on in the end.

At this point, I foresee that you will very naturally exclaim that you
asked me for stage-directions, and that I am sending you a sermon. I
am very sorry; but the truth really is, that as the best of plays and
the cleverest of actors will not ensure success, if the actors quarrel
about the parts, and are unwilling to suppress themselves for the
common good, one is obliged to set out with a good stock of philosophy
as well as of "properties."

Now, in case it should strike you as "unfair" that any one of your
party should have so much of his own way as I have given to the
stage-manager, you must let me say that no one has more need of
philosophy than that all-powerful person.

_The stage-manager will have his own way, but he will have nothing
else._

He will certainly have "no peace" from the first cry of "Let us have
some private theatricals" till the day when the performance ceases to
be discussed. If there are ten actors, it is quite possible that ten
different plays will be warmly recommended to him, and that, whichever
he selects, he will choose it against the gloomy forebodings of nine
members of his company. Nine actors will feel a natural disappointment
at not having the best part, and as it is obviously impossible to fix
rehearsals so as to be equally convenient for everybody, the
stage-manager, whose duty it is to fix them, will be very fortunate if
he suits the convenience of the majority. You will easily believe that
it is his painful duty to insist upon regular attendance, and even to
enforce it by fines or by expulsion from the part, if such stringent
laws have been agreed to by the company beforehand. But at the end he
will have to bear in mind that private theatricals are an amusement,
not a business; that it is said to be a pity to "make a toil of a
pleasure"; that "boys will be boys"; that "Christmas comes but once a
year," and holidays not much oftener--and in a general way to console
himself for the absence of defaulters, with the proverbial philosophy
of everyday life, and the more reliable panacea of resolute good
temper.

He must (without a thought of self) do his best to give the right
parts to the right people, and he must try to combine a proper "cast"
with pleasing everybody--so far as that impossible task is possible!

He must not only be ready to meet his own difficulties with each
separate actor, but he must be prepared to be confidant, if not
umpire, in all the squab