Books: Peg Woffington
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Charles Reade >> Peg Woffington
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"Margaret, remember I have known you much longer than you have known me.
"No!"
"Yes! Two months before we ever spoke I lived upon your face and voice.
"That is to say you looked from your box at me upon the stage, and did
not I look from the stage at you?"
"Never! you always looked at the pit, and my heart used to sink."
"On the 17th of May you first came into that box. I noticed you a little,
the next day I noticed you a little more; I saw you fancied you liked me,
after a while I could not have played without you."
Here was delicious flattery again, and poor Vane believed every word of
it.
As for her request and her promise, she showed her wisdom in both these.
As Sir Charles observed, it is a wonderful point gained if you allow a
woman to tell her story her own way.
How the few facts that are allowed to remain get molded and twisted out
of ugly forms into pretty shapes by those supple, dexterous fingers!
This present story cannot give the life of Mrs. Woffington, but only one
great passage therein, as do the epic and dramatic writers; but since
there was often great point in any sentences spoken on important
occasions by this lady, I will just quote her defense of herself. The
reader may be sure she did not play her weakest card; let us give her the
benefit.
One day she and Kitty Clive were at it ding-dong; the green-room was full
of actors, male and female, but there were no strangers, and the ladies
were saying things which the men of this generation only think; at last
Mrs. Woffington finding herself roughly, and, as she thought, unjustly
handled, turned upon the assembly and said: "What man did ever I ruin in
all my life? Speak who can!"
And there was a dead silence.
"What woman is there here at as much as three pounds per week even, that
hasn't ruined two at the very least?"
Report says there was a dead silence again, until Mrs. Clive perked up,
and said she had only ruined one, and that was his own fault!
Mrs. Woffington declined to attach weight to this example. "Kitty Clive
is the hook without the bait," said she; and the laugh turned, as it
always did, against Peggy's antagonist.
Thus much was speedily shown to Mr. Vane, that, whatever were Mrs.
Woffington's intentions toward him, interest had at present nothing to do
with them; indeed it was made clear that even were she to surrender her
liberty to him, it would only be as a princess, forging golden chains for
herself with her own royal hand.
Another fortnight passed to the mutual satisfaction of the lovers. To
Vane it was a dream of rapture to be near this great creature, whom
thousands admired at such a distance; to watch over her, to take her to
the theater in a warm shawl, to stand at the wing and receive her as she
came radiant from her dressing-room, to watch her from her rear as she
stood like some power about to descend on the stage, to see her
falcon-like stoop upon the said stage, and hear the burst of applause
that followed, as the report does the flash; to compare this with the
spiritless crawl with which common artists went on, tame from their first
note to their last; to take her hand when she came off, feel how her
nerves were strung like a greyhound's after a race, and her whole frame
in a high even glow, with the great Pythoness excitement of art.
And to have the same great creature leaning her head on his shoulder, and
listening with a charming complacency, while he purred to her of love and
calm delights, alternate with still greater triumphs; for he was to turn
dramatic writer, for her sake, was to write plays, a woman the hero, and
love was to inspire him, and passion supply the want of pencraft. (You
make me laugh, Mr. Vane!)
All this was heavenly.
And then with all her dash, and fire, and bravado, she was a thorough
woman.
"Margaret!"
"Ernest!"
"I want to ask you a question. Did you really cry because that Miss
Bellamy had dresses from Paris?"
"It does not seem very likely."
"No, but tell me; did you?"
"Who said I did?"
"Mr. Cibber."
"Old fool!"
"Yes, but did you?"
"Did I what?"
"Cry!"
"Ernest, the minx's dresses were beautiful."
"No doubt. But did you cry?"
"And mine were dirty; I don't care about gilt rags, but dirty dresses,
ugh!"
"Tell me, then."
"Tell you what?"
"Did you cry or not?"
"Ah! he wants to find out whether I am a fool, and despise me."
"No, I think I should love you better. For hitherto I have seen no
weakness in you, and it makes me uncomfortable."
"Be comforted! Is it not a weakness to like you!"
"You are free from that weakness, or you would gratify my curiosity."
"Be pleased to state, in plain, intelligible English, what you require of
me."
"I want to know, in one word, did you cry or not?"
"Promise to tease me no more then, and I'll tell you."
"I promise."
"You won't despise me?"
"Despise you! of course not."
"Well, then--I don't remember!"
On another occasion they were seated in the dusk, by the side of the
canal in the Park, when a little animal began to potter about on an
adjacent bank.
