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Page 36
In the case of the little children there are none, or few, at any
rate, of the drawbacks. Not one in fifty goes on the stage; the mites
are engaged only at certain seasons; and their harvest-time enables
poor people to obtain many little comforts and necessaries. Further,
there is one curious thing which may not be known to the highly
particular sect--no manager, actor, or actress would use a profane or
coarse word among the children; such an offender would be scouted by
the roughest member of any company and condemned by the very
stage-carpenters. I own that I have sometimes wished that a child here
and there could be warm asleep on a chilly night, especially when the
young creature was perilously suspended from a wire; but that is very
nearly the furthest extent of my pity. So long as the youngsters are
not required to perform dangerous or unnatural feats, they need no
pity. Instead of being inured to brutalities, they are actually taken
away from brutality--for no man or woman would sully their minds. We
have heard it said that the stage-children who return to school after
their spell of pantomime corrupt the others. This is a gross and
stupid falsehood which is calculated to injure a cause that has many
good points. I earnestly sympathise with the well-meaning people who
desire to succour the little ones; but I beseech them not to be led
away by misstatements which are concocted for sensational purposes. So
far from corrupting other children, the young actors invariably act as
a good influence in a school. The experienced observer can almost make
certain of picking out the boys and girls who have had a
stage-training. They like to be smart and cleanly, their deportment
and general manners are improved, and they are almost invariably
superior in intelligence to the ordinary school-trained child. Imagine
Mme. Katti Lanner having a corrupt influence! Imagine those delightful
beings who play "Alice in Wonderland" corrupting anybody or anything!
I have always been struck by the pretty manners of the trained
children--and the advance in refinement is especially noticeable among
those who have been speaking or singing parts. The most pleasing set
of youths that I ever met were the members of a comic-opera troupe.
Some of them, without an approach to freedom of manner, would converse
with good sense on many topics, and their drill had been so extended
as to include a knowledge of polite salutes. Not one of the boys or
girls would have been ill at ease in a drawing-room; and I found their
educational standard quite up to that of any Board school known to me.
These nice little folk were certainly in no wise pallid or distraught;
and, when they danced on the stage, the performance was a beautiful
and delightful romp which suggested no idea of pain. To see the "prima
donna" of the company trundling her hoop on a bright morning was as
pretty a sight as one would care to see. The little lady was neither
forward nor unhealthy, nor anything else that is objectionable--and it
was plain that she enjoyed her life. Is it in the least likely that
any sane manager would ill-treat a little child that was required to
be pleasing? One or two acrobats have been known to be stern with
their apprentices; but the rudest circus-man would not venture to
exhibit a pupil who looked unhappy. The rascally "Arabs" who entrapped
so many boys in years gone by were fiends who met with very
appropriate retribution; but such villains are not common.
I am always haunted by the argument about late hours--and give it
every weight. As aforesaid, I used sometimes to wish that some wee
creature could only be wrapped in a night-gown and sent to rest. But,
for the benefit of those who cannot well imagine what the horrors of a
city slum are like, let me describe the nightly scene in a typical
city alley. It is cold in the pantomime season; but the folk in that
alley have not much fire. Joe, the costermonger, Bill, the
market-labourer, Tom, the fish-porter, and the rest come home in a
straggling way; and, if they can buy a pennyworth of coal, they boil
the little kettle. Then one of the children runs to the chandler's and
gets a halfpennyworth of tea, a scrap of bread, and perhaps a penny
slice of sausage. The men stint themselves in food and firing; but
they always have a little to spare for gin and beer and tobacco. There
is no light in the evil-smelling room; but there is a place at the
corner of the alley where the gas is burning as cheerily as the foul
wreaths of smoke will permit. The men go out and squat on barrels in
the hideous bar; then they call for some liquor which may be warranted
to take speedy effect; then they smoke, and try to forget.
What is the little child to do? Go to bed? Why, it has no bed! If it
were earning a little money, its parents might be able to provide a
flock or straw bed with some sort of covering; but the poverty of
these people is so gnawing and dire that very few lodgings contain
anything which could possibly be pawned for twopence. Usually the
child seeks the streets; and in the dim and filthy haze he or she
sports at large with other ragged companions. Then the women--the
match-box makers, trouser-makers, and such like--begin to troop
in--and they gravitate towards the gin-shop. The darkness deepens; the
bleared lamps blare in the dirty mist; the hoarse roar from the
public-house comes forth accompanied by choking wafts of reek; the
abominable tramps move towards the lodging-house and pollute the
polluted air further with the foulness of their language; the drink
mounts into unstable heads; and presently--especially on Saturday
nights--there are hoarse growls as from rough-throated beasts, shrill
shrieks, and a running chorus of indescribable grossness. Drunken men
are quarrelling in the street, drunken women yell and stagger, and the
hideous discord fills the night on all sides. No item of corruption is
spared the children; and the vile hurly-burly ceases only at midnight.
The children will always try to sneak through the swinging doors of
the gin _inferno_ when the cold becomes too severe; and they will
remain crouched like rats until some capricious guest sends them out
with an oath and a kick. There is not one imaginable horror that does
not become familiar to these children of despair--and they sometimes
have a very good chance of seeing murder. When the last hour comes,
and the father and mother return to their dusky den, the child
crouches anywhere on the floor; undressing is not practised; and, if
any sentimental person will first of all go into a common Board school
in a non-theatrical quarter on a wet afternoon, and if he will then
drive on and pass through a few hundreds of the theatrical children,
his "olfactories" will teach him a lesson which may make him think a
good deal.
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