Appear as Clown and tottering Pantaloon.
Now away! begin your magic sport,
And bring me back a good report.’
Then I cried, ‘Hulloa! here we are!’ and the sports begin.
“The first trip, as we calls it—a dance, to use your terms—is Harlequin comes in with Columbine for a hornpipe. If he can’t dance, Clown, as soon as he begins, cries, ‘Here we are!’ and rushes in and drives them off.
“After that, Clown runs on and says, ‘Here we are!’ and knocks Pantaloon down; who exclaims, ‘Oh! ain’t I got the tooth-ache!’ Clown says, ‘Let me feel your tooth. Oh, it’s quite loose! I’ll get a bit of string and soon have it out.’ Clown goes off for string, Pantaloon singing out, ‘Murder! murder!’ Clown returns with string and a pistol, and then ties the string, and cries, ‘Here goes one, and now it’s two, and here goes three,’ and fires and pulls a wooden tooth, as big as your fist, with four sharp prongs to it. I’ve had these teeth often as big as a quartern loaf, but I’m talking of my first appearance. Pantaloon says, ‘Here, that’s my tooth!’ and Clown replies, ‘So it is,’ and hits him on the head with it. Then he asks Pantaloon if he’s better; but he answers, ‘No, I’m worse. Oh! oh! I’ve got a cold in my gum!’ Then a red-hot poker is introduced, and he burns him with it all round the stage. That concludes the first scene. Then there’s another trip, a would-be polka or so; and then comes the bundle-scene. Enter a Yorkshireman—it’s mostly Harlequins do this, because most of the others are outside parading, to keep the crowd together—he’s got a smockfrock on and russet boots at Johnson’s, and he says, ‘I’ve coome up here to Lunnon to see my Dolly. I feel rather dry, and I’ll just gi’ in here to get half-a-point of yale. I’ll just leave my bunnel outside, and keep a strict eye on it, for they say as how Lunnon has plenty of thieves in it.’ Enter Clown, very cautiously. He sees the bundle, and calls Pantaloon. He tells Pantaloon, ‘I must have it, because I want it.’ He goes and picks up the bundle, and says to Pantaloon, ‘I shouldn’t wonder but what this bundle belongs to——’ ‘Me,’ the Yorkshireman says, and the Clown says, ‘Ah, I thought so;’ and then he takes Pantaloon’s hand, and says, ‘Come along, little boy, we shall get into trouble,’ and leads him off. They come on again, and this time Clown tells Pantaloon to get it; so he goes and picks up the bundle, and Yorkshireman knocks him down. Clown runs off and Pantaloon after. Clown then returns on his belly, drawing himself on with his hands. He gets the bundle in his mouth, and is just going off when Yorkshireman turns round, and Clown seeing him, gives the bundle to Pantaloon, and says, ‘Hold this.’ Yorkshireman seizes Clown and tells him he wants his bundle. Pantaloon having run away with it, Clown says, ‘I haven’t got it, starch me’ (that means, ‘search me’); and there is a regular run over the stage crying ‘Hot beef! hot beef!’ (instead of ‘Stop thief!’) The Yorkshireman collars Pantaloon, and says, ‘I’ll take you to the station-house,’ and Clown exclaims, ‘Yes, and I’ll take this bundle down the lane’ (meaning Petticoat-lane, because there is a sale for anything there). Then comes the catch-scene as we call it; that is, they all come on in the dark, Clown singing, ‘Puss, puss! have you seen my pussy?’ Then in pops the fairy, and cries, ‘Hold! your magic sports is run, and thus I step between.’ Pantaloon adds, ‘Aye, it’s all so gay;’ and Clown cries, ‘Yes, and all serene;’ and the fairy says, ‘And with my magic wand I change the scene.’ Then everybody sings:—
‘Now our pantomime’s done,
Here’s an end to our fun,
We shall shortly commence again:
Our tricks are o’er,