Part 11 (2/2)
CHAPTER XXVII.
A THICKNESS IN THE THROAT.
The date is September, 1805, and the room before us is a drawing-room in a pleasant house at Brighton. The hot sun is beating down on cliff and terrace, beach and pier, on the downs behind the town and the sparkling sea in front. The brightness of the blue sky is softened by white vapor that here and there resembles a vast curtain of filmy gauze, but nowhere has gathered into visible ma.s.ses of hanging cloud. In the distance the sea is murmuring audibly, and through the screened windows, together with the drowsy hum of the languid waves, comes a light breeze that is invigorating, notwithstanding its sensible warmth.
Besides ourselves there are but two people in the room: a gentlewoman who has said farewell to youth, but not to feminine grade and delicacy; and an old man, who is lying on a sofa near one of the open windows, whilst his daughter plays pa.s.sages of Handel's music on the piano-forte.
The old man wears the dress of an obsolete school of English gentlemen; a large brown wig with three rows of curls, the lowest row resting on the curve of his shoulders; a loose grey coat, notable for the size of its cuffs and the bigness of its heavy b.u.t.tons; ruffles at his wrists, and frills of fine lace below his roomy cravat. These are the most conspicuous articles of his costume, but not the most striking points of his aspect. Over his huge, pallid, cadaverous, furrowed face there is an air singularly expressive of exhaustion and power, of debility and latent strength--an air that says to sensitive beholders, ”This prostrate veteran was once a giant amongst giants; his fires are dying out; but the old magnificent courage and ability will never altogether leave him until the beatings of his heart shall have quite ceased: touch him with foolishness or disrespect, and his rage will be terrible.”
Standing here we can see his prodigious bushy eyebrows, that are as white as driven snow, and under them we can see the large black eyes, beneath the angry fierceness of which hundreds of proud British peers, a.s.sembled in their council-chamber, have trembled like so many whipped schoolboys. There is no l.u.s.tre in them now, and their habitual expression is one of weariness and profound indifference to the world--a look that is deeply pathetic and depressing, until some transient cause of irritation or the words of a sprightly talker rouse him into animation. But the most noticeable quality of his face is its look of extreme age. Only yesterday a keen observer said of him, ”Lord Thurlow is, I believe, only seventy-four; and from his appearance I should think him a hundred years old.”
So quiet is the reclining form, that the pianist thinks her father must be sleeping. Turning on the music-stool to get a view of his countenance, and to satisfy herself as to his state, she makes a false note, when, quick as the blunder, the brown wig turns upon the pillow--the furrowed face is presented to her observation, and an electric brightness fills the big black eyes, as the veteran, with deep rolling tones, reproves her carelessness:--”What are you doing?--what are you doing? I had almost forgotten the world. Play that piece again.”
Twelve months more--and the lady will be playing Handel's music on that same instrument; but the old man will not be a listener.
From Brighton, in 1805, let readers transport themselves to Canterbury in 1776, and let them enter a barber's shop, hard by Canterbury Cathedral. It is a primitive shop, with the red and white pole over the door, and a modest display of wigs and puff-boxes in the window. A small shop, but, notwithstanding its smallness, the best shop of its kind in Canterbury; and its lean, stiff, exceedingly respectable master is a man of good repute in the cathedral town. His hands have, ere now, powdered the Archbishop's wig, and he is specially retained by the chief clergy of the city and neighborhood to keep their false hair in order, and trim the natural tresses of their children. Not only have the dignitaries of the cathedral taken the worthy barber under their special protection, but they have extended to his little boy Charles, a demure, prim lad, who is at this present time a pupil in the King's School, to which academy clerical interest gained him admission. The lad is in his fourteenth year; and Dr. Osmund Beauvoir, the master of the school, gives him so good a character for industry and dutiful demeanor, that some of the cathedral ecclesiastics have resolved to make the little fellow's fortune--by placing him in the office of a Chorister. There is a vacant place in the cathedral choir; and the boy who is lucky enough to receive the appointment will be provided for munificently. He will forthwith have a maintenance, and in course of time his salary will be 70 per annum.
During the last fortnight the barber has been in great and constant excitement--hoping that his little boy will obtain this valuable piece of preferment; persuading himself that the lad's thickness of voice, concerning which the choir-master speaks with aggravating persistence, is a matter of no real importance; fearing that the friends of another contemporary boy, who is said by the choir-master to have an exceedingly mellifluous voice, may defeat his paternal aspirations. The momentous question agitates many humble homes in Canterbury; and whilst Mr.
Abbott, the barber, is encouraged to hope the best for his son, the relatives and supporters of the contemporary boy are urging him not to despair. Party spirit prevails on either side--Mr. Abbott's family a.s.sociates maintaining that the contemporary boy's higher notes resemble those of a penny whistle; whilst the contemporary boy's father, with much satire and some justice, murmurs that ”old Abbott, who is the gossip-monger of the parsons, wants to push his son into a place for which there is a better candidate.”
To-day is the eventful day when the election will be made. Even now, whilst Abbott, the barber, is tr.i.m.m.i.n.g a wig at his shop window, and listening to the hopeful talk of an intimate neighbor, his son Charley is chanting the Old Hundredth before the whole chapter. When Charley has been put through his vocal paces, the contemporary boy is requested to sing. Whereupon that clear-throated compet.i.tor, sustained by justifiable self-confidence and a new-laid egg which he had sucked scarcely a minute before he made his bow to their reverences, sings out with such richness and compa.s.s that all the auditors recognize his great superiority.
