The Sun.
London, England, 1862-05-20 00:00:00

HER MAJESTY'S CONCERT 1?0011.

MR. AND MRS. CHARLES MATHEWS,
To the great mass of our play going and amuse-
ment seeking public, London without Mr. Charles
Mathews would be as dull as a wet Sunday. For
more than a quarter of a century he has been their
great comic restorative,—the agreeable mixture
they have taken nightly after the wear and tear of
the day, and found themselves for the most part
considerably better for it in the morning. He has
been a sort of social alcoholic test to them to prove
the soundness of their spirits, and the pleasantest
possible form of that excellent invention, the
" galvanic belt," since he can relieve the languor of
the system, without the slightest recourse to acids.
At this great Exhibition period there are many
would think their favourite more than ever indis-
pensable. Our World's Show for several months
will open the eyes and ears of the public, and it is
but a proper balance of organic functions to have
something that will also be pretty sure to
open our mouths. Nor does it abate from
Mr. Mathews' attraction that he hes quitted
his old arena for a time—that he has left the
old firm in the Haymarket and started in
business for himself as a good mirthmaker, dis-
pensing with a company, and taking in lieu of
them a partner. His young, hilarious, and agree-
able wife brings no little capital into the enter-
prize, in the unfailing vigour of her spirits and the
abundance of her pleasantry. Mr. and Mrs.
Matthews on this occasion have shown an excellent
sense of fitness in associating with their experiment
ore of our best dramatic humorists, Mr. Byron,
whose distinction is to startle us as much in prose as
his great namesake did in poetry, the chief of modern
burlesque writers—and a perfect magician in the
realm of pantomime—forms with Mr. and Mrs.
Mathews a sort of comic tripod, on which the public,
when it rests—if not destined to become as enlight-
ened as an ancient Delphic priestess—certainly is
likely to exhibit a fair share of her convulsions. Not,
we confess, that we are always able to roar outright
at Mr. Byron. In order to vary our experience,
and possibly, therefore, intensify its palpable en-
joyments, ho throws us occasionally into rather
exhausting speculations in respect to the iden-
tity and integrity of certain English words—that
nothing under the budelight cf a Max Muller could
elucidate. Dr. Richardson and others have shown
us how the English tongue is composed, and the
analytic Mr. Byron shows us how it takes to pieces.
He is the Frikell of philology, who turns a word
into a trick, and shows you at the same moment
that it is itself and something else. Mr. Byron,
however, can do more than play upon one string. He
has always exhibited genuine humour, and his pre-
sent entertainment shows he possesses, in addition,
no trifling sense of character. It has the merit, in
the first place, of being admirably compact. It lies
within the compass of two hours, and in a night or two
will exhibit all the signs of a good fit; it will come
on and go off with equal gracefulness and ease. Its
story has a right simplicity. All the world was
coming to London, so Mr. and Mrs. Mathews, in
order to get out of the crowd, resolved to take a
country ramble. Their house, too, has an unfortu-
nate proximity to the Exhibition, and might have
been converted by country friends into an extension
of the refreshment rooms. They accordingly take
refuge in a little town, where they find a country
manager and his wife, who have lost their
company and their theatre, and have taken the
Town-hall in order to erect it into a temple of
Thespis, and immortalise it by the production of a
" sensation drama" played by themselves. Mr. and
Mrs. Mathews are therefore induced to give us a
notion of the experiment. They divide the picture
into two portions—the first representing the pre-
parations for the drama ; the second, the play itself.
The first portion becomes accordingly a tolerable
vehicle for character. We have the manager
and manageress, Mr. and Mrs. Prospero Blogs,
converting the Town-hall into a stage, and
also laying their plans for converting the
towns-people into an audience. We have
the cleaner of the hall—Anna Maria Gulp—a capi-
tal sketch by Mr. Mathews—who relates all her
experiences of hall usage and employment, from
benevolent and missionary down to scientific and
" nigger" evenings—appreciating each of them by
the simple test of the amount of dust that they
kicked up or of dirt they left behind them. We
have a boy and girl coming to the play—Timothy
and Wilhemina Worrits—a companion pair o

