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SAMUEL FOOTE

(1720-1777)

HE name of Samuel Foote suggests a whimsical, plump little man, with a round face, twinkling eyes, and one of the readiest wits of the eighteenth century. This contemporary of the elder Colman, Cumberland, Mrs. Cowley, and the great Garrick, knew many famous men and women, and they admired as well as feared his talents.

Samuel Foote was born at Truro in 1720. He was a young boy when he first exhibited his powers of mimicry at his father's dinnertable. At that time he did not expect to earn his living by them, for he came of well-to-do people, and his mother, who was of aristocratic birth, inherited a comfortable fortune.

Throughout his school days at Worcester and his college days at Worcester College, Oxford, where he did not remain long enough to take a degree, and the idle days when he was supposed to be studying law at the Temple and was in reality frequenting coffee-houses and drawing-rooms as a young man of fashion, he was establishing a reputation for repartee, bons mots, and satiric imitation. So, when the wasteful youth had squandered all his money, he naturally turned to the stage as offering him the best opportunity. Like many another amateur addicted to a mistaken ambition, Foote first tried tragedy, and made his début as Othello. But in this and in other tragedies he was a failure; so he soon took to writing comic plays with parts especially adapted to himself. The Diversions of the Morning' was the first of a long series, of which 'The Mayor of Garratt,' The Lame Lover,' 'The Nabob,' and 'The Minor,' are among the best known. As these were written from the actor's rather than from the dramatist's point of view, they often seem faulty in construction and crude in literary quality. They are farces rather than true comedies. But they abound in witty dialogue, and in a satire which illuminates contemporary vices and follies.

He

Foote seems to have been curiously lacking in conscience. lived his life with a gayety which no poverty, misfortune, or physical suffering could long dampen. When he had money he spent it lavishly, and when the supply ran short he racked his clever brains to make a new hit. To accomplish this he was utterly unscrupulous, and never spared his friends or those to whom he was indebted,

if he saw good material in their foibles. His victims smarted, but his ready tongue and personal geniality usually extricated him from consequent unpleasantness. Garrick, who aided him repeatedly, and who dreaded ridicule above all things, was his favorite butt, yet remained his friend. The irate members of the East India Company, who called upon him armed with stout cudgels to administer a castigation for an offensive libel in The Nabob,' were so speedily mollified that they laid their cudgels aside with their hats, and accepted his invitation to dinner.

To us, much of his charm has evaporated, for it lay in these very personalities which held well-known people up to ridicule with a precision which made it impossible for the originals to escape recognition. Even irascible Dr. Johnson, who wished to disapprove of him, admitted that there was no one like "that fellow Foote." So this "Aristophanes of the English stage" was mourned when he died at the age of fifty-seven, and a company of his friends and fellow-actors buried him one evening by the dim light of torches in a cloister of Westminster Abbey.

There is often a boisterous unreserve in the plays of Foote, as in other eighteenth-century drama, which revolts modern taste. As they consist of character study rather than incident, mere extracts are apt to appear incomplete and meaningless. Therefore it seems fairer to represent the famous wit not alone by formal citation, but also by some of his bons mots extracted from the collection of William Cooke in his 'Memoirs of Samuel Foote' (2 vols. 1806).

HOW TO BE A LAWYER

From The Lame Lover>

Enter Jack

ERJEANT-So, Jack, anybody at chambers to-day?

SERJEA Jack Fieri Facias from Fetter Lane, about the bill to

be filed by Kit Crape against Will Vizard this term. Serjeant - Praying for an equal partition of plunder? Jack-Yes, sir.

Serjeant- Strange world we live in, that even highwaymen can't be true to each other! [Half aside to himself.] But we shall make Vizard refund; we'll show him what long hands the law has.

Jack-Facias says that in all the books he can't hit a prece

dent.

Serjeant-Then I'll make one myself; Aut inveniam, aut faciam, has been always my motto. The charge must be made for partnership profit, by bartering lead and gunpowder against money, watches, and rings, on Epping Forest, Hounslow Heath, and other parts of the kingdom.

Jack-He says if the court should get scent of the scheme, the parties would all stand committed.

Serjeant - Cowardly rascal! but however, the caution mayn't prove amiss. [Aside.] I'll not put my own name to the bill. Jack-The declaration, too, is delivered in the cause of Roger Rapp'em against Sir Solomon Simple.

Serjeant-What, the affair of the note?

Jack-Yes.

Serjeant - Why, he is clear that his client never gave such a

note.

