FWI BETWEEN THE ACTS. CTING is confined to one side of the curtain, but a theatre may furnish equally pleasant entertainment on the other. It is quite as good as a play, the scene in the auditorium at Christmas time, and far better, I need scarcely add, than certain plays by authors who might be mentioned. The audience are a performance in themselves. With the exception of a few hardened frequenters nobody comes to be critical. Paterfamilias, who has taken a box, or a little colony of seats in the circle, for the daughters and sons of his house and heart, is as determined as they are to be amused; and it would take a very clever piece indeed to baulk their intention. For To the younger children the scene is entirely new. But the idea of a play has been handed down to them by oral tradition; and of a pantomime in particular they have a clear conception. They will be certain to know the Harlequin when he comes on; and the Clown must be unmistakable. has not one of the elders-Master Jackey, who was at the theatre last year-performed all the Clown's antics, to the confusion of the nursery? The opening the pantomime, it must be confessed, causes a little disappointment. It is very beautiful to look at; the fairies are lovely; and the people with preposterously large heads, delightful. But this is not quite what the little people have been waiting for. The transformation scene diverts them from the pressure of hope deferred by taking their breath away. Can they believe their eyes! How wonderful are those red coral caves beneath the silent sea, where enchanted nightingales sing songs of the morning of life! And what wonders are worked upon them by that fairy queen! Who could have supposed that each of those flowers would contain a young lady-and a young lady, too, of such surpassing beauty! Still, as the red and green fire becomes pale, the impression made by even this marvellous spectacle fades away; and the first bound of the Harlequin-the first salute of the Clown-is hailed as the beginning of the real business-that is to say, the real pleasure-of the night. During the remainder of the performance the juveniles give themselves up to unrestrained enjoyment. They will have something to talk about for six months to come. They have had a fortnight's talk in anticipation. The first idea of going to see the pantomime' furnished a subject for inquiries which, not being quite rational, were found difficult to answer. As the day drew near the excitement increased, and the younger children awoke at a preternaturally early hour in the morning, having a settled idea in their heads that they were destined to be too late for the theatre at night. Their restlessness all day has tried the patience of the authorities to a dreadful extent. Mamma has early given up the idea of combining complaisance with the exercise of a necessary amount of repression. The governess has undertaken the task, not without some slight ebullitions of temper; and the elder sisters have exercised what influence they could in the cause of peace and quietness. Early in the day the children have taken their meals with some tractability; but the meal which they comprehensively call 'tea' in domestic circles had been sadly neglected; and indeed the serious business of the toilette, which took place about the same time, was alone sufficient for any amount of demoralisation in the matter of refreshments. the servant girl at the play, mentions, as a remarkable fact, that she liked even the waiting between the acts, which, he says, is so tiresome to other people. But in Charles Lamb's days theatres were not so commodious as they are in these; and to move about them freely was to mix in all sorts of society. So people stayed more continuously in their places than they do in these days, and the places themselves were by no means such pleasant accommodation as is now provided. That waiting between the acts was peculiarly vexatious under such conditions may easily be conceived. The children, however, are only a part of the entertainment in front of the curtain. There are the young ladies, of course, who are the chief attraction in entertainments of most kinds. These may be divided broadly into two classes -those who are 'out,' and those who are in, but may be seen out occasionally. The former, being free of society, are tolerably well known. Every one among them is of course conducting herself as if the entire theatre-scenery, dresses, and decorations, play, pantomime, Harlequin, Columbine, and Clown-were her own freehold property; and any respect and attention paid to her she receives as strictly her due. But the younger girls, who are not yet released from governesses and professors-and not so long ago pursued studies associated with slate pencils and dogs'-eared elementary works are far more affable. They take any attention they can get in a most grateful manner, and are pronounced charming by everybody but very young men of their own age, who hold them in natural scorn. They love a little dignity, perhaps, when their young brothers interfere with a 'grownup' conversation by a playful reference to juvenile topics, and it may be a more