Page:Notes and Queries - Series 11 - Volume 10.djvu/8

 NOTES AND QUERIES. m a. x. JULY 4, 191*.

Inchbald' (2: 83), refers to this connexion: " The crowd at a manager's door electrically attracts upon the publishers, and a play that draws is already destined to the press." I have therefore "accepted the indications of editions as given on the title-pages, but have also made notes of similarity in letterpress.

The arrangement of the following Biblio- graphy is chronological, by first editions ; later editions are listed with the first, and not in chronological sequence. The references to volumes are in Arabic figures followed by a colon. ? (Early, certainly before October, 1777.) Some

articles in Whitehall Evening Post.

Vide ' Memoirs,' 1902, Waller-Glover ed., p. 87.

? Scotch songs and other songs for Vauxhall.

' Memoirs,' p. 87, merely state that he had written some Scotch songs, including one beginning " Down the bourne and through the mead."

1777. " Elegies. I. On the death of Samuel Foote, Esq. II. On Age. By Thomas Hoi- croft, of the Theatre-Royal, Drury-Lane. 4to. 1. London : Bew. 1777." This was probably published in November- Samuel Foote died 21 Oct. As the book was reviewed in The Monthly Review for Decem- ber, 1777 (57: 489), and listed as published in November in the November, 1777, number of The London Magazine (46: 575), and the same month in The Universal Magazine (61: 279), we date it within the month, and obviously not " in the spring of the follow- ing year," as Hazlitt says(' Memoirs,' p. 87).

? (Before 1779.) ' Maid of the Vale,' an opera, from ' La Buona Figliuola ' of Carlo Goldoni. Not acted and never printed. ' Memoirs ' (p. 86) say that it was not brought forward. ' Biographia Dramatica,' however, speaks of an edition, Dublin, 1775, which I have not seen, and which I doubt to be Hoi- croft's play.

1778. ' The Crisis, or Love and Fear,' a musical

afterpiece.

Written 1777-8, not printed. Produced at Drury Lane, 1 May, 1778, for the benefit of Miss Hopkins and ill-received. Played but once. ' Memoirs,' pp. 83-4 ; Oulton, ' History of the Theatres of London,' 2: 188 ; Genest ; ' Biographia Dramatica,' 1: 1, 353 ; 2: 142. It is as ' Love and Famine ' that the sub -title appears in the ' Memoirs ' (p. 83), though Genest, Oulton, and the ' Biographia

Dramatica ' give the title as ' Love and Fear.' Periodical reference to the play a* ' The Crisis, or Love and Fear,' is to be found in The European Magazine (1: 49, 1782, and 22: 403, 1792).

1778. Contributions to The Toicn and Country Magazine :

' The Philosopher.'

' History of Manthorn the Enthusiast.'

Other articles (?).

Ascribed to him in article in European Magazine, 1: 49.

177!). ' A Rondeau. Written by Mr. Holcroft.'

This begins " Tell me when, inconstant rover." Universal Magazine, August, 1779= (65: 98).

1779. (Written during the summer, ' Memoirs/ p. 86.) ' The Shepherdess of the Alps, a comic opera.'

Not acted and not printed. Indisputable evidence that Holcroft did a piece of this- title is to be found in direct mention of it, and of his work on it, in a letter to Mrs. Sheridan (' Memoirs,' p. 86).

" The Shepherdess of the Alps : a comic opera in three acts as it is performed at the Theatre- Royal in Covent Garden. London : Printed for G. Kearsley, No. 46, Fleet Street. 1780."

The anonymous publication of a play of this title, acted at Covent Garden, 18 Jan.,

1780. would seem to settle the question of acting and printing, and so the 1902, Waller- Glover, edition of the ' Memoirs ' in a note indicates this as the play mentioned by Holcroft to Mrs. Sheridan when he was begging production. But the note is wrong. 'The Thespian Dictionary' of 1800, the- ' Biographia Dramatica ' in 1812, and the ' English Stage ' of Genest, in 1832, all give- it to Charles Dibdin (1745-1814). Oulton, in 1796, gives no author ; but there is quite an array of evidence for the Dibdin ascription, as is shown by MB. E. RIMBAUI/T DIBDIN, who includes the title in the Bibliography of his great-grandfather (' N. & Q.,' 9 S. viii. 279), and who, answering a lengthy claim for the piece as Holcroft's, which I pre- sented to him by letter, writes to me, " The style of the songs and dialogue is almost certainly Dibdin's " a stronger claim than I can make for Holcroft.

MR. E. R. DIBDIN also submits the follow- ing facts (cf. ' N. & Q.,' 11 S. ix. 68) :

Kearsley was Dibdin's usual publisher at that time.

In his 'Professional Life' (1803) Dibdin refers to the production of this piece in terms.