In legitimate comedy, his old men and intriguing valets were excellent; while Lingo, Quotem, Nipperkin, Midas
Sharp, Wiggins, &c. &c. in farce, have seldom met with merrier representatives. His broken English was superb; his country boobies were unsophisticated nature; and his Paddies the richest distillation of whisky and praties. He was the finest burletta singer of his day, and in his patter songs, his rapidity of utterance and distinctness of enunciation were truly wonderful.
His Dicky Suett in pawn for the cheesecakes and raspberry tarts at the pastry-cook's, in St. Martin's Court, was no less faithful than convulsing; Tate Wilkinson, Cooke, Jack Bannister, and Bensley, were absolute resurgams; and if he was not the identical Charles Incledon, "there's no purchase in money."
He was the first actor that introduced Jonathan into England, for the entertainment of his laughter-loving brothers and sisters. The vraisemblance was unquestionable, and the effect prodigious.
A kindred taste for pictures, prints, and theatrical relics, often brought the writer into his company. At his pleasant Thatched Cottage at Kentish Town, rising in the midst of green lawns, flower-beds, and trellis-work, fancifully wreathed and overgrown with jasmine and honey-suckles! was collected a more interesting museum of dramatic curiosities than had ever been brought together by the industry of one man. Garrick medals in copper, silver, and bronze; a lock of his hair; the garter worn by him in Richard the Third; his Abel Drug-ger shoes; his Lear wig; his walking-stick; the managerial chair in which he kept his state in the green- room of Old Drury; the far-famed Casket (now in the possession of the writer) carved out of the mulberry-tree planted by Shakspere; the sandals worn by John Kemble in Coriolanus on the last night of that great actor's performance, and presented by him to his ardent admirer on that memorable occasion, were all regarded by Mathews as precious relics. He was glad of his sandals, he wittily remarked, since he never could hope to stand in his shoes! The Penruddock stick, and Hamlet wig were also carefully preserved. So devoted was he to his art, and so just and liberal in his estimation of its gifted professors, that he lost no opportunity of adding to his interesting store some visible tokens by which he might remember them.