Mrs. Woffington contemplated it with curiosity and delight.
"Oh, you pretty creature!" said she. "Now you are a rabbit; at least, I
think so."
"No," said Vane, innocently; "that is a rat."
"Ah! ah! ah!" screamed Mrs. Woffington, and pinched his arm. This
frightened the rat, who disappeared. She burst out laughing: "There's a
fool! The thing did not frighten me, and the name did. Depend upon it,
it's true what they say--that off the stage, I am the greatest fool there
is. I'll never be so absurd again. Ah! ah! ah! here it is again" (scream
and pinch, as before). "Do take me from this horrid place, where monsters
come from the great deep."
And she flounced away, looking daggers askant at the place the rat had
vacated in equal terror.
All this was silly, but it pleases us men, and contrast is so charming!
This same fool was brimful of talent--and cunning, too, for that matter.
She played late that night, and Mr. Vane saw the same creature, who dared
not stay where she was liable to a distant rat, spring upon the stage as
a gay rake, and flash out her rapier, and act valor's king to the life,
and seem ready to eat up everybody, King Fear included; and then, after
her brilliant sally upon the public, Sir Harry Wildair came and stood
beside Mr. Vane. Her bright skin, contrasted with her powdered periwig,
became dazzling. She used little rouge, but that little made her eyes two
balls of black lightning. From her high instep to her polished forehead,
all was symmetry. Her leg would have been a sculptor's glory; and the
curve from her waist to her knee was Hogarth's line itself.
She stood like Mercury new lighted on a heaven-kissing hill. She placed
her foot upon the ground, as she might put a hand upon her lover's
shoulder. We indent it with our eleven undisguised stone.
Such was Sir Harry Wildair, who stood by Mr. Vane, glittering with
diamond buckles, gorgeous with rich satin breeches, velvet coat, ruffles,
_pictcae vestis et auri;_ and as she bent her long eye-fringes down on
him (he was seated), all her fiery charms gradually softened and quivered
down to womanhood.
"The first time I was here," said Vane, "my admiration of you broke out
to Mr. Cibber; and what do you think he said?"
"That you praised me, for me to hear you. Did you?"
"Acquit me of such meanness."
"Forgive me. It is just what I should have done, had I been courting an
actress."
"I think you have not met many ingenuous spirits, dear friend."
"Not one, my child."
This was a phrase she often applied to him now.
"The old fellow pretended to hear what I said, too; and I am sure you did
not-- did you?"
"Guess."
"I guess not."
"I am afraid I must plead guilty. An actress's ears are so quick to hear
praise, to tell you the truth, I did catch a word or two, and, 'It told,
sir--it told.'"
"You alarm me! At this rate, I shall never know what you see, hear or
think, by your face."
"When you want to know anything, ask me, and I will tell you; but nobody
else shall learn anything, nor even you, any other way."
"Did you hear the feeble tribute of praise I was paying you, when you
came in?" inquired Vane.
"No. You did not say that my voice had the compass and variety of nature,
and my movements were free and beautiful, while the others when in motion
were stilts, and coffee-pots when in repose, did you?"
"Something of the sort, I believe," cried Vane, laughing.
"I melted from one fine statue into another, I restored the Antinous to
his true sex.--Goose!--Painters might learn their art from me (in my
dressing-room, no doubt), and orators revive at my lips the music of
Athens, that quelled mad mobs and princes drunk with victory.--Silly
fellow!--Praise was never so sweet to me," murmured she, inclining like a
goddess of love toward him; and he fastened on two velvet lips, that did
not shun the sweet attack, but gently parted with a heavenly sigh; while
her heaving bosom and yielding frame and swimming eyes confessed her
conqueror.
That morning Mr. Vane had been dispirited, and apparently
self-discontented; but at night he went home in a state of mental
intoxication. His poetic enthusiasm, his love, his vanity, were all
gratified at once. And all these, singly, have conquered Prudence and
Virtue a million times.
She had confessed to him that she was disposed to risk her happiness on
him; she had begged him to submit to a short probation; and she had
promised, if her confidence and esteem remained unimpaired at the close
of that period--which was not to be an unhappy one--to take advantage of
the summer holidays, and cross the water with him, and forget everything
in the world with him, but love.
How was it that the very next morning clouds chased one another across
his face? Was it that men are happy but while the chase is doubtful? Was
it the letter from Pomander announcing his return, and sneeringly
inquiring whether he was still the dupe of Peg Woffington? or was it that
same mysterious disquiet which attacked him periodically, and then gave
way for a while to pleasure and her golden dreams?
