Aaron Hill was the exact opposite of quiet Fenton. His beech-nut oil company having failed, he joined Sir Robert Montgomery in a project for colonising South Carolina; and this too proving unproductive, he turned to the stage, and brought out in the season of 1723-24, at Drury Lane, his tragedy of "Henry V."--an "improvement" of Shakspeare's historical play of the same name. Hill's additions comprise a Harriet (Mrs. Thurmond), for whom he invented a breeches part, and some melodramatic situations--especially between her and Henry (Booth). Hill cut out all Shakspeare's comic characters; but he was so anxious for the success of the piece, that he spent £200 of his own on the scenery, of which he made a present to the managers; and, after all, his play failed, despite the brilliant Katherine of Mrs. Oldfield, and the Dauphin of Wilks.
More successful was the "Captives," by Gay. The ex-mercer was now a poet, whom the "quality" petted; but he was not yet at the summit of his fame. The "Captives" did not help to raise him. The story was found unnatural, and the style stilted. A Persian captive (Booth) is a Joseph, against whom the Median Queen, whom he has offended, vows vengeance; in pursuit of which, love and murder are extensively employed. Mrs. Oldfield had one good scene in it as Cydene, captive wife of the Persian Joseph, for whom she entertains a warm regard, of which he is worthy; yet these actors, well seconded, could only drag the tragedy through seven representations, before it was consigned to oblivion. But the company was strong enough to make their old repertory, with Shakspeare in the van, attractive; and they had nothing to regret, when the season closed, but the death of Pinkethman, who for two and thirty years, and chiefly at Drury Lane, had been the most irresistible laughter-compeller of that stage, on which he had originated Beau Clincher, Old Mirabel, and a score of similar merry characters.
The company had not to complain; yet the managers had found it necessary to support their stock-pieces by a novelty--a ballet-pantomime, "The Necromancer,"[117] by the younger Thurmond, a dancing-master. Rich, at Lincoln's Inn, where "Edwin" could not have drawn a shilling; where Belisarius (Boheme) begged an obolus in vain; and Hurst's "Roman Maid" (Paulina, Mrs. Moffat), represented a hermit as dwelling in a lone cave, near the Mount Aventine--a hermit would be as likely to be found in a wood on Snow Hill--Rich, I say, improved on Thurmond's idea, by producing on the 20th of December 1723, "The Necromancer, or the History of Dr. Faustus," and thereby founded pantomime, as it has been established among us, at least during the Christmas-tide, for now a hundred and forty years.