“Lament, you beaus and players every one, The only champion of your cause is gone: The stars are surly, and the fates unkind, Joe Haines is dead, and left his Ass behind! Ah, cruel fate! our patience thus to try, Must Haines depart, while asses multiply? If nothing but a player down would go, There's choice enough besides great Haines the beau! In potent glasses, when the wine was clear, Thy very looks declared thy mind was there. Awful, majestic, on the stage at sight, To play (not work) was all thy chief delight: Instead of danger and of hateful bullets, Roast beef and goose, with harmless legs of pullets! Here lies the Famous Actor, Joseph Haines, Who, while alive, in playing took great pains, Performing all his acts with curious art, Till Death appear'd, and smote him with his dart.” Thomas Dogget, the last of our triumvirate, was “a little lively sprat man.” He dressed neat, and something fine, in a plain cloth coat and a brocaded waistcoat. He sang in company very agreeably, and in public very comically. He was the _Will Kempe_ of his day. He danced the Cheshire Round full as well as the famous _Captain George_, but with more nature and nimbleness. * * Dogget had a sable rival. “In Bartholomew Fair, at the Coach-House on the Pav'd Stones at Hosier-Lane-End, you shall see a Black that dances the Cheshire Rounds, to the admiration of all spectators.” Temp. William Third. Here, too, is Dogget's own bill! “At Parker's and Dogget's Booth, near Hosier-Lane-End, during the time of Bartholomew Fair, will be presented a New Droll, called Fryar Bacon, or the Country Justice; with the Humours of Tollfree the Miller, and his son Ralph, Acted by Mr. Dogget. With variety of Scenes, Machines, Songs, and Dances. Vivat Rex, 1691.” A writer in the Secret Mercury of September 9, 1702, says, “At last, all the childish parade shrunk off the stage by matter and motion, and enter a hobbledehoy of a dance, and Dogget, in old woman's petticoats and red waistcoat, as like Progue Cock as ever man saw. It would have made a stoic split his lungs if he had seen the temporary harlot sing and weep both at once; a true emblem of a woman's tears!” He was a faithful, pleasant actor. He never deceived his audience; because, while they gazed at him, he was working up the joke, which broke out suddenly into involuntary acclamations and laughter. He was a capital face-player and gesticulator, and a thorough master of the several dialects, except the Scotch; but was, for all that, an excellent Sawney. [Illustration: 0026]