His mind, however, was healthy only for the night; fitful seasons there were in which he tried to act in the country; but he soon became diseased again, and, shut up in a madhouse, poor Reddish might be seen on visitors' days at St. Luke's, a sad and humiliating spectacle, herding among the lunatics in that once popular place of cruel exhibition. Two old feelings survived the otherwise complete wreck--his love of good living, and his dislike of inferior company. He drank greedily his draught of milk, out of a wooden bowl, but the "gentleman of easy fortune" complained bitterly of his forced association with the low people who thronged the gallery. Poor Reddish! he was moved to better air, improved diet, and less plebeian society,--in the Asylum at York. The outside world had been by him long forgotten, and he forgotten by the world, when he happily died there, not one hour too soon, in the last month of the year 1785. Little more than eight years later his stepson, George Canning, made his maiden-speech in the Commons, as Tory member for Newport, and _failed_; but like noble actors in another house, he gained ultimate success, by turning his experience to advantage. About the same time disappeared from the London stage, Ross, who, like Barton Booth, was a Westminister boy, and the son of a gentleman. Less fortunate than Booth, his father discarded him, for going on the stage. Ross, the actor, had for school-fellow Churchill, the poet--John Nicoll then being master; and Booth had for condiscipulus the poet Rowe, under the famous mastership of Busby. Like Booth, Ross first tried his fortune on the Dublin stage in 1749, when he came to London to be of the school of Garrick, as Booth came to be a follower of Betterton. Both men had pleasing and powerful voices and fine figures, but Ross's countenance lacked expression. Ross, like Booth, played Young Bevil with great ability, and, as the Ghost of Banquo, produced almost as much effect as Booth in the Ghost of Hamlet's father. Here, however, all parallel ends. Wanting Booth's industry, Ross never raised himself to Booth's level; he originated very few characters, wasted his powers, grew fat and indolent, and lost what Barry kept to the last,-- "A voice as musically clear As ever pour'd, perhaps, upon the ear." With a passion for the stage, and every qualification but industry, he marred his prospects by letting "mere chance conduct him every night," till the town wearied of him. He had been at Drury Lane, from 1751, when he first appeared as Young Bevil, to 1757; and at Covent Garden, where he commenced with Hamlet,[31] from that year to 1768, when he became manager of the new theatre in the Canongate, Edinburgh.[32]