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diff --git a/old/jjstg10.txt b/old/jjstg10.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..5c3af9e --- /dev/null +++ b/old/jjstg10.txt @@ -0,0 +1,2261 @@ +*** Project Gutenberg etext of Stage-Land by Jerome K. Jerome *** + + +Scanned and proofed by Ron Burkey (rburkey@heads-up.com) and Amy +Thomte, from a volume entitled "Idle Thoughts of an Idle Fellow", +published by A. L. Burt. + +Notes on the editing of this text: + +1. Italicized phrases are delimited by the underline character ("_"). +2. Hyphens have been left in the text only where it was the clear +intention of the author. For example, throughout the text, "tonight" +and "tomorrow" appear as "to-night" and "to-morrow". This is +intentional, and is not simply a legacy of words having been broken +across lines in the printed text. +3. The pound (currency) symbol has been replaced by the word +"pounds". + + + + +STAGE-LAND. + + +TO + +THAT HIGHLY RESPECTABLE BUT UNNECESSARILY + +RETIRING INDIVIDUAL, + +OF WHOM + +WE HEAR SO MUCH + +BUT + +SEE SO LITTLE, + +"THE EARNEST STUDENT OF THE DRAMA," + +THIS + +(COMPARATIVELY) TRUTHFUL LITTLE BOOK + +IS LOVINGLY DEDICATED. + + + +CONTENTS. + +THE HERO +THE VILLAIN +THE HEROINE +THE COMIC MAN +THE LAWYER +THE ADVENTURESS +THE SERVANT GIRL +THE CHILD +THE COMIC LOVERS +THE PEASANTS +THE GOOD OLD MAN +THE IRISHMAN +THE DETECTIVE +THE SAILOR + + + +STAGE-LAND. + + +THE HERO. + +His name is George, generally speaking. "Call me George!" he says to +the heroine. She calls him George (in a very low voice, because she +is so young and timid). Then he is happy. + +The stage hero never has any work to do. He is always hanging about +and getting into trouble. His chief aim in life is to be accused of +crimes he has never committed, and if he can muddle things up with a +corpse in some complicated way so as to get himself reasonably +mistaken for the murderer, he feels his day has not been wasted. + +He has a wonderful gift of speech and a flow of language calculated to +strike terror to the bravest heart. It is a grand thing to hear him +bullyragging the villain. + +The stage hero is always entitled to "estates," chiefly remarkable for +their high state of cultivation and for the eccentric ground plan of +the "manor house" upon them. The house is never more than one story +high, but it makes up in green stuff over the porch what it lacks in +size and convenience. + +The chief drawback in connection with it, to our eyes, is that all the +inhabitants of the neighboring village appear to live in the front +garden, but the hero evidently thinks it rather nice of them, as it +enables him to make speeches to them from the front doorstep--his +favorite recreation. + +There is generally a public-house immediately opposite. This is +handy. + +These "estates" are a great anxiety to the stage hero. He is not what +you would call a business man, as far as we can judge, and his +attempts to manage his own property invariably land him in ruin and +distraction. His "estates," however, always get taken away from him +by the villain before the first act is over, and this saves him all +further trouble with regard to them until the end of the play, when he +gets saddled with them once more. + +Not but what it must be confessed that there is much excuse for the +poor fellow's general bewilderment concerning his affairs and for his +legal errors and confusions generally. Stage "law" may not be quite +the most fearful and wonderful mystery in the whole universe, but it's +near it--very near it. We were under the impression at one time that +we ourselves knew something--just a little--about statutory and common +law, but after paying attention to the legal points of one or two +plays we found that we were mere children at it. + +We thought we would not be beaten, and we determined to get to the +bottom of stage law and to understand it; but after some six months' +effort our brain (a singularly fine one) began to soften, and we +abandoned the study, believing it would come cheaper in the end to +offer a suitable reward, of about 50,000 pounds or 60,000 pounds, say, +to any one who would explain it to us. + +The reward has remained unclaimed to the present day and is still +open. + +One gentleman did come to our assistance a little while ago, but his +explanations only made the matter more confusing to our minds than it +was before. He was surprised at what he called our density, and said +the thing was all clear and simple to him. But we discovered +afterward that he was an escaped lunatic. + +The only points of stage "law" on which we are at all clear are as +follows: + +That if a man dies without leaving a will, then all his property goes +to the nearest villain. + +But if a man dies and leaves a will, then all his property goes to +whoever can get possession of that will. + +That the accidental loss of the three-and-sixpenny copy of a marriage +certificate annuls the marriage. + +That the evidence of one prejudiced witness of shady antecedents is +quite sufficient to convict the most stainless and irreproachable +gentleman of crimes for the committal of which he could have had no +possible motive. + +But that this evidence may be rebutted years afterward, and the +conviction quashed without further trial by the unsupported statement +of the comic man. + +That if A forges B's name to a check, then the law of the land is that +B shall be sentenced to ten years' penal servitude. + +That ten minutes' notice is all that is required to foreclose a +mortgage. + +That all trials of criminal cases take place in the front parlor of +the victim's house, the villain acting as counsel, judge, and jury +rolled into one, and a couple of policemen being told off to follow +his instructions. + +These are a few of the more salient features of stage "law" so far as +we have been able to grasp it up to the present; but as fresh acts and +clauses and modifications appear to be introduced for each new play, +we have abandoned all hope of ever being able to really comprehend the +subject. + +To return to our hero, the state of the law, as above sketched, +naturally confuses him, and the villain, who is the only human being +who does seem to understand stage legal questions, is easily able to +fleece and ruin him. The simple-minded hero signs mortgages, bills of +sale, deeds of gift, and such like things, under the impression that +he is playing some sort of a round game; and then when he cannot pay +the interest they take his wife and children away from him and turn +him adrift into the world. + +Being thrown upon his own resources, he naturally starves. + +He can make long speeches, he can tell you all his troubles, he can +stand in the lime-light and strike attitudes, he can knock the villain +down, and he can defy the police, but these requirements are not much +in demand in the labor market, and as they are all he can do or cares +to do, he finds earning his living a much more difficult affair than +he fancied. + +There is a deal too much hard work about it for him. He soon gives up +trying it at all, and prefers to eke out an uncertain existence by +sponging upon good-natured old Irish women and generous but +weak-minded young artisans who have left their native village to +follow him and enjoy the advantage of his company and conversation. + +And so he drags out his life during the middle of the piece, raving at +fortune, raging at humanity, and whining about his miseries until the +last act. + +Then he gets back those "estates" of his into his possession once +again, and can go back to the village and make more moral speeches and +be happy. + +Moral speeches are undoubtedly his leading article, and of these, it +must be owned, he has an inexhaustible stock. He is as chock-full of +noble sentiments as a bladder is of wind. They are weak and watery +sentiments of the sixpenny tea-meeting order. We have a dim notion +that we have heard them before. The sound of them always conjures up +to our mind the vision of a dull long room, full of oppressive +silence, broken only by the scratching of steel pens and an occasional +whispered "Give us a suck, Bill. You know I always liked you;" or a +louder "Please, sir, speak to Jimmy Boggles. He's a-jogging my +elbow." + +The stage hero, however, evidently regards these meanderings as gems +of brilliant thought, fresh from the philosophic mine. + +The gallery greets them with enthusiastic approval. They are a +warm-hearted people, galleryites, and they like to give a hearty +welcome to old friends. + +And then, too, the sentiments are so good and a British gallery is so +moral. We doubt if there could be discovered on this earth any body +of human beings half so moral--so fond of goodness, even when it is +slow and stupid--so hateful of meanness in word or deed--as a modern +theatrical gallery. + +The early Christian martyrs were sinful and worldly compared with an +Adelphi gallery. + +The stage hero is a very powerful man. You wouldn't think it to look +at him, but you wait till the heroine cries "Help! Oh, George, save +me!" or the police attempt to run him in. Then two villains, three +extra hired ruffians and four detectives are about his +fighting-weight. + +If he knocks down less than three men with one blow, he fears that he +must be ill, and wonders "Why this strange weakness?" + +The hero has his own way of making love. He always does it from +behind. The girl turns away from him when he begins (she being, as we +have said, shy and timid), and he takes hold of her hands and breathes +his attachment down her back. + +The stage hero always wears patent-leather boots, and they are always +spotlessly clean. Sometimes he is rich and lives in a room with seven +doors to it, and at other times he is starving in a garret; but in +either event he still wears brand-new patent-leather boots. + +He might raise at least three-and-sixpence on those boots, and when +the baby is crying for food, it occurs to us that it would be better +if, instead of praying to Heaven, he took off those boots and pawned +them; but this does not seem to occur to him. + +He crosses the African desert in patent-leather boots, does the stage +hero. He takes a supply with him when he is wrecked on an uninhabited +island. He arrives from long and trying journeys; his clothes are +ragged and torn, but his boots are new and shiny. He puts on +patent-leather boots to tramp through the Australian bush, to fight in +Egypt, to discover the north pole. + +Sometimes he is a gold-digger, sometimes a dock laborer, sometimes a +soldier, sometimes a sailor, but whatever he is he wears +patent-leather boots. + +He goes boating in patent leather boots, he plays cricket in them; he +goes fishing and shooting in them. He will go to heaven in +patent-leather boots or he will decline the invitation. + +The stage hero never talks in a simple, straightforward way, like a +mere ordinary mortal. + +"You will write to me when you are away, dear, won't you?" says the +heroine. + +A mere human being would reply: + +"Why, of course I shall, ducky, every day." + +But the stage hero is a superior creature. He says: + +"Dost see yonder star, sweet?" + +She looks up and owns that she does see yonder star; and then off he +starts and drivels on about that star for full five minutes, and says +he will cease to write to her when that pale star has fallen from its +place amid the firmament of heaven. + +The result of a long course of acquaintanceship with stage heroes has +been, so far as we are concerned, to create a yearning for a new kind +of stage hero. What we would like for a change would be a man who +wouldn't cackle and brag quite so much, but who was capable of taking +care of himself for a day without getting into trouble. + + + +THE VILLAIN. + +He wears a clean collar and smokes a cigarette; that is how we know he +is a villain. In real life it is often difficult to tell a villain +from an honest man, and this gives rise to mistakes; but on the stage, +as we have said villains wear clean collars and smoke cigarettes, and +thus all fear of blunder is avoided. + +It is well that the rule does not hold off the stage, or good men +might be misjudged. We ourselves, for instance, wear a clean +collar--sometimes. + +It might be very awkward for our family, especially on Sundays. + +He has no power of repartee, has the stage villain. All the good +people in the play say rude and insulting things to him, and smack at +him, and score off him all through the act, but he can never answer +them back--can never think of anything clever to say in return. + +"Ha! ha! wait till Monday week," is the most brilliant retort that he +can make, and he has to get into a corner by himself to think of even +that. + +The stage villain's career is always very easy and prosperous up to +within a minute of the end of each act. Then he gets suddenly let in, +generally by the comic man. It always happens so. Yet the villain is +always intensely surprised each time. He never seems to learn +anything from experience. + +A few years ago the villain used to be blessed with