Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 63.djvu/428

 pone,’ and Fidelia in the ‘Plain Dealer.’ In Mrs. Centlivre's ‘Artifice’ she was the first Louisa on 2 Oct. 1722, and in Steele's ‘Conscious Lovers’ the first Phillis on 7 Nov. She also played Hoyden in the ‘Relapse,’ Edging in the ‘Careless Husband,’ Sylvia in the ‘Recruiting Officer,’ Frances in ‘Ram Alley,’ and other parts.

During the season of 1724–5 she disappears. On 4 Oct. 1725, as the Country Wife, she made her entry on the stage of Lincoln's Inn Fields, at which house for the next seven seasons she remained. In her first year she played Charlot Weldon in ‘Oroonoko,’ Desdemona, Euphronia in ‘Æsop,’ Lady Fanciful in ‘Provoked Wife,’ Flippanta in the ‘Confederacy,’ Dorinda in the ‘Beaux' Stratagem,’ Belinda, Gatty in ‘She would if she could,’ and Juletta in ‘Pilgrim.’ She was also the first Graciana in ‘Capricious Lovers,’ Scuttle in ‘Female Fortune-teller,’ and Mariana in Southerne's ‘Money the Mistress.’ Subsequently she was the original Miss Severne, disguised as Sir Harry Truelove, in Welsted's ‘Dissembled Wanton’ on 14 Dec. 1726, and Olympias in ‘Philip of Macedon,’ and played Miranda in ‘Woman's a Riddle,’ Cordelia, Leonora in the ‘Mistake,’ Angelica in the ‘Gamester,’ Selima in ‘Tamerlane,’ Miranda in ‘Busybody,’ Schoolboy, Kitty Carrot in ‘What d'ye call it?’ ‘Lucia in ‘Cato,’ Fair Quaker, Lady Lurewell in ‘Constant Couple,’ Lady Townly, Hippolita in ‘She would and she would not,’ Mrs. Ford, Estifania in ‘Rule a Wife and have a Wife,’ and Mrs. Conquest in ‘Lady's Last Stake.’ Her original parts comprise: Ariaspe in Sturmy's ‘Sesostris’ on 17 Jan. 1728, Artesia in Barford's ‘Virgin Queen’ on 7 Dec., Isabella in the ‘Rape’ on 25 Nov. 1729, Myrtilla in an alteration by Gay of his ‘Wife of Bath’ on 19 Jan. 1730, Hilaret in Fielding's ‘Coffee House Politician’ on 4 Dec. (in this piece, probably given previously at the Haymarket, she spoke a not too decent epilogue); Hermione in Theobald's ‘Orestes’ on 3 April 1731, and Violetta in Kelly's ‘Married Philosopher,’ 25 March 1732, a translation apparently of ‘Le Philosophe Marié of Destouches.’ On the opening performance at the new theatre in Covent Garden she played Millamant in the ‘Man of the World,’ and was seen during the season as Bellaria in ‘Tunbridge Walks,’ Olivia in the ‘Plain Dealer,’ and Eudosia in ‘Siege of Damascus.’ She was on 9 Jan. 1734 the original Betty in Popple's ‘Lady's Revenge,’ played Lady Betty Modish in the ‘Careless Husband,’ and had an original part, probably Lady Willit, in Gay's ‘Distressed Wife’ on 5 March 1734.

The last part to which Mrs. Younger's name appears is Victoria in ‘Fatal Marriage’ on 4 May, though a day or two later she probably played in the ‘Busybody.’ She retired at the close of the season 1733–4, and about the same date she married the Hon. John Finch, fourth son of Daniel, earl of Nottingham; he died on 12 Feb. 1763. Twenty years before his marriage to her Finch was stabbed all but fatally in a quarrel by the famous Sally Salisbury, alias Pridden (, Corresp. ed. Cunningham, ii. 79n.; see also Cat. Nos. 1216, 1217); he was member of parliament for Higham Ferrers (1734–44). She had by him a daughter Elizabeth, who married, on 2 June 1757, John Mason, of Greenwich. Mrs. Younger, otherwise Mrs. Finch, died on 24 Nov. 1762. She was a pleasing actress, and, when she retired from the stage, left behind her a good reputation, artistic and social. From the parts of sprightly chambermaid, she rose to play the leading characters in comedy. Her essays in tragedy did little for her reputation. Her most popular parts were Belinda in the ‘Old Bachelor,’ Miranda in the ‘Busybody,’ and the Country Wife.

[Genest's Account of the English Stage; Hist. of the English Stage (attributed to Betterton); Davies's Dramatic Miscellanies; Walpole's Correspondence, ed. Cunningham; Doran's Stage Annals, ed. Lowe; Gent. Mag. 1763; Collins's Peerage, ed. 1812, iii. 403; Notes and Queries, 9th ser. iii. 69, 153.]  YOUNGER, JOHN (1785–1860), of St. Boswells, writer on angling, shoemaker, and poet, the youngest of the six children of William Younger, a border shoemaker, by his wife, Jean Henderson, was born at Longnewton in the parish of Ancrum, Roxburghshire, on 5 July 1785. His grandfather, John Younger, had put by 900l. as a gardener in England, but lost it all by an unlucky speculation. He himself was put to the last when barely nine. The countryside was a poor one, even before the black famine of the closing years of the eighteenth century, and while the quartern loaf stood at 2s. John had some sharp straits to live through, the details of which supply some truly pathetic passages in his ‘Autobiography.’ He soon surpassed any poacher of the day in his knowledge of fur and feather, but, above all, he became an unrivalled angler. When things began to mend he married (9 Aug. 1811) Agnes Riddle, and settled at St. Boswells, some three miles from Longnewton, as the village shoemaker. Having bought a copy of Burns for sixpence at St. Boswells fair, John began to feel that he too was a poet, but it was not until 1834 that he published