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THE BEGINNINGS OF BURLESQUE.

Who shall say when the spirit of burlesque first made its appearance on our stage? There were traces of it, we may be sure, in the Mysteries and Moralities of pre-Elizabethan days; the monkish dramatists were not devoid of humour, and the first lay playwrights had a rough sense of ridicule. The "Vice" which figured in so many of our rude old dramas had in him an element of satire, and the pictures drawn of his Satanic Majesty were conscious or unconscious caricatures of the popular conception of the Evil One.

In all these cases, however, the burlesque was general. It was of the nature of travestie, and of the vaguest sort. Of particular parody one finds but few signs in the Elizabethan drama. There is a little of it in Shakespeare, where he pokes fun at the turgidity of contemporary tragedy or at the obscurity of contemporary Euphuism. The Pyramus and Thisbe episode is less burlesque than satire. It is an exposé of the absurdities of the amateur performer, for whom Shakespeare, as a professional actor, could have only an amused contempt.

"The Bard" parodied, but he did not burlesque. That was left to the initiative of the gifted literary Dioscuri, Beaumont and Fletcher. "The Knight of the Burning Pestle," which saw the light in 1611, is not wholly a travestie, but it contains a travestie within itself. In the main it is a dramatic exposition of a love story, the scene of which is laid in the middle-class life of the time. Ralph, the Knight of the Burning Pestle, is by no means the hero of the tale; rather is he an excrescence upon it. A grocer and his wife sit on the stage, and suggest to the actors that Ralph, their apprentice, shall take part in the performance. They want a play in which a grocer shall do "admirable things," and Ralph is bound to do them. The apprentice, it would seem, is an amateur actor—he "hath played before," and so finds no difficulty in adapting himself to the situation. When he enters, it is "like a grocer in his shop, with two prentices, reading 'Palmerin of England.'" This gives us the key to the satire. Ralph is to burlesque the romances of chivalry, which were then so common in England, as elsewhere. "Palmerin of England" had been "translated out of French" by Anthony Munday and assistants, and published between 1580 and 1602. Ralph starts with a quotation from it, and then goes on to say:—

Certainly those knights are much to be commended who, neglecting their possessions, wander with a squire and a dwarf through the deserts to relieve poor ladies. … There are no such courteous and fair well-spoken knights in this age.

He whom Palmerin would have called "Fair Sir," and she whom Rosiclear would have called "Right beauteous Damsel," are now spoken of opprobriously. But why should not Ralph be the means of wiping out this reproach?—

Why should I not pursue this course, both for the credit of myself and our company? For amongst all the worthy books of achievements, I do not call to mind that I yet read of a grocer-errant: I will be the said knight. Have you heard of any that hath wandered unfurnished of his squire and dwarf? Thy elder prentice Tim shall be my trusty squire, and little George my dwarf. Hence, my blue apron! Yet, in remembrance of my former trade, upon my shield shall be portrayed a burning pestle, and I will be called the Knight of the Burning Pestle. My beloved squire, and George my dwarf, I charge you that henceforth you never call me by any other name but "the right courteous and valiant Knight of the Burning Pestle"; and that you never call any female by the name of a woman or wench, but "fair lady," if she have her desires; if not, "distressed damsel"; that you call all forests and heaths "deserts," and all horses "palfreys."

After this, Ralph reappears at various points in the action. He interposes, Quixote-like, in the aforesaid love-affair, and gets belaboured by the favoured lover for his pains. Later, he puts up at an inn, and, about to leave, is surprised when the tapster draws his attention to the fact that the reckoning is not paid:—

Ralph. Right courteous Knight, who for the order's sake Which thou hast ta'en, hang'st out the holy Bell, As I this flaming pestle bear about, We render thanks to your puissant self, Your beauteous lady, and your gentle squires, For thus refreshing of our wearied limbs, Stiffen'd with hard achievements in wild desert.

Tapster. Sir, there is twelve shillings to pay.

