his clothing. I have seen him thrown into the “cut” in the stage with
the possibility of a fall to the mezzanine floor below. On another
occasion something went wrong with the bracing up of the framed cloths
and the whole scene fell about the stage. This happened between the acts
whilst Irving was showing the stage to some American friends. Happily no
one was hurt. Such accidents, veritable bolts from the blue, are,
however, both disconcerting and alarming. During _Faust_ the great
platforms which made the sloping stage on which some hundreds of people
danced wildly at the Witches’ Sabbath on the Brocken had to be suspended
over the acting portion of the stage. The slightest thing going wrong
would have meant death to all underneath. In such cases there must
always be great apprehension.
VII
I have mentioned all these matters under the heading of “Adventures”—
torpedoes, fires, floods, train accidents, storms at sea, mishaps of the
stage—for a special reason. Not once in the twenty-seven years of our
working together did I ever see a sign of fear on Henry Irving. Whether
danger came in an instant unexpectedly, or slowly to expecting eyes, it
never disturbed him. Danger of any kind, so far as I ever had the
opportunity of judging, always found him ready.
When he was lying ill at Wolverhampton in the spring of 1905 Ellen Terry
ran down from London, where she was then playing, to see him. She had
known from me and others how dangerously ill he had been and was
concerned as to how fear of death might act on his strength. She had
asked him if he had such fear; her description of the occasion as she
gave it to me after his death left the matter settled:
“He looked at me steadily for a minute, and then putting his third
finger against his thumb—like that—held his hand fixedly for a few
seconds. Then with a quick movement he snapped his fingers and let his
hand fall. How could I not understand!”
As the great actress spoke, her face through some mysterious power grew
like Irving’s. The raised hand, with the fingers interlaced, was rigid
till with a sudden movement the fingers snapped, the hand going down as
if propelled from the wrist! It conveyed in a wonderful way the absence
of a sense of fear, even on such a subject as Death. Even at second hand
it was not possible not to understand. It said as plainly as if in
words: “Not _that_!” There was no room for doubt!
LXXIII
BURNING OF THE LYCEUM STORAGE
At ten minutes past five on the morning of Friday, 18th February 1898, I
was wakened by a continuous knock at a door somewhere near my house in
Chelsea. I soon discovered that it was at my own house. I went
downstairs and opened the door, when a muffled-up cab-driver gave me a
letter. It was from the police station at Bow Street telling me that the
Lyceum Storage, Bear Lane, Southwark, was on fire. The four-wheeler was
waiting, and I was soon on the way there as fast as the horse could go.
It was a dim, dark morning, bitterly cold. I found Bear Lane a chaos.
The narrow way was blocked with fire-engines panting and thumping away
for dear life. The heat was terrific. There was so much stuff in the
storage that nothing could possibly be done till the fire had burnt
itself out; all that the firemen could do was to prevent the fire
spreading.
These premises deserve some special mention, for they played an
important part in many ways, as shall be seen.
One of the really great difficulties in the management of a London
theatre is that of storage. A “going” theatre has to be always producing
new plays and occasionally repeating the old. In fact, to a theatrical
manager his productions form the major part of his stock-in-trade. Now,
no one outside theatrical management—and very few who are inside—can
have any idea of the bulk of a lot of plays. In Irving’s case it was
really vast; the bulk was almost as big as the whole Lyceum theatre. To
get housing for such is a very serious matter. Scenery is long,
difficult stuff to handle. That of the Lyceum was forty-two feet long
when the cloths were rolled up round their battens; the framed cloths
were thirty feet high and six feet wide in the folding plaques. We were
always on the look-out for a really fine storage; and at last we heard
of one. This consisted of two great, high railway arches under the
Chatham and Dover Railway, then leased to the South-Eastern. It was a
part of Southwark where the ground lies low and the railway line very
high, so that there was full height for our scenes. In the front was a
large yard. We took the premises on a good long lease and set to work to
make them complete for our purpose. The backs of the arches were bricked
up. Great scaffold-poles were firmly fixed for the piling of scenery
against them. It is hard to believe what lateral pressure a great pack
of scenery can exercise. Before we had occupied this storage a year, one
of the poles gave way and the scenery sinking against the new wall at
the back of the arch carried it entirely away. We had to pay expenses of
restoration to the injured neighbour and to compensate him. We had the
entire yard in front roofed over, brought in gas, which was carefully
protected, and water, and made the storage the best of its kind that was
known. The experience of a good many years went to the making of it.
