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 PALGRAVE STUDIES IN
BRITISH MUSICAL THEATRE

CULTURAL IDENTITY
IN BRITISH MUSICAL
THEATRE, 1890–1939
KNOWING ONE’S PLACE

BEN MACPHERSON
Palgrave Studies in British Musical Theatre

Series Editors
Millie Taylor
Department of Performing Arts
University of Winchester
Winchester, UK

Dominic Symonds
Lincoln School of Performing Arts
University of Lincoln
Lincoln, UK
Britain’s contribution to musical theatre in the late twentieth century is
known and celebrated across the world. In historiographies of musical
theatre, this assertion of British success concludes the twentieth century
narrative that is otherwise reported as an American story. Yet the use of
song and music in UK theatre is much more widespread than is often
acknowledged. This series teases out the nuances and the richness of
British musical theatre in three broad areas: British identity; Aesthetics and
dramaturgies; Practices and politics.

More information about this series at

http://www.palgrave.com/gp/series/15105
 Ben Macpherson

Cultural Identity in
British Musical
Theatre, 1890–1939
Knowing One’s Place
Ben Macpherson
School of Media and Performing Arts
University of Portsmouth
Portsmouth, UK

Palgrave Studies in British Musical Theatre

ISBN 978-1-137-59806-6    ISBN 978-1-137-59807-3 (eBook)
https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-59807-3

Library of Congress Control Number: 2018939086

© The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s) 2018

The author(s) has/have asserted their right(s) to be identified as the author(s) of this work
in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
This work is subject to copyright. All rights are solely and exclusively licensed by the
Publisher, whether the whole or part of the material is concerned, specifically the rights of
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known or hereafter developed.
The use of general descriptive names, registered names, trademarks, service marks, etc. in this
publication does not imply, even in the absence of a specific statement, that such names are
exempt from the relevant protective laws and regulations and therefore free for general use.
The publisher, the authors and the editors are safe to assume that the advice and information
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For Lauren
 Permissions

All citations for Betty (1915) and The Maid of the Mountains (1917) are
used by kind permission of the Estate of Frederick Lonsdale.
The Better ’Ole (1917), written by Bruce Bairnsfather, © 2017 The
Estate of Barbara Bruce Littlejohn. All rights reserved. Citations used by
permission.
The Dancing Years by Ivor Novello. Play-script published by Samuel
French Ltd, 1953. Citations reprinted by permission of Samuel French
Ltd and Sir Tom Arnold.
Miss Hook of Holland by Paul Rubens and Austen Horgan. Play-script
published by Samuel French Ltd. Citations reprinted by permission of
Samuel French Ltd.
Chapter 4 uses material previously published in ‘Some Yesterdays
Always Remain: Black-British and Anglo-Asian Musical Theatre’, The
Oxford Handbook of the British Musical (eds. Robert Gordon and Olaf
Jubin, 2017), pp. 673–696, published by Oxford University Press and
used with permission.
Efforts were made to contact all copyright holders and estates for the
works used. Where this was not possible, the author offers due acknowl-
edgement to the source material under the statutory provision for fair use
and fair dealing, under Section 107 of the Copyright Act 1976 (USA) and
Section 29 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 (UK).

vii
 Acknowledgements

While hours spent in archives and weeks spent writing are, by nature, soli-
tary, this project has nevertheless always been something of a collective
endeavour, in which a small army of friends, colleagues, scholars, students,
and other interested parties, have rendered direct or indirect assistance,
encouragement, or material support over the past six years. First, I want to
express a huge debt of gratitude to Stephen Banfield, from whom I
acquired a large collection of materials upon his retirement from the
University of Bristol in 2014. While the research for this project was
already well underway, this set of resources, including books, scripts,
scores, and several collectable items, proved invaluable in extending my
reach. The collection is now housed in the University of Portsmouth
Library for students and staff, and has given our drama and musical the-
atre students access to some fascinating reference material they would not
otherwise have been able to retrieve.
I have mused with and shared with (and undoubtedly bored) each and
every one of my colleagues at the University of Portsmouth on numerous
occasions. Thanks must therefore be extended to George Burrows, Laura
Doye, Erika Hughes, Colin Jagger, Laura MacDonald, Matt Smith, and
Walid Benkhaled, for putting up with half-formed ideas and meandering
conversations over the past few years. Their support—kindly listening,
reading, challenging, encouraging, or even helping by lightening my
workload during the writing process—was, and is, much appreciated. In
addition, support from my Faculty of Creative and Cultural Industries,
which took various forms, has also been useful in the completion of this

ix
x ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

project, and I am grateful in particular to Esther Sonnet, Deborah

Sugg Ryan, and Deborah Shaw for their direct assistance.
As a member of the British Musical Theatre Research Institute, I have
benefitted from the fact that dear colleagues from around the UK and
elsewhere have championed these ideas for a number of years and shared
initial conversations at several conferences. Specifically, I want to note the
tireless enthusiasm of Robert Gordon and Olaf Jubin, with whom I have
had many conversations and whose interest and support have meant so
much. Encouragement and some fruitful conversations have also been
forthcoming from a range of colleagues, scholars, and friends, including
William Everett, John Graziano, Elizabeth Titrington-Craft, Maya Cantu,
Simon Sladen, Chris Balme, John Snelson, and Christine Berberich.
Thanks should also go to David Linton and Elizabeth Wells for providing
me with access to some of their research, which I had not been able to
otherwise locate; this was specifically relevant for Chap. 6. In addition, I
am very grateful to Mark Warby of the Bruce Bairnsfather Society for sup-
plying me with, at almost lightning speed following a chance email, a host
of materials about Bruce Bairnsfather and the writing of The Better ’Ole.
Mark’s enthusiasm was mirrored by that of Doug Reside, Anne Marie van
Roessel, and the team at the New York Public Library Lincoln Center of
the Performing Arts, and that of Sylvia Wang and the team at the Shubert
Archives in Manhattan. Their assistance, knowledge, and efficiency were
invaluable in the brief visits I made to New York between 2015 and 2017.
Similarly, the research teams at the British Library and the Victoria and
Albert Theatre and Performance Archives in London, along with those at
the Bristol Theatre Archives, the Noël Coward archives, and the University
of Birmingham Cadbury Archives have been a source of expertise, sup-
port, advice, and enthusiasm on every occasion.
Appreciation must also be noted for the twenty-three second-year
undergraduate students that studied an optional unit on British musical
theatre I delivered in 2016, along with those students to whom I have
delivered it subsequently. This class was regularly augmented by a range of
first- and third-year undergraduates along with two postgraduate students,
and served as a test run for many of the arguments here; it was an enjoy-
able opportunity to air these ideas. For an entire academic year, it made
Friday-afternoon teaching a pleasure. In addition, in December 2016, a
group of first-year musical theatre students workshopped Florodora as part
of their course, providing a welcome performance of a key British musical
success. Working with these students, and their creative and production
 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
   xi

team, was a fascinating experience which informed the reading I present in

Chap. 2. Despite their initial scepticism, the students enjoyed the chal-
lenge, while I suspect I gained more from the project than they did. All
the students I have worked with have been nothing but enthusiastic and
supportive of this endeavour, and I only hope they benefit from the result
in their studies.
I have also truly valued the personal and professional support given to
me by my collaborator and friend Konstantinos Thomaidis. Even while
this project fell outside our shared area of work and research in voice stud-
ies, his support was much valued and needed throughout the writing and
research of this book, both while he was my colleague at Portsmouth, and
subsequently, after he moved to the University of Exeter. Likewise, Millie
Taylor and Dominic Symonds have been outstanding series editors, giving
advice, support, encouragement, and rigorous feedback, from the initial
discussions until the final submission. Both Millie and Dominic have sup-
ported my development as a scholar and colleague since I first talked with
Dominic about a postgraduate research project during my final year as an
undergraduate. I owe both of them a huge debt of gratitude, and am
proud to be included in this book series, which has been tirelessly sup-
ported by Tomas, Vicky, and the team at Palgrave.
Finally, I want to thank my family and friends, who have given me
encouragement and support when needed, and space to think and write
when necessary—often without my even having to request it. In particular
I would like to thank my parents, and my lovely wife Lauren, who humours
me, encourages me, and has endured too many mornings listening to the
sounds of Edwardian England—on CD, online, and from the piano. I
could not have done this without her quiet support and the never-ending
supply of coffee that was lovingly handed to me in increasing amounts
during the writing process. She is enjoying a welcome break from ‘Sly
Cigarette’ and ‘Chin Chin Chinaman’. It has to be said, she is not the only
one.
 Contents

1 The British Musical in Seven Stories   1

Part I Domestic and Personal Identities  29

2 Nation: Modernity and Mythology  31

3 Femininity: Cinderellas and Caretakers  63

4 Manliness: Domesticity and Defence  91

Part II Imperial and Ideological Identities 119

5 Empire: Ornamentalism and Orientalism 121

6 Conflict: Continuity and Change 155

7 Peace: Nostalgia and Nationhood 181

xiii
xiv Contents

8 The English Musical in Many Stories 209

References 215

Index 233
 Author’s Note

Because of the nature of using extensive archival material, some of the

references between different archival volumes may differ in their detail. In
particular, with regards to the use of the Lord Chamberlain’s Plays
Collection (British Library), several of the play-scripts were in volumes
specified by year and folder, rather than licence number. I have included as
much information as appropriate per reference.
Secondly, in the brief excerpts from the works under consideration,
dialogue is featured in lowercase, while lyrics are indicated using uppercase
letters. I have attempted to retain as much of the original typesetting and
spelling as possible, only adapting it in a number of instances for the sake
of consistency.
Finally, an acknowledgement of intent. In the words of Stephen
Banfield, ‘[t]he real problem with the scripts of the West End’s golden age
of musical comedy […] is that we have not bothered to study them’
(2017, p. 131). This book is intended to offer critical discourses by means
of close textual analysis of play-scripts, using over forty sources from archi-
val and published materials. To this end, while there are a number of refer-
ences to the scores and musical performances throughout, I do not
pretend to offer rigorous musical analysis as part of this study.