a hopeful and +philosophical temperament, which enabled him to bear up under these +constantly recurring disappointments and reverses. It was "no +matter," he would say. Crushed for the moment though he might be, his +buoyant heart never lost courage. He had a simple, child-like faith +in Providence. "A time will come," he would remark, and this idea +consoled him. + +Of late, however, this trusting hopefulness of his, as expressed in +the beautiful lines we have quoted, appears to have forsaken him. We +are sorry for this. We always regarded it as one of the finest traits +in his character. + +The stage villain's love for the heroine is sublime in its +steadfastness. She is a woman of lugubrious and tearful disposition, +added to which she is usually incumbered with a couple of priggish and +highly objectionable children, and what possible attraction there is +about her we ourselves can never understand; but the stage +villain--well, there, he is fairly mashed on her. + +Nothing can alter his affection. She hates him and insults him to an +extent that is really unladylike. Every time he tries to explain his +devotion to her, the hero comes in and knocks him down in the middle +of it, or the comic man catches him during one or the other of his +harassing love-scenes with her, and goes off and tells the "villagers" +or the "guests," and they come round and nag him (we should think that +the villain must grow to positively dislike the comic man before the +piece is over). + +Notwithstanding all this he still hankers after her and swears she +shall be his. He is not a bad-looking fellow, and from what we know +of the market, we should say there are plenty of other girls who would +jump at him; yet for the sake of settling down with this dismal young +female as his wife, he is prepared to go through a laborious and +exhaustive course of crime and to be bullied and insulted by every one +he meets. His love sustains him under it all. He robs and forges, +and cheats, and lies, and murders, and arsons. If there were any +other crimes he could commit to win her affection, he would, for her +sweet sake, commit them cheerfully. But he doesn't know any +others--at all events, he is not well up in any others--and she still +does not care for him, and what is he to do? + +It is very unfortunate for both of them. It is evident to the merest +spectator that the lady's life would be much happier if the villain +did not love her quite so much; and as for him, his career might be +calmer and less criminal but for his deep devotion to her. + +You see, it is having met her in early life that is the cause of all +the trouble. He first saw her when she was a child, and he loved her, +"ay, even then." Ah, and he would have worked--slaved for her, and +have made her rich and happy. He might perhaps even have been a good +man. + +She tries to soothe him. She says she loathed him with an unspeakable +horror from the first moment that her eyes met his revolting form. +She says she saw a hideous toad once in a nasty pond, and she says +that rather would she take that noisome reptile and clasp its slimy +bosom to her own than tolerate one instant's touch from his (the +villain's) arms. + +This sweet prattle of hers, however, only charms him all the more. He +says he will win her yet. + +Nor does the villain seem much happier in his less serious love +episodes. After he has indulged in a little badinage of the above +character with his real lady-love, the heroine, he will occasionally +try a little light flirtation passage with her maid or lady friend. + +The maid or friend does not waste time in simile or in metaphor. She +calls him a black-hearted scoundrel and clumps him over the head. + +Of recent years it has been attempted to cheer the stage villain's +loveless life by making the village clergyman's daughter gone on him. +But it is generally about ten years ago when even she loved him, and +her love has turned to hate by the time the play opens; so that on the +whole his lot can hardly be said to have been much improved in this +direction. + +Not but what it must be confessed that her change of feeling is, under +the circumstances, only natural. He took her away from her happy, +peaceful home when she was very young and brought her up to this +wicked overgrown London. He did not marry her. There is no earthly +reason why he should not have married her. She must have been a fine +girl at that time (and she is a good-looking woman as it is, with dash +and go about her), and any other man would have settled down cozily +with her and have led a simple, blameless life. + +But the stage villain is built cussed. + +He ill-uses this female most shockingly--not for any cause or motive +whatever; indeed, his own practical interests should prompt him to +treat her well and keep friends with her--but from the natural +cussedness to which we have just alluded. When he speaks to her he +seizes her by the wrist and breathes what he's got to say into her +ear, and it tickles and revolts her. + +The only thing in which he is good to her is in the matter of dress. +He does not stint her in dress. + +The stage villain is superior to the villain of real life. The +villain of real life is actuated by mere sordid and selfish motives. +The stage villain does villainy, not for any personal advantage to +himself, but merely from the love of the thing as an art. Villainy is +to him its own reward; he revels in it. + +"Better far be poor and villainous," he says to himself, "than possess +all the wealth of the Indies with a clear conscience. I will be a +villain," he cries. "I will, at great expense and inconvenience to +myself, murder the good old man, get the hero accused of the crime, +and make love to his wife while he is in prison. It will be a risky +and laborious business for me from beginning to end, and can bring me +no practical advantage whatever. The girl will call me insulting +names when I pay her a visit, and will push me violently in the chest +when I get near her; her golden-haired infant will say I am a bad man +and may even refuse to kiss me. The comic man will cover me with +humorous opprobrium, and the villagers will get a day off and hang +about the village pub and hoot me. Everybody will see through my +villainy, and I shall be nabbed in the end. I always am. But it is +no matter, I will be a villain--ha! ha!" + +On the whole, the stage villain appears to us to be a rather badly +used individual. He never has any "estates" or property himself, and +his only chance of getting on in the world is to sneak the hero's. He +has an affectionate disposition, and never having any wife of his own +he is compelled to love other people's; but his affection is ever +unrequited, and everything comes wrong for him in the end. + +Our advice to stage villains generally, after careful observation of +(stage) life and (stage) human nature, is as follows: + +Never be a stage villain at all if you can help it. The life is too +harassing and the remuneration altogether disproportionate to the +risks and labor. + +If you have run away with the clergyman's daughter and she still +clings to you, do not throw her down in the center of the stage and +call her names. It only irritates her, and she takes a dislike to you +and goes and warns the other girl. + +Don't have too many accomplices; and if you have got them, don't keep +sneering at them and bullying them. A word from them can hang you, +and yet you do all you can to rile them. Treat them civilly and let +them have their fair share of the swag. + +Beware of the comic man. When you are committing a murder or robbing +a safe you never look to see where the comic man is. You are so +careless in that way. On the whole, it might be as well if you +murdered the comic man early in the play. + +Don't make love to the hero's wife. She doesn't like you; how can you +expect her to? Besides, it isn't proper. Why don't you get a girl of +your own? + +Lastly, don't go down to the scenes of your crimes in the last act. +You always will do this. We suppose it is some extra cheap excursion +down there that attracts you. But take our advice and don't go. That +is always where you get nabbed. The police know your habits from +experience. They do not trouble to look for you. They go down in the +last act to the old hall or the ruined mill where you did the deed and +wait for you. + +In nine cases out of ten you would get off scot-free but for this +idiotic custom of yours. Do keep away from the place. Go abroad or +to the sea-side when the last act begins and stop there till it is +over. You will be safe then. + + + +THE HEROINE. + +She is always in trouble--and don't she let you know it, too! Her +life is undeniably a hard one. Nothing goes right with her. We all +have our troubles, but the stage heroine never has anything else. If +she only got one afternoon a week off from trouble or had her Sundays +free it would be something. + +But no; misfortune stalks beside her from week's beginning to week's +end. + +After her husband has been found guilty of murder, which is about the +least thing that can ever happen to him, and her white-haired father +has become a bankrupt and has died of a broken heart, and the home of +her childhood has been sold up, then her infant goes and contracts a +lingering fever. + +She weeps a good deal during the course of her troubles, which we +suppose is only natural enough, poor woman. But it is depressing from +the point of view of the audience, and we almost wish before the +evening is out that she had not got quite so much trouble. + +It is over the child that she does most of her weeping. The child has +a damp time of it altogether. We sometimes wonder that it never +catches rheumatism. + +She is very good, is the stage heroine. The comic man expresses a +belief that she is a born angel. She reproves him for this with a +tearful smile (it wouldn't be her smile if it wasn't tearful). + +"Oh, no," she says (sadly of course); "I have many, many faults." + +We rather wish that she would show them a little more. Her excessive +goodness seems somehow to pall upon us. Our only consolation while +watching her is that there are not many good women off the stage. +Life is bad enough as it is; if there were many women in real life as +good as the stage heroine, it would be unbearable. + +The stage heroine's only pleasure in life is to go out in a snow-storm +without an umbrella and with no bonnet on. She has a bonnet, we know +(rather a tasteful little thing); we have seen it hanging up behind +the door of her room; but when she comes out for a night stroll during +a heavy snow-storm (accompanied by thunder), she is most careful to +leave it at home. Maybe she fears the snow will spoil it, and she is +a careful girl. + +She always brings her child out with her on these occasions. She +seems to think that it will freshen it up. The child does not +appreciate the snow as much as she does. He says it's cold. + +One thing that must irritate the stage heroine very much on these +occasions is the way in which the snow seems to lie in wait for her +and follow her about. It is quite a fine night before she comes on +the scene: the moment she appears it begins to snow. It snows +heavily all the while she remains about, and the instant she goes it +clears up again and keeps dry for the rest of the evening. + +The way the snow "goes" for that poor woman is most unfair. It always +snows much heavier in the particular spot where she is sitting than it +does anywhere else in the whole street. Why, we have sometimes seen a +heroine sitting in the midst of a blinding snow-storm while the other +side of the road was as dry as a bone. And it never seemed to occur +to her to cross over. + +We have even known a more than unusually malignant snow-storm to +follow a heroine three times round the stage and then go off (R.) with +her. + +Of course you can't get away from a snow-storm like that! A stage +snow-storm is the kind of snow-storm that would follow you upstairs +and want to come into bed with you. + +Another curious thing about these stage snow-storms is that the moon +is always shining brightly through the whole of them. And it shines +only on the heroine, and it follows her about just like the snow does. + +Nobody fully understands what a wonderful work of nature the moon is +except people acquainted with the stage. Astronomy teaches you +something about the moon, but you learn a good deal more from a few +visits to a theater. You will find from the latter that the moon only +shines on heroes and heroines, with perhaps an occasional beam on the +comic man: it always goes out when it sees the villain coming. + +It is surprising, too, how quickly the moon can go out on the stage. +At one moment it is riding in full radiance in the midst of a +cloudless sky, and the next instant it is gone! Just as though it had +been turned off at a meter. It makes you quite giddy at first until +you get used to it. + +The stage heroine is inclined to thoughtfulness rather than gayety. + +In her cheerful moments the stage heroine thinks she sees the spirit +of her mother, or the ghost of her father, or she dreams of her dead +baby. + +But this is only in her very merry moods. As a rule, she is too much +occupied with weeping to have time for frivolous reflections. + +She has a great flow of language and a wonderful gift of metaphor and +simile--more forcible than elegant--and this might be rather trying in +a wife under ordinary circumstances. But as the hero is generally +sentenced to ten years' penal servitude on his wedding-morn, he +escapes for a period from a danger that might well appall a less +fortunate bridegroom. + +Sometimes the stage heroine has a brother, and if so he is sure to be +mistaken for her lover. We never came across a brother and sister in +real life who ever gave the most suspicious person any grounds for +mistaking them for lovers; but the stage brother and sister are so +affectionate that the error is excusable. + +And when the mistake does occur and the husband comes in suddenly and +finds them kissing and raves she doesn't turn round and say: + +"Why, you silly cuckoo, it's only my brother." + +That would be simple and sensible, and would not suit the stage +heroine at all. No; she does all in her power to make everybody +believe it is true, so that she can suffer in silence. + +She does so love to suffer. + +Marriage is undoubtedly a failure in the case of the stage heroine. + +If the stage heroine were well advised she would remain single. Her +husband means well. He is decidedly affectionate. But he is +unfortunate and inexperienced in worldly affairs. Things come right +for him at the end of the play, it is true; but we would not recommend +the heroine to place too much reliance upon the continuance of this +happy state of affairs. From what we have seen of her husband and his +business capabilities during the five acts preceding, we are inclined +to doubt the possibility of his being anything but unfortunate to the +end of his career. + +True, he has at last got his "rights" (which he would never have lost +had he had a head instead of a sentimental bladder on his shoulders), +the Villain is handcuffed, and he and the heroine have settled down +comfortably next door to the comic man. + +But this heavenly existence will never last. The stage hero was built +for trouble, and he will be in it again in another month, you bet. +They'll get up another mortgage for him on the "estates;" and he won't +know, bless you, whether he really did sign it or whether he didn't, +and out he will go. + +And he'll slop his name about to documents without ever looking to see +what he's doing, and be let in for Lord knows what; and another wife +will turn up for him that he had married when a boy and forgotten all +about. + +And the next corpse that comes to the village he'll get mixed up +with--sure to--and have it laid to his door, and there'll be all the +old business over again. + +No, our advice to the stage heroine is to get rid of the hero as soon +as possible, marry the villain, and go and live abroad somewhere where +the comic man won't come fooling around. + +She will be much happier. + + + +THE COMIC MAN. + +He follows the hero all over the world. This is rough on the hero. + +What makes him so gone on the hero is that when they were boys +together the hero used to knock him down and kick him. The comic man +remembers this with a glow of pride when he is grown up, and it makes +him love the hero and determine to devote his life to him. + +He is a man of humble station--the comic man. The village blacksmith +or a peddler. You never see a rich or aristocratic comic man on the +stage. You can have your choice on the stage; you can be funny and of +lowly origin, or you can be well-to-do and without any sense of humor. +Peers and policemen are the people most utterly devoid of humor on the +stage. + +The chief duty of the comic man's life is to make love to +servant-girls, and they slap his face; but it does not discourage him; +he seems to be more smitten by them than ever. + +The comic man is happy under any fate, and he says funny things at +funerals and when the bailiffs are in the house or the hero is waiting +to be hanged. + +This sort of man is rather trying in real life. In real life such a +man would probably be slaughtered to death and buried at an early +period of his career, but on the stage they put up with him. + +He is very good, is the comic man. He can't bear villainy. To thwart +villainy is his life's ambition, and in this noble object fortune +backs him up grandly. Bad people come and commit their murders and +thefts right under his nose, so that he can denounce them in the last +act. + +They never see him there, standing close beside them, while they are +performing these fearful crimes. + +It is marvelous how short-sighted people on the stage are. We always +thought that the young lady in real life was moderately good at not +seeing folks she did not want to when they were standing straight in +front of her, but her affliction in this direction is as nothing +compared with that of her brothers and sisters on the stage. + +These unfortunate people come into rooms where there are crowds of +people about--people that it is most important that they should see, +and owing to not seeing whom they get themselves into fearful trouble, +and they never notice any of them. They talk to somebody opposite, +and they can't see a third person that is standing bang between the +two of them. + +You might fancy they wore blinkers. + +Then, again, their hearing is so terribly weak. It really ought to be +seen to. People talk and chatter at the very top of their voices +close behind them, and they never hear a word--don't know anybody's +there, even. After it has been going on for half an hour, and the +people "up stage" have made themselves hoarse with shouting, and +somebody has been boisterously murdered and all the furniture upset, +then the people "down stage" "think they hear a noise." + +The comic man always rows with his wife if he is married or with his +sweetheart if he is not married. They quarrel all day long. It must +be a trying life, you would think, but they appear to like it. + +How the comic man lives and supports his wife (she looks as if it +wanted something to support her, too) and family is always a mystery +to us. As we have said, he is not a rich man and he never seems to +earn any money. Sometimes he keeps a shop, and in the way he manages +business it must be an expensive thing to keep, for he never charges +anybody for anything, he is so generous. All his customers seem to be +people more or less in trouble, and he can't find it in his heart to +ask them to pay for their goods under such distressing circumstances. + +He stuffs their basket full with twice as much as they came to buy, +pushes their money back into their hands, and wipes away a tear. + +Why doesn't a comic man come and set up a grocery store in our +neighborhood? + +When the shop does not prove sufficiently profitable (as under the +above-explained method sometimes happens to be the case) the comic +man's wife seeks to add to the income by taking in lodgers. This is a +bad move on her part, for it always ends in the lodgers taking her in. +The hero and heroine, who seem to have been waiting for something of +the sort, immediately come and take possession of the whole house. + +Of course the comic man could not think of charging for mere board and +lodging the man who knocked him down when they were boys together! +Besides, was not the heroine (now the hero's wife) the sweetest and +the blithest girl in all the village of Deepdale? (They must have +been a gloomy band, the others!) How can any one with a human heart +beneath his bosom suggest that people like that should pay for their +rest and washing? The comic man is shocked at his wife for even +thinking of such a thing, and the end of it is that Mr. and Mrs. Hero +live there for the rest of the play rent free; coals, soap, candles, +and hair-oil for the child being provided for them on the same terms. + +The hero raises vague and feeble objections to this arrangement now +and again. He says he will not hear of such a thing, that he will +stay no longer to be a burden upon these honest folk, but will go +forth unto the roadside and there starve. The comic man has awful +work with him, but wins at last and persuades the noble fellow to stop +on and give the place another trial. + +When, a morning or so after witnessing one of these beautiful scenes, +our own landlady knocks at our door and creates a disturbance over a +paltry matter of three or four weeks' rent, and says she'll have her +money or out we go that very day, and drifts slowly away down toward +the kitchen, abusing us in a rising voice as she descends, then we +think of these things and grow sad. + +It is the example of the people round him that makes the comic man so +generous. Everybody is generous on the stage. They are giving away +their purses all day long; that is the regulation "tip" on the +stage--one's purse. The moment you hear a tale of woe, you grab it +out of your pocket, slap it in to the woe-er's palm, grip his hand, +dash away a tear, and exit; you don't even leave yourself a 'bus fare +home. You walk back quickly and get another purse. + +Middle-class people and others on the stage who are short of purses +have to content themselves with throwing about rolls of bank-notes and +tipping servants with five-pound checks. Very stingy people on the +stage have been known to be so cussed mean as to give away mere +sovereigns. + +But they are generally only villains or lords that descend to this +sort of thing. Respectable stage folk never offer anything less than +a purse. + +The recipient is very grateful on receiving the purse (he never looks +inside) and thinks that Heaven ought to reward the donor. They get a +lot of work out of Heaven on the stage. Heaven does all the odd jobs +for them that they don't want to go to the trouble and expense of +doing for themselves. Heaven's chief duty on the stage is to see to +the repayment of all those sums of money that are given or lent to the +good people. It is generally requested to do this to the tune of a +"thousand-fold"--an exorbitant rate when you come to think of it. + +Heaven is also expected to take care that the villain gets properly +cursed, and to fill up its spare time by bringing misfortune upon the +local landlord. It has to avenge everybody and to help all the good +people whenever they are in trouble. And they keep it going in this +direction. + +And when the hero leaves for prison Heaven has to take care of his +wife and child till he comes out; and if this isn't a handful for it, +we don't know what would be! + +Heaven on the stage is always on the side of the hero and heroine and +against the police. + +Occasionally, of late years, the comic man has been a bad man, but you +can't hate him for it. What if he does ruin the hero and rob the +heroine and help to murder the good old man? He does it all in such a +genial, light-hearted spirit that it is not in one's heart to feel +angry with him. It is the way in which a thing is done that makes all +the difference. + +Besides, he can always round on his pal, the serious villain, at the +end, and that makes it all right. + +The comic man is not a sportsman. If he goes out shooting, we know +that when he returns we shall hear that he has shot the dog. If he +takes his girl out on the river he upsets her (literally we mean). +The comic man never goes out for a day's pleasure without coming home +a wreck. + +If he merely goes to tea with his girl at her mother's, he swallows a +muffin and chokes himself. + +The comic man is not happy in his married life, nor does it seem to us +that he goes the right way to be so. He calls his wife "his old Dutch +clock," "the old geyser," and such like terms of endearment, and +addresses her with such remarks as "Ah, you old cat," "You ugly old +nutmeg grater," "You orangamatang, you!" etc., etc. + +Well, you know that is not the way to make things pleasant about a +house. + +Still, with all his faults we like the comic man. He is not always in +trouble and he does not make long speeches. + +Let us bless him. + + + +THE LAWYER. + +He is very old, and very long, and very thin. He has white hair. He +dresses in the costume of the last generation but seven. He has bushy +eyebrows and is clean shaven. His chin itches considerably, so that +he has to be always scratching it. His favorite remark is "Ah!" + +In real life we have heard of young solicitors, of foppish solicitors, +of short solicitors; but on the stage they are always very thin and +very old. The youngest stage solicitor we ever remember to have seen +looked about sixty--the oldest about a hundred and forty-five. + +By the bye, it is never very safe to judge people's ages on the stage +by their personal appearance. We have known old ladies who looked +seventy, if they were a day, turn out to be the mothers of boys of +fourteen, while the middle-aged husband of the young wife generally +gives one the idea of ninety. + +Again, what appears at first sight