sketches, in which the personal was almost as strik-
ing as the mental transformation, Mrs. Mathews

especially, looking and acting the child
to the life ; and we have two of the lady patrons of
the town, Miss B. Tracter and Miss Pamela Python,

who are also its principal scandal-mongers, who
hate everything but themselves, and each other most
of all ; and are only happy when they unite in a
wholesale flood of defamation. The personal trans-
formation in this case was quite as extraor-
dinary as in the others; and the duet to the tune of
" Skilly-golee," in which they poured out their rap-
turous malignity, was one of the most comic and
comic—and only occasionally of the effective features of the night. After some other per-
sonations, some capital songs, and a flow of dialogue,
always
philo-
logical form of humour—the manager and mana-
geress re-enter to announce that their preparations
are completed, the theatre ready, and what is more
important—so also is the audience. The manager
has paid a visit, among others, to the principal
dentist of the town, and, in evidence of his sym-
pathy, "he has taken two in front." Thus we come
to the second portion—the grand sensation drama,
which, of course, is a burlesque on some
of our recent London novelties and the
humour
of which may be inferred from
the mere name of its hero—a captain of ban-
ditti, who is denominated—Stckitinhisghizzardi
The Greek and German languages are distinguished'
i

by their compounds; but there is nothing in the
genius of the Greek or German equal to the genius
of Mr. Byron. We have no hesitation in saying
that there is no other living humorist who could
have concocted such a name. It stalks out upon
the ear with all the muddy grandeur of the old
Coburg in the days of Davidge. The owner of
this title is a count, who, having in his younger
days unconsciously appropriated a silver fork (he
calms his remorse by believing it was plated) at a
fashionable supper at Naples, has been driven in
consequence to the hills and brigandage, where his
band consists of his lieutenant_Spangalette (Mrs.
Mathews)—who is always swearing devotion to
him and always attempting his life. Here he is
followed by his daughter, the Lady Luna, who
carries the evidence of her father's innocence—the
fatal fork—in her pocket, and who, having been
wandering about for twenty years, finds it conve-
nient to sit down. As every heroine in such a
position sleeps, her father takes advantage of her
unconsciousness to pick her pocket of the fork, and
thus arousing her, his petty larceny further arouses
her slumbering filial instinct. She recognises her
father, and rushes into his arms. A maniac
then enters. A wild woman of the hills,
who is, of course, the wife of the bandit count and
the mother of the Lady Luna; and though her
reasoning faculty is unsettled, has remarkably good
spirits, and hops about to a negro melody with the
greatest possible enjoyment. This interesting
being, receiving a mortal injury, is only to be re-
vived, like the Adelphi " Vampire," by being
placed in the light of the rising moon; but, as
the moon on this occasion won't get up to do a
good action, she is revived by being placed
under the light of a policeman's bull's-eye, and
directly after her enemy, taking a tremendous
header from a bridge, the other strong sensation
features of the " Colleen Bawn" and the "Peep o'
Day " are in some measure illustrated,
and the Count and his daughter recover-
_ . .
tions, but also their best clothes, with an appro-
priate song and dance, bring this powerfully con-
structed sensation drama to a close.

Written with great humour, and very admirably
acted, the mysterious and remorseful brigand con-
trasting as happily with the more demonstrative
disposition and whiskers of his lieutenant—as the
exuberant maniac mother—relieves the classic
sadness of the child—each of which were
embodied to the life by Mr. and Mrs.
Mathews ; this burlesque elicited very hearty
laughter and applause, and when a little shortened
will become the very best thing of the kind that
has been witnessed for some years.
The entertainment, therefore, we are happy to
record, was entirely, and deservedly successful.
Mr. and Mrs. Mathews being summoned at the close
of it to receive the congratulations of the audience.