A Book for a Rainy Day; or, Recollections of the Events of the Years 1766-1833Smith, John Thomas
History
A Book for a Rainy Day; or, Recollections of the Events of the Years 1766-1833
Smith, John Thomas
Great Britain -- Social life and customs -- 18th century; Great Britain -- Social life and customs -- 19th century
[76] Michael Angelo Rooker (1743-1801), the water-colour painter
and engraver. “His works are drawn with conscientious accuracy,
and show a sweet pencil” (Redgrave). He died March 3, 1801, in
Dean Street, Soho, and was buried in the ground belonging to St.
Martin-in-the-Fields, in the Kentish Town Road. Examples of his
work are hung at South Kensington.
[77] The wonderful extra-illustrated copy presented to the Museum
by John Charles Crowle, and valued at £5000.
[78] That is to say tiled.
[79] The Rev. John Fountayne was more than “noticed” by Handel;
the two men were intimate. A grandson of Fountayne wrote in 1832:
“One evening as my grandfather and Handel were walking together
and alone, a new piece was struck up by the band. ‘Come, Mr.
Fountayne,’ said Handel, ‘let us sit down and listen to this
piece--I want to know your opinion of it.’ Down they sat, and
after some time the old parson, turning to his companion, said,
‘It is not worth listening to--it’s very poor stuff.’ ‘You are
right, Mr. F.,’ said Handel, ‘it is very poor stuff--I thought so
myself when I had finished it.’ The old gentleman, being taken
by surprise, was beginning to apologise; but Handel assured him
there was no necessity; that the music was really bad, having
been composed hastily, and his time for the production limited;
and that the opinion given was as correct as it was honest”
(Hone’s _Year Book_). “Clarke” was doubtless Dr. Adam Clarke, the
Wesleyan, who died in Bayswater in 1832, and was well known for his
bibliographical and theological works.
[80] Lady Harrington might well lend her jewels, since she often
borrowed. Horace Walpole tells how, at the Coronation of George
III., she appeared “covered with all the diamonds she could borrow,
hire, or seize, with the air of Roxana, the finest figure at a
distance.”
[81] The great actress. She played Violante to Garrick’s Don Felix
in the actor’s last appearance.
[82] In his _Memoirs_, the Rev. John Trusler, who was educated
at Dr. Fountayne’s school, does not spare Mrs. Fountayne’s
tuft-hunting tendencies. In one instance she was covered with
ridicule through the action of a Soho pastry-cook named Jenkins,
who, wishing his son to enter the school, arranged that he should
do so under the name of the Prince De Chimmay. When Mrs. Fountayne
discovered that his father made tarts a mile from the school door,
“she had the laugh so much against her, that she could not show her
face for months.”
[83] The Royal College of Physicians, then housed in Warwick Lane.
[84] Norfolk Street was the northern continuation of Newman Street;
it is now merged in Cleveland Street.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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