On his uneasy slumber entered from the theater Mrs. Triplet.
She was a lady who in one respect fell behind her husband; she lacked his
variety in ill-doing, but she recovered herself by doing her one thing a
shade worse than he did any of his three. She was what is called in grim
sport an actress; she had just cast her mite of discredit on royalty by
playing the Queen, and had trundled home the moment the breath was out of
her royal body. She came in rotatory with fatigue, and fell, gristle,
into a chair; she wrenched from her brow a diadem and eyed it with
contempt, took from her pocket a sausage, and contemplated it with
respect and affection, placed it in a frying-pan on the fire, and entered
her bedroom, meaning to don a loose wrapper, and dethrone herself into
comfort.
But the poor woman was shot walking by Morpheus, and subsided altogether;
for dramatic performances, amusing and exciting to youth seated in the
pit, convey a certain weariness to those bright beings who sparkle on the
stage for bread and cheese.
Royalty, disposed of, still left its trail of events. The sausage began
to "spit." The sound was hardly out of its body, when poor Triplet
writhed like a worm on a hook. "Spitter, spittest," went the sausage.
Triplet groaned, and at last his inarticulate murmurs became words:
"That's right, pit now, that is so reasonable to condemn a poor fellow's
play before you have heard it out.
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