But this change, far from displeasing me, stimulated my energies and dash, and I was soon at my ease with my new spectators, when I saw that they took a lively interest in my experiments. Still, an accident at the outset nearly aroused the popular dissatisfaction.
The Manchester artisans, far from coming to my performances to improve their French accent, were greatly surprised at hearing themselves addressed in any language but their own. Protests were put in on every side, and soon shouts were heard of “Speak English!”
As for my complying with the request, it was simply impossible; for though I had been six months in London, as I was always among my own countrymen, or persons who talked French, I had no occasion to apply myself to the English language. Still, I tried to satisfy a claim that appeared to me legitimate, and make up for my deficiencies by boldness and good-will. I began by pronouncing the few English words I knew; when my vocabulary was at fault, and I was about to run short, I invented expressions which, owing to their strange shape, greatly amused my audience. Often, too, when in a difficulty, I boldly asked them to come to my aid, and it was my turn to feel a great inclination to laugh.
“How do you call it?” I said, with a serio-comic air, as I held up the article whose name I wished to know; and straightway a hundred voices responded to my appeal. Nothing could be more pleasant than a lesson thus taken, when my teachers, contrary to the usual fashion, paid for the privilege of giving it.
Through my condescension I succeeded in making peace with my audience, who warmly cemented it on several occasions by their hearty applause. The last trick especially created a tremendous excitement—I mean the inexhaustible bottle, produced with scenery and decorations never before witnessed on any stage.
The picture presented by this trick is indescribable, and a skillful pencil could alone reproduce its numerous details. Here, however, is a sketch as accurate as possible:
I have already said that although the spectators were few and far between in some parts of the house, the pit was crowded, and it consequently contained more than twelve hundred persons.
I own it was a really curious sight to see all these heads issuing invariably from dark-colored waistcoats, heightened by that ruddiness of face which can be only produced by the beef and porter of Great Britain.
In order that I might communicate more freely with my numerous spectators, the machinist had put up a plank running from the stage to the end of the pit, and as I also wished to address persons at the sides, two other “practicables,” much shorter than the centre one, ran across to the boxes. The latter did not occupy room like the first, for they were just over a passage, while those who entered by it had to stoop down to reach their seats; but what was that slight inconvenience to the pleasure they promised themselves in seeing the “French conjurer?”
The public were still entering the pit after my performance had commenced, and so many persons were allowed to come in that there was soon no room for the laggards.