The Season Reopens—I meet the Yellow Breeches and become a Utility Man—Mr. Murdock Escapes Fits and my "Luck" Proves to be Extra Work.
The exuberance of my joy over the opening of the new season was somewhat modified by my close relations with a certain pair of knee-breeches—and I wish to say right here that when Gail Hamilton declared inanimate things were endowed with powers of malice and general mischievousness, she was not exaggerating, but speaking strictly by the card.
Some men think her charge was made solely against collar-buttons, whose conduct the world admits is detrimental to good morals; but they are wrong; she included many things in her charge. Consider the innocent-looking rocking-chair, for instance. When it strikes does not the rocker always find your ankle-joint? In darkness or in light did it ever miss that exact spot? Never! And then how gently it will sway, while you rear and stamp, and, with briny eyes, say—well, things you should not say, things you would not say but for the malice of an inanimate thing.
Perhaps the quickest way to win your sympathy is to tell you at once that those knee-breeches were made of yellow plush, bright yellow—I thought that would move you! There was a coat, too—yes, things can always be worse, you see; and when I was crowded into that awful livery I felt like hopping about in a search for hemp-seed, I looked so like an enormous canary that had outgrown its cage.
Had Gail Hamilton known those breeches she would have said: "Here is total depravity in yellow plush!"
You see, the way they got their grip on me originally was this. There had been two utility men engaged for the company, but one of them was taken sick and could not come to the city at all, and the other one made the manager sick, and was discharged for utter incompetency, and that very night there was required a male servant who could in the first act summon the star to the presence of his employer, with a name hard to pronounce; and in the last act, when the star had become the boss of the whole affair, could announce the coming of his carriage.
"Could I do those two lines?"
"Oh, yes!" I joyfully announced my ability and my willingness; "but I had no clothes."
And then, instead of turning the part into a girl attendant, in an evil moment the manager bethought himself of some wardrobe he had purchased from a broken up or down opera manager, and search discovered the yellow-plush breeches, coat, and white wig. I put them on—the canary was hatched!
I played the part of two announcements; I walked out clear from the hip, like a boy—and I became the utility man of the company, and the tormented victim of the yellow breeches.
I was a patient young person and willing to endure much for art's sake, but that wig was too much. Built of white horse-hair mounted upon linen, its heat and weight were fearful. It had evidently been constructed for a big, round, perfectly bumpless head. It came down to my very eyebrows on top, and at the sides, instead of terminating just at the hair-line above the ear, it swallowed up my ears, covered my temples, and extended clear to my eyes, giving me the appearance of being harnessed up in large white blinders—like a shying horse. In common humanity the manager released me from the wig and let me wear powder, but the clutch of the yellow breeches remained unbroken.
As in their opera days (I don't know what they sang, but they were probably in the chorus) they had wandered through the world, knowing all continental Europe and the South Americas, so now they wandered through dramatic literature. One night accompanying me on to deliver a note to Madame de Pompadour, the next night those same yellow breeches and I skipped back to Louis XIV., and admitted many lords and ladies, with tongue-tying names, to that monarch's presence, only to skip forward again, in a few days, to bring in mail-bags to snuffy rural gentry, under almost any of the Georges. Though the lace ruffles and jabots of the French period might give place to a plain red waistcoat for the Georgian English household, the canary breeches were always there, ready to burst into song at any moment, to basely fire off a button or break a buckle just at the moment of my entrance-cue, treacherously suggesting, by their easy wrinkling while I stood, that I might just as well sit down and rest my tired feet, and the moment I attempted to lower myself to a chair, beginning such a mad cracking and snapping in every seam as brought me upright with a bound and the settled conviction that weariness was preferable to public shame.
I am glad to this day that the stage-door was always kept locked, for, had it been open, heaven only knows where those cosmopolitan breeches might have taken me—they were such experienced travellers that a trip to Havana or to the City of Mexico would have struck them as a nice little jaunt.
My pleasantest moments as utility man came to me when, in a very brief white cotton Roman shirt and sandals, I led the shouts for the supers, who are proverbially dumb creatures before the audience, though noisy enough behind the scenes. So all the furious and destructive mobs of that season were led on by a little whipper-snapper who yelled like a demon with a copper-lined throat and then stood about afterward peacefully making tatting.
It must not be thought that I had in the first place a monopoly of the small parts; far from it, but the company being rather short of utility people, if the ballet-girls could play speaking servants, it not only saved a salary or two to the manager, but it was of immense advantage to the girls themselves. Then, too, Mr. Ellsler was particularly anxious to avoid any charge of favoritism; so in the earliest days these little parts were given out turn and turn about, without choice or favor—indeed, two or three times my short dress caused me to be passed over in favor of long dresses and done-up hair. But a few disasters, caused by failure of memory or loss of nerve on the part of these competitors, gave the pas to me, and it must be remembered that these lapses and mishaps, though amusing to recall, were absolutely disastrous at the time, ruining, as they did, the scene, if not the entire act, in which they occurred.
With special vividness I recall the first one of these happenings. "Romeo and Juliet" was the play, and Balthazar the part. I longed for it because, aside from his fine speech, he was really quite important and had to show tenderness, anxiety, and determination during the time Romeo addressed him. I pleaded with my eyes, but I could not, dared not speak up and ask for the part, as did Annie, who was older than I. The star and prompter exchanged a few low-spoken sentences. I caught the condemnatory word "child," and knew my fate was sealed—long skirts and turned-up hair had won. However, my wound was salved when the page to Paris was given me with two lines to speak.