xv
 CHAPTER 1

The British Musical in Seven Stories

The history of the world is made up of stories. When told by enough

people, these stories take on an air of inalienable truth: they become
mythologies. These mythologies—and the stories we tell that use them—
are as important as they are dangerous. As Roland Barthes once said, the
mythologies that arise from commonly rehearsed stories allow a particular
historical reality to emerge, whether or not that reality is true or accurate
(2000, p. 142). Nevertheless, the imperative to tell stories as a way of
making meaning from experience is a fundamental facet of the human
condition; even neuroscience suggests that storytelling is embedded
within human biology.1 It is also a fundamental part of this book.
This book is made up of stories. These stories intertwine, inform each
other, contradict one another, and together, create a rich narrative that
allows a particular historical reality to emerge. In seeking to tell the story
of early British musical comedy as a cultural phenomenon that reflected,
commented upon, and critiqued British society, the chapters in this book
all tell slightly different stories. There are seven stories altogether: ‘A
History of British Musical Theatre’, ‘Britishness (According to the
English)’, ‘Knowing One’s Place’, ‘Nation’, ‘Personal Identity’, ‘Empire’,
and ‘Nostalgia’. Three of them begin in this chapter. This is the first.

© The Author(s) 2018 1

B. Macpherson, Cultural Identity in British Musical Theatre,
1890–1939, Palgrave Studies in British Musical Theatre,
https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-59807-3_1
2 B. MACPHERSON

A (Very Brief) History of British Musical Theatre

In his potted history of British musical theatre, Stephen Banfield suggests
that after the success of the Savoy comic operas created by Arthur Sullivan
and William Schwenk Gilbert between the years 1875 and 1889, ‘a riot of
“gaiety” overtook the West End, as befitted the “naughty nineties” and the
frivolous, heartlessly capitalist Edwardian era that followed’ (Banfield, 2017,
p. 117). This ‘riot of “gaiety”’ was led by impresario George Edwardes and
a roll call of talented writers, directors, and artistes whose names are, today,
hardly remembered. ‘The cuckoo in the nest was Broadway, first importing
British musical comedies [and then] by the 1920s exporting its own to the
West End’ thereby ushering in an era of ‘American superiority coupled with
the built-in generic obsolescence of topical musical comedy’ which saw ‘gai-
ety’ effectively disappear, and with it an entire era of shows that have been
long since forgotten, full of ‘tunes no longer hummed or even remembered
except in tiny pockets of cultural nostalgia’ (Banfield, 2017, p. 117).
This story—as recounted by Banfield—offers a sweeping summary of
musical theatre in Britain from 1875 to the mid-1920s. It ends on a some-
what bitter note, suggesting that this form, synonymous with frivolity,
reached ‘obsolescence’ sometime in the first half of the twentieth century.
As Banfield observes, this narrative necessitates ‘cross-examination’
because at its zenith British musical comedy was vital, modern, and noth-
ing short of a ‘cultural phenomenon’ (2017, p. 118). However, the sense
of obsolescence and the easy attribution of frivolous modernity means that
a large, formative part of British musical theatre history—indeed, musical
theatre history at large—has routinely been overlooked in scholarship,
receiving ‘precious little sustained’ critical or cultural analysis (Banfield,
2017, p. 118).
While Banfield is right to note the scarcity of scholarship on musical
comedy, it is nevertheless the case that—along with a few general-interest
publications by journalists and enthusiasts—there have been a number of
works published that have considered discrete aspects of this story.2 These
are often disparate, compartmentalised, or removed from a sense of broad
cultural context, but together they do provide compelling evidence that
musical comedy is worthy of the detailed attention Banfield champions. For
example, Tracy C. Davis’ Actresses as Working Women: Their Social Identity
in Victorian Culture (1991) re-evaluated the social position of women as
working actresses during the fin de siècle, while Erika Diane Rappaport’s
(2001) more recent study of women in London in the 1890s articulates
 THE BRITISH MUSICAL IN SEVEN STORIES 3

the ascent of actresses in musical comedies, within a broader context of a

growing consumer culture and the rise of the (sub)urban middle classes.
Elsewhere, Brian Singleton (2004) and Martin Clayton and Bennett Zon
(2007) have published collections that include considerations of musical
comedy as a popular cultural product of the British Empire, examining
strategies employed to anglicise ‘Otherness’ in the music, production val-
ues, narratives, and performances of these shows. Jacky Bratton (1986) and
Peter Bailey (1994, 1996) have explored connections between the class and
gender politics of music hall and the growth of musical comedy into a
respectable art form.3 In addition, far from the genre’s representing some
kind of frivolous stopgap between Gilbert and Sullivan’s last collaboration
in 1899 and the predominance of the American musical in the early 1940s,
the resonance of musical comedy was felt on an international scale, with
many productions successfully transferring from London to America,
Australia, Europe, India, and elsewhere; Len Platt, David Linton, and
Tobias Becker (2014) curated a collection of essays that demonstrate some
surprising Anglo-German interactions between 1890 and 1939.4
While these various histories offer evidence of the rich and diverse
nature of early British musical comedy, none offer a full overview of the
subject thematically or chronologically. In fact, until now Len Platt’s
Musical Comedy on the West End Stage 1890–1939 has represented the only
sustained and full-length study of the form. Platt tells the story of a culture
preoccupied with capitalist modernity and imperialism, and asserts that
modernity—characterised socially by a rejection of tradition, increased
secularisation, the growth of the free market, urbanisation, and
­nationalism—was inextricably linked with the cultural phenomenon of
musical comedy; a phenomenon that ‘lasted for a very long time and
included a large number of texts’ (2004, p. 2). He acknowledges the cul-
tural impact of the form arises from the fact that ‘musical comedies, like all
cultural products, are constitutive and have an explicitly reflexive relation-
ship with the societies from which they stem’ (2004, p. 19), and suggests
that—to the contemporary eye and ear—the popular successes of the late
Victorian and Edwardian period may now seem ‘quaint, small-scale and
“British” in a stereotypical way’ (Platt, 2004, p. 3).
At the time, of course, this was far from being the case. As the studies
listed above demonstrate—and as Platt and Banfield have shown—musical
comedy was seen as complex, contemporary and metropolitan; it was a trans-
atlantic genre that dominated the international stage for decades. For exam-
ple, Florodora was the first musical to be produced for gramophone record in
4 B. MACPHERSON

1900, acting as a forerunner of the modern-day cast recording. As a popular

phenomenon in its own right, Florodora enjoyed success worldwide, includ-
ing a number of performances in 1936 at Randall’s Island Municipal Stadium,
New York, which held up to 10,000 spectators, in an early iteration of some
contemporary arena performances of musical theatre. Elsewhere, the war-
time musical Chu Chin Chow set a world record for the longest run when it
played at His Majesty’s Theatre, London, for 2238 continuous performances
between 1916 and 1921. While he does not refer to these two examples,
Platt’s story similarly demonstrates and celebrates the sheer scale of such a
phenomenon.
However, while challenging contemporary ideas of the quaint or the
small-scale, one part of Platt’s statement is left largely undefined, demand-
ing further examination. Beyond the advent of commercial consumption
during the fin de siècle, what might be understood by the suggestion that
late Victorian and Edwardian musical comedy can be seen as ‘“British” in
a stereotypical way’ (2004, p. 3)? If cultural products such as the stage
musical are always imbricated within, and constitutive of, the society and
culture in which they are created, in what ways did musical comedy con-
stitute or represent what might be called Britishness, when, in Platt’s view,
it was both commercial and implicitly modern, and might easily be dis-
missed in retrospect as a mere expression of frivolous gaiety?5 These
­concerns form the basis of this book, because while Platt proffers contin-
ued references to modernity as the means by which we can understand the
advent of musical comedy, the use of this perspective only offers a particu-
lar version of the story; after all, Britishness as a sense of identity cannot be
(and is not) the same for the English, Irish, Scottish, and Welsh. Socially
and culturally, the experience of ‘being British’ likewise differed between
the reigns of Queen Victoria (1837–1901), King Edward VII (1901–1910),
and King George V (1910–1936), as the Empire changed, suffragists and
the working classes gained momentum for their causes, and the nation was
shattered by the first global conflict of the twentieth century.
By means of a forensic examination of the scripts and scores for over
forty musical comedies staged between 1892 and 1939, and in light of the
many complementary and contrasting stories told by Davis, Rappaport,
Bratton, Bailey, Platt, and many others, the rest of this book seeks to
engage in the ‘cross-examination’ encouraged by Banfield, expanding,
extending, and (at times) offering an alternative to Platt’s story. Doing so,
it asks one overarching question: As a form that dominated British popular
culture from the end of Gilbert and Sullivan’s collaboration through to
 THE BRITISH MUSICAL IN SEVEN STORIES 5

the outbreak of World War II, in what ways can musical comedy be under-
stood as constitutive, reflective, or representative of Britishness? To answer
this question, a definition of this term is a good place to start. Coincidentally,
this definition is the second (and oldest) story in the book.

