Part 41 (2/2)

Belfond, Junior, second Son to Sir William; adopted by Sir Edward, and bred from his childhood by him, with all tenderness, and familiarity, and bounty, and liberty that can be, instructed in all the liberal sciences, and in all gentlemanlike education. Somewhat given to women, and now and then to good fellows.h.i.+p, but an ingenious, well-accomplished gentleman: a man of honour, and of excellent disposition and temper.

Truman, his friend, a man of honour and fortune.

Cheatly, a rascal, who by reason of debts dares not stir out of Whitefriars, but there inveigles young heirs in tail, and helps them to goods and money upon great disadvantages; is bound for them, and shares with them, till he undoes them. A lewd, impudent, debauched fellow, very expert in the cant about town.

Shamwell, cousin to the Belfonds, an heir, who being ruined by Cheatly, is made a decoy-duck for others; not daring to stir out of Alsatia, where he lives. Is bound with Cheatly for heirs, and lives upon them a dissolute, debauched life.

Captain Hack.u.m, a blockheaded bully of Alsatia; a cowardly, impudent, bl.u.s.tering fellow; formerly a sergeant in Flanders, run from his colours, retreated into Whitefriars for a very small debt, where, by the Alsatians, he is dubbed a captain; marries one that lets lodgings, sells cherry brandy, and is a bawd.

Sc.r.a.peall, a hypocritical, repeating, praying, psalm-singing, precise fellow, pretending to great piety, a G.o.dly knave, who joins with Cheatly, and supplies young heirs with goods and money.

Attorney to Sir William Belfond, who solicits his business and receives all his packets.

Lolp.o.o.p, a North-country fellow, servant to Belfond, Senior, much displeased at his master's proceedings.[37]

It is more than doubtful if anything so elaborate could be found in the ma.n.u.scripts of Wycherley and Shadwell. Their purpose was doubtless the same as that of certain modern dramatists who, with a view to making plays less difficult for those unaccustomed to reading them, greatly amplify the stage directions before their plays go to print. Mr.

Granville Barker in the ma.n.u.scripts of his plays is particularly frugal of stage directions, but in the printed form of _The Madras House_,[38]

practically the whole history of Julia is given in the opening stage direction:

_Julia started life--that is to say, left school--as a genius. The head mistress had had two or three years of such dull girls that really she could not resist this excitement. Watercolour sketches were the medium. So Julia was dressed in brown velveteen, and sent to an art school, where they wouldn't let her do watercolour drawing at all.

And in two years she learnt enough about the trade of an artist not ever to want to do those watercolour drawings again. Julia is now over thirty, and very unhappy. Three of her watercolours (early masterpieces) hang on the drawing-room wall. They shame her, but her mother won't have them taken down. On a holiday she'll be off now and then for a solid day's sketching; and as she tears up the vain attempt to put on paper the things she has learnt to see, she sometimes cries.

It was Julia, Emma, and Jane who, some years ago, conspired to present their mother with that intensely conspicuous cosy corner. A cosy corner is apparently a device for making a corner just what the very nature of a corner should forbid it to be. They beggared themselves; but one wishes that Mr. Huxtable were more lavish with his dress allowances, then they might at least have afforded something not quite so hideous._

Such characterizing is an implied censure on the ability of most readers to see the full significance of deft touches in the dialogue. If not, then it is necessary because some part of it is not given in the text as it should be, or it is wholly unnecessary and undesirable, for the text, repeating all this detail, will be wearisome to an intelligent reader.

The safest principle is, in preparing a ma.n.u.script for acting, to keep stage directions to matters of setting, lighting, essential movements, and the intonations which cannot, by the utmost efforts of the author, be conveyed by dialogue.[39] In this last group belong certain every-day phrases susceptible of so many shadings that the actor needs guidance.

In the last line of this extract from the opening of Act III of _Mrs.

Dane's Defence_, the ”tenderly” is necessary.

_Enter Wilson right, announcing Lady Eastney. Enter Lady Eastney.

Exit Wilson._

_Lady Eastney._ (_Shaking hands._) You're busy?

_Sir Daniel._ Yes, trying to persuade myself I am forty--solely on your account.

_Lady Eastney._ That's not necessary. I like you well enough as you are.

_Sir Daniel._ (_Tenderly._) Give me the best proof of that.

Notice that the statement just formulated as to stage directions reads, ”cannot be conveyed,” not ”may not.” Cross the line, and differences between the novel and the play are blurred, for the author runs a fair chance of omitting exposition needed in the text and of writing colorless dialogue. A recently published play prefaces not only every speech, but even parts of the speeches with careful statements as to how they should be given, even when the text is perfectly clear. Nothing is left to the imagination, and the text is often emotionally colorless.

Let it be remembered, then, that the stage direction is not a pocket into which a dramatist may stuff whatever explanation, description, or a.n.a.lysis a novelist might allow himself, but is more a last resort to which he turns when he cannot make his text convey all that is necessary.

The pa.s.sing of the soliloquy and the aside[40] makes the dramatist of today much more limited than were his predecessors in letting a character describe itself. Today everything depends on the naturalness of the self-exposition. The vainglorious, the self-centered, the garrulous will always talk of themselves freely. The reserved, the timid, and persons under suspicion will be sparing of words. When the ingenuity of the dramatist cannot make self-exposition plausible, the scene promptly becomes unreal. The point to be remembered is, as George Meredith once said, that ”The verdict is with the observer.” Not what seems plausible to the author but what, as he tries it on auditors, proves acceptable, may stand.

Description of one character by another is usually more plausible than the method just treated. Even here, however, the test remains plausibility. It requires persuasive acting to make the following description of Tartuffe perfectly natural. There is danger that it will appear more the detailed picture the dramatist wishes to place in our minds than the description the speaker would naturally give his listeners:

_Orgon._ Ah! If you'd seen him, as I saw him first, You would have loved him just as much as I.

He came to church each day, with contrite mien, Kneeled, on both knees, right opposite my place, And drew the eyes of all the congregation, To watch the fervor of his prayers to heaven; With deep-drawn sighs and great e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.i.o.ns.

He humbly kissed the earth at every moment; And when I left the church, he ran before me To give me holy water at the door.

I learned his poverty, and who he was, By questioning his servant, who is like him, And gave him gifts; but in his modesty He always wanted to return a part.

”It is too much,” he'd say, ”too much by half; I am not worthy of your pity.” Then, When I refused to take it back, he'd go, Before my eyes, and give it to the poor.

At length Heaven bade me take him to my home, And since that day, all seems to prosper here.

He censures nothing, and for my sake He even takes great interest in my wife; He lets me know who ogles her, and seems Six times as jealous as I am myself.

You'd not believe how far his zeal can go: He calls himself a sinner just for trifles; The merest nothing is enough to shock him; So much so, that the other day I heard him Accuse himself for having, while at prayer, In too much anger caught and killed a flea.[41]

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