VIENNA.
Under a domed roof, a green garden with flower-beds and gravel paths. In
the centre a fountain. The outer circle built as a series of stages,
each with a set scene--one a scene from a Russian play, another a scene
from a German opera, another a scene from a Hungarian comedy, and so
forth, until about a dozen set scenes have been set out. Around, in
outer rings, with rooms branching off, various galleries containing old
musical instruments, cases of theatrical costumes, portraits of actors
and actresses, and working models of stages. Beyond, in the grounds,
cafés, restaurants, and wooden theatres in which performances of various
kinds are given; also ‘Old Vienna,’ after the manner of ‘Old London.’
That is the Vienna Musical and Dramatic Exhibition of 1892.
I spent two afternoons and one morning in this exhibition, not because I
amused myself, but because I felt that it was my duty to see all that
was to be seen. Naturally my first endeavour, after I had taken a
scamper round, was to find the English department--or the section
allotted to England--in order to see what sort of a show my
fellow-countrymen had made. The catalogue which I purchased for
seventy-five kreuzers informed me that the president of the English
committee was Se. Königliche Hoheit Herzog von Edinburgh, and that
among the committee were A. C. Macencie, W. G. Cusins, S. B. Bankroft,
Sir George Grow, etc. The correct spelling of names is not a strong
point, evidently, at the Vienna Exhibition.
There is a good old proverb which says, ‘Blessed is he that expecteth
little, for he shall not be disappointed.’ After wandering wearily about
for three-quarters of an hour and closely cross-examining every official
I encountered, an obliging Austrian workman, who was doing something to
a packing-case, volunteered to take me to the British Section. He led me
to a huge vacant space, in which in disorderly array stood a number of
dirty empty glass cases. ‘This, sir, is the British Section,’ he said,
waving his hand around a few feet of bare wall, and then pointing to a
battered old packing-case labelled ‘This side up--with care.’ That,
gentle reader, was the British Section as I saw it on May 16, and that
was all that there was to see. The British exhibits, I was told, had
only just arrived, and they would not be unpacked for several days.
I am told that the British exhibits, when they are unpacked, will be
exceedingly novel and interesting. There is a curious coffin-shaped case
still at the Custom House, which is said to contain the skeleton of a
dramatic critic who attended every _matinée_ to which he was invited.
There is a full-length portrait of Mr. William Archer felling the
Examiner of Plays to earth with the manuscript of a Norwegian tragedy.
There is a wax model of a lady sitting in the stalls at a _matinée_ with
a hat three feet high, and behind her are several gentlemen standing up
and dividing the feathers and ribbons on the top of it in order to peep
through them at the stage. There is a life-size figure of Mr. Horace
Sedger sitting with the map of London in front of him, and pointing out
Islington as a provincial town to Mr. W. S. Gilbert. There is the famous
‘No Fee’ banner which was lowered from the gallery of the Olympic as a
welcome back to London to Mr. Wilson Barrett; and there is also a
complete collection in a glass case of the costumes worn by sandwich-men
as advertisements for the West End Theatres of London.
All these things, I am assured, will be exhibited in due time to the
gaze of the wondering crowd that will flock to the Vienna Exhibition.
That they will give the foreigner an excellent idea of the status of the
drama in Great Britain I have not the slightest doubt. Up to the
present, unfortunately, so far as the British Section is concerned,
‘there is nothing in it.’
When I found nothing in the English Section, and very little in any
other section except the Bavarian and the Russian, I determined to see
something, and so I asked for Frederick the Great’s flute. Somebody had
told me that it had been forwarded to Vienna from Berlin. The first day
that I went to the exhibition I asked many officials where it was, and
they directed me to various parts of the building. I found hundreds of
flutes of all ages here. As none of them had anything but a number on,
and the catalogue would not be ready for a fortnight, I was unable to
pitch upon the particular instrument. (There is a catalogue
published--the one to which I am indebted for the names of the English
committee--but that is only a catalogue of the modern instruments.) On
the second day of my visit I made further inquiries, and drove the
officials to despair. I suppose I must have asked the same people over
and over again without knowing it, for at last when they saw me coming
they walked rapidly away and hid behind grand pianos. I heard one man
say to another, ‘Lieber Gott, here is this Englander again who wants
Frederick the Great’s flute!’ And the pair disappeared as if by magic.
