Horemord

Stage-managers to come! Be not deluded with the vain notion that a system of
fines is at all efficacious in fanning the fires of histrionic genius. Even the greed for gold
has no effect in alluring the talented ones to rehearse the scenes destined to set them on
a pinnacle of glory.

At least so it was with 1906 in the weeks preceding the final performance of “D’Arcy
of the Guards.” If any, sufficiently, persuaded of their potential genius, now and then
attended a rehearsal, their confidence soon met its ‘Waterloo before the scorching blast of
the torrent of invective hurled forth by Mr. King. .

. We fear that Miss Thomas’ pleasure in witnessing our masterpiece was a bit alloyed
by the dread that either the cost of the.costumes, despite her injunctions to the contrary,
would exceed ten cents per head, or else that the exploding .of the deadly firearm in the
third act would endanger the lives of the actors. We are humbly grateful to record, how-
ever, that no casualty resulted from the bursting of the paper bag, inflated for twenty
minutes previous behind the scenes, by the anxious efforts of Miss McAnulty.

At a critical point in an affecting scene, Major D’Arcy thrust his hand into his
trousers’ pocket, purposing to produce therefrom the key of the chamber in which was
secreted Captain Henry Townshend. He was a trifle mystified when his eager fingers
closed on-—-nothing. Later in the evening, feeling a slight obstruction in his boot
(said boot being good and roomy) he gleaned that the above key was below.

The Punch! was also a tasty feature of the occasion. It was warm, and red, and
weak; and the gallant company who gathered round the table to imbibe, were like-
wise warm, and red, and weak. Their long cadaverous pipes shortened, as bit by bit the
stems broke off and were dashed to the floor.. ‘Towards the close of the scene, the effect of
Captain Farquhar’s appealing strains, in the song of ‘‘Sally in Our Alley,’ was intensified
by the baso profundo rumbling of the chorus. (That baso was an alto never heard on
land or sea.)

The points we have touched upon do not perhaps adequately portray the full
extent of our triumph, but we offer them in the hope that they will at least serve to keep
alive the memory of the Sophomore Play of the Class of 1906.

(P. $.—1907 was there, too.)
PHOEBE §. CRosBy,

ANNA E. MacCLANAHAN.

45