Again take the death scene in "A Parisian Romance." He is supposed to die from a stroke of apoplexy, not a stroke of lightning. Mansfield flopped over as if hit on the head with a club. The original, Germaine, who played the part in Paris, received his stroke like a gentleman, sank into his chair, was carried into an ante-room and calmly passed away, a white hand appearing between the curtains as he endeavored to rejoin his disreputable friends. If one were privileged to read the original manuscript one would find that the Baron is supposed to faint as he has fainted many times before. The people carry him off and the party continues its revels until notified that its host has passed away in the adjacent room. Not so with Mansfield, catering to the masses, which enjoy "detail!" He got his stroke, dropped his glass upon the table, fell – tableau! All stand riveted. Someone cries, "The Baron is dead! Stop that music!" Curtain!
The American people not only fancy "detail"; they also want "ginger" and "the punch"! No pousse café for them! They want "the straight goods" – and Mansfield certainly handed them over!
Chapter XIII
IN VARIETY
After my engagement with Robson at the Howard Athenaeum, which lasted for only a week, my mind was fully made up to adopt the stage as my vocation. I went to New York and secured a position as utility man at Niblo's Garden, under the management of Charles R. Thorne, Sr., and Edwin Eddy. But this lasted for only a few weeks, the season proving a failure.
During the seasons of 1875 and 1876 I found it difficult to secure any employment whatever. The variety business, now called vaudeville, about this time had well-nigh supplanted the legitimate drama in the estimation of the masses and I, being rather an astute observer for a youngster, determined to turn my attention in that direction. The salaries offered were tempting and the opportunities of advertising one's ability much greater than in the legitimate. I persuaded my father to advance me enough money to have some costumes prepared and succeeded in inducing Bradford to prepare a sketch for me. It was called "His First Rehearsal," the receipt for which I take pleasure in submitting. You will see that sketches in those days cost small fortunes!
I succeeded in procuring an opening at the Howard Athenaeum under the management of John Stetson. My associates appearing in the same programme were Gus Williams, Sol Smith Russell, Pat Rooney, Denman Thompson and several others who afterwards became famous players. I was handicapped to a great extent by this competition and my success was not very flattering until about the end of the week when I gained more confidence and my methods were a bit surer. On the Saturday night of my engagement Bradford brought a friend of his, Clay Greene, to see his protegé. That evening, fortunately for me, my sketch went particularly well. Years after Mr. Greene wrote the following tribute:
THE LEGEND OF NATHANIEL
By Clay M. Greene
"Come thou with me, tonight, and sit awhile,
To see the mummers; not at the Museum:
'Tis laughter's Tomb. The Park's a dull Te Deum;
The Globe's a Morgue. Mayhap there be a smile
That lurketh somewhere in the dingy Athenaeum."
Thus spake my friend, Joe Bradford: Rest his soul!
I'd known him then a day, and we were chumming,
As though we'd been for years Love's lute-strings thumbing.
We'd told each other's lives; each ope'd his soul,
And drank the other's health 'till riotous becoming.
To his beloved Athenaeum, then,
We almost reeled, and in a trice were seated,
So close that we could scent the footlights heated.
We laughed indeed, again, again, again,
As clownish Mummers ancient songs and quips repeated.
Then came into the light a slender boy,
And Bradford yelled with lusty acclamation:
"That's Nat, God bless him!" Then, without cessation,
The stripling held each hearer like a toy,
And thrilled him now with song, then wondrous imitation.
First Farce, then Opera, now broad Burlesque,
Then e'en in tragic realms majestic soaring,
And each attempt success prodigious soaring;
(Be it pathetic, tuneful, or grotesque,)
Till every palm was bruised with ravenous encoring.
The youth had scarce outgrown his spelling book,
And yet tho' oft some honored name defaming,
By matchless ridicule, his pure declaiming
Came easily as ripples to a brook,
Or thrills to lover's souls when latest sweethearts naming.
"Who is this boy?" I cried. "He's clever, quite;
Whence came he? Where began his gentle schooling?
'Tis pity there's no art in such tomfooling,
And much I fear this youth I've seen, tonight,
Is but a clever clown! Alas! Such kindless ruling!"
"Then thou'rt a weakling Judge to so decide!"
Cried Joseph, redd'ning in his indignation.
"A clown? No art? Why 'tis no imitation
That we have heard; nor can it be denied
This callow boy is that one genius of a nation!"
"You smile; you purse your lips; and even doubt.
E'er I have drunk myself into perdition,
Nat Goodwin will have filled with inanition
The fame of every actor hereabout: —
For Nature gave him the Creator's tireless mission!"
