Scene in a Western Theatre

– Some time since, Mill L was playing in the character of Mrs. Haller, in the town of P, within the vast bosom of the Mississippi. A very athletic lumberman, as straight as one of the pines on his own hills, sat close by the orchestra. The play had progressed to the closing scene, and so intense was the interest this son of nature had felt, that he rose involuntarily from his seat, and leaned with breathless interest over the bass-viol, with his face peering in between the foot-lights. The tears were streaming in torrents down over his rough, strong, weather-beaten, but manly countenance. The dialogue had reached the point where the long-deserted wife so pathetically asks to be restored to the heart of her husband, and he sternly and energetically refuses. The refusal was too much for the highly-excited sympathies of our Alleghany river friend. Rolling his huge, doubled-up fists over his eyes, the hard, horny knuckles wet with blistering tears, be blubbered out:

“I say, sissy, don’t have anything more to do with that hard-hearted brute. Come and go-go-go with me-me-up the Alleghaner, and I’ll keep you with mar for the balance of your life. D-n me if I don’t.”

It is useless to say that the house came down more effectually than ever. The skill of the great actress had brought it. She had her own gravity completely overthrown; pit, boxes, gallery and stage alike roared with mirth; the curtain fell, and the play progressed no further that night.