In 1733 and 1734, Shakspeare was in the ascendant at the theatre at the Tailors' Hall, in the Cowgate, varied by the works of Gay, Congreve, and Mrs. Centlivre; pantomime, ballet and farce; with excellent scenery, and machinery,--the troop occasionally visiting Dundee, Montrose, and Aberdeen. Dramatic taste spread to schools, where the pupils began to act plays. While this was confined to "Cato," "Julius Cæsar," and the like, there was no harm done; but when the Perth schoolboys, at Candlemas 1735, took to acting "George Barnwell," the Kirk Session once more bestirred itself, and shut up the house built by Allan Ramsay, in Carrubber's Close.[68] Subsequently, Ryan, the actor, laid the first stone of a new theatre in the Canongate, which was opened in 1746, but without sanction of law, which, however, was not so rigorous as in earlier days, when Lord Somerville, to screen a principal performer from stern pains and penalties, engaged him in his household, as butler! To this theatre, in 1756, the Rev. John Home, then thirty-two years of age, brought his tragedy of "Douglas." He had been the successor of Blair (of the _Grave_), in the living of Athelstanford; and had left it, to fight against the Pretender, at Falkirk, where he was captured. The reverend warrior ultimately escaped to England. Collins dedicated to him his _Ode on the Superstitions of the Highlands_. Home returned northward, full of the love of poetry, and powerful in the expression of it. His great dramatic essay was a grievous offence against the laws of his church, to the practical duties of which he had again surrendered himself. Had it not been that Sarah Ward was willing to help author and friends, even the reading of "Douglas" would never have come off. Sarah lent her sitting-room in the Canongate, to Home; and Digges was present and silent, for once, with Mrs. Ward, to enact audience. The characters were thus cast; and a finer group of intellectual persons sitting as they could best catch the light, in an obscure room of the Canongate, cannot well be imagined. Lord Randolph (or Barnard, according to the original cast) was read by Robertson; Glenalvon, by the greater historian, David Hume; Old Norval, by the famous Dr. Carlyle, the minister of Musselburgh; and Douglas, by Home, in right of authorship. Lady Randolph was allotted to Professor Ferguson; and the part of Anna was read by Dr. Blair, the minister of the High Church, and author of the once popular sermons!