Now there is no one but Romeo on the stage when Balthazar enters, which, of course, gives him great prominence. His first speech, of some fifty or fifty-six words, is simply expressed, not at all involved, yet from the moment Annie received the part she became a broken, terror-stricken creature. Many people when nervous bite their nails, but Annie, in that state of mind, had a funny habit of putting her hand to the nape of her neck and rubbing her hair upward. She had a pretty dress of her own, but she had to borrow a wig, and, like all borrowed wigs, it failed to fit; it was too small, and at last, when the best had been done, its wobbly insecurity must have been terrifying.
The girl's figure was charming, and as she stood in the entrance in her boy's costume, I remarked: "You look lovely, Annie!"
Silently she turned her glassy, unseeing eyes toward me, while she shifted her weight swiftly from one foot to the other, opening and shutting her hands spasmodically. Romeo was on, and he joyously declared:
He then described his happy dream—I heard the words:
And there Annie staggered forward on to the stage.
Oh, well might he ask "How now?" for, shifting from foot to foot, this stricken Balthazar was already feeling at the nape of her neck, and instead of answering the questions of Romeo about Juliet with the words:
these were the startling statements he made in gulps and gasps:
[titter from audience, and amazement on Romeo's face]
Perhaps she would have got to the right words at last, but just there the wig, pushed too hard, lurched over on one side, giving such a piratical look to the troubled face that a very gale of laughter filled the house, and she retired then and there, though in the next speech she should have refused to leave Romeo:
yet now, because his looks were red and wild, she left without permission, and the enraged instead of grieving Romeo had no one to receive his order:
So when, in his confusion, he went on continuing his lines as they were written, and, addressing empty space, fiercely bade Balthazar:
and in unintentionally suggestive tones promised:
the audience laughed openly and heartily at the star himself.
"Yes, sir," he snorted later on to Mr. Ellsler, "by heaven, sir! they laughed at me—AT ME! I have been made ridiculous by your measly little Balthazar—who should have been a man, sir! Yes, sir, a man, whom I could have chastised for making a fool of himself, sir! and a d——d fool of me, sir!"
For the real tragedy of that night lay in the wound given to the dignity of Mr. F. B. Conway, who played a measured and stately Romeo to the handsome and mature Juliet of his wife.
We had no young Juliets just then, they were all rather advanced, rather settled in character for the reckless child of Verona. But every lady who played the part declared at rehearsal that Shakespeare had been foolish to make Juliet so young—that no woman had learned enough to understand and play her before middle age at least.
Mrs. Bradshaw, one day, said laughingly to me: "By your looks you seemed to disagree with Mrs. Ellsler's remarks this morning. She, too, thinks a woman is not fit for Juliet until she has learned much of nature and the world."
"But," I objected, lamely, "while they are learning so much about the world they are forgetting such a lot about girlhood!"
Her laughter confused and distressed me. "I can't say it!" I cried, "but you know how very forward Juliet is in speech? If she knew, that would become brazen boldness! It isn't what she knows, but what she feels without knowing that makes the tragedy!" And what Mrs. Bradshaw meant by muttering, "Babes and sucklings—from the mouths of babes and sucklings," I could not make out; perhaps, however, I should say that my mate Annie played few blankverse parts after Balthazar.
Then, one Saturday night, we were all corralled by the prompter before we could depart for home, and were gravely addressed by the manager—the whole thing being ludicrously suggestive of the reading of the riot act; but after reminding us that Mr. James E. Murdoch would begin his engagement on Monday night, that the rehearsals would be long and important, he proceeded to poison the very source of our Sunday's rest and comfort by fell suggestions of some dire mishap threatening the gentleman through us. We exchanged wondering and troubled glances. What could this mean?
Mr. Ellsler went on: "You all know how precise Mr. Murdoch has always been about your readings; how exacting about where you should stand at this word or at that; how quickly his impatience of stupidity has burst into anger; but you probably do not know that since his serious sickness he is more exacting than ever, and has acquired the habit, when much annoyed, of—of—er—well, of having a fit."
"O-h!" it was unanimous, the groan that broke from our oppressed chests. Stars who gave us fits we were used to, but the star who went into fits himself—good heavens! good heavens!
Rather anxiously, Mr. Ellsler continued: "These fits, for all I know, may spell apoplexy—anyway, he is too frail a man to safely indulge in them; so, for heaven's sake, do nothing to cross him; be on time, be perfect—dead letter-perfect in your parts; write out all his directions if necessary; grin and bear anything, so long as he doesn't have a fit! Good-night."
The riot act had been read, the mob dispersed, but the nerve of the most experienced was shaken by the prospect of acting a whole week with a gentleman who, at any moment, might get mad enough to have a fit.
Think, then, what must have been the state of mind of my other ballet-mate, Hattie, who, in her regular turn, had received a small part, but of real importance, and who had to address her lines to Mr. Murdoch himself. Poor girl, always nervous, this new terror made her doubly so. She roused the star's wrath, even at rehearsal.
"Speak louder!" (imperatively). "Will you speak louder?" (furiously). "Perhaps, in the interest of those who will be in front to-night, I may suggest that you speak loud enough to be heard by—say—the first row!" (satirically). Now a calmly controlled body is generally the property of a trained actress, not of a raw ballet-girl, and Hattie's restless shifting about and wriggling drove him into such a rage that, to the rest of us, he seemed to be trembling with inchoate fits, and I saw the property man get his hat and take his stand by the stage-door, ready to fly for the doctor, or, as he called him, "the fit sharp."
She, too, was to appear as a page. She was to enter hurriedly—always a difficult thing for a beginner to do. She was to address Mr. Murdoch in blank verse—a more difficult thing—and implore him to come swiftly to prevent bloodshed, as a hostile meeting was taking place between young Count So-and-so and "your nephew, sir!"
This news was to shock the uncle so that he would stand dazed for a moment, when the page, looking off the stage, should cry:
With a cry, the uncle should recover himself, and furiously order the page to
Alas! and alas! when the night, the play, the act, the cue came, Hattie, as handsome a boy as you could wish to see, went bravely on, as quickly, too, as her terror-chilled legs could carry her, but when she got there had no word to say—no, not one!
In a sort of icy rage, Mr. Murdoch gave her her line, speaking very low, of course:
But the poor girl, past prompting properly, only caught wildly at the sense of the speech, and gasped out:
She saw his foot tapping with rage—thought his fits might begin that way, and madly cried, at the top of her voice:
then, through the laughter, rushed from the stage, crying, with streaming tears: "I don't care if he has a dozen fits! He has just scared the words out of my head with them!"
And truly, when Mr. Murdoch, trembling with weakness, excitement, and anger, staggered backward, clasping his brow, everyone thought the dreaded fit had arrived.
Next day he reproachfully informed Mr. Ellsler that he could not yet see blank verse and the King's English (so he termed it) murdered without suffering physically as well as mentally from the shocking spectacle. That he was an old man now, and should not be exposed to such tests of temper.
Yes, as he spoke, he was an old man—pallid, lined, weary-faced; but that same night he was young Mirabel—in spirit, voice, eye, and movement. Fluttering through the play, "Wine Works Wonders," in his satins and his laces—young to the heart—young with the immortal youth of the true artist.
Both these girls spoke plain prose well enough, and always had their share of the parts in modern plays; but, as all was grist to my individual mill, most of the blankverse and Shakespearean small characters came to me. Nor was I the lucky girl they believed me; there was no luck about it. My small success can be explained in two words—extra work. When they studied their parts they were contented if they could repeat their lines perfectly in the quiet of their rooms, and made no allowance for possible accidents or annoyances with power to confuse the mind and so cause loss of memory and ensuing shame. But I was a careful young person, and would not trust even my own memory without first taking every possible precaution. Therefore the repeating of my lines correctly in my room was but the beginning of my study of them. In crossing the crowded street I suddenly demanded of myself my lines. At the table, when all were chatting, I again made sudden demand for the same. If on either occasion my heart gave a jump and my memory failed to present the exact word, I knew I was not yet perfect, and I would repeat those lines until, had the very roof blown off the theatre at night, I should not have missed one. Then only could I turn my attention to the acting of them—oh, bless you, yes! I quite thought I was acting, and at all events I was doing the next best thing, which was trying to act.
But a change was coming to me, an experience was approaching which I cannot explain to myself, neither has anyone else explained it for me; but I mention it because it made such a different thing of dramatic life for me. Aye, such a difficult thing as well. Looking back to that time I see that all my childhood, all my youth, was crowded into that first year on the stage. There I first knew liberty of speech, freedom of motion. There I shared in the general brightness and seemed to live by right divine, not by the grudging permission of some task-mistress of my mother. I had had no youth before, for in what should have been babyhood I had been a troubled little woman, most wise in misery. In freedom my crushed spirits rose with a bound. The mimicry, the adaptability of childhood asserted themselves—I pranced about the stage happily but thoughtlessly.
It seems to me I was like a blind puppy, born into warmth and comfort and enjoying both, without any fear of the things it could not see. As I have said before, I knew no fear, I had no ambition, I was just happy, blindly happy; and now, all suddenly, I was to exchange this freedom of unconsciousness for the slavery of consciousness.
With Mr. Dan. Setchell I Win Applause—A Strange Experience Comes to Me—I Know Both Fear and Ambition—The Actress is Born at Last.
My manager considered me to have a real gift of comedy, and he several times declared that my being a girl was a distinct loss to the profession of a fine low comedian.
It was in playing a broad comedy bit that my odd experience came to me. Mr. Dan. Setchell was the star. He was an extravagantly funny comedian, and the laziest man I ever saw—too lazy even properly to rehearse his most important scenes. He would sit on the prompt table—a table placed near the footlights at rehearsal, holding the manuscript, writing materials, etc., with a chair at either end, one for the star, the other for the prompter or stage manager—and with his short legs dangling he would doze a little through people's scenes, rousing himself reluctantly for his own, but instead of rising, taking his place upon the stage, and rehearsing properly, he would kick his legs back and forth, and, smiling pleasantly, would lazily repeat his lines where he was, adding: "I'll be on your right hand when I say that, Herbert. Oh, at your exit, Ellsler, you'll leave me in the centre, but when you come back you'll find me down left."
After telling James Lewis several times at what places he would find him at night, Lewis remarked, in despair: "Well, God knows where you'll find me at night!"
