_For the Table Book._
“Nothing like this in _London_!”
_John Reeve_ in Peregrine Proteus.
At this season, every thing appears dull and lifeless in the
neighbourhood of my favourite mountain village. In my younger days it
was otherwise. Christmas was then a festival, enlivened by a round of
innocent amusements, which the present enlightened age has pronounced
superstitious or trifling. Formerly we had a theatre, at this season,
and perhaps a few particulars relating to it may not be uninteresting.
Gentle reader! should you ever visit Skipton-in-Craven, go on the
market-day, and stand opposite to the vicarage-house in the High-street;
there you will see a cart with this inscription, “Thomas Airay,
Grassington and Skipton carrier.” Keep your eye on that cart, and about
the hour of three in the afternoon you will behold approach the owner, a
little, fat, old man, with reddish whiskers and a jolly face, that
Liston or John Reeve would not be ashamed to possess. In that
countenance a mere tyro in physiognomy may discover a roguish slyness, a
latent archness, a hidden mine of fun and good humour. Then when Airay
walks, mark his stately gait, and tell me if it does not proclaim that
he has worn the sock and buskin, and trod the Thespian floor: he was the
manager of the Grassington theatre--the “Delawang” of Craven.
I fancy some rigid moralist bestowing a cold glance on poor Tom, and
saying to himself, “Ah, old man, this comes of acting; had you, in your
youth, followed some industrious pursuit, nor joined an idle strolling
company, instead of now being a country carrier, you might have been
blessed with a comfortable independence!” Think not so harshly of Airay;
though not the manager of a patent theatre, nor of one “by royal
authority,” he never was a stroller, nor an associate with vagabonds,
nor did he ever, during his theatrical career, quake under the terrors
of magisterial harshness, or fear the vagrant act.
No idle, worthless, wandering man was he,
But in the dales, of honest parents bred,
Train’d to a life of honest industry,
He with the lark in summer left his bed,
Thro’ the sweet calm, by morning twilight shed,
Walking to labour by that cheerful song,
And, making a pure pleasure of a tread,
When winter came with nights so dark and long,
’Twas his, with mimic art, to amuse a village throng!
Tom Airay’s sole theatre was at Grassington; and that was only “open for
the season”--for a few weeks in the depth of winter, when the inclemency
of the weather, which in these mountainous parts is very severe,
rendered the agricultural occupations of himself and companions
impossible to be pursued. They chose rather to earn a scanty pittance by
acting, than to trouble their neighbours for eleemosynary support.
The _corps dramatique_ of Tom Airay consisted chiefly of young men,
(they had no actresses,) who moved in the same line of life as the
manager, and whose characters were equally respectable with his, which
was always unassailable; for, setting aside our hero’s occasionally
getting tipsy at some of the neighbouring feasts, nothing can be said
against him. He is a worthy member of society, has brought up a large
family respectably, and, if report speak truth, has realized about a
thousand pounds.
Few of Tom Airay’s company are living, and the names of many have
escaped me. There was honest Peter W----, whose face peeped from behind
the green curtain like the full moon. He was accounted a bit of a wag:
ever foremost in mischief, he, more than once, almost blew up the stage
by gunpowder, half suffocated the audience by assafœtida, and was wont
to put hot cinders in the boots of his associates. He has “left the
mimic scene to die indeed,” and sleeps peacefully under the beautiful
lime-trees of Kirby Malhamdale church-yard, undisturbed by the murmur of
that mountain stream, which, rippling over its pebbly channel, hymns, as
it were, his requiem. Then there was Isaac G----, the fiddler and comic
singer: _he_ exists no longer. There was Waddilove, and Frankland of
Hetton, and Bill Cliff, the Skipton poet and bailiff--all dead! There
were, also, the Hetheringtons, and Jack Solomon the besom maker, and
Tommy Summersgill the barber and clock maker, and Jack L---- the
politician of Threshfield, who regarded John Wilkes as his tutelary
saint, and settled in the Illinois, from whence he occasionally sends a
letter to his old friends, informing them what a paltry country England
is, what a paradise the new world is, and how superior the American
rivers are to those
“That through our vallies run
Singing and dancing in the gleams
Of summer’s cloudless sun.”
Besides these, there were fifteen or sixteen others from Arncliffe,
Litton, Coniston, Kilnsay, and the other romantic villages that enliven
our heath-clad hills.
