Chapter 19

In old times Charles Fisher often figured in the old comedies, and he was one of the last of the thin and rapidly lessening group of actors capable of presenting those pieces--wherein, although the substance be human nature, the manner is that of elaborate and diversified artifice. When he played Lieutenant Worthington, in _The Poor Gentleman_, he was a gentleman indeed--refined, delicate, sensitive, simply courageous, sustained by native integrity, and impressive with a dignity of manner that reflected the essential nobility of his mind; so that when he mistook Sir Robert Bramble for a bailiff, and roused that benevolent baronet's astonishment and rage, he brought forth all the comic humour of a delightful situation with the greatest ease and nature. He played Littleton Coke, Sir Harcourt Courtly, old Laroque--in which he gave a wonderful picture of the working of remorse in the frail and failing brain of age--and Nicholas Rue, in _Secrets worth Knowing_, a sinister and thrilling embodiment of avarice and dotage. He played Dr. Bland, the elegant medical cynic of _Nos Intimes_; De la Tour, the formidable, jealous husband of Henriette, in _Le Patte de Mouche_; Horace, in _The Country Squire_; Goldfinch, in which he was airy, sagacious, dashing, and superb, in _The Road to Ruin_; and Captain Cozzens, the nonchalant rascal of _The Knights of the Round Table_, which he embodied in a style of easy magnificence, gay, gallant, courageous, alert, imperturbable, and immensely comic. He was the original Matthew Leigh in Lester Wallack's romantic play of _Rosedale_ (1863). He acted Joseph Surface in the days when Lester Wallack used to play Charles, and he always held his own in that superior part. He was equally fine in Sir Peter and Sir Oliver. When the good old play of _The Wife's Secret_ was revived in New York, in 1864, he gave a dignified and impetuous performance of Sir Walter Amyott. I remember him in those parts, with equal wonder at his comprehensive variety of talent and admiration for his always adequate skill. I saw him as the volatile Ferment, in _The School of Reform_, and nothing could be more comic than his unwitting abuse of General Tarragon, in that blustering officer's presence, or his equally ludicrous scene of cross purposes with Bob Tyke. He was a perfect type, as Don Manuel Velasco, in _The Compact_, of the gallant, stately Spanish aristocrat. He excelled competition when, in a company that included George Holland, W. Holston, A.W. Young, Mark Smith, Frederick C.P. Robinson, and John Gilbert, he enacted the convict in _Never Too Late to Mend_. He was equally at home whether as the King in _Don Cæsar de Bazan_ or as Tom Stylus the literary hack, in _Society_. He passed easily from the correct and sentimental Sir Thomas Clifford, of _The Hunchback_, to the frivolous Mr. Willowear, of _To Marry or Not to Marry_. No one could better express than he did, when playing Wellborn, both pride of birth and pride of character. One of his most characteristic works was Hyssop, in _The Rent Day_. His scope and the rich resources of his experience are denoted in those citations. It is no common artist who can create and sustain a perfect illusion, and please an audience equally well, whether in such a part as Gilbert Featherstone, the villain, in _Lost in London_, or old Baptista, in _The Taming of the Shrew_. The playgoer who never saw Charles Fisher as Triplet can scarcely claim that he ever saw the part at all. The quaint figure, the well-saved but threadbare dress, the forlorn air of poverty and suffering commingled with a certain jauntiness and pluck, the profound feeling, the unconscious sweetness and humour, the spirit of mind, gentility, and refinement struggling through the confirmed wretchedness of the almost heart-broken hack--who that ever laughed and wept at sight of him in the garret scene, sitting down, "all joy and hilarity," to write his comedy, can ever forget those details of a true and touching embodiment? His fine skill in playing the violin was touchingly displayed in that part, and gave it an additional tone of reality. I once saw him acting Mercutio, and very admirable he was in the guise of that noble, brave, frolicsome, impetuous young gentleman. The intense vitality, the glancing glee, the intrepid spirit--all were preserved; and the brilliant text was spoken with faultless fluency. It is difficult to realise that the same actor who set before us that perfect image of comic perplexity, the bland and benevolent Dean, in _Dandy Dick_, could ever have been the bantering companion of Romeo and truculent adversary of fiery Tybalt. Yet this contrast but faintly indicates the versatile character of his mind. Fisher was upon the American stage for thirty-eight years, from August 30, 1852, when he came forth at Burton's theatre as Ferment. Later he went to Wallack's, and in 1872 he joined Daly's company, in which he remained till 1890. It may be conjectured that in some respects he resembled that fine comedian Thomas Dogget, to whom Sir Godfrey Kneller, the painter, said, "I can only copy Nature from the originals before me, while you vary them at pleasure and yet preserve the likeness." Like Dogget he played, in a vein of rich, hearty, jocose humour, and with great breadth of effect and excellent colour, the sailor Ben, in _Love for Love_. The resemblance was in mental characteristics, not physique--for Dogget was a slight and sprightly man, whereas Fisher could represent majesty as well as frolic. After he went to Daly's theatre he manifested a surprising range of faculty. He first appeared there on October 28, 1872, as Mr. Dornton, in _The Road to Ruin_, and on November 19, following, he acted Falstaff for the first time. He presented there the other Shakespearean parts of Leonatus, Armado, and Malvolio--the last of these being a model of fidelity to the poet, and now a classic in reputation. He also assumed Adam and Jaques. He presented the living image of Shakespeare himself, in _Yorick_, and his large, broad, stately style gave weight to Don Manuel, in _She Would and She Wouldn't_; to that apt type of the refined British aristocrat, Sir Geoffrey Champneys, in _Our Boys_; and to many a noble father or benevolent uncle of the adapted French society drama. Just as Dogget was supreme in such parts as Fondlewife, so was Fisher superb in the uxorious husband whom the demure child-wife bamboozles, in the comedies of Molière. No man has ever better depicted than he did a sweet nature shocked by calamity and bowed down with grief, or, as in Joe Chirrup, in _Elfie_, manliness chastened by affliction and ennobled by true love: yet his impersonation of Fagin was only second to that of J.W. Wallack, Jr.; his Moody, in _The Country Girl_, was almost tragic in its grim and grizzled wretchedness and snarling wrath; and I have seen him assume to perfection the gaunt figure and crazy mood of Noah Learoyd, in _The Long Strike_, and make that personality a terrible embodiment of menace. From the time he first acted the comic Major Vavasour, in _Henry Dunbar_, no actor of equal quaintness has trod our stage. He died on June 11, 1891, and was buried at Woodlawn.

