Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Editorial Practice
- Abbreviations
- Introduction
- The Tragedy of Crusoe, C.S.
- Twenty Years After
- Dis Aliter Visum
- De Profundis
- The Unlimited “Draw” of “Tick” Boileau
- My Christmas Caller
- The History of a Crime
- Prisoners and Captives
- “From Olympus to Hades”
- “Les Miserables.”
- A Nightmare of Rule
- What Came of It
- An Official Secret
- Le Roi en Exil
- A Scrap of Paper
- The Mystification of Santa Claus
- “Love in Old Cloathes”
- The Case of Adamah
- A Tale of ’98
- A Rather More Fishy Case
- The House of Shadows
- The Confession of an Impostor
- The Judgment of Paris
- Five Days After Date
- The Hill of Illusion
- Le Monde ou L'On S'Amuse
- An Intercepted Letter
- The Recurring Smash
- How Liberty Came to the Bolan
- “Under Sentence”
- The Dreitarbund
- In Memoriam
- On Signatures
- The Great Strike
- “The Biggest Liar in Asia”
- Deputating a Viceroy
- A Merry Christmas
- The New Year's Sermon
- New Year's Gifts
- Mister Anthony Dawking
- “The Luck of Roaring Camp”
- The Wedding Guest
- The Tracking of Chuckerbutti
- “Bread upon the Waters”
- A Free Gift
- A Hill Homily
- The “Kingdom” of Bombay
- Bombaystes Furioso
- A Day Off
- The Unpunishable Cherub
- In Gilded Halls
- “Till the Day Break”
- The Fountain of Honour
- The Burden of Nineveh
- His Natural Destiny
- That District Log-Book
- An Unequal Match
- A Horrible Scandal
- An Exercise in Administration
- My New Purchase
- Exercises in Administration
- The Dignity of It.
- Exercises in Administration
- In Wonderland
- In the Year ’92
- “A Free Hand”
- Susannah and the Elder
- The Coming K
- What the World Said
- An Interesting Condition
- The Comet of a Season
- Gallihauk's Pup
- The Inauthorated Corpses
- One Lady at Wairakei
- The Princess in the Pickle-Bottle
- Why Snow Falls at Vernet
- The Cause of Humanity
- appendices
- Glossary
Le Monde ou L'On S'Amuse
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 12 November 2018
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Editorial Practice
- Abbreviations
- Introduction
- The Tragedy of Crusoe, C.S.
- Twenty Years After
- Dis Aliter Visum
- De Profundis
- The Unlimited “Draw” of “Tick” Boileau
- My Christmas Caller
- The History of a Crime
- Prisoners and Captives
- “From Olympus to Hades”
- “Les Miserables.”
- A Nightmare of Rule
- What Came of It
- An Official Secret
- Le Roi en Exil
- A Scrap of Paper
- The Mystification of Santa Claus
- “Love in Old Cloathes”
- The Case of Adamah
- A Tale of ’98
- A Rather More Fishy Case
- The House of Shadows
- The Confession of an Impostor
- The Judgment of Paris
- Five Days After Date
- The Hill of Illusion
- Le Monde ou L'On S'Amuse
- An Intercepted Letter
- The Recurring Smash
- How Liberty Came to the Bolan
- “Under Sentence”
- The Dreitarbund
- In Memoriam
- On Signatures
- The Great Strike
- “The Biggest Liar in Asia”
- Deputating a Viceroy
- A Merry Christmas
- The New Year's Sermon
- New Year's Gifts
- Mister Anthony Dawking
- “The Luck of Roaring Camp”
- The Wedding Guest
- The Tracking of Chuckerbutti
- “Bread upon the Waters”
- A Free Gift
- A Hill Homily
- The “Kingdom” of Bombay
- Bombaystes Furioso
- A Day Off
- The Unpunishable Cherub
- In Gilded Halls
- “Till the Day Break”
- The Fountain of Honour
- The Burden of Nineveh
- His Natural Destiny
- That District Log-Book
- An Unequal Match
- A Horrible Scandal
- An Exercise in Administration
- My New Purchase
- Exercises in Administration
- The Dignity of It.
- Exercises in Administration
- In Wonderland
- In the Year ’92
- “A Free Hand”
- Susannah and the Elder
- The Coming K
- What the World Said
- An Interesting Condition
- The Comet of a Season
- Gallihauk's Pup
- The Inauthorated Corpses
- One Lady at Wairakei
- The Princess in the Pickle-Bottle
- Why Snow Falls at Vernet
- The Cause of Humanity
- appendices
- Glossary
Summary
Published: Civil and Military Gazette, 1 October 1887.
Attribution: In Scrapbook 3 (28/3, p. 147).
Text: Civil and Military Gazette.
Notes: Unreprinted. RK had himself just acted in a play at Simla, taking the role of ‘Brisemouche’ in a farce called A Scrap of Paper, an adaptation of Sardou's Les Pattes de Mouche. The performance, in the first week of September 1887, was at the new theatre in Simla, but it was, RK later wrote, ‘a dull play which fell flat’ (Letters, i, 239). In the CMG, ‘Le Monde ou L'On S'Amuse’ is printed in run-on form to fit the restricted column space; for convenience I have put it into conventional play form, with a new line for each successive speaker.
Scene:– A damp cellar, anywhere in the Himalayas, tastefully ornamented with stale scenery, slides, traps and hidden pitfalls. Enter, tumultuously, procession of amateur actors, headed by Affable and Energetic Stage Manager.
A.&E.S.M.:– “Is everybody here? Where's Hortense?”
Voice from Prompt Side:– “She's tired and she told me to say” ….
Contralto, R.C.:– “Oh! How can you! I saw her going to Jelliti's with” ….
A.&E.S.M. foreseeing a storm:– “Well, anyhow, we'd better begin.”
Decisive Soprano:– “At the second act of course.”
A.&E.S.M.:– “No! The first, without books.”
Chorus, seven feminine voices:– “How horrid!”
A.&E.S.M. (apologetically):– “I told you so last week.”
Mezzo-Soprano tartly:– “Yes! But I haven't had a minute to call my own for the last ten days; and there's a dance to-night and to-morrow I'm dining”….
Voice from L.:– “And I had it guipured on the bias, with a good tuck in box-pleats over green chevelure, and green boutons of purple je ne sais quoi at the gathers where the breadths are taken in, and a sacque over the left shoulder, and chenille pompons all down the back.”
A.&E.S.M. hopefully:– “Well, now, I think we'd better begin. Ermintrude, you come in first.”
Ermintrude hastily:– “Oh! do I? What do I say?”
A.&E.S.M. wearily:– “That is for you to decide.”
Ermintrude viciously:– “Well, if you're going to be rude of course –”
A.&E.S.M. penitently:– “On my honour I didn't mean anything. Only please go on.”
Ermintrude sulkily:– “‘Since first I saw your face’ – but surely this chair is in the way.”
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- The Cause of Humanity and Other StoriesThe Cause of Humanity and Other Stories Uncollected Prose Fictions, pp. 129 - 132Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2018