I did get a big one. I’ve got it now. It’s downstairs in the washhouse. I’ve never been able to get rid of it from that day to this. I’ve tried leaving it behind when removing into new lodgings, but it has always been sent on after me, generally in a wagon with a couple of men, who, evidently imagining they were restoring me a treasured heirloom, have been disappointed at my complete absence of enthusiasm. I have lured stray boys into the house, and offered them half a crown to take it away and lose it, but they have become frightened, and gone home and told their mothers, and, after that, it has got about in the neighborhood that I have committed a murder. It isn’t the sort of thing you can take out with you on a dark night, and drop down somebody else’s area.
When I used it, I had to do all my packing in the hall, for it was impossible to get the thing up and down stairs. It always stood just behind the front door, which left about six inches of space for people to squeeze past, and every one that came in got more or less injured. The owner of the house, returning home late at night, would pitch head foremost over it, and begin yelling murder and police, under the impression it was burglars. The girl, coming in with the beer, would bang up against it, and upset the jug over it, when the whole contents would become saturated, and smell like a public-house.
The language used in connection with that basket was simply appalling. It roused railway porters and cabmen to madness, and the savage way in which they rushed upon it used to make my blood run cold. Landladies, who upon my first call had welcomed me with effusion, grew cool and distant when the basket arrived. Nobody had a good word for it. Everywhere, it was hated and despised. I even feared that some day its victims would rise up and sweep it from the face of the earth. But no, it has survived both curses and kicks, and feeling it is hopeless ever to expect to get rid of it, I have made up my mind to be buried in it.
Faithful old basket! it is a good many years since you and I started on our travels that snowy seventeenth of December, and what a row we had with the cabman, ah me! But why did you desert me at Bristol? Why did you———
But stay, wherefore should I go on apostrophizing the miserable old thing in this imbecile manner, And now I come to think of it, why too should I sit here sucking the end of my pen and scowling savagely at the lamp, in the agonies of composition, when “copy,” which one of Field & Tuer’s devils is plaguing me for (I do wish they’d send a boy who couldn’t whistle), is lying ready to my hand?
Before me, borrowed for reference in penning these reminiscences, is a pile of letters, written during my travels to my old pal, Jim. Here’s one:
“Dear Jim:
“We (the basket and I) had a terribly cold journey down. Lost the basket at Bristol and had to telegraph after it. That basket will be the death of me, I know. There is one advantage, though; it stamps you as an actor at once, and the porters don’t expect any gratuities. Got jolly lodgings here. Nice, big bedroom, use of sitting-room, full attendance, and cooking for four bob a week. Pleasant, homely people, everything as clean as a new pin, and daughter rather pretty.
“I should have written before, but we have been so busy. Two and sometimes three rehearsals a day, to say nothing of painting the scenery, at which we all assisted. We had a crowded house for the opening on Boxing night, and have had very fair ones ever since—all over fifteen pounds.
“Sergeant Parry was in the stalls the other night, and a big London actor, whose name I forget just now. We (I say ‘we’ because we all help in everything—two of us went out early a morning or two ago bill-posting: we’ve got a regular billposter, but it’s his week for being drunk)—we, then, had a good deal of trouble training the supers and ballet. You should hear the supers dance: you can do so easily a mile off. They shake the whole building. Both they and the ballet are drawn from the fishing population of the town, and this is their first appearance on any stage. The ballet consists of eight at present, but that is only for the first go off, we shall reduce it to six in a little while. We have also got about a dozen children to do a May-pole dance. It’s a treat to see them. They are paid threepence a night, but they get three shillings’ worth of enjoyment out of it for themselves. There is one little girl with the face of an angel—I honestly confess I’ve never seen an angel’s face, and don’t suppose I ever shall till I die, but I think it is that sort of face. She is dressed by seven every evening, and, from then, till she goes on the stage at ten, she is dancing and singing on her own account all over the place. When the May-pole is at last set up, she stands and gazes at it open-mouthed, and laughs to herself with glee. In her excitement, she always dances round the wrong way, and with the wrong boy—but it’s always the same wrong boy, that is what makes it extraordinary. Happy wrong boy, only he doesn’t know he’s happy; he is so small. After the dance, the little boys kiss the little girls. You ought to see this little fairy turn aside and giggle, and push her little lover away. The boys are awfully shy over the business, but the little girls don’t seem a bit afraid. Such is the superiority of woman over man?