Joseph Addison: THE DRUMMER, or THE HAUNTED HOUSE

A comedy. As it is acted at the Theatre-Royal in Drury-Lane, by His Majesty’s servants: 1715

I believe I hunted this play down because of Doug Skinner’s Music from Elsewhere which I have been reading for a while and quite enjoying but progress through it has been slow because just about every other page or so (it seems) I have to go look for something or try out the music on a keyboard. Not a complaint! Also it has been filling me with vague notions and schemes.

Schemes are at the heart of this play. The YT link at the top will take you to a Librivox recording of the play. It’s always better to have a performance than just read a play, unless you are good at turning a script into a performance in your head — and even if you are it’s always fun to let somebody else do it. You can however read it at the Internet Archive, home of a lot of great stuff and well-deserving of your support (cough).

Falsis terroribus implet, ut magus gives all away at the start, assuming you read Latin. If not, I’ll give more away that will not harm your enjoyment in the slightest as we know it’s all a con right from the start — though not everyone in the play knows that. Obviously this ties into my interest in the spook racket as well as that of sounds from elsewhere. A ghostly drummer is not uncommon as hauntings go: expressive, simple, loud — and certainly in human history there are a lot of dead soldiers.

Addison is not a great wit nor a great stylist. The character names generally indicate the role: the true husband George Truman, the false suitor Tinsel, the steward Vellum, the abigail is named Abigail. We have the comic servants always trying to cadge an extra treat or ale; the hilariously insufferable false suitor who can barely fit his ego through the door; the scheming abigail who nonetheless protects her lady. Lady Truman herself lives up to the ideal of Penelope albeit on a less heroic level.

It’s interesting, too, for how it portrays both hauntings and their remedies (and snarks at would-be intellectual bros):

Pugh, this is all froth! you understand nothing of the Matter ought to be done, I wou’d have the Steward speak Latin to it. …but alack what can one of us poor Men do with a Spirit, that can neither Write nor Read? [i.e. Latin wouldn’t frighten it then]

LADY. I vow, Mr. Tinsel, I’m afraid malicious People will say I’m in Love with an Atheist.
TINSEL. Oh, my Dear, that’s an old-fashion’d Word. I’m a Free thinker, Child.
LADY. Really, Mr. Tinsel, considering that you are so fine a Gentleman, I’m amaz’d where you got all this Learning ! I wonder it has not spoil’d your Breeding.
TINSEL. To tell you the Truth, I have not time to look into these dry Matters my self, but I am convinc’d by four or five learned Men, whom I sometimes over-hear at a Coffee house I frequent, that our Fore fathers were a Pack of Asses, that the World has been in an Error for some Thousands of Years, and that all the People upon Earth, excepting those two or three worthy Gentlemen, are impos’d upon, cheated, bubbled, abus’d, bamboozl’d–
ABIGAIL. Madam, how can you hear such a Profligate ? he talks like the London Prodigal.

‘Tis the Solitude of the Country that creates these Whimsies; there was never such a thing as a Ghost heard of at London, except in the Play house…

VELLUM. I will be concise. There is a certain Person arrived this Morning, an aged Man of a venerable Aspect, and of a long hoary Beard, that reacheth down to his Girdle. The common People call him a Wizard, a White-Witch, a Conjurer, a Cunning- Man, a Necromancer, a–
LADY. No matter for his Titles. But what of all this?
VELLUM. Give me the hearing, good my Lady! he pretends to great Skill in the Occult Sciences, and is come hither upon the rumor of this Drum. If one may believe him, he knows the Secret of laying Ghosts, or of quieting Houses that are haunted.

GARDENER. Why! I remember a Conjurer once at a Fayr, that to my thinking was a very Smock-fac’d Man, and yet he spew’d out fifty Yards of green Ferret. I fancy, John, if thou didst get him into the Pantry and give him a Cup of Ale, he’d shew us a few Tricks. Do’st think we could not persuade him to swallow one of thy Case – Knives for his Diversion? He’ll certainly bring it up again.
BUTLER. Peter! thou art such a Wise-acre! Thou do’st not know the Difference between a Conjurer and a Jugler. This Man must be a very great Master of his Trade. His Beard is at least half a Yard long, he’s dress’d in a strange dark Cloak, as black as a Cole, your Conjurer always goes in Mourning.

I had no idea that wise-acre went that far back. I guess it does sound like an older construction. Checking Merriam-Webster I find it’s related to the ‘Middle Dutch word wijssegger, meaning “soothsayer.” Ah, ha. Of course mostly used ironically in English as we would not be surprised to learn. First use 1595!

I think this play could be put on now with very few changes and offer a good deal of entertainment. If I were an organising kind of person I would do that but I am no, so I’ll leave it to you.