Punch (95.1888)

184

PUNCH, OR THE LONDON CHARIVARI. [October 20, 1888.

OUB BOOKING-OFFICE.

At a time -when more or less nonsense is talked and written about
the status of tie Actor,—recently rather Moore than less,—Mr. Fitz-
gerald Molloy's Life and Adventures
of Edmund Kean will interest a large
number of readers on and off the stage.
I should be inclined to say that Edmund
Kean was the greatest histrionic genius
the English Stage ever saw, not except-
ing David Garrick. There seems to
have been no single department of his
art in which he did not excel. He had
a strong sense of humour (in which
the Kembles were deficient), he could
execute acrobatic feats, was an excellent S
mimic, could play pantomime, could -pu
burlesque tragedy, could sing, play, ,3Cv,.
dance, fence, excite laughter, inspire
terror, draw tears, and extort enthusi-
astic applause from most unsympathetic
and occasionally antagonistic audiences.
He conquered all along the line. As for
"social status," he could have been
whatever he liked to be, a peer among
peers, had that been his desire ; but he
was what he chose to be, and what at last he despised himself for
being.

"Social Status," forsooth! What is "Status"? The answer
will be found in Whitaker's Almanack, where you will learn the
status of everybody, from the highest rank down to a cab-rank.
" 'Tis in ourselves that we are thus and thus." Conventionality is
the sworn foe of genius. Real genius cannot rest satisfied with
humdrum middle-class respectability. Poor Kean ! A staunch
loyal friend, a wilful man of generous impulses, lavish with boon
companions, but mean where love and_ duty demanded generosity,
the self-indulgent victim of a designing woman and her highly
respectable husband, pelted, hooted, broken by disease and intem-
perance,—what a finish to a brilliant career!

Mr. Fitzgerald Molloy is an impartial biographer, neither use-
lessly blaming, nor needlessly moralising, but writing with charit-
able sympathy for the human errors of the man, and with honest
scorn for the Pecksniffian Pharisee, who cannot understand genius,
and is quite as unable to imagine, as he is unwilling to make allow-
ances for, the dangers which beset the path of any public favourite,
especially that of an extraordinary histrionic genius. "Alas, poor
King of shreds and patches ! " Baron de Book Worms.

DUE NORTH.

Excursion to a Waterfall—The Wicked Uncle's Strange Story.

Next Mvrning.—Rain, and occasionally half-hours with the best
sunshine. Good Aunt and young ladies have driven off to pay a few
neighbourly oalls within a "radius of fifteen miles or so, do a little
shopping,—no matter how bare the village, where there are ladies
there is always shopping—and lunch out. Wicked Uncle feeling a
bit rheumatic, says that as I am not accompanying the shooters, he
will show me a beautiful Waterfall, not a very great distance off. It
is so damp and cold that I propose taking the least drop possible of
whiskey before we start. Wicked Uncle negatives the proposal with
prompt decision. I agree with him, and totally abstain. We start,
carrying macintoshes and umbrellas. From talking about sport we
get to scenery: from scenery to the extent of the Laird's property:
from this to a comparison with other big properties: and finally, by
a very easy and natural transition, we arrive at the vast estates of
which the Wicked Uncle would now be the proud possessor, as I
understand him, but for the machinations of the Machiavelli in
petticoats, whom I have heard "D. B." irreverently term "Mary
Queen of Squats." For this unfortunate sovereign the Wicked
Uncle cannot find epithets sufficiently insulting. Hitherto I have
imagined myself pretty well posted up in the history of this ill-used
lady, whom I have always championed as a victim, if not a martyr.
But the Wicked Uncle throws an entirely new side-light on Mary's
character. He speaks with the conviction of a contemporary who
had known her personally, and who had. suffered a great wrong at her
hands, which he is in a position to prove up to the hilt. It is curious
too, that in his narrative he brings in scarcely one well-known his-
torical name. I listen with momentarily increasing interest to the
commencement of his story when the Wicked Uncle suddenly stops
near a small inn, and observes that he is not quite sure if there isn't
a shorter cut to the Waterfall than the road we are taking. He will
'' inquire within." We enter. _

"Mornin'," he says, addressing a very youthful bar-maiden, who
smilinglv returns, ,fGood morning, Mr. Fraser," and immediately

pours out a small measure of whiskey, empties it into a tumbler, and
pushes the water towards the Wicked Uncle. "Will you?" he
asks, hesitatingly. It is my turn to decline with thanks. He drinks
it oft, observes that this will make him feel a little less chilly, and
adds that he was wrong to have refused it at starting. Then as he
is leaving I remind him that he hasn't asked the shortest way to the
Waterfall.

