The San Francisco Call. Newspaper, March 29, 1898, Page 12

THE SAN FRANCISCO CALL, TUESDAY, MARCH 29, 1898. 11 THE PHYSICAL ACCOMPLISHMENTS OF ANNA HELD AND “JIM™ CORBETT The Charteuse’s Re- ception Was Kind- ly, Not Torrid. Her Personal Charms Were oo Obviously | Pa-aded for Art. | | The Lin:it of Tenderloin Farce | Exposed in “A Gay | Deceiver.” STRONG ORPHEUM BILL. Pailding a Hit as the Aloazar's Mummy”—Temperance Drama at Morosco's. | MTle. Held sang her little songs last night, danced and capered, smiled and | kissed, flirted her wee skirt, swooned and revived her large humid eyes, zgled and joked her pectoral em- bonpoint with amazing facility and made a gratuitous little speech, in which she linked in her love the dears Paree and San Francisco and hoped to be with us a long, long time. But the town—and quite a good deal of it was | there—did not singe and flame. It was amiable enough, and, to a slight ex- tent, helped out the {llusion of each new song being an encore. But it did not smoke and melt and sizzle. Mlle. Held’s visit need not increase the in- | surance rates on the Baldwin Theater. The accomplishments of Mlle. Held are almost entirely physical. She has the little roly-poly figure in its roundest perfection and her face is brightly beauti- ful r the conventional French mode, and would be pe f its type, too, but for a too emph nose. And of course she is chic—that art of her conven- tionality and nationality, for this Polish bred vaudeville singer manifestations. But By this I make no , which is neither the jolly chirp you | her manner of doing too obvious—you feel the one effect she is h is palpat 1 1 while cl she sings French | FRom ‘G#E PU(J”—DU HAND-BOOK, OF ACTING DECLAMATORY [(BleckiNG A RGHT -7wv~G) - INTENSELY INDIGNANT) SYMPATHETIC AT TITUDE. WERE THE THE songs with cleverer insinuation than the English and American women give to them, and her “Play wiz me” is quite an experience for even a hardened music hall fancler. But Mlle. Held does noth- ing so cleverly that you can forget that her talents are all centered below the brow. “A Gay Deceiver,” the farce by Paul Wilstach and Joseph Grismer, which in- troduces Anna Held at the close of its third act, is one calculated to prepare you for the limit of riskiness. In a way it is quite the limit itself, and so literal that misinterpretation would be impossible. First I would rather say that it is clever, the construction quite good to sustain the suspense in 8o slim a fabric and some of the lines adroitly witty for all their cheap slang. But the whole scheme is rankly vulgar; it reeks of the tenderlofn. The story deals in a Boston man with {l- licit love affairs and his wife, with the same. He leaves home, returns suddenly and pretends he is his own twin brother, while a senile gentleman of sinful ambi- tion openly fondles the wife. The acting | of the farce is heavy and characterless, | with the one exception of M. A. Ken- | nedy, who is scandalously real as the aged rake. Mr. Fernald’s “The Cat and the Cher- ub,” which finished the evening at a late hour, seems superfluous to me, after see- ing Powers’ “First Born.” It has a cer- tain literary quality that Powers’' China- | town piece lacked in places, but it is prac- | tically the same play without as intense an atmosphere and with more of theusual melodrama in the working out of the plot. | ~©900 ° O ATRICAL EVENTS. The Townsman and Not the Play Was the Attraction. An Ovation That Shook the House Greeted James J. Old - Fashioned Melodrama, With Reminiscences of the Prize Ring. FLOWERS AND CHEERS. The Audience at the Columbia Went ‘Wild in Their Testimonials of Admiration. If “The Naval Cadet” had opened in an Eastern city, the audience, as it filed out, would have sald it was a melodrama of the good old-fashioned sort, with plenty of love, heroism, blood and villainy thrown around the conventional orphan with a heritage who loves the hero but who a designing villain determines shall | marry his son and thus relieve him, from the pecuniary embarrassment he has been little less force and a little more accent. Millie James, the daughter of Louis James, who does the ingenue, is about the cutest little thing that has happened | since Gladys Wallace was here, and won | her way into favor at once. | The third act was the one which was | most eagerly watched for, as it is then that “Jim” spars three rounds with Mc- [ Vey, and every man In the Touse was watching to see if be has lost any of his | old-time speed and cleverness. That he is | as agile as ever was apparent before he | had been a minute at it, and when the wind-up came it took three ushers and a couple of boys to haul all the flowers over the footlights, while the audience went wild and would not be satisfied until Cor- bett delivered a speech. in which he apolo- gized for his cold and assured his ad- mirers that the one thing in this world he ! lived for was to again meet Fitzsimmons | and win back the laurels he had lost at Carson. When seen in his dressing-room between the acts of the performance Corbett looked, barring