Booth, Mrs. Wilks, and himself. Booth sold a half of his share to a man named Highmore, who knew nothing of theatrical matters; Mrs. Wilks appointed one Ellis to act for her, who was equally unqualified, and Cibber foreseeing nothing but ruin, closed with an offer of Highmore, and sold his share for 3000 guineas. About this time, likewise, a rage for theatrical speculation sprang up. Odell built a theatre in Goodman's Fields, in 1729; Giffard another in 1732, and Rich opened the theatre in Covent Garden on the 7th of December of the same year.
Fielding, with his Great Mogul's Company, took the Haymarket, and the ferocious satires of that extraordinary writer induced the government to pass the celebrated bill limiting the number of theatres, and obliging all managers to submit their pieces to the supervision of a licenser.
We now recur to Cibber's dramatic career. After the comparative failure of his last play,[1] he was meditating what new line he could take up, when an event occurred which he had the skill to avail himself of, and he adroitly made a public calamity minister to his private benefit. The rebellion in Scotland, in favour of the Pretender, gave him the cue, and he accordingly made a formal and vigorous attack on Jacobitism in his play, "The Non-Juror," founded on the "Tartuffe," of Molière. His success was great, although such success depends more on the temper of the audience than the merit of the piece, and is always one-sided; for, though he pleased many, he offended many, who could still remain faithful to their earlier predilections. He acquired, however, a noisy popularity. Lintot, the publisher, gave him a hundred guineas for the copyright, an unprecedented price at that time; and on presenting a copy to King George I. his magnanimity did not restrain him from pocketing £200 as the reward of his triumph over the fallen.
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