which, some years since, Madame Celeste was wont to perform at the Adelphi, is also a drama of the same class. But, indeed, works contrived for doubling purposes are numerous enough. And in this category may be included the elaborate melodramas which deal with long lapses of years, and relate the adventures of more than one generation, and in which the hero or heroine of the earlier scenes reappears at a later stage of the performance as his or her own child. Here, however, frequent change of dress is not required; the character first personated, when once laid aside, is not resumed, but is supposed to have been effectually removed from the scene by death, generally of a violent description. It is to be added that the applause often won by the actor who doubles a part on account of his rapid changes of attire, are in truth due much less to him than to the activity of his dresser—a functionary, however, who is never seen by the public. Still, calls before the curtain have now become such common compliments, that even the dressers of the theatre may yet obtain this form of recognition of their deserts.
The services of a mute double to assist the illusion of the scene, or to spare a leading performer needless fatigue, have often been required upon the stage. Such a play as "The Corsican Brothers" could scarcely be presented without the aid of a mute player to take the place, now of Louis, now of Fabian dei Franchi, to personate now the spectre of this twin, now of that. In former days, when the deepest tragedy was the most highly esteemed of theatrical entertainments, funeral processions, or biers bearing the corpses of departed heroes, were among the most usual of scenic exhibitions. Plays closed with a surprising list of killed and wounded. But four of the characters in Rowe's "Fair Penitent" are left alive at the fall of the curtain, and among those survivors are included such subordinate persons as Rossano, the friend of Lothario, and Lucilla, the confidante of Calista, whom certainly it was worth no one's while to put to death. The haughty gallant, gay Lothario, is slain at the close of the fourth act, but his corpse figures prominently in the concluding scenes. The stage direction runs at the opening of the fifth act: "A room hung with black; on one side Lothario's body on a bier; on the other a table with a skull and other bones, a book and a lamp on it. Calista is discovered on a couch, in black; her hair hanging
loose and disordered. Soft music plays." In this, as in similar cases, it was clearly unnecessary that the personator of the live Lothario of the first four acts should remain upon the stage to represent his dead body in the fifth. It was usual, therefore, to allow the actor's dresser to perform this doleful duty, and the dressers of the time seem to have claimed occupation of this nature as a kind of privilege, probably obtaining in such wise some title to increase of salary. The original Lothario—the tragedy being first represented in 1703—was George Powell, an esteemed actor who won applause from Addison and Steele, but who appears to have been somewhat of a toper, and was generally reputed to obscure his faculties by incessant indulgence in Nantes brandy. The fourth act of the play over, the actor was impatient to be gone, and was heard behind the scenes angrily demanding the assistance of Warren, his dresser, entirely forgetful of the fact that his attendant was employed upon the stage in personating the corpse of Lothario. Mr. Powell's wrath grew more and more intense. He threatened the absent Warren with the severest of punishments. The unhappy dresser, reclining on Lothario's bier, could not but overhear his raging master, yet for some time his fears were surmounted by his sense of dramatic propriety. He lay and shivered, longing for the fall of the curtain. At length his situation became quite unendurable. Powell was threatening to break every bone in his skin. In his dresser's opinion the actor was a man likely to keep his word. With a cry of "Here I am, master!" Warren sprang up, clothed in sable draperies which were fastened to the handles of his bier. The house roared with surprise and laughter. Encumbered by his charnel-house trappings, the dead Lothario precipitately fled from the stage. The play, of course, ended abruptly. For once the sombre tragedy of "The Fair Penitent" was permitted a mirthful conclusion.
