Twelfth Night (I.ix): Mrs. Abington as Olivia, 1779.

This is the moment when Olivia unveils before Viola/Cesario, with whom she falls in love, mistaking a girl (played by a boy originally) for a boy (which the actor really is!). Frances Abington was born Frances Barton (1787-1815), her father, having served as a private soldier in the King's Guards, kept a cobbler's stall in Vinegar Yard; her brother was an ostler in Hanway Yard. She at first sold flowers and was known as Nosegay Fan.' Then singing in the streets or reciting at tavern doors, she was sometimes carried within the Bedford and Piazza coffee-houses, to amuse the company with the delivery of select passages from the poets. She became the servant of a French milliner in Cockspur Street, from whom she acquired a taste in dress and a knowledge of French. She was afterwards cookmaid in the kitchen ruled by Robert Baddeley, admired at a later date for his performance upon the stage of foreign footmen, Jews, and 'broken-English' parts. Frances Barton underwent many ignoble, painful, and vicious experiences. 'Low, poor, and vulgar as she had been,' a contemporary critic writes, 'she was always anxious to acquire education. . . . She was well acquainted with the French authors, could read and speak French with facility, and could converse in Italian.'

In the summer of 1755 the Haymarket was opened under the management of Theophilus Cibber. On 21 Aug. the comedy of "The Busybody" was presented, the bills announcing "the character of Miranda by Miss Barton, being her first essay." For more than a year she was absent from London, fulfilling engagements at Bath and Richmond. She reappeared in November 1756, as a member of the Drury Lane company. In 1759 she was first described as Mrs. Abington: she had become the wife of her music-master, one of the royal trumpeters. The marriage was of an unhappy sort and the husband and wife lived apart. At Drury Lane Mrs. Abington advanced but slowly and she left England for Ireland, and was absent five years. Her success in Dublin was very great. Hitchcock, the historian of the Irish stage, writes: "So rapidly did this charming actress rise, and so highly was she esteemed by the public - even so early did she discover a taste in dress and a talent to lead the ton - that several of the ladies' most fashionable ornaments were distinguished by her name, and the 'Abington cap' became the prevailing rage of the day." She returned to Drury Lane upon the pressing invitation of Garrick, and for some eighteen years continued a member of the company, the most admired representative of the grand coquettes and queens of comedy, greatly successful as Beatrice, Lady Townley, Lady Betty Modish, and Millamant. She could also descend to country girls, romps, hoydens, and chambermaids. Her Shakespearian characters were Portia, Beatrice, Desdemona, Olivia, and Ophelia. In 1782 she left Drury Lane for Covent Garden.

In 1772, when James Northcote saw her as Miss Notable in Cibber's The Lady's Last Stake, he remarked: "I never saw a part done so excellent in all my life, for in her acting she has all the simplicity of nature and not the least tincture of the theatrical". Others described her as of a singularly elegant figure; she was of graceful address, with animated and expressive gestures. Her voice was not by nature musical, but her elocutionary skill was very great, and her articulation was so exact that every syllable she uttered was distinct and harmonious. Her taste in dress was admitted to be supreme by the many ladies of quality whose friendship she enjoyed. Her ambition, personal wit and cleverness won her a distinguished position in society, in spite of her humble origin. She was real-life Eliza Doolittle.(Data from the Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900) The print is the frontispiece to "Twelfth Night, or, What You Will:a Comedy: As it is acted at the Theatre Royal in Drury Lane and Covent Garden. Written by Shakespeare. London: printed for J. Harrison and sold by J. Wenman, 1779." (National Library of Australia)