But let us get back to our own theatres, and to the manners of audiences, between the commencement of this century and the coming of Edmund Kean. Such manners are most strikingly illustrated by the O. P., or _old price_ riots of 1809. In ten months a new Covent Garden Theatre had risen, at an expense of £150,000. Smirke had taken for his model the Acropolis of Athens, and in a narrow, flat street, had built, or hidden, his imitation of the mountain fortress of the Greeks. The house was unnecessarily large, and attendant costs so heavy, that the proprietors raised the price of admission to the boxes from 6s. to 7s., and to the pit, from 3s. 6d. to 4s. They had also converted space, usually allotted to the public--the third tier, in fact--into private boxes, at a rental of £300 a year for each. The pit and box public resolved to resist, and the gallery public having a grievance in its defective construction,--the view being impeded by solid divisions, and the _run_ of the seats being so steep that the occupants could see only the legs of the actors at the back of the stage,--joined the insurrection. The house opened on the 18th of September 1809, with "Macbeth," and the "Quaker." The audience was dense and furious. They sat with their backs to the stage, or stood on the seats, their hats on, to hiss and hoot the Kemble family especially; not a word of the performance was heard, for when the audience were not denouncing the Kembles, they were singing and shouting at the very top of their then fresh voices. The upper gallery was so noisy, that soldiers, of whom 500 were in the house, rushed in to capture the rioters, who let themselves down to the lower gallery, where they were hospitably received. The sight of the soldiers increased the general exasperation. "It was a noble sight," said the _Times_, "to see so much just indignation in the public mind;" and that paper scorned the idea that the prices were to be raised, to pay such vanities as were exhibited by Mrs. Siddons and John Kemble, who were on the stage "with clothes on their backs worth £500." Such was the first of nearly seventy nights of riot, out of which the public issued with a cry of "victory," but under a substantial defeat. In alluding to this matter, it is only necessary to notice the additions to, or the variations in, the riot--in the conduct of which the proceedings of the first night were imitated, with this exception, that the insurrectionists did not enter the theatre till half-price. First came the introduction of placards and banners, for furnishing pins to affix one of which, in front of the boxes, a lady received an ovation; then speeches were made against the exorbitant salaries of the Kembles, and prisoners were made of the speakers; magistrates appeared on the stage to read the Riot Act, and the public, preparing to rush on the stage itself, were deterred by the sudden opening of all the traps.