Whenever unusual physical exertion is required of a player, a perilous fall, or a desperate leap, a trained gymnast is usually engaged as double to accomplish this portion of the performance. When in the stage versions of "Kenilworth," Sir Richard Varney, in lieu of Amy Robsart, is seen to descend through the treacherous trap and incur a fall of many feet, we may be sure that it is not the genuine Varney, but his double who undergoes this severe fate. The name of the double is not recorded in the
playbill, however, and he wins little fame, let him acquit himself as skilfully as he may. Occasionally, however, doubles of this kind are found to emerge from obscurity and establish a reputation of their own. In 1820, a pantomime, dealing with the fairly tale of "Jack and the Beanstalk," was produced at Drury Lane. The part of the hero was allotted to little Miss Povey, who declined, however, to undertake Jack's feat of climbing the famous beanstalk, a formidable structure reaching from the stage to the roof of the theatre. It became necessary to secure a substitute who should present some resemblance to the small and slight figure of the young actress, and yet be sufficiently strong and courageous to undertake the task she demurred to. The matter was one of some difficulty, and for some time no competent double was forthcoming. One morning, however, Winston, the stage-manager, descried a little active boy, acting as waterman's assistant, at the hackney-coach stand in Bedford Street, Covent Garden. He was carried to the theatre and his abilities put to the test at a rehearsal of the pantomime. His performance was pronounced satisfactory. He nightly appeared during the run of "Jack and the Beanstalk" as the climbing double of Miss Povey. Subsequently, he became one of the pupils of the clown. The boy said he believed his name was Sullivan. Years afterwards he was known to fame as Monsieur Silvain, ballet-master, and principal dancer of the Academic Royale, Paris, an artist of distinction, and a most respectable member of society.
Mrs. Mowatt, the American actress, has recorded in her Memoirs a curious instance of a double being employed in connection with a dummy to secure a theatrical illusion of a special kind. The play produced at the Olympic Theatre some twenty years ago, was an English version of the "Ariâne" of Thomas Corneille. In the original, Ariadne, upon the discovery of the perfidy of Theseus, falls upon a sword and expires. This catastrophe was altered in the adaptation, and a startling effect produced by the leaping of the heroine from a rock, and her plunging into the sea, while the ship of Theseus is seen departing in the distance. It was found necessary that three Ariadnes, similarly costumed, and identical in appearance, should lend their aid to accomplish this thrilling termination. Mrs. Mowatt, as Ariadne the first, paced the shore, and received
the agonising intelligence of the desertion of Theseus. A ballet-girl, as Ariadne the second, climbed the rocks of the Island of Naxos, reaching the highest peak to catch the last glimpse of the vanishing vessel. The third Ariadne was a most lifelike lay figure, which, on a given signal, was hurled from the cliff, and seen to fall into the abyss below.
The greatest difficulty seems to have been experienced at rehearsal in persuading Ariadne the second even to walk up the steep rocks of Naxos. The poor ballet-girl had been chosen for this duty less because of her courage than on account of an accidental resemblance she bore to Mrs. Mowatt. "She stopped and shrieked halfway, protested she was dizzy, and might fall, and would not advance a step farther. After about half-an-hour's delay, during which the poor girl was encouraged, coaxed, and scolded abundantly, she allowed the carpenter, who had planned the rocky pathway, to lead her carefully up and down the declivity, and finally rushed up alone." At a certain cue she was required to fall upon her face, concealed from the audience by an intercepting rock, and then the lay figure took its flight through the air.
The success of the performance appears to have been complete. The substitution of the double for Ariadne, and the dummy for the double, even puzzled spectators who were provided with powerful opera-glasses. "The illusion was so perfect," Mrs. Mowatt writes, "that on the first night of the representation, when Ariadne leaped from the rock, a man started up in the pit, exclaiming in a tone of genuine horror: 'Good God! she is killed!'" How this exclamation must have rejoiced the heart of the stage-manager! For one would rather not consider the possibility of the "man in the pit" having been placed there by that functionary with due instructions as to when and what he was to exclaim.
It is a sort of doubling when, in consequence of the illness or absence of a performer, his part is read by some other member of the company. In this way curious experiments have sometimes been made upon public patience. At Dublin, in 1743, Addison's tragedy was announced for representation, with Sheridan, the actor, in the character of Cato. Sheridan, however, suddenly declined to appear, the costume he had usually assumed in his performance of Cato being absent