I remember another old friend of mine—John Madden—he made a hit in that ill-fated play, A Little Bit Off the Top—who had an extraordinary passion for shell-fish. I have often seen him seated on Southend Pier eating shrimps out of a paper-bag. By the way, I ought to add that he always purchased the shrimps in town and travelled down with them.
Poor John, he might still be eating shrimps to-day if he hadn't caught a chill throwing off his sable coat during a rehearsal at the "Lane."
Talking of fur coats, Florence Montgomery, who flourished in the early eighties, and took the town by storm singing, "Let me share your umbrella," in tights, had a perfect passion for them. She had one for every day in the week, as she laughingly told me once. She vanished suddenly, and everybody thought she had eloped with the Russian Duke B—— (he had been paying her marked attention), but it turned out afterwards that she had married a dustman.
I met him casually at one of the yearly dinners given to this hardworking body of men—a most affable person he was too and deeply interested in the chemical properties of manure—and it came out. Some people might have thought a marriage like this a bit of a hygienic risk, but Florence always had a heart of gold.
I have often thought this possession to be a particular attribute of the theatrical profession. Bessie Bean, the "Cocoa Queen," possessed it in a marked degree. I remember we called her the "Cocoa Queen" because she always fancied "a drop of something comforting" just before the curtain went up on the Third Act. Only, unfortunately, it wasn't cocoa.
Arthur Batchen, manager of the Fly-by-Night Theatre and one of the best fellows that ever breathed, told me once he thought the soda must get into Bessie's legs. But her dresser was positive about her instructions always to forget the soda. So I don't think it can have been that.
I remember too—
[For the continuation of this interesting series of reminiscences see to-morrow's Evening Cues.]