‘Britishness’ (According to the English)

The year is 1890. The nineteenth century—often called the ‘imperial cen-
tury’—is drawing to a close. In the years since the defeat of France follow-
ing the Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars in 1815, and in parallel to the
industrial revolution, Britain has expanded its Empire, emerging as the
global hegemon, and Victoria is on the throne as ‘Queen of Great Britain
and Ireland, and Empress of India’. She has reigned for over half a cen-
tury, and will continue to do so for more than a decade from this point.
Between 1815 and 1914, British imperial rule would come to dominate in
excess of 400 million people worldwide, with the British Empire control-
ling around 10 million square miles of territories, dominions, and colo-
nies.6 With an empire built on trade routes and sea power, Britannia really
did rule the waves. Yet, beneath the regnal longevity and seemingly uni-
fied vision of imperial ‘civilising’ progress, there was trouble at home.
In 1886, incumbent Liberal Prime Minister William Gladstone had
tabled a bill for Irish Home Rule in the House of Commons, as a result of
political upheavals that had been ongoing since 1878. Challenging the
motion, Lord Salisbury, Conservative Leader of Her Majesty’s Opposition,
believed that the bill threatened not only the Union of Great Britain and
Ireland, but also the British Empire, and in a speech of 8 April 1896, he
pointed to the example of Turkey, which had recently granted autonomy
to Romania, Serbia, and Bulgaria: ‘Turkey is a decaying Empire; England,
I hope, is not’ (in Roberts, 1999, p. 382). This short statement reveals an
anxiety about the future of the Union and simultaneously implies that the
Empire of Great Britain is, in fact, English. While it might be a small
semantic misadventure, Salisbury’s invocation of an ‘English Empire’ her-
alds a devastating plot twist in the story of Britishness.
It is not hard to see why Salisbury referred to the British Empire in
English terms. As historians have noted, Great Britain and its Empire were
‘creations’ of England (Kumar, 2003, p. 179). Considering the Act of
Union that joined Scotland to England and Wales in 1707, along with the
1801 Act of Union (Ireland), historian Linda Colley notes that ‘England
has always been the preponderant country [in the Union]’, with the
6 B. MACPHERSON

­ iggest population, a universal language, and an older centralised state

b
structure and regnal heritage than Scotland, Ireland, or Wales (2014,
p. 57). England was the nation that forged Great Britain and the subse-
quent British Empire, with a capital city that was the centre of the Empire
and the world’s largest metropolis when Salisbury defended the Union.7
In this light, defining Britishness does not seem too difficult, and a logical
working definition might be expressed as: ‘Englishness writ large’.
However, such an elision is fraught with dangers and generalities, for as
Colley further suggests, the British state was ‘an invented nation superim-
posed […] onto much older alignments and loyalties’ in a manner which,
Krishan Kumar notes, served to ‘supplement and, at times, suppress’
national identities at home, as well as in the Empire (1992, p. 5; Kumar,
2003, p. 145). In short, Britishness was born of political expedience, and
as Mike Storry and Peter Childs warn in their study of British Cultural
Identity, ‘political Union is not cultural Union’ (1997, p. 45). Subsequently,
the history of Great Britain is one of a fraught and paradoxical negotiation
between the unifying political ideal of Britishness and the distinct cultural
identities of England, Ireland, Scotland, and Wales.8 Importantly for the
Welsh, Scottish, and Irish, the ‘older alignments and loyalties’ of cultural
and regional heritage have remained a crucial component of identity and
belonging, even while those nations retain political membership of the
British Union (Colley, 1992, p. 5).
However, a parallel sense of cultural identity is often absent in discus-
sions or histories of the English. In his study The Politics of English
Nationhood, Michael Kenny has noted that while there is a large body of
histories that explore Scottish, Irish, and Welsh cultural identities, English
identity ‘remains a subject which is usually skirted rather than directly
engaged, and is mainly confined to the margins of political analysis’; politi-
cal analysis which invariably concerns the Union, rather than the nation
(2014, p. 1). This English cultural identity crisis is further seen in the way
the English use (or abuse) the idea of Britishness as a synonym for what
are more correctly aspects of English cultural identity, in a situation that
Kumar calls ‘the English dilemma’ (2003, p. 179). He suggests that per-
ceived English indifference about the nation’s own cultural identity—
beyond mythologies and stereotypes including the Sunday roast, country
pubs, rainy seaside holidays, and Morris dancing—might be connected
directly to England’s historical position of political dominance in the
British Union. As the historical proponents of both Union and Empire,
the English ‘had to find objects other than the English nation on which to
 THE BRITISH MUSICAL IN SEVEN STORIES 7

fasten’, and Kumar concludes that this led to Great Britain and the British
Empire becoming cultural markers of English identity (2003, p. 179).9 In
other words, the cultural identity of the English became inextricably linked
with their role in the political identity of Great Britain. As journalist Jeremy
Paxman surmises, this ‘dilemma’ is one possible reason why the imperial
English—such as Salisbury in his speech above—‘didn’t need to think too
hard about whether being “English” was the same as being “British”: the
terms were virtually interchangeable’ (1998, p. ix).10 Unsurprisingly, for
an expedient political union built on military alliances and religious ideals,
the invisibility of Wales, Ireland, and Scotland that results when the
English freely interchange the name of their nation state and their union
has been a source of historical tension, leading to seismic political shifts in
the British landscape, including the devolution of power to Wales in 1997,
to the Northern Ireland Assembly in 1999 and 2007, and further planned
devolution in Scotland, set in motion in 2014 following a referendum on
independence that took place that year.
This complex situation might be helpfully explained with reference to
cultural historian Raymond Williams’ definition of ideology. In his land-
mark text Culture, Williams considers the term ‘ideology’, suggesting a
fluidity between its two common definitions: ‘the formal and conscious
beliefs of a class or other social group’ (which he summarises as ‘dogma’),
and ‘the characteristic world-view or general perspective of a class or other
social group, which will include formal and conscious beliefs but also less
conscious, less formulated attitudes, habits and feelings, or even uncon-
scious assumptions, bearing and commitments’ (1981, p. 26). Understood
in these terms, ‘Britishness’—according to the English—might be defined
as follows:

Britishness (according to the English): A world-view that is not universal,

but which operates on an unconscious assumption by the English, that
English cultural identity and British national identity are synonymous. In
this definition, the latter is used as an expression of the former, manifested
through unconscious attitudes and historical habits that appear as ‘dogma’
to the other member nations of Great Britain, even if they are less formal in
reality.

In short, the English might be ideologically British in their expression of

cultural identity, and this reveals an implicit tension between that cultural
identity and their national identity as English subjects; for although
8 B. MACPHERSON

England is a member nation of the Union of Great Britain and (Northern)

Ireland, history has shown that this Union is far from the ‘homogenous,
superior and/or unchanging’ entity that its rhetoric seems to suggest
(Harvie, 2005, p. 2). In other words: it is complicated.
However, this complexity it is also telling, for if Barthes’ definition of a
myth is true, the historical reality of Britishness as experienced by the English
supplies some much-needed detailing to the story of musical theatre out-
lined earlier. Crucially, this detailing relates to Platt’s observation that early
musical comedy is ‘stereotypically British’ (2004, p. 3) because if Platt’s
understanding of ‘stereotypical Britishness’ is substituted by the definition I
have given above, then the history of late Victorian and early Edwardian
musical comedy may be less about Britain, and more about England and its
search for cultural identity. To begin examining this, the third and final story
of this chapter lays the groundwork for analysing early musical comedy in
terms of its English cultural identity (or, Britishness). It is the story of a very
personal sense of English identity, of hypocrisy and contradiction, of para-
dox and progress, of tension and anxiety. It is called ‘Knowing One’s Place’,
and perhaps more by design than coincidence it is also the story of how
musical comedy first came to be seen on the London stage.

