His farce of the Crisis was, I believe, played but once, for the benefit of Hopkins, the prompter, when it was favourably received. This Mr Hopkins, who had the regulation of the inferior parts in the theatre, entertained a very low opinion of Mr Holcroft’s powers as an actor; and he remained unnoticed, till Mr Sheridan by chance saw him in the part of Mungo, with which he was so much pleased as to order his weekly salary to be raised to five and twenty shillings. Both his salary and his reputation in the theatre seem now to have remained stationary during this and the following season, though he constantly attended the theatre to perform the most menial parts. The following extract from a letter addressed to Mr Sheridan, will sufficiently explain both his situation and feelings at this time:— ‘Depressed, dejected, chained by Misfortune to the rock of Despair, while the vultures Poverty and Disappointment are feasting with increase of appetite upon me, I have no chance of deliverance but from you. You, Sir, I hope, will be my Alcides! Mr Evans says, he must increase the deductions he already makes from my salary (9s. per week), unless I can obtain your order to the contrary. It is scarcely possible I should maintain my family, which will shortly be increased, upon my present income. Were I not under deductions at the office, my receipts would very little exceed sixty pounds a year; and this I enjoy more through your favour than any consequence I am of to the theatre, though continually employed. But then it is either to sit in a senate or at a card-table, or to walk in a procession, or to sing in a chorus, which is all that the prompter, who has the direction of this kind of business, thinks me capable of. Nay, in so little esteem am I held by Mr Hopkins, that he took the part of a dumb steward in Love for Love from another person, and made me do it; and when by your permission I played Mawworm, he said, had he been well and up, it should not have been so. I do not mention this as a subject of accusation against Mr Hopkins, but merely to shew that if I am consigned to his penetration, I am doomed to everlasting oblivion. ‘Unhappily for me, when I performed Mawworm, you were not at the theatre. Interest rather than vanity makes me say, I was more successful than I had any reason to expect. The audience were in a continual laugh. I played Jerry Sneak for my own benefit last year, and with the same success; and if I could only be introduced to the town in old men and burletta singing, I know from former experience how soon I should be held in a very different estimation from what I am at present. You do not know, Sir, how useful I could be upon a thousand emergencies in the theatre, if I were but thought of; but this I shall never be till your express mandate is issued for that purpose.