The “Grassington theatre,” or rather “playhouse,” for it never received
a loftier appellation, where (to borrow the phraseology of the Coburg)
our worthies received their “nightly acclamations of applause,” has been
pulled down, but I will endeavour to describe it. It was an old
limestone “lathe,” the Craven word for barn, with huge folding-doors,
one containing a smaller one, through which the audience was admitted to
the pit and gallery, for there were no boxes. Yet on particular
occasions, such as when the duke of Devonshire or earl of Thanet
good-naturedly deigned to patronise the performances, a “box” was fitted
up, by railing off a part of the pit, and covering it, by way of
distinction, with brown paper, painted to represent drapery. The prices
were, pit sixpence, and gallery threepence. I believe they had no half
price. The stage was lighted by five or six halfpenny candles, and the
decorations, considering the poverty of the company, were tolerable. The
scenery was respectable; and though sometimes, by sad mishap, the sun or
moon would take fire, and expose the tallow candle behind it, was very
well managed--frequently better than at houses of loftier pretension.
The dresses, as far as material went, were good; though not always in
character. An outlaw of the forest of Arden sometimes appeared in the
guise of a Craven waggoner, and the holy friar, “whose vesper bell is
the bowl, ding dong,” would wear a bob wig, cocked hat, and the surplice
of a modern church dignitary. These slight discrepancies passed
unregarded by the audience; the majority did not observe them, and the
few who did were silent; there were no prying editors to criticise and
report. The audience was always numerous, (no empty benches _there_) and
respectable people often formed a portion. I have known the village
lawyer, the parson of the parish, and the doctor comfortably seated
together, laughing heartily at Tom Airay strutting as Lady Randolph, his
huge Yorkshire clogs peeping from beneath a gown too short to conceal
his corduroy breeches, and murdering his words in a manner that might
have provoked Fenning and Bailey from their graves, to break the
manager’s head with their weighty publications. All the actors had a bad
pronunciation. Cicero was called _Kikkero_, (which, by the by, is
probably the correct one;) Africa was called _Afryka_, fatigued was
_fattygewed_, and pageantry was always called _paggyantry_. Well do I
remember Airay exclaiming, “What _pump_, what _paggyantry_ is there
here!” and, on another occasion, saying, “_Ye damons o’ deeth come
sattle my swurd!_” The company would have spoken better, had they not,
on meeting with a “dictionary word,” applied for information to an old
schoolmaster, who constantly misled them, and taught them to pronounce
in the most barbarous mode he could devise; yet such was the awe
wherewith they were accustomed to regard this dogmatical personage, and
the profound respect they paid to his abilities, that they received his
deceiving tricks with thankfulness. One of them is too good to be
omitted: Airay, in some play or farce, happened to meet with this stage
direction, “they sit down and play a game at piquet;” the manager did
not understand the term “piquet,” and the whole of the _corps
dramatique_ were equally ignorant--as a _dernier ressort_, application
was made to their old friend, the knight of the birch, who instructed
them that “piquet” was the French word for _pie-cut_, and what they had
to do was to make a large pie, and sit round a table and eat it; and
this, on the performance of the piece, they actually did, to the great
amusement of the few who were acquainted with the joke. When Tom was
informed of the trick, he wittily denominated it a _substantial_ one.
The plays usually performed at Grassington were of the regular drama,
the productions of Shakspeare, Dryden, Otway, or Lillo. George Barnwell
has many a time caused the Craven maids to forget “Turpin,” and
“Nevison,” and bloody squires, and weep at the shocking catastrophe of
the grocer’s apprentice. Melodramas were unknown to them, and happy had
it been for the dramatic talent of this country if they had remained
unknown elsewhere; for since these innovations, mastiff dogs, monkeys,
and polichinellos have followed in rapid succession, and what _monstrum
horrendum_ will next be introduced, is difficult to conceive. We may
say,
“Alas, for the drama, its day has gone by.”
At the time of Airay’s glory, had the word melodrama been whispered
in his ear, he would probably have inquired what sort of a beast
it was, what country it came from, and whether one was in the
tower?--Grassington being too poor to support a printer, the play-bills
were written, and by way of making the performances better known, the
parish bellman was daily employed to cry the play in a couplet composed
by the manager. I only remember one.
Guy in his youth, our play we call,
At six to the hay-mow[23] hie ye all!
This not only apprized the inhabitants of the play for the evening, but
frequently the novelty of the mode induced a passing stranger to honour
the house with his presence. It was also preferable to printing, for
that was an expense the proceeds of the house could not afford.
While thus hastily sketching the peculiarities of Airay and his
associates, it would be unjust not to state in conclusion, that their
performances were always of a moral character; if any indelicate
sentiment or expression occurred in their plays, it was omitted; nothing
was uttered that could raise a blush on the female cheek. Nor were the
audiences less moral than the manager: not an instance can be recorded
of riot or indecency. In these respects, Tom Airay’s theatre might serve
as a model to the patent houses in town, wherein it is to be feared the
original intent of the stage, that of improving the mind by inculcating
morality, is perverted. Whenever Airay takes a retrospective glance at
his theatrical management, he can do it with pleasure; for never did he
pander to a depraved appetite, or render his barn a spot wherein the
vicious would covet to congregate.