Knowing One’s Place

While Salisbury and Gladstone were busy embodying the tensions between
imperialism and the fragile constitution of Great Britain, the social and
personal make-up of England’s population was also undergoing immense
social change. Along with an expansion of educational opportunities and
a narrowing of religious influence in daily life, this was a period marked by
overseas conflict, the appearance of the ‘New Woman’, the suffrage move-
ment, and the rise of proletariat socialism, coupled with the ascent of trade
unionism, that spawned the newly formed labour movement. Historian
Robert Ensor notes that the 1880s and 1890s saw a sharp rise in the visi-
bility of the working class, and concomitantly its increased voice in p
­ olitical
and social life, as trade union membership exploded from around
750,000 in 1880 to 4.1 million in 1914; the majority of these members
were unskilled labourers from the working classes (1936, p. 304; James,
2006, p. 285).11
At the same time, another class of society was also enjoying new-found
growth and prosperity. Earlier in the century, the industrial revolution had
seen mass migration from rural areas to urban centres, including London,
 THE BRITISH MUSICAL IN SEVEN STORIES 9

Manchester, and Liverpool, as the economy grew and a newly moneyed

middle class exercised expanding influence. Historian Lawrence James
casts this new middle class in the leading role of the story of Victorian
England: ‘Its members ruled cities and towns where, by 1901, four-fifths
of the population lived’, claiming as an absolute that ‘the middle classes
created modern, urban Britain’ (2006, p. 232). This claim to modernity
can be seen in the increasing reliance on commerce in public life at that
time, powered by means of an intense concentration of people in metro-
politan social and public arenas that encompassed an acute rise in con-
sumer demand for leisure pursuits. This increased emphasis on commercial
and material interests reflected one facet of modernity in England: a move
away from the centrality of religion in personal and social English identity.
Crucially, Peter Clarke (1972, p. 51) observes that this shift brought with
it a paradoxical electoral move from liberalism to conservatism: while the
middle classes purported to celebrate liberal modernity and individual
social aspiration, for seventeen of the years between 1886 and 1906, they
were largely responsible for returning a right-wing, imperialist Conservative
government to power in Britain.12 The story of increased modern leisure
pursuits and commercial consumption in this period is therefore implicitly
connected to the conservative rhetoric of growing social respectability, an
ideological driver largely derived from the social and economic anxieties
felt by the middle class, conscious of the need to distinguish itself from the
proletariat (Huggins, 2000, p. 586).
In the case of the theatre—which received patronage from Queen
Victoria and enjoyed a boom as mass popular entertainment in the long
nineteenth century—the drive towards respectability might find a natural
starting point in the Theatres Act of 1843.13 This legislation served to
enhance the ‘respectability’ of popular entertainment in at least three spe-
cific ways. First, the act served an economic purpose that resonated with
the middle-class pursuit of work and profit, removing the patent monop-
oly on performance and allowing local authorities to license more theatres.
Second, it wrote social respectability in performances into law, refining the
censorship powers of the Lord Chamberlain, whose role was now con-
cerned with ‘the preservation of good manners, decorum or of the public
peace’.14 Third, the act legislated against alcohol consumption in auditoria
and banned smoking during the performance. While many small saloon
bars closed their theatres as a result, magistrates were granted the author-
ity to license public houses to offer entertainment resulting in a vast
10 B. MACPHERSON

e­ xpansion of theatrical entertainments in pubs; this provision catalysed the

rise of the music hall, variety, and revue, in urban and regional centres.
Further indicators of the rapid drive towards respectability in theatrical
performance might be seen in the fact that theatre design had become a
specialist architectural occupation by the middle of the nineteenth cen-
tury. With proponents including C.J. Phipps and Frank Matcham, larger
venues were built or older ones expanded, affording the opportunity to
model the auditorium and public areas in a way that would promote and
engender a sense of status and respectability among consumers as they
performed the ritual of theatre-going. Separate entrances and exits were
assigned for differing social classes of patrons, and the comfort, quality,
and range of amenities visibly differed between the stalls, the dress circle,
the boxes, and the upper gallery.15 The introduction of variable ticketing
also reinforced status and social expectations, although working-class
patronage was encouraged by means of such schemes as half-price ticket-
ing for those who ‘could only arrive at the theatre after their shops closed
or when work finished or who simply couldn’t afford the full price’
(Emeljanow, 2014, p. 56).
On this basis, the act of consuming popular culture was also an act of
class identification, and an enactment of aspiration or perceived respecta-
bility. Allardyce Nicoll’s (1949) account of theatre-going habits in London
during the nineteenth century echoes this narrative of the increasing
(class-based) sophistication of the theatre that resulted from the above
developments, and claims that the riotous lower orders found a more nat-
ural home in the seedy music halls. As Jim Davis and Victor Emeljanow
suggest, ‘Nicoll’s narrative is very much one of triumphalist progress as
the century draws to its conclusion’; progress, that is, as a synonym for
modernity, respectability, and middle-class values (2001, p. 98). This link
between progress, modernity, and the middle class is also echoed in James,
when he suggests that: ‘After 1850, the theatres had endeavoured to shed
their reputation for vulgarity and noisiness’ as they strove for respectability
and mass appeal, ‘leaving the working classes to beat a path to the music
halls’ (2006, p. 385).
However, there is more to this narrative than the expansion of theatre
as a mass entertainment, built upon middle-class moralistic ideals of vir-
tue, restraint, and conservatism. The story of knowing one’s place is a
story of paradox, leading to a different historical reality from that sug-
gested by Nicoll; one in which the respectable conservative modernity of
late Victorian popular culture becomes ‘contested’, reflecting the ‘ram-
 THE BRITISH MUSICAL IN SEVEN STORIES 11

shackle’ and ‘diverse’ demographic of the consumers in metropolitan

urban centres (Huggins, 2000, pp. 585–586). This increase in consumer
culture, while accompanied by a drive towards respectable social interac-
tions, accompanied a more fundamental shift from ‘puritanism to raffish-
ness’ in attitudes towards (and relationships between) class, gender, and
vice in public life, as a result of which ‘the boundaries between sexual and
economic exchange all but disappeared’ and ‘the working class and the
wealthy, local residents and foreign tourists thought of [modern urban
spaces such as the West End] as a special arena’ (Ensor, 1936, p. 304;
Rappaport, 2001, pp. 179–180). While this modern, urban Britain was
outwardly conservative and increasingly commercial, its social make-up
complicates any attempt at an easy demarcation of class identity. In fact,
spaces of leisure and entertainment—and the very act of consumption
itself—were as diverse as their patrons, and involved a much more compli-
cated set of social parameters beneath, beyond, and because of this air of
middle-class respectability. As this story will demonstrate, while certain
commercial aspects and rituals served to reinforce class identities in the
consumption of entertainment, sating the moderate conservatism of the
middle class, consumers themselves configured spaces of public entertain-
ment as a much more fluid arena. It was out of this contested, complicated
and paradoxical cultural space that musical comedy was to appear, primar-
ily developing as the modern progeny of three popular Victorian forms of
entertainment: comic opera, burlesque, and the music hall.16

English Comic Opera

In part, the development of English comic opera was reactionary. In her
memoir, actress and soprano Jessie Bond recalled that London theatregoers
of the late nineteenth century began to grow ‘tired of heavy tragedy and
stale farce, and of French importations’ (1930). When impresario Richard
D’Oyly Carte took up residence at the Savoy Theatre in 1875, it was part of
a broader cultural reaction against Continental culture flooding the English
stage; a reaction which says much about England’s fraught relationship with
Europe even at the height of the British Empire. Nevertheless, English
comic opera still bore distinctly European sensibilities, with stock characters
borrowed from Italian opera buffa, while the farcical topsy-turvydom associ-
ated with the works of W.S. Gilbert and Arthur Sullivan was derived from
French works of opéra comique such as Jacques Offenbach’s The Grand
Duchess of Gerolstein, which successfully transferred to London in 1867.
12 B. MACPHERSON

Two things seem to characterise English comic opera in relation to the

development of musical comedy. First, in his consideration of the influ-
ences on the American musical, Raymond Knapp examines the ostenta-
tion, satire, and topicality in the works of Gilbert and Sullivan, noting that
their comic operas ‘celebrated Englishness as much as mocked it’ (2005,
p. 45). Using HMS Pinafore (1878) as a case study, Knapp offers the para-
dox of self-praise and self-mockery as evidence of a particularly English
sensibility; a self-consciousness that is implicit in many musical comedies.
Secondly, as Regina Oost (2009) and Michael Goron (2016) have argued,
this paradoxical construction of praise and mockery was framed within the
boundaries of class concerns:

Gilbert’s notion of social hierarchy, at least in terms of the way it is present

in the operas, is […] essentially viewed from the standpoint of the confident,
socially assertive ‘middle classes’. Petit-bourgeois values are deemed poten-
tially comic and dispensable in The Sorcerer, and egalitarianism is shown as
untenable in that opera and in HMS Pinafore. (Goron, 2016, p. 25)

Paradoxical values of Britishness were, therefore, configured for the mid-

dle classes, in an effort to perpetuate the preoccupation with respectability
that Goron sees as symptomatic of Victorian social hierarchy. It is this
sense of class consciousness that elicits a ‘nationalism’ in the Savoy operas;
a cultural ideology seen in the many symbolic examples of eccentric and
paradoxical Britishness in Gilbert and Sullivan’s works: singing policemen
(The Pirates of Penzance), inept naval captains (HMS Pinafore), and ghostly
aristocrats (Ruddigore) (Oost, 2009, pp. 11, 46, 84, 98). This is impor-
tant to the story of musical comedy because while ‘the surface charm of
the Savoy operas’ enabled Gilbert and Sullivan to produce works with a
‘powerful thematic core’, the modishness and formulaic narratives often
found in musical comedy likewise obscured the ‘powerful thematic core’
shared with the Savoy operas; a core that was specifically concerned with
the British (English) middle-class condition and its attendant anxieties
about identity and ideology (Wren, 2001, p. 4).

