Eddie Gray's Juggling Act

Just been reading about 'Monsewer' Eddie Gray in John Fisher's lovely book about the Music Hall roots of much modern* comedy, Funny Way to Be A Hero.

THE ENTERTAINING CLUBMAN

He sounds fascinating: part of his act was his use of a sort of French-English patter ("Moi's gonna travailler a packet of cards," etc.), and he was by all accounts an inventive practical joker:

Gray is said to have originated the gag in which, posing as a borough surveyor he would ask a passer-by to hold the end of a tape-measure while he went to the other side of the building to measure the distance between one part of the wall and another. Once round the corner, he would approach another unsuspecting stranger with the same request and then, under the pretext of having to fetch his 'sextant for the hydrographics', take refuge in a nearby café to see how long the two gullible victims would continue in their futile positions.
     At his own estimation the duration of the world tape-measure holding record exceeded three hours!

(Funny Way to Be A Hero, p. 72)

I thought I'd spend a while looking for some evidence of his act, and, as you can tell from the find from the British Pathé website I've posted above, I am glad I did.

*Well, it was still modern when the book was written.