. "I know a publication called
Punch very well, but I never heard of a performance so named. I'll go in
and see it. Who knows but it may be an avatar[1] of the Editor of that
illustrious periodical, who condescends to discard his dread incognito for
the nonce, in order to exhibit himself, for one night only, to the eyes
and understandings of admiring London."

[1] The Avatar we do not allow--the illustrious periodical we
do.--ED. OF PUNCH.

In another minute I was seated in the boxes, and found a crowded audience
in full enjoyment of the quiet waggery of Keeley, who was fooling them to
the top of their bent, accoutred from top to toe as Mynheer Punch the
Great, while his clever little wife--who, by the way, possesses, I think,
more of the "vis comica" than any actress of the day--caused sides to
shake and eyes to water by her naive and humorous delineation of Mrs.
Snozzle.

The curtain had hardly fallen more than a couple of minutes, when a door
behind me opened hastily, and a box-keeper thrusting in his head, called
out--"Is there a medical man here?" "I am one," said I, getting up;
"anything the matter?" "Come with me then, sir, if you please," said he;
"a severe accident has just happened to Mrs. Keeley; a falling scene has
struck her head, sir, and hurt her dreadfully."

"Good heavens!" said I, much shocked; "I will come immediately."

I followed the man to the stage door, and was ushered into a dressing-room
with several people in it, where, extended on a sofa, lay the unfortunate
lady, whom I had but a few minutes before seen full of life and spirits,
delighting hundreds with her unrivalled humour and _espieglerie_,--there
she lay, in the same fantastic dress she had worn on the stage, pale as
death--a quantity of blood flowing from a fearful wound on her head, and
uttering those low quick moans which are indicative of extreme suffering.

Poor little Keeley stood beside the couch, holding her hand; he was still
in full fig as _Polichinel_; and the grotesqueness of his attire
contrasted strangely with the anguish depicted on his countenance. As I
came forward, he slowly made way for me--looked in my face imploringly, as
if to gather from its expression some gleam of hope, and then stood aside,
in an attitude of profound dejection.

Having felt the sufferer's pulse, I was about to turn her head gently, in
order to examine the nature of the wound, when a hustling noise behind me
causing me to turn