Arthur O'Leary Part 54

"It was to see the play then, Monsieur came?" said the Director, inquiringly, for alas! my explanation had been none of the clearest.

"Yes," said I, "for the play--but----" Before I could finish the sentence, he flung himself into my arms, and cried out with enthusiasm, "Du bist mein Vater's Sohn!"

This piece of family information, was unquestionably new to me, but I disengaged myself from my brother's arms, curious to know the meaning of such enthusiasm.

"And so you came to see the play?" cried he, in a transport, while he threw himself into a stage att.i.tude of great effect.

"Yes." said I, "to see the 'Junker,' and 'Krahwinkel.'"

"Ach Grott! that was fine, that was n.o.ble!"

Now, how any man's enterprising a five-franc piece or two gulden-muntze, could, deserve such epithets, would have puzzled me at another moment; but as the dramatist said, I wasn't going to "mind squibs after sitting over a barrel of gunpowder," and I didn't pay the least attention to it.

"Give me your hand!" cried he, in a rapture, "and let me call you friend."

The Director's mad as a March hare! thought I, and I wished myself well out of the whole adventure.

"But as there's no play," said I, "another night will do as well, I shall remain here for a week to come, perhaps longer----"

But while I went on expressing the great probability of my pa.s.sing a winter in Erfurt, he never paid the least attention to my observations, but seemed sunk in meditation, occasionally dropping in a stray phrase, as thus--"Die Wurtzel is sick, that is, she is at the music garden with the officers; then, Blum is drunk by this; der Ettenbaum couldn't sing a note after his supper of schenkin. But then there's Grundenwald, and Catinka, to be sure, and Alte Kreps--we'll do it, we'll do it! Come along, mien aller Liebster, and choose the best 'loge du premier,' take two, three, if you like it--you shall see a play."

"What do you mean? you are surely not going to open the house for _me!_"

"An't I though! you shall soon see--it's the only audience I ever had in Erfurt, and I'm not going to lose it. Know, most worthy friend,"

continued he with a most melodramatic tone and gesture, "that to-night is the twelfth time I have given out an announcement of a play, and yet never was able to attract--I will not say an audience--but not a row--not a 'loge'--not even a 'stalle' in the balcon. I opened, why do I say I opened? I advertised, the first night, Schiller's Maria Stuart, you know the Maria--well, such a Madchen as we have for the part! such tenderness--such music in her voice--such grace and majesty in every movement; you shall see for yourself, Catinka is here. Then I gave out 'Nathan der Weise,' then the 'Goetz,' then 'l.u.s.t und Liebe,'--why do I go on? in a word I went through all our dramatic authors from Schiller, Gothe, Leasing, Werner, Grillparzer, down to Kotzebue, whose two pieces I advertised for this evening--"

"But--pardon my interruption--did you always keep the doors closed, as I found them?"

"Not at first," responded he, solemnly; "the doors were open, and a system of telegraphs established between the bureau for payment and the orchestra, by which the footlights were to be illuminated on the arrival of the first visiter; but the ba.s.soon and the drum, the clarinette and the oboe, stood like cannoneers, match in hand, from half-past six till eight, and never came the word 'fire!' but here we are."

With these words he produced from his pocket a ma.s.sive key, with which he unlocked the door, and led me forward by the arm into a dark pa.s.sage, followed by our coatless friend, whom he addressed as "Herr Stauf,"

desiring him to come in also. While the Herr Director was waiting for a light, which the Vrau seemed in no hurry to bring, he continued his recital. "When I perceived matters were thus, I vowed two vows, solemnly, and before the whole corps, ballet, chorus, and all; first, that I would give twelve representations--I mean announcements of representation--from twelve separate dramatists, before I left Erfurt; and, secondly, that for a single spectator, I would open the house, and have a play acted. One part of my oath is already accomplished; your appearance calls on me for the other. This over, I shall leave Erfurt for ever; and if," continued he, "the fates ever discover me again within the walls of a fortified town--unless I be sent there in handcuffs, and with a peloton of dragoons--may I never cork my eyebrows while I live!"

This resolve, so perfectly in accordance with the meditations I had lately indulged in myself, gave me a higher opinion of the Herr Director's judgment, and I followed him with a more tranquil conscience than at first.

"There are four steps there--take care," cried he, "and feel along by the wall here; for though this place should be, and indeed is, by right, one blaze of lamps, I must now conduct you by this miserable candle."

And so, through many a narrow pa.s.sage, and narrower door, up-stairs and down, over benches, and under part.i.tions, we went, until at length we arrived upon the stage itself. The curtain was up, and before it, in yawning blackness, lay the audience part of the house--a gloomy and dreary cavern; the dark cells of the boxes, and the long, untenanted, benches of the "balcon," had an effect of melancholy desolation impossible to convey. Up above, the various skies and moon scenes hung, flapping to and fro with the cold wind, that came, Heaven knows whence, but with a piercing sharpness I never felt the equal of within doors; while the back of the stage was lost in a dim distance, where fragments of huts, and woods, mills, mountains, and rustic bridges, lay discordantly intermixed--the chaos of a stage world.

