work to do; but it is not sterner nor harder work than this.

The individualities of pantomimists are exhibited in a striking light at a morning rehearsal, when the unromantic daylight streams down upon them.

One thing perplexes you very much, and that is, among the motley crowd at the wing to determine who is who. Two men in canvas trousers with white skullcaps on their heads are busying themselves in front. Who are they? Clown and Pantaloon. But which is which? It would be difficult to guess from their present appearance, for they have left off the clothes of the outer world, and have not yet endued themselves in the distinguishing garments of the pantomime. And this crowd of men, women, and children of all ages, sizes, and apparent conditions--who are they? Some of the men are of clerical aspect and wear black, somewhat rusty, and shiny hats of the respectable chimney-pot order. A good many of them are grizzled with age, and bear the stamp of care upon their brows. The women are a thin, poorly-clad, anxious-looking set; most of them with children in their charge some of them little mites of things, not more than three or four years old. There is an air of combined poverty and respectability about this motley crowd which sadly puzzles the stranger.

He would scarcely guess that they are there to represent shopkeepers, and policemen, and butchers, and bakers, and the other personages of the pantomime, whom it is the business of the Clown to buffet and ill use. They have had an anxious time of it for a week past for fear they should not be engaged. You may have seen them in a crowd, waiting round the stage door in the cold, day after day. So anxious have they been for an engagement at a shilling a night, or perhaps less, to be tripped up, and bonneted, and burned with pokers, and banged with shutters! The moment it got wind that there was a frog scene in the piece, the manager was inundated with offers of children. The mothers of the neighbourhood went from one to another, and spread the report of

frogs, and the would-be representatives of frogs came upon the manager like a plague of Egypt. And when, at length, the order went forth, 'no more frogs,' there was wailing and lamentation outside the stage door in the cold. It is curious, almost pitiful, to see little children, who can barely speak, sent on to the stage to amuse others-they who have never had a toy to amuse themselves. We have seen little human frogs and human rats hushed to sleep in the corner of a dressingroom until it was time to put them into their pasteboard skins.

Fancy that, Materfamilias-a babe just weaned earning its mother's Sunday dinner! We know two little, chubby, black-eyed things, a boy and a girl, whose heads scarcely reach above our knee, who have been earning the Sunday dinner of a whole family for three months past. The independence of their behaviour in the theatre, owing to their childish unconsciousness of any authority, forms a striking contrast to the obsequiousness of the grown-up employés. One day we saw the manager passing through behind the scenes, and carpenters and sceneshifters made way for him, and highplaced officials and leading gentlemen and ladies bowed and kotowed with respectful awe. So far the progress of the manager was that of a terrible potentate through the ranks of his subjects. But presently the great man entered the greenroom, and there our two little, chubby, black-eyed friends were engaged in boisterous play, jumping on and off the sofas and chairs. Did they stop their play and sneak away into a corner with scared looks? Not they. They continued their romping and jumping quite unconcerned; and when the manager told them in awful tones to be quiet, the little black-eyed boy said Shan't!' and the little black-eyed girl ran against the great man, and slapping him in a child's wayward manner, plainly told him this bit of her little innocent mind- I don't like you!' Bless their little hearts, they had no idea of a great Bashaw of a manager who held engagements in his hands and paid salaries on Saturday. They

only knew that mother brought them there, that they played little frogs, and that somehow or other-through mother-money came of it, and a nice baked dinner on Sunday.

It is proverbial that one half the world does not know how the other half lives. The rehearsal of a pantomime sometimes helps One-halfthe-world's ignorance. Among that motley, mouldy throng of supernumeraries waiting at the wing there are men who have been educated and brought up as gentlemen; there are decayed tradesmen; there are clerks and shopmen out of employment; there are poor artisans of the superior class; there are faded coryphées who once upon a time were pets of the ballet and the admired divinities of the stalls. Most of them have had a theatrical connection all their lives. The decayed tradesman has served the theatre perhaps; or he has had customers among actors. The clerk may have dabbled in theatrical copying. These are all thoroughly up in their business, and take their kicks and slaps and trippings-up with methodical and unruffled precision. For a new comer, however, the ordeal is a painful one, and if he be a superior person, it is rarely that he passes through it with success; neither his will nor his poverty will make him consent to shake his leg when a redhot poker is put in his pocket. A case in point rises in our memory. The usual front scene of shops was set, and a pale, anxious-looking young man, who stood in the front of the crowd at the wing, was ordered by the Clown to go on.' The young man advanced nervously and the Clown followed and put the painted poker in his pocket. The youth walked on placidly and made his exit, at the opposite side, as if nothing had happened. Of course the Clown was disgusted. 'That will never do; come back.' The young man came back, rather sulkily, and went through the business again, but without expressing the desired amount of comic painindeed, without expressing any at all. The Clown was now losing his temper, and he roared out-' Now, would you walk off as quietly as

