Читать книгу The Magnificent Montez: From Courtesan to Convert - Horace Wyndham - Страница 29

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If she had a quick temper, Lola Montez had a good heart, and was always ready to lend a helping hand to others. In this connection Edward Fitzball, a hack dramatist with whom things were not going well, has a story of how she volunteered to assist in a benefit performance that was being got up to set him on his legs. It was difficult to secure attractions; and the beneficiare, realising that, as was the custom in such cases, he would have to make good any deficit himself, was feeling depressed.

"This benefit," he says, "which I fully expected would prove to be a decided loss, annoyed me sadly. I was sauntering along Regent Street when I met Stretton, the popular singer, whose own benefit was just coming off. He said that he had secured every attraction worthy of the public, and that there was no hope for me, 'unless,' he added, 'you could secure Lola Montez.'

"'Pray, who is that?' I said in my ignorance.

"'Lola Montez is a lady who appeared the other night at Her Majesty's Theatre as a dancer, but, due to some aristocratic disturbance, has left in disgust. The papers were full of it. I offered her £50 to dance for me, and met with a decided refusal. Hence, I see no hope for you.'"

Fitzball, however, thinking it worth while taking a chance, hurried to Lola's lodgings and begged her to contribute to the programme he was offering. He had not expected to be successful, since he knew that she was smarting under a sense of injury. To his surprise and delight, however, she promised her services, and refused to accept any payment.

Overjoyed at the success of his embassy, Fitzball rushed off to the printers and had the hoardings plastered with bills, directing special attention to the novelty:

THEATRE ROYAL, COVENT GARDEN

Monday, July 10, 1843.

COLOSSAL ATTRACTION!

(For the Benefit of Mr. Fitzball)

EXTRAORDINARY COMBINATION OF TALENT!

During the evening the celebrated Donna Lola Montez (whose recent performance created so pronounced a sensation at Her Majesty's Theatre) will execute, by special request, her remarkable dance, "El Oleano."

N.B.—This will positively be the Donna's only appearance in London, as she departs on Thursday next for St. Petersburg.

"The theatre," says Fitzball, in his account of the evening, "was crammed. Lola Montez arrived in a splendid carriage, accompanied by her maid. When she was dressed, she enquired if I thought her costume would be approved. I have seen sylphs and female forms of the most dazzling beauty in ballets and fairy dramas, but the most dazzling and perfect form I ever did gaze upon was that of Lola Montez in her white and gold attire studded with diamonds. Her bounding before the public was the signal for general applause and admiration. On the conclusion of her performance, there was a rapturous and universal call for her reappearance."