The apparition of Sheridan, meteor-like, in the laborious, active, well-regulated lives of Mrs. Siddons and her brother, and the history of his professional intercourse with them, is one of the greatest proofs of the extraordinary glamour exercised by the specious Irishman on all who came under his personal influence. After Garrick’s retirement from the management of Drury Lane, the overwhelming success of the _School for Scandal_, and the engagement of Mrs. Siddons, staved off financial difficulties for a time; but no amount of receipts were sufficient to withstand Sheridan’s reckless private expenditure and unbusiness-like habits. The brilliant Brinsley did not recognise that other qualities besides the power to write a good play, or make a great speech, were necessary for the management of such a concern as Garrick’s Drury Lane. The truth, however, was borne home to him by the utter chaos that ultimately ensued: actors unpaid, and the treasury repeatedly emptied by the proprietor himself before the money had been diverted into its legitimate channels. Yet the receipts at the doors amounted to nearly sixty thousand pounds a year. Things would have gone better could he have been persuaded entirely to abstain from management, but he persistently interfered with his subordinates. When a dramatist was employed in reading his tragedy to the performers, Brinsley would saunter in, yawning, at the fifth act, with no other apology than, having sat up late two nights running, he was unable to appear in time; or he would arrive drunk, go into the green-room, ask the name of a well-known actor who was on the stage, and bid them never to allow him to play again. He was once told, with some spirit, by one of the company, that he rarely came there, and then never but to find fault. Things grew worse and worse. It was piteous to hear the complaints of the actors and staff of the theatre, who found it impossible to obtain payment of their weekly salaries. The shifts and devices which he employed to escape from their importunity was a constant subject of jest. At last he was obliged to let the reins of management fall from his incapable hands. They were taken up by King; but he in turn soon found the position intolerable, and the stern and businesslike Kemble was called in to restore discipline among unruly players whose salaries were overdue, and amongst upholsterers and decorators who had never been paid for the pieces they had mounted.