Cornish Characters and Strange EventsBaring-Gould, S. (Sabine)
History
Cornish Characters and Strange Events
Baring-Gould, S. (Sabine)
Cornwall (England : County) -- Biography; Cornwall (England : County) -- History; Legends -- England -- Cornwall (County)
Incledon belonged in town to "The Glee Club," composed of Shield,
Bannister, Dignum, himself, and one or two others. It met on Sunday
evenings during the season at the Garrick Coffee House, in Bow Street,
once a fortnight. At one of these little gatherings Incledon was
amusingly hoaxed. Though an admirable singer, he was a shockingly bad
actor. When he came in one of the party informed him that an intended
musical performance for a charitable purpose, in which he, Incledon,
was to sing, had been abandoned, on account of the Bishop of London
objecting to an actor performing in church. Incledon, who was an
extremely irritable man, broke out in a violent strain, conceiving the
word _actor_ to have been employed as a term of reproach, and
addressing himself to Bannister, said with great vehemence, "There,
Charles, do you hear that?" "Why," said Bannister, "if I were you, I'd
make his lordship _prove his words_."
Incledon one day was at Tattersall's, when Suett, the actor, also
happened to be there, and asked him whether he had come to buy a
horse. "Yes," said Charles, "I have. I must ride, it is good for my
health. But why are you here, Dickey? Do you think that you know the
difference between a horse and an ass?"
"Oh, yes," replied the comedian. "If you were among a thousand horses,
I would know you immediately."
There was a public-house in Bow Street called "The Brown Bear," which
was famous for a compound liquor, a mixture of beer, eggs, sugar, and
brandy. Incledon and Jack Johnstone were partial to this, and
frequently indulged themselves with it during the evening at the
theatre, and, as a jest, occasionally obtained it in the following
manner. When there happened to be several ladies of the theatre in the
green-room, they took that opportunity to represent to them the hard
case of the widow of a provincial actor, left with her children in
great distress, and to solicit from them a few shillings to enable
them to purchase some _flannel_ during that inclement season. Having
obtained contributions, they despatched the dresser to "The Brown
Bear" for a quart of egg-hot, and had the modesty not to drink it all
themselves, but to present a glass to each of the females who had
subscribed, requesting them to drink to the health of the widow and
the flannel. When Incledon and Johnstone had practised this trick
several times, Quick, the comedian of the same theatre, bribed the
dresser to infuse into the mixture a dose of ipecacuanha, and that
brought the joke to an end. But the mixture thenceforth, without the
last ingredient, was popularly called Flannel.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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