BARBARA S----


On the noon of the 14th of November, 1743 or 4, I forget which it was,
just as the clock had struck one, Barbara S----, with her accustomed
punctuality ascended the long rambling staircase, with awkward
interposed landing-places, which led to the office, or rather a sort
of box with a desk in it, whereat sat the then Treasurer of (what few
of our readers may remember) the Old Bath Theatre. All over the island
it was the custom, and remains so I believe to this day, for the
players to receive their weekly stipend on the Saturday. It was not
much that Barbara had to claim.

This little maid had just entered her eleventh year; but her important
station at the theatre, as it seemed to her, with the benefits which
she felt to accrue from her pious application of her small earnings,
had given an air of womanhood to her steps and to her behaviour. You
would have taken her to have been at least five years older.

Till latterly she had merely been employed in choruses, or where
children were wanted to fill up the scene. But the manager, observing
a diligence and adroitness in her above her age, had for some few
months past intrusted to her the performance of whole parts. You may
guess the self-consequence of the promoted Barbara. She had already
drawn tears in young Arthur; had rallied Richard with infantine
petulance in the Duke of York; and in her turn had rebuked that
petulance when she was Prince of Wales. She would have done the elder
child in Morton's pathetic after-piece to the life; but as yet the
"Children in the Wood" was not.