* An example of his inventive storytelling was his reply to the claim of someone that the weather was hot: “Hot! What d'ye call hot? Pho—nonsense! Why, I've been in countries where salamanders dropped down dead with the heat of the sun. I dined one day with a friend and his wife at Callimahammaquackadelore, near Cudderapoo. Well, after dinner, as we were taking our wine, a coup de soliel struck the lady and in a moment reduced her to a heap of ashes! … My friend, who was accustomed to such accidents, coolly rang the bell, and said to his servant, ‘Kit, my gar, and consumar, hithertoo jumma chaudra put:’ which means, in plain English, ‘Bring fresh glasses, and sweep away your mistress!’ “(Memoirs of Charles Mathews, Comedian, by Mrs. Mathews [London, 1839], III, 183–84.)Google Scholar

This was a part of the actor's one-man entertainment in 1821, which was included in the performances given in America in 1822–23. The source was indicated, perhaps, in the program, which called the major “a modern Munchausen.” The major's boast sounds much like that of a stereotype frontiersman: “There's muscle!—strong as Hercules!—hard as marble!—hit me with a hammer, a sledge hammer if you like, can't hurt me!—I've been cut in halves in a saw-pit! jammed to a jelly in a steam engine! and blown up in a powder mill!!! but couldn't damage me! … And, after all, I'm the finest piece of anatomy upon the face of the earth; never took a dose of physic; double jointed all over, and my hip three inches higher than any man in Europe!” (Mr. Mathews in America [New York, n.d.], pp. 3–4.) His habit was to follow tall tales with: “Upon my life it's true! What'll you lay it's a lie?”