And some modification of the original text might be reasonably permitted.  For instance, the reference by name to the long-since departed actors, King, Dodd, and Palmer, and the once famous scene-painter, Mr. De Loutherbourg, must necessarily now escape the comprehension of a general audience.  But the idiotic interpolations, and the gross tomfoolery the actors occasionally permit themselves in the later scenes of the play, should not be tolerated by the audience upon any plea or pretext whatever.

One kind of gag is attributable to failure of memory or deficiency of study on the part of the player.  “I haven’t got my words; I must gag it,” is a confession not unfrequently to be overheard in the theatre.  Incledon, the singer, who had been in early life a sailor before the mast, in the royal navy, was notorious for his frequent loss of memory upon the stage.  In his time the word “vamp” seems to have prevailed as the synonym of gag.  A contemporary critic writes of him:  “He could never vamp, to use a theatrical technical which implies the substitution of your own words and ideas when the author’s are forgotten.  Vamping requires some tact, if not talent; and Incledon’s former occupation had imparted to his manners that genuine salt-water simplicity to which the artifices of acting were insurmountable difficulties.”  Incledon had, however, a never-failing resource when difficulty of this kind occurred to him, and loss of memory, and therefore of speech, interrupted his performances.  He forthwith commenced a verse of one of his most popular ballads!  The amazement of his fellow-actors at this proceeding was, on its first adoption, very great indeed.  “The truth is, I forgot my part, sir,” Incledon frankly explained to the perplexed manager, “and I could not catch the cue.  I assure you, sir, that my agitation was so great, that I was compelled to introduce a verse of ‘Black-eyed Susan,’ in order to gain time and recover myself.”  Long afterwards, when the occupants of the green-room could hear Incledon’s exquisite voice upon the stage, they were wont to ask each other, laughingly:  “Is he singing his music, or is he merely recollecting his words?”

That excellent comedian, the late Drinkwater Meadows, used to relate a curious gagging experience of his early life as a strolling player.  It was at Warwick, during the race week.  He was to play Henry Moreland, in “The Heir-at-Law,” a part he had never previously performed, and of which, indeed, he knew little or nothing.  There was no rehearsal, the company was “on pleasure bound,” and desired to attend the races with the rest of Warwickshire.  No book of the play was obtainable.  A study of the prompt-book had been promised; but the prompter was not to be found; he was probably at the races, and his book with him.  The representative of Henry Moreland could only consult with the actor who was to play Steadfast—­for upon Steadfast’s co-operation Moreland’s scenes chiefly depend.