175
was enough to account for that. In addition quite a few women were the wives of missionaries, and in religious circles suspicions about the theatre in general and the role of females in particular often still lingered on. This was indeed so conspicuous that the list of "contributors" in the first issue of "Puck" (April 1, 1871!) mockingly included: “Our Dramatic Critiques will be undertaken by the Missionary Body who are so frequently absent from the Performances and will therefore be impartial judges of the merits of the Performances". And then, of course, it may just have been possible that the taipans did not like to see their wives before the footlights with other men.
Reading about the early Thespian evenings one may nonetheless be fooled into thinking that women had in fact taken their place on the stage. In the circumstances it was only natural that the "actresses” should be called "Miss" or "Mrs.", but what should we think about the glowing term in which one of them, a “Mrs Nesbit” (was this stage name a pun on the rather well-known British actress Louisa Nisbett?) was described on more than one occasion:
“The acting of our charming favourite Mrs. Nesbit, as Mrs. Lullaby [in Henry Danvers' A Conjugal Lesson, on March 26, 1857 – JH] left nothing to be desired. It was perfect of its kind and were it not that she gave a too vivid, and, it may be, truthful portrait of that dread of club-haunting bachelors like ourselves, the matrimonial chamber, we could on the instant have made Mrs. Nesbit the offer of our hand”.* Stronger even, on February 16, 1859:
#
"But where shall we find words to express our admiration of Mrs. Nesbit, that beautiful Nesbit, who, blessed with an incomparable modiste, displayed so many feminine graces, such latent charms, as effectually to revive the enthusiasm of our younger days and cause us to run round the stage door in the hope of once more beholding so fair a 'genius of the lamps'.
* 34
And in an epilogue to the evening of May 26, 1864, the ladies were again put under the spotlight:
"But stay! The Ladies' praises must be sung. These Belles were surely meant to be well rung. There's Wiggins, Lizzie, Baby, only choose.
175
was enough to account for that. In addition quite a few women were the wives of missionaries, and in religious circles suspicions about the theatre in general and the role of females in particular often still lingered on. This was indeed so conspicuous that the list of "contributors" in the first issue of "Puck" (April 1 1871!) mockingly included: “Our Dramatic Critiques will be undertaken by the Missionary Body who are so frequently absent from the Performances and will therefore be impartial judges of the merits of the Performances". And then, of course, it may just have been possible that the taipans did not like to see their wives before the footlights with other men.
Reading about the early Thespian evenings one may nonetheless be fooled into thinking that women had in fact taken their place on the stage. In the circumstances it was only natural that the "actresses” should be called "Miss" or "Mrs.", but what should we think about the glowing term in which one of them, a “Mrs Nesbit” (was this stagename a pun on the rather well known British actress Louisa Nisbett?) was described on more than one occasion:
“The acting of our charming favourite Mrs. Nesbit, as Mrs. Lullaby [in Henry Danvers A Conjugal Lesson, on March 26 1857 – JH] left nothing to be desired. It was perfect of its kind and were it not that she gave a too vivid, and, it may be, truthful portrait of that dread of club haunting bachelors like ourselves the matrimonial chamber we could on the instant have made Mrs. Nesbit the offer of our hand".* Stronger even, on February 16 1859:
#
"But where shall we find words to express our admiration of Mrs. Nesbit that beautiful Nesbit, who, blessed with an incomparable modiste, displayed so many femine graces, such latent charms, as effectually to revive the enthusiasm of our younger days and cause us to run round the stagedoor in the hope of once more beholding so fair a 'genius of the lamps'
* 34
And in an epilogue to evening of May 26 1864, the ladies were again put under the spotlight:
"But stay! The Ladies' praises must be sung These Belles were surely meant to be well rung. There's Wiggins, Lizzie, Baby, only choose
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