Page:Once a Week Dec 1860 to June 61.pdf/269

 258 observation lead me to say that, in an aristocratic theatre, pieces of low life, or of broad fun, should be the staple.”

“The contrary opinion hath its upholders, Aventayle the Discoverer.”

“It may be so. But the thing stands to reason. These Swells come to the theatre to be amused. They do not want to see transcripts of their own life, with inelegant representatives of themselves, doing queerly what the folks in the private boxes have been taught to do properly from their gilded youth upwards—gilded youth is a pretty phrase—jeunesse dorée, eh?”

“You are evidently engaged in pirating some French piece. But let us hear about the gilded youths—I once heard of a spangled officer in a melodrama.”

“Spangled officer—that’s a pretty idea, too. Harlequin in the Guards. Very good notion. Well, sir, touching the pieces you won’t write. The upper classes want to see something new to them, different from what is always before their eyes, and they have, I suppose, a curiosity to see the habits and customs of their inferiors. Therefore, instead of trying a weak reproduction of good society, fill your boxes with Countesses by exhibiting the home life and troubles of a costermonger. Do it well, of course; and let it be understood that the sorrows of a costermonger are, on the whole, rather grotesque—and you have got what you want, and the street is blocked with carriages.”

“But I am not acquainted with the home life of a costermonger, you see.”

“No more are your spectators, so they can’t find out your mistakes. Besides, I suppose a costermonger is a human being—if you tickle him, shall he not laugh?—if you poison him—”

“If you make hack quotations to him, shall he not yawn?”

“Then, again, my son, touching farces, which belong to another department of the drama. I should like, instead of putting up delicate little comediettas, with the idea of pleasing the Ten Thousand, to give them the broadest fun that can be got upon the boards. Their lives are delicate little comediettas, which they play with more grace and finesse than we can show them. But as for fun—”

“True. I don’t suppose that in Belgravia a footman very often drops the tray with the tea-things and falls on his knees, or sits down upon the baby of the house, and says he has squashed it.”

“There are other means of obtaining a hearty laugh than those, Mr. Scoffer, though those are to farce what the red-hot poker is to pantomime, and I shall regret to see the day when China or baby is deemed too sacred to be demolished before a British audience.”

“You have evidently thought deeply over an important subject.”

“Paley, sir, holds nothing unimportant that contributes to the harmless enjoyment of multitudes. Paley, sir.”

“I am rejoiced to see an evidence of your Christianity, my dear Aventayle, and I shall leave you in that becoming state of mind.”

“Stop a bit. I see you are out of sorts, and like any man out of sorts, you have been angular and unpleasant, but I have not done with you yet. One word, by the way. Shall I give you a cheque?”

“Thanks, no. Keep it for the present.”

“You’ve only to say the word,” said the manager, who, at other times, would merely have answered “Very well,” but whose experience taught him how many of the troubles of life connect themselves with the state of the banker’s account, and whose liking for Hawkesley was very sincere.

“I know that,” said Hawkesley, and looking straight at Aventayle, he caught the kindly intention in the manager’s pleasant face. “My dear fellow, I comprehend. But there’s nothing of that kind now. We are fundholders and all the rest of it.”

“Two gowns, and everything handsome about you,” laughed Aventayle. “You know that I could not mean to be obtrusive, but your harping upon old times, and, as I said, your general out-of-sort-ish-ness (which one notices in a cheerful man: a Mulligrubs may sulk unquestioned), made me think that some infernal relations might have been tugging too hard at the purse-strings.”

“Thanks again, my dear Aventayle. But they have not been doing that.”

“Well, you are too wise a man to let anybody tug at your heart-strings,” replied Aventayle, who had once actually interrupted the run of a prosperous drama, in which he was acting, in order to attend the death-bed of a little child.

“Some day I’ll tell you something about what has annoyed me,” said Hawkesley, “but I can’t now.”

“Make it into a play,” said the man of business. “That’s the way to utilise your troubles. And if you do nothing else, you can revenge yourself on your enemies by putting their names to all the bad characters. I knew a young author who was much persecuted to pay his just debts, and who always consoled himself for having to hand over law costs, by sticking into his next piece some character he could describe in the play-bill as “Macgriddle—a low thief—Mr. So-and-so,” the unhappy Mac being of course the plaintiff, or the attorney. It was delightful to my young friend to find every wall placarded with this pleasant little analysis of his creditor’s character.”

“I am afraid that I have no enemy at present.”

“You’ll have a good many in the morning after Reckoning Without The Host, if it is as successful as I hope it will be.”

“Aventayle, you have a bad opinion of mankind.”

“And womankind—have I not reason, beldames that they are? There is another letter from that woman I sent the private box to, and she says that she should not have intruded upon me, but for my kindness in obliging her before: and now she wants to send some of her husband’s constituents to the theatre. Also, she is good