Ralph. Thou merry squire Tapstero, thanks to thee For comforting our souls with double jug: And if adventurous fortune prick thee forth, Thou jovial squire, to follow feats of arms, Take heed thou tender ev'ry lady's cause, Ev'ry true knight, and ev'ry damsel fair, But spill the blood of treacherous Saracens, And false enchanters that with magic spells Have done to death full many a noble knight.

Host. Thou valiant Knight of the Burning Pestle, give ear to me: there is twelve shillings to pay, and as I am a true knight, I will not bate a penny. …

Ralph. Sir knight, this mirth of yours becomes you well; But, to requite this liberal courtesy, If any of your squires will follow arms, He shall receive from my heroic hand A knighthood, by the virtue of this pestle.

The host, however, insists upon receiving his twelve shillings, and the grocer's wife, in great fear lest harm shall befall her Ralph, requests her husband to pay the money. In a subsequent scene, Ralph conquers the giant Barbaroso, and releases his captives. By-and-by he goes into Moldavia, where he touches the heart of the king's daughter, but tells her that he has already pledged his troth to Susan, "a cobbler's maid in Malte Street," whom he vowed never to forsake. At the end of the play he comes on to explain, at length, that he is dead, taking the opportunity to recount his various performances.

The fun is never very brilliant; and the "Knight of the Pestle," albeit by writers so distinguished, is not, for the present-day Englishman, particularly exhilarating reading. One can imagine, however, how droll it seemed to our ancestors, with whom it remained popular for over half a century, surviving till the time of Mistress Eleanor Gwynne, who once spoke the prologue to it.

Our first burlesque, then, was a satire upon exaggerated fiction. Our second was a satire upon extravagant plays. It is possible that "The Rehearsal" was represented before "The Knight of the Burning Pestle" left the boards. Begun in 1663, and ready for production before 1665, it was first performed in 1671. It is ascribed to George Villiers, Duke of Buckingham; but probably there were several hands engaged in it. It was the outcome of the boredom and the laughter caused by the wildness and bombast of the Restoration plays. There were some things in the stage of that day which the wits could not abide:—

Here brisk insipid rogues, for wit, let fall

Sometimes dull sense; but oft'ner none at all.

There, strutting heroes, with a grim-fac'd train,

Shall brave the gods, in King Cambyses' vein.

For (changing rules, of late, as if man writ

In spite of reason, nature, art, and wit)

Our poets make us laugh at tragedy,

And with their comedies they make us cry.

So runs the prologue to "The Rehearsal," which was destined to strike the first blow at the mechanical dramas that had succeeded the masterpieces of the Shakespearian period. Bayes, the playwright whose tragedy is supposed to be "rehearsed," is usually accepted as a skit upon Dryden, whose dress, speech, and manner were openly mimicked by Lacy, the interpreter of the part. But there is reason to believe that Davenant first sat for the portrait, and in the end Bayes became a sort of incarnated parody of all the Restoration playwrights. This preposterous play travesties a whole school of dramatic writing. Dramas by Dryden, Davenant, James and Henry Howard, Mrs. Behn, and Sir William Killigrew and others, are directly satirised in certain passages; but in the main the satire is general. For instance, in one place fun is made of the prevalence of similes in the dramas aimed at. Prince Prettyman, in the rehearsed play, falls asleep, and Chloris, coming in, finds him in that situation:—

Bayes. Now, here she must make a simile.

Smith (one of the spectators). Where's the necessity of that, Mr. Bayes?

Bayes. Because she's surpris'd. That's a general rule: you must ever make a simile when you are surpris'd; 't is the new way of writing.

Elsewhere it is confusion of metaphor, very common among the second-rate "tragedians," that is derided. Says the physician in the play:—

All these threat'ning storms, which, like impregnant clouds, do hover o'er our heads (when once they are grasped but by the eye of reason), melt into fruitful showers of blessings on the people.

Bayes. Pray mark that allegory. Is not that good?

Johnson (another spectator). Yes, that grasping of a storm with the eye is admirable.

