HUMOUR OF DRUDGERY.

Dominion, Volume 1, Issue 58, 2 December 1907, Page 9

HUMOUR OF DRUDGERY.

;■ Most people-are intensely annoyed and-not a little Inirt wheh one presumes to present them to themselves as others see them. Hut not so the 1500 gallant, charwomen of London who were invited by-ars. Madge-Carr Cook to a special matinee of ".Mrs., Wirgs of. the Cabbage Patch",, at the Adelplii Theatre. Oil the eontrar.v, these poor, care-worn, toiling women , were deligiued. Perhaps it was a relief to them to discover that there was actually a comic side to what for many tragic years they had regarded-as'a hopeless round of drudgery. ■ Jt'or- over, three hours they submitted cheerfully to the'ordeal of seeing themselves as Others see them. They ..looked, on goouhumoureiliy while their tragedies "and. their squalor were held out daintily and artistically to them by Mrs. Carr Cook on the stage, \ They'were gallant and brave enough to laugh at' thenise.lves, their own absurdities, their own 'crudities,.and tlieir own manners. They 'were courageous .enough to enjoy being shown a sjd.ij of themselves which tliey, iiau .never seen before...'..' .The shock.of. being shown that they were "funny,"' thai; . they were quaint-; and absurd enough'.to amuse some hundreds'-of people.a. night;/only, made them .laugh tin: more heartily.. They revelled in their own, failings, their own untidiness, their own poverty. The women knew also that the Mrs. Wir'gs ol the stage was a dainty, cultured lady, witn smooth hands which had known no" work. They knaw that'her wrinkles were of paint, and that directly she left the stage she would change her patched charwoman's clothes lor some delicate dress in the.latest fashion, and would drive oil" somewhere in a motor-car. And yet, despite that,' and despite also the kiidwledge 't-hal their wrinkles were real iiiicl that their'iiaiids were bruised anil rough', these Mrs;. 'AViggscs of liethnal Green aliii Sh'oreditcb 1 laughed long and loudly." ". Tliey wero : 'grateful to this cultured iaiiy for showing 'thenV how "funny" they 'wore.'" It.-,would b'e"difficult to say which whs tile' liner performance—that of the audience or tli.it on the stage.