I AM INTRODUCED TO A THEATRICAL FAMILY.
I think if I had been suddenly plunged into Aladdin's cave, I should
not have been more amazed. There I should have expected to see the
rich treasures of gold and precious stones and the magic fruit growing
on magic trees with which that cave is filled, but for the strange
wonders by which I was here surrounded I was totally unprepared. These
loomed upon me only gradually, for the two tallow candles which threw
light upon the scene were but a dim illumination. The kitchen, which
comprised nearly the whole of the basement, was irregularly shaped,
and so large that the distant corners were almost completely in shade.
Lurking, as it were, in one of these distant corners was a man
strangely accoutred, whom I expected would presently step forward and
join our party, but not a motion did the figure make. I subsequently
discovered that it was a dummy man, in chain armour, which had once
played a famous part (the armour, not the man) in a famous drama of
the middle ages. Hanging upon the walls were numberless articles of
male and female attire, some mentionable, some un-ditto; but with rare
exceptions the dresses were not such as I was accustomed to rub
against in my daily walks. These that I saw hanging around the room,
covering every inch of available space from ceiling to floor, were
theatrical dresses of different fashions and degrees; many were of
silk and satin, very much faded, for persons of quality, and some were
of commoner stuff for commoner folks--which latter, from their
appearance, seemed to have worn better. Here the dress of a noble
Roman fraternised with the kilts of a canny Scotchman, and here the
satin cloak and trunks of a fashionable melodramatic nobleman
contemplated (doubtless with sinister designs) the modest bodice which
covered the breast of female virtue. High life and low life, in every
description of ancient, mediæval, and modern fashion, were here
represented, and to an eye more practised and fanciful than mine, the
room might have been supposed to be furnished with all the cardinal
vices and virtues in allegory. Here were long boots whose character
could not be mistaken--they represented villainy of the very deepest
dye, and they frowned upon the heavy hobnails of a model peasantry.
Here were the woollen garments and broad-buckled belt which had played
their parts in a hundred smuggling adventures; and here the breeches,
stockings, and natty shoes which had danced hundreds of jigs amidst
uproarious applause. Here was a harlequin's dress ready to flash into
life and play strange antics at the mere waving of the wand which hung
above the mask; and clinging to it on either side, as if in fond
memory of old triumphs, were the short skirts of dainty columbines.
Here was the dress of Wah-no-tee, feathers, bald scalp, moccasins, and
hatchet, all complete, side by side with the fripperies of my Lord
Foppington. Among the pots and pans on the dresser were polished
breastplates and gauntlets and shields of various patterns. There were
other dresses, very much bespangled and be-jewelled, and pasteboard
helmets and crowns of priceless value, and masks that had had a hard
life of it, being dented here and bulged there and puffed up and
bunged up in tender places, worse than any prizefighter's face after
the severest encounter. A donkey's head and shoulders hung immediately
above me, and by its side the plaster cast of a face without the
slightest expression in it, and which is popularly supposed to
represent an important branch of the histrionic art. Whichever way I
turned, these and a hundred other strange articles most incongruously
mixed together met my gaze.
'Well, what do you think of us?' asked Miss West. 'We're a queer
bunch, ain't we?'
'It's a strange place,' I said, thinking it best to avoid
personalities. 'I never saw anything like it.'
'We're a theatrical family, my dear,' said Miss West complacently,
'born in the profession every one of us. Are you fond of theatres?'
As a matter of fact, I had only been twice to a theatre, but it was a
place of enchantment to me, and I said as much to Miss West.
'Ah!' she mused. 'It looks so from the front, I daresay; and a good
job for us that it does. But it is bright, and it _does_ carry you
away.'
A familiar voice behind the curtain caused a diversion, and I turned
eagerly in that direction. Miss West gave me another of her sharp
looks.
'Don't you wish you had eyes in your ears?' she said. 'You're one of
the bashful ones, I can see. Could you play the part of the Bashful
Lover do you think?' (This question was accompanied by a significant
dig in the ribs and a merry laugh.)
'I don't think,' I stammered, very red and confused, 'that I should
ever be able to act.'
'Not _that_ part!' exclaimed my good-natured tormentor. 'Well, then,
you _could_ play "The Good-for-nothing."'
