The Sun.
London, England, 1864-03-29 00:00:00

STRAND.

The Christmas burlesque of " Orpheus and Eury-
dice,' continues to be so attractive that it retains its
place in the Easter play bills. A new comedietta,
by Mr. I. P. Wooler, was, however, produced for
holyday visitors, entitled " A Hunt for a Husband."
Mr. Poppleton (Mr. H. J. Turner), a retired farrier
and susceptible old bachelor, has proposed to a fair
widow, Mrs. Courthope (Miss K. Carson), who
consents to accept a husband as soon as her young
niece, Sophy (Miss L. Weston). is married. That
capiicions young lady, however, rejects all the
swains whom the indefatigable Poppleton brings
to her feet. An anonymous letter at length ap-
prises him that she is privately married. The widow
now seems to be his own, for he has only to tell her
of the match, as he thinks, to win her. But Sophy
is not the only young married female in the house
who is believed to be a spinster. Mr. Poppleton's
servant Mary Ann (Miss F. Hughes) is secretly
married to Jack Sharp (Mr. A. Wood), groom to
Mr. Arthur Stanley (Mr. D. James), the favoured
lover of Mrs. Courthope. Jack Sharp comes to visit
his Mary Ann, and is hid in the bedroom of Miss
Poppleton, Mr. P.'s ancient and romantic sister.
When detection seems inevitable ho reappears in
feminine guise, having arrayed himself in Miss P.'s
" front" and other garments. Jack Sharp is the
real hero of the piece, but another comic personage
presents himself in Chicory (a young grocer), who
writes Jove-letters to Sophy, which are picked up
by Miss Poppleton. Jack Sharp finds one of these
letters in his Mary Ann's apron, and, becoming
jealous of the grocer, bastes him freely with a culi-
nary ladle, and is admirably seconded by Mr. Pop-
pleton, who, having a spite against young Chicory,
wears out several pairs of boots in kicking him
about the house as often as he sees him. Jack
Sharp, in his female habiliments, is successively
claimed by Miss Poppleton and Sophy as their dis.
guised lover, but he is taken possession of at last by
his lawful sponse Mary Ann. Arthur Stanley
appears at the right moment to claim the widoW's
hand, and Mr. Poppleton having remembered that,
although Mrs. Courthope promised to marry when
her niece took a husband, she omitted to say " whom,"
is Tronaded to live on terms of amity and friend-
ship with everybody, and to consent to the ladies
being happy in their own way. Mr. A.Wood played
Jock Sharp in petticoats with great humour and
drollery ; and, in a character admitting of great
exaggeration and presenting some temptation to
coarseness, had the good taste to tone down the
part, and to divest it of everything objectionable.
The piece, although light in structure, was amusing
and successful. The curtain then rose upon
"Orpheus and Eurydice," in which Miss Marie Wil•
ton, Miss Ada Swanborough, Miss M. Simpson,Mr.G.
Honey, Mr. A. Wood, and the other characters in
this popular burlesque exerted themselves with
more than their accustomed vigour. The scena of
" Polly Perkins" created the usual furore. It appears
to be the custom to encore this song five times every
night ! The entertainments concluded with " Mar.
gate Sands," The house was well attended.

ASTLEY'S.
The entertainment provided by Mr. E. T. Smith
for his patrons last night was on a more than
usually liberal scale. Two new pieces were pro-
duced, and both, with respect to scenery and ap-
pointments, inja style:of splendour and completeness
with which even a transpontine audience would
have been more than satisfied. Of the first—" Ro-
salie; or, The Chain of Crime"—we must be con-
tent to say at present that it introduced the clever
Miss Furtado (from the Royalty Theatre) in the
part of the heroine, brought for ward Miss Fanny
Clifford in a character well suited to exhibit her
graceful talent as an actress to much advantage.
and comprised one of the most vivid, lifelike, and
picturesque representations of a shipwreck ever
exhibited on the London stage. The specially cha-
racteristic attraction of the evening was a fairy ex-
travaganza, written and constructed by Mr. T. H.
Higgie, with music, both spirited and characteristic,
by Mr. J. H. Tully. " The Trap of Gold" is a bona
fide piece of the good old stamp, with a plot not very
easy nor very necessary to unravel; personages,
natural and supernatural, whose actions are fre-
quently rather fantastic than accountable, rather
diverting than logical; costumes and scenery moie
calculated to puzzle the eye by their variety, and
dazzle by their magnificence, than to conciliate the
understanding by their propriety or fix the identity
of time and place—an Easter pantomime, in short.
The chief character—Roprecht Schampt, "student
and libertine," a sort of cross between Faust and
Don Giovanni—at the instigation of the Bhargeist,
head of the tribe of Kobolds, enters into a compact,
by force of which, in return for the privilege of be-
ing allowed to pursue his career of dissipation and
profligacy under the guise and possessed of the
attributes of one of those malignant sprites, he is,
at the termination of a certain period, either to
send a substitute, or go to perdition himself. In the
end, after a series of adventures, during which he
enjoys the power of becoming invisible at will,
Poetical justice is done ; and, at the critical juncture
—when the pseudo-Kobold fancies he has caught a
deputy, by the sacrifice of whom he will be entitled
to a new lease of immunity—he is entrapped him-
self through the unexpected failure of his own de-
vice. His intended victim, Pipelee (Miss Booth),
a sprightly and handsome village maiden, is under
the protection of a beneficent fairy, called Nixa
(Miss Grace Eaton), an avowed enemy of the Bhar-
geist and frustrator of all his demoniacal plans.
grouped around these principal
The personages
figures are sufficiently` vari▪
ed and consistently gro•
ho represents the character
tesque. M. Milano,
of Roprecht Schampt, besi▪ des exhibiting a consi-
derable amount of humour, is a model of agility.
His invisible ce-operation in the progress of a
Danish rustic dance (the scene takes
place in
Schleswig, on the banks of the Eider) leads to
endless diverting incidents ; while his " grand pas
fantastique" with,Mies Fanny Brown (a dancer of
more than ordinary skill) is in its way a master-
piece of ealtatory burlesque. The entire scenic
business is admirably arranged ; and the last tableau
"the Fairy Transformation and Fiery Denoue-
ment"—in which the supernaturally transformed
libertine is caught in his own trap and consigned
to the nether regions, raised a storm of approbation.
An audience more determined to be pleased has
seldom assembled together on Easter: Monday ;
and tra
the ns as
port of enthusi with whicti Mr.
E. T. Smith was summoned after the wonderful
was
eoibition of the ehipvireci, in the first piece,