Becoming Tom Thumb. Eric D. Lehman

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СКАЧАТЬ at this time, and since Benjamin Franklin had walked these streets in the 1770s and 1780s, none had drawn the often indifferent attention of the French so much as Charles Stratton. The daughters of the French king, Louis Philippe, had seen Charles perform in London, and “General Tom Pouce” was immediately invited to the Tuileries Palace. Louis Philippe was a progressive king who had to, as Victor Hugo put it in Les Miserables, “bear in his own person the contradiction of the Restoration and the Revolution, to have that disquieting side of the revolutionary which becomes reassuring in governing power … He had lived by his own labor. In Switzerland, this heir to the richest princely domains in France had sold an old horse in order to obtain bread.” He had also been to the United States, and was a huge fan of the American “go-ahead” mentality that Barnum and Charles represented to Europe.

      The French court asked questions of the two Americans, and Louis Philippe reminisced about his exile there. “What can you say in French?” he asked Charles. “Vive le Roi,” Charles replied cheekily.¹⁹ The editor of Journal des Débats was also present and reported the next day: “General Tom Thumb accompanied by his guide, Mr. Barnum, has had the high honor of being received at the palace of the Tuileries, by their Majesties the King and Queen of the French, who condescendingly personally addressed the General several questions respecting his birth, parentage and career. … The King presented this courteous and fantastic little man with a splendid pin, set in brilliants, but it had the convenience of being out of proportion to his height and size. It might answer for his sword. …”

      Charles danced for the king, and the Journal reported his “extraordinary lightness and nimbleness, even as a dwarf.” He had reached the point where he could improvise with dancing as well as humor, because “he executed an original dance, which was neither the polka, nor the mazurka, nor indeed anything known.” However, it was apparently not very well received, since the paper joked that “no one will ever venture to try it after him.”²⁰

      More significantly, an important part of Charles’s repertoire needed to be left at the border. The Journal des Débats warned, “We will not mention a celebrated uniform which he wore in London, and which was amazingly successful with our overseas neighbors. General Tom Thumb had too much good taste to take the costume to the Tuileries. We hope, then, as he possesses such fine feelings, that while he sojourns in Paris, he will leave it at the bottom of his portmanteau.”²¹ The Journal was of course referring to the Napoleon costume he wore for Queen Victoria and the Duke of Wellington.²² Despite this admonishment, Barnum claimed that Louis Philippe asked for the Bonaparte character “on the sly”—no doubt what would have been offensive to the populace was quite funny to this heir of the Bourbons.²³

      Barnum also asked the King for permission to take part in the Longchamps celebration. Once an annual religious ceremony, this was now a display of pomp and wealth on the glamorous Champs Elysses and in the green fields of the Bois de Boulogne. The king instructed the prefect of police to give Barnum a permit. The tiny carriage had been shipped across the Channel and took its place in the parades along the crowded boulevards. The French people cheered their new celebrity: “Vive Le General Tom Pouce!” Barnum had once again arranged free advertising, and the later exhibition was a huge success, with 500 francs taken on the first day. Two months of afternoon and evening performances were booked solid.²⁴ Chocolates and plaster statuettes sold at every gas-lit shop, and the café Le Tom Pouce was named in his honor. The famous Goncourt Brothers refer to Charles in their journals, when making fun of a painting, comparing the subject to “Tom Thumb in Napoleon’s Wellington boots.”²⁵ And Barnum made sure it was not just the wealthy that saw Charles. On Sundays he took him to the gardens on the outskirts of Paris where he performed for free.²⁶

      Along with fascinating new acts, in which he would be dragged in a large wooden shoe or served in a pie, he appeared in a farcical play, mostly as a walk-on, though he was described as “well-formed and graceful,” while passing between the legs of ballet dancers. He also continued his costumed poses; they loved his highland outfit in Paris, and he handled his tiny sword well. But the favorite of the French may have been the “character of the gentleman,” in which “he takes out his watch and tells you the hour or offers you a pinch of snuff or some pastiches, or a cigar, each of which are in uniformity with his size.” But, as the Journal des Débats pointed out, “He is still better when he sits in his golden chair, crossing his legs and looking at you with a knowing and almost mocking air. It is then that he is amusing; he is never more inimitable than when he imitates nothing—when he is himself.”²⁷

      This point of view would become the prevalent one in the following years, and although Charles would act in many plays over the next decade, he “posed” less and less often, and when exhibiting in public simply behaved as himself: a very funny human being. How else does someone become a comedian other than rehearsing the routines of others? After a time, there is no need for rehearsal, and comic timing and “quick wit” become natural.

      At the same time as Charles was growing as a comedian, conflicts erupted around him. Along with condescending officials annoyed by the attention being paid to a “dwarf,” there were always people trying to surreptitiously cash in on his success. In May, Sherwood had to sue a man named Nestor Roqueplan, manager of the Théâtre des Variété, who was advertising a play called “Tom Pouce.” The Tribunal of Commerce awarded victory to the American plaintiff, since “the young Stratton was known by the name of Tom Pouce.” The manager had to remove the bills and pay all the costs of the suit.²⁸ But the worst conflicts were between Charles’s parents and Barnum, and were becoming more acute the longer they toured together. Furthermore, the showman’s family had gone home to America by this time, and he was not in the best humor.

      P. T. Barnum’s tutoring helped to bring out Charles’s natural comic talents at a young age. National Portrait Gallery, Smithsonian Institution/Art Resource, NY.

      After showing in Paris for three and a half months, during which time Charles “hit them [the public] rather hard,” the troupe left to tour Belgium and rural France.²⁹ The company had grown to twelve people, including assistant manager H. G. Sherman, a piano player and an interpreter, Professor Pinte, as well as the tiny carriage and ponies. So, Barnum bought three large diligences and twelve horses, saying “persons catering for the public amusement must dash ahead and damn-dang the expense … When the public sees twelve horses, twelve persons, and three post carriages come into town, they naturally begin to inquire what great personages have arrived.”³⁰ The method worked, and the border crossing into Belgium made such a scene that a customs officer asked if Charles was a “prince.” Apparently H. G. Sherman exclaimed, “he is Prince Charles the First, of the dukedom of Bridgeport and the kingdom of Connecticut.” A few days later, the “Prince” appeared in Brussels at the palace of “fellow royalty” King Leopold and Queen Louise-Marie, though they had already seen him in London.³¹

      While in Belgium, Barnum visited the battlefield at Waterloo, the event then less than three decades in the past. The immense conical hill of the Butte du Lion had already been raised to commemorate the famous battle, and various “humbugs” had turned the battleground into something like Barnum’s own museum, with a firm in England manufacturing relics and know-nothing tour guides lying to the visitors.³² The following day Sherwood and some of the troupe went to Waterloo as well, but their carriage broke down. Barnum took the opportunity to play a mean trick on the Bridgeport former carpenter, saying that the show had lost all the money that afternoon. He repeated the story in print, making Charles’s father look like a complete fool. He continued with a story about Sherwood falling asleep on a Belgian barber’s chair, unwittingly having his black, bushy hair shaved down to the scalp.³³

      Though Barnum’s complaints took the form of jokes, in lashing out at him in this public way, he clearly didn’t like Sherwood very much. Most of the СКАЧАТЬ