I was determined not to be beaten, so on the third day I tried again;
but the first man I went to, instead of replying, took me to the room of
the secretary of the exhibition. The secretary was extremely polite.
‘Ah, sir,’ he exclaimed, ‘I am very pleased to see you. You have driven
our people very nearly mad. One of them came to me yesterday with a
telegram which he wished sent to Berlin, and the entire staff had
subscribed to the expense of forwarding it. This was the telegram: “For
Heaven’s sake tell us where Frederick the Great’s flute is. There is an
Englishman who does nothing but ask us all day long.” I sent that
telegram, sir, and have received a reply. Frederick the Great’s flute
has not been sent. It is still in Germany.’ Of course, I apologized for
the trouble I had given, and blamed the person who had told me the
famous instrument was among the German exhibits. Fancy an exhibition of
famous musical instruments without Frederick the Great’s flute! It is
‘Hamlet’ without the Prince of Denmark.
In the theatres of Austria, as in those of the German Empire, ladies are
expected to remove their bonnets everywhere except in the private boxes.
No hats or bonnets are allowed in the stalls, dress circle, pit, or
gallery. The reason of this restriction is that hats have of late years
assumed such gigantic proportions, that a front row of females would
shut out a view of the stage from the rest of the house.
But the ladies--Heaven bless them!--have discovered a way of taking
their revenge. They have invented a method of wearing the hair which
makes the removal of the hat a mere farce. The authorities are now
seriously discussing the question of making lady playgoers leave their
hair in the cloak-room as well as their hats.
I have been peculiarly unfortunate in my attempts to see something of
the German and Austrian stage. The fact which I am about to narrate
will, I have no doubt, be taken with several grains of salt, but on my
honour it _is_ a fact nevertheless. I went to the theatre in Dresden--to
the opera--and a lady sat in front of me. She was a charming American
lady, with a mass of gray hair, but she wore it absolutely a foot high,
after the manner of a pantaloon’s wig. At Prague, when I went to the
Czechish Theatre, to my intense astonishment this lady came in with her
husband and again sat in front of me. Two days later, on the Sunday
night, I went to the Vienna Opera House to see the ‘Puppenfee’ and
‘L’Amico Fritz.’ The seats in front of me were vacant, and I was just
congratulating myself on at last getting a view of the stage during a
performance, when in walked the lady with the Eiffel Tower hair!
That I should have sat behind the same person, an utter stranger to me,
in three towns one after the other, is a coincidence so extraordinary
that I think it worth mentioning. I don’t know what the odds against
such a treble event coming off are--something in trillions I should
fancy--but it did come off. The hair unfortunately did not.
The Prater on Sunday was thronged, and a dozen bands were playing in the
excellent coffee gardens scattered about it. But the great sight to me
was the ‘Punch and Judy, or People’s Prater.’ Here, among hundreds of
merry-go-rounds, Richardson’s shows, outdoor balls, and the general ‘fun
of the fair,’ you could walk upon the people’s heads. I should like to
take Messrs. M’Dougall and Parkinson through the Punch and Judy Prater
of Vienna one day and show them how the toiling masses of a great city
can enjoy themselves when plenty of cheap amusement and good wholesome
refreshment are provided for them.
There is one peculiar custom in certain parts of Austria, notably in
Vienna, which it takes an Englishman some time to get accustomed to.
When you are generous to anyone the recipient of your bounty makes a
tremendous bow and ‘kisses your hand.’ Sometimes this phrase is a mere
form of words, ‘Ich küsse die hand’ (the Viennese say, ‘Ich kiss die
hand), but frequently the actual performance takes place. A lady gives,
say, to the chambermaid of her hotel a gulden, and instantly the
chambermaid exclaims, ‘I kiss your hand,’ and does it. I have seen the
English ladies thoroughly nonplussed at the unexpected homage.
The porter at the Vienna railway-station who put my portmanteau on a cab
told me that he kissed my hand, and my cabman, to my complete
discomfiture, actually did it. As soon as I discovered it was a custom
of the country, I became rather nervous, and when I went to a little
theatre and an old lady handed me a programme, fearing the possible
salute, I only gave her a copper coin. She didn’t ‘kiss my hand,’ but
went off muttering in the Viennese dialect something which, fortunately
for my self-esteem, I was unable to grasp.
