An American talking act going over to England to play has got a big job on hand. The trouble is going to come from a totally unexpected source too. It is because we do not speak the language. We say that we speak English; but we don't; that is, mighty little of it. We speak mostly plain, unadulterated, United States language, which is very different from English. So when we go over there, in addition to talking about things that they do not understand, we are also using a language that they don't know.

For instance: We opened up in Manchester with a play called The Wyoming Whoop. Now out of that title they understood just one word—"The." They did not know whether "Wyoming" was a battleship or some patent skin food. And "Whoop" was still worse.

During the progress of the play one of the characters speaks of having left the day's ice on the steps all the forenoon; I say—

"Has that piece of ice been out in that Wyoming sun all the forenoon?"

"Yes, sir."

"Well, you take a sponge and go out and get it."

After two or three shows the manager came to me and asked me what that line about the ice meant; was it supposed to be funny? I told him it was in America. He wanted to know why.

"Well," I said, "you know Wyoming is the hottest place in America, don't you?"

"No; is it?"

"Well then, you know that if you left a piece of ice out in the sun all the forenoon it would melt, don't you?"

"No; would it?"

Upon investigation I found that there was probably not one person in ten thousand in those manufacturing towns of England who ever saw a piece of ice. They didn't know but that you could bake it.

It took me only three days to discover that I was in wrong with The Wyoming Whoop. So the next week in Liverpool I switched to Bill Biffin's Baby. Now we were on the right track. We had a subject, Babies, that they understood and liked. But on the second show I began writing it over—into the English language. I found that in twenty-four minutes I was using thirty-two words that they either knew nothing of, or else meant something entirely different from what I intended they should.

For instance: Take the words Trolley Car. An American player spoke of having seen a lady riding on a trolley, and the audience went into fits. The player was astounded; he hadn't told his "gag" at all yet—(and, by the way, it isn't a "gag" there; it is a "wheeze")—and the audience was laughing. And then when he finally told his "gag" not a soul laughed. Upon investigation he found that over there what he meant by a trolley car was "a tram." And what they called a "trolley" was the baggage truck down at the railway station that they hauled trunks around on.

Another of their "gags" was—

"I saw you coming out of a saloon this morning.""Well, I couldn't stay in there all day, could I?"

Received with more chunks of silence.

He meant a place where they sold liquor. He should have said "a Pub."

A "saloon" there is a barber shop.

The ticket office is the booking office.

The ticket agent is the booking clerk (pronounced "clark").

A depot is the railway station.

You don't buy your ticket; you "book your ticket."

A policeman is a "Bobbie."

You drive to the left and walk to the right.

An automobile is a motor car.

The carburetor is the mixer.

The storage battery is the accumulator.

Gasolene is petrol.

Ask your way and instead of saying "second street to the left" they will say "second opening to the left."

If they bump into you instead of saying "excuse me" or "pardon me" they say "sorry."

Your trunks are "boxes," and your baggage checks are "brasses."

Your hand baggage is "luggage."I found English audiences just as quick, just as appreciative and even more enthusiastic than our American audiences—if you talked about things they understood and in words they understood.

But the average American talking act is talking what might just as well be Greek to them. I never realized until I played in England what an enormous lot of slang and coined words we Americans use.

Another thing that we Americans are shy on, both in speaking and singing, is articulation. I always had an idea that I enunciated uncommonly clearly—until I went over there, when I learned more about speaking plainly in three days than I had in a lifetime here.

You will notice you can always understand every word and syllable uttered by an English singer.

One of the funniest things I saw over there were English actors trying to play "Yankee" characters. The only "Yankee" they had to it was to spit and say "By Gosh."

Upon the occasion of our first show in England, at Manchester, I said to my wife,

"Now we are closing the show, so let's get made up early and watch the other acts, and in that way we can get sort of a line on the particular style of humor that appeals strongest."

So when the show started we were right there in the wings, watching and listening.

The first act was a typical English "Comic Singer" of the poorest type, although we did not know that then. He had a pair of trousers six inches too short, white hose, an old Prince Albert coat, buttoned up wrong, a battered silk hat (called a "topper," by the way) and a violently red nose. His first song was about his recent wedding; he had evidently married an old maid of rather sad appearance. The first verse told of the wedding and the wedding dinner; and how they then went upstairs to their room, and, as soon as they got into the room she wanted him to kiss her. But he looked at her and said—

(Chorus)

Wife and I looked sadly into each other's eyes, clasped hands, and walked sadly to the dressing room. We knew we didn't have anything strong enough to compete with that.

After three weeks "in the Provinces," as they call everything outside of London, we went into the Palace Theater, London. We had had time to learn the language and sort of get acclimated so we did very well there.

But we kept bumping up against new quirks in the language. For instance, somebody asked me if we didn't "play two houses a night in Portsmouth?" and I said No. But I then discovered that "two houses a night" did not mean playing two different theaters a night, but playing two different shows in the same house each night.

I also discovered that several words which had a perfectly innocent meaning in America had entirely different meanings in London. I nearly got licked twice for using improper language.

I discovered that what we would call a Tramp over here was a Moocher over there. I could see a lady in the street but I mustn't see her on the street. I could go up the street two squares but I mustn't go up two blocks. I did not get my salary; I got my treasury. You did not "kid" anybody; you "schwanked" them (spelling not guaranteed) or perhaps you were "spoofing" them.

The big Artists are all "Toppers" or "Bottomers." A "Topper" is one who is always billed at the top of the list of players. A "Bottomer" is the act that is considered next in importance to the "Topper," and is billed in big type at the bottom of the billing.

One thing that makes it hard to please an English Music Hall audience is its widely different classes. Admission to the gallery is from four to six cents while the orchestra seats are two dollars and a half.

While you can see a first-class Vaudeville show for four cents, it costs you twenty-four cents to sit in the gallery of most any Moving Picture show; and sixty-two cents downstairs.

The Palace Theater in London is probably the highest class Vaudeville theater in the world. This is very nice, but it has its drawbacks. The audience applauds by gently tapping two fingers together and nodding heads approvingly.

Oscar Hammerstein asked Mrs. Cressy how she liked the London audiences.

"First-rate," replied Mrs. C., "only you have to look at them to see whether they are applauding or not."

"Look at them?" said Mr. H. "You have to ask them."

George Whiting had just had his hat cleaned.

"How does it look?" he asked of his partner, Aubrey Pringle.

"Looks all right enough," said Pringle, "but it smells like a monkey wedding."

It was Tuesday afternoon in St. Paul; the show was going very badly; the first three acts had gone on and come off, without a laugh; then Frank Moran went on. After he had come off, and was on his way to his room, one of the ladies who had been on before him called from her dressing room,

"Did you succeed in waking them up, Mr. Moran?""Um—yes—I woke up a couple of them," said Frank.

"What did they do?" asked the girl.

"Went out," said Frank.

We had received a letter from a European Booking Office requesting us to play an engagement at Glasgow, Scotland.

"I would like to know what they think we could do in Scotland," I said; "those chaps never could understand me."

"Well, my goodness," said my wife, "if they can understand each other they shouldn't have any trouble understanding us."

Probably the line that has been jumbled up and spoken wrong more times on the stage than any other is

"I am still fancy free and heart whole."

Try it; and see how many ways there are to go wrong on it.

At Keith's Theater in Boston one week the program announced that two of the acts to be seen that week were—

"Cressy & Dayne; The latest importation in trained animal acts."

and—

"Barron's Dogs, in Mr. Cressy's one act play, Bill Biffin's Baby."