The London fairs were attended this year by a remarkable Dutch boy, about eight or nine years of age, whose eyes presented markings of the iris in which sharp-sighted persons, aided perhaps by a considerable development of the organ of wonder, read certain Latin and Hebrew words. In one eye, the observer read, or was persuaded that he could read, the words _Deus meus_; in the other, in Hebrew characters, the word _Elohim_. The boy's parents, by whom he was exhibited, affirmed that his eyes had presented these remarkable peculiarities from his birth. Great numbers of persons, including the most eminent physiologists and physicians of the day, went to see him; and the learned, who examined his eyes with great attention, were as far from solving the mystery as the crowd of ordinary sight-seers. Some of them regarded the case as an imposture, but they were unable to suggest any means by which such a fraud could be accomplished. Others regarded it as "almost" supernatural, a qualification not very easy to understand. The supposed characters were probably natural, and only to be seen as Roman and Hebrew letters by imaginative persons, or those who viewed them with the eye of faith. Whatever their nature, the boy's sight was not affected by them in the slightest degree. The theatrical booths attending the London fairs began at this time to be more numerous, and to present an entertainment of a better character than had hitherto been seen. The elder Penkethman appears to have been the first actor of good position on the stage who set the example of performing in a temporary canvas theatre during the fairs, and it was soon followed by the leading actors and actresses of the royal theatres. In a dialogue on the state of the stage, published in 1702, and attributed to Gildon, Critick calls Penkethman "the flower of Bartholomew Fair, and the idol of the rabble; a fellow that overdoes everything, and spoils many a part with his own stuff." He had then been ten years on the stage, having made his first appearance at Drury Lane in 1692, as the tailor, a small part in _The Volunteers_. Four years later, we find him playing, at the same theatre, such parts as Snap in _Love's Last Shift_, Dr. Pulse in _The Lost Lover_, and Nick Froth in _The Cornish Comedy_. What the author of the pamphlet just quoted says of this actor receives confirmation and illustration from an anecdote told of him, in connection with the first representation of Farquhar's _Recruiting Officer_ at Drury Lane in 1706. Penkethman, who played Thomas Appletree, one of the rustic recruits, when asked his name by Wilks, to whom the part of Captain Plume was assigned, replied, "Why, don't you know my name, Bob? I thought every fool knew that." "Thomas Appletree," whispered Wilks, assuming the office of prompter.