The hero of the play, after putting up a stiff fight with the villain, had died to slow music.
The audience insisted on his coming before the curtain.
He refused to appear.
But the audience still insisted.
Then the manager, a gentleman with a strong accent, came to the front.
"Ladies an" gintlemen," he said, "the carpse thanks ye kindly, but he says he"s dead, an" he"s goin to stay dead."
Mrs. Minnie Maddern Fiske, the actress, was having her hair dressed by a young woman at her home. The actress was very tired and quiet, but a chance remark from the dresser made her open her eyes and sit up.
"I should have went on the stage," said the young woman complacently.
"But," returned Mrs. Fiske, "look at me--think how I have had to work and study to gain what success I have, and win such fame as is now mine!"
"Oh, yes," replied the young woman calmly; "but then I have talent."
Orlando Day, a fourth-rate actor in London, was once called, in a sudden emergency, to supply the place of Allen Ainsworth at the Criterion Theatre for a single night.
The call filled him with joy. Here was a chance to show the public how great a histrionic genius had remained unknown for lack of an opportunity. But his joy was suddenly dampened by the dreadful thought that, as the play was already in the midst of its run, none of the dramatic critics might be there to watch his triumph.
A bright thought struck him. He would announce the event. Rushing to a telegraph office, he sent to one of the leading critics the following telegram: "Orlando Day presents Allen Ainsworth"s part to-night at the Criterion."
Then it occurred to him, "Why not tell them all?" So he repeated the message to a dozen or more important persons.
At a late hour of the same day, in the Garrick Club, a lounging gentleman produced one of the telegrams, and read it to a group of friends. A chorus of exclamations followed the reading: "Why, I got precisely the same message!" "And so did I." "And I, too." "Who is Orlando Day?" "What beastly cheek!" "Did the a.s.s fancy that one would pay any attention to his wire?"
J. M. Barrie, the famous author and playwright, who was present, was the only one who said nothing.
"Didn"t he wire you too?" asked one of the group.
"Oh, yes."
"But of course you didn"t answer."
"Oh, but it was only polite to send an answer after he had taken the trouble to wire me. So, of course, I answered him."
"You did! What did you say?"
"Oh, I just telegraphed him: "Thanks for timely warning.""
Twinkle, twinkle, lovely star!
How I wonder if you are When at home the tender age You appear when on the stage.
--_Mary A. Fairchild_.
Recipe for an actor:
To one slice of ham add a.s.sortment of roles.
Steep the head in mash notes till it swells, Garnish with onions, tomatoes and beets, Or with eggs--from afar--in the sh.e.l.ls.
--_Life_.
Recipe for an ingenue:
A pound and three-quarters of kitten, Three ounces of flounces and sighs; Add wiggles and giggles and gurgles, And ringlets and dimples and eyes.
--_Life_.
ADAPTATION
"I know a nature-faker," said Mr. Bache, the author, "who claims that a hen of his last month hatched, from a setting of seventeen eggs, seventeen chicks that had, in lieu of feathers, fur.
"He claimed that these fur-coated chicks were a proof of nature"s adaptation of all animals to their environment, the seventeen eggs having been of the cold-storage variety."
ADDRESSES
In a large store a child, pointing to a shopper exclaimed, "Oh, mother, that lady lives the same place we do. I just heard her say, "Send it up C.O.D." Isn"t that where we live?"
An Englishman went into his local library and asked for Frederic Harrison"s _George Washington and other American Addresses_. In a little while he brought back the book to the librarian and said:
"This book does not give me what I require; I want to find out the addresses of several American magnates; I know where George Washington has gone to, for he never told a lie."
ADVERTISING
Not long ago a patron of a cafe in Chicago summoned his waiter and delivered himself as follows:
"I want to know the meaning of this. Look at this piece of beef. See its size. Last evening I was served with a portion more than twice the size of this."