"Oh, never mind, old man," answered the ever-smiling, steadily kicking Setchell, "if you're there, all right; if you're not there, no matter!" which was not exactly flattering.
Of course such rehearsals led to many errors at night, but Mr. Setchell cleverly covered them up from the knowledge of the laughing audience.
It is hard to imagine that lazy, smiling presence in the midst of awful disaster, but he was one of the victims of a dreadful shipwreck while making the voyage to Australia. Bat-blind to the future, he at that time laughed and comfortably shirked his work in the day-time, and made others laugh when he did his work at night.
In one of his plays I did a small part with him—I was his wife, a former old maid of crabbed temper. I had asked Mr. Ellsler to make up my face for me as an old and ugly woman. I wore corkscrew side curls and an awful wrapper. I was a fearful object, and when Mr. Setchell first saw me he stood silent a moment, then, after rubbing his stomach hard, and grimacing, he took both my hands, exclaiming: "Oh, you hideous jewel! you positively gave me a cramp at just sight of you! Go in, little girl, for all you're worth! and do just what you please—you deserve the liberty for that make-up!"
And goodness knows I took him at his word, and did anything that came into my giddy head. Even then I possessed that curious sixth sense of the born actress, and as a doctor with the aid of his stethoscope can hear sounds of grim warning or of kindly promise, while there is but the silence to the stander-by, so an actress, with that stethoscopic sixth sense, detects even the forming emotions of her audience, feeling incipient dissatisfaction before it becomes open disapproval, or thrilling at the intense stillness that ever precedes a burst of approbation.
And that night, meeting with a tiny mishap, which seemed to amuse the audience, I seized upon it, elaborating it to its limit, and making it my own, after the manner of an experienced actor.
There was no elegant comedy of manners in the scene, understand, it was just the broadest farce, and it consisted of the desperate effort of a hen-pecked husband to assert himself and grasp the reins of home government, which resolved itself at last into a scolding-match, in which each tried to talk the other down—with what result you will know without the telling.
The stage was set for a morning-room, with a table in the centre, spread with breakfast for two; a chair at either side and, as it happened, a footstool by mine. His high silk hat and some papers, also, were upon the table. For some unexplainable cause the silk hat has always been recognized, both by auditor and actor, as a legitimate object of fun-making, so when I, absent-mindedly, dropped all my toast-crusts into that shining receptacle, the audience expressed its approval in laughter, and so started me on my downward way, for that was my own idea and not a rehearsed one. When my husband mournfully asked if "There was not even one hot biscuit to be had?" I deliberately tried each one with the back of my knuckles, and remarking, "Yes, here is just one," which was the correct line in the play, I took it myself, which was not in the play, and so went on till the scolding-match was reached.
In my first noisy speech I meant to stamp my foot, but by accident I brought it down upon the footstool. The people laughed, I saw a point—I lifted the other foot and stood upon the stool. By the twinkle in Mr. Setchell's eye, as well as by the laughter in front, I knew I was on the right track.
He roared—he lifted his arms above his head, and in my reply, as I raised my voice, I mounted from the stool to the seat of the chair. He seized his hat, and with the toast-crusts falling about his face and ears, jammed it on his head, while in my last speech, with my voice at its highest screech, I lifted my foot and firmly planted it upon the very breakfast-table.
It was enough—the storm broke from laughter to applause. Mr. Setchell had another speech—one of resigned acceptance of second place, but as the applause continued, he knew it would be an anti-climax, and he signalled the prompter to ring down the curtain.
But I—I knew he ought to speak. I was frightened, tears filled my eyes. "What is it?" I whispered, as I started to get down.
"Stand still," he sharply answered, then added: "It's you, you funny little idiot! you've made a hit—that's all!" and the curtain fell between us and the laughing crowd in front.
The prompter started for me instantly from his corner, exclaiming, in his anger: "Well, of all the cheeky devilment I ever heard or saw—" But Mr. Setchell had him by the arm in a second, crying: "Hold on, old man! I gave her leave—she had my permission! Oh, good Lord! did you see that ascent of stool, chair, and table? eh? ha! ha! ha!"
I stood trembling like a jelly in a hot day. Mr. Setchell said: "Don't be frightened, my girl! that applause was for you! You won't be fined or scolded—you've made a hit, that's all!" and he patted me kindly on the shoulder and broke again into fat laughter.
I went to my room, I sat down with my head in my hands. Great drops of sweat came out on my temples. My hands were icy cold, my mouth was dry, that applause rang in my ears. A cold terror seized upon me—a terror of what, the public?
Ah, a tender mouth was bitted and bridled at last! the reins were in the hands of the public, and it would drive me—where?
The public! the public! I had never feared it before, because I had never realized its power. If I pleased, well and good. If I displeased it, I should be driven forth from the dramatic Eden I loved, in which I hoped to learn so many things theatrical and to become very wise, and I should wander all my life in the stony places of poverty and disappointment! I clenched my hands and writhed in misery at the thought. I seemed again to hear that applause, which had been for me—my very self! and I thrilled at its wild sweetness. Ah, the public! it could make or it could mar my whole life. Mighty monster, without mercy! The great many-headed creature, all jewelled over with fierce, bright eyes, with countless ears a-strain for error of any kind! That beat the perfumed air with its myriad hands when pleased—when pleased! A strange, great stillness seemed to close about me; something murmured: "In the future, in the dim future, a woman may cause this many-headed monster you fear to think as one mind, to feel as one heart! Then the bit and bridle will be changed—that woman will hold the reins and will drive the public!" At which I broke into shrill laughter, in spite of flowing tears. Two women came in, one said: "Why, what on earth's the matter? Have they blown you up for your didoes to-night? What need you care, you pleased the audience?" But another said, quietly: "Just get a glass of water for her, she has a touch of hysteria—I wonder who caused it?"
