Personal reminiscences of Henry IrvingStoker, Bram
General
Personal reminiscences of Henry Irving
Stoker, Bram
Actors -- Great Britain -- Biography; Irving, Henry, Sir, 1838-1905
As I have said, Arnott always got even in some way with those who tried
to best him. I remember once when a group of short lines, now
amalgamated into the Irish Great Northern Railway and worked in quite a
different way, did what we all considered rather too sharp a thing. We
had to have a special train to go from Dublin to Belfast on Sunday. For
this they charged us full fare for every person and a rate for the train
as well. Then when we were starting they took, at the ordinary rate,
other passengers in our train for which we had paid extra. This,
however, was not that which awoke Arnott’s ire. The _causa teterrima
belli_ was that whilst they gave us only open trucks for goods they
charged us extra for the use of tarpaulins, which are necessary in
railway travelling where goods are inflammable and sparks many. Having
made the arrangement I had gone back to London on other business, and
did not go to Belfast, so I did not know, till after the tour had
closed, what had happened later. When I was checking the accounts in my
office at the Lyceum, I found that though the railway company had
charged us what we thought was an exorbitant price, still the cost of
the total journey compared favourably with that of other journeys of
equal length. I could not understand it until I went over the accounts,
comparing item by item with the other journeys. Thus I “focussed” the
difference in the matter of “goods.” Then I found that whereas the other
railways had charged us on somewhere about nineteen tons weight this
particular line had only assessed us at seven. I sent for Arnott and
asked him how could the difference be, as on the first journey I had
verified the weight as I usually did, such saving much trouble
throughout a tour as it made the check easier. He shook his head and
said that he did not know. I pressed him, pointing out that either this
railway had underweighed us or that others had overweighed.
“Oh, the others were all right, sir,” he said. “I saw them weighed at
Euston myself!”
“Then how on earth can there be such a difference?” I asked. “Can’t you
throw any light on it?” He shook his head slowly as though pondering
deeply and then said with a puzzled look on his face:
“I haven’t an idea. It must have been all right, for the lot of them was
there, and the lot of us, too. There couldn’t have been any mistake with
them _all_ looking on. No, sir, I can’t account for it; not for the life
of me!” Then seeing that I turned to my work again he moved away. When
he was half way to the door he turned round, his face brightening as
though a new light had suddenly dawned upon him. He spoke out quite
genially as though proud of his intellectual effort:
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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