Public ledger. [volume] (Memphis, Tenn.) 1865-1893, 1874-01-21

the guillotiue; and that so horrible q
subject as capital punishment is suscep-
tible Of grotesque treatment is curiously
manifest from the fact that large pro-
portion of the very best Jokes extant
have the gallows for their themo, while
there is no droller episode in the i'm.
mortal drama of Punch than the inter-
view Of that ligneous clown with jack
Keteh.' Extremes meet, and it was
perhaps because Deburau was so mex.
pressibly sad that he was so intolerably
funny.
1t is pleasant to learn that the de-
ceased pantommist was most estima.
BILE man. he had brought mp large
family Of orphan brothers and sisters,
was himself married and has left two
daughters, whom he had most carefully
educated. His conduct in all the rela.
tions of private life was most exemplary.
Late in life he became a manager, and
was not less prosperous as the director
of a theater than he had been successful
as a clown. He had acquired q large
fortune, and by single visit to Egypt,
whittier he went at the express invita-
ton of the Khedve, he realized the sum
Il
artist even somewhat of poet, and
although one of the most modest and re
tiring of mankind, had proper sense
of his own dignity. There was current
some years ago in Paris a story concern
ing him, which has escaped the notice
of his most recent French biographers,
but which we have every reason to be.
lieve is thoroughly authentic. It is to the
effect that he was once asked to dinner
by distinguished French nobleman-a
Duke, academician, and peer of France,
indeed--who, with very bad taste for so
grand a seigneur, invited party of
savants, professors of classics and math.
ematics, to meet him, and instructed
them to talk shop" throughout the re.
past, with a view of putting poor Pierrot
out of countenance. Deburau was him
self, as we have said no mean scholar, |
but he was oyerawed by the social dis |
tinction of the company and persistently |
held his tongue. The discussions, how.
ever, concerning the square of the by |
pothenuse the backbone Of the megathe- |
rum, and the scholast on Pindar, we're |
at last too much for his patience. He |
drew back his chair, stood up, seized |
two tapers from the candleSticks on the |
table before him, turned double somer-
sault with that grace and agility OF which |
he was so great a master, and, in de- |
scending, replaced the candles in their
sockets. Meanwhile, stare of blank
had pervaded the counte-
nances of the assembled pedants and
philosophers. Gentlemen, quietly re
marked Deburau, you have said what
you know, and have done what | know;
nous sommes quittes. Thus it will be
seen that Pierrot had mother wit as we'll |
as artistic talent. But all his mumme.
ries and jests are at an end nov, and
the curtain must be drawn, for the farce
is played out The fame of Deburau,
we may venture TO predict, will be as
lasting in his own country as that of
Grimaldi the Elder has been in England
land that is saying a great deal; for,
although nearly forty years have elapsed
since his death, the pantomimic glory OF
Joey has not yet begun to pale. De
burau was spared the dreadful physical
which embittered the later
years OF our greatest English clown;
nor did he ever feel as poor Grimaldi
felt too often, the icy hand of poverty
The French Pierrot was n prosperous !
gentleman, and deserved in every way
the good opinion of the French states
man who remarked that it was unfor
impossible to give Pierrot the
cross Of the Legion of Honor Yet it
is something to have led useful and
blameless life, and to leave a bright and
unsullied name; and TO do this was the
fate of poor Perrot, who
has just died at Bordeaux"