He reproduced no song, no speech, no jest,
But it was lustered by some hidden power
That comes to Genius born with Fortune's dower.
Youth in his veins, ambition in his breast,
This boy will be one day the hero of his hour.
More than a decade passed. Unlike to me,
Joe lived not to fulfill that night's foretelling;
Yet oft adown the years there comes a welling
From that Somewhere, to green prophecy
Which in my doubting soul that night usurped a dwelling.
Today, I saw an eager, jostling throng,
Like some greed-laden human panorama,
Surround a playhouse door with vulgar clamour,
To honor Bradford's star. "Seats! Seats!" their song: —
To witness his, Nathaniel's, show of laurelled glamour.
Oh, gentle friend of mine, thou art no more;
But lend thy spirit ear while I am spinning
My admiration's tale of endless winning
Nat ever made. He never failed to score
Since we together saw his modest first beginning.
I hid thy prophecy within my breast,
And ever and anon its force recalling,
Watched Goodwin stride with speed that was appalling;
Till now his very foes proclaim him best
Amongst his votaries, thy very words forestalling.
And I am glad to know, my spirit chum,
That I long since let honest admiration
Be leavened by a Friendship's adulation
For him who in these decades hath become
No artless clown, but that one genius of a nation.
Drink deep with us, thou gentle Friendship's wraith; —
If thou hast aught to drink where thou'rt abiding,
And Nat and I'll recall thy stalwart faith
Which met my doubting with indignant chiding,
That night when you a new star's orbit were deciding.
"Come thou with me, tonight, and sit awhile,
To see the Mummers (not at the Museum.
'Tis laughter's tomb; the Park's a dull Te Deum;
The Globe's no more): for I would see thee smile,
While thousands laud the star of thy loved Athenaeum!"
After my run at the Howard Athenaeum Tony Pastor offered me an engagement at $50 a week to appear at his Variety theatre in New York. When I arrived I was terror stricken at the way in which he had announced me. I was advertised as "Actor, Author and Mimic." I remained with Tony several weeks and when I left Gotham my salary had grown to the sum of $500 a week, a tremendous salary in those days.
Variety was hardly to my liking as it gave me too much time to myself and I regret to say that I saved but little from my season's work.
Colonel Sinn of the Olympic Theatre, New York, made me alluring offers to continue on the variety stage, but I decided to enter the legitimate and accepted an engagement to appear as Captain Crosstree under the management of Matt Morgan, then the manager of the 14th Street Theatre in the burlesque of "Black-eyed Susan." It was there I met for the first time dainty little Minnie Palmer and we appeared together in two farces, "Sketches in India" and "The Little Rebel."
After a few weeks at the Fourteenth Street house we accepted an engagement to return to the Howard Athenaeum and we opened there at a joint salary of $750 a week. I was very proud of this, as I had previously left that theatre, not particularly successful, at a salary of only $15 a week.
Chapter XIV
ELIZA WEATHERSBY
Minnie and I determined to remain together and continue in vaudeville through the following year and made our arrangements accordingly. But these were vetoed by her mother who decided that we had better earn our respective livings apart.
The following summer (1876) I opened in the production of Rice and Goodwin's "Evangeline," words and lyrics by J. Cheever Goodwin, music by Edward E. Rice. I appeared in the character of Captain Dietrich. My associates in this production were William H. Crane, James Moffit, Harry Josephs, Veney Clancy, Lizzie Webster and Eliza Weathersby, one of the most famous beauties of the burlesque stage, who came to this country originally with Lydia Thompson.
A friendship sprang up between Miss Weathersby and me. It quickly ripened into love and at the close of our season we were married by the Rev. M. Kennedy of New Rochelle, New York, on the 24th day of June, 1877.
Eliza Weathersby proved a loving and lovable wife and was of great assistance to me in my profession, playing the principal female rôles in all my plays with great success until she was forced to retire from the stage because of the illness which gradually brought about her death.
Eliza Weathersby was one of the most beautiful women whom I have ever known and one of the most self-sacrificing wives that ever blessed man with devotion and love.
Forced by circumstances, she left a position at the Haymarket Theatre, London, where she was considered the best soubrette since Mrs. Keely, and came to America with the celebrated Lydia Thompson's famous troupe of British blondes. Her environment was most distasteful to her as the women with whom she was forced to associate were not to her liking. Lydia Thompson, herself, was a most exemplary woman and as virtuous as Eliza. She, too, was a very clever actress even before entering the field of burlesque and a friendship sprang up between them which lasted for many years.
