[460] George Garrard, A.R.A. (1760-1826), animal painter and sculptor, led a successful movement to obtain copyright protection for works of plastic art. He died at Queen’s Buildings, Brompton. [461] Michael Dahl (1656-1743) was born in Stockholm. He settled in London, and became the rival of Kneller. “If he excelled, it was only in the mediocrity by which he was surrounded” (Redgrave). He was buried in St. James’s Church, Piccadilly. [462] “I have not heard that song better performed since Mr. Incledon sung it. He was a great singer, sir, and I may say, in the words of our immortal Shakespeare, that, take him for all in all, we shall not look upon his like again.” In these words Hoskins of the _Cave of Harmony_ complimented Colonel Newcome on his rendering of “Wapping Old Stairs.” Incledon began life in the navy, where he sang himself into the good graces of his Admiral. Coming to London in 1783, he became a public singer; but it was not until 1790 that his success was established by his performance in _The Poor Soldier_ at Covent Garden. In his later years he relied mainly on the provinces, in which he travelled under the style of “The Wandering Melodist.” Though exquisite in song he was clumsy in appearance. Leslie, the painter, describes him as having “the face and figure of a low sailor,” yet with these “the most manly and at the same time the most agreeable voice I ever heard.” Another good authority records that his voice “was of extraordinary power, both in the natural and the falsetto. The former, from A to G, a compass of about fourteen notes, was full and open, neither partaking of the reed nor the string, and sent forth without the smallest artifice; and such was its ductility, that when he sang _pianissimo_, it retained its original ductility. His falsetto, which he could use from D to E or F, or about ten notes, was rich, sweet, and brilliant.” [463] Funny-movers attended to the boats. A funny was a narrow, clinker-built pleasure boat for a pair of sculls. “A most melancholy accident happened one evening this week in the river off Fulham. A young couple, on the point of marriage, took a sail in a funny, which unfortunately upset, and the two lovers were drowned” (_Annual Register_, 1808). [464] The Battersea market-gardeners were famous. A rhyme of 1802 says-- “Gardeners in shoals from Battersea shall run, To raise their kindlier hot-beds in the sun.” The first asparagus raised in England is said to have come from Battersea; and such was the extent of the market-gardens, that large numbers of Welshwomen tramped thither every spring for employment in the summer months. [465] Not Shakespeare. [466] In _A Sentimental Journey_. See “The Passport,” “The Captive,” and “The Starling.” [467] “Old Granby” was doubtless intended as a jesting compliment to the pensioner, in allusion to the bluff Lord Manners, Marquess of Granby, renowned for his toughness and gallantry.