Ere ten more minutes have pa.s.sed Charley Abbot knows that he has lost the election; and he hastens from the cathedral with quick steps.
Running into the shop he gives his father a look that tells the whole story of--failure, and then the little fellow, unable to command his grief, sits down upon the floor and sobs convulsively.
Failure is often the first step to eminence.
Had the boy gained the chorister's place, he would have a cathedral servant all his days.
Having failed to get it, he returned to the King's School, went a poor scholar to Oxford, and fought his way to honor. He became Chief Justice of the King's Bench, and a peer of the realm. Towards the close of his honorable career Lord Tenterden attended service in the Cathedral of Canterbury, accompanied by Mr. Justice Richardson. When the ceremonial was at an end the Chief Justice said to his friend--”Do you see that old man there amongst the choristers? In him, brother Richardson, behold the only being I ever envied: when at school in this town we were candidates together for a chorister's place; he obtained it; and if I had gained my wish he might have been accompanying you as Chief Justice, and pointing me out as his old school-fellow, the singing man.”
PART VI.
AMATEUR THEATRICALS.
CHAPTER XXVIII.
ACTORS AT THE BAR.
Some years since the late Sergeant Wilkins was haranguing a crowd of enlightened electors from the hustings of a provincial borough, when a stentorian voice exclaimed, ”Go home, you rope-dancer!” Disdaining to notice the interruption, the orator continued his speech for fifty seconds, when the same voice again cried out, ”Go home, you rope-dancer!” A roar of laughter followed the reiteration of the insult; and in less than two minutes thrice fifty unwashed blackguards were roaring with all the force of their lungs, ”Ah-h-h--Go home, you rope-dancer!” Not slow to see the moaning of the words, the unabashed lawyer, who in his life had been a dramatic actor, replied with his accustomed readiness and effrontery. A young man unacquainted with mobs would have descanted indignantly and with many theatrical flourishes on the dignity and usefulness of the player's vocation; an ordinary demagogue would have frankly admitted the discourteous impeachment, and pleaded in mitigation that he had always acted in leading parts and for high salaries. Sergeant Wilkins took neither of those courses, for he knew his audience, and was aware that his connection with the stage was an affair about which he had better say as little as possible. Instead of appealing to their generosity, or boasting of his histrionic eminence, he threw himself broadly on their sense of humor. Drawing himself up to his full height, the big, burly man advanced to the marge of the platform, and extending his right hand with an air of authority, requested silence by the movement of his arm. The sign was instantly obeyed; for having enjoyed their laugh, the mult.i.tude wished for the rope-dancer's explanation. As soon as the silence was complete, he drew back two paces, put himself in an oratorical _pose_, as though he were about to speak, and then, disappointing the expectations of the a.s.sembly, deliberately raised forwards and upwards the skirts of his frock-coat. Having thus arranged his drapery he performed a slow gyration--presenting his huge round shoulders and unwieldy legs to the populace. When his back was turned to the crowd, he stooped and made a low obeisance to his vacant chair, thereby giving the effect of caricature to the outlines of his most protuberant and least honorable part. This pantomime lasted scarcely a minute; and before the spectators could collect themselves to resent so extraordinary an affront, the sergeant once again faced them, and in a clear, rich, jovial tone exclaimed, ”_He_ called me a rope-dancer!--after what you have seen, do you believe him?”
With the exception of the man who started the cry, every person in the dense mult.i.tude was convulsed with laughter; and till the end of the election no turbulent rascal ventured to repeat the allusion to the sergeant's former occupation. At a moment of embarra.s.sment, Mr.
Disraeli, in the course of one of his youthful candidatures, created a diversion in his favor by telling a knot of unruly politicians that he _stood on his head_. With less wit, and much less decency, but with equal good fortune, Sergeant Wilkins took up his position on a baser part of his frame.
The electors who respected Mr. Wilkins because he was a successful barrister, whilst they reproached him with having been a stage-player, were unaware how close an alliance exists between the art of the actor and the art of the advocate. To lawyers of every grade and speciality the histrionic faculty is a useful power; but to the advocate who wishes to sway the minds of jurors it is a necessary endowment. Comprising several distinct abilities, it not only enables the orator to rouse the pa.s.sions and to play on the prejudices of his hearers, but it preserves him from the errors of judgment, tone, emphasis--in short, from manifold blunders of indiscretion and tact by which verdicts are lost quite as often as through defect of evidence and merit. Like the dramatic performer, the court-speaker, especially at the common law bar, has to a.s.sume various parts. Not only should he know the facts of his brief, but he should thoroughly identify himself with the client for whom his eloquence is displayed. On the theatrical stage mimetic business is cut up into specialities, men in most cases filling the parts of men, whilst actresses fill the parts of women; the young representing the characteristics of youth, whilst actors with special endowments simulate the qualities of old age; some confining themselves to light and trivial characters, whilst others are never required to strut before the scenes with hurried paces, or to speak in phrases that lack dignity and fine sentiment. But the popular advocate must in turn fill every _role_. If childish simplicity be his client's leading characteristic, his intonations will express pliancy and foolish confidence; or if it is desirable that the jury should appreciate his client's honesty of purpose, he speaks with a voice of blunt, bluff, manly frankness.
<script>