see the scornful critics, bunched
with glistening ribbons, shaking back their cascades of blonde hair,
lolling contemptuously on the foremost benches, and "looking big through
their curls." There from "Fop's Corner" rises the tipsy laugh, the
prattle, and the chatter, as the dukes and lords, the wits and
courtiers, practise what Dryden calls "the diving bow," or "the toss and
the new French wallow"--the diving bow being especially admired, because
it--

"With a shog casts all the hair before,
Till he, with full decorum, brings it back,
And rises with a water-spaniel's shake."

Nor does the poet fail to recall the affrays in the upper boxes, when
some quarrelsome rake was often pinned to the wainscoat by the sword of
his insulted rival. Below, at the door, the Flemish horses and the
heavy gilded coach, lighted by flambeaux, are waiting for the noisy
gallant, and will take back only his corpse.

Of Dryden's coldly licentious comedies and ranting bombastic tragedies a
few only seem to have been produced at the Dorset Gardens Theatre. Among
these we may mention _Limberham_, _OEdipus_, _Troilus and Cressida_, and
_The Spanish Friar_. _Limberham_ was acted at the Duke's Theatre, in
Dorset Gardens; because, being a satire upon a Court vice, it was deemed
peculiarly calculated for that playhouse. The concourse of the citizens
thither is alluded to in the prologue to _Marriage a la Mode_.
Ravenscroft, also, in his epilogue to the play of _Citizen Turned
Gentleman_, which was acted at the same theatre, takes occasion to
disown the patronage of the more dissolute courtiers, in all probability
because they formed the minor part of his audience. The citizens were
his great patrons.

In the _Postman_, December 8, 1679, there is the following notice,
quoted by Smith:--"At the request of several persons of quality, on
Saturday next, being the 9th instant, at the theatre in Dorset Gardens,
the famous Kentish men, Wm. and Rich. Joy, design to show to the town
be