The Herr Director waved his dip candle to and fro, above his head, like a stage magician, invoking spirits and goblins d.a.m.ned; while he repeated, from one of Werner's pieces, some lines of an incantation.

"Gelobt sey Marie!" said the Herr Stauf, blessing himself devoutly; for he had looked upon the whole as an act of devotion.

"And now, friend," continued the Director, "wait here, at this fountain, and I will return in a few minutes." And so saying, he quitted the place, leaving Stauf and me in perfect darkness--a circ.u.mstance which I soon discovered was not a whit more gratifying to my friend than myself.

"This is a fearful place to be in the dark," quoth Stauf, edging close up to me; "you don't know, but I do, that this was the Augustine Convent formerly, and the monks were all murdered by the Elector Frederick, in--What was that?--Didn't you see something like a blue flame yonder?"

"Well, and what then; you know these people have a hundred contrivances for stage purposes----"

"Ach Gott! that's true; but I wish I was out again, in the Mohren Ga.s.se; I'm only a poor sausage maker, and one needn't be brave for my trade."

"Come, come, take courage; here comes the Herr Director;" and with that he entered with two candles in large gilt candlesticks.

"Now, friend," said he, "where will you sit? My advice is, the orchestra; take a place near the middle, behind the leader's bench, and you'll be out of the draught of wind. Stauf, do you hold the candles, and sit in the 'pupitre.' You'll excuse my lighting the foot lights, won't you?--well, what do you say to a great coat; you feel it cold--I see you do."

"If not too much trouble----"

"Not at all--don't speak of it;" and with that he slipped be-hind the flats, and returned in an instant with a huge fur mantle of mock sable.

"I wear that in 'Otto von Bohmen,'" said he proudly; "and it always produces an immense effect. It is in that same 'peltzer' I stab the king, in the fourth act; do you remember where he says, (it is at the chess table,)--'Check to the Queen;' then I reply, 'Zum Koenig, selbst.'

and run him through."

"Gott bewahr!" piously e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed Stauf, who seemed quite beyond all chance of distinguishing fiction from reality.

"You'll have to wait ten or twenty minutes, I fear," said the Director.

"Der Catinka can't be found, and Der Ungedroht has just washed his doublet, and can't appear till if s dry; but we'll give you the Krfihwinkel in good style. You shall be content; and now I must go dress too."

"He is a strange carl," said Stauf, as he sat up on a tall bench, like an office stool; "but I wish from my soul it was over!"

I can't say I did not partic.i.p.ate in the wish, notwithstanding a certain curiosity to have a peep at the rest of the company. I had seen, in my day, some droll exhibitions in the dramatic way; but this, certainly, if not the most amusing, was the very strangest of them all.

I remember at Corfu, where an Italian company came one winter, and gave a series of operas; amongst others, "II Turco in Italia." The strength of the corps did not, however, permit of their being equal to those armies of Turks and Italians, who occasionally figure "en scene;" and they were driven to ask a.s.sistance from the Commandant of the Garrison, who very readily lent them a company of; I believe, the eighty-eighth regiment.

The worthy Director had sad work to drill his troops; for unhappily he couldn't speak a word of English; and as they knew little or no Italian, he was reduced to signs and pantomime. When the piece, however, was going forward, and the two rival Armies should alternately attack and repulse each other, the luckless Director, unable to make them fight and rally, to the quick movement of the orchestra, was heard shouting out behind the scenes, in wild excitement, "Avanti Turki!--Avanti Christiani!--Ah, bravo Turki!--Maledetti Christiani!" which threw the whole audience into a perfect paroxysm of laughter.

Come then, thought I, who knows but this may be as good as Corfu. But lo! here he comes, and now the Director, dressed in the character of the "Herr Berg-Bau und Weg-Inspector" came to the front of the stage, and beginning thus, spoke, "Meine Herren und Damen--there are _no_ ladies,"

said he, stopping short, "but whose fault is that?--Meine Herren, it grieves me much, to be obliged on this occasion------Make a row there, why don't you?" said he, addressing me, "ran-tan-tan!--an apology is always interrupted by the audience; if it were not, one could never get through it."

I followed his directions by hammering on the bench with my cane, and he continued to explain that various ladies and gentlemen of the corps were seriously indisposed, and that, though the piece should go on, it must be with only three out of the seven characters; I renewed my marks of disapprobation here, which seemed to afford him great delight, and he withdrew bowing respectfully to every quarter of the house.

Kotzebue's Krahwinkel, as many of my readers know, needs not the additional absurdity of the circ.u.mstances, under which I saw it performed, to make it ludicrous and laughable. The Herr Director played to the life; and Catinka, a pretty, plump, fair-haired "fraulein," not however, exactly the idea of Maria Stuart, was admirable in her part.