In one place, Smith, the aforesaid onlooker, complains that, amid all the talk, the plot stands still; to which Bayes replies, "Why, what the devil is the plot good for but to bring in fine things?" At another juncture we have the first hint of a bit of persiflage which Sheridan afterwards imitated in "The Critic." It has reference to the portentous reticence of some of the dialogue in Restoration plays. An usher and a physician are on the stage:—

Phys. If Lorenzo should prove false (which none but the great gods can tell) you then perhaps would find that—— (whispers).

Usher. Alone, do you say?

Phys. No, attended with the noble—— (whispers).

Usher. Who, he in grey?

Phys. Yes, and at the head of—— (whispers).

Usher. Then, sir, most certain 'twill in time appear, These are the reasons that have induc'd 'em to't; First, he—— (whispers). Secondly, they—— (whispers). Thirdly, and lastly, both he and they—— (whispers).

[Exeunt whispering.

"Well, sir," says Smith to Bayes, "but pray, why all this whispering?" "Why, sir," replies the dramatist, "because they are supposed to be politicians, and matters of state ought not to be divulg'd."

In its direct travestie "The Rehearsal" is often very happy. Dryden had claimed for his tragedies that they were written by "th' exactest rules"; so Bayes exhibits to his friends Smith and Johnson what he calls his "Book of Drama Commonplaces, the mother of many plays," containing "certain helps that we men of art have found it convenient to make use of." "I do here aver," he says, "that no man yet the sun e'er shone upon has parts sufficient to furnish out a stage, except it were by the help of these my rules." Davenant, in his "Love and Honour," had portrayed a mental and spiritual struggle between those potent forces. Bayes, accordingly, is made to introduce a scene in which Prince Volscius, sitting down to pull on his boots, wonders whether he ought or ought not to perform that operation:—

My legs, the emblem of my various thought,

Show to what sad distraction I am brought.

Sometimes, with stubborn Honour, like this boot,

My mind is guarded, and resolv'd to do't:

Sometimes, again, that very mind, by Love

Disarmèd, like this other leg does prove.

Shall I to Honour or to Love give way?

Go on, cries Honour; tender Love says, Nay;

Honour aloud commands, Pluck both boots on;

But softer Love does whisper, Put on none.

In the end, he "goes out hopping, with one boot on, and t'other off." Again, there was a passage in the drama called "The Villain," in which the host supplied his guests with a collation out of his clothes—a capon from his helmet, cream out of his scabbard, and so on. In like manner, Pallas, in Mr. Bayes's tragedy, furnishes forth the two usurping kings:—

Lo, from this conquering lance

Does flow the purest wine of France:

And to appease your hunger, I

Have in my helmet brought a pie;

Lastly, to bear a part with these,

Behold a buckler made of cheese.

Of the direct parody in the burlesque a few instances will suffice. Almanzor, in "The Conquest of Granada," becomes the Drawcansir of Mr. Bayes's work; and while the former ejaculates—

He who dares love, and for that love must die,

And, knowing this, dares yet love on, am I—

the latter caps it with—

He that dares drink, and for that drink dares die,

And knowing this, dares yet drink on, am I.

Again, while Almanzor says to his rival in love—

Thou dar'st not marry her, while I'm in sight;

With a bent brow, thy priest and thee I'll fright—

Drawcansir, snatching the bowls of wine from the usurpers, cries—

Whoe'er to gulp one drop of this dare think,

I'll stare away his very power to drink.

The simile of the boar and the sow has often been quoted; it seems to have been always a favourite with our playgoing ancestors. In "The Conquest of Granada" we read:—

So two kind turtles, when a storm is nigh,

Look up, and see it gathering in the sky. …

Perch'd on some dropping branch, they sit alone,

And coo and hearken to each other's moan.

Mr. Bayes imitated this in what he called "one of the most delicate, dainty similes in the world, egad":—

So boar and sow, when any storm is nigh,

Snuff up, and smell it gath'ring in the sky. …

Pensive in mud they wallow all alone,

And snort and gruntle to each other's moan.

