"a few feet distant" from the existing Haymarket Theatre, was the New,
or Little Theatre in the Haymarket, which, from the fact that it had
been opened eight years before by "the French Comedians," was also
sometimes styled the French House. Next comes the no-longer-existent
theatre in Lincoln's Inn Fields, which Christopher Rich had rebuilt in
1714, and which his son John had made notorious for pantomimes. Here the
_Beggar's Opera_, precursor of a long line of similar productions, had
just been successfully produced. Finally, most ancient of them all,
there was the Theatre-Royal in Drury Lane, otherwise the King's Play
House, or Old House. The virtual patentees at this time were the actors
Colley Cibber, Robert Wilks, and Barton Booth. The two former were just
playing the _Provok'd Husband_, in which the famous Mrs. Oldfield
(Pope's "Narcissa") had created a _furore_ by her assumption of Lady
Townley. These, in February 1728, were the four principal London
theatres. Goodman's Fields, where Garrick made his debut, was not opened
until the following year, and Covent Garden belongs to a still later
date.

Fielding's first dramatic essay--or, to speak more precisely, the first
of his dramatic essays that was produced upon the stage--was a five-act
comedy entitled _Love in Several Masques_. It was played at Drury Lane
in February 1728, succeeding the _Provok'd Husband_. In his "Preface"
the young author refers to the disadvantage under which he laboured in
following close upon that comedy, and also in being "contemporary with
an Entertainment which engrosses the whole Talk and Admiration of the
Town,"--i.e. the _Beggar's Opera_. He also acknowledges the kindness of
Wilks and Cibber "previous to its Representation," and the fact that he
had thus acquired their suffrages makes it doubtful whether his stay at
Leyden was not really briefer than is generally supposed, or that he
left Eton much earlier. In either case he must have been in London some