The awkward position of a "masher" who gets into the "wings" by some hook or crook is often extremely laughable. I saw a serio-comic vocalist--as the songstresses of the variety stage are named--astonish a well-dressed and admiring gentleman who was lounging around at his leisure,--having in some mysterious manner passed the stage door-keeper,--by handing him a pin and remarking, "Pin up my skirts." The man's eye-glass was knocked out of place by the impertinence of the demand, but he took the pin and obeyed the lady's command, and this, too, notwithstanding a second female in tights, was near by, who could have done the job a thousand times better. It was the sweet singer's little joke, though. [Illustration: ANNIE PIXLEY AS "M'LISS."] Charlotte Cushman and her sister were playing in Trenton, New Jersey, one night. The bill announced was "Romeo and Juliet," with Miss Cushman in her afterwards famous impersonation of the male character and her sister as _Juliet_. The ball-room of the town which was used as a theatre, when occasion required, was sadly lacking in scenery and properties. The sisters went to work, however, and succeeded in getting together everything they needed for the performance, except the balcony in the garden scene. After looking around they found an old bed-quilt, patched, and abounding in numerous colors; it was arranged that a colored bell-boy from an adjacent hotel should, while stationed in the side-scenes, out of view, hold up one end of the quilt while the fair _Juliet_ supported the other. The boy was on hand in the evening, and everything went swimmingly until towards the end of the scene, and in a most tender part, the darkey stuck his head out from the side and said: "I say, Miss Cushing, I hear my bell ringin' an' Ize obliged to let my side ob de house drap!" He dropped the quilt; and not only the balcony, but "the house"--the audience--came down, and that brought the scene to an abrupt and ridiculous end. [Illustration: THE CALL-BOY'S REVENGE.]