Which was an allusion I did not at all understand. Miss West
proceeded:
'All you've got to do, my dear, is to stick to nature. Turk gets mad
with me when I tell him that. "Stick to nature!" he cries. "Why, then
every fool could act." I say to him, every fool _could_ act if he
stuck to nature. Then he rolls his eyes and glares, does Turk.'
'Why does he do that?' I inquire.
'He plays the heavy villains, my dear, at the Royal Columbia Theatre;
and what's a heavy villain without his glare? You should see him in
_The Will and the Way!_ It's a sight.'
'I should like to see him; but you haven't told me who Turk is.'
'Turk is my brother.'
'He is not here?' I ask, with another glance at the curtain.
'Oh, no; he is playing a new part to-night Poor Turk! the new school
of acting depresses him. Say, O.'
'O,' I said, with a smile.
'Ah, you should hear Turk say it! It would fill a large page. Do you
remember when you first learnt to write?'
'Yes.'
'And how, with your left arm sprawling over the table, and your left
ear listening for something you never heard, and your eyes as staring
wide open as ever they could be, and your tongue half out of your
mouth, you dug your pen into the copy-book to produce your first O,
which took about five minutes in the making, and then came out
squabbled? That's the way Gus says his O's. He takes a long time over
them. Now Brinsley's different.'
'Brinsley?'
'My brother. He's sensible. He plays walking gentlemen in the new
style, and rattles off what he has to say quite in the elegant way--as
if he didn't care a bit for it, you know. Turk sneers at him
(dramatically, my dear), and says that the new school of acting is the
ruin of the profession. But to come back to the Bashful Lover. You
shall play it, my dear. Gus shall write the piece.'
'Gus?'
'One of my brothers. Gus can write anything--tragedies, melodramas,
farces--and he shall write _The Bashful Lover_, after the style of
_The Conjugal Lesson_. One scene, and only two performers--you and
Jessie. That would be nice, as Jessie says. You shall quarrel, of
course, and make it up, and quarrel again, and snub each other, and
sulk, and say spiteful things (Gus will see to all that), but--don't
look so glum!--it shall all come right in the end. You shall drop into
each other's arms and kiss, and while you are folding her to your
heart (that's the style nowadays, my dear), the curtain shall fall.
We'll have a select audience--none of the boys, for that would spoil
it, eh? but Gus--he must be present as the author. There'll be me, and
Florry, and Matty, and Rosy, and Nelly, and Sophy, and we'll all
applaud at the right places, you may be sure.'
Miss West counted the names on her fingers as she went over them; the
young ladies who bore them were all seated round the table and about
the room, engaged in various ways. One was cutting-out stars of paper
tinsel, and gluing them on to a gauze dress; another was making
dancing shoes; another was amusing herself with a cardboard stage and
cardboard characters, which she drew on and off by means of tin
slides. Miss West, who also had an article of female attire, in an
unfinished state, in her lap, which she worked upon in the intervals
of her conversation, called these young ladies by name, one by one,
and desired each to perform a magnificent curtsy to me, which the
little misses, the eldest of whom could not have been more than
fourteen years of age, did in grand style, worthy of the finest ladies
in the land. I was somewhat bewildered at the extent of Miss West's
family, and I asked if there were any more of them.
'Heaps, my dear,' she complacently replied; 'there are nineteen of us
altogether--eleven boys and eight girls, and all straight made, with
the exception of me. I'm crooked. My legs are wrong. But I've been on
the stage too. I played an old witch for an entire season, and got
great applause. People in the house wondered how I could keep doubled
up almost for such a long time together; I was on in one scene for
twenty minutes; they didn't know I was doubled up naturally.'
In proof of her words Miss West rose, and hobbled to the end of the
kitchen as if in search of something, and hobbled back, the most
genial and good-humoured of old witches. She was barely four feet in
height, and was a queer little figure indeed, but her face was bright,
and her eyes were bright I could not help liking the little woman, and
I told her so.
'That's right, Master Christopher. We'll be friends, you and me. Well,
but to come back.' (This was evidently one of her favourite figures of
speech.) got two pound five a week for playing the old witch; it
lasted for twenty-two weeks, and it was almost the death of me. I had
to do it though.'
'Why?'
Her voice grew quieter and she spoke in subdued tones, so that the
little misses should not hear.
