[ Georgian theatre in Cheltenham. ] Autograph Letter Signed from the actress Cecilia Crisp to actor-manager Benjamin Webster, offering to buy, for performance at her benefit, the rights to his interlude 'Pay for Peeping''.

2pp., 4to. Bifolium. Addressed on reverse of second leaf, with seal of a harp in green wax, 'To | - Webster Esqre. | Theatre Royal Haymarket'. Writing two days before her father's death, she explains that she commissioned a friend to offer a guinea for his 'Interlude of "Pay for Peeping"', but finds that 'in return you expect one pound eleven for it'. She points out that she was 'the original (at the Strand Theatre) in the piece', and that she is offering the same terms accepted from her by 'Mr Selby for his "Day in Paris"'. She hopes that he will oblige her by 'getting it copied', and sending it to 'Mr. Capper No 381 Strand, (corner of Southampton Street)'. She explains: 'My only wish to have it is that I may play it for my Benefit in Cheltenham.' For information regarding the Crisp theatrical family, see the article by 'Alpha' titled 'The Theatre in Hereford', published in 'Notes and Queries', 15 February 1868, which states of that 'Mr. Charles Crisp [...] lessee for many years of the theatres of Gloucester, Cheltenham, Leominster, Bridgnorth, and Ludlow [...] married a niece of the late Sir Astley Cooper, Bart., M.D., and had two daughters, both accomplished actresses; but the youngest (Miss Cecilia Crisp) left the profession soon, and married [on 23 November 1833] a medical practioner [i.e. Walter F. Carey] at Cheltenham'.