We had had to put in a clause when making the agreement to take the
lease for a reason not devoid of humour to any one not a sufferer by it.
When I went to look at the arches I found them full almost to the top
with mud—old mud that had been put in wet and had dried in time to
something like the consistency of that to be found at Herculaneum. The
manager of the estate office of the railway told me the history of it.
Some years before, the arches were placarded as to let, and in due
course came an applicant. He said he was satisfied with the rent and
took out his lease. The railway people were pleased to get such a big
place off their hands and took no more trouble about it till the
half-year’s rental became due. They applied to the lessee, but could get
no reply. So they sent to the premises to make inquiries. There was no
one there; and they could not hear any tidings of the lessee. They did
find, however, that the arches were filled with mud, and discovered on
inquiry that the lessee had taken a contract for the removal of road
sweepings. This is a serious item in municipal accounts, for the
conveyance of such out of London is costly, whether by road or barge or
rail. Into the arches he had for half a year dumped all the stuff;
thousands and thousands of loads of it. He had drawn his money as earned
from the municipal authorities. Rent day drew near, and as he feared
discovery he had bolted, leaving every one, including the contractors
for carting, unpaid.
It took the railway company months of continuous work with a large staff
of men and carts and horses to remove the accumulation.
As the premises were secure in every way we could devise we looked upon
them as comparatively immune from fire risk. No one lived in them. They
were all brick, stone, and slate—as the insurance policies put it. They
were completely isolated front and back; at the sides were blocks of
solid brickwork like bastions. I had at first, with Irving’s consent,
insured the contents for £10,000, but only that year when the policies
were to be renewed he said it was wasting money as the place was so
secure, and would not let me put on more than £6000.
In these premises were the scenes for the following plays, forty-four in
all, of which in only ten Irving himself did not play. Twenty-two were
great productions:
_Hamlet._
_The Merchant of Venice._
_Othello._
_Much Ado About Nothing._
_Twelfth Night._
_Macbeth._
_Henry VIII._
_King Lear._
_Cymbeline._
_Richard III._
_The Corsican Brothers._
_The Cup._
_The Belle’s Stratagem._
_Two Roses._
_Olivia._
_Faust._
_Werner._
_The Dead Heart._
_Ravenswood._
_Becket._
_King Arthur._
_Richelieu._
_The Lady of Lyons._
_Eugene Aram._
_Jingle._
_Louis XI._
_Charles I._
_The Lyons Mail._
_The Bells._
_The Iron Chest._
_Iolanthe._
_The Amber Heart._
_Robert Macaire._
_Don Quixote._
_Raising the Wind._
_Daisy’s Escape._
_Bygones._
_High Life Below Stairs._
_The Boarding School._
_The King and the Miller._
_The Captain of the Watch._
_The Balance of Comfort._
_Book III. Chapter V._
_Cool as a Cucumber._
For the plays there were over _two hundred and sixty_ scenes, many of
them of great elaboration. In fact, each scene, even if only a single
cloth at back with wings and borders, took up quite a space. There were
in all more than _two thousand_ pieces of scenery, and bulky properties
without end. And the prime cost of the property destroyed was over
thirty thousand pounds sterling.
But the cost price was the least part of the loss. Nothing could repay
the time and labour and artistic experience spent on them. All the
scene-painters in England working for a whole year could not have
restored the scenery alone.
