WILLIAM HENRY WEST BETTY.

New Zealand Times, Volume XXIX, Issue 4243, 26 October 1874, Page 4

WILLIAM HENRY WEST BETTY.

The death of this gentleman ia announced in the latest news from home. Probably not one in fifty of the present generation in New Zealand has ever heard the name before, Mr. Betty having outlived his fame for a period reaching very near to “ three score years and ten;” but aa he made no small stir in hia time, and ia the last link in the chain that connects us with the theatre of the days of Sheridan, Pox, Pitt, Siddons, Kemble, and Elliston, he is entitled to a passing notice. “ His first appearance at Covent Garden was December 1, 1801. Aa early as one o’clock the people began to pour into the piazzas and fill Bow-street. In the house was a large body of constables, and outside a strong detachment of the Guards. Thousands pressed forward when the doors opened, and the house being immediately filled, the crowd made ineffectual efforts to press back. The shrieks and screams of the choking, trampled, people were terrible. Eights for places grew ; the constables were beaten back ; the boxes were invaded ; the pit-way being narrow, many went round to the flt»x-ofiice, paid box prices, and passed from the boxes into the pit. The heat was so fearful that men all but lifeless were lifted up and dragged through the boxes into the lobbies which had windows. This young Eoscius is said to have drawn an average of £650 a night to Drury Bane as Young Nerval. At first he was paid £SO a night, but in three nights this was raised to £IOO.”—W. Clarke Eussell. “ It would be impossible to describe the enthusiasm which he excited—it seemed an epidemic mania; at the doors of the theatre where he was to perform for the evening, the people crowded as early as one o’clock ; and when the hour of admittance came the rush was so dreadful, that numbers were nightly injured by the pressure. One hundred pounds a night was now given to young Betty; and he soon quitted the stage with a large fortune, accumulated at a period in life when other boys are only on the point of entering a public school.”—“Percy Anecdotes.” “ While young Betty was in all his glory, X went with Pox and Mrs. Pox, after dining with them in Arlington Street, to see him act 4 Hamlet;’ and during the play scene, Pox, to my infinite surprise, said, ‘ This is finer than Garrick.” —Sam Eogers. “Northcote then spoke of the boy, as he always called him. Ho asked if I had ever seen him act*; and I said, yes, and was one of his admirers. He answered, ‘ Oh, yes, it was such a beautiful effusion of natural sensibility.’ Humphreys, the artist, said 1 He had never seen the little Apollo off the pedestal before.’ ’’ —Hazlitt’s ‘ Conversations with Northcote.’ As is the case with all phenomenons from Master Betty through Mias Crummies down to the last that “ tickled her under the chin” at the Theatre in Wellington, public opinion was much exercised on the merits and demerits of the young Betty, it is but fair therefore to look upon the other side of the picture. “I hate all prodigies—partly, I fancy, because I have no faith in them. Under this prejudice I saw his first performance, and was bo disgusted by a monotony, a preaching-like tone, that I gave up my place at the end of the third act, and walked behind the scenes, where myriads of critics were gathered, to listen to their remarks. Here some vociferated that Garrick had returned to the stage ; whilst others whispered, ‘ The Bottle Conjurer" has come again,”—Mrs. Inchbald. “The popularity of that baby-faced boy, who possessed not even the elements of a good actor, was an hallucination in the public mind, and a disgrace to our theatrical history. It enabled managers to give him sums for his childish ranting that were never accorded to the acting of a Garrick or a Siddons. His bust was stuck up in marble by the best sculptors ; he was painted by Opie and Northcote ; and the verses that were poured out upon him were in a style of idolatrous adulation. Actors and actresses of merit were obliged to appear on the stage with this minion, and even to affect the general taste for him, in order to avoid giving offence.”—Thomas Campbell. The above particulars are extracted from ' "Kepresentative Actors,” by W. Clarko Eus-

sell, and our readers mint form their own opinions therefrom ; it remains to say that the subject of these remarks died full of yeax-s, and had that which should accompany old age—“honor, love, obedience, troops of friends.”