Even Stauf himself was so carried away by his enthusiasm, that he laid down his candles to applaud, and for the extent of the audience, I venture to say, there never was a more enthusiastic one. Indeed to this fact the Director himself bore testimony, as he more than once, interrupted the scene to thank us for our marks of approval. On both sides, the complaisance was complete. Never did actors and audience work better together, for while _we_ admired, _they_ relished the praise with all the gusto of individual approbation, frequently stopping to a.s.sure us that we were right in our applause, that their best hits were exactly those we selected; and that a more judging public never existed. Stauf was carried away in his ecstasies, and between laughing and applauding, I was regularly worn out with my exertions.

Want of light--Stauf's candles swilled frightfully from neglect--compelled them to close the piece somewhat abruptly; and in the middle of the second act, such was the obscurity, that the Herr Berg-Bau und Weg-Inspector's wife, fell over the prompter's bulk, and nearly capsized Stauf into the bowels of the big fiddle. This was the finale, and I had barely time to invite the corps to a supper at the Fox, which they kindly accepted, when Stauf announced that we must beat a retreat by "inch of candle." This we did in safety, and I reached the Fox in time to order the repast, before the guests had washed off their paint, and changed their dresses.

If it has been my fortune to a.s.sist at more elegant "re-unions," I can aver with safety I never presided over a more merry or joyous party, than was our own at the Fox. Die Catinka sat on my left, Die Vrau von "Mohren-Kopf," the "Mere n.o.ble" of the corps, on my right, the Herr Director took the foot of the table, supported by a "ba.s.soon" and a "first lover," while various "trombones," "marquis," waiting maids, walking gentlemen, and a "ghost," occupied the s.p.a.ce at either side, not forgetting our excellent friend Stauf, who seemed the very happiest man of the party. We were fourteen souls in all, though where two-thirds of them came from, and how they got wind of a supper, some more astute diviner than myself must ascertain.

Theatrical folks, in all countries, are as much people in themselves as the Gypsies. They have a language of their own, a peculiarity of costume and a habit of life. They eat, drink, and intermarry with each other; and, in fact, I shouldn't wonder, from their organization, if they have a king in some sly corner of Europe, who, one day will be restored, with great pomp and ceremony. One undeniable trait distinguishes them all--at least wherever I have met them in the old world and in the new--and that is, a most unbounded candour in their estimation of each other.

Frankness is unquestionably the badge, of all their tribe; and they are, without exception, the most free of hypocrisy, in this respect, of all the cla.s.ses with whom it has ever been my fortune to forgather. Nothing is too sharp, nothing too smart to be said; no thrust too home, no stab too fatal; it's a melee tournament, where all tilt, and hard, knocks are fair. This privilege of their social world, gives them a great air of freedom in all their intercourse with strangers, and sometimes leads even to an excess of ease, somewhat remarkable, in their manners. With them, intimacy is like those tropical trees that spring up, twenty feet high in a single night. They meet you at rehearsal, and before the curtain rises in the evening, there is a sworn friendship between you.

Stage manners, and green-room talk, carry off the eccentricities which other men dare not practise, and though you don't fancy "Mr. Tuft"

asking you for a loan of five pounds, hang it! you can't be angry with Jeremy Diddler! This double ident.i.ty, this Ja.n.u.s attribute, cuts in two ways, and you find it almost impossible to place any weight on the opinions and sentiments of people, who are always professing opinions and sentiments, learned by heart. This may be--I'm sure it is,--very illiberal--but I can't help it. I wouldn't let myself be moved by the arguments of Brutus on the Corn Laws, or Cato on the Catholic question, any more than I should fall in love with some sweet sentiment of a day-light Ophelia or Desdemona. I reserve all my faith in stage people, for the hours between seven and twelve at night; then, with footlights and scenery, pasteboard banquets, and wooden waves, I'm their slave, they may do with me as they will, but let day come, and "I'm a man again!"

Now as all this sounds very cross-grained, the sapient reader already suspects there may be more in it than it appears to imply, and that Arthur O'Leary has some grudge against the Thespians, which he wishes to pay off in generalities. I'm not bound to answer the insinuation; neither will I tell you more of our supper at the Fox, nor why the Herr Director Klug invited me to take a place in his wagon next day, for Weimar, nor what Catinka whispered, as I filled her gla.s.s with Champagne, nor how the "serpent" frowned from the end of the table; nor, in short, one word of the whole matter, save that I settled my bill that same night, at the Kaiser, and the next morning, left for Weimar, with a very large, and an excessively merry party.

NOTE.

Should the Reader feel--as in reason he may--some chagrin at the abrupt conclusion of this volume, I have only to beg the same indulgence, which I set out by asking, for a memoir so broken and fragmentary. If any curiosity should be found to exist regarding Mr. O'Leary's future wanderings, or any desire to learn further of his opinions on men, women and their children, the kind Public has only, like "Oliver," to "ask for more," and the wish, unlike his, shall be complied with.

Ed.