But I only thought of that woman of the dim future, who was to conquer the public—who was she?
Why that round of applause should have so shattered my happy confidence I cannot understand, but the fact remains that from that night I never faced a new audience, or attempted a new part, without suffering a nervous terror that sometimes but narrowly escaped collapse.
My Promiscuous Reading wins me a Glass of Soda—The Stage takes up my Education and Leads me through Many Pleasant Places.
I suppose it sounds absurd to say that during those first seasons, with choruses, dances, and small parts to learn, with rehearsals every day and appearances every night, I was getting an education.
But that depends upon your definition of the word. If it means to you schooling, special instruction, and formal training, then my claim is absurd; but if it means information, cultivation of the intellectual powers, enlightenment, why then my claim holds good, my statement stands, I was getting an education. And let me say the stage is a delightful teacher; she never wearies you with sameness or drives you to frenzy with iteration. No deadly-dull text-book stupefies you with lists of bare, bald dates, dryly informing you that someone was born in 1208, mounted the throne in 1220, died in 1258, and was succeeded by someone or other who reigned awhile—really you can't remember how long, and don't much care. There's nothing in figures for the memory to cling to. But no one can forget that Edward V. was born in 1470, because he is such a tragic little figure, only thirteen years old and of scant two months reign, because there was the Tower and there the crafty, usurping Duke of Gloster eager for his crown.
Perhaps people would remember that Edward III. was born in 1312 and was succeeded by his grandson, Richard, if they were told at the same moment that he was father to that superb Black Prince, beloved alike of poet, painter, and historian.
Now, to be a good actress and do intelligent work, one should thoroughly understand the play and its period in history, as the mainspring of its action is often political. To be able to do that requires a large fund of general information. That I had from my very babyhood been a reckless reader, came about from necessity—I had no choice, I simply read every single thing in print that my greedy hands closed upon; the results of this promiscuous reading, ranging from dime novels to Cowper, were sometimes amusing. One day, I remember, an actress was giving a very excited account of a street accident she had witnessed. Her colors were lurid, and some of her hearers received her tale coldly. "Oh!" she cried, "such an awful crowd—a mob, you know—a perfect mob!"
"Oh, nonsense!" contradicted another, "there couldn't have been a mob, there are not people enough in that street to make a mob!"
Then I mildly but firmly remarked: "Oh, yes, there are, for you know that legally three's a mob and two's a crowd."
A shout of laughter followed this bit of information. "How utterly absurd!" cried one. "Well, of all the ridiculous ideas I ever heard!" laughed another. And then, suddenly, dear old Uncle Dick (Mr. Richard Stevens and player of old men, to be correct) came to my support, and, with the authority of a one-time barrister, declared my statement to be perfectly correct.
"But where, in the name of Heaven, did you get your information?"
"Oh," I vaguely replied, "I just read it somewhere."
"That's a rather broad statement," remarked Uncle Dick; "you don't give your authority, page and line, I observe. Well, see here, now, Clara mia, in whatever field you found that one odd fact, you certainly gleaned others there, so if you can produce, at once, three other legal statements, I will treat you to soda-water after rehearsal."
Oh, the delicious word was scarcely over his lips when I was wildly searching my memory, and presently, very doubtfully, offered the statement: "It is a fraud to conceal a fraud."
But Uncle Dick gravely and readily accepted it. Another search, and then joyfully I announced: "Contracts made with minors, lunatics, or drunkards are void."
A shout of laughter broke from the kind old man's lips, but he accepted that, too. Oh, almost I could hear the cool hiss of the soda—but now not another thing could I find. My face fell, my heart sank. Hitherto I had been thinking of papers, now I frantically ran through stories. Suddenly I cried: "A lead-pencil signature stands in law."
But, alas! Uncle Dick hesitated—my authority was worthless. Oh, dear! oh, dear! was I to lose my treat, just for lack of a little legal knowledge? Sadly I remarked, "I guess I'll have to give it up, unless—unless you'll take: 'Principals are responsible for their agents,'" and, with pleasure beaming in his kind old eyes, he accepted it.
Ah, I can taste that vanilla soda yet—and, what is more, the old gentleman took the trouble to find out about the legality of the lead-pencil signature; and, as my statement had been correct, he took great pains to make the fact known to all who had heard him question it, and he added to my little store of knowledge, "that a contract made on Sunday would not stand," which, by the way, later on, saved me from a probably painful experience.
I mention this to show that even my unadvised reading had not been absolutely useless, I had learned a little about a variety of things; but now, plays continually presented new subjects to me to think and read about; thus "Venice Preserved" set me wild to find out what a Doge was, and why Venice was so adored by her sons, and I straightway obtained a book about the wonderful city—whose commerce, power of mart and merchant may have departed, but whose mournful beauty is but hallowed by her weakness.
So many plays were produced, representing so many periods, so many countries, I don't know how I should have satisfied my craving for the books they led me to had not the Public Library opened just then. I was so proud and happy the day my mother surprised me with half the price of a membership, and happier yet when I had the right to enter there and browse right and left, up and down, nibbling here, feeding long and contentedly there. Oh, the delight of reading one book, with two or three others in my lap; 'twas the pleasure of plenty, new to one who could have spelled "economy" in her sleep.
Then, again, if it is the Stage that is making you read, you have to keep your eyes wide open and take note of many things. Some girls read just for the sake of the story, they heed nothing but that, they are even guilty of the impertinence of "skipping," "to get to the story more quickly, you know." But if you are on the stage you understand, for instance, that different kinds of furniture are used for different periods and for different countries; so even the beginner knows, when she sees the heavy old Flemish pieces of furniture standing on the stage in the morning, that no modern play is on that night, and is equally sure that the bringing out of the high tile-stove means a German interior is in preparation. Therefore, if you read for the stage, you watch carefully, not only Sir Thomas's doings, but his surroundings. If his chair or desk or sideboard is described, you make a note of the "heavily carved wood," or the "inlaid wood," or the "boule," or whatever it may be, and then you note the date of the story, and you say to yourself: "Ah, such and such furniture belongs to such a date and country."
I once heard the company expressing their shocked amazement over the velvet robes of some Macbeth. I could not venture to ask them why it was so dreadful, but later I found some paper stating that velvet was first known in the fifteenth century, and was confined to the use of the priests or high ecclesiastical authorities—and my mind instantly grasped the horror of the older actors at seeing Macbeth swathed in velvet in the grim, almost barbaric Scotland of about 1012; for surely it was a dreadful thing for an actor to wear velvet four hundred years ahead of its invention.
You never know just where the Stage is going to lead you in your search for an education; only one thing you may be sure of, it will not keep you very long to any one straight road, but will branch off in this direction or in that, taking up some side issue, as it seems, like this matter of furniture, and lo, you presently find it is becoming a most important and interesting subject, well worth careful study. You come to believe you could recognize the workmanship of the great cabinet-makers at sight. You learn to shrink from misapplied ornament, you learn what gave rise to the "veneering reign-of-terror," you bow at the name of Chippendale, and are filled with wonder by the cinque-cento extravagance of beauty. You find yourself tracing the rise and fall of dynasties through the chaste beauty or the over-ornamentation of their cabinet work. If all that Sir Henry Irving knows on this subject could be crowded into a single volume, the book would have at least one fault—'twould be of most unwieldy size.
Then holding you by the hand the Stage may next lead you through the green and bosky places that the poets loved, and, having had your eyes opened to natural beauties, lo! you go down another lane, and you are learning about costumes, and suddenly you discover that "sumptuary laws" once existed, confining the use of furs, velvets, laces, etc., to the nobility. Fine woollens and linens, and gold and silver ornaments being also reserved for the privileged orders. That the extravagant young maids and beaux of the lower class who indulged in yellow starched-ruff, furred mantle, or silver chain were made to pay a cruel price for their folly in aping their betters. So it was well for me to make a note of the date of the "sumptuary law," that I might not some day outrageously overdress a character.
It is a delightful study, that of costume—to learn how to drape the toga, how to hang the peplum; to understand the meaning of a bit of ribbon in the hair, whether as arranged in the three-banded fillet of the Grecian girl or as the snood of the Scottish lassie; to know enough of the cestus and the law governing its wearing, not to humiliate yourself in adopting it on improper occasions; to have at least a bowing acquaintance with all foot-gear, from sandals down to an Oxford tie; to be able to scatter your puffed, slashed, or hanging sleeves over the centuries, with their correct accompanying, small-close, large-round, or square-upstanding ruffs. Why the mere detail of girdles and hanging pouches, from distant queens down to "Faust's" Gretchen, was a joy in itself.
Then a girl who played pages, and other young boys, was naturally anxious to know all about doublets, trunks, and hose, as well as Scottish "philibeg and sporran." And wigs? I used to wonder if anyone could ever learn all about wigs—and I'm wondering yet.
But as one studies the coming and going of past fashions in garments, it is amusing to note their influence upon the cabinet-makers, as it is expressed in the changing shape of their chairs. For instance: when panniers developed into farthingale and monstrous hoop, chairs, high and narrow, widened, lowered their arms—dropped them entirely, making indeed a fair start toward our own great easy-chair of to-day.
I remember well what a jump my heart gave when in rooting about among materials—their weaves and dyes—I came upon the term "samite." It's a word that always thrills me, "samite, mystic, wonderful." Almost I was afraid to read what might follow; but I need not have hesitated, since the statement was that "samite" was supposed to have been a delicate web of silk and gold or silver thread. How beautiful such a combination must have been—white silk woven with threads of silver might well become "mystic, wonderful," when wrapped about the chill, high beauty of an Arthur's face.
But hie and away, to armor and arms! for she would be but a poorly equipped actress who had no knowledge of sword and buckler, of solid armor, chain-mail, rings of metal on velvet, or of plain leather jerkin—of scimitar, sword, broadsword, foil, dagger, dirk, stiletto, creese.
