Social Gossip From Home.

Daily Telegraph (Napier), Issue 5684, 18 November 1889, Page 2

Social Gossip From Home.

The London correspondent of tho Melbourne Argus writes: —

This week was buried one of the last of the old Bohemians — Edward Laman Blanchard. Hβ was an established playwright three-and-fifty years ago, and ever since 1856 he had written, or been announced to have written, the p&ntomine at Drury-. lane Theatre. Latterly his work there had x . _■ come to bo a mere trap for the sixpences of ** the unwary. The book, as sold b-v- tho • attendants, was as vacuous aa its author's " face. Behind the footlights, on the other hand, a brilliant piece of drollery was being set forth by the players—all of it "gag" elaborated gradually at rehearsal and nighiaf tor night—uutilabout mid-Lent it becarqfe something for fineness and actuality whioh, the playwrights of the Palais Royal en vy. The burden of all its improvisation lay upon a real humorist, who finds no other opportunity in the year for taking-the public into his confidence, one Harry Nioholsl the lowest of low comedians.

The leading characteristic of the old Bohemians, liko Blanchard, was that they Bcemed to be gas dried. They never looked at their best except under the full glare of the gas-jet. In the daytime thej appeared just tolerable, if you met them in the Strand or Fleet street. The worn grimy coloring and hazy atmosphere of these unique thoroughfares were a good setting for them; f elsewhere in the daylight, and anywhere J under electric light, they seemed to be "v wholly "out of the picture," or, indeed, out of their element. For Blanchard the universe consisted of an area measuring about four square miles, having the Thames on the south, Holborn on the north, St. Paul's on the east, and the equestrian statue of King Charles on the west, but ho has known everyone who had made a. figure in that marvellous four square miles for more than 50 years. He was an intimate of Jerrold, Dickens, Thackeray, Albert Smith, John Oxenf ord, and a hundred others whom ho survived—his equable mediocrity • outlasting the self-con3uraing fire of their genius. He knew all about " the theatre" of the century, and was ever roady to talk about it. He always meant to write its history, but he confined himself, in fact, to the current work which constituted his livelihood; and there is nothing extant of his magnum opus except a series of papers in old numbers of the Era Almanack on the " vanished houses" of the metropolis. They are to be collected and reprinted. He was a most ropectable man, which many of his contemporaries were not. His wife is an active philanthropist. They were childless, . but delighted in giving children's parties, They lived f oryears in the Adelphi-terrace— J a stately pile of buildings on the Thames, built over the famous "Adelphi-Arches"— tho sleeping place and death chamber of countless generations of the unhappy. The houses constituting tho terrace were built in the last century, and in one of them Garrick lived. They hare a unique view, ! closed on the left by St. Paul's, and on the right by tho Palace of Westminister. Far below at the foot of " Arches" winds a fair garden, bordering the Thamps embankment, and right across the river on clear days you can see (or you can tell your shortsighted friends that you can see) the sun rays glaucing off the roof of the Chrystal Palace. At the back, two short and deserted streets bring you into all the bustle of the beloved Strand. Circumstances recently obliged Blanchard to quit his old-world habitation and sock now quarters. These he found in a, flat in Victoria street, where he found hot and cold water laid on at all hours, electricbells, the electric light, a lift, and a hall/ porter in a gold-lace cap and covered with. Egyptian medals. But his organism was unequal to adapting itself to its new environment, and, giving up the attempt, he laid down his life. Almost thn only men of his age in the theatrical world who survive him are " Old Howe" of Mr Irving's company, and Walter Lacy, a veteran actor, who played leading parts before the Queen came to the throne, and was a Government doctor in Tasmania before he ever went iipon the ' stage — an incomparable rhetorician in private life, with a store of memories equal to that of Blanohard, but dealing with, a different side of dramatic life. Blanchard could givo you particulars about every execution levied by the sheriff of Middlesex in the house of every actor or dramatist for 60 years past. He knew what they had all died of, and he could say how much money there was on the average in the house during the run of every piece which had been produced since 1831. Walter Lacy, on the other hand, remembers little of the squalid, financial miseries of his fellows; but he can recite endless couplets addressed by poets toMrs Niebet and Madarao Vestris. He can recite whole billets-doux in prose addressed for half a century past to himself and other actors by the wives and daughters of peers, ambassadors, church dignitaries, statesmen, and field-marshals. He has at his fingers* cuds the details of every theatrical romance, sc-mdal, quprrel, and tragedy of the century. His recollections would far surpass in interest those of Blanchard. Unluckily, he can only compose in poetry. Hie prose is confined to verbal declamation at the Garcick. Some one should record his sayings.