a slight cold, the very picture of health, and, as he stood strip- ed waiting to don his ring costume for is go with big McVey, it was evident that it would need but little training to make him fit to battle for a kingdom. He seems to have taken care of himself for the past year, with the result that the vim, so noticeably lacking just before his departure for Nevada, has returned, and he is once again the happy-go-lucky sky- larking Jim of Olympic Club days, full of a nervous energy that will not allow him to remain quiet for & minute. “I would give my entire receipts for the week if I did not have this cold,” he said, | as he laughingly shook hands and asked after the boys. ‘I have brought out a good company and I_want every one to see what I can do. But this hoarseness makes it impossible for me to appear at my best, and I am afraid I will be a dis- appointment. “Who do 1 think is the coming man? Jeffries, by all odds. He is young and clever, and as strong as a bull, and in my opinion able to give a good account of himself with the best of them. As to Mc- Coy, he is a good man, but I don’t see on what he bases his claims to championship honors. He never fought a heavy-weight in his life that I ever heard of, so I don’t see how he can consider himself in the topnotcher class. A go between him and Choynski would be a hot one and worth going miles to see. 1 am sorry to hear of poor Joe's illness. He is a good fellow, and I am going to see him. T would like to have him as a sparring partner if I go on the road and he would take the place. Sharkey is a hard game, but he has the reputation of neverfighting on the square. He Is strong and can stand any amount of punishment, and if he would only let the referee decide one of his contests instead of the police he would be much better oft and have much more reason to consider himself in line for the champlonship in | the future. | | | | | | MR CORBETT wWAS THE RECPIENT OP A FEw S5MALL FLORAL OFFERINGS. :) ez g5 8 ety .(LEFT HAND LEAD AT BOKZ/oy OING RIGHT HAND SWING.) A (OWARD IN UNIFORM .~ (LEFT HAND LOWING.) e * ol = d The ending, where the victim is strangled with his own queue and propped up in a sitting posture so as to deceive the pass ing policeman, could be made even more dramatic than that of “The First Born,” | but it is marred by the delay in reaching | ft. Half the audience saw it over their shoulders as they left the theater. In point of actual time “The Cat and the Cherub” is much shorter than “The First Born,” but it seemed hours longer last night. The acting is something less than | we are used to in Chinatown drama. ASHTON STEVENS. Rlcazar. Frederick Paulding makes a good gal- | vanized mummy. There is no doubt about that. His rendition of the title role in | ““The Mummy,” which is on the boards at the Alcazar this week indicates that he is discovered. With the assistance of the kindergarten element of the stock | company the play was carried to a finish | without an outbreak. The audience was | tolerant of infant prodigies. Miss Gert- rude Foster and Mrs. Bates worked hard and largely redeemed the performance. J. W. Turton, arrested early Sunday morning for robbing Miss Annie B. Kedon, 4 Hyde street, appeared in Judge | Campbell’s court yesterday morning to be | arraigned on the charge of robbery. Miss | Kedon refused to swear to a complaint, | and said she would not prosecute Turton, | so0 Justice of the Peace Groezinger, who | occupied the bench, had to dismiss the case. foolish enough to get into. True, a French | adventuress with a husband in a lunatic | asylum who links her fortune with a ras- ally fellow countryman in his endeavor o defraud the hero out of the fruits of coupled with a few | incidental crimes and hints of dark pasts, together with the quick transition from a scene of quiet domesticity on Long Island might somewhat complicate matters and con- fuse the casual spectator, but still the verdict on the whole would have been his inventive genius, to murder In a Parisian cellar, that the play was full of life and action, that the situations were well arranged, the climaxes, of which there were about a dozen, well worked up, and that James J. Corbett was more than a fairly good ac- tor, notwithstanding the fun that has been poked at him during his career on the stage. This is what an Eastern audience would have said—mot what the audience that packed the Columbia to the doors last night did say. They were there not to see the play but to welcome “Jim” to his home, and when he came on the stage orchestra and dress circle clapped until its palms tingled, while the galleries rose up and fairly howled. It was fully ten minutes before quiet enough was restored to allow Corbett to go ahead with his lines, which, notwithstanding the severe cold with which he is suffering, he ren- dered remarkably well, fully earning the comment of the Hayes Valley contin- gent, who were unanimous in declaring that “Jim done fine.” Corbett is supported by a fairly good company, among whom is Lillian Lam son, a San Francisco girl, who, in the