Oh, no! don't pull your hand away if the Stage wants to lead you among arms and armor for a little while; be patient, for by and by it will take you up, up into the high, clear place where Shakespeare dwells, and there you may try your wings and marvel at the pleasure of each short upward flight, for the loving student of Shakespeare always rises—never sinks. Your power of insight grows clearer, stronger, and as you are lifted higher and higher on the wings of imagination, more and more widely opens the wonderful land beneath, more and more clearly the voices of its people reach you. You catch their words and you treasure them, and by and by, through much loving thought, you comprehend them, after which you can no longer be an uneducated woman, since no man's wisdom is superior to Shakespeare's, and no one gives of his wisdom more lavishly than he.
Therefore, while a regular school-education is a thing to be thankful for, the actress who has been denied it need not despair. If she be willing to work, the Stage will educate her—nor will it curtly turn her away at the end of a few years, telling her her "term" is ended. I clung tightly to its hand for many a year, and was taken a little way through music's halls, loitered for a time before the easel, and even made a little rush at a foreign language to help me to the proper pronunciation of names upon the stage; and no man, no woman all that time rose up to call me ignorant. So I give all thanks and all honor to the profession that not only fed and clothed me, but educated me too!
The Peter Richings' Engagement brings me my First Taste of Slander—Anent the Splendor of my Wardrobe, also my First Newspaper Notice.
I remember particularly that second season, because it brought to me the first taste of slander, my first newspaper notice, and my first proposal of marriage. The latter being, according to my belief, the natural result of lengthening my skirts and putting up my hair—at all events, it was a part of my education.
Of course the question of wardrobe was a most important one still. I had done very well, so far as peasant dresses of various nationalities were concerned; I had even acquired a page's dress of my own, but I had no ball-dress, nothing but a plain, skimpy white muslin gown, which I had outgrown; for I had gained surprisingly in height with the passing year. And, lo! the report went about that Mr. Peter Richings and his daughter Caroline were coming in a fortnight, and they would surely do their play "Fashion," in which everyone was on in a dance; and I knew everyone would bring out her best for that attraction, for you must know that actresses in a stock company grade their costumes by the stars, and only bring out the very treasures of their wardrobes on state occasions. I was in great distress; one of my mates had a genuine silk dress, the other owned a bunch of artificial gold grapes, horribly unbecoming, stiff things, but, mercy, gold grapes! who cared whether they were becoming or not? Were they not gorgeous (a lady star had given them to her)? And I would have to drag about, heavy-footed, in a skimpy muslin!
But in the company there was a lady who had three charming little children. She was the singing soubrette (by name Mrs. James Dickson). One of her babies became sick, and I sometimes did small bits of shopping or other errands for her, thus permitting her to go at once from rehearsal to her beloved babies. Entering her room from one of these errands, I found her much vexed and excited over the destruction of one of a set of fine new lace curtains. The nursemaid had carelessly set it on fire. Of course Mrs. Dickson would have to buy two more curtains to replace them; and now, with the odd one in her hand, she started toward her trunk, paused doubtfully, and finally said to me: "Could you use this curtain for some small window or something, Clara?"
At her very first word a dazzling possibility presented itself to my mind. With burning cheeks, I answered: "Oh, yes, ma'am, I—I can use it, but not at a window, I'm afraid." Her bonnie face flashed into smiles.
"All right; take it along, then!" she cried, "and do what you like with it. It's only been up two days, and has not a mark on it."
I fairly flew from the house. I sang, as I made my way uptown to buy several yards of rose-pink paper cambric and a half garland of American-made artificial roses. Then I sped home and, behind locked doors, measured and cut and snipped, and, regardless of possible accident, held about a gill of pins in my mouth while I hummed over my work. All my fears were gone, they had fled before the waving white curtain, which fortunately for me was of fine meshed net, carrying for design unusually small garlands of roses and daisies. And when the great night came, I appeared as one of the ball guests in a pink under-slip, with white lace overdress, whose low waist was garlanded with wild roses. So, happy at heart and light of foot, I danced with the rest, my pink and white gown ballooning about me in the courtesies with as much rustle and glow of color as though it had been silk.
But, alas! the imitation was too good a one! The pretty, cheap little gown I was so happy over attracted the attention of a woman whose whisper meant scandal, whose lifted brow was an innuendo, whose drooped lid was an accusation. Like a carrion bird she fed best upon corruption. Thank Heaven! this cruel creature, hated by the men, feared by the women, was not an actress, but through mistaken kindness she had been made wardrobe woman, where, as Mr. Ellsler once declared, she spent her time in ripping up and destroying the reputation of his actors instead of making and repairing their wardrobes.
That nothing was too small to catch her pale, cold eye is proved by the fact that even a ballet-girl's dress received her attention. Next day, after the play "Fashion" had been done, this woman was saying: "That girl's mother had better be looking after her conduct, I think!"
"Why, what on earth has Clara done?" asked her listener.
"Done!" she cried, "didn't you see her flaunting herself around the stage last night in silks and laces no honest girl could own? Where did the money come from that paid for such finery?"
A few days later a woman who boarded in the house favored by the mischief-maker happened to meet Mrs. Dickson, happily for me, and said, en passant: "Which one of your ballet-girls is it who has taken to dressing with so much wicked extravagance? I wonder Mrs. Ellsler don't notice it."
