Our Aunt

								
You ought to have known our aunt; she was charming! That is to
say, she was not charming at all as the word is usually understood;
but she was good and kind, amusing in her way, and was just as any one
ought to be whom people are to talk about and to laugh at. She might
have been put into a play, and wholly and solely on account of the
fact that she only lived for the theatre and for what was done
there. She was an honorable matron; but Agent Fabs, whom she used to
call "Flabs," declared that our aunt was stage-struck.

"The theatre is my school," said she, "the source of my knowledge.
From thence I have resuscitated Biblical history. Now, 'Moses' and
'Joseph in Egypt'--there are operas for you! I get my universal
history from the theatre, my geography, and my knowledge of men. Out
of the French pieces I get to know life in Paris--slippery, but
exceedingly interesting. How I have cried over 'La Famille
Roquebourg'--that the man must drink himself to death, so that she may
marry the young fellow! Yes, how many tears I have wept in the fifty
years I have subscribed to the theatre!"

Our aunt knew every acting play, every bit of scenery, every
character, every one who appeared or had appeared. She seemed really
only to live during the nine months the theatre was open. Summertime
without a summer theatre seemed to be only a time that made her old;
while, on the other hand, a theatrical evening that lasted till
midnight was a lengthening of her life. She did not say, as other
people do, "Now we shall have spring, the stork is here," or, "They've
advertised the first strawberries in the papers." She, on the
contrary, used to announce the coming of autumn, with "Have you
heard they're selling boxes for the theatre? now the performances will
begin."

She used to value a lodging entirely according to its proximity to
the theatre. It was a real sorrow to her when she had to leave the
little lane behind the playhouse, and move into the great street
that lay a little farther off, and live there in a house where she had
no opposite neighbors.

"At home," said she, "my windows must be my opera-box. One
cannot sit and look into one's self till one's tired; one must see
people. But now I live just as if I'd go into the country. If I want
to see human beings, I must go into my kitchen, and sit down on the
sink, for there only I have opposite neighbors. No; when I lived in my
dear little lane, I could look straight down into the ironmonger's
shop, and had only three hundred paces to the theatre; and now I've
three thousand paces to go, military measurement."

Our aunt was sometimes ill, but however unwell she might feel, she
never missed the play. The doctor prescribed one day that she should
put her feet in a bran bath, and she followed his advice; but she
drove to the theatre all the same, and sat with her feet in bran
there. If she had died there, she would have been very glad.
Thorwaldsen died in the theatre, and she called that a happy death.

She could not imagine but that in heaven there must be a theatre
too. It had not, indeed, been promised us, but we might very well
imagine it. The many distinguished actors and actresses who had passed
away must surely have a field for their talent.

Our aunt had an electric wire from the theatre to her room. A
telegram used to be dispatched to her at coffee-time, and it used to
consist of the words, "Herr Sivertsen is at the machinery;" for it was
he who gave the signal for drawing the curtain up and down and for
changing the scenes.

From him she used to receive a short and concise description of
every piece. His opinion of Shakspeare's "Tempest," was, "Mad
nonsense! There's so much to put up, and the first scene begins with
'Water to the front of the wings.'" That is to say, the water had to
come forward so far. But when, on the other hand, the same interior
scene remained through five acts, he used to pronounce it a
sensible, well-written play, a resting play, which performed itself,
without putting up scenes.

In earlier times, by which name our aunt used to designate
thirty years ago, she and the before-mentioned Herr Sivertsen had been
younger. At that time he had already been connected with the
machinery, and was, as she said, her benefactor. It used to be the
custom in those days that in the evening performances in the only
theatre the town possessed, spectators were admitted to the part
called the "flies," over the stage, and every machinist had one or two
places to give away. Often the flies were quite full of good
company; it was said that generals' wives and privy councillors' wives
had been up there. It was quite interesting to look down behind the
scenes, and to see how the people walked to and fro on the stage
when the curtain was down.

Our aunt had been there several times, as well when there was a
tragedy as when there was a ballet; for the pieces in which there were
the greatest number of characters on the stage were the most
interesting to see from the flies. One sat pretty much in the dark
up there, and most people took their supper up with them. Once three
apples and a great piece of bread and butter and sausage fell down
right into the dungeon of Ugolino, where that unhappy man was to be
starved to death; and there was great laughter among the audience. The
sausage was one of the weightiest reasons why the worthy management
refused in future to have any spectators up in the flies.

"But I was there seven-and-thirty times," said our aunt, "and I
shall always remember Mr. Sivertsen for that."

On the very last evening when the flies were still open to the
public, the "Judgment of Solomon" was performed, as our aunt
remembered very well. She had, through the influence of her
benefactor, Herr Sivertsen, procured a free admission for the Agent
Fabs, although he did not deserve it in the least, for he was always
cutting his jokes about the theatre and teasing our aunt; but she
had procured him a free admission to the flies, for all that. He
wanted to look at this player-stuff from the other side.

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