[Footnote 143: Creon (Dryden and Lee's "OEdipus"); Malignii (Porter's "Villain"); Machiavil (Lee's "Cæsar Borgia").]
[Footnote 144: The "Tatler," No. 134: "I must own, there is something very horrid in the publick Executions of an _English_ Tragedy. Stabbing and Poisoning, which are performed behind the Scenes in other Nations, must be done openly among us to gratify the Audience.
When poor _Sandford_ was upon the Stage, I have seen him groaning upon a Wheel, stuck with Daggers, impaled alive, calling his Executioners, with a dying Voice, Cruel Dogs, and Villains! And all this to please his judicious Spectators, who were wonderfully delighted with seeing a Man in Torment so well acted."]
[Footnote 145: Bellchambers notes: "This anecdote has more vivacity than truth, for the audience were too much accustomed to see Sandford in parts of even a comic nature, to testify the impatience or disappointment which Mr. Cibber has described." I may add that I have been unable to discover any play to which the circumstances mentioned by Cibber would apply. But it must not be forgotten that, if the play were damned as completely as Cibber says, it would probably not be printed, and we should thus in all probability have no record of it.]
[Footnote 146: Probably the Earl of Shaftesbury.]
[Footnote 147: Macready seems to have held something like this view regarding "villains." At the present time we have no such prejudices, for one of the most popular of English actors, Mr. E. S. Willard, owes his reputation chiefly to his wonderfully vivid presentation of villainy.]
[Footnote 148: The play in question is "The Triumphs of Virtue," produced at Drury Lane in 1697, and the actress is Mrs. Rogers, who afterwards lived with Wilks. The lines in the Epilogue are:--
"I'll pay this duteous gratitude; I'll do That which the play has done--I'll copy you. At your own virtue's shrine my vows I'll pay, Study to live the character I play."]
[Footnote 149: Chetwood gives a short memoir of this "first-born," who became the wife of Christopher Bullock, and died in 1739. Mrs. Dyer was the only child of Mrs. Bullock's mentioned by Chetwood.]
[Footnote 150: See memoir of Sandford at end of second volume.]
[Footnote 151: It is a very common mistake to state that Cibber founded his playing of Richard III. on that of Sandford. He merely says that he tried to act the part as he knew Sandford _would_ have played it.]