_Mr. Edwin Booth--Othello and Iago at supper--The guest--Mr. Irving’s
little speech--Mr. Booth’s graceful reply--A striking tableau--A
more memorable gathering--The hundredth night of “The Merchant of
Venice”--The guests--Lord Houghton’s speech--Mr. Irving’s reply--Mr.
J: L. Toole supplies an omission--Mr. Dion Boncicault at the
Lyceum--English as she is spoke--“Trippingly on the tongue”--The man
who was born to teach the pronunciation of English--A Trinity College
student--The coveted acorn--A good word for the English._
I DID not mean to enter upon a course of theatrical anecdotage in these
pages, but having mentioned the name of a great actor recently dead, I
cannot refrain from making a brief reference to what was certainly one
of the most interesting episodes in his career. I allude to Mr. Edwin
Booth’s professional visit to London in 1881. It may truthfully be said
that if Mr. Booth was not wholly responsible for the financial failure
of his abbreviated “season” at the Princess’s Theatre, neither was he
wholly responsible for his subsequent success at the Lyceum. I should
like, however, to have an opportunity of bearing testimony to his frank
and generous appreciation of the courtesy shown to him by Mr. Henry
Irving, in inviting him to play in _Othello_. when it became plain that
the performances of the American actor at the Princess’s were not likely
to make his reputation in England. It would be impossible for me to
forget the genuine emotion shown by Mr. Booth when, on the Saturday
night that brought to a close the notable representations of _Othello_
at the Lyceum, he referred to the kindness which he had received at that
theatre. Although the occasion to which I refer was the most private of
private suppers, I do not feel that I can be accused of transgressing
the accepted _codex_ of the Beefsteak Room in touching upon a matter
which is now of public interest. Early in the week Mr. Irving had been
good enough to invite me to meet Mr. Booth at supper on the Saturday.
After the performance, in which Mr. Irving was Othello and Mr. Booth
Iago, I found in the supper-room, in addition to the host and the guest
of the evening, Mr. John McCullough, who, it will be remembered, paid
a visit to England at the same time as Mr. Booth; and a member of
Parliament who subsequently became the Leader of the House of
Commons. Mr. J. L. Toole and Mr. Bram Stoker subsequently arrived. We
found a good deal to talk about, and it was rather late--too late for
the one guest who was unconnected with theatrical matters (at least,
those outside St. Stephen’s)--when Mr. Irving, in a few of those
graceful, informal sentences which he seems always to have at his
command, and only rising to his feet for a moment, asked us to drink to
the health of Mr. Booth. Mr. Irving, I recollect, referred to the fact
that the representations of _Othello_ had filled the theatre nightly,
and that the instant the American actor appeared, the English actor had
to “take a back seat.”
The playful tone assumed by him was certainly not sustained by Mr.
Booth. It would be impossible to doubt that he made his reply under the
influence of the deepest feeling. He could scarcely speak at first, and
when at last he found words, they were the words of a man whose eyes are
full of tears. “You all know how I came here,” he said. “You all know
that I went to another theatre in London, and that I was a big failure,
although some newspaper writers on my side of the water had said that
I would make Henry Irving and the other English actors sit up. Well,
I didn’t make them sit up. Yes, I was a big failure. But what happened
then? Henry Irving invites me to act with him at his theatre, and makes
me share the success which he has so well earned. He changes my big
failure into a big success. What can I say about such generosity? Was
the like of it ever seen before? I am left without words. Friend Irving,
I have no words to thank you.” The two actors got upon their feet, and
as they clasped hands, both of them overcome, I could not help feeling
that I was looking upon an emblematic tableau of the artistic union of
the Old World and the New. So I was.
*****
I could not help contrasting this graceful little incident with the more
memorable episode which had taken place in the same building some years
previously. On the evening of February 14th, 1880, Mr. Irving gave
a supper on the stage of the Lyceum, to celebrate the hundredth
representation of _The Merchant of Venice_. I do not suppose that upon
any occasion within the memory of a middle-aged man so remarkable a
gathering had assembled at the bidding of an actor. Every notable man
in every department of literature, art, and science seemed to me to
be present. The most highly representative painters, poets, novelists,
play-writers, actors of plays, composers of operas, singers of operas,
composers of laws, exponents of the meaning of these laws, journalists,
financiers,--all this goodly company attended on that moist Saturday
night to congratulate the actor upon one of the most signal triumphs of
the latter half of the century. Of course it was well understood by Mr.
