Do my readers know Shoreditch? I do not mean the Eastern Counties
Railway Station, but the regions dark and dolorous lying beyond. In an
old map of London, by my side, dated 1560, I see it marked as a street
with but one row of houses on each side, and the five windmills in
Finsbury Fields not far off. Here stood the Curtain Theatre. In Stowe's
time there were in Shoreditch "two publique houses for the acting and
shewe of comedies, tragedies, and histories for recreation." Here,
according to the learned and indefatigable Mr. Timbs, "at the Blue Last
public-house, porter was first sold, about 1730." And here still, if I
may judge from the immense number of public-houses all round, the
consumption of porter and other intoxicating liquors is still carried on
on a somewhat extensive scale. Hard working and businesslike as
Shoreditch is by day, with its clothes marts and extensive shoe depots,
by night it is a great place for amusement. Here are theatres where
melodrama reigns supreme. Close by is the renowned Britannia Saloon.
And here concerts exist where, over their beer, the listeners are regaled
with the sentimental and comic songs of a generation long gathered to its
fathers. To me I confess there is somewhat of pathos in these places.
What tales cannot that ancient landlord tell! The young, the beautiful,
the brave he has outlived, where are they?
But let us pass on to the penny theatre, a place not hard to find in this
region of shell-fish and fruit-pie shops, those sure indications of a
neighbourhood rather poor and very wild. We pay our money at the door,
and then follow the direction given us by the businesslike young woman
who takes the fee, "First turn to the left, and then to the right." But
instead of being allowed to enter at once, we have to wait with several
others, chiefly boys, very dirty, who regard us apparently with no very
favourable eye, till a fresh house is formed. Our new acquaintances are
not talkative, and we are not sorry when our turn comes to enter the
dirty hole set apart for the entertainment of the Shoreditch youth. We
climb up a primitive staircase, and find ourselves in a gallery of the
rudest description, a privilege for which we have to pay a penny extra.
Here we have an ample view of the stage and the pit, the latter chiefly
filled with boys, very dirty, and full of fun, with the usual proportion
of mothers with excited babies. The performance commences with a
panorama of American scenery, with some very stale American criticisms,
about the man who was so tall that he had to go up a ladder to shave
himself, and so on; all, however, exciting much mirth amongst the
youthful and apple-eating audience. Then a young lady, with very short
petticoats and very thick ancles, dances, and takes all hearts by storm.
To her succeeds one who sings about true love, but not in a manner which
the Shoreditch youthdom affects. Then a fool comes upon the stage, and
keeps the pit in a roar, especially when he directs his wit to the three
musicians who form the orchestra, and says ironically to one of them,
"You could not drink a quartern of gin, could you?" and the way in which
the allusion was received evidently implied that the enlightened but
juvenile audience around me evidently had a very low opinion of a man who
could not toss off his quartern of gin. Then we had the everlasting
niggers, with the bones, and curiously-wrought long coats, and doubtful
dialect, and perpetual laughter, which the excited pit copiously
rewarded. One boy tossed a button on the stage, another a copper, and
another an apple; and so pleasing was this liberality to the supposed
young men of African descent, that they did not think it beneath them, or
inconsistent with their dignity as professionals, to encourage it in
every possible way. And well they might. Those gay blacks very likely
had little white faces at home dependent on the liberality of the house
for next day's crust. But the treat of the evening was a screaming
farce, in one act, in which the old tale of "Taming the Shrew" was set
forth in the most approved Shoreditch fashion. A husband comes upon the
stage, whose wife--I would not be ungallant, but conscientious regard to
truth compels me sorrowfully to declare--is an unmitigated shrew. She
lords it over her husband as no good woman ever did or wishes to do. The
poor man obeys till he can stand it no longer. At length all his manhood
is aroused. Armed with what he calls a persuader--a cudgel of most
formidable pretensions--he astonishes his wife with his unexpected
resistance. She tries to regain the mastery, but in vain; and great is
the delight of all as the husband, holding his formidable instrument over
his cowed and trembling wife, compels her to obey his every word. All
the unwashed little urchins around me were furious with delight. There
was no need for the husband to tell the audience, as he did, as the moral
of the piece, that the best remedy for a bad wife was to get such another
cudgel for her as that he held in his hand. It was quite clear the
little Britons around me had resolved how they would act; and I fear, as
they passed out to the number of about 200, few of them did not resolve,
as soon as they had the chance, to drink their quartern of gin and to
whop their wives.
On another occasion it chanced to me to visit a penny gaff in that dark
and dolorous region, the New Cut. There the company and the
entertainment were of a much lower character. A great part of the
proceedings were indecent and disgusting, yet very satisfactory to the
half-grown girls and boys present. In the time of the earlier Georges we
read much of the brutality of the lower orders. If we may believe
contemporary writers on men and manners, never was the theatre so
full--never was the audience so excited--never did the scum and refuse of
the streets so liberally patronise the entertainment as when deeds of
violence and blood were the order of the night. This old savage spirit
is dying out, but in the New Cut I fear it has not given way to a better
one.