to be a comfortable-looking and +eminently respectable elderly lady is often discovered to be, in +reality, a giddy, girlish, and inexperienced young thing, the pride of +the village or the darling of the regiment. + +So, too, an exceptionally stout and short-winded old gentleman, who +looks as if he had been living too well and taking too little exercise +for the last forty-five years, is not the heavy father, as you might +imagine if you judged from mere external evidence, but a wild, +reckless boy. + +You would not think so to look at him, but his only faults are that he +is so young and light-headed. There is good in him, however, and he +will no doubt be steady enough when he grows up. All the young men of +the neighborhood worship him and the girls love him. + +"Here he comes," they say; "dear, dear old Jack--Jack, the darling +boy--the headstrong youth--Jack, the leader of our juvenile +sports--Jack, whose childish innocence wins all hearts. Three cheers +for dancing, bright-eyed Jack!" + +On the other hand, ladies with the complexion of eighteen are, you +learn as the story progresses, quite elderly women, the mothers of +middle-aged heroes. + +The experienced observer of stage-land never jumps to conclusions from +what he sees. He waits till he is told things. + +The stage lawyer never has any office of his own. He transacts all +his business at his clients' houses. He will travel hundreds of miles +to tell them the most trivial piece of legal information. + +It never occurs to him how much simpler it would be to write a letter. +The item for "traveling expenses" in his bill of costs must be +something enormous. + +There are two moments in the course of his client's career that the +stage lawyer particularly enjoys. The first is when the client comes +unexpectedly into a fortune; the second when he unexpectedly loses it. + +In the former case, upon learning the good news the stage lawyer at +once leaves his business and hurries off to the other end of the +kingdom to bear the glad tidings. He arrives at the humble domicile +of the beneficiary in question, sends up his card, and is ushered into +the front parlor. He enters mysteriously and sits left--client sits +right. An ordinary, common lawyer would come to the point at once, +state the matter in a plain, business-like way, and trust that he +might have the pleasure of representing, etc., etc.; but such simple +methods are not those of the stage lawyer. He looks at the client and +says: + +"You had a father." + +The client starts. How on earth did this calm, thin, keen-eyed old +man in black know that he had a father? He shuffles and stammers, but +the quiet, impenetrable lawyer fixes his cold, glassy eye on him, and +he is helpless. Subterfuge, he feels, is useless, and amazed, +bewildered at the knowledge of his most private affairs possessed by +his strange visitant, he admits the fact: he had a father. + +The lawyer smiles with a quiet smile of triumph and scratches his +chin. + +"You had a mother, too, if I am informed correctly," he continues. + +It is idle attempting to escape this man's supernatural acuteness, and +the client owns up to having had a mother also. + +From this the lawyer goes on to communicate to the client, as a great +secret, the whole of his (the client's) history from his cradle +upward, and also the history of his nearer relatives, and in less than +half an hour from the old man's entrance, or say forty minutes at the +outside, the client almost knows what the business is about. + +On the other occasion, when the client has lost his fortune, the stage +lawyer is even still happier. He comes down himself to tell the +misfortune (he would not miss the job for worlds), and he takes care +to choose the most unpropitious moment possible for breaking the news. +On the eldest daughter's birthday, when there is a big party on, is +his favorite time. He comes in about midnight and tells them just as +they are going down to supper. + +He has no idea of business hours, has the stage lawyer--to make the +thing as unpleasant as possible seems to be his only anxiety. + +If he cannot work it for a birthday, then he waits till there's a +wedding on, and gets up early in the morning on purpose to run down +and spoil the show. To enter among a crowd of happy, joyous +fellow-creatures and leave them utterly crushed and miserable is the +stage lawyer's hobby. + +The stage lawyer is a very talkative gentleman. He regards the +telling of his client's most private affairs to every stranger that he +meets as part of his professional duties. A good gossip with a few +chance acquaintances about the family secrets of his employers is food +and drink for the stage lawyer. + +They all go about telling their own and their friends' secrets to +perfect strangers on the stage. Whenever two people have five minutes +to spare on the stage they tell each other the story of their lives. +"Sit down and I will tell you the story of my life" is the stage +equivalent for the "Come and have a drink" of the outside world. + +The good stage lawyer has generally nursed the heroine on his knee +when a baby (when she was a baby, we mean)--when she was only so high. +It seems to have been a part of his professional duties. The good +stage lawyer also kisses all the pretty girls in the play and is +expected to chuck the housemaid under the chin. It is good to be a +good stage lawyer. + +The good stage lawyer also wipes away a tear when sad things happen; +and he turns away to do this and blows his nose, and says he thinks he +has a fly in his eye. This touching trait in his character is always +held in great esteem by the audience and is much applauded. + +The good stage lawyer is never by any chance a married man. (Few good +men are, so we gather from our married lady friends.) He loved in +early life the heroine's mother. That "sainted woman" (tear and nose +business) died and is now among the angels--the gentleman who did +marry her, by the bye, is not quite so sure about this latter point, +but the lawyer is fixed on the idea. + +In stage literature of a frivolous nature the lawyer is a very +different individual. In comedy he is young, he possesses chambers, +and he is married (there is no doubt about this latter fact); and his +wife and his mother-in-law spend most of the day in his office and +make the dull old place quite lively for him. + +He only has one client. She is a nice lady and affable, but her +antecedents are doubtful, and she seems to be no better than she ought +to be--possibly worse. But anyhow she is the sole business that the +poor fellow has--is, in fact, his only source of income, and might, +one would think, under such circumstances be accorded a welcome by his +family. But his wife and his mother-in-law, on the contrary, take a +violent dislike to her, and the lawyer has to put her in the +coal-scuttle or lock her up in the safe whenever he hears either of +these female relatives of his coming up the stairs. + +We should not care to be the client of a farcical comedy stage lawyer. +Legal transactions are trying to the nerves under the most favorable +circumstances; conducted by a farcical stage lawyer, the business +would be too exciting for us. + + + +THE ADVENTURESS. + +She sits on a table and smokes a cigarette. A cigarette on the stage +is always the badge of infamy. + +In real life the cigarette is usually the hall-mark of the +particularly mild and harmless individual. It is the dissipation of +the Y.M.C.A.; the innocent joy of the pure-hearted boy long ere the +demoralizing influence of our vaunted civilization has dragged him +down into the depths of the short clay. + +But behind the cigarette on the stage lurks ever black-hearted +villainy and abandoned womanhood. + +The adventuress is generally of foreign extraction. They do not make +bad women in England--the article is entirely of continental +manufacture and has to be imported. She speaks English with a +charming little French accent, and she makes up for this by speaking +French with a good sound English one. + +She seems a smart business woman, and she would probably get on very +well if it were not for her friends and relations. Friends and +relations are a trying class of people even in real life, as we all +know, but the friends and relations of the stage adventuress are a +particularly irritating lot. They never leave her; never does she get +a day or an hour off from them. Wherever she goes, there the whole +tribe goes with her. + +They all go with her in a body when she calls on her young man, and it +is as much as she can do to persuade them to go into the next room +even for five minutes, and give her a chance. When she is married +they come and live with her. + +They know her dreadful secret and it keeps them in comfort for years. +Knowing somebody's secret seems, on the stage, to be one of the most +profitable and least exhausting professions going. + +She is fond of married life, is the adventuress, and she goes in for +it pretty extensively. She has husbands all over the globe, most of +them in prison, but they escape and turn up in the last act and spoil +all the poor girl's plans. That is so like husbands--no +consideration, no thought for their poor wives. They are not a +prepossessing lot, either, those early husbands of hers. What she +could have seen in them to induce her to marry them is indeed a +mystery. + +The adventuress dresses magnificently. Where she gets the money from +we never could understand, for she and her companions are always more +or less complaining of being "stone broke." Dressmakers must be a +trusting people where she comes from. + +The adventuress is like the proverbial cat as regards the number of +lives she is possessed of. You never know when she is really dead. +Most people like to die once and have done with it, but the +adventuress, after once or twice trying it, seems to get quite to like +it, and goes on giving way to it, and then it grows upon her until she +can't help herself, and it becomes a sort of craving with her. + +This habit of hers is, however, a very trying one for her friends and +husbands--it makes things so uncertain. Something ought to be done to +break her of it. Her husbands, on hearing that she is dead, go into +raptures and rush off and marry other people, and then just as they +are starting off on their new honeymoon up she crops again, as fresh +as paint. It is really most annoying. + +For ourselves, were we the husband of a stage adventuress we should +never, after what we have seen of the species, feel quite justified in +believing her to be dead unless we had killed and buried her +ourselves; and even then we should be more easy in our minds if we +could arrange to sit on her grave for a week or so afterward. These +women are so artful! + +But it is not only the adventuress who will persist in coming to life +again every time she is slaughtered. They all do it on the stage. +They are all so unreliable in this respect. It must be most +disheartening to the murderers. + +And then, again, it is something extraordinary, when you come to think +of it, what a tremendous amount of killing some of them can stand and +still come up smiling in the next act, not a penny the worse for it. +They get stabbed, and shot, and thrown over precipices thousands of +feet high and, bless you, it does them good--it is like a tonic to +them. + +As for the young man that is coming home to see his girl, you simply +can't kill him. Achilles was a summer rose compared with him. Nature +and mankind have not sufficient materials in hand as yet to kill that +man. Science has but the strength of a puling babe against his +invulnerability. You can waste your time on earthquakes and +shipwrecks, volcanic eruptions, floods, explosions, railway accidents, +and such like sort of things, if you are foolish enough to do so; but +it is no good your imagining that anything of the kind can hurt him, +because it can't. + +There will be thousands of people killed, thousands in each instance, +but one human being will always escape, and that one human being will +be the stage young man who is coming home to see his girl. + +He is forever being reported as dead, but it always turns out to be +another fellow who was like him or who had on his (the young man's) +hat. He is bound to be out of it, whoever else may be in. + +"If I had been at my post that day," he explains to his sobbing +mother, "I should have been blown up, but the Providence that watches +over good men had ordained that I should be laying blind drunk in +Blogg's saloon at the time the explosion took place, and so the other +engineer, who had been doing my work when it was his turn to be off, +was killed along with the whole of the crew." + +"Ah, thank Heaven, thank Heaven for that!" ejaculates the pious old +lady, and the comic man is so overcome with devout joy that he has to +relieve his overstrained heart by drawing his young woman on one side +and grossly insulting her. + +All attempts to kill this young man ought really to be given up now. +The job has been tried over and over again by villains and