The next day Bradbury came out of the asylum, telling everybody that he was perfectly recovered, having got well in as sudden a manner as he fell ill, and in the following week his benefit took place. Grimaldi played and sang for him, and took money at the gallery door, to boot. The house was quite full, and everything went on well until Bradbury made his appearance, when, impelled by some strange and sudden whim, he was guilty of a disgusting piece of irreverence and impertinence. The consequence of this was, that the audience very naturally and properly took great offence, and upon a repetition of the conduct, literally hooted him from the stage.
This was the ruin of Bradbury as a pantomimist. He did not appear again in London for many years, and, although he played occasionally in the country theatres, never afterwards regained his former rank and celebrity in the profession. As far as pecuniary matters were concerned, it did not matter much to him, the annuity affording him a handsome independence; but whether he afterwards sold it and dissipated the money, or whether the annuity itself was discontinued in the course of years, this at least is certain, that when he died, which he did in London, in 1828, he was in very indifferent circumstances, if not in actual want.
In October, Covent Garden commenced the new campaign, and brought forward "Mother Goose," which ran, with the same degree of success as before, until nearly Christmas, and was played altogether twenty-nine times.
On the 15th of this month, a most frightful accident occurred at Sadler's Wells. The pantomime was played first that night, which, joined to his having nothing to do at Covent Garden, enabled Grimaldi to go home early to bed. At midnight he was awakened by a great noise in the street, and loud and repeated knocks at the door of his house: at first he concluded it might be some idle party amusing themselves by knocking and running away; an intellectual amusement not at that time exclusively confined to a few gentlemen of high degree; but finding that it was repeated, and that the noise without increased, he hastily slipped on a morning-gown and trowsers, and hurried to the street-door.
The people who were clamouring outside, were for the most part friends, who exclaimed, when he appeared, that they had merely come to assure themselves of his personal safety, and were rejoiced to find that he had escaped. He now learned, for the first time, that some vagabonds in the pit of the theatre had raised a cry of "Fire!" during the performance of the last piece, "The Ocean Fiend," and that the audience had risen simultaneously to make their escape: that a violent rush towards the doors had ensued, and that in the confusion and fright a most fearful loss of life had taken place. He waited to hear no more, but instantly ran off to the theatre.