than playful pull at their hair; but they are not quite sure that they do not like this kind of fun as well as any other, and when placed in a situation between flirting and romps-like Gar rick between Tragedy and Comedythey may find an undefined charm in flirting, but romps will usually carry the day. Young ladies have been known to romp after they come out,' but of course such proceedings are buried in domestic oblivion. Next to the young people who enjoy pantomimes, old people interest us the most. They would not dream of seeking such entertainments for themselves; but those who live again in their children must have sympathy with their amusements, and sympathy will carry the elders of a family into the keenest enjoyment of the escapades of Harlequin and Columbine, Clown and Pantaloon. We should think twice before calling Materfamilias an old girl, but Paterfamilias has many representatives among old boys, who take intense delight in seeing the Pantaloon robbed of the sausages from his capacious pockets, and in beholding the agility of the Clown in connexion with a red-hot poker. They remember the days when such antics were enacted for their especial benefit; and they can no more forget them than they can forget the days when they committed such preposterous irregularities at school, and suffered accordingly; their irregularities, as well as their sufferings-as they will tell you-being far beyond anything that boys have an idea of in these days. I dare say that their school frolics were much like the school frolics of their descendants; but it is the old story. In our latter years there seems to have 'passed away a glory from the earth.' The old nobleman in Gil Blas' thought that the peaches used to be larger when he was young; and even the delinquencies of boyhood appear in a magnified form to matured memories. Some old boys, by-the-way, who were re He classes it-if exclusive in his views -with bad weather and the absurd pretensions of the masses. The oi polloi, however, cannot do him much harm in the stalls; and even the camellia in his buttonhole is safe from any popular atmosphere. He does not usually care about the Christmas element among the audience, and has so little respect for the pantomime that he departs after the transformation scene. His nil admirari views are shared by professional critics in his neighbourhood, who, however, go away and praise the piece in their papers with charming inconsistency. In the stalls they talk from their own point of view; in their offices they write from the point of view of the public-a happy arrangement, without which the readers of the journals, who give their trust thereto, would be at the mercy of individual vagaries to an absurd extent. The majority of the audience-in all parts of the house-come determined to enjoy any entertainment prepared for them at Christmas-time; and they do not like it the less if they make less noise than they used to do. There is a tradition about Drury Lane and Covent Garden which still leads to a call for a senseless song about 'Hot Codlins,' which the Clown has usually to sing; but I think that the demonstration is dying out by degrees; and of late years holiday audiences, even at the large theatres, are much better behaved than they used to be. But pits will be pits, and galleries will be galleries, and unruliness from the latter part especially -may still be considered on the cards. This, however, is part of the entertainment before the curtain; and far be it from me to deprecate the public delight. Many of the audience move about the theatre between the acts-or between the pieces, as the case may be; and those who go outside for a time will find crowds of persons there assembled, who, without seeing anything of the performance, are assisting at it in their own way. Towards the time when carriages are ordered many vehicles assemble, of which the private con veyances have the pas. There is a great crowding, too, of cabs claiming to be hired, and necessary contentions between them and the police. The. number of volunteer vagabonds, who are ready to run anywhere in the cause of the comers-out, is nothing less than legion; and those who commission one of them to get a cab usually find a dozen claimants to the honour of the service rendered. But the cabby who is really engaged, and waits in good faith, is not, of course, to be tampered with by these marauders. He is there, punctual to his post when wanted; and, although he has not seen the pantomime, considers that he has had a good evening's entertainment. Let us hope that he will be well rewarded by his patrons when they arrive home; and if during his time of trial he has not been insensible to the attraction of refreshment, let us also hope that this frailty-a mere nothing for Christmastime-will be taken into account. A gentleman who is clinging to a lamp-post hard by has abused this claim to consideration, and the only hope appropriate to him is, that he will be taken care of by the police. He is happily little noticed by the crowd coming away from fairy land, and going home to dream-as all but the disillusioned are sure to do through the ivory gate. |