Chapter 10 J.E. OWENS'S WANDERING BOYS. A HOLE IN THE WALL INCIDENT

The late John E. Owens, while acting in Cincinnati, had a severe cold. He was feverish, and fearing for his throat, which was apt to give him trouble, he had his physician, an old friend, come to see him back of the scenes. The doctor brought with him an acquaintance, and Mr. Owens asked them to wait till the next act was over to see how his throat was going to behave.

It's always a dangerous thing to turn outsiders loose behind the scenes; for if they don't fall into traps, or step into paint pots, they are sure to pop on to the stage.

Mr. Owens supposed the gentlemen would stop quietly in his room, but not they. Out they wandered on discovery intent. A well-painted scene caught the doctor's eye. He led his friend up to it, to take a better look; then as only part of it was visible from where they stood, they followed it along.

Mr. Owens and I were on the stage. Suddenly his eyes distended. "What in the devil?" he whispered. I looked behind me, and at the same moment the audience burst into shouts of laughter; for right into the centre of the stage had walked, with backs toward the audience, two tall gentlemen, each with a shining bald head, each tightly buttoned in a long black overcoat, and each gesticulating with a heavy cane.

I whispered to Mr. Owens, "The two Dromios"; but he snapped out, "Two blind old bats."

When they heard the roar behind them, they turned their heads, and then a funnier, wilder exit I never saw than was made by these two dignified old gentlemen; while Owens added to the laughter by taking me by the hand, and when we had assumed their exact attitude, singing "Two wandering boys from Switzerland."

I am reminded that the first performance I ever saw in my life had one of the most grotesque interruptions imaginable. At a sort of country hotel much frequented by driving parties and sleighing parties, a company of players were "strapped,"-to use the theatrical term, stranded,-unable either to pay their bills or to move on. There was a ballroom in the house, and the proprietor allowed them to erect a temporary stage there and give a performance, the guests in the house promising to attend in a body.

One of the plays was an old French farce, known to English audiences as "The Hole in the Wall." The principal comedy part was a clerk to two old misers, who starved him outrageously.

I was a little, stiffly starched person, and I remember that I sat on some one's silk lap, and slipped and slipped, and was hitched up and immediately slipped again until I wished I might fall off and be done with it. Near me sat a little old maiden lady, who had come in from her village shop to see "the show." She wore two small, sausage curls either side of her wrinkled cheeks, large glasses, a broad lace collar, while three members of her departed family gathered together in one fell group on a mighty pin upon her tired chest. She held a small bag on her knee, and from it she now and then slid a bit of cake which, as she nibbled it, gave off a strong odour of caraway seed.

[Illustration: John E. Owens]

Now the actor was clever in his "make-up," and each time he appeared he looked thinner than he had in the scene before. Instead of laughing, however, the old woman took it seriously, and she had to wipe her glasses with her carefully folded handkerchief several times before that last scene, when she was quite overcome.

His catch phrase had been, "Oh! oh! how hungry I am!" and every time he said it, she gave a little involuntary groan; but as he staggered on at the last, thin as a bit of thread paper, hollow-cheeked, white-faced, she indignantly exclaimed, "Well now, that's a shame!"

The people laughed aloud; the comedian fixed his eyes upon her face, and with hands pressed against his stomach groaned, "O-h! how hungry I am!" and then she opened that bag and drew forth two long, twisted, fried cakes, rose, stood on her tip-toes, and reaching them up to him tearfully remarked:-

"Here, you poor soul, take these. They are awful dry; but it's all I've got with me."

The audience fairly screamed; but poor and stranded as that company was, the comedian was an artist, for he accepted the fried cakes, ate them ravenously to the last crumb, and so kept well within the character he was playing, without hurting the feelings of the kind-hearted, little old woman.

It's pleasant to know that that clever bit of acting attracted the attention and gained the interest of a well-to-do gentleman, who was present, and who next day helped the actors on their way to the city.

A certain foreign actor once smilingly told me "I was a crank about my American public." I took his little gibe in good part; for while he knew foreign audiences, he certainly did not know American ones as well as I, who have faced them from ocean to ocean, from British Columbia to Florida. Two characteristics they all share in common,-intelligence and fairness,-otherwise they vary as widely, have as many marked peculiarities, as would so many individuals. New York and Boston are the authorities this side of "the Great Divide," while San Francisco sits in judgment by the blue Pacific.

One never-to-be-forgotten night I went to a fashionable theatre in New York City to see a certain English actress make her début before an American audience, which at that time was considered quite an interesting event, since there were but one or two of her countrywomen over here then. The house was very full; the people were of the brightest and the "smartest." I sat in a stage box and noted their eagerness, their smiling interest.

The curtain was up, there was a little dialogue, and then the stage door opened. I dimly saw the actress spreading out her train ready to "come on," the cue was given, a figure in pale blue and white appeared in the doorway, stood for one single, flashing instant, then lurched forward, and with a crash she measured her full length upon the floor.

The shocked "O-h-h" that escaped the audience might have come from one pair of lips, so perfect was its spontaneity, and then dead and perfect silence fell.

The actress lay near but one single piece of furniture (she was alone in the scene, unfortunately), and that was one of those frail, useless, gilded trifles known as reception chairs. She reached out her hand, and lifting herself by that, had almost reached her knee, when the chair tipped under her weight, and they both fell together.

It was awful. A deep groan burst from the people in the parquet. I saw many women hide their eyes; men, with hands already raised to applaud, kept the attitude rigidly, while their tight-pressed lips and frowning brows showed an agony of sympathy. Then suddenly an arm was thrust through the doorway; I knew it for the head carpenter's. Though in a shirt sleeve, it was bare to the elbow, and not over clean, but strong as a bough of living oak. She seized upon it and lifting herself, with scarlet face and neck and breast, she stood once more upon her feet. And then the storm broke loose; peal on peal of thunderous applause shook the house. But four times in my life have I risked throwing flowers myself; but that night mine were the first roses that fell at her feet. She seemed dazed; quite distinctly I heard her say "off" to some one in the entrance, "But what's the matter?"

At last she came forward. She was plump almost to stoutness, but she moved most gracefully. Her bow was greeted with long-continued applause. Sympathy, courtesy, encouragement, welcome-all were expressed in that general and enthusiastic outburst.

"Why," said she after all was over, "at home they would have hissed me, had that happened there."

"Oh!" exclaimed one who heard, "never; they could not be so cruel."

"Oh, yes," she answered, "afterward they might have applauded, but not at first. Surely they would have hissed me."

And with these words ringing in my ears, no wonder that, figuratively speaking, I knelt at the feet of a New York audience and proudly kissed its hand.

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