409. Red Deer, after Landseer.
MAY—A new drop scene at the Opera.
MAY.—A New Drop Scene at the Opera.
No lady is a lady without having a box at the Opera: so my Jemmy, who knew as much about music,—bless her!—as I do about sanscrit, algebra, or any other foreign language, took a prime box on the second tier. It was what they called a double box; it really could hold two, that is, very comfortably; and we got it a great bargain—for five hundred a year! Here, Tuesdays and Saturdays we used regularly to take our places, Jemmy and Jemimarann sitting in front; me, behind: but as my dear wife used to wear a large fantail gauze hat, with ostrich feathers, birds of paradise, artificial flowers, and tags of muslin or satin, scattered all over it, I'm blest if she didn't fill the whole of the front of the box; and it was only by jumping and dodging, three or four times in the course of the night, that I could manage to get a sight of the actors. By kneeling down, and looking steady under my darling Jemmy's sleeve, I did contrive, every now and then, to have a peep of Senior Lablash's boots, in the Puritanny, and once saw Madame Greasi's crown and head-dress in Annybalony.
What a place that Opera is, to be sure! and what enjoyments us aristocracy used to have! Just as you have swallowed down your three courses (three curses I used to call them; for so, indeed, they are, causing a deal of heartburns, headaches, doctor's bills, pills, want of sleep, and such like)—just, I say, as you get down your three courses, which I defy any man to enjoy properly, unless he has two hours of drink and quiet afterwards, up comes the carriage, in bursts my Jemmy, as fine as a duchess, and scented like our shop. "Come, my dear," says she, "it's Normy to-night (or Annybalony, or the Nosey di Figaro, or the Gazzylarder, as the case may be); Mr. Coster strikes off punctually at eight, and you know it's the fashion to be always present at the very first bar of the aperture;" and so off we budge, to be miserable for five hours, and to have a headache for the next twelve, and all because it's the fashion!
After the aperture, as they call it, comes the opera, which, as I am given to understand, is the Italian for singing. Why they should sing in Italian, I can't conceive; or why they should do nothing but sing: bless us, how I used to long for the wooden magpie in the Gazzylarder, to fly up to the top of the church-steeple, and see the chaps with the pitchforks to come in and carry off that wicked Don June. Not that I don't admire Lablash, and Rubini, and his brother, Tomrubini, him who has that fine bass voice, I mean, and acts the Corporal in the first piece, and Don June in the second; but three hours is a little too much, for you can't sleep on those little rickety seats in the boxes.
The opera is bad enough; but what is that to the bally? You should have seen my Jemmy the first night when she stopped to see it; and when Madamsalls Fanny and Theresa Hustler came forward, along with a gentleman, to dance, you should have seen how Jemmy stared, and our girl blushed, when Madamsall Fanny, coming forward, stood on the tips of only five of her toes, and raising up the other five, and the foot belonging to them, almost to her shoulder, twirled round, and round, and round, like a teetotum, for a couple of minutes or more; and as she settled down, at last, on both feet, in a natural decent posture, you should have heard how the house roared with applause, the boxes clapping with all their might, and waving their handkerchiefs; the pit shouting, "Bravo!" Some people, who, I suppose, were rather angry at such an exhibition, threw bunches of flowers at her; and what do you think she did? why, hang me, if she did not come forward, as though nothing had happened, gather up the things they had thrown at her, smile, press them to her heart, and began whirling round again, faster than ever!—Talk about coolness, I never saw such in all my born days.
"Nasty thing!" says Jemmy, starting up in a fury; "if women will act so, it serves them right to be treated so."