Burlesque
Burlesque has a long history, dating back to sixteenth-century Italy. As a
term derived from the Italian word burla, the form embodied the idea of
the grotesque or comedic imitation of cultural polarities, either the highly
 THE BRITISH MUSICAL IN SEVEN STORIES 13

dignified or the incredibly pathetic. In Victorian England, burlesques were

illegitimate adaptations of popular plays, operas, and ballets, performed in
a manner that mocked the style and musical content of the original work.
Peppered with light innuendo and topical references, these burlesques
were, at times, risqué comedies that functioned by juxtaposing lofty sub-
ject matter with performances that celebrated the mundane or were at
odds with the cultural weight of their content.
In particular, burlesques were known for their irreverent handling of
classical literature or mythological themes. For example, in 1831, the
burlesque Olympic Revels opened with gods of Greek mythology playing
a card game. Studies have demonstrated the political and cultural func-
tions of Greek and Roman mythologies in Victorian culture—which
included the teaching of Latin and ancient civilisations in private schools,
a practice which, Edith Hall suggests, ‘served to create and maintain class
divisions’ (1999, p. 336).17 While the imperial romanticism of the ancient
world might have resonated with Britain’s civilising ideology, embodied
perhaps in the increased visibility of the goddess Britannia as a symbol of
British naval dominance, the trend for classical texts to become fodder for
burlesque could not have been driven simply by an imperialising ten-
dency, a desire to mock the middle- or upper classes, or a fascination with
the (seemingly) pious and elite cultures of the past. The reason for this, as
Hall demonstrates, is that burlesques ‘transcended class barriers. Unlike
virtually all other professionals, actors were recruited from across the class
spectrum. Theatre audiences also included the proletariat: in 1859 as
many as sixty thousand individuals attended the plebeian Standard
Theatre in the East End of London—at the time the largest theatre in
Britain—to witness John Heraud’s tragedy Medea in Corinth.’ In fact,
Hall goes further, and cites one audience member who describes the bur-
lesque audience as a mixture of ‘vapid groundlings who take stalls’, and
the fashionable ‘swell of our day’ (E. Hall, 1999, p. 338). Such observa-
tions demonstrate that the cultural space of theatrical consumption was
diverse, complex, and fluid.
Along with a preoccupation with grand themes from the ancient world
(although, of course, not all burlesques drew on this subject matter),
Victorian burlesque shared theatrical conventions with other English
forms, including ballad opera, in which topical lyrics were often added to
well-known melodies of the day. In the 1870s and 1880s, the short one-­
act burlesques began to extend, and some began to deviate from the use
of popular music, instead employing composers such as F. Osmond Carr
14 B. MACPHERSON

and Arthur Sullivan to provide original scores, as the ‘extravaganza’ of

burlesque performance became more modish, increasing its reliance on
dance, formal staging, and costuming.
Often, burlesques were referred to as ‘travesties’, a term directly
associated with a hallmark of their performance aesthetics: cross-gen-
der casting. Drawing our attention to its connection with the English
pantomime dame, Hall has suggested that the ‘trouser roles’ of a young
actress playing a boy highlighted the entertainment value of the theat-
rics, and knowingly sought to obscure or distract from the moral value
of the play that had been adapted. Importantly, the aesthetic qualities of
‘trouser roles’ were often erotic—with actresses embodying a ‘flashy,
“leggy”’ performance style, found to be debasing and demoralising by
certain contemporary critics (Heyward, 1885, p. 477). Yet, in her dis-
cussion of a similar practice in pantomime, that of the ‘principal boy’,
Millie Taylor notes that this role was often more androgynous than that
of the highly feminised burlesque ‘trouser role’ performer (2007,
p. 117). This sexualisation of the actress not only distracted from the
moral content of the performance, but the implicit invitation to the
male gaze also reflected the status of working actresses in London at
this time. This status, implicitly linked to class and gender identities, is
one that endured for most of the nineteenth century: paid female per-
formers were often viewed as little more than prostitutes, even at popu-
lar burlesque venues such as the Gaiety Theatre or the Royal Strand
Theatre (Buszek, 1999).

Music Hall
In addition to comic opera and burlesque, music hall had grown into a
vast and popular form by the end of the nineteenth century. As places of
commerce at which to eat, drink, meet, solicit or be solicited, and hear
favourite songs and jokes of the day, the halls thrived by means of a variety
format that Dagmar Kift summarises as featuring ‘circus numbers, music
and theatre, and information and innovations’ (1996, p. 53). At the centre
of this format were the music hall songs, many of which courted innuendo
and suggestion in their titles and references.18 These songs often adhered
to strict musical styles and conventions that became symptomatic of the
music hall aesthetic, including the use of dance-form structures (predomi-
nantly the waltz and the polka), a reliance on the verse-and-chorus struc-
ture of popular song, and the inclusion of repetitive melodic shapes in the
 THE BRITISH MUSICAL IN SEVEN STORIES 15

chorus to encourage communal singing with the audience, often

prompted by a common lead-in on the dominant chord after the verse
had concluded on the tonic (Bennett, 1986, p. 10). These aesthetic and
musical features would find their way into musical comedy, and some of
them will be explored in the following chapters. However, this emphasis
on communal inclusion, simplistic harmonic structures, and the overt
use of popular dance rhythms led English composer Hubert Parry to
dismiss the fare on offer in the halls, branding it degraded and depraved,
unintelligent, and morally loose in its lyrical content (1881, p. 422). A
similar tenor of cultural discomfort at the content of music hall enter-
tainment (although without dismissing the intellect of its audiences) can
be seen in the essay ‘Theatre and Music-Hall’ by critic William Archer, in
which he suggests that the ‘“art” of the music-hall is like the “science”
of pugilism’, suggesting that the music hall celebrates the art of ‘elabo-
rate ugliness, blatant vulgarity, alcoholic humour, and rancid sentiment’
(1896, pp. 99–100).
Yet, far from its being solely a working-class and lowbrow form of
entertainment, the reality of music hall was somewhat different. By the
late 1880s, music hall had gained a crucial body of supportive journalists
and theatrical critics whose writings provide evidence of a growing gen-
trification and provide a means to understand its growing appeal to a
broad cross-section of society. Max Beerbohm saw the halls as a mirror of
the national character, while Elizabeth Rennell wrote ‘The Pedigree of
the Music Hall’, claiming the form had a ‘genetic resemblance’ to tradi-
tional English folk theatre, such as mummers’ plays and Everyman per-
formances (Beerbohm, 1969; Pennell, 1893, p. 575).19 As Barry J. Faulk
suggests, ‘cultured observers appeared certain that music hall accultur-
ated its audiences [as] the most authentic expressive form of native
Englishness. Star performers [were seen as] representatives of English
character’ (2004, p. 23).
This index of ‘native Englishness’ was not simply preoccupied with
end-of-the-pier innuendo or risqué content, for while the halls largely
operated outside of the formal remit of the Lord Chamberlain’s censor-
ship powers, Steve Attridge has noted that ‘it was in the commercial inter-
ests of proprietors to avoid antagonizing the authorities [and because of]
the possibility of licensing censure they tended to phase out anti-­
Establishment or overtly risqué songs in favour of sentimentality, “improv-
ing” patriotism and appeals to national unity’ (2003, p. 19). As ‘arenas of
changing social relations in England’, the halls also became vehicles for
16 B. MACPHERSON

patriotic sentiment and commercially driven populism—attitudes and vir-

tues that would appeal to the middle classes as echoes of the imperialist
zeitgeist (Attridge, 2003, p. 17). This appeal to a broad stratum of social
classes meant that, by the end of the nineteenth century, music hall audi-
ences were a heady mixture of ‘mashers’ (aristocratic bachelors), ‘judies’
(working-class prostitutes), and working-class and middle-class patrons, of
both sexes.20 This development in the audience demographic was not
always a welcome one. In his impassioned defence of the halls in 1912,
William Titterton bemoaned the imposition of a middle class who attended
the halls ‘to laugh at what we consider funny and they consider vulgar’,
championing the working-class origins of the halls as ‘a glimpse of a genu-
ine vivid life—the life of the working classes, so different from anything
one sees in the suburbs’ (1912, p. 11).21
Yet, as Louis Rutherford has noted, the mix of audiences led to an
increasingly satirical representation of the middle classes themselves in the
halls, as comedians, writers, and performers responded to the shift in a
topical and vital way: ‘Characters representing the hegemonic middle-class
culture were as vulnerable to ridicule as the comic working man, and there
were many instances of their social superiority and moral authority being
undermined by the lower-class comic protagonist’ (1986, p. 151). This
dramatic trope of satirising the nouveau riche was a staple of music hall in
much the same way that critical satire of the establishment was a bench-
mark of many of the Savoy operas, and along with the musical stylings of
the halls and many of their star performers, such topical satire would soon
find its way into the new form of musical comedy.

The Arrival of Musical Comedy

In his memoir, Good Old Gaiety, producer John Hollingshead recalls: ‘The
year 1892 was a black year for the Gaiety—as black as any year that has
ever fallen on a popular London theatre—especially a theatre dealing in
the lighter forms of the drama’ (1903, p. 63). In December 1891, Ellen
Farren—a regular star of burlesques at the Gaiety Theatre—was ‘seized
with an illness’ (Hollingshead, 1903, p. 63). This was followed by the sud-
den death the following year of Fred Leslie, a stalwart who would often
star opposite Farren in burlesques produced by Hollingshead and his co-­
manager of the Gaiety Theatre, George Edwardes. The absence of both
performers meant that Edwardes’ upcoming burlesque of Don Juan at the
Gaiety Theatre was jeopardised, eventually being postponed as a result of
Another random document with
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adult. In the Lobata and Cestoidea there is, however, a definite larval
stage, of the general appearance of a Mertensia, and during this
stage fertile eggs and spermatozoa are formed and set free.

