CLARA MORRIS.
The snow-storm and the other illusions described above are only a fraction of the things the property-man has to look after and keep in order. He has charge of everything upon the stage and is responsible for everything except the scenery. When a play is running that requires handsome appointments, it is his business to provide. Within the past decade or so of years it has become the custom to borrow expensive furniture from generous local dealers who are often satisfied with the simple and easy remuneration of a line or two acknowledging the loan, in the programme; or a certain price is paid for the use of the furniture during the run of the play; or the set is purchased outright from the dealer and repurchased by him at a reduction when the theatre is done with it. Nearly all theatres, however, are supplied with suitably handsome furniture for an ordinary society play, and it is only when gorgeousness is aimed at that managers are obliged to borrow. Pistols, knives, helmets, lances, battle-axes, canes, cigars, money, pocket-books, the vial from which Juliet takes the fatal draught, the marble or majolica pedestals, the rich vases, sunflowers such as are used in the æsthetic play of "The Colonel," the paste-board ham, the tin cups, or cut glasses that the characters drink from, fire-place, mantel, and looking-glass—these, and many other articles the property-man furnishes the players, either placing the stationary fixtures on the stage, or sending the call-boy to the performers with the articles they require. The check-book that the rich banker draws from his pocket when he hands $100,000, more or less, over to somebody else in the play, the quill or pen he writes the check with, and the bottle out of which he dips the imaginary ink, all come from the property-room, and go back to it again after the act is over. A list of the articles required for a play is furnished the property-man when a play is to be put on, and these articles he must have when the prompter calls or sends for them. Sometimes the property-man forgets, and then there is trouble in the camp. It is related that having forgotten to provide a Juliet with her vial of poison, in time, the article being called for as the actress was about to go on the stage, the property-man snatched up the first thing that looked like a vial that he got his eyes on. It was a bottle from the prompter's desk, and when Juliet placed the awful draught to her lips and took a pull at the bottle, she discovered to her horror that she had swallowed a dose of ink. The actress, who tells the story herself in her autobiography, said, she wanted to "swallow a sheet of blotting-paper," when she made the inky discovery.
HELEN DINGEON.
I find in Miss Logan's book from which I have before quoted in this chapter, the following funny inventory of properties furnished a new lessee of the Drury Lane Theatre, London: "Spirits of wine, for flames and apparitions, £12 2s.; three and one-half bottles of lightning, £—; one snow-storm, of finest French paper, 3s.; two snow-storms of common French paper, 2s.; complete sea, with twelve long waves, slightly damaged, £1 10s.; eighteen clouds, with black edges, in good order, 12s., 6d.; rainbow, slightly faded, 2s.; an assortment of French clouds, flashes of lightning and thunder-bolts, 15s.; a new moon, slightly tarnished, 15s.; imperial mantle, made for Cyrus, and subsequently worn by Julius Cæsar and Henry VIII., 10s.; Othello's handkerchief, 6d.; six arm-chairs and six flower-plots, which dance country dances, £2." The same author adds another quotation that gives a better idea of the quantity and character of the property-man's possessions, saying:—
"He has charge of all the movables and has to exercise the greatest ingenuity in getting them up. His province is to preserve the canvas water from getting wet, keep the sun's disk clear and the moon from getting torn; he manufactures thunder on sheet iron, or from parchment stretched drum-like on a frame; he prepares boxes of dried peas for rain and wind, and huge watchman's rattles for the crash of falling towers. He has under his charge demijohns for the fall of concealed china in cupboards; speaking trumpets to imitate the growl of ferocious wild beasts; penny whistles for the 'cricket on the hearth;' powdered rosin for lightning flashes, where gas is not used; rose pink, for the blood of patriots; money, cut out of tin; finely cut bits of paper for fatal snow-storms; ten-pin balls, for the distant mutterings of a storm; bags of gold containing bits of broken glass and pebbles, to imitate the musical ring of coin; balls of cotton wadding for apple dumplings; links of sausages, made of painted flannel; sumptuous boquets of papier mache; block-tin rings with painted beads puttied in for royal signets; crowns of Dutch gilding lined with red ferret; broomstick handles cut up for truncheons for command; brooms themselves for witches to ride; branches of cedar for Birnam wood; dredging boxes of flour for the fate-desponding lovers; vermilion to tip the noses of jolly landlords; pieces of rattan silvered over for fairy wands; leaden watches, for gold repeaters; dog-chains for the necks of knighthood, and tin spurs for its heels; armor made of leather, and shields of wood; fans for ladies to coquet behind; quizzing-glasses, for exquisites to ogle with; legs of mutton, hams, loaves of bread and plum-puddings, all cut from canvas, and stuffed with sawdust; together with all the pride, pomp, and circumstance of a dramatic display. Such is the property-man of a theatre. He bears his honors meekly; he mixes molasses and water for wine and darkens it a little shade for brandy; is always busy behind the scenes, but is seldom seen, unless it is to clear the stage, and then what a shower of yells and hisses does he receive from the galleries! The thoughtless gods cry 'Supe! Supe!' which if intended for an abbreviation of superior or superfine, may be opposite, but in no other view of the case. What would a theatre be without a property-man? A world without a sun * * * Kings would be truncheonless and crownless; brigands without spoils; old men without canes and powder; Harlequin without his hat; Macduff without his leafy screen; theatres would close—there would be no tragedy, no comedy, no farce without him. Jove in his chair was never more potent than he. An actor might, and often does get along without the words of his part, but not without the properties. What strange quandaries have we seen the Garricks and Siddonses of our stage get into when the property-man lapsed in his duty! We have seen Romeo distracted because the bottle of poison was not to be found; Virginius tear his hair because the butcher's knife was not ready on the shambles; Baillie Nicol Jarvie nonplussed because there was no red-hot poker to singe the Tartan fladdie with; Macbeth frowning because the Eighth Apparition did not bear a glass to show him any more; William Tell in agony because there was no small apple for Gesler to pick; the First Murderer in distress because there was no blood for his face ready; Hecate fuming like a hellcat because her car did not mount easily; Richard the Third grinding his teeth because the clink of hammers closing rivets up was forgotten; Hamlet brought up all standing because there was no goblet to drink the poison from, and Othello stabbing Iago with a candlestick because he had no other sword of Spain, the Ebro's temper, to do the deed with. So, the property-man is no insignificant personage—he is the mainspring which sets all the work in motion; and an actor had better have a bad epitaph when dead than his ill will while living."
SCOTT-SIDDONS.