Part 1

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PUNCH LIBRARY OF HUMOUR

Edited by J. A. HAMMERTON

Designed to provide in a series of volumes, each complete in itself, the cream of our national humour, contributed by the masters of comic draughtsmanship and the leading wits of the age to "Punch," from its beginning in 1841 to the present day.

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MR. PUNCH AT THE PLAY

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MR. PUNCH AT THE PLAY

HUMOURS OF MUSIC AND THE DRAMA

_WITH 140 ILLUSTRATIONS_

BY CHARLES KEENE, PHIL MAY, GEORGE DU MAURIER, BERNARD PARTRIDGE, L. RAVEN-HILL, E. T. REED, F. H. TOWNSEND, C. E. BROCK, A. S. BOYD, TOM BROWNE, EVERARD HOPKINS AND OTHERS

PUBLISHED BY SPECIAL ARRANGEMENT WITH THE PROPRIETORS OF "PUNCH"

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THE EDUCATIONAL BOOK CO. LTD.

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THE PUNCH LIBRARY OF HUMOUR

_Twenty-five volumes, crown 8vo, 192 pages fully illustrated_

LIFE IN LONDON COUNTRY LIFE IN THE HIGHLANDS SCOTTISH HUMOUR IRISH HUMOUR COCKNEY HUMOUR IN SOCIETY AFTER DINNER STORIES IN BOHEMIA AT THE PLAY MR. PUNCH AT HOME ON THE CONTINONG RAILWAY BOOK AT THE SEASIDE MR. PUNCH AFLOAT IN THE HUNTING FIELD MR. PUNCH ON TOUR WITH ROD AND GUN MR. PUNCH AWHEEL BOOK OF SPORTS GOLF STORIES IN WIG AND GOWN ON THE WARPATH BOOK OF LOVE WITH THE CHILDREN

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BEFORE THE CURTAIN

Most of the PUNCH artists of note have used their pencils on the theatre; with theatricals public and private none has done more than Du Maurier. All have made merry over the extravagances of melodrama and "problem" plays; the vanity and the mistakes of actors, actresses and dramatists; and the blunderings of the average playgoer.

MR. PUNCH genially satirises the aristocratic amateurs who, some few years ago, made frantic rushes into the profession, and for a while enjoyed more kudos as actors than they had obtained as titled members of the upper circle, and the exaggerated social status that for the time accrued to the professional actor as a consequence of this invasion.

The things he has written about the stage, quite apart from all reviewing of plays, would more than fill a book of itself; and he has slyly and laughingly satirised players, playwrights and public with an equal impartiality.

He has got a deal of fun out of the French dramas and the affected pleasure taken in them by audiences that did not understand the language. He has got even more fun out of the dramatists whose "original plays" were largely translated from the French, and to whom Paris was, and to some extent is still, literally and figuratively "a playground."

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MR. PUNCH AT THE PLAY

SOMETHING FOR THE MONEY

(_From the Playgoers' Conversation Book. Coming Edition._)

I have only paid three guineas and a half for this stall, but it is certainly stuffed with the very best hair.

The people in the ten-and-sixpenny gallery seem fairly pleased with their dado.

I did not know the call-boy was at Eton.

The expenses of this house must be enormous, if they always play _Box and Cox_ with a rasher of real Canadian bacon.

How nice to know that the musicians, though out of sight under the stage, are in evening dress on velvet cushions!

Whoever is the author of this comedy, he has not written up with spirit to that delightful Louis the Fifteenth linen cupboard.

I cannot catch a word "Macbeth" is saying, but I can see at a glance that his kilt would be extremely cheap at seventy pounds.

I am not surprised to hear that the "Tartar's lips" for the cauldron alone add nightly something like fifty-five-and-sixpence to the expenses.

Do not bother me about the situation when I am looking at the quality of the velvet pile.

Since the introduction of the _live_ hedgehog into domestic drama obliged the management to raise the second-tier private boxes to forty guineas, the Duchess has gone into the slips with an order.

They had, perhaps, better take away the champagne-bottle and the diamond-studded whistle from the prompter.

Ha! here comes the chorus of villagers, provided with real silk pocket-handkerchiefs.

It is all this sort of thing that elevates the drama, and makes me so contented to part with a ten-pound note for an evening's amusement.

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THE HEIGHT OF LITERARY NECESSITY.--"Spouting" Shakspeare.

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WHEN are parsons bound in honour not to abuse theatres?

When they take orders.

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WHAT VOTE THE MANAGER OF A THEATRE ALWAYS HAS.--The "casting" vote.

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"STAND NOT ON THE ORDER OF YOUR GOING."--An amiable manager says the orders which he issues for the pit and gallery are what in his opinion constitute "the lower orders."