The reason for Eliza Weathersby's entry into the burlesque field was that the salary offered enabled her to support her widowed mother and five sisters who were left in want by the death of their father. She knew that no matter what her surroundings were she was proof against all temptations and her after life revealed how thoroughly she had diagnosed her character and future. Every week after our marriage a certain sum was sent across the ocean, out of our joint salary, to the widow and orphans left in London and, one by one, each succeeding year a sister would come over and join our happy family. Emmy, the most beautiful, our favorite sister, was taken away from us two years after she arrived. Contracting a severe cold she died of pneumonia and we sorrowfully put her away in Woodlawn. She was a charming girl. And she gave promise of becoming a splendid actress.
I was only a stripling when I married this beautiful creature. Moreover I was unreliable and, I confess, unappreciative of what the fates had been so kind as to bestow upon me. Many have accused me of "wanton neglect." I may have neglected her, but only for the companionship of men. She never complained and during the ten years of our happy married life there was never one discordant note. She was ten years my senior and treated me more like a son than a husband, but, like the truant boy who runs away from school now and then, I was always glad to return and seek the forgiveness that an indulgent mother always gives a wayward child. Our own home near Boston was a little paradise. I was seldom away from it and together we spent many, many happy hours, surrounded by our little sisters and my friends – who were always her friends. She was domesticated to a degree and never cared for the theatre. A loving sister, a dutiful daughter, a loving wife, she is resting in Woodlawn and the daisies grow over her grave.
We remained with the "Evangeline" aggregation during the summer of 1876. This engagement was interrupted by my accepting another to appear at the Walnut Street Theatre in Philadelphia in conjunction with the famous John Brougham. This only lasted for two weeks when I rejoined Rice and continued with him until I was discharged for having a fistic encounter with the stage manager who was always making things particularly disagreeable for me. Eliza was offered an increase of salary to remain, but she preferred casting her lot with me.
We packed up our parcels and went to New York in search of an engagement. I succeeded in procuring an opening with Harrigan and Hart at the Theatre Comique where I remained for several weeks. Tony Hart and I were always like Damon and Pythias.
What a delightful character was Tony Hart!
"His face was a thanksgiving for his past life and a love letter to all mankind."
About 1872 a bright-eyed Irish-American lad named Anthony Cannon came over the theatrical horizon like a burst of sunshine and it took but a few short years for him to establish himself in the hearts of the American public. I met him about 1874, before I went on the stage, and a friendship sprang up between us that terminated only when he was laid to rest in the Worcester graveyard.
Tony Hart was the name of the lad of melody, after he had fired the Cannon. From the time he became associated with Edward Harrigan until the name of Harrigan and Hart became famous from coast to coast, that boy caused more joy and sunshine by his delightful gifts than any artist of his time. To refer to him as talented was an insult. Genius was the only word that could be applied. He sang like a nightingale, danced like a fairy, and acted like a master comedian. No dialect was too difficult for him – Irish, Negro, Dutch, German, Italian became his own, and one lost sight of the individual in the truthfulness of portrayal. His magnetism was compelling, his personality charming. He had the face of an Irish Apollo. His eyes were liquid blue, almost feminine in their dove-like expression. His head was large and round and covered with a luxurious growth of brown curly hair which clustered in ringlets over a strong brow. His feet and hands were small, his smile almost pathetic. His disposition turned December into May. This was the lad who sang, danced and acted himself into the hearts of America during the seventies and early eighties.
Tony Hart was the friend of all mankind and my especial pal.
I have loved three men in my life, and he was two of them.
I miss him greatly, especially on the 25th of each July. We both were born on that day and during a period of twenty years we exchanged telegrams, letters or cables of loving friendship.
He went away many years ago, but his memory will always linger with me. We laughed and sang together for twenty years and when they took him away to join the seraphs, nature discarded the mold that fashioned him. She could find no one worthy to fill it. When poor Tony left us the stage was seen through tears; an artist had gone to join the past masters; the world had lost a man and I, man's greatest treasure – a friend.
After leaving Harrigan and Hart, Eliza and I made up our minds to go on our own. I knew my limitations and her reputation. She had previously made one or two journeys into stardom alone and I thought it would be a good idea to organize a company featuring her. I would be in her support.
Our finances prohibited a production sufficiently elaborate for a burlesque organization so we determined to have a play written on the lines of The Vokes Family skits and Salsbury's Troubadors which were then playing successfully throughout the country, I interested a ne'er-do-well playwright named George Murray. We collaborated and brought out a little play called "Cruets" into which we injected all the little stunts in which we excelled (and all others that we could crib!). Thus we started out on our first starring tour, her name heading the company.
We played through the New England circuit where we had previously appeared in "Evangeline." Our proceeds the first week went away beyond our most iridescent expectations. We cleared in the neighborhood of two thousand dollars profit.
