Punch (49.1865)

246

PUNCH, OR THE LONDON CHARIVARI.

[December 23, 1865.

A DARWINIAN IDEA.

SUGGESTED BY THE CATTLE SHOW.

THE MODERN IMPROVEMENT.

WHaT IT MUsT come to.

A PHENOMENON IN THE PULPIT.

Tre performances of juvenile prodigies have hitherto been confined
to theatres, halls, and concert-rooms. But now precocity has begun to
appear in the pulpit. The natives of Yorkshire have, according to a
contemporary, been astonished by—

“ A Boy Preacher. — On Sunday last Two Sermons were preached in the
Methodist Free Church, North Whittington, near Sheffield, by a youth aged thirteen
years. Crowded congregations were attracted, and the collections amounted to
£3 6s., which will be devoted to the purohase of a harmonium."

Eor the boy? Surely an accordion would have done as well for a
young gentleman oulv thirteen years old; perhaps indeed the Infant
Preacher would have been very well satisfied with a penny trumpet.

Now Ready.—The Red Hot Poker at all the Pantomimes.

“ HENRY DUNBAR” AT THE OLYMPIC.

What a happy destiny is that of the dramatic author .

Not for his freedom of the theatres, both before and behind the
curtain; not for his opportunities of direct appeal to the dear British
public, and his certainty of getting his applause (or his condemnation,
as the case may be), not cold-drawn, and “ in notes by distance made
less sweet,” but hot and hot, and at the hands of his hearers ; not for
his privilege of fitting pretty actresses with pretty parts, and taking
the measure, in the most familiar style, of the popular favourites of the
other sex;—all these are pleasant chances, but there is one chance in
which the dramatic author now-a-days is still more blessed beyond his
pen-fellows, and that is, in his critics. He is judged by his brethren,
and not seldom by his unsuccessful brethren. It is difficult to enu-
merate all the advantages which thus accrue to him. In the first place,
he is sat upon by what the Erench call experts, workmen of his own
craft—gentlemen who, to use a vulgarism, have been “in the oven
themselves.” Now we all know how two of a trade are apt to agree.
Of course such judges are keenly appreciative of beauties or demerits,
especially the former, and generous, as brethren should be, iu their
tribute of admiration. But, besides this, the practice secures to the
author criticised the inestimable advantage of a series of lessons in his
art. Each critic takes his turn to point out to him how his piece might
have been better conceived and better executed ; how the scenes might
have been re-arranged, the dialogue re-written, and the characters
re-combined, to the immense advantage of the general effect.

There is only one drawback to the value of this kind of instruction,
that the instructors are never agreed among themselves—one gentleman
invariably praising what the other blames, and Oracle A. suggesting as
highly desirable, what Oracle B. protests against as inevitably fatal to
success.

We have been led into these remarks by reading the criticisms on
the recent adaptation of Henry Dunbar at the Olympic, as to which,
however, we find the critics, who differ on every other point, agreeing
in two things, which probably the author and the manager of the
Olympic may consider a very sufficient set-off against their conflicting
testimony or contradictory counsel on all other points. The first point
of agreement is, that the piece was eminently successful—a fact which
some of these gentlemen may find it difficult to reconcile with their
judgments of it, and which no doubt the Morning Advertiser is right
in thinking discreditable to the British public; not the “public,” by
the way, with which he, as the Tap-Tub oracle, is naturally most
familiar.

The second point of agreement is that the acting, especially that of
Miss Kate Terry, Mr. H. Neville and Mr. Vincent was admirable,
—of the very best quality.

On both these points Mr. Hunch is happy to agree with the critios.
He can testify to the success of the piece, though he is unhappily under
the necessity of differing with the oracular gentleman of the 'Tizer as to
its merits. And respecting the quality of the acting, he is also happy to
bear his testimony, in common with his friends the critics of the daily
papers, to the exquisite refiaement, sensibility and unaffected truth of
Miss Kate Terry, one of the most consummate actresses of her own
range of parts we have ever seen on the English stage, in Margaret
Wentworth—a debt he pays all the more readily, because he feels himself
very heavily in arrears to that young lady for the tears she made him
shed in Anne Carew, for some of which, by the way, her little sister is
partly answerable—and to Mr. Neville’s earnestness, well-conceived
reserve, and self-restraint in Henry Dunbar. The Major, iu Mr.
Vincent’s hands, is a scamp worthy to take his place by Montague
Tigg and Robert Macaire, and few better-conceived bits of acting have
been seen on our stage of late years. Oh, if The Mayor will only stay
where he is, and not let himself be carried away by the applause of the
dear B. P., which does like its bit of fat, and never quite kuows when
it has had enough!

Thanks to these artists, to Mr. Soutar, and Mr. Montague, and
to the acting of the smaller parts of a waiter by Mr. F. Cooper, and
of the old banker, Balderby, Punch found in Henry Dunbar what he
rarely finds—Ensemble; and he can only say to other managers and
authors charged with drilling a company, “ Go ye and do likewise.”

Accidentally Correct.

The power of aspirating words, which Londoners are supposed to
possess, but which provincials practise to au incalculably greater extent,
sometimes hits the truth, though it. is ouly by what is called a happy
accident. For instance, we heard Slipper the other day, saying, “ Tlie
great fault he had to find with young ladies of the present day was, that
they were always giving themselves such tremendously false ^airs.”
By-Jove, he wasn’t far wrong.

An Exclusive Set.—A New series of dances has been arranged for
County Balls. It is named the County-Court Quadrilles.