that if you had a red-hot poker in your pocket? That's a red-hot poker, young man; look at me.' Here the Pantaloon practised on the clown, and the Clown went into the most exquisite contortions.

Now then, try again;' and the Clown roughly took the young man by the collar to bring him back to his place; but he had scarcely touched him before the young man, whose face was scarlet with indignation, first 'squared up' at Clown, and then bursting away from him, rushed precipitately off the stage and out of the theatre. Ah!' said Clown, he's too much of a gentleman for the work.' Which was just the truth.

A prime minister during the time of a great international difficulty is the popular beau-idéal of a harassed man; but we question if any prime minister, at such a time, ever worked harder, or suffered more anxiety, than does the property-man, or the stage-manager of a theatre during the production of a pantomime. For the information of such as are not versed in theatrical affairs, we may explain that 'properties is the name given to all the articles used in the business of a scene. Tables, chairs, bedsteads, trick-boxes, carrots, snowballs, fairy wands, seaweed, locomotive engines, tobacco pipes, babies, thunder and lightning, and a thousand other things too merous to mention, are included under the denomination. All these things have to be made and got ready, sometimes on the shortest notice. It is rarely, indeed, that they are all finished until some days after the opening night. We once heard an author complimenting a property-man for having done his work so well and in so short a time. You must have had hard work over it.' 'Hard work! Why, sir, I call this nothing; when I was getting up the pantomime at the

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Theatre I never had my clothes off for four days and nights before it was produced, nor for four days and nights after it was producedexcept to play Harlequin.' That was his only refreshment. Nor does the property-man's anxiety cease when the work of manufacture is

over. Every night, when we are shaking our sides at the mad pranks which the Clown plays with his canvas turnips and calico sausages, he is toiling and sweating behind, getting all these things ready. Each scene requires its own particular set of properties, and when one set is taken away another must immediately be brought in to supply its place. The red herrings and the ducks, and the quartern loaves which fly about so miscellaneously in front, must all be in their proper places at the wing. Then there are innumerable trick-boxes to drag out and prepare; one little boy has to be put into one, and another little boy into another, and great care must be taken that all the strings and flaps are in proper working order. A vast amount of strong language is required to help these multifarious arrangements to their due consummation. A stage manager will tell you that it is as impossible to do without strong language during the performance of a pantomime, as it is to command a man-of-war without it, in a gale of wind. Speak' genteelly' to your scene-shifter or your foremast-man, and a trap sticks, or away go your topsails. But the stage-manager and the prompter have plenty of work of their own to do besides the 'ungenteel' urging of others. Look at that elaborate business plot which the prompter has spread out before him in his box. Every leap, every flap change, every trap trick is there marked down; and the prompter must be ready on the instant to give the signal to those working them behind the flats, on the flies above, and in the galleries under the stage. A second too late with

a signal and the trick is spoiled, or, worse still, some one is hurt by being shot against a shored trap or a buttoned door. The dangers to which pantomimists are exposed are more serious and more constantly imminent than the public have any idea of. Supposing, when the Harlequin leaps through the trap in the flat, that the four men appointed to catch him are not at their posts. Why, poor Harlequin comes down with a crash on the hard boards, and per

haps maims himself for life. It is one of the great grievances of pantomimists that they cannot get these men to attend to their duties, unless by constantly feeing them, or treating them to beer. There have been many instances where these men have absented themselves on purpose to serve out' a Clown or Pantaloon who has refused or neglected to comply with their exactions. It is a pity that the law does not provide a special punishment-and it could not be too severe-for such criminal neglect and wilful malice.

