world is content to
live upon half-rations at other seasons of the year, there is
extraordinary storing of provisions at certain of the theatres. These
are not edible, however; they are due to the art of the
property-maker, and are designed for what are known as the "spill and
pelt" scenes of the pantomime. They represent juicy legs of mutton,
brightly streaked with red and white, quartern loaves, trussed fowls,
turnips, carrots, and cabbages, strings of sausages, fish of all
kinds, sizes, and colours; they are to be stolen and pocketed by the
clown, recaptured by the policeman, and afterwards wildly whirled in
all directions in a general "rally" of all the characters in the
harlequinade. They are but adroitly painted canvas stuffed with straw
or sawdust. No doubt the property-maker sometimes views from the wings
with considerable dismay the severe usage to which his works of art
are subjected. "He's an excellent clown, sir," one such was once heard
to say, regarding from his own standpoint the performance of the
jester in question; "he don't destroy the properties as some do."
Perhaps now and then, too, a minor actor or a supernumerary, who has
derided "the sham wine-parties of Macbeth and others," may lament the
scandalous waste of seeming good victuals in a pantomime. But, as a
rule, these performers are not fanciful on this, or, indeed, on any
other subject. They are not to be deceived by the illusions of the
stage; they are themselves too much a part of its shams and artifices.
Property legs of mutton are to them not even food for reflection but
simply "properties," and nothing more.

CHAPTER XXIII.

STAGE WIGS.

Wigs have claims to be considered amongst the most essential
appliances of the actors; means at once of their disguise and their
decoration. Without false hair the fictions of the stage could
scarcely be set forth. How could the old look young, or the young look
old, how could scanty locks be augmented, or baldness concealed, if
the _coiffeur_ did not lend his aid to the costumier? Nay, oftentimes
calvity has to be simulated, and fictitious foreheads of canvas
assumed. Hence the quaint advertisements of the theatrical hairdresser
in professional organs, that he is prepared to vend "old men's bald
pates" at a remarkably cheap rate. King Lear has been known to appear
without his beard--Mr. Garrick, as his portrait reveals, played the
part with a clean-shaven face, and John Kemble followed his exa