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GREAT THEATRICAL EFFECT.--During a performance of _Macbeth_ at the Haymarket, the thunder was so natural that it turned sour a pint of beer in the prompter's-box.

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TO ACTORS WHO ARE NOT WORTH A THOUGHT.--We notice that there is a book called "Acting and Thinking." This is to distinguish it, we imagine, from the generality of acting, in which there is mostly no thinking?

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A CRUSHER.--_Country Manager (to Mr. Agrippa Snap, the great London critic, who has come down to see the production of a piece on trial)._ And what do you think, sir, of our theatre and our players?

_Agrippa Snap (loftily)._ Well, frankly, Mr. Flatson, your green-room's better than your company.

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Theatrical managers are so often accused of being unable to break with tradition, that it seems only fair to point out that several of them have recently produced plays, in which the character of "Hamlet" does not appear at all.

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ON A DRAMATIC AUTHOR

"Yes, he's a plagiarist," from Tom this fell, "As to his social faults, sir, one excuses 'em; 'Cos he's good natured, takes a joke so well." "True," cries an author, "he takes mine and uses 'em."

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THE MANAGER'S COMPLAINT

She danced among the unfinished ways That merge into the Strand, A maid whom none could fail to praise, And very few withstand.

A sylph, accepted for the run, Not at a weekly wage; Fair as a star when only one Is shining on the stage.

She met a lord, and all men know How soon she'd done with me; Now she is in _Debrett_, oh, and, That's where they all would be!

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_Smart._ How do, Smooth? (_to theatrical manager, who frowns upon him_). What's the matter, eh?

_Smooth._ Matter? Hang it, Smart, you wrote me down in "The Stinger."

_Smart (repressing something Shakspearian about "writing down" which occurs to him, continues pleasantly)._ Wrote you down? No, I said the piece was a bad one, because I thought it was; a very bad one.

_Smooth._ Bad! (_Sarcastically._) You were the only man who said so.

_Smart (very pleasantly)._ My dear fellow, _I was the only man who saw it._ Good-bye.

[_Exeunt severally._

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MOTTO FOR A BOX-OFFICE KEEPER.--"So much for booking 'em."

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"A considerable demonstration of approval greeted the fall of the curtain." How are we to take this?

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DRAMATIC NOTES OF THE FUTURE

[A little cheild is the hero of _Everybody's Secret_; the curtain rises upon four little cheildren in _Her Own Way_; there are cheildren of various ages in _Alice-Sit-by-the-fire_.]

Mr. Barrie's new play, _The Admirable Creche_, will be presented to-morrow. We understand that there is a pretty scene in the third act in which several grown-ups are discovered smoking cigars. It may confidently be predicted that all the world will rush to the "Duke of York's" to see this novelty. _The Admirable Creche_ will be preceded at 8.30 by _Bassinette--A Plea for a Numerous Family_, a one-act play by Theodore Roosevelt and Louis N. Parker.

Little Baby Wilkins is making quite a name with her wonderful rendering of "Perdita" in the Haymarket version of _A Winter's Tale_. As soon as actor-manager Wilkins realised the necessity of cutting the last two acts (in which "Perdita" is grown up) the play was bound to succeed. By the way, Mr. E. H. Cooper's new book, "Perditas I have Known," is announced.

Frankly, we are disappointed in Mr. Pinero's new play, _Little Arthur_, produced at Wyndham's last week. It treated of the old old theme--the love of the hero for his nurse. To be quite plain, this stale triangle, mother--son--nurse, is beginning to bore us. Are there no other themes in every-day life which Mr. Pinero might take? Could he not, for instance, give us an analysis of the mind of a young genius torn between the necessity for teething and the desire to edit a great daily? Duty calls him both ways: his duty to himself and his duty to the public. Imagine a Wilkins in such a scene!

The popular editor of the "Nursery," whose unrivalled knowledge of children causes him to be referred to everywhere as our greatest playwright, is a little at sea in his latest play, _Rattles_. In the first act he rashly introduces (though by this time he should know his own limitations) two grown-ups at lunch--Mr. Jones the father, and Dr. Brown, who discuss Johnny's cough. Now we would point out to Mr. Crouper that men of their age would be unlikely to have milk for lunch; and that they would not say "Yeth, pleath"--unless of Hebraic origin, and Mr. Crouper does not say so anywhere. Mr. Crouper must try and see something of grown-ups before he writes a play of this kind again.

We regret to announce that Cecil Tomkins, _doyen_ of actor-managers, is down again with mumps.

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NO FIRST-NIGHTER.--_First Man in the Street._ See the eclipse last night?

_Second Man in the Street._ No. Thought it might be crowded. Put off going till next week.