The example set by Buckingham in "The Rehearsal" was followed, more than half a century later, by Henry Fielding, in "The Tragedy of Tragedies, or the Life and Death of Tom Thumb the Great." This was brought out in 1730, in two acts, and was so immediately and largely successful that the author was induced to expand its two acts into three. It was afterwards published, with elaborate notes, setting forth a number of "parallel passages" from Dryden downwards, and with a preface, in which the supposed editor, H. Scriblerus Secundus, gravely assigned the origin of the "tragedy" to the age of Elizabeth. Apropos of parallel passages, the editor says:—

Whether this sameness of thought and expression [on the part of the authors quoted] … proceeded from an agreement in their way of thinking, or whether they have borrowed from our author, I leave the reader to determine. I shall adventure to affirm this of the Sentiments of our author, that they are generally the most familiar which I have ever met with, and at the same time delivered with the highest dignity of phrase; which brings me to speak of his diction. Here I shall only beg one postulatum—viz., that the greatest perfection of the language of a tragedy is, that it is not to be understood; which granted (as I think it must be), it will necessarily follow that the only ways to avoid this is by being too high or too low for the understanding, which will comprehend everything within its reach.

The editor goes on to say that "our author excelleth" in both these styles. "He is very rarely within sight through the whole play, either rising higher than the eye of your understanding can soar, or sinking lower than it careth to stoop."

Fielding does not adopt in "Tom Thumb" the machinery of "The Rehearsal." "Tom Thumb" is a burlesque tragedy, standing by itself, and intended for representation in the serious spirit which should animate all true burlesque. Tom Thumb is "a little hero, with a great soul," who, as a reward for his victories over the race of giants, demands in marriage the hand of Huncamunca, the daughter of King Arthur. As he observes:—

I ask not kingdoms, I can conquer those;

I ask not money, money I've enough;

For what I've done, and what I mean to do,

For giants slain, and giants yet unborn

Which I will slay—if this be call'd a debt,

Take my receipt in full: I ask but this—

To sun myself in Huncamunca's eyes.

"Prodigious bold request," remarks the King; but he decides, nevertheless, to give Huncamunca to Tom Thumb. Unhappily, Lord Grizzle is enamoured of the princess, and, in revenge, leads an insurrection against the Court. He is, however, conquered by the little hero, who is about to be wedded to his charmer, when, alas! as he is marching in triumph through the streets, he is swallowed by "a cow, of larger than the usual size." Queen Dollallolla, who is in love with Tom, slays with her own hand the messenger who brought the news. Thereupon, Cleora, who is in love with the messenger, kills the Queen. Huncamunca, by way of reprisal, kills Cleora. A certain Doodle kills Huncamunca; one Mustacha kills Doodle; the King kills Mustacha, and then kills himself, exclaiming—

So when the child, whom nurse from danger guards,

Sends Jack for mustard with a pack of cards,

Kings, queens and knaves throw one another down,

Till the whole pack lies scatter'd and o'erthrown;

So all our pack upon the floor is cast,

And all I boast is—that I fall the last.

We have here a happy satire upon the sanguinary conclusions given to the tragedies of the seventeenth century. Great pains, too, are taken, throughout the "tragedy," to travestie that bête noire of the humourists, the dragged-in simile, to which not even "The Rehearsal" had given the coup de grâce. The ghost of Tom Thumb's father is made to say—

So have I seen the bees in clusters swarm,

So have I seen the stars in frosty nights,

So have I seen the sand in windy days,

So have I seen the ghost on Pluto's shore,

So have I seen the flowers in spring arise,

So have I seen the leaves in autumn fall,

So have I seen the fruits in summer smile,

So have I seen the snow in winter frown.

Whereupon the king says, "D—n all thou hast seen!" Grizzle, when on the point of expiring, cries—

Some kinder sprite knocks softly at my soul,

And gently whispers it to haste away.

I come, I come, most willingly I come.

