In a week's
time I married the widow and succeeded to the throne. "The funeral
baked meats did coldly furnish forth the marriage table," as Hamlet
says. But the ghost of my predecessor never haunted me; and I inherited
crowns, sceptres, bowls, daggers, and all the stage trappings and
trumpery, not omitting the widow, without the least molestation.
I now led a flourishing life of it; for our company was pretty strong
And attractive, and as my wife and I took the heavy parts of tragedy,
it was a great saving to the treasury. We carried off the palm from all
the rival shows at country fairs; and I assure you we have even drawn
full houses, and being applauded by the critics at Bartlemy fair
itself, though we had Astley's troupe, the Irish giant, and "the death
of Nelson" in wax-work to contend against.
I soon began to experience, however, the cares of command. I discovered
that there were cabals breaking out in the company, headed by the
clown, who you may recollect was a terribly peevish, fractious fellow,
and always in ill-humor. I had a great mind to turn him off at once,
but I could not do without him, for there was not a droller scoundrel
on the stage. His very shape was comic, for he had to turn his back
upon the audience and all the ladies were ready to die with laughing.
He felt his importance, and took advantage of it. He would keep the
audience in a continual roar, and then come behind the scenes and fret
and fume and play the very devil. I excused a great deal in him,
however, knowing that comic actors are a little prone to this infirmity
of temper.
I had another trouble of a nearer and dearer nature to struggle with;
which was, the affection of my wife. As ill luck would have it, she
took it into her head to be very fond of me, and became intolerably
jealous. I could not keep a pretty girl in the company, and hardly
dared embrace an ugly one, even when my part required it. I have known
her to reduce a fine lady to tatters, "to very rags," as Hamlet says,
in an instant, and destroy one of the very best dresses in the
wardrobe; merely because she saw me kiss her at the side
scenes; - though I give you my honor it was done merely by way of
rehearsal.
This was doubly annoying, because I have a natural liking to pretty
faces, and wish to have them about me; and because they are
indispensable to the success of a company at a fair, where one has to
vie with so many rival theatres. But when once a jealous wife gets a
freak in her head there's no use in talking of interest or anything
else.