Irving’s personal friends that an omission of their names from the list
of invitations to this marvellous function was inevitable. Capacious
though the stage of the Lyceum is, it would not meet the strain that
would be put on it if all the personal friends of Mr. Irving were to be
invited to the supper. So soon as I heard, however, that every living
author who had written a play that had been produced at the Lyceum
Theatre would be invited, I knew that, in spite of the fact that I only
escaped by the skin of my teeth being an absolute nonentity--I had only
published nine volumes in those days--I would not be an “outsider” upon
this occasion. Two years previously a comedietta of mine had been played
at this theatre for some hundred nights, while the audience were being
shown to their places and were chatting genially with the friends whom
they recognised three or four seats away. That was my play. No human
being could deprive me of the consciousness of having written a play
that was produced at the Lyceum Theatre. It was not a great feat, but it
constituted a privilege of which I was not slow to avail myself.
The invitations were all in the handwriting of Mr. Irving, and
the _menu_ was, in the words of Joseph in “Divorçons,” _délicat,
distingué--très distingué_. While we were smoking some cigars the merits
of which have never been adequately sung, though they would constitute a
theme at least equal to that of the majority of epics, our host strolled
round the tables, shaking hands and talking with every one in that
natural way of his, which proves conclusively that at least one trait of
Garrick’s has never been shared by him.
“Twas only that when he was off he was acting,”
wrote Garrick’s--and everybody else’s--friend, Goldsmith. No; Mr. Irving
cannot claim to be the inheritor of all the arts of Garrick.
More than an hour had passed before Lord Houghton rose to propose the
toast of the evening. He did so very fluently. He had evidently prepared
his speech with great care; and as the _doyen_ of literature--the true
patron of art and letters during two generations--his right to speak
as one having authority could not be questioned. No one expected a
commonplace speech from Lord Houghton, but few of Mr. Irving’s guests
could have looked for precisely such a speech as he delivered. It struck
a note of far-reaching criticism, and was full of that friendly counsel
which the varied experiences of the speaker made doubly valuable. Its
commendation of the great actor was wholly free from that meaningless
adulation, which is as distasteful to any artist who knows the
limitations of his art, as it is prejudicial to the realisation of his
aims. In his masterly biography of the late Lord Houghton, Mr. Wemyss
Reid refers to the great admiration which Lord Houghton had for Mr.
Irving; and this admiration was quite consistent with the tone of the
speech in which he proposed the health of our host. It was probably Lord
Houghton’s sincere appreciation of the aims of Mr. Irving that caused
him to make some delicate allusion to the dangers of long runs.
Considering that we had assembled on the stage of the Lyceum to
celebrate a phenomenal run on that stage, the difficulty of the course
which Lord Houghton had to steer in order to avoid giving the least
offence to even the most susceptible of his audience, will be easily
recognised. There were present several playwriters who, by the exercise
of great dexterity, had succeeded in avoiding all their lives the
pitfall of the long run; and these gentlemen listened, with mournful
acquiescence, while Lord Houghton showed, as he did quite conclusively,
that, on the whole, the interests of dramatic art are best advanced by
adopting the principles which form the basis of the Théâtre Français.
But there were also present some managers who had been weak enough to
allow certain plays which they had produced, to linger on the stage,
evening after evening, so long as the public chose to pay their money
to see them. I glanced at one of these gentlemen while Lord Houghton was
delivering his tactful address, and I cannot say that the result of my
glance was to assure me that the remarks of his lordship were convincing
to that manager. Contrition for those past misdeeds that took the form
of five-hundred-night runs was not the most noticeable expression upon
his features. But then the manager was an actor as well, so that he may
only have been concealing his remorse behind a smiling face.
Mr. Irving’s reply was excellent. With amazing good-humour he touched
upon almost every point brought forward by Lord Houghton, referring to
his own position somewhat apologetically. Lord Houghton had, however,
made the apologetic tone inevitable; but after a short time Mr. Irving
struck the note for which his friends had been waiting, and spoke
strongly, earnestly, and eloquently on behalf of the art of which he
hoped to be the exponent.
We who knew how splendid were the aims of the hero of a hundred nights,
with what sincerity and at how great self-sacrifice he had endeavoured
to realize them; we who had watched his career in the past, and were
hopefully looking forward to a future for the English drama in a
legitimate home; we who were enthusiastic almost to a point of passion
in our love and reverence for the art of which we believed Irving to
be the greatest interpreter of our generation,--we, I say, felt that
we should not separate before one more word at least was spoken to our
friend whose triumph we regarded as our own.
