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_A Pirate of Parts_
_By RICHARD NEVILLE_
_"One man in his time plays many parts."_
--SHAKESPEARE
NEW YORK
The Neale Publishing Company
1913
Copyright, 1913, by
The Neale Publishing Company
_All rights reserved_
[Illustration: (signature) Yours Sincerly Richard Neville]
_"All the worlds' a stage
And all the men and women merely players"_
To my sister, Mrs. Mary Hughes, who for years has been associated with
several of the most notable presentations on the American stage and with
many of the most prominent and talented of American players, both male
and female.
_"BILL OF THE PLAY"_
I.--Is all our company here?--_Shakespeare_
II.--What stories I'll tell when my sojerin' is o'er.--_Lever_
III.--Come all ye warmheart'd countrymen I pray you will draw
near.--_Old Ballad_
IV.--Now would I give a thousand furlongs of sea for an acre of
ground.--_Shakespeare_
V.--I would rather live in Bohemia than in any other land.--_John
Boyle O'Reilly_
VI.--What strange things we see and what queer things we
do.--_Modern Song_
VII.--He employs his fancy in his narrative and keep his
Recollections for his wit.--_Richard Brindsley Sheridan_
VIII.--Every one shall offer according to what he hath.--_Deut._
IX.--One man in his time plays many parts.--_Shakespeare_
X.--Originality is nothing more than judicious
imitation.--_Voltaire_
XI.--All places that the eye of heaven visits are happy
havens.--_Shakespeare_
XII.--There are more things in heaven and earth,
Horatio.--_Shakespeare_
XIII.--Life is mostly froth and bubble.--_The Hill_
XIV.--Nature hath fram'd strange fellows in her time.--_Shakespeare_
XV.--Come what come may, time and the hour runs through the
roughest day.--_Shakespeare_
XVI.--A new way to pay old debts.
XVII.--The actors are at hand.--_Shakespeare_
XVIII.--Twinkle, twinkle little star.--_Nursery Rhymes_
XIX.--Experience is a great teacher--the events of life its
chapters.--_Sainte Beuve_
XX.--I am not an imposter that proclaim myself against the level of
my aim.--_Shakespeare_
XXI.--I'll view the town, peruse the traders, gaze upon the
buildings.--_Shakespeare_
XXII.--Is this world and all the life upon it a farce or
vaudeville.--_Geo. Elliott_
XXIII.--All the world's a stage and all the men and women merely
players.--_Shakespeare_
XXIV.--There's nothing to be got nowadays, unless thou can'st fish
for it.--_Shakespeare_
XXV.--Joy danced with Mirth, a gay fantastic crowd.--_Collins_
XXVI.--Say not "Good Night," but in some brighter clime bid me "Good
Morning."--_Barbauld_
_A Pirate of Parts_
CHAPTER I
"Is all our company here?"
--MIDSUMMER NIGHT'S DREAM.
Yes, he was a strolling player pure and simple. He was an actor by
profession, and jack of all trades through necessity. He could play any
part from _Macbeth_ to the hind leg of an elephant, equally well or bad,
as the case might be. What he did not know about a theatre was not worth
knowing; what he could not do about a playhouse was not worth
doing--provided you took his word for it. From this it might be inferred
he was a useful man, but he was not. He had a queer way of doing things
he ought not to do, and of leaving undone things he should have done.
Good nature, however, was his chief quality. He bubbled over with it.
Under the most trying circumstances he never lost his temper. He laughed
his way through life, apparently without care. Yet he was a man of
family, and those who were dependent upon him were not neglected, for
his little ones were uppermost in his heart. Acting was his legitimate
calling, but he would attempt anything to turn an honest penny. In turn
he had been sailor, engineer, pilot, painter, manager, lecturer,
bartender, soldier, author, clown, pantaloon, and a brass band. To
preach a sermon would disconcert him as little as to undertake to
navigate a balloon. He could get away with a pint of Jersey lightning,
and under its stimulating influence address a blue ribbon temperance
meeting on the pernicious effects of rum. Where he was born no one could
tell. He claimed laughingly that it was so long since he was first
produced he had lost track of the date. A friend of his maintained that
he was bred in the blue grass region, he was such an admirable judge of
whisky. On that score he might as well have been born in the County
Galway as in the state of Kentucky. He had a voluminous shock of red
hair; his name was Handy, and no one ever thought of addressing him
otherwise, even on the slightest acquaintance. When he had an engagement
he was poorer than when he was out of a job. He was a daisy of the
chronic impecunious variety.
The summer of --'7 was a hard season with actors, and as Handy was one
of the guild he suffered like the rest of his calling. He was not so
fortunate as to have country relatives with whom he might visit and
spend a brief vacation down on the old farm, so he had to bestir himself
to hit upon some scheme or other to bridge over the so-called dog days.
He pondered over the matter, and finally determined to organize a
company to work the towns along the Long Island Sound coast. Most men
would have shrunk from an undertaking of this character without the
necessary capital to embark in the venture. Handy, however, was not an
individual of that type. He was a man of great natural and economical
resources, when put to the test. Moreover, he had a friend who was the
owner of a good-sized canvas tent; was on familiar terms with another
who was the proud possessor of a fairly good-sized sailing craft; his
credit at the printer's was good for twenty or twenty-five dollars, and
in addition he had eleven dollars in hard cash in his inside pocket.
What more could an enterprising man, with energy to burn, desire?
On the Rialto Handy picked up seven good men and true, who, like
himself, had many a time and oft fretted their brief hour upon the
stage--and possibly will again,--who were willing to embark their fame
and fortune in the venture. They knew Handy was a sailor bold, and so
long as they had an angel in the shape of a vessel to perform the
transportation part of the scheme without being compelled to count
railroad ties, in case of ill luck, sailing was good enough for them.
Besides, time was no object, for they had plenty of it to spare.
They were all actors like Handy himself. The stories they could unfold
of barn-storming in country towns in years gone by would fill a volume
as bulky as a census report. Moreover, they could turn their talents to
any line of business and double, treble, quintuple parts as easily as
talk. They were players of the old stock school.
One of the company played a cornet badly enough to compel the
inhabitants of any civilized town to take to the woods until he had made
his departure; another was a flutist of uncertain qualifications, while
a third could rasp a little on the violin; and as for Handy himself, he
could tackle any other instrument that might be necessary to make up a
band; but playing the drum,--the bass drum,--or the cymbals, was his
specialty.
A company was accordingly organized, the day of departure fixed, the
printing got out--and the printer "hung up." The vessel was anchored off
Staten Island, and was provisioned with one keg of beer, a good-sized
box of hardtack, a jar of Vesey Street pickles, a Washington Street ham,
five large loaves and all the fishes in the bay. The company, after some
preliminary preparations, boarded the _Gem of the Ocean_, for such was
the pretentious name of the unpretentious craft that was to carry Caesar
and his fortunes. Perhaps Handy's own description of the first night's
adventure might prove more interesting than if given by another.