His conduct as a manager presents the brightest side of his character. The judgment and resolution he displayed, strange in one of so mercurial a temperament, the mismanagement he corrected, the difficulties he overcame by his marvellous equanimity and perseverance, and the strict punctuality he observed in all pecuniary engagements, constituted him, in the opinion of one well competent to judge, "a character of as singular utility to the theatre as any that ever existed."
We embrace so tempting an opportunity to suspend the narrative, in order to present to the reader a rapid sketch of theatrical history from the time of Davenant to the final retirement of Cibber.
As we have observed in a preceding memoir, at the Restoration two companies were established by royal letters patent. In the dearth of existing dramatic talent, their principal resource lay in the older writers, and particularly in the works of Shakespeare, Jonson, Massinger, and Fletcher, with the understood proviso that the two theatres should never bring out the same play at the same time.
In the rivalry of competition, Davenant, probably during a temporary depression, called in auxiliary aid, and by opera, masque, and spectacle, outran his competitor in public favour. Killegrew took up the same weapons, and angry altercations arose between the two companies, while both seemed on the verge of ruin.
In 1684, Betterton, who had succeeded Davenant in the management, to put a stop to these dissensions, proposed a union. A suspension of hostilities was agreed upon, and the companies united under Davenant's patent. This, with the dormant one of Killegrew, had all the properties of personal estate. Davenant bequeathed it to his son Charles; he assigned it to his brother Alexander, who sold it to Christopher Rich, a lawyer. From Rich it went