As to Irving, it was checkmate to the _répertoire_ side of his
management. Given a theatre equipped with such productions, the plays to
which they belong being already studied and rehearsed, it is easy to put
on any of them for a few nights. There is only the cost of carting and
hanging the scenes and generally getting ready—small matters in the vast
enterprise of putting on a big play. They had had their long runs, and
though they were good for occasional repetitions, few of them could be
relied on for great business over any considerable period. Several of
them were held over for a second run, of which good things might have
been fairly expected. For instance, _Macbeth_ was good for another
season. It was taken off because of the summer vacation when it was
still doing enormous business. _Ravenswood_, too, had only gone a part
of its course when the Baring failure, as I have shown, necessitated its
temporary withdrawal. _Henry VIII._ and _King Arthur_ and _Becket_ and
_Faust_ were certain draws. When for _répertoire_ purposes in later
years several were required, _Louis XI._, _Charles I._, _The Bells_,
_The Lyons Mail_, _Olivia_, _Faust_, _Becket_ were all reproduced at an
aggregate cost of over eleven thousand pounds.
The effect of the fire on Irving was not only this great cost, but the
deprivation of all that he had built up. Had it not occurred he could
have gone on playing his _répertoire_ for many years, and would never
have had to produce a new play.
The fire was so fierce that it actually burned the building of the
railway arches three bricks deep and calcined the coping-stones to
powder. The Railway Company, therefore, not only made a rule that in no
case was theatrical scenery ever to be stored on their premises, but
actually refused to allow us to reinstate or to have use for the term of
their lease. They were prepared to fight an action over it, but the
scenery having all been burned, we had no more present use for so large
a storage, and we compromised the matter.
LXXIV
FINANCE
I
So much that is erroneous regarding Irving’s financial matters has been
said at any time from the beginning of his success on to the day of his
death—and after—that I think it well to speak frankly of the matter now.
Indeed there is no reason that I know of why it should not be made
public. During his lifetime, ever since his business affairs were
conducted on a big scale, we observed for purely protective reasons a
very strict reticence. It must be remembered that a theatre, and
especially a popular one, is a centre of great curiosity. Every one
wants to know all about it, and curiosity-mongers if they cannot
discover facts invent them. The only possible safeguard that I know of
is strict reticence at headquarters, and the formulation of such a
system of accounts as makes it impossible for lesser officials to know
any more than their own branch of work entails. To this end all our
books at the Lyceum were designed and kept. Not one official of the
theatre outside myself knew the whole of the incomings and the
outgoings. Some knew part of one, some knew part of the other; not even
that official who was designated “treasurer” knew anything of the high
finance of the undertaking. The box-office keeper made entry of daily
receipts and checked over the nightly booking-sheet so as to secure
accuracy in his own work; but he had no knowledge whatever of the cash
receipts at pit or gallery, where all is ready money. The treasurer made
to the bank such lodgments as I gave him; he paid treasury to the actors
and staff on each Friday according to the list which I gave him, and on
every Tuesday he paid such accounts as were settled in cash and such of
my own cheques as I gave to his keeping for the purpose to be paid
according to my list. But he did not pay all the salaries—did not know
them. Certain of them I myself paid, and these were not of the smaller
amounts. He did not pay all the trade accounts; not the larger of them
in any case. The weekly accounts of the heads of departments-carpenters,
property, wardrobe, gas, electric, supers, chorus, orchestra, &c.—having
been thoroughly checked in the office and vouched for by the stage
manager, were paid in bulk to the heads of the departments, who
distributed the amounts, and returned to me the receipted accounts with
vouchers. In fact, the minor books kept by the various departments of
both receipts and expenditure had practically only one side. Such
officials either received money for handing in to me or paid out money
given to them for the purpose. None of them did both. Thus it was that
we kept our business to ourselves. Even in such a matter as free
admissions none except those in the “office” knew of them. They did not
go through the box-office at all, but were sent out under my own
instruction in each individual case. Even the “bill orders”—the
equivalent given in kind to those small traders who exhibit in their
windows bills of the play of “double crown” or “folio” size—were not
distributed in the usual way through the “bill inspector,” but sent out
in properly directed envelopes by the clerical staff. The account-books
of the theatre were kept by myself and rigidly preserved in a great safe
of which I alone had the key. The safe stood in the room which Irving
and I and Loveday used in common, so that the books were always
available for Irving’s purposes when he required them. The accounts were
very carefully audited by chartered accountants whose clerks made
monthly check of details. Then at the end of each season the audit was
completed by the accountants themselves, who made return to Irving
direct in sealed envelopes.
