plunge into a veritable morass of inconsistencies, dubieties and
slovenlinesses.

These considerations, however, have not yet taken us to the heart of the
matter. We have seen that the dramatist has no rational course open to
him but to assume complete ignorance in his audience; but we have also
seen that, as a matter of fact, only one audience will be entirely in
this condition, and that, the more successful the play is, the more
widely will subsequent audiences tend to depart from it. Does it not
follow that interest of plot, interest of curiosity as to coming events,
is at best an evanescent factor in a play's attractiveness--of a certain
importance, no doubt, on the first night, but less and less efficient
the longer the play holds the stage?

In a sense, this is undoubtedly true. We see every day that a mere
story-play--a play which appeals to us solely by reason of the adroit
stimulation and satisfaction of curiosity--very rapidly exhausts its
success. No one cares to see it a second time; and spectators who happen
to have read the plot in advance, find its attraction discounted even on
a first hearing. But if we jump to the conclusion that the skilful
marshalling and development of the story is an unimportant detail, which
matters little when once the first-night ordeal is past, we shall go
very far astray. Experience shows us that dramatic _interest_ is
entirely distinct from mere _curiosity_, and survives when curiosity is
dead. Though a skilfully-told story is not of itself enough to secure
long life for a play, it materially and permanently enhances the
attractions of a play which has other and higher claims to longevity.
Character, poetry, philosophy, atmosphere, are all very good in their
way; but they all show to greater advantage by aid of a well-ordered
fable. In a picture, I take it, drawing is not everything; but drawing
will always count for much.

This separation of interest from curiosity is partly explicable by one
very simple reflection. However well we may know a play beforehand, we
seldom know it by heart or nearly by heart; so that, though we may
anticipate a development in general outline, we do not clearly foresee
the ordering of its details, which, therefore, may give us almost the
same sort of pleasure that it gave us when the story was new to us. Most
playgoers will, I think, bear me out in saying that we constantly find a
great scene or act to be in reality richer in invention and more