UNKNOWN.

Daily Telegraph (Napier), Issue 3198, 28 September 1881, Page 4

UNKNOWN.

Foote presents the most remnrka 1 . insianee of a one-legged player. While o* a visit nfc r orel Moxboi-ough's, rifling a to spirited horse, lie was thrown, and reeeiv. so severe a hurl, that his 1 _t leg had to br amputated. It was suggested at tlie tin. "as a marvellous proof of the efficacy oi' avarice," that Foote had unnecessarily undergone amputation that he might surely enlist the sympathies of the Puke of York and by his influence obtain the Chamberlain's license for the little " theatre in the Haymarket ■ " but such, a supposition is wholly incredible, Foote jested, as was his wont, even under th« surgeon's knife. A little while before he had caricatured, in his farce of " The Orators," the manner and aspect of Alderman Faulkner, the eccentric Dublin publisher, whose wooden leg had been turned to laughable account upon the stage. " Now I shall be able to take off old Faulkner to the life," said the satirist, when it was announced to him that the operation must be performed. But, in truth, he feli his misfortune acutely ; lie suffered deeply both in mind and body. He wrote pathetically of his state to Garnck : " I am very weak, in pain, and can procure no sleep but by the aid of opiates. Oh! it is incredible all I have suffered." After an interval he reappeared upon the stage. however, the public finding little abatement of his mirthfulness or of his power to entertain. But, as O'Keeffe writes, " with all his high comic humour, one could not help pitying him sometimes as he stood upon his one leg leaning against the wall, whilst his servant wa3 putting on his stage false leg, with shoe and stocking, and fastening it to the stump. He looked sorrowful, but, instantly resuming all his high comi<* humour and mirth hobbled forward, entered the scene, an**} gave the audience what they expected, their plenty of laugh and delight." He wrote his comedy of " The Lame Lover," as it were to introduce bis false leg to the public, and as Sir Luke Limp protested that he was not the worse, but much the better, for his loss. " Consider," he urged, " I can have neither stain' splint, spavin, nor gout • have no fear of corns, kibes, or that another man should kick my shins or tread on my toes. . . . What,d'ye think I'd change

with Bill Spindle for one of his drumsticks, or chop with Lord Lumber for both his legs'? What is there lam not able to do ? To be sure, I am a little awkward at running ; but then, to make me amends, I'll hop with any man in the town. . . . A leg! a redundancy ! a mere nothing at all. Man is from nature an extravagant creature. In my opinion, we might all be full as well as vie are with but half the things that we have !" —Belravia,