Distribution.—Ctenophora are found at the surface of nearly all

seas, and many of the genera have a cosmopolitan distribution.
Some of the Lobata, the Cestoidea, and the Platyctenea are more
commonly found in the warmer regions of the world. Pleurobrachia
pileus, Bolina infundibulum, Beroe ovata, and B. cucumis occur off
the British coast.

Most of the Ctenophora are from 5 to 20 mm. in diameter, but Beroe

reaches the length of 90 mm., Eucharis multicornis a height of 250
mm., and Cestus veneris has been found no less than 1½ metres
from one extremity to the other.

Ctenophores usually go about in shoals, and in the case of Beroe

cucumis and Eucharis multicornis the shoals may be of very great
extent. Pleurobrachia pileus of the British coasts is often found at the
end of the season (July) as a series of isolated individuals; but in
June they occur in small shoals, swimming so close together that
they will choke a tow-net in a very short space of time.

CLASS I. TENTACULATA
Ctenophora provided with a pair of tentacles in the larval stages only
or in both larval and adult stages.

Order I. Cydippidea.
This order includes a number of spherical or oval Ctenophores, with
a pair of tentacles retractile into deep tentacular pits in the adult
stage.
Fam. 1. Mertensiidae.—The body is compressed in the transverse
plane, and the ribs on the transverse areas are longer than those on
the sagittal areas. The family includes the genus Euchlora, which
occurs in the Mediterranean and in the northern part of the Atlantic
Ocean. In Charistephane there are only two enormous ctenophoral
plates in each of the longitudinal tracts. These plates are so broad
that they almost meet laterally to form two continuous circlets round
the body of the animal. This genus is found in the Mediterranean, but
a few specimens have also been obtained in the Atlantic.

In Tinerfe the body is almost cylindrical, and there is a pair of kidney-

shaped swellings at the sides of the aboral pole. It has a pale blue
colour, and is found in the Guinea and south equatorial currents of
the Atlantic Ocean.

The name Mertensia has been given to several forms that are
undoubtedly the young stages of genera belonging to the Lobata, but
Chun retains the name M. ovum for a species which is very
abundant in the Arctic currents of the North Atlantic.

Fam. 2. Callianiridae.—Two or four wing-like processes, into which

the longitudinal canals extend, are found at the aboral pole.
Callianira has two of these processes arranged in the transverse
plane, and Lophoctenia has four. Callianira is found in the
Mediterranean and in the Atlantic from the Arctic to the Antarctic
waters.

Fam. 3. Pleurobrachiidae.—The body is almost spherical in form,

and the eight ribs are equal in length.

This family includes the genus Pleurobrachia, in which the ribs

extend for a considerable distance along the lines of longitude of the
spherical body, but do not reach either the oral or the aboral areas.
P. pileus is the commonest British Ctenophore, and may be found in
shoals in May, June, and July at the surface of the sea or cast up on
the sand as the tide ebbs. It is widely distributed in the North Atlantic
waters. P. rhodopis of the Mediterranean has rather shorter ribs than
P. pileus. Two new species have recently been described from the
Malay Archipelago.[430] Hormiphora (Fig. 180, p. 413) differs from
Pleurobrachia in having much shorter ribs, and in possessing two
kinds of pinnae on the tentacles, those of the ordinary kind and
others much larger and sometimes palmate in character. This genus
has a world-wide distribution.

In Lampetia and Euplokamis the body is more cylindrical in shape

than it is in the other genera, but the ribs and subjacent longitudinal
canals extend up to the margin of the aboral field. Both these genera
occur in the Mediterranean, but Lampetia is also found in the Malay
Archipelago.

Order II. Lobata.

The body is considerably flattened in the transverse plane, and the
sagittal areas are extended into the form of two wide peristomial
lobes. The oral ends of the areas between the transverse and
sagittal ribs are extended to form four flaps, called the "auricles."
There are no tentacles nor tentacle-sheaths of the ordinary kind in
the adult form; but numerous tentilla, similar in some respects to the
pinnae of the tentacles of other Ctenophora, form a fringe round the
margin of the auricles and the peristome. A single pair of long,
filamentous, non-retractile tentacles arise from the sides of the
peristomium in Eucharis multicornis. These tentacles have no
sheaths, and do not bear pinnae. They are probably not homologous
with those of other Ctenophora.

The characters that separate the families of Lobata are chiefly those
of varying size, shape, and position of the peristomial lobes and
auricles. In the Lesueuriidae the peristomial lobes are rudimentary;
in the other families they are moderately or very large. In the
Bolinidae the auricles are short, but in most of the other families they
are long and ribbon-like. In Eucharis they can be spirally twisted in
repose.

The modifications of the external form seen in the Lobata are

accompanied by some modifications of the internal structure. Among
these, perhaps the most interesting is a communication between the
transverse longitudinal and the paragastric canals, and the long
convoluted tubes given off to the peristomial lobes by the sagittal
longitudinal canals. Very little is known about the life-history and
development of most of the Lobata, but Chun has shown that in
Eucharis and Bolina there is a Cydippiform larval stage which
produces ripe ova and spermatozoa. This is followed by a period of
sterility, but when the adult characters are developed they become
again sexually mature. To this series of sexual phenomena the name
"Dissogony" is given.

Fig. 181.—Ocyroe crystallina. Ab, aboral sense-organ; au, auricle; Can,

diverticulum from the paragastric canal passing into peristomial lobe; Ct,
costae; M, mouth; Par, paragastric canal passing outwards to join one of
the transverse subcostal canals; P.L, peristomial lobe; w, wart-like tubercles
on the lobe. (After Mayer.)

The order contains only fifteen genera, but they are usually arranged
in the following eight families:—

1. Lesueuriidae. Lesueuria.
2. Bolinidae. Bolina, Bolinopsis.
3. Deiopeidae. Deiopea.
4. Eurhamphaeidae. Eurhamphaea.
5. Eucharidae. Eucharis.
6. Mnemiidae. Mnemia, Mnemiopsis.
7. Calymmidae. Calymma.
8. Ocyroidae. Ocyroe.
Most of these Ctenophores occur in the warm and tropical seas; but
Bolina is found occasionally at Plymouth in the month of May, on the
west coast of Ireland, and at other stations on the British coasts.
Eucharis is regarded as one of the most beautiful of the Phylum. A
swarm, some miles in length, of large specimens of E. multicornis
was met by the Plankton Expedition in the south equatorial current of
the Atlantic during the month of September.

Order III. Cestoidea.

In this order the body is so much compressed in the transverse
plane and elongated in the sagittal plane that it assumes the shape
of a long narrow band or ribbon. The tentacular sheaths are present
but the tentacles are degenerate in the adult. The tentacular
functions are performed by numerous tentilla situated in long
grooves extending along the whole length of the oral side of the
band-like body. The transverse ribs are reduced; the sagittal ribs
extend along the whole of the aboral side.

Fam. Cestidae.—This is the only family of the order. Cestus veneris,

the Venus's girdle of the Mediterranean Sea, is also found in the
Atlantic Ocean, and specimens belonging to the same genus, but
probably to a different species, occur as far north as the White Sea.
Some of the larger specimens are considerably over 1 metre in
length.

Fig. 182.—Cestus pectenalis. Ab, aboral sense-organ; Ct, the sagittal ribs; M,
mouth. (After Bigelow.)
C. pectenalis was found in abundance off one of the Maldive Islands
[431] and differs from C. veneris in having a large and prominent
orange patch at each end of the body. It is said to be extremely
graceful in the water, moving with slow, ribbon-like undulations, and
shining in the sunlight with a violet iridescence. Vexillum, from the
Mediterranean Sea and Canary Islands, is rather more pointed at the
extremities than Cestus, and differs from it in some important
anatomical characters.

Order IV. Platyctenea.

This order has been constituted for two remarkable genera, in which
the oro-apical axis is so much reduced that distinct dorsal and
ventral surfaces can be distinguished.

There is a single pair of long milky-white tentacles capable of

complete retraction into tentacular sheaths.

Fam. 1. Ctenoplanidae.—Ctenoplana was discovered by Korotneff

in 1886 floating with the Plankton off the coast of Sumatra. In 1896
Willey [432] discovered four specimens on a cuttle-bone floating off
the coast of New Guinea. To these authors we are indebted for the
only accounts of this animal that have been published.

When the Ctenoplana is creeping on the bottom of a dish or with its

dorsal side downwards on the surface film of the water, it has the
form of a flattened disc with a notch on each side. On the upper or
dorsal surface eight short rows of ctenophoral plates may be seen,
and in a position corresponding with the two notches in the margin of
the body are situated the two sheaths from which the long pinnate
tentacles protrude. In the exact centre of the dorsal surface is
situated the statolith, supported by stiff processes from adjacent
cells; and forming a circlet round the statolith there is a row of short
ciliated tentacles. These tentacles, however, when examined
carefully in the living animal, are found to be arranged in two sets of
about nine in each, separated by narrow gaps on each side, the
gaps corresponding in position with the axis through the tentacles.

When the animal is swimming it assumes a helmet-shape by

depressing the sides of the body like a pair of flaps on the tentacular
axis, and then the ctenophoral plates come into play and produce
the progressive movements of the animals. The pinnate tentacles
are opaque white in colour, and have peculiar serpentine
movements. Very little is known at present concerning many details
of the internal anatomy, but there is one point of considerable
theoretical interest—namely, the presence of definite male genital
ducts.

