LITERATURE.

Globe, Volume XXII, Issue 1899, 25 March 1880, Page 3

LITERATURE.

A CHARADE AND ITS CONSEQUENCES. [Abridged from the Christmas Number of “Belgravia.”] The Small End of the Wedge. Proverbs, like people, are sometimes so familiar that they only excite contempt. There is one connected with ‘ the small end of the wedge’ which, from its ‘constant appearance upon platforms in connection with the British lion,’ used to form a subject of mirth with dear Charles Dickens, and I confess (until lately) with me also. I had heard of it so many times, always spoken of in tones of warning, and yet seen no sort of harm result from its application, that I did not believe it, even as a metaphor. It had become a mere vague and shadowy menace, like ‘the beast’ in Revelations, only, of course, smaller. Therefore, when a certain loving daughter of mine whispered to me after dinner one evening, ‘Papa, let us have charades,’ and my brother the lawyer, who overheard her, remarked, ‘Take care what yon are about, Jim ; charades are the small end of the wedge,’ I said, ‘ Well, we’ll see about it, darling,’ to the one, and ‘ Why not, Jack ?’ to the other.

‘Well, I’ll tell you “why not,’” said Jack, who didn’t look like a Jack at all—only wo had always called each other by our boyish names—being bald and fat, and also recorder of Maryboro’, ‘ and if you are wise you’ll In ten to my advice. Charades are not bad in themselves, except for their stupidity, but if by some unlucky accident they chance to succeed, they are as certain as D.T. is the end of drinking to be followed by private theatricals.’

‘Oh, nothing would induce me,’ said I with confidence, ‘ to have my house turned upside down by the performance of private theatricals ’ ‘ That girl there, Jenny, will induce you,’ was Jack’s oracular reply, delivered in the severe tone with which he addressed prisoners in the dock; ‘once convicted of weakness in allowing them to act charades, you will be hurried by your wife and daughters into the vortex of the amateur drama, and ’ Here Jack’s mouth was stopped by a pink plump hand, about an inch long, which belonged to our baby, and had been dexterously applied to the offending mouth by his favorite sister Grace. She had picked him up and cast him into his uncle’s lap—who dosed on the child—with the quickness of a fireman who sees at once the point where a conflagration is making head, and turns the hose on. In ‘Baba’s’ clutch uncle John, who was also his godfather, was powerless ; his judicial lips could then only kiss and purr. • But what are these charades ?’ inquired I, more alarmed than I oared to show at the loss of my ally ; for Jack, though not himself a paterfamilias, had a fellow-feeling for me, I knew ; ‘ I thought charades were the same as riddles. Of course you may ask as many ridd’es ’ ‘ Oh, you wicked story,’ cried Jenny. ‘ Oh, Mr Innocence,’ cried Grace. It was hopeless to stem the tide of juvenile Sadduceeism, and the more so as I felt convicted of being a Pharisee myself, for I knew perfectly well what charades were. In this strait I looked towards my wife for help, with, ‘ What do you think, Julia ?' Julia was working at some embroidery, from which she had never raised her eyes, and she only raised them now to say, ‘ The girls seem to have set their hearts upon it, Jim; but of course you will do as you please, ’ which was equivalent to going over to the enemy When a wife tells her husband that of ‘course he will do as ha pleases.’ he is, if I may use the expression, ‘ done for.’ There is no compulsion, only he must. It was not necessary for Jack to laugh contemptuously (which he did), and to inform me that the affair was settled from that moment as to the charades.

* You see, Grace, being tall and stately,’ explained Jenny, ‘ is to be Thaleatris, Queen of the Amazons; and I, being a good deal shorter, though much more beautiful and accomplished, am to be her daughter Lampeto. Cousin Tom has written the loveliest verses for ns to recite in character ; and Baba is to appear with gilt all round her frock as the grandchild of Alexander. My dear old papa knows the story, of course.’ ‘Oh, yes,’ said I coldly, for it was the first time I had ever heard of it; ‘but I hope Baba will not have much to say, because his vocabulary Is rather limited.’ « What nonsense you talk, papa. Ho is to be my baby, of course, and Thaleatris wants to kill him, because he is not a girl, such being the custom among the Amazons ’ ‘And a very good notion too,’observed Jack, judicially; ‘if wo had only one criminal class, or at least sex, even though that were the most troublesome one, to deal with in this country, it would immensely simplify matters.’ •There, you see,’ cried Jenny triumphantly (chough not understanding him in the least), ‘uncle John is already converted to our opinion. He Bees that it will be an excellent charade.’