'Mother and father died within a month of each other, and there were
the doctor's bills and the funeral expenses to be provided for. Then
there's a large family of us, Master Christopher, and taking us
altogether in a lump, we're no joke. The boys wouldn't hear of my
going on the stage again, and I don't see myself how I could do it
regularly, for there's a deal of business to look after indoors,
letting alone the household affairs. Though I like it! If
anybody--that is, anybody who's somebody--would write me a strong
one-part piece, I could make a big hit with my figure. 'Tisn't every
day you see such a figure as mine; it's worth a mint of money on the
stage if it was properly worked. They're all on the stage but me;
little Sophy there--she's the youngest, four years--spoke two lines in
the pantomime last year to rounds of applause. The people love to see
a clever child on the stage, though the papers write against it. But
what are the papers? as Turk says, with a glare.'
'Of course,' I repeated, with a foolish air of wisdom, 'what are the
papers?'
'Turk says, if they were what they ought to be, somebody that he knows
(that's himself, my dear) would be at the top of the tree.'
'Turk is very clever, then?'
He's the best murderer to slow music that _I've_ ever seen. But Gus is
the genius of the family. In the matter of that, we're all geniuses.
But blighted, my dear, blighted!'
She gave me the merriest look, as little like a blighted being as can
well be imagined.
'We're all of us very conceited, my dear, and very vain. What was that
thing in the fable that tried to blow itself out, and came to grief?'
'The frog.'
'We're all of us frogs, my dear. If people would only give us as much
room as we think we ought to have, the world wouldn't be big enough
for a quarter of us. And of all the conceited creatures in this
topsy-turvy world, actors and actresses are the worst. We're good
enough in our way, but we _do_ think such a deal of ourselves.'
'Is Mr. Gus a good actor?'
'Plays leading business; he's out of an engagement just now, He's
behind the curtain with Jessie.'
I was burning to ask what they were doing there, but the words hung on
my tongue, and an inquiry of another description came forth. It was
concerning the wonderful collection of dresses and theatrical
properties with which the kitchen was filled. I wanted to know if they
were used solely for the adornment of the persons of the Wests.
'Bless your heart, my dear, no,' was the reply. This is the
'stock-in-trade of our theatrical wardrobe business. We lend them out
for private theatricals and bal masques. It was a good business once,
but it has fallen off dreadfully. When bal masques were in fashion,
mother used to lend as many as twenty and thirty dresses a night
sometimes. If ever you want a dress for a bal masque--though there's
scarcely one a year now, worse luck!--come to me, and make you a
nobleman, or a chimney sweep, or a brigand, or the Emperor of
Russia, in the twinkling of a bedpost, and all for the small charge
of--nothing, to you. But to come back. You wanted to ask just now what
Gus and Jessie are doing behind that curtain. They're rehearsing a
scene, my dear, out of _As You Like It_. Not that she wants teaching;
Jessie's a born actress, and if she were on the stage, she'd make a
fortune with her face and voice. And as for her laugh--there, listen!
I never _did_ hear Mrs. Nesbit laugh--I'm not old enough to have seen
her act, my dear--but if her laugh was as sweet and musical as
Jessie's, I'll eat my stock-in-trade down to the last feather. And
there's another reason, Master Christopher--Gus is in love with her.
Bless my soul! how the boy changes colour! Why, they're all in love
with her. Turk is mad about her, and Brinsley is pining away before
our eyes. He doesn't mind it so much, because a slim figure suits his
line of acting. It wouldn't do for a walking gentleman to be fat.'
Miss West placed her hand upon mine, and said, with sagacious nods,
'My dear, if Jessie was on the stage, she would have ten thousand
lovers. Hark! there's the bell. They're going to play the scene. Are
you ready, Jessie?'
'Yes,' cried Jessie, 'but we want some one for Celia; she only speaks
twice.'
'Florry will do Celia,' replied Miss West. 'Go behind, Florry; we'll
commence the scene properly, and I'll read Jacques. Now, then. Act
four, scene one: The Forest of Arden. Up with the curtain.'
The curtain was drawn aside, and disclosed a roughly constructed
stage, and absolutely an old scene representing a wood.