" Oh," he replies, " I think I remember it."

And as we resume our walk, I ask him to go on with his narrative,
in which I am already deeply interested, not so much on his behalf,
as for the sake of the good name and reputation of Mary Queen of
Squats.

"My ancestor," the Wicked Uncle recommences in a gloomily-con-
fidential manner, his countenance flushing slightly with the air and
exercise; "my ancestor was Sir Werdie Fraser, of Kantork, the
Master of the Sentences in the Scotch Chancellene, you know—he
was the Fraser, you may remember, who threw himself across the
doormat, and declared that if they wanted to get at the Queen, it
must be over his body—you recollect, of course-"

I have a vague recollection of some incident of this sort, and so
reply, " Yes, yes," and he continues, " Well, he was the descendant
of Werdie of the Whirlpool."

" Why Whirlpool ? " I ask.

"Because," answers the Wicked Uncle, somewhat testily, as if
annoyed at my ignorance, '' he lived in a castle where no one could
get at him without crossing a whirlpool"—(I am satisfied)—" and he
refused to pay the Queen a road collop."

I do not like to irritate him by inquiring what a '1 road collop " may
be, and so nod my head as a sign of intelligent assent which seems to
relieve his mind of some considerable load as he quickens his step,
and proceeds with his narrative in a more cheerful tone.

" A road collop, to which she was no more entitled than you are.
So from that minute she hated him. Mary never forgave, you
know "—(I was not aware of this, but I think it safer not to dispute
the assertion)—" and she was determined to take it out of him some-
how ; and, by Jove, she did. And," he adds, bitterly, " our family
lost about a hundred thousand pounds by it."

"How?" I ask, stopping to put on my macintosh, as the rain is
beginning again.

How!" returns the Wicked Uncle, sarcastically; and then,
suddenly changing his tone, he says, " It's such a nuisance walking
in macintoshes. We'd better take shelter in here." _ And I follow
him up a narrow path to a small cottage, over which there is a
board with the intimation that Mrs. MUlean _ is licensed to sell
spirits. "Mornin', Ma'am," says the Uncle, politely.

"It's a wee bit moist," observes the dame, returning his saluta-
tion, and forthwith produces a whiskey-bottle, two glasses, and a
jug of water. I sip mine. The Uncle, complaining of rheumatism
in the left arm, which he can scarcely lift, he says, and which is
evidently quite different to the other, which he can lift easily, dis-
poses of his "wee drappit" at a draught; and, as I walk to the
window to watch the weather, I fancy he repeats the dose. The
rain ceases, and once more we are on our road.

" Are we near the Waterfall ? " I ask him.

" The Waterfowl ? " he asks; and for the moment he appears quite
oblivious of the main object of our walk. Then, as if suddenly
recalling it, he answers somewhat indistinctly, "Oh, yes,—we're
quite near now,—there's a short cut somewhere off this road."

"Good," I return, not feeling such perfect confidence in the
Wicked Uncle's topographical knowledge as I did at starting.
" And now, what had Mary Queen of Scots to do with your losing
the property ? "

He walks a little slower, and regards me fixedly, as if failing to
comprehend the exact bearing of my question. I repeat it, and
remind him at the same time at what point of his story he had
arrived.

" Ah!" he says, '' Yes! "—as if the whole narrative were once more
coming back to him more vividly than ever. Then he mutters vin-
dictively, " Mary was a bad 'un,—a regular right down bad 'un."

"But" I ask, being unwilling to contradict him until I have
heard what ground he has for the assertion, "what did she do to
Werdie of the Whirlpool P" . ,,.„.„.,

'' What! " he exclaims, hotly. '' She fascinated him. He fell in love
with her, deserted his wife and children, made over all his estates
to her. She gammoned him into a marriage. They were privately
married in Scoop Castle-" , .

"Oh, my dear fellow!" I cannot help protesting, "what proof
can there be of this ?" , ,

" Proof! " he exclaims, stopping still. "Proofs! We have the
documents in our family. There are whole roomfals of old papers.
When the wretched creature had got all she wanted out of him, she
was afraid of his betraying her, and so she had the poor devil stabbed
in several places at once, and when he was on his death-bed some old
abbot or monk wrote down the story as it came from the dymg man s
lips, when the whole truth came out."

" What became of the document? " I ask, intensely interested.