THE curtain having fallen on the first act, Irving received the honor
of a triple call, after which I went to his room, and found him reading
some of the numerous cables and telegrams from home, and from several
distant American and Canadian cities, wishing him success.
“How kind everybody is!” he exclaimed, as he handed me a bundle of
despatches. “You should have seen the hundreds of telegrams and letters
that were sent to me on board the steamer as I was leaving Liverpool!”
“You are pleased?”
“More than pleased,” he said. “What an audience! I never played to
a more sympathetic lot of people in my life. They respond to every
movement and point of the scene with a marvellous promptitude.”
“You still feel that you are among friends?”
“I do, indeed.”
“I believe you played that first act to-night better than ever you
played it in London.”
“Do you think so? ‘Art is long and life is fleeting.’”
There was in the atmosphere behind the foot-lights something of the
electricity of a first night at the Lyceum,—no fuss, but a suppression
of feeling, a kind of setting of the teeth and a girding up of the
loins. The fine “property” horse of the vision scene, covered with snow
that would not melt, had been dragged to the rear, and the stage was
being set for the trial scene. Mr. Frank Tyars had donned his ermine
as the judge, the mesmerist was ready at the wing, the last nail was
being driven into the judicial bench. The local stage-hands and supers
were at last evidently impressed with the importance of attention to
some little matter of detail which they had daily tried to shirk at
rehearsal. There had even been difficulties, on the stage and off, in
regard to the regulation of the lights. Prominent gas-brackets had been
removed from the auditorium, but the lowering of the lights down nearly
to darkness for the last act of “The Bells” had been resisted. Later,
however, Mr. Loveday found his New York collaborators in this respect
willing allies; and within the first week the man who had charge of
the calcium lights said, “I have seen them all; every one of the great
actors and stage-managers; and they don’t begin to know as much about
lighting the stage as this Mr. Henry Irving has forgotten!”
A breathless silence testified to the impressiveness of the last act.
You might almost have fancied you heard, in the car-bells of the
streets, faint echoes of the sleigh-bells that jangled in the ears of
Mathias. I remember the first night of “The Bells,” at the Lyceum.
The stillness in this New York house, as Mathias died of imaginary
strangulation, reminded me of the London theatre on that occasion. The
sensation in the two houses was the same. Nobody moved until the thud
of the drop-curtain roller emphatically announced the end. Then the
Star audience, as the Lyceum audience had done before them, gave vent
to their enthusiasm.
Called and recalled, Irving appeared before the curtain. Then there was
a cry of “Speech!” “Speech!” whereupon, he said:—
“Ladies and Gentlemen,—I believe it is a custom with you to allow
an actor to thank you for the pleasure you have given to him; and I
will avail myself of that custom now, to say that I thank you with all
my heart and soul. It seems to me that the greatness of your welcome
typifies the greatness of your nation. I thank you, and, ‘beggar that
I am, I am even poor in thanks.’ Let me say that my comrades are also
deeply sensible of your kindness, and let me add that I hope you will
give a warmer welcome, if such were possible, than I have received,
to my associate and friend, Miss Ellen Terry, who will have the honor
of appearing before you to-morrow night. And, finally, if it be not
a liberty, will you allow me to express the hope ‘that our loves may
increase even as our days do grow.’”
As the audience left the theatre, the opinions expressed accentuated
the reality of the actor’s success. “The things that have been said
about his mannerisms are shameful”; “Why, he has no more mannerisms
than Booth!” “I never was more agreeably surprised”; “He speaks like
an educated American”; “And in the street looks like a Yale or Harvard
professor”; “Never saw anything finer”; “Most awfully impressive
scene, that last act”; “Stage magnetism in the highest degree”;
“Guess he is safe for the biggest run of popularity of any actor or
any man who has ever come to this country”; “Oh, he is immense!”
“Did you hear Tony Pastor say it’s the intensest acting he’s ever
seen,—that’s a compliment, from what you may call a low comedian”;
“Madame Nilsson,—wasn’t she delighted?” “Yes, she wouldn’t sing
to-night; would have a box to come and see Irving.” These were some of
the remarks one caught as the audience left the theatre, and the most
practical criticism is often heard as one leaves a theatre among the
crowd.
Coming upon a group of critics and others I learn that the critic of
“The Telegram” says, “Irving is, indeed, a revelation!” while Mr. Oakey
Hall, of “Truth,” thanks God he has lived to see such an actor. Several
members of the Press Club join in the chorus of praise. Buck and Fiske,
of “The Spirit of the Times,” smile quietly, as much as to say, “We
told you so.” The famous critic of the “Tribune” goes out saying,
“Yes, it is great; there is no denying it.” Mr. Wallack, who, too ill
to walk, had been carried to his box, expresses his hearty admiration
of the actor whom for so many years he had longed to see; and Mr.
Gilbert,[9] the veteran comedian and stage-manager at Wallack’s, is
“impressed beyond expression, especially with the business of counting
the dowry.”
There is a rush of critics, reporters, correspondents, “down-town” to
chronicle the night’s success. One or two writers, whose eccentricities
give a commercial value to their work, go away to maintain their
lively reputations; but, on the whole, it is evident that everybody,
press men and public, is greatly pleased. Many American journals in
distant States were represented at the theatre by their own critics
and by correspondents. Long telegraphic despatches were wired to the
leading cities of the Union; the Associated Press sent out special
messages; the London journals were in evidence, and a new Anglo-French
paper in Paris had commissioned its New York correspondent to cable
some thousand or more words of Irving’s opening night. Since the
Forrest-Macready riot no theatrical event had created so general an
interest as the first appearance of Irving in America.