Judge — December 17, 1881 — page 13: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

THEATRICAL BRIEFS. May it Please Your Honor: Thave to report that the Lighta o’ London, accord. ing to the best of my knowledge and Lelief, stand a poor chance of being appreciated by the livers in New York. Althoussh e any number of talented young professional idiota, who can say “can't” for *+ean't,” and *sha-n’t” for *shan't;” who call dollars “harf crowns” (which they're not); who wear the shape and dimensions of sonp-plates; whose loons are like pan-cakes, and whe represent the F cad” is wonderful, still do we lack artists capable of giving those fine effects of dialect, those shades and semi-tones of cbar- acter which are as characteristic of London a8 they are not characteristic of Now York. For instance, I have only to ask of Your Honor that you shall imagine, if you can, a Shoreditch Street Arab played by a Five Point boot-black! A scarcely less comic blunder could be the attempt of an ‘h”-less English company to produce on their native soll that sterling and thoroughly American drama entitled * Kit, the Arkansas Travel I respectfully submit to Your Honor that the perfor- mance of the aforesaid play, the Lights o' London, brings up another point, against which I desire to file my adverse ruling. Like the World, its success will un- doubtedly go to show that our own varied and cosmo- politan society, teeming not so much with classes as with distinct national types, is incapabie of being worked up into dramatic effect, either by consequence of incompeteney on the part of our native American playw-ights, or because the material itself 1s not suf. ficiently rich of plastic Tam disposed to decide that neither of these 1atter conditions apply, and that the only reason no Ameri- can Worlds, and no Lights o* New York, or Lights o° Cincianati, or Lights 0’ Chicago exist (in dramatic form), fs to be found in the fact that American managers un- patriotically prefer giving tho first chance to foreign staff, daubed together by foreign craftsmen, In the case of Jobn Stetson, proprietor (rice Oakes Ames) and manager (rice two dozen bankrupts) of Booth’s Theater, I have to report as follows: It appears that the sald Stetson (who otherwise bears an unimpeachable character) is publicly charged with willfully and maliciously murdering the English lan- guage on divers and sundry occasions. The said Stet- son, It is alleged, has been guilty, among other enormi- ties and outrages, of speaking of “Shakes Perian Vases,” of Quinine doors” (in liew of **Qucen Anne doors";) of a man’s being “convalescent with his business” (in lien of conversant"); of buying furniture “on the in- solvent plan” (in lieu of “the installment plan”); of he Paradisine Equinox” (in liew of + the Paradox”), and other like crimea and misdemeanors. ‘On citing the said Stetson to appear before me, in glish music hall + j addicte plementary procealings, and show precisely inuch he, i Stetson, actually knows of the English la foresaid, the said Stetson, maki by one Augustus Piton, straightway demonstrated sufficient knowledge of the #aid English language to recommend this Honorable Court to spend its limitad vacation in a climate compared with which the temperature of the Union Square Theater is an Arctic frost. On which account I resp that a warrant be issuad for U Stetson for contempt of court. I have, moreover, to report that the numerous atrocities and outrages lately committed by two erim- inals of the deepest dye, Charles Backus and William Birch, of the Minstrel Hall of San county of New York, to-wit, call for i nd severe punishment. mmeliate atten- T have ascertained by neh safferin my fee-bill—that the cently become tion personal e: which will be daly set forth on said Backts and the said Bireh to exbuming and disi rom the ceme- tery of oblivion jokes, puns and witticisms which died of old age at the beginning of the eighteenth century. They have ¢ «1 ferocionsly, from their tin Il manner of such jokes, jests, and witticisms, and eynically inditte honored graves, t to public opinion and decency samo, t contortions—all of a strictly ille , at the Hall of San Fran Being duly admonished of the gravity o fense, the said Backus and the said Birch bes clemency of th court on the ground of their They have, however, nd