perfectly staggered. I bowed and bowed and placed my hand upon my heart to express my gratitude, but some minutes elapsed before I could begin my part. I need hardly say, that after such a reception all my points told, and every exit and entrance was marked by the most demonstrative approval. When the curtain fell, I had to appear and again bow my acknowledgments and gesticulate my gratitude.
The manager was delighted, and seemed anxious to accompany me to my lodgings, but as I was greatly fatigued by acting and the excitement of the evening, I begged that I might see him in the morning.
What a happy night I passed! It was evident that I had made a greater success in London than I had thought for, and that my fame had travelled to this distant land before me.
I had finished breakfast when my friend the manager was announced. He entered smiling confidently, and holding out his hand in rather a professional. manner, shook mine with a vigour that was far from agreeable. “Well, sir,” he said, “I hope you were satisfied with last night’s success.”
“Satisfied!” I exclaimed, “I never can forget the generous enthusiasm—the gratifying appreciation of that distinguished audience!”
“I am glad to hear this,” said the manager, “since it was partly my doings.”
“Your doings? I don’t understand you.”
“Yes! that was mine in our paper—you saw it, didn’t you?” asked the fellow with something of a smile.
“No, sir,” I said; “I saw nothing but the advertisement of the theatre.”
“Then I’ve the pleasure of reading you myself a paragraph which has exceeded my expectation.” He then read, smirking as he did so, a paragraph which became afterwards so fixed in my memory that I can now repeat it word for word. It ran thus:—
About three years ago, the little town of B was visited by a very alarming fire. It broke out at a tallow-chandler’s, and the inflammable nature of the stock-in-trade soon gave the devouring element the mastery over the fire-engines. At the moment that the flames were at their utmost fury, the figure of a child was seen at one of the third-floor windows. Shrieks and cries from the multitude rent the air, but none offered to rescue the innocent victim. A ladder was at length procured, but such was the power of the flames that all hesitated to ascend and risk what seemed to be certain death. Fearful pause! When all hope appeared to be lost, a young man rushed from the crowd, removed his coat, which he threw to a bystander, and, with the agility of a bricklayer’s labourer, ascended the ladder. In another minute he was descending with the rescued child, which he placed safely in the arms of its distracted mother. When she turned to thank the deliverer of her offspring he had disappeared. Who was he? Who was this gallant deliverer of infantine helplessness? None knew—until one, more knowing than the rest, looked at the lining of the coat the noble fellow had abandoned, and there read the name of , the now eminent actor! Inhabitants of ! on Monday next he makes his first appearance amongst you. Rush to give him the ovation he deserves. Let not one seat remain unoccupied! Honour to the brave!
When the manager had finished reading, I seized him by the collar, and so far forgot myself as to shake him. Need I say that the paragraph contained no word of truth so far as I was concerned, and that my amour propre was seriously wounded by the discovery?
“I guess at the actor,” said Buffboot, “and the manager I can swear to. He was a great oddity. He had his theatre newly painted once upon a time, and was particularly careful to keep it in good order. He was playing Hamlet, and had come to the soliloquy, when he saw a boy in the gallery hanging his dirty arms over the front, and playing with the gold mouldings. His respect for his new gilding was greater than his reverence for the text of the bard, and so Hamlet spoke thus:
‘To be or not to be, that is the question.’
(Take your hands off that moulding there, you boy in the gallery.)
‘Whether ’tis better in the mind to suffer
The slings and arrows’—
(Officer, turn that boy out immediately, he’s picking the gold off.)
‘Of outrageous fortune,’
and so on.”
“Oh, I knew him well,” said Spangles; “he once served me a pretty trick when I was very young. I had to play a part in a melodrama, and there were no buff boots in the wardrobe which would fit me. I appealed to the manager, as he had engaged to find me all my dresses. He promised I should have a pair at night, and I went away contented. He was as good as his word, and a pair of clean buff boots awaited me. The piece began and I was called.
Enter Rolando,—perceiving Justine, exclaims, ‘Ha! what do I see?’ [Starts.]
I followed my stage directions—I did start, and in doing so necessarily stamped violently with my right foot, when, to my horror, all the yellow ochre with which my boot had been daubed fell off in flakes, and left me with one black boot and a buff one! The audience saw my embarrassment and was kind enough to laugh very heartily.”
“He nearly ruined me in Virginius,” said Spangles. “When Virginia gives me her drawing of her lover, Icilius, I have to say,
‘Who’s face is this you have given to Achilles?
Tut! I know it as well as I know my own face.’
I looked at the ‘property,’ and found it was a portrait of Tim Bobbin. Nor was that all, for when they uncovered the urn supposed to contain the ashes of Virginia, it was a tea-urn with the tap running.”
There were many more of these stories, but I must beg respectfully to conclude, as I’ve got the cramp in my fore-finger, which makes my spelling worse than ordinary.