Thus I can say that all through Irving’s management from the time of my
joining him in 1878 till the time of my handing over such matters as
were in my care to the executors—by their own desire, after his will had
been found, and before his funeral—no one, except Irving himself,
myself, and the chartered accountants (who made audit and whose
profession is one sworn to individual secrecy) knew Irving’s affairs. I
am thus particular because the very reticence which we adopted as a
policy and pursued as a system was a wise protection, with of course
such attendant possibilities as belong to a custom of strict reticence.
Not once, in all our long connection of friendship and business, have I
given to any one without Irving’s special permission a single detail of
his business. It was not until 1904, when I was writing an article by
request of the Editor of the _Manchester Guardian_, _apropos_ of his
return to Sunderland after an absence of nearly fifty years, that we
made known even approximately the vast total of his takings during his
management. I quoted figures in that article—which in modern form the
paper designated as “an appreciation”—with Irving’s consent, and ran up
to London from Derby, where we were then playing, to verify them. When
we were arranging the matter I reminded him that I had never in all the
years given a figure unless he had asked me to. Whereupon he said:
“But you are always free to use what figures and anything else of mine
you will. You know, my dear fellow, what confidence I have in your
discretion. You are quite free in the matter, now and always!”
With this permission I feel at ease in now dealing publicly with matters
regarding which I have been silent for so many years. I deal with them
now because I regard them as good for Irving—for that memory which he
valued more than life.
When Irving took over the Lyceum from Mrs. Bateman he had then
accumulated no fortune. He received only a salary up to the time of
Colonel Bateman’s death. He then had salary—an extraordinarily mild one
considering all things—and a prospective share of profits, which under
the circumstances did not amount to much. Practically such little as he
had in the autumn of 1878 was rather in the nature of a treasury balance
than of capital. Of course, in his tour he was earning good money, and
this came in a “ready” form; but the expenses which he was incurring in
the reorganising and beautifying the Lyceum were vastly in excess of his
present earning. When I came to London and took over his financial
matters his bankers, the London and County Bank, had already arranged
with him a large overdraft, some £12,000, for which he had given bills.
This debt and all others incurred in preparation of his long campaign at
the Lyceum were duly paid. Throughout his whole managerial life his
payment was twenty shillings in the pound, with added interest whenever
such was due or possible.
When he was undertaking the provincial tour in the autumn of 1878—the
first under his own management, his friend, Mrs. Hannah Brown, the
life-long friend and companion of the Baroness Burdett-Coutts, pressed
on him a loan of fifteen hundred pounds. She had wished him to accept a
larger sum, but he limited the amount to this. Indeed he took it at all
to please her; such a sum went but a small way in the vast enterprise on
which he had entered. Unhappily she died before he began to play in his
own theatre. The sum which she had lent was repaid to her executor in
due season.
When he first knew her, Mrs. Brown was a very old lady. She had been
immensely struck with his power, and had recognised before most others
the probable destiny that lay before him. When she was almost if not
entirely blind he used to often go to see her and the Baroness, in the
house in Stratton Street or elsewhere as they resided. Of course, all
this I only know from being told it, for Mrs. Brown had died just before
I came to live in London. Lady Burdett-Coutts told me of the great
affection which Mrs. Brown had for the clever man whose genius she so
much admired, and whose friendship was such a delight in her old age.
