Manners and customs of ye Englyshe/Madame Tvssavd her Wax Werkes. Ye Chamber of Horrors!!
Manners and Customs of ye Englyshe in 1849. No. 27.
Madame Tvssavd her Wax Werkes. Ye Chamber of Horrors!!
MR. PIPS HIS DIARY.
Madame Tvssavd her Wax Werkes. Ye Chamber of Horrors!!
[Wedneſday, September 5, 1849.]
TO pleaſe my Wife, did take her this Evening to Madame Tussaud her Wax Works; a grand large Room, exceeding fine with Gilding, lighted up very fplendid, and full of People, and a Band of Muſique playing as they walked about: coſt 2s., and a Catalogue 6d. The Wax Figures a patty Show: but with their painted Cheeks and glaſſy Eyes—eſpecially ſuch as nod and move—do look like Life in Death. The Drefſſes very handſome, and I think, correct; and the Sight of ſo many People of Note in the Array of their Time, did much delight me. Among the Company Numbers of Country Folk, and to ſee how they did dare at the Effigies of the Queen, and the Prince, and the Duke of Wellington, and the King of the Belgians, and the Princess Charlotte that was, and George the Fourth in his Coronation Robes, magnificent as a Peacock! The Catalogue do ſay that his Chair is the very one wherein he ſat in the Abbey; but how like a Play-Houſe Property it do look, and little thought the King it would come down to figure in a Raree Show! A Crowd of Dames and Matrons gazing at the Group of the Royal Family, calling the Children "Dears" and "Ducks," and would, I verily believe, have killed their Wax Chaps, if they had been differed. My Wife feaſting her Eyes on the little Princes and Princeſſſes, I did fix mine upon a pretty, modeſt, black Maid beſide me, and ſhe hers on me, till my Wife ſpying us, did pinch me with her Nails in the Arm. Pretty, to ſee the Sovereign Allies in the laſt War, and bluff old Blucher, and Bonaparte and his Officers, in brave Poſtures, but ſtiff. Alſo the two King Charleses, and Oliver, together; Charles the First proteſting againſt his Death-Warrant, and his Son backing him; and Cardinal Wolsey looking on. Lord Byron in the Dreſs of a Greek Pirate, looking Daggers and Piſtols, cloſe to John Wesley preaching a Sermon, was likewiſe mighty droll; and methought, if all Madame Tussaud's Figures were their Originals inſtead, what Ado there would be! Many of the Faces that I knew by Recollection, or Pictures, very like; and my Lord Brougham I did know directly, and Liston in Paul Pry. But ſtrange, among the Kings to ſee him that was the Railway King; and methinks that it were as well now if he were melted up. Thence to the Napoleon Rooms, where Bonaparte's Coach, and one of his Teeth, and other Reliques and Gimcracks of his, well enough to ſee for ſuch as care about him a Button. Then to the Chamber of Horrors, which my Wife did long to ſee moſt of all; coſt 1s.', with the Napoleon Rooms, 1s. more; a Room like a Dungeon, where the Head of Robespierre, and other Scoundrels of the great French Revolution, in Wax, as though juſt cut off, horrid ghaſtly, and Plaſter Carts of Fellows that have been hanged: but the chief Attraction a Sort of Dock, wherein all the notorious Murderers of late Years; the foremoſt of all, Rush, according to the Bill, taken from Life at Norwich, which, ſeeing he was hanged there, is an odd Phraſe. There was likewiſe a Model of Stanfield Hall, and Rush his Farm, as though the Place were as famous as Waterloo. Methinks it is of ill Conſequence that there ſhould be a Murderers' Corner, wherein a Villain may look to have his Figure put more certainly than a Poet can to a Statue in the Abbey. So away again to the large Room, to look at Jenny Lind inſtead of Greenacre, and at 10 of the Clock Home, and ſo to Bed, my Wife declaring ſhe ſhould dream of the Chamber of Horrors.