PERSONAL ANECDOTES.

Daily Telegraph (Napier), Issue 3055, 11 April 1881, Page 3

PERSONAL ANECDOTES.

By J. L. Toole,

It was a pleasant little country town, and they had just lighted the lamps, where I was .announced to play f oi' orie night. The carriages were setting down afc tho front door of the Assembly Rooms, and crowds had besieged the side one. I could discover no other entrance, so returned to the front and tried to pass the portals, when I witnessed a little comedy in which I was at once engaged for my own edification. " Can't yon let me in ?" I asked a hot and excited country policeman who had been posted at the principal entrance. " Yellow tickets this way," was the policeman's constant cry. " Have you got a yellow ticket ?" he asks. "No, I've not, but I must go in, I can't come to-morrow night." " Tomorrow night!" says the policeman with disdain, " ifc wouldn't be no good if you could, he won't be here to-morrow night." "Whom?" I asked. "Why this here Toole." " Oh, he won't, won't he ? Well, then, I really must go in." "Ifc ainfc no use a shoving, you can't go in without a yellow ticket," adding for the benefit of the crowd in a louder key, " Yellow tickets this way !" I looked at my watch and returned to the attack. " I say, look here, I don't mind telling you, but you know this hero Toolo can't act unless I'm hero." " Oh, go on, now, don't you keep a bothering me. Yellow tickets this way." "But I must keep a bothering you ; I'm his barber, and I curl his hair." "You curls his hair! How am Ito know that ?" " Well, if you'll come outside I'll show you the scissors." " Come outside! how can I come outsideP" "Well, you can come outsi&e without a yellow ticket. Don't want a yellow ticket to come outside, do you ?" said I. "Now look hero, Mister, you must stand aside. Yellow tickets this way." " I don't want a yellow ticket to stand aside, then, do I?" " No," said the policeman ; " and you don't want a yellow ticket to come outside, and yet you want a yellow ticket to go inside. Now how do you reconcile that to your conscience ? I can't make ifc out." _ The policeman looked at me with a bewildered air, inclined to get angry, and shouts aloud once more, "Yellow tickets this way," just as a peal of laughter came down the room denoting the first piece is nearly finished. I looked anxiously at my watch, and was just rescued from what might have been an awkward dilemma by the appearance of Mr George Lovoday, my Manager, who at once preceded me with a yellow ticket. The clay previously I had said " goodbye" to my friend Sothern on his journey to America, which reminds me of an anecdote in which this prince of practical jokers occupies a central interest. He played a clever trick off on me once, but the opportunity for retaliation came quicker than he imagined j it was in a well-known chophouse in the City, where a friend and myself had imdertaken to meet Sothern on a little matter of business which was to be consummated over luncheon. Sothern was late. My friend and myself were both attracted as we entered by a very cantanker-ous-looking old gentleman, who was not eating a chop but devouring it in a fierce manner. It was very wrong, I suppose, but on the impulse of the moment I stepped up to him at a critical moment of his luncheon, slapped him familiarly on the shoulder, and said, " Hallo, George, my dear fellow, how are you ?" The old gentleman leaped from his seat very indignantly, dropped his knife and fork, and asked what I meant, how I dared to salute him in that way ? I apologised in the most graceful manner possible ; said he reminded me of an old friend; hoped he would not think anything of ifc ; it's quite a mistake ; and in due time overcame his evident desire to strangle me. We adjourned to another part of the room, when Sothern that moment came in. I nudged my friend, feeling that my pleasant opportunity of revenge had arrived. You all know Sothern's intense love of fun, his great animal spirits, and his general anxiety for excitement. " Odd-looking fellow that, yonder," I said to him. The grim old gentleman had just commenced his second chop. " I've a good mind to step over, slap him on the shoulder, call bim George, and say it's years since I've seen him, he's such an odd-looking fellow." " I'll do ifc," said Sothern. " No," I rejoined, "perhaps he'd know you." " Not at all; he'd never know me," answers Sothern ; " what a sfcrangelooking old boy ifc is." "I clon'fc think yo\i had befcter do ifc," I said ; bufc nothing would restrain Sothern when once an idea had taken possession of him. Walking quietly to the other end of the room, just as the old gentleman was conveying a dainty morsel to his capacious mouth, Sothern saluted him with a hearty smack on the back and an exclamation of " Hallo, George ! Why ifc must be years since I've seen you." The stranger could scarcely speak for passion. " How dare you, you ruffian," he exclaimed, whereupon Sothern in his plcasantest manner began to make his excuses. " Don't tell me, Sir ; you did it on purpose, I know ifc. I've had my chop here for twenty years, and such a thing never occurred before. Landlord, waiter, what is the meaning of this ? I will not put up with it; this is the second time I've been assaulted and called ' George' in this very room within ten minutes." Ifc suddenly occurred to me it would he as well to take our luncheon in some other restaurant, and as we left we were presently joined by Sothern, and I am bound to do him the justice to say that although a little chagrined he shook his head and cried "Quits!" as calmly as could be expected under the circumstances, and I hope that is the greatest liberty I ever took with a stranger in my life. I made an opportunity to find out that old gentleman on a subsequent occasion, and over a glass of a particular vintage of port wine which he always favoured at the house in question, I made my peace with him, and laid the foundation of an agreeable acquaintanceship. Some years ago, when I was playing in Dearer Than Life with Irving and Billington, after the play several gentlemen were in the general room of the hotel where wo were staying, and among thorn aMr Jones, who professed to have a long acquaintance in the profession, and who appeared to havo a local reputation as a judge of ages. " Well, how old," said some one, "would you take Mr Toole to be ?" " Well," said he, " sixty-five if he's a day." "Do yon know him ?" I asked. " Oh, yes, very well indeed." " All! and how old should you take me to be ?" " Well, I should take you to be forty if you're a day." Irving asked Mr Jones if he didn't think Mr Toole was nearer seventy-five than sixty-five. " No," he said, " sixty-five if he's a day," and the company present seemed to put ifc down that that would be my age. They had most of them been to the theatre, and seen me for the first time probably playing an old man, and as it was my first visit to tho town, and we were going on by the mail I train that night, I had a fancy not to go i away and leave them under the impression that I was this very old gentleman.

I found that Jones was a decent sort of fellow, and I said aside to Irving that before I went I should just give him my-card, and let him know what a mistake ho had made. By-and-by, when our cab arrived, we said good-night to our casual acquaintances, and taking Mr Jones aside I handed him my card, whereupon he said, " Oh, indeed," and placing the tip of the thumb of his right hand to the tip of his nose, turned upon his heel and walked away.

"Well," I said to my friends as we drove away, "that's the most impertinent fellow I think I ever mot," whereupon Irving and Billington went into fits of laughter, and presently confessed that they had warned Mr Jones I was continually passing myself off as Mr Toole, and that he was to bo quite prepared for my handing him a card and continuing the imposition with him.—Era Almanack.