est of Mr. Landon's play lay almost wholly in the story. There
was just enough character in it to keep the story going, so to speak.
The author might, on the other hand, have concentrated our attention on
character, and made his play a soul-tragedy; but in that case it would
doubtless have been necessary to take us some way backward in the
heroine's antecedents and the history of her marriage. In other words,
if the play had gone deeper into human nature, the preliminaries of the
crisis would have had to be traced in some detail, possibly in a first
act, introductory to the actual opening, but more probably, and better,
in an exposition following the crisply touched _einleitende Akkord_.
This brings us to the question how an exposition may best be managed.

It may not unreasonably be contended, I think, that, when an exposition
cannot be thoroughly dramatized--that is, wrung out, in the stress of
the action, from the characters primarily concerned--it may best be
dismissed, rapidly and even conventionally, by any not too improbable
device. That is the principle on which Sir Arthur Pinero has always
proceeded, and for which he has been unduly censured, by critics who
make no allowances for the narrow limits imposed by custom and the
constitution of the modern audience upon the playwrights of to-day. In
_His House in Order_ (one of his greatest plays) Sir Arthur effects part
of his exposition by the simple device of making Hilary Jesson a
candidate for Parliament, and bringing on a reporter to interview his
private secretary. The incident is perfectly natural and probable; all
one can say of it is that it is perhaps an over-simplification of the
dramatist's task.[3] _The Second Mrs. Tanqueray_ requires an unusual
amount of preliminary retrospect. We have to learn the history of Aubrey
Tanqueray's first marriage, with the mother of Ellean, as well as the
history of Paula Ray's past life. The mechanism employed to this end has
been much criticized, but seems to me admirable. Aubrey gives a farewell
dinner-party to his intimate friends, Misquith and Jayne. Cayley
Drummle, too, is expected, but has not arrived when the play opens.
Without naming the lady, Aubrey announces to his guests his approaching
marriage. He proposes to go out with them, and has one or two notes to
write before doing so. Moreover, he is not sorry to give them an
opportunity to talk over the announcement he has made; so he retires to
a side-table in the s