The Gentleman's Daughter by Vickery Amanda

Author:Vickery, Amanda [Vickery, Amanda]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
ISBN: 9780300102222
Publisher: Yale University Press
Published: 2003-08-11T00:00:00+00:00

43 ‘View of the Ball at St James's on the Celebration of Her Majesty's Birth Night February 9 1786’, from the New Lady's Magazine.

Nonsensical farce or no, Bessy Ramsden made no secret of her desire to feast on every morsel of the royal pageant. Her triumph was to procure a place in the gallery to view the queen's birthday court in 1766 and to have ‘had the honour of being with Her [Majesty] & the Children in their own Apartments’ on coronation day in 1773. Similarly, a visitor who scrutinized the royal family at prayer mused, ‘I like the Queen much; her appearance is not at all majestick but there is in her mien Countenance and behaviour (for I have had several opportunities to observe it) so much sweetness, affability & condescension that it is impossible to see her often without loving her’.17 For all the cultural mediocrity of the Hanoverians, an unflagging interest in the court and royal festivity is suggested by the letters of visitors and natives alike.

Outside the court, the most prestigious commercial entertainment and strongest concentration of sheer aristocratic glamour was to be found at the opera. For historians, the emergence of the London opera, particularly Italian opera at Sir John Vanbrugh's King's Theatre in the Haymarket (‘English opera’ with spoken interludes could be enjoyed at Covent Garden and Drury Lane), represents the cultural elaboration of Whig oligarchical power. The King's Theatre was established and largely administered by noblemen and gentlemen until the late eighteenth century, but even when handed over to professional management, Italian opera retained its social cachet. William Weber has calculated that in 1783 two-thirds of the male subscribers were, or had been, MPs or peers of the realm. The opera became another setting for the playing out of party politics from the highly visible front boxes. Moreover, Weber calculates that of the 354 subscribers to boxes, there were 49 peers, one peeress and 44 wives of peers.18 Even if not possessing boxes in her own right, a lady's presence, dress and deportment could be the subject of detailed commentary. Consequently, the female profile was as high, if not higher than the male. Indeed, the Countess Spencer wrote to her daughter Georgiana Duchess of Devonshire in 1782, to warn her that she had been seen too much at the opera in the company of the Prince of Wales, prompting rumours of romantic and political entanglement: ‘When, dear Georgiana, shall I see you out of scrapes that injure your character? If you and your sister would but give up the Opera or any public place this one winter, on the just pretence of nursing your children, how easily might all this [adverse publicity] still be avoided.’19 However, there were spatial distinctions to be drawn within the opera theatre. There were five levels of boxes, the fourth and fifth being the least exclusive. For the first fifty nights of the season the boxes were privately subscribed for, after which a second, less fashionable subscription was opened and more boxes were made available to the general public.

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