Amongst actors one finds some of the queerest people in the world. The
men of the modern school are very much like other people; but the old
stagers can still find some of their number who are as richly comical as
Mr. Vincent Crummies himself. They are like the dyer's hand, subdued
to what they work in. I was thrown a great deal into the society of one
elderly young gentleman whose speciality had for years been that sort
of high-flying rattling comedy of which Charles Mathews was the chief
exponent in my youth. He had the most suasive, genial, and gentlemanly
comedy manner conceivable, and was never for a minute away from the
footlights. At breakfast, at luncheon, at dinner, he played to the
public of the hotel coffee-room. In the street he played to his
fellow-promenaders. He played, and played hard, in the simplest private
conversation. He had no more sense of moral responsibility than a
butterfly. He was as admirable a stage liar, or nearly, as Mr. Hawtrey
is; and off the stage he was as free from the trammels of veracity as he
was when on it He could promise, explain, evade, as dexterously in
his own person as in the character of Lord Oldacre or Greythorne or
Hummingtop. The world to him was literally a stage, and all the men and
women merely players. Old age will teach him no sadness. He will play at
being old. Death will have none of its common terrors for him. He will
play at dying. When last I heard of him I was told that he was very,
very poor; but I am sure he suffers little. He is playing at making a
fortune or playing at having lost one: pluming himself on some visionary
splendour, or commiserating some picturesquely broken nobleman in his
own person.
I enjoyed the most astonishing adventure of my lifetime with this
gentleman's aid, and by his express invention. He had secured the right
to perform a play of mine through the Australasian colonies and through
India. Of course there were certain pecuniary obligations attached to
the matter, and, these being disregarded, I ventured into the theatre
with a request for a settlement My comedian was not in a position to
effect a settlement, or perhaps he did not care to do it. He found a way
out of the difficulty which I do not think would have occurred to one
man in a million. He got rid of his creditor by giving him into custody
for trespass; and I, being marched off by the police, had to find bail
until the case was heard next morning. The magistrate advised me that
I had a legal remedy; but my gentleman disbanded his company and betook
him to a neighbouring colony. I was incensed at the time, though the
business is laughable enough now, and I took out a writ against him, but
never succeeded in serving it When I had found my bail (a local editor
was kind enough to pledge his word to save me from durance), I had to
put in an appearance at the police station. There was a big policeman
on duty there, and he went through the essential technicalities with so
grave a face that the farce for a moment seemed quite real.
'What's your name?' asked the big policeman.