XXVI.

MRS. G.H. GILBERT.

Students of the English stage find in books on that subject abundant information about the tragedy queens of the early drama, and much likewise, though naturally somewhat less (because comedy is more difficult to discuss than tragedy), about the comedy queens. Mrs. Cibber still discomfits the melting Mrs. Porter by a tenderness even greater than the best of Belvideras could dispense. Mrs. Bracegirdle and Mrs. Oldfield still stand confronted on the historic page, and still their battle continues year after year. All readers know the sleepy voice and horrid sigh of Mrs. Pritchard in Lady Macbeth's awful scene of haunted somnambulism; the unexampled and unexcelled grandeur of Mrs. Yates in Medea; the infinite pathos of Mrs. Dancer (she that became in succession Mrs. Spranger Barry and Mrs. Crawford) and her memorable scream, as Lady Randolph, at "Was he alive?"; the comparative discomfiture of both those ladies by Mrs. Siddons, with her wonderful, wailing cry, as Isabella, "O, my Biron, my Biron," her overwhelming Lady Macbeth and her imperial Queen Katharine. The brilliant story of Peg Woffington and the sad fate of Mrs. Robinson, the triumphant career of Mrs. Abington and the melancholy collapse of Mrs. Jordan--all those things, and many more, are duly set down in the chronicles. But the books are comparatively silent about the Old Women of the stage--an artistic line no less delightful than useful, of which Mrs. G.H. Gilbert is a sterling and brilliant representative. Mrs. Jefferson, the great-grandmother of the comedian Joseph Jefferson, who died of laughter, on the stage (1766-68), might fitly be mentioned as the dramatic ancestor of such actresses as Mrs. Gilbert. She was a woman of great loveliness of character and of great talent for the portrayal of "old women," and likewise of certain "old men" in comedy. "She had," says Tate Wilkinson, "one of the best dispositions that ever harboured in a human breast"; and he adds that "she was one of the most elegant women ever beheld." Mrs. Gilbert has always suggested that image of grace, goodness, and piquant ability. Mrs. Vernon was the best in this line until Mrs. Gilbert came; and the period which has seen Mrs. Judah, Mrs. Vincent, Mrs. Germon, Mary Carr, Mrs. Chippendale, Mrs. Stirling, Mrs. Billington, Mrs. Drew, Mrs. Phillips, and Madam Ponisi, has seen no superior to Mrs. Gilbert in her special walk. She was in youth a beautiful dancer, and all her motions have spontaneous ease and grace. She can assume the fine lady, without for an instant suggesting the parvenu. She is equally good, whether as the formal and severe matron of starched domestic life, or the genial dame of the pantry. She could play Temperance in _The Country Squire_, and equally she could play Mrs. Jellaby. All varieties of the eccentricity of elderly women, whether serious or comic, are easily within her grasp. Betsy Trotwood, embodied by her, becomes a living reality; while on the other hand she suffused with a sinister horror her stealthy, gliding, uncanny personation of the dumb, half-insane Hester Dethridge. That was the first great success that Mrs. Gilbert gained, under Augustin Daly's management. She has been associated with Daly's company since his opening night as a manager, August 16, 1869, when, at the Fifth Avenue theatre, then in Twenty-fourth Street, she took part in Robertson's comedy of _Play_. The first time I ever saw her she was acting the Marquise de St. Maur, in _Caste_, on the night of its first production in America, August 5, 1867, at the Broadway theatre, the house near the southwest corner of Broadway and Broome Street, that had been Wallack's but now was managed by Barney Williams. The assumption of that character, perfect in every particular, was instinct with pure aristocracy; but while brilliant with serious ability it gave not the least hint of those rich resources of humour that since have diffused so much innocent pleasure. Most of her successes have been gained as the formidable lady who typifies in comedy the domestic proprieties and the Nemesis of respectability. It was her refined and severely correct demeanour that gave soul and wings to the wild fun of _A Night Off_. From Miss Garth to Mrs. Laburnum is a far stretch of imitative talent for the interpretation of the woman nature that everybody, from Shakespeare down, has found it so difficult to treat. This actress has never failed to impress the spectator by her clear-cut, brilliant identification with every type of character that she has assumed; and, back of this, she has denoted a kind heart and a sweet and gentle yet never insipid temperament--the condition of goodness, sympathy, graciousness, and cheer that is the flower of a fine nature and a good life. Scenes in which Mrs. Gilbert and Charles Fisher or James Lewis have participated, as old married people, on Daly's stage, will long be remembered for their intrinsic beauty--suggestive of the touching lines:

"And when with envy Time, transported, Shall think to rob us of our joys, You'll in your girls again be courted, And I'll go wooing with my boys."

XXVII.

JAMES LEWIS.

A prominent representative type of character is "the humorous man," and that is Shakespeare's phrase to describe him. Wit is a faculty; humour an attribute. Joseph Addison, Laurence Sterne, Washington Irving--whatever else they might have been they were humourists. Sir Roger de Coverley, Tristram Shandy, Uncle Toby, Diedrich Knickerbocker, Ichabod Crane--these and other creations of their genius stand forth upon their pages to exemplify that aspect of their minds. But the humourist of the pen may, personally, be no humourist at all. Addison's character was austere. Irving, though sometimes gently playful, was essentially grave and decorous.

Comical quality in the humorous man whom nature destines for the stage must be personal. His coming brings with it a sense of comfort. His presence warms the heart and cheers the mind. The sound of his voice, "speaking oft," before he emerges upon the scene, will set the theatre in a roar. This was notably true of Burton and of William Warren. The glance, motion, carriage, manner, and the pause and stillness of such a man, instil merriment. Cibber says that Robert Nokes had a palpable simplicity of nature which was often as unaccountably diverting in his common speech as on the stage, John E. Owens, describing the conduct of a big bee in an empty molasses barrel, once threw a circle of his hearers, of whom I was one, almost into convulsions of laughter. Artemas Ward made people laugh the moment they beheld him, by his wooden composure and indescribable sapience of demeanour. The lamented Daniel E. Setchell, a comedian who would have been as famous as he was funny had he but lived longer, presented a delightful example of spontaneous humour. It is ludicrous to recall the simple gravity, not demure but perfectly solemn, with which, on the deck of a Hudson River steamboat, as we were passing West Point, he indicated to me the Kosciuszko monument, saying briefly, "That's the place where Freedom shrieked." It was the quality of his temperament that made his playfulness delicious. Setchell was the mental descendant of Burton, as Burton was of Reeve and as Reeve was of Liston. Actors illustrate a kind of heredity. Each species is distinct and discernible. Lester Wallack maintained the lineage of Charles Kemble, William Lewis, Elliston, and Mountfort--a line in which John Drew has gained auspicious distinction. John Gilbert's artistic ancestry could be traced back through Farren and Munden to King and Quin, and perhaps still further, to Lowin and Kempe.

The comedian intrinsically comical, while in his characteristic quality eccentric and dry, has been exemplified by Fawcett, Blisset, Finn, and Barnes, and is conspicuously presented by James Lewis. No one ever saw him without laughter--and it is kindly laughter, with a warm heart behind it. The moment he comes upon the stage an eager gladness diffuses itself throughout the house. His refined quaintness and unconscious drollery capture all hearts. His whimsical individuality never varies; yet every character of the many that he has portrayed stands clearly forth among its companions, a distinct, unique embodiment. The graceful urbanity, the elaborate yet natural manner, the brisk vitality, the humorous sapience of Sir Patrick Lundy--how completely and admirably he expressed them! How distinct that fine old figure is in the remembrance of all who saw it! But he has never played a part that he did not make equally distinct. A painter might fill a gallery with odd, characteristic creations by merely copying his compositions of "make-up." The amiable professor in _A Night Off_, the senile Gunnion in _The Squire_, Lissardo in _The Wonder_, Grumio in _The Shrew_--those and many more he has made his own; while in the actor's province of making comic characters really comical to others there is no artist who better fulfils the sagacious, comprehensive injunction of Munden (imparted to a youthful actor who spoke of being "natural" in order to amuse), "Nature be d----d! Make the people laugh!" That, aside from all subtleties, is not a bad test of the comic faculty, and that test has been met and borne by the acting of James Lewis.