Out of the proceeds of our first week I paid a retainer to Benjamin Wolfe, a Boston journalist who had written "The Mighty Dollar" for W. J. Florence, to write us a play on the lines of the one we were then doing. Had I known what was in store for us I would not have indulged in such extravagance. For the next five months we never saw a house of more than two hundred dollars at any performance and in a little while the remainder of our $2,000 had almost vanished. I had paid Wolfe a thousand dollars down as a retainer on his agreeing to deliver the manuscript in five months. We had been travelling through New York, Ohio and Illinois to gradually decreasing business. We always left a favorable impression, so much so that John Albaugh who was then managing the leading theatre at Albany wired me for a return date. I accepted with avidity, as it meant a week's rest and a possible relief from bad business.
Upon our arrival at Albany I received a telegram saying that Wolfe had sent his play, called "Hobbies" C. O. D. A thousand dollars was needed to get the manuscript from the confines of the post-office. A thousand dollars to me then looked like a million!
Poor Eliza had saved enough from her earnings to enable her to put aside ten one thousand dollar government bonds. These I insisted she lock up in a safe deposit box the day after our marriage with instructions to tell no one of her hidden fortune nor ever to molest it unless we were starving. When the telegram arrived she insisted upon going down to New York and taking out one of the bonds with which to release our play. I would not give my consent and started out to try to borrow the money. I knew few people in Albany, but had two friends in Troy whom I thought I could rely upon to come to my rescue. One was a judge, the other a gambler. I found them both financially embarrassed, but between them they dug up a hundred dollars which they presented to me.
My gambler friend suggested that I take the hundred dollars, go upstairs into a faro game in which he held a slight interest and try to win out. I reasoned that the hundred was of no use to me and determined to take a chance. I went into the gambling room, and bet the hundred dollars on the high card. It won. I let it stay and it won again, giving me four hundred dollars. I asked for a chair then and sat down.
In ten minutes I had eleven hundred and fifty dollars! I immediately returned the hundred dollar loan, bought Eliza a bunch of lilacs, her favorite flower, went to the post-office and returned home with the much coveted manuscript.
I was ashamed to tell her how I "earned" the money, but I wouldn't tell her a falsehood and finally told her of my afternoon's experience. This worried her greatly as she never believed that any good results came from money obtained that way. I assuaged her grief and as usual was forgiven. We spent that night pondering over the manuscript and at the finish we both decided it was vastly inferior to our little play "Cruets." However, we announced a production for Friday night. This gave us only five days of preparation. We thought so little of it that we never gave any attention as to what we should wear, arriving at no definite conclusion until the night of the performance. So little did we think of the play that I offered Charles Bowser, my leading comedian, a half interest in it for five hundred dollars and a cancellation of the three hundred and fifty dollars I owed him for back salary.
"Natty," he said, "I haven't five hundred dollars and even if I had I wouldn't care to invest it in your property." How little did he know he was refusing a fortune!
When the curtain rang down on the finale of that play I would not have sold a half interest in it for fifty thousand dollars! It was a whirlwind of laughter from beginning to end. We were all dumbfounded and could not understand why the play was received with such manifestations of delight. Everything was encored time and time again and the rafters shook with applause and laughter. The Saturday morning papers were most enthusiastic and in a few days I was besieged with offers from all over the country.
We performed this play successfully for four years, Eliza and I dividing a small fortune. Hers was put away in the safe deposit vault while most of mine went back into the coffers of the proprietors of various places of the same kind as that in which I won the original thousand dollars.
I really never knew how much we did make out of that play until Eliza died and willed me her share. It came in very handy at the time and was gratifying for two reasons – it eliminated all my debts and was a vindication for me, in a way, as I considered it proof that (since she left me every dollar she possessed, with the exception of the ten thousand dollars in bonds which she had earned before our marriage) I had not treated her as cruelly as my vilifiers would have the world believe.
We followed "Hobbies" with several other productions including "The Member for Slocum," "Sparks," "Ourselves," "The Ramblers" and one or two others. Then we associated ourselves with Edwin F. Thorne and produced a melodrama by Henry Pettit called "The Black Flag." I appeared as Sim Lazarus and Eliza as Ned the waif. We produced this play at the Union Square Theatre in September, 1882, and continued through that theatrical season with very gratifying success.
Our association with Edwin Thorne was a delightful one. Though only a mediocre actor, he was a charming companion and his personality was most attractive. It was a funny experience to be associated with Thorne as it seemed but a few short months since Frank Burbeck and I would sneak into Thorne's bedroom at my mother's house, abscond with his sword and scabbard, adjourn to the back yard and indulge in a "duel" which we would continue until interrupted by the Thornes or other occupants of the dwelling.