Not long after Irving’s death, when I was dining with her and Mr.
Burdett-Coutts, she said:
“I don’t think he ever passed the house in her later years without
coming in to see her, if only for a moment!” Others, too, of the old
friends have spoken to me of Mrs. Brown without stint; and of her Irving
often spoke to me himself. She used to go to the Lyceum time after time.
During the long run of _Hamlet_ she went some thirty times. For her
pleasure the Baroness rented from the management a box at the Lyceum.
This was not in itself unique, for she had already a box at Drury Lane
Theatre and another at Her Majesty’s Opera House. I was told that when
the old lady was dying—she was then I believe about or over eighty—she
spoke of Irving and his future, mentioning him as: “My poor brave boy!”
Irving was then forty, but he was still a “boy” to a woman of her great
age.
Mrs. Brown had very considerable means of her own, and a bequest paid by
her executor to Irving was five thousand pounds. This was handed to him
at the final settlement of her affairs in, strange to say, bank-notes.
That evening he told me of it when he arrived at the theatre. When he
did so I opened the door of the safe thinking that he intended to place
it there in safety until the next morning, when it could be lodged in
bank. I was mightily surprised when he told me that he had not got it
with him. He smiled at me as he said:
“I was afraid to carry it with me. I never in my life had so much money
close to me!”
“What have you done with it?” I asked.
“I left it in my room at home!”
“Is it put by safely?” I asked again.
“Oh yes!” he added quickly, as though justifying himself. I had an idea
that it was _not_ quite safe and went on with my queries:
“Where is it?” He smiled, I thought superiorly, as he answered:
“In my hat-box!”
“You locked it, I hope?” Again the smile:
“What would be the use of that? If I had locked away anything it would
only have called attention to it. The hat-box is simply lying there as
usual with the lid half off. No one would dream of suspecting it—not in
a thousand years!”
This illustrates, I think, in a remarkable way the subtlety of his own
character, and the method by which he judged others. He had passed the
possibilities “through his mind,” and was so content with his knowledge
that he backed it with a fortune. Later on there was a boy who _did_
take things from his rooms. He was, however, found out and the property
recovered, all except Edwin Forrest’s watch of which a part had been
probably melted down.
That legacy of five thousand pounds was, so far as I know, and had there
been other I should certainly have known, the only money which Irving
received for which he did not work, through all the long course of his
years of much toil. I mention it now specifically because one of the
unkindly, presuming that his ignorance of fact was the ignorance of
others also, made after the actor’s death a statement that he had been
“subsidised.” It ought not to be necessary to contradict such reckless
statements—they ought never to have been made; but having been made it
is best to let the exact facts be known. The best of all bucklers, for
the living or the dead, is simple, honest truth.
The needs of the theatre were very great; at the beginning almost
overwhelming. On my first taking over the responsibility of business
affairs I acquired a wide experience of what is known as “pulling the
devil by the tail.” When Irving took the Lyceum its entire holding
capacity was £228. Sometimes under extraordinary pressure, when every
inch of standing room was occupied, we got in a little more; but only
once in the first two seasons did we cover £250. That was on Irving’s
“Benefit,” as it was then called.
The autumn of 1881 was devoted to enlarging and improving the house. At
a cost of over £12,000 it was made to hold another £100. Thence on,
various improvements and certain dispositions of the seating were
effected, which brought up the holding power to a maximum of about £420,
though on very special occasions we managed to squeeze in a little more.
Some idea may be formed of the vast expense of working such a theatre as
the Lyceum, and in the way which Irving worked it, when I say that on
that theatre he spent in what we called “Expenses on the House” a sum of
£60,000. During my time the “Production account” amounted to nearly
£200,000.
The takings for his own playing between the time of beginning
management, 30th December 1878, and the day of his death, 13th October
1905, amounted to the amazing total of over two million pounds sterling.
II