The next day was to be a day of delight. He was to entertain her at his
own house; and, to do her honor, he had asked Mr. Cibber, Mr. Quin and
other actors, critics, etc.
Our friend, Sir Charles Pomander, had been guilty of two ingenuities:
first, he had written three or four letters, full of respectful
admiration, to Mrs. Woffington, of whom he spoke slightingly to Vane;
second, he had made a disingenuous purchase.
This purchase was Pompey, Mrs. Woffington's little black slave. It is a
horrid fact, but Pompey did not love his mistress. He was a little
enamored of her, as small boys are apt to be, but, on the whole, a
sentiment of hatred slightly predominated in his little black bosom.
It was not without excuse.
This lady was subject to two unpleasant companions--sorrow and
bitterness. About twice a week she would cry for two hours; and after
this class of fit she generally went abroad, and made a round of certain
poor or sick _proteges_ she had, and returned smiling and cheerful.
But other twice a week she might be seen to sit upon her chair,
contracted into half her size, and looking daggers at the universe in
general, the world in particular; and on these occasions, it must be
owned, she stayed at home, and sometimes whipped Pompey.
Pompey had not the sense to reflect that he ought to have been whipped
every day, or the _esprit de corps_ to be consoled by observing that this
sort of thing did his mistress good. What he felt was, that his mistress,
who did everything well, whipped him with energy and skill; it did not
take ten seconds, but still, in that brief period, Pompey found himself
dusted and polished off.
The sacred principle of justice was as strong in Mrs. Woffington as in
the rest of her sex; she had not one grain of it. When she was not in her
tantrums, the mischievous imp was as sacred from check or remonstrance as
a monkey or a lap-dog; and several female servants left the house on his
account.
But Nemesis overtook him in the way we have hinted, and it put his little
black pipe out.
The lady had taken him out of great humanity; he was fed like a
game-cock, and dressed like a Barbaric prince; and once when he was ill
his mistress watched him, and nursed him, and tended him with the same
white hand that plied the obnoxious whip; and when he died, she alone
withheld her consent from his burial, and this gave him a chance black
boys never get, and he came to again; but still these tarnation lickings
"stuck in him gizzard." So when Sir Charles's agent proposed to him
certain silver coins, cheap at a little treachery, the ebony ape grinned
till he turned half ivory, and became a spy in the house of his mistress.
The reader will have gathered that the good Sir Charles had been quietly
in London some hours before he announced himself as _paulo post futurum._
Diamond cut diamond; a diplomat stole this march upon an actress, and
took her black pawn. One for Pomander! (Gun.)
CHAPTER IV.
TRIPLET, the Cerberus of art, who had the first bark in this legend, and
has since been out of hearing, ran from Lambeth to Covent Garden, on
receipt of Mr. Vane's note. But ran he never so quick, he had built a
full-sized castle in the air before he reached Bow Street.
The letter hinted at an order upon his muse for amatory verse; delightful
task, cheering prospect.
Bid a man whose usual lot it is to break stones for the parish at
tenpence the cubic yard--bid such an one play at marbles with some stone
taws for half an hour per day, and pocket one pound one--bid a poor horse
who has drawn those stones about, and browsed short grass by the
wayside-- bid him canter a few times round a grassy ring, and then go to
his corn--in short, bid Rosinante change with Pegasus, and you do no more
than Mr. Vane's letter held out to Triplet.
The amatory verse of that day was not up-hill work. There was a beaten
track on a dead level, and you followed it. You told the tender creature,
with a world of circumlocution, that, "without joking now," she was a
leper, ditto a tigress, item marble. You next feigned a lucid interval,
and to be on the point of detesting your monster, but in twenty more
verses love became, as usual, stronger than reason, and you wound up your
rotten yarn thus:
You hugged a golden chain. You drew deeper into your wound a barbed
shaft, like--(any wild animal will do, no one of them is such an ass, so
you had an equal title to all). And on looking back you saw with horrible
complacency that you had inflicted one hundred locusts, five feet long,
upon oppressed humanity.
Wont to travel over acres of canvas for a few shillings, and roods of
paper on bare speculation, Triplet knew he could make a thousand a year
at the above work without thinking.
He came therefore to the box-keeper with his eyes glittering.
"Mr. Vane?"
"Just gone out with a gentleman."
"I'll wait then."
