THE SALA RECOLLECTIONS.

Tuapeka Times, Volume XXVII, Issue 4192, 3 April 1895, Page 5

THE SALA RECOLLECTIONS.

CHARACTERISTIC STORIES. Mr Sala has just published (through Messrs Cassell and Co.) ' The Life and Adventures of George Augustus Sala, by Himself.' We extracb bherefrom the following characteristic items : — "A FAIRY GODMOTHER, POSSIBLY." Two or three years ago an unknown female correspondent wrote to me saying that she was the possessor of my christening cap. Whether she wished bo present that trifling article of infantile attire to me as a gift, or whether her wish ■was to part with it for a consideration, I am not certain. I am afraid that in any case I never answered her letter. Again, a few days after I landed in Melbourne, in 1885, a venerable lady called upou me at Menses's Hotel, and informed me that she had held me in her arms at the baptismal font. She was very talkative, and very nice ; and I think she did not go away without some slightly substantial appreciation on my part of the honor which she had done me in the winter of 1828 ; but, oddly enough, it chanced that dining that self-same evening at Government House with the then Governor of Victoria, Sir Henry Loch, I incidentally alluded to the visit paid me by the nice old lady. " Dear me," quoth His Excellency, "a nice old lady such as you describe called on me a short time after my arrival in the colony ; and she informed me that she had held me in her arms at the baptismal font ever so many years ago." Well, we are all born to fulfil some function or another. This lady's calling in life was evidently to hold babies when they were christened. Perhaps she was a third godmother whose name had escaped me. A. fairy godmother, possibly. AN ANECDOTE OF PAGANINI. Madame Sala gave an annual benefit concert at Brighton, and the eminent artistes engaged sometimes did, and sometimes did not, pocket the fees she offered them for their services. G. A. S. wont with his mother one day to engage Pdganini for one of these occasions. " 1 can see him now— a lean, wan, gaunt man in black, busily hair something like Henri Rocheforb, and a great deal more like Henry Irving. He looked at me long and earnestly ; and somehow, although he was about as weird a looking creature as could well be imagined, I did not feel afraid of him. In a few broken words my mother explained her mission, and put down the fifty guineas on the table. When I say that he washed his hands in the gold — that he scrambled at it, as David of old did at the gate— and grasped ib and built ib up into little heaps, panting the while, I am not in any way exaggerating. He bundled ib up ab lasb in a blue cotton pocket handkerchief wibh white spobs and darted from the room. And we — my poor mother convulsively clasping my hand — went out on the landing and were aboub bo descend bhe sbairs when the mighty violinist bolted again from his bedroom door. 'Take that, little boy,' he said; ' take that,' and he thrust a piece of paper, rolled up almost into a ball, into my hand. It was a bank note for £50 !" A FIRST SIGHT OF NAPOLEON 111. It was ab Lady Blcssington's that Mr Sala first meb the late Emperor of the French :—: — " Une of the guests ab Gore House was a personage whom I was destined to see very often afterwards in active life. A short, slight form he had, and not .a very graceful way of standing. His complexion was swarthily pale, if I may be allowed to make use of that somewhat paradoxical expression. His hair struck me as being of a dark brown (it was much lighter in afber years) ; and, while his cheeks were clean shaven, the lower part of his face was concealed by a thick moustache and an "imperial" or chin-tuft. He was gorgeously arrayed in the dandy evening costume of the period — a costume which to some up-to-date critics might seem preposterous, but which others (comprising, I should say, Mr Oscar Wilde) might deem comely and tasteful and worthy of revival. He wore a satin "stock," green, if I am not mistaken ; and in the centre of that stock was a breastpin in the image of a gold eagle encircled with diamonds. And the young gentleman with the satin stock and the diamond breastpin was none other than Prince Louis Napoleon Bonaparte, pretender to the Throne of France. It must have been shortly before or shortly after his madcap escapade t Strasburg that I first saw bhe Prince." A SCHOOLFELLOW OF DUMAS FILS. In 1839, his youbhful education having been seriously retarded by ill-health, George Sala was sent to a Parisian school, his reminiscences of which are entertaining :—: — "Among my schoolfellows in the pit were the two young sons of Casimir Delavigne, poet and dramatist ; a son of Dumanoir, a prolific vaudevillist ; and a son of Jamie, another versatile dramaturge of the period. But there was another, son of a noted dramatic author, and one destined bo achieve the brightest fame both as a novelist and a writer for the stage. This was a shapely young fellow, who in 1839 must have been about sixteen. He had very light blue-grey eyes and an abundance of soft, light, auburn hair, which cm led in rather a frizzled mass. The name of this youth was Alexandre Dumas ; and he was the son of the renowned author of ' Les Trois Mousquetaires ' and of 'Le Comte de Monte Cristo.' Among the articles the use of which was for some absurd reason or another forbidden to us pensionnaires was an opera-glass ; and young Alexandre Dumas, who was at the back of the pit, and who was, I believe, naturally shortsighted, coolly produced such a forbidden object, and began to scan Frederick the Greab and his page behind bhe fooblighbs. The mutinous acb was at once perceived and resenbed by the Prefecb of Sbudies. ' A bas le lorgnon, Monsieur Dumas ! A bas le lorgnon!' he exclaimed in wrathful tones. Unprophetical prefect ! Little could the pedanb, unendowed with foresight, know that the lad who had violated the school regulations by using a lorgnon was destined to be the author of 'Le Demi-Monde and ' La Dame aux Camelias.' AN EXPENSIVE RINGLET. He was taken into Parisian society a good deal by Madame Sala, and tells many diverting anecdotes of the French beau monde, of which the following may serve as a specimen :—": — " Lady Harriet D'Orsay was really the heroine of a story which has been told in at least twenty forms of different ladies of fashion. She was presiding at a stall at a veiUe de cltarUe", or bazaar, held in aid of the f uuds of some asylum or another, when there came up the young Duke of Orleans, son and heir of King Louis Philippe. The Duke, after some polite small talk, began to extol the beauty of her hair ; and, indeed, her Henrietba Maria coiffure had never looked glossier or softer than it did this day. ' Oh,' j said his Royal Highness, 'if I could only j possess one of those enchanting ringlets i ' 4 How much would Monseignour give for one?' asked Lady Harriet, gravely; 'five thousand francs ?' ' Five thousand francs !' repeated the Duke ; ' a mere bagatelle /' 'Six thousand francs?' 'Anything so charming a lady chose to ask.' ' I will not be extortionate,' pursued Lady Harriet ; "we will Bay Jive thousand.' And then she very composedly produced a dainty little pair of scissors; snipped off the adorable Henrietta Maria ringieb ; wrapped ib in silver paper and handed it, wibh a smile and a curtsey full of graceful dignity, to the Duke. His Royal Highness looked very straight down his nose ; and returning Lady Henrietta's salute, stalked, somewhat gloomily, away. But the Privy Purse duly forwarded the money next day."