I spent a pleasant week in Vienna, but felt rather the worse for wear
when I left. The custom of the country is that you should consume a
mid-day meal with several glasses of beer, have wine in the middle of
it, and finish up with cognac or kummel. Then in the afternoon everybody
goes to the Prater, and sits at the first, second, or third coffee-house
and drinks more beer--sometimes six glasses, one after the other. The
middle-day meal is a terrific one, consisting of six or seven courses;
but towards four the Viennese get hungry again, and so at the Prater
coffee-gardens a man walks about with a basket of enormous sausages in
one hand and a pair of scales in the other, and about half a
hundredweight of Gruyère cheese under his arm. You have rolls of bread
on every little table where you drink your beer, so all you have to do
is to cry ‘salami,’ which is sausage, and instantly the gentleman with
the basket comes to your table, cuts you as many slices as you require,
weighs them, and puts them in front of you on a piece of clean white
paper. You then drink your beer and eat your sausage with your fingers,
gnawing a piece of bread in between. And thus the happy hours glide away
towards evening, and the best military bands of Vienna soothe you with
the soft strains of music. It is only in Vienna that you can have
Strauss and salami together.
At ten, after the theatres are over, eating begins again, and is of a
most formidable character. The best restaurants are crowded. At Sacher’s
you cannot get a table, for all the elegant world from the opera is
there. At Leidinger’s there is scarcely room for you to pass between the
crowd of feasters and find a place for your hat and umbrella, and at the
Old Tobacco-pipe, where the Viennese kitchen proper (or improper if you
prefer it) reigns supreme, you sometimes have to wait your turn and
stand at the door eagerly watching for a supster to come out that you
may go in.
Before I left Vienna, having exhausted the theatres, I did a round of
the waxwork exhibitions. These delighted me hugely, many of the subjects
being realistic enough to make M. Zola’s hair stand on end. Our Chamber
of Horrors at Madame Tussaud’s is buttermilk compared with the chambers
of horrors I saw in Vienna. The whole series of tortures inflicted by
the Inquisition are realized in one establishment in the Kohl Market,
and the wax figures roll their eyes and quiver with agony, and open
their mouths and gasp in so lifelike a manner, that sometimes the
country-folks grow indignant and want to get at the Grand Inquisitor and
the executioner and lynch them.
The Schneiders, who systematically robbed and murdered servant-girls,
are prominent features in all the waxworks of Austria; but they didn’t
interest me nearly so much as an elegantly-dressed young gentleman of
aristocratic appearance, who won renown some time ago by committing a
murder under rather novel circumstances. He was a young man of good
family, and at one time had money; but he gambled and lost it, and,
being hard up, conceived a highly original plan for replenishing his
purse. It is the custom in Austrian as in many European towns for the
postman to bring a registered letter up to the room of the person who is
to receive it, and to take the signature for it there. As this causes
considerable delay on a round, the registered letters are kept back from
the ordinary delivery, and sent out by a special postman. Our hero
addressed an envelope to himself, put some money in it, registered it,
and then made his little arrangements. When the postman came up to his
bachelor apartment on the fourth-floor of a big house, he stunned him
with a sudden blow, then finished him off, and, taking his bag of
registered letters, opened the lot, extracted the banknotes, jewellery,
etc., and made tracks with them. He got a very large sum of money, but
the postman’s body was quickly discovered, and the aristocratic youth
went through the dead-letter office.
But the most ghastly bit of realism of all is, I think, a representation
of ‘The Last Moments of Alexander II.’ The Czar lies on a real bed, with
his uniform and his linen saturated with blood. His shirt is open to
the breast, and a horrible gaping wound is exposed to the eye of the
spectator. As the figure breathes convulsively, the eyes roll up in the
head, and _real blood_ gushes up to the surface of the terrible wound. I
have never been so horribly fascinated in my life as I was by that
figure of the dying Cæsar, with his life-blood welling up before my
eyes. It was shocking, it was brutal, it was hideous; but it held me
spellbound by its intense reality. You forgot you were looking at a wax
figure in a glass-case. You seemed to be watching a real man dying a
horrible death. It was with the greatest difficulty that I prevented
myself running for the nearest doctor.