character of Hortense Reynolds, a French adventuress, does some clever work, which, however, she could improve by a G e 8 S 33 — .? BT I . coowm~’D “Well, you fellows will have to excuse me. T inust go on now, but don't leave until you have seen my rough and t with McVey in the last act: it 18 the Bor test thing on the stage.” The|\'lsitlnrs stayed, saw and agreed it was about as near the real t a pras about hing as could Corbett’s family occupied the ¢ boxes on one side, and . the oig penie must have felt proud of their son for in spite of the fact that the diary scend between Corbett and Miss James. whieh is one of his best, had to be cut owing to Jim’s cold, he acquitted himself nobly and helped to' make the entire performance wha s, a well presented an - Tali d entertain: - Orpheum. Of the five out of the six new Orpheum turns seen by the writer at the opening performance four are signal successes and the other one not at all bad in its kind. It is of a rather poor kind, how- ever, this “Dramatic Agent” sketch pre- sented by Harry Watson and Alice Hutchings, with the trampy assistance of Ed Edwards, and culminates in tne worm-eaten business of attempting to carve a rubber fowl. But the other four are unique and clever, and they put the show on something like its old level of excellence. Montgomery and Stone do coon songs, buck and wing dances and flash nigger repartee In a way that beats the record Lere for a white team in a colored act. The Five Arabian Whirle winds are remarkable tumblers. _Their turn is quick, short and exciting. An odd feature Is that the heavy Arabian who does the feats of strength is also the lithest and most expert of the tumblers, The Glisandos clown very musically and very entertainingly. On the whole, the Orpheum biil this week would seem especially calculated to please persons who Lave not been pleased by most of the bills of the last several months. Morosco’s. “Ten Nights in a Barroom” was re- vived at Morogco's last night, with Harry Mainhall as the touching drunkard, La Petite Lund as his daughter, and Landers Stevens as the principal viliain. The old sermon against intemperance still finds the sympathies of a South Side audience, and last night the entr’acte bar business sllzflered acutely through the moral of the play. Tivoli. “The Widow O'Brien” continues a pop- ular farcical attraction at the Tivoll, Ghutes. SUPERVISOR HOSTILE T0 COMPETITION Show Their Hands in the Electric Light- ing Contract. Dodge’s Efforts to Save Money Is Energy Use- lessly Expended. A Resolution Calling for Cer- tain Information Sent to Committee. FIGHTING TO SAVE TIME. Smith and Britt Lead the Fight to Delay Action Until the Last Minute. The first move toward securing com- peting bids for lighting the streets and public buildings was made by Super- visor Dodge at the meeting of the board, and was promptly met by Smith and Britt, who adopted the only course left open to the monopoly and fought for delay. As the Smith-Britt forces numbered seven, they succeeded in having the matter referred to a joint committee consisting of the Streets and and Street Lights committees. The subject was brought up in the form of the following resolution, pre- sented by Supervisor Dodge: WHEREAS, The Mutual Electric Light Company proposes to furnish the city with electric light for streets and public buildings at a saving to the city of at least $40,000 per an- num under the present cost, which is about $120,000 per annum, provided they be now given the same facilities that are enjoyed by the present con- tractors; and whereas, said company will give a bond if necessary for $100,000 to guarantee such saving, signed by such responsible citizens as Alvinza Hayward, D. 0. Mills and P. B. Cornwall; and whereas, three months’ time is required by said company to erect necessary poles, ete., Resolved, That ¢aid company be invited to make a specific request Zor the privilege of erecting poles, desig- nating their number and location, and that the Street LightsCommittee be instructed to invite proposals in such language that no company shall be excluded from competing; and that bids be invited forthwith for ‘| supplying artificial light for streets and public buildings for two years from and after August 1, 1898. Resolved, That the Gas Inspector be instructed to forthwith furnish this board with a map showing the location of every gas and electric street lamp for which the city pays, designating them respectively as gas or electric. Dodge moved the adoption of the res- olution at once. He called attention to the fact that the Mutual Electric Light Company had guaranteed to save the city at least $40,000 a year under the present cost, and spoke of the annual deficit which necessitated cutting off a portion of the lights each year and leaving some parts of the city in dark- ness for weeks. He bélieved that pri- vate individuals could get the same ser- vice that the city gets at a much less cost. There was a rush between Smith and Britt to get the floor first, both hav- ing the same object in view—opposition to the