Now Mr. Vane, we know, was in the green-room, and went home by the
stage-door. The last thing he thought of was poor Triplet; the rich do
not dream how they disappoint the poor. Triplet's castle fell as many a
predecessor had. When the lights were put out, he left the theater with a
bitter sigh.
"If this gentleman knew how many sweet children I have, and what a good,
patient, suffering wife, sure he would not have chosen me to make a fool
of!" said the poor fellow to himself.
In Bow Street, he turned, and looked back upon the theater. How gloomy
and grand it loomed!
"Ah!" thought he, "if I could but conquer you; and why not? All history
shows that nothing is unconquerable except perseverance. Hannibal
conquered the Alps, and I'll conquer you," cried Triplet, firmly. "Yes,
this visit is not lost; here I register a vow: I will force my way into
that mountain of masonry, or perish in the attempt."
Triplet's most unpremeditated thoughts and actions often savored
ridiculously of the sublime. Then and there, gazing with folded arms on
this fortress of Thespis, the polytechnic man organized his first
assault. The next evening he made it.
Five months previously he had sent the manager three great, large
tragedies. He knew the aversion a theatrical manager has to read a
manuscript play, not recommended by influential folk; an aversion which
always has been carried to superstition. So he hit on the following
scheme:
He wrote Mr. Rich a letter; in this he told Mr. Rich that he (Triplet)
was aware what a quantity of trash is offered every week to a manager,
how disheartening it must be to read it at all, and how natural, after a
while, to read none. Therefore, he (Triplet) had provided that Mr. Rich
might economize his time, and yet not remain in ignorance of the dramatic
treasure that lay ready to his hand.
"The soul of a play," continued Triplet, "is the plot or fable. A
gentleman of your experience can decide at once whether a plot or story
is one to take the public!"
So then he drew out, in full, the three plots. He wrote these plots in
verse! Heaven forgive us all, he really did. There were also two margins
left; on one, which was narrow, he jotted down the _locale_ per page of
the most brilliant passages; on the other margin, which was as wide as
the column of the plot, he made careful drawings of the personages in the
principal dramatic situations; scrolls issued from their mouths, on which
were written the words of fire that were flowing from each in these
eruptions of the dramatic action. All was referred to pages in the
manuscripts.
"By this means, sir," resumed the latter, "you will gut my fish in a
jiffy; permit me to recall that expression, with apologies for my
freedom. I would say, you will, in a few minutes of your valuable
existence, skim the cream of Triplet."
This author's respect for the manager's time carried him into further and
unusual details.
"Breakfast," said he, "is a quiet meal. Let me respectfully suggest, that
by placing one of my plots on the table, with, say, the sugar-basin upon
it (this, again, is a mere suggestion), and the play it appertains to on
your other side, you can readily judge my work without disturbing the
avocations of the day, and master a play in the twinkling of a teacup;
forgive my facetiousness. This day month, at ten of the clock, I shall
expect," said Triplet, with sudden severity, "sir, your decision!"
Then, gliding back to the courtier, he formally disowned all special
title to the consideration he expected from Mr. Rich's well-known
courtesy; still he begged permission to remind that gentleman that he
had, six years ago, painted for him a large scene, illuminated by two
great poetical incidents: a red sun, of dimensions never seen out of
doors in this or any country; and an ocean of sand, yellower than up to
that time had been attained in art or nature; and that once, when the
audience, late in the evening, had suddenly demanded a popular song from
Mr. Nokes, he (Triplet), seeing the orchestra thinned by desertion, and
nugatory by intoxication, had started from the pit, resuscitated with the
whole contents of his snuff-box the bass fiddle, snatched the leader's
violin, and carried Mr. Nokes triumphantly through; that thunders of
applause had followed, and Mr. Nokes had kindly returned thanks _for
both;_ but that he (Triplet) had hastily retired to evade the manager's
acknowledgments, preferring to wait an opportunity like the present, when
both interests could be conciliated, etc.
This letter he posted at its destination, to save time, and returned
triumphant home. He had now forgiven and almost forgotten Vane; and had
reflected that, after all, the drama was his proper walk.
"My dear," said he to Mrs. Triplet, "this family is on the eve of a great
triumph!" Then, inverting that order of the grandiloquent and the homely
which he invented in our first chapter, he proceeded to say: "I have
reared in a single day a new avenue by which histrionic greatness,
hitherto obstructed, may become accessible. Wife, I think I have done the
trick at last. Lysimachus!" added he, "let a libation be poured out on so
smiling an occasion, and a burnt-offering rise to propitiate the
celestial powers. Run to the 'Sun,' you dog. Three pennyworth of ale, and
a hap'orth o' tobacco."
