DOI Heft:
January 24, 1880
DOI Seite / Zitierlink:https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.17763#0041
January 24, 1880.] PUNCH, OR THE LONDON CHARIVARI.
DRAMATIC INFANT-SCHOOLS.
There is much talking
and writing about
Dramatic Schools
just now; but Professors,
if not Professionals, seem
to forget the admirable
Infant-Schools already
open in the Christmas
Theatres.
Punch knows no pret-
tier or more pathetic sight
than that presented by
most of our Pantomime
stages, when tilled, like
the boxes, with little
ones. Gardens—true
Kindergarten—all blos-
soming with flowers of
childhood—babyhood
almost—real and sweet
flowers, though often
grown among the soot
and smoke of the slums,
and the filth and foulness
of the gutter. The magic
of the flowers transmutes
foulness to fragrance.
At these times, Panto-
mime is not only the scene of Big-heads, but the school of Big-
hearts, for they must he big, to take in all these little ones as they
do ; everyone in the theatre, from Stage-manager and. Ballet-master
downwards, having a kind way and a kind word in dealing with
these mites.
Punch has produced his Pantomime, and he knows there is no
happier season than Pantomime time for the children lucky enough
to he engaged for Birds or Bees, Spiders or Sprites, Fiends or
Fairies, Farm Labourers or Small Soldiers. The run of the
Pantomime means the grandest holiday entertainment for them,
something beyond all conceivable feasts and summer outings; warmth
and brightness, splendour and sparkle, frolic and fun, dressing up
and dancing, romping and making a row for two or three hours in
the afternoon or at night, and live, or even seven, shillings to carry
home to mother at the week’s end!
And if this Child’s Paradise has to be reached through a few weeks’
drilling and dressing, shouting and scolding, what’s that to the
restraint and stern discipline of the Board-School, or the ups and
downs of the battle of life in court or gutter ?
And even for teaching, Punch is open to back the Theatre, while it
lasts, against the Board-School any day. Its teaching is pre-
eminently proved by results. Everything taught is tested by
Bubiic examination. If we don’t hear quite so much of the Three
..’s or the Standards, cleanliness, attention, punctuality, and prompt
obedience are not bad practical iessons, any more than dancing and
deportment, and the conveying of a meaning by look or gesture.
What the children get in the theatre, in fact, is school, drill, and
dancing-lesson rolled into one.
If Punch's readers want to see this Dramatic Infant-School in
full swing, let them go to the Opera Comique, and enjoy The
Children's Pinafore. They will find the music, duly transposed to
the small pipes, as well given in most cases, and the parts as well
played, by the children, as by their big brothers and sisters, their
cousins and their uncles and their aunts, in the evening.
There is a Sir Joseph Porter, whose official solemnity is in the
inverse ratio of his size, and who comports himself with as portentous
a gravity as if he carried not only the “ Queen's Navee,” but the
Queen’s Army, and Civil Service, and the Bench of Bishops, and
the Judges of all the Law Courts—nay, the whole weight of Church
and State on his small shoulders. There is a Captain Corcoran, at
once a pink of politeness and a Tartar of tautness, who never
“forgets himself,” his note, or his word, and looks like a model
Captain seen through the small end of a telescope, there is a rnid-
shipmite of the mite-iest dimensions, and most deedy determination.
There is a bluff Boatswain, a tender and touching Ralph Rackstraw,
with a sweet, mellow, and well-trained pipe, a pretty and grace-
ful Josephine, an ideal and idyllic Little Buttercup and a blithe
and buxom coryphee of the “cousins and the aunts,” and, above
all, there is a Dick Deadeye who is a Robson in miniature. Punch
does not remember to have seen any actor since that genius in the
Telloio Dwarf at once so weird and so funny.
In short, every part is capitally filled, and the Children's Pinafore
iRust be pronounced a model piece of as clean, neat, and tasteful
getting up, as Punch would wish to see in his own laundry.
In Little Boy Blue, at the Aquarium, besides a smart and
33
sprightly Blue Boy, and a pretty Red Riding Hood, a real cow, and
turkeys, and pigeons, and cocks and hens, there are the humours of
Master Lionel Brough as a big little-boy, and a Board-School, con-
ducted on strictly Pantomime principles, with Mr. Bannister for
Mistress, and Mr. Paulo for Inspector. The teaching and its results,
in these competent hands, may be imagined. Lord Sandon and Sir
Francis Sandford should visit this model school, so conveniently
near Whitehall.