resolution in some form, they hardly knew what, for it had been sprung on them so suddenly there was no opportunity to form a plan of de- fense. Smith was recognized and, un- able to pick any flaw in the terms of the resolution, demanded that it be referred to committee—any committee suited him, so that it could be held up until some plan could be formed to defeat it. Britt wanted it referred to the Street Committee. He launched forth into an incoherent statement about giving away a franchise that would be worth more to the company than it agreed to save the city and that it could well afford to make the offer it did. Mayor Phelan called Briit's attention to the fact that the resolution did not glve anything away, but merely in- vited the company to make a specific request for the privilege of erecting poles, desienating their number and lo- cation. This seemed to disconcert Britt for a moment and he called for another reading of the resolution. which was done. Dodge oprosed any delay. He said it was a matter that should be con- sidered by the full board and at once. Here was a company that offered to save the city thousands of dollars if granted the same privileges at present enjoyed by another, and without which the city was absolutely at the mercy of a monopoly. It would require three months for the opposition to place itself in readiness to carry out the provisions of the contract and there was no time to be lost. The resolution was plain and he could see no necessity for referring it to a committee. Britt again talked in favor of send- ing the resolution to the joint commit- tee. 1t would be necessary, he said, to have the interested parties appear and explain what they wanted and the joint committee could then make an intel- ligent report to the board. Mr. Britt, had he really desired a personal ex- planation of what was wanted, could have called upon the representatives of the opposition comp ny who were in attendance at the meeting for that very purpose, and he ignored the i.ain fea- ture of the resolution, which provided that the company should give that very information. What Mr. Britt wanted was time, but whether he wanted time in which to hear from the company that is charging the city 11 cents per thousand volts for light, measured on meters that, 2~ 50 per cent fast, while it only charges some of its private con- sumers 5% and 6 cents, he did not make known. Lackmann urged that immediate ac- tion be taken in view of the shortness of time. If there was any chance to save the city such a sum the Super- visors were in duty bound to do so. Smith made another fight for delay by ignoring the terms of the resolution, as Britt had done, and claiming that the granting of permission to erect The Zoo and Chiquita draw thousands 1dmuy. poles was a valuable privilege and should be taxed by the city. Dodge A Xknocked this argument out by showin; JUDGE RHODES BORDEN. (From a Photograph by Taber.) Appointed by Governor Budd to Succeed Judge Charles W. Slack. Rhodes Borden, who was yesterday appointed to the superior bench by Governor Budd to fill the place made vacant by the resignation of Judge Charles W. Slack, County Attorney Harry T. Creswell, is at present chief deputy in the office of City and which position he has held since 1892. In 1896, at the earnest solicitations of the members of the local bar, he accepted the nomination of Superior Judge, running on both the regular Democratic and non-partisan tickets, but failed of election. Judge Borden is comparatively a young man. in 1858, and is therefore but 40 years old. education at the University of Kentucky, coming to California parents, before graduating, in 1869, and located in Fresno County. Immediately after arriving here he took up the moved to this city in 1881. He was born in Alabama He received his rudimentary with his He re- study of law in the office of Judge John Garber, and graduated from the Hastings Law College in 1883. For a number of years he was engaged by Garber, Boalt & Bishop, attending to much of their outside business. The Borden family is one of the oldest in the United States. England they arrived in Rhode Island in 1635. Leaving The branch to which the new appointee belongs settled in Virgihia in 1711, removing to Alabama in 1836, and can therefore be numbered among the oldest families of the South. The appointment is indeed a great compliment to the successful aspi- rant, as Frank Murasky, his chief opponent, is a very popular and equally as well qualified man. Either of them is eminently fitted for the place. Powerful influence must have been brought to bear to overcome the infiu- ence of the friends of Murasky. It is rumored among attorneys that upon Judge Borden taking his seat the criminal cases heretofore assigned to Judge Dunne's department will be assigned to Judge Borden’s court. that the passage of the resolution would in no way affect the right to tax the privilege, which could be done if the city saw fit to do so. He referred to the former attempt to stop the Mu- tual Company from erecting poles in the city, and