On the whole Carlton Conway looks superbly handsome and effective, when, as Ferdinand, he takes up a highly picturesque pose right in the centre of the stage. His head erect, his chest well thrown out, a little after Kyrle Bellew; his shirt-front ample; his tail-coat, and waistcoat and trousers, his patent leather boots, unimpeachable; and a gardenia from Hooper’s, in Oxford Street, although he can ill-afford the half-a-crown paid for it, fresh and snowy and fragrant, reposing on his broad breast.
With one white hand uplifted, the forefinger pointing in scorn; the third finger sparkling with a tiny but pure brilliant (Zai’s gift), he hurls:
“Oh, cursed hunger of pernicious gold,
What bands of faith can impious lucre hold?”
in a deep, impassioned voice, that fairly electrifies his audience, but makes very little impression apparently on the Lady Yolande, who has quite made up her mind to give up love and poverty for a comfortable mansion in Mayfair and plenty of diamonds and money.
Miss Flora Fitzallan, as the Lady Yolande, is at her best to-night. She looks, in fact, as if a whole page of “Debrett” was devoted to her ancestry, thereby proving that we are not what we seem, and often seem what we are not.
In the palest of blue brocades, heavily embroidered with silver, and a tuft of pale blue ostrich tips placed jauntily a little on one side of her head, and a long Court train, edged with the very best imitation ermine, she looks quite good enough for a leader of Society.
On the finger of scorn being pointed at her, the Lady Yolande laughs tragically, and with an artistic twirl of her skirt swoops down close to the foot-lights, and while her glance roves over the jeunesse dorée gathered in the stalls, cries in a contralto voice:
My name is Blue-blood! In the House of Lords
My father sits and has his say;
My mother was a Mistress of the Robes,
Before those awful Tories had their sway!
Thou forgettest, Ferdinand, that sangre azul flows
Through all my veins; that in my face
Not only love, but high ambition glows,
With which, alas! thou never canst keep pace!
Lapped in soft luxury, born in marble halls,
Vassals and serfs to answer to my calls,
I could not brave the humiliating woe
Of in this world coming down so low.
Ferdinand, forgive me! and let me go!
Without my purse full, I should surely pine,
I love good dinners, and I love good wine;
My beauty decked in velvets, satins, lace,
A jewelled diadem to crown my face.
Ferdinand, I leave thee! heart-broken, with a sigh,
But without gold and diamonds I should die!—die!
Upon this confession Ferdinand shows the laceration of his feelings by striking another attitude, an attitude of giant but picturesque despair. He folds his arms tightly across his chest, strides heavily towards her, and wears generally a depressed appearance.
“Oh!” he exclaims, lifting up his fine eyes to the gods in the gallery. “Lend me, I pray, strength to bear her perfidy.”