t
"'The Spectator's' account of 'The Distrest Mother' had raised the
author's expectation to such a pitch that he made an excursion from
college to see that tragedy acted, and upon his return was commanded
by the dean to write upon the Art, Rise, and Progress of the English
Stage; which how well he has performed is submitted to the judgment of
that worthy gentleman to whom it is inscribed." Dr. Reynardson's poem
is not a work of any great distinction, and need only be referred to
here for its mention of the means then in use for raising the storms
of the theatre. Noting the strange and incongruous articles to be
found in the tiring-room of the players--such as Tarquin's trousers
and Lucretia's vest, Roxana's coif and Statira's stays, the poet
proceeds:

Hard by a quart of bottled lightning lies
A bowl of double use and monstrous size,
Now rolls it high and rumbles in its speed,
Now drowns the weaker crack of mustard-seed;
So the true thunder all arrayed in smoke,
Launched from the skies now rives the knotted oak,
And sometimes naught the drunkard's prayers prevail,
And sometimes condescends to sour the ale.

There is also allusion to the mustard-bowl as applied to theatrical
uses in "The Dunciad:"

"Now turn to different sports," the goddess cries,
"And learn, my sons, the wondrous power of NOISE.
To move, to raise, to ravish every heart,
With Shakespeare's nature or with Jonson's art,
Let others aim; 'tis yours to shake the soul
With thunder rumbling from the mustard-bowl."

And further reference to the frequency of stage storms is continued in
the well-known lines, written by way of parodying the mention of the
Duke of Marlborough in Addison's poem "The Campaign:"

Immortal Rich! how calm he sits at ease,
'Mid snows of paper and fierce hail of pease;
And proud his mistress' orders to perform,
Rides in the whirlwind and directs the storm.

A note to the early editions of "The Dunciad" explains that the old
ways of making thunder and mustard were the same, but that of late the
thunder had been advantageously simulated by means of "troughs of wood
with stops in them." "Whether Mr. Dennis was the inventor of that
improvement, I know not," writes the annotator; "but it is certain
that being once at a tragedy of a new author he fell into a great
passion at hearing some, and cried: ''Sdeath! that is my thunder.'"
Dennis's thunder was first he