But she had a mind of her own and could speak up on occasion. When she was ten years old her father lived in a house on Poland Street, next door to a wig-maker, who supplied perukes to the judges and lawyers of London. The children of the wig-maker and the Burney children played together in a little garden behind the former's house, and one day they went into the wig-maker's house, and each put on one of the fine wigs he had for sale. Then they began to play in the garden until one of the perukes, which was very fine and worth over ten guineas, fell into a tub of water and lost all its curl. The wig-maker came out, fished out the peruke, and declared it was entirely ruined. With that he spoke very angrily to his children, when suddenly the quiet Fanny stepped forth, and with the manner of an old lady said, "What is the use of talking so much about an accident? The wig is wet, to be sure, and it was a very good wig, but words will do no good, because, sir, what's done can't be undone." The wig-maker listened in great surprise, and then made Fanny a little bow. "Miss Burney speaks with the wisdom of ages," he said, and without another word went into the house. Among all their father's friends the Burney children thought there was no one quite so amusing as the great actor David Garrick. He would drop in at all hours of the day, and always playing some new part. Sometimes he would sit still and listen to Dr. Burney talk on the history of music, and gradually his face and manner would change until the children could scarcely believe he was the same man who had entered the room a short time before. He would seem to become an old crafty man before their very eyes, or a villain from the slums of London, or a Spanish grandee for the first time in England. Sometimes he would appear at the house in disguise and give a new name to the maid and appear in the dining-room as a stranger to the family. Once he arrived at the door in an old, ill-fitting wig and shabby clothes and the servant refused to admit him, taking him for a beggar. "Egad, child," he said to the maid, "you don't guess whom you have the happiness to see! Do you know that I am one of the first geniuses of the age? You would faint away upon the spot if you could only imagine who I am!" The maid, very much startled, let him pass, and he shambled into the house, again pretending to be a beggar. The children were always delighted to have him come, and Fanny in particular, because she had a talent for mimicking people herself, and she liked to study him. He often sent them tickets to see him act at Drury Lane Theatre, and there they saw their friend play the greatest rôles of the English stage as no actor had ever played them before.