ason there have been omitted Mr. William
Gillette's "Secret Service," available to readers in so many forms, and
Mr. Percy Mackaye's "The Scarecrow." No anthology of the present
historical scope, however, can disregard George Henry Boker's "Francesca
da Rimini" or Bronson Howard's "Shenandoah." In the instance of Mr.
Langdon Mitchell's "The New York Idea," it is possible to supersede all
previous issues of this refreshing comedy by offering a text which, as
to stage directions, has been completely revised by the author. Mr.
Mitchell wishes to have this regarded as the correct version, and has
himself prepared the "copy" of same. Because of the easy accessibility
of Dion Boucicault's "The Octoroon; or, Life in Louisiana," it was
thought best to omit this Irish-American playwright, whose jovial
prolixity enriched the American stage of the '60's and '70's. His
"London Assurance" is included in the present Editor's collection of
"Representative British Dramas: Victorian and Modern."

Of more historical significance than Joseph Jefferson's final version of
"Rip Van Winkle," are the two texts upon which Boucicault and Jefferson
based their play. It has been possible to offer the reader a comparative
arrangement of the John Kerr and Charles Burke dramatizations.

In the choice of Steele Mackaye's "Paul Kauvar; or, Anarchy" a period is
illustrated which might be described as transitional. Executors of the
Augustin Daly estate are not ready to allow any of Daly's original plays
or adaptations to be published. The consequence is "Paul Kauvar" must
stand representative of the eighteen-eighty fervour of Lester Wallack,
A.M. Palmer, and Daly, who were in the Mackaye tradition.

Oliver Bunce's "Love in '76" has been selected for the same reason that
one might select Clyde Fitch's Revolutionary or Civil War
pieces--because of its bloodless character; because it is one of the
rare parlour comedies of the period.

Of the new pieces, Fitch's "The Moth and the Flame" has remained
unpublished until now. It exemplifies many of his most sprightly
observational qualities. "The Truth" and "The Girl with the Green Eyes"
are more mature, but are no less Fitchean than this. Mr. David Belasco's
"The Return of Peter Grimm" is as effective in the reading as it was on
the stage under his triumphant management. Mr. Eugene Walter's "The
Easiest Way," at the last moment, was released from publication in the
_Drama League Series of Plays_; it still st