Page:What will he do with it.djvu/649

Rh Phenomenon had vanished and gone, as I was told, to America, where I now wish I was myself, acting Rolla at New York or elsewhere, to a free and enlightened people—then, Sir, the Mania grew on me still stronger and stronger. There was a pride in it, Sir—a British pride. I said to this faithful Hag—'What—shall I not have the York because that false child has deserted me? Am I not able to realize a Briton's ambition without being beholden to a Phenomenon in spangles?' Sir, I took the York! Alone I did it!"

"And," said Losely, feeling a sort of dreary satisfaction in listening to the grotesque sorrows of one whose condition seemed to him yet more abject than his own—"And the York Theater alone perhaps did you."

"Right, Sir," said Rugge—half dolorously, half exultingly. "It was a Grand Concern, and might have done for the Bank of England! It swallowed up my capital with as much ease, Sir, as I could swallow an oyster if there were one upon that plate. I saw how it would be the very first week—when I came out myself, strong—Kean's own part in the Iron Chest—Mortimer, Sir; there warn't three pounds ten in the house—packed audience, Sir, and they had the face to hiss me. 'Hag,' said I, to Mrs. Gormerick, 'this Theater is a howling wilderness.' But there is a fascination in a Grand Concern, of which one is the head—one goes on and on. All the savings of a life devoted to the British Drama and the productions of native genius went in what I may call—a jiffy! But it was no common object, Sir, to your sight displayed—but what with pleasure, Sir (I appeal to the Hag!), Heaven itself surveyed!—a great man struggling, Sir, with the storms of fate, and greatly falling, Sir, with—a sensation! York remembers it to this day! I took the benefit of the Act—it was the only benefit I did take—and nobody was the better for it. But I don't repine—I realized my dream: that is more than all can say. Since then I have had many downs, and no ups. I have been a messenger, Sir—a prompter, Sir, in my own Exhibition—to which my own clown, having married into the tragic line, succeeded, Sir, as proprietor; buying of me, when I took the York, the theater, scenery, and properties, Sir, with the right still to call himself, 'Rugge's Grand Theatrical Exhibition,' for an old song, Sir—Melancholy. Tyrannized over, Sir—snubbed and bullied by a creature dressed in a little brief authority; and my own tights—scarlet—as worn by me in my own applauded part of 'The Remorseless Baron.' At last, with this one faithful creature, I resolved to burst the chains—to be free as air—in short, a chartered libertine, Sir. We have