I am the cat at the theatre door.
My name, as I ought to have told you before,
is really Asparagus, but that’s such a fuss
to pronounce, that you usually call me just Gus.
When ever I join my friends at the club
(which takes place at the back of a neighboring pub)
I love to regale them, if someone else pays,
with anecdotes drawn from my sunniest days.
For I am a star, of the highest degree.
I have acted with Irving I have acted with Tree.
And I love to relate my success on the halls
where the gallery once gave me seven cat calls.
But my grandest creation, as I love to tell
was Firefrorefiddle the Fiend of the Fell.
I will play, in my time, every possible part
and I almost know seventy speeches by heart
I can extemporize back chat, I know how to gag
and I know how to let the cat out of the bag!
I know how to act with my back and my tail
with an hour of rehearsal I never can fail
I’ve a voice that can soften the hardest of hearts
when I take the lead, or in character parts!
I have sat by the bed side of poor little Nell
When the curfew was rung then I swung on the bell
in the Pantomime season I never fell flat
and I once understudied Dick Wittington’s cat!
but my grandest creation as history will tell
was Firefrorefiddle the fiend of the fell!
Then if someone will give me a toothful of gin
I will tell how I once played a part in East Lynn
at a Shakespeare performance I once walked on pat
when some actor suggested the need for a cat!
But there’s nothing to equal
from what I hear tell
that moment of mystery
when I made history
as Firefrorefiddle the Fiend of the Fell!