But what Punch wants to talk about just now, is a trio of the
sweetest little tots who sing nursery songs in chorus, with a glee
and gusto that seems to shine out of their bright black eyes and
to break in smiles on their rosy lips, particularly those of a small
person of three or four, who, in smock-frock and leggings, and
carter’s-whip in hand, sings the praises of John Barleycorn behind
a brown jug almost as big as herself.
A prettier and more pleasing sight than this childish glee-party
Punch has not found in the whole realm of Pantomime this year.
And why, though she has grown from pretty child to graceful
girl, should he not make his old-fashioned conge to Miss Harriet
Laurie, the Columbine in Little Boy Blue, who—but he despairs of
doing her justice in prose—“ Facit admiratio versum."
Who, for archest expression and daintiest grace,
Sports a linked chain of charms from her foot to her face;
Who keeps up her entrechats, battues, jioussetles,
Her languishing poses and her light pirouettes,
And trips it from opening to close of the sets,
And her Columbine-rule ne’er forsakes nor forgets,
And is, altogether, the prettiest of pets!
And in her black tarlatane more heart-hauls gets
Than were e’er caught in thinnest and whitest tulle nets,
Worn by less "winning fishers, less charming coquettes.
Punch, you see, can’t pass over her charmingly eccentric dress.
She is the only Columbine he ever saw in black, and she makes it
look the prettiest and most becoming costume for the part—which
it isn’t.
This Columbine of Columbines, Punch is glad to say, pervades the
Comic Scenes of the Aquarium Pantomime in company with Mr. D.
Kitchen—an Artist far more suggestive of drawing-room than
kitchen—a Harlequin for sprightliness and agility not unworthy of
such a Columbine.
It is the first time, for long, that Punch has seen a Harlequin
and Columbine able, as well as willing, to get out of their spangles
and stripes all that feminine grace and masculine activity can find
in them. Then Miss Alice Holt and Miss Percival—blondine and
brunette—are two charming premieres danseuses. Mr. Paulo is a
very good Clown indeed, and has true humour, though, like most
clever Clowns nowadays, he takes out in talk what he should put
into Pantomime.
Passing from Stage to Platform, hut still keeping to Children,
Punch must say a word on the performance of the Sisters Webling.
He loves young ability and its natural flowers as much as he hates
precocity and its forced fruits. These three sisters, the eldest
(Josephine) not yet out of her teens, the youngest (Peggy) not yet
into them, have none of the objectionable quality of the Juvenile
Prodigy or the repulsiveness of the Infant Phenomenon.
Touching and true as may be the pathos of Josephine, Punch, as
is natural, warms more to the fun of Peggy, which is quite out of
the common, and seems to give promise of a future. Only don’t let
those who have charge of these clever children spoil them with
stove-heat and soiree-iorcing. Let their intelligence be carefully
developed and trained, and leave their cleverness to look after itself.
Punch could not help thinking as he watched their performance,
“ What a trio of foundation-scholars for his own Dramatic College,
or Professor Mobley’s Dramatic School—whichever of them is first
opened! ”
“ Your Surplus to its Right Use.”
Minor Irish ex-incumbents want the Irish Church Surplus em-
ployed to eke out the scanty ex-lrish-Church surplice, and fit it
better to cover their nakedness. But, ill-fed and ill-clad as the
poorer among the Irish Protestant Clergy may be, Government seems
disposed to think that the Church Surplus may be better employed
in feeding the still hungrier, and clothing the still nakeder, surplus
population. At any rate, if it will feed nothing else, it will feed
their popularity, at this moment rather in a state of inanition.
Tight v. Loose.
The quarrel between the Tight Habit-ans and Jjoose Habit-ans
promises to become as fierce and as prolific of paper, if not party,
warfare, as that of the Big Endians and Little Endians in Lilliput.
Without stepping, where all but angels should fear to tread, on
the Ladies’ riding skirts, Punch may venture one remark, that
Ladies who are inclined to be fast goers, are likelier to be safe with
tight habits than loose ones.