Ere the month was out, I am sorry to say, the Triplets were reduced to a
state of beggary. Mrs. Triplet's health had long been failing; and,
although her duties at her little theater were light and occasional, the
manager was obliged to discharge her, since she could not be depended
upon.
The family had not enough to eat! Think of that! They were not warm at
night, and they felt gnawing and faintness often by day. Think of that!
Fortune was unjust here. The man was laughable, and a goose; and had no
genius either for writing, painting, or acting; but in that he resembled
most writers, painters, and actors of his own day and ours. He was not
beneath the average of what men call art, and it is art's
antipodes--treadmill artifice.
Other fluent ninnies shared gain, and even fame, and were called
'penmen,' in Triplet's day. Other ranters were quietly getting rich by
noise. Other liars and humbugs were painting out o' doors indoors, and
eating mutton instead of thistles for drenched stinging-nettles, yclept
trees; for block-tin clouds; for butlers' pantry seas, and
garret-conceived lakes; for molten sugar-candy rivers; for airless
atmosphere and sunless air; for carpet nature, and cold, dead fragments
of an earth all soul and living glory to every cultivated eye but a
routine painter's. Yet the man of many such mediocrities could not keep
the pot boiling. We suspect that, to those who would rise in life, even
strong versatility is a very doubtful good, and weak versatility
ruination.
At last, the bitter, weary month was gone, and Triplet's eye brightened
gloriously. He donned his best suit; and, while tying his cravat,
lectured his family. First, he complimented them upon their deportment in
adversity; hinted that moralists, not experience, had informed him
prosperity was far more trying to the character. Put them all solemnly on
their guard down to Lucy, _aetat_ five, that they were _morituri_ and
_ae,_ and must be pleased to abstain from "insolent gladness" upon his
return.
"Sweet are the uses of adversity!" continued this cheerful monitor. "If
we had not been hard up this while, we should not come with a full relish
to meat three times a week, which, unless I am an ass (and I don't see
myself in that light)," said Triplet dryly, "will, I apprehend, be, after
this day, the primary condition of our future existence."
"James, take the picture with you," said Mrs. Triplet, in one of those
calm, little, desponding voices that fall upon the soul so agreeably when
one is a cock-a-hoop, and desires, with permission, so to remain.
"What on earth am I to take Mrs. Woffington's portrait for?"
"We have nothing in the house," said the wife, blushing.
Triplet's eye glittered like a rattlesnake's.
"The intimation is eccentric," said he. "Are you mad, Jane? Pray,"
continued he, veiling his wrath in scornful words, "is it requisite,
heroic, or judicious on the eve, or more correctly the morn, of affluence
to deposit an unfinished work of art with a mercenary relation? Hang it,
Jane! would you really have me pawn Mrs. Woffington to-day?"
"James," said Jane steadily, "the manager may disappoint you, we have
often been disappointed; so take the picture with you. They will give you
ten shillings on it."
Triplet was one of those who see things roseate, Mrs. Triplet lurid.
"Madam," said the poet, "for the first time in our conjugal career, your
commands deviate so entirely from reason that I respectfully withdraw
that implicit obedience which has hitherto constituted my principal
reputation. I'm hanged if I do it, Jane!"
"Dear James, to oblige me!"
"That alters the case; you confess it is unreasonable?"
"Oh, yes! it is only to oblige me.
"Enough!" said Triplet, whose tongue was often a flail that fell on
friend, foe and self indiscriminately. "Allow it to be unreasonable, and
I do it as a matter of course--to please you, Jane."
Accordingly the good soul wrapped it in green baize; but to relieve his
mind he was obliged to get behind his wife, and shrug his shoulders to
Lysimachus and the eldest girl, as who should say _voila bien une femme
votre mere a vous!_
At last he was off, in high spirits. He reached Covent Garden at
half-past ten, and there the poor fellow was sucked into our narrative
whirlpool.
We must, however, leave him for a few minutes,
CHAPTER V.
SIR CHARLES POMANDER was detained in the country much longer than he
expected.
He was rewarded by a little adventure. As he cantered up to London with
two servants and a post-boy, all riding on horses ordered in relays
beforehand, he came up with an antediluvian coach, stuck fast by the
road-side. Looking into the window, with the humane design of quizzing
the elders who should be there, he saw a young lady of surpassing beauty.
This altered the case; Sir Charles instantly drew bridle and offered his
services.
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