So, when some city wife, for country air,

To Hampstead or to Highgate does repair,

Her to make haste her husband does implore,

And cries, "My dear, the coach is at the door":

With equal wish, desirous to be gone,

She gets into the coach, and then she cries, "Drive on!"

Some of the mock similes in "Tom Thumb" are among the most familiar things in literature. We all remember the lines—

So, when two dogs are fighting in the streets,

When a third dog one of the two dogs meets,

With angry teeth he bites him to the bone,

And this dog smarts for what that dog has done.

And these—

So, when the Cheshire cheese a maggot breeds,

Another and another still succeeds;

By thousands and ten thousands they increase,

Till one continued maggot fills the rotten cheese.

The burlesque contained within the pages of "Tom Thumb" covers a considerable field. Dryden is once more very freely satirised, some nine or ten of his plays being held up to ridicule. But much attention is at the same time paid to dramas which saw the light after the production of "The Rehearsal." Thus, there are allusions to the "Mithridates," "Nero," and "Brutus" of Nathaniel Lee, which belong to 1674–1679; to the "Marius" of Otway (1680); to the "Anna Bullen," "Earl of Essex," "Mary Queen of Scots," and "Cyrus the Great" of Banks (1680–1696); to the "Persian Princess" of Theobald (1711), to Addison's "Cato" (1713), to Young's "Busiris" and "The Revenge," and even to Thomson's "Sophonisba," which had come out only in the year preceding that in which "Tom Thumb" was performed. "O Sophonisba, Sophonisba O" (which had already been parodied in the form of "O Jemmy Thomson, Jemmy Thomson O") is here laughed at in "O Huncamunca, Huncamunca O!" In "Cyrus the Great" the virtuous Panthea remarks to one lover—

For two I must confess are gods to me,

Which is my Abradatus first, and thee.

And, in a like spirit, Huncamunca, after wedding Tom Thumb, is quite willing to wed Grizzle:—

My ample heart for more than one has room:

A maid like me Heaven form'd at least for two.

I married him, and now I'll marry you—

thereby reminding us of the obliging defendant in Mr. Gilbert's "Trial by Jury," who is ready to "marry this lady to-day, and marry the other to-morrow." In the third act of "Cato" is a simile which Fielding parodies thus—putting it into the mouth of Grizzle:—

So have I seen, in some dark winter's day,

A sudden storm rush down the sky's highway,

Sweep through the streets with terrible ding-dong,

Gush thro' the spouts, and wash whole crowds along,

The crowded shops the thronging vermin screen,

Together cram the dirty and the clean,

And not one shoe-boy in the street is seen.

Finally, we have this equally well-known passage, suggested by the remark of Lee's Mithridates that he "would be drunk with death":—

Doodle. My liege, I a petition have here got.

King. Petition me no petitions, sir, to-day; Let other hours be set apart for business. To-day it is our pleasure to be drunk, And this our queen shall be as drunk as we.

It was the fate of "Tom Thumb" to be transformed—so far as it was possible to transform it—into a burlesque of Italian opera as well as of conventional drama. "Set to music after the Italian manner," it was brought out in 1733 as "The Opera of Operas," and had considerable vogue in the new guise thus given to it. It had been preceded in 1727 by Gay's "Beggar's Opera"; but that famous work was a social and political satire rather than a travestie of the exotic lyrical drama. It may be regarded as a species of prototype of the burletta or ballad opera of later days. Not even the transformed "Tom Thumb"[1] could be called an effective reductio ad absurdum of the Italian opera of those days. For that the public had to wait a short time longer.

Meanwhile, four years after the production of "Tom Thumb" came the "Chrononhotonthologos" of Henry Carey, author of "Sally in our Alley." This also is a burlesque tragedy, but the travestie is purely general. No individual play is directly satirised; the satire is aimed at a whole class of dramas—the same class as that which had suggested the composition of "Tom Thumb."