It was Mr. J. L. Toole, our host’s oldest and closest friend, who, in
the Beefsteak Room some hours after midnight, expressed, in a few
words that came from his heart and were echoed by ours, how deeply Mr.
Irving’s triumph was felt by all who enjoyed his friendship--by all who
appreciated the difficulties which he had surmounted, and who, having at
heart the best interests of the drama, stretched forth to him hands of
sympathy and encouragement, and wished him God-speed.
Thus closed a memorable gathering, the chief incidents in which I have
ventured to chronicle exactly as they appeared to me.
*****
Only to one more Lyceum performance may I refer in this place. It may be
remembered that ten or eleven years ago the late Mr. Dion Boucicault
was obliging enough to offer to give a lecture to English actors on the
correct pronunciation of their mother-tongue. The offer was, I suppose,
thought too valuable to be neglected, and it was arranged that the
lecture should be delivered from the stage of the Lyceum Theatre. A more
interesting and amusing function I have never attended. It was clear
that the lecturer had formed some very definite ideas as to the way
the English language should be spoken; and his attempts to convey these
ideas to his audience were most praiseworthy. His illustrations of
the curiosities of some methods of pronouncing words were certainly
extremely curious. For instance, he complained bitterly of the way the
majority of English actors pronounced the word “war.”
“Ye prenounce the ward as if it wuz spelt w-a-u-g-h,” said the lecturer
gravely. “Ye don’t prenounce it at all as ye shud. The ward rhymes with
‘par, ‘are,’ and ‘kyar,’ and yet ye will prenounce it as if it rhymed
with ‘saw’ and ‘Paw-’ Don’t ye see the diffurnce?”
“We do, we do!” cried the audience; and, thus encouraged by the ready
acquiescence in his pet theories, the lecturer went on to deal with
the gross absurdity of pronouncing the word “grass,” not to rhyme with
“lass,” which of course was the correct way, but almost--not quite--as
if it rhymed with “laws.”
“The ward is ‘grass,’ not ‘graws,’” said our lecturer. “It grates on a
sinsitive ear like mine to hear it misprenounced. Then ye will never be
injuced to give the ward ‘Chrischin’ its thrue value as a ward of
three syllables; ye’ll insist on calling it ‘Christyen,’ in place of
‘Chrischin.’ D’ye persave the diffurnce?”
“We do, we do!” cried the audience.
“Ay, and ye talk about ‘soots’ of gyar-ments, when everybody knows
that ye shud say ‘shoots’; ye must give the full valye to the letter
‘u’--there’s no double o in a shoot of clothes. Moreover, ye talk of the
mimbers of the polis force as ‘cunstables,’ but there’s no ‘u’ in the
first syllable--it’s an ‘o,’ and it shud be prenounced to rhyme with
‘gone,’ not with ‘gun.’ Then I’ve heard an actor who shud know better
say, in the part of Hamlet, ‘wurds, wurds, wurds’; instead of giving
that fine letter ‘o’ its full value. How much finer it sounds to
prenounce it as I do, ‘wards, wards, wards’! But when I say that I’ve
heard the ward ‘pull’ prenounced not to rhyme with ‘dull,’ as ye’ll all
admit it shud be, but actually as if it was within an ace of being spelt
‘p double o l,’ I think yell agree with me that it’s about time that
actors learnt something of the rudiments of the art of ellycution.”
I do not pretend that these are the exact instances given by Mr.
Boucicault of the appalling incorrectness of English pronunciation,
but I know that he began with the word “war,” and that the impression
produced upon my mind by the discourse was precisely as I have recorded
it.
*****
There is a tradition at Trinity College, Dublin, that a student who
spoke with a lovely brogue used every art to conceal it, but with
indifferent success; for however perfect the “English accent” which
he flattered himself he had grafted upon the parent stem indigenous to
Kerry may have been when he was cool and collected, yet in moments of
excitement--chiefly after supper--the old brogue surrounded him like
a fog. This was a great grief to him; but his own weakness in this way
caused him to feel a deep respect for the natives of England.
After a visit to London he gave the result of his observations in a few
words to his friends at the College.
“Boys,” he cried, the “English chaps are a poor lot, no matter how you
look at them. But I will say this for them,--no matter how drunk any one
of them may be, he never forgets his English accent.”