Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 11.djvu/398

 chancery proceedings were continued for some years, with sufficiently damaging results to the management. At the end of nine years Macklin won his cause (Memoirs of Macklin, 1804, pp. 271-2). New pieces, including Goldsmith's 'Good-natured Man,' were, however, produced, and new actors, among whom were Spranger Barry and Miss Dancer, were brought on the stage. Colman, moreover, revived ' Cymbeline ' on 28 Dec. 1767, and produced a version of 'King Lear,' altered by himself, on 20 Feb. 1768. In four acts of this Shakespeare, with some alteration, is substituted for Tate's miserable ver- sion. In the last act a happy termination is supplied. Colman's additions, though commended in their day, contrast, it is needless to say, unpleasantly with the original text with which they are associated. Beaumont and Fletcher's comedy, 'The Beggar's Bush,' was given on 14 Dec. 1767 as an opera, entitled 'The Royal Merchant.' At this time Colman was the subject of an onslaught from William Kenrick in a satire entitled 'A Poetical Epistle to George Colman.' Colman underwent a great loss in the death (3 July 1769) of Powell, his partner, friend, and principal actor. Two years later, in April 1771, Colman lost his wife. For Powell Colman wrote a prologue, which was recited at Bristol for the benefit of the actor's family by Holland, and an epitaph, which is on Powell's tomb in St. Mary Redclyffe at Bristol. In November 1771 the differences between the partners were settled, and on 30 Nov. of the same year Colman had a fit in the theatre, from which he recovered. On 15 March 1773 the management produced Goldsmith's 'She stoops to conquer.' Colman resigned, on 26 May 1774, his post of manager at Covent Garden. In addition to the pieces named, he had during his seven years of management produced, among other works, his own 'Oxonian in Town,' a two-act comedy, 7 Nov. 1767; 'Man and Wife,' a three-act comedy, 7 Oct. 1769 ; 'The Portrait,' a burletta from the French, 22 Nov. 1770 ; 'The Fairy Prince,' a masque founded on Ben Jonson's ' Oberon,' 12 Nov. 1771 ; 'Achilles in Petticoats,' an opera in two acts, altered from Gay, 16 Dec. 1773 ; an alteration of 'Comus,' 16 Oct. 1773 ; and the 'Man of Business,' a five-act comedy extracted from Terence and other writers, 31 Jan. 1774. After a retirement to Bath, Colman, who spent most of his time at the Literary Club, started in 1764, in the company of Dr. Johnson, Boswell, Beauclerck, Bunbury, &c., contributed to the 'London Packet' some essays called 'The Gentleman.' The first number appeared on 10 July 1775, the last, which is signed 'The Blackguard,' on 4 Dec. 1775. Among his associates, past or present, were Woodfall, master of the Stationers' Company, Glover, author of 'Leonidas,' Hawkesworth, Goldsmith, Smollett. On 7 March 1776 Garrick, whose feud with Colman had been healed, and who had maintained with him an active correspondence, produced ' The Spleen, or Islington Spa,' a two-act comedy of Colman, and on 13 Jan. 1776 a version by Colman of Ben Jonson's ' Epicoane, or the Silent Woman.' In 1776 the result of negotiations with Foote was the transfer to Colman of the Haymarket Theatre. Foote died on 21 Oct. 1777, relieving Colman from an annuity of 1,600l., which was part of the transaction. Engaging Henderson, who was a country actor, with Palmer, Parsons, Bannister, Miss Farren, and others, and bringing forward Edwin, whom Foote had kept in the background, Colman got together a good company, with which the Haymarket opened with ' The English Merchant ' on 15 May 1777 ; after which, on account of the players being engaged at Drury Lane, it closed for twenty days. On the 8th of the same month Colman supplied the epilogue to 'The School for Scandal,' produced at Drury Lane. The season of 1778 opened on 18 May with Colman's unprinted 'Female Chevalier,' an alteration of ' The Artful Husband ' of Taverner, intended to turn to advantage the curiosity stirred by the Chevalier d'Eon. ' The Suicide,' a four-act drama of Colman's, also never printed, followed on 11 July with little success. Better fortune attended his alteration of Beaumont and Fletcher's ' Bonduca,' produced 30 July 1778. With his own prelude, 'The Manager in Distress,' Colman began on 30 May his season of 1780. On 2 Sept. 1780 he played his extravaganza (unprinted), 'The Genius of Nonsense.' The chief novelty of the season of 1781 was the ' Beggar's Opera,' played with women in the male characters, and vice versa. This absurd experiment proved very remunerative. On 16 Aug. 1782 was produced 'The Female Dramatist,' the first dramatic essay of George Colman the younger. In 1783 Colman published a translation of Horace's 'Art of Poetry,' with a commentary, in which he advanced a theory concerning the poem which won the approval of Hurd, bishop of Worcester, Walpole, and the Wartons. 'The Election of the Managers,' an 'occasional prelude' of Colman's, served, 2 June 1784, for the reopening of the Haymarket. With Reynolds, Burke, Sir John Hawkins, and others Colman was pall-bearer at the funeral of Dr. Johnson, 20 Dec. 1784. After the close of the theatre in 1785 Colman, then at Margate, had a stroke of paralysis. Some