loathsome appropriation of nf the 9 obtain money from simple country people on the frivolous and unreasonable pretext that they are, indeed, funny and bun T have fixed the penalty in this case, subject to Your Honor's approval, at the following figure The said Backus shall be compelled to open a bottle of wine once in each six months, and the said Birch snall read once a day a stenographic report of his own spontaneous humor of the night before. Thelr crime Is and ought to be a capital one. have heartlessly exposed the ther with their own guffaws, grimaces, and al kind—night after isco aforesaid. honorab invention. ued their terrible poverty ontinue pron! Respectfully submitted. Tue Rereree. Trax Grres, Esg., was lugging up coal, when he stubbed his toe and fell, causing ally tet slip a cuss worl, *Haint you ‘shamed of yourself! Waere do you expect you'll go to when you die?” asked his wife. To a place where f shan’t have to lug eva: by thunder!” and the Lait Justiss continued on Whitehall Times. im to accider Ick men are preparing to “gather at the river.”- Trenton Gazette. WHIFFS WITH CORRESPONDENTS. DO. T.—AN right, Salt ia. M. D.—Dectined, No thanks, ELy Puy.--A slight improvement, 1. R. Muxerys.—Deciine BrLLDAd,—Not original oF so well pat together as It has bees by others. Cugscent Noox.—No. pitched tt {nto the W. B. PETER I.—"'The Wid Rose of Hoboken” will be dramatized and pat apon the stage. JEAN PIERRE.—A portion accepted, piled with, Write again, please. G.S.S—Accepted; but make your articles shorter tn the future. Brevity is the soul of wit peare. Touwy.—We suggest that " The due ts on the rye" would be good motto to hang up over your bar. Sorter suggestive to delinquents, eh? “AN ADMIRER”—This correspondent writes to ask why we do not publish all the good things that are sald of us in the papers, Well, really, we might gratify our vanity to that way for very many and good things have been sald about Tag JvcE, since he opened his conrt, bat we are too modest, to say nott ing of the bad taste of sach a thing. Resides our space ts too valuabie, and we wish to give some reading matter, which we could not do were-we to copy all the friendly notices we get. but we think you can do better, Not up to the pitch, and so we have pd your request com: according to Mr. Shakes: | | “JAY CHARLTON.” Is it a reflection on the Secretary or on the Navy to call the holder of the portfolio an old hulk? id that he had two brothers who traveled, was of course one of the triplets. Tue dry goods drummer, who sa Tue silly fellow who always makes jokes at the boarding-house table is a proof of the Darwinian theory. Ilis very smiles are man- key shines. Coup, the circus man, is about to build a hippodrome in Washington, His chicken-coop itself is a very coup de ta-tah. NERAL BUTLER is said to have a matri- monial bee in his bonnet. Of course it is a | honey bee. Tue bear was the original tail-bearer, Tue “aside” in many a play on the stage is aside-splitting jok SPEAKING of high-whines, the reading ofsome proofreaders is above proof, Jouxxy was asked by his little brother whether they were going to have chicken for dinner—there came such a smell of burnt hair from the kitchen. “No,” said Johnny, “mother is only singeing the hash.” Way is it that a lady wears an opera cloak in a theater, and hangs it on a chair when she goes in to drink beer? Bic Steve worked for three hours trying to put up the stove, and then he said, “My head's all stove. Sour of the page girls in the comic opera wear very high boots. The prettiest girl is beauty and booty. PeNysytvasta and Maryland have what they call Grave-yard Insurance Companies, New York has them also; but is lees cuphoni ous, and calls them gin mills. They are just as sure’as the Pennsylvania kind. Masya man is broke when day breaks. Tue boy who is born with a silver spoon in his mouth frequently becomes a silver spoon. Now it is said that the syrup we eat with our breakfast cakes is not syrup at all—but only a syruptitious article. ‘Two Westchester young men who had too much of the bloom upon the rye, the next morning had the bloom upon their eye. Ay exchange asks, ‘ When is yacht?” When she sa; long.” a girl like a “Tuff a little—lut me R. N. used to mean Royal Navy, but now it seems to mean R-attic N-rique. icbooks.com.