Life on the Stage: My Personal Experiences and Recollections

by Clara Morris

"But what can I do for a horse?" asked R. E. J. M.

"Use old Bob," answered Mr. Ellsler.

"Good Lord!" groaned Bob's master. They argued long, but neither wanted to lose the good house, so the bill was allowed to stand, and "Mazeppa" was performed with old white Bob as the "Wild Horse of Tartary." Think of it, that ingratiating old Bob! That follower of women and playmate of children! Why, even the great bay blotches on his white old hide made one think of the circus, paper hoops, and training, rather than of wildness. Meaning to make him at least impatient and restless, he had been deprived of his supper, and the result was a settled gloom, an air of melancholy that made Mr. Miles swear under his breath every time he looked at him. There was a ring, known I believe as a Spanish ring, made with a sharp little spike attachment, and used sometimes by circus-men to stir up horses to a show of violence or of high spirits, and when a whip was not permissible. It could be resorted to without arousing any suspicion of cruelty, since the spike was on the under side and so out of sight. The man with the ring on his finger would stand by a horse, and resting his hand on the animal's neck, just at the most sensitive spot of his whole anatomy—the root or end of his mane—would close the hand suddenly, thus driving the spike into the flesh. It must have caused exquisite pain, and naturally the tormented animal rears and plunges. Sometimes they get effect enough by pricking the creatures on the shoulder only. On that night, Mr. Miles, after gazing at the mild and melancholy features of his new "Wild Horse of Tartary," went to his room and dug up from some trunk a Spanish ring. Calling one of the men who used to be dragged and thrashed about the stage by the black wild horse, he explained to him its use, ending with: "I hate to hurt the old fellow, so try him on the shoulder first, and if he dances about pretty lively, as I think he will, you need not prick his mane at all."

The play moved along nicely, the house was large, and seemed pleased. Mazeppa fell into his enemy's hands, the sentence was pronounced, and the order followed: "Bring forth the fiery, untamed steed!"

The women began to draw close to their escorts; many of them remembered the biting, kicking entrance of the black, and were frightened beforehand. The orchestra responded with incidental creepy music, but—that was all. Over in the entrance, old Bob, surrounded by the four men who were supposed to restrain him, stood calmly. But those who sat in the left box heard "get-ups!" and "go-ons!" and the cluckings of many tongues. The mighty Khan of Tartary (who could not see that entrance) thought he had not been heard, and roared again: "Bring forth the fiery, untamed steed!" Another pause, the house tittered, then some one hit old Bob a crack across the rump with a whip, at which he gave a switch of his tail and gently ambled on the stage, stopping of his own accord at centre, and, lowering his head, he stretched his neck and sniffed at the leader of the orchestra, precisely as a dog sniffs at a stranger. It was deliciously ridiculous. We girls were supposed to scream with terror at the "wild horse," and, alas! we were only too obedient, crowding down at right, clinging together in attitudes of extremest fright, we shrieked and screeched until old Bob cocked up his ears and looked so astonished at our conduct that the audience simply rocked back and forth with laughter, and all the time Mazeppa was saying things that did not seem to be like prayers. Finally he gave orders for the men to surround Bob, which they did, and then the ring was used—the ring that was to make him dance about pretty lively. It pricked him on the shoulder, and the "wild horse" stood and switched his tail. It pricked him again—he switched his tail again. The men had by that time grown careless, and when the ring was finally used at his mane, he suddenly kicked one of them clear off the stage, and then resumed his unruffled calm. The public thought it was having fun all this time, but pretty soon it knew it. Nothing under heaven could disturb the gentle serenity of that dog-like old horse. But when Mazeppa was brought forward to be bound upon his back, instead of pulling away, rearing, and fighting against the burden, his one and only quick movement was his violent effort to break away from his tormentors to welcome Mazeppa joyously.

"Oh!" groaned Miles, "kill him, somebody, before he kills me!"

While he was being bound on the wild horse's back, our instructions were to scream, therefore we screamed as before, and being on the verge of insanity, Mazeppa lifted his head from the horse's back, and said: "Oh, shut up—do!" The audience heard, and—well, it laughed some more, and then it discovered, when the men sprang away and left the horse free to dash madly up the mountain, that Mazeppa had kept one foot unbound to kick his horse with—and truly it did seem that the audience was going into convulsions. Such laughter, pierced every now and then by the shrill scream of hysteria. Then old Bob ambled up the first run all right, but, alas! for poor Mazeppa, as he reached the first turn-table, a woman passed on the way to her room, and hungry Bob instantly stopped to negotiate a loan in sugar. Oh, it was dreadful, the wait, and when finally he reappeared, trotting—yes, trotting up the next run, Mr. Miles's foot could be plainly seen, kicking with the regularity of a piston-rod, while his remarks were—well, they were irregular in the extreme.

Of course the play was hopelessly ruined; the audience laughed at the slightest mention of the "wild horse," and when, broken and exhausted, the shepherds find them both lying at the foot of the mountain, the house seemed to shake with laughter.

When the play was at last over, old white Bob walked over to his master and mumbled his hand. Mr. Miles pushed him away with pretended anger, crying: "You infernal old idiot, I'd sell you for a three-cent stamp with gum on it!"

Bob looked hard at him a moment, then he calmly crossed behind him and mumbled his other hand, and Mr. Miles pulled his ears, and said that "he himself was the idiot for expecting an untrained, unrehearsed horse to play such a part," and old Bob agreeing with him perfectly, they were, as always, at peace with each other.