Yon. 78.
2
DRAMATIC INFANT-SCHOOLS.
There is much talking
and writing about
Dramatic Schools
just now; but Professors,
if not Professionals, seem
to forget the admirable
Infant-Schools already
open in the Christmas
Theatres.
Punch knows no pret-
tier or more pathetic sight
than that presented by
most of our Pantomime
stages, when tilled, like
the boxes, with little
ones. Gardens—true
Kindergarten—all blos-
soming with flowers of
childhood—babyhood
almost—real and sweet
flowers, though often
grown among the soot
and smoke of the slums,
and the filth and foulness
of the gutter. The magic
of the flowers transmutes
foulness to fragrance.
At these times, Panto-
mime is not only the scene of Big-heads, but the school of Big-
hearts, for they must he big, to take in all these little ones as they
do ; everyone in the theatre, from Stage-manager and. Ballet-master
downwards, having a kind way and a kind word in dealing with
these mites.
Punch has produced his Pantomime, and he knows there is no
happier season than Pantomime time for the children lucky enough
to he engaged for Birds or Bees, Spiders or Sprites, Fiends or
Fairies, Farm Labourers or Small Soldiers. The run of the
Pantomime means the grandest holiday entertainment for them,
something beyond all conceivable feasts and summer outings; warmth
and brightness, splendour and sparkle, frolic and fun, dressing up
and dancing, romping and making a row for two or three hours in
the afternoon or at night, and live, or even seven, shillings to carry
home to mother at the week’s end!
And if this Child’s Paradise has to be reached through a few weeks’
drilling and dressing, shouting and scolding, what’s that to the
restraint and stern discipline of the Board-School, or the ups and
downs of the battle of life in court or gutter ?
And even for teaching, Punch is open to back the Theatre, while it
lasts, against the Board-School any day. Its teaching is pre-
eminently proved by results. Everything taught is tested by
Bubiic examination. If we don’t hear quite so much of the Three
..’s or the Standards, cleanliness, attention, punctuality, and prompt
obedience are not bad practical iessons, any more than dancing and
deportment, and the conveying of a meaning by look or gesture.
What the children get in the theatre, in fact, is school, drill, and
dancing-lesson rolled into one.
If Punch's readers want to see this Dramatic Infant-School in
full swing, let them go to the Opera Comique, and enjoy The
Children's Pinafore. They will find the music, duly transposed to
the small pipes, as well given in most cases, and the parts as well
played, by the children, as by their big brothers and sisters, their
cousins and their uncles and their aunts, in the evening.
There is a Sir Joseph Porter, whose official solemnity is in the
inverse ratio of his size, and who comports himself with as portentous
a gravity as if he carried not only the “ Queen's Navee,” but the
Queen’s Army, and Civil Service, and the Bench of Bishops, and
the Judges of all the Law Courts—nay, the whole weight of Church
and State on his small shoulders. There is a Captain Corcoran, at
once a pink of politeness and a Tartar of tautness, who never
“forgets himself,” his note, or his word, and looks like a model
Captain seen through the small end of a telescope, there is a rnid-
shipmite of the mite-iest dimensions, and most deedy determination.
There is a bluff Boatswain, a tender and touching Ralph Rackstraw,
with a sweet, mellow, and well-trained pipe, a pretty and grace-
ful Josephine, an ideal and idyllic Little Buttercup and a blithe
and buxom coryphee of the “cousins and the aunts,” and, above
all, there is a Dick Deadeye who is a Robson in miniature. Punch
does not remember to have seen any actor since that genius in the
Telloio Dwarf at once so weird and so funny.
In short, every part is capitally filled, and the Children's Pinafore
iRust be pronounced a model piece of as clean, neat, and tasteful
getting up, as Punch would wish to see in his own laundry.
In Little Boy Blue, at the Aquarium, besides a smart and
33
sprightly Blue Boy, and a pretty Red Riding Hood, a real cow, and
turkeys, and pigeons, and cocks and hens, there are the humours of
Master Lionel Brough as a big little-boy, and a Board-School, con-
ducted on strictly Pantomime principles, with Mr. Bannister for
Mistress, and Mr. Paulo for Inspector. The teaching and its results,
in these competent hands, may be imagined. Lord Sandon and Sir
Francis Sandford should visit this model school, so conveniently
near Whitehall.
