STAGE-LAND By Jerome K. Jerome CHAPTER I THE STAGE HERO IS name is George, generally speaking: "Call me George (in a very low voice, because she is so young and timid). Then he is happy. The Stage hero never has any work to do. He is always hanging about, and getting into trouble. His chief aim in life is to be accused of crimes he has never committed, and if he can muddle things up with a corpse, in some complicated way, so as to get himself reasonably mistaken for the murderer, he feels his day has not been wasted. He has a wonderful gift of speech, and a flow of language, calculated to strike terror to the bravest heart. It is a grand thing to hear him bullyragging the villain. The Stage hero is always entitled to "estates," chiefly remarkable for their high state of cultivation and for the eccentric ground plan of the "Manor House" upon them. The house is never more than one story high, but it makes up in green stuff over the porch what it lacks in size and convenience. The chief drawback in connection with it, to our 199 eyes, is that all the inhabitants of the neighboring village appear to live in the front garden, but the hero evidently thinks it rather nice of them, as it enables him to make speeches to them from the front door stephis favorite recreation. There is generally a public house immediately opposite. This is handy. These "estates" are a great anx iety to the Stage hero. He is not what you would call a business man, as far as we can judge, and his attempts to manage his own property invariably land him in ruin and distraction. His "estates," however, always get taken away from him by the villain, before the first act is over, and this saves him all further trouble with regard to them, until the end of the play, when he gets saddled with them once more. Not but what it must be confessed that there is much excuse for the poor fellow's general bewilderment concerning his affairs; and for his legal errors and confusion, generally. Stage "law" may not be quite the most fearful and wonderful mystery in the whole universe, but it's near it-very near it. We were under the impression, at one time, that we ourselves, knew something just a little-about statutory and common law, but, after paying attention to the legal points of one or two plays, we found that we were mere children at it. We thought we would not be beaten, and we determined to get to the bottom of Stage law, and to understand it; but, after some six months' effort, our brain (a singularly fine one) began to soften; and we abandoned the study, believing it would come cheaper, in the end, to offer a suitable reward, of about fifty or sixty thousand pounds, say, to any one who would explain it to us. The reward has remained unclaimed to the present day, and is still open. One gentleman did come to our assistance, a little H |