Here is a pleasingly characteristic story of MISS NIGHTINGALE. " Alexis Soyer, who, during his stay in the East, did yeoman's service in the hospital kitchens at Balaclava and Scutari, told me a story about Miss Nightingale which I have not yet seen in print. A soldier who had been severely and shockingly wounded was in such dire agony that, after the manner of his kind, he burst into a frenzy of cursing and swearing, for which he was sternly rebuked by the Burgeon who was bandaging his wounds. 'How dare he,' asked the medico, ' use such language in the presence of a lady ?' Miss Nightingale was standing close by, and she said quietly to the surgeon : ' Please to mind your own business. Can't *you see that the poor man is in fearful pain, and does not know what he is saying ?' " And here another regarding the great American actor. JOSEI'H JEFFERSON AND HIS HOST'S BLUNDER. " Before, however, I recount my experiences of a trip to Barbary, I may mention a somewhat ludicrous adventure which happened to me in connection with that excellent American comedian, Mr Joseph Jefferson, the unrivalled impersonator of Rip Van Winkle. One Saturday I saw an advertise- | ment in the papers stating that on the ensuing Monday Mr Jefferson was to make ' his appearance at the Adelphi Theatre in Dion Boucicault's strikingly romantic ' Rip Van Winkle.' It seemed to me that I had often met Mr Jefferson in society in New York, and that we had been on friendly and, indeed, intimate terms ; so I wrote to him at the Charing Cross Hotel as follows : — 'Dear old Hoss, — Pork and beans to-morrow at seven. Come on.' The letter was duly sent to the hotel ; but early on Sunday morning the terrible truth broke on my mind that the actor who had been so friendly to me in New York was not named Jefferson, but had an entirely different appellation ; and that I did not know Mr Joseph Jefferson of • Rip Van Winkle ' fame from the man in the moon. How the astounding aberration had come about I cannot tell. I passed the day in moody perturbation. At 7.30, lo and behold ! Mr Joseph 'Jefferson, in full evening dress, duly made his appearance. 'I wasn'c going to miss a good chance,' he said, as he took his seat at our modest board, and we spent a delightful evening." THE GENESIS OK ' BOX AND COX.' The true genesis of 'Box and Cox' is eminently noteworthy: — "One morning Maddox gave me a French vaudeville called ' Une Chambre a deux Lits,' and bade me render it in English. In the course of a couple of days my work was finished, and was submitted to Mr Compton, who was then our low comedian ; but he failed to see any fun in the farce. Not long afterwards the immortal drollery of ' Box and Cox ' was produced at the Lyceum, the two male characters being played by Harley and J. B. Buckstone ; and ' Box and Cox ' was only an adaptation of ' Une Chambre a deux Lits,' with portions of another French farce grafted on to it. It is necessary to accentuate this fact, as there waa produced at the Haymarket, some years previous to 1847, a piece called 'The Double-bedded Room/ in which the part of an irascible old gentleman was played, with consummate ability, by William Farren the elder. The adaptor of the screaming little piece at the Lyceum was Mr Thomas Madison Morton, who, as I have said before, died a Brother of the Charterhouse. When he passed away most of the newspapers spoke of him as the ' author ' of 'Box and Cox.'" " COLONEL " BATEMAN. One or two quaint reminiscences of "Colonel" Bateman, under whose management of the Lyceum Mr Irving achieved some of his most brilliant successes, merit quotation :— •' Colonel Bateman had one curious phj'sical peculiarity ; he had a head of hair as bushy as Henri Rochefort's ; but it was rebellious hair, hair that would not be either parted or smoothed. There was a story told about this head of hair and clever little William MacConnell, the artist, which will bear relating. There waa a dress rehearsal at the Lyceum one evening, and the stalls were very full. Little MacConnell was sitting just behind Colonel Bateman, who had his hat on. The artist could see nothing of what was going on, and he touched the manager on the shoulder, saying : ' Will you be kind enough to take your hat off?' 