bad people +of all kinds, but no one has ever succeeded. There has been an amount +of energy and ingenuity expended in seeking to lay up that one man +which, properly utilized, might have finished off ten million ordinary +mortals. It is sad to think of so much wasted effort. + +He, the young man coming home to see his girl, need never take an +insurance ticket or even buy a _Tit Bits_. It would be needless +expenditure in his case. + +On the other hand, and to make matters equal, as it were, there are +some stage people so delicate that it is next door to impossible to +keep them alive. + +The inconvenient husband is a most pathetic example of this. Medical +science is powerless to save that man when the last act comes round; +indeed, we doubt whether medical science, in its present state of +development, could even tell what is the matter with him or why he +dies at all. He looks healthy and robust enough and nobody touches +him, yet down he drops, without a word of warning, stone-dead, in the +middle of the floor--he always dies in the middle of the floor. Some +folks like to die in bed, but stage people don't. They like to die on +the floor. We all have our different tastes. + +The adventuress herself is another person who dies with remarkable +ease. We suppose in her case it is being so used to it that makes her +so quick and clever at it. There is no lingering illness and doctors' +bills and upsetting of the whole household arrangements about her +method. One walk round the stage and the thing is done. + +All bad characters die quickly on the stage. Good characters take a +long time over it, and have a sofa down in the drawing-room to do it +on, and have sobbing relatives and good old doctors fooling around +them, and can smile and forgive everybody. Bad stage characters have +to do the whole job, dying speech and all, in about ten seconds, and +do it with all their clothes on into the bargain, which must make it +most uncomfortable. + +It is repentance that kills off the bad people in plays. They always +repent, and the moment they repent they die. Repentance on the stage +seems to be one of the most dangerous things a man can be taken with. +Our advice to stage wicked people would undoubtedly be, "Never repent. +If you value your life, don't repent. It always means sudden death!" + +To return to our adventuress. She is by no means a bad woman. There +is much good in her. This is more than proved by the fact that she +learns to love the hero before she dies; for no one but a really good +woman capable of extraordinary patience and gentleness could ever, we +are convinced, grow to feel any other sentiment for that irritating +ass, than a desire to throw bricks at him. + +The stage adventuress would be a much better woman, too, if it were +not for the heroine. The adventuress makes the most complete +arrangements for being noble and self-sacrificing--that is, for going +away and never coming back, and is just about to carry them out, when +the heroine, who has a perfect genius for being in the wrong place at +the right time, comes in and spoils it all. No stage adventuress can +be good while the heroine is about. The sight of the heroine rouses +every bad feeling in her breast. + +We can sympathize with her in this respect. The heroine often affects +ourselves in precisely the same way. + +There is a good deal to be said in favor of the adventuress. True, +she possesses rather too much sarcasm and repartee to make things +quite agreeable round the domestic hearth, and when she has got all +her clothes on there is not much room left in the place for anybody +else; but taken on the whole she is decidedly attractive. She has +grit and go in her. She is alive. She can do something to help +herself besides calling for "George." + +She has not got a stage child--if she ever had one, she has left it on +somebody else's doorstep which, presuming there was no water handy to +drown it in, seems to be about the most sensible thing she could have +done with it. She is not oppressively good. + +She never wants to be "unhanded" or "let to pass." + +She is not always being shocked or insulted by people telling her that +they love her; she does not seem to mind it if they do. She is not +always fainting, and crying, and sobbing, and wailing, and moaning, +like the good people in the play are. + +Oh, they do have an unhappy time of it--the good people in plays! +Then she is the only person in the piece who can sit on the comic man. + +We sometimes think it would be a fortunate thing--for him--if they +allowed her to marry and settle down quietly with the hero. She might +make a man of him in time. + + + +THE SERVANT-GIRL. + +There are two types of servant-girl to be met with on the stage. This +is an unusual allowance for one profession. + +There is the lodging-house slavey. She has a good heart and a smutty +face and is always dressed according to the latest fashion in +scarecrows. Her leading occupation is the cleaning of boots. She +cleans boots all over the house, at all hours of the day. She comes +and sits down on the hero's breakfast-table and cleans them over the +poor fellow's food. She comes into the drawing-room cleaning boots. + +She has her own method of cleaning them, too. She rubs off the mud, +puts on the blacking, and polishes up all with the same brush. They +take an enormous amount of polishing. She seems to do nothing else +all day long but walk about shining one boot, and she breathes on it +and rubs it till you wonder there is any leather left, yet it never +seems to get any brighter, nor, indeed, can you expect it to, for when +you look close you see it is a patent-leather boot that she has been +throwing herself away upon all this time. + +Somebody has been having a lark with the poor girl. + +The lodging-house slavey brushes her hair with the boot brush and +blacks the end of her nose with it. + +We were acquainted with a lodging-house slavey once--a real one, we +mean. She was the handmaiden at a house in Bloomsbury where we once +hung out. She was untidy in her dress, it is true, but she had not +quite that castaway and gone-to-sleep-in-a-dust-bin appearance that +we, an earnest student of the drama, felt she ought to present, and we +questioned her one day on the subject. + +"How is it, Sophronia," we said, "that you distantly resemble a human +being instead of giving one the idea of an animated rag-shop? Don't +you ever polish your nose with the blacking-brush, or rub coal into +your head, or wash your face in treacle, or put skewers into your +hair, or anything of that sort, like they do on the stage?" + +She said: "Lord love you, what should I want to go and be a bally +idiot like that for?" + +And we have not liked to put the question elsewhere since then. + +The other type of servant-girl on the stage--the villa +servant-girl--is a very different personage. She is a fetching little +thing, dresses bewitchingly, and is always clean. Her duties are to +dust the legs of the chairs in the drawing-room. That is the only +work she ever has to do, but it must be confessed she does that +thoroughly. She never comes into the room without dusting the legs of +these chairs, and she dusts them again before she goes out. + +If anything ought to be free from dust in a stage house, it should be +the legs of the drawing-room chairs. + +She is going to marry the man-servant, is the stage servant-girl, as +soon as they have saved up sufficient out of their wages to buy a +hotel. They think they will like to keep a hotel. They don't +understand a bit about the business, which we believe is a complicated +one, but this does not trouble them in the least. + +They quarrel a good deal over their love-making, do the stage +servant-girl and her young man, and they always come into the +drawing-room to do it. They have got the kitchen, and there is the +garden (with a fountain and mountains in the background--you can see +it through the window), but no! no place in or about the house is good +enough for them to quarrel in except the drawing-room. They quarrel +there so vigorously that it even interferes with the dusting of the +chair-legs. + +She ought not to be long in saving up sufficient to marry on, for the +generosity of people on the stage to the servants there makes one +seriously consider the advisability of ignoring the unremunerative +professions of ordinary life and starting a new and more promising +career as a stage servant. + +No one ever dreams of tipping the stage servant with less than a +sovereign when they ask her if her mistress is at home or give her a +letter to post, and there is quite a rush at the end of the piece to +stuff five-pound notes into her hand. The good old man gives her ten. + +The stage servant is very impudent to her mistress, and the master--he +falls in love with her and it does upset the house so. + +Sometimes the servant-girl is good and faithful, and then she is +Irish. All good servant-girls on the stage are Irish. + +All the male visitors are expected to kiss the stage servant-girl when +they come into the house, and to dig her in the ribs and to say: "Do +you know, Jane, I think you're an uncommonly nice girl--click." They +always say this, and she likes it. + +Many years ago, when we were young, we thought we would see if things +were the same off the stage, and the next time we called at a certain +friend's house we tried this business on. + +She wasn't quite so dazzlingly beautiful as they are on the stage, but +we passed that. She showed us up into the drawing-room, and then said +she would go and tell her mistress we were there. + +We felt this was the time to begin. We skipped between her and the +door. We held our hat in front of us, cocked our head on one side, +and said: "Don't go! don't go!" + +The girl seemed alarmed. We began to get a little nervous ourselves, +but we had begun it and we meant to go through with it. + +We said, "Do you know, Jane" (her name wasn't Jane, but that wasn't +our fault), "do you know, Jane, I think you're an uncommonly nice +girl," and we said "click," and dug her in the ribs with our elbow, +and then chucked her under the chin. The whole thing seemed to fall +flat. There was nobody there to laugh or applaud. We wished we +hadn't done it. It seemed stupid when you came to think of it. We +began to feel frightened. The business wasn't going as we expected; +but we screwed up our courage and went on. + +We put on the customary expression of comic imbecility and beckoned +the girl to us. We have never seen this fail on the stage. + +But this girl seemed made wrong. She got behind the sofa and screamed +"Help!" + +We have never known them to do this on the stage, and it threw us out +in our plans. We did not know exactly what to do. We regretted that +we had ever begun this job and heartily wished ourselves out of it. +But it appeared foolish to pause then, when we were more than half-way +through, and we made a rush to get it over. + +We chivvied the girl round the sofa and caught her near the door and +kissed her. She scratched our face, yelled police, murder, and fire, +and fled from the room. + +Our friend came in almost immediately. He said: + +"I say, J., old man, are you drunk?" + +We told him no, that we were only a student of the drama. His wife +then entered in a towering passion. She didn't ask us if we were +drunk. She said: + +"How dare you come here in this state!" + +We endeavored unsuccessfully to induce her to believe that we were +sober, and we explained that our course of conduct was what was always +pursued on the stage. + +She said she didn't care what was done on the stage, it wasn't going +to be pursued in her house; and that if her husband's friends couldn't +behave as gentlemen they had better stop away. + +The following morning we received a letter from a firm of solicitors +in Lincoln's Inn with reference, so they put it, to the brutal and +unprovoked assault committed by us on the previous afternoon upon the +person of their client, Miss Matilda Hemmings. The letter stated that +we had punched Miss Hemmings in the side, struck her under the chin, +and afterward, seizing her as she was leaving the room, proceeded to +commit a gross assault, into the particulars of which it was needless +for them to enter at greater length. + +It added that if we were prepared to render an ample written apology +and to pay 50 pounds compensation, they would advise their client, +Miss Matilda Hemmings, to allow the matter to drop; otherwise criminal +proceedings would at once be commenced against us. + +We took the letter to our own solicitors and explained the +circumstances to them. They said it seemed to be a very sad case, but +advised us to pay the 50 pounds, and we borrowed the money and did so. + +Since then we have lost faith, somehow, in the British drama as a +guide to the conduct of life. + + + +THE CHILD. + +It is nice and quiet and it talks prettily. + +We have come across real infants now and then in the course of visits +to married friends; they have been brought to us from outlying parts +of the house and introduced to us for