LITERATURE.

Globe, Volume XXII, Issue 2084, 28 October 1880, Page 3

LITERATURE.

THE STRANGE LOVE OF A 11 STAR ” ACTBES3. [Abridged from the “ Theatre.”] ( Concluded.') Utterly bewildered, I rushed to my dressing roam just aa the curtain rose. What was my surprise then, not five minutes later, to hear the band strike np another overture. I sent my dresser to inquire the cause, hut she o: uld only ascertain that there was a regular tumult among the audience ; that they were yelling for the manager, and would not allow ‘The Loves of a Lamplighter” to proceed. Heceivinp no intimation to the contrary, I went on dressing as the Verenose Maiden. I was nearly ready, when the “ drat low ” knocked at my door, and begged me not to miss the fun, adding that the “ guv’nor ” was before the curtain. I found the whole strength of the company on the stsge, and every one with a broad grin upon his countenance ; for some minutes the turmoil in front was deafening ; a thousand voices seemed to be screaming out contradictory orders at once ; at last Mr Rowe, after several vain efforts to speak, made a feint of retiring with all his immense supply of injured dignity displayed ; this acted like a charm, and, waving himself back to the middle of the stsge and into his George thaFourthern attitude, as I could see by his shadow on the curtain, he thus begun ;

* Ladies and gentlemen ’ (‘ and dummies,’ shouted a voice) —‘ Ladies and gentlemen,’ he resumed, imperturbably, ‘ if I am again interrupted I shall retire.’ He said this as if he considered it the most terrible threat that man could use. ‘ That you should bo angry with me I cannot believe ; that what I have done requires explanation, I am willing to admit—[cheers]—the first thing I have to say is, that the high-minded and distinguished lady who is at present honouring ns with a visit—l allude to Miss Aster—is in nowise the cause of your excitement — [cheers] —nay, more, I have taken pains to keep her in absolute ignorance of—of the step which I am about to attempt to justify in your eyes ; what I have done, ladies and gentlemen, was as much—nay, more —for your sakea than my own— (a boy in the gallery : ‘ Catch a weasel ’) —I wanted, for all our cakes, lhat the great talent of a highly-endowed tragedienne should not be wasted on her first visit to oar town from the appalling apathy which at this season of the year is so apt to take possession even of the appreciative and intelligent, with regard to visiting the temple of onr glorious drama—(faint applause)—l hold that, as manager, it was not wholly unjustifiable if—if—if I extended the legitimate delusions of the stage for a few yards beyond the footlights ; having made up my mind, and acting upon that maxim of mine which has so often obtained favor in your eyes, that ‘ what is worth doing is worth doing well’—(a wag from the pit! ‘You’ve done us well!’)—I procured from London these triumphs of the art of waxwork.’ (Here the nptoar burst forth again with the force and suddenness of thunder, and lasted for more than a minute). ‘ 1 did so, ladies and gentlemen, to dispel that gloom which empty boxes mast needs impart alike to audience and performers ; so dexterously was the mirror held np to nature that I doubt if the artifice would have been discovered, bnt that last night, ladies and gentlemen, last night, an nnforseen accident occurred, and the praternaturally stoical behaviour of —of my statuesque friends from London betrayed their want of feeling, although, no doubt, they had never been so nearly ‘‘melting” in the whole course of their existence.’ Here Mr Betterton Rowe ventured on a laugh at his own wit, which he hoped might cajole his hearers into a good hnmor; but they had come out for a row, or at any rate for a scene, and were not going to be baulked of their fun ; so that when the speaker went on to express a hope that they would soon listen to ‘‘the immortal bard’s snblime tragedy,” the turmoil and confusion burst forth with even renewed vigor. At last he managed to say that if they would elect a spokesman, and state what the majority required him to do, he would, if possible, carry out their wishes. Poor man ! His chief dread was that they would manufacture a plea for demanding back their money, and he knew there was at least a hundreid and fifty pounds in the house.

After much rough and noisy squabbling it was at last amicably arranged that the offending graven images shonid be handed over to the audience, and that after being passed with ignominy from hand to hand through the other parts of the house, they should be given over to the fury of the ‘gods,’to receive such condign punishment as those divinities should deem fit to inflict.

The scene shifters forthwith invaded the boxes, and proceeded to carry out the sentence of vox populi. I was looking through the hole In the curtain, and when it came to the turn of my * Lara ’ 1 felt how bitter a thing is a shattered dream.

The wax works were demolished to that degree that I believe there were few out of the many hundreds present but obtained some fragments as a relic. After half an hour given up to this childish havoc, ‘Borneo and Juliet’ was suffered to begin, and I have seldom played to a better, warmer, or more orderly set of spectators. Business from that night continued brisk till the end of my stay. The waxworks had given all the theatregoers of Flushington a wholesome fillip, and I return there regularly once a year to reap quite a little golden harvest from their patronage.