Punch/Volume 147/Issue 3822/A Possible Source
Dear Mr. Punch,—Having recently dropped into several London theatres and halls of variety I have been struck by the numerical strength, agility and apparently abounding vitality of the young men forming the chorus. These gallant fellows sing and caper with the utmost spirit throughout the whole evening, both in musical comedy or revue; and in London alone, where revues are now being postponed at many of the outlying halls, there must be more than a thousand of them. Now and then they even go so far as to impersonate recruits—the chorus to the recruiting songs which have crept into more than one programme—and they make, I can assure you, Sir, a very brave show with their refles and their miliary paces, a little accelerated perhaps by the exigencies of the tune, but a marvel of discipline none the less.
Watching these brisk and efficient male choruses at work, the thought has come to me—in fact has often been forced upon me by the martial nature of the musical number which they were engaged in rendering with so much capability and cheerfulness—that at a time when England is particularly in need of her young men in the field, the audiences of London might consent to forgo a little of the pleasure that comes from watching athletic youths covered with grease-paint and gyrating in the limelight, and, by expressing their readiness to see these necessary evolutions carried out by older men, liberate so much good material to join the Army. Such is the power of the make-up (I am told) that a man of fifty could easily be arranged to look sufficiently like a man of half his age, at any rate without imperilling the success of the entertainment from the point of view of the spectator. And of course the girls will remain in all their charm, since girls cannot enlist.
The point may be worth considering. The decision, I feel sure, rests entirely with the public. If the public says: "Let the young go, and give us more mature choristers for a while, and we will patriotically endeavour to endure the privation"—then all the young men will, of course, enlist as one. But unless the public says this they must remain in the choruses against the grain.
I am, Sir,
Yours gratefully,
Over Age.