Three of Dr. Willey's specimens were mottled with a green pigment,

whereas his fourth specimen and Korotneff's only specimen were
mottled with a red pigment. It has yet to be determined whether the
differences which have been observed in the individual specimens
are of specific value.

Fam. 2. Coeloplanidae.—Coeloplana was originally discovered by

Kowalevsky in the Red Sea, but has recently been found by Abbott
[433] on the coast of Japan.

Fig. 183.—Coeloplana mitsukurii, floating at the surface of the sea with the
dorsal side downwards. T, T, the tentacles expanded. (After Abbott.)

The Japanese species are found principally on encrusting Algae,

Zostera, Melobesia, etc., which they resemble very closely in colour.
The Red Sea species is, according to Kowalevsky, ciliated all over,
but the Japanese species are ciliated only on the ventral surface. As
in Ctenoplana, the body of Coeloplana is a flattened disc with a
notch at each end of the tentacular axis, when creeping; but
Coeloplana does not swim, nor at any time does it assume a helmet-
shape. The tentacles are very long and of a chalky-white colour.
They can be retracted into tentacle-sheaths. When the animal is
excited it throws out the whole tentacle in a cloud of white filaments,
"and to watch it at such a time, shooting out and retracting the
tentacles, moving along the side of the aquarium like a battleship in
action is truly a remarkable spectacle."[434] On the dorsal side of the
body there is a series of processes which are called the dorsal
tentacles. The statolith is very small, and is not surrounded by
sensory processes as it is in Ctenoplana. There are no ctenophoral
plates. The colours of the Japanese species are scarlet or carmine
red and dirty brown or brownish yellow. They are from 1 to 2
centimetres in diameter.

CLASS II. NUDA

Ctenophora without tentacles.

Fam. Beroidae.—Beroe, the only genus of this family and class,

differs from other Ctenophora in several important particulars. There
are no tentacles, and the stomodaeum is so large that the body-form
assumes that of a thimble with moderately thick walls. The
infundibulum is small. The paragastric and longitudinal canals give
rise to numerous ramifications which form a network distributed
throughout the surface of the body. The statolith is unprotected by a
dome, and the polar fields are bordered by a number of small
branching papillae. The eight ribs extend for nearly the whole length
of the body. Beroe is almost cosmopolitan, and is frequently found at
the surface of the sea in great numbers. B. ovata is found off the
Shetlands, Hebrides, and west coast of Ireland, but is rare on the
east coast of the British Islands and in the English Channel. At
Valencia it is common in August and September, and sometimes
reaches the great size of 90 mm. in length by 50 mm. in breadth. It is
usually of a pale pink colour.

Appendix to Ctenophora

Hydroctena salenskii has recently been discovered by Dawydoff[435]

floating with the Plankton off the island Saparua in the Malay
Archipelago. It is claimed to be a connecting link between the
Ctenophora and the Medusae of the Hydrozoa.

In external features it is like one of the Narcomedusae, having a

transparent jelly-like bell with a wide bell-mouth guarded by a velum
(Fig. 184, V). There are only two simple but solid tentacles (t),
provided with tentacle-sheaths, but inserted on opposite sides of the
bell—not on the margin, but, as in the Ctenophore, at a level not far
removed from the aboral pole. At the aboral pole there is a minute
pore surrounded by a high ciliated epithelium bearing an orange
pigment. This leads into a short blind canal, which terminates in an
ampulla bearing two statoliths supported by elastic processes from
the ampullar epithelium.

The sub-umbrellar cavity extends for a distance of about one-half the

height of the bell. The mouth (M), which opens into this cavity, leads
into a wide cavity that gives off a short blind canal to the side of each
tentacular sheath, and a straight tube that leads straight to the
statocyst, where it also ends blindly. There are no radial canals and
no ring canal at the margin of the umbrella. There are also no
ctenophoral plates. In the absence of any information concerning the
position of the genital glands, the character of the epithelium of the
tentacles and the development, we are not justified in regarding
Hydroctena either as a Ctenophore or as a connecting link between
the Ctenophora and the Hydromedusae. It may be regarded simply
as a Craspedote Medusa, probably related to the Narcomedusae,
with a remarkable aberrant aboral sense-organ.
Fig. 184.—Hydroctena salenskii. ab, Aboral organ; M, manubrium; t, tentacle; V,
velum. (After Dawydoff.)
 ECHINODERMATA

BY

E. W. MacBRIDE, M.A., FRS.

Formerly Fellow of St. John's College
Professor of Zoology in McGill University, Montreal.

CHAPTER XVI

ECHINODERMATA—INTRODUCTION—CLASSIFICATION—ANATOMY OF A
STARFISH—SYSTEMATIC ACCOUNT OF ASTEROIDEA

The name Echinodermata[436] means literally "spiny-skinned," and

thus brings into prominence one very conspicuous feature of most of
the animals belonging to this phylum. All, it is true, do not possess
spines; but with one or two doubtful exceptions, all have calcareous
plates embedded in the skin, and these plates, in many cases, push
out projections which raise the skin into corresponding elevations,
which are called the spines. The spines are, like the other plates,
inside the skin, and to speak of an Echinoderm living in its shell, as
we speak of a Snail, is a serious error. The shell of a Mollusc is
fundamentally a secretion poured forth from the skin, and is thus
entirely external to the real living parts; but the plates and spines of
an Echinoderm may be compared to our own bones, which are
embedded deeply in the flesh. Hence the name ossicle (little bone) is
used to designate these organs.

Besides the possession of these spines, Echinoderms are

characterised by having their organisation pervaded by a
fundamental radial symmetry. The principal organs of the body are
repeated and are arranged like the spokes of a wheel round a
central axis instead of being, as, for example, in Chaetopoda,
arranged behind one another in longitudinal series.

In addition to these striking peculiarities, Echinoderms possess a

most interesting internal organisation, being in this respect almost
exactly intermediate between the Coelenterata and the higher
Invertebrata. Like so many of the latter, the Echinodermata have an
anus, that is, a second opening to the alimentary canal through
which indigestible material is rejected; like them also, they have a
body-cavity or coelom surrounding the alimentary canal—from the
lining of which the genital cells are developed. On the other hand,
there is no definite circulatory system, nor any specialised excretory
organ, and the nervous system exhibits no concentration which
could be called a brain, and is, moreover, in close connexion with the
skin. In all these points the Echinodermata resemble the
Coelenterata.

One of the most characteristic features of the internal anatomy of

Echinodermata is the presence of a peculiar series of organs, known
collectively as the water-vascular system or hydrocoel. This is really
a special division of the coelom or body-cavity which takes on the
form of a ring-shaped canal embracing the mouth, from which are
given off long radial canals, usually five in number, running to the
more peripheral parts of the body.[437] Each radial canal carries a
double series of lateral branches, which push out the skin so as to
appear as appendages of the body. These appendages are known
as tentacles or tube-feet; they are both sensory and respiratory in
function, and often in addition, as the name tube-foot indicates,
assist in locomotion. As a general term for these appendages, to be
applied in all cases without reference to their function, the name
podium has been suggested and will be employed here. A system
of canals, in many ways resembling the water-vascular system, is
found in Brachiopoda, Gephyrea and Polyzoa, but the peculiarity of
Echinodermata is the way in which it is kept filled with fluid. From the
ring-canal in the interval (or interradius) between two radial canals,
a vertical canal, termed the stone-canal, is given off, which
communicates with the exterior by means of a sieve-like plate, the
madreporite, pierced by fine canals. These canals and the stone-
canal itself are lined with powerful cilia, which produce a strong
inward current, and keep the water-vascular system tensely filled
with sea water.

The phylum includes the familiar Starfish and Sea-urchins, which in

sheltered spots are found between tide-marks; the Brittle Stars and
Sea-cucumbers, which can be dredged up from below low-water
mark, and lastly the beautiful Feather-stars, of which there are
comparatively few species still living, although huge beds of
limestone are composed of the remains of fossil Feather-stars.

One species of Sea-cucumber (Synapta similis)[438] is said to enter

brackish water in the mangrove swamps of the tropics; but, with this
exception, the whole phylum is marine. A few species can endure
partial exposure to the air when left bare by the receding tide, but the
overwhelming majority are only found beneath low-water mark, and
a considerable number live in the deepest recesses of the ocean.

Their distribution is, no doubt, partly determined by food, a number

of species being strictly confined to the neighbourhood of the shore.
On the other hand, since a very large number of species live on the
layer of mud impregnated with animal remains which forms the
superficial layer of the deposit covering the sea-floor, it is not
surprising to learn that many have an exceedingly wide range, since
this deposit is very widely distributed. Another equally important
factor in determining distribution is wave-disturbance, and it is
surprising to learn to what a depth this extends. Off the west coast of
Ireland a large wave literally breaks on a submerged rock 15
fathoms beneath the surface. Speaking generally, it is useless to
look for Echinoderms on an exposed coast, and the same species,
which in the sheltered waters of the Clyde are exposed at low water,
must be dredged up from 20 to 30 fathoms outside Plymouth Sound.
The ordinary collector is attracted to the group chiefly by the
regularity and beauty of the patterns produced by the radial
symmetry, but to the scientific zoologist they are interesting from
many other points of view. Differing widely nevertheless from the
higher Invertebrata in their symmetry when adult, they have as
larvae a marked bilateral symmetry, and the secondary development
of the radial symmetry constitutes one of the most remarkable life-
histories known in the animal kingdom.

