fast becoming the general social center
and club house in many crowded neighborhoods. It is easy of access
from the street the entire family of parents and children can attend
for a comparatively small sum of money and the performance lasts for
at least an hour; and, in some of the humbler theaters, the spectators
are not disturbed for a second hour.

The room which contains the mimic stage is small and cozy, and less
formal than the regular theater, and there is much more gossip and
social life as if the foyer and pit were mingled. The very darkness of
the room, necessary for an exhibition of the films, is an added
attraction to many young people, for whom the space is filled with the
glamour of love making.

Hundreds of young people attend these five-cent theaters every evening
in the week, including Sunday, and what is seen and heard there
becomes the sole topic of conversation, forming the ground pattern of
their social life. That mutual understanding which in another social
circle is provided by books, travel and all the arts, is here
compressed into the topics suggested by the play.

The young people attend the five-cent theaters in groups, with
something of the "gang" instinct, boasting of the films and stunts in
"our theater." They find a certain advantage in attending one theater
regularly, for the _habitues_ are often invited to come upon the stage
on "amateur nights," which occur at least once a week in all the
theaters. This is, of course, a most exciting experience. If the
"stunt" does not meet with the approval of the audience, the performer
is greeted with jeers and a long hook pulls him off the stage; if, on
the other hand, he succeeds in pleasing the audience, he may be paid
for his performance and later register with a booking agency, the
address of which is supplied by the obliging manager, and thus he
fancies that a lucrative and exciting career is opening before him.
Almost every night at six o'clock a long line of children may be seen
waiting at the entrance of these booking agencies, of which there are
fifteen that are well known in Chicago.

Thus, the only art which is constantly placed before the eyes of "the
temperamental youth" is a debased form of dramatic art, and a vulgar
type of music, for the success of a song in these theaters depends not
so much upon its musical rendition as upon the vulgarity of its
appeal. In a song which held the stage of a cheap theater in Chicago
for weeks, t