A HAUNT OF EDMUND KEAN
To muse over the dust of those about whom we have read so much--the
great actors, thinkers, and writers, the warriors and statesmen for whom
the play is ended and the lights are put out--is to come very near to
them, and to realise more deeply than ever before their close
relationship with our own humanity; and we ought to be wiser and better
for this experience. It is good, also, to seek out the favourite haunts
of our heroes, and call them up as they were in their lives. One of the
happiest accidents of a London stroll was the finding of the Harp
Tavern,[1] in Russell Street, Covent Garden, near the stage door of Drury
Lane theatre, which was the accustomed resort of Edmund Kean.
[1] An account of the Harp, in the _Victuallers' Gazette_, says that this
tavern has had within its doors every actor of note since the days of
Garrick, and many actresses, also, of the latter part of the eighteenth
century; and it mentions, as visitants there, Dora Jordan, Nance
Oldfield, Anne Bracegirdle, Kitty Clive, Harriet Mellon, Barton Booth,
Quin, Cibber, Macklin, Grimaldi, Eliza Vestris, and Miss Stephens--who
became Countess of Essex.
Carpenters and masons were at work upon it when I entered, and it was
necessary almost to creep amid heaps of broken mortar and rubbish
beneath their scaffolds, in order to reach the interior rooms. Here, at
the end of a narrow passage, was a little apartment, perhaps fifteen
feet square, with a low ceiling and a bare floor, in which Kean
habitually took his pleasure, in the society of fellow-actors and boon
companions, long ago. A narrow, cushioned bench against the walls, a few
small tables, a chair or two, a number of churchwarden pipes on the
mantlepiece, and portraits of Disraeli and Gladstone, constituted the
furniture. A panelled wainscot and dingy red paper covered the walls,
and a few cobwebs hung from the grimy ceiling. By this time the old room
has been made neat and comely; but then it bore the marks of hard usage
and long neglect, and it seemed all the more interesting for that
reason.
Kean's seat is at the right, as you enter, and just above it a mural
tablet designates the spot,--which is still further commemorated by a
death-mask of the actor, placed on a little shelf of dark wood and
covered with glass. No better portrait could be desired; certainly no
truer one exists. In life this must have been a glorious face. The eyes
are large and prominent, the brow is broad and fine, the mouth wide and
obviously sensitive, the chin delicate, and the nose long, well set, and
indicative of immense force of character. The whole expression of the
face is that of refinement and of great and desolate sadness. Kean, as
is known from the testimony of one who acted with him,[1] was always at
his best in passages of pathos.
[1] The mother of Jefferson, the comedian, described Edmund Kean in this
way. She was a member of the company at the Walnut Street Theatre,
Philadelphia, when he acted there, and it was she who sang for him, when
he acted The Stranger, the well-known lines, by Sheridan,--
"I have a silent sorrow here,
A grief I'll ne'er impart;
It breathes no sigh, it sheds no tear,
But it consumes my heart."
To hear him speak Othello's farewell was to hear the perfect music of
heart-broken despair. To see him when, as The Stranger, he listened to
the song, was to see the genuine, absolute reality of hopeless sorrow.
He could, of course, thrill his hearers in the ferocious outbursts-of
Richard and Sir Giles, but it was in tenderness and grief that he was
supremely great; and no one will wonder at that who looks upon his noble
face--so eloquent of self-conflict and suffering--even in this cold and
colourless mask of death. It is easy to judge and condemn the sins of a
weak, passionate humanity; but when we think of such creatures of genius
as Edmund Kean and Robert Burns, we ought to consider what demons in
their own souls those wretched men were forced to fight, and by what
agonies they expiated their vices and errors. This little tavern-room
tells the whole mournful story, with death to point the moral, and pity
to breathe its sigh of unavailing regret.
Many of the present frequenters of the Harp are elderly men, whose
conversation is enriched with memories of the stage and with ample
knowledge and judicious taste in literature and art. They naturally
speak with pride of Kean's association with their favourite resort.
Often in that room the eccentric genius has put himself in pawn, to
exact from the manager of Drury Lane theatre the money needed to relieve
the wants of some brother actor. Often his voice has been heard there,
in the songs that he sang with so much feeling and sweetness and such
homely yet beautiful skill. In the circles of the learned and courtly he
never was really at home; but here he filled the throne and ruled the
kingdom of the revel, and here no doubt every mood of his mind, from
high thought and generous emotion to misanthropical bitterness and
vacant levity, found its unfettered expression. They show you a broken
panel in the high wainscot, which was struck and smashed by a pewter pot
that he hurled at the head of a person who had given him offence; and
they tell you at the same time,--as, indeed, is historically true,--that
he was the idol of his comrades, the first in love, pity, sympathy, and
kindness, and would turn his back, any day, for the least of them, on
the nobles who sought his companionship. There is no better place than
this in which to study the life of Edmund Kean. Old men have been met
with here who saw him on the stage, and even acted with him. The room is
the weekly meeting-place and habitual nightly tryst of an ancient club,
called the City of Lushington, which has existed since the days of the
Regency, and of which these persons are members. The City has its Mayor,
Sheriff, insignia, record-book, and system of ceremonials; and much of
wit, wisdom, and song may be enjoyed at its civic feasts. The names of
its four wards--Lunacy, Suicide, Poverty, and Juniper--are written up in
the four corners of the room, and whoever joins must select his ward.
Sheridan was a member of it, and so was the Regent; and the present
landlord of the Harp (Mr. M'Pherson) preserves among his relics the
chairs in which those gay companions sat, when the author presided over
the initiation of the prince. It is thought that this club grew out of
the society of The Wolves, which was formed by Kean's adherents, when
the elder Booth arose to disturb his supremacy upon the stage. But there
is no malice in it now. Its purposes are simply convivial and literary,
and its tone is that of thorough good-will.[1]
[1] A coloured print of this room may be found in that eccentric book _The
Life of an Actor,_ by Pierce Egan: 1825.
One of the gentlest and most winning traits in the English character is
its instinct of companionship as to literature and art. Since the days
of the Mermaid the authors and actors of London have dearly loved and
deeply enjoyed such odd little fraternities of wit as are typified, not
inaptly, by the City of Lushington. There are no rosier hours in my
memory than those that were passed, between midnight and morning, in the
cosy clubs in London. And when dark days come, and foes harass, and the
troubles of life annoy, it will be sweet to think that in still another
sacred retreat of friendship, across the sea, the old armour is gleaming
in the festal lights, where one of the gentlest spirits that ever wore
the laurel of England's love smiles kindly on his comrades and seems to
murmur the charm of English hospitality--
"Let no one take beyond this threshold hence
Words uttered here in friendship's confidence."