But what Punch wants to talk about just now, is a trio of the
sweetest little tots who sing nursery songs in chorus, with a glee
and gusto that seems to shine out of their bright black eyes and
to break in smiles on their rosy lips, particularly those of a small
person of three or four, who, in smock-frock and leggings, and
carter’s-whip in hand, sings the praises of John Barleycorn behind
a brown jug almost as big as herself.
A prettier and more pleasing sight than this childish glee-party
Punch has not found in the whole realm of Pantomime this year.
And why, though she has grown from pretty child to graceful
girl, should he not make his old-fashioned conge to Miss Harriet
Laurie, the Columbine in Little Boy Blue, who—but he despairs of
doing her justice in prose—“ Facit admiratio versum."
Who, for archest expression and daintiest grace,
Sports a linked chain of charms from her foot to her face;
Who keeps up her entrechats, battues, jioussetles,
Her languishing poses and her light pirouettes,
And trips it from opening to close of the sets,
And her Columbine-rule ne’er forsakes nor forgets,
And is, altogether, the prettiest of pets!
And in her black tarlatane more heart-hauls gets
Than were e’er caught in thinnest and whitest tulle nets,
Worn by less "winning fishers, less charming coquettes.
Punch, you see, can’t pass over her charmingly eccentric dress.
She is the only Columbine he ever saw in black, and she makes it
look the prettiest and most becoming costume for the part—which
it isn’t.
This Columbine of Columbines, Punch is glad to say, pervades the
Comic Scenes of the Aquarium Pantomime in company with Mr. D.
Kitchen—an Artist far more suggestive of drawing-room than
kitchen—a Harlequin for sprightliness and agility not unworthy of
such a Columbine.
It is the first time, for long, that Punch has seen a Harlequin
and Columbine able, as well as willing, to get out of their spangles
and stripes all that feminine grace and masculine activity can find
in them. Then Miss Alice Holt and Miss Percival—blondine and
brunette—are two charming premieres danseuses. Mr. Paulo is a
very good Clown indeed, and has true humour, though, like most
clever Clowns nowadays, he takes out in talk what he should put
into Pantomime.
Passing from Stage to Platform, hut still keeping to Children,
Punch must say a word on the performance of the Sisters Webling.
He loves young ability and its natural flowers as much as he hates
precocity and its forced fruits. These three sisters, the eldest
(Josephine) not yet out of her teens, the youngest (Peggy) not yet
into them, have none of the objectionable quality of the Juvenile
Prodigy or the repulsiveness of the Infant Phenomenon.
Touching and true as may be the pathos of Josephine, Punch, as
is natural, warms more to the fun of Peggy, which is quite out of
the common, and seems to give promise of a future. Only don’t let
those who have charge of these clever children spoil them with
stove-heat and soiree-iorcing. Let their intelligence be carefully
developed and trained, and leave their cleverness to look after itself.
Punch could not help thinking as he watched their performance,
“ What a trio of foundation-scholars for his own Dramatic College,
or Professor Mobley’s Dramatic School—whichever of them is first
opened! ”
“ Your Surplus to its Right Use.”
Minor Irish ex-incumbents want the Irish Church Surplus em-
ployed to eke out the scanty ex-lrish-Church surplice, and fit it
better to cover their nakedness. But, ill-fed and ill-clad as the
poorer among the Irish Protestant Clergy may be, Government seems
disposed to think that the Church Surplus may be better employed
in feeding the still hungrier, and clothing the still nakeder, surplus
population. At any rate, if it will feed nothing else, it will feed
their popularity, at this moment rather in a state of inanition.
Tight v. Loose.
The quarrel between the Tight Habit-ans and Jjoose Habit-ans
promises to become as fierce and as prolific of paper, if not party,
warfare, as that of the Big Endians and Little Endians in Lilliput.
Without stepping, where all but angels should fear to tread, on
the Ladies’ riding skirts, Punch may venture one remark, that
Ladies who are inclined to be fast goers, are likelier to be safe with
tight habits than loose ones.
Yon. 78.
2