ir steps.
Velvet-cushioned bars have to this end been secured at convenient
points, and the floor has been given the same slope as that of the
stage, so that the labor expended may be thoroughly profitable to the
performance. The singers' foyer, on the same floor, is a much less
lively resort than the foyer de la danse, as vocalists rarely leave
their dressing-rooms before they are summoned to the stage. Thirty
panels with portraits of the artists of repute in the annals of the
Opera adorn this foyer.

"Some estimate ... may be arrived at by sitting before the concierge an
hour or so before the representation commences. First appear the stage
carpenters, who are always seventy, and sometimes, when L'Africaine,
for example, with its ship scene, is the opera, one hundred and ten
strong. Then come stage upholsterers, whose sole duty is to lay
carpets, hang curtains, etc.; gas-men, and a squad of firemen.
Claqueurs, call-boys, property-men, dressers, coiffeurs,
supernumeraries, and artists, follow. The supernumeraries number about
one hundred; some are hired by the year, but the 'masses' are generally
recruited at the last minute and are generally working-men who seek to
add to their meagre earnings. There are about a hundred choristers,
and about eighty musicians.

"Next we behold equeries, whose horses are hoisted on the stage by
means of an elevator; electricians who manage the light-producing
batteries; hydrauliciens to take charge of the water-works in ballets
like La Source; artificers who prepare the conflagration in Le Profeta;
florists who make ready Margarita's garden, and a host of minor
employees. This personnel is provided for as follows: Eighty
dressing-rooms are reserved for the artists, each including a small
antechamber, the dressing-room proper, and a little closet. Besides
these apartments, the Opera has a dressing-room for sixty male, and
another for fifty female choristers; a third for thirty-four male
dancers; four dressing-rooms for twenty female dancers of different
grades; a dressing-room for one hundred and ninety supernumeraries,
etc."

A few figures taken from the article will suggest the enormous capacity
and the perfect convenience of the house. "There are 2,531 doors and
7,593 keys; 14 furnaces and grates heat the house; the gaspipes if
connected would form a pipe almost 16 miles long; 9 reservoirs, and two
tanks hold 22,222 gallons of water and distribute their contents
through