The London pleasure gardens of the eighteenth centuryWroth, Warwick William
History
The London pleasure gardens of the eighteenth century
Wroth, Warwick William
London (England) -- History -- 18th century; Parks -- England -- London -- History
A masquerade of 1792 (14 February) was attended by Mrs. Jordan,
“supported” (as the newspapers said) “between the friendly arms of
the Prince of Wales and the Duke of Clarence.” Mr. Petit was good as
a man walking in his sleep with a candle, and amid the usual crowd of
harlequins, sailors and flower-girls, “a monkey of the largest size was
offensively dexterous.”[237] At another masquerade this year (16 May)
a Guy Faux, a ‘Bath Maccarony,’ an African Princess, and three or four
Romps attracted attention.
On May 7th, 1792, the exhibition called Mount Etna was introduced and
remained popular at Ranelagh for several years. A special building with
a scene designed by G. Marinari, ‘painter to the Opera,’ was prepared
for it in the gardens. The idea was evidently borrowed from Torré’s
Forge of Vulcan, the great attraction at the Marylebone Gardens some
twenty years earlier. The scene represented Mount Etna and the Cavern
of Vulcan with the ‘Cyclops’ forging the armour of Mars, “as described
(the advertisements add) in the Aeneid of Virgil.” To an accompaniment
of music “compiled from Gluck, Haydn, Giardini, and Handel,” we see the
‘Cyclops’ going to work. “The smoke thickens, the crater on the top of
Etna vomits forth flames, and the lava rolls dreadful along the side of
the mountain. This continues with increasing violence till there is a
prodigious eruption, which finishes with a tremendous explosion.”
On June 27th, 1793, the Chevalier D’Eon fenced in the Rotunda with M.
Sainville, and received the congratulations of the Prince of Wales and
Mrs. Fitzherbert.[238]
In 1797 (April) there was an enjoyable masquerade, at which there
reigned (we are told) “good nature and pleasant hilarity, without
riot”: all this, in spite of a crowd of imaginary Dutch skippers,
lunatics, coachmen, quack doctors and watercress girls.
At a concert in 1798 (June) Incledon and Madame Mara sang. In 1799 a
January masquerade was diversified by a drawing for fifty twelfth cakes
as prizes for the masks.
The Directors now began to offer prizes for regattas and volunteer
shooting-matches, and a few splendid entertainments mark the closing
years of Ranelagh.
On 2 June, 1802, Boodle’s Club gave an elegant dance at which the
ladies “wore white and silver, ornamented with laurel”--and diamonds,
and amused themselves by drawing prizes of trinkets in a Lottery
Booth. On the 28 June (1802) the Picnic Society gave an “afternoon
breakfast,” and at five o’clock Garnerin, the French aeronaut, and
Captain Sowden ascended in a balloon from the gardens.[239]
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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