"Fishpingle."

Sir Geoffrey Pomfret, "that almighty man, the county god," claimed to exercise the same divine right over the souls of his village that he exercised, in the matter of breeding, over the bodies of his cattle and pigs. Nothing, I think, has brought the present War more closely home to my bosom than the humours of this feudal relic—taken in all seriousness by everyone, including the author. It seems almost inconceivable that Mr. Vachell's play deals with conditions that still survived only a few years ago. Yet the Squire's devotion to the science of eugenics establishes its date as quite recent. It was his sole taint of modernity; and indeed where his own son's marriage was concerned he omitted to apply his scientific principles, and made a choice for him in which no regard was paid to eugenics, but only to established social traditions.

At first the play opened up prospects of a pleasant gaiety. A love scene, conducted in a rich Western brogue, between the Squire's footman and his still-room maid, and the embarrassment caused by her eagerness to learn the philosophy of "eujanics," were full of promise. It was confirmed by the appearance of Mr. Ainley, whose manner reminded us of his many triumphs in the art of eccentric detachment. His part—the title-rôle—was that of Sir Geoffrey's faithful butler, on such familiar, though respectful, terms with his master that the two sipped port together in the former's room in broad daylight while discussing family matters. They took an unconscionable time about it, but, as I said, it promised well. However, Mr. Vachell had other designs than our mere amusement. We were not to have our comedy without paying for it with our heart's blood. Very soon the shadow of melodramatic pathos and mystery crept over the sunny scene. Fishpingle takes a box from a cupboard and glances at a miniature and a bundle of letters. There is illegitimacy in the air, and a lady near me in the stalls confides to her neighbour that "he's the Squire's half-brother." I can't think where she got her information, for the rest of us never learned the facts of the mystery till the very end of the evening, and even then the details of Fishpingle's origin only transpired (as they say) under extreme pressure arising out of his dismissal by his master on the strength of a violent disagreement about fundamentals.

Sir Geoffrey's father, it seems, had before his marriage run away with a girl not of his own rank, who had generously refused to spoil the family tree by marrying him; and Fishpingle was the result. You might judge from the peculiarity of his surname that the matter was taken lightly by his parents. But you would be wrong. His mother died when he was born, and his first name (for I cannot call it a Christian name) was Benoni, which, being interpreted, means "the child of sorrow." Sir Geoffrey's grandmother, who had discouraged the legal adjustment of the relationship between the lovers, had tried to repair matters by educating Fishpingle above the obscurity of his irregular birth; hence his comparative erudition, rare in a butler.

THE BREED OF THE POMFRETS.

Fishpingle (to himself). "How anybody can fail to see the extraordinary family likeness between us I cannot imagine."

Fishpingle.... Mr. Henry Ainley. Sir Geoffrey Pomfret. Mr. Allan Aynesworth.

Now the opening of the play had put me into a mood which was not the right one for the reception of this extract from a deplorable past. Some comedies would be all the better for a little tragic relief; but this was too much. Mr. Vachell had no business to give his play a title like Fishpingle. He should have called it "Nature's Nobleman, or The Tragical Romance of a Faithful Butler's Birth," and then I might have known what to expect. As it was I felt aggrieved. It was not, of course, a question of asking for my money back at the doors (critics, to be just to them, never do this in the case of a complimentary seat), but I felt I had a right to protest against this attempt to harrow my heart-strings, attuned as they were to the key of comedy, with a painful drama dating back to more than half a century before the rise of the curtain, and with its chief actors all dead. And the irritating mystery in which it was wrapped only made things worse. Further, I suffered a considerable strain on both my head and my heart in consequence of obscure hints (vaguely involving a photograph on his mantelpiece) as to the reason why Fishpingle remained a bachelor to the bitter end.

But I am ashamed to appear flippant, for Mr. Ainley played with exquisite feeling and a fine sincerity. And I have to thank Mr. Vachell for giving us some excellent studies of character—not character developed before our eyes by circumstance (except perhaps a little at the last), but admirably observed as a kind of fixture to be taken with the house.

And if the play is not quite on the high level of Mr. Galsworthy's The Eldest Son, which it faintly recalls, it is much more worthy of Mr. Vachell's gifts than the poor thing, Penn, which died so young. Also he is very much more fortunate this time in his cast. Miss Marion Terry, as Lady Pomfret, was a pattern of sweet graciousness; and Mr. Allan Aynesworth was at his happiest as Sir Geoffrey. And the two pairs of lovers, Mr. Cyril Raymond and Miss Maud Bell above stairs, and Mr. Reginald Bach and Miss Doris Lytton below (they were really all of them on the ground floor, the butler's room being the common trysting-place), served as delightful examples of natural selection—both on their own part and that of the management—and were as fresh and healthy as the most eugenical could desire.

O. S.