our edification; and we have +found them gritty and sticky. Their boots have usually been muddy, +and they have wiped them up against our new trousers. And their hair +has suggested the idea that they have been standing on their heads in +the dust-bin. + +And they have talked to us--but not prettily, not at all--rather rude +we should call it. + +But the stage child is very different. It is clean and tidy. You can +touch it anywhere and nothing comes off. Its face glows with soap and +water. From the appearance of its hands it is evident that mud-pies +and tar are joys unknown to it. As for its hair, there is something +uncanny about its smoothness and respectability. Even its boot-laces +are done up. + +We have never seen anything like the stage child outside a theater +excepting one--that was on the pavement in front of a tailor's shop in +Tottenham Court Road. He stood on a bit of round wood, and it was +fifteen and nine, his style. + +We thought in our ignorance prior to this that there could not be +anything in the world like the stage child, but you see we were +mistaken. + +The stage child is affectionate to its parents and its nurse and is +respectful in its demeanor toward those whom Providence has placed in +authority over it; and so far it is certainly much to be preferred to +the real article. It speaks of its male and female progenitors as +"dear, dear papa" and "dear, dear mamma," and it refers to its nurse +as "darling nursey." We are connected with a youthful child +ourselves--a real one--a nephew. He alludes to his father (when his +father is not present) as "the old man," and always calls the nurse +"old nut-crackers." Why cannot they make real children who say "dear, +dear mamma" and "dear, dear papa?" + +The stage child is much superior to the live infant in every way. The +stage child does not go rampaging about a house and screeching and +yelling till nobody knows whether they are on their heads or their +heels. + +A stage child does not get up at five o'clock in the morning to +practice playing on a penny whistle. A stage child never wants a +bicycle and drives you mad about it. A stage child does not ask +twenty complicated questions a minute about things that you don't +understand, and then wind up by asking why you don't seem to know +anything, and why wouldn't anybody teach you anything when you were a +little boy. + +The stage child does not wear a hole in the seat of its knickerbockers +and have to have a patch let in. The stage child comes downstairs on +its feet. + +The stage child never brings home six other children to play at horses +in the front garden, and then wants to know if they can all come in to +tea. The stage child never has the wooping-cough, and the measles, +and every other disease that it can lay its hands on, and be laid up +with them one after the other and turn the house upside down. + +The stage child's department in the scheme of life is to harrow up its +mother's feelings by ill-timed and uncalled-for questions about its +father. It always wants to know, before a roomful of people, where +"dear papa" is, and why he has left dear mamma; when, as all the +guests know, the poor man is doing his two years' hard or waiting to +be hanged. It makes everybody so uncomfortable. + +It is always harrowing up somebody--the stage child; it really ought +not to be left about as it is. When it has done upsetting its mother +it fishes out some broken-hearted maid, who has just been cruelly +severed forever from her lover, and asks her in a high falsetto voice +why she doesn't get married, and prattles to her about love, and +domestic bliss, and young men, and any other subject it can think of +particularly calculated to lacerate the poor girl's heart until her +brain nearly gives way. + +After that it runs amuck up and down the whole play and makes +everybody sit up all round. It asks eminently respectable old maids +if they wouldn't like to have a baby; and it wants to know why +bald-headed old men have left off wearing hair, and why other old +gentlemen have red noses and if they were always that color. + +In some plays it so happens that the less said about the origin and +source of the stage child the better; and in such cases nothing will +appear so important to that contrary brat as to know, in the middle of +an evening-party, who its father was! + +Everybody loves the stage child. They catch it up in their bosoms +every other minute and weep over it. They take it in turns to do +this. + +Nobody--on the stage, we mean--ever has enough of the stage child. +Nobody ever tells the stage child to "shut up" or to "get out of +this." Nobody ever clumps the stage child over the head. + +When the real child goes to the theater it must notice these things +and wish it were a stage child. + +The stage child is much admired by the audience. Its pathos makes +them weep; its tragedy thrills them; its declamation--as for instance +when it takes the center of the stage and says it will kill the wicked +man, and the police, and everybody who hurts its mar--stirs them like +a trumpet note; and its light comedy is generally held to be the most +truly humorous thing in the whole range of dramatic art. + +But there are some people so strangely constituted that they do not +appreciate the stage child; they do not comprehend its uses; they do +not understand its beauties. We should not be angry with them. We +should the rather pity them. + +We ourselves had a friend once who suffered from this misfortune. He +was a married man, and Providence had been very gracious, very good to +him: he had been blessed with eleven children, and they were all +growing up well and strong. + +The "baby" was eleven weeks old, and then came the twins, who were +getting on for fifteen months and were cutting their double teeth +nicely. The youngest girl was three; there were five boys aged seven, +eight, nine, ten, and twelve respectively--good enough lads, +but--well, there, boys will be boys, you know; we were just the same +ourselves when we were young. The two eldest were both very pleasant +girls, as their mother said; the only pity was that they would quarrel +so with each other. + +We never knew a healthier set of boys and girls. They were so full of +energy and dash. + +Our friend was very much out of sorts one evening when we called on +him. It was holiday-time and wet weather. He had been at home all +day, and so had all the children. He was telling his wife when we +entered the room that if the holidays were to last much longer and +those twins did not hurry up and get their teeth quickly, he should +have to go away and join the County Council. He could not stand the +racket. + +His wife said she could not see what he had to complain of. She was +sure better-hearted children no man could have. + +Our friend said he didn't care a straw about their hearts. It was +their legs and arms and lungs that were driving him crazy. + +He also said that he would go out with us and get away from it for a +bit, or he should go mad. + +He proposed a theater, and we accordingly made our way toward the +Strand. Our friend, in closing the door behind him, said he could not +tell us what a relief it was to get away from those children. He said +he loved children very much indeed, but that it was a mistake to have +too much of anything, however much you liked it, and that he had come +to the conclusion that twenty-two hours a day of them was enough for +any one. + +He said he did not want to see another child or hear another child +until he got home. He wanted to forget that there were such things as +children in the world. + +We got up to the Strand and dropped into the first theater we came to. +The curtain went up, and on the stage was a small child standing in +its nightshirt and screaming for its mother. + +Our friend looked, said one word and bolted, and we followed. + +We went a little further and dropped into another theater. + +Here there were two children on the stage. Some grown-up people were +standing round them listening, in respectful attitudes, while the +children talked. They appeared to be lecturing about something. + +Again we fled, swearing, and made our way to a third theater. They +were all children there. It was somebody or other's Children's +Company performing an opera, or pantomime, or something of that sort. + +Our friend said he would not venture into another theater. He said he +had heard there were places called music-halls, and he begged us to +take him to one of these and not to tell his wife. + +We inquired of a policeman and found that there really were such +places, and we took him into one. + +The first thing we saw were two little boys doing tricks on a +horizontal bar. + +Our friend was about to repeat his customary programme of flying and +cursing, but we restrained him. We assured him that he would really +see a grown-up person if he waited a bit, so he sat out the boys and +also their little sister on a bicycle and waited for the next item. + +It turned out to be an infant phenomenon who sang and danced in +fourteen different costumes, and we once more fled. + +Our friend said he could not go home in the state he was then; he felt +sure he should kill the twins if he did. He pondered for awhile, and +then he thought he would go and hear some music. He said he thought a +little music would soothe and ennoble him--make him feel more like a +Christian than he did at that precise moment. + +We were near St. James' Hall, so we went in there. + +The hall was densely crowded, and we had great difficulty in forcing +our way to our seats. We reached them at length, and then turned our +eyes toward the orchestra. + +"The marvelous boy pianist--only ten years old!" was giving a recital. + +Then our friend rose and said he thought be would give it up and go +home. + +We asked him if he would like to try any other place of amusement, but +he said "No." He said that when you came to think of it, it seemed a +waste of money for a man with eleven children of his own to go about +to places of entertainment nowadays. + + + +THE COMIC LOVERS. + +Oh, they are funny! The comic lovers' mission in life is to serve as +a sort of "relief" to the misery caused the audience by the other +characters in the play; and all that is wanted now is something that +will be a relief to the comic lovers. + +They have nothing to do with the play, but they come on immediately +after anything very sad has happened and make love. This is why we +watch sad scenes on the stage with such patience. We are not eager +for them to be got over. Maybe they are very uninteresting scenes, as +well as sad ones, and they make us yawn; but we have no desire to see +them hurried through. The longer they take the better pleased we are: +we know that when they are finished the comic lovers will come on. + +They are always very rude to each other, the comic lovers. Everybody +is more or less rude and insulting to every body else on the stage; +they call it repartee there! We tried the effect of a little stage +"repartee" once upon some people in real life, and we wished we hadn't +afterward. It was too subtle for them. They summoned us before a +magistrate for "using language calculated to cause a breach of the +peace." We were fined 2 pounds and costs! + +They are more lenient to "wit and humor" on the stage, and know how to +encourage the art of vituperation. But the comic lovers carry the +practice almost to excess. They are more than rude--they are abusive. +They insult each other from morning to night. What their married life +will be like we shudder to think! + +In the various slanging matches and bullyragging competitions which +form their courtship it is always the maiden that is most successful. +Against her merry flow of invective and her girlish wealth of +offensive personalities the insolence and abuse of her boyish adorer +cannot stand for one moment. + +To give an idea of how the comic lovers woo, we perhaps cannot do +better than subjoin the following brief example: + + _SCENE: Main thoroughfare in populous district of London. Time: + Noon. Not a soul to be seen anywhere._ + + _Enter comic loveress R., walking in the middle of the road._ + + _Enter comic lover L., also walking in the middle of the road._ + + _They neither see the other until they bump against each other in + the center._ + +HE. Why, Jane! Who'd a' thought o' meeting you here! + +SHE. You evidently didn't--stoopid! + +HE. Halloo! got out o' bed the wrong side again? I say, Jane, if you +go on like that you'll never get a man to marry you. + +SHE. So I thought when I engaged myself to you. + +HE. Oh! come, Jane, don't be hard. + +SHE. Well, one of us must be hard. You're soft enough. + +HE. Yes, I shouldn't want to marry you if I weren't. Ha! ha! ha! + +SHE. Oh, you gibbering idiot! (_Said archly._) + +HE. So glad I am. We shall make a capital match (_attempts to kiss +her_). + +SHE (_slipping away_). Yes, and you'll find I'm a match that can +strike (_fetches him a violent blow over the side if the head_). + +HE (_holding his jaw--in a literal sense, we mean_). I can't help +feeling smitten by her. + +SHE. Yes, I'm a bit of a spanker, ain't I? + +HE. Spanker. I call you a regular stunner. You've nearly made me +silly. + +SHE (_laughing playfully_). No, nature did that for you, Joe, long +ago. + +HE. Ah, well, you've made me smart enough now, you boss-eyed old cow, +you! + +SHE. Cow! am I? Ah, I suppose that's what makes me so fond of a +calf, you German sausage on legs! You-- + +HE. Go along. Your mother brought you up on sour milk. + +SHE. Yah! They weaned you on thistles, didn't they? + +And so on, with such like badinage do they hang about in the middle of +that road, showering derision and contumely upon each other for full +ten minutes, when, with one culminating burst of mutual abuse, they go +off together fighting and the street is left once more deserted. + +It is very curious, by the bye, how deserted all public places become +whenever a stage character is about. It would seem as though ordinary +citizens sought to avoid them. We have known a couple of stage +villains to have Waterloo Bridge, Lancaster Place, and a bit of the +Strand entirely to themselves for nearly a quarter of an hour on a +summer's afternoon while they plotted a most diabolical outrage. + +As for Trafalgar Square, the hero always chooses that spot when he +wants to get away from the busy crowd and commune in solitude with his +own bitter thoughts; and the good old lawyer leaves his office and +goes there to discuss any very delicate business over which he +particularly does not wish to be disturbed. + +And they all make speeches there to an extent sufficient to have +turned the hair of the late lamented Sir Charles Warren White with +horror. But it is all right, because there is nobody near to hear +them. As far as the eye can reach, not a living thing is to be seen. +Northumberland Avenue, the Strand, and St. Martin's Lane are simply a +wilderness. The only sign of life about is a 'bus at the top of +Whitehall, and it appears to be blocked. + +How it has managed to get blocked we cannot say. It has the whole +road to itself, and is, in fact, itself the only traffic for miles +round. Yet there it sticks for hours. The police make no attempt to +move it on and the passengers seem quite contented. + +The Thames Embankment is an even still more lonesome and desolate +part. Wounded (stage) spirits fly from the haunts of men and, leaving +the hard, cold world far, far behind them, go and die in peace on the +Thames Embankment. And other wanderers, finding their skeletons +afterward, bury them there and put up rude crosses over the graves to +mark the spot. + +The comic lovers are often very young, and when people on the stage +are young they _are_ young. He is supposed to be about sixteen and +she is fifteen. But they both talk as if they were not more than +seven. + +In real life "boys" of sixteen know a thing or two, we have generally +found. The average "boy" of sixteen nowadays usually smokes cavendish +and does a little on the Stock Exchange or makes a book; and as for +love! he has quite got over it by that age. On the stage, however, +the new-born babe is not in it for innocence with the boy lover of +sixteen. + +So, too, with the maiden. Most girls of fifteen off the stage, so our +experience goes, know as much as there is any actual necessity for +them to know, Mr. Gilbert notwithstanding; but when we see a young +lady of fifteen on the stage we wonder where her cradle is. + +The comic lovers do not have the facilities for love-making that the +hero and heroine do. The hero and heroine have big rooms to make love +in, with a fire and plenty of easy-chairs, so that they can sit about +in picturesque attitudes and do it comfortably. Or if they want to do +it out of doors they have a ruined abbey, with a big stone seat in the +center, and moonlight. + +The comic lovers, on the other hand, have to do it standing up all the +time, in busy streets, or in cheerless-looking and curiously narrow +rooms in which there is no furniture whatever and no fire. + +And there is always a tremendous row going on in the house when the +comic lovers are making love. Somebody always seems to be putting up +pictures in the next room, and putting them up boisterously, too, so +that the comic lovers have to shout at each other. + + + +THE PEASANTS. + +They are so clean. We have seen peasantry off the stage, and it has +presented an untidy--occasionally a disreputable and +unwashed--appearance; but the stage peasant seems to spend all his +wages on soap and hair-oil. + +They are always round the corner--or rather round the two corners--and +they come on in a couple of streams and meet in the center; and when +they are in their proper position they smile. + +There is nothing like the stage peasants' smile in this world--nothing +so perfectly inane, so calmly imbecile. + +They are so happy. They don't look it, but we know they are because +they say so. If you don't believe them, they dance three steps to the +right and three steps to the left back again. They can't help it. It +is because they are so happy. + +When they are more than usually rollicking they stand in a semicircle, +with their hands on each other's shoulders, and sway from side to +side, trying to make themselves sick. But this is only when they are +simply bursting with joy. + +Stage peasants never have any work to do. + +Sometimes we see them going to work, sometimes coming home from work, +but nobody has ever seen them actually at work. They could not afford +to work--it would spoil their clothes. + +They are very sympathetic, are stage peasants. They never seem to +have any affairs of their own to think about, but they make up for +this by taking a three-hundred-horse-power interest in things in which +they have no earthly concern. + +What particularly rouses them is the heroine's love affairs. They +could listen to them all day. + +They yearn to hear what she said to him and to be told what he replied +to her, and they repeat it to each other. + +In our own love-sick days we often used to go and relate to various +people all the touching conversations that took place between our +lady-love and ourselves; but our friends never seemed to get excited +over it. On the contrary, a casual observer might even have been led +to the idea that they were bored by our recital. And they had trains +to catch and men to meet before we had got a quarter through the job. + +Ah, how often in those days have we yearned for the sympathy of a +stage peasantry, who would have crowded round us, eager not to miss +one word of the thrilling narrative, who would have rejoiced with us +with an encouraging laugh, and have condoled with us with a grieved +"Oh," and who would have gone off, when we had had enough of them, +singing about it. + +By the way, this is a very beautiful trait in the character of the +stage peasantry, their prompt and unquestioning compliance with the +slightest wish of any of the principals. + +"Leave me, friends," says the heroine, beginning to make preparations +for weeping, and before she can turn round they are clean gone--one +lot to the right, evidently making for the back entrance of the +public-house, and the other half to the left, where they visibly hide +themselves behind the pump and wait till somebody else wants them. + +The stage peasantry do not talk much, their strong point being to +listen. When they cannot get any more information about the state of +the heroine's heart, they like to be told long and complicated stories +about wrongs done years ago to people that they never heard of. They +seem to be able to grasp and understand these stories with ease. This +makes the audience envious of them. + +When the stage peasantry do talk, however, they soon make up for lost +time. They start off all together with a suddenness that nearly +knocks you over. + +They all talk. Nobody listens. Watch any two of them. They are both +talking as hard as they can go. They have been listening quite enough +to other people: you can't expect them to listen to each other. But +the conversation under such conditions must be very trying. + +And then they flirt so sweetly! so idyllicly! + +It has been our privilege to see real peasantry flirt, and it has +always struck us as a singularly solid and substantial affair--makes +one think, somehow, of a steam-roller flirting with a cow--but on the +stage it is so sylph-like. She has short skirts, and her stockings +are so much tidier and better fitting than these things are in real +peasant life, and she is arch and coy. She turns away from him and +laughs--such a silvery laugh. And he is ruddy and curly haired and +has on such a beautiful waistcoat! how can she help but love him? And +he is so tender and devoted and holds her by the waist; and she slips +round and comes up the other side. Oh, it is so bewitching! + +The stage peasantry like to do their love-making as much in public as +possible. Some people fancy a place all to themselves for this sort +of thing--where nobody else is about. We ourselves do. But the stage +peasant is more sociably inclined. Give him the village green, just +outside the public-house, or the square on market-day to do his +spooning in. + +They are very faithful, are stage peasants. No jilting, no +fickleness, no breach of promise. If the gentleman in pink walks out +with the lady in blue in the first act, pink and blue will be married +in the end. He sticks to her all through and she sticks to him. + +Girls in yellow may come and go, girls in green may laugh and +dance--the gentleman in pink heeds them not. Blue is his color, and +he never leaves it. He stands beside it, he sits beside it. He +drinks with her, he smiles with her, he laughs with her, he dances +with her, he comes on with her, he goes off with her. + +When the time comes for talking he talks to her and only her, and she +talks to him and only him. Thus there is no jealousy, no quarreling. +But we should prefer an occasional change ourselves. + +There are no married people in stage villages and no children +(consequently, of course-happy village! oh, to discover it and spend a +month there!). There are just the same number of men as there are +women in all stage villages, and they are all about the same age and +each young man loves some young woman. But they never marry. + +They talk a lot about it, but they never do it. The artful beggars! +They see too much what it's like among the principals. + +The stage peasant is fond of drinking, and when he drinks he likes to +let you know he is drinking. None of your quiet half-pint inside the +bar for him. He likes to come out in the street and sing about it and +do tricks with it, such as turning it topsy-turvy over his head. + +Notwithstanding all this he is moderate, mind you. You can't say he +takes too much. One small jug of ale among forty is his usual +allowance. + +He has a keen sense of humor and is easily amused. There is something +almost pathetic about the way he goes into convulsions of laughter +over such very small jokes. How a man like that would enjoy a real +joke! One day he will perhaps hear a real joke. Who knows? It will, +however, probably kill him. One grows to love the stage peasant after +awhile. He is so good, so child-like, so unworldly. He realizes +one's ideal of Christianity. + + + +THE GOOD OLD MAN. + +He has lost his wife. But he knows where she is--among the angels! + +She isn't all gone, because the heroine has her hair. "Ah, you've got +your mother's hair," says the good old man, feeling the girl's head +all over as she kneels beside him. Then they all wipe away a tear. + +The people on the stage think very highly of the good old man, but +they don't encourage him much after the first act. He generally dies +in the first act. + +If he does not seem likely to die they murder him. + +He is a most unfortunate old gentleman. Anything he is mixed up in +seems bound to go wrong. If he is manager or director of a bank, +smash it goes before even one act is over. His particular firm is +always on the verge of bankruptcy. We have only to be told that he +has put all his savings into a company--no matter how sound and +promising an affair it may always have been and may still seem--to +know that that company is a "goner." + +No power on earth can save it after once the good old man has become a +shareholder. + +If we lived in stage-land and were asked to join any financial scheme, +our first question would be: + +"Is the good old man in it?" If so, that would decide us. + +When the good old man is a trustee for any one he can battle against +adversity much longer. He is a plucky old fellow, and while that +trust money lasts he keeps a brave heart and fights on boldly. It is +not until he has spent the last penny of it that he gives way. + +It then flashes across the old man's mind that his motives for having +lived in luxury upon that trust money for years may possibly be +misunderstood. The world--the hollow, heartless world--will call it a +swindle and regard him generally as a precious old fraud. + +This idea quite troubles the good old man. + +But the world really ought not