Having attempted to give some idea of the vast resources which are called into play, of the anxious and heavy labour which is gone through, and of the serious dangers which are encountered, during the performance of a pantomime, it only remains for us to speak of the great mystery which is involved in the concoction and designing of the so-called comic business. We know all about the opening. We are informed a month beforehand that such and such a popular author will write the introduction, and in due time it is presented to us-in return for sixpence-in the form of a book, with the author's name and a record of his dramatic triumphs on the title-page. But who is the author of the comic business?-the opening is not regarded as comicwho arranges those sometimes smart hits at the passing events of the day which are pantomimically carried out by Clown and Pantaloon? From what fertile and facetious brain proceeds the notion of turning a sack of alum into quartern loaves, Mr. Spurgeon into a gorilla, and transforming the label on a box of American pills, into National Debt 1,000,000,000 dollars?' Does any one imagine that these are impromptu funniments; or that their design is left to Clown and Pantaloon? Perhaps the matter never occupies a thought. Be it known, however, that there are authors of the harlequinade, as well as of the burlesque opening, and that all the business is written down on paper with equal minuteness and care, though the production is never printed in a book, and the name of

the author is never glorified in the newspapers. We have, at this moment, two or three MS. scenes before us; and we are about to break through an envious silence which has hitherto been preserved with regard to such important work. We have no space to review these clever productions at length, but some extracts may serve as curiosities of dramatic literature. Scene number 2, manufactory, &c., is illustrated by a pen and ink sketch in the MS.:

Old

Enter Clown and Pant. Man X with boards,' (x be it understood, means 'crosses')' written on, "Just arrived, the New American Anticipating Machine." C. purchases it, and they place it against door of warehouse and exit' (sic). An old gentleman enters with little dog. Pant. gives him bill. Clown steals dog. gent. exits. Clown pops dog into machine, turns handle, and pulls out from other side long row of sausages. Gent. returns, calls and whistles for dog. The sausages commence wagging, à la dog's tail. Gent. frightened, and runs off. Baker's man places board at door, "Bakings carefully done." A boy brings on dish and cover. Clown says, "All right," and places it on c. of stage. Calls Pant. He takes off cover, and discovers a sheep's head and potatoes. He is about to steal one when the sheep's eyes become illuminated and work. C., frightened, pops on cover and runs off."

Here is a hit at the faculty:-1

'Clown enters with a shabby hat, old coat, and bludgeon (à la burglar) from chemist's shop. A gent. comes out of door. Clown walks behind him, steals book from pocket at same time policeman enterssecures him. Clown begs for mercytakes out a scroll, written on, "I'm a victim to kleptomania." Policeman holds up another scroll-" I'm the cure for that." Har. waves: Clown's scroll changes to 'Twelve months' hard labour."

The next scene may be described as Ethnological, Zoological, and

Theological. We quote again from our cherished MS.:

'Man from curiosity shop brings on large book which masks in bale. On the outside, "History of Gorilla." He opens book, and shows picture of the animal. Ladies and gents. come on at different wings, and form a half circle. From shop a gent. enters dressed à la Spurgeon. He commences, "Ladies and gentlemen, this is the gorilla, an animal that so closely resembles the human species"-the roar of the animal is heard behind the book: they all start, ladies scream, man drops the book. The bale has dropped-discovers the Clown made up as a gorilla-they are all going to exit-gent. holds up scroll"Don't be alarmed; I'm the Perfect Cure." Band play the tune-Spurgeon and Gorilla dance in front-the rest form a line and dance to the music. At the end Clown lifts up the mask-all pitch into Spurgeon, and exit."

Too bad of you, Mr. Comic-scenewriter. Why 'pitch into' Mr. Spurgeon?

And now we will conclude with the statement of a fact which we suspect is not generally known,' viz., that the pantomime which finds so many people in bread at Christmas-time is in many instances the sole sustaining prop of the House. At some theatres there is no profit made except at pantomime-time. All the rest of the year it is hard struggle to make both ends meet until Boxing Night comes again. And when the curtain comes down for the last time on the concluding glories of the pantomime of this Christmas, the manager will send for the property-man and the scene painter, and will instruct them to begin without a day's delay to prepare for the next, which will be performed for the first time on the 26th of December, 1862.

H.

* These scenes are the composition of Mr. William Smith of the Royal Adelphi Theatre.