DOI issue:
September 13, 1884
DOI Page / Citation link:https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.17757#0138
September 13 1884.] PUNCH, OR THE LONDON CHARTVART 13i
ON THE SVIOORS.
- The Laird's Brother-in-law [from London). “It’s very strange, Lachlan! I’m having no Lhck !—and yet I seem to see
Two Birds in place of One ? That was sorely very strong Whiskey your Master gave me at Lunch ! ”
Keeper. “Maybe Aye and maybe No—the Whuskey was goot ; but any way ye dinna manage to hit the Right Bird
o’ the Twa ! ! ”
“LOOK HERE UPOH THIS PICTURE, AND 0IT THIS!”
Mr. Punch, Sir,
Several people not very well acquainted, I presume, with
the ordinary progress of a dramatic career, have erroneously assumed
that, in his projected production of Hamlet at the Princess’s, Mr.
Wilson Barrett had made up his mind to take, so to speak, a flying
leap into Shakspeare, and essay now, for the first time in his life, the
part of the lugubrious Dane. Now this nonsense, for it is well
known that my worthy young friend has already startled the pro-
vinces with his remarkable impersonation of the character, is the
direct outcome of that foolish idea so common nowadays in the
minds of most youthful aspirants for stage notoriety ; namely, that
eminence on the boards is to be secured at a jump, and need in no
way be the legitimate fruit either of much vicissitude or of intelli-
gent perseverance and real hard work.
What I want to make clear is, that whatever you may do with
Hamlet, with your foot firmly placed on the last rung of the ladder,
there is always a day when you have to deal with him modestly as you
timidly tread the first. Mr. Wilson Barrett, believe me, has gone
through it. It is a wholesome experience. Let me recount my own.
At the ripe age of nine-and-twenty, in the year 1834, just fifty
years ago, Sir, after having placed myself for eighteen months in the
hands of a distinguished retired Tragedian, who grounded me
thoroughly in all the technical business, I, on the first of April—I
remember the date well—finally determined to make my first appear-
ance as Hamlet at Little Grinton, where my good instructor had, as
arranged in our terms, secured me a three-nights’ engagement to
show them what I could do, and prepare myself for taking the town
by storm the very next month.
There were some drawbacks to the success of my undertaking, for
my hired dress, a very fine one, elaborately adorned with jet,.had
not, at 2 p.m., come down from London, and I was ultimately
forced to appear in the only approach to sable apparel in the local
wardrobe—a sort of loose suit of black calico over-alls covered with
cabalistic signs of silver tinsel, and worn in the previous Christmas
Pantomime (so I afterwards discovered) by Silkstonobolos, the Coal-
Demon. However, by taking it in considerably in the legs, and
wearing on my head half a tray of funereal plumes that I was for-
tunate enough to pick up very cheap at a sale the same afternoon, I
managed to invest the attire with sufficient character to carry me
decently through the piece ; though the shoes being inconveniently
large, my action was shuffling and hampered to that extent that on
every entrance I made after about the commencement of the Second
Act, I was greeted with a good-natured, though persistent cry of,
“ Go it, Slippers! ”
Add to this that the Ophelia of the occasion was the Prompter’s
mother, and that the gentleman who played the Ghost had been to a
wedding breakfast, where he had so freely partaken of inferior
champagne, and was through onr great scene so evidently under the
impression I was the bride’s father, that whenever I took my cue he
struck the battlements with a dessert knife he had apparently
brought away with him by mistake, and shouted, “Hear! hear!”
And you can, Sir, understand that my final exit amidst a shower of
orange-peel, eggs, and, I think, a dead eat, was not, after all,
such a very unflattering reception as I might have, on the whole,
expected. This, Sir, was how I put my foot on the lowest rung of
the ladder—but I took the lesson to heart.
To cut a long story short, I gladly accepted the following day an
engagement to play Joko the Monkey, a small comic part in The
Cannibals of the Pacific. This was not King Lear—but in ten
years I was cast for Banquo by mistake, and got my chance. Since
then I have risen step by step—I need not weary you with giving
them in detail—to my present proud position. No, Sir—believe me
there is no taking Shakspeare at a leap! He has to be approached
humbly and patiently, and even then, as I can vouch for, is not
always essayed with success!