Then again, owing to the possession of ossicles, the Echinodermata

are one of the few groups of Invertebrata of which abundant remains
occur fossilised. In attempting, therefore, to decipher the past history
of life from the fossil record, it is necessary to have an exact and
detailed knowledge of Echinoderm skeletons and their relation to the
soft parts. Lastly, the internal organisation of Echinoderms throws
valuable light on the origin of the complicated systems of organs
found in the higher animals.

Echinodermata are divided into two great sub-phyla, which must

have very early diverged from one another. These are:—

(1) Eleutherozoa,
(2) Pelmatozoa.[439]
The sub-phylum Pelmatozoa, to which the living Feather-stars
(Crinoidea) and the majority of the known fossil species belong, is
characterised by the possession of a fixing organ placed in the
centre of the surface opposite the mouth—the aboral surface as it is
called. Ordinarily this organ takes on the form of a jointed stalk, but
in most modern species it is a little knob with a tuft of rooting
processes, termed cirri. In the other sub-phylum, the Eleutherozoa,
no such organ is found, and the animals wander about freely during
their adult life, though for a brief period of their larval existence they
may be fixed by a stalk-like protuberance arising from the oral
surface.
 SUB-PHYLUM I. ELEUTHEROZOA
The Eleutherozoa are divided into four main classes, between
which no intermediate forms are found amongst the living species,
though intermediate types have been found fossil.

The four classes into which the Eleutherozoa are divided are defined
as follows:—

(1) Asteroidea (Starfish).—"Star"-shaped or pentagonal

Eleutherozoa with five or more triangular arms, not sharply marked
off from the central disc. The mouth is in the centre of one surface,
called from this circumstance the "oral"; the anus is in the centre of
the opposite surface, termed the "aboral." From the mouth a groove
runs out on the under surface of each arm towards its tip, termed the
"ambulacral" groove. Projecting from the ambulacral groove are
found the podia or tube-feet, the organs of movement and sensation
of the animal.

(2) Ophiuroidea (Brittle Stars).—Eleutherozoa, in which the body

consists of a round disc with long worm-like arms inserted in grooves
on its under surface. No anus is present, and the ambulacral
grooves are represented by closed canals. The podia are merely
sensory and respiratory, locomotion being effected by muscular jerks
of the arms.

(3) Echinoidea (Sea-urchins).—Globular or disc-shaped

Eleutherozoa, in which the skeleton forms a compact cuirass except
for a short distance round the mouth (peristome) and round the anus
(periproct). The ambulacral grooves are represented by canals
which, like meridians of longitude on a school-globe, run from the
neighbourhood of the mouth to near the aboral pole of the body. The
spines are large and movably articulated with the plates. The
animals move by means of podia and spines, or by means of the
latter only. The anus is usually situated at the aboral pole, but is
sometimes displaced towards the side, or even on to the ventral
surface.

(4) Holothuroidea (Sea-cucumbers).—Sausage-shaped

Eleutherozoa, in which the skeleton is represented only by isolated
nodules of calcium carbonate, and in which the body-wall is highly
muscular. The mouth and anus are situated at opposite ends of the
body, and the ambulacral grooves (represented by closed canals)
run from near the mouth to the proximity of the anus. Movement is
accomplished by means of the podia, aided by worm-like
contractions of the body.

CLASS I. ASTEROIDEA[440] (Starfish)

The Starfish derive their name from their resemblance in shape to
the conventional image of a star. The body consists of broad
triangular arms (generally five in number) which coalesce in the
centre to form a disc. The skin is soft and semi-transparent,
permitting the skeleton to be easily detected; this consists of a mesh-
work of rods or plates, leaving between them intervals of soft skin. In
a living Starfish it can be seen that many of these soft places are
raised up into finger-like outgrowths, which are termed "papulae" or
"dermal gills," through the thin walls of which an active interchange
of gases with the surrounding water takes place, and the animal
obtains in this way the oxygen necessary for its respiration.

Very few and feeble muscle-fibres exist in the body-wall, and the
movements of the arms, as a whole, are very slow and limited in
range. There is a membranous lip surrounding the mouth, from
which five broad grooves run outwards, one on the underside of
each arm. These are termed the "ambulacral grooves." Each groove
is Λ-shaped, and its sides are stiffened by a series of rod-like
ossicles called the "ambulacral ossicles."
The animal progresses by the aid of a large number of translucent
tentacles, termed "tube-feet" or "podia," which are attached to the
walls of the ambulacral grooves.

Anatomy of a Starfish.—As an introduction to the study of the

anatomy not only of Starfish but of Echinodermata as a whole, we
select Asterias rubens, the common Starfish of the British coasts,
which in many places may be found on the beach near low-water
mark.

External Features.—In this species (Fig. 185) the skeleton is a net-

work of rod-like plates, leaving wide meshes between them, through
which protrude a perfect forest of transparent papulae. From the
points of junction of the rods arise short blunt spines surrounded by
thick cushions of skin. The surfaces of these cushions are covered
with a multitude of whitish specks, which, on closer inspection, are
seen to have the form of minute pincers, each consisting of two
movable blades crossing each other below and articulated to a basal
piece. These peculiar organs are termed "pedicellariae" (Fig. 186),
and their function is to keep the animal clean by seizing hold of any
minute organisms which would attempt to settle on the soft and
delicate skin. When irritated the blades open and then snap together
violently, and remain closed for a long time.[441] These actions are
brought about by appropriate muscles attaching the blades to the
basal piece.
 Fig. 185.—Asterias rubens, seen from the aboral surface, × 1. mad, Madreporite.

The last-named ossicle increases the certainty of the grip by fixing

the lower parts of each blade in the same vertical plane, and
preventing lateral slipping, so that it serves the same purpose as the
pivot in a pair of scissors. Each blade, in fact, fits into a groove on
the side of this piece. The muscles which close the blades arise from
the lower ends (handles) of the blades, and are united below to form
a common muscular string which attaches the whole organ to one of
the plates of the skeleton. An attempt of the victim to tear the
pedicellaria out is resisted by the contraction of this string, which
thus brings about a closer grip of the blades. In order that the blades
may open they must first be lifted out of the grooves on the basal
piece—this is effected by special lifting muscles. The opening is
brought about by muscles extending from the "handle" of one blade
to the upper part of the other.

Scattered about amongst the papulae between the cushions are

other pedicellariae of a larger size in which the blades do not cross
one another (Fig. 186, B).

In the space or "interradius" between two arms, on the aboral

surface, there is found a button-shaped ossicle. This is covered with
fine grooves, and from a fancied resemblance between it and some
forms of coral it has received the name "madreporite" (Fig. 185,
mad). The bottoms of the grooves are perforated by capillary canals
lined by flagella, through the action of which water is constantly
being introduced into the water-vascular system.

The anus is situated near the centre of the upper surface of the disc,
but it is so minute as to require careful inspection in order to discover
its position (Fig. 185).

Fig. 186.—View of pedicellariae of A. glacialis. A, Crossed form, × 100. 1,

Ectoderm covering the whole organ; 2, basal piece; 3, auxiliary muscle
closing the blades; 4, muscle lifting right blade out of the groove; 5, handle
of left blade; 6, muscles closing the blades, and uniting to form 7, the
muscular string attaching the pedicellaria to the skeleton. B, straight form, ×
10. 1, Basal piece; 2, blades; 3 and 4, muscles closing the blades; 5,
muscle opening the blades. (From Cuénot.)

On the under side of the animal the most conspicuous features are
the five ambulacral grooves which radiate out from the "peristome," a
thin membranous area surrounding the central mouth. The grooves
are filled with the tube-feet, which are closely crowded together and
apparently arranged in four rows.

Skeleton.—The sides of the ambulacral grooves are stiffened by the

rod-like "ambulacral ossicles." To the outer ends of these are
articulated a set of shorter rods termed the "adambulacral ossicles"
which carry each two or three rod-like spines, the "adambulacral
spines," the skin covering which bears numerous pedicellariae (Fig.
187, B). When the animal is irritated the edges of the groove are
brought together, and these spines then form a trellis-work covering
and protecting the delicate tube-feet; the numerous pedicellariae are
then in a position to make it unpleasant for any intruder. The closure
of the groove is effected by means of powerful muscles connecting
each ambulacral ossicle with its fellow. There are also feebler
muscles connecting these plates with their successors and
predecessors, which enable the arm to be bent downwards in a
vertical plane. It is raised by a muscular band running along the
dorsal wall of the coelom to the point of the arm.

Fig. 187.—A, Asterias rubens, seen from the oral surface, drawn from a living
specimen, × 1. B, an adambulacral spine, showing three straight
pedicellariae; C, a tube-foot expanded and contracted.

When the series of ambulacral and adambulacral ossicles is followed

inwards towards the mouth it is seen that the first ambulacral ossicle
is closely fixed to the second, but is widely separated from its fellow,
remaining, however, connected with the latter by a powerful adductor
muscle. In consequence of the separation of this pair of ossicles
each is brought into closer contact with the corresponding ossicle in
the adjacent radius, to which it is connected by a muscle called the
abductor. The first adambulacrals in adjacent radii are also brought
into closer contact and carry long spines which, when the ambulacral
grooves are contracted, project like a grating over the mouth. In the