'We have three scenes,' whispered Miss West: 'a chamber scene, a
street scene, and a wood. You'll see how beautifully Gus will play
Orlando. He'll be dressed for the part. Enter Rosalind, Celia, and
Jacques. Look over the book with me. Florry knows her part. I
commence: "I prithee, pretty youth--"'
I looked up, and saw Jessie and Florry on the stage. Jessie, looking
towards us, did not appear to recognise me; her face was flushed, and
her eyes were brilliant with excitement.
Miss West (as Jacques): 'I prithee, pretty youth, let me be better
acquainted with thee.'
Jessie (as Rosalind): 'They say you are a very melancholy fellow.'
Miss West: 'I am so; I do love it better than laughing.'
Jessie: 'Those that are in extremity of either are abominable fellows,
and betray themselves to every modern censure worse than drunkards.'
Miss West: 'Why, 'tis good to be sad and say nothing.'
Jessie: 'Why, then, 'tis good to be a post!'
The raillery of the tone was perfect, and I was aglow with admiration.
I had never in my life heard anything more exquisitely intoned, and
this was but a foretaste of what was to follow.
Jessie (to Miss West): 'A traveller! By my faith, you have great
reason to be sad: I fear you have sold your own lands to see other
men's; then, to have seen much, and to have nothing, is to have rich
eyes and poor hands.'
Miss West: 'Yes, I have gained my experience.'
Jessie: 'And your experience makes you sad: I had rather have a fool
to make me merry than experience to make me sad; and to travel for it,
too!'
Here Gus West entered, dressed as Orlando. Very noble and handsome he
looked, and in the love scene that followed between him and Jessie, he
played much too well for my peace of mind. When Jessie said, 'Ask me
what you will, I will grant it;' and he answered, 'Then love me,
Rosalind,' he spoke in so natural a tone, and with so much eagerness,
that I could not believe he was acting, especially with Miss West's
words in my mind that he really was in love with her. I was heartily
glad when the scene was at an end. But I was somewhat comforted at
Jessie's unfeigned delight that I had at last found my way to the
Wests'.
'I thought at first that I had you to thank for being here,' I said;
'but Miss West sent me an invitation without you knowing anything of
it, it seems.'
'Miss West is a meddlesome--dear delightful creature! She's as good as
gold! And I'm a little bit glad that it has happened so; it was manly
in you not to give in, and I had a good mind to commence coaxing you
again to come.'
'And I was beginning to be so miserable,' I said, adding my confession
to hers, 'at not being able to be where you were, that I was on the
point of giving way myself, and asking you if I might come without an
invitation.'
'So the best thing you can do,' cried Miss West, who had overheard us,
'is to kiss and make friends.'
Jessie laughed, and said, 'I didn't see you while I was acting, Chris.
I was so excited that I couldn't see a face in the room.'
Not even Orlando's?' I suggested, with a furtive look at Jessie.
'Oh, yes; his of course, but then we were acting to each other.'
'Only acting, Jessie?' I inquired, with much anxiety.
'Only acting, Jessie!' mimicked Miss West, whose sharp ears lost
not a word. 'Why, what else _should_ it be? Or else she's married to
Gus--Scotch fashion, my dear. "I take thee, Rosalind (meaning Jessie),
for wife," says Gus. "I do take thee, Orlando (meaning Gus), for my
husband," says Jessie. But she'd say that to any man who played
Orlando as well as Gus does--wouldn't you, Jessie?'
'Of course I would,' replied Jessie, entering into her friend's
humour.
'Why, my dear, I knew a young lady who was married a dozen times a
week (in two pieces every night) for more than six months. And her
sweetheart was the stage carpenter, and saw it all from the
wings--imagine his sufferings, my dear! Ah, but such marriages are
often a good deal happier than real ones; there's more fun in them,
certainly. Jessie, there's ten o'clock striking; it's time for you to
go. Now mind,' concluded Miss West, addressing me, 'no more standing
on ceremony; you're welcome to come and go when you like; we shall
look on you as we look on Jessie, as one of the family.'
I promised to come very often, and Miss West said I could not come too
often. There was no mistaking the hearty sincerity of the invitation.
Jessie and I walked very slowly home, and she listened delightedly to
my praises of her acting.
'I don't want them at home to know about it, Chris,' she said; 'at
least, not till I tell them.'
'Very well, Jessie;' and we entered the little parlour together in a
very happy mood.