I enclose my card, and beg to subscribe myself,—
Tour old and faithful admirer,
A Romeo oe Eighty.
ON THE SVIOORS.
- The Laird's Brother-in-law [from London). “It’s very strange, Lachlan! I’m having no Lhck !—and yet I seem to see
Two Birds in place of One ? That was sorely very strong Whiskey your Master gave me at Lunch ! ”
Keeper. “Maybe Aye and maybe No—the Whuskey was goot ; but any way ye dinna manage to hit the Right Bird
o’ the Twa ! ! ”
“LOOK HERE UPOH THIS PICTURE, AND 0IT THIS!”
Mr. Punch, Sir,
Several people not very well acquainted, I presume, with
the ordinary progress of a dramatic career, have erroneously assumed
that, in his projected production of Hamlet at the Princess’s, Mr.
Wilson Barrett had made up his mind to take, so to speak, a flying
leap into Shakspeare, and essay now, for the first time in his life, the
part of the lugubrious Dane. Now this nonsense, for it is well
known that my worthy young friend has already startled the pro-
vinces with his remarkable impersonation of the character, is the
direct outcome of that foolish idea so common nowadays in the
minds of most youthful aspirants for stage notoriety ; namely, that
eminence on the boards is to be secured at a jump, and need in no
way be the legitimate fruit either of much vicissitude or of intelli-
gent perseverance and real hard work.
What I want to make clear is, that whatever you may do with
Hamlet, with your foot firmly placed on the last rung of the ladder,
there is always a day when you have to deal with him modestly as you
timidly tread the first. Mr. Wilson Barrett, believe me, has gone
through it. It is a wholesome experience. Let me recount my own.
At the ripe age of nine-and-twenty, in the year 1834, just fifty
years ago, Sir, after having placed myself for eighteen months in the
hands of a distinguished retired Tragedian, who grounded me
thoroughly in all the technical business, I, on the first of April—I
remember the date well—finally determined to make my first appear-
ance as Hamlet at Little Grinton, where my good instructor had, as
arranged in our terms, secured me a three-nights’ engagement to
show them what I could do, and prepare myself for taking the town
by storm the very next month.
There were some drawbacks to the success of my undertaking, for
my hired dress, a very fine one, elaborately adorned with jet,.had
not, at 2 p.m., come down from London, and I was ultimately
forced to appear in the only approach to sable apparel in the local
wardrobe—a sort of loose suit of black calico over-alls covered with
cabalistic signs of silver tinsel, and worn in the previous Christmas
Pantomime (so I afterwards discovered) by Silkstonobolos, the Coal-
Demon. However, by taking it in considerably in the legs, and
wearing on my head half a tray of funereal plumes that I was for-
tunate enough to pick up very cheap at a sale the same afternoon, I
managed to invest the attire with sufficient character to carry me
decently through the piece ; though the shoes being inconveniently
large, my action was shuffling and hampered to that extent that on
every entrance I made after about the commencement of the Second
Act, I was greeted with a good-natured, though persistent cry of,
“ Go it, Slippers! ”
Add to this that the Ophelia of the occasion was the Prompter’s
mother, and that the gentleman who played the Ghost had been to a
wedding breakfast, where he had so freely partaken of inferior
champagne, and was through onr great scene so evidently under the
impression I was the bride’s father, that whenever I took my cue he
struck the battlements with a dessert knife he had apparently
brought away with him by mistake, and shouted, “Hear! hear!”
And you can, Sir, understand that my final exit amidst a shower of
orange-peel, eggs, and, I think, a dead eat, was not, after all,
such a very unflattering reception as I might have, on the whole,
expected. This, Sir, was how I put my foot on the lowest rung of
the ladder—but I took the lesson to heart.
To cut a long story short, I gladly accepted the following day an
engagement to play Joko the Monkey, a small comic part in The
Cannibals of the Pacific. This was not King Lear—but in ten
years I was cast for Banquo by mistake, and got my chance. Since
then I have risen step by step—I need not weary you with giving
them in detail—to my present proud position. No, Sir—believe me
there is no taking Shakspeare at a leap! He has to be approached
humbly and patiently, and even then, as I can vouch for, is not
always essayed with success!
I enclose my card, and beg to subscribe myself,—
Tour old and faithful admirer,
A Romeo oe Eighty.