Carey says, in his prologue:—

To-night our comic muse the buskin wears,

And gives herself no small romantic airs;

Struts in heroics, and in pompous verse

Does the minutest incidents rehearse;

In ridicule's strict retrospect displays

The poetasters of these modern days,

Who with big bellowing bombast rend our ears,

Which, stript of sound, quite void of sense appears;

Or else their fiddle-faddle numbers flow,

Serenely dull, elaborately low.

"Chrononhotonthologos" is a short piece, in one act and seven scenes. It is described in its sub-title as "the most tragical tragedy that ever was tragedised by any company of tragedians," and it bears out the description tolerably well. When the curtain rises, there enter two courtiers of Queerummania—Rigdum-Funnidos and Aldiborontiphoscophornio. Says the latter to the former:—

Aldiborontiphoscophornio!

Where left you Chrononhotonthologos?

Chrononhotonthologos is the king, and we learn that he is in his tent, in a kind of waking slumber. Presently he enters, very much put out that he should be so inclined to doze, and very angry, consequently, with the God of Sleep. Says he:—

Sport not with Chrononhotonthologos,

Thou idle slumb'rer, thou detested Somnus;

and "exits in a huff." Whereupon the two courtiers, who have retired, re-enter:—

Rigdum. The King is in a most cursed passion! Pray who is the Mr. Somnus he's so angry withal?

Aldi. The son of Chaos and of Erebus, Incestuous pair! brother of Mors relentless, Whose speckled robe, and wings of blackest hue, Astonish all mankind with hideous glare: Himself, with sable plumes, to men benevolent Brings downy slumbers and refreshing sleep.

Rigdum. This gentleman may come of a very good family, for aught I know; but I would not be in his place for the world.

Aldi. But lo! the king his footsteps this way bending, His cogitative faculties immers'd In cogibundity of cogitation.

Thereupon the king re-enters, followed almost immediately by the captain of the guard, who informs him that "th' antipodean pow'rs from realms below have burst the entrails of the earth" and threaten the safety of the kingdom. "This world is too incopious to contain them; armies on armies march in form stupendous"—"tier on tier, high pil'd from earth to heaven." The king, however, is not alarmed. He bids Bombardinian, his general, draw his legions forth, and orders the priests to prepare their temples for rites of triumph:—

Let the singing singers,

With vocal voices, most vociferous,

In sweet vociferation, out-vociferise

Ev'n sound itself.

Happily the Antipodeans (who walk upon their hands) are badly beaten, and all run away except their king, with whom, alas! Fadladinida, the wife of Chrononhotonthologos, promptly falls in love. As she herself says to her favourite maiden:—

Oh, my Tatlanthe! Have you seen his face,

His air, his shape, his mien, his ev'ry grace?

In what a charming attitude he stands,

How prettily he foots it with his hands!

Well, to his arms—no, to his legs—I fly,

For I must have him, if I live or die.

Meanwhile, Bombardinian has invited the King to drink wine with him in his tent. The King accepts, but, not content with liquor, asks for something more substantial:—

Hold, Bombardinian, I esteem it fit,

With so much wine, to eat a little bit.

The cook suggests "some nice cold pork in the pantry," and is instantly slain by the irate monarch, who, deeming that Bombardinian is "braving" him, strikes him. Whereupon the General:—

A blow! shall Bombardinian take a blow?

Blush! blush, thou sun! start back, thou rapid ocean!

Hills! vales! seas! mountains! all commixing crumble,

And into chaos pulverise the world;

For Bombardinian has receiv'd a blow,

And Chrononhotonthologos must die.

[They fight. He kills the king.

Ha! what have I done?

Go, call a coach, and let a coach be call'd;

And let the man that calls it be the caller;

And, in his calling, let him nothing call,

But coach, coach, coach! Oh, for a coach, ye gods!

[Exit, raving.

The doctor, pronouncing the king dead, is killed by the General, who then kills himself. The Queen mourns her widowhood, and Tatlanthe proposes that she should wed Rigdum-Funnidos. To this, however, Aldiborontiphoscophornio objects; and so, to save discussion, the Queen will give no preference to either:—