the city’s defeat in the Su- preme Court, and asked if the Supervi- sors cared to undertake any more such litigation. By this time Britt and Smith had matters well in hand and the resolu- tion was referred to the joint commit- tee, with instructions to report at the next meeting. Dodge and Lackmann were the only ones to oppose it, while 1 askins, Dela- ny, Sheehan, Morton, Britt. Smith and Rivers voted in the affirmative. In view of that part of the resolu- tion instructing the Street Lights Com- mittee to invite proposals in such lan- guage that no company shall be ex- cluded from biddir~ {t is an interest- ing fact that Mr. Rivers, the chairman of that committee, has in his possession now a proposal approved by the com- mittee, which does just what it is in- tened shall not be done; namely, the cutting off of all but the San Francisco company from bidding, owing to the terms imposed. If that proposal takes the same course it has in the past, it will be held back until about ten days before the expiration of the present contract and then rushed through, thus effectually choking all opposition. Marion Crawford on the Pope. Marion Crawford's style of oratory is very much on a par with his literary style. There is the same fluent, easy de- livery, the same absolute perfection of manner. It is clean cut. polished work, vet somehow he never rises to the higher flights of eloquence: he never wakes his audience to an outburst of enthusiasm. He is a good talker. in short, rather than a great speaker. and that Is really all one can demand of a popular lecturer of the day. )gatura_“y the large audience which filled the California Theater last night was extremely sympathetic. The lecturer is himself an ardent Roman Catholic, the lecture dealt with Pope Leo XIII, and his life in the Vatican, and was given un~ der the auspices of the Y. M. I. Mayor Phelan, in a speech of somewhat unnec- essary length, undertook the introductory part of the business, as 1f Crawford re- quires any introduction to an audience of cultured, novel reading Californians. The lecturer, who bears himself with all the ease of a polished gentleman of the world, commanded the attention of his audience from the first. He b n with a_short historical introduction, explaining the po- litical causes which led to the downfall of the temporal power of the papacy, and contrasting very strongly the gentie fee- bleness of Pius IX's administration with that of his successor, Leo XIIL Under ’ius the political power of the Vatican nk to zero, but under the vigorous rule of Leo it has won the respect of all na- ions. Marion Crawford regards the Pope as among the greatest statesmen of the century, and in one of the most forcible passages of his lecture compared him with Lincoln and Gladstone, bracketing the three great statesmen together. All three, he pointed out, were men who pos- sessed remarkable physical qualifications in their youth. All three could be elo- quent on occasion, and all three had a certain element of melancholy sadness in their composition. Leo is now nearly 9 years of age, yet Crawford drew a wonderful picture of his paysical vigor. With almost a super- fluity of detail he told of the hours the Pope keeps, of the scanty meals he eats; all the little peculiarities of his character were set orth with photographic accur- acy. The Pope has great conversational power. Rarely does a distinguished per- sonage pass through Rome without being summoned to an audience. .. his dicta- torial way, Leo will sometimes ta.x for a couple of hours, and the visitor feels through it all that he is listening to a man of real power, who unites the three great essendals of strength—those of head, heart and hand. The Pope, as Mr. Crawford sums him up, is evenly bal- anced as a statesman, a scholar and a man. No such personage has appeared at the head of the church for centuries. He has turned tue feeling of the nations of Europe from hostility to friendliness. He has achieveu greater results than Mazzini and Garibaldi, Bismarck or Napoleon III. Ye., despite all this ex- treme praise, Mr. Crawford had to admit that Leo is practically a prisoner in his own Vatican. Political reasons are often given for his voluntary seclusion; but the real cause is the disturbed condition of Rome. A volcano of anarchical senti- ment rages beneath the surface, and the Pope’s life, should he venture beyond his own grounds, would not be safe for a day. Some fanatical revolutionist, af- flicted with the “sour indigestion of free thought,” would cut his career short. and, therefore, the rulers of modern Italy, who bave the highest respect for Leo's char- acter and ability, are glad to have him remain at home. The lecture to-night will describe the “Original Mr. Isaacs® Early Newspaper Experience in India.” ———e—————— Hobos Rob a Saloon. WOODLAND, Marc¢h 28.—A saloon at Cacheville was entered by burglars last night. Four hobos were arrested at Knights Landing this morning with a por- tion of the plunder in their possession. 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