Now Mrs. Dickson was Scotch, generous, and "unco" quick-tempered, and after she had put the inquiring friend right, she visited her wrath upon the originator of the slander in person, and verily the Scottish burr was on her tongue, and her "r's" rolled famously while she explained the component parts of that extravagant costume: window curtain—her gift—and paper cambric and artificial flowers to the cost of one dollar and seventy-five cents; "and you'll admit," she cried, "that even the purse of a 'gude lass' can stand sic a strain as that; and what's mair, you wicked woman, had the girl been worse dressed than the others, you would ha' been the first to call attention to her as slovenly and careless."
This was the first drop of scandal expressed especially for me, and I not only found the taste bitter—very bitter—but learned that it had wonderful powers of expansion, and that the odor it gives off is rather pleasant in the nostrils of everyone save its object.
Mrs. Dickson, who, by the way, is still doing good work professionally, has doubtless forgotten the entire incident, curtain and all, but she never will forget the bonnie baby-girl she lost that summer, and she will remember me because I loved the little one—that's a mother's way.
Mr. Peter B. Richings was that joy of the actor's heart—a character. He had been accounted a very fine actor in his day, but he was a very old man when I saw him, and his powers were much impaired. Six feet tall, high-featured, Roman-nosed, elegantly dressed; a term from bygone days—and not disrespectfully used—describes him perfectly: he was an "old Buck!"
His immeasurable pride made him hide a stiffening of the joints under the forced jauntiness of his step, while a trembling of the head became in him only a sort of debonair senility at worst. Arrogant, short-tempered, and a veritable martinet, he nevertheless possessed an unbending dignity and a certain crabbed courtliness of manner very suggestive of the snuff-box and ruffle period of a hundred years before.
His daughter, by adoption, was the object of his unqualified worship—no other word can possibly express his attitude toward her. No heavenly choir could have charmed him as she did when she sang, while her intellectual head and marble-cold face seemed beautiful beyond compare in his eyes. Really it was worth going far to see him walk through a quadrille with her. His bow was a thing for young actors to dream of, while with trembling head, held high in air, he advanced and retreated, executing antiquated "steps" with a grace that deprived them of comicality, while his air of arrogant superiority changed instantly to profound homage whenever in the movement of the figures he met his daughter.
His pronunciation of her name was as a flourish of trumpets—Car-o-line! Each syllable distinct, the "C" given with great fulness, and the emphasis on the first syllable when pleased, but heavily placed upon the last when he was annoyed.
He was unconscionably vain of his likeness to Washington, and there were few Friday nights, this being considered the fashionable evening of the week, that he failed to present his allegorical picture of Washington receiving the homage of the States, while Miss Richings, as Columbia, sang the "Star-Spangled Banner," the States joining in the chorus.
In this tableau the circular opening in the flat, backed by a sky-drop and with blue clouds hanging about the opening, represented heaven. And here, at an elevation, Washington stood at the right, with Columbia and her flag on his left, while the States, represented by the ladies of the company, stood in lines up and down the stage, quite outside of heaven.
Now a most ridiculous story anent Mr. Richings and this heaven of his was circulating through the entire profession. Some of our company refused to believe it, declaring it a mere spiteful skit against his well-known exclusiveness; but that gentleman who had wished to send me for an "Ibid," being an earnest seeker after knowledge, determined to test the truth of the story. Therefore, after we had been carefully rehearsed in the music and had been informed by the star that only Car-O-line and himself were to stand back of that skylike opening, this "inquiring" person gave one of the extra girls fifty cents to go at night before the curtain rose and take her stand on the forbidden spot. She took the money and followed directions exactly, and when Mr. Richings, as Washington, made his pompous way to the stage, he stood a moment in speechless wrath, and then, trembling with anger, he stamped his foot, and waving his arm, cried: "Go a-way! Go a-way! you very presuming young person; this is heaven, and I told you this morning that only my daughter Car-O-line and I could possibly stand in heaven!"
It was enough; the "inquiring one" was rolling about with joy at his work. He had taken a rise out of the old gentleman and proved the truth of the story which had gone abroad in the land as to this claim of all heaven for himself and his Car-O-line.
I naturally remember these stars with great clearness, since it was for a small part in one of their plays that I received my first newspaper notice. Imagine my incredulous joy when I was told of this journalistic feat—unheard of before—of praising the work of a ballet-girl. Suspecting a joke, I did not obtain a paper until late in the day, and after I had several times been told of it. Then I ventured forth, bought a copy of the Herald, and lo, before my dazzled eyes appeared my own name. Ah, few critics, with their best efforts, have thrown as rosy a light upon the world as did Mr. Jake Sage with his trite ten-word statement: "Clara Morris played the small part allotted to her well."
My heart throbbed hard, I seemed to catch a glimpse, through the rosy light, of a far-away Temple of Fame, and this notice was like a petal blown to me from the roses that wreathed its portals. Could I ever, ever reach them!
"Played the small part allotted to her well." "Oh," I cried aloud, "I will try to do everything well—I will, indeed!" and then I cut the notice out and folded it in a sheet of paper, and put both in an envelope and pinned that fast to my pocket, that I might take it to my mother, who was very properly impressed, and was a long time reading its few words, and was more than a trifle misty about the eyes when she gave it back to me. Looking at them now, the words seem rather dry and scant, but then they had all the sweetness, life, and color of a June rose—the most perfect thing of God's bounteous giving.