to blame him. No one, we are sure, +could be more ready and willing to make amends (when found out); and +to put matters right he will cheerfully sacrifice his daughter's +happiness and marry her to the villain. + +The villain, by the way, has never a penny to bless himself with, and +cannot even pay his own debts, let alone helping anybody else out of a +scrape. But the good old man does not think of this. + +Our own personal theory, based upon a careful comparison of +similarities, is that the good old man is in reality the stage hero +grown old. There is something about the good old man's chuckle-headed +simplicity, about his helpless imbecility, and his irritating damtom +foolishness that is strangely suggestive of the hero. + +He is just the sort of old man that we should imagine the hero would +develop into. + +We may, of course, be wrong; but that is our idea. + + + +THE IRISHMAN. + +He says "Shure" and "Bedad" and in moments of exultation "Beghorra." +That is all the Irish he knows. + +He is very poor, but scrupulously honest. His great ambition is to +pay his rent, and he is devoted to his landlord. + +He is always cheerful and always good. We never knew a bad Irishman +on the stage. Sometimes a stage Irishman seems to be a bad man--such +as the "agent" or the "informer"--but in these cases it invariably +turns out in the end that this man was all along a Scotchman, and thus +what had been a mystery becomes clear and explicable. + +The stage Irishman is always doing the most wonderful things +imaginable. We do not see him do those wonderful things. He does +them when nobody is by and tells us all about them afterward: that is +how we know of them. + +We remember on one occasion, when we were young and somewhat +inexperienced, planking our money down and going into a theater solely +and purposely to see the stage Irishman do the things he was depicted +as doing on the posters outside. + +They were really marvelous, the things he did on that poster. + +In the right-hand upper corner he appeared running across country on +all fours, with a red herring sticking out from his coat-tails, while +far behind came hounds and horsemen hunting him. But their chance of +ever catching him up was clearly hopeless. + +To the left he was represented as running away over one of the wildest +and most rugged bits of landscape we have ever seen with a very big +man on his back. Six policemen stood scattered about a mile behind +him. They had evidently been running after him, but had at last given +up the pursuit as useless. + +In the center of the poster he was having a friendly fight with +seventeen ladies and gentlemen. Judging from the costumes, the affair +appeared to be a wedding. A few of the guests had already been killed +and lay dead about the floor. The survivors, however, were enjoying +themselves immensely, and of all that gay group he was the gayest. + +At the moment chosen by the artist, he had just succeeded in cracking +the bridegroom's skull. + +"We must see this," said we to ourselves. "This is good." And we had +a bob's worth. + +But he did not do any of the things that we have mentioned, after +all--at least, we mean we did not see him do any of them. It seems he +did them "off," and then came on and told his mother all about it +afterward. + +He told it very well, but somehow or other we were disappointed. We +had so reckoned on that fight. + +By the bye, we have noticed, even among the characters of real life, a +tendency to perform most of their wonderful feats "off." + +It has been our privilege since then to gaze upon many posters on +which have been delineated strange and moving stage events. + +We have seen the hero holding the villain up high above his head, and +throwing him about that carelessly that we have felt afraid he would +break something with him. + +We have seen a heroine leaping from the roof of a house on one side of +the street and being caught by the comic man standing on the roof of a +house on the other side of the street and thinking nothing of it. + +We have seen railway trains rushing into each other at the rate of +sixty miles an hour. We have seen houses blown up by dynamite two +hundred feet into the air. We have seen the defeat of the Spanish +Armada, the destruction of Pompeii, and the return of the British army +from Egypt in one "set" each. + +Such incidents as earthquakes, wrecks in mid-ocean, revolutions and +battles we take no note of, they being commonplace and ordinary. + +But we do not go inside to see these things now. We have two looks at +the poster instead; it is more satisfying. + +The Irishman, to return to our friend, is very fond of whisky--the +stage Irishman, we mean. Whisky is forever in his thoughts--and often +in other places belonging to him, besides. + +The fashion in dress among stage Irishmen is rather picturesque than +neat. Tailors must have a hard time of it in stage Ireland. + +The stage Irishman has also an original taste in hats. He always +wears a hat without a crown; whether to keep his head cool or with any +political significance we cannot say. + + + +THE DETECTIVE. + +Ah! he is a cute one, he is. Possibly in real life he would not be +deemed anything extraordinary, but by contrast with the average of +stage men and women, any one who is not a born fool naturally appears +somewhat Machiavellian. + +He is the only man in the play who does not swallow all the villain +tells him and believe it, and come up with his mouth open for more. +He is the only man who can see through the disguise of an overcoat and +a new hat. + +There is something very wonderful about the disguising power of cloaks +and hats upon the stage. This comes from the habit people on the +stage have of recognizing their friends, not by their faces and +voices, but by their cloaks and hats. + +A married man on the stage knows his wife, because he knows she wears +a blue ulster and a red bonnet. The moment she leaves off that blue +ulster and red bonnet he is lost and does not know where she is. + +She puts on a yellow cloak and a green hat, and coming in at another +door says she is a lady from the country, and does he want a +housekeeper? + +Having lost his beloved wife, and feeling that there is no one now to +keep the children quiet, he engages her. She puzzles him a good deal, +this new housekeeper. There is something about her that strangely +reminds him of his darling Nell--maybe her boots and dress, which she +has not had time to change. + +Sadly the slow acts pass away until one day, as it is getting near +closing-time, she puts on the blue ulster and the red bonnet again and +comes in at the old original door. + +Then he recognizes her and asks her where she has been all these cruel +years. + +Even the bad people, who as a rule do possess a little sense--indeed, +they are the only persons in the play who ever pretend to any--are +deceived by singularly thin disguises. + +The detective comes in to their secret councils, with his hat drawn +down over his eyes, and followed by the hero speaking in a squeaky +voice; and the villains mistake them for members of the band and tell +them all their plans. + +If the villains can't get themselves found out that way, then they go +into a public tea-garden and recount their crimes to one another in a +loud tone of voice. + +They evidently think that it is only fair to give the detective a +chance. + +The detective must not be confounded with the policeman. The stage +policeman is always on the side of the villain; the detective backs +virtue. + +The stage detective is, in fact, the earthly agent of a discerning and +benevolent Providence. He stands by and allows vice to be triumphant +and the good people to be persecuted for awhile without interference. +Then when he considers that we have all had about enough of it (to +which conclusion, by the bye, he arrives somewhat late) he comes +forward, handcuffs the bad people, sorts out and gives back to the +good people all their various estates and wives, promises the chief +villain twenty years' penal servitude, and all is joy. + + + +THE SAILOR. + +He does suffer so with his trousers. He has to stop and pull them up +about twice every minute. + +One of these days, if he is not careful, there will be an accident +happen to those trousers. + +If the stage sailor will follow our advice, he will be warned in time +and will get a pair of braces. + +Sailors in real life do not have nearly so much trouble with their +trousers as sailors on the stage do. Why is this? We have seen a +good deal of sailors in real life, but on only one occasion, that we +can remember, did we ever see a real sailor pull his trousers up. + +And then he did not do it a bit like they do it on the stage. + +The stage sailor places his right hand behind him and his left in +front, leaps up into the air, kicks out his leg behind in a gay and +bird-like way, and the thing is done. + +The real sailor that we saw began by saying a bad word. Then he +leaned up against a brick wall and undid his belt, pulled up his +"bags" as he stood there (he never attempted to leap up into the air), +tucked in his jersey, shook his legs, and walked on. + +It was a most unpicturesque performance to watch. + +The thing that the stage sailor most craves in this life is that +somebody should shiver his timbers. + +"Shiver my timbers!" is the request he makes to every one he meets. +But nobody ever does it. + +His chief desire with regard to the other people in the play is that +they should "belay there, avast!" We do not know how this is done; +but the stage sailor is a good and kindly man, and we feel convinced +he would not recommend the exercise if it were not conducive to piety +and health. + +The stage sailor is good to his mother and dances the hornpipe +beautifully. We have never found a real sailor who could dance a +hornpipe, though we have made extensive inquiries throughout the +profession. We were introduced to a ship's steward who offered to do +us a cellar-flap for a pot of four-half, but that was not what we +wanted. + +The stage sailor is gay and rollicking: the real sailors we have met +have been, some of them, the most worthy and single-minded of men, but +they have appeared sedate rather than gay, and they haven't rollicked +much. + +The stage sailor seems to have an easy time of it when at sea. The +hardest work we have ever seen him do then has been folding up a rope +or dusting the sides of the ship. + +But it is only in his very busy moments that he has to work to this +extent; most of his time is occupied in chatting with the captain. + +By the way, speaking of the sea, few things are more remarkable in +their behavior than a stage sea. It must be difficult to navigate in +a stage sea, the currents are so confusing. + +As for the waves, there is no knowing how to steer for them; they are +so tricky. At one moment they are all on the larboard, the sea on the +other side of the vessel being perfectly calm, and the next instant +they have crossed over and are all on the starboard, and before the +captain can think how to meet this new dodge, the whole ocean has slid +round and got itself into a heap at the back of him. + +Seamanship is useless against such very unprofessional conduct as +this, and the vessel is wrecked. + +A wreck at (stage) sea is a truly awful sight. The thunder and +lightning never leave off for an instant; the crew run round and round +the mast and scream; the heroine, carrying the stage child in her arms +and with her back hair down, rushes about and gets in everybody's way. +The comic man alone is calm! + +The next instant the bulwarks fall down flat on the deck and the mast +goes straight up into the sky and disappears, then the water reaches +the powder magazine and there is a terrific explosion. + +This is followed by a sound as of linen sheets being ripped up, and +the passengers and crew hurry downstairs into the cabin, evidently +with the idea of getting out of the way of the sea, which has climbed +up and is now level with the deck. + +The next moment the vessel separates in the middle and goes off R. +and L., so as to make room for a small boat containing the heroine, +the child, the comic man, and one sailor. + +The way small boats are managed at (stage) sea is even more wonderful +than the way in which ships are sailed. + +To begin with, everybody sits sideways along the middle of the boat, +all facing the starboard. They do not attempt to row. One man does +all the work with one scull. This scull he puts down through the +water till it touches the bed of the ocean, and then he shoves. + +"Deep-sea punting" would be the technical term for the method, we +presume. + +In this way do they toil--or rather, to speak correct{y, does the one +man toil--through the awful night, until with joy they see before them +the light-house rocks. + +The light-house keeper comes out with a lantern. The boat is run in +among the breakers and all are saved. + +And then the band plays. + +THE END. + + + +End of Project Gutenberg etext of Stage-Land by Jerome K. Jerome +
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