GRETCHEN.--"Bless you, my husband. Promise me never more to touch the
intoxicating beer-mug."
RIP.--"I promise. Hereafter I will take my TUPPER'S Proverbial
Philosophy and my glass of water, and I will daily address all my
friends on the subject of total abstinence from everything that cheers,
whether it inebriates or not. And I will now close this evening's
lecture by an appeal to the audience now present, to take warning by me,
and never drink a drop of lager-beer. Think, my friends, what would be
the feelings of your respective wives, should you return home, after a
drunken sleep of twenty or thirty years, and find them all married to
richer husbands! Think how they would revile the weakness of the beer
which could not keep you asleep forever. Think how you would complicate
the real estate business, when you came to turn out the mistaken people
who had occupied, improved, and sold your property during your brief
absence. Think of the difficulties that would arise from the increase in
the size of your families, which would probably have taken place while
you were sleeping out in the open air, and for which you would have to
provide, although you had not been consulted in the matter. Think, too,
of the extent to which you would be interviewed by the reporters of the
_Sun_, and the atrocious libels concerning yourselves and your families
which that unclean sheet would publish. Think of all these things, my
friends, and then step into the box-office on your way out and sign the
total abstinence pledge. The ushers will now make a collection for the
support of the temperance cause. Mr. MOLLENHAUER will please lead the
audience in singing that beautiful temperance anthem--"
"'Cold water is the only thing
Worth loving here below;
The man who won't its praises sing,
Will straight to Hades go.'"
Now, for one, I don't like this improved version of "RIP." Of course,
the Temperance Reformers will construe this expression of opinion into
an admission that every man, woman, or advocate of female suffrage, who
has ever written a line for PUNCHINELLO is a confirmed drunkard. In
spite of this probability, I still have the courage to maintain that so
long as Mr. JEFFERSON is an artist, and not a temperance lecturer, he
need not mix up the drama with the Temperance Reform, or any other
hobby. If he is to be compelled to deliver a temperance address every
time he plays _Rip Van Winkle,_ let us compel Mr. GREELEY to play "RIP"
every time he gives a temperance lecture. If the latter catastrophe were
to happen, the punishment of the Reforming Nuisances would be complete.
There are, however, plays which could be changed so as to terminate much
more naturally and effectively than they now do. For example, there is
_Enoch Arden._ At present ENOCH, when he looks through the window and
sees his wife enjoying herself with PHILIP in the dining-room,
immediately lies down on the grass-plat in the back-yard, and groans in
a most harrowing style,--after which he picks himself up, and, going
back to his hotel, dies without so much as recognizing his old friends
and congratulating them upon their prosperity. Now the way in which the
play should have ended, had the dramatist wished to convince us that
"ENOCH" was a reasonable being, would have been somewhat as follows:--
ENOCH (looking through the window).--"Well, here's a go. My wife has
actually married PHILIP. They look pretty comfortable, too. PHILIP is
evidently rich. Here's luck for me at last. I've got him where I can
strike him pretty heavily." _[He enters the house,]_
PHILIP AND HIS WIFE.--"ENOCH! Can it be possible? Why, we thought you
were entirely dead, and so we married. Well! well! This is a healthy
state of things."
ENOCH (sternly).--"Mr. PHILIP RAY. You have had the impertinence to
marry my wife. Sir! I consider that you have taken an unjustifiable
liberty. Have you anything to say for yourself before I proceed to shoot
you? I might mention that I once had a third cousin whose aunt by
marriage was slightly insane, so you see that I can kill you with a calm
certainty that the jury will acquit me, on the ground of my hereditary
insanity."
PHILIP.--"Take a drink, old boy. We'll be reasonable about this matter.
Don't attempt murder,--it's no longer respectable since MCFARLAND went
into the business. Why can't we compromise this affair?"
ENOCH.--"It will cost you something. There are my lacerated feelings,
which can't be repaired without a good deal of expense. Still I will do
the fair thing by you. Give me fifty thousand dollars and I'll leave the
country and say nothing more about it. You can keep my wife, if you want
her. I'm sure _I_ don't."
PHILIP.--"But I've been to a good deal of expense about her. Her clothes
have cost me no end of money, and there are all our new children
besides. Children, let me tell you, are a great deal more expensive now
than they were in your day. Now, I'll give you twenty thousand dollars,
and your wife, and we'll call it square."
ENOCH.--"No, sir. I don't want the wife, and I insist on more than
twenty thousand dollars. I've got you entirely in my power, and you know
it. I'll come down to forty thousand dollars, but not a cent less. Draw
a check on the bank, or I'll draw a revolver on you. Be quick about it,
too, for my hereditary insanity may develop itself at any moment."
PHILIP.--"Well, if I must, I must. Here is your money. How did you leave
things at--well, at the place you came from? Everybody well, I hope?"
ENOCH.--"There were no people, and consequently nothing to drink there.
Don't speak of the wretched place. Thanks for the check. Hope you'll
find your wife satisfactory. Let this be a warning to you, not to marry
a widow another time, unless you have a sure thing. Don't believe her
when she says her husband is dead, unless you have him dug up, and
personally inspect his bones. Thank you! I _will_ take another drink
since you insist upon it. Here's luck! You'll agree with me that this is
the best day's work I have ever done. Good-by. I'm off to Chicago."
Now, would not that be the way in which "ENOCH" would have acted had he
been a practical business man? You see the play thus altered is
eminently probable, not to say realistic. I have several more improved
catastrophes, which, if substituted for the present ending of some of
our more recent popular plays, would render them quite perfect. _Hamlet_
especially needs changing in this respect. Some of these days I will
show the readers of PUNCHINELLO how SHAKSPEARE should have ended that
drama. I rather think they will agree with me, that SHAKSPEARE, clever
as he doubtless was in certain respects, knew very little about writing
plays that should be at once effective and probable.