Subsequently, at the minor theatres, plays, which could only be legally acted at the patent houses, were performed, without being converted into burlettas. The proprietors of the patents prosecuted the offenders; but the levying of penalties (£50 nightly) against Englishmen, for producing or acting in Shakspeare's plays, seemed so absurd, that after some toying with the question, in 1842, the government brought forward the bill of 1843, which passed both houses, after Lord Campbell had deprived it of some tyrannic authority it conferred upon the Lord Chamberlain. A "free trade" principle was thereby introduced. The patent houses lost all their privileges, save that of being exempt from a yearly renewal of license to act; and the legitimate drama could be performed in any licensed theatre. At Sadler's Wells, for instance, it was long and worthily upheld by Mr. Phelps, without fear of every actor therein incurring a penalty of £300 weekly, as when he played every night, contrary to law. Since 1843, then, the term of "Their," or "Her Majesty's Servants," is a mere formality, as there is no especial company now privileged to serve or solace royalty. Mr. Webster, who occupies Garrick's chair, in the management of the Theatrical Fund, tells me, that Baddeley was the last actor who wore the uniform of scarlet and gold, prescribed for the "gentlemen of the household," who were patented actors; and that he used to appear in it at rehearsal. He was proud of being one of their "Majesties' servants;"--a title once coveted by all nobly-aspiring actors. They were sometimes nearest to the desired end when they seemed farthest off. "Have you ever heard," asks Garrick, in an unpublished letter to Moody, then at Liverpool, "of a Mrs. Siddons, who is strolling about somewhere near you?" Four months later, Garrick brought her out at Drury Lane. That space of time intervened, between the periods when Edmund Kean was starving and triumphing. And now, in the green-room of Drury Lane Theatre, the busts of Mrs. Siddons and Kean face each other; while that of Shakspeare, opposite Garrick, seems to smile on all three,--_his_ great interpreters, as well as THEIR MAJESTIES' SERVANTS. [Illustration: Mr. Foote as Sir Thomas Lofty.] FOOTNOTES: [118] Buckstone told me that, when young, he starved with a company at Hastings, and that Kean relieved them by leaving his yacht and playing for them two nights, gratis. Mr. York, of Penzance, told us that Kean came with his yacht into Mount's Bay, and that he acted superbly Richard, Othello, and Sir Giles, at the Penzance Theatre,--which is now a carpenter's shop. 1871.--_Doran MS._ [119] Alderman Cox was as much to blame as Kean. Kean, in 1824, writing to Mr. Vizell (?) says: "I imagine Mrs. Cox's age to be about forty-five. When she first flapped her ferret eyes and affections on me, I was about twenty-seven."--_Doran MS._ INDEX.