So I confess quite frankly that I did not appreciate until it was too late, my advantages in serving at the Haymarket with comrades who were the most surpassingly fine actors and actresses in old comedy that I have ever known. There were [Mr. Buckstone], the [Chippendales], [Mr. Compton], [Mr. Farren]. They one and all thoroughly understood [Sheridan]. Their bows, their curtseys, their grand manner, the indefinable style which they brought to their task were something to see. We shall never know their like again, and the smoothest old-comedy acting of this age seems rough in comparison. Of course, we suffer more with every fresh decade that separates us from Sheridan. As he gets farther and farther away, the traditions of the performances which he conducted become paler and paler. Mr. Chippendale knew these traditions backwards. He might even have known Sheridan himself. [Charles Reade]'s mother did know him, and sat on the stage with him while he rehearsed "The School for Scandal" with [Mrs. Abingdon], the original Lady Teazle in the part.
Mrs. Abingdon, according to Charles Reade, who told the story, had just delivered the line, "How dare you abuse my relations?" when Sheridan stopped the rehearsal.
"No, no, that won't do at all! It mustn't be pettish. That's shallow—shallow. You must go up stage with, 'You are just what my cousin Sophy said you would be,' and then turn and sweep down on him like a volcano. 'You are a great bear to abuse my relations! How dare you abuse my relations!'"
I want to refrain, in telling the story of my life, from praising the past at the expense of the present. It is at best the act of a fogey and always an easy thing to do, as there are so few people who can contradict one. Yet even the fear of joining hands with the people who like every country but their own, and every age except that in which they live, shall not deter me from saying that although I have seen many improvements in actors and acting since I was at the Haymarket, I have never seen artificial comedy acted as it was acted there.
Not that I was much good at it myself. I played Julia in "[The Rivals]" very ill; it was too difficult and subtle for me—ungrateful into the bargain—and I even made a blunder in bringing down the curtain on the first night. It fell to my lot to finish the play—in players' language, to speak the "tag." Now, it has been a superstition among actors for centuries that it is unlucky to speak the "tag" in full at rehearsal. So during the rehearsals of "The Rivals," I followed precedent and did not say the last two or three words of my part and of the play, but just "mum, mum, mum!" When the first night came, instead of dropping my voice with the last word in the conventional and proper manner, I ended with an upward inflection, which was right for the sense, but wrong for the curtain.
This unexpected innovation produced utter consternation all round me. The prompter was so much astounded that he thought there was something more coming and did not give the "pull" for the curtain to come down. There was a horrid pause while it remained up, and then Mr. Buckstone, the Bob Acres of the cast, who was very deaf and had not heard the upward inflection, exclaimed loudly and irritably: "Eh! eh! What does this mean? Why the devil don't you bring down the curtain?" And he went on cursing until it did come down. This experience made me think more than ever of the advice of an old actor: "Never leave your stage effects to chance, my child, but rehearse, and find out all about it!"
How I wished I had rehearsed that "tag" and taken the risk of being unlucky!
For the credit of my intelligence I should add that the mistake was a technical one, not a stupid one. The line was a question. It demanded an upward inflection; but no play can end like that.
It was not all old comedy at the Haymarket. "[Much Ado About Nothing]" was put on during my engagement, and I played Hero to Miss [Louisa Angell's ]Beatrice. Miss Angell was a very modern Beatrice, but I, though I say it "as shouldn't," played Hero beautifully! I remember wondering if I should ever play Beatrice. I just wondered, that was all. It was the same when Miss Angell played Letitia Hardy in "[The Belle's Stratagem]," and I was Lady Touchwood. I just wondered! I never felt jealous of other people having bigger parts; I never looked forward consciously to a day when I should have them myself. There was no virtue in it. It was just because I wasn't ambitious.
[Louise Keeley], a pretty little woman and clever, took my fancy more than any one else in the company. She was always merry and kind, and I admired her dainty, vivacious acting. In a burlesque called "[Buckstone at Home]" (in which I played Britannia and came up a trap in a huge pearl, which opened and disclosed me) Miss Keeley was delightful. One evening the Prince and Princess of Wales (now our [King] and [Queen]) came to see "Buckstone at Home." I believe it was the very first time they had appeared at a theater since their marriage. They sat far back in the royal box, the ladies and gentlemen of their suite occupying the front seats. Miss Keeley, dressed as a youth, had a song in which she brought forward by the hand some well-known characters in fairy tales and nursery rhymes—Cinderella, Little Boy Blue, Jack and Jill, and so on, and introduced them to the audience in a topical verse. One verse ran: