Punch (35.1858)

November 27, 1858.] PUNCH, OR THE LONDON CHARIVARI 221

PEN.

WOMAN 0? THE "WOULD

THE EANGMAH OF FREEDOM.

What lawyer will thy rulers hire,
O France, eternal shame to dare,

fter all, it, is with men as with What venal slave will gold inspire

dinners—the plain and simple To plead against Montalembsr? ?

ones are those we have re- How deeply is thy bar disgraced

course to the oftenest, and of j By harbouring so vile a wretch,

which we tire the least. j Who, if he suitably were placed.

Creditors and Poor Be- Would £11 the office of Jack Ketch !
lations never call at the right

moment. An executioner, indeed,

Thelovethatisfedwith pre- Is whosoever shall advance

sents always requires feeding. In such a cause for sordid meed,

Promises go further than \ Jack Ketch of Liberty, 0 France !

performances, on tbe principle Let men reject him from their face,

ihat Hope has as many lives The caitiff, meanest of the mean !

as a cat, whilst Gratitude no Let children hoot, let women chase

sooner crosses our path, than The menial of the Guillotine.

it is crushed with as little pity____

as a blackbeetle !

Timidity in a man is ad-
mired by women a great deal
more than it is liked.

Scandal is a visitor, who
never calls without bringing
her work witli her.

Abuse of woman, like the
abuse of wine, only falls on
the head of him who freely
indulges in it.

If it is difficult to see any fault in a child, or a book, or a padding, or any one we love,
how is it possible that we should see any in ourselves ?

Every woman has some cos- Gun for Gun.

metic in her cupboard.

Tbe Queen, a short time ago, presented tka
Emperor of the Frekch with an English field-
piece. The Emperor has returned the compli-
ment by sending Her Majesty a howitzer made,
so to speak, out of his ovn head. This is as it
should be, as we say at a penny a line. The two
great Powers exchange guns instead of shots.

uniform LOVE.

The love of a Lady for au Officer who wears
a love of an uniform.

AN ACTOR'S PARADISE.

One occasionally hears of instances of what the irreverent are wicked
enough to call presumption and self-conceit on the part of the British
Actor. Now and then the theatrical world is excited, and society j
amused, by a disturbance between a hard-ridden manager and a selfish
" popular favourite," because the latter has not been offered more
than ten times the amount of the united salaries of the rest of the
company, because the letters in which his famous name is placarded
have been only a yard long, or because the line in which his sacred name
is announced has not been far enough away from the lines containing
the names of his brother and sister professionals. Sometimes, too, one
hears of a " popular favourite " turning sulky, because somebody else
has a good part in a piece with him or her, and even refusing a part
because the piece is not a monologue. But our English actors are
poor and vulgar egotists, compared to those of the French stage.
There has recently, says a Paris correspondent of the Literary Gazette,
been an action brought by the actor Laeerriere,—

" Against tbe Director of the Theatre de la Porte St. Martin, to obtain damages
for violation of agreement, in not having, at the beginning of the present winter
season, a new piece ready for him (Laferriere) to perform in.

•' In this case we had a specimen of the conditions which a popular actor in Paris
thinks himself warranted in imposing on his manager. Listen : Laferriere
stipulated,—

" 1. Tuat a new piece should be written expressly for him by M. Barriers, oue
ef the most successful authors of the day.

" 2. That (of course) he should play the leading part in that piece.

"3. That the number of nights tie should perform should not be fewer than sixty,
even if the said piece should be a failure.

;' 4. That having other engagements from the 1st September, his sixty perform-
ances should take place betore that date.

" 5. That he should be paid £12 sterling, for each performance.

" 6. That payment should be made every five days without fail.

" 7. That he should have a performance for his benefit.

" 8. That he should have two free admissions to the best places in the house
every night.

"9. That a relative of his of the name of Godefroy should be admitted free to
tbe house at each of the sixty representations, and also be allowed to go behind the
scenes.

" 10. That every bill of each night's performances should bear the words, in
gigantic letteis, ' Performances of M. Lafkkriere.'

"11. That besides, his name should agam figuie on the bill in letters of a large
size and peculiar shape.

*' j2. That whatever might be the space required for other things on the bill,
these two conditions should never be modified.

" 13. That no other name should ever be placed before his.

" 14. That no other name should ever appear on the same line as his.

" 15. That no other actor should be engaged extraordinarily in tbe course of his
performances,—not even to add to tbe iclat of the piece of which he was the hero.

" 16. That paid paragraphs should be inserted in the newspapers about the piece
in which he played.

" 17. That his name, and the name of his part, should invariably be mentioned
before any other in the said paragraphs.

" 18. That he should have the dressing-room which Frederick Lem aitrz used to
occupy,—that is, tho best in the house.

" l'J. That the said room should be elegantly furnished, and well lighted.

" 20. That his benefit should be announced all over Paris by means of posting
bill yards long, and in letters inches high.

" 21. That he should be properly applauded by the claque ; and

" 22. That in case the manager should fail in any one of these engagements, tha
sum of £1000 should be paid by him ! "

That is a tolerably stringent agreement, and it will make the mouths
of some English "popular favourites" water. What a splendid
tyranny to establish in a theatre ! But it remains to be said, that
the unfortunate manager of the Porte St. Martin did manage to fail in
some one of these engagements. Which, we are not informed, and
should like to know whether he had begged to be let off the sixty
nights of a piece that was a failure, or had been seen on the
Boulevard speaking to a young actor in M. Laeerriere's line, or could
not get M. Jules Lecomte, or any agent of that class, to procure the
insertion of sufficiently laudatory puffs of the comedian. But he failed,
and the action was duly brought, and the court gave the performer
the full amount of damages claimed, francs to the amount of One
Thousand Pounds!

Actors and malefactors seem to have it all their own way in Paris.

BRITISH AlND BELGIAN GROCERY.
Among other particulars of Continental news, we observe that—

" Five grocers of Brussels have been lately convicted for adulterating severai
articles of consumption, especially pepper and chicory."

It were well if London could say as much for itself as Brussels can.
Adulteration is detected here continually in numerous instances ; but
few of the rogues who practise it are ever found out. As is the
number of grocers in Brussels to five adulterators, so is the number of
grocers in thi3 Metropolis to how many ? The answer to the question
would be a large number of adulterant rogues; though only a small
proportion of the absolute multitude of such rogues existing among
London grocers. They would probably amount to a considerable
multiple of five ; to a figure that, could they be convicted, would pretty
well suffice for the purpose of example. Had we the requisite statistics
at hand, it would be interesting to calculate the quantity of oakum
those rogues could pick in a given time, of motive power which they
could communicate to the treadmill or crank, and t he extent of line
which, if the pillory were re-established (as, for the sake of such
rogues, is almost desirable) and the whole lot of them were pilloried
in a row, their collocated pillories would occupy.

" Bight about face ! " as the man said when he asked his friend to
publish a Treatise oa Physiognomy.