Jack-Defendant never saw plaintiff since the hour he was born; but notwithstanding, they have three witnesses to prove a consideration and signing the note.

Serjeant-They have!

Jack-He is puzzled what plea to put in.
Serjeant-Three witnesses ready, you say?
Jack-Yes.

Serjeant-Tell him Simple must acknowledge the note [Jack starts]; and bid him against the trial comes on, to procure four persons at least to prove the payment at the Crown and Anchor, the 10th of December.

Jack-But then how comes the note to remain in plaintiff's possession?

Serjeant-Well put, Jack: but we have a salvo for that; plaintiff happened not to have the note in his pocket, but promised to deliver it up when called thereunto by defendant.

Jack-That will do rarely.

Serjeant - Let the defense be a secret; for I see we have able people to deal with. But come, child, not to lose time, have you carefully conned those instructions I gave you?

Jack-Yes, sir.

Serjeant - Well, that we shall see. How many points are the great object of practice?

Jack-Two.

Serjeant-Which are they?

Jack The first is to put a man into possession of what is his right.

Serjeant-The second?

Jack-Either to deprive a man of what is really his right, or to keep him as long as possible out of possession.

Serjeant-Good boy! To gain the last end, what are the best means to be used?

Jack-Various and many are the legal modes of delay.
Serjeant-Name them.

Jack-Injunctions, demurrers, sham pleas, writs of error, rejoinders, sur-rejoinders, rebutters, sur-rebutters, re-plications, exceptions, essoigns, and imparlance.

Serjeant [to himself]- Fine instruments in the hands of a man who knows how to use them. But now, Jack, we come to the point: if an able advocate has his choice in a cause, which if he is in reputation he may readily have, which side should he choose, the right or the wrong?

Jack A great lawyer's business is always to make choice of the wrong.

Serjeant - And prithee, why so?

Jack-Because a good cause can speak for itself, whilst a bad one demands an able counselor to give it a color.

Serjeant-Very well. But in what respects will this answer to the lawyer himself?

Jack-In a twofold way. Firstly, his fees will be large in proportion to the dirty work he is to do.

Serjeant-Secondly?

Jack-His reputation will rise, by obtaining the victory in a desperate cause.

Serjeant — Right, boy. Are you ready in the case of the cow? Jack-Pretty well, I believe.

Serjeant - Give it, then.

Jack First of April, anno seventeen hundred and blank, John a-Nokes was indicted by blank, before blank, in the county of blank, for stealing a cow, contra pacem, etc., and against the statute in that case provided and made, to prevent stealing of cattle.

Serjeant-Go on.

Jack-Said Nokes was convicted upon the said statute.
Serjeant-What followed upon?

Jack-Motion in arrest of judgment, made by Counselor Puzzle. First, because the field from whence the cow was conveyed is laid in the indictment as round, but turned out upon proof to be square.

Serjeant-That's well. A valid objection.

Jack-Secondly, because in said indictment the color of the cow is called red; there being no such things in rerum natura as red cows, no more than black lions, spread eagles, flying griffins, or blue boars.

Serjeant - Well put.

Jack-Thirdly, said Nokes has not offended against form of the statute; because stealing of cattle is there provided against: whereas we are only convicted of stealing a cow. Now, though cattle may be cows, yet it does by no means follow that cows must be cattle.

Serjeant-Bravo, bravo! buss me, you rogue; you are your father's own son! go on and prosper. I am sorry, dear Jack, I must leave thee. If Providence but sends thee life and health, I prophesy thou wilt wrest as much land from the owners, and save as many thieves from the gallows, as any practitioner since the days of King Alfred.

Jack—I'll do my endeavor. [Exit Serjeant.]

IR LUKE

A MISFORTUNE IN ORTHOGRAPHY

From The Lame Lover'

STR A pox o' your law; you make me lose sight of my SiR story.

story. One morning a Welsh coach-maker came with his bill to my lord, whose name was unluckily Lloyd. My lord had the man up: "You are called, I think, Mr. Lloyd?"— “At your Lordship's service, my lord."-"What, Lloyd with an L?" -"It was with an L indeed, my lord." "Because in your part

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of the world I have heard that Lloyd and Floyd were synonymous, the very same names. "Very often indeed, my Lord.” -“But you always spell yours with an L?" "Always." — "That, Mr. Lloyd, is a little unlucky; for you must know I am now paying my debts alphabetically, and in four or five years you might have come in with an F; but I am afraid I can give you no hopes for your L. Ha, ha, ha!"

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