| Citation |
VGW(HU.774.125
8 Dec 1774:13 (1218)
London, September 23. The last night of Mr. Foote's
performance this season at the Haymarket, Mr. Fisher, one of
the patentees of Covent Garden Theatre, applied to the
boxkeeper for admittance gratis, and was highly offended his
name was not set down as free of the house. "Foote never
pays for admission into our house, says he; we looked on him
as a brother manager; but by G--d he shall always leave his
money at the door for the future, as I do now." At these
words, he flung into the box. When the humourist heard this
circumstance the next morning, he wrote Mr. Fisher a letter,
purporting, that he wished to inform him he did not derive
his freedom of Covent Garden Theatre from being a brother
manager, but from having written several dramatick pieces
which had been played with great success there, and which,
from an old theatrical custom, entitled him to the liberty
of the house. After having explained this matter, Foote
concluded with assuring Mr. Fisher, that whenever he (Mr.
Fisher) wrote anything for the Haymarket Theatre, which was
worthy the countenance of the publick, he, his wife, his
children, and his children's children, should have places,
gratis, at the Haymarket, not only while they possessed the
third part of the fourth part of the patent they now
enjoyed, but even if they were to divide and sub-divide
their shares into as many semibreves, minims, crotches,
quavers, and semiquavers, as were to be found in any solo or
sonata Mr. Fisher ever composed.
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