Memoirs Of Joseph Grimaldi

MEMOIRS OF JOSEPH GBIIIAIDI.

CHAPTER VI.
1798.

Tribulations connected with " Old Lucas," the constable, with an account of the
subsequent proceedings before Mr. Blamire, the magistrate, at Hatton
Garden, and the mysterious appearance of a silver staff—A guinea wager
with a jocose friend on the Dartford-road—The Prince of Wales, Sheridaa,
and the Crockery G-irl.

AT this 'time all the ground upon which Claremont, Myddle-
ton, Lloyd, and Wilmington Squares have since been built,
together with the numberless streets which diverge from them
in all directions, was then pasture-land or garden-ground, bear-
ing the name of Sadler's Wells Eields. Across these fields it was
of course necessary that Grrinialdi should pass and repass in
going to and returning from the theatre. Upon this particular
morning, a mob, consisting of at least a thousand persons, were
actively engaged here in hunting an over-driven ox,—a diver-
sion then in very high repute among the lower orders of the
metropolis, but which is now, happily for the lives and limbs of
the more peaceable part of the community, falling into desue-
tude : there not being quite so many open spaces or waste
grounds to chase oxen in, as there used to be a quarter of a cen-
tury ago. The mob was a very dense one, comprised of the
worst characters; and perceiving that it would be a task of
some difficulty to clear a passage through it, he paused for a
minute or two, deliberating whether he had not better turn
back at once and take the longer but less obstructed route by
the Angel at Islington, when a young gentleman whom he had
never seen before,, after eyeing him with some curiosity, walked
iip and said—

"Is not your name Grrimaldi, sir ?"
Beard, Bed Beard, and Grey Beardj" in which the motley hero of Pantomime,