< Nay, my dear, I only said it would have a g'od moral, ’ observed the recorder grav< ly ‘ The monl is everything,’ said Grace confidently ; ‘ that is if we can hire the proper dresses. Mamma thinks that for five pounds ’ Julia shook her head. ‘ Well, then, for six pounds ’ ‘ I never said one word about the matter, Grace, as yru know very well,’ said my wife reprovingly ; ‘I simply referred you to your father. ’ ‘ Well then, let us say six pounds, papa. ’1 hat will procure the armour ’ * Armour ! ’ cried I; ‘ you’re not going to appear i . armour, surely 1 ’ ‘ Oh, yes, and on horseback, ’ put in uncle John ; ’yon can hire trained horses from the h ppodromo,’ ‘ Don’t believe him, papa. We wish for nothing out of the way nor extravagant.

Just a little body armour, with silver sandals instead of shoes.’ ‘ Ihe well-greaved Grecians,’ observed the recorder, who prided himself on his classical attainments, ‘ Jnst so,’ continued Grace, whose way it is to take not only silence for consent to any of her propositions, but also all remarks not absolutely of an antagonistic character ; * and Tom will lend ns his bow and arrows.’ ‘ No, no. Yon will be shooting all over the place,' said I. I had begun to perceive, by my wife being so quiet, that the suggestion was insidious, and the whole affair of quite a serious character. * But, my dear papa, the bows will only bo strung at our backs, and the arrows will be in their quivers ; and yon said yon would “see about it,” yon know, and you never go back from yonr word.’

And that was how the charades came abont, as many other things do in the house r-f which I am the reputed master, where to hesitate is to be compromised, and to “see abont it ” is a binding promise. The girls assured me that the “proper dresses” had been procured from Nathan’s (the costumier) j so, although I confess that they did not altogether come up to —or rather down to—my ideas of propriety, I suppose It was so. The spectators, too, were fortunately confined to a select circle of relations or familiar friends ; and really the way in which Grace stood, spear in hand, as Queen of the Amazons, and denonnced the degeneracy of her daughter because she wouldn’t drown Baba like a kitten, made one qnite a convert of Infanticide With the trifling exception of the child himself, who resented his own assassination beyond measure, the performance was a complete success, and my nephew Tom, who wrote the charade, came in for his full share of congratulations. He had evidently, it was agreed, a talent for domestic drama, and some one suggested aloud that it was qnite a pity he didn’t write for the stage. Tom looked at Jack, expecting an outburst of disapprobation; but his uncle only .nodded and said he could see no harm in that, so long as nothing he wrote was accepted. “I have known a young man to write for the stage for years," were his words, “and not be a penny the worse for itwhich I very well knew was a sly hit at me, who had had a few plays in manuscript for an indefinite period, though the fact was only known to some friends of my early days, and -I should have been very sorry (from a professional point of view) had it got abroad. There was a good deal of talk about the charade both then and afterwards; but it had been played at Ghristmas-time, when diversions of all kinds abound, and it was taken by onr friends very much ns a matter of course. “Months rolled on,” as the story-tellers say, and I flattered myself that the excitement created by Thalestris and Lampeto (not to mention Baba) had died ont; that the girls, thongh proud of the success that had attended their first dramatic effort a year ago, wore content to rest upon their laurels ; and that I should hear no more on the subject, at all events in connection with the small end of the wedge. I confess I had taken some measures for self-defence by earnestly observing that, after what I had seen of the fuss and trouble earned by the getters up of a mere charade, it seemed to me that people must go mad before they allowed their back drawing-rooms to bo turned into a stage, and that, while I had not mnch to say against the Amazonian affair, I thought the less young ladies exhibited themselves in other characters than their own before spectators, the more highly men of sense—and means—would he likely to regard them; bnt these precautions seemed to be unnecessary. I was at ease and unsuspecting as Adam In the garden—indeed, I was reading the evening paper after dinner—when Eve appeared one evening. In the person of my Julia, and caused my fall. I My dear husband,’ said she, * I have come upon quite a treasure and with that she handed me, not an apple, bnt a little rolled-np manuscript, dim with the rnst of ages, which I presently recognised as one of my almort forgotten plays. It was called ‘ The Deputy,” and I must confess it was a very pretty little thing, and would have been worth a good many crowns to a discerning manager, (To be continued.')