XXVIII.

A LEAF FROM MY JOURNAL.

[November 23, 1867.]

Thirty years hereafter many who are now active and honoured in dramatic life will be at rest--their work concluded, their achievements a fading tradition. But they will not be wholly forgotten. The same talisman of memory that has preserved to our time the names and the deeds of the actors of old will preserve to future times the names and the deeds that are distinguished now in the mimic world of the stage. Legend, speaking in the voice of the veteran devotee of the drama, will say, for example, that of all the actors of this period there was no light comedian comparable with Lester Wallack; that he could thoroughly identify himself with character,--though it did not always please him to do so; that his acting was so imaginative and so earnest as to make reality of the most gossamer fiction; and that his vivacity--the essential element and the crown of comedy-acting--was like the dew on the opening rose. And therewithal the veteran may quaff his glass to the memory of another member of the Wallack family, and speak of James Wallack as Cassius, and Fagin, and the Man-in-the-Iron-Mask, and the King of the Commons, and may say, with truth, that a more winning embodiment of bluff manliness and humour was never known to our stage than the versatile actor who made himself foremost in those characters. It will be impossible to remember him without recalling his intimate professional associate, Edwin L. Davenport. He was the only Brutus of his time, our old friend will say, and in his prime the best Macbeth on the American stage; and he could play almost any part in the drama, from the loftiest tragedy to mere trash; and he was an admirable artist in all that he did. There will be plenty of evidence to fortify that statement; and if the veteran shall also say that Wallack's company contained, at the same time, the best "old men" in the profession, no dissentient voice, surely, will challenge the names of George Holland, John Gilbert, James H. Stoddart, and Mark Smith. Cibber could play Lord Foppington at seventy-three; but George Holland played Tony Lumpkin at seventy-seven. A young part,--but the old man was as joyous as a boy and filled it with a boisterous, mischievous humour at once delightful and indescribable. You saw him to the best advantage, though, in Mr. Sulky, Humphrey Dobbin, and kindred parts, wherein the fineness of his temperament was veiled under a crabbed exterior and some scope was allowed for his superb skill in painting character. So the discourse will run; and, when it touches upon John Gilbert, what else than this will be its burden?--that he was perfection as the old fop; that his Lord Ogleby had no peer; that he was the oddest conceivable compound of dry humour, quaint manners, frolicsome love of mischief, honest, hearty mirth, manly dignity, and tender pathos. To Mark Smith it will render a kindred tribute. Squire Broadlands, Old Rapid, Sir Oliver Surface--they cannot be forgotten. Extraordinary truthfulness to nature, extraordinary precision of method, large humanity, strong intellect, and refined and delicate humour that always charmed and never offended--those were the qualities that enrolled him among the best actors of his time. And it will not be strange if Old Mortality passes then into the warmest mood of eulogium, as he strives to recall the admirable, the incomparable "old woman" Mrs. Vernon. She was a worthy mate of those worthies, he will exclaim. She could be the sweet and loving mother, gentle and affectionate; the stately lady, representative of rank and proud of it and true to it; and the most eccentric of ludicrous old fools. She was the ideal Mrs. Malaprop, and she surpassed all competitors in the character of Mrs. Hardcastle. Mary Gannon was her stage-companion and her foil, he will add--the merriest, most mischievous, most bewitching player of her time, in her peculiar line of art. As Hester, in _To Marry or Not to Marry_, and as Sophia, in _The Road to Ruin_, she was the incarnation of girlish grace and delicious ingenuousness, and also of crisp, well-flavoured mirth. No taint of tameness marred her acting in those kindred characters, and no air of effort made it artificial. Nor was Fanny Morant less remarkable for the glitter of comedy and for an almost matchless precision of method. So will our friend of the future prose on, in a vein that will be tedious enough to matter-of-fact people; but not tedious to gentle spirits who love the stage, and sympathise with its votaries, and keep alive its traditions--knowing that this mimic world is as real and earnest as the strife that roars and surges around it; that there as everywhere else humanity plays out its drama, whereof the moral is always the same--that whether on the stage or in the mart, on the monarch's throne or in the peasant's cot,

"We are such stuff As dreams are made on, and our little life Is rounded with a sleep."

THE END.

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