threat to "Custom," an iterative word throughout the essay. Mrs. Clive
first speaks of salary, a matter obviously important to her "Liberty and
Livelihood."[15] One writer on the dispute, in a quasi-satirical tract,
denounces the managers in this regard and in so doing echoes Mrs. Clive:
"When there are but two Theatres allowed of, shall the Masters of those
two Houses league together, and oblige the Actors either to take what
Salary or Treatment they graciously vouchsafe to offer them, and to be
parcelled out and confined to this House or t'other, just as they in
their Wisdoms think meet; or else to be banished the Kingdom for a
Livelihood? This is Tyranny with a Vengeance--but perhaps these generous
noble-spirited Masters may intend their Performers a Compliment in it,
and by thus fixing them to one Place, effectually wipe off that odious
Appellation of Vagabonds, which has been sometimes given them."[16] The
licensing act, subsequent cartel, and mistreatment of players were then
not only in the mind of Mrs. Clive. Treated in most of the arguments for
or against the players was salary, but it was only a cover hiding an
underlying malaise.

Implying that the managers set out to ruin certain performers, including
herself, Mrs. Clive accuses them of putting on "a better Face to the
Town" by publishing (inaccurate) salary figures--a ploy to get public
sanction for lower salaries. Mrs. Clive alludes to salaries published
ostensibly by Fleetwood in the papers (e.g., _Gentleman's Magazine_,
XIII, October 1743, 553), where the pay of such lights as Garrick,
Macklin, Pritchard, and Clive in the 1742-1743 season is made to seem
higher than the salaries of such worthies as Wilks, Betterton, Cibber,
and Oldfield in the 1708-1709 season. The actors, in presenting their
case (_Gentleman's Magazine_, XIII, November 1743, 609), hit at
Fleetwood for citing 1708-1709 salaries, for "the Stage [then] both of
_Drury-Lane_ and the _Hay-market_, were in so wretched a Condition ...