Punch (78.1880)

March 6, 1880.] PUNCH, OR THE LONDON CHARIVARI.

A FACT FOR NATURALISTS.

Young Housewife. “Dear me I what very small Eggs for Twopence-

HALFPENNY EACH ! It SEEMS QUITE EXTRAVAGANT TO TAKE THEM ! ”

Affable Dairy- Woman (who has always a conclusive reply for complaints).
“Well, yes, M’m, so it does. But I’ve always noticed that New-laid
Eggs are small ! ”

“AS YOU LIKE IT” AS WE LIKE IT.

With the Merchant of Venice still on the crest of the full tide of success at
the Lyceum, Macbeth in occupation of the hoards of Sadler’s Wells, with Othello
and Hamlet to follow, and now—last and not least—As You Like It at the
Imperial, who shall say that the immortal William is not holding his own
on the London Boards ?

For tragedy at Islington Mr. Punch regrets he has not yet found a night.
But with the Royal Merchant, the heavily-handicapped Jew, and the fair and
witty Lady of Belmont, he has long been at home in the Lyceum ; and for As
You Like It in Westminster he has been happy enough to find two afternoons
already, and hopes to find more.

Among Shakspeare’s romantic comedies, the exquisite story of Rosalind in
Arden holds as prominent a place as that of the Prince of Denmark among his
tragedies. The fragrant breath of young life, and the pure passion of young
love; the chequered shine and shadow and wholesome odour of the woodland ;
the primitive labours and lowly passions of shepherd, and shepherdess; the
woodland sport, seasoned with the quiet and sweet philosophy of the Banished
Duke ; Jaques’s world-weariness under the mask of philosophy, and his Stoic
disguise for cynical and effete Epicureanism, are all harmonised in a series of
pictures, to which the tinkle of the sheep-bells, the song and horn of the hunters,
and the jingle of Touchstone’s motley, make a delightful music. In what part
did ever strength and lustihood, swift love and high-born youth, spring to
hfe before us, as in Orlando ? Where shall we find courage, archness,
and. buoyancy with grace of opening womanhood, embodied with such charm
as in Rosalind J What fooling was ever subtler and sharper than Touchstone’s?
What dignity in exile is statelier and wiser than the Duke’s f When did philo-
sophic pretension ever find amore imposing vocabulary than in the mouth of Jaques ?

The piece is at once play and poem, romance and idyl, philosophic essay and
day-dream. Among the enchanting glades of Arden we seem to fleet the time
carelessly as they did in the golden world!

All very well this, the reader may say, a propos of the
play when presented before the mind’s eye, with Fancy
to cast the parts, and Imagination to set the scenes.

But how reconcile this rhapsody with the play as pre-
sented on the Imperial boards, with Miss Litton to super-
intend the action, and Mr. Perkins to paint the scenery ?

Well, really, Mr. Punch did not think he could have
seen the play through with so little sense of jar between
his fancy and the facts set before him as he did at the
Imperial last Wednesday. The beautiful Comedy is
beautifully put on the stage, and as well acted as we can
have any hope of seeing it acted in London, failing a
theatrical realisation of Aliena’s notion, that “Mountains
may be removed with earthquakes, and so encounter.”

Meantime, Punch recommends all who want to see As
You Like It, as he likes it, and as he ventures to say,
they ought to like it, to take their places at the Imperial.
It is an afternoon theatre, and they can get their plea-
sure over before dinner, so that it need not involve
their carrying an ill-digested meal to their stalls—
places, however suited to a fattened ox, eminently unfit
for a well-dined man.

Punch has a great respect for the critics, and of course
he likes, if possible, to steer his judgment by their com-
passes ; though this is by no means easy when they point
different ways ; when, in fact, you have not only to box
the compass, but to consult compasses that box each other.
One critic tells him that the play is too sumptuously
attired and mounted, that the dresses of the foresters in
particular are too gay and bright. Now it seemed to him
that while the Court of the usurping Duke was very
handsomely furnished in regard of courtiers and ladies,
as well as terraces and gardens, the Court of his
banished brother in Arden was appropriately arrayed in
serge of hodden grey, autumnal brown, and Kendal
or Lincoln green, leather jerkins, and rough leggings
■—very fitting for hunters’ garb, and not a hit too fine for
their place and purpose. He has, certainly, never seen
a Rosalind so appropriately, modestly, and tastefully
attired, and so much at home in her doublet and hose;
never an Orlando better dressed, as well as of more
youthful figure, hearing, and movement; never a
more prettily costumed transformation of Celia into
Aliena.

The complaint of over-splendour of attire, or over-elabo-
ration of scenic setting, is the last he would have expected
in these days of sumptuous realism in furniture, dresses,
and decorations in such high places as the Haymarket and
the St. James’s. On the contrary, the costumes, artisti-
cally designed by Mr. Forbes-Robertson, and the scenery,
excellently planned and beautifully painted by Mr. Per-
kins, seemed to Punch to satisfy, but not more than fairly
satisfy, the exigences of our time in the presentation of a
play of Shakspeare’s. There was certainly no more dis-
play in the Imperial As You Like It than in the Lyceum
Merchant of Venice, and, above all, there was no undue-
sacrificing of the cast or the performance to the stage-show.
For the play was very well acted all round; exceptionally
well acted, as times and companies go.

You had first and foremost an eminently satisfactory
pair of lovers in Miss Litton’s Rosalind and Mr. Bellew’s
Orlando. The former has never till now, to Punch’s
knowledge, played a Shakspearian part. But as Rosalind
she revealed a rare power of intelligent, consistent, and
well matured conception, gracefully, spiritedly, and
thoroughly worked out.

The critics tell me her acting lacked tenderness. I
should be glad to know where Rosalind is to show it,
except in her asides to Celia ; and in Miss Litton’s per-
formance I did not see any want of feeling in these rare
revelations of Rosalind’s more loving self, after she has
donned doublet and hose. She tells Celia, before her first
encounter with Orlando in the forest, that “she will speak
to him like a saucy lacquey, and under that habit play the
knave with him,” and this is precisely what Miss Litton
did, thereby honourably, as it seems to Punch, distin-
guishing herself from the other Rosalinds he remembers,
who, all of them, let too much of the woman show under
doublet and hose, thereby risking the purity of the part,
which depends mainly on the absence of sex-conscious-
ness with which Rosalind gives herself to the full flow of
spirits and sauciness.

So I see some of the critics complain that Mr. Bellew
lacked tenderness. I can only say that I did not see him
pass by any opportunity of showing it that Shakspeark