'Willingly,' replied the always courteous and obliging Colonel. Off went his hat, but suddenly up sprang his rebellious hair like so many quills of the fretful porcupine. ' For Heaven's aake, pub your hat on again,' cried little MacConnell in dismay. A very good fellow, an ' all-round ' oue, was Colonel Bateman ; he had a varied experience as a theatrical manager in the States, and was full of droll stories of theatrical vicissitudes ; among which I remember one of his having taken a company touring in a barge down the Mississippi. Times were bad, and audiences scanty. One evening when the Colonel was playing King Lear to a sadly exiguous audience, in the middle of the storm scene the actor who played Edgar rushed on to the stage and exclaimed : ' By Jove ! Colonel, Cordelia has got a bite.' Cordelia, who was not wanted from the end of the first to the fifth act, had been busily engaged at the stern of the barge in fish- j ORISI AND ' GOD SAVE THE QUEEN.' Here is a good story of Giulia Grisi and ' God Save the Queen ' :— " Ab the end of the first act the National Anthem was sung, each of the principals taking a verse. The j effect was altogether magnificent ; but there was just one brief ripple of merriment when Grisi sang the verse apportioned to her. That wonderful cantatrice could never master the pronunciation of the English language. Quarrelling with Mario once, and having denounced him in French and Italian, she thought that, by way of a change, she would abuse him in English. She wished lo bestow upon him bhe opprobious epibheb of ' beggar,' but she could nob succeed in calling him anything else but a ' bakdre.' Similarly, dear Mrs Stirling, having to act the part of a heroine who spoke broken English, and wishing to call the villain of the piece a traitor in French, addressed him as traiteur. Grisi at Covenb Garden made only one mistake in her verse. She sang : — Confound thejr politics, Frustrate their knavish tricks ; but instead of singing In Thee our hopes we fix, she gave the new reading of In Thee our hopes we sticks." "that bothering king." Ab one time Don Juan de Borbou, titular King of Spain, and father to Don Carlos, was a frequent caller upon Mr Sala, ab the latter's residence in Guilford street : — " My wife, womanlike, was naturally a little pleased that I should be visited by so illustrious a personage ; and, as naturally, she told her maid who the little dark foreign gentleman was. Ab all events, coming home to dinner one evening, I asked the parlormaid : ' Anybody been here to-day, Jane?' 'No, sir,' she replied ; ' only that King's been bothering here again.'" MACREADY AND "MOTHER SHIPTON." Mr Sala was scene painting at the Princess's when Macready was playing tragedy there, and his brother, C. K. Sala, was playing secondary parbs. When Macready was playing Wolsey in 'Henry V 111.,' C. K. Sala was cast for Cardinal Campeius, and the great tragedian was very anxious that the two princes of the church should be dressed exactly alike. Bub he reckoned without the frugal-minded manager; —

" The tragedian presented a gorgeous spectacle, cassock of scarlet damask, cape of the same material, but of rose-colored hue, point lace petticoat, scarlet velvet hat and silken tassels, and an emerald ring on the forefinger of the left hand, worn over the glove. As for my unfortunate relative, Mr Smithers, the master tailor, had attired him in a red cassock of coarse serge, a cut paper petticoat, a cape of pink-glazed calico, a pasteboard hat covered with red flannel, and an immense pair of white Berlin gloves dyed crimson. Macready cast one look at him, and with the observation 'Mother Shipton, by ,' averted his head in horror and disgust."