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THEATRICAL.--When it is announced that an actor will be supported by the _entire_ company, it is not thereby meant that the said professional is sustained in his arduous part solely by draughts of Barclay, Perkins and Co.

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The wretch who refuses to take his wife to the theatre deserves to be made to sit out a play.

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GOOD "PIECE" OF FURNITURE FOR THEATRICAL MANAGERS.--A chest of "drawers."

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REGENERATION OF THE BRITISH DRAMA.--There are at this moment three English managers in Paris "in search of novelty!" More: three distinguished members of the Dramatic Authors' Society started for France last night.

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"AS GOOD AS A PLAY."--Performing a funeral.

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A PLANT IN SEASON.--Now is the time of year when managers of theatres show a botanical taste, for there is not one of them who does not do his best to have a great rush at his doors.

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THE DRAMATIC AUTHOR'S PLAYGROUND.--Paris.

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THEATRICAL NOTE.--_Net_ profits are generally the result of a good "_cast_."

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A DUBIOUS COMPLIMENT.--_Rector's Wife_ (_after harvest festival_). Well, Mrs. Piggleswade, how did you like the Bishop's sermon?

_Mrs. Piggleswade._ Oh! ma'am, I ain't been so much upset since my old man took me to the wariety theayter in London last August twelve-month, and 'eard a gen'leman sing about his grandmother's cat.

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There was a poor actor on the Norwich circuit who squinted most dreadfully: he was put up on one occasion for "Lear." "We must succeed," said the manager, "for there never was a _Lear_ with so strong a _cast_."

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A RICHMOND DINNER.--A shouting actor who performs the part.

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BY DEPUTY

As Shakspeare could not write his plays (If Mrs. Gallup's not mistaken), I think how wise in many ways He was to have them done by Bacon; They might have mouldered on the shelf, Mere minor dramas (and he knew it!) If he had written them himself Instead of letting Bacon do it.

And if it's true, as Brown and Smith In many learned tomes have stated, That Homer was an idle myth, He ought to be congratulated; Since, thus evading birth, he rose For men to worship from a distance: He might have penned inferior prose Had he achieved a real existence.

To him and Shakspeare some agree In making very nice allusions, But no one thinks of praising me, For I composed my own effusions: As others wrote their works divine, And they immortal thus to day are, If someone else had written mine I might have been as great as they are!

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Numerous applications were received by the manager of Covent Garden from "professionals" wishing to take part in _The Forty Thieves_. It was not found possible to offer engagements to the following (amongst others):--

_The Thief_--who stole a march.

_The Thief_--in the candle.

_The Thief_--who was set to catch a thief.

_The Thief_--who stole the "purse" and found it "trash."

_The Thief_--who stole up-stairs.

_The Thief_--of time, _alias_ procrastination, and--

_The Thief_--who stole a kiss (overwhelming number of applicants).

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THE REAL AND THE IDEAL; OR, THE CATASTROPHE OF A VICTORIA MELO-DRAMA

_Berthelda._--Sanguino, you have killed your _mother_!!!

_Fruitwoman._--Any apples, oranges, biscuits, ginger-beer!

(_Curtain falls._)

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"Bishops," said the Rev. Mr. Phillips to the Playgoers' Club, "are not really so stiff and starchy as they are made out to be. There is a good heart beneath the gaiters." Calf-love, we presume.

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DIFFERENT VIEWS.--Bishops complain of a dearth of candidates for orders. Managers of theatres think differently.

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LEG-ITIMATE SUCCESSES.--Modern extravaganzas.

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THEATRICAL.--The only people who never suffer in the long run--managers of theatres.

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"STANDING ORDERS."--Free admissions who can't get seats.

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AT A PROBLEM PLAY.--_Mr. Dinkershein_ (_eminent critic_). How did you enjoy the piece, Miss MacGuider?

_Miss MacGuider._ Well, to tell the truth, I didn't know what it was all about.

_Mr. Dinkershein._ Excellent. The author gives us so much to think of.

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QUESTION AND ANSWER.--"Why don't I write plays?" Why should I?

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NOT EXACTLY A THEATRICAL MANAGER'S GUIDING MOTTO.--"Piece at any price."

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OUR SHAKSPEARIAN SOCIETY.--In the course of a discussion, Mrs. ---- observed, that she was positive that Shakspeare was a butcher by trade, because an old uncle of hers had bought _lambs' tails from Shakspeare_.

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"SOUND DUES."--Fees to opera box-keepers.

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COPYRIGHT AND COPYWRONG.--The dramatist who dramatises his neighbour's novel against his will, is less a playwright than a plagiary.

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A